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THE LEFT IS OFFICIALLY ISIS: Thug Destroys Oldest Monument to Christopher Columbus [Video] | The left is officially ISIS ISIS terrorists have destroyed ancient sites that have been preserved for hundreds and hundred of years. Well, the left isn t too far behind them some jackwagon took a sledgehammer to a 225-year old monument to Christpher Columbus Unreal!The Columbus statue is in Baltimore Shame on these thugs!Baltimore Brew has this to say about the memorial:Baltimore s 225-year-old monument to Christopher Columbus, said to be the oldest in the country and the world dedicated to the explorer that is still standing, has been severely vandalized.In case you re wondering, this is happening in other places in America. We reported on two Catholic Saint statues that were vandalized and the Peace Monument in Atlanta that was also vandalized. Are you getting the picture now? It s not about the Confederacy but about hating anything America stands for. Our kids have been well taught by liberal academia so they only know that Imperialist America stole everything from everyone Yada, Yada, Yada,,,THIS IS A TURNING POINT Some jackwagon narrates the video: Christopher Columbus symbolizes the initial invasion of European capitalism into the Western Hemisphere. Columbus initiated a centuries-old wave of terrorism, murder, genocide, rape, slavery, ecological degradation and capitalist exploitation of labor in the Americas. That Columbian wave of destruction continues on the backs of Indigenous, African-American and brown people. Racist monuments to slave owners and murderers have always bothered me. Baltimore s poverty is concentrated in African-American households, and these statues are just an extra slap in the face. They were built in the 20th century in response to a movement for African Americans human dignity. What kind of a culture goes to such lengths to build such hate-filled monuments? What kind of a culture clings to those monuments in 2017? | 1real |
South African farmers jailed for forcing black man into coffin | MIDDELBURG, South Africa (Reuters) - Two white South African farmers who were filmed pushed a wailing black man into a coffin were sentenced to jail on Friday for attempted murder, assault and kidnapping. The 20-second video, widely circulated on social media last year, shows the victim, Victor Mlotshwa, cowering inside a coffin as one man pushes the lid down and the other threatens to put petrol and a snake inside. The defendants - Theo Jackson, sentenced to 14 years, and Willem Oosthuizen, sentenced to 11 years - had pleaded not guilty. They said they had caught Mlotshwa trespassing on their farm in possession of stolen copper cables. The case, heard at a court in Middelburg, about 160 km (100 miles) east of the capital, Pretoria, has caused outrage in a country where deep racial divides persist 23 years after the end of apartheid. When she handed down the sentences, Judge Segopotje Mphahlele said she was appalled that the accused had put Mlotshwa into a coffin. The evidence before court indicates that the seriousness of the offence far outweighs the mitigating factors and the personal factors of the offenders, she said. The conduct of the accused fueled social division and racial tension. The defense immediately requested that it be allowed to appeal the sentence, but Mphahlele dismissed their application. The defense then said it would lodge their appeal directly to the Supreme Court of Appeal, saying that the sentence was too harsh, since no one had been killed. South Africa s Justice Minister Michael Masutha said the sentence could serve as a deterrent to others. South Africa is no longer prepared to treat racism with kid gloves and we are ready to act, Justice Minister Michael Masutha said in an interview with eNCA. A large crowd formed outside the packed courtroom. The police presence around the court was heavy. What they did was painful to us, Qgoga Mnyamezeli said outside the court. Hundreds of members of the country s main political parties, including the ruling African National Congress and the main opposition Democratic Alliance party, gathered outside carrying placards, some which said Black Lives Matter! , and shouting slogans in support of Mlotshwa. Black people make up 80 percent of South Africa s 54 million population, but most its wealth remains in the hands of whites, who account for about 8 percent of the population. | 0fake |
Serbian, U.S. paratroopers to earn 'wings' during bilateral military exercise | BERLIN (Reuters) - Serbian and U.S. paratroopers will jump side-by-side during a joint exercise aimed at strengthening military ties with Serbia, the U.S. general in charge of NATO s Allied Air Command said, a move that could trigger protests from Moscow. In the exercise, which is taking place at the invitation of the Serbian government, paratroopers from both countries will jump side-by-side from 2 C-130J transport planes built by Lockheed Martin Corp in a so-called insertion exercise. About 100 U.S. Air Force and U.S. Army personnel will participate in the event, General Tod Wolters, who also oversees U.S. Air Forces in Europe and Africa, told Reuters. They will actually get their paratroop wings as a result of these activities. These are confidence-building activities - relationships that will last for a lifetime. And they will certainly enhance the technical expertise of the Serbs, he said. It was not immediately clear how many Serbian forces would participate. Wolters said tensions in the Balkans remained a challenge for NATO and the U.S. military, but engagement was key. It will continue to be a challenge, but we ve got the right command focus. We ve got the right resources. We ve got the right dialogue and time will tell what unfolds, he said. Any NATO-related activities in Serbia are a red flag for Russia, which worries about NATO expansion in the former communist east. Moscow has also sought to bolster military ties with Belgrade with the donation of six MiG-29 fighter jets. Serbia has been performing a delicate balancing act between Russia and the West, rejecting calls by U.S. officials to pick a side. The largest of the states to emerge from the collapse of Yugoslavia in the 1990s, Orthodox Christian and Slavic Serbia has natural affinity with Moscow, but it is keen to join the European Union. Although the EU is Serbia s single largest trade partner and investor, Russia controls its oil and gas supplies. | 0fake |
Chris Pratt Says ’Average Blue-Collar Americans’ Not Represented in Hollywood Movies, Then Apologizes | Actor Chris Pratt, one of Hollywood’s biggest movie stars, has apologized for saying his industry does not represent “the average, American. ”[In an interview with Men’s Fitness, the Parks and Recreation alum decried the disparity of roles that “resonate” with him. “I don’t see personal stories that necessarily resonate with me, because they’re not my stories,” Pratt told the outlet. “I think there’s room for me to tell mine — and probably an audience that would be hungry for them. The voice of the average, American isn’t necessarily represented in Hollywood. ” It did not take long before social media users pounced on Pratt’s comments, some suggesting that several films, including several Academy movies, featured characters and storylines: Recent movies about blue collar people: FencesManchester By the SeaMoonlightHidden FiguresHell or High Water, xo @prattprattpratt, — Scott Weinberg (@scottEweinberg) April 21, 2017, @1followernodad There’s a fucking blue collar mark wahlberg movie every two months. — Brittany and Cory (@bpikecsmith) April 21, 2017, Running away from my Chris Pratt crush like pic. twitter. — Russell (@RussellFalcon) April 21, 2017, ”The average, American worker isn’t represented in Hollywood” says Chris Pratt who played a shoe shiner on a popular sitcom pic. twitter. — Eric Francisco (@EricTheDragon) April 21, 2017, Some blogs also piled on: Jezebel: “Chris Pratt Is Kind of a ” Marie Claire: While it’s nice that Chris wants to see more people like himself he is a straight, white male. And Hollywood has an *actual* diversity problem at the moment — both in terms of race and gender. So, actually, maybe it’s time for there to be less stories like Chris Pratt’s, and more stories about, oh, you know, literally any other marginalized community in this country. The Mary Sue: “I Miss Not Knowing What Chris Pratt Thinks About Things” Pratt hopped on Twitter on Friday and walked his comments all the way back. “That was actually a pretty stupid thing to say,” the Virginia, Minnesota, native wrote to his four million followers. “I’ll own that. There’s a ton of movies about blue collar America”: That was actually a pretty stupid thing to say. I’ll own that. There’s a ton of movies about blue collar America. https: . — chris pratt (@prattprattpratt) April 21, 2017, Pratt, who stars in blockbuster franchise films, including Universal’s Jurassic World and Disney’s Guardians of the Galaxy, received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame Friday. Follow Jerome Hudson on Twitter @jeromeehudson. | 0fake |
Muslims BUSTED: They Stole Millions In Gov’t Benefits | Print They should pay all the back all the money plus interest. The entire family and everyone who came in with them need to be deported asap. Why did it take two years to bust them?
Here we go again …another group stealing from the government and taxpayers! A group of Somalis stole over four million in government benefits over just 10 months!
We’ve reported on numerous cases like this one where the Muslim refugees/immigrants commit fraud by scamming our system…It’s way out of control! More Related | 1real |
U.S. Congress shrugs off guns, Zika as summer break nears | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Congress is headed for a seven-week recess without addressing gun violence, the Zika virus outbreak and other pressing issues, amid persistent election-year bickering. Despite recent gun violence, the House of Representatives will not vote this week on a proposal to keep firearms out of the hands of people on terrorism watch lists, that chamber’s Republican leader Kevin McCarthy told reporters on Tuesday. Similarly, President Barack Obama’s request for $1.9 billion in funds to combat the Zika virus and the birth defects it can cause has been stalled in Congress since February. Republicans and Democrats were also at odds over spending bills to keep the government functioning beyond Sept. 30, when current fiscal year funding expires. When Republicans took control of Congress, they vowed to get things done but have had difficulty doing so during this election year, failing to pass a budget or even consider Obama’s nomination of Merrick Garland to fill a Supreme Court vacancy. Congress did, however, approve bipartisan legislation helping Puerto Rico out of a crippling debt crisis and is trying to make progress on legislation to improve police relations with local communities in the aftermath of gun violence. With barely four days left before the start of an unusually long recess, a failure to vote on guns would postpone any possible action by the House until at least Sept. 6, when lawmakers return. After that, they will work only for short stints ahead of the Nov. 8 presidential and congressional elections. Mass shootings in Orlando and Dallas, and gun violence in other cities, has again propelled gun control to prominence. But the National Rifle Association and its allies in Congress so far have staved off legislation. Gun control is generally opposed by Republicans and supported by Democrats. Some Republicans have talked about a gun bill possibly moving through Congress in the fall, in the midst of the campaign season, but Democrats were skeptical. “This Congress will do nothing on curbing gun violence,” Representative Xavier Becerra of California, a member of the House Democratic leadership, told reporters. The two sides even disagree on whether House Speaker Paul Ryan and House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi talked about a proposal to establish a special committee to study gun violence. Democrats say Pelosi raised the issue with Ryan last week. Ryan’s office says he has never discussed the topic with anyone. Republicans in the House and Senate have signed onto a $1.1 billion Zika funding bill. But Democrats are balking over what they see as “poison pills” attached to the money that would deny funds to women’s healthcare provider Planned Parenthood and ease some environmental provisions. Democrats, who warn the current legislation will not pass the Senate, said on Tuesday that they offered to accept some Republican provisions. But Senate Republicans insist the bill cannot be altered. Ryan meanwhile showcased his “A Better Way” agenda, flashing a glossy pamphlet at a press conference listing proposals designed to lure votes in November but do nothing this year legislatively. Republicans have also pushed for new federal probes of Hillary Clinton, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, on her use of private emails while secretary of state. | 0fake |
The Latest Celebrity Diet? Cyberbullying - The New York Times | The reality TV star Rob Kardashian had a family matter to discuss, so naturally, he turned to Twitter. “Didn’t invite the Mother of my child to a baby shower you all were trying to throw for me! !?” he tweeted late last month, reigniting the feud between the clan and his model fiancée, Blac Chyna. “You all must have lost your damn minds. ” In retaliation for the slight, he tweeted out his little sister Kylie Jenner’s phone number. Mr. Kardashian, in internet parlance, had doxxed Ms. Jenner — he published personal, private information about her online, seemingly without her consent. It’s a maneuver harassers use to humiliate, intimidate or silence their targets. It also helped Mr. Kardashian score his most popular tweet ever. Lately, celebrity feuds have taken on the contours of cyberbullying, with famous rivals integrating the tactics of online harassers into their P. R. offensives. What looks like a public display of immaturity can actually be part of a sophisticated image management strategy. Retweet counts and Instagram followers are the new Billboard 100, and celebrities can gin up their numbers by instigating feuds with one another in increasingly nasty or technologically intriguing ways. But the game can have a dark side, especially for the losers. The modern celebrity arsenal incorporates these other digital bullying tools: SECRET RECORDINGS The celebrity squabble of the summer exploded when Kim Kardashian West released a surreptitiously recorded Taylor Swift talking on the phone with Ms. Kardashian West’s husband, Kanye West — a bid to prove that Ms. Swift had preapproved his controversial lyrics about her in his song “Famous. ” Ms. Kardashian West posted the video evidence to Snapchat in July. (Such recordings are illegal in some states, including California, and run afoul of YouTube’s harassment rules.) SEXUAL HUMILIATION When the rappers Wiz Khalifa and Mr. West tussled on Twitter in January, Amber Rose, their mutual ex, stepped in to tease Mr. West about their sex life. And when Justin Bieber’s Selena Gomez waded into his Instagram comments to scold him for posting pictures with a new girlfriend and to accuse him of cheating on her, he struck back by accusing her of using the relationship for attention. REVENGE PORN After the teenage actress Chloë Grace Moretz tweeted dismissively about the feud, yet another Kardashian — Kim’s sister Khloé — responded by posting a photo of a woman resembling Ms. Moretz. She had jumped onto a young man’s back on the beach, and her bikini bottoms were yanked to the side, revealing everything underneath. Ms. Moretz tweeted back to debunk the depantsing, writing that Ms. Kardashian had instead exposed “some girl who was wrongfully photographed. ” MOB DEPLOYMENT For celebrities with the most rabid fandoms, even an oblique nod from the star can set off a fan stampede. After Ms. Kardashian West posted the Snapchat video of Ms. Swift’s phone call, Kanye fans and allies — many aligned with her spurned Calvin Harris — gathered under the #KimExposedTaylorParty hashtag to shovel out cruelly exultant GIFs and memes. (A commemorative reading “In Memory of Taylor Swift, RIP, 1989 to 2016” was soon offered for sale online.) And when Ms. Kardashian West cryptically tweeted a line of snake emoji, revelers bombarded Ms. Swift’s Instagram with snake after snake after snake. It’s no coincidence that a Kardashian fingerprint can be lifted from many of the most incidents. While most celebrities use the internet to promote their mainstream careers — movies, albums — Ms. Kardashian West’s core product is herself. Stirring up dramatic personal narratives on her reality television show and social media accounts is her main event. Ms. Swift, who studiously avoids confrontation while writing veiled riddles about her and frenemies into her songs, didn’t stand a chance. Ms. Kardashian West’s assault was part of a multiplatform offensive. On Twitter, she leveraged Ms. Swift’s phone call to advertise her new Snapchat account. And she went on to milk the publicity by posting another Snapchat video of herself singing along to the “Famous” lyrics in question. Her clip became an internet blockbuster not only because of the story it told but also because of the tactics it deployed. In the polished world of celebrity P. R. it’s exceptional to see a celebrity exposed in a private moment, especially by one of her own kind. Meanwhile, Ms. Swift was put on the defensive, left to quibble about the details of the exchange in a message that she typed on Apple’s Notes app. She then took a screen shot of it and posted it to Instagram. Her response to Ms. Kardashian West’s raucous exposé — “I would very much like to be excluded from this narrative” — soon curdled into a mocking meme. Who was in the right didn’t matter — Ms. Kardashian West won the game. Blac Chyna, who recently clawed her way into the Kardashian universe through her relationship with Rob, has proved a quick study. A few days after Mr. Kardashian doxxed his sister, Ms. Chyna posted his number to Twitter, too, then toggled over to Snapchat to explain that she’d done it to compel her fiancé to change his number — and flush out all the women who had been texting him. It was a strategic move, both personally and professionally — it locked down her man, drew attention to her suite of social accounts and stirred interest in the couple’s E! reality series, “Rob Chyna. ” You’d think that the utter savageness on display here would horrify fans. Online celebrity feuds capitalize on some of the most vile and destructive social ideas: that sexual shaming is an acceptable response to a stated opinion that women are manipulative liars and that a person who missteps in a private dispute deserves to be punished by the crowd. And these days, nearly everybody has a story about being subjected to similar abuse online. Occasionally, attacks backfire: In May, the rapper Azealia Banks posted a racist tirade against the pop star Zayn Malik and soon found herself booted from Twitter for violating its harassment policy. But most of the time, salty celebrities have little to lose and millions of followers to gain. “Bullying” and “harassment” are amorphous categories, and the seriousness we attach to these tactics varies considerably depending on the power dynamics at play. Unlike the muscled jock who picks on the scrawny nerd, the straight teenager who harasses the gay kid or the jilted boyfriend who uses the cover of the internet to mar his ex’s reputation, these celebrity cases can make us feel like mere mortals peering up at a couple of Greek gods shooting lightning bolts at each other. For some fans, their own experiences with harassment may fuel their desire to see the rich and famous get dragged down to their level. Instead of pity and concern for the targeted party, celebrity harassment produces in fans feelings of both fascination and schadenfreude. For the famous person caught in the cross hairs, though, it’s not always so fun. Just ask Ms. Swift, who called Ms. Kardashian West’s stunt “character assassination. ” Or the pop star Demi Lovato, who announced a career hiatus last week after getting dragged across Twitter over dismissive comments about Ms. Swift she made in a magazine interview. (“Taking a break from the spotlight,” Ms. Lovato tweeted last week. “I am not meant for this business and the media. ”) Or Ms. Moretz, who did not deserve to be sexually humiliated for subtweeting Ms. Kardashian West. It’s a P. R. game, until it’s a real thing. | 0fake |
Schumer Goes ALL IN On ‘Incompetent’ Trump White House After Healthcare Bill Fails | The Republican Party and the Trump White House just suffered a humiliating defeat as their signature campaign promise to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act immediately couldn t even pass a vote on the House floor with a large GOP majority.Of course, this is a major victory for Democrats, and a political disaster for Republicans. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer wasted no time in blasting the Republicans inability to govern, and the Trump White House in particular. In a press conference shortly after the bill failed, Schumer said: The TrumpCare bill failed because of two traits that have plagued the Trump presidency since he took office: incompetence and broken promises. I have never seen an administration as incompetent as the one occupying the White House. Schumer went on to openly mock Trump s own claim to fame deal-making. He snarked, so much for the art of the deal, referencing Trump s famous book. Schumer went on to say that Trumpcare should be abandoned in favor of fixing Obamacare: They should depart the field, cut their losses and abandon their quixotic attempt to pass TrumpCare once and for all. Schumer then reminded Republicans that he is willing to work with them on a fix for Obamacare, but will not be helping them to repeal anything to do with the Affordable Care Act: What we said, we stand by. If they would denounce repeal .then we ll work with them on improving [ObamaCare] and making it better. But they can t continue to want to repeal. Schumer went on to remind everyone of a truth that we see every time Republicans are in power: They are very good at criticizing. They re not very good at governing. Schumer also waved away Trump s pathetic attempt to blame Democrats for the bill s failure, and even went so far as to essentially call him a liar: It s another one of his big tall tales. He couldn t get enough Republican votes, he never tried to reach out to Democrats in any way. So the blame falls with president trump and with the Republicans. Indeed. They know how to be against things, how to try and pass draconian laws that are way outside the mainstream opinion of the American people. But when it comes to actually making lives better and making government work, they haven t a clue.Thanks for your candor, Senator Schumer. We need voices like yours right now.Featured image by Alex Wong via Getty Images | 1real |
U.N. refugee agency hopes resettlement resumes soon to U.S. | GENEVA (Reuters) - The United Nations refugee agency voiced alarm on Monday at U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to suspend entry of refugees, saying that this week alone 800 people set to make America their new home had been barred, causing anxiety and heartbreak. An estimated 20,000 refugees in “precarious circumstances” would have been resettled to the United States during the 120 days covered by the suspension announced last Friday, the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said in a statement. “Refugees are anxious, confused and heartbroken at this suspension in what is already a lengthy process,” it said. “Those accepted for resettlement by the United States, after a rigorous U.S. security screening process, are coming to rebuild their lives in safety and dignity. UNHCR hopes that they will be able to do so as soon as possible,” it said. | 0fake |
Bid to stop heavy water purchase from Iran blocked in U.S. Senate | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Senate Democrats defeated a Republican effort to undercut the Iran nuclear agreement on Wednesday by blocking an amendment to a spending bill that would have stopped the Obama administration from buying heavy water from Tehran. The amendment to an energy spending bill offered by Republican Senator Tom Cotton received 57 yes votes and 42 no votes. It had needed 60 yes votes to advance in the 100-member Senate. Cotton withdrew his amendment after the vote and the Senate is expected to vote later on a version of the spending bill without it. The measure would have barred the use of U.S. government funds to purchase heavy water, which is non-radioactive and used in nuclear reactors and for making nuclear weapons. Under last year’s nuclear deal between Iran, the United States and five other world powers, Tehran is responsible for reducing its stock of the substance, which it can sell, dilute or dispose of, under certain conditions. President Barack Obama’s administration had warned Congress that it strongly opposed any move to prevent the planned purchase of $8.6 million-worth of heavy water from Iran. Senate Democrats and a handful of Republicans had also banded together in late April to block the Cotton amendment, and hence the spending bill. The dust-up had put a crimp in Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s plans to pass bipartisan appropriations bills to keep the federal government functioning beyond Sept. 30, the end of the government’s fiscal year. | 0fake |
WaPo: “Don’t Like Trump’s Piggish Prejudice? Blame the World of Golf.” | X Dear Reader! VDARE.com isn’t just a website. We are the voice of the Historic American Nation . Our goal is nothing less than to develop a full spectrum media network to speak up for our people during this difficult time for our country. Part of that means building institutions which are offline and in the real world. There’s something about a paper journal that suggests permanence, which inclines people to take it more seriously. And because the news cycle is so fast, some of the most important, substantial, and potentially influential writings fall through the cracks and don’t get the attention they deserve. For that reason, we’re proud to announce the creation of VDARE QUARTERLY, a print journal featuring the best material from our webzine. This will replace our yearly anthologies and ensure that the information and analysis you really don't want to miss will get in front of you as quickly as possible. However, we need your help. For us to unveil this exciting new product we need 600 magazines ordered to cover the print expenses. Fill out the form below to instantly receive a digital copy of VDARE QUARTERLY, and when we have the number of necessary subscribers it will go to print and your exclusive paper copy will ship directly to you! Depending on the package you choose, you will receive multiple paper copies (provided enough readers support the community effort). We encourage you to pass these around – they serve as an excellent gift for friends and family, while at the same time helping to build our community. VDARE QUARTERLY is aesthetically pleasing as well as ideologically powerful. But this isn’t just a service we are providing. VDARE QUARTERLY is a tangible manifestation of your investment in us, and in our country. A subscription is one of the most effective ways you can help us build our media network, expand our influence, and build the kind of movement we will need to take back our country and ensure our children have a recognizable America.
We count on your support! Yours sincerely, Peter Brimelow, Editor of VDARE.com VDARE QUARTERLY countdown: 258 already ordered, 342 still to go | 1real |
WHEN DIVERSITY TRUMPS ALL: Bishop Of London Suggests Vicars Should Reach Out To Muslims By Making This Major Change In Their Appearance | If the beard is a way to honor the prophet Mohammed in the Muslim faith, why would a Christian leader ask his subordinates to adhere to a such an obligation?Clergymen should grow beards to emphasise their holiness to Muslims, the Bishop of London has suggested.Rt Reverend Richard Chartres said the modern fashion for facial hair should not be the preserve of hispters, but would also be likely to impress those from Eastern cultures where wearing a beard could mark a man out as holy.He singled out two priests in Tower Hamlets the Rev. Adam Atkinson, Vicar of St Peter s church in Bethnal Green, and Rev. Cris Rogers of All Hallows Bow who have grown bushy beards. Writing in the Church Times, Rev. Chartres, who himself sports a modest beard, said: The discovery that two of the most energetic priests in east London had recently grown beards of an opulence that would not have disgraced a Victorian sage prompted me to look again at the barbate debate throughout Church history.The Rev Cris Rogers, Vicar of All Hallows, BowMuslim men are encouraged to wear beards to honor the Prophet Mohammed. The two priests work in parishes in Tower Hamlets. Most of the residents are Bangladeshi-Sylheti, for whom the wearing of a beard is one of the marks of a holy man. He said the desire of the clergy of Tower Hamlets to reach out to the culture of the majority of their parishioners can only be applauded .Via: UK Daily Mail | 1real |
Calling All Ohio Voters ... Diebolt | Report Copyright Violation Calling All Ohio Voters ... Diebolt I called the election board this morning, in Summit County. I talked to a man who assured me that basically no voter fraud is going to happen there.However he mentioned that to the west and south of me might be at risk, as they use the Diebolt voting machines.Anyone in Ohio please call your election board and ask about voter fraud.I think we need boots on the ground where Diebolt voting machine are being used. | 1real |
SPEAKER SCHEDULED TO Praise Hillary Totally Trashes Her…Taken Off Stage By Security [Video] | A Bernie Sanders supporter who slammed Hillary Clinton at her own rally in Iowa was kicked off stage after urging attendees not to vote for Clinton because you can t trust her.Kaleb Vanfosson, president of Iowa State University s Students for Bernie chapter, trashed Clinton s ties to Wall Street and lack of empathy for the average American. She is so trapped in the world of the elite that she has completely lost grip on what it s like to be an average person, Vanfosson said, as cheers erupted from the audience. She doesn t care. He s no Trump fan but this was supposed to be a glowing endorsement of Hillary Clinton Read more: BPR | 1real |
The Dark Agenda Behind Globalism And Open Borders | Leave a reply
Brandon Smith – When people unfamiliar with the liberty movement stumble onto the undeniable fact of the “conspiracy” of globalism they tend to look for easy answers to understand what it is and why it exists. Most people today have been conditioned to perceive events from a misinterpreted standpoint of “Occam’s Razor” — they wrongly assume that the simplest explanation is probably the right one.
In fact, this is not what Occam’s Razor states. Instead, to summarize, it states that the simplest explanation GIVEN THE EVIDENCE at hand is probably the right explanation.
It has been well known and documented for decades that the push for globalism is a deliberate and focused effort on the part of a select “elite;” international financiers, central bankers, political leaders and the numerous members of exclusive think tanks. They often openly admit their goals for total globalization in their own publications, perhaps believing that the uneducated commoners would never read them anyway. Carroll Quigley, mentor to Bill Clinton and member of the Council on Foreign Relations, is often quoted with open admissions to the general scheme: “The powers of financial capitalism had (a) far-reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole. This system was to be controlled in a feudalist fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent meetings and conferences. The apex of the systems was to be the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland; a private bank owned and controlled by the world’s central banks which were themselves private corporations. Each central bank… sought to dominate its government by its ability to control Treasury loans, to manipulate foreign exchanges, to influence the level of economic activity in the country, and to influence cooperative politicians by subsequent economic rewards in the business world.” – Carroll Quigley, Tragedy And Hope
The people behind the effort to enforce globalism are tied together by a particular ideology, perhaps even a cult-like religion, in which they envision a world order as described in Plato’s Republic. They believe that they are “chosen” either by fate, destiny or genetics to rule as philosopher kings over the rest of us. They believe that they are the wisest and most capable that humanity has to offer, and that through evolutionary means, they can create chaos and order out of thin air and mold society at will.
This mentality is evident in the systems that they build and exploit. For example, central banking in general is nothing more than a mechanism for driving nations into debt, currency devaluation, and ultimately, enslavement through widespread economic extortion. The end game for central banks is, I believe, the triggering of historic financial crisis, which can then be used by the elites as leverage to promote complete global centralization as the only viable solution.
This process of destabilizing economies and societies is not directed by the heads of the various central banks. Instead, it is directed by even more central global institutions like the International Monetary Fund and the Bank for International Settlements, as outlined in revealing mainstream articles like Ruling The World Of Money published by Harpers Magazine.
We also find through the words of globalists that the campaign for a “new world order” is not meant to be voluntary. “… When the struggle seems to be drifting definitely towards a world social democracy, there may still be very great delays and disappointments before it becomes an efficient and beneficent world system. Countless people … will hate the new world order … and will die protesting against it. When we attempt to evaluate its promise, we have to bear in mind the distress of a generation or so of malcontents, many of them quite gallant and graceful-looking people.” – HG Welles, Fabian Socialist and author of The New World Order “In short, the ‘house of world order’ will have to be built from the bottom up rather than f rom the top down. It will look like a great ‘booming, buzzing confusion,’ to use William James’ famous description of reality, but an end run around national sovereignty, eroding it piece by piece, will accomplish much more than the old-fashioned frontal assault.” – Richard Gardner, member of the Trilateral Commission, published in the April, 1974 issue of Foreign Affairs
“The New World Order cannot happen without U.S. participation, as we are the single most significant component. Yes, there will be a New World Order, and it will force the United States to change its perceptions.” – Henry Kissinger, World Action Council, April 19, 1994
I could quote globalists all day long, but I think you get the general idea. While some people see globalism as a “natural offshoot” of free markets or the inevitable outcome of economic progress, the reality is that the simplest explanation (given the evidence at hand) is that globalism is an outright war waged against the ideal of sovereign peoples and nations. It is a guerrilla war, or fourth generation warfare, waged by a small group of elites against the rest of us.
A significant element of this war concerns the nature of borders. Borders of nations, states and even towns and villages, are not just lines on a map or invisible barriers in the dirt. This is what the elites and the mainstream media would like us to believe. Instead, borders when applied correctly represent principles; or at least, that is supposed to be their function.
Human beings are natural community builders; we are constantly seeking out others of like-mind and like-purpose because we understand subconsciously that groups of individuals working together can (often but not always) accomplish more. That said, human beings also have a natural tendency to value individual freedom and the right to voluntary association. We do not like to be forced to associate with people or groups that do not hold similar values.
Cultures erect borders because, frankly, people have the right to vet those who wish to join and participate in their endeavors. People also have a right to discriminate against anyone who does not share their core values; or, in other words, we have the right to refuse association with other groups and ideologies that are destructive to our own.
Interestingly, globalists and their mouthpieces will argue that by refusing to associate with those who might undermine our values, it is WE who are violating THEIR rights. See how that works?
Globalists exploit the word “isolationism” to shame sovereignty champions in the eyes of the public, but there is no shame in isolation when such principles as freedom of speech and expression or the right to self defense are on the line. There is also nothing wrong with isolating a prosperous economic model from unsuccessful economic models. Forcing a decentralized free market economy to adopt feudal administration through central banking and government will eventually destroy that model. Forcing a free market economy into fiscal interdependency with socialist economies will also most likely undermine that culture. Just as importing millions of people with differing values to feed on a nation after it has had socialism thrust upon it is a recipe for collapse.
The point is, some values and social structures are mutually exclusive; no matter how hard you try, certain cultures can never be homogenized with other cultures. You can only eliminate one culture to make room for the other in a border-less world. This is what globalists seek to achieve. It is the greater purpose behind open border policies and globalization – to annihilate ideological competition so that humanity thinks it has no other option but the elitist religion. The ultimate end game of globalists is not to control governments (governments are nothing more than a tool). Rather, their end game is to obtain total psychological influence and eventually consent from the masses.
Variety and choice have to be removed from our environment in order for globalism to work, which is a nice way to say that many people will have to die and many principles will have to be erased from the public consciousness. The elites assert that their concept of a single world culture is the pinnacle principle of mankind, and that there is no longer any need for borders because no other principle is superior to theirs. As long as borders as a concept continue to exist there is always the chance of separate and different ideals rising to compete with the globalist philosophy. This is unacceptable to the elites.
This has led not so subtle propaganda meme that cultures that value sovereignty over globalism are somehow seething cauldrons of potential evil. Today, with the rising tide of anti-globalist movements, the argument in the mainstream is that “populists” (conservatives) are of a lower and uneducated class and are a dangerous element set to topple the “peace and prosperity” afforded by globalist hands. In other words, we are treated like children scrawling with our finger paints across a finely crafted Mona Lisa. Once again, Carroll Quigley promotes (or predicts) this propaganda decades in advance when he discusses the need for “working within the system” for change instead of fighting against it: “For example, I’ve talked about the lower middle class as the backbone of fascism in the future. I think this may happen. The party members of the Nazi Party in Germany were consistently lower middle class. I think that the right-wing movements in this country are pretty generally in this group.” – Carroll Quigley, from Dissent: Do We Need It?
The problem is that these people refuse to confront the fruits of globalization that can be observed so far. Globalists have had free reign over most of the world’s governments for at least a century, if not longer. As a consequence of their influences, we have had two World Wars, the Great Depression, the Great Recession which is still ongoing, too many regional conflicts and genocides to count and the systematic oppression of free agent entrepreneurs, inventors and ideas to the point that we are now suffering from social and financial stagnation.
The globalists have long been in power, yet, the existence of borders is blamed for the storm of crises we have endured for the past hundred years? Liberty champions are called “deplorable” populists and fascists while globalists dodge blame like slimy slithering eels?
This is the best card the globalists have up their sleeve, and it is the reason why I continue to argue that they plan to allow conservative movements to gain a measure of political power in the next year, only to pull the plug on international fiscal life support and blame us for the resulting tragedy.
There is no modicum of evidence to support the notion that globalization, interdependencey and centralization actually work. One need only examine the economic and immigration nightmare present in the EU to understand this. So, the globalists will now argue that the world is actually not centralized ENOUGH. That’s right; they will claim we need more globalization, not less, to solve the world’s ailments.
In the meantime, principles of sovereignty have to be historically demonized — the concept of separate cultures built on separate beliefs has to be psychologically equated with evil by future generations. Otherwise, the globalists will never be able to successfully establish a global system without borders.
Imagine, for a moment, an era not far away in which the principle of sovereignty is considered so abhorrent, so racist, so violent and poisonous that any individual would be shamed or even punished by the collective for entertaining the notion. Imagine a world in which sovereignty and conservatism are held up to the next generation as the new “original sins;” dangerous ideas that almost brought about the extinction of man.
This mental prison is where globalists want to take us. We can break free, but this would require a complete reversal of the way in which we participate in society. Meaning, we need a rebellion of voluntary associations. A push for decentralization instead of globalization. Thousands upon thousands of voluntary groups focusing on localization, self reliance and true production. We must act to build a system that is based on redundancy instead of fragile interdependencey. We need to go back to an age of many borders, not less borders, until every individual is himself free to participate in whatever social group or endeavor he believes is best for him, as well as free to defend against people that seek to sabotage him; a voluntary tribal society devoid of forced associations.
Of course, this effort would require unimaginable sacrifice and a fight that would probably last a generation. To suggest otherwise would be a lie. I can’t possibly convince anyone that a potential future based on a hypothetical model is worth that sacrifice. I have no idea whether it is or is not. I can only point out that the globalist dominated world we live in today is clearly doomed. We can argue about what comes next after we have removed our heads from the guillotine. SF Source Alt_Market Oct. 2016 Share this: | 1real |
Exclusive: Immigration judges headed to 12 U.S. cities to speed deportations | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Justice Department is developing plans to temporarily reassign immigration judges from around the country to 12 cities to speed up deportations of illegal immigrants who have been charged with crimes, according to two administration officials. How many judges will be reassigned and when they will be sent is still under review, according to the officials, but the Justice Department has begun soliciting volunteers for deployment. The targeted cities are New York; Los Angeles; Miami; New Orleans; San Francisco; Baltimore, Bloomington, Minnesota; El Paso, Texas; Harlingen, Texas; Imperial, California; Omaha, Nebraska and Phoenix, Arizona. They were chosen because they are cities which have high populations of illegal immigrants with criminal charges, the officials said. A spokeswoman for the Justice Department’s Executive Office of Immigration Review, which administers immigration courts, confirmed that the cities have been identified as likely recipients of reassigned immigration judges, but did not elaborate on the planning. The plan to intensify deportations is in line with a vow made frequently by President Donald Trump on the campaign trail last year to deport more illegal immigrants involved in crime. The Department of Homeland Security asked for the judges’ reshuffle, an unusual move given that immigration courts are administered by the Department of Justice. A Homeland Security spokeswoman declined to comment on any plan that has not yet been finalized. Under an executive order signed by Trump in January, illegal immigrants with pending criminal cases are regarded as priorities for deportation whether they have been found guilty or not. That is a departure from former President Barack Obama’s policy, which prioritized deportations only of those convicted of serious crimes. The policy shift has been criticized by advocate groups who say it unfairly targets immigrants who might ultimately be acquitted and do not pose a threat. The cities slated to receive more judges have more than half of the 18,013 pending immigration cases that involve undocumented immigrants facing or convicted of criminal charges, according to data provided by the Justice Department’s Executive Office of Immigration Review. More than 200 of those cases involve immigrants currently incarcerated, meaning that the others have either not been convicted or have served their sentence. The Justice Department did not provide a breakdown of how many of the remainder have been convicted and how many are awaiting trial. As part of the Trump administration crackdown on illegal immigrants, the Justice Department is also sending immigration judges to detention centers along the southwest border. Those temporary redeployments will begin Monday. Former immigration judge and chairman of the Board of Immigration Appeals Paul Schmidt said the Trump administration should not assume that all those charged with crimes would not be allowed to stay in the United States legally. “It seems they have an assumption that everyone who has committed a crime should be removable, but that’s not necessarily true. Even people who have committed serious crimes can sometimes get asylum,” Schmidt said. He also questioned the effectiveness of shuffling immigration judges from one court to another, noting that this will mean cases the judges would have handled in their usual courts will have to be rescheduled. He said that when he was temporarily reassigned to handle cases on the southern border in 2014 and 2015, cases he was slated to hear in his home court in Arlington, Virginia had to be postponed, often for more than a year. “That’s what you call aimless docket reshuffling,” he said. Under the Obama administration, to avoid the expense and disruption of immigration judges traveling, they would often hear proceedings from other courthouses via video conference. The judges’ reshuffling could further logjam a national immigration court system which has more than 540,000 pending cases. The cities slated to receive more judges have different kinds of immigrant populations. Imperial, California, for example, is in one of the nation’s largest agriculture hubs, attracting large numbers of immigrant farmworkers from Mexico and Central America. Bloomington, Minnesota, near St. Paul, is home to a large number of African immigrants, many of whom traveled from war-torn countries like Somalia to claim asylum in the United States. | 0fake |
Report: Freddie Gray may have intentionally tried to injure self in police van | Freddie Gray, whose death triggered Monday’s rioting in Baltimore, may have intentionally tried to injure himself in a police van, according to another prisoner in the vehicle, the Washington Post reported late Wednesday night.
The Post said the unidentified prisoner, who was separated from Gray by a metal partition and could not see him, reportedly said he heard Gray “banging himself against the walls” and believed he “was intentionally trying to injure himself.
The prisoner’s statements were contained in an investigative document obtained by the paper, which said it was unclear if there was any additional information to support the theory.
Gray, who is black, was arrested April 12 after he ran from police. Officers held him down, handcuffed him and loaded him into the police van. While inside, he became irate and leg cuffs were put on him, police had said. At some point, he suffered a severe spinal injury and was unconscious when the van arrived at a police station.
Authorities have not explained how or when Gray’s spine was injured. He died April 19.
The death of Gray sparked riots earlier this week in Baltimore as protests turned violent resulting into major property damage throughout the city and around 200 arrests
Tuesday, the city started to enforce a curfew starting at 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. More than 3,000 National Guardsmen and law enforcement officers were called into the city to make sure no more violence took place in the city. Baltimore stayed quiet throughout the night Wednesday as well.
Baltimore mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake has also come under fire after a senior law enforcement told Fox News Wednesday that she ordered police to stand down.
The source, who is involved in the enforcement efforts, confirmed to Fox News there was a direct order from the mayor to her police chief Monday night, effectively tying the hands of officers as they were pelted with rocks and bottles.
The claim follows criticism of the mayor for, over the weekend, saying they were giving space to those who "wished to destroy."
Rawlings-Blake has defended her handling of the unrest, which grew out of protests over the death of Freddie Gray while in police custody.
The mayor, in an interview with Fox News' Bill Hemmer on Tuesday, denied any order was issued to hold back on Monday.
"You have to understand, it is not holding back. It is responding appropriately," she said, saying there was no stand-down directive.
She said her critics have a right to their opinion.
Baltimore police are expected to finish their investigation Friday and turn the results over to the city’s state’s attorney office, which will decide whether to seek indictment. Six police officers, including a lieutenant and a sergeant, have been suspended.
Fox News' Leland Vittert and The Associated Press contributed to this report. | 0fake |
WATCH: Democratic Rep Delivers Scathing Rebuke Of Trumpcare Bill To Thunderous Applause On House Floor
| Massachusetts Rep. Jim McGovern brought the House down with a scathing rebuke of the pathetic Republican healthcare bill on Tuesday.He began by pointing out that the bill destroys all of the good things that the Affordable Care Act provides, such as covering preexisting conditions and allowing kids to stay on their parents insurance until the age of 26.McGovern conceded that the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, is not perfect. It has some issues that can be fixed, and Democrats have repeatedly offered to work with Republicans to fix the problems and cover more people while also bringing down costs.But as McGovern noted, Republicans are only obsessed with repealing the law. They have no interest in fixing the minor problems, many of which they created themselves by chipping away at the law over the years.So far, the Republican bill touted by Trump has failed several times in the House because even many Republicans are concerned about the fact that repealing the Affordable Care Act would strip healthcare away from millions of Americans, including their own constituents.For months, Republicans have been torn a new one by their constituents at town halls over their effort to repeal what has become a very popular law. It is even more popular than Donald Trump now.In their continued effort to sell the bill to the American people, Trump and House Republicans have been insisting that it covers pre-existing conditions. But that is a complete lie.Nowhere in the Trumpcare bill will you find a passage making it clear that people with pre-existing conditions won t lose their insurance. It s just not there.McGovern called out Republicans for this lie on the House floor. To claim or to imply that the Republican plan covers people with preexisting conditions, it is a lie, McGovern declared. It is a lie. And let s be honest about it. This does not cover people with preexisting conditions. And to come on the floor and say it does, to try to fool people, well, you may get away with it in the short term, you may get a headline but I tell you people will figure out soon enough when they are denied health care coverage. Furthermore, Republicans refuse to get a CBO score for the bill before holding a vote because they know it will get a failing grade.For one thing, the bill would be a massive tax cut for the wealthy at the expense of the millions of Americans who finally got healthcare coverage through the Medicaid expansion.McGovern shamed Republicans for this. You should be ashamed, McGovern said. To have a health care bill that cuts Medicaid by $880 billion so you can give a tax cut to the wealthiest people in this country, you should be ashamed. He then called upon Republicans to vote against the bill or pull it entirely and received a standing ovation.Here s the video via YouTube.If Trump and Republicans have their way, millions of Americans will suffer so that wealthy assholes can get even richer. That s outrageous.But even more outrageous is the fact that while the American people will lose the benefits of the Affordable Care Act, Republicans have exempted themselves from losing the same benefits the law provides.That s right. Republicans are literally making sure that they get to keep their Obamacare. That makes them heartless and selfish as well as hypocrites. They should not only be ashamed, they should be booted out of office.Featured image screenshot | 1real |
Restaurant Owner Apologizes After Employees Sing ’F*ck tha Police’ to Cops | A North Carolina fast food restaurant owner has apologized to the Raleigh Police Department after officers said the store’s employees sang NWA’s enforcement anthem, “F*ck tha Police,” while they dined on Friday. [A Facebook post claimed that the restaurant’s “manager sang along as well,” The News Observer reports. The viral social media message prompted David Harris, the owner of Smithfield’s Chicken ’N restaurant, to issue a stern apology and promise to “terminate anyone employed that doesn’t share our RESPECT of ALL law enforcement. ” On Saturday, a Facebook post on the Raleigh Police Department’s page said that the department “appreciates the long term and strong relationship it continues to have with Smithfield’s. ” Raleigh Police Protective Association union President Matthew Cooper also posted a Facebook message. “We really appreciate the support we have received from the incident involving Smithfield’s Chicken and BBQ,” Cooper’s message read. “We are confident that a positive resolution will occur as a result from our effort”: As recently as last July, rapper Ice Cube vowed to continue to perform the vulgar 1980s song. In the wake of fatal police shootings in Dallas, Texas, and Baton Rouge, Louisiana, the NWA rapper and actor told TMZ, “I ain’t gonna change nothing I do because I ain’t do nothing wrong. ” The profane “f*ck the police” refrain is often heard at Black Lives Matter rallies and is shouted during protests. Ice Cube performed “F*ck the Police” last July at the 2016 Le Festival d’été de Québec (Quebec City Summer Festival) just two days after Houston New Black Panther Party member Micah X Johnson shot and killed five officers in Dallas. Follow Jerome Hudson on Twitter: @jeromeehudson. | 0fake |
WATCH: Pat Robertson Gets INCREDIBLY Offensive In Full-Throated Defense Of Trump | How much more depraved does a so-called pastor have to get before people acknowledge that he is not a real Christian?Because one would think that conservative Christians of all people would be absolutely opposed to Donald Trump after his lewd comments about groping women came to light on Friday.But evangelical leaders are willing to abandon their own supposed values and continue supporting Trump as long as it means Hillary Clinton does not become president.Family Research Council head Tony Perkins made that clear on Saturday when he STILL voiced support for Trump despite his grab them by the p*ssy remark. My personal support for Donald Trump has never been based upon shared values, it is based upon shared concerns about issues such as: justices on the Supreme Court that ignore the Constitution, America s continued vulnerability to Islamic terrorists and the systematic attack on religious liberty that we ve seen in the last 7 1/2 years, Perkins said.Ralph Reed of Faith and Freedom Coalition basically said the same thing. Voters of faith are voting on issues like who will protect unborn life, defend religious freedom, create jobs, and oppose the Iran nuclear deal. Ten-year-old tapes of private conversation with a television talk show host rank very low on their hierarchy of concerns. In other words, Trump could sexually assault all the women he wants and still be supported by conservative Christian leaders.And that includes 700 Club preacher Pat Robertson, who called Trump s behavior macho while continuing to endorse him for president. A guy does something 11 years ago, it was a conversation in Hollywood where he s trying to look like he s macho, Robertson said on Monday. And 11 years after that they surface it from The Washington Post or whatever, bring it out within 30 days or so of the election and this is supposed to be the death blow and everybody writes him off, Okay, he s dead, now you ve got to get out of the way and let Mike Pence run the campaign. Robertson proceeded to declare Trump the winner of Sunday night s debate and called him a Phoenix rising from the ashes of an imploded campaign.Here s the video via YouTube.These hypocrites have been whining for years about how America needs a president who shares their so-called biblical values, but now they couldn t care less about those values as long as they can put a puppet in the White House who will rubber stamp their extreme religious agenda and force it upon the nation, even if the candidate they want is totally unfit for the office. These people are NOT Christians. They merely used religion to gain power and wealth and if conservatives actually had spines they would toss these pretenders out on their asses for disgracing the church.Featured Image: Screenshot | 1real |
WATCH: Jimmy Kimmel Hilariously WRECKS Trump For Whining About ‘Hamilton’ | If Donald Trump doesn t want to be booed or lampooned over the next four years he should start acting presidential instead of like a big baby.Instead of putting on his big boy pants and accepting the reality that people are going to boo him and Mike Pence for the way they have treated others, Trump chose to lash out after hearing that Pence was booed by the audience at a performance of Hamilton on Broadway.But Trump focused his ire on the cast for reading a message to Pence at the end of the play.Our wonderful future V.P. Mike Pence was harassed last night at the theater by the cast of Hamilton, cameras blazing.This should not happen! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 19, 2016The Theater must always be a safe and special place.The cast of Hamilton was very rude last night to a very good man, Mike Pence. Apologize! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 19, 2016The cast and producers of Hamilton, which I hear is highly overrated, should immediately apologize to Mike Pence for their terrible behavior Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 20, 2016Despite Trump s claims, the cast of Hamilton did not disrespect Mike Pence. They merely expressed their hope that he learned something by watching the play and the hope that he will be a vice-president for everyone. And even Mike Pence has twice said that he wasn t offended. So, Mike Pence wasn t offended and Donald Trump was, Kimmel said. Why do I feel like we re going to see a lot more of this dynamic? Who gets into a fight with a musical? Kimmel continued. How is it possible that Donald Trump can get along with Putin but not Hamilton? Kimmel went on to say that if Trump really wants Hamilton to apologize he should apologize to the long list of people he insulted and offended over the last year and a half and proceeded to run that list on the screen.Here s the video via YouTube.Donald Trump cannot continue lashing out every time he he thinks someone is disrespecting him. We have freedom of speech in this country and our leaders are supposed to be busy running the nation instead of ordering people to be nice to them. The bottom line is that the level of disrespect towards Trump is nowhere near to how conservatives have treated President Obama for the last eight years. So Trump should stop being a total hypocrite, and if he can t do that he should step aside, tell the electors he can t do this job, and allow an adult like Hillary Clinton to do it.Featured Image: Screenshot | 1real |
BREAKING: RNC Pulls Funding For Trump — Is It All Over? | A major indicator that Donald Trump s campaign might be over just occurred. The Republican National Committee has put a temporary halt on their program aimed at getting Trump into the White House. According to an email obtained by Politico, at least one top vendor in what is called the Victory program and one official at the RNC are named in the email s cc line. Politico reports: In an email from the RNC to a victory program mail vendor, with the subject line Hold on all projects, the committee asked the vendor to put a hold on mail production. Please put a hold/stop on all mail projects right now. If something is in production or print it needs to stop. Will update you when to proceed, Lauren Toomey, a staffer in the RNC s political department, wrote in an email that was obtained by POLITICO. Officials with the RNC have yet to release a statement on the matter.This, of course, comes after an audio recording was released where Trump can be heard talking about violently groping women. Trump has a long record of using hateful misogynistic language towards women. After hearing Trump s remarks in the recording, several Republicans in Congress have called for Trump to drop out of the race. This includes a video that Senator Mike Lee posted to his Facebook page, where he said that If anyone spoke to my wife or my daughter or my mother or any of my five sisters the way [Donald Trump] has spoken to women, I wouldn t hire that person. Even Mike Pence, Trump s running mate released a statement where he lambasted Trump for the comments. If your wingman in your campaign has to call you out for making violently misogynistic comments, then your campaign is probably doomed.The evidence is beginning to mount that Trump s reign of terror may finally be over. While Trump dropping out at this juncture would almost assure Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton s victory it was beginning to look like she already had the election in the bag anyway. It isn t too hard to imagine the GOP accepting that they are damned with Trump or without him. They may have figured the best they can do at this point is to give up and try and conserve their resources rather than try to back a loser.Featured image from Alex Wong/Getty Images | 1real |
Heroin Addict Trump Voter Sad Now That Donald Is Taking Away His Treatments (VIDEO) | Pennsylvania resident Kurt Farmer was perfectly fine with building a wall to keep brown people out of the country, banning Muslims from entering the United States, and Donald Trump s other horrifying policies, but he (like the Ku Klux Klan and other hate groups who backed Trump during the election) also made the mistake of believing that The Donald had his interests as a white man at heart.Unfortunately, as a recovering heroin addict, Farmer is now suffering quite a bit of buyer s remorse after learning that his treatments are going to go bye-bye under Trump. Farmer relies on Medicaid to pay for his recovery treatments, and Trump is currently in the process of trying to gut healthcare for all those dirty poors in the country who act like the Constitution guarantees the right to life or something. If I didn t have Medicaid, I wouldn t be able to pay for this, Farmer told CNN. I would like to say I wouldn t relapse but the chances are from past experience, if I m not going to treatment, in a matter of a few weeks I start getting high. Farmer recently learned like the rest of us that the White House intends to allow states to opt out of the Essential Health Benefits regulations under Obamacare the very same ones that force private insurers and Medicaid to pay for substance abuse recovery.Farmer is the most recent in Trump voters who have lost the faith but only after learning that they would be hurt by his policies just as much as immigrants, Muslims, and others Trump and his supporters view as Untermensch.This is the difference between conservatives and the rest of us: While we realized The Donald is bad for America as a whole, they waited until he was bad for them to care.Watch the CNN segment below:Featured image via screengrab | 1real |
Saudi Arabia and Arab allies push for unity against Iran, Hezbollah meddling | CAIRO (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia and other Arab foreign ministers criticized Iran and its Lebanese Shi ite ally Hezbollah at an emergency meeting in Cairo on Sunday, calling for a united front to counter Iranian interference. Regional tensions have risen in recent weeks between Sunni monarchy Saudi Arabia and Shi ite Islamist Iran over Lebanese Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri s surprise resignation, and an escalation in Yemen s conflict. Hariri, a Saudi ally, resigned on Nov. 4 from Riyadh, accusing Iran and Hezbollah of spreading strife. But Lebanese President Michel Aoun and other politicians accused Saudi Arabia of holding Hariri hostage and said he had been coerced into resigning. Saudi Arabia and Hariri both deny that. Hezbollah, both a military force involved in Syria s war and a political movement, is part of a Lebanese government made up of rival factions, and an ally of Aoun. Saudi Arabia also accuses Hezbollah of a role in the launch of a missile towards Riyadh from Yemen this month. Iran denies accusations that it supplies Houthi forces there. The kingdom will not stand by and will not hesitate to defend its security, Saudi Arabia s Foreign Minister Adel Jubeir told the assembly. We must stand together. The emergency Arab foreign ministers meeting was convened at the request of Saudi Arabia with support from the UAE, Bahrain, and Kuwait to discuss means of confronting Iranian intervention. In a declaration after the meeting, the Arab League accused Hezbollah of supporting terrorism and extremist groups in Arab countries with advanced weapons and ballistic missiles. It said Arab nations would provide details to the U.N. Security Council of Tehran s violations for arming militias in Yemen. Lebanon s Arab League representative objected to the declaration accusing Hezbollah of terrorism and said it is part of Lebanon s government, the Hezbollah-affiliated al-Manar television channel reported. United Arab Emirates Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Anwar Gargash said on Twitter later that the declaration was a clear message about joint Arab action against Iran. Yemen s civil war pits the internationally recognized government, backed by Saudi Arabia and its allies, against the Houthis and forces loyal to former president Ali Abdullah Saleh. Iranian threats have gone beyond all limits and pushed the region into a dangerous abyss, Arab League Secretary General Ahmed Aboul Gheit said. Unfortunately countries like the Saudi regime are pursuing divisions and creating differences, and because of this they don t see any results other than divisions, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told Iranian state media on Sunday on the sidelines of a meeting in Antalya. Egypt s foreign minister received a call from U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson on Sunday when they also discussed regional tensions over Lebanon, the foreign ministry said in a statement. After French intervention, Hariri flew to France and met President Emmanuel Macron in Paris on Saturday. He will arrive in Cairo for a visit on Tuesday, his office said. Speaking in Paris, Hariri said he would clarify his position when he returns to Beirut in the coming days. He said he would take part in Lebanese independence day celebrations, scheduled for Wednesday. | 0fake |
German police present stolen John Lennon diaries | BERLIN (Reuters) - German police presented on Tuesday diaries, pairs of glasses and other items belonging to late Beatle John Lennon that were stolen from his widow Yoko Ono in 2006 and eventually ended up in Berlin. Police arrested a man in Berlin on Monday suspected of receiving the 86 stolen items, which include Lennon s last diary that ended on the day he was shot and killed in New York on Dec. 8, 1980. This day contains the entry that on that morning John Lennon and Yoko Ono had an appointment with Annie Leibovitz to take a photo which I think is world famous, Berlin prosecutor Michael von Hagen told a news conference. The Leibovitz portrait of a naked Lennon curled up around Ono on their bed ran on the January 1981 cover of Rolling Stone magazine. Hagen rejected suggestions that Ono might have lent or given away the objects: The diaries especially ... were also treated by Yoko Ono as something sacred. And the idea that she would have given away three original diaries, especially the one that ends on the very day Lennon died, can be completely ruled out. Carsten Pfohl, head of property crime for Berlin police, said investigators had found one of the pairs of glasses and a receipt in Lennon s name hidden in the trunk of the car of the accused on Monday. Police suspect that the items were stolen by Ono s former driver and then taken to Turkey and were only brought to Berlin in 2013 or 2014. Another suspect lives in Turkey, they said. The Berlin police was alerted after they were found by the administrator for a bankrupt auction house, which had previously valued the objects at 3.1 million euros ($3.64 million). ($1 = 0.8519 euros) | 0fake |
Robert Scheer and Lizbeth Mateo Explore the Contradictions of U.S. Immigration Policy | Robert Scheer and Lizbeth Mateo Explore the Contradictions of U.S. Immigration Policy Posted on Nov 4, 2016 Lawyer and immigrant rights activist Lizbeth Mateo. (KCRW)
In this week’s episode of “Scheer Intelligence,” the Truthdig editor in chief speaks with the lawyer and immigrant rights activist who self-deported in order to illuminate the plight of immigrants.
Mateo came to the United States with her family at age 14 and attended college and law school. She returned to Mexico for several days in 2013 and was subsequently denied DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals), calling into question her ability to live and work in the United States.
In their conversation, Mateo tells Scheer why she decided to become an activist and self-deport, knowing it was a risky move. She discusses why President Obama has been called by some “The Deporter-in-Chief,” and tells Scheer that whatever happens in the presidential election, immigrants will not forget the politicians who remained silent while Donald Trump insulted them.
A rushed transcript follows.
—Posted by Alexander Reed Kelly
Robert Scheer: Hi. This is Robert Scheer. Welcome to another addition of Scheer Intelligence where the intelligence comes from my guests and in this case it is LIzbeth Mateo, a immigrant activist, who has had a rich history ever since she came into this country, dealing with immigration laws. She came in at the age of fourteen from Oaxaca, she went to local schools, graduated from Venice High School and actually, spent two years at Santa Monica College, where we are broadcasting from. Very proud alumni. Went on, then to Cal State-Northridge and another great local institution and then went up to Santa Clara College, a Jesuit institution in Silicon Valley and graduated from law school.
All of which would now put her in position for a great career except there is a question about her documentation, which is actually the subject of this podcast. Everybody is now talking about immigration reform or getting rid of immigrants or what have you and there is a lot of hypocrisy around this issue but one of the bright spots, although maybe Elizabeth will disagree with me, is that at least here in the state of California, which has been ahead of the country, I think, on immigration reform as far as licenses. In one bill, Jerry Brown, our Governor, signed, you can actually get credentialed as a lawyer and function.
Why don’t we begin with that? On the one hand, you represent the great achievement of the American melting pot. A person who did everything right and yet you could have been eligible for the Dream Act that Obama has proclaimed or seems to support. There is a bit of a mixed record there from Obama on this, which you can discuss, but you have a problem in your record in that you were an activist and one of your activist actions was to self-deport, so why don’t we talk about that.
Lizbeth Mateo: Yes, first of all, thank you so much for inviting me, for having me here. I am essentially what a lot of people call a dreamer. I came to the US at a very young age. I went to high school, college in the area, I graduated from law school and yes, California has been, I think, at the forefront of immigrant rights issues for a long time. We are able to get in-state tuition, pay like everyone else who is a citizen. Also get certain financial aid and more recently, at least for me, the most crucial thing in my career is that I can actually get a license. I can take the Bar, get a license, and practice law.
The issue is, now, I can’t work legally in the US. I don’t have a work permit because I do qualify, in my opinion, for deferred action for childhood arrivals or DACA as most people know it, which is a program that President Obama created in 2012.
However, as part of my activism, I left the country in 2013, briefly, with two other young people and we joined a campaign called the Bring Them Home Campaign. We essentially met with other young people in Mexico who had been deported, who had left for family reasons, for other emergencies, who wanted to come home. We came back , the nine of us, we were named the Dream Nine and we presented ourselves at the border and asked the government to allow us to come home, which they did after seventeen days in detention and so, I went on to law school, thinking I am going to remain in this country, I have been allowed to come home and I am going to apply for DACA eventually, which I did, only to receive not one but two notices of intent to deny from the government citing that exit. That is what I am dealing with right now and that is what I am fighting for.
Scheer: So this is a situation that a lot of people fall into. That something has gone array in their papers either because they were really great citizens, like you, activists to try to make the country better or they had some technical difficulty.
Speaking as a lawyer, what can be done now, not just in your case, where do we stand on the immigration issue? I know the Democrats are saying they are great on it and they are getting a lot of votes based on that. They weren’t always great and the Republicans are being led by an out and out neo-fascist, Donald Trump, who wants to just blame, when he is not blaming Muslims, he wants to blame immigrants, undocumented immigrants, for all of our problems. Of course, they have nothing to do with it. We are in a weird place where the good people haven’t always been so good.
Mateo: Yes, and that is a problem. Especially during this election that has been very negative, where immigrants have been described with some of the most horrible words but I think, at least for me, not so much from the stand point of a law graduate or a future lawyer, but more from the stand point of an immigrant and an organizer, I think that we need to be ready regardless of who becomes President. Even if it is Hilary Clinton. She is saying some great things about immigrants now but she hasn’t always been on our side. She was the first one to call for the deportation of minors, refugee children from Central America. She has agreed with the policies of President Obama to deport almost three million people at this point, 2.5 million people, including many of those refugee children, many of who are still in jails across the country at this point.
To me, that is just unacceptable that in this country we put kids in jails, in prisons. I think whoever becomes President, we have to be ready to keep organizing like we have so far and that is part of the reason why I am speaking out on my case and why the government wants to deny me a benefit that, one, I qualify for and two, that I think I have worked very hard for and have, in many ways, earned through my activism, through my work in my personal life and that is the kind of message that I am trying to send to the community at this point.
Scheer: You know, living here in Los Angeles and running into a lot of people, students of my own at USC and elsewhere who have questionable status, they are a little angry with Obama and some of them, my students, have called him the Deporter in Chief.
Mateo: He is the President who has deported more undocumented immigrants in the history of this country and that is ...
Scheer: More than any other President. | 1real |
Coke and Pepsi Give Millions to Public Health, Then Lobby Against It - The New York Times | The beverage giants and PepsiCo have given millions of dollars to nearly 100 prominent health groups in recent years, while simultaneously spending millions to defeat public health legislation that would reduce Americans’ soda intake, according to public health researchers. The findings, published on Monday in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, document the beverage industry’s deep financial ties to the health community over the past five years, as part of a strategy to silence health critics and gain unlikely allies against soda regulations. The study’s authors, Michael Siegel, a professor at the Boston University school of public health, and Daniel Aaron, a student at Boston University’s medical school, scoured public records including news releases, newspaper databases, lobbying reports, the medical literature and information released by the beverage giants themselves. While some of the incidents cited in the study already have been reported by news organizations, the medical journal report is the first to take a comprehensive look at the industry’s strategy of donating to health organizations while at the same time lobbying against public health measures. The study tracked industry donations and lobbying spending from 2011 through 2015, at a time when many cities were mulling soda taxes or other regulations to combat obesity. “We wanted to look at what these companies really stand for,” said Mr. Aaron, the study’s . “And it looks like they are not helping public health at all — in fact they’re opposing it almost across the board, which calls these sponsorships into question. ” Mr. Aaron said that the industry donations created “ conflicts of interest” for the health groups that accepted them. The report found a number of instances in which influential health groups accepted beverage industry donations and then backed away from supporting soda taxes or remained noticeably silent about the initiatives. In one instance cited in the study, the nonprofit group Save the Children, which had actively supported soda tax campaigns in several states, did an about face and withdrew its support in 2010. The group had accepted a $5 million grant from Pepsi and was seeking a major grant from Coke to help pay for its health and education programs for children. Responding to the new research, Save the Children said, in a statement, that the group in 2010 had decided to focus on early childhood education, and that its decision to stop supporting soda taxes “was unrelated to any corporate support that Save the Children received. ” When New York proposed a ban on sodas in 2012, the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics cited “conflicting research” and didn’t support the effort. The academy accepted $525, 000 in donations from Coke in 2012. The following year it took a $350, 000 donation from the company. The academy said it no longer has a sponsorship relationship with the beverage firms. The N. A. A. C. P. and the Hispanic Federation have publicly opposed initiatives despite disproportionately high rates of obesity in black and Hispanic communities. Coke made more than $1 million in donations to the N. A. A. C. P. between 2010 and 2015, and more than $600, 000 to the Hispanic Federation between 2012 and 2015. The groups did not respond to requests for comment. “The beverage industry is using corporate philanthropy to undermine public health measures,” said Kelly D. Brownell, dean of the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke, who was not involved in the new research. The American Diabetes Association accepted $140, 000 from the company between 2012 and 2014. The American Heart Association received more than $400, 000 from Coke between 2010 and 2015. And the National Institutes of Health received nearly $2 million from Coke between 2010 and 2014. In a statement, the heart association said the group is “leading efforts to reduce consumption of sugary drinks,” and the group has advocated for increased taxes on sugary drinks. “To achieve our goals, we must engage a wide variety of food and beverage companies to be part of the solution,” the statement said. The soda sponsorship does not have “ any influence on our science and the public policy positions we advocate for. ” Coke referred questions about the study to their trade group, the American Beverage Association. “We believe our actions in communities and the marketplace are contributing to addressing the complex challenge of obesity,” the beverage association said. “We stand strongly for our need, and right, to partner with organizations that strengthen our communities. ” The beverage association said it disagreed with public health advocates “on discriminatory and regressive taxes and policies on our products. ” In a statement PepsiCo said it is “incorrectly painted as a ‘soda company,’ when only a quarter of our global revenue comes from carbonated soft drinks. ” “We believe that obesity is a complex, multifaceted issue and that our company has an important role to play in addressing it which includes engaging with public health organizations and responding to consumers’ demand for healthier products,” the statement said. The New York Times last year reported that Coke had paid for scientific research that downplayed the link between sugary drinks and obesity. After that article was published, the beverage giant released a database showing that since 2010 it had spent more than $120 million on academic research and partnerships with health organizations involved in curbing obesity. From 2011 to 2015, Coke spent on average more than $6 million per year lobbying against public health measures aimed at curbing soda consumption, according to data from the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics. Pepsi spent about $3 million per year during that period, and the American Beverage Association spent more than $1 million each year, the study found. In 2009 alone, when the government proposed a federal soda tax to curb obesity that would help finance health care reform, Coke, Pepsi and the American Beverage Association spent a combined $38 million lobbying against the measure, which ultimately failed. When the mayor of Philadelphia proposed a soda tax in 2010, the beverage industry offered $10 million to the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia if the tax proposal was dropped. The City Council voted down the measure, and the beverage association later made the donation. Philadelphia did ultimately impose a soda tax this year. The beverage industry filed a lawsuit in September, calling the tax illegal. The industry also is spending millions on advertising campaigns against soda taxes that are on the ballot in at least four cities this November — three in Northern California, and one in Boulder, Colo. Marion Nestle, a professor of nutrition, food studies and public health at New York University, said the paper shows that soda companies “want to have it both ways — appear as socially responsible corporate citizens and lobby against public health measures every chance they get. ” | 0fake |
Obama Says He Told Putin: ‘Cut It Out’ on Hacking - The New York Times | WASHINGTON — President Obama said for the first time on Friday that he had held back from retaliating against Russia’s meddling in the presidential race for fear of inciting further hacking “that could hamper vote counting. ” But he said he was weighing a mix of public and covert actions against the Russians in his last 34 days in office, actions that would increase “the costs for them. ” Mr. Obama said he was committed to sending the Kremlin a message that “we can do stuff to you,” but without setting off an escalating cyberconflict. “There have been folks out there who suggest somehow if we went out there and made big announcements and thumped our chests about a bunch of stuff, that somehow it would potentially spook the Russians,” he said. “I think it doesn’t read the thought process in Russia very well. ” The president did not reveal what steps he was considering and suggested that some of the options, if they were carried out, could remain secret. “Some of it we will do in a way that they will know, but not everybody will,” he said. Mr. Obama made his comments at an annual news conference. His remarks were tinged with melancholy at the impending end of his presidency, with foreboding about the changes that could follow Donald J. Trump into office next month and with uneasiness about the role Russia played in the political upheaval that has resulted from his election. The president spoke hours after Hillary Clinton, addressing campaign donors in New York, bluntly accused President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia of orchestrating the hacks of her campaign and the Democratic National Committee computers “to undermine our democracy,” as part of a “personal beef against me. ” Mr. Obama declined to place the blame so squarely on Mr. Putin, though he noted, “Not much happens in Russia without Vladimir Putin. ” Mr. Obama also sought to diminish the specter of Russian influence over the American political process, saying Russia was a smaller, weaker country that “doesn’t produce anything that anybody wants to buy, except oil and gas and arms. ” Still, the president was clearly wrestling with what he said the hacking affair and the reaction to it revealed about the state of American politics. Citing a recent poll that showed more than a third of Trump voters saying they approved of Mr. Putin — “Ronald Reagan would roll over in his grave,” Mr. Obama said — the president appealed to Americans not to allow partisan hatred and feuds to blind them to manipulation by foreign powers. “Unless that changes,” Mr. Obama said, “we’re going to continue to be vulnerable to foreign influence because we’ve lost track of what it is that we’re about and what we stand for. ” Mr. Obama offered a long list of accomplishments that he said marked his eight years in office. But the messy aftermath of Mr. Trump’s victory has raised questions about Mr. Obama’s response to the hacking, ignited a nasty squabble between Mr. Trump and the nation’s intelligence agencies, and left a residue of suspicion over the vote itself. The president continued to defend his cautious approach to reports of hacking — an approach that has come under criticism from Democrats after it emerged last week that the intelligence agencies had concluded Russia was trying to help Mr. Trump win the election. “We were playing this thing straight — we weren’t trying to advantage one side or the other,” Mr. Obama said. “Imagine if we had done the opposite. It would have become one more political scrum. ” The president, however, is likely to face further questions after his C. I. A. director, John O. Brennan, issued a statement Friday disputing reports of a rift between the intelligence agencies and the C. I. A. over Russia’s motives in hacking the D. N. C. and handing over emails to WikiLeaks, which released them in the weeks leading up to the vote. In his statement, first reported by The Washington Post, Mr. Brennan said he had met with the director of the F. B. I. James B. Comey, and the director of national intelligence, James R. Clapper, and “there is strong consensus among us on the scope, nature and intent of Russian interference in our presidential election. ” That statement will also challenge Mr. Trump, who has seized on reports of an interagency squabble to undermine the credibility of the hacking findings. He has criticized the C. I. A. analysis, saying it was supplied by the same agency that provided erroneous intelligence about Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction before the Iraq War. Mr. Obama held out hope that when Mr. Trump takes office, he would take a more sober approach. He said he had had “cordial” conversations with his successor, and that Mr. Trump had listened to his suggestions about “maintaining the effectiveness, integrity, cohesion of our office, our various democratic institutions,” though he was not specific. The president defended the F. B. I. which has come under fierce criticism from Mrs. Clinton and her aides because of Mr. Comey’s announcement that the bureau was considering reopening its investigation of Mrs. Clinton’s email, which she has said cost her the election. Mrs. Clinton’s remarks on Thursday underscored longstanding differences she has had with her former boss in how the United States should view Mr. Putin. For his part, Mr. Obama also made a startling admission as he described how his administration had reacted to the Russian hack: He said it was not until the “beginning of the summer” that the White House was “alerted to the possibility that the D. N. C. has been hacked. ” That was nine months after an F. B. I. agent had first contacted the Democratic National Committee with evidence that a major, hacking group was inside the committee’s networks, raising the question of why it took so long for that news to reach the president. Mr. Obama made it clear that he went out of his way to play down the news, because “in this hyperpartisan atmosphere” he did not think he or anyone else at the White House could talk about it without risking to appear to be acting on behalf of Mrs. Clinton. But the unintended result, as some of Obama aides concede, was that the Russians faced very little resistance. Not until September, when Mr. Obama pulled Mr. Putin aside at a Group of 20 meeting in Hanghzhou, China, was the Russian leader given a warning directly from the United States. Mr. Obama said he told him “to cut it out, there were going to be serious consequences if he did not. ” The president made it sound like that worked, saying “we did not see further tampering of the election process. ” But the leaks of D. N. C. emails, and those of John D. Podesta, the Clinton campaign manager, continued, because they were already in the hands of WikiLeaks, which doled them out to an eager news media until the last days of the campaign. The Russian government’s motives were hardly a mystery, Mr. Obama said, “because you guys wrote about it every day, every single leak about every little juicy piece of political gossip, including John Podesta’s risotto recipe. ” | 0fake |
White House Sinks To New Low: Spokesperson Makes Fun of Trump’s ‘Outrageous Appearance’ and Hair | This is really reaching the spokesperson for the President has just made an a@@ of himself by making fun of a candidate for the 2016 Presidency. He said we can t take Trump seriously with his fake hair . Nice, huh? Speaking of fake hair Not to sink to his level but (two can play this childish game)now that he mentions it, can we talk about Mooch? White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Tuesday that Donald Trump s appearance, and particularly his famous hair, makes it easy to understand why people don t take him seriously as a presidential candidate.At the White House, Earnest said Trump s overall appearance should give voters pause for thought. The Trump campaign for months now has had a dustbin of history-like quality to it, from the vacuous sloganeering, to the outright lies to even the fake hair, the whole carnival barker routine that we ve seen for some time now, Earnest said. Earnest was pressed to explain later why the White House would seemingly play Trump s game by mocking his appearance, but Earnest defended his remarks.Read more: iotw | 1real |
Heckler Crashes Ted Cruz Speech By Shouting ‘Ted Cruz Looks So Weird’ And Pretends To Barf (VIDEO/TWEET) | Hecklers at GOP rallies rarely disappoint after all, the Republican presidential candidates have given them so much material to be inspired by. On Sunday, at one of his last rallies before the Iowa caucus, Ted Cruz had an experience with a heckler he probably won t ever forget.As Cruz gave his stump speech, an audience member shouted that he didn t feel so well while pretending to vomit in a trash can, stating that his illness was because Ted Cruz looks so weird! This brave heckler wasn t far from Cruz and he repeated it loud and clear just in case the candidate missed it the first time. Scott Bauer, a reporter for the Associated Press, fortunately captured part of this hilarious interruption on video and tweeted it for all to see:.@tedcruz enters Des Moines rally pic.twitter.com/06Itp606hN Scott Bauer (@sbauerAP) February 1, 2016Of course, security removed the heckler out of the rally almost immediately and Cruz said, I guess the bars let out early. On social media, some people in the audience expressed sadness that the heckler was taken away, as the rally certainly could have used him.twitterCruz then used the moment to take a jab at one of his rivals and joked, Is that Donald Trump yelling in the back? The joke was completely appropriate, considering that Trump and Cruz are competing with each other for the Iowa Caucuses later tonight.It was actually reported by the Associated Press that the heckler was in fact ill so perhaps it was really Cruz s creepy appearance that set the protester off. It would make perfect sense, considering the unpleasant, cringeworthy effect that Cruz s face had on his own daughter! To top off Cruz s disastrous, rejection-filled weekend, his tour bus got stuck in the mud in Iowa and he had to hitch a ride with his aides.We ve seen some pretty creative hecklers during the GOP candidate s campaigns so far, and Cruz has had more than his fair share. Earlier this month, two hecklers actually made it onto Cruz s stage at a gun event, making for a completely awkward moment. But he s not the only one recently, front runner Donald Trump got treated to tomatoes being thrown at him. Featured image via Gage Skidmore | 1real |
This City Ballet Dancer Has a New Role: Being Bad - The New York Times | Fairies can be so fickle. One night, all you want to do is break a spell. The next, with ice in your veins and a malicious flourish, you put a curse into action. On Thursday, Sara Mearns, the glamorous New York City Ballet principal, made an unlikely debut: the evil Fairy Carabosse in “The Sleeping Beauty. ” Her usual role, which she performed Wednesday, is the Lilac Fairy, Princess Aurora’s shimmering protector who counteracts Carabosse’s curse of death. Ms. Mearns, 31, is no polite ballerina, but an dancer who reacts on the spot through her deep connection with music. Speaking twice in her dressing room on Thursday — once during intermission and later after her brief, ferocious appearance in the second act — Ms. Mearns reflected on the two roles. “Carabosse is like spitfire — short and sweet,” she said. “With the Lilac Fairy, I feel very empowered. You’re sort of in charge of the whole extravaganza. You’re always there. ” After a parting hug so she could take her bow — “Don’t get caught in the wing,” she said, referring not to the stage but to the appendage on her glittering black dress — she headed back out. For the record, the crowd roared. Ms. Mearns grinned with delight. Here are edited excerpts from the conversation. Who did you model Carabosse on? I wanted her to be the Maleficent Disney [animated] version where she just stands there. She’s actually somewhat nice and doesn’t scream in the beginning. Peter [Martins, the ballet master in chief] told me: “Carabosse is just as beautiful as the Lilac Fairy. You should be above it all. But what’s different is that your soul is evil. ” Your rage seemed to bubble up inside of you. Is that what it felt like? Yes. I actually didn’t think that was going to happen! When I’ve seen people do that, I’ve been like, there’s no way that I could get myself to do that. I would feel so stupid. And then when I got onstage, there was no one standing in front of me. I was just like, oh my God, this feels right. What did you not want Carabosse to be? I didn’t want to come out screaming like a crazy person. I feel like I have a really different approach. The music makes you want to go there because it’s so powerful — it makes you want to scream. The costume does it. You just standing there already does it. You just have to rein it in. It was hard, but once I really committed to the way I was going to do it, I felt comfortable. Was the experience what you thought it would be like? Yes and no. I was waiting for this thrill of being evil onstage. I was more nervous than I thought I would be. I don’t think I’ve actually done a character role that doesn’t require dancing. There was such a different nervousness, such a different placement of your feet and your stance. Lilac Fairy is so much a part of me that I can grab it at a moment’s notice, but Carabosse is so much deeper and harder to find that it took everything out of me. I actually get more tired doing this because my whole body is so tense. You can’t hide behind your dancing, which is your comfort zone. Were you dancing with your hands? Yes. The first time I had used the nails was in the stage rehearsal, and I saw how much you can do because your fingers are much longer than they normally are. I came up with this thing that I was doing on my chest. [She drummed her fingers slowly.] That part made me laugh. I came up with it in the shower this morning. I felt like my hands were dancing instead of my feet. Your nails are scary. What are they? They’re plastic fingers, and we have to tape them on. In the dress rehearsal, I lost two nails when I pulled off [the master of ceremonies] Catalabutte’s wig because I didn’t tape them right. I can’t really feel my fingertips right now because they’re so tight, but it’s good. They won’t fall off. Does Carabosse produce a different kind of adrenaline than the Lilac Fairy? Yes. Dancing adrenaline is excitement — it’s like, I can’t wait to do those steps, I can’t wait to have that feeling. This is deeper. It’s a thing happening. You transform your soul to a dark place. You’re not really happy when you come offstage. I couldn’t tell if you were annoyed because you had to do an interview, or if you were still in character. [Laughs.] No. I’m still so mad! When you come off, you’re not like, I did such a great job. You’re simmering. With Carabosse, you can really go for it. You can scare people, throw people, just do whatever. I want to shock them. | 0fake |
Foreign government code reviews 'problematic': White House cyber official | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Allowing foreign governments to require reviews of software secrets of technology products built by U.S. companies is “problematic,” the top White House cyber security official said on Tuesday, adding that the increasingly common arrangements presented both security and intellectual property risks. Rob Joyce, the White House cyber security coordinator, said that letting countries inspect source code, the closely guarded internal instructions of software, as a condition for entry into foreign markets was a protectionist effort by certain regimes that threatened a “free and open internet” and could “hobble” a product’s security and privacy features. Reuters on Monday reported that Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) last year allowed a Russian defense agency to review the inner workings of cyber defense software known as ArcSight that is used by the Pentagon to guard its computer networks. (Read the original Reuters special report: here ) Cyber security experts, former U.S. intelligence officials and former ArcSight employees said the practice could help Moscow discover weaknesses in the software, potentially helping attackers to blind the U.S. military to a cyber attack. “There are security aspects of those disclosures (and) they are problematic,” Joyce, a former hacker at the U.S. National Security Agency, said at a Washington Post Cybersecurity Summit when asked specifically about the story. He added that he was more concerned about the intellectual property risks associated with the reviews, however. “If you give your source code to China as a condition of entering into that market, you’ve got to wonder if competitors are then going to start to adopt those features,” Joyce said at the event, which was sponsored by HPE. “And we’ve seen some examples of that in the past and that really concerns us.” Asked about Joyce’s comments, an HPE spokeswoman said the company “has never and will never take actions that compromise the security of our products or the operations of our customers.” The company said the reviews have taken place for years and are conducted by a Russian testing company at an HPE research and development center outside of Russia, where the software maker closely supervises the process, and that no code is allowed to leave the premises. HPE has said the inspection process was necessary to obtain certification from Russia’s Federal Service for Technical and Export Control (FSTEC), a defense agency tasked with countering cyber espionage, in order to sell software in Russia. The review of ArcSight’s code was conducted by Echelon, a company with close ties to the Russian military, on behalf of FSTEC, according to Russian regulatory records and interviews with people with direct knowledge of the issue. British tech company Micro Focus International Plc (MCRO.L), which purchased ArcSight from HPE last year in a transaction completed in September, did not respond when asked about Joyce’s remarks. Micro Focus has not responded to requests for comment on whether it would allow Russia to do similar source code reviews in the future. Russia in recent years has stepped up demands for source code reviews as a requirement for doing business in the country, Reuters reported in June. China in May adopted a new cyber security law that western companies have criticized for requiring overly strict data surveillance and storage requirements. The law has raised concern that companies will need to choose between compromising security to protect business and losing out on the enormous Chinese market. “The idea that you can’t enter China’s market without offering up your intellectual property in this way, without agreeing maybe to hobble some of the security and privacy features of it ... Russia is heading that way, a bunch of totalitarian regimes are heading that way,” Joyce said. | 0fake |
Cambodia revokes diplomatic passports of banned opposition members | PHNOM PENH (Reuters) - Cambodia has canceled the diplomatic passports of some opposition members weeks after a Supreme Court ruling dissolved their political party, senior government officials said on Thursday. The court outlawed the Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP) this month at the request of authoritarian Prime Minister Hun Sen s government in a move that prompted the United States to cut election funding and threaten more punitive steps. Huy Vannak, undersecretary of state at the Interior Ministry, said 56 diplomatic passports of former members of the CNRP had been revoked. Legally, they are just ordinary citizens, they are no longer special officials who receive diplomatic passports, Huy Vannak told Reuters. They can no longer use them and it means that they can use normal passports. The move comes after a warning this week from Hun Sen that former members of the CNRP who have fled to Thailand may be sent back to Cambodia. Government spokesman Phay Siphan told Reuters on Thursday he was unaware whether there was any attempt to bring back to Cambodia those in hiding in Thailand. Rights groups and some Western governments have voiced concern over what they say is the deterioration of Cambodia s political landscape ahead of a 2018 election that had looked set to be the biggest challenge to Hun Sen s 32-year rule. CNRP leader Kem Sokha was arrested in September and charged with treason over an alleged plot to take power with American help. Washington has rejected the accusations as baseless. The Nov. 16 Supreme Court ruling ordered a five-year political ban for 118 members of the CNRP, including Kem Sokha. The 55 parliamentary seats the CNRP won in the last election in 2013 were allocated to smaller parties after the ruling. | 0fake |
TUCKER CARLSON Shocked At Lawyer’s Delusion On Rejection Of Voter ID Law In Texas [Video] | A Texas federal judge appointed by Obama has again rejected the 2011 Texas voter ID law, stating that the legislators meant to discriminate against minority voters.Tucker Carlson interviewed one of the lawyers involved in the case. The reasoning is beyond flawed! The only people being discriminated against are the LEGAL voters of this nation! Why is this activist judge assuming that minorities are being discriminated against? You will find her reasoning to be biased and racist. The Court of Appeals even came back with this statement: some of the evidence used by the judge wasn t relevant. U.S. District Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos made this same ruling in 2014, which forced an appeal. The Fifth Circuit issued a stay against the order. The Supreme Court stepped in and allowed Texas to use the voter ID law.But last July the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans asked the judge to re-examine the decision since the judges found that some of the evidence used by the judge wasn t relevant. The two sides reached a deal for the 2016 election, which allowed a voter to sign a declaration swearing that he or she has had a reasonable difficulty that prevented obtaining one of the accepted forms of photo identification. Ramos went back to the drawing board but came to the same conclusion.The Texas Tribune reported:After weighing the evidence again, she came to the same conclusion, according to Monday s ruling. Her decision did not identify what some have called a smoking gun showing intent to discriminate, but it cited the state s long history of discrimination; virtually unprecedented radical departures from normal practices in fast-tracking the 2011 bill through the Legislature; the legislation s unduly strict terms; and lawmakers shifting rationales for passing a law that some said was needed to crack down on voter fraud. The Court holds that the evidence found infirm did not tip the scales, Ramos wrote. Civil rights groups and others suing the state offered evidence that established a discriminatory purpose was at least one of the substantial or motivating factors behind passage of SB 14, she added.The law requires a voter to use one of seven forms of identification when they vote. The voter can use a driver s license, concealed handgun license, military ID, passport, or a state-issued personal ID card.Democrats and civil rights activists claimed the Republican legislators departed from procedural norms in passing the law, including classifying it as emergency legislation, cutting debate short and bypassing the ordinary committee process in both chambers. But Republican officials, which includes Governor Greg Abbott, insists the law stops voter ID and strengthens the integrity of elections.From The New York Times:They said that the law was aimed at preventing voter fraud and that the departures from the normal legislative process were made to prevent Democratic lawmakers from manipulating procedural rules to thwart passage. They maintained that opponents had turned up no evidence that any legislator had intended to discriminate against blacks and Hispanics.Texas lawmakers have not announced how they ll respond, but they can choose to appeal again.Fox News reported:Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton did not immediately react to the ruling, although the state could once again appeal, which is what one of Paxton s top deputies appeared to suggest would happen while testifying to lawmakers just as the ruling came down. Brantley Starr, a deputy first assistant attorney general, acknowledged that Texas could be dragged back under preclearance but noted there was little precedent. It s possible. It s our belief that you d have to have multiple instances of discriminatory purpose, he said. | 1real |
Two Powerful Quakes Hit Italy Within Hours | Two Powerful Quakes Hit Italy Within Hours page: 1 Near the location of the deadly August quake. (see ATS for the August Quake info). The first quake: a magnitude-5.5 quake struck the same region. The epicenter was about 9 kilometers away, south-southwest of Visso. (It) hit at 7 p.m. (1 p.m. ET) between Perugia and Macerata, according to ANSA. The second quake -- with a magnitude of 6.1 -- was 3.2 kilometers (2 miles) north of Visso and 58 km (36 miles) from Perugia, the USGS reported. The depth of both is 10 km. There have been 2 aftershocks, 4.1 and 4.9, also at a depth of 10 KM. "We don't have any reported victims, but we're in the dark and under a downpour," said Mauro Falcucci, the mayor of the small town of Castelsantangelo sul Nera, according to state news agency ANSA. CNN's Barbie Nadeau was in Rome when the quakes struck. "Incredible aftershock or earthquake felt in Testaccio in Rome. Wow," she said on Twitter. Video showed a blocked road. Much of the are is small vilages that can't be reached by night. Some reports of damage and an injury has come in: News.com.au The quakes crumbled churches and buildings, knocking out power and sending panicked residents into the rain-drenched streets.One person was injured in Visso, where the rubble of collapsed buildings tumbled into the streets. But the Civil Protection agency, which initially reported two injured, had no other immediate reports of injuries or deaths. “We’re without power, waiting for emergency crews,” said the mayor of Castel Santangelo Sul Nera, a tiny town just north of some of the hard-hit areas of the August 24 quake. edit on 26-10-2016 by reldra because: (no reason given) edit on 26-10-2016 by reldra because: (no reason given) Italian Prime Minister Renzi tweets: 'I want to thank those who are working in the rain in the earthquake areas. All Italy hugs those affected' - @matteorenzi edit on 26-10-2016 by reldra because: (no reason given) edit on 26-10-2016 by reldra because: (no reason given) new topics | 1real |
Zimbabwe's ruling party expels former vice president Mnangagwa | HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwe s former vice president Emmerson Mnangagwa, who was sacked by President Robert Mugabe this week, has been expelled from the ruling Zanu-PF, a party spokesman said on Wednesday. Mnangagwa, a liberation war veteran and a long-time ally of Mugabe, was until this week seen as a favorite to succeed the 93-year-old leader. But Mnangagwa s relationship with Mugabe s wife, Grace, has become increasingly strained as their two factions within Zanu-PF fight for dominance. Mnangagwa s removal on Monday came two days after Grace publicly called him a coup plotter . | 0fake |
Comment on Hillary Clinton is an alcoholic by Jonathan Brooks | The American Medical Association defines an “alcoholic” as someone who: Has a prolonged period of frequent, heavy alcohol use. Is unable to control drinking once it has begun. Has withdrawal symptoms when the individual stops using alcohol. Needs to use more and more alcohol to achieve the same effects. Has a variety of social and/or legal problems arising from alcohol use.
By that definition, Hillary Clinton is an alcoholic . Exhibit A
In an email to Hillary’s campaign chairman John Podesta on August 8, 2015, Director of Communications for Hillary’s campaign Jennifer Palmieri wrote, referring to Hillary:
“I think you should call her and sober her up some.”
Here’s a screenshot of the email released by WikiLeaks : Exhibit B
On Feb. 23, 2015, Hillary’s spokesman Nick Merrill sent an email (presumably to Hillary’s campaign staff) with the subject: “HRC Clips” (news clips on Hillary Rodham Clinton). The news clips that day included an article by Benjamin Bell for ABC News titled, “One Thing That Might Surprise You About Hillary Clinton,” which Merrill reproduced in its entirety in his email.
Bell’s article was an interview with New York Times national political reporter Amy Chozick, on whether Hillary Clinton would announce she’s running for the presidency. One of the questions Bell asked Chozick was: “Covering [Hillary] Clinton, what is one thing that has surprised you about her?”
Chozick answered:
“Hmm. She likes to drink. We were on the campaign trail in 2008 and the press thought she was just taking shots to pander to voters in Pennsylvania. Um, no.”
Here’s a composite screenshot of the relevant part of Merrill’s email, from WikiLeaks : Exhibit C
According to the National Enquirer , “top staffers” of Hillary’s campaign told the Enquirer “they even began this year’s presidential campaign by secretly planning a stint in rehab for Hillary.” But any rehab therapy “quickly failed amid the pressures of the campaign” and “the effort of making a deal over an FBI probe into her e-mail scandal”.
A source said, “The stress of her political career, the never-ending scandals and her worsening health plunged her into a life-threatening booze hell. She turned to drink to drown her fears. Hillary tries to hide her problem, like she lies about so many things.” A “close friend” of Hillary added, “ Hillary has been drinking heavily for years to forget her miserable marriage to serial cheater Bill. She’s also hit the bottle to cope with other stress, as well as the boredom of flying all over the world when she was Secretary of State.”
One “Hillary insider” told the Enquirer that Hillary “has blackouts and wakes up wondering where she is and what she has done ” and that “She’s not fit to be President”.
Certainly, Hillary must be drunk when she obscenely ground against the twerking black woman (see below) because no sane person in her then position as U.S. Secretary of State would behave like this in public.
~Eowyn
Dr. Eowyn’s post first appeared at Fellowship of the Minds Don't forget to follow the D.C. Clothesline on Facebook and Twitter. PLEASE help spread the word by sharing our articles on your favorite social networks. Share this: | 1real |
Romney-Ryan | Laurence M. Vance https://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/romney-ryan/
Remember them? They were the Republican presidential candidates in the last election. Aside from the possible repeal of Obamacare (more likely the substitution of a Republican plan), what major thing would be different right now as concerning the welfare state, the warfare state, or U.s. foreign policy? I have been trying all day to think of something. 3:34 pm on October 30, 2016 | 1real |
Russian banker who met Trump son-in-law not acting on our orders: Kremlin | MOSCOW (Reuters) - A senior Russian banker who met President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, did not do so on the Kremlin’s orders, a spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday. Kushner, who was quizzed on Monday by Senate investigators on his contacts with Russians as part of an investigation into possible Kremlin meddling in last year’s presidential election, said he had met Sergei Gorkov, the head of Russian state-owned Vnesheconombank, on Dec. 13. Russia flatly denies it interfered with the U.S. election. When asked about Kushner’s meeting on Tuesday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a conference call that Gorkov had been in the United States as part of a roadshow meeting various U.S. representatives in the course of his work. “These contacts do no need any approval from the Kremlin and naturally (these meetings) did not happen on the Kremlin’s orders,” Peskov said. He said it was “normal practice” for the head of a major Russian bank conducting a roadshow to hold various meetings. | 0fake |
Kunitz’s Double-OT Goal Sends Penguins Back to Stanley Cup - Breitbart | PITTSBURGH (AP) — Chris Kunitz spent a portion of the spring nursing a injury and wondering if his time with the Pittsburgh Penguins was over. The veteran forward’s contract is up this summer and he’s been around long enough to know how these things go, particularly when you’re 37. [“It’s not fun thinking about the future,” Kunitz said. He found a pretty compelling way to put it off for at least four more games and push his team to the brink of history in the process. Kunitz’s knuckling shot from outside the circle fluttered past Craig Anderson 5:09 into the second overtime to give the defending Stanley Cup champions a victory over the Ottawa Senators in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference final Thursday night. Thrust alongside old linemate Sidney Crosby as the game wore on, the two reconnected for a goal that moved the Penguins closer to becoming the first team since the 1998 Detroit Red Wings to win titles. Crosby sent a soft backhand pass from the right faceoff circle to Kunitz and for a moment, it seemed like old times. “With the way he was holding the stick you could tell he wanted it bad,” Crosby said. “I just tried to lay it there for him. I’ve seen him score from there pretty often. It was a huge goal for us, and a great reward for him for the way he played all night. ” Kunitz scored twice, his first two of the playoffs. Justin Schultz added the other in his return from an injury, and Matt Murray stopped 27 shots on his 23rd birthday. The Penguins will host Western Conference champion Nashville in Game 1 on Monday night. Not bad for a team that watched so many of its core players — from defenseman Kris Letang to Evgeni Malkin to Crosby — deal with some serious bumps along the way. And yet here they are on the doorstep to a title once again. “If you look at the amount of guys who have played on this roster throughout the course of the year, it’s a lot of guys,” Crosby said. “The biggest step is ahead. ” Mark Stone and Ryan Dzingel scored for Ottawa. The Senators rallied twice to tie it, with Dzingel making it with 5:19 left in regulation. Craig Anderson made 39 saves, but couldn’t get a handle on Kunitz’s shot as the Senators fell to in Game 7s in franchise history. Just don’t call them cursed. A year ago, Ottawa didn’t even make the playoffs yet they found a way to push the Penguins to the 85th minute of Game 7 of the conference finals. “We wanted to make then earn it and they earned it, rightfully so,” said Senators defenseman Erik Karlsson, who assisted on both of Ottawa’s goals and played the entire postseason with a pair of hairline fractures in his left heel. “We got to give it to them. They were the better team. ” The Senators forced a return trip to Pittsburgh — where they lost in Game 5 on Sunday — by leaning heavily on Anderson in a Game 6 victory. Ottawa coach Guy Boucher told his team to not get caught up in the big picture but instead focus on the small ones, a recipe that carried the Senators throughout a bumpy transition under their head coach to within a victory of the franchise’s second Cup appearance. The Penguins, trying to become the first defending champion to return to the Final since Detroit in 2009, came in confident they would advance if they could replicate their dominant Game 6, when they were undone only by Anderson’s brilliance. Pittsburgh has been nearly unflappable in the face of adversity under Mike Sullivan, and is now in playoff games following a loss over the last two springs. “I couldn’t be more proud of our team for just its ‘sticktoitiveness,’” Sullivan said. “The last four games of this series, we found our game. ” Kunitz ended a playoff goal drought when he completed a with Conor Sheary — a healthy scratch in Games 5 and 6 — by slipping the puck by Anderson 9:55 into the second period. The momentum lasted all of 20 seconds. Ottawa responded immediately with Stone — who stretched his left skate to stay onside — fired a wrist shot that handcuffed Murray . Pittsburgh kept coming. Schultz, returning after missing four games with an injury, zipped a shot from the point through Kunitz’s screen and into the net with 8:16 left in the third. Once again, the Penguins could not hold the lead. Dzingel set up at the right post and banged home a rebound off Erik Karlsson’s shot that hit the left post and caromed off Murray’s back right to Dzingel’s stick . Unbowed, Pittsburgh continued to press. The Penguins pumped eight shots at Anderson in the first overtime before finally breaking through when Kunitz won just the fourth Game 7 of a conference final in NHL history. The next step, the last step, awaits. NOTES: The home team is in overtime Game 7s in NHL playoff history. … Pittsburgh F Patric Hornqvist skated during warmups, but was held out of the lineup for a sixth straight game with an injury. … Karlsson had 16 assists in the playoffs to set a team record. … The Penguins are in Game 7s. … It was the fifth game of the series. | 0fake |
Fox News Finally Fired An Analyst For Going TOO FAR With Lies Defending Trump | Donald Trump just lost another one of his propagandists thanks to Fox News.Last week, Andrew Napolitano opened his big mouth and threw gasoline on a raging fire by claiming that President Obama enlisted British Intelligence agency GCHQ to wiretap Trump.Napolitano s desperate claim came after Trump and his team repeatedly were unable to produce any evidence that President Obama ordered such a wiretap.Rather than vet the claim, White House mouthpiece Sean Spicer repeated it to the press and a firestorm ensued as GCHQ issued a rare statement refuting the accusation. Thus, Napolitano helped create an international incident between the United States and one of our oldest allies.But when asked about the accusation during a press conference, Trump threw Fox News under the bus by blaming them directly instead of taking personal responsibility for repeating an accusation made by a pundit. We said nothing, Trump said. All we did was quote a certain very talented legal mind who was the one responsible for saying that on television. That was a statement made by a very talented lawyer on Fox. So you shouldn t be talking to me, you should be talking to Fox. Fox News immediately scrambled to refute Napolitano. Fox News cannot confirm Judge Napolitano s commentary, Fox anchor Shep Smith said. Fox News knows of no evidence of any kind that the now-President of the United States was surveilled at any time in any way. Full stop. Fox anchor Bret Baier soon followed. We love the judge, we love him here at Fox, but the Fox News division was never able to back up those claims and was never reported on this show, Baier said.And now that FBI Director James Comey has put the nail in the coffin of Trump s wiretapping accusation, Fox News has moved to punish Napolitano.According to the Los Angeles Times, Fox News has removed Napolitano from their programming indefinitely. People familiar with the situation who could speak only on the condition of anonymity said Napolitano is not expected to be on Fox News Channel any time in the near future, the Times reported.Indeed, it appears that Napolitano really has been yanked off the air. After all, Monday has been a heavy legal news day considering Trump is being investigated by the FBI and Neil Gorsuch is being grilled on Capitol Hill. It s heaven for legal analysts but Napolitano didn t provide any analysis for Fox News. That s because instead of being an objective analyst, Napolitano chose to support Trump by tossing out unverified claims even though he damn well knew that Trump s accusation was a lie in the first place.Napolitano s credibility is now in shambles just like Trump s. The only difference is that while Napolitano has been removed from his job, Trump continues to remain in the White House.Featured image via screenshot | 1real |
U.S. companies decry Trump action on transgender student rights | NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. companies led by tech firms Yahoo Inc YHOO.O, Apple Inc (AAPL.O) and Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O) criticized the Trump administration’s decision to revoke Obama administration guidance that allowed transgender public school students to use the bathroom of their choice. Their statements evoked the opposition expressed by many businesses last year when the state of North Carolina passed a law that forces transgender people to use public restrooms matching their gender assigned at birth. The resulting boycotts have cost North Carolina more than $560 million in economic activity, according to the online magazine Facing South. Companies lacked the same opportunity to protest with their dollars in this instance, since the Trump administration action pertains to schools, but still signaled they stood with the Obama policy of using the federal government to expand transgender civil rights. “It’s ultimately going to come down to the business community to stop it because it’s so bad for business,” said Christopher Gergen, chief executive of Forward Impact, an entrepreneurial organization based in Raleigh, North Carolina. In unveiling the new direction on Wednesday, Trump administration officials argued that transgender policies should be an issue for the states to decide. “The action taken by the administration is troubling and goes against all that we believe in,” Yahoo said in a statement. Social conservatives have hailed the decision by the Justice and Education departments to defer transgender bathroom policies to the states, calling it a victory for privacy and traditional values. But companies have tried to persuade state and local governments to side with transgender people. “We support efforts toward greater acceptance, not less, and we strongly believe that transgender students should be treated as equals,” Apple said in a statement. Microsoft President Brad Smith looked to history as a guide, referencing the date that the Emancipation Proclamation took effect, when President Abraham Lincoln declared freedom for slaves. “Since Jan. 1, 1863, the federal government has played a vital role in protecting the rights of all Americans. Let’s not stop now,” Smith said on Twitter. Twitter and Square CEO Jack Dorsey joined other tech firms criticizing the Trump administration’s position. “Rolling back rights for transgender students is wrong,” Dorsey said in a tweet on Thursday. “Twitter and Square stand with the LGBTQ community, always.” In response to the North Carolina law, companies such as Deutsche Bank (DBKGn.DE) and PayPal (PYPL.O) canceled expansion plans, costing the state jobs. By invoking states’ rights, the Trump administration is potentially emboldening legislatures in other states that are considering laws similar to North Carolina’s HB2. | 0fake |
Google appoints Vice-President | Katehon think tank. Geopolitics & Tradition | Главная » News » Google appoints Vice-President Google appoints Vice-President Tuesday, 1 November, 2016 - 09:30
Israel Meir Brand has become a new Vice President of Google Corporation. Sundar Pichai, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Google Inc reported this information. Brand was the first Google Israel employee and was appointed CEO of Google Israel.
At the same time Meir Brand will continue to rule Israel, the Middle East, Africa, Russia, Turkey, and Greece.
Against the background of the latest Wikileaks data about rigging custom queries of Google and Yahoo in favor of Clinton and other assistance provided by the corporation of the Democratic Party headquarters (also financing by Israeli billionaires), the appointment of Meir Brand means the strengthening Israel's role in the information space.
Despite the fact that Google has apologized for the changes on their maps (Palestine, for example, has not been marked as autonomy one, there was no Serbian monastery of Visoki Dečani), Tel Aviv is known to use actively possibilities of censorship in Internet. The recent changes are likely aimed to an active information attack including at strategically important areas, with which Meir Brand is familiar (Russia, Turkey, Middle Eastern countries). Related links | 1real |
Germany's Greens want power plants shut as price of coalition | BERLIN (Reuters) - Germany s Greens said on Monday that closing the country s 20 dirtiest coal-fired power stations would be a key condition of any coalition with Chancellor Angela Merkel s conservatives after this month s election. Greens co-leader Cem Ozdemir said he wanted to anchor the fight against climate change as the core philosophy of the next government, particularly given the backdrop of recent severe weather - from flooding in Germany to drought in southern Europe. It is almost as if nature is trying to speak to us, Ozdemir told journalists on a solar-powered boat anchored in Berlin, which the Greens planned to sail past Merkel s office later in the day. Polls show Merkel s conservatives are likely to win the Sept. 24 election with around 38 percent of the vote but will need a coalition partner to govern, with options including a Jamaica coalition of the conservatives, the Greens and the liberal FDP. The Greens, however, have raised doubts about the viability of such an alliance, as they would be reluctant to work with the FDP. Ozdemir highlighted the gulf between these two parties, noting that a leading member of the FDP had branded links between recent extreme weather events and climate change as fake news . We will talk to everybody but not about everything, Ozdemir said of potential coalition negotiations. Support for the Greens is on 8 percent in the latest polls but a Forsa survey showed half of Germans would welcome the Greens being part of the new government. A study last week showed that Germany is set to miss its goal to cut carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions by a far wider margin than previously thought. Instead of being world champions in climate protection, we are world champions in lignite coal, Ozdemir said, noting that Germany s CO2 emissions have been rising for eight years. Once dubbed the climate chancellor for pushing other wealthy nations to address climate change, Merkel has come under fire for not moving Germany fast enough to cut its reliance on fossil fuels as it phases out nuclear power. Merkel has suggested that Germany should eventually consider phasing out lignate coal power plants to help it cut CO2 emissions, but she is treading carefully as the move could hit tens of thousands of jobs. Ozdemir said the Greens would demand that any government it joins must allot 1 billion euros ($1.2 bln) a year to improve public transport and cycle paths, and should push for improved CO2 emissions trading at a European level. ($1 = 0.8335 euros) | 0fake |
Kerry's ceaseless diplomacy faces sternest test on Syria | NEW YORK (Reuters) - John Kerry had heard enough. After last week’s bombing of a U.N. aid convoy in Syria dealt a death blow to a ceasefire deal in which he had invested all his diplomatic capital with Russia, the U.S. Secretary of State tossed aside a page of notes and looked at Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov across the horseshoe-shaped table in the U.N. Security Council. “I listened to my colleague from Russia, and I sort of felt a little bit like they’re sort of in a parallel universe here,” said a visibly angry Kerry, effectively calling Lavrov a liar for blaming the United States for spoiling the ceasefire. The moment in some ways captured the former politician’s time as the top U.S. diplomat, which will end with a new administration in January. Not for the first time, Kerry had invested months of intensive diplomacy and tireless traveling on an issue only to end up feeling let down or deceived by negotiating partners. On Syria, Kerry has wanted greater U.S. involvement than President Barack Obama was willing to support. In an interview on Friday with Reuters, Kerry said Lavrov’s “blatant obfuscation of reality ... took my breath away.” The attempted Syria ceasefire was his most ambitious effort to fix what some argue was the biggest foreign policy misstep of Obama’s administration, which began with the failure in 2013 to follow through on a “red line” threat against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad over the use of chemical weapons. Kerry hammered out the truce two weeks ago, but was left pleading in vain with Russia last week to halt renewed air strikes on the besieged city of Aleppo. James Dobbins, a former U.S. special envoy to Afghanistan, noted Kerry’s “tireless, ceaseless engagement” even when pursuing administration policies he didn’t always agree with. “Kerry to his credit has stayed in the game even when he had a weak hand,” said Dobbins, a career diplomat who worked alongside Kerry in 2013 to hammer out a deal with President Hamid Karzai to keep U.S. forces in Afghanistan. “The situation in Syria is too serious and too consequential to simply back off and leave it to others.” From Kerry’s perspective, it is better to fail than not to have tried. “The weakest hand of all would be to have another round of migrants going into Europe, (Russian President Vladimir) Putin do whatever he wants by dropping bombs and the United States doing nothing but pretending we’re sending some support to people,” Kerry told Reuters. “That is the weakest hand, and it is far stronger to stand up and find a way to leverage getting to the table and getting some kind of an understanding,” he added. In his nearly four years as America’s top diplomat, Kerry has racked up more miles than any other secretary of state, sometimes appearing to rush in without a clear strategy. “It is clear that Kerry is prepared to take greater risks with his own personal reputation than others might have ... because they did not want to be identified with failure,” said Dobbins. But some critics say Kerry stayed in the game too long in negotiating with Russia, which they argue manipulated his quest for a deal over Syria to strengthen its position. The Syrian conflict, with its shifting geopolitical forces, complex new alliances and new threats such as the rise of Islamic State, has tested Kerry like no other issue. After Obama declined to carry out threatened attacks on Assad’s forces over chemical weapons, Kerry perceived an opening to work with Lavrov on an agreement to get Syria to turn over its chemical arsenal, he told Reuters. That deal struck in 2013 was considered a success, but the war has since deteriorated and grown more complex following Russia’s military intervention backing Assad last year. Now the continuing ceasefire push by Kerry strikes some as hopeless gesturing. “Kerry’s plan is to do more of the same despite the repeated failure of U.S. attempts to strike a deal with Russia,” said Mutasem Alsyofi of the Syrian Civil Society Declaration Initiative, who met Kerry in New York last week. It’s not the first time Kerry’s been accused of overreaching. At the start of his term in 2013, Kerry vigorously pursued a peace deal between the Israelis and Palestinians. Even as others warned of failure, an undaunted Kerry spent months shuttling between Jerusalem and Ramallah. However, U.S. ally Israel’s announcement of 700 new housing units for Jewish settlements in territory the Palestinians claim for a future state finally caused the talks to collapse, although Israel blamed the Palestinians move to apply to join 15 international conventions and treaties. Kerry’s biggest accomplishments came in 2015 with the Iran nuclear deal and the U.N. climate change agreement. In both instances, he had Obama’s leadership and full support for the very visible U.S. role, though both deals have been vilified domestically in the polarized American political environment. Last week’s failure of a second Syrian ceasefire agreement brokered by Kerry unleashed a fresh round of stinging criticism of the administration’s Syria policy. Republican Senator John McCain called Kerry “intrepid but delusional” for placing too much faith in the prospect of cooperation with Russia. Kerry, a Vietnam veteran who lost to George W. Bush in the 2004 presidential election, is not running for office again and has often remarked that he has nothing to lose. “In this business of diplomacy, you have to test things sometimes,” he told Reuters. “It is a mistake to delude yourself. It is also a mistake to avoid putting something to test where there is a reasonable chance something may be able to happen.” Hours after the tense exchange at the U.N. Security Council, Lavrov and Kerry met again. The Russian diplomat had brought a new proposal for putting the ceasefire back on track. Kerry looked at the sheet of paper, folded it tightly and stuffed it into his top pocket. | 0fake |
U.S. House Speaker Ryan: Meeting with Trump 'encouraging' | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan on Thursday said he was “very encouraged” following his meeting with presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump earlier on Thursday, adding that the process to unify the party would talk time. “We had a very good and encouraging, productive conversation,” Ryan, the top elected Republican in the United States, told reporters at his weekly news conference. | 0fake |
HOLLYWOOD DARLING SANDRA BULLOCK To Play “Abortion Barbie” In New Movie | Oscar-winning actress Sandra Bullock is set to play Wendy Davis, or more commonly known to conservatives as, Abortion Barbie . When radical feminist Wendy Davis decided to make her gubenatorial campaign about killing babies, conservatives wasted no time outing her, and her radical agenda for the state of Texas. While attending a fundraiser in Los Angeles during her campaign for governor in the state of Texas, Davis was greeted by life size Abortion Barbie posters created by conservative artist Sabo .The Texas Democratic state senator who became a progressive darling after filibustering an abortion bill in 2013.Davis donned pink running shoes and filibustered for more than 11 hours on June 25, 2013, successfully blocking Senate Bill 5. The bill, among other measures, banned abortion after 20 weeks. WFBDavis got the unflattering nickname during her infamous filibuster. Thanks to conservative writer and Red State editor Erick Erickson, Davis will forever be known as Abortion Barbie. The moniker is a bit insulting but apropos given her steadfast defense of abortion on demand.Davis lost the race to the very popular conservative candidate, Republican Governor Greg Abott in a landslide.According to Variety, Sandra Bullock will star in the spec Let Her Speak as Texas senator Wendy Davis, whose 11-hour filibuster helped stall an anti-abortion bill in the Texas state house.Todd Black and Jason Blumenthal are on board to produce through their Escape Artists banner. | 1real |
Trump Has Ruined His Own Name So Badly His Hotels Resort To DRASTIC Steps To Bring In Business | Donald Trump probably thought that running for president would be a huge boon for all his businesses. However, it s starting to look as though that may not be anything like true. Trump Hotels just announced that they re dropping Trump s name from all their new hotels. His name will stay on existing hotels, but new ones will carry the name Scion. According to Travel and Leisure, the company insists that this move is an attempt to reach Millennials, and has nothing to do with how Trump may have damaged his own brand. They re ignoring the fact that Trump s newest hotel, built inside the historic Post Office building in D.C., actually had to reduce prices to fill rooms during the peak season.But worse than that they had to drop prices below $500 per night to try and get people in for the International Monetary Fund conference two weeks ago.Every other luxury hotel in that same area sold out weeks ahead of time for that conference, while Trump International struggled to attract guests. As New York Magazine put it: For a five-star hotel in downtown Washington to have vacancies during major IMF meetings is a little like having empty rooms when the Super Bowl is in town. The reason why there were vacancies is the political atmosphere. People don t want to go there for fear that they would be asked, Why are you staying here? says Ada Pena, a travel agent with ABA Travel in Washington, D.C. In addition to that, reservations throughout the company have plunged by well over 50 percent, too, showing that Trump s absurd campaign is destroying his name. A destroyed name means a destroyed brand he s not nearly the wonderful, amazing, brilliant person and businessman he believes himself to be.It s so bad that, on Oct. 7, Mark Cuban tweeted that Bernard Madoff had a better brand than Trump. For those that don t know, Madoff was behind one of the biggest Ponzi schemes this country ever saw, and is now behind bars. That s how toxic Cuban believes Trump has become to his own businesses.Every single @realDonaldTrump hotel and golf course is toast. Done. Over. Bernie Madoff now has a better brand. Mark Cuban (@mcuban) October 8, 2016Trump s bragging about being able to sexually assault women definitely doesn t help. Yet, Trump Hotels refuses to acknowledge that their namesake is a source of their problems. They re as delusional as Trump himself over what s happening.Businessman brilliant enough to get the U.S. back on track? Ha! We think not.Featured image by Brian Blanco via Getty Images | 1real |
WOULD YOU LIKE TO LIVE FOR FREE On A Luxury Cruise Ship?…You Only Have To Be A Muslim Refugee To Qualify | Just when you think you ve heard everything there s this What a great respite for the deserving rapists refugees Thousands of migrants are being given rooms aboard a luxury ocean liner which comes complete with a theatre and swimming pool because Sweden can no longer cope with the numbers arriving at its borders every week, it has been revealed.Sweden s Migration Board is renting the Ocean Gala once the world s largest cruise liner where holidaymakers pay 2,500 for a two-week break for at least the next year at the eye-watering cost of of 65,000 a day.When the giant cruise ship is full it will provide bed and board for 1,790 migrants about the number arriving in the country every single day at the height of the crisis.A spokesman said: Having a theatre sounds really nice. Those who are going to stay at the ship will probably have to do that for quite a bit of time while their applications are being processed. So they need every encouragement they can get. However, at that cost they will not enjoy the same luxuries afforded those who paid as much as 2,500 for a two-week cruise during the ships previous incarnation as the Island Escape, then owned by Thomson Cruises.The 768 cabins on the 623-foot ship, which range from smartly turned out but snug doubles, to expansive suites with private dining areas and balconies, was then a haven for those in search of entertainment, sunbathing and sightseeing.But those who make it their home in the next year will not be treated to all the extras holidaymakers who floated around the Med were used to enjoying, including a casino, outdoor pool and even a beauty salon.In fact, if the Swedish Migration Board is successful in finding a spot in the northern port of H rn sand, where temperatures are currently firmly below freezing.Willis berg, head of housing issues at the Swedish Migration Board, boasted that the organisation was thinking outside the box . Those who are going to stay in the boat will of course be a bit cramped in the cabins, so it is really important that we arrange for them to have large common areas outside, he told MailOnline. But having a theatre sounds really nice. Those who are going to stay at the ship will probably have to do that for quite a bit of time while their applications are being processed. So they need every encouragement they can get. Via: UK Daily Mail | 1real |
Trump DEVASTATED After Poll Reveals Americans Trust Media More Than Him (TWEET) | It was just this morning that Donald Trump once again tried to ignore his mounting failures and pump up his ego by trashing the press. Taking to Twitter, the undeserving POTUS bashed the New York Times (again) with yet another one of his lies. And after Trump trashed the New York Times, he posted another tweet about the vicious and inaccurate media:If the people of our great country could only see how viciously and inaccurately my administration is covered by certain media! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 29, 2017However, thanks to a new poll released by Monmouth University, Trump s temper tantrums about the press are far from over, because he seems to be alone in his opinion. The Monmouth University poll revealed that thanks to Trump s numerous lies and falsehoods, Americans now view MSNBC as a more credible source than him!You can only imagine how devastating it is for Trump to realize that his attacks on fake news are actually working against him and HELPING networks that dare to publish the truth about him. The poll stated: Only 28% of Americans are more likely trust Trump as an information source compared to ABC news while most (53%) say they would tend to trust ABC more, with 15% saying they would trust both sides equally. When pitted against MSNBC, 33% trust Trump more while 47% trust the liberal leaning cable channel more, with 15% trusting both about equally. When pitted against Fox News, only 17% trust Trump more while 37% trust the politically conservative news outlet more, with 36% trusting both about equally. Another interesting but not surprising finding from the poll was the fact that networks like MSNBC and ABC were viewed as more credible than Fox News, which has previously been outed as the most dishonest network (which is likely why Trump cites them so much). The only area where Trump is actually succeeding in credibility is among Republicans, who tend to take Trump s nonsense as the truth. The poll reported: The story is different, though, when isolating the views of Republicans. Americans who identify as GOP partisans are more likely to have confidence in Trump over any of the news sources tested in the poll. This is especially true for MSNBC Trump is more trusted by a 66% to 16% margin and ABC News Trump is more trusted by a 56% to 22% margin. The president even has a slight, although statistically insignificant, 29% to 26% trust advantage over Fox News among his fellow partisans, with 44% of Republicans saying they trust both equally as an information source. So, Trump basically screwed himself over by trying to damage the credibility of the free press. While it s somewhat satisfying to see his attacks on the media backfire, we must not forget that what Trump s ridiculous behavior has resulted in is extremely dangerous. The White House now has no credibility, which could be devastating in the event that something serious happens. No one can trust the president, and he has undermined the credibility of the government. It will take a long time to repair this and rebuild the trust of the American people.Featured image is a screenshot | 1real |
Russian Theatre Cancels Jesus Christ Superstar After ‘Blasphemy’ Accusations | Originally appeared at Pravoslavie.ru
A Siberian theatre triggered a storm today by cancelling a staging of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical Jesus Christ Superstar after a pro-Kremlin nationalist group condemned it as blasphemy.
The touring production by Saint Petersburg’s Rock Opera theatre was due to open November 1 in the Musical Theatre of the city of Omsk, but the organisers cancelled it this week following protests by conservative activists.
In a report from Omsk, Regnum news agency wrote today that the scandal “has prompted a major public reaction”.
It quoted art critic Vadim Klimov as saying: “Today you cannot say that Russia is a secular state.”
An obscure group called Family, Love, Fatherland had appealed to regional authorities to stop the staging and applied to hold a demonstration, accusing the long-running musical of “non-stop blasphemy” and “mockery of faith”.
The closure comes as relatively small numbers of nationalist activists with Orthodox beliefs are voicing their views more and more stridently, supported by some officials.
Amnesty International called the cancellation of the show “the latest example of interference in Russian cultural life by nationalist ‘activists’.”
The region’s culture ministry distanced itself from the decision to stop the show, with a spokesman saying the promoter cancelled the show “for some reasons of its own,” RIA Novosti state news agency reported.
The Omsk diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church also denied any “interference” in the theatre’s repertoire.
Last year a director and the head of another Siberian theatre in Novosibirsk went on trial for “desecrating religious symbols” over a staging of Richard Wagner’sTannhauser opera. The case was dropped, but the theatre’s head was sacked.
Rossiya-24 state television reported the decision to close Lloyd Webber’s “legendary rock opera” was most likely taken by the theatre “fearing to repeat the fate” of the Tannhauser staging.
The musical was first staged in Russia in 1990 during Mikhail Gorbachev’s perestroika reforms.
Russia made offending religious believers a criminal offence after the Pussy Riot punk band performed a song slamming President Vladimir Putin in a Moscow church in 2012. | 1real |
Ying and Yang (the Gold and Silver Set-Up) | Ying and Yang (the Gold and Silver Set-Up) Posted on Home » Silver » Silver News » Ying and Yang (the Gold and Silver Set-Up) No, this is not a post about some new Chinese law firm. Instead, it’s just an update on the gold and silver markets which, while refusing to go further down, aren’t making much progress to the upside, either. From Craig Hemke, TFMetalsReport : Today’s message: A few more slightly positive US economic datapoints and these are likely enough to make a December FF rate hike a fait accompli. Again, though…and I can’t stress this enough… we have traced out a pattern that is remarkably similar to last October and November in the run up to the most recent FF rate hike. And what happened beginning the very next day? Well, by now you know the story. The week of the October 2o15 FOMC produced a high trade in the Dec15 contract of $1183. As the Fedlines were digested later that week, it became clear that the Fed was going to raise the FF rate at the December 2015 meeting come hell or high water. And they did. However, take a close look at how gold traded in the days and weeks between the Oct15 FOMC and the December rate hike. Price fell from $1180 to $1050 in about five weeks but note that it bottomed well in advance of the actual “news” of the FF rate hike. This 10+% drop was fueled by a near panic level liquidation of the Specs at the Comex. How bad was it? From the CoT survey of 10/27/15, just one day before that fateful FOMC and Fedlines, the Large Specs in gold were NET long more than 157,000 contracts while the Commercials were NET short nearly 166,000. Just five weeks later, the NET position of the Large Specs was down to only 10,000 contracts with the Commercial position reaching an alltime low of just 2,911 contracts NET short. We even speculated at the time that there were some days, intraweek, where the Gold Commercials were actually and historically NET LONG. Well now compare last autumn to our current situation. Just as back then, a FF rate hike is a near certainty at the FOMC in December. However, as you know, the anticipatory move in gold began a few weeks ago with the beatdown and purposeful break of both the 50-day and 100-day moving averages in late September. Take a look at the current chart and compare it to the one posted above: In 2015, we had the October FOMC and then two stout down weeks. Before price turned, we slogged through 5-6 weeks of consolidation and CoT improvement before the blast higher began. In 2016, we had the September FOMC and then two stout down weeks. Price is attempting to bottom and turn while the CoT improves, but it doesn’t seem ready just yet to begin moving consistently higher. In 2015, the turn in gold began once the actual rate hike took place. The rate hike and forecast for 3 or 4 more in 2016 led to dollar strength, which led to Chinese devaluations, which led to emerging market crises, which led to equity selloffs and the gold price was already 5-10% off its lows by late January before the real fun began with the USDJPY falling 10% in early February. Are we headed down that same path again? It certainly appears so as the first major salvos of Chinese yuan devaluation were fired last week: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-10-20/dear-janet-china-devalues-most-august-yuan-tumbles-lowest-sept-2010 And, just as in 2015, the CoT is certainly undergoing a makeover, too. From the survey of 9/27/16, the Large Specs in gold were NET long 292,000 contracts while the Commercials were NET short 325,000. As of last Tuesday and just three weeks later, the Large Specs were down to 180,000 NET long for a reduction of 38% and the Commercials were NET short 203,000. To be sure, these are still hefty positions but much more “bullish” than the levels seen through the past summer. And now check the full long-term chart. You can see again the similarities between now and last fall. Also be sure to note, however, that the trend has clearly changed and that price is pointed higher. So while we must still deal with the consolidation for a while longer…the Ying and Yang mentioned in the title of this post…it is clear to me that the trend remains higher and that the now-expected FOMC FF rate hike will be simply another “sell-the-rumor, buy-the-news” type of event for gold and silver. This current period of relative quiet should be used to prepare for the next leg UP, not some sort of new bear market where paper prices are sharply falling. Use your time wisely and continue to prepare/stack accordingly. TF On Sale At SD Bullion… This Week Only… This entry was posted in Gold News , Silver News and tagged Craig Hemke , December Rate Hike , gold update , silver update , TFMetals Report . Bookmark the permalink . Post navigation | 1real |
Devastating aftermath of twin quakes in Italy (drone footage) | Drone footage shows the devastation caused by twin earthquakes that rocked Borgo Sant’Antonio, near Visso, which left buildings reduced to rubble or partially collapsed.
Central Italy was struck twice in quick succession the previous day, with the first tremor hitting it at around 19:11 local time (17:11 GMT). The quake measured 5.5 on the Richter scale and could be felt as far as Rome some 240 km (149 miles). Shortly after a second quake of 6.1-magnitude, struck at around 21:18 local time (19:18 GMT). Buildings were shaking, some parts even caving in, and residents fled into the street to save themselves. Several dozen people have been treated across the region for light injuries, while four are said to have been seriously hurt.
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WaPo’s Ruth Marcus: Trump ’Doesn’t Understand the Role of America’ - Breitbart | Sunday on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” Washington Post columnist Ruth Marcus said President Donald Trump did not have an “understanding” of the role of courts” and added that he didn’t “understand the role of America. ” Marcus said, “I think there there is a lot of fallout here. Mike talked about how you can’t run the government by improv, and Vice President Pence talked about Washington niceties. These aren’t just Washington niceties, they are questions about whether you can run this government. And there is lasting damage here in his relationships with congress, in his relationship with the country, which saw these terrible stories of people needing medical treatment being denied, in the relationship with his court, in his relationship with the world. ” “And a more fundamentally, the lesson of the week to me is that we have a president who fundamentally is not understanding the role of courts, this tweet about judges was not just, you know, something that we should ignore, and he doesn’t understand the role of America as it has historically been in the world as a beacon of hope and welcoming place for refugees,” she added. Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN | 0fake |
Knesset Speaker asks Vatican to join battle against UNESCO’s denial of history | October 26, 2016 Knesset Speaker asks Vatican to join battle against UNESCO’s denial of history
The resolution, the Speaker wrote, “is an assault on history and is deeply offensive to both Christianity and Judaism. The denial of the historicity of the two Jerusalem Temples and the Temple Mount as recounted in both the Old and New Testaments is a terrible indictment of the international community when repeatedly adopted by an important UN body.
“The outrageous repudiation of the millennia-old bond between Judaism and its holiest shrines in Jerusalem is a blatant attempt to rewrite history,” he added. “The annals of both our religions cannot be erased by raised hands and counted votes.”
Edelstein said the time has come for the international community to pass a resolution reaffirming Jerusalem as the holy city for the three major monotheistic religions, “a city where the two Temples stood and from which the Word of G-d was first promulgated to humanity by our prophets.”
Education Minister Naftali Bennett called UNESCO’s decision “a denial of history, and history will erase the embarrassing decision. | 1real |
Watch Trump Desperately Pander To Evangelicals In The Most Pathetic Way Imaginable (VIDEO) | When you re a salesperson, you try your best to identify the need of the customer to convince them to buy what you re selling. And in the case of Republican presidential frontrunner Donald Trump, he knows the Republican base has a need for someone who claims to be Christian. This was apparent at the last GOP debate when Rev. Senator Marco Rubio kept bringing up Jesus Christ time and time again, when Sen. Ted Cruz seems to claim to be the chosen one, and now when Donald Trump brings out his childhood Bible to prove how Christian he really, truly is.You see, there is no religious test in order to be President of the United States. In fact, it would be unconstitutional if it were to be required of candidates to prove their faith or deem themselves worthy of being elected. However, Republicans aren t known for following the Constitution, as much as they like to say they do, so we end up seeing things like this pathetic display to pander to evangelical Christians who are apparently so dimwitted that they can t see straight through the farce.Evangelicals, he s selling you a line. That s what salespeople do so you buy into whatever it is they re selling. And in regards to who would be the best candidate for the job of president, if they have to tell you how much they love Jesus to make up for the fact that they have zero policy experience, realize you re being duped. Please.// < ![CDATA[ // < ![CDATA[ // < ![CDATA[ // < ![CDATA[ // < ![CDATA[ (function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.3"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk')); // ]]>Christian ValuesI want to thank evangelical Christians for the warm embrace I ve received on the campaign trail. I will not let you down! #MakeAmericaGreatAgainPosted by Donald J. Trump on Saturday, January 30, 2016Video/Featured image: Facebook | 1real |
‘Scandal’ Star Tony Goldwyn Applauds ‘Lifesaving’ Planned Parenthood | Scandal star Tony Goldwyn hailed what he called Planned Parenthood’s “lifesaving work” for women’s health care in an interview this week, adding that those those who oppose abortion are actually “sabotaging” their “own moral stance. ”[Goldwyn, who plays the role of POTUS on the hit ABC show, wore a Planned Parenthood pin to the PaleyFest television festival in Hollywood this week. The actor says activists are wrong to think putting an end to abortion will save lives. “There’s been a lot of disinformation about Planned Parenthood and the focus of the lifesaving work that they do for women’s health care,” the actor told Glamour magazine in an interview, adding: “I saw a image of all those white men sitting around in a room at the White House talking about what should be done about women’s health care, and I thought I would step up [by wearing this and speaking out]. If Planned Parenthood is defunded, millions of women, particularly women struggling economically, are going to be in serious trouble. And the truth is, there will be far more abortions performed — and unsafe ones as a result. The people that are antiabortion actually are sabotaging their own moral stance by taking this position. ” Glamour writer Jessica Radloff praised Goldwyn for his support of the abortion giant, and also cited Planned Parenthood’s already debunked “3 percent” statistic: “As we’ve pointed out numerous times, abortion constitutes just 3 percent of Planned Parenthood’s services, and except in cases of rape, incest, or severe threat to a mother’s life, no federal money is used to fund abortion services. But cutting federal funding for PP would put access to breast exams, Pap tests, colposcopy procedures, HPV vaccines, reversible contraception procedures, pregnancy tests, STI tests, and HIV tests at risk. ” Live Action’s video demonstrates how the abortion chain calculates its deceptive “3 percent statistic” by dividing the number of abortions it performs by the total number of services it provides, counting a $10 pregnancy test or a package of condoms as equivalent to a $500 abortion. “To justify its half billion dollars in taxpayer funding, Planned Parenthood downplays abortion — falsely claiming that it only makes up three percent of its business — and instead plays up its cancer screenings and ‘women’s health care,’” explains Lila Rose, president of Live Action. Rose adds: According to its own annual reports, Planned Parenthood does less than one percent of all Pap tests in the United States, less than two percent of all clinical breast exams, zero mammograms, and virtually no prenatal care, yet it does 34. 9 percent of all U. S. abortions, killing over 320, 000 preborn children every year. Former Planned Parenthood managers have provided testimonials about how the abortion giant uses quotas to push abortions, doesn’t provide the health care it claims it does, and “treats women like cattle. ” In fact, when President Donald Trump offered Planned Parenthood the opportunity to keep its taxpayer funding if it would stop performing abortions, the group’s officials rejected the offer. Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards even tweeted that its abortion services were “as vital to our mission as birth control or cancer screenings. ” Planned Parenthood is proud to provide abortion — a necessary service that’s as vital to our mission as birth control or cancer screenings. https: . — Cecile Richards (@CecileRichards) March 6, 2017, activists are urging Congress and Trump to eliminate Planned Parenthood’s taxpayer funding and redirect it to other community health care centers that provide more comprehensive healthcare services than Planned Parenthood. These community facilities outnumber the abortion business’s clinics by at least 20 to 1. | 0fake |
California lethal injection plan spurs capital punishment fight | SACRAMENTO, Calif. (Reuters) - Advocates and opponents of capital punishment sparred on Friday over California’s proposed new lethal injection protocol, highlighting deep divisions in a state that houses a quarter of U.S. death row inmates but has not executed anyone in a decade. The plan to use barbiturates to execute inmates sentenced to die in the most populous U.S. state drew fire from religious activists, who called capital punishment grisly and anti-democratic at a hearing in Sacramento. Law-and-order advocates urged its adoption. “As of next month, the state will have been remiss in its duties for a decade,” said Michele Hanisee, vice president of the Los Angeles Association of Deputy District Attorneys. “The family members of the victims are dying before the murderers.” The informational hearing was part of the state’s process for adopting a new protocol for lethal injection that would use one drug, a barbiturate, to put condemned inmates to death. It would replace a three-drug cocktail that a California court declared unconstitutional 10 years ago because it could possibly cause pain. Under a court settlement, the state must develop a new procedure for executions. At the same time, Californians have grown more divided over capital punishment, with nearly half the electorate and many top officials now opposing the death penalty. Death penalty opponents hope to place an initiative on the November ballot that would outlaw capital punishment. On the same ballot, supporters back a different initiative to speed up executions. “The people on death row, most of them have perpetrated grave crimes,” said Linda Fox, a board member of the group Death Penalty Focus, who spoke against the protocol. “But they are still human beings.” There was no proof, she argued, that using a barbiturate to carry out a death sentence would not result in a botched or painful execution. California juries have sentenced nearly 900 people to death since 1978, but only 13 have been executed. Sixty-eight have died of natural causes, 36 for other reasons. Of more than 750 inmates currently on death row, seven have been there since the 1970s. If the new protocol is adopted by corrections officials and voters do not outlaw the death penalty next November, the state could theoretically begin executing 18 prisoners who have exhausted their appeals. Legal challenges to the lethal injection drug, however, could drag on for years. | 0fake |
Julian Assange Statement on the U.S. Election | By Julian Assange
In recent months, WikiLeaks and I personally have come under enormous pressure to stop publishing what the Clinton campaign says about itself to itself. That pressure has come from the campaign’s allies, including the Obama administration, and from liberals who are anxious about who will be elected US President.
On the eve of the election, it is important to restate why we have published what we have.
The right to receive and impart true information is the guiding principle of WikiLeaks – an organization that has a staff and organizational mission far beyond myself. Our organization defends the public’s right to be informed.
This is why, irrespective of the outcome of the 2016 US Presidential election, the real victor is the US public which is better informed as a result of our work.
The US public has thoroughly engaged with WikiLeaks’ election related publications which number more than one hundred thousand documents. Millions of Americans have pored over the leaks and passed on their citations to each other and to us. It is an open model of journalism that gatekeepers are uncomfortable with, but which is perfectly harmonious with the First Amendment.
We publish material given to us if it is of political, diplomatic, historical or ethical importance and which has not been published elsewhere. When we have material that fulfills this criteria, we publish. We had information that fit our editorial criteria which related to the Sanders and Clinton campaign (DNC Leaks) and the Clinton political campaign and Foundation (Podesta Emails). No-one disputes the public importance of these publications. It would be unconscionable for WikiLeaks to withhold such an archive from the public during an election.
At the same time, we cannot publish what we do not have. To date, we have not received information on Donald Trump’s campaign, or Jill Stein’s campaign, or Gary Johnson’s campaign or any of the other candidates that fufills our stated editorial criteria. As a result of publishing Clinton’s cables and indexing her emails we are seen as domain experts on Clinton archives. So it is natural that Clinton sources come to us.
We publish as fast as our resources will allow and as fast as the public can absorb it.
That is our commitment to ourselves, to our sources, and to the public.
This is not due to a personal desire to influence the outcome of the election. The Democratic and Republican candidates have both expressed hostility towards whistleblowers. I spoke at the launch of the campaign for Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate, because her platform addresses the need to protect them. This is an issue that is close to my heart because of the Obama administration’s inhuman and degrading treatment of one of our alleged sources, Chelsea Manning. But WikiLeaks publications are not an attempt to get Jill Stein elected or to take revenge over Ms Manning’s treatment either.
Publishing is what we do. To withhold the publication of such information until after the election would have been to favour one of the candidates above the public’s right to know.
This is after all what happened when the New York Times withheld evidence of illegal mass surveillance of the US population for a year until after the 2004 election, denying the public a critical understanding of the incumbent president George W Bush, which probably secured his reelection. The current editor of the New York Times has distanced himself from that decision and rightly so.
The US public defends free speech more passionately, but the First Amendment only truly lives through its repeated exercise. The First Amendment explicitly prevents the executive from attempting to restrict anyone’s ability to speak and publish freely. The First Amendment does not privilege old media, with its corporate advertisers and dependencies on incumbent power factions, over WikiLeaks’ model of scientific journalism or an individual’s decision to inform their friends on social media. The First Amendment unapologetically nurtures the democratization of knowledge. With the Internet, it has reached its full potential.
Yet, some weeks ago, in a tactic reminiscent of Senator McCarthy and the red scare, Wikileaks, Green Party candidate Stein, Glenn Greenwald and Clinton’s main opponent were painted with a broad, red brush. The Clinton campaign, when they were not spreading obvious untruths, pointed to unnamed sources or to speculative and vague statements from the intelligence community to suggest a nefarious allegiance with Russia. The campaign was unable to invoke evidence about our publications—because none exists.
In the end, those who have attempted to malign our groundbreaking work over the past four months seek to inhibit public understanding perhaps because it is embarrassing to them – a reason for censorship the First Amendment cannot tolerate. Only unsuccessfully do they try to claim that our publications are inaccurate.
WikiLeaks’ decade-long pristine record for authentication remains. Our key publications this round have even been proven through the cryptographic signatures of the companies they passed through, such as Google. It is not every day you can mathematically prove that your publications are perfect but this day is one of them.
We have endured intense criticism, primarily from Clinton supporters, for our publications. Many long-term supporters have been frustrated because we have not addressed this criticism in a systematic way or responded to a number of false narratives about Wikileaks’ motivation or sources. Ultimately, however, if WL reacted to every false claim, we would have to divert resources from our primary work.
WikiLeaks, like all publishers, is ultimately accountable to its funders. Those funders are you. Our resources are entirely made up of contributions from the public and our book sales. This allows us to be principled, independent and free in a way no other influential media organization is. But it also means that we do not have the resources of CNN, MSNBC or the Clinton campaign to constantly rebuff criticism.
Yet if the press obeys considerations above informing the public, we are no longer talking about a free press, and we are no longer talking about an informed public.
Wikileaks remains committed to publishing information that informs the public, even if many, especially those in power, would prefer not to see it. WikiLeaks must publish. It must publish and be damned. Share: | 1real |
Train Crash in Italy Leaves at Least 25 Dead and Dozens Injured - The New York Times | ROME — Two passenger trains collided in the Puglia region of southern Italy on Tuesday morning, killing at least 25 people and injuring dozens more, some of them critically. The crash occurred around 11:30 a. m. on a single track running through an olive grove between the towns of Andria and Ruvo di Puglia. The closest major city is Bari, about 20 miles east of Ruvo di Puglia. Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, who was attending the opening of a new science museum in Milan, announced that he would return immediately to Rome and ordered an investigation. He later visited the site of the crash, the news agency ANSA reported. “We won’t stop until we clarify what happened,” he told reporters in Milan. “There is an absolute need to understand who is responsible and to shed total light” on what happened, he said. Mr. Renzi sent the infrastructure and transportation minister, Graziano Delrio, and the head of the civil protection agency, Fabrizio Curcio, who oversees emergency response in Italy, to the site of the crash. “It’s an incident of enormous proportions,” Mr. Delrio said when he reached the scene on Tuesday afternoon, adding that the crash was “very violent. ” The circumstances that led to the collision were unclear. A team of inspectors from the transportation ministry will work with local prosecutors to determine the cause, officials said. Teams of rescuers worked through the afternoon to separate the two trains, extricating victims and searching for survivors in the intense July heat. One exhausted policeman, who appeared barely able to walk, was escorted from the scene by another officer. “It’s so horrible,” a woman who survived the crash told a local television channel, Telesveva, in an interview. “I don’t know how it happened, but in a second, my husband was suddenly two meters away from me. ” The woman, whom Telesveva did not identify, described seeing body parts strewn on the ground, and said she had had to step over them barefoot to get away from the crash after pulling her husband free of the wreckage. “I could do nothing for them,” she said. The front cars of both trains were smashed, and both trains were at least partly derailed. Television images showed heavily damaged rail cars. At least one car was still on the tracks with its windows blown out another was laying off to the side, twisted at an odd angle with its undercarriage facing upward. News agencies also broadcast images of rescue officials taking away wounded passengers on stretchers. The jarring sound of cicadas could be heard as firefighters searched for survivors among the wreckage. ANSA reported that emergency workers had extracted a young boy from the wreckage and taken him by helicopter to a hospital. With no access roads near the tracks, it was difficult for teams to get vehicles through the olive grove to the crash site. Local officials made an appeal for blood donations, and put the number of injured at 55, most in critical or serious condition. Stefania Gnesi, an information technology staff researcher at the National Research Council, said in a telephone interview that there was no automatic brake system in use on the stretch of track where the crash occurred. Ms. Gnesi said that the trains were probably operating on instructions from dispatchers. “It’s probable that there was some human error in this chain, in a section of train track that has no automatic control or automatic brake system,” she said. Automatic systems are used on most of Italy’s railway lines, but have not yet been installed in some areas, especially in southern Italy, which is less developed and less prosperous than the north. The line where the crash occurred links the cities of Andria and Bari on the Adriatic coast, and is used by about 10, 000 passengers a day, according to Riccardo Amirante, a deputy dean at Politecnico University in Bari. There are two tracks along most of the line, Mr. Amirante said in a phone interview, “but unfortunately not that stretch. ” He said trains typically travel the line at around 90 kilometers an hour, or 56 m. p. h. The accident appeared to be one of the most deadly rail disasters in Italy in seven years. In June 2009, a freight train carrying liquefied petroleum gas derailed and exploded in Viareggio, on the west coast of Italy in the Tuscany region. That disaster killed 32 people. President Sergio Mattarella of Italy expressed “deep pain” over the crash, which he called an “unacceptable tragedy. ” Mr. Mattarella said in a statement: “We need to ascertain immediately and precisely responsibilities and possible flaws. ” | 0fake |
null | By Daily News Bin | October 28, 2016 | 10 6265 SHARES
The ranking Democrats in the House of Representatives have publicly given FBI Director James Comey a very short deadline for clarifying the intentionally vague and misleading letter he sent today and fixing the mess he’s created with eleven days remaining before the Presidential election. Led by Congressman Elijah Cummings, the ranking member on the House Oversight Committee, the House Democrats have made clear that they intend to finish Comey off if he doesn’t fix this in time.
Cummings wasn’t clear what the specific consequences for James Comey will be if he fails to walk back his criminal actions. But during his CNN on-air appearance on Friday night, he did make clear that Comey only has until the end of this weekend in order to find a way to rectify the mess he’s made. The Democrats do not currently have majority control over the House Oversight Committee, making it difficult for them to haul Comey in for interrogation on Monday, as none of the Republicans on the committee would likely be willing to go along with it. However that can’t stop Cummings and the other Democrats on the committee from immediately moving forward against Comey in other ways.
Among the various legal paths the House Democrats can pursue are the fact that James Comey violated the Hatch Amendment which makes it a crime to use ones position as a government official to try to rig a Presidential election; there is already Department of Justice action in this regard . Comey also severely violated the FBI’s own policy of never interfering in Presidential elections with less than sixty days remaining; in this instance there are just eleven days remaining. All eyes are now on Elijah Cummings and the House Democrats, who now have a clear intention of ending James Comey’s tenure if he continues down this illegal path beyond the weekend. If you enjoy Daily News Bin, consider making a contribution: Contributed by Daily News Bin staff 6265 SHARES | 1real |
Reporter Presses Trump On Birther Conspiracy And Trump Cannot Handle It (VIDEO) | Only but a few years ago, during far simpler times, Donald Trump s biggest accomplishment in politics was his amplification of the birther conspiracy. The right-wing conspiracy alleges that President Obama is not qualified to be the president of the United States because he was not born on U.S. soil. It s a ridiculous conspiracy that resulted in the Tea Party demanding that President Obama release his birth certificate to the public.Trump has been all but silent on the matter since he began his campaign. Now that he is currently the second likeliest person in the world to replace Mr. Obama, people are eager to hear if Trump still believes in the conspiracy theory.On Friday, Trump made a stop in Philadelphia, where he was set to pander to the African-American community.WPVI news anchor Matt O Donnell questioned Trump on his past views regarding President Obama and the birther movement. You don t talk about the birth certificate anymore, says O Donnell. Do you regret even bringing it up? Trump responds by saying, I don t talk about it anymore. I don t talk about it anymore. O Donnell then presses Trump. Do you regret bringing it up back then? I told you, I don t talk about it anymore, Trump says.That appears to be as close to an answer as the public gets concerning Trump s thoughts on the matter. It seems as if Trump knows just exactly how absurd the affair was, yet cannot admit as much, due to not wanting to alienate his conspiracy theory minded, Tea Party base.You can watch the interview below: Featured image from video screenshot | 1real |
Russia says not ready to strangle North Korea economically: Ifax | MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Igor Morgulov said on Friday that Russia was not ready to sign up to new sanctions on North Korea that would strangle the Asian country economically, the Interfax news agency reported. He was also cited as saying that pressure on North Korea was approaching a red line and that U.S. security guarantees for North Korea could be the subject of talks between Pyongyang and the United States. | 0fake |
TN Lawmakers Got Big Money To Approve 279 Percent Interest Rate Loans (VIDEO) | In 2014, Tennessee lawmakers passed a bill which legalized an entirely new type of loan in the state, often referred to as a Flex loan. These loans have an annual interest rate of 279 percent.According to WTVF, the Flex loan is the brainchild of the payday loan industry. The bill, which allows payday lenders to push these predatory loans in Tennessee, was introduced just as the U.S. Congress was talking about cracking down on traditional payday loans.The Flexible Credit Act, which created the loans and legalized an interest rate of 279 percent, was sponsored by republican State Representative Cameron Sexton.It passed with bipartisan support in both houses.An investigation by WTVF revealed that, just before and just after the bill was passed, at least $400,000 was funnelled to state lawmakers from payday lending companies.The only person to testify regarding the bill was a lobbyist from the payday loan industry.Only one lawmaker, democratic Representative Mike Stewart, questioned the legislation as it made its way through the assembly.Video shows that Representative Stewart, who voted against the legislation, initially asked Sexton about the bill. Do we have any idea as we re passing this bill today, which is creating an entirely new financial product, what it s going to cost the average guy on the street? When Sexton did not have an immediate answer, Stewart continued to press him on the issue. Well what is the APR? he asked. I m sure we know it. What is it? What is the answer? What is it? Sexton finally replied, saying, The highest interest rate that could be charged is 24%. Sexton s answer was deceptive. While Flex loans have a 24 percent annual interest rate, there is an additional interest rate of .7 percent, which is charged to the consumer every single day, throughout the life of the loan.Veteran Joshua Hause had two existing payday loans in Tennessee, before the Flex loans were legalized. His total debt at the time was $925.As he explains here, he was forced to convert the two loans to a Flex loan. He now pays more than $2,000 a month on the $925 he originally borrowed, and his payments continue to grow larger every month.Hause is not alone. WTVF also talked to Tennessee resident Malia Andrews. I just about had a complete meltdown in the car, Andrews recalled, describing the moment she realized it would take years to pay off her flex loan.She explained, And only like $20 of my payment was going to the principal and the rest was, like $300, was going towards the interest rate. The single mother said that, if she d known how much the loan would end up costing her, she never would have taken it out. According to WTVF, the bill that legalized Flex loans in Tennessee never addressed the 279 percent APR.WTVF interviewed Sexton on February 17, 2016.NewsChannel 5 Investigates asked Sexton about the exchange on the House floor in 2014: Why weren t you able to just say this is what the APR is ? Sexton s response: I don t think anybody was trying to dodge the question. What happens is you want to make sure the information he s provided is accurate. It gets better.NewsChannel 5 Investigates asked Sexton, So you d have to do some real math to figure out its 279%. I don t know about real math, but it would take a little work to come up with 278%, he replied. Watch the video below, courtesy of WTVF.Featured image via video screen capture from WTVF | 1real |
BREAKING: WikiLeaks’ Big Anti-Hillary October Surprise CANCELLED | There s something about Donald Trump and his surrogates. They threaten information that s bound to doom their opponents and then, nothing.Perhaps the most obvious example was when Donald Trump insisted that he sent investigators to Hawaii to examine President Obama s birth certificate. He promised that his investigators cannot believe what they re finding. Apparently, they couldn t believe what they found because it was literally nothing. Barack Obama was born in Hawaii and Trump s promise of a surprise never panned out.Now we have tacit Trump surrogate Julian Assange making promises of emails that will destroy Hillary Clinton. This was supposed to happen before the debate last Monday night. It didn t. Then, he promised that the emails would be released next week. They won t be. He s blaming security. Due to security concerns at the Ecuadorian Embassy, Julian Assange s balcony announcement on Tues has been cancelled, per @wikileaks Jesse Rodriguez (@JesseRodriguez) September 30, 2016The Trump campaign is probably reeling. Roger Stone, the CNN pundit, who, until just last week, was double dipping on Trump s payroll as well, tweeted this on Saturday:[email protected] is done. #Wikileaks. Roger Stone (@RogerJStoneJr) October 2, 2016Perhaps the security concerns are real or perhaps they re not. Still, as someone on Twitter pointed out, Assange has other platforms, like video. Why does he need that particular balcony to make his big, oh so damning announcement?@JesseRodriguez @wikileaks okay, I can understand the balcony announcement being cancelled but will Julian make a video/news announcement? Susan Reaney (@SSReaney) October 2, 2016So far, Assange s leaks have been pretty weak. The most damaging was during the primaries when he released emails damning to the DNC head, Debbie Wasserman Schultz who trash talked Bernie Sanders. Yes, there were a lot of problems with this leak, and yes, Schultz did deserve to lose her job, but there was no evidence of any actual wrongdoing. It just looked bad.While the DNC leaks showed that they were likely colluding with Hillary Clinton, Assange s motives are much more suspect. It s likely that Russia is behind the hacking, which would mean that Trump is being assisted, in a scenario that would have made even Richard Nixon say whoa, by foreign nationals. Trump even asked Russia to hack Clinton. That may be treason.Featured image via Carl Court/Getty Images. | 1real |
'It's like kumbaya:' Trump's genial private meetings with CEOs jar with public attacks | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - When the bosses of some of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies headed to Washington in January to meet U.S. President Donald Trump, it had all the makings of a potentially hostile meeting. Just weeks before, Trump had sent drug stock prices plummeting after accusing the companies of “getting away with murder” by charging too much for medicines. But the Trump who greeted chief executives of Johnson & Johnson (JNJ.N), Novartis (NOVN.S), Merck (MRK.N), Eli Lilly (LLY.N), Celgene (CELG.O) and Amgen (AMGN.O) on Jan. 31 was a surprisingly genial host who even gave them a personal tour of the Oval Office, according to several participants in the breakfast. “There is no question that it was better than it could have been or we thought it could be,” said one industry insider familiar with the meeting. Trump did not repeat his public attacks on the industry. Instead, he focused on “outdated” regulations that drive costs up for drugmakers, according to participants interviewed by Reuters. The CEOs left with Trump’s word that he would streamline regulations and reform the high U.S. corporate tax rate. Since taking office on Jan. 20, Trump has held at least nine meetings with groups of business leaders, including automakers, airlines, retailers and health insurers. On Wednesday, he was hosting lunch for a group of New York real estate developers and private equity CEOs, during which possible private-public partnerships on infrastructure would be discussed, according to a person briefed on the meeting. In early morning or late-night tweets and in speeches, Trump has lambasted many of these companies for cost over-runs, or high prices, or foreign manufacturing, often knocking down their share prices. But Reuters interviews with nearly a dozen executives and lobbyists who have taken part in these meetings or have been briefed on them reveal a Trump who is very different from his uncompromising and demanding @realDonaldTrump Twitter handle. When he meets the nation’s top chief executives in person, he is a mix of charm and cajoling. This Trump is flexible and inquisitive, a schmoozer who remembers birthdays and often lavishes praise on their companies, said the people, who spoke on condition of anonymity so they could freely discuss private meetings. This private side of Trump sheds light on why many CEOs have expressed confidence that the Republican president is good for business, despite his share-denting public attacks. As recently as Tuesday, Trump tweeted he was working on a system to increase competition in the health industry and lower drug pricing, sending pharma shares lower. In the White House meetings, Trump focuses much of his talk on cutting regulations, the sources said, underscoring one of his administration’s key priorities - getting rid of rules imposed by his predecessor Barack Obama. He typically asks which regulations are holding businesses back from adding new jobs and promises to resolve the issues, executives say. “He said one thing for the cameras and the door shuts and then it’s like kumbaya,” said one person who was briefed on a meeting between Trump and a group of CEOs. “He likes to be seen as engaging and buddy buddy with other big important business leaders,” said this person. A former businessman, Trump runs his closed-door meetings with CEOs as if they were a corporate board meeting, attendees said. In contrast to his doctrinaire tweets, he likes to seek input from everyone at the table, and compared to former presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush, conversations are less scripted. Trump’s approach to these meetings is “one of listening and not lecturing”, said a senior White House official who has participated in industry meetings. “I’ve seen a president who is listening and asking questions to get to how he can create a thriving economy,” the official said. An Amgen spokeswoman said Trump made it clear that he wanted to work with the company on U.S. job creation and biotech innovation. Representatives of the other drugmakers declined to comment. Because so little is known about how Trump interacts privately with CEOs, trade groups and company officials have begun to swap tips on how to approach their meetings with him. “There is this undercurrent of information sharing about what to expect, what to do,” said one trade group official who prepared CEOs for a recent meeting with Trump. He said he has gotten a flurry of calls from other industries next in line for a White House visit. At the end of most meetings, Trump leads CEOs into the Oval Office, showing off paintings, sculptures and the furniture, as well as the rug and curtains he has picked out. He also points out a bust of Martin Luther King Jr., which he inherited from Obama. Then he takes a group photo behind the desk. “He becomes tour guide and brings them over to the Oval Office,” the same official said. “He’s very proud of the Oval Office.” The White House official said Trump recognized the “awe” of the Oval Office. Chief executives of Detroit’s top three automakers - General Motors Co (GM.N), Ford Motor Co (F.N) and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV (FCHA.MI) - were pleasantly surprised when they went to the White House for a breakfast with Trump on Jan. 24. Since his election, Trump has frequently attacked the car companies for building in Mexico and warned U.S. firms would no longer be able to move U.S. jobs abroad “without consequences.” When Trump entered the Roosevelt Room, he greeted GM CEO Mary Barra with a playful tap on the shoulder as he gently prodded her to add jobs in the United States and later pulled out her chair before the meeting started, a review of the video transcripts of the first part of the meeting shows. He greeted Ford CEO Mark Fields with a “Happy Birthday. It’s his birthday ladies and gentlemen.” Trump said it was a “great honor” to see Fiat Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne. Trump did not specifically ask them to build plants in the United States - as he had tweeted he would before the meeting - but instead listened to their complaints about regulations and indicated a willingness to help them, people briefed on the meeting said. Ford declined to comment and referred to Fields’ comments to dealers in January that Trump had asked for a list of regulations that automakers wanted cut or kept. GM CEO Mary Barra said in a speech last week that Trump “really listened” to the automakers, while Marchionne told reporters at the Geneva auto show on Tuesday that Trump was “quite willing to make our lives easier” in terms of compliance and taxes in order to encourage U.S. job creation. Trump has been complimentary of his high-profile guests - and at times playful. After Denise Morrison, chief executive of Campbell Soup (CPB.N), introduced herself in one of those meetings, Trump quickly responded: “Good soup.” At another, after Target Corp (TGT.N) CEO Brian Cornell spoke, Trump responded by pronouncing the name of the company as “Tar-Jay,” a common joke to make the retailer sound more fancy. | 0fake |
Paris climate summit: What to expect from historic talks | For the first time, nearly all of the countries are committing to some level of action.
Fog and smog swallow up the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, Monday, Nov. 2, 2015. The UN's environmental authority has quietly raised its assessment of the level global greenhouse gas emissions can reach in 2020 while still avoiding dangerous climate change, ahead of the Paris climate summit scheduled for late November.
Negotiators from 195 countries are set to meet in Paris for two weeks, beginning Nov. 30, to wrap up a new, historic pact to limit global warming. A committed group-effort approach replaces top-down strategies that haven’t worked.
For the first time, nearly all countries are committing to some level of action, eroding a long-standing divide between developed and developing countries. To get there, however, negotiators jettisoned specific targets on greenhouse gas emissions imposed in a binding treaty. Those targets have been replaced by an overall goal countries have accepted: to hold global warming to no more than 2 degrees C (3.6 degrees F.) by 2100. Each country will determine its own approaches and how much it can contribute to curbing emissions – through cuts or a reduction in the growth rate of emissions – that, collectively, would put the world on the 2-degree path.
These commitments have deadlines of 2030, and in some cases 2025. They represent the first step in a process that would lead to periodic reviews and intensification of these efforts until atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases, mainly carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuel, are stabilized at a level that holds warming to 2 degrees C.
Q: What do the commitments look like?
More than 150 countries have submitted “intended nationally determined commitments” (INDCs), according to Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. These countries represent about 90 percent of global emissions. The commitments vary in ambition. Each country sets its own baseline against which it gauges progress. And some commitments are contingent on receiving financial help.
China has pledged to slow the growth in its CO emissions so that they peak around 2030. That includes a pledge to increase the share of electricity generated by renewable and nuclear sources to 20 percent by 2030. The United States has pledged to cut carbon emissions to at least 26 to 28 percent below 2005 levels by 2025. Others, such as Ethiopia and Guatemala, use “business as usual” projections as their baselines and hold part or all of their emissions pledges contingent on receiving aid to pay for green energy technologies and for adaptation.
Q: What effect will these have on global warming?
These commitments represent an encouraging shift away from business as usual. But if they all are fully implemented and nothing more is done in the interim, they will have placed the planet on a path to warming around 3 degrees C (5.4 degrees F.) by 2030 rather than 2 degrees. The draft agreement recognizes this, however. It envisions regular reviews aimed at assessing progress and intensifying efforts. If the reviews are set up at five-year intervals, as some expect, the first would come in 2020.
Q: What gives people hope that this will work?
Climate policy specialists cite several factors. One of the most important is a change in attitude. Strategies that once seemed burdensome are increasingly seen as economic opportunities, notes Taryn Fransen, a climate policy specialist with the World Resources Institute in Washington who leads an international collaboration tracking the INDCs and efforts to fulfill them. In addition, over time countries have become more aware of how global warming is affecting them. And renewable technologies are taking hold faster than many had predicted, a pace many models don’t incorporate.
Still, that growth may not be enough, others argue. The UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has noted that to hold warming to 2 degrees C by 2100, countries will need two more arrows in their quivers: the use of bioenergy combined with trapping the CO emissions and sequestering that carbon underground. Both are controversial and, for now, neither is available on a large scale.
Q: What are the remaining hurdles to the agreement?
One critical element is money: How much financing will be forthcoming for developing countries, and what sort of compensation might there be for loss and damage? Developing countries still have doubts about the credibility of past commitments from rich countries to increase access to financing for climate-related projects. In 2009, rich nations pledged $100 billion by 2020. Even when that is met, questions remain about what follows. Developing countries are looking for language that indicates this help will continue and increase.
On loss and damage, the US, for instance, is working to ensure that the agreement has no language that implies open-ended liability on the part of developed countries for the damage global warming inflicts on developing countries. That issue may await the final week of the talks to get sorted out, notes Alden Meyer, with the Union of Concerned Scientists in Washington. Another issue is the gap between the commitments and emissions reductions needed to put the planet on the 2-degree C path and how that will be addressed. Provisions for some sort of review process will come out of the talks, Mr. Meyer says.“But how they are couched and how effective they will be, and whether they really create an opening to stand back and look at this again in four or five years – that’s a question,” he says. | 0fake |
Senator Who Once Betrayed America To Iran Has Gall To Accuse Harry Reid Of ‘Cancerous Leadership’ | Senator Tom Cotton just put on a legendary show of hypocrisy on the floor of the Senate and my jaw has not quite left the floor. Cotton is known these days as Tehran Tom thanks to his poorly executed attempt to derail President Obama s nuclear agreement with Iran by organizing a secret letter that was sent to the Iranian government instructing the country to ignore the diplomatic agreement or else, so it s a little rich that he feels confident in lecturing another senator on leadership. However, it s not just Cotton s shameless hypocrisy that is striking, but the apparently fully realized fantasy world he lives in. So powerful are the delusions and so blind is he to the real world, it s a wonder Cotton manages to walk through his office without bumping into a coffee table. Here s Cotton, a man who recently held up a crucial bill because it would have allowed the Iranian nuclear agreement to go forward, slamming Sen. Harry Reid for don t laugh, this is serious obstructing a defense bill. As a junior senator, I preside over the Senate. I usually do in the morning, which means I m forced to listen to the bitter, vulgar, incoherent ramblings of the Minority Leader, Cotton said. Normally, like other Americans, I ignore them. I can t ignore them today, however. Cotton tore into Reid for stalling a vote on a crucial defense bill, even though the bill eventually passed 98-0. When was the last time the Minority Leader read a bill? It was probably an electricity bill, Cotton quipped.Why was Reid holding up the bill? For one thing, Republicans decided to add an amendment that would allow religious organizations to legally discriminate against gay people (in defiance of federal law). It s a favorite pet project of the GOP and, you may have noticed, has absolutely nothing to do with funding the military. Reid may be forgiven for feeling like amendments like these are unfettered bullshit and intentionally placed in important defense bills so that people like Tom Cotton can grandstand about them.Ironically, another aspect of the defense bill that has led to controversy is amendment requiring women to register for the draft. Why is that in there? Well, it s a funny story.The move to require women to register for the draft had an unlikely origin, when Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) who opposes the Obama administration s recent decision to open up all combat roles to women proposed the change in the House Armed Services Committee to start a discussion. But to GOP leaders surprise, the committee approved his language, prompting them to yank out the provision in a Rules Committee maneuver before it could go to the floor.In other words, Republicans in both the House and Senate have worked overtime to shoot themselves in the foot then scream at Democrats for not providing them with bulletproof shoes.It s clear what going on here. The Republican-led Congress has bravely led Congress to its lowest approval numbers in history. It s function as an equal branch of government has been replaced by a level of gridlock so severe that almost nothing gets accomplished. Having gotten Congress to this point by obstruction, Republicans are eager to diffuse the blame by pretending both sides do it.In Cotton s hysterical screeching, there s a very real fear that nobody is buying it anymore. Even someone as delusional as him can see that.Watch Cotton s ravings below via C-SPAN:Featured image via YouTube | 1real |
FRANCE: “Topless Trump” And “Topless Marine Le Pen” Dragged Away From Polling Place, As Country Under Siege By Islamic Radicals Votes | Earlier this evening, Le Pen had security authorities on high alert, with rioting expected across the country in protest due to her election success.Topless protesters wearing Donald Trump and Marine LePen masks were seen being dragged away from a polling place in France by police. Because nothing says I want a candidate who is willing to keep our nation safe from the massive invasion of Muslim immigrants which include an untold number of Islamic extremists who want to destroy our nation, like throwing on a mask and protesting topless at your local polling place. More than 50,000 police and gendarmes were deployed to the 66,000 polling stations for Sunday s election, which comes after Thursday s deadly attack on the Champs-Elysees in which a police officer and a gunman were slain.French intelligence have warned of there would be public disturbances in the case of the presence of parties in the second round that are extremist, according to Le Parisien newspaper.Le Pen has vowed to offer French voters a referendum to leave the EU and wants to leave the Euro, known as Frexit.Pro-EU Macron, is against Brexit, but despite being a former socialist finance minister is standing a centrist independent candidate, who counts former US President Barack Obama as a supporter.The truth about the French election and why it matters.SHARE: https://t.co/sDLAIZn7hG pic.twitter.com/SrGlZ0lcn0 Paul Joseph Watson (@PrisonPlanet) April 19, 2017In Besancon eastern France a stolen car was abandoned outside a polling station with the engine running.Police found a hunting rifle inside the vehicle which had been disguised with stolen number plates.In Rouen, Normandy, a gunman shot and wounded another man but the incident was classified as non-terror related .Two other polling station, in Saint Omer, northern France, were evacuated because of a suspicious vehicle with Dutch number plates.Ballots were cast in the wake of took place after a series of devastating terror attacks across France, but despite that armed police and soldiers are outlawed from protecting 67,000 French polling stations.There had been a serious concern that groups including Islamic State would target the election.However the 50,000 policemen and gendarmes that were only standby along with 7,000 soldiers were not required as the day went on.The top two candidates Macron and Le Pen face an election run off for the French presidency on Sunday 7 May. The presidential poll is the first to be held during a state of emergency, put in place since the Paris attacks of November 2015.For entire story Daily Mail | 1real |
North Korea to Tillerson: We Are Ready for ’Any War the U.S. Would Like’ | North Korea’s foreign ministry warned Monday that its government is prepared to go to war with the United States, following remarks from Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in which he said the Trump administration was prepared for a military engagement with the communist dictatorship should they strike U. S. allies. [“The U. S. should face up to the situation of the world with its eyes wide open. The DPRK has the will and capability to fully respond to any war the U. S. would like to ignite,” the Korean Central News Agency quoted a foreign ministry spokesman as saying, according to the South Korean newswire service Yonhap. “If the . S. thought that they would frighten the DPRK, they would soon know that their method would not work on the latter,” the spokesman continued. “The world will soon witness what eventful significance the great victory won by the DPRK in the recent ground jet test of engine will carry. ” Addressing Secretary Tillerson directly, the spokesman said he was “repeating what Obama touted much sanctions [sic] until he left the White House. What matters is that neither Obama nor Tillerson knows the reason why the DPRK had to have access to nuclear weapons and why it is dynamically bolstering up the nuclear force. ” The North Korean official appeared to be responding to Tillerson’s statements in South Korea on Friday where he told reporters that the Trump administration would not back down in protecting its allies in Seoul and Tokyo. “The policy of strategic patience has ended. We are exploring a new range of diplomatic, security and economic measures. All options are on the table,” Tillerson said, clarifying to one reporter that these options did include a military last resort. Tillerson also repeated on multiple stops during his Asia trip that he hoped to see North Korea’s closest ally, China, take steps to ensure that Pyongyang abides by United Nations sanctions. In China, Tillerson emphasized issues on which the two nations agreed, though reports suggest that he privately urged Beijing to cut economic ties with North Korea. Pyongyang appears to have received the message. In addition to the foreign ministry’s response, the Rodong Sinmun, a state propaganda newspaper, published a column Monday arguing that North Korea needs nuclear weapons because the United States will invade it if it does not threaten a nuclear attack. “Our army and people will continuously bolster up our nuclear deterrent for down the road under the conditions that U. S. government officials adamantly stick to their hostile policy toward us,” the column read. In addition to public statements, North Korea tested a new rocket engine model on Sunday at the orders of dictator Kim . The Rodong reported that Kim applauded the test as a success: He noted that the success made in the current test marked a great event of historic significance as it declared a new birth of the rocket industry which has radically turned into a industry both in name and in reality by completely doing away with dogmatism, conservatism and formalism left in the field of rocket industry and the dependence on the technology of other countries. Kim said of the test, “the whole world will soon witness what eventful significance the great victory won today carries. ” The rocket engine, experts presume, is meant to fuel the launch of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). North Korea has been developing nuclear technology in the hopes of creating a nuclear weapon with enough reach to successfully strike U. S. soil. Reuters corroborated the claims in North Korean media that the rocket engine test was an advance in the nation’s weapons technology, citing the South Korean defense ministry. | 0fake |
BREAKING: OBAMA POISED To Exact Revenge On PUTIN With Unprecedented Cyber Attack For Allegedly Exposing Hillary Emails…While Campaigning For Hillary | Putin Tells Russian Army To Prepare For WWWIII With U.S While Obama whines about Trump campaigns for Hillary Is our Community Organizer In Chief actually willing to put our nation s security at risk because he believes Putin is responsible for Hillary s email hacks? What kind of sick, reckless and vengeful clown do we have running our nation? The Obama administration is contemplating an unprecedented cyber covert action against Russia in retaliation for alleged Russian interference in the American presidential election, U.S. intelligence officials told NBC News.Current and former officials with direct knowledge of the situation say the CIA has been asked to deliver options to the White House for a wide-ranging clandestine cyber operation designed to harass and embarrass the Kremlin leadership.The sources did not elaborate on the exact measures the CIA was considering, but said the agency had already begun opening cyber doors, selecting targets and making other preparations for an operation. Former intelligence officers told NBC News that the agency had gathered reams of documents that could expose unsavory tactics by Russian President Vladimir Putin.Vice President Joe Biden told Meet the Press moderator Chuck Todd on Friday that we re sending a message to Putin and that it will be at the time of our choosing, and under the circumstances that will have the greatest impact. When asked if the American public will know a message was sent, the vice president replied, Hope not. Retired Admiral James Stavridis told NBC News Cynthia McFadden that the U.S. should attack Russia s ability to censor its internal internet traffic and expose the financial dealings of Putin and his associates. NBC NewsFULL REPORT: @NBCNews has learned the CIA is preparing a major unprecedented cyber-strike against Russia. @CynthiaMcFadden reports pic.twitter.com/MjxKrdL7zS NBC Nightly News (@NBCNightlyNews) October 14, 2016Vladimir Zhirinovsky, a flamboyant veteran lawmaker known for his fiery rhetoric, told Reuters in an interview that Trump was the only person able to de-escalate dangerous tensions between Moscow and Washington.Americans should vote for Donald Trump as president next month or risk being dragged into a nuclear war, according to a Russian ultra-nationalist ally of President Vladimir Putin who likes to compare himself to the U.S. Republican candidate.By contrast, Trump s Democratic rival Hillary Clinton could spark World War Three, said Zhirinovsky, who received a top state award from Putin after his pro-Kremlin Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR) came third in Russia s parliamentary election last month.Zhirinovsky s comments coincide with deep disagreements between Washington and Moscow over Syria and Ukraine and after the White House last week accused Russia of a campaign of cyber attacks against Democratic Party organizations.Even as WikiLeaks released another trove of internal documents from Clinton s campaign on Wednesday, Putin insisted his country was not involved in an effort to influence the U.S. presidential election. Via: Reuters | 1real |
VETERAN WHO GAVE TRUMP His Purple Heart Explains Why He Did It…SHUTS DOWN Critics [VIDEO] | He asked me if I wanted it back and I said, no!' The veteran who gave Donald Trump his Purple Heart medal during a campaign rally in Ashburn, Virginia, on Tuesday joined Jenna Lee on Happening Now to explain his gesture.Retired Lt. Col. Louis Dorfman said that he gave Trump his medal because he wants the Republican nominee to remember all the people who have fought and died for our country.Dorfman said that when he shook Trump s hand and gave him the medal, they had a very genuine moment.Lee asked Dorfman about Trump s controversial remark upon receiving the medal: I always wanted to get the Purple Heart. This was much easier. He took it in the manner in which I gave is, Dorfman said, adding that Trump wasn t trying to be offensive with his comment.Why do you believe in him? Lee asked. I just think he d make a good commander-in-chief, Dorfman said. I like what he says. WATCH HERE:Via: FOX News | 1real |
White House In Chaos As Trump Fires Scaramucci After Only 10 Days On The Job | Just ten days into the job and White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci has been reportedly removed from his position by amateur president Donald Trump, according to three people familiar with the situation, the New York Times reports. It was just this morning that Trump assured the public on Twitter that there is no White House chaos! but the revolving door at the Trump administration tells another story.ABC reports that Scaramucci handed in his resignation. Perhaps it s a matter of unrequited love since Scaramucci has repeatedly professed his love for the former reality show star.According to Politico, the request to oust Scaramucci came from the new chief of staff, John Kelly, who started Monday.The Mooch s last tweet on the 30th reads, Had great call w/ @GOPChairwoman. @GOP doing fantastic work to support @POTUS #MAGA looking forward to building even stronger relationship. Had great call w/ @GOPChairwoman. @GOP doing fantastic work to support @POTUS #MAGA looking forward to building even stronger relationship. Anthony Scaramucci (@Scaramucci) July 30, 2017The potty-mouthed White House communications director has a problem with communicating.Just days ago, Scaramucci unleashed an expletive-laden tirade against Trump administration officials. He also said he would be sure that leakers are forced to resign, yet he s the one hitting the front door a week and a half after he was hired.Scaramucci will never be forgiven by the public for at least one thing: his tirade included suggesting that Steve Bannon tries to suck his own cock and that s a visual all of us could have lived without, thankyouverymuch.While Scaramucci appears to be out of a job, his marriage is over, too, and all because of his political ambition to get close to Trump.Scaramucci is a Wall Street financier and former Trump transition team official.The abrupt removal comes just 10 days after he was brought into the White House. It also follows just a few days after Trump fired White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus. Trump demands loyalty from his administration officials but that loyalty is never returned. Case in point: Attorney General Jeff Sessions.But there is no chaos in the White House. Just ask Trump.Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images. | 1real |
Exclusive: Turkey to deploy troops inside Syria's Idlib - Erdogan | NEW YORK (Reuters) - Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Thursday Turkey will deploy troops in Syria s northern Idlib region as part of a so-called de-escalation agreement brokered by Russia last month. The de-escalation zones, agreed by Turkey, Russia and Iran, would be further discussed in talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin during his trip to Ankara next week, Erdogan said in an interview with Reuters while he was in New York for the annual United Nations General Assembly. Under the agreement, Russians are maintaining security outside Idlib and Turkey will maintain the security inside Idlib region, Erdogan said. The task is not easy ... With Putin we will discuss additional steps needed to be taken in order to eradicate terrorists once and for all to restore peace. Erdogan also said Turkey was considering counter-measures, including imposing sanctions, against Kurdish northern Iraq over a planned referendum. Iraqi Kurdish authorities have defied growing international pressure to call off the referendum on independence. Iraq s neighbors fear it will fuel unrest among their own Kurdish populations and Western allies said it could detract from the fight against Islamic State. Turkey has brought forward a cabinet meeting and national security council session to Friday over the referendum, Erdogan said. He said that parliament would also convene for an extraordinary meeting on Saturday. Without any further delay we are going to discuss what kind of sanctions should be imposed and when the sanctions will be imposed, he said without elaborating on what they might be. Turkish troops are also carrying out military exercises near the border and Erdogan said on Saturday the resolution on troop deployment abroad will be submitted to parliament for a vote. Erdogan called on the United States to extradite U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, whom Erdogan accuses of orchestrating a failed coup attempt in Turkey, in which rogue soldiers commandeered tanks and fighter jets, bombing parliament and trying to abduct or kill Erdogan. Gulen denies any involvement in the July 2016 coup attempt, during which more than 240 people were killed. Gulen s entire network is being run from the United States. Terrorists should not be harbored here. We need U.S. assistance on this matter, Erdogan said. Since the failed coup, Turkish authorities have shut more than 130 media outlets and a press union says more than 150 journalists have been jailed, raising concerns about media freedom in Turkey. Turkey has also suspended or dismissed more than 150,000 judges, teachers, police and civil servants and has arrested nearly 50,000 others suspected of links to the Gulen movement. The EU and human rights organizations have expressed concern over Turkey s security crackdown since the failed coup. Turkey says its crackdown is targeting supporters of Gulen. Let me be very clear, in terms of freedom of press, there are no challenges in Turkey ... If journalists are supporters of terrorists, if they are double-agents, are we not supposed to do what is necessary against them? Erdogan said. Turkey is a state of law, within which the judiciary takes necessary measure ... This is sheer lie ... they were coup plotters. Meeting Erdogan on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly, U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday praised his leadership and said he has become a friend of mine. Relations between Turkey and the United States were strained over Turkish security officials involved in street fighting with protesters during a visit to Washington in May. Turkey is part of the U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State (IS) in Syria and Iraq but Ankara s ties with Washington are strained over support provided by the United States to the Syrian Kurdish militia YPG. Viewed by Turkey as the Syrian extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), the YPG has been among the most effective partners on the ground in the U.S.-led fight against the Islamic State. Erdogan warned Washington that arming the YPG could end up hurting Washington and its allies. Weapons are being deployed to YPG ... We are strategic allies with the United States ..., we should avoid helping YPG, he said. At a critical time for Turkish-Germany relations, Erdogan said in the interview he hoped relations with Germany could be improved, praising German Chancellor Angela Merkel for refraining from criticizing Turkey and its policies. I am quite hopeful relations will improve ... We have no problem with the German public. We have a problem with some officials wrong attitude against Turkey, he said. Merkel, who has been at odds with Erdogan on many fronts over the last year, has said that the fact is clear that Turkey should not become a member of the EU . Merkel has said she will speak to other European Union leaders to end Turkey s EU accession talks. Things never went well for the last 54 years regarding Turkey s EU membership ... We have been lingering at the doorstep of the EU and things have got worse. They have never kept their promises, Erdogan said. | 0fake |
IT JUST GOT REAL! GOP Rep. Jim Jordan Tells Judge Jeanine Key Players in anti-Trump Scam Will Be Subpoenaed [Video] | One of the big players in trying to get to the truth about the bias against President Trump just told Judge Jeanine that this is getting serious and very real. Four key players will be subpoenaed!FIREWORKS! GOP Rep. Jim Jordan reveals the House Judiciary Committee will subpoena Andrew McCabe, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, Bruce and Nellie Ohr pic.twitter.com/PO8o6nsI0k Josh Caplan (@joshdcaplan) December 17, 2017OUR PREVIOUS REPORT ON JORDAN: Rep. Jordan is firm in his desire to get to the bottom of what is going on at the FBI and DOJ:GOP Rep. Jim Jordan on Lou Dobbs: Listen you can t make this stuff up. It gets worse each and every day. What deep down scares me, if this actually happened the FBI had a concerted effort with the people at the top to go after one party s nominee to help the other party s nominee. If that actually happened in the United States of America and everything each and every day points to more and more likely that that is what took place, it is sad for our country if that took place. And I think it did based on everything I am seeing. All the evidence points to that..@Jim_Jordan on Peter Strzok: "In case the American people, in his mind, are crazy enough to elect Donald Trump we need something else to stop Trump. That's what this guy was thinking at the highest levels at the FBI." pic.twitter.com/vNWUhDvDuE FOX Business (@FoxBusiness) December 14, 2017The Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein testified yesterday about the clear case of corruption and political bias in our intel agencies. Changing Hillary s charge from grossly negligent to extremely careless is disturbing enough but it s clear that Jim Jordan knows this goes much deeper. Hillary was protected by the political hacks in the intel agencies but a target was put on President Trump s back using the FISA court to open up spying on the him and those around him using a doctored up opposition research document that was never proven to be anywhere close to true The questioning from Jordan is well worth watching:BYRON YORK:An insurance policy? From the Strzok-Page texts. https://t.co/Ru5P1dWFXI pic.twitter.com/hiyApwb7Jg Byron York (@ByronYork) December 13, 2017BRET BAIER:Text-from Peter Strzok to Lisa Page (Andy is Andrew McCabe): "I want to believe the path u threw out 4 consideration in Andy's office-that there's no way he gets elected-but I'm afraid we can't take that risk.It's like an insurance policy in unlikely event u die be4 you're 40" Bret Baier (@BretBaier) December 13, 2017ANDREW MCCARTHY COMMENTED ON THE TWEET THAT EXPOSED THE AGENTS FOR THEIR POLITICAL BIAS:Obviously, this is not political banter. Clearly indicates professional duties infected by political viewpoints, which is disqualifying. I was going on the published accounts I'd seen, which didn't include this one. Should follow my own advice to wait til all facts in. https://t.co/fXk7GPnk5U Andrew C. McCarthy (@AndrewCMcCarthy) December 13, 2017 | 1real |
Alvin Ailey’s Robert Battle on His First Real Dance Shoes - The New York Times | I’ll never forget the impact of my first dance shoes. We didn’t have a lot of money, especially when I was in elementary school. So I got “imitation” shoes they weren’t Converse — they were “ . ” Kids would pick on you because you didn’t have trendy shoes and that was a source of anxiety to me. But when I was 12 my mother took me to the Star Styled store in Miami to buy me genuine tap shoes, ballet slippers and jazz oxfords. She made it a priority, as I had to have all of these types of shoes before my first classes started. It was such a big deal when I got those shoes that I would even sleep with them. Just by putting them on, I had the keys to what I was hoping to become. In the back room of our house, I would imitate photographs of dancers from the magazines my teacher had given me. All of a sudden, I was connected to a magical world. The power of those shoes as something tangible, and as a metaphor, was enormous for me. Anything I learned, I would try to teach to the neighborhood kids. Soon I would cast them in dance videos with my front porch as the stage. I choreographed to the song “Word Up!” by Cameo, and persuaded a group of my fellow students to participate, including football players. We performed the routine for no one, because we were all in it. But it sparked my desire to create dance, not just to perform it. Growing up in the Liberty City neighborhood of Miami had its rough edges. Two blocks away, there were drug deals and shootings, which I saw walking to and from school. Pretty much everyone I knew had security bars on their windows. I would use the ones on the inside of my front porch as a ballet barre. It was a challenge being a kid who played classical piano, danced and sang soprano in the choir. Sometimes I was threatened, so I started carrying a hammer in my dance bag for protection. I carried myself differently, and people left me alone. The first time I saw Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, classes from our school were bused to a special performance for students at Jackie Gleason Theater in Miami Beach. The dancers were in some ways a reflection of me they looked like me, but more than that they looked like what I wanted to become. The highlight of the performance was “Revelations,” Ailey’s masterpiece, created in 1960 at the cusp of the civil rights movement. It’s not just a dance, but a suite of spirituals relating to the black experience in this country and expressing the trials, tribulations, faith and hope to which everyone can relate. As a boy who grew up in the church, I felt connected to it in a very personal way. One section that really resonated with me was “Wade in the Water,” a depiction of a baptism. Across the stage, fabric billowed, representing the water, and dancers stepped forward and back with equal parts fear and joy. That’s what I felt being baptized in my own church. “Revelations” was my story as much as it was Ailey’s blood memories. It felt very much like the life I already knew. So I could walk into a positive image that was much more powerful than all of the negatives I had ever seen, combined. Images were important to me. I would cut out pictures from dance magazines — Anna Pavlova, Judith Jamison — and paste them on big square pieces of wood. In my dark room at night I would slowly shine a flashlight over them, intrigued by the contrast, which is in some ways a metaphor for life. Even in a dark space, a dark time, with your imagination and your ability to see beyond your circumstance, there is always light. That vision board was a powerful exercise for me. But termites eventually got to the wood, and I had to throw it away. My imagination was my passport to the world. We had a lot of trees in the yard in Florida, but the mango tree was the biggest, with a place that I could perch. There was something about being high above the ground that elevated me beyond place, time and circumstance. I would envision what it would be like to perform in front of thousands in New York City and walk through Times Square. I would envision the audience’s faces, what they were wearing, even how they got to the theater. I felt the same adrenaline rush as if I were actually performing. I’m convinced that exercise moved me closer to my destiny. Eventually I auditioned for Juilliard and was fortunate to be accepted on full scholarship. There I was, in New York, just a few blocks away from the Ailey company, which at the time was on West 61st Street. Visiting the studios, I could peer through the windows, catch the occasional sighting of the legendary Judith Jamison, who was then artistic director. Years later, when she grabbed my hands, looked into my eyes and asked me to lead the company — “It’s yours,” she said — everything that I visualized while studying those images of her came flooding back. Even to this day, when someone says, “Please welcome the artistic director of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Robert Battle,” there’s something in me that is reduced to that young person in the mango tree. I always tell young people, ‘It costs you nothing to use your imagination, but it will cost you everything if you don’t use it.’ When I think back to that moment of putting on my first dance shoes, I know now that it was about unlocking the mystery of my imagination. Putting on those shoes allowed me to walk into this magnificent world of dance, and, step after step, it continues to be . | 0fake |
Texas official to retire after criticizing Planned Parenthood cuts | AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) - A senior Texas health official who co-authored a report that criticized the state’s funding cuts to Planned Parenthood for reducing access to reproductive healthcare will retire from his post next month, a Texas commission said on Friday. Rick Allgeyer, the Texas Health and Human Services Commission’s director of research, faced criticism from the state’s Republican leaders over the report published in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine this month. The report said state funding cuts to Planned Parenthood and its affiliates had an adverse effect on family planning for lower-income people. Allgeyer is eligible to retire and decided to do so effective on March 31, the commission said. Allgeyer, who has been at the commission for 16 years and was one of the study’s five listed authors, declined to comment. In 2011, the Texas state legislature cut Planned Parenthood out of one family-planning program and revamped the way another program hands out funds, placing it and other private clinics at the bottom of the list. Top Texas political leaders have said after cutting off funding for Planned Parenthood that the state has been able to rebuild its safety net. Independent health experts dispute the claim, saying Texas still has a long way to go before it can provide the level of service it did when Planned Parenthood was an integral part of its family planning efforts. The Texas plan has garnered attention among Republicans in the U.S. Congress who are looking to defund the nation’s largest family-planning provider at the national level. The study said the cuts appeared to lead to an increase of unintended pregnancies among lower-income residents and a decrease in access to long-acting reversible contraception. It also said the cuts appeared to increase the rate of childbirths covered by Medicaid. Some Texas Republicans said it was inappropriate for a state employee to be involved in such a study and that its results were flawed, putting political pressure on Allgeyer. | 0fake |
Ranking Dem On House Russia Probe Has EXPLOSIVE News For Trump That Will Have Him Running Scared | As everybody who still believes in democracy and true freedom reels from FBI Director James Comey s firing, the media and members of Congress have been frantically working to get the deets on what happened. Rep. Adam Schiff, the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee (which is conducting its own investigation into Russia), just dropped a truth bomb about Comey, and Trump would be wise to go find a cave and hide in it now.Schiff was asked, on CNN, whether he believes this is a cover-up. He doesn t. He thinks it s something worse: It s a brazen interference with a criminal investigation. After all, the president calls this whole investigation a fake, and here you had an FBI director who was seriously looking into whether Trump associates were colluding with the Russians. The end of his statement to CNN should be particularly jarring to anybody familiar with history. Watch below:Rep. Adam Schiff on firing of FBI Director James Comey: It s a brazen interference with a criminal investigation https://t.co/5SXgAuTVBP CNN (@CNN) May 10, 2017Earlier this year, the White House tried to get the FBI to publicly dispute stories appearing in The New York Times about contacts between Trump s associates and Russian actors. They ve been trying to bend the FBI to their will for a long time, and when Comey wouldn t lie under oath for them, or end his Russia probe, Trump decided to fire him.In fact, Jeff Sessions was actually told to find reasons to fire Comey, and they ve been working on it for at least a week. Trump likely wants someone in that position who ll end that investigation before they discover something really damning. He wants a puppet.If Trump was innocent, the White House wouldn t have been looking for reasons to fire Comey now. Comey may not have even been fired, but if he was, Trump probably would have done it when he took office under the guise of getting a fresh start, as Schiff said to CNN. This is not the behavior of an innocent man.Featured image via Mark Wilson/Getty Images | 1real |
SUPREME COURT AGREES TO TAKE ON Obama’s Un-American Plan To Shield Millions Of Illegals From Deportation | So far, the Supreme Court has not prevented one single unconstitutional act committed by Obama. Is there any reason to believe they will stop the invasion of illegals to save America and the American worker?The Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to review President Obama s plan to shield up to 5 million illegal immigrants from deportation, after lower courts blocked the president s sweeping executive actions from taking effect.The decision sets up an election-year clash over the controversial plan that many Republicans have likened to amnesty. The justices said Tuesday they will consider undoing lower court rulings that blocked the plan from taking effect. The Obama administration had appealed to the Supreme Court last fall.The decision to review the case may be welcome on both sides of the aisle. Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch, of Utah, issued a statement praising the court for taking it on and urging the justices to rule against the administration. President Obama s executive action is an affront to our system of republican self-government, Hatch said. The Constitution vests legislative authority in Congress, not the President. With his actions, President Obama has attempted to bypass the constitutionally ordained legislative process and rewrite the law unilaterally. The case probably will be argued in April and decided by late June, about a month before both parties presidential nominating conventions. The issue of illegal immigration has taken a center-stage role in the Republican primary battle, as Donald Trump calls for a wall between the U.S. and Mexico and candidates spar over who is toughest on the issue.The immigrants who would benefit from the Obama administration s plan are mainly the parents of U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents.But more than two-dozen mostly Republican-led states challenged Obama s executive actions after they were rolled out in 2014, and the plan has been tied up in litigation ever since.Critics say the plan is unconstitutional. Shortly before the administration took the case to the Supreme Court, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the states in early November.Solicitor General Donald Verrilli Jr. later said in a court filing that allowing those rulings to stand would force millions of people to continue to work off the books, without the option of lawful employment to provide for their families. At issue is the Deferred Action for Parents of Americans program, which Obama said would allow people who have been in the United States more than five years and who have children who are in the country legally to come out of the shadows and get right with the law. Via: Fox News | 1real |
Barrel Bomb: The Cataclysmic Close of Campaign 2016 : Information | Barrel Bomb: The Cataclysmic Close of Campaign 2016 By Chris Floyd
Well, here we are: at the bottom of the barrel under forty feet of slag. In a few days time, well know our fate: the five-alarm fire of Trump Rule (oh, how those police unions are chomping at the bit!) or the Clinton Age of Hyper-War (oh, how those neocons are chomping at the bit!). In either case, the entrenched coagulation of corporate interests and war profiteers that have strangled the peace, prosperity and prospects of the American people will not be budged an inch. The change that people are so desperately hungry for so hungry that that some of them might well elect an Establishment insider whose sinister clowning makes him appear to be a rebel will not come. Thus their bitterness will grow deeper, more sour, erupting more and more often in physical violence: from militarized police against protestors, from Trump-empowered racists (if he wins or loses), from extremist militias, from angry, maddened people on every side. And of course there will be more much more of the horrific, never-ending, globe-spanning violence of the bipartisan Terror War that churns on and on, no matter who is sitting temporarily in the White House.
Theres no use in pretending thats not what we face. But theres also no use in pretending that this situation is somehow sui generis , some terribly unlucky conflation of unforeseen circumstances coming together at this particular time. It is in fact the culmination and embodiment of the deliberate choices of the most powerful forces in society: the choices to enrich themselves beyond all reason and extend their military and economic dominance over the earth.
It doesnt matter that many if not most of the practitioners and functionaries of this system believe in its rightness. It doesnt matter that brutal neoliberal nostrums and extremist imperial notions have become religious dogmas for those who see themselves as the meritocracy. It doesnt matter if the leaders and factotums genuinely believe in the exceptionalism they preach or if they are cynical power-seekers. It doesnt matter if they actually believe their rapacious financial machinations are reflections of the natural law of the the market that will eventually benefit all, or if they know themselves to be what they really are: ugly souls disfigured by greed. The end result has been the same: a long series of deliberate choices by a bipartisan elite that have hollowed out the lives and communities and futures of millions of Americans, and created a living hell of war, ruin and hatred over much of the earth.
This is a system that has delegitimized itself, a system that has undermined its own institutions. Through its own actions, it has rotted out the foundations of trust and reason which once upheld it. Some might say, Oh, but theres been a decades-long, concentrated effort by right-wing billionaires and corporate forces to foment ideological and religious extremism to undermine the legitimacy of secular government, which might restrict their profiteering or let more people have a share in power. And thats true. But its been accompanied at every step by the collusion and cowardice of the putative opposition. The so-called New Democrats, exemplified by the Clintons, jettisoned concern for the common good to embrace centrist and technocratic policies: i.e., to adopt the neoliberal dogma that unbridled pursuit of private profit by a connected elites will somehow, someday, lead to general prosperity. The idea that the party should fight to improve the lives of ordinary people in the here and now, to fight for their quality of life in a genuine, substantive way, came to be seen as old-hat, a quaint and fusty notion of has-beens and dreamers who didnt understand the way the world really worked. A true, savvy moderate knows you must compromise every ideal, show yourself to be a willing and avid servant of the monied interests and the militarists, in order to gain power so you can make a few cosmetic changes around the edges, a few little social improvements here and there (but only of course! in partnership with private interests), but never, ever challenge the system at its core.
This is the only deal in town: outright, unvarnished right-wing rule, or simpering, cowardly moderate management of a violent, rapacious system. Thats been the choice on offer since 1976. Thats the choice on offer today. The only difference is that the system has metastasized to a monstrous degree over the years: lacking any genuine opposition, the system has grown more violent, more rapacious.
Establishment collusion and Democratic cowardice finally and completely degraded and delegitimized the American electoral process 16 years ago, when the Supreme Court with two members who had direct family ties to the Bush campaign stopped a recount that would have resulted in the actual winner of the election to take office. This outrageous action was accepted by every single organ and institution of the American system. (With the momentary exception of the Black Congressional Caucus, whose members tried, in vain, to get a single Democratic senator to challenge the result.) Instead, Americans were encouraged to applaud the fact that power had changed hands without tanks in the street. That is, we were to celebrate that an actual coup detat had taken place before our eyes without the slightest show of resistance.
Once in place, the coup regime staffed at the highest levels by extremists who a year before had publicly called for a vast militarization of American policy and society, even if the public had to be galvanized by a new Pearl Harbor led the nation into a disastrous war based on false pretenses, a vast crime that not only killed hundreds of thousands of innocent people but has led directly to unbridled turmoil, extremism, conflict and corruption around the world. The elite-supported coup regime instituted torture programs and death squads, and launched an orgy of war profiteering unprecedented in world history. The regime then presided over the worst economic collapse in generations.
Not a single member of the regime was ever tried or even investigated, at even the most preliminary level for a single crime committed during its time in power. There were no high-profile Congressional investigations into the hideous carnage and ruin and instability they wrought; not even a Chilcot Commission into the origins of the war, as the UK belatedly launched. Instead the regimes leaders and top factotums were heaped with honors and wealth. Today their endorsement is eagerly sought and gained by the progressive Democratic candidate for president.
In 2008, the desperate electorate turned to a figure presented to them as an outsider who would at last bring real change. He had the trappings of difference a black man with a Muslim name, who spoke eloquently of peace and social justice, who most people thought was far to the left but voted for him anyway. But Barack Obama was of course a meritocratic centrist to his core. Riding an enormous wave of popularity, and a strong Congressional majority, he proceeded to bail out Wall Street fraudsters and finaglers with tax money and create a health care system based on the plan of a rightwing think-tank that prioritized corporate profit and probably killed the chance for a genuinely public health care system for generations, if not for good. He also doubled down on the Terror War, expanding it to more countries, extended Bushs death squads, helped destroy nations like Libya and Yemen (thus spawning more chaos and terror), expanded illegal surveillance of the populace (and the world) to an extent beyond the wildest dreams of the Stasi or KGB. And after saving Big Money from itself and securing the guaranteed profits of the healthcare-insurance corporate complex, he spent most of his time on the domestic front trying to strike a grand bargain with Republicans to cut Social Security and Medicare.
Again, all hopes of any real change were thwarted. So now the nation swings from being ready to embrace a perceived leftist to the brink of voting in a bellicose rightist as it seeks the genuine change no one will give them. Of course, after the scorched-earth tactics of bipartisan neoliberalism and the inevitable moral degradation and brutalization that comes from year after year after year of vicious aggressive war, the choice for Trump is more nihilistic. Its as if people believe positive change is no longer possible so lets tear everything down and see what happens. (This is the actual, open philosophy of the Breitbart gang, who are now directing Trumps campaign.)
Even if Clinton wins, this nihilism will still be rampant. And given that she happily embodies the bipartisan Establishment now roundly despised on all sides for its many depredations, the nihilism will grow even worse especially as she has given no indication whatsoever that she will even try to make substantive changes in the neoliberal-militarist system that is strangling us. Quite the contrary.
So yes, this has been a campaign like no other but mostly because it has brought the systematic decay of the Republic into the sharpest possible relief, and has shown, more clearly than before, that the neoliberal-militarist ascendency offers no hope for a better life, a better world; indeed, that it offers nothing at all except more violence, more bitterness, more ruin, more degradation for us all.
Chris Floyd blogs at www.chris-floyd.com . | 1real |
Unforced errors and miscalculations end Bush's White House hopes | CHARLESTON, S.C. (Reuters) - Before Donald Trump’s put-downs and the stumbles in presidential debates, and before the profound frustration of voters became so unmistakably apparent, Jeb Bush appeared to be best positioned to win back the White House for Republicans in 2016. He amassed a $150 million war chest in 2015, surrounded himself with some of the best minds in the party, had a famous last name and attracted the support of the party establishment. And yet, after a dismal finish in South Carolina, Bush dropped out of the race on Saturday with an emotional speech. “I firmly believe the American people must entrust this office to someone who understands that whoever holds it is the servant, not the master, someone who will commit to that service with honor and decency,” he said. How Bush found himself out of the race after just the third nominating contest of 2016 is a cautionary tale of political miscalculation and strategic errors, according to interviews with a dozen Republican operatives, many with close ties to the Bush campaign and others who worked for the last two Republican presidential nominees, conducted during the last days of his campaign. From the start, they said, Bush appeared to misjudge the mood of the Republican base. In December 2014, for instance, Bush gathered his senior aides and a small group of national political operatives for a meeting in Miami to talk about his coming candidacy. A survey to gauge the national mood of the party was dismissed by Bush and his aides as unnecessary. Such polling, a participant said, would have made clear to Bush the rebellious sentiment of the conservative base of the party. “They missed the boat,” the participant said. The polling may have also helped the campaign spot the threat of Trump, a billionaire and political outsider who tapped into that anti-establishment anger and stormed to the top of the polls. The Bush campaign disputed the charge as inaccurate. “He has shared the frustration of voters from the outset and he has not strayed from that,” said spokeswoman Kristy Campbell. “He has presented a hopeful, optimistic message that is based on the belief that he has the leadership skills to get the job done.” Viewing Trump as a summer fad who would fade given his outrageous comments, the campaign was slow to respond to the billionaire when he first blasted Bush last August as “low-energy.” Bush maintained his above-the-fray strategy and focused on his policy proposals instead of mixing it up with Trump. Trump relentlessly and bluntly attacked Bush in speeches and on Twitter, portraying him as tired, weak and out of touch with the party. Trump has mentioned Bush on Twitter hundreds of times, far more than any other Republican candidate. “There was a decision made that he was not a serious person and would fade away,” said one Republican strategist close to the Bush camp, who asked to remain anonymous. “You don’t want to dignify somebody who wasn’t a serious candidate. It wasn’t just Jeb. Nobody thought he was.” When the “low energy” attacks on Bush started to take hold and his poll numbers began dropping, he went out of his way to insist he had plenty of energy to be president, talking of working 16-hour days, putting in feistier appearances on the stump and hitting back at Trump hard. Behind the scenes, though, donors said they fretted that too much time had gone by before he took the problem seriously. Some confidants of the former Florida governor seethed for weeks at Trump’s taunts and urged the campaign to shift to a more aggressive posture. “They made a horrendous miscalculation in not understanding the intent of the low-energy attack, which was designed to emasculate Bush, to make him look weak,” said Steve Schmidt, who was campaign manager to 2008 Republican nominee John McCain. “Defining him as weak denied him the ability to make the argument that by resume, competence and experience he was the most fit to command,” said Schmidt. When Bush launched his campaign in June, he was the clear frontrunner among Republicans, polling at nearly 18 percent in a crowded field. Roughly six weeks later Trump had taken a commanding lead with 26 percent and Bush had dropped to around 12 percent, according to Reuters/Ipsos polling. Today Trump stands at 38 percent. But Trump was hardly Bush’s only obstacle. Perhaps his biggest misstep was one of his own making, when he spent days trying to explain whether he would have launched the Iraq war begun by his brother, former President George W. Bush. Even George W. Bush has admitted mistakes were made in the 2003 conflict. But for a week last May, Jeb Bush was flummoxed by the question. The trouble began when he told Fox News that “I would have” launched the invasion even knowing what is now known - that Iraq did not possess weapons of mass destruction. While Bush said he did not understand the question, his response began days of controversy that fed a narrative pushed by Democrats that he was little different from his brother when it came to Iraq. Some of Bush’s foreign policy advisers were surprised that Bush did not have an answer prepared for the inevitable question. There was a disagreement among his advisers on how best to respond, “a genuine amount of confusion and upsetness about the whole thing,” said one outside adviser to the campaign, who asked to be anonymous. Not wanting to be disloyal to his brother, Bush spent days trying to articulate a position until he finally disavowed the statement and declared he would not have ordered the war. “The fact that we went through this anguished process of several days and several kinds of answers was quite astonishing,” the adviser said. Finally, George W. Bush told his brother he did not need to defend decisions made back in 2003. Jeb Bush had an on-again, off-again strategy to embrace the family name, but finally took full advantage of his family in New Hampshire and especially in South Carolina, where the Bush family name remains a valuable brand. For the first time in the campaign former President George W. Bush hit the campaign trail in South Carolina for his brother, addressing thousands of Republicans at a rally. “I know campaigns are stressful and taxing,” he said. “But they should be. Because the job of the president is much harder than the campaign.” The challenges of the campaign were driven home two days later when Jeb Bush learned that South Carolina’s governor, Nikki Haley, would endorse Rubio. It was a double blow for Bush: not only did he fail to secure the backing of a popular governor, it went instead to Rubio, his one-time political protégé who has been the target of stinging attacks from Bush. His allied Super PAC, Right to Rise USA, spent at least $12.5 million on advertising opposing Rubio, according to Federal Election Commission data. Bush learned about the endorsement at a town hall meeting in Summerville, South Carolina, where some members of the audience gave him advice on how to run his campaign. He summed up the news briskly. “Disappointed,” he said. By Saturday night, less than two hours after the polls had closed, Bush had called it quits. (Additional reporting by Grant Smith, Melissa Fares and Chris Kahn; Editing by Paul Thomasch and Ross Colvin) This article was funded in part by SAP. It was independently created by the Reuters editorial staff. SAP had no editorial involvement in its creation or production. | 0fake |
Major Veterans Group Shreds Trump In A Statement For Attacking Parents Of Fallen War Hero | After GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump attacked the family of a fallen U.S. soldier, a well-deserved backlash ensued. Khizr Khan delivered a powerful speech criticizing Trump at last week s Democratic National Convention. That s all it took for Donald to unleash angry tweets and interviews directed at Khizr and Ghazala Khan, the parents of Humayun Khan, 27, who ordered those around him to take cover as soon as he saw a taxi barreling through the gates of his base in Baquba, Iraq in 2004. As he approached the vehicle, it exploded.The Veterans of Foreign Wars released a strongly worded statement against Trump on Monday for his comments about Ghazala Khan, calling the Republican nominee out of bounds, according to Politico. Election year or not, the VFW will not tolerate anyone berating a Gold Star family member for exercising his or her right of speech or expression, said VFW leader Brian Duffy in the statement.Trump said during an interview on ABC on Sunday that Ghazala Khan wasn t allowed to have anything to say in an attempt to attack her faith. Mrs. Khan said she didn t speak because she felt emotional talking about her son s death. There are certain sacrosanct subjects that no amount of wordsmithing can repair once crossed, Duffy continued to say in the statement. Giving one s life to nation is the greatest sacrifice, followed closely by all Gold Star families, who have a right to make their voices heard. In addition to the VFW, Gold Star families released a letter blasting Trump. The Gold Star families called Trump s comments repugnant, and personally offensive. When you question a mother s pain, by implying that her religion, not her grief, kept her from addressing an arena of people, you are attacking us, the letter added. When you say your job building buildings is akin to our sacrifice, you are attacking our sacrifice. This isn t Trump s first attack on a war hero. He mocked John McCain for being a prisoner of war and now the Arizona Senator has responded to Trump s attack on the parents of Humayun Khan.Featured image via Gustavo Caballero/Getty. | 1real |
CIA chief Pompeo says he warned Iran's Soleimani over Iraq aggression | SIMI VALLEY, Calif. (Reuters) - U.S. Central Intelligence Agency Director Mike Pompeo said on Saturday he sent a letter to Iranian Major General Qassem Soleimani and Iranian leaders expressing concern regarding Iran s increasingly threatening behavior in Iraq. Speaking during a panel at the annual Reagan National Defense Forum in Southern California, Pompeo said he sent the letter after the senior Iranian military commander had indicated that forces under his control might attack U.S. forces in Iraq. He did not specify the date. What we were communicating to him in that letter was that we will hold he and Iran accountable for any attacks on American interests in Iraq by forces that are under their control, Pompeo told the panel. We wanted to make sure he and the leadership in Iran understood that in a way that was crystal clear. Soleimani, who is the commander of foreign operations for Iran s elite Revolutionary Guards, refused to open the letter, according to Pompeo, who took over the CIA in January. Iranian media earlier quoted Mohammad Mohammadi Golpayegani, a senior aide to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, as saying an unnamed CIA contact had tried to give a letter to Soleimani when he was in the Syrian town of Albu Kamal in November during the fighting against Islamic State. I will not take your letter nor read it and I have nothing to say to these people, Golpayegani quoted Soleimani as saying, according to the semi-official news agency Fars. Reuters reported in October that Soleimani had repeatedly warned Kurdish leaders in northern Iraq to withdraw from the oil city of Kirkuk or face an onslaught by Iraqi forces and allied Iranian-backed fighters, and had traveled to Iraq s Kurdistan region to meet Kurdish leaders. The presence of Soleimani on the frontlines highlights Tehran s heavy sway over policy in Iraq, and comes as Shi ite Iran seeks to win a proxy war in the Middle East with its regional rival and U.S. ally, Sunni Saudi Arabia. A U.S.-led coalition has been fighting Islamic State in Iraq and Syria and is often in proximity to Iran-allied militia fighting Isis there. You need to only look to the past few weeks and the efforts of the Iranians to exert influence now in Northern Iraq in addition to other places in Iraq to see that Iranian efforts to be the hegemonic power throughout the Middle East continues to increase, Pompeo said. The CIA chief said Saudi Arabia had grown more willing to share intelligence with other Middle Eastern nations regarding Iran and Islamist extremism. The Israeli government said last month that Israel had covert contacts with Saudi Arabia amid common concerns over Iran, a first disclosure by a senior official from either country of long-rumored secret dealings. We ve seen them work with the Israelis to push back against terrorism throughout the Middle East, to the extent we can continue to develop those relationships and work alongside them - the Gulf states and broader Middle East will likely be more secure, said Pompeo. | 0fake |
Twitter TEARS Paul Ryan To BLOODY RIBBONS For Praising CBO Review Of GOP Healthcare Plan (TWEETS) | The Congressional Budget Office s review of the Republicans replacement plan for the ACA is out, and it s not good news. Under the plan, 24 million people will lose their healthcare coverage by 2026. 14 million of those people will see their insurance ripped from them just in the next two years. In total, this plan will result in 52 million uninsured people in 2026. Over the next four years, premiums are expected to rise by as much as 20 percent more than they would under the ACA. Premiums might fall for younger people after 2020 but would continue to rise for older people.And on it goes.Paul Ryan, however, sees the report as a resounding endorsement of the plan because it will reduce the deficit by a whole $336 billion over a decade and is supposed to maybe lower premiums at some point in the future.CBO report confirms it American Health Care Act will lower premiums & improve access to quality, affordable care. https://t.co/jNzmYFPe9H pic.twitter.com/f0NGuLiztl Paul Ryan (@SpeakerRyan) March 13, 2017And Twitter is throwing a livid fit with him for that tweet, as well they should. The GOP s first priority should be the uninsured and the risk of people becoming uninsured. Instead, they re worried about deficits and getting lower premiums at some point for some demographics. Twitter is being merciless in their evaluation of his response.@SpeakerRyan Delete your account. David Podhaskie (@davidpodhaskie) March 13, 2017.@SpeakerRyan it literally says 24 million will lose coverage pic.twitter.com/iDDTerO77X Jordan Uhl (@JordanUhl) March 13, 2017.@SpeakerRyan ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? TALK ABOUT THE 24,000,000 AMERICANS LOSING COVERAGE! Tony Posnanski (@tonyposnanski) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan Goal achieved. You ve given Americans the freedom to die bankrupt. Erich McElroy (@erichmcelroy) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan This tweet isn t a misrepresentation it s a straight up lie. Seth Grahame-Smith (@sethgs) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan Quick question: When you sell your soul, whose blood do you sign with? Your own, right? Ryan Parker (@TheRyanParker) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan Why don t you just tell the truth about the new law? You believe the gov t shouldn t be providing health care, right? Say so Jeremy Greenfield (@jdgreenfield) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan it literally says 24 million people will be uninsured by 2026, how fucking evil are you dude? Jeremy M (@thismyshow) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan that s not what the report says. You re a dumb liar and your selfish actions will kill people. Myles Tanzer (@mylestanzer) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan 24 million people will lose coverage, as per the CBO s report. _Your own guy_ is saying this bill is a healthcare disaster. Laura Anne Gilman (@LAGilman) March 13, 2017.@SpeakerRyan the CBO report says literally the opposite. Specifically, how premiums will go up and will cause 24 million to lose insurance Emanuel Zbeda (@therealezway) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan You re a liar and I wish hell was real. BenDavid Grabinski (@bdgrabinski) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan It will. Take insurance. Away from. 24 million people. Who will die. And the blood. Will be on. Your hands. K. Thor Jensen (@kthorjensen) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan you re a disingenuous amoral shitstain Matthew Kory (@mattymatty2000) March 13, 2017@speakerryan You re a walking pile of horseshit shaped like a man. Robot Chicken (@cyborgturkey) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan I wonder if @oreillyfactor still has that No Spin Zone segment cause this is some dressed up trash. 24 million w/o access! Sophia (@SophiaTesfaye) March 13, 2017.@SpeakerRyan for real, what report are you reading that caused you to draw *this* conclusion? Jay Willis (@jaywillis) March 13, 2017.@SpeakerRyan Did you even read it? Beth Elderkin (@BethElderkin) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA Bruce Holsinger (@bruceholsinger) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan BRO seriously do even READ? AltUSCustoms (@alt_uscbp) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan By improve access do you mean making 24 million people lose coverage? Joe Hurwitz (@Joe_Hurwitz) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan Facts : CBO confirmed 24 Million will lose their Health Care : You ve put us all in danger https://t.co/R7UTjARnVi pic.twitter.com/WqHckwAxAm Jolene Sugarbaker (@JolenesTrailer) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan Your willingness to lie and let people die to save millionaires some money makes my skin crawl. Nerdista (@Nerdista) March 13, 2017@SpeakerRyan You are a pile of earwax in a suit. Dennis Perkins (@DennisPerkins5) March 13, 2017The CBO s report shows a bloodbath that Republicans are couching in pretty flowers, and Ryan is busy trying to convince us that the pretty flowers are all that exist here. Perhaps, in his mind, the scent of the flowers will cover the scent of blood in this if he just says it will enough times.Featured image via Win McNamee/Getty Images | 1real |
Texas cuts funding to Travis County over 'sanctuary city' policy | (Reuters) - Texas Governor Greg Abbott made good on his promise to cut $1.5 million in grant money to Travis County after the county sheriff said she would limit her department’s cooperation with federal immigration officers, county officials said on Wednesday. Travis County includes the Texas capital Austin, which is a so-called “sanctuary city”. Abbott spokeswoman Ciara Matthews said the money that would be withheld from Travis County is a series of one-time criminal justice grants totaling $1.8 million. About $300,000 of that has already been spent, but she said the governor would not try to claw back that money. Sanctuary cities in general offer safe harbor to illegal immigrants and often do not use municipal funds or resources to advance the enforcement of federal immigration laws. Sanctuary city is not an official designation. In January, newly elected Sheriff Sally Hernandez said in a statement on the Sheriff’s Office website that she was “following all state and federal laws, and upholding constitutional rights to due process for all in our criminal justice system. Our community is safer when people can report crimes without fear of deportation.” In a Jan. 20 memo seen by Reuters, her office said it would make an exception for people charged with serious crimes like murder, aggravated sexual assault, or human smuggling. Hernandez was not available to comment on Wednesday. Travis County Judge Sarah Eckhardt, who manages the county’s budget, said on Wednesday that Hernandez’s directive does not violate state or federal law. “Any of the 254 sheriffs across the state of Texas has discretion to decide whether or not to put their resources toward assisting federal immigration enforcement,” she said in a press conference that was webcast. “I will do everything I can to protect revenue sources. I believe it is foolhardy for the state to starve itself by starving its own programs,” she said. In a letter to Hernandez in January, Abbott said her position was “not a pronouncement of sound public policy; it is a dangerous game of political Russian roulette – with the lives of Texans at stake.” Abbott has voiced strong support for proposed legislation in Texas that would penalize sanctuary cities. On Tuesday, San Francisco, another sanctuary city, filed a lawsuit challenging a Jan. 25 executive order by President Donald Trump directing the U.S. government to withhold money from cities that have adopted sanctuary policies toward illegal immigrants. The lawsuit marked the first court challenge over the sanctuary order. New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Philadelphia, Boston, Denver, Washington and Seattle, in addition to San Francisco, offer forms of protection to illegal immigrants, and billions of dollars in federal aid to those cities could be at risk. | 0fake |
Republicans Actually Think White People Face More Oppression – Seriously (DETAILS) | There are a lot of polls out there, a lot of research, and it s hard to discern what s real from the signal-to-noise ratio. That s why, as a general rule, I prefer to read studies, polls, academic papers the things meant to educate me from people who aren t getting paid to produce them. Not that a paycheck is bad, mind you. It just creates a motive for a certain outcome that usually aligns with the checkbook holder s opinion. The Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) is a non-profit whose focus I suppose you can probably guess.The newest paper from PRRI comes on the heels of Trump s directive to the DOJ to begin investigating universities for discriminating against white people. Like all Republicans, Trump believes that Affirmative Action, by leveling the playing field, actually tilts it in favor of people of color.That s asinine, but I guarantee that you whoever you are, reading this you know someone who thinks the same thing.In fact, that was the focus of PRRI s latest research. This graph shows responses from different demographics to queries on just who, exactly, is discriminated against in America.There are some interesting takeaways here: First, of course, is that Democrats are likeliest to see discrimination where it demonstrably exists. To be a partisan at least requires one to be versed in the aims of the party they favor, and Democrats aim to reduce discrimination. But even more fascinating to me are the averages, over in the All Americans section of the graph. This reflected the opinions of both partisan groups and those who identified as neither, combined.The fact that any respondents indicated they thought there even was discrimination against whites is hilarious to me. I personally think they re confusing you didn t get that job with you kinda felt uncomfortable on the subway the other night, but I don t really have science on my side with that informal study. But Christians? Are you kidding me? You don t even have to be a member to get their holidays off work! That kind of response makes Republicans even more heartbreakingly stupid than I thought.In literally every case, the group of Democratic respondents is closer to the views of All Americans than the group of Republicans. All of them. Look back at the graph and do the addition or subtraction. In every case, Republicans were less likely to see discrimination where it does exist and more likely to see it where it does not.Me, looking for an image for this article. (screenshot)Explains a lot, doesn t it?Featured image via Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images | 1real |
Catalonia's High Court asks Spanish police to provide security in case of independence | BARCELONA (Reuters) - Catalonia s High Court has asked for Spanish national police to provide extra security at the court building in case the Catalan parliament goes ahead with a unilateral declaration of independence, the court said on Monday. The decision to ask for Spanish national police to supplement Catalan police guarding the building was taken in order to increase the security of the building and to guarantee its full and normal operation in the event of a Catalan declaration of independence from Spain, the court said in a statement. | 0fake |
Incoherent Lady Goes On CNN To Inform Paul Ryan She’ll Destroy Him For Bashing Trump (VIDEO) | If there s one thing politicians should be terrified of, it s the power and influence of Sarah Palin. You know, because her guy always wins. Oh wait, no, that s wrong. She s a joke and tries to stay relevant by grabbing onto the nearest coattails of anyone who will thrust her back into the spotlight.The failed former vice presidential candidate and reality television star is apparently furious Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) isn t backing Donald Trump, and she s hellbent on ending his career. Although, the only political career she s been great at destroying is her own.Palin told CNN s Jack Tapper, using Cantored as a verb, you know, like Eric Cantor, I think Paul Ryan is soon to be Cantored.' Of course, Cantor was ousted in his primary back in 2014. A man who, as House Majority Leader, everyone assumed would be a shoo-in for Speaker of the House, a job that eventually went to Paul Ryan.I m sure Paul Ryan is trembling in his penny loafers.Watch Palin ramble on here about Ryan:Sarah Palin: Paul Ryan s political career is over, but for a miracle https://t.co/peFwtPCwKy #PalinOnCNN https://t.co/NxEo9lH0If CNN Politics (@CNNPolitics) May 8, 2016 She wasn t done, though, Palin said: His political career is over but for a miracle because he has so disrespected the will of the people, and as the leader of the GOP, the convention, certainly he is to remain neutral, and for him to already come out and say who he will not support is not a wise decision of his. No no, your political career is over, Palin. You. But she believes Ryan s ultimate goal is a White House run in 2020: If the GOP were to win now, that wouldn t bode well for his chances in 2020, and that s what he s shooting for. Palin also insinuates that she ll be backing Paul Ryan s primary challenger in Wisconisn, Trump supporter Paul Nehlen, stating: This man is a hard-working guy, so in touch with the people. Paul Ryan and his ilk, their problem is they have become so disconnected by the people whom they are elected to represent. Also saying: They feel so threatened at this point that their power, their prestige, their purse will be adversely affected by the change that is coming with Trump and with someone like Paul Nehlen, that they re not thinking straight right now. Sarah Palin: I will do whatever I can for Paul Ryan s primary challenger https://t.co/fRtfZtmgag #PalinOnCNN https://t.co/2OgJQlv9Ri CNN (@CNN) May 8, 2016Will Speaker Ryan be threatened by Palin? Likely not. The only thing she threatens is the decency of the spoken English word.The fact that Jake Tapper had her on State of the Union is still mind-boggling, but alas, there she was, to spew her world salad and throw a hissy fit because someone dared to have an opinion about Trump that differed from her own. One day she won t be taken seriously anymore by the media, and that day can t come soon enough.Featured image via video screen capture | 1real |
Trump luxury hotel opens just blocks from the White House | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump opened the latest outpost in his real estate empire on Monday, a luxury hotel in a historic building five blocks from the White House that underwent a two-year, $200 million renovation. While staff members at the 263-room Trump International Hotel planned little hoopla for what they described as a “soft opening,” about 40 protesters opposed to the New York real estate developer’s presidential run gathered outside. The opening came eight weeks before the Nov. 8 election. “It kind of fits his personality that he finds a way to be on Pennsylvania Avenue, one way or another,” said protester Judy Byron, 70, a Washington artist. The hotel, which includes a $20,000-a-night suite, is less than a mile (km) down Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House. The hotel is housed in Washington’s third-tallest building, the 1899 Old Post Office, built in the Romanesque Revival architectural style. Trump said on Twitter he had stopped by the property “to thank all of the tremendous men & women for their hard work!” The protesters criticized some of Trump’s positions, including a promise to build a wall along the Mexican border to block illegal immigrants. Protest organizer Andrew Castro of Baltimore said: “We’re out here building a wall against racism.” Dozens of people filtered in and out on Monday afternoon, some to gawk and others pausing for a drink at the hotel’s bar. On his way in, Ric Hedlund, who works in port development, said he had been impressed by the renovations of a building that he said was previously “a dump.” “I’m going in to drink Trump wine,” said Hedlund, who added he also supported Trump as a candidate. Trump’s daughter Ivanka, who helped negotiate the 60-year lease with the U.S. government and oversaw the building’s revamp and design, said the project had come in a year ahead of schedule and under budget. “We have really positioned this hotel to not only be the finest hotel in D.C. but in the country,” she said in a telephone interview. A grand-opening ceremony is planned for next month. Trump attended the 2014 groundbreaking for the renovations alongside local Democratic officials before launching his presidential campaign last year. While Trump’s name is hard to escape in his native New York, where it adorns structures including the Trump Tower as well as a Bronx golf course, the hotel marks his most visible presence in Washington. His comments describing some Mexican immigrants as criminals prompted celebrity chefs Jose Andres and Geoffrey Zakarian to pull out of the project. Trump has sued them. | 0fake |
Canada jury clears man of terrorism charges in Christmas lights bomb case | MONTREAL (Reuters) - A Canadian jury on Tuesday found a man guilty of possessing an explosive substance but cleared him and his partner of three terrorism-related charges after the government alleged they were trying to build a bomb with ingredients that included Christmas lights. The Montreal couple, El Mahdi Jamali and Sabrine Djermane, were charged with trying to leave Canada to join a terrorist group, possessing an explosive substance, facilitating a terrorist activity and committing an offense for a terrorist group. Jamali, now 20, was found guilty of a reduced charge of possessing explosives without a lawful excuse and acquitted of other charges. Jamali was given credit for time served and ordered released during a Tuesday afternoon hearing. He was also prohibited from owning a firearm for 10 years. Djermane, 21, was acquitted of all charges. The two had been detained since they were arrested in 2015, when they were teenagers. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police found a handwritten bomb-making recipe copied from a propaganda magazine published by al Qaeda militants when the police searched a condo rented by the couple in 2015, according to prosecutors. The two were arrested at a time when international security forces reported that college students from Montreal were among waves of young people heading to Syria to join Islamic State militants. RCMP began investigating the couple after receiving a tip, and arrested them days later. Canadian prosecutor Lyne Decarie said she has not ruled out filing an appeal and would examine the judge s instructions to the jury. The government has 30 days to file an appeal. | 0fake |
Gunmen fire shots at Greece's socialist party headquarters | ATHENS (Reuters) - Two gunmen fired a round of shots at the headquarters of Greece s socialist Pasok party in central Athens on Monday, causing no injuries but slightly damaging a nearby clothing store, police said. The shots were fired about an hour before a televised debate among candidates to lead the broader socialist alliance. There were about 30 people inside the party s headquarters when at least four shots were fired. Two men were seen leaving the scene on a motorbike, a police official said. A police officer on duty had seen an assailant pointing a gun at him but managed to take cover, the official said, suggesting the gunmen were not targeting the party but the police outside. Pasok has often been the target of violent attacks in the past and its current leader Fofi Gennimata blamed the government for not taking action to prevent this. We have repeatedly been the target of attacks, Gennimata told Skai TV. We have repeatedly warned the citizens protection minister in the past. In January attackers shot at riot police guarding the Pasok offices, slightly wounding one officer. The leftist-led government condemned the attack. | 0fake |
Turkey, Russia and an Assassination: The Swirling Crises, Explained - The New York Times | Turkey and Russia, whose relationship has helped shape the Syrian war and its related crises, shared a new trauma on Monday after an Turkish police officer assassinated Russia’s ambassador. The killing of Andrey G. Karlov in Ankara caused global alarm and raised questions about the larger consequences. On social media, many drew parallels to the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, which helped set off World War I — a comparison that analysts, thankfully, reject. No group has claimed responsibility for the attack, which took place at an art gallery in the Turkish capital where Mr. Karlov was speaking. The gunman, who was killed at the scene by security forces, shouted “God is great” in Arabic and later said in Turkish: “Don’t forget Aleppo. Don’t forget Syria. ” That may hint at his motive: The Russian Air Force was a key part of the Syrian government’s successful assault on parts of Aleppo, which included widespread attacks on civilians. What follows is an explanation of what the episode means for Turkey, Russia, Syria and the United States. That seems very unlikely. So far, both countries are working to manage the situation and sending signals of cooperation. They appear to be aligning their explanations of what happened, pointing their fingers at mutual enemies but not each other. The reason is Syria. In the past few months, Turkey and Russia have taken pains to line up their strategies there. Aaron Stein, a Turkey expert at the Atlantic Council, put it bluntly: “Turkey needs Russia to advance its war interests. Russia needs Turkey to win, as it defines winning, in Syria. Everyone has an incentive to handle this like adults. ” A crisis over a dead ambassador could jeopardize the two countries’ stakes in Syria — or, worse, revive the destabilizing tensions of last year — so they are working to smooth things over. Also over Syria, which goes to show the volatility of the situation. It also demonstrates that both countries are so focused on protecting their Syria agendas that even their nationalistic, leaders would rather play it cool. The two countries were, and to some extent still are, on opposite sides of the Syrian war. Turkey opposes President Bashar of Syria and has backed rebel groups. Russia supports Mr. Assad and entered the conflict on his behalf in the fall of 2015. Shortly after Russia intervened, its planes began bombing rebels and flew along — Turkey says across — the border. In November 2015, Turkey shot down a Russian jet, precipitating a major crisis and fears of war. That also could have pulled in the United States, which is bound by treaty to defend Turkey, a NATO ally, and wanted to avoid escalation in Syria. Under those circumstances, the assassination of an ambassador could provoke an even larger conflict. But over the last year, the countries’ relationship has changed significantly. After years of pursuing Mr. Assad’s downfall, Turkey shifted this summer to a more modest strategy: preventing Syrian Kurdish groups from accumulating too much territory along the border. That change aligned the country with Russia. Turkey fears that Kurdish control of the border would strengthen Kurdish separatism in Turkey, where the government is fighting Kurdish groups, some of which have carried out terrorist attacks. Russia’s entry into the war also changed Turkey’s calculus, making the campaign against Mr. Assad suddenly costlier and less likely to succeed. Russia, for its part, initially struggled to gain ground against the Syrian rebels, some of whom received Turkish backing. Moscow appears to have concluded that it is better off with Turkey as a partner than an adversary. The two countries appeared to settle on an unofficial deal: Turkey would drop its support for certain rebels who threatened Russian interests in Syria, and Russia would drop its support for Syrian Kurdish groups. Russia also allowed Turkish troops and allied militias to occupy Syrian border territory that had previously been controlled by Kurds and the Islamic State. Mr. Stein of the Atlantic Council called the arrangement “Aleppo for Al Bab”: Russia and Mr. Assad would take Aleppo, while militias would take the strategically located town of Al Bab. Because the cities are nearly adjacent, the Turkish and Russian campaigns benefit each other. At the same time, with their forces mere miles apart, a major breakdown over Mr. Karlov’s assassination would simply be too dangerous to tolerate. There is no indication so far that Turkey or Russia will alter their Syria policies. If anything, the attack may cement their partnership. Mr. Stein predicted that President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey would seek to distract attention from his government’s unpopular Syria policy by pinning the attack on the United Turkish cleric Fethullah Gulen, whom Mr. Erdogan also blamed for a coup attempt in Turkey this summer. Mr. Gulen has denied the charges, and Washington has refused to extradite him, citing a lack of evidence. That has strained ties between the United States and Turkey, though this tension serves Mr. Erdogan by helping him to rally support at home, where America is unpopular. “The biggest loser from this will be Washington,” Mr. Stein said. “It’s completely counterintuitive, but it’s Washington. ” | 0fake |
Is This Why Comey Broke: A Stack Of Resignation Letters From Furious FBI Agents | Is This Why Comey Broke: A Stack Of Resignation Letters From Furious FBI Agents Source: Zero Hedge
Conspiracy theories have swirled in recent days as to why FBI Director James Comey reopened Hillary's email investigation after just closing it back in July concluding that, although Hillary had demonstrated gross negligence in her establishment of a private email server, that "no reasonable prosecutor" would bring a case against her. Democrats, after lavishing Comey with praise for months on concluding his investigation in an "impartial" way, have since lashed out at him for seeking to influence the 2016 election cycle with Hillary herself describing his recent actions as "deeply troubling". Republicans, on the other hand, have praised Comey's recent efforts as an attempt to correct a corrupt investigation that seemingly ignored critical evidence while granting numerous immunity agreements to Clinton staffers.
According to the Daily Mail , and a source close to James Comey, the decision, at least in part, came after he "could no longer resist mounting pressure by mutinous agents in the FBI" who "felt that he betrayed them and brought disgrace on the bureau by letting Hillary off with a slap on the wrist."
James Comey's decision to revive the investigation of Hillary Clinton's email server and her handling of classified material came after he could no longer resist mounting pressure by mutinous agents in the FBI , including some of his top deputies, according to a source close to the embattled FBI director.
'The atmosphere at the FBI has been toxic ever since Jim announced last July that he wouldn't recommend an indictment against Hillary,' said the source, a close friend who has known Comey for nearly two decades, shares family outings with him, and accompanies him to Catholic mass every week.
'Some people, including department heads, stopped talking to Jim, and even ignored his greetings when they passed him in the hall,' said the source. 'They felt that he betrayed them and brought disgrace on the bureau by letting Hillary off with a slap on the wrist.'
According to the source, Comey fretted over the problem for months and discussed it at great length with his wife, Patrice.
He told his wife that he was depressed by the stack of resignation letters piling up on his desk from disaffected agents. The letters reminded him every day that morale in the FBI had hit rock bottom.
'The people he trusts the most have been the angriest at him,' the source continued. 'And that includes his wife, Pat. She kept urging him to admit that he had been wrong when he refused to press charges against the former secretary of state.
Though we're sure there are many facets behind Comey's decision making process, we can all be quite certain, at this point, that he's not motivated by a desire to make friends having now alienated just about everyone in Washington, both in law enforcement and in both political parties. In fact, after Tim Kaine just last week praised Comey as a "wonderful" career public servant with the "highest standards of integrity" ....
...everything has now been turned on it's head with Hillary calling his latest moves "unprecedented and deeply troubling"...seemingly implying an attempt, on the part of Comey, to "rig" the election from Trump .
Meanwhile, President Obama and Attorney General Loretta Lynch are apparently also "furious" with Comey over his recent decision.
His announcement about the revived investigation, which came just 11 days before the presidential election, was greeted with shock and dismay by Attorney General Loretta Lynch and the prosecutors at the Justice Department.
'Jim told me that Lynch and Obama are furious with him,' the source said.
'Lynch and Obama haven't contacted Jim directly,' said the source, 'but they've made it crystal clear through third parties that they disapprove of his effort to save face.'
And while the decision to reopen the case may appease FBI agents and republicans, in the short-term, we suspect it does very little to restore overall faith in his competence. As such, we continue to question just how long Comey can hold out before being forced to resign his post. At a bare minimum, in light of his continued questionable judgement and serious doubts raised about the integrity of the first investigation, we fail to understand how an independent investigation into Hillary's email server isn't warranted.
OOOOh! The remorse! The GUILT ! I can almost feel it from here!
Get off it, ....you jabbering, fast talking, asshole.
Statements? ... 'Reopening investigations' (Is that a maybe you wiil have a couple of interns fiddle with Emails a little longer?) and then having legal promptly announce they will take MONTHS and MONTHS to complete the case? .... We Have AN ELECTION LOOKING AT US! ..We need to know who the bad guys are. But, then we already know, don't we?
No, a resignation is in order. .. Declare a 'conflict of interest' and turn states evidence would be more like it. .... You - Are - A - Crook Dir Comey.
I know ZHers are getting tired of seeing this but for the benefit of any little clueless FBI junior G-Men out there that can still read English: | 1real |
Quarter of Republicans think Cruz's birthplace disqualifies him for president: poll | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A quarter of Republicans think White House hopeful Ted Cruz is disqualified to serve as U.S. president because he was born in Canada to an American mother, a new Reuters/Ipsos poll found. Republican voters nearly mirror independents and the broader electorate in their belief that Cruz cannot hold the White House, with 27 percent of all voters and 28 percent of independents responding he should be disqualified. Cruz, a U.S. Senator from Texas who was born to a U.S. citizen mother and Cuban father in Calgary, Alberta, has brushed aside the attacks about his eligibility as pure politics. But the questions could hamper his ability to rally the broad Republican support he would need to win the party’s nomination to run for the presidency in November’s election. Only 47 percent of all voters surveyed responded that they thought Cruz is qualified to be president with regard to his citizenship, with 26 percent saying they were not sure. The poll was taken from Jan. 7 to Jan. 14, before questions about Cruz’s eligibility became one of the most heated moments of Thursday night’s Republican primary debate. New York businessman and reality TV star Donald Trump has made questions about Cruz’s eligibility a regular attack line on the campaign trail and the debate stage. “I already know the Democrats are going to be bringing a suit. You have a big lawsuit over your head while you’re running, and if you become the nominee, who the hell knows if you can even serve in office?” Trump said during Thursday night’s debate. “So you should go out, get a declaratory judgment, let the courts decide.” But Cruz tried to use Trump’s own previous words against him in response. “Back in September, my friend Donald said that he had his lawyers look at this from every which way and there was nothing to do this,” Cruz said. “Since September, the Constitution hasn’t changed, but the poll numbers have.” Trump became a conservative darling in 2011 when he repeatedly questioned President Barack Obama’s eligibility to be president, insisting that the president may have been born in another country and demanding to see his birth certificate. Obama was born in Hawaii. It made Trump one of the most well-known “birthers,” a term used to describe those who insisted Obama had been born elsewhere. The constitutional issue at question is the requirement that a president be a “natural born” citizen. Cruz, 45, has argued that because he became a citizen at the time he was born, that makes him qualify as natural born. But his opponents argue that at the time of the writing of the Constitution, natural born would have required being born on American soil. U.S. Senator John McCain, who ran as the Republican nominee in 2008, was born in Panama, but argued he met the requirement because his birth took place on a U.S. military installation, which is the same as American soil. The poll, which has a confidence interval of 5 percentage points, posed two questions to two separate polls of voters. One group was asked about Cruz’s eligibility. The other half was asked a generic question about the eligibility of anyone born in Canada with an American parent. (Reporting by Ginger Gibson and Chris Kahn; editing by Grant McCool) SAP is the sponsor of this coverage which is independently produced by the staff of Reuters News Agency. | 0fake |
Dumb American Youth | Email
Do you wonder why Sen. Bernie Sanders and his ideas are so popular among American college students? The answer is that they, like so many other young people who think they know it all, are really uninformed and ignorant. You say, "Williams, how dare you say that?! We've mortgaged our home to send our children to college." Let's start with the 2006 geographic literacy survey of youngsters between 18 and 24 years of age by National Geographic and Roper Public Affairs.
Less than half could identify New York and Ohio on a U.S. map. Sixty percent could not find Iraq or Saudi Arabia on a map of the Middle East, and three-quarters could not find Iran or Israel. In fact, 44 percent could not locate even one of those four countries. Youngsters who had taken a geography class didn't fare much better. By the way, when I attended elementary school, during the 1940s, we were given blank U.S. maps, and our assignment was to write in the states. Today such an assignment might be deemed oppressive, if not racist.
According to a Philadelphia magazine article, the percentage of college grads who can read and interpret a food label has fallen from 40 to 30. They are six times likelier to know who won "American Idol" than they are to know the name of the speaker of the House. A high-school teacher in California handed out an assignment that required students to use a ruler. Not a single student knew how.
An article on News Forum for Lawyers titled "Study Finds College Students Remarkably Incompetent" cites a study done by the American Institutes for Research that revealed that over 75 percent of two-year college students and 50 percent of four-year college students were incapable of completing everyday tasks. About 20 percent of four-year college students demonstrated only basic mathematical ability, while a steeper 30 percent of two-year college students could not progress past elementary arithmetic. NBC News reported that Fortune 500 companies spend about $3 billion annually to train employees in "basic English."
Reported by Just Facts , in 2009, the Pentagon estimated that 65 percent of 17- to 24-year-olds in the U.S. were unqualified for military service because of weak educational skills, poor physical fitness, illegal drug usage, medical conditions or criminal records. In January 2014, the commander of the U.S. Army Recruiting Command estimated this figure at 77.5 percent, and in June 2014, the Department of Defense estimated this figure at 71 percent (http://tinyurl.com/guz7pqy).
A few weeks ago, my column discussed the dishonesty of college officials. Here's more evidence: Among high-school students who graduated in 2014 and took the ACT college readiness exam, here's how various racial/ethnic groups fared when it came to meeting the ACT's college readiness benchmarks in at least three of the four subjects: Asians, 57 percent; whites, 49 percent; Hispanics, 23 percent; and blacks, 11 percent. However, the college rates of enrollment of these groups were: Asians, 80 percent; whites, 69 percent; Hispanics, 60 percent; and blacks, 57 percent. What I am labeling as dishonest, fraudulent or deceitful comes from the fact that many more students are admitted to college than are in fact college-ready. Admitting such students may satisfy the wants and financial interests of the higher education establishment, but whether it serves the interests of students, families, taxpayers and the nation is another question.
To accommodate less-college-ready students, colleges must water down their curricula, lower standards and abandon traditional tools and topics. Emory University English professor Mark Bauerlein writes in his book The Dumbest Generation : Tradition "serves a crucial moral and intellectual function.... People who read Thucydides and Caesar on war, and Seneca and Ovid on love, are less inclined to construe passing fads as durable outlooks, to fall into the maelstrom of celebrity culture, to presume that the circumstances of their own life are worth a Web page."
Walter E. Williams is a professor of economics at George Mason University. To find out more about Walter E. Williams and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate webpage at www.creators.com .
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Watch Father of #Benghazi Victim Slam Hillary: “My son would still be alive…” – #NeverForget The Benghazi Heroes 9/11/12 [Video] | We will never forget the men who gave everything in Benghazi EVER!Charles Woods speaks up on Hillary Clinton s ineptness and inability to properly do her job as Secretary of State: My son would still be alive if she had performed her duties and protected the people under her care and supervision in Libya. If she couldn t protect four Americans in Libya, how can she protect 330 million Americans here in our country? THIRTEEN HOURS IN BENGHAZI-THE SURVIVORS TELL THEIR STORY:FIVE FACTS ABOUT HILLARY AND BENGHAZI:THIS IS EVERYTHING IN ONE PICTURE: EVIL! | 1real |
Black Agenda Radio for Week of Nov. 7, 2016 | News, information and analysis from the black left. Black Agenda Radio for Week of Nov. 7, 2016 Submitted by Nellie Bailey a... on Mon, 11/07/2016 - 19:35 Venezuela Hi-Tech Production in the Service of Humanity in Mississippi
Renaissance Jackson, the organization that briefly won the mayor’s office in predominantly Black Jackson, Mississippi, has launched a campaign to purchase a coding and programming capacity and a 3-D fabrication facility. They call it “Fab Lab.” This technology, “if it is democratically controlled, could actually serve humanity,” said Cooperation Jackson spokesman Kali Akuno . These kinds of projects are crucial, “first and foremost, to satisfy some of the basic needs of our community, and -- on a deeper level -- to really put this means of production directly in our community’s hands.” High tech is “one of these areas of the so-called ‘digital divide’ that Black people have been sorely and strategically absent from,” said Akuno. “So, we are doing it for ourselves.” Obamacare “Imploding and Beyond Repair”
The current wave of insurance rate hikes and medical service cutbacks is the predictable result of an Affordable Care Act (ACA) that “was pretty much a gift to the health insurance industry” when Congress passed it, in 2010, said Dr. John Geyman , professor emeritus of family medicine at the University of Washington School of Medicine, in Seattle. ACA “was never designed for affordability -- it’s a misnomer in the name of the bill,” he said. Obamacare is “imploding and beyond repair,” and unsustainable. “Tweeks cannot work in the long term. The main fight should be for what will save money and give universal coverage to everyone: namely, single payer national health insurance.” Dr. Geyman said single payer healthcare could save $500 billion a year -- about the same as the entire U.S. “defense” budget. The Fight for Education for Liberation in Detroit
At a “Community Conversation on the Crisis in the Schools,” Detroit activists, educators and parents gathered to address the question: “Who Created the School Crisis, and How are We Responding to it?” Among those wrestling with the issue was Dr. Thomas Pedroni , professor of Curriculum Studies at Wayne State University. He said the decline began with the state takeover of schools in the 1990s, and worsened dramatically after the imposition of state-appointed “emergency managers.” “School could be one of the most meaningful places for our communities, but instead, it’s deadened,” Dr. Pedroni told the crowd at the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History. “But, we’re going to fight to get back to the place where we have culturally relevant curriculum, not just producing a test score but to develop people who are self-empowered and who know how to fight for their community.” Venezuela Weathering Financial Storm, Despite Disinformation Campaign
“I challenge you to find one item of news that is positive to Venezuela in these last 16 or 17 years,” said Maria Paez Victor , a Venezuelan-born sociologist living in Toronto, Canada, and author of an article titled “Hating Venezuela.” Ms. Victor said the United States and its rightwing allies in Venezuela have kept up a non-stop disinformation campaign ever since the late Hugo Chavez and his Socialist Party were democratically elected in 1998. A crisis triggered by the collapse of world oil prices allowed the opposition to capture the legislature, last year, but Victor says the government is coping. “Venezuela has managed to weather a terrible financial situation, but this is bad news for corporate capitalism and for the United States, because they want Venezuela to be controlled by their lackies.” Black Agenda Radio on the Progressive Radio Network is hosted by Glen Ford and Nellie Bailey. A new edition of the program airs every Monday at 11:00am ET on PRN. Length: one hour. | 1real |
A One-Cent Soda Tax Gets Expensive in California - The New York Times | In this most contentious of elections, you wouldn’t think that a soda tax would be the issue to attract the big bucks. But measures in just two California cities have drawn more money than that state’s Senate race and statewide referendums on marijuana legalization and gun control — combined. Soda taxes are on the ballots in San Francisco and Oakland, Calif. and spending to persuade citizens to vote for or against them has topped $50 million — enough to buy every person in those two cities about 100 cans of Coke, at least if you bought them in bulk. On the side are big donations from billionaires: Michael Bloomberg, the former mayor of New York, and Laura and John Arnold. And opposing them are the companies in the beverage industry, which is outspending them by a ratio of about 3 to 2. The battle is the biggest so far by health advocates in their efforts to reduce the consumption of sugary carbonated soft drinks that they say leads to obesity, diabetes and tooth decay. The idea of taxing beverages, which the measures would do, was initially an esoteric idea hashed out in medical journals. Some municipal officials showed interest, but, until recently, no soda tax got far. The failure of 40 tax measures around the country reflected public skepticism about the idea, often seen as a intrusion. But it also reflected the lopsided investment of industry to defeat them. Recently, the tide has begun to turn, helped in part by big donations from Mr. Bloomberg. Two years ago, Berkeley, Calif. became the first city in the country to pass such a tax. Mr. Bloomberg got involved late in the effort, when it became clear the law had a chance of passing. (San Francisco had its own failed initiative that year it won a majority of votes but failed to clear a supermajority threshold, a bar it won’t need to clear this time.) In June, Philadelphia passed its own soda tax through the City Council. The beverage industry spent about $10 million there, but Mr. Bloomberg weighed in too, contributing about $1. 6 million of the $2. 5 million spent to support the bill. Albany, Calif. another community in the Bay Area, is also voting Tuesday, though there has been less direct spending there. Boulder, Colo. will vote on a soda tax measure Tuesday. And Cook County, Ill. which includes Chicago, is to consider a soda tax measure later this month. Public sentiment on soda is also shifting. Many Americans now say they are trying to avoid the products, and national sales of such drinks have been slipping. The Bay Area initiatives are expensive prizes. Unlike Philadelphia, where much of the battle was fought through lobbying, both California tax proposals must win passage by a majority of voters. That means both sides have invested in big public outreach campaigns. Citizens have been inundated with and tax TV and radio commercials, and mailboxes are filled with direct mail from both sides. Canvassers are making phone calls and going door to door in the final days of the campaign. Dan Newman, a political consultant with SCN Strategies, who is working on the campaign, said the volume of messages about the measures dwarfs the 2014 effort. “It was intense and expensive, and folks were amazed in talking about it,” he said of 2014. “And it was nothing like this. ” The tax battle has also prompted accusations of skulduggery. The soda industry enlisted the help of several local grocers to pose for mailers and state their opposition to the tax. Several of them, later approached by advocates and reporters, said they had been misled about the nature of the tax proposal. Others have become the subjects of negative Yelp reviews and threatened with boycotts, what an campaigner described as “intimidation. ” The measures are similar in both cities: They would impose a tax of one cent per ounce of any drink with added sugar, including sugary soft drinks, iced teas and smoothies. The taxes would be imposed on beverage distributors, not at the checkout registers. The emerging evidence from existing soda taxes suggests those higher prices will be passed through to retailers and then to shoppers. If they are, they could result in a price increase of 67 cents on a bottle, or $1. 44 for a . Those higher prices are intended to discourage shoppers from consuming so many sugary drinks, which have been linked to obesity, diabetes and tooth decay. The side has been emphasizing the negative health effects of consumption, and arguing the tax will make the city’s children healthier. Research from Mexico, which passed a national soda tax in 2014, shows that the taxes can drive down soda consumption. But it is not known yet whether those reductions will result in better health. The industry argues that the taxes have no clear connection to public health and that they will fall disproportionately on shoppers. In California, they have also been arguing that the taxes could result in higher prices for other items at the grocery store as retailers try to spread the rising wholesale cost of soft drinks over other products. But there is no research from Berkeley or Mexico that advocates could cite to support the notion. A local coalition of advocates, led by the American Beverage Association, a trade group for began sending direct mail months earlier than is typical for a ballot initiative. Susan Neely, the association’s president, said her organization was committed to fighting soda taxes on every front. “We oppose them wherever they are introduced — that is a clear position that we have staked out,” she said. “That is not going to change. ” There has been little public polling on the measures, though consultants on both sides said they have been polling privately, and the vote will be close. The complexity of the city’s ballots this year makes predicting a result hard. In San Francisco, voters are considering more than 40 initiatives, including two separate measures about plastic shopping bags. The beverage tax is fairly far down on both ballots, which means some voters may grow fatigued and fail to weigh in. | 0fake |
Gritty New Jersey a source of wealth for Trump's son-in-law | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Roadside apartments, industrial lots and a trailer park in New Jersey counted among the sources of wealth for Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, before he took up his new role as a senior White House adviser. A lengthy financial disclosure form released on Friday by the White House, along with scores of others for senior White House staffers, showed the downscale New Jersey roots of the family business run until recently by Ivanka Trump’s husband. For instance, in the 12 months before he began his White House employment, Kushner made more than $2,500 in rental income from tenants of Union, New Jersey’s Park Lane Mobile Home Park. A small, industrial lot nearby brought in no more than $5,000. In the town of Wayne, New Jersey, Kushner disclosed ownership of a block of street-level apartments that returned more than $15,000, according to the paperwork. Kushner’s stakes in such holdings were among the smallest he reported. White House ethics officials said the legally required disclosure document gave a snapshot of the assets and positions Kushner held when he entered his new job as adviser to his father-in-law, and before he would have started selling assets that could pose conflicts of interest. Kushner’s 54-page report also included most of the assets and income of his wife. It covered scores of assets worth six- and seven-figures. The New York Times reported the couple’s real estate and investment empire was worth as much as $741 million. As reported, Kushner’s property portfolio did not rival the collection of glitzy hotels, casinos and golf courses owned, controlled or licensed by the president. But Kushner reported an interest in the Puck Building, a landmark in New York City. It was one of his most valuable holdings and delivered millions of dollars in income. Kushner’s grandfather anchored the family real estate business in northern New Jersey. His father, Charles, built that empire until 2004 when he pleaded guilty to 18 counts of tax evasion, witness tampering and making unlawful campaign donations and was sentenced to two years in prison. | 0fake |
Ethics Office Just Called Out GOP For Shady Schemes To Confirm Trump’s Corrupt Cabinet Picks | A lot can be said for Trump s cabinet picks. They are the richest of the rich, the lowest of the low, and the most corrupt of the corrupt. Republicans are fully aware of this but they plan to push them through without even completing the vetting process and a federal watchdog just called them out on their shady scheme.According to the Washington Post, the head of the Office of Government Ethics penned a letter to Democratic Senators on Saturday, which warns that Republicans are planning to hold confirmation hearings on Trump s nominees before the necessary paperwork has even been done to ensure there are no ethical, financial or criminal concerns. Walter M. Shaub Jr., the ethics director, said the idea that the GOP intends to hold confirmation hearings without an ethics review is of great concern to me. The Post reports:Plans for at least seven Trump nominees to sit for hearings on Capitol Hill in the coming days have created undue pressure on OGE s staff and agency ethics officials to rush through these important reviews, Shaub wrote. More significantly, it has left some of the nominees with potentially unknown or unresolved ethics issues shortly before their scheduled hearings. Shaub added: I am not aware of any occasion in the four decades since OGE was established when the Senate held a confirmation hearing before the nominee had completed the ethics review process. The letter gives even more firepower to concerned Democrats who say the GOP is trying to rush Trump s cabinet picks through. Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) says the letter makes crystal-clear that the transition team s collusion with Senate Republicans to jam through these Cabinet nominees before they ve been thoroughly vetted is unprecedented. The Senate and the American people deserve to know that these Cabinet nominees have a plan to avoid any conflicts of interest, that they re working on behalf of the American people and not their own bottom line, and that they plan to fully comply with the law. Senate Republicans should heed the advice of this independent office and stop trying to jam through unvetted nominees. Among Trump s top picks scheduled for confirmation hearings this week are Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), Trump s racist choice to serve as attorney general, and Rex Tillerson, the former ExxonMobil chief executive that Trump has nominated as secretary of state.It is unclear what effect, if any, the concerns of the ethics office will have on the confirmation of Trump s cabinet picks but it could make it more difficult for Republicans to simply wave them through without objection. Hearings are scheduled to take place on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.Featured image via Zach Gibson/Getty Images | 1real |
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