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3 Effects of Substance Abuse on Individual, Family and Community | Drug and substance abuse has ruined and taken the lives of many. Substance addiction or abuse happens to be a complicated and complex disease which gradually gnaws the addict of their physical,... | 1real |
ISIS activity prompts threat level increase at bases | Washington (CNN) Security conditions at U.S. military bases have been increased over growing concerns about terror threats, officials said Friday.
A U.S. official confirmed to CNN that U.S. military bases are now at "Force Protection Bravo," which is defined by the Pentagon as an "increased and predictable threat of terrorism." It is the third-highest threat level on a five-tier scale used by the Department of Defense.
U.S. military officials added Friday that the announcement, which comes in the aftermath of the shooting at a Texas cartoon contest featuring drawings of the Prophet Mohammed, was not the result of a specific threat but because the military had become concerned about several recent incidents.
The military became alarmed when one of the jihadists linked to the Garland attack tweeted the name and address of a U.S. military officer connected to the military's Syrian rebel training program, a U.S. military official told CNN.
The tweet, first published on an account connected to British-born jihadist Junaid Hussain, was sent out a few days before the attack on the cartoon exhibit and appeared to encourage an attack on the address.
Hussain is the same jihadist who is also believed, according to U.S. law enforcement officials, to have been messaging with Elton Simpson, one of the two attackers of the Texas event, and had been urging Simpson to take action.
That followed the publishing several weeks ago on ISIS-connected accounts of the name and addresses of about 100 military members.
On Thursday, FBI Director James Comey told reporters that there are thousands of ISIS, also known as ISIL, followers online in the U.S.
"We have a general concern, obviously, that ISIL is focusing on the uniformed military and law enforcement," Comey told reporters Thursday.
The order to upgrade the threat level was signed by Admiral William Gortney, head of the U.S. Northern Command, which oversees all U.S. military installations in the continental U.S. The security order affects 3,200 sites, including bases, National Guard facilities, recruiting stations and health clinics, a Pentagon official said.
"We have the same concern about the potential threat posed by violent homegrown extremists," said Captain Jeff Davis, spokesman for the U.S. Northern Command, or NORTHCOM.
Davis declined to specify the new security measures.
But the change in threat level status could mean more checks of vehicles entering bases, and more thorough identity checks of all personnel. Davis emphasized that "this is the new normal, that we are going to have increased vigilance and force protection. We seek to be unpredictable."
A U.S. military official said the order to raise the force protection level to Bravo also applies to all National Guard installations, recruiting stations, and ROTC detachments, though practically speaking, the official acknowledges it will be difficult for the ROTC detachments to do much more than security awareness.
In addition, security was raised recently at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton, Ohio, in response to a perceived threat to the base security, another U.S. military official said. The threat was never deemed credible, but it came after another security concern at a base in Delaware used by Vice President Joe Biden when he flies home.
On Friday, Wright-Patterson announced that the Air Force museum, which is part of the base, was canceling a planned Friday night concert and was stopping tours that were regularly offered until further notice. The base said this was "due to elevated security measures."
Since NORTHCOM was established in October 2002, the threat level has reached Bravo on four occasions: Feb. 9, 2003, amid concerns al Qaeda was planning attacks on American targets; Dec. 21, 2003, when officials were concerned about attacks during the holiday season; May 1, 2011, in the aftermath of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden; and the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.
It reached "Delta," its highest level, on Sept. 11, 2001, Pentagon officials told CNN at the time. | 0fake |
OBAMACARE AND THE FORGOTTEN FAMILY: A Tale Of How The Middle Class Was Royally Scr*wed By Washington [Video] | In light of Republican failure to pass the American Health Care Act, Charles Krauthammer dismissed the idea that Chuck Schumer would try to work with Republicans at all, since the Democrats are moving toward a single-payer system as the country increasingly expects coverage to be an entitlement:Read more: CNN | 1real |
Meet a man who will help determine Trump's fate in 2016 race | (Reuters) - Mark Strang spends his days delivering farm equipment, listening to politics on the radio during cross-country drives. But in July, the 63-year-old could have an outsized voice in choosing the Republican nominee for president of the United States. For the first time in 40 years, Republicans could arrive at their national convention in Cleveland without a nominee. If front-runner Donald Trump fails to lock up the nomination before then, as some pollsters are predicting, Strang will have a chance to make history. Strang, from Illinois, is one of 2,472 delegates to the convention who will ultimately determine the party’s choice for the White House this November. In recent elections, the delegates have simply rubberstamped the presumptive nominee. But this year the convention could become a brutal fight in which every delegate vote will count. Trump currently has 673 delegates after winning a string of nominating contests, but if he wants to avoid a floor fight at the convention he needs the magic number of 1,237. There is some doubt among election number crunchers that he can hit it. And that’s when Strang will step into the spotlight. After filling roles in local Republican politics, Strang was selected by Illinois voters to serve as a delegate for Republican candidate U.S. Senator Ted Cruz, of Texas. He likes Cruz for his position on guns and immigration. But if the convention becomes a fight because no candidate has the needed 1,237 delegates on the first round of voting, most of the delegates would eventually be released. States are still sorting through some rules governing how long delegates are bound to candidates. Strang said if he found himself a free agent, he would be open to switching his vote. (Graphic on how a contested convention works: tmsnrt.rs/1ROtOHw) “I am going to be loyal to Ted Cruz, and I will stick with him until I see if there’s no hope. And if there’s no hope for Ted getting in, as I understand it I can pledge my votes to somebody else, and I would hope Ted would understand,” he said. Interviews with Republican state party officials and some delegates who have already been selected reveal widespread soul-searching in anticipation of a potential fight. Officials and delegates described weighing their personal preference with the need to rally around a candidate going into the general election. Party faithful are steeling themselves for a battle, not just for the nomination, but also for the party’s core values. Establishment Republicans deeply opposed to Trump’s candidacy say he does not represent social and economic conservative values on healthcare, trade and the role of government in daily life. Trump has built his campaign on anti-establishment rhetoric and promises to build a wall along the Mexican border to keep out illegal immigrants, impose a temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States and restore the country’s manufacturing base. A contested convention would pose a major test for Trump’s campaign, which thus far has eschewed a traditional grassroots organization. His rivals, Cruz and Ohio Governor John Kasich, are already trying to lobby delegates who might be open to changing sides once they are allowed to become free agents in the convention. In every state, the party chair and two national committee members, a man and a woman, are automatically selected to be delegates. But from there, state parties use a wide variety of procedures to pick delegates, most of whom won’t be named until late spring or summer. “These are the base of the party,” said Michigan Republican Party chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel. “The delegates are not the establishment. They are the base. And I think that’s a great misunderstanding.” Often sporting outfits with homemade decorated hats or jackets weighed down with dozens of buttons, delegates who show up every four years include everyone from lawmakers to homemakers, and from those who write million dollar checks to retirees who make phone calls. Many states use small conventions to pick delegates, many of whom are long-time party activists and elected office holders. Not all of them personally back the candidate they are pledged to support in the first round of convention voting, said Virginia Republican Party chairman John Whitbeck. “We have two former governors, a former attorney general, state senators, state House of Delegates members, party leaders, big and small and donors,” said Whitbeck. In other states, such as Illinois, some delegates are elected by primary voters. In Ohio, which gives all its delegates to the statewide primary winner, candidates pick their own slate of convention representatives. Jim Carns, a state representative from Alabama, where delegates are selected in the primaries, signed up to represent Trump last fall — when many still viewed the rise of the New York real estate mogul as a temporary phenomenon. He sees no circumstance in which he would switch candidates. But he knows there will be efforts to win over delegates by both the Trump camp and their opponents. Once delegates are allowed to change their votes, some establishment figures have floated the potential to nominate someone who didn’t even run for president — such as House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan. But most of the 14 delegates interviewed by Reuters dismissed that as an option. “I almost think that I would walk away from the Republican Party if they did that,” said Strang, the Illinois delegate. “If we’d wanted Paul Ryan, we would have drafted him. And I don’t dislike Paul Ryan, but he didn’t run.” Ryan has said he is not interested in the presidency. | 0fake |
Breitbart News Daily: Paris Terror - Breitbart | On the Friday edition of Breitbart News Daily, broadcast live on SiriusXM Patriot Channel 125 from 6AM to 9AM Eastern, Breitbart Alex Marlow will continue our discussion of the first 100 days of the Trump administration. [Breitbart London Raheem Kassam will join Marlow to discuss the latest terror attack in Paris, which the Islamic State has claimed responsibility for. Peter Navarro, director of the White House National Trade Council, will discuss the president’s “Hire American” executive order and Trump’s call for an investigation of foreign steel imports. Mark Krikorian, the Executive Director of the Center for Immigration Studies, will discuss the deportation of a convicted illegal immigrant DREAMer. We’ll also hear from veteran pollster Pat Caddell. Live from London, Rome, and Jerusalem, Breitbart correspondents will provide updates on the latest international news. Breitbart News Daily is the first live, conservative radio enterprise to air seven days a week. SiriusXM Vice President for news and talk Dave Gorab called the show “the conservative news show of record. ” Follow Breitbart News on Twitter for live updates during the show. Listeners may call into the show at: . | 0fake |
North Korea petitions Russia to let workers stay despite sanctions: Ifax | MOSCOW (Reuters) - North Korea has petitioned the Russian parliament to help 3,500 migrant workers from the isolated Asian country stay in Russia despite new U.N. sanctions, the Interfax news agency reported on Friday, citing a Russian lawmaker. Tougher sanctions on North Korea, imposed by the United Nations Security Council over Pyongyang s ballistic missile and nuclear programs on Sept. 11, banned countries from providing new work permits for North Korean nationals, but allowed existing workers to remain. Most of the around 30,000-40,000 North Korean migrants legally working in Russia were hired before the new sanctions entered into force and the ban will not affect them, Interfax said, quoting an earlier statement from Maxim Topilin, Russia s labor minister. But the ban could apply to 3,500 workers who only signed their contracts in September, the month when the U.N. Security Council, including Russia, voted for the new sanctions, Interfax reported. It cited Kazbek Taysayev, a lawmaker in the lower house of parliament and a member of a friendship group between the Russian and North Korean parliaments, as saying: North Korea s embassy officially addressed us. We supported them and sent our petitions in order to let these people stay so that they can work. Even if the workers signed their contracts after the ban took effect, they had started making arrangements and preparing the documents earlier and could be allowed to stay, said Taysayev. The U.N. resolution said it did not apply to work permits for which written contracts have been finalized prior to the adoption of this resolution. North Korea s embassy in Moscow was not available for immediate comment. | 0fake |
Can Immigration Hurt the Economy? An Old Prejudice Returns - The New York Times | For a nation of immigrants, the United States has worked hard to keep foreigners out. The Statue of Liberty was less than 40 years old when President Calvin Coolidge signed the Immigration Act of 1924. It barred immigration from most of Asia. It cut the overall quota of immigration from countries outside the Americas in half. And it limited immigrants from other countries to 2 percent of the number of people of that country’s ancestry in the United States in 1890 — restricting immigration mostly to people from Northern and Western Europe. Those from Eastern and Southern Europe, not to say Africans, brought too many “types of social inadequacy. ” “Physically, the bodies of recent immigrants are sounder than those of the average American stock,” Harry H. Laughlin, appointed “expert eugenics agent” to the House Committee on Immigration and Naturalization, noted in 1922 testimony. “But with this sound body we have recently admitted inferior mental and social qualities of a constitutional nature which neither education nor better environment can be expected to raise above, or even to approximate, the average of the American descended from older immigrants. ” The quota system was overhauled in 1965, and immigration law today is more evenhanded. Still, the suspicion of immigrants as threats to society remains close to the surface. By claiming that people from Muslim nations threaten national security, that Mexicans are drug dealers and rapists, that immigrants take the jobs of Americans or burden taxpayers by reliance on welfare, President Trump has drawn it back to the center of political debate. This time, suspicion is being buttressed by some economists with a proposition not too dissimilar to Laughlin’s: that immigrants could sap America’s vitality by bringing inferior cultural traits from their dysfunctional home countries to erode American social norms. It’s an unsettling assertion. It is laid out with striking candor by Paul Collier, the noted British development economist from Oxford, in his 2013 book “Exodus: How Migration Is Changing Our World” (Oxford University Press). “Migrants bring their culture with them,” he wrote. Countries that receive them run the risk “that the social model will become blended in such a way that damagingly dilutes its functionality. ” This idea has gained more currency in Europe — which until the recent influx from North Africa and the Middle East had experienced comparatively little immigration from poorer nations. But it is getting a hearing in the United States, too, giving shape to an argument that immigration, by bringing inferior norms and culture from abroad, may be eroding American productivity. Not unlike Laughlin in his time, George J. Borjas, a prominent Harvard economist who has written innumerable publications making a case for stricter immigration policies, argues that the quality of immigrants has deteriorated since the old days. To him, however, the dividing line is set in 1965. In his recent book “We Wanted Workers: Unraveling the Immigration Narrative” (Norton) he argues that “the new and the old arrivals are different kinds of workers, with the new arrivals being less productive. ” Contagion by immigrants from the global South is top of mind: “Imagine that immigrants do carry some baggage with them, and that baggage, when unloaded in the new environment, dilutes some of the North’s productive edge. ” Mr. Trump’s chief strategist, Stephen K. Bannon, architect of the administration’s turn against immigration, might be drawn to some of this scholarship. The proposition that immigrants hamper productivity in their newfound homes could make a case for far more restrictive immigration controls than the United States has in place today. “Analogous to climate change, we do not know how large an unabsorbed diaspora would need to be before it significantly weakened the mutual regard on which the societies depend,” Professor Collier wrote. It is true that people from other countries sometimes carry sketchy norms with them. A 2006 study by the economists Raymond Fisman and Edward Miguel found that diplomats from more corrupt countries like Egypt and Pakistan were much more likely to park illegally in New York City than those from more places like Australia and Norway. Many studies have found that ethnic and racial heterogeneity reduces support for public goods, like trash collection and public education. The sociologist Robert Putnam, while noting many benefits from immigration, proposed that in the short to medium run, “immigration and ethnic diversity challenge social solidarity and inhibit social capital. ” And as Mr. Borjas points out, it is true that the gap between wages of immigrants and natives is larger than it was a few decades ago, and that immigrants take longer to catch up. This may suggest that their productivity may not match that of previous waves of immigrants. Still, the proposition that immigration weighs on productivity is in tension with many studies that show that immigration tends to raise productivity and increase economic output, mostly by multiplying the earnings of immigrants themselves. Immigration to the United States increases innovation, slows the aging of the work force and opens new opportunities for some domestic workers. The growing wage gap identified by Professor Borjas may relate to things other than the immigrants’ own qualities — like rising income inequality in the United States. Critically, those asserting that immigrants bring a contagious decline in productivity have yet to provide any evidence that this has happened, only conjecture. Is there a threshold where further immigration starts doing real damage? How close is the United States to it? What is the mechanism whereby productivity in the United States might be reduced by immigrants’ weaker attributes? If productivity growth comes from better technology or production capabilities, how could immigrants sap it? If immigrants’ culture affects American productivity — say, by reducing investment or undermining belief in private property — how big would immigration have to be to yield that effect? It doesn’t seem the United States is anywhere near the threshold. So far, empirical evidence suggests that countries with a larger variety of immigrants are richer, more productive and more innovative. Regions that receive more immigrants grow faster. And immigration may actually improve the institutions of the countries immigrants go to. In a rebuttal of Mr. Collier’s and Mr. Borjas’s proposition, Michael A. Clemens of the Center for Global Development and Lant Pritchett from the Kennedy School at Harvard note that there is no meaningful relationship between the share of immigrants from poor countries and productivity growth in the rich countries they immigrated to. Even if unfettered immigration from, say, Mexico, were at some point to transmit low productivity to the United States, today the evidence suggests that restrictions on immigration are too tight, not too weak. This is not to say that there is no conceivable case to slow immigration down. But the case has nothing to do with contagion. If anything, the xenophobia that powered Mr. Trump’s presidential campaign suggests that the more problematic cultural consequence of immigration is the eruption of bigotry among the natives. That could well impose a hefty cost. | 0fake |
Longtime Republican Strategist Just Cast Her Vote For Hillary | This is not something that happens every day, but it s exactly what Ana Navarro did on Monday.Navarro has been a Republican since Ronald Reagan was in office, but the rise of Donald Trump as the GOP nominee has disgusted her so much that she denounced the party said she would be writing in her mother s name on her ballot rather than give a vote to Trump.But Navarro changed her mind after thinking about the close election in Florida in 2000 in which George W. Bush won by a mere 537 votes. As a Florida resident, Navarro doesn t want a repeat that send Trump to the White House.So she cast her vote for Hillary and told the world all about it in a column published on CNN.I had hoped that a week before the election, Trump would be losing Florida by a large enough margin that my vote wouldn t matter. But darn it, my home state is too close to call. Florida could be the decisive state (again) as to who ultimately becomes the next president of the United States. I thought back to the 2000 election, which was decided by 537 votes in Florida. I thought about how I would feel if the same thing happened in 2016. I thought and I thought and I thought .Then I cast my vote for Hillary Clinton. Let me rephrase that. I cast my vote against Donald Trump. I did it without joy or enthusiasm. I did it out of civic duty and love for our country.Navarro, who is an immigrant, said she voted against Trump because of the way he has insulted and demonized immigrants like her over the past year and half. On the first day of his campaign, Trump called Mexicans rapists and as a Hispanic immigrant that infuriated Navarro. I voted against Donald Trump for every American who looks and sounds like me, Navarro wrote. Because we love this country. We are proud of this country. We stand as equals in the United States of America. Trump has also repeatedly insulted women, and as a woman herself, that disgusted Navarro to her core. I voted against Donald Trump because of all women in my life who have been sexually harassed or assaulted and remained silent, bearing the embarrassment, even shame, for years, she continued.And Trump has also insulted disabled Americans, which made this election gave Navarro a more personal reason to vote against Trump.I voted against Trump because of Daniel Navarro, my severely disabled brother. My entire life, I have been pained and angered seeing young kids stare at him and mimic his disability. I had never seen a grown man mimic a disabled person. Trump did so in front of thousands of people at one of his rallies. In front of millions of people watching on TV. Most of us would punish our children for exhibiting such behavior.For Navarro it came down to choosing a candidate who has bad character or a candidate who made some bad judgments. In the end, Navarro voted for the latter because she believes a president needs to be a role model for children and while bad judgments can be avoided in the future, bad character won t change.She slammed Trump for being a terrible role model and blasted him for calling our democratic system rigged just because he is losing. And that s why she urged everyone to use their vote as a weapon to defeat Trump. Some tell me, in 2016 we should no longer expect the president of the United States to be a role model, Navarro wrote. I refuse to accept that. The president of the United States has to lift us all in moments of national grief. The president of the United States has to hug the children and spouses of fallen soldiers. That person represents us all. That person is recognized as the face and the voice for America in front of the rest of the world, and more importantly, by our children. A person supported by the Klu Klux Klan and its former Grand Wizard David Duke can never represent me. He can never be a role model for me.We each have a right and a duty to make a personal choice based on those things that are most important to us, that we value most. My conscience compels me to do every little thing I can to make sure a bad person is not our next president. In America, we don t choose our leaders through violence or armed insurrections.One vote is our right. One vote is our weapon. I am exercising mine against Donald Trump.Donald Trump is so toxic that many Republicans like Navarro have jumped ship to endorse or vote for Hillary Clinton. So much so that some red states such as Texas, Arizona, and Georgia are in play for the Democrats this year and may end up becoming battleground states in elections to come. That s how bad Republicans screwed up by choosing Trump as their leader.Featured Image: Twitter | 1real |
Obese Woman Loses More Than 100 Kilograms After Breaking Up With Her Feeder Boyfriend | Patty Sanchez, 51, used to eat 13,000 calories a day and weigh more than 320 kilograms as she tried to satisfy boyfriend's fantasies
Patty weighed more than 320 kilograms when she split from her feeder boyfriend, who was constantly encouraging and enabling her weight gain.
Patty Sanchez has gone from 320 kilograms to 215 kilograms after years of constant eating with the encouragement of her ex-boyfriend and online fat fetishists.
Having purposefully consumed up to 13,000 calories per day for years on end, it is a minor miracle in itself that Patty has made it to 51 and is in position to change her lifestyle.
After splitting from her boyfriend of ten years, Patty soon realized that she had become very isolated and vulnerable due to her size.
The mother-of-four has spoken out about the positive effect weight loss has had on both her personal and family life, also allowing her to undertake a wide range of everyday tasks previously impossible to her.
"I was tremendous – and I was dying a slow death.I realized that the feeding relationship I was in and the squashing was benefiting others, but it wasn’t for me. The weight loss had a lot to do with my break up with my ex – I was being served every meal daily, and when we broke up I had to take care of myself.I never feared death before – it was something I never thought about when I was getting bigger and bigger. But when I reached my lowest and couldn’t walk to the bathroom without getting winded I was worried I wouldn’t be there for my kids and grand kids. My struggles didn’t fully surface until I was single and had no one to help me and couldn’t cook, bathe, or leave the house – it was very lonely,” she said in an interview. Today, with the help of her sons, Patty eats 3,000 calories a day and is more mobile.
She said: “I stay away from fast food and eat more vegetables, fruits and poultry. Now I can do things that people take for granted that I couldn’t do - like walk, bathe, and paint my toenails which I couldn't reach for years."
“My children are very proud of me for changing my life around - we have a better relationship now," she added.
Sizzling Feed SOURCE | 1real |
Iran open to talks over its ballistic missile programme: sources | ANKARA/LONDON/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Iran has suggested to six world powers that it may be open to talks about its ballistic missile arsenal, seeking to reduce tension over the disputed programme, Iranian and Western officials familiar with the overtures told Reuters. Tehran has repeatedly vowed to continue building up what it calls defensive missile capability in defiance of Western criticism, with Washington saying the Islamic Republic s stance violates its 2015 nuclear deal with the powers. But the sources said that given U.S. President Donald Trump s threats to ditch the deal reached under his predecessor Barack Obama, Tehran had approached the powers recently about possible talks on some dimensions of its missile programme. During their meeting on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly last month, Iran told members of the (world powers) that it could discuss the missile programme to remove concerns, an Iranian source with knowledge of the meeting told Reuters on condition of anonymity. U.S. and Western officials did not confirm the matter was discussed at the Zarif-Tillerson meeting. But two U.S. officials said Iran had recently been keeping it alive by feeding certain media reports and via third parties such as Oman. A former U.S. Defense Department official said Iran s overtures had reached Washington in recent weeks. Iran has put feelers out saying it is willing to discuss its ballistic missile programme and is using contacts ... officials who were holdovers from the Obama administration, the former official said. Iran s reported approach came after Trump called the nuclear accord an embarrassment and the worst deal ever negotiated . He is expected to announce soon that he will decertify the deal, a senior administration official said on Thursday. Such a step could unravel the breakthrough agreement - seen by supporters as crucial to forestalling a Middle East arms race and tamping down regional tensions, since it limits Iran s ability to enrich uranium in exchange for sanctions relief. The other five powers are Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China, all of whom have reaffirmed commitment to the deal. Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif met his counterparts from the six powers, including U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson for the first time, on the fringes of the U.N. gathering on Sept. 20. The Americans expressed their worries about Iran s missile capability and Zarif said in reply that the programme could be discussed, the Iranian source told Reuters. A U.S. official with first-hand knowledge of dealings with the Islamic Republic said Zarif had been recycling offers that have been lying dormant on the table for some time. Zarif knows that if Trump goes ahead and decertifies Iran, it (Iran) will be on the high ground, and the U.S. will be isolated among the (six powers), the official said. Iran s Foreign Ministry spokesman Bahram Qasemi said on Friday Tehran s ballistic missile programme was for defence purposes only and non-negotiable. Iran has in all bilateral diplomatic meetings, including the recent visit of ... Zarif to New York, emphasised that its defensive missile programme is not negotiable, Qasemi was quoted as saying by Iranian media. The U.S. mission at the United Nations referred Reuters to the U.S. State Department for comment. The State Department declined to comment on whether possible talks on missiles were addressed at the meeting or whether Iran had recently communicated such interest. But it said Washington remained committed to countering the full range of threats the Iranian regime poses to the U.S., our allies, and regional stability, including its ballistic missile development . The Trump administration has imposed fresh unilateral sanctions on Iran, saying its missile tests violate the U.N. resolution that formalised the nuclear deal. It calls on Tehran not to undertake activities related to missiles capable of delivering nuclear bombs. Iran says it has no such plans and denies breaching the resolution. Iran has one of the biggest ballistic missile programmes in the Middle East, viewing it as an essential precautionary defence against the United States and other adversaries, primarily Gulf Arab states and Israel. A senior Iranian official, who also asked not to be named, said pragmatist President Hassan Rouhani, Zarif and Revolutionary Guards commanders have had several meetings with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has the last say on all Iranian policy, to secure his backing for missile talks. The leader was not optimistic during the meetings because he does not trust Americans. Others argued that the heightening tension over the missile programme could be resolved through talks, said the official, involved in backroom negotiations. Any talks would not aim to end or suspend Iran s missile programme but to negotiate some dimensions of it, like limiting production of some missiles with specific ranges , he said. Diplomacy worked well in ending the nuclear stand-off ... The dispute over the missile programme also can be resolved through talks, the official said. A third Iranian official said Tehran would be willing to discuss long-range missiles. He did not elaborate. A U.S. official with extensive experience negotiating with Iran said putting this out there publicly as Zarif has done puts pressure on the (Trump) administration . A Western official said the administration had assessed Zarif s approach to be a stalling tactic by Tehran . Another Western official said Iran must present concrete details for missile talks: What will need to be seen are the specifics on load capability, the distance range of missiles and how many kilograms can a missile warhead carry. When asked if Iran appeared willing to negotiate on its missile programme, a French diplomat said: We talk about everything with them, including the ballistic programme. Our objective is that this leads to concrete acts. On the ballistic issue they repeat that it s all defensive and has nothing to do with nuclear. | 0fake |
Germany's far-right AfD calls for repatriation of Syrian refugees | BERLIN (Reuters) - The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party called on Thursday for the repatriation of half a million Syrian refugees living in Germany, saying the war there was nearly over and that President Bashar al-Assad had urged refugees to return home. Earlier on Thursday, Syria s army declared victory over Islamic State, saying its capture of the jihadists last town in the country marked the collapse of their three-year, hardline reign in the region. However, fighting is continuing in many areas, the United Nations says, in a complex civil war in which millions have been killed or forced to flee their homes, many to neighboring countries or to Europe. The AfD s proposal for repatriating Syrian refugees is its first since it swept into Germany s lower house of parliament, the Bundestag, in September s federal election on an anti-immigrant platform. It is the third largest party in the new Bundestag but the proposal is very unlikely to win approval as mainstream parties including Chancellor Angela Merkel s conservatives, the biggest bloc, have refused to work with the AfD. In its proposal, the AfD said the new German government should immediately start talks with Syrian authorities over a deal to repatriate the refugees. This deal should ensure that the returnees will be accepted in Syria and accommodated only in safe areas, the AfD said in a statement adding that Damascus must guarantee not to persecute citizens who escaped the military draft. The proposal said Syrian refugees children in Germany should now be taught the Syrian school curriculum, either by Syrian teachers already resident in Germany or by teachers sent by the Syrian government for this purpose. The statement, signed by the two party leaders Alexander Gauland and Alice Weidel, said the Syrian government should work with Germany to finance the repatriation, which they said should be free for the individual refugees. The Greens party, which is expected to join Merkel s new conservative-led coalition, said the AfD proposal showed the party to be irresponsible, inhumane and heartless . No subject is too abysmal, no populism is too dirty for you. Shame on you! Greens politician Luise Amtsberg said on her Facebook account, commenting on the proposal. Immigration is one of the difficult issues where Merkel s conservative bloc, the left-leaning Greens and the pro-business Free Democrats (FDP) are struggling to forge a common stance in their coalition talks. Since the beginning of the year, some 156,000 people have applied for asylum in Germany, more than 25 percent of them from Syria, making them the biggest national group, data from the Federal Interior Ministry showed on Thursday. | 0fake |
CNN CUTS FEED Of GOP Rep Scott Taylor When He Cites New FBI Report Showing 30% Of Domestic Terror Cases Involve Refugees | CNN is notorious for cutting the mic when they don t like what someone is saying on their network.Rep. Scott Taylor was being interviewed by CNN host Dana Bash about the refugee ban when he began to say how the American people are overwhelmingly in support of the ban in the interest of their safety. He goes on to say that 30% of domestic terrorism is committed by refugees when his sound and picture is instantly cut out of the broadcast.Bash is quick to blame the cut on the TV gremlins .Rep Scott Taylor's feed is cut off after he says 30% of Refugees commit domestic terrorism Selective Journalism SMH pic.twitter.com/KLeFDNawqq Eye On The Sparrow (@2Chron169) July 16, 2017 | 1real |
HILLARY’S CHICKENS ARE COMIN’ HOME TO ROOST: News Reports Suggest Hillary May Have Used A Second Private Server | Hillary may have gotten away with lying to the public for decades, but what she underestimated this time around was the enormous power of Chicago thugs, Valerie Jarrett and Barack Hussein Obama. If the two of them decide they don t want you running for office, you likely won t stand a chance The tens of thousands of emails on Hillary Clinton s private server from when she was secretary of state could also be on a second device or server, according to news reports.The FBI now has the only confirmed private server, as part of a Justice Department probe to determine whether it sent of received classified information for Clinton when she was the country s top diplomat from 2009 to 2013.Platte River Networks, which managed Clinton s server and private email network after she left the State Department, has indicated it transfer or migrated emails from the original server in 2013, according to The Washington Examiner.However, Clinton, the front-running Democratic presidential candidate, has suggested that she gave the department 55,000 pages of official emails and deleted roughly 30,000 personal ones in January, which raises the possibility they were culled from a second device.Neither a Clinton spokesman nor an attorney for the Colorado-based Platte River Networks returned an Examiner s request for comment, the news gathering agency reported Saturday.The DailyMail.com on Aug. 14 was among the first to report the possibility of a second server.The FBI took the server last week, after a U.S. Intelligence Community inspector general reportedly found two Clinton emails that included sensitive information, then asked the FBI to further investigate.Platte River Networks has told news agencies that the server, now in New Jersey, has been wiped clean. But forensics experts still might be able to recover some information.There have been reports that some of the emails that Clinton turned over included classified information. Clinton maintains that she neither sent nor received classified data, which suggests the missives might have been marked after the fact as classified or with some other top-secret classification.The emails that Clinton gave to the State Department were on multiple storage devices. A Clinton lawyer turned over at least one thumb drive that reportedly included copies of the emails that his client has already given to the federal government.Clinton has maintained that she has done nothing wrong or illegal and says she will cooperate fully with the non-criminal investigations.Via: FOX News | 1real |
Britain, Russia clash over Syria at chemical weapons body | AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - Britain accused Russia on Thursday of carrying out a thinly veiled political attack on the head of the world s chemical weapons watchdog, escalating a row over the agency s investigation into toxic attacks in Syria. The comments, made during a session at the Hague-based Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), were the latest sign of deep political division at the body over the Syrian conflict. In an Oct. 26 report the U.N.-OPCW investigation team blamed the Syrian government for an April 4 attack using the banned nerve agent sarin in the opposition-held town of Khan Sheikhoun, killing around 80 people. The Syrian government has denied using chemical weapons and Moscow rejected the findings. The mechanism was established in 2015 by the U.N. Security Council to identify individuals, organizations or governments responsible for chemical attacks in Syria. Its mandate expires on Nov. 17, but its work is incomplete. Moscow is poised to veto efforts by Britain, France, Germany and the United States to extend the mandate. U.S. representative Kenneth Ward told delegates at a meeting of the OPCW s 41-member executive council that they were fighting for the future of the Chemical Weapons Convention, the watchdog s founding treaty. There can be no doubt that since 2013, Syria has engaged in a grotesque and calculated campaign of chemical weapons use, he said. Russia continues to deny the truth and, instead, collaborates with the Assad regime. A draft Russian-Iranian proposal circulated at the OPCW and seen by Reuters called for a new investigation, to be based on samples taken from the attack site. The Syrian government itself has already presented samples from the scene to the investigation team, which tested positive for sarin. It is a thinly veiled political attack on the professional integrity of the director general, the British delegation said in a statement, referring to the OPCW s outgoing Turkish head, Ahmet Uzumcu. It seeks to undermine the capability and competence of the (OPCW). The Russian delegation at the OPCW could not be reached for comment. Syria joined the OPCW after a sarin attack on Aug. 21, 2013, killed hundreds of people in Ghouta, a district on the outskirts of Damascus. It has said it declared and destroyed all its chemical stockpile, but chemical attacks continue in the country s civil war. | 0fake |
Trump Fires Warning Shot in Battle Between Bannon and Kushner - The New York Times | WASHINGTON — As he grappled on Thursday with his first major decision involving military action, a and frustrated President Trump turned to his two top aides and told them he had had enough of their incessant in the media. “Work this out,” Mr. Trump said, according to two people briefed on the exchange. The admonition was aimed at Stephen K. Bannon, the tempestuous chief strategist, and Reince Priebus, the chief of staff, over a series of with Jared Kushner, the president’s and senior adviser, and the top economic adviser, Gary D. Cohn. But they may not be able to. The president is said to be aware that a meaningful reconciliation will take work to achieve between Mr. Bannon, who sees himself as the keeper of Mr. Trump’s campaign promises, and the competing ideologies of Mr. Kushner and Mr. Cohn, a longtime Wall Street executive and a Democrat. And he is considering a of his senior staff, according to four people with direct knowledge of the process. Whether he acts on it remains to be seen. Mr. Trump has often pondered making changes for several weeks or even months before making them, if he does at all. He has a high tolerance for chaos, and a unique gift for creating it — and, despite his famous “You’re fired!” tagline from the show “The Apprentice,” an aversion to dismissing people. But this past week, one that some of his aides considered the best of his presidency, was marred by fits, starts and wounds — and the constant churn of news accounts of a White House at war with itself finally wore the president out. And notice of a possible was a warning shot to his team to make adjustments. A spokeswoman for Mr. Trump, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, insisted that such accounts were untrue. “Once again this is a completely false story driven by people who want to distract from the success taking place in this administration,” she said in an emailed statement. “The President’s pick for the Supreme Court (a decision that has generational impact) was confirmed today, we hosted multiple foreign leaders this week and the President took bold and decisive military action against Syria last night. The only thing we are shaking up is the way Washington operates as we push the President’s aggressive agenda forward. ” But two people who have spoken with Mr. Trump said he recognized that the continuing state of drama was unsustainable. No changes are imminent, they said. But the president is considering a range of options, including a shift in role for Mr. Bannon, who has become increasingly isolated in the White House as other power centers have grown, as well as additional senior staff. Mr. Priebus has been a source of contention for a number of Mr. Trump’s former advisers, with the president pushing back on criticism with the response that the former chairman of the Republican National Committee is a “nice guy. ” Mr. Bannon, a confidant of the president’s whose roving job in the White House has given him influence over policy and hiring decisions, now finds himself in the undesirable position of being caught between the president and his family. That is a position that others have not survived, most notably Corey Lewandowski, the first of the president’s three campaign managers. Mr. Bannon, whose portfolio is broad but vague as a chief strategist, has told people he believes Mr. Kushner’s allies have undermined him, that he has no plans to quit and is digging in for a fight. One option being discussed is moving Mr. Bannon to a different role. His allies at an outside group supporting him run by his main benefactor, the investor Rebekah Mercer, have also discussed him joining them to provide strategy. Mr. Kushner, 36, a government neophyte who has taken on a much larger portfolio as a top West Wing aide and foreign envoy, was said to be displeased after hearing that Mr. Bannon made critical remarks about him to other aides and Trump associates while he was in Iraq recently. Mr. Bannon has told confidants that he believes Mr. Kushner’s contact with Russians, and his expected testimony before Congress on the subject, will become a major distraction for the White House. Kushner allies have also raised the issue with the president of the increasingly unflattering coverage that Mr. Kushner is receiving from Breitbart News, the website that Mr. Bannon used to run. But Mr. Bannon has his own core of supporters outside the White House. And he has argued that Mr. Kushner’s efforts to pull his more to the center on issues like immigration would poison him with the conservative base — a hopeless position to be in because Mr. Bannon believes so few Democrats would ever consider supporting Mr. Trump. In the White House blame game, no one is safe. Mr. Bannon’s team is blamed for the contested and controversial travel bans. Mr. Priebus was damaged by the failure of health care legislation. Mr. Kushner has yet to show he can master his own portfolio, and his role is so large that miscues will be magnified. Mr. Trump does not like any staff member gaining too much attention, including those who are related to him. He had three campaign in the 2016 cycle, and he tends to make changes based on instinct. As he learns the job of a president, his allies say, he was destined to make such changes. There is a long history of presidents making staff changes, and one of Mr. Trump’s predecessors, Bill Clinton, made changes within the first six months of his administration. Newt Gingrich, an informal adviser to Mr. Trump and a former House speaker, said, “I think first of all a very high amount of tension in the White House is normal. ” “I think they have particular tension right now because the health bill failed,” he added. The stories about infighting “probably bother him some,” Mr. Gingrich said. “But do I think they’re damaging to his prospects? I think they’re noise. ” | 0fake |
With Operation in Syria, Erdogan Shows His New Power Over Turkey’s Military - The New York Times | KARKAMIS, Turkey — In recent years, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan ordered plans drawn up for a Turkish military incursion into Syria. At every turn, though, military commanders, already fighting a war inside Turkey against Kurdish militants, pushed back. And then last month a rebel faction of the military tried to stage a coup, and that changed everything. In the aftermath of the coup, which failed but claimed more than 200 lives, Mr. Erdogan purged thousands of officers from the ranks, leaving the military seemingly depleted. It also provoked worry from Western allies, including the United States, that Turkey would either be unwilling or unable to be a reliable partner in the fight against the Islamic State. Instead, the opposite happened on Wednesday, as Mr. Erdogan ordered Turkish tanks and special forces soldiers into Syria, under cover of American and Turkish warplanes, to assist Syrian rebels in seizing the city of Jarabulus, one of the last border strongholds of the Islamic State. More Turkish tanks rumbled into northern Syria on Thursday to support rebels there, and the Turkish military seemed to be succeeding in clearing the border area of Islamic State militants, and preventing Kurdish militias from seizing more territory in the region — a primary goal of Turkey in the campaign. The operation, coming so soon after the failed coup, has highlighted how Mr. Erdogan, even after the purge, secured more operational control of the military. It allowed him to undertake Turkey’s most ambitious role yet in the long Syrian civil war and to bolster the flagging fortunes of rebel groups, of which Turkey has been one of the most consistent supporters. Other factors holding back Turkey’s ambitions in Syria were also recently resolved. A feud with Russia, which began last year after Turkey shot down a Russian warplane near the border, ended after Mr. Erdogan expressed regret for the episode. After Ankara’s relations with Moscow deteriorated, a Turkish incursion into Syria could have risked war with Russia, which has been bombing rebels in support of the Syrian government. And the United States, which had previously been opposed to Turkey’s intervention, agreed to support it. The operation also buoyed the hopes of armed opposition groups that are not affiliated with the Islamic State or Al Qaeda, whose fighters and supporters have been dejected for months over losses in northern Syria that their foreign backers did little to prevent, and a fear that the United States and Turkey were preparing to abandon them to pursue of a broader deal with the Russians. A senior Turkish official, who spoke anonymously as a matter of protocol, said that many commanders had resisted an operation in Syria in recent years. Many analysts who closely follow the Turkish military have said the same thing. One of the most prominent commanders opposed to a Syria operation, the official said, was the former head of the Turkish special forces, Brig. Gen. Semih Terzi, who was one of the most prominent plotters and was killed during the coup attempt. The incursion seemed to support the opinion of many experts that the Turkish military’s combat capabilities had not been substantially diminished. “This is the second largest military in NATO,” said Ross Wilson, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council in Washington and ambassador to Turkey from 2005 to 2008. “Yes, it’s been somewhat reduced in the last month, but it is still a very potent and fighting force. They are very capable in their own region. ” On Thursday, an estimated 350 Turkish soldiers were in Syria taking part in the operation, called Euphrates Shield, including 150 members of the special forces, the local media reported. Two Syrian rebels interviewed in Karkamis, which lies just across the border from Jarabulus, said that Turkish soldiers were mainly helping to defuse and dismantle the numerous bombs and that the Islamic State, which fled the city without much of a fight, had left behind. Witnesses reported loud explosions, followed by plumes of smoke, coming from Jarabulus on Thursday afternoon. The question now, with the Turkish troops inside Syria, is how long they will remain there. Turkish officials have not given a timetable, but have indicated that the army would stay as long as it takes to neutralize security threats to Turkey — defined as the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, and Syrian Kurdish militias. Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. who arrived in Ankara, the capital, on Wednesday just as the operation began, seemed to suggest on Thursday that the Turkish military would stay in northern Syria indefinitely, and with the blessing of the United States. “I think the Turks are prepared to stay in an effort to take out ISIL as long as takes,” Mr. Biden said during a visit to Sweden, according to Reuters. He added that the Turks have gradually come to “the realization that ISIL is an existential threat to Turkey. ” Some analysts said that Turkish forces, wary of being perceived as occupiers, would likely clear a swath of territory west of the Euphrates River, perhaps several miles inside Syria, and then eventually turn operations in that area over to Syrian rebels backed by Turkish special operations troops and trusted local Turkmen militia forces. “While Turkey could hold whatever area they clear, I don’t think that’s the plan rather the point is to deny the area to the Kurds, and allow the other rebel groups more to Turkey’s liking to hold it,” said Patrick M. Skinner, director of special projects for the Soufan Group, a political risk assessment firm in New York. Hassan Ahmed, a Syrian rebel who works with fighting groups, but mainly concerns himself with the political side of the Syrian opposition, predicted that Turkey would remain in Jarabulus for about two weeks. Metin Gurcan, an expert on the military and a columnist at an online news outlet, said that, depending on whether Syrian Kurdish militias try to challenge the Turks, the Turkish Army would most likely end its operation within two or three weeks. Still, thwarting the Islamic State was not the only objective of the Turks, nor even its primary one. Turkish officials have made little secret that the main purpose of the operation was to ensure that Kurdish militias did not consolidate control over an area west of the Euphrates that they had seized during a United campaign against the Islamic State in the city of Manbij, south of Jarabulus. That message was strongly seconded by Mr. Biden on Wednesday. He said the Kurds had to return to east of the Euphrates or risk losing American support. Militias affiliated with the Democratic Union Party, the main Syrian Kurdish party, have been crucial allies of the United States in the fight against ISIS in Syria. But Turkey considers the group’s expansion along its border a threat to its national security because of its links to Kurdish insurgents in Turkey. Syrian Kurdish forces said in a statement on Thursday that their fighters had returned to their bases after capturing Manbij from the Islamic State, without specifying locations. A press officer for the United coalition fighting Islamic State militants said the Kurds had retreated east of the Euphrates to prepare for the eventual liberation of Raqqa, the de facto capital of the Islamic State in Syria. But in the evening, the Turkish military shelled a group of Syrian Kurdish fighters near Manbij after they had made an advance west of the Euphrates, in a breach of the Kurds’ agreement with the United States. Suleiman Kankilic, a Turkish paramedic and ambulance driver, said that before the Islamic State took control of Jarabulus, merchants enjoyed a robust business selling things like wheat, milk, cooking gas and soft drinks to the city, which was then under the control of the moderate Free Syrian Army. “We really want this war to end,” he said in a small clinic about a from the border on Wednesday. “Turkey getting involved is good for us because we feel safer with our soldiers on the other side. ” | 0fake |
NUTTY LEFTY Breaks Into TRUMP’S Mar-A-Lago Club…Vandalizes With Bananas | PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) A woman is being charged with sneaking onto President Donald Trump s private Mar-a-Lago club shortly before his inauguration and smearing bananas on cars.Palm Beach, Florida, police say in a report released Monday that 48-year-old Kelly Weidman also typed a profanity about Trump on a Mar-a-Lago computer and moved outside some ballroom balloons a few hours before Trump was sworn-in Friday.She was confronted by security guards, who called police. She allegedly told officers she wanted to be arrested because no one was paying attention to her claim of being cyber attacked. She was charged with misdemeanor trespassing and released.Because Trump wasn t at the ritzy club, the Secret Service wasn t involved.No one answered a phone number listed for Weidman on Monday and court records didn t list an attorney.VIA: WPTV | 1real |
WAR ON THE STREETS OF PARIS: Armed migrants fight running battles in the French capital | By wmw_admin on November 3, 2016 Nick Gutteridge — Daily Express Nov 2, 2016 .
The area around Stalingrad Metro station was turned into a refugee battleground as rival gangs of migrants set upon each other in shocking scenes of violence.
Asylum seekers wearing hooded tops wielded makeshift clubs fashioned from lengths of wood which they used to bludgeon each other as horrified pedestrians looked on.
The blood-curdling brawl erupted just yards from the Stalingrad Metro station, where a squalid migrant camp has popped up following the demolition of the Jungle.
It was not immediately clear what sparked the early morning fight, but rival gangs of people smugglers have previously been involved in violent brawls in Calais.
And despite the horrific brawl, a pro-migrant rally is apparently being organised to take place at the camp at 6pm tonight.
The once peaceful neighbourhood, in Paris’ 10th Arrondissement, used to be a popular area with tourists, boasting a lively nightlife scene bustling with restaurants and bars.
But worried residents have revealed how it has become a no go zone in recent weeks following the establishment of the refugee camp, which has brought squalor and violence.
Thousands of migrants – mostly from Sudan, Libya, Afghanistan, and Eritrea – have pitched tents under the Metro station after the demolition of the Jungle hampered their attempts to reach Britain. Gangs of migrants armed with clubs and staves prowl the streets of the 10th Arrondissement, Paris, at night. Click to enlarge
French police have tried and failed on many occasions to clear the squalid squat, but asylum seekers simply keep on returning and reestablishing it.
There are now nore than 2,500 migrants pitching up in the makeshift camp, with locals saying the eyesore is ruining their businesses and making life a “living hell”.
Residents in the once popular district say that the squatters are now becoming increasingly violent and dangerous, with increased reports of muggings.
Faisal, a shopkeeper, told the French daily Le Figaro that Stalingrad locals are living in fear, threatening the future of his business.
He said: “The stench of urine, faeces, and rubbish has made Stalingrad an insalubrious place to live. The place is dead – no-one wants to come here anymore. People are afraid to go out and lock themselves in.
“I’m making less than €60 (£53) a day. A few more weeks like this and I’ll go bust!
“French people have been kind to them. I know they’re desperate, but the least they can do is respect the law and try and integrate into French society.”
Jeanne, another Stalingrad resident, told Le Figaro the migrants had become increasingly violent towards locals.
She said: “Brazen migrants are snatching jewellery and handbags off passers-by – they’re even stealing bread. I’ve seen them beat people up too.”
Police have raided the camp some 30 times in the past year, and on Monday French president François Hollande vowed to close the camp for good.
But within 24 hours of a police operation to move migrants on tents had sprung up again, showing the uphill battle authorities in the French capital face to shut down such illegal encampments.
Furious locals have demanded that the camp be closed once and for all, describing how they have heard “blood-curdling noises” coming from it in the middle of the night.
Marie, who lives right next to the makeshift camp, told Le Figaro: “Life here has become unbearable. More than 2,500 squatters were evacuated in September, and now, less than two months later, they’re back. And now that the ‘Jungle’ camp has been closed, things are about to get even worse.”
Another local, Monique, said that she was at “a loss for words” and “utterly distraught” over the situation.
She said: “The streets are littered with rubbish and faeces. We can hear blood-curdling screams coming from the camp in the middle of the night. | 1real |
LIBERAL HACK ALEC BALDWIN Performed Rank Trump-Bashing Skit Last Night…Baldwin Is No Saint! | Open Borders/ImmigrationTrade/OverregulationForeign PolicyNow that s what we need to discuss but will America get over the reality TV sort of political season we re having? Here s what I m hoping I m hoping Americans finally realize we have way too much to lose in this election than to be swayed by something someone said 10 years ago: This election cycle, Republicans finally realized that we need to stop playing the civility game and put someone in the ring who can fight back. We finally recognized the futility of complaining to the referee about unfairness. Unfortunately, it took us almost a decade to realize that the MSM have stacked the deck. We re not after another gentleman politician; we needed a card shark, a gunslinger, and a hustler. And that s what we got with Trump. Yes, we realize that that type of person brings a lot of baggage, but we re desperate to win. There is too much to lose Read more: American Thinker | 1real |
Trump’s Relationship With This Woman Could Lead To HUGE Scandal For GOP | Many Republicans believe that if Donald Trump s presidential campaign is as unsuccessful as it is ramping up to be, that they can contain the damage. The thought process goes that if Trump is a failure, it is best to keep him at an arm s length, and Republicans won t have to suffer too much for it.But the Trump containment strategy is facing a test, as evidence emerges that Trump s controversial Trump University may have dodged criminal prosecution thanks to a relationship between Trump and Florida attorney general Pam Bondi.Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi is denying that a $25,000 donation from Donald Trump is in any way connected to her office s decision not to pursue action against Trump University, despite dozens of complaints in Florida, her spokesman said.Bondi, who endorsed Trump in March, received the donation in 2013 via a political action committee raising money for her re-election.Bondi, who rose to fame within conservative circles thanks to repeated appearance on Fox News, reportedly received multiple complaints about Trump University s business practices, as new documents released in the fraud litigation against Trump University recently revealed.Instead of doing her job and being an advocate for consumers bilked by Trump University, Bondi s office decided against prosecuting the organization.The complaints show several unsatisfied customers called the course a scam and one man claimed it forced him in to personal bankruptcy.Trump has recently announced a campaign event in Florida where Bondi, who supports his nomination, will appear.Texas governor Greg Abbott, who served as state attorney general when legal action was heating up on Trump University, declined to announce that the company was facing a $5.4 million penalty for how they had conducted business in the state. Trump University soon after stopped doing business in the state.Featured image via Twitter | 1real |
San Francisco Just Told Trump In No Uncertain Terms To Go F*ck Himself | Donald Trump hasn t even stepped into office yet and he has already managed to fill his cabinet with the richest people ever to self-serve in that position, start an international incident with China, hire multiple white supremacists and other assorted bigots to top-level positions, and generally show us that the next four years will be a test of all that we are as Americans and the city of San Fransisco has already made it clear where they stand.Just before Thanksgiving, the city s Board of Supervisors released an 11-point resolution telling Donald Trump that his hateful ideals are not welcome. The resolution reminds Trump and other assorted bigots that the city stands with the LGBT community, women, Muslims (including refugees) and people of all religions, African-Americans, and every other group sure to be marginalized and harassed under the Trump administration:WHEREAS, On November 8, 2016, Donald Trump was elected to become the 45th President of the United States; now, therefore, be itRESOLVED, That no matter the threats made by President-elect Trump, San Francisco will remain a Sanctuary City. We will not turn our back on the men and women from other countries who help make this city great, and who represent over one third of our population. This is the Golden Gate-we build bridges, not walls; and, be itFURTHER RESOLVED, That we will never back down on women s rights, whether in healthcare, the workplace, or any other area threatened by a man who treats women as obstacles to be demeaned or objects to be assaulted. And just as important, we will ensure our young girls grow up with role models who show them they can be or do anything; and, be itFURTHER RESOLVED, That there will be no conversion therapy, no withdrawal of rights in San Francisco. We began hosting gay weddings twelve years ago, and we are not stopping now. And to all the LGBTQ people all over the country who feel scared, bullied, or alone: You matter. You are seen; you are loved; and San Francisco will never stop fighting for you; and, be itFURTHER RESOLVED, That we still believe in this nation s founding principle of religious freedom. We do not ban people for their faith. And the only lists we keep are on invitations to come pray together; and, be itFURTHER RESOLVED, That Black Lives Matter in San Francisco, even if they may not in the White House. And guided by President Obama s Task Force on 21st Century Policing, we will continue reforming our police department and rebuilding trust between police and communities of color so all citizens feel safe in their neighborhoods; and, be itFURTHER RESOLVED, That climate change is not a hoax, or a plot by the Chinese. In this city, surrounded by water on three sides, science matters. And we will continue our work on CleanPower, Zero Waste, and everything else we are doing to protect future generations; and, be itFURTHER RESOLVED, That we have been providing universal health care in this city for nearly a decade, and if the new administration follows through on its callous promise to revoke health insurance from 20 million people, San Franciscans will be protected; and, be itFURTHER RESOLVED, That we are the birthplace of the United Nations, a city made stronger by the thousands of international visitors we welcome every day. We will remain committed to internationalism and to our friends and allies around the world-whether the administration in Washington is or not; and, be itFURTHER RESOLVED, That San Francisco will remain a Transit First city and will continue building Muni and BART systems we can all rely upon, whether this administration follows through on its platform to eliminate federal transit funding or not; and, be itThe San Francisco Board of Supervisors is determined to maintain the safety and values of the city.FURTHER RESOLVED, That California is the sixth largest economy in the world. The Bay Area is the innovation capital of the country. We will not be bullied by threats to revoke our federal funding, nor will we sacrifice our values or members of our community for your dollar; and, be itFURTHER RESOLVED, That we condemn all hate crimes and hate speech perpetrated in this election s wake. That although the United States will soon have a President who has demonstrated a lack of respect for the values we hold in the highest regard in San Francisco, it cannot change who we are, and it will never change our values. We argue, we campaign, we debate vigorously within San Francisco, but on these points we are 100 percent united. We will fight discrimination and recklessness in all its forms. We are one City. And we will move forward together.Dark times are ahead for our country something even once stalwart Trump supporter Sarah Palin is quickly realizing after The Donald s deal with Carrier to save 1,000 jobs by handing out gigantic tax breaks as a reward for threatening to move a plant to Mexico.Every city needs to follow this example, as it is up to each and every one of us to preserve what America is about Trump will not, after all.Featured image via Getty Images/Chip Somodevilla | 1real |
South Koreans seek to visit once-jointly run factory zone in North | SEOUL (Reuters) - A group of South Korean businessmen who own factories in the Kaesong industrial complex inside North Korea said on Wednesday they want to visit to verify the North s claim that it had restarted some operations there on its own. South Korea pulled out of the joint venture last year in response to the North s nuclear and missile tests, ending more than a decade of cooperation at the factory park, on the North s side of the demilitarized zone (DMZ), that was the last remaining symbol of inter-Korean cooperation. North Korea s state-run web sites said on Friday North Korean workers were operating in the district, adding that it was nobody s business what we do in an industrial complex where our nation s sovereignty is exercised . The South Koreans said they would ask the Ministry of Unification for permission to visit. South Koreans have to obtain approval to contact North Koreans or travel in the country. The two sides are technically still at war after their 1950-53 conflict ended in a truce, not a treaty. We urge the North to immediately halt the operation of any of our corporate assets, said Shin Han-yong, the leader of the group, who used to operate a plant making fishing nets in Kaesong. In recent weeks, North Korea has launched two missiles over Japan and conducted its sixth nuclear test, a sign that it may be fast advancing toward its goal of developing a nuclear-tipped missile capable of hitting the U.S. mainland. U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said last weekend that Washington was directly communicating with the North on its weapons programs but that it had shown no interest in dialogue. When the South suspended the operations at the industrial park, it said the North had diverted wages paid to its workers by South Korean firms to fund its nuclear and missile programs. But in July, two months after liberal President Moon Jae-in was elected in the South, a government official said there was no hard evidence to back up the assertion. Moon had initially sought to engage North Korea in talks and cooperation, but current political tensions have tied the president s hands. Despite military tension, the businessmen s visit, if it comes off, may provide a chance to restart talks with the North, Shin said. We don t know if the North will accept our trip at a time when it only sees the U.S. as its dialogue partner, but we are pinning our hopes on a one in ten chance that may exist, he said. | 0fake |
U.S. takes North Korea threat of H-bomb test seriously, Trump official says | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - It would be a “game-changer” if North Korea conducts a hydrogen bomb test over the Pacific and the United States is taking the threat seriously, but it does not give “too much credence” to Pyongyang taking such action, a senior U.S. official said on Friday. “There’s a certain amount of bluster that’s taken for granted when you’re dealing with North Korea,” the Trump administration official told Reuters. The official added, however, that “we have to some extent take it seriously.” The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there were questions whether North Korea had the capabilities to conduct such a test but declined to specify how the United States would respond. “It would be a game-changer in some sense,” the official said. “But I don’t think we should give too much credence to it at the moment.” | 0fake |
People Can Stop Giving Obama S*it About His Speaking Fee; Here’s What He’s Doing With It | Our White House is currently occupied by someone who s likely certifiably insane, yet for many on both the right and the left, the real travesty is that Trump s predecessor is *gasp* earning a lot of money in speaking fees, just like just about every white male former president in the last 40 years.The news that former President Barack Obama will reportedly accept $400,000 to give a speech to Wall Street investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald has inspired a strange paroxysm of rage from writers on the center-left. Obama s $400,000 Wall Street speaking fee will undermine everything he believes in, Vox s Matt Yglesias proclaimed. Obama and Bill Clinton biographer David Maraniss said the 44th president does not need the money and should not accept it. Others noted the unseemliness of the fee at a time of income inequality and seemingly rampant populism, especially since Barack and Michelle Obama have already struck insanely lucrative book deals.Even Elizabeth Warren was troubled by Obama s speaking fees. Bernie Sanders called the fees distasteful. Well, everyone can relax now. On Wednesday it was announced that the Obamas would be giving that amount and far more to help youth in Obama s adopted hometown of Chicago. One of the things that we ll be starting this year is Michelle and I are personally going to donate $2 million to our summer jobs programs here in the community, he said at the South Shore Cultural Center. [It s] so that right away young people can get to work and we can start providing opportunities to all of them. Obama is expected to use the center as he focuses on issues such as criminal justice reform and education for underprivileged children now that he has left office. Social media was quick to notice that the Obamas are literally donating five times what he will earn for that one speaking fee.THIS is President Obama. Compassion & class. FIVE times his speaking fee. The @GOP can now shut the hell up. #ObamaFoundation #DemValues ?? https://t.co/IfQH7zvV08 Fight Back America (@RonIsrael) May 3, 2017Will all the commentators who condemned Obama for his $400,000 speaking fee commend him for his $2,000,000 charity donation today? Crickets. eli friedmann (@eligit) May 3, 2017@bravenak @edfischman @JessikaJayne @Endoracrat @tinalc1958 @KikiAdine @webgenie01 @Wharfrat2004 @MonicaChilton @imwithher61 @Quietness_Trust @HerbertjeJames @Fangirl31 @Toncuz @SadCondiment @edisn @total_janarchy @adirado29 @dcpetterson @pollyollydoodle @RoseRoselaurie @JustAGurLnSwedn @Zebop @Deemoney521 @IngridBush @Wilkey43 @alaskawater @EmilyEggbert @Eviljohna @Playfulimp @jamescoleman07 @JohnSmithChgo @ShirlsAdams @goodtroubleme @abracadabraNY @livemusic4me @jmichaelkell @RBReich @PolitikMasFina Bernie has the audacity to attack Obama over his speaking fee? When has Bernie ever given to charity? pic.twitter.com/j7FWPkBkSc Impeach tRump (@vicsepulveda) May 3, 2017Obama just donated $2 million to a summer jobs program so I don t want to hear shit about his $450,000 speaking fee. ?liberal bitch? (@ALiberalLady) May 3, 2017Of course, there s also the fact that President Obama is retired. He can spend the rest of his days Twitter trolling Donald Trump and passing out Kenyan flags and it would be perfectly within his rights. But that s not who Obama is. As this proves, he still has his principles and he s still managing to kick everyone s ass in his game of three-dimensional chess.Featured image via Scott Olson/Getty Images. | 1real |
Former SNL Cast Member Breaks Silence On Trump’s EMBARRASSING Behavior At Rehearsal (VIDEO) | A former Saturday Night Live cast member has just spilled the beans about one of Donald Trump s secrets.Taran Killam, who left SNL in 2016, completely destroyed Trump in an interview published in Brooklyn magazine, putting to rest the massive amount of speculation about whether or not Trump actually knows how to read. Apparently, Trump cannot. According to Killam, Trump struggled to read even the simple jokes the writers had given him.Trump made an appearance on the show in December 2015, right after he announced he was entering the presidential race. Killam said that particular episode was not fun and most of the cast and writers were not excited to have him there. However, having Trump there taught the cast something interesting about him. During the table read prior to the rehearsal, the host of the week is supposed to read through the jokes they re given. Killam said Trump struggled to read at the table read, which did not give many of us great confidence. Didn t get the jokes, really. He s just a man who seems to be powered by bluster. I didn t get the feeling that he was excited to be there. When Killam was asked if Trump was unpleasant to work with on the show, Killam said: He was everything you see. What you see is what you get with him, really. I mean, there was no big reveal. There have been rumors circulating about Trump s inability to read before, and now this confirms it. From Trump s refusal to read through documents in front of people to his tendency to ditch his teleprompter during his speeches, Trump s erratic behavior raised suspicions that he was hiding something. And when you look at a video like the one below, it certainly confirms Killam s confession that Trump is challenged when it comes to literacy.Featured image via Pool / Getty Images | 1real |
Fact-checking the third round of GOP debates | CNBC aired two GOP presidential debates Wednesday: a prime-time event starring 10 candidates and an earlier debate featuring four second-tier contenders, based on an average of recent polls.
Not every candidate uttered facts that are easily fact checked, but following is a list of 14 suspicious or interesting claims. As is our practice, we do not award Pinocchios when we do a roundup of facts in debates.
Fiorina, who served as a surrogate for Mitt Romney’s during his 2012 presidential run, recycles a misleading talking point from that unsuccessful campaign — but oddly, she never double-checked the math. The Romney campaign calculated these figures by comparing the decline in the number of all nonfarm employees from January 2009 to March 2012 with the decline in jobs held by women in that period.
While the statistic was technically correct for one month in 2012 — about three years into Obama’s first term — it quickly was dropped by Romney’s campaign because newer economic data made it obsolete.
In the debate, Fiorina claimed that this statistic was true for Obama’s first term. But by the time he took the oath of office a second time, his jobs record was a net winner, both for men and women. So this claim is utterly wrong.
This is false, though it has increasingly emerged as a GOP talking point. Sanders, an independent from Vermont who is seeking the Democratic presidential nomination, has not yet released a tax plan, but has repeatedly denied that he would increase taxes from the current marginal rate of 39.6 percent to 90 percent. (The margin rate is what you pay on each additional dollar earned.)
The United States had a marginal tax rate of 90 percent in the Dwight Eisenhower administration, and then John F. Kennedy proposed to reduce it to 70 percent. (The tax cut was passed after his assassination.) But even such rates would not take 90 percent of a person’s income.
Bush repeatedly claims $19 billion in taxes over his eight years as governor, but that is quite misleading. This refers to cumulative state revenue changes as a result of state and federal decisions, and it includes revenue changes from tax and non-tax legislative actions during his tenure as governor.
Moreover, this $19 billion figure includes revenues the state would have received if the federal estate tax credit had not been phased out. There were some states that levied new state taxes to balance out the phase-out of the federal estate tax. Bush didn’t fight the estate tax repeal. But that’s certainly not the same as actively “cutting” those tax revenues from the state budget.
Bush’s 1.3 million jobs number is accurate, as far as it goes, and he avoided claiming that he “led the nation” in job creation. But, as we repeatedly warn, readers should be wary when state executives take credit for the number of jobs in their state. There’s not one policy decision that affects jobs figures.
Cruz’s comment is based on research by Emmanuel Saez, a University of California at Berkeley economics professor who is often cited for claims on income inequality.
Saez analyzed Internal Revenue Service income data dating to 1913, and found that the top 1 percent in 2012 had the highest share of income since 1928, the peak of the stock market bubble of the roaring 1920s. Saez compiled market income data, including capital gains and excluding government transfers.
The top 1 percent’s income share fell slightly in 2013 compared to 2012, to 20.1 percent from 22.8 percent. But the trend remained the same.
Incomes in the top 1 percent fluctuated more sharply since 1928 compared to the bottom 99 percent. And the bottom 90 percent’s income share did not increase as much as the top decile in recent decades, Saez wrote. “Those at the very top of the income distribution therefore play a central role in the evolution of U.S. inequality over the course of the 20th century,” Saez wrote.
Moderator Becky Quick: “You had talked a little bit about Marco Rubio. I think you called him Mark Zuckerberg’s personal senator because he was in favor of the H-1B [visa].”
Donald Trump: “I never said that. I never said that.”
Perhaps Trump should have read his own campaign Web site before the debate.
Among the immigration policy proposals listed on DonaldJTrump.com is a proposal to increase the prevailing wage for those in the H-1B program. H-1B visas are granted to highly skilled immigrant workers who are coveted by technology companies, particularly ones in Silicon Valley.
Trump has proposed restricting the H-1B program. He criticized the program for giving away coveted entry-level IT jobs to workers getting flown in cheaper from overseas. More STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) graduates receive degrees than find STEM jobs each year, according to Trump’s proposal. He proposed raising the prevailing wage paid to H-1B visa holders so that entry-level IT jobs can go to “the existing domestic pool of unemployed native and immigrant workers in the U.S., instead of flying in cheaper workers form overseas.”
“Mark Zuckerberg’s personal Senator, Marco Rubio, has a bill to triple H-1Bs that would decimate women and minorities,” the white paper read. (We could not find any evidence that Trump himself has made this assertion.)
During the debate, Trump denied that he was critical of Zuckerberg, of Facebook: “I am all in favor of keeping these talented people here so they can go to work in Silicon Valley.”
Christie loves to say this but that doesn’t make it true. And he significantly misstates the date for when Social Security’s trust funds will be depleted; that will not happen for another 20 years (and even then Social Security can pay partial benefits).
An IOU is just a pejorative way of saying “bond.” These bonds are backed by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government. Until the 2011 debt-ceiling impasse, one could not imagine that any president or Congress would risk defaulting on them because it would damage the nation’s financial standing. Still, Treasury bonds are considered a good bet — deemed to be one of the safest places to keep money.
The bonds are a real asset to Social Security, but they also represent an obligation of the rest of the government. Like any entity that issues debt, such as a corporation, the government will have to make good on its obligations, generally by taking the money out of revenue, reducing expenses or issuing new debt. The action taken really depends on the resources available at the time. There is nothing particularly unusual about this, except that the U.S. government is better placed to make good on these obligations than virtually any other debt-issuer.
Some analysts, however, question whether the Social Security system holding those bonds lowers the cost of paying benefits relative to if the system did not hold them. Since the bonds have to be redeemed by general taxpayers, as a group taxpayers have to provide the same level of revenues to finance benefit payments as if Social Security were not holding any bonds.
So then the question becomes whether the fact that Social Security ran these surpluses in the past improved the government’s overall fiscal position and thereby made it easier for the government to finance the total level of upcoming benefit payments. Some analysts contend that the existence of the earlier Social Security surpluses spurred lawmakers to spend more, resulting in higher public debt.
Rubio is referring to a report published in 2014 by the Brookings Institution, which studied Census Bureau data called Business Dynamic Statistics. Brookings analysts tracked data back to 1978 and found that starting in 2008, business deaths exceeded business births through 2011.
But note that this started happening seven years ago, while Rubio makes it sound like it is a new development. (Update: PolitiFact noted that more recent data shows the trend shifted in 2012 and in the past two years, business starts began to exceed business deaths.)
These are Kasich’s go-to claims about his record as Ohio governor and chairman of the House Budget Committee. But some of his figures lack context.
The $8 billion figure reflects the breadth of the budget imbalance that Kasich’s administration faced when he took office (the actual figure is $7.7 billion). But the projection did not end up being as high, and the actual shortfall was decreased by hundreds of millions of dollars.
Kasich’s $2 billion figure and jobs numbers largely check out. The $2 billion surplus is the state government’s tally of the rainy day fund. While Bureau of Labor Statistics support his job creation numbers, we’ve frequently urged readers to be wary about such claims. So much of what happens in an economy and the impact on jobs is beyond a single politician’s control.
Kudos to Kasich for clarifying that the $5 trillion surplus was a projection, not an actual surplus, when he left Congress in 2000. We’ve urged him to clarify this point in the past. The figure he uses was a projected, 10-year surplus — but it didn’t end up materializing because of a slower economy, tax cuts and increased government spending after 9/11 in the years after Kasich left Washington.
Trump, referring to the shooting at the Naval Reserve center in Chattanooga, Tenn., in July, is wrong on this point. The service members at the Naval Reserve center in Chattanooga, Tenn., were armed. In fact, the military is investigating why they were armed, as the Pentagon has restrictions on who can carry weapons at such facilities.
The FBI said a 24-year-old gunman armed with a semiautomatic assault rifle and a handgun methodically hunted for Marines and sailors to kill.
Edward Reinhold, special agent in charge of the FBI’s field office in Knoxville, Tenn., provided the first definitive account of the terrorist attack that left four Marines and a Navy petty officer dead.
Reinhold told reporters at a news conference in Chattanooga that Mohammad Youssef Abdulazeez smashed through the gate of the reserve center last Thursday and was almost immediately confronted by a service member who had his own gun.
The service member fired several rounds, but it has not yet been determined whether he managed to hit Abdulazeez, who quickly entered the reserve center looking for targets, mortally wounding the sailor inside the building.
This is false. Manufacturing took a huge hit during the Great Recession, so 2 million jobs were lost between December 2007 and June 2009, the official length of the recession, according to government statistics. But the recession began a year before Obama took office.
Meanwhile, from those depths, manufacturing has slowly crawled its way back. From the start of Obama’s presidency, there are about 250,000 fewer manufacturing jobs. That is still about 1.4 million fewer than the start of the recession, however.
This is Jindal’s go-to line about his record as governor. But he takes too much credit.
The state budget in fiscal 2009, Jindal’s first budget after taking office in 2008, was $34.3 billion. In fiscal 2016, the proposed budget was $25.1 billion. That is a $9.2 billion decrease, or a 26.8 percent decrease.
But this budget decrease was not due to his executive decisions alone. Federal funding also decreased by $10 billion during those eight years, from $19.7 billion to $9.7 billion. Part of this decrease was waning federal funding for hurricane recovery, the Times-Picayune has reported.
The labor participation rate fell to 62.4 percent in September, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. That’s actually lowest since 1977, when it touched 62.3 percent — but that’s 38 years, not 50. So Santorum’s a bit off with his figure.
When Obama took office in January, 2009, the workforce participation rate was 65.7 percent. So there has certainly been a decline. But the rate had already been on a steady downward track since it hit a high of 67.3 percent in the last year of Bill Clinton’s presidency.
A key reason? The composition of the labor force has been affected by the retirement of the leading edge of the baby-boom generation.
The Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago in 2012 concluded that just over half of the post-1999 decline in the participation rate comes from the retirement of the baby boomers. Critically, the research showed that the problem is only going to get worse in the rest of the decade, with retirements accounting for two-thirds of the decline of participation rate by 2020. In other words, the rate will keep declining, no matter how well the economy does.
Will this zombie claim about the shrinking Navy ever go away? Apparently not; we already awarded Graham three Pinocchios earlier this year for the same claim. Fact checkers repeatedly debunked this in the 2012 presidential elections, and it’s being repeated again this time around.
But, surprise: A lot has changed in 100 years, including the need and capacity of ships. After all, it’s a now a matter of modern nuclear-powered fleet carriers, versus gunboats and small warships of 100 years ago. The push for ships under the Reagan era (to build the Navy up to 600-ship levels) no longer exists, and ships from that era are now retiring.
Navy Secretary Ray Mabus recently spoke about this problematic ship-counting exercise. There are other ways to measure seapower than just the sheer number of ships, he said: “That’s pretty irrelevant. We also have fewer telegraph machines than we did in World War I and we seem to be doing fine without that. … Look at the capability. Look at the missions that we do.” Plus, the Navy is on track to grow to just over 300 ships, approximately the size that a bipartisan congressional panel has recommended for the current Navy.
As for his statement about the army, Graham is on a bit more solid ground because he’s talking about the number of troops. (Under sequestration, the number of troops was due to be reduced to 420,000 in fiscal year 2016, the lowest since 1940, but the new budget deal will likely change that.) But even then, it’s apples and oranges to compare the capabilities of a World War II army with today’s army.
That the Export-Import Bank levels the playing field for the U.S. economy is a common argument for reauthorizing the federal agency. But there are data limitations to how the Ex-Im Bank’s loans has affected American jobs.
The Government Accountability Office in 2013 found that there are limitations to the method the bank uses to keep track of employment figures. This method plays an essential role in the bank’s jobs calculation process, the GAO found.
But because of limitations out of the agency’s direct control, the GAO found that the data “cannot be used to distinguish between jobs that were newly created and those that were maintained.” | 0fake |
Young German conservatives call for change after election losses | DRESDEN, Germany (Reuters) - The youth wing of German Chancellor Angela Merkel s conservatives said on Friday the bloc had a credibility problem on migration and needed new faces after suffering big losses in the Sept. 24 national election. Merkel won a fourth term in office, but her Christian Democrats (CDU) and their Bavarian sister party saw their worst results since 1949, bleeding support to the far-right Alternative for Germany and the pro-business Free Democrats (FDP). Merkel, who will address 1,000 delegates from the Young Union (JU) in Dresden on Saturday, will try to hammer out differences with Bavarian party leaders on Sunday about their call for an upper limit to migration. An agreement is needed before conservatives can enter into talks on a tricky three-way coalition with the FDP and the environmentalist Greens, an alignment untested thus far on a national level. The young conservatives Dresden declaration called for an honest and unflinching questioning of our polices of the past years given the election results. Things cannot just continue as they were, the declaration said. Many people have the feeling that those up there have forgotten us down here . The declaration said conservatives had a credibility problem on the migration issue, but emphasized the group s wish for Merkel s continued leadership. At the same time, it said conservatives should have the courage to represent the full spectrum of the party through new faces in government, the parliamentary group and party. Deputy finance minister Jens Spahn, considered a possible successor to Merkel, drew sustained applause for a speech in which he blamed the government s migration policies for the election losses, and said conservative leaders had refused to acknowledge that fact or address the public s fears head on. The declaration did not demand an upper limit on migration as the Bavarian Christian Social Union (CSU) has done, but said a clear limit on migration and a quota for refugees were needed. What we don t need is uncontrolled immigration into our social welfare systems, it said. Merkel and the Greens have rejected the call by the CSU for a migrant cap but there are signs that conservatives could agree on different wording. I honestly don t care what it s called, Spahn told delegates, adding that conservatives understood that some change was needed. We got the message, he said. Some members of Merkel s conservatives and potential coalition partners have called for an immigration law as a way to solve the issue. A new poll released by Focus magazine showed that 67 percent of Germans back the migrant cap demanded by the CSU, while 26 percent reject such a plan. | 0fake |
Trump says NATO is obsolete but still 'very important to me' | LONDON (Reuters) - U.S. President-elect Donald Trump said NATO was obsolete because it had not defended against terror attacks, but that the military alliance was still very important to him, The Times of London reported. “I took such heat, when I said NATO was obsolete,” Trump told the newspaper in an interview. “It’s obsolete because it wasn’t taking care of terror. I took a lot of heat for two days. And then they started saying Trump is right.” Trump added that many NATO members were not paying their fair share for U.S. protection. “A lot of these countries aren’t paying what they’re supposed to be paying, which I think is very unfair to the United States,” Trump said. “With that being said, NATO is very important to me. There’s five countries that are paying what they’re supposed to. Five. It’s not much.” | 0fake |
Russian Lobbyist Blows Jeff Sessions’ Story Right Out Of The Water | As Attorney General, Jeff Sessions is the top law enforcement person in this country. He s also under investigation for colluding with the Russians and for lying about it. Let that sink in for just a moment.There s a new report out on Thursday, which, whether or not it is to be believed, is more bad news for Sessions.According to an article in The Guardian, an American lobbyist for Russian banking and oil interests claims that he had dinner with Sessions. This is in direct conflict to what Sessions claimed in front of the Senate just this week.Sessions testified under oath on Tuesday that he did not believe he had any contacts with lobbyists working for Russian interests over the course of Trump s campaign. But Richard Burt, a former ambassador to Germany during the Reagan administration, who has represented Russian interests in Washington, told the Guardian that he could confirm previous media reports that stated he had contacts with Sessions at the time. I did attend two dinners with groups of former Republican foreign policy officials and Senator Sessions, Burt said.Burt, who previously served on the advisory board of Alfa Capital Partners, a private equity fund where Russia s Alfa Bank was an investor and last year was lobbying on behalf of a pipeline company that is now controlled by Gazprom, Russia s state-controlled energy conglomerate, first told Politico in October that he had been invited to two dinners that were hosted by Sessions last summer, at the height of the presidential campaign.There are two ways this could play out for Sessions. Either Burt is telling the truth, which is a possible smoking gun for perjury and obstruction, or he s lying. While Republicans seem to be operating under the assumption that Putin is holding them tight in his warm shirtless embrace, the truth is that Putin doesn t give a crap about Jeff Sessions, Donald Trump or Paul Ryan.Russia s goal is to destabilize the United States using the best tools at their disposal, and right now, Republicans are their biggest tools. That will change the moment the idiots prove they re no longer useful. Burt s statement could, even if not true, prove that Session s usefulness is done. Russia could be ready to turn on the Trump administration.Featured image via Alex Wong/Getty Images. | 1real |
Iran Nuclear Deal: Does Obama want Israel to commit suicide? | In 1982, during one of many visits to Israel, I had the opportunity to speak with Prime Minister Menachem Begin, who told me, "Israel needs friends." He added that in the end, his nation could not trust any nation with its fate and security. The protection of Israel, he said, was ultimately the responsibility of Israelis.
Begin's comment was prophetic given the petulance of our current president, who behaves like an enemy of Israel when he attempts to impose a Palestinian state on Israel and negotiate a deal with Iran that can only lead to new threats against the Jewish state and further destabilize the chaotic Middle East.
In his determination to strike a deal with Iran over its nuclear weapons program (which Iran has denied exists, so what is the U.S. negotiating?), President Obama has traded history, facts and reality for a potential deal with a regime that promotes terrorism around the world and is busy attaching Iraq to its vision of a greater Persian Empire.
Last Saturday, Iran's Supreme leader Ali Khamenei again called for "Death to America," just one day after President Obama appealed to Iranians in a video message to seize a "historic opportunity" for a nuclear deal and a better future. The leader of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, also continues to use inflammatory rhetoric about the ultimate destruction of Israel. What should this tell us?
The president is cozying up to a nation that oppresses women, has an apocalyptic view of the world and believes that if it starts a nuclear war the 12th Imam -- the Islamic messiah -- will emerge from a well and bring peace on Earth and good will, at least to Shia Muslim men. Women will remain subject to male domination and have only the few rights given to them by men.
Israel, which embraces Western values of free elections, religious tolerance and pluralism, a free press and equal rights for women is treated by President Obama and his administration as Iran should be treated. Do these people suffer from diplomatic dyslexia, or anti-Semitism?
The coming nuclear deal with Iran, if it occurs, will be a sham from the start. Agreements between nations require at least some trust, but Iran has as much credibility as a double-your-money promise from Bernie Madoff.
Why should Israel be forced to surrender more land to an enemy that has sworn to destroy it? A Palestinian state would likely be used as a launching pad for an attack. Gaza is a perfect example. It has been used by Hamas to attack Israel, which unilaterally and foolishly gave it up in hopes of promoting peace.
Suicide is not in Israel's interests, or that of the United States, but suicide is what President Obama seems to want Israel to commit by pressuring it to return to indefensible 1967 borders and accept a nuclear deal with Iran.
That two states is not what Israel's enemies want was made clear enough when President Clinton brought then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and PLO leader Yasser Arafat to Camp David in 2000. Barak offered Arafat virtually everything he asked for -- 95 percent by some estimates -- and Arafat rejected the offer. Arafat, his contemporaries and those who have come after him, desire only one state headed by themselves with no Jewish state and no Jewish presence, as evidenced by the wars and terrorist attacks they have launched and continue to wage against Israel.
In Deuteronomy 17:7, God instructs the ancient Israelites: "You must purge the evil from among you."
In his dangerous pursuit of a problematic nuclear weapons deal with Iran and his attempt to marry a cancerous Palestinian state to the land of Israel, President Obama is not purging evil; he's inviting it to spread. History will judge him for this as it has every other nation that has harmed "the apple of His eye." (Zechariah 2:8)
Cal Thomas is America's most widely syndicated op-ed columnist. He joined Fox News Channel in 1997 as a political contributor. His latest book is "What Works: Common Sense Solutions for a Stronger America" is available in bookstores now. Readers may email Cal Thomas at tcaeditors@tribune.com. | 0fake |
MIND-BLOWING LIVE Facebook POLL comments show Trump winning 95%! (90k comments+) … This is PROOF we need if election is rigged. | MIND-BLOWING LIVE Facebook POLL comments show Trump winning 95%! (90k comments+) … This is PROOF we need if election is rigged. by IWB · October 27, 2016 Tweet
Another Facebook poll showing Trump winning 90% of votes, 90,000 comments — look at these comments, stunning — from all over the country. Unbiased poll… I have yet to see Hillary produce ANY Facebook poll where she wins.
This coincides with the other 500,000 FB comment poll posted on GLP a while back, also showing Trump winning 90% of comments:
Minnesota’s 8th District – traditionally Democrat working class
The eighth Congressional District of Minnesota is a working class area in Eastern Minnesota. It has voted for a Democrat in the last four Presidential elections. It has a Democrat Congressman and will likely be the most expensive Congressional race this year.
Usually, a Democrat Presidential candidate would win. But a recent poll held a shock:
Donald Trump is up 12 points!
And more: Trump is winning among women. And the Democrat Party is losing members. They’re becoming Independents.
What The Data Says did this analysis of the Eighth Congressional District of Minnesota:
– Trump is beating Hillary by 12 points: “Our poll shows Republican Donald Trump with a 12-point lead over Clinton, 47 percent to 35 percent“ – Trump is winning with women: “leading Clinton 41 percent to 39 percent.” – Dems are crossing over: “the number of Democrats dropped from 34 percent in 2014 to 27 percent in 2016. The number of independents jumped from 31 percent two years ago to 41 percent this year.“
WHY CAN’T HILLARY PRODUCE ANYTHING CLOSE TO A WINNING FACEBOOK COMMENT POLL?
AMISH VOTERS Rally for DONALD TRUMP in Pennsylvania (VIDEO) thousands in the rain for Trump rally…incl Amish!Lancaster Co., PA pic.twitter.com/pB7XaMAsV2
— Chris Pontius (@cpFNC) October 1, 2016 AMISH COME OUT FOR TRUMP IN PA. GOD BLESS TRUMP!!! pic.twitter.com/hAAypaL6PV | 1real |
Report: Almost Half of Germans Agree With Israel-Centric Anti-Semitism | Modern in Germany is increasingly being found to include criticism of the modern state of Israel in general and Jews in particular, according to a new report. [The Independent Expert Group on published its findings in Germany at the end of last month. It found Jews are “increasingly concerned for their safety due to everyday experiences of ” as the number surveyed who agreed with statements rose from 28 per cent in 2014 to 40 per cent in 2016. It added: “While the majority does not see current manifestations of as a relevant problem, Jews in Germany feel they are facing a growing threat … there is concern about among Muslims, these days especially in refugee and migrant populations. ” German broadcaster Deutsche Welle (DW) reports the study has the support of politicians from across the political spectrum, observing that more needs to be done to fight modern forms of in the country. The Expert Group said that while traditional forms of had declined somewhat, modern for example, criticism of Israel being transferred to Jews in general, remained “alarmingly popular”. About 200, 000 Jews live in Germany, Europe’s third largest community after Britain and France, up from only about 15, 000 who survivied after the end of the Nazi Third Reich. “Forty percent agree with ” Green Party member of the Bundestag Volker Beck told DW. “That’s almost half of the society. It says a lot about the intellectual environment in which Jews have to live. ” “New forms of have arisen, and unfortunately the end of the Holocaust and the Second World War didn’t mean the end of ” conservative MP Barbara Woltmann said. “It does worry me that around 20 percent latent still exists within the populace. ” The parliamentary panel report said rising Jewish fears were partly due to “the growing importance of social media” which was “key to the spread of hate speech and agitation”. The experts issued five “key demands” to fight . They include appointing an ombudsman, establishing a national data base for crimes and providing support for groups researching and trying to combat . As Breitbart Jerusalem reported, in Germany at the end of 2016 there were 2, 083 reported cases of attacks on Jews, Jewish property, and hate speech in 2015, up from just 691 cases in 2014. Previous analysis of crime figures had put the number of cases in 2015 at 1, 366, but closer analysis revealed that crimes such as the smashing of headstones in Jewish ceremonies, or starting fires at synagogues had been incorrectly classified as criminal damage or attempted arson in some states, with no mention made of the nature of the crimes. | 0fake |
A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS: A Lone Socialist Takes This Ironic Message To Trump | We re gonna go out on a limb and guess that this young man s presence will only harden the resolve of most Trump supporters to support his campaign Lone Bernie fan before Trump appearance at OK State Fair. Tyler Woodfin, 21, OU student. pic.twitter.com/6YTAo4wYLr Rosie Gray (@RosieGray) September 25, 2015 | 1real |
Austria's far-right Freedom Party congratulates Trump | VIENNA (Reuters) - Austrian far-right leader Heinz-Christian Strache congratulated Donald Trump on his victory in the U.S. presidential elections on Wednesday. “The political left as well as the aloof and sleazy establishment are being punished by voters and voted out of various decision-making positions,” the head of the populist Freedom Party (FPO) said on Facebook. The FPO hopes for its own candidate Norbert Hofer to become the European Union’s first far-right head of state on Dec. 4. Hofer, 45, an anti-immigrant EU critic hopes to succeed former Green Party leader Alexander Van der Bellen in a re-run of an annulled May election. | 0fake |
Congressional Hawks Rush to Intensify War in Syria | Tweet Widget by Rick Sterling
Warmongers in the U.S. Congress -- Democrats and Republicans – are in a mad dash towards war with Russia in Syria. A “No Fly Zone” resolution passed the House with little debate, cloaked in “humanitarian” language that blames the besieged Syrian government for the totality of the deaths in the U.S.-backed proxy war. The bipartisan regime changers are desperate to complete their mission before the regime change that will occur in Washington, on January 20. Congressional Hawks Rush to Intensify War in Syria by Rick Sterling
This article previously appeared in Dissident Voice .
“ They are desperate to prevent the Syrian government from finally eliminating the terrorist groups which the West and allies have promoted for the past 5+ years.”
Hawks pass HR5732
Late in the day Tuesday November 15, Congress convened in special session. With normal rules suspended, they passed House Resolution 5732 the “Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act.” The resolution calls for intensifying already harsh sanctions on Syria, assessing implementation of No Fly Zone in Syria and escalating efforts to press criminal charges against Syrian officials.
HR5732 claims to promote a negotiated settlement in Syria but, as analyzed by Friends Committee for National Legislation, imposes preconditions which would actually make that more difficult.
There was 40 minutes of “debate” with six representatives (Royce, Engel, Ros-Lehtinen, Kildee, Smith, and Curbelo) speaking in favor of the resolution. There were few other Congressional representatives present in Congress. The House Foreign Affairs Committee stated that the resolution was passed “unanimously” without mentioning the special conditions.
The “Non Controversial” Resolution that could lead to World War III
According to wikipedia “ Suspension of the rules is a procedure generally used to quickly pass non-controversial bills in the United States House of Representatives ….such as naming Post Offices…” In this case, the resolution calls for evaluating and developing plans for a “No Fly Zone” which is an act of war. This is obviously controversial and it seems clear the resolution should have been debated and discussed under normal rules with a normal amount of Congressional presence and debate.
The motivation for bypassing normal rules and rushing the bill through without debate was articulated by the bill’s author and ranking Democrat Eliot Engel: “We cannot delay action on Syria any further…. if we don’t get this legislation across the finish line in the next few weeks, we are back to square one.” The current urgency may be related to the election results since Trump has spoken out against “regime change” foreign policy. As much as they are critical of Obama for not doing more, Congressional neoconservatives are concerned about the prospect of a President who might move toward peace and away from war.
The Caesar Fraud
HR5732 is titled the “Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act”. Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Ed Royce (R-Ca) explained that the resolution is named after “the brave Syrian defector known to the world as Caesar, who testified to us the shocking scale of torture being carried out within the prisons of Syria.”
In reality, the Caesar story was a grand deception involving the CIA with funding from Qatar to sabotage the 2014 Geneva negotiations. The 55,000 photos which were said to show 11,000 torture victims have never been publicly revealed. Only a tiny number of photos have been publicized. However, in 2015 Human Rights Watch was granted access to view the entire set. They revealed that almost one half the photos show the opposite of what was claimed: instead of victims tortured by the Syrian government, they actually show dead Syrian soldiers and civilian victims of car bombs and other terror attacks! The “Caesar” story, replete with masked ‘defector’, was one of the early propaganda hoaxes regarding Syria.
False Claims that the US has been doing nothing
One of the big lies regarding Syria is that the US has been inactive. Royce says:
The administration has decided not to decide. And that itself, unfortunately, has set a course where here we sit and watch and the violence only worsens. Mr. Speaker, America has been sitting back and watching these atrocities for far too long. Vital U.S. national security interests are at stake.
The ranking Democrat Eliot Engel said:
Four years ago I thought we should have aided the Free Syrian Army. They came to us in Washington and begged us for help… they were simply looking for weaponry. I really believe if we had given it to them, the situation in Syria would have been different today.
This is nonsense. The US was actively coordinating, training and supplying armed opposition groups beginning in late 2011. When the Qadaffi government was toppled in Fall 2011, the CIA oversaw the theft of the Libyan armories and shipment of weapons to Syrian armed opposition as documented in the Defense Intelligence Agency report of October 2012.
These weapons transfers were secret. For the public record it was acknowledged that the US was supplying communications equipment to the armed opposition while Saudi Arabia and Qatar were supplying weaponry. This is one reason that Saudi purchases of weapons skyrocketed during this time period; they were buying weapons to replace those being shipped to the armed opposition in Syria. It was very profitable for US arms manufacturers.
Huge weapons transfers to the armed opposition in Syria have continued to the present. This past Spring, Janes Defense reported the details of a U.S. delivery of 2.2 million pounds of ammunition, rocket launchers and other weaponry to the armed opposition.
“The US has done everything short of a direct attack on Syria.”
Claims that the US has been inactive are baseless. In reality the US has done everything short of a direct attack on Syria. And the US military is starting to cross that barrier. On September 17 the US air coalition did a direct attack on the Syrian Army in Deir Ezzor, killing 80 Syrian soldiers and enabling ISIS to launch an attack on the position. Claims that it was a “mistake” are highly dubious.
The claims by Congressional hawks that the US has been “inactive” in the Syrian conflict are part of the false narrative suggesting the US must “do something” which leads to a No Fly Zone and full scale war. Ironically, these calls for war are masked as “humanitarian.” And never do the proponents bring up the case of Libya where the US and NATO “did something”: destroyed the government and left chaos.
Congress as a Fact-Free House of Propaganda
With only a handful of representatives present and no debate, the six Congress members engaged in unrestrained propaganda and misinformation. The leading Democrat, Eliot Engel, said “We’re going into the New Year 2017, Assad still clings to power, at the expense of killing millions of his citizens.” That number is way off anyone’s charts.
Rep Kildee said “The world has witnessed this terrible tragedy unfold before our eyes. Nearly half a million Syrians killed. Not soldiers – men, women, children killed.”
The official text of the resolution says,
It is the sense of Congress that–
(1) Bashar al-Assad’s murderous actions against the people of Syria have caused the deaths of more than 400,000 civilians…
The above accusations – from “millions of citizens” to “half a million” to “400,000 civilians” – are all preposterous lies.
Credible estimates of casualties in the Syrian conflict range from 300,000 to 420,000. The opposition supporting Syrian Observatory for Human Rights estimates the documented 2011-2016 death toll as follows:
killed pro Syrian forces – 108,000
killed anti government forces – 105,000
killed civilians – 89,000
In contrast with Congressional and media claims, civilians comprise a minority of the total death count and the largest casualty group is those fighting in defense of the the Syrian state. These facts are ignored and never mentioned because they point to the reality versus the propaganda narrative which allows the USA and allies to continue funding terrorism and a war of aggression against Syria.
The Congressional speakers were in full self-righteous mode as they accused the Syrian government of “committing crimes against humanity and war crimes against civilians including murder, torture and rape. No one has been spared from this targeting, even children.” A naive listener would never know that the Syrian government is primarily fighting the Syrian branch of Al Qaeda including thousands of foreigners supplied and paid by foreign governments.
The Congressional speakers go on to accuse the Syrian military of “targeting” hospitals, schools and markets. A critical listener might ask why they would do that instead of targeting the Al Qaeda terrorists and their allies who launch dozens and sometimes hundreds of hell cannon missiles into government held Aleppo every day.
“The White Helmets actively promote US/NATO intervention through a No Fly Zone.”
The Congressional propaganda fest would not be complete without mention of the “ White Helmets “. House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce said:
“We (previously) heard the testimony of Raed Saleh of the Syrian White Helmets. These are the doctors, nurses and volunteers who actually, when the bombs come, run towards the areas that have been hit in order to try to get the injured civilians medical treatment…They have lost over 600 doctors and nurses.”
This is more Congressional nonsense. There are no nurses or doctors associated with the White Helmets. The organization was created by the USA and UK and heavily promoted by a “ shady PR firm .” The White Helmets operate solely in areas controlled by Nusra and associated terrorist groups. They do some rescue work in the conflict zone but their main role is in the information war manipulating public opinion. The White Helmets actively promote US/NATO intervention through a No Fly Zone. Recently the White Helmets has become a major source of claims of innocent civilian victims in east Aleppo. Given the clear history of the White Helmets, these claims should be treated with skepticism. What exactly is the evidence? The same skepticism needs to be applied to video and other reports from the Aleppo Media Center. AMC is a creation of the Syrian Expatriates Organization whose address on K Street, Washington DC indicates it is a US marketing operation.
What is really going on?
The campaign to overthrow the Syrian government is failing and there is possibility of a victory for the Syrian government and allies. The previous flood of international jihadi recruits has dried up. The Syrian Army and allies are gaining ground militarily and negotiating settlements or re-locations with “rebels” who previously terrorized Homs, Darraya (outer Damascus) and elsewhere. In Aleppo the Syrian army and allies are tightening the noose around the armed opposition in east Aleppo.
This has caused alarm among neoconservative lawmakers devoted to Israel, Saudi Arabia and U.S. empire. They are desperate to prevent the Syrian government from finally eliminating the terrorist groups which the West and allies have promoted for the past 5+ years.
“Pro Israel” groups have been major campaigners for passage of HR5732. The name of Simon Wiesenthal is even invoked in the resolution. With crocodile tears fully flowing, Rabbi Lee Bycel wrote “ Where is the Conscience of the World? ” as he questioned why the “humanitarian” HR5732 was not passed earlier.
Israeli interests are one of the primary forces sustaining and promoting the conflict. Syria is officially at war with Israel which continues to occupy the Syrian Golan Heights; Syria has been a key ally of the Lebanese resistance; and Syria has maintained its alliance with Iran. In 2010 Secretary of State Clinton urged Syria to break relations with Hezbollah, reduce relations with Iran and come to settlement with Israel. The Syrian refusal to comply with these Washington demands was instrumental in solidifying Washington’s hostility .
Congressional proponents of HR5732 make clear the international dimension of the conflict. Royce explains “It is Russia, it is Hezbollah, that are the primary movers of death and destruction…it is the IRGC fighters from Iran”. Engel echoes the same message: “Yes, we want to go after Assad’s partners in violence…along with Iranian and Hezbollah forces”.
These statements are in contrast with the analysis of some writers who believe Israel is not deeply opposed to the Damascus government. For example, Phyllis Bennis recently wrote that belief in an “arc of resistance” has been “long debunked” and that “the Syrian regime …. often plays a useful role for US and Israeli interests.”
It’s remarkable that this faulty analysis continues to be propounded. In words and deeds Israel has made its position on Syria crystal clear. Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren explained in an interview:
“We always wanted [President] Bashar Assad to go, we always preferred the bad guys who weren’t backed by Iran to the bad guys who were backed by Iran … the greatest danger to Israel is by the strategic arc that extends from Tehran, to Damascus to Beirut. And we saw the Assad regime as the keystone in that arc.”
These statements have been fully backed up by Israeli actions bombing Syrian positions in southern Syria and providing medical treatment for Nusra/Al Qaeda and other armed opposition fighters.
What Will Happen Now?
If the Syrian government and allies continue to advance in Aleppo, Deir Ezzor, outer Damascus and the south, the situation will come to a head. The enemies of Syria – predominately the USA, Gulf Countries, NATO and Israel – will come to a decision point. Do they intervene directly or do they allow their regime project to collapse?
HR5732 is an effort to prepare for direct intervention and aggression.
One thing is clear from the experience of Libya: Neoconservatives do not care if they leave a country in chaos. The main objective is to destabilize and overthrow a government which is too independent. If the USA and allies cannot dominate the country, then at least they can destroy the contrary authority and leave chaos.
What is at stake in Syria is whether the USA and allies Israel, Saudi Arabia, etc. are able to destroy the last secular and independent Arab country in the region and whether the US goal of being the sole superpower in the world prevails.
The rushed passing of HR5732 without debate is indicative that:
* “regime change” proponents have not given up their war on Syria
* they seek to escalate US aggression.
* the US Congress is a venue where blatant lies are said with impunity and where violent actions are advanced behind a cynical and amoral veneer of “humanitarianism” and crocodile tears. Rick Sterling is an investigative journalist and member of Syria Solidarity Movement. He can be reached at [email protected] | 1real |
Trump Angrily Goes After Hillary’s Competency With Misspelled Tweet | On Thursday afternoon, Hillary Clinton delivered an impassioned speech regarding foreign policy and how dangerous Donald Trump would be not only to the nation, but to the world. She delivered it well and made point after point driving home the fact that Trump simply cannot be our next president.Not taking too kindly to the fact that Clinton was going after him, Trump quickly took to his medium of choice Twitter.Trump wrote: Bad performance by Crooked Hillary Clinton! Reading poorly from the telepromter! She doesn t even look presidential! Bad performance by Crooked Hillary Clinton! Reading poorly from the telepromter! She doesn't even look presidential! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 2, 2016If only he knew how to spell teleprompter.And does Trump consider name-calling, explanation points and spelling incorrectly presidential? Apparently so.Oh, and yes, Trump did use a teleprompter for his foreign policy speech as well, and it was about as awkward as a 13-year-old boy asking the prettiest girl in school to the middle school spring fling.Truth be told, Trump doesn t even have the maturity level of a 13-year-old boy, probably more along the lines of a five- or six-year old. It s gotten to the point where you re waiting for him to tell people Hillary has cooties. Maybe he already has. Who s to know, really?Trump can go after Clinton all he wants on foreign policy, but the facts are the facts, and she absolutely wipes the floor with him in regards to experience. For example, he has none, and she s a former Secretary of State who is more traveled than any other Secretary of State in the history of the republic. She s brokered peace deals, for goodness sake.At the end of the day, it comes down to who can actually lead and get the job done, and Trump most certainly is not that person. No matter who the nominee is for the Democrats, they need to win in November.Featured Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images Twitter | 1real |
Neil Young Celebrates His 71st Birthday By Performing At Standing Rock | By Amanda Froelich The rock legend’s latest song, Indian Givers, is about the pipeline and seeks to raise awareness about the Native water protectors in North Dakota. Since Donald Trump won the... | 1real |
New York City Will Change Lead Testing Methods at Its Schools - The New York Times | New York City said on Friday that it would adjust its procedure of testing for lead in the water supply of schools, after experts said the city’s methods could lower the levels found. Between March and June, the city tested the water in all 1, 520 occupied school buildings. The night before taking samples, the contractors who conducted the testing arrived at the buildings and let the water run from all outlets for two hours, a practice known as flushing. An investigation by The New York Times uncovered the practice, which cleans pipes of soluble lead and lead particles, and thus can result in samples with lower than normal lead levels. The Environmental Protection Agency’s voluntary guidelines for testing water in schools do not mention flushing, and the agency has recommended against it when testing water in people’s homes. In July, the city said that less than 1 percent of samples tested had lead concentrations that exceeded the agency’s “action level” of 15 parts per billion. But Marc Edwards, a civil engineering professor at Virginia Tech, said that a long period of flushing would have skewed the results significantly and that the city should throw out the test results and start over. City officials initially defended their methods, saying the flushing did not affect the accuracy of the test results. They said the flushing protocol was developed for testing during the summer, when many school buildings are empty, to mimic normal water use, and then extended to all tests. On Friday, the city changed course — partly. A spokeswoman for Mayor Bill de Blasio, Freddi Goldstein, said that in the future the city would try to conduct as many tests as possible while school was in session, and on mornings other than Mondays, and that for these tests it would abandon the flushing step. But she said the city would continue doing the flushing when it was necessary to collect samples on Monday mornings or over school holidays. Ms. Goldstein said that starting in October, the city would retest every building that had at least one water sample that exceeded 15 parts per billion of lead (there were 510 of them). The city will also begin retesting the buildings that did not have any samples over that threshold. In buildings where one or more sample exceeded the E. P. A. ’s action level, the city has removed those outlets and also instructed its staff to flush all of the outlets in the building briefly every Monday morning. It has said that those steps will protect children from consuming water with high levels of lead. | 0fake |
Help Wanted, Apply Now! | Written by Peter Van Buren You may have seen the stories last week — President-elect Donald Trump was shocked to learn he needs to hire over 4,000 political appointees by January 20, or that people in Washington may refuse to work in a Trump administration, or that Trump, as a newcomer to politics, may not know enough people to get down to the business of hiring. I doubt any of those statements are true, and the task is easier than you think.Trump was well aware if he won he would need to do some hiring, and if he was not keeping lists of potential candidates, you can be sure others around him were. Far from some kind of chore, political organizations stretching back to Tammany Hall if not ancient Rome live for this task — handing out jobs is one of the prizes the election winner takes home. And as a businessperson, Trump himself is no stranger to the concept of hiring. The standing bureaucracy Washington oversees these transitions every four to eight years, as do the national party offices. Trump, though he is new to government, is not beginning from a cold start.But when it gets down to the actual work of filling positions, exactly how will Trump do it? I worked in a non-politically appointed position for the State Department for 24 years worth of transitions. Trump will fill positions pretty much the same way as every other modern president before him has.Trump starts with the big jobs, such as transition head Vice President-elect Mike Pence, and Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, former chair of the Republican National Committee. Soon after that will come the Secretaries of State, Treasury, Defense, the head of the Central Intelligence Agency, and an Attorney General.Those appointees will then fill in below them, the deputy and assistant secretaries, U.S. attorneys and advisors who do most of the work of government. Rudy Giuliani, for example, who has been in politics for some time, will have plenty of people he will want to work for him. Given the number of employees he knows and trusts from his business empire, Trump himself may seed in some mid-level individuals, particularly in agencies like Treasury and Commerce. These positions, give or take, amount to about one-fourth of the jobs that need to be staffed quickly. And of those, maybe fewer than 100 are critical for Day One.One important point: the first few layers of political appointees require Senate confirmation. A good strategy to both ease that process and to locate experienced people quickly is to turn to Senators and Congresspeople for recommendations. They are more than happy to help friends and allies into positions in the White House and, for Congresspeople who have lost their seats, find jobs for their soon-to-be-unemployed staffers.With those Senate confirmation jobs lined up, Trump’s transition team will move to the other positions. These jobs include any number of economic, national security, and other advisers. Many of those will be drawn from the campaign staff, people already advising Trump, or selected out of think tanks, lobbying groups, and academics. The nice thing about those pools of talent is that they are already ideologically vetted based on their association and/or past work. Had Hillary Clinton won, it is likely she would have also drawn staff from the Clinton Foundation.And don’t believe what you might read about people in Washington, including those who criticized Trump during the campaign, refusing to work in his White House. Oh, there will be a few, whose stories will get media attention. But the currency of Washington is power, and members of official Washington will kneel on broken glass before any would turn down a job in the West Wing. Trump (or Clinton, or…) will never lack for candidates. Don’t be surprised if even a few of those high-profile Republican national security officials who signed letters in March and August spring saying they’ll never work for Trump change their minds, “for the good of the country.”The largest category of jobs left to fill include people who do scheduling, subject matter experts, special counsels, and staff assistants. Many will trickle down as associates from the layer of appointees above them, or be pulled from the cadre of campaign volunteers and interns — why do you think someone spent two months sleeping in cheap motels? Just so they could knock on voters’ doors an Iowa winter?The last way Trump will staff up his administration is via application. In fact, you can go right now to President-elect Trump’s “Serve America” web site and complete an online application. Many people will also be submitting applications through their local Republican party office, their Congressional representatives, or just about anyone who knows someone who knows someone. And yes, it is a long shot.One more thing: while it is not common, Trump’s team can ask some current staffers to stick around, especially those in technical positions that are less ideological. And not every job has to be filled by Inauguration Day; there are layers of career civil servants who can fill in as needed, same as when the boss goes on vacation. The president can also appoint a temporary acting head of an agency while awaiting a confirmation hearing. In fact, many administrators don’t complete their first cycle of appointments for months . Reprinted with permission from WeMeantWell.com . Related | 1real |
null | There’s another whopper in Obamas lie about hillarys email, he says the administration strives for transparency. Not true Jonathan Gruber , ACA architect was recorded admitting specifically that transparency is a liability so the ACA was written to be long and convoluted. | 1real |
MTV Releases Racist ‘Hey Fellow White Guy’s Video’…Social Media Goes Crazy! [Video] | 1real | |
OBAMA COZIES UP TO ANOTHER COMMUNIST LEADER TO DISCUSS HUMAN RIGHTS… AND TPP? | So much for the US refusing to work with countries who are guilty of some of the worst human rights violations in the world From Human Rights Watch: Vietnam s human rights record remains dire in all key areas. A one-party communist state suppresses virtually all forms of political dissent, using a broad array of repressive measures. Freedom of expression, association and assembly are tightly controlled. The police routinely use torture and beatings to extract confessions and punish detainees. Religious minorities and activists are harassed, intimidated and imprisoned. The criminal justice system lacks independence and operates under the direction of the government and party. State-run drug rehabilitation centers exploit detainees as forced laborers making goods for local markets and export. Despite the pressure, increasing numbers of courageous bloggers and activists are vocal in calling for democracy and greater freedoms.A coalition of 14 human rights groups strongly condemns the Feb. 2014 decision by an appeals court upholding a 30-month prison sentence for Vietnamese human rights lawyer and blogger Le Quoc Quan. Mr. Quan has been detained since December 2012.The groups believe Mr. Quan s detention is politically motivated and a reaction to his blog, where he frequently exposes human rights violations by the Vietnamese government. Mr. Quan is a victim of a coordinated government crackdown on bloggers, citizen journalists and pro-democracy activists.Meanwhile President Barack Obama met Tuesday with Vietnamese communist party leader Nguy n Ph Tr ng in the hopes of strengthening ties between the two nations. The President also welcomes the opportunity to discuss other issues, including the Trans-Pacific Partnership, human rights, and bilateral defense cooperation, the White House said in a statement.The meeting came nearly four decades after the Vietnam War. Since that time, the two countries have made efforts to improve diplomatic relations. In just the past two years, Obama has met with Vietnam s President Tr ng T n Sang and Prime Minister Nguy n T n D ng. Like in any relations between two countries in the world, Vietnam and the U.S. have differences on a number of issues, such as perception on democracy, human rights and trade, Tr ng wrote, according to NPR. To resolve differences, I believe the most effective way would be open and constructive dialogues. Via: Daily Caller | 1real |
U.S.-Led Force Reduces Attacks on ISIS in Syria After Airstrike - The New York Times | WASHINGTON — The task force that is battling the Islamic State has sharply reduced airstrikes against the militants in Syria as commanders assess whether Syrian government forces or their Russian allies plan to respond to the United States’ cruise missile strike on a Syrian airfield this past week, American officials said. The precautionary move, revealed in statistics made public by the command on Saturday, was taken as Russian officials have threatened to suspend the communication line the American and Russian militaries use to notify each other about air operations in Syria. So far, the Russian military does not appear to have taken any threatening actions, such as directing its battlefield radar or air defense systems to confront the Americans, or carrying out aggressive actions in the skies, United States officials said. But officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal planning said the commanders needed time to determine whether the Syrian president, Bashar and the Russian military would treat the American cruise missile strike as a operation that they would not respond to militarily. As a precaution, the Pentagon is flying patrols in Syrian skies with jets, the Air Force’s most advanced fighter. If it becomes clear that the Syrians and Russians will not follow their sharp criticism of the operation with significant military action, the pace of American airstrikes against Islamic State forces in Syria can be quickly increased. Over the last two years, American and allied warplanes striking Islamic State targets in Syria have had to fly among formidable Syrian and air defenses. While there have been a few close calls between Russian and American jets, some of them unintentional, the air campaign has for the most part proceeded without interference from Russian or Syrian fighters or air defenses. Publicly, American officials had little to say about the reduction in strikes against the militants. “We are using resources as appropriate to the commander’s priorities and as the situation dictates,” a military official said. On Friday in Syria, the day the United States fired 59 cruise missiles around 3:40 a. m. local time against Al Shayrat airfield, the coalition carried out just seven airstrikes against Islamic State targets in Syria, according to the command. All the airstrikes were near Tabqah, where Syrian fighters and American advisers are trying to take the town and a nearby dam, a move that would cut off the western approaches to Raqqa, the Islamic State’s capital. By contrast, on Tuesday the command carried out twice as many strikes in Syria against the Islamic State, and against a broader array of targets. On March 27, the command conducted 19 strikes in Syria against Islamic State militants. In the Raqqa mission, United States Special Operations forces assisting Syrian Kurdish and Arab fighters in their encirclement of the city, in eastern Syria, have also taken unspecified precautions against possible retaliatory attacks, military officials said. The United States struck the airfield in response to a deadly chemical weapons attack by the Syrian government. American officials have said that the purpose of the airfield attack was to dissuade Mr. Assad from using chemical weapons again and that it was not intended to be part of a broader military effort to undermine the Syrian leader’s hold on power. As long as Mr. Assad refrains from using chemical weapons again, the officials have said, the United States does not plan to carry out further attacks on his forces. Some American and other Western counterterrorism officials have said the missile strike could nonetheless make the fight against the Islamic State in Syria more difficult. “It seems clear that the strikes will complicate our efforts to pursue our campaign in Syria,” said Matthew Olsen, a former director of the National Counterterrorism Center. “In particular, the ability to carry out U. S. airstrikes in Syria in support of the coalition against ISIS requires some degree of cooperation with Russia, which is now in serious jeopardy. ” Other security experts said that much depended on the Trump administration’s next steps, and how the Assad government and its Russian patrons responded. “U. S. aircraft operating over are already ostensibly in range of the Russian system at the Humaymin Air Base, and we might see Russia deploy more air defense assets to Syria,” Jeremy Binnie, the Middle East editor of Jane’s Defense Weekly, said in an email. “But if the U. S. makes no moves to threaten Assad’s position, then they may well accept the punishment and move on. ” William McCants, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and the author of “The ISIS Apocalypse,” offered a similar assessment. If the strikes are limited to what took place this past week, “then they don’t change much,” Mr. McCants said. “They won’t help jihadists propagandize against the U. S. because the missiles targeted the hated Assad regime. Russia wasn’t doing much against ISIS, so Russian anger at the strikes won’t affect the coalition effort against the group. ” But Mr. McCants added: “If the United States continues to degrade Assad’s air force, it will be a boon to all the rebel groups, including the jihadists who have been targeted by the regime. They will begin to recapture some of the territory they have lost. ” Russia sent warplanes to Syria in 2015 in a successful effort to help Mr. Assad maintain his hold on power and expand the territory under his control. The Russians began their first airstrikes in late September of that year. American officials have frequently complained that most of the Russian airstrikes have been directed not against the Islamic State but against rebels fighting Mr. Assad’s forces, including the moderate opposition that has been trained and equipped covertly by the C. I. A. | 0fake |
The Republican Jewish Coalition Loves Trump So Much They FINALLY Condemned Nazis | The Republican Jewish Coalition finally caught on to Donald Trump s extreme views after his latest remarks in defense of the Nazis marching in Charlottesville, Virginia in his name while shouting Blood and soil and Jews will not replace us! The former reality show star turned amateur president lashed out at the media during his press conference while blaming what he called the Alt-Left for the violence which besieged Charlottesville and rocked the nation. There were people in that rally, and I looked the night before, Trump said. If you look, they were people protesting very quietly the taking down of the statue of Robert E Lee. I m sure in that group there were some bad ones. But, the night before, which he mentioned, was when the Nazis took Tiki torches and stormed down the street shouting Nazi-era slogans. Obviously, the Republican Jewish Coalition noticed that, too.First, they sent out a tweet to honor Heather Heyer, 32, the woman murdered by a Trump supporting Nazi, but this fell on deaf ears because they still support Trump.pic.twitter.com/yIMu9TyL5n RJC (@RJC) August 16, 2017Then they released a statement to explain (and this shouldn t have to be explained) that The Nazis, the KKK, and white supremacists are dangerous anti-Semites. There are no good Nazis and no good members of the Klan. But then the statement reads that thankfully, in Modern America, the KKK and Nazis are small fringe groups that have never been welcome in the GOP. Except those fringe groups helped to elevate Trump into power so maybe they haven t been paying attention. The name of the group responsible for the hate-rally is called Unite the Right so that s another clue.The statement calls on Trump to provide greater moral clarity in rejecting racism, bigotry, and anti-Semitism. The statement references Abraham Lincoln who is spinning in his grave as the founder of the Republican party. We state unequivocally our rejection of these hate mongers you can expect no less from the Republican Jewish Coalition, the statement says.Statement by RJC National Chairman Senator Norm Coleman and RJC Executive Director Matt Brooks on behalf of the Republican Jewish Coalition pic.twitter.com/dbgLPxoyc8 RJC (@RJC) August 16, 2017A statement on their site reads:We mourn the loss of life at Charlottesville this weekend, and will continue to pray for all those impacted. Anti-Semitism and all forms of hate are anti-American, anti-Jewish, and antithetical to any sense of decency. We regret that we continue to be faced with these issues, but the RJC will never shy away from our role of standing up to racists, fascists, and Nazis.That s nice but if the coalition rejects hate then they should start with the leader of their party who defended Nazis that marched on American soil. We ll take the group seriously when they finally realize that Trump needs to be ejected from office. He s emboldening the worst in society. And as for Vice-President Pastor Pence, he said today that he supports his boss s language during the presser. That should tell them that the whole damned administration is complicit.Featured image via Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images | 1real |
Brad Pitt SHOCKS AMERICA: “I’m Tired Of Liberals Taking My Money. I’m Voting For TRUMP!” | Email
“We need more and more jobs. Unemployment is way up here,” he said. “He’s hired more employees, more people, than anyone I know in the world.”
I believe in him first of all because he’s a businessman. I think jobs are badly needed.
Hollywood star, Brad Pitt is usually catching some heat through supporters of President Obama after calling his agenda “anti-Christian.”
Pitt talked out about his own Christian beliefs during the 1999 interview. During the interview, he shared his story of how he or she uncovered religion.
As the particular son of a preacher and spending a majority of his time in the church, he grew to become rebellious as a teen.
After what Pitt calls a personal face along with God, he came back in order to the church in his 20s.
“I had this particular tremendous physical and spiritual experience.”
His devotion to his faith has shocked liberal Hollywood plus angered President Obama supporters who support his alleged “anti-Christian agenda.”
As other celebrities live a liberal and free life-style, Pitt has explained that he is proud of his religion
Because of this, Brad has finally come out in support of Donald Trump and his run for Presidency. | 1real |
Trump goes on offensive against former beauty queen, Clinton calls him 'unhinged' | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump increased his attacks on a former beauty queen with a vague and unsubstantiated allegation about a sex tape in predawn Twitter posts on Friday, and Democratic rival Hillary Clinton denounced him as “unhinged.” Trump’s refusal to drop his invective against Alicia Machado, the Miss Universe from Venezuela whom he criticized for gaining weight after she won the crown in 1996, threatened to damage his already weak standing among women and Hispanics. With less than six weeks to go until the Nov. 8 election, Trump made reference - without giving evidence - to a sex tape involving Machado, who had publicly denounced him all week as a humiliating bully. His attacks provided critics with new fodder to question his temperament for the White House. “Did Crooked Hillary help disgusting (check out sex tape and past) Alicia M become a U.S. citizen so she could use her in the debate?” Trump said in his Twitter messages in the early hours of Friday. He did not elaborate on his allegations beyond saying that the Clinton campaign was unaware of the beauty queen’s past and had been “duped” by her. At a campaign rally in Coral Springs, Florida, Clinton said the episode was evidence that “a man who can be provoked by a tweet should not have the nuclear codes.” “Who gets up at 3 a.m. in the morning to engage in a Twitter attack against a former Miss Universe? I mean he hurled as many insults as he could. Really, why does he do things like that? “His latest Twitter meltdown is unhinged, even for him. It proves again he is temperamentally unfit to be President of the United States,” she said. Later on Friday, BuzzFeed said Trump made an appearance in a Playboy softcore pornographic movie from 2000 that it said it had obtained from an online adult video store in New York state. “Trump’s role in the porn is relatively benign and centers around him breaking a bottle of champagne on a Playboy-branded limo while several of the playmates are visiting New York City,” the online media outlet said. “There’s been a lot of talk about sex tapes today and in a strange turn of events only one adult film has emerged today and its star is Donald Trump,” Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill told reporters after a campaign event in Florida. Reuters could not confirm the BuzzFeed report. The Trump campaign did not respond to a Reuters request for comment. Merrill earlier said Clinton called Machado on Friday to thank her for what he said was the courage she has shown. Politico reported that Machado has starred in racy reality TV programs and posed naked for Playboy’s Mexican version, but said media outlets have found no evidence that she has starred in pornographic films. Machado, now a U.S. citizen, dismissed the fresh attacks with a message on Instagram, calling them “cheap lies” from a man intent on defaming her. “By way of his hate campaign, the Republican candidate insists on discrediting and demoralizing a woman, which is clearly one of his most frightening characteristics,” she wrote in her post in Spanish, next to a photo of herself draped in an American flag. Clinton raised Trump’s treatment of Machado during their first presidential debate on Monday as an example of how he views women. Clinton said Trump, the former owner of the Miss Universe pageants, had called Machado “Miss Piggy” and also “Miss Housekeeping” because she was a Latina. Trump attacked Machado the following day in a television interview as he sought to rebound from a debate that Clinton was widely viewed as having won. He also promised to hit Clinton harder in their next debate, on Oct. 9, suggesting he might attack Clinton on the infidelities of her husband, former President Bill Clinton. Speaking to Fox News on Tuesday, Trump said Machado had gained a “massive amount of weight” after her pageant win and that it was a “real problem.” Critics said his offensive this week raised questions about Trump’s character. The 70-year-old former reality TV star has never run for office before and his habit of making off-the-cuff insults has alarmed many in the Republican Party establishment. In taking the bait Clinton dangled on Monday, Trump echoed his August entanglement in a days-long public dispute with the parents of a Muslim Army captain killed in Iraq. That incident caused anguish among many Republican leaders concerned that he had nothing to gain by attacking a grieving family. Trump’s remarks on Friday could hurt him further with women and Hispanic voters. Clinton, 68, a former U.S. senator and secretary of state, is the first woman to win the presidential nomination of a major U.S. political party and has led Trump in opinion polls. The latest Reuters/Ipsos national tracking poll, released on Friday, showed Clinton leading by 43 percent to Trump’s 38 percent among likely voters. Clinton mocked Trump this week after he complained that he had a faulty microphone during Monday’s debate. The Commission on Presidential Debates said on Friday that, “Regarding the first debate, there were issues regarding Donald Trump’s audio that affected the sound level in the debate hall.” The sound was not affected for the record-setting audience of 84 million people who tuned into the 90-minute exchange. At a rally in Novi, Michigan, Trump wondered aloud whether the microphone problem was deliberate. “It’s difficult, and when you have a situation like that and you know it’s bad and you think that 100 million people are watching, what do you do, stop the show? I wonder why it was bad,” he said. | 0fake |
Report Reveals 7 Most Disgusting Things Trump Did To Women | The New York Times has done an in-depth new report on how Donald Trump behaved in private with women. It is called Crossing the Line: How Donald Trump Behaved With Women in Private and looks at his sexist, misogynist and just creepy behavior based on first-hand interviews with women who have interacted with him over the years.The Times reports that the interviews reveal unwelcome romantic advances, unending commentary on the female form, a shrewd reliance on ambitious women, and unsettling workplace conduct. Here are 7 of the worst moments from the piece:Trump already has huge negatives with female voters, and since then he has attacked both Hillary Clinton and Senator Elizabeth Warren for playing the woman card when they have criticized his sexist attitudes and attacks on women.This story won t help.Featured image via YouTube | 1real |
Petrol bombs and tear gas in Athens rally to mark rapper killing | ATHENS (Reuters) - Greek police fired tear gas at protesters who hurled petrol bombs in Athens on Saturday during a rally marking four years since the killing of an anti-fascism rapper by an ultranationalist Golden Dawn supporter. The killing of Pavlos Fyssas, who performed under the stage name Killah P, had sparked protests across Greece and led to an investigation into Golden Dawn for evidence linking it to violent attacks. A trial of party members is continuing. Clashes broke out on Saturday after dozens of hooded demonstrators broke off from a march of about 2,000 people, including activists and migrants, towards the Golden Dawn offices in central Athens. Protesters shouted Pavlos is alive! Crush the Nazis! and held up banners demanding the party s offices are shut down and its members are jailed. Police buses and officers in riot gear blocked the column from reaching the building. A second rally to mark Fyssas s death anniversary on Sept. 18 has been called for Monday in the working-class neighborhood of Keratsini where he was stabbed to death. | 0fake |
FEEL GOOD STORY OF THE DAY: [Video] HOW CHRISTIAN OWNERS OF MEMORIES PIZZA WILL SPEND THE $842K In Donations They Received After Death Threats From The Left Shut Them Down | I don t hate these people. They are just angry. Mr. O Connor, owner of Memories PizzaMemories Pizza-1 Gay Mafia-0 If a child of mine was gay I would love them, but I still wouldn t go to the wedding. The pizza parlor owners who received death threats and were subjected to an online hate campaign will reopen for business tomorrow with the backing of $842,000 from well wishers and a defiant message that they stand by their opposition to gay weddings. They were going to open today but were advised to hold off for security reasons.In an exclusive first interview inside Memories Pizza restaurant since it closed down last week, owner Kevin O Connor and daughter Crystal emerged from hiding and told Daily Mail Online they had been heartened by the support of 29,000 people who donated and many more who wrote to them.They revealed they are set to share their new fortune with disabled children, a women s help group, fire fighters, police trusts, Christian churches and Washington florist Barronelle Stutzman, 70, who was fined after declaring she would not serve a gay wedding.The tiny pizza joint in the unremarkable town of Walkerton, which has a population of just over 2000, became the focal point of a raging national debate over Indiana s Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which was passed last month.Critics said it would allow individuals and businesses to use religion as a defense against any accusation of discrimination from gay people.The bill was severely tested over the last week after Crystal, 22, a devout Christian, told a local radio station that the restaurant she runs with her father would never cater a wedding of two people of the same sex.Mr. O Connor and his daughter were still adamant today, despite the furor that has engulfed them, that they would refuse to serve gay marriages with their pizzas. He added: If any child of mine came out as gay and entered into a gay marriage, I would still love them, but Daddy wouldn t be going to the wedding. The O Connors, who serve around 100 pizzas a week to locals, admitted they had never actually been commissioned to provide their 16 inch $12.99 cheese pizzas or pulled pork $5.75 sandwiches to a same sex wedding.Crystal said: I was asked a hypothetical question and that was the answer I gave. But I didn t hope to gain anything by saying what I said. I wasn t trying to score points. It is something I believe in from my heart and my faith about gay weddings. But I don t regret what I said. I have been scared, but God is giving me strength. I think it is nothing compared to what Christ had to suffer. Speaking to ABC57 a week ago, Crystal said: If a gay couple came in and wanted us to provide pizzas for their wedding, we would have to say no. The remark was quickly picked up by opponents of the new law and sparked an intense and angry debate, with threats being made against the O Conners, forcing them to close down and go into hiding until today.Crystal said: I don t like attention, period. Before all this I was the Pizza Girl and I didn t like that and now I got even more attention. I don t know how to take it. She said the abuse in telephone calls and in online remarks had frightened her of being attacked when walking along the sidewalk in tiny Walkerton which is primarily set around a small stretch of a busy highway. I didn t want to leave my apartment. I was scared. People were looking at me and all that brought my spirits down. But the support we got also lifted me and made me stronger and humbled. But it has been difficult. Her father, who has owned the business for around nine years, said: I am overwhelmed and not just because of the money, but the positive feedback that we have met with. There are just a lot of good people out there. It seems like all we hear about is the bad ones and when something like this happens, it seems like the bad ones are the first to come out and get after you. I don t hate these people. They are just angry. I am not really sure what they are so angry about. So many things today are topsy turvey. What used to be wrong is now right and what used to be right is now wrong. I don t hold anything against them. When this country was founded it was a Christian nation and those were the rights given to us by the founders and before that by God. People just don t want you to have those rights any more. I just don t understand it all. But it is kind of like fighting the fire. The fire burns big until the fire trucks get there. The fire rages and the more supportive people are like the fire trucks as they come in and start displacing the flames, putting it down and building your spirits back up. He recalled how the fury began over a few words Crystal chose to reveal her deep rooted opposition to same sex marriages. This all happened last Tuesday. Crystal was by herself and I was by myself in a different spot. He said his daughter telephoned him to discuss a reporter s request for an interview on the ramifications of the new law and whether she should agree to talk.Mr O Conner said he considered the situation after he recalled a verse from the Bible when Christ said If you deny me before a man, I will deny you before the father . He said he felt it would be denying his and his daughters Christian beliefs if they did not admit to their opposition against gay marriage.After the interview had been broadcast and the negative remarks began, he said he saw his daughter s despair. She was feeling more and more helpless about it and I was telling her Its going to be ok its not going to be that big. And then it just blew up and the ugliness arrived. But it was not a throwaway remark that she made. We do not believe in gay marriages, so we will not support them. A local teacher sent a message out on Twitter, which was quickly deleted, calling for Memories Pizza to be firebombed. The message is now the subject of a police investigation and charges are being considered against her. The sports school coach has been suspended.Mr O Connor said he had read some of the remarks against him and his daughter and he found them vile and disgraceful . I have seen some of the stuff and it disgusts me and I don t know how one human being can think about doing something like that to another. I had never really thought about being hated before. But on the day after which was a Wednesday, stuff started rolling in and it really started lifting ourspirits. There were a whole lot of people out there who began voicing our support and just building our confidence. It is very encouraging to know there are other people out there who think the way you do and feel the same way you feel.Via: UK Daily Mail | 1real |
Forget ‘Pat the Bunny.’ My Child Is Reading Hemingway. - The New York Times | Alice Hemmer’s favorite part of Jack Kerouac’s novel “On the Road” doesn’t involve the road trips, encounters with prostitutes in Mexico or wild parties in Manhattan. Alice, who is 5 and lives in a Chicago suburb, likes the part when Sal Paradise eats ice cream and apple pie whenever he feels hungry. She hasn’t actually read Kerouac’s classic. (Alice is a precocious reader, but not that precocious.) Instead, her father read her a heavily abridged and sanitized illustrated version of “On the Road” designed for to children. “She didn’t love it,” said her father, Kurt Hemmer, an English professor at Harper College and scholar of the Beat Generation, who noted that even some college students failed to appreciate the novel’s subtle spiritual message. “To really grasp it, you need to be a bit more mature. ” “On the Road,” with its recurring references to sex, drugs and domestic violence, might not seem like an ideal bedtime story for a child. But that’s precisely the point of KinderGuides, a new series of books that aims to make challenging adult literary classics accessible to very young readers. Along with “On the Road,” KinderGuides recently published picture book versions of Ernest Hemingway’s “The Old Man and the Sea” and Truman Capote’s melancholy novella “Breakfast at Tiffany’s. ” (It skipped over the awkward question of whether Holly Golightly is a prostitute.) In one of its most ambitious and bizarre efforts, it released a cheerful take on Arthur C. Clarke’s opaque, science fiction novel, “2001: A Space Odyssey,” an allegory about the evolution of human consciousness that many adult readers find impenetrable. With their bright illustrations and breezy language — “Sal is ready for an adventure!” pretty much typifies the tone of “On the Road” — the books almost seem like parodies, or the perfect gag gift for the hipster parent who has everything. But the creators of the series, the graphic designer Melissa Medina and her partner, the writer Fredrik Colting, insist they aren’t joking. They’re already working on the next four titles in the series — versions of Paulo Coelho’s novel “The Alchemist,” Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice,” J. D. Salinger’s “The Catcher in the Rye” and Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird” (minus the rape charges, Ku Klux Klan rallies and racial slurs). “The goal of all of this is to get them really psyched about these books now, so that they’ll want to read the originals later,” Ms. Medina said. Though the premise of their project may strike some as absurd — does a first grader really need to be introduced to Kerouac or Capote? — kiddie lit has become a surprisingly lucrative and crowded niche. Anxious parents who played Mozart for their babies in utero and showed them Baby Einstein educational videos have snapped up children’s books that promise to turn their offspring into tiny literature lovers. BabyLit, an imprint that publishes board books for babies based on “Anna Karenina,” “Wuthering Heights,” “Don Quixote” and other classics, has sold more than 1. 5 million copies of its 24 titles. Next fall, the company will introduce a series of picture books based on classic novels geared toward older children, which will include more of the plot, starting with “ ” and “Pride and Prejudice. ” “It’s a more educational approach than just Spot the dog,” said Suzanne Gibbs Taylor, the creator of the BabyLit series. Another popular series, Cozy Classics, which was created by the twin brothers Jack and Holman Wang, reduces great works of literature to stories, illustrated with photos of handmade felt figurines. (Their rendition of Tolstoy’s “War and Peace” can be rattled off in a single breath: “ ! . ”) Their titles, which include “Jane Eyre,” “Emma” and “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” are designed for babies and toddlers, but include some arch visual jokes directed at the parents, like a felt figurine of Miss Havisham flailing about in flames in “Great Expectations. ” Even with the adorable fuzzy figures, the books can be overwhelming. “My daughter started crying hysterically 3 pages into it,” one reader wrote of her in an Amazon review of “ . ” Another reviewer questioned whether a toddler is ready for “Jane Eyre,” and called the Cozy Classics version “weird, dark and not the most appropriate for kids who are reading board books. ” Holman Wang said he and his brother wanted to preserve the sometimes grim and complex tone of the originals, rather than conforming to the “fluffy bunny aesthetic” of most contemporary picture books. “It’s not about saying, ‘My has read ‘Pride and Prejudice,’” he said. “We try not to cheaply capitalize on these stories by sanitizing them and losing the themes. ” Some educators are skeptical of efforts to complex literary works to small children, especially when there’s such a rich body of classic children’s literature. “It’s ludicrous to take great works that are clearly for adults and reduce them for children,” said Monica Edinger, a teacher at the Dalton School in Manhattan, who dismissed KinderGuides as a disingenuous attempt to exploit parents’ insecurities. Still, some parents counter that children can absorb the bigger themes, like the idea of resilience in “The Old Man and the Sea” or adventurousness in “On the Road. ” Brent Almond, a graphic designer and parenting blogger who lives in Maryland, said his son, Jon, had responded enthusiastically to some of the books. “A lot of these books are melancholy or outright depressing, but it’s been cool to see how he reacts to them,” Mr. Almond said. Jon likes the book based on “2001” the best, because “it’s in space and it’s kind of creepy,” Mr. Almond said. (Jon didn’t seem especially bothered by one of the more chilling scenes, when the ship’s computer, Hal, turns on the astronauts and sends one of them out of the spaceship to his death, Mr. Almond said. ) Ms. Medina and Mr. Colting got the idea for KinderGuides about a year ago, when they were visiting her family in Kansas. Mr. Colting was reading “The Old Man and the Sea,” and Ms. Medina’s niece asked him what it was about. He realized the story was easy to summarize, and saw a market opportunity. Mr. Colting, a native of Sweden, already had a background in publishing, albeit a somewhat checkered one. In 2009, he was sued by the Salinger estate for publishing an unauthorized sequel to “The Catcher in the Rye. ” He settled the lawsuit and withdrew copies from North America. Despite that earlier legal entanglement, Mr. Colting had no qualms about repurposing famous novels as picture books, including “The Catcher in the Rye. ” He argues that because they function as study guides as well as entertainment, the KinderGuides books don’t infringe on copyrighted works. Some copyright experts dispute that logic. “If you are literally taking a book and trying to translate it for children, taking what makes it literature and copying that, that sounds like infringement,” said Rebecca Tushnet, a professor at the Georgetown University Law Center. This year, Mr. Colting and Ms. Medina started an independent publishing company out of their home in Los Angeles, and began making a list of beloved classics to recast. After choosing their first few titles, they read the original works and highlighted the central themes and characters, and consulted study guides like CliffsNotes and SparkNotes. Mr. Colting wrote the text, and Ms. Medina created storyboards pairing the texts with sketches or descriptions of images. They hired a different illustrator for each book, and printed 20, 000 copies in total for the first four titles. They aim to publish 50 books, though not every classic novel seems feasible. James Joyce’s “Ulysses,” for instance, was considered but ultimately rejected. “We couldn’t in good faith do it,” Mr. Colting said, “because we haven’t read it. ” | 0fake |
Evangelical leaders stick with Trump, focus on defeating Clinton | WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - Leaders of religious conservative groups largely stood behind Donald Trump on Saturday, the day after vulgar sexual comments he made about women surfaced online, but some expressed concern that the U.S. Republican presidential nominee’s remarks could depress evangelical turnout on Election Day. Most evangelical leaders did not condemn Trump, and instead pointed to an urgent need to prevent Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton from winning the presidency, reshaping the Supreme Court and implementing liberal policies. The latest blow to Trump’s campaign came after a 2005 video surfaced of the then-reality TV star talking on an open microphone about groping women and trying to seduce a married woman. Vice presidential running mate Mike Pence said he could not defend Trump’s words. Gary Bauer, chairman of the Campaign for Working Families, said Trump’s “grossly inappropriate language” does not change the choice facing the country in the Nov. 8 election and that “I continue to support the Trump-Pence ticket.” “Hillary Clinton is committed to enacting policies that will erode religious liberty, promote abortion, make our country less safe, and leave our borders unprotected,” Bauer said. White evangelicals make up about 20 percent of the U.S. population, according to the Public Religion Research Institute, and represent a crucial voting bloc Trump needs to win the presidency. They have long represented a pillar of support for Republicans. In 2004, they were instrumental in President George W. Bush’s re-election. They turned out in similar numbers in 2008 and 2012, when Mitt Romney, a Mormon who many evangelicals considered too moderate, was the Republican nominee, according to a report by the Pew Research Center. Support from evangelicals for Trump has been strong throughout his campaign, even though it was only late in life that the New York businessman adopted their cause. Social conservatives flocked to his side over other deeply religious Republican presidential candidates, such as Ted Cruz. “Naturally I’m disappointed,” said Steve Scheffler, head of the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition. “But, you know, the Bible tells me that we are all sinners saved by grace and I don’t think there’s probably a person alive that I know of that hasn’t made some mistakes in the past.” He said Clinton has peccadilloes of her own, most notably marital woes with her husband, former President Bill Clinton. “So yes, I will vote for Donald Trump. I’m not excusing his behavior at all. It’s disgusting,” he said. Still, politically active Christian conservative leaders across the country said they were worried that Trump’s comments could depress turnout among evangelicals. “Evangelicals are not going to vote for Hillary,” said religious political activist David Lane. “But this could cause them to stay home. This could be a big deal. Things like this matter.” Much will hinge on Trump’s performance in the second presidential debate on Sunday night, and whether he can convince Christians that he is a changed man, Lane said. “He already apologized and said he was wrong,” said Lane. “I think he’s moving in the right direction. But he’s got to do really well in the debate Sunday night.” Other religious leaders, however, were less forgiving. Russell Moore, president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, tweeted an article detailing evangelical apathy toward the Trump tape, calling it a “disgrace.” “What a scandal to the gospel of Jesus Christ and to the integrity of our witness,” Moore wrote. Still, the majority view among religious conservatives appeared to be summed up by Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council action group, who said evangelicals “are left with a choice of voting for the one who will do the least damage to our freedoms.” “This is far from an ideal situation, but it is the reality in which we find ourselves and as difficult as it is, I refuse to find sanctuary on the sidelines and allow the country and culture to deteriorate even further by continuing the policies of the last eight years,” he said. | 0fake |
Report: Obama Administration Spent $77 Million to Promote Obamacare in 2016 - Breitbart | The Obama administration spent more than $77 million to promote Obamacare in 2016, the New York Post reported. [Contracts obtained by the Post show that the federal government had a contract with PR firm Weber Shandwick, where the government paid the firm $74. 15 million on July 28, 2016, and an additional $3. 69 million on September 9, 2016, to promote the plan. Of that money, $64 million went to radio, television, and digital $4 million went to creative development and production $5 million to direct response marketing $2 million to campaign strategy $1 million to branding and $1. 5 million to encourage small business enrollment. An official from the Trump administration dismissed the efforts of the Obama administration to make a effort to boost enrollment. “Tens of millions in taxpayer funds spent on TV ads won’t sell a fundamentally flawed approach to health care,” the official told the Post. Pam Jenkins, president of Weber Shandwick, signed the contract. Obama selected the firm’s chairman, Jack Leslie, to be chairman of the U. S. African Development Foundation. Leslie donated $1, 000 to former President Barack Obama’s 2012 campaign and $2, 700 to Hillary Clinton’s failed presidential bid. On Monday, President Trump met with nine people who have suffered from the healthcare law’s high costs, telling them that he would put in its place a better plan that would “lower costs” and “expand choice. ” Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price said Sunday that “nobody would be worse off financially” if Republicans in Congress made an effort to repeal and replace Obamacare with the House replacement plan. | 0fake |
Review: A Transfer of Power in ‘Homeland.’ Situation Normal, for Now. - The New York Times | “Homeland,” a series always conscious of current events, tries for some enforced topicality in its sixth season, which begins on Sunday on Showtime. Moving out of the fall for the first time, the show has a story line pegged to its new winter slot and to the recent election: The season is set during a presidential transition, with a whose relationship to intelligence agencies is dicey. Not even the most prescient of shows can see the future perfectly, though. The fictional incipient president is a woman (played by Elizabeth Marvel) and her politics appear to be dovish: She floats the idea of the United States’ pulling all its troops out of the Middle East. Those details put quite a distance between “Homeland” and the reality of the real Donald J. Trump. But it’s not gender or views that make the show feel out of tune with the times. It’s the courtesy the characters exhibit as they argue and negotiate, their automatic respect for the traditional processes of government. Life, at the moment, is scarier than fiction, and compared with the wholesale disintegration of civility taking place in Washington, “Homeland” looks quaint. It’s as if it were happening in another century. And that’s not a bad thing. There’s something comforting about the normalcy of plot and counterplot, action and intrigue. Those have always been the series’s strong points, not ideas, and it may be easier to focus on them without worrying about how closely the story is mimicking events. This peripatetic show is set for the first time in New York, where the former C. I. A. officer Carrie Mathison (Claire Danes) is working for an outpost of the German foundation that employed her in Season 5. Otto Düring (Sebastian Koch) her boss and (as far as we know) unrequited admirer, asks why she’s wasting her time doing work, helping Muslim Americans negotiate the legal system. The answer is that it’s where she can keep an eye on her soul mate, Quinn (Rupert Friend) who’s living in a veterans’ hospital after being last season. The show’s usual roles have been reversed: Quinn is a mess, and Carrie, who appears to be safely on her meds, is the caretaker. By the end of the season premiere, Quinn has moved into her basement. episodes of “Homeland” tend to be a bit labored, as the elaborate machinery of the plot is put into place, and having only two episodes to review (presumably a defense against spoilers) makes it impossible to tell how the machinery will be. Sunday’s premiere introduces two plot strands that we know will eventually, somehow, converge: A young Muslim video blogger (J. Mallory McCree) is arrested on what seem to be shaky grounds, and Dar (F. Murray Abraham) worries about a C. I. A. mission that needs to be completed quickly. Who’s the mole? When will Saul (Mandy Patinkin) stop doubting Carrie? In “Homeland” (as in “24,” also from the executive producer Howard Gordon) we look forward to the questions almost as much as to the answers. In the meantime, there’s more than enough pleasure to be had from the cast to keep us interested. Mr. Abraham and Mr. Patinkin, as his C. I. A. colleague Saul, have perfected their partnership: Their scenes together are little masterpieces of gamesmanship and exasperation. Mr. Friend’s performance of addiction may not convince every viewer, but it is, counterintuitively, fun to watch — he brings the same edge of sardonic humor to Quinn the junkie that he brought to Quinn the killing machine in past seasons. And Ms. Danes continues to deliver an interesting and sympathetic portrayal of a character whose trademark is her lack of humor. That’s a far more impressive trick than telling the future. | 0fake |
PROVOCATION? Republican Senators Introduce New Bill to Move US Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem | 21st Century Wire says Donald Trump s campaign promise to move the US Embassy in Tel Aviv to Jerusalem could trigger a series of events pushing the region back towards serious conflict. Trump s appointment of right-wing Jewish bankruptcy lawyer David Friedman (image, left) as his ambassador to Israel is seen by many as an aggressive move to promote an ultra-Zionist agenda, as Friedman is a supporter of illegal Israeli settlement expansion in Palestine.Moving the US Embassy to Jerusalem would be in direct violation of numerous other UN resolutions 11 UN Security Council resolutions have ruled that Israel s seizure of East Jerusalem is that of an occupied territory.Hussein Ibish of Foreign Policy Magazine outlines some of the context of this issue in terms of US politics: Among the many alarming ways in which President-elect Donald Trump might upend traditional American foreign policy, one of the most immediate and troubling concerns his pledge to move the U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem.Other successful presidential candidates, most notably Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, made the same promise, only, once inaugurated, to emulate all of their predecessors by invoking the executive waiver to the 1995 Congressional Mandate to relocate the embassy. According to Saeb Erekat, a senior Palestinian official and peace negotiator, said that annexing settlements in the West Bank and moving the embassy to Jerusalem might mean the destruction of the peace process as a whole. Naturally, bellicose Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu denied it would inflame any conflict, stating in December that is was great step forward to peace. Middle East advocate Camille Mansour, told Al-Monitor that the US move would be devastating to relations between Palestinians and Israel, stating: It is a clear abandonment of the corpus-separatum issue, which Jerusalem has enjoyed since before 1947, he said. A number of consulates were based in Jerusalem US, Italian, English, Turkish, Spanish, French and Belgian based on this separate recognition of the city. NOTE: Corpus-separatum refers to Jerusalem s observed neutral legal and political status, closely related to that of an independent city-state.This comes on the heals of the recent controversy over the recent UN Security Council Resolution condemning Israeli settlements. Apparently, the UN also followed up the settlement resolution with a plan to track activities of companies doing business in the illegally occupied West Bank.Either way, this latest push by Republicans on behalf of Netanyahu and the Zionist Lobby seems to be a prelude to increased tensions in the Middle East David Smith The GuardianThree Republican senators have introduced legislation to recognise Jerusalem as Israel s official capital and move the US embassy there from Tel Aviv, a plan backed by Donald Trump but likely to ignite fierce protests.After being sworn into the 115th Congress in Washington, Ted Cruz of Texas, Dean Heller of Nevada and Marco Rubio of Florida unveiled the Jerusalem Embassy and Recognition Act.Similar moves by Republican majorities over the past two decades have come to nought, but this time they have a sympathetic president-elect in Trump. He has repeatedly pledged to relocate the embassy to Jerusalem and nominated a US ambassador who shares that view.Critics warn that the move could unleash a wave of violence and further rattle the Israel-Palestine peace process and the future of a two-state solution.Cruz, runner-up to Trump in the Republican presidential primary, said on Tuesday: Jerusalem is the eternal and undivided capital of Israel. Unfortunately, the Obama administration s vendetta against the Jewish state has been so vicious that to even utter this simple truth let alone the reality that Jerusalem is the appropriate venue for the American embassy in Israel is shocking in some circles.[ ] Rubio added: Jerusalem is the eternal capital of the Jewish state of Israel, and that s where America s embassy belongs. It s time for Congress and the president-elect to eliminate the loophole that has allowed presidents in both parties to ignore US law and delay our embassy s rightful relocation to Jerusalem for over two decades. The US embassy has been located on Tel Aviv s HaYarkon Street for half a century. US state department policy has long held that the status of Jerusalem will only be determined in final talks between Israel and the Palestinians Continue this story at The GuardianREAD MORE ISRAEL NEWS AT: 21WIRE Israel FilesSUPPORT 21WIRE SUBSCRIBE & BECOME A MEMBER@ 21WIRE.TV | 1real |
Henningsen on CrossTalk: American Foreign Policy ‘Dumbed Down’ | 21st Century Wire says Is there any difference in US foreign policy between the two major parties? Just how important is foreign policy in the minds of American voters come November?CrossTalk: It is a truism American voters are far more interested in domestic issues during a presidential election. And this suits the foreign policy establishment just fine. Since the Cold War there has been a narrowing of foreign policy debate. Does this explain why Washington blunders from one fiasco to another?CrossTalking with 21WIRE s Patrick Henningsen, along with UCSF s Stephen Zunes, and DC policy expert Daniel Faraci. Watch: | 1real |
THE ULTIMATE COMMUNITY ORGANIZER: IS YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD TOO WHITE? IS IT TOO RICH? Obama Plans To ‘Fix’ Them Using Government to Force Diversity | Of course, the government will have to address that whole income inequality issue, because clearly every illegal alien or underprivileged American doesn t have the financial means to live in the wealthier communities or suburbs. Socialism is here, and unless we find someone in Congress willing to stand up to this president, everything Americans have worked so hard for will likely be taken away by government force This is what you get when you put a community organizer in the White House he tries to reorganize your community from Washington.Apparently, President Obama thinks your neighborhood may not be inclusive enough, so he has instructed his Department of Housing and Urban Development to issue a new rule called Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing, which is designed to force communities to diversify.According to the Obama administration, in too many neighborhoods housing choices continue to be constrained through housing discrimination, the operation of housing markets, [and] investment choices by holders of capital. (Yes, that is a quote from an actual HUD document, not a bad undergraduate thesis on Karl Marx.)Under Obama s proposed rule, the federal government will collect massive amounts of data on the racial, ethnic and socioeconomic makeup of thousands of local communities, looking for signs of disparities by race, color, religion, sex, familial status, national origin, or disability in access to community assets. Then the government will target communities with results it doesn t like and use billions of dollars in federal grant money to bribe or blackmail them into changing their zoning and housing policies.This is not about blocking housing discrimination, which has been illegal since 1968. It is unlawful for someone to deny you a loan or prevent you from buying a home because of your race, creed or color. Socioeconomic status is and ought to be another matter. If you want to buy a nice house in the suburbs, you have to be able to afford it. Apparently, Obama thinks that s unfair discrimination by the holders of capital. Putting decisions about how local communities are run in the hands of federal bureaucrats is an assault on freedom. Local autonomy is essential to liberty. As Milton Friedman put it in Capitalism and Freedom, If I don t like what my local community does, be it in sewage disposal, zoning or schools, I can move to another local community. . . . If I don t like what my state does, I can move to another. If I do not like what Washington imposes, I have few alternatives in this world of jealous nations. Washington has no business imposing decisions about zoning and housing policies on thousands of local communities.The proposed rule could become an issue in the presidential race. HUD Secretary Julian Castro, the man assigned to implement this new policy, is on everyone s shortlist to be Hillary Clinton s running mate. Moreover, as National Review s Stanley Kurtz points out, collecting all the data will take time which means decisions about how to use that data will be up to the next president, whoever that turns out to be.Local communities across the United States will be up in arms over this rule and rightly so. The federal government should have no say over whether your neighborhood is too Jewish, or too Caucasian, or has too many married couples. But Republicans need to be very careful. Democrats want the GOP to rail against this rule and see it as an opportunity to paint the Republicans as the party that wants to protect the wealthy, white suburbs and keep out poor people of color.Conservatives need to make this absolutely clear: We believe Americans of all races, colors and creeds should be free to live wherever they want. And we want to help them do so by unleashing economic opportunity for those at the bottom so that more Americans can get better educations and better jobs and ultimately move to better neighborhoods.Under Obama, those opportunities have been disappearing for Americans at the bottom of our economy. While he talks a good game about inequality, the poor have gotten poorer while the rich have gotten richer on Obama s watch. During the Obama recovery, Americans in the top 5 percent of households (those with average incomes of more than $320,000) were the only group in the United States to see incomes rise from 2009 to 2013. Meanwhile, those worst hit were in the bottom 20 percent, who saw their real incomes fall by 7 percent on average. As American Enterprise Institute President Arthur C. Brooks explains , Our putatively progressive president has inadvertently executed a plutocratic tour de force. Having Washington micromanage the housing and zoning policies of thousands of local communities is not going to change this. The answer is not to force local governments to build affordable housing in affluent communities. The answer is to restore upward mobility in the United States so that more people can afford housing in affluent communities.Via: Washington Post | 1real |
BREAKING! #DemExit BERNIE SANDERS LEAVES DEMOCRAT PARTY! | It s over for Hillary It s officially over for the Democrat Party Obama built this!The nomination was barely sealed up at the Democratic National Convention before Bernie Sanders, who had campaigned against Hillary Clinton for the party s nod, went back to being an Independent.Sanders, who considers himself, officially, an Independent in Congress because his views lean further left than the Democratic party s platform, caucuses with Democrats. But until declaring an intention to run for the presidency in 2015, he had rarely, if ever, identified as a member of the Democratic Party (he s been in politics since 1979).And now, despite pleading with his base to support Hillary, even though they re concerned that she s too moderate, Sanders will return to Vermont and to his seat in the Senate, and he ll do it with no official party affiliation.Bernie Sanders tells @bpolitics breakfast w/reporters he'll return to the Senate as an Independent, not a Dem: 'I was elected as an Ind.' Susan Page (@SusanPage) July 26, 2016Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who was forced to resign as Chairwoman of the DNC after leaked emails revealed she d tried to keep Sanders from challenging Clinton for the party s nomination, might even be vindicated sort of.Sanders has struggled all along with whether to call himself a Democrat, even ducking the question of his party affiliation, raised by local Vermont media, just days after he declared. He later tried to reinforce that he was, indeed, a Democrat. But Sanders certainly wasn t a party player and that s exactly the concern Wasserman Schultz voiced in the Wikileaks document dump.Via: Heatstreet | 1real |
Boiler Room #103 – Smoking Gunz | Tune in to the Alternate Current Radio Network (ACR) for another LIVE broadcast of The Boiler Room tonight 6:00 PM PST | 8:00 PM CST | 9:00 PM EST for this special broadcast. Join us for uncensored, uninterruptible talk radio, custom-made for bar fly philosophers, misguided moralists, masochists, street corner evangelists, media-maniacs, savants, political animals and otherwise lovable rascals.Join ACR hosts Hesher and Spore along with Daniel Spaulding of Soul of the East, Funk Soul, Randy J, Stewart Howe (ACR/21WIRE contributors) and Andy Nowicki, author of Conspiracy, Compliance, Control & Defiance, for the hundred and third episode of BOILER ROOM. Turn it up, tune in and hang with the ACR Brain-Trust for this weeks boil downs and analysis and the usual gnashing of the teeth of the political animals in the social reject club.Listen to Boiler Room #103 Smoking Gunz on Spreaker.Direct Download Episode #103Please like and share the program and visit our donate page to get involved!Reference Links: | 1real |
BREAKING: TRUMP Announces “Phenomenal” Tax Cut Plan For Businesses In Next 2-3 Weeks…Stock Markets Respond [VIDEO] | President Donald Trump said his administration would be announcing a big league tax cut that would lower the burden on businesses within the next two or three weeks.The revelation saw the Dow Jones industrial average rise around 115 points to a record, with Goldman Sachs contributing the most gains. Lowering the overall tax burden on American business is big league, that s coming along very well, Trump said at the top of a White House meeting with airline industry executives Thursday. We re way ahead of schedule, I believe. And we re going to be announcing something I would say over the next two or three weeks that will be phenomenal. The president s comment had an immediate effect on the value of the U.S. dollar against other currencies.The administration had gotten pushback a day earlier from conservative web site proprietor Matt Drudge, an influential media figure who Trump regularly lauded during the campaign. Republican party should be sued for fraud. NO discussion of tax cuts now. Just lots of crazy. Back to basics, guys! Drudge tweeted, on a day filled with fallout from the Senate effort to silence liberal Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren.Tax reform has also been a top priority for House Speaker Paul Ryan and others in the GOP congressional majority, which has been anxious to slash taxes and regulations now that it finally has an ally in the White House.Trump has pledged to cut the top corporate tax rate from 35 per cent to 15 per cent, but he offered no details on what his proposal might be. The value of the dollar against the Japanese yen jumped by 1 percentage point after the president s comments, Reuters reported. Airline stocks also spiked after the meeting. All three major market indexes jumped on news of the tax cut timetable. Daily Mail | 1real |
BOOM! SMALL ALABAMA TOWN TAKES ON TARGET: Any Man Using Women’s Restroom, Changing Rooms Will Face Fine Or Jail Time | America is experiencing an overwhelming climate of hostility and bullying by the Left (think Alinsky), as a means to shove their agenda down our throats. This story of courage and conviction by a small town in Alabama who is fighting back, will make you want to stand up and cheer! This is about a city council who is actually putting the safety and well-being of 99.80% of the population before the .2% of transgenders in America. As expected, the gay mafia descends on Oxford, AL. Please call the Mayor of Oxford, Leon Smith at 256-831-2660 and let him know you support him and the city council s decision to keep our women and children safe.The Oxford City Council on Tuesday made it illegal for anyone to use a public bathroom that doesn t align with the gender they were born with.The new law, approved unanimously by the council s members, restricts a person s use of public bathrooms and changing rooms to the facilities designated for use by those of the gender listed on his or her birth certificate. The law applies within both the city s limits and police jurisdiction.After members approved the new city ordinance, Council President Steven Waits read from a prepared statement.Waits said he and the council sought the law not out of concerns for the 0.3 percent of the population who identify as transgender, but to protect our women and children. He said the measure isn t meant to be discriminatory, and comes in direct response to the bathroom and changing-room usage policy put forth by supermarket chain Target, which has a store at Oxford s Exchange shopping center.The company posted that policy in a blog on its website last week, referencing recent debate around proposed laws in several states. That debate has been heated in North Carolina, where news outlets report that scores of protesters have been arrested this week while demonstrating for or against a statewide law that extends similar restroom restrictions. We welcome transgender team members and guests to use the restroom or fitting room facility that corresponds with their gender identity, read the company s post, put online last Tuesday.Waits said he s received an overwhelming number of complaints from city residents regarding the company s policy since it was announced.Under the new law, alleged violations must be reported by a witness or committed in front of a police officer to be prosecutable.Those found to have violated the law would be fined $500, or sentenced to six months in jail.There are some exceptions to the new rule, though: Adults are allowed to accompany children under the age of 12 into the restroom. Those who need to do janitorial or maintenance work, to offer emergency medical assistance, or to assist the disabled, likewise are permitted to enter any bathroom.Via: Anniston Star | 1real |
PRIORITIES: Obama Puts Illegals Before Social Security Retirees In A BIG Way! | Anyone who s been paying attention can tell you that Obama s agenda comes before the American people. You could play Let me count the ways for days with this president but here s one that s a doozy: President Obama has budgeted $17,613 for each of the estimated 75,000 Central American teens expected to illegally cross into the United States this year, $2,841 more than the average annual Social Security retirement benefit, according to a new report.The total bill to taxpayers: $1.3 billion in benefits to unaccompanied children, more than double what the federal government spent in 2010, according to an analysis of the administration s programs for illegal minors from the Center for Immigration Studies. The average Social Security retirement benefit is $14,772.The report notes that the president s budget, facing congressional approval, includes another $2.1 billion for refugees, which can include the illegals from Central America, mostly Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador.What s more, the administration is also spending heavily on a program with the United Nations to help the illegal minors avoid the dangerous trip by declaring them refugees and handing them a plane ticket to the U.S. where, once here, they get special legal status.The report, titled Welcoming Unaccompanied Alien Children to the United States, is a deep dive into the administration s evolving efforts to let hundreds of thousands of mostly 16- and 17-year-old males settle in the country.Read more: WT | 1real |
Unbelievable: Trump’s DISGUSTING Comment About Black Voters | Donald Trump is back to his pre-election habit of saying rude, dismissive, and bigoted things about black voters in America. In another of his strange post-election rallies, Trump brought up the topic of black voter turnout, and then proceeded to say that one set of blacks are not as good as another.President-elect Donald Trump claimed Friday night that African Americans came through for him big league in the November election and said those who stayed home were almost as good as those who voted for him.Trump s comments came during a rally in Grand Rapids, Mich., the latest stop on an ongoing thank you tour of states where the Republican prevailed against Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.As has been the trend for decades, Trump was trounced among black voters who voted for Clinton by a margin of 89 percent to 8 percent. It s an almost-standard part of Republican rhetoric to ignore the lopsided vote among this key set of Americans instead of denigrating the choices this group of citizens has made at the ballot box.During the campaign, Trump also generated a backlash among black voters, describing the black community as crime-ridden and uneducated, while telling black voters they had nothing to lose by voting for him. A vast majority of them evidently rejected his message, perhaps in large part coming from his decision to woo white supremacist support while also supporting the racist birther conspiracy against President Obama.While Clinton did not get as strong a turnout with black voters as Obama did, she earned enough of their vote to end up with a popular vote victory over Trump, leading him by 2.7 million votes and making him the second Republican in 20 years to win the presidency without getting most of the votes.Perhaps if Trump was less flippant or dismissive with black voters, his party would be competitive in that arena instead of the constant routs.Featured image via Flickr | 1real |
Disgusting Trump Super-PAC Uses Obama’s Voice To Help Steal Election | Republicans are panicking over today s special election in Georgia, which pits Democrat John Ossoff against Republican Trump sycophant and woman who politicized the Susan G. Komen Foundation, Karen Handel.In a normal year, this district wouldn t be competitive at all. But this isn t a normal year. We have the least popular president in our history in office and he happens to be dragging the rest of the party down with him at least that will be the argument if Ossoff manages to win the squeaker election.Because the election is being seen as a referendum on Trump, a Trump Super-PACs are aggressively targeting voters with some pretty awful tactics, including associating Ossoff with the gunman who shot Rep. Steve Scalise during a baseball practice. Another Trump Super-PAC is using President Obama s voice to mislead voters into voting against Ossoff.Great America Alliance, which calls itself the largest and most effective pro-Trump Super PAC, took a passage from Obama s book Dreams From My Father to use it against Ossoff. The passage describes Obama s first haircut after arriving in Chicago to become a community organizer.Obama s barber, named Smitty, speaks in the passage of the racial and political tension in Chicago before the city elected Harold Washington as its first black mayor in 1983, and the neglect African Americans felt from the Democratic Party at the time.In the paperback version of the book, Obama directly quotes Smitty s words. In the audio version, Obama reads them aloud.Source: Washington PostOnly instead of using the real meaning of the passage, Great Alliance turned it on its head as a way to get African-American voters to not vote for the Democrat.In the ad, an African-American man named Autry Pruitt says, Hi, my name is Autry Pruitt, a fellow black American working hard every day, just like you. It may seem out of season, but all of a sudden, Democratic politicians have started coming around again. We normally only see them every other November, swarming around and making promises to get our vote. But nothing ever changes for us, does it? Here s what President Barack Obama had to say about it. Then, President Obama s voice comes on with the out of context quote: A plantation. Black people in the worst jobs. The worst housing. Police brutality rampant, Obama says. But when the so-called black committeemen came around election time, we d all line up and vote the straight Democratic ticket. Sell our souls for a Christmas turkey. Then Pruitt tells listeners not to sell out for another Christmas turkey. Here it is:Don t sell out for a #ChristmasTurkey. The time for change is NOW! #GaPol #GA06 pic.twitter.com/DrKiwbUUVQ Great ?? Alliance (@TrumpAlliance) June 13, 2017The real passage, though, had nothing to do with the Democratic Party. Instead, it laments a time before Chicago elected its first black mayor, Harold Washington.The misinterpretation is so blatant that Politifact ranks it a pants on fire lie.Featured image via Alex Wong/Getty Images | 1real |
British Healthcare Offers a Glimpse into the Future of Obamacare | Print
Obamacare is once again in the news – this time for the massive rate hikes Americans have to look forward to in a few months. The right is decrying the hikes, as the left desperately tries to down-play them or just deflect and change the subject.
Citizens already stretched to their budgetary limits are wondering how on Earth they will ever be able to afford the insurance premiums – some rising well over 50%. I personally fail to see how a family who is struggling to pay their current premiums will ever be able swing even a 15 or 20% increase, much less 50%.
Combine the massive rate hikes with the availability of insurers, which shrink every year, and you have a recipe for mass financial disaster. Can you say a record year for personal bankruptcy? Yeah – I think so. And always remember – Obamacare is just shoddy health insurance. It is NOT healthcare, as everyone on the left consistently and purposely sells it. The left does like their word games.
But, as has been said a myriad of times from us on the right – Obamacare is a fiasco by design. It is a premeditated failure. A single-payer, entirely government-run system has always been the end. Obamacare was always intended to be the deceptive means to that end.
As a single-payer healthcare system is the want of the leftist statists, let me site yet another example of what the future holds for many in the good ole U.S. of A.
Jolly old England is said to have the “best of both worlds” – private and public healthcare; but in fact, only the wealthiest 5-7% can afford the private care, leaving the rest to the public option – which is far from adequate.
Inadequate care and hopelessly long wait times just to receive the sub-par care is the rule in England, not the exception.
In 2011, the UK Telegraph reported that, “NHS [National Health Service] managers are deliberately delaying operations as they wait for patients either to die or go private in order to save money, according to an official report.” That’s right. In order to cut costs, bureaucrats at the NHS have become defacto “death panels.” Sound familiar?
One such poor sap who just recently ended up caught in the maze of the British healthcare bureaucracy is Paul Dibbins, a former British Army Lance Corporal. The father of three had suffered serious frost bite. After months of trying to heal his toes, he had developed gangrene.
The NHS scheduled surgery to remove his lower leg – below the knee. Without the surgery, the gangrene would spread, eventually killing him. A grim outlook either way, but having no lower leg is better than an agonizing death, he thought.
Unfortunately for the former soldier, the NHS made him wait six weeks for the procedure. And then something happened. At the eleventh hour, NHS postponed the surgery yet again, for another six weeks – no doubt, in an attempt to cut costs.
Mr. Dibbins was desperate at this point and decided to do the only thing he could. He said: “Knowing that it would take at least another six weeks to get me in front of a surgeon again, that’s when I bit the bullet and cut off the toes.”
And that he did. Using no painkillers at all, Dibbins scraped away the dead flesh from his two blackened toes and proceeded to sever the tendons with the only thing he had available – a pair of nail clippers. The procedure took him about an hour to remove both affected toes. A surgeon later told him he was crazy, but that the home-style operation was “textbook.”
So, as we proceed further down the path of a single-payer, government run healthcare system, home surgery may also be in our future – as Washington bureaucrats and death panels decide which of us is worth saving.
I better dust off my old game of “ Operation ” and start practicing. shares | 1real |
Dakota Access Pipeline violence grows as militarized police use extreme force, tear gas on praying protesters | Dakota Access Pipeline violence grows as militarized police use extreme force, tear gas on praying protesters
Tuesday, November 01, 2016 by: J. D. Heyes Tags: Dakota Access Pipeline , protestors , police violence (NaturalNews) Tensions are ratcheting up in a region of North Dakota where construction of a pipeline that will take oil to a refinery facility in Illinois is being built, as protestors objecting to the project are clashing with increasingly militarized police . The Bismark Tribune reported that police and protestors clashed as authorities moved in to break up a camp on private property belonging to the pipeline developers.Protestors had initially formed a line of no surrender, the paper said, but it became a line of retreat in the face of a militarized police presence that overwhelmed hundreds of Dakota Access Pipeline protestors, pushing them back from the front line of resistance to their main camp.For about five hours on Thursday, beginning around noon, police officers pressed the protesters back about a half-mile on N.D. Highway 1806, which was away from a new camp they had built earlier in the week that sat directly atop the pipeline easement. Rubber bullets, bean bags, smoke grenades and tasers Unrest continued into the evening hours, however, as police said that two fires were started on a nearby bridge, and protestors began lobbing Molotov cocktails at officers. In addition, police reported two incidents where shots were fired.The Tribune reported that one woman allegedly fired a handgun in the direction of police as she was being arrested, while an armed man who was reportedly run off the road by protesters, and was perhaps not connected to the protest, had to be treated for a gunshot wound to the hand.As police moved in, some protestors were urging calm and prayer, but others threw rocks and water bottles at approaching officers. Eventually the crowd retreated under a barrage of pepper spray, rubber and bean bag bullets, smoke grenades and tasers.By late afternoon, flames and thick plumes of smoke belched out of the cab of one of three Dakota Access Pipeline earth movers, while protestors walked back to their main camp on U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' land.In all, police arrested 141 people, the local sheriffs' department said, charging suspects with engaging in a riot, maintaining a public nuisance, and conspiracy to endanger by fire and explosion.A day before the violence, as reported by AMI Newswire , opponents of the pipeline barricaded a highway and pitched their camp on private land. These actions were led by members of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe.The previous weekend some 127 people had been arrested.Standing Rock Chairman Dave Archambault II issued a statement last week in which he blamed the rising militarization of police for the increased tensions."The militarization of local law enforcement and enlistment of multiple law enforcement agencies from neighboring states is needlessly escalating violence and unlawful arrests against peaceful protesters at Standing Rock," Archambault said, as quoted by AMI Newswire . "We do not condone reports of illegal actions, but believe the majority of peaceful protesters are reacting to strong-arm tactics and abuses by law enforcement." Destruction of burial grounds, water are chief concerns Law enforcement officers countered by saying that, for the vast majority of the protest thus far, they have shown remarkable patience and restraint, and that they only moved after protestors became more aggressive.Morton County Sheriff Kyle Kirchmeier ticked off a list of alleged violations by protestors, including buzzing a police helicopter with a drone and firing arrows in the direction of officers. He also said that journalists had been harassed and security personnel assaulted."For months protesters have described us as an aggressive police force," Kirchmeier said in a prepared statement, AMI Newswire reported. "We have done nothing but demonstrate patience and restraint."Protestors are angry about the pipeline stretching across ancient burial grounds, NewsTarget reported , as well as the potential for pipeline leaks that would pollute local water sources . Sources: | 1real |
Boehner, McConnell split over NSA bill | With less than two weeks to go before the National Security Agency surveillance program's authority expires, House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell -- who both stress the need for the program -- are at odds over how to renew it.
The disagreement centers on whether it should be the responsibility of the government or telecommunications companies to store phone records. McConnell wants to see the current law extended as it is. Boehner, however, favors the USA Freedom Act, a law overwhelmingly passed by the House last week that would have the companies hold onto the data, which could only be accessed by intelligence agencies through authorization from special courts.
Both Democratic and Republican proponents of the law admit that they aren't confident the dispute will be resolved in time to avoid a disruption in the program that was put in place after the 9/11 attacks.
"The House had an overwhelmingly large vote for the USA Freedom Act. It's time for the Senate to act," Boehner said Tuesday after he was asked about McConnell's opposition to the law. "I don't try to suggest what the Senate should or shouldn't do. But the Senate needs to act, and when they act, we'll get the next step."
Boehner sidestepped a question on whether he would support a short-term extension of the current law or another compromise proposal, repeating that the Senate needed to deal with the issue. It's an argument being echoed by Senate Democrats. New York Sen. Chuck Schumer, the third highest-ranking Senate Democrat, said McConnell was "alone on an island" and that the broad support for the USA Freedom Act in the House was like a "boat" being offered to McConnell to get off that island. Minority Leader Harry Reid also pointed to the strong bipartisan vote for the reform bill in the House and called the path in the Senate "extremely clear." Reid also referred to the current law as "illegal," a reference to a recent federal appeals court ruling that Congress had not specifically authorized the data collection program when it approved the Patriot Act in the wake of the 2001 terror attacks. "We should reform the NSA's illegal spying powers. Extending an illegal program would be deeply irresponsible, especially when bipartisan reform is on the table," Reid said. "One hundred and ninety Republicans voted for it in the House. How can Republicans over here say that's not good enough?" McConnell said Tuesday there would be a vote on the USA Freedom Act in the Senate this week, but while Schumer said "almost all the Democrats" would vote for the legislation, it is not clear the bill can get the 60 votes needed to clear the chamber. McConnell has put forward a bill to extend the current law as is for 60 days, a move supported by top Senate Republican leaders, but it is not clear whether that bill has enough support to pass, either. Sen. Mitch McConnell speaks to members of the media after a weekly Senate Republican Policy Luncheon in December 2014 in Washington. For 30 years, McConnell has represented Kentucky in the Senate, and this year he went from minority leader to majority leader after the GOP swept to power in the midterm elections. Click through to see other moments from McConnell's political career. Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn, left, McConnell, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and Senate Minority Leader Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nevada, pose for photos at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on March 3, the day of Netanyahu's controversial speaking engagement before a joint session of Congress. President Barack Obama sits beside McConnell before a meeting in the Cabinet Room at the White House on January 13. A voter gives a thumbs-down as McConnell votes in the midterm elections in November 2014 in Louisville, Kentucky. McConnell waves to a crowd while riding with his wife, Elaine Chao, in the Hopkins Country Veterans Day Parade in November 2014 in Madisonville, Kentucky. McConnell and Kentucky Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes, his Democratic opponent in the 2014 election, sit with "Kentucky Tonight" host Bill Goodman before their debate in October in Lexington. McConnell talks with supporters at a campaign rally in Hindman, Kentucky, during a two-day bus tour of the eastern part of the state in August 2014. McConnell walks with "America's Got Talent" contestant Jimmy Rose to a news conference on the economic ramifications of the Environmental Protection Agency's proposed power plant rules in July 2014. McConnell and Chao wave to supporters at a victory celebration following McConnell's victory in the Republican senatorial primary on May 20, 2014, in Louisville, Kentucky. McConnell carries a musket onstage before his speech during the American Conservative Union's Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in National Harbor, Maryland, in March 2014. McConnell and fellow Republican Rand Paul, Kentucky's junior senator, attend an event in the East Room of the White House in July 2013. McConnell points to a stack of papers representing what he says are the regulations associated with the Affordable Care Act as he speaks at the 2013 CPAC in National Harbor, Maryland. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, and McConnell listen during a dedication ceremony of the statue of former President Gerald Ford at the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol in May 2011. McConnell answers questions from reporters at the Capitol in September 2007. McConnell introduces then-President George W. Bush at a National Republican Senatorial Committee Reception in Washington in October 2006. Then-Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tennessee, center, is flanked by McConnell, Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and then-Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchinson, R-Texas, as he speaks to reporters after a Senate vote in May 2005. McConnell poses with wife Elaine Chao at the 128th running of the Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs in Louisville in May 2002. McConnell, left, Sen. Trent Lott, R-Mississippi, Vice President Dick Cheney, President George W. Bush, Sen. Strom Thurmond, R-South Carolina, and House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Illinois, are pictured during Bush's inauguration to his first term on January 20, 2001. Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Connecticut, and McConnell hammer the "first nails" into a piece of wood during a nail-driving ceremony in December 2000 on Capitol Hill. Both senators participated in the ceremony to signify the beginning of construction of the 2001 Inaugural platform on the West Front Terrace of the U.S. Capitol. Sen. Robert Byrd, D-West Virginia, and McConnell enter the "Old Senate Chamber" in January 1999 to attend a bipartisan caucus to possibly establish rules and guidelines for the impeachment trial of President Bill Clinton. House leaders say they plan to wrap up work and leave town Thursday for a week-long recess for the Memorial Day holiday, potentially before the Senate votes. Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr said Monday he is trying to find a compromise that would keep the data in the hands of the government for now but eventually transition it to the phone companies. He said if the Senate passes that bill or a separate short-term extension, the House could approve it when it reconvenes June 1 and not cause significant disruption to the surveillance program. Such a plan is not likely to sit well with House members, who feel their big vote last week was a clear signal of what the House feels should become law. "They ought to take the House-passed bill, which was passed overwhelmingly in bipartisan fashion, and pass that bill," said Maryland Democratic Rep. Steny Hoyer, the second highest-ranking House Democrat. But he said he didn't believe the Senate would be able to pass any NSA bill this week, citing a threat from Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul to filibuster an extension. Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain, who supports a clean extension of the Patriot Act, downplayed Paul's ability to block the bill. "He'll get a lot of publicity for a day or so, but it won't affect the process overall," he said. McCain was also asked what the split over the issue says about the Republican Party. "It says that we ought to get our act together," McCain replied. John Boehner has been the speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives since 2011, making him second in line for the presidency, behind the vice president. On September 25, Boehner told colleagues he's stepping down as speaker and will leave Congress at the end of October. Look back at his career in politics so far. Pope Francis walks with Speaker Boehner and Vice President Joe Biden after delivering a speech to Congress in Washington on September 24. Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani (right) expresses his country's gratitude for America's fiscal commitment and military sacrifices during an address to a joint meeting of the United States Congress with Vice President Joe Biden (left) and Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH) in the House Chamber of the U.S. Capitol March 25 in Washington. U.S. President Barack Obama walks with Speaker of the House John Boehner as they depart the annual Friend's of Ireland luncheon on Capitol Hill in Washington on March 17. U.S. Vice President Joe Biden and Speaker of the House John Boehner await the arrival of President Barack Obama for the State of The Union address on January 20 in the House Chamber of the Capitol. The image of the Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH) is displayed in a monitor of a camera as he talks with reporters in his office in the Capitol in November 2014 in Washington. Boehner blasts conservative groups during a press conference in December 2013 after passing a compromise budget deal aimed at removing the threat of another government shutdown. Fed up with criticism from conservative advocates, Boehner said they were "misleading their followers." He followed up with: "Frankly, I just think that they've lost all credibility." Reporters question Boehner as he arrives at the U.S. Capitol as the government stalemate continued in October 2013. President Obama signed a bill on October 17 that ended the 16-day shutdown and raised the debt ceiling. Boehner speaks to the media after a meeting with President Obama at the White House in October 2013, the second day of the federal government's recent shutdown. The White House squared off with Republican rivals in Congress over how to fund federal agencies, many of which were forced to close, leaving a fragile economy at risk. Boehner is sworn in as the speaker of the House after his re-election in January 2013. Boehner presents golfing legend Arnold Palmer with the Congressional Gold Medal at a special ceremony in the Rotunda of the Capitol in September 2012. On January 5, 2011, Boehner wipes away tears as he waits to receive the gavel from outgoing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-California, during the first session of the 112th Congress. Boehner hugs his wife, Debbie, after addressing the crowd at the NRCC Election Night watch party on November 2, 2010, when Republicans took back control of the House of Representatives. Boehner met his wife in college, and they have been married since 1973. Boehner voices his concerns about the health care reform bill championed by Obama during a news conference in Washington on October 29, 2009. Boehner, an avid golfer, talks with Tiger Woods while golfing at the Congressional Country Club in Bethesda, Maryland, in 2009. Boehner, center, looks on as President Barack Obama speaks with then-House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer in the East Room of the White House on February 23, 2009. Boehner and Obama have butted heads over the years. Boehner, center, and fellow Republican House members sing Boehner's birthday song during a news conference on Capitol Hill on November 17, 2006. Boehner served as the House Minority Leader from 2007 to 2011. Boehner answers questions during an interview with Bloomberg in Washington on June 29, 2005. President George W. Bush signs into law the federal education bill No Child Left Behind at a high school in Hamilton, Ohio, in 2002. The law offered the promise of improved schools for the nation's poor and minority children and better-prepared students in a competitive world. Boehner, second from right, backed the bill. Boehner and House Majority Leader Dick Armey, R-Texas, listen to House Speaker Newt Gingrich at a 1997 news conference with entrepreneurs promoting the GOP tax relief plan. Boehner dumps out coal, which he called a Christmas gift to President Clinton, during a news conference about the federal budget on December 21, 1995. Many government services and agencies were closed at the end of 1995 and beginning of 1996 as a Republican-led Congress battled Clinton over spending levels. Boehner at a Capitol Hill news conference on February 6, 1995. He has had a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives since 1990. Before that he was a member of the Ohio State House of Representatives for six years. Boehner, R-Ohio, holds a copy of the Constitution on Capitol Hill in Washington on May 7, 1992, as Sen. Don Nickles, D-Oklahoma, looks on. Both men proclaimed it was a historic day when the Michigan House ratified the 27th Amendment to the Constitution, which would require that any Congressional pay raises not go into effect until after the next election. | 0fake |
PINT-SIZED MALCOLM X Kneels During Pledge of Allegiance…Mom’s Shocking Reaction Says It All | A first-grader in Florida must have been inspired by the anti-American jackwagons in the NFL. He refused to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. He took a knee a la Kaepernick. Instead of tanning his hide, his mother took the side of the disrespectful 6-year-old. The mother doesn t think that the Pasco County School District takes inclusion and diversity seriously.That boy s mother is speaking out because of a text message she received from her son s first-grade teacher about the incident.The text message read: I just wanted to let you know that this morning when it was time to do the Pledge of Allegiance, (your son) went down on one knee. I knew where he had seen it but I did tell him that in the classroom we are learning what it means to be a good citizen we re learning about respecting the United States of America and our country symbols and showing loyalty and patriotism and that we stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. I know its [sic] a sensitive issue but I wanted to make you aware. Thanks The mom complained that the teacher doesn t have a right to tell her son to stand: She told him right away, based on what he told me, to stand up and to stop it That s not her right. Standing for the pledge is state law. No matter; the pint-sized Malcolm X is black. The whole point of the anti-American antics that now define the NFL is to bully people into accepting that laws should not be enforced when they are violated by persons of politically preferred pigmentation, because racism.The rules apply to EVERYONE .Read more: ABC | 1real |
Obamacare on the Ropes as House Follows Senate in Voting to Repeal - Breitbart | The House of Representatives voted Friday to approve Senate Concurrent Resolution 3, which sets in motion the repeal of President Barack Obama’s healthcare reform legislation, Obamacare, by a vote of with nine Republicans voting against the repeal bill. [“This provided Congress with the legislative tools that we need to repeal and replace Obamacare,” said Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R. .) who spoke on the House floor before the vote. “This is the critical first step toward delivering relief to Americans who are struggling under this law. ” It is very rare for a speaker to take to the House floor and comment on a bill, so Ryan’s remarks signal the importance of the vote. “The law is collapsing, the insurers are pulling out, and people can’t afford it,” he said. “The deductibles are so high, it doesn’t even feel like you have insurance in the first place,” Ryan said. “This is a rescue mission. This is a necessary move and I urge all of my colleagues to do what is right. ” Nine Republicans voted with Democrats against the bill and no Democrats voted for the bill. After Ryan was done, he shook hands with other Republicans and walked off the floor. Although it is the custom for the speaker not to vote, Ryan did join the rest of his conference to support passage of the bill that does not truly repeal the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Rather, because it is a bill using the track set up to pass the federal budget, it only addresses the financial underpinnings of Obamacare, such as the fees, taxes and, subsidies. Future legislation would have to address the rules and regulations. Republican leaders chose the budget reconciliation process because Senate Republicans do not have the 60 votes required to end debate and proceed to a vote. A budget bill, however, has a fixed 50 hours of debate and then proceeds directly to a vote. The incomplete repeal and the failure by Republicans to have a companion replacement bill that would cement the parts of Obama’s healthcare reforms that have consensus support — such as protections for people with conditions or the ability to keep children on a parent’s plan until age 26 — has raised concerns. Following the speaker at the rostrum, the Minority Leader Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D. .) approached to be recognized. “I’m so sorry that the speaker left the floor, because I have some very good news for him,” she said. “Clearly, he does not understand what the Affordable Care Act has brought to our country in terms of expanding access to many more people and to the promise of our Founding Fathers of Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness,” she said. The chairman of the House Freedom Caucus — the conservative bloc inside the House Republican Conference — Rep. Mark R. Meadows (R. . C.) voted for the partial repeal but has voiced his concerns about not having the replacement to Obamacare . “This has been a top priority of mine and the Freedom Caucus, as I believe it is critical that we give the American people a clear direction and assurance of a smooth transition toward a sound, high quality, and affordable healthcare market — especially so the most vulnerable can get the coverage they need,” Meadows said. “Going forward, I strongly believe and will continue to express that a full repeal of Obamacare should take effect within two years during the 115th Congress,” he said. “That is what we promised the voters we would do. That is our job — and it’s high time we accomplish it. ” Now that the bill has passed, House and Senate committees must come up with specific proposals for the transition to the world. The committees are allowed to submit their proposals beginning Jan. 27 in order to be incorporated in a final “budget” bill. The congressman Meadows whom succeeded as leader of the House Freedom Caucus, Rep. James D. Jordan (R. ) said he voted for the bill because he wanted to get the process going. This is step one in the process to repeal Obamacare, a law that has driven up prices and hurt care, — Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) January 13, 2017, “This is step one in the process to repeal Obamacare, a law that has driven up prices and hurt care. There are several steps to come but the goal is very clear: repeal it all — every regulation, every tax, every mandate — and do it this Congress,” Jordan said. “All the talk of a three to four year phase out is not what we told the voters we would do. I will work to repeal it all as fast as we can,” he said. | 0fake |
Former key ally of Nigeria's Buhari joins opposition party | ABUJA (Reuters) - Nigeria s Atiku Abubakar, a former vice president and key ally of President Muhammadu Buhari, said on Sunday he had joined the country s opposition party after quitting the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) last month. Abubakar is the first political heavyweight to signal a potential bid for the presidency, which could pit him against the 74-year-old Buhari. Buhari took power in 2015, but illness has kept him absent for much of this year. Abubakar is prepared to run for president in 2019, a spokesman said last month when he left the APC. He did not indicate on Sunday whether he would try to become the opposition People s Democratic Party s (PDP s) presidential candidate. Abubakar rejoined the PDP after four years because it has resolved its issues, he said, according to a statement on Sunday. He had left the PDP because he believed it was no longer aligned to the principles of equity, democracy and social justice, he said. In Sunday s statement, Abubakar criticized the APC for letting down the Nigerian people by failing to create a strong economy and jobs, especially for the young, with one quarter of 18-25 year olds unemployed. | 0fake |
WATCH: Joe Biden Just Took Trump To The Woodshed For Acting Like A Petulant Child | Joe Biden is an adult, so he treated Donald Trump the way adults treat petulant children.On Thursday morning, Trump personally and publicly insulted Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer by calling him a clown, and threw a fit because Democrats are not helping Republicans repeal Obamacare, a move that would strip millions of Americans of their healthcare.The Democrats, lead by head clown Chuck Schumer, know how bad ObamaCare is and what a mess they are in. Instead of working to fix it, they.. Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 5, 2017 do the typical political thing and BLAME. The fact is ObamaCare was a lie from the beginning. Keep you doctor, keep your plan! It is . Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 5, 2017 time for Republicans & Democrats to get together and come up with a healthcare plan that really works much less expensive & FAR BETTER! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 5, 2017Schumer, unlike Trump, later responded like an adult. Instead of calling names, [the] president-elect should roll up his sleeves and show us a replacement plan that will cover the 20 million Americans who gained coverage, that will cover students or post-college students, 21 to 26, who want to stay on their parents plan, that will show how we cover people with pre-existing conditions. So I d say to the president-elect and the Republicans that this is not a time for calling names. It s time for them to step up if they want to repeal, and show us what they replace it with. And now, Joe Biden just scolded Trump for not acting like an adult and slammed him for not offering a real plan to replace the program he wants to repeal. Grow up, Donald, Biden told PBS News Hour s Judy Woodruff when she asked him to respond. Grow up. Time to be an adult, you re president. You gotta do something, show us what you have, Biden said. You re gonna propose the legislation, we re going to get to debate it, let the public decide. Let em vote in Congress. Let s see what happens. It s going to be much clearer what he s for and against and what we re for and against now that it s going to get down to actually discussing, in detail, these issues that affect people s lives. Here s the video via Twitter:WATCH TONIGHT: @VP Joe Biden tells President-elect @realDonaldTrump, Grow up, Donald Time to be an adult. pic.twitter.com/hhpIaIDhRo PBS NewsHour (@NewsHour) January 5, 2017Donald Trump claims he wants the country to unite behind him, but he sabotages his own message by insulting members of the opposing party. This behavior is far from being presidential. It s proof that Trump is incapable of controlling himself, and is too immature to lead this nation.It s truly sad that adults like President Obama and Vice President Biden are about to be replaced by a toddler.Featured Image via Wikimedia | 1real |
Daily News Brief: Vote Rigging Down in Texas and the Fight to Save Globalism |
On this edition of the “Daily News Brief”, Joe Joseph discusses the rampant voter fraud going on in Texas and throughout the US with early voting. Not that anyone should be surprised… He also discusses a very dangerous stance that Donald Trump has taken in the past with regard to Edward Snowden. The Russians test their newest nuclear missile now that Britain has sent troops to their border to join their American allies, and the dark agenda behind “Globalism”.
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BUSTED: Trump Supporter Tries To Rig Election For The GOP, Gets ARRESTED | Donald Trump has repeatedly accused Democrats of rigging the election against him, but it turns out his own supporters are doing everything they can to rig it in his favor.And that includes voting twice, something Republicans continually claim that Democratic voters always get away with doing.The Des Moines Register reports,Terri Lynn Rote, 55, was booked into the Polk County Jail about 3:40 p.m. Thursday on a first-degree election misconduct charge, which is a Class D felony.Rote, a registered Republican, reportedly cast an early voting ballot at the Polk County Election Office, 120 Second Ave., and another ballot at a county satellite voting location in Des Moines, according to a Des Moines police report.So just to recap, Rote literally committed voter fraud in a desperate attempt to get Trump and the Republican Party an extra vote in this election.That s the precise definition of election rigging, but you won t hear Trump say anything about this because he thinks that Democrats are the ones committing voter fraud, which is why he has called for his supporters to intimidate minority voters at polling places.But this incident is far from the only time during this election that a Republican has been caught trying to rig the election.A Wisconsin city clerk was recently busted for trying to deny an extra polling place near the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay because she argued in an email that students lean Democratic. I was reading the statutes and read: No site may be designated that affords an advantage to any political party, Kris Teske wrote. UWGB is a polling location for students and residents on Election Day but I feel by asking for this to be the site for early voting is encouraging the students to vote more than benefiting the city as a whole. I have heard it said that students lean more toward the democrats and he is a democrat. I have spoken with our Chief of Staff and others at City Hall and they agree that budget wise this isn t going to happen. I would like to know your thoughts on this. Do I have an argument about it being more of a benefit to the democrats. Imagine if a Democratic clerk denied letting a church be a polling place on the premise that most religious people are Republicans. The outrage and whining would last for days.And a right-wing group is literally creating fake badges so they can infiltrate polling places in order to intimidate voters on Election Day. Keep in mind that Republicans often accuse Democratic voters of using fake IDs to vote multiple times, but here s a right-wing group making fake IDs so they can use voter suppression tactics to swing the vote in favor of Trump.Thus far, it appears that only Donald Trump s supporters are trying to rig the election, not Democrats as he so often claims. And just think, there are still ten days left until Election Day. Still plenty of time for even more hypocritical Trump supporters to be caught trying to rig the election for the small-handed man who whines about how unfair our democratic system is.Featured Image: Joe Raedle/Getty Images | 1real |
Two dead in 'Day of Rage' over Jerusalem, Palestinian president defiant | JERUSALEM/GAZA (Reuters) - At least two people were killed in clashes with Israeli troops on Friday when thousands of Palestinians demonstrated against U.S. President Donald Trump s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel s capital and the Palestinian president said Washington could no longer be a peace broker. Across the Arab and Muslim worlds, thousands more protesters took to the streets on the Muslim holy day to express solidarity with the Palestinians and outrage at Trump s reversal of decades of U.S. policy. Israeli soldiers shot dead a Palestinian man near the Gaza border, the first confirmed death in two days of unrest. Scores of people were wounded on the Day of Rage . A second person later died of their wounds, a Gaza hospital official said. The Israeli army said hundreds of Palestinians were rolling burning tyres and throwing rocks at soldiers across the border. During the riots IDF soldiers fired selectively towards two main instigators and hits were confirmed, it said. More than 80 Palestinians were wounded in the occupied West Bank and Gaza by Israeli live fire and rubber bullets, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent ambulance service. Dozens more suffered from tear gas inhalation. Thirty-one were wounded on Thursday. As Friday prayers ended at the Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, worshippers made their way toward the walled Old City gates, chanting Jerusalem is ours, Jerusalem is our capital and We don t need empty words, we need stones and Kalashnikovs . Scuffles broke out between protesters and police. In Hebron, Bethlehem and Nablus, dozens of Palestinians threw stones at Israeli soldiers who fired back with tear gas. In Gaza, controlled by the Islamist group Hamas, calls for worshippers to protest sounded over mosque loudspeakers. Hamas has called for a new Palestinian uprising like the intifadas of 1987-1993 and 2000-2005, which together saw thousands of Palestinians and more than 1,000 Israelis killed. Whoever moves his embassy to occupied Jerusalem will become an enemy of the Palestinians and a target of Palestinian factions, said Hamas leader Fathy Hammad as protesters in Gaza burned posters of Trump. We declare an intifada until the liberation of Jerusalem and all of Palestine. Protests largely died down as night fell. Rocket sirens sounded in southern Israeli towns near the Gaza border, and the Israeli military said it had intercepted one of at least two projectiles fired from Gaza. No casualties were reported. Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, a militant group linked to Abbas s Fatah party, claimed responsibility for firing one of the rockets, and said it was in protest against Trump s decision. The military said another rocket hit the Israeli town of Sderot. No casualties were reported. Israel s military said that in response to the rocket fire, its aircraft bombed militant targets in Gaza and the Palestinian Health Ministry said at least 25 people were wounded in the strikes, including six children. The Israeli military said it had carried out the strikes on a militant training camp and on a weapons depot. Witnesses said most of the wounded were residents of a building near the camp. At the United Nations, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said Washington still had credibility as a mediator. The United States has credibility with both sides. Israel will never be, and should never be, bullied into an agreement by the United Nations, or by any collection of countries that have proven their disregard for Israel s security, Haley told the U.N. Security Council. But Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas appeared defiant. We reject the American decision over Jerusalem. With this position the United States has become no longer qualified to sponsor the peace process, Abbas said in a statement. He did not elaborate further. France, Italy, Germany, Britain and Sweden called on the United States to bring forward detailed proposals for an Israeli-Palestinian settlement . Trump s announcement on Wednesday has infuriated the Arab world and upset Western allies. The status of Jerusalem has been one of the biggest obstacles to a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians for generations. Israel considers all of Jerusalem to be its capital. Palestinians want the eastern part of the city as the capital of a future independent state of their own. Most countries consider East Jerusalem, which Israel annexed after capturing it in the 1967 Middle East War, to be occupied territory. It includes the Old City, home to sites considered holy to Muslims, Jews and Christians alike. For decades, Washington, like most of the rest of the international community, held back from recognizing Jerusalem as Israel s capital, saying its status should be determined as part of the Palestinian-Israeli peace process. No other country has an embassy there. The Trump administration argues that the peace process has become moribund, and outdated policies need to be jettisoned for the sides in the conflict to make progress. Trump has also noted that Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton all promised as candidates to recognize Jerusalem as Israel s capital. I fulfilled my campaign promise - others didn t! Trump tweeted on Friday with a video montage of campaign speeches on the issue by his three predecessors. U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said on Friday it would still be up to the Israelis and Palestinians to hammer out all other issues surrounding the city in future talks. With respect to the rest of Jerusalem, the president ... did not indicate any final status for Jerusalem. He was very clear that the final status, including the borders, would be left to the two parties to negotiate and decide. Still, some Muslim countries view the Trump administration s motives with particular suspicion. As a candidate he proposed banning all Muslims from entering the United States, and in office he has tried to block entry by citizens of several Muslim-majority states. In Ramallah, the seat of Abbas s Palestinian Authority, the leader s religious affairs adviser said Trump s stance was an affront to Islam and Christianity alike. America has chosen to elect a president who has put it in enmity with all Muslims and Christians, said Mahmoud al-Habbash. In Iran, which has never recognized Israel and supports anti-Israel militants, demonstrators burned pictures of Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu while chanting Death to the Devil . In Cairo, capital of Egypt, a U.S. ally which has a peace treaty with Israel, hundreds of protesters who had gathered in Al-Azhar mosque and outside in its courtyard chanted Jerusalem is Arab! O Trump, you madman, the Arab people are everywhere! Al Azhar s Imam, Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb, rejected an invitation to meet U.S. Vice President Mike Pence. Large demonstrations also took place in Jordan, Tunisia, Somalia, Yemen, Malaysia and Indonesia, and hundreds protested outside the U.S. embassy in Berlin. France said the United States had sidelined itself in the Middle East. The reality is they are alone and isolated on this issue, Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said. | 0fake |
Sicilian election holds mirror up to national trends | ROME (Reuters) - A regional ballot in Sicily this weekend will serve as a dress rehearsal for a forthcoming general election, with the political dynamics on the Mediterranean island matching those being played out on the national stage. Bolstered by the return of four-times prime minister Silvio Berlusconi to the campaign trail, a resurgent centre-right is looking to reclaim its supremacy over Sicily and show that after years of scandals it is once again a force to be reckoned with. It faces a fierce opponent in the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement, which has never won control of a Italian region and hopes victory on Sunday might propel it to success in next year s parliamentary election. Meanwhile, the centre-left, which now heads both the Sicilian and national governments, has succumbed to feuding with leftist rivals - a fratricidal struggle that looks likely to wreck its chances of regaining power. Sicily is one of the poorest regions in Europe, ranking 237 out of 263 in European Union competitiveness rankings, and has become a byword for bloated public payrolls, wasteful administration and the ever-present scourge of corruption and organized crime. It is also seen as a bellwether of national politics. The centre-right won all 61 seats on offer here in a 2001 national election when Berlusconi was at the zenith of his power. By 2012, with the mood in the country changing, Sicily shifted towards the centre-left, foreshadowing the bloc s subsequent victory five months later at a national level. The 5-Star hopes the political winds are now blowing in its favor and that voters are ready to embrace its manifesto, which focuses on fighting graft, promoting green energy and offering universal income support for the poor. The vote on November 5 is like a referendum ... You are choosing between the future and the past, between legality and corruption, said Luigi Di Maio, the 5-Star s new national leader, who has campaigned relentlessly in Sicily for weeks. Final opinion polls published before a blackout was imposed on Oct. 23 put the centre-right candidate Nello Musumeci on some 33 percent against 31.5 percent for the 5-Star s Giancarlo Cancelleri. The centre-left s Fabrizio Micari was seen taking some 16 percent, just ahead of the leftist Claudio Fava. Since the release of the last surveys, Musumeci has come under pressure over candidates on his list, some of whom have criminal records or are awaiting trial for graft. The 5-Star says the scandal has given it a major lift ahead of Sunday. While 5-Star and centre-right leaders have criss-crossed Sicily this autumn, the head of the ruling centre-left Democratic Party, former prime minister Matteo Renzi, has kept a low profile, insisting the vote is just about regional issues. Sicily certainly has its share of problems. The island s economic output fell more than 13 percentage points between 2008 and 2015 and it will take many years before it recovers the lost ground. Unemployment stands at over 22 percent, twice the national average, and youth unemployment is at 57.2 percent, compared with some 36 percent nationally. But should the Democratic Party candidate suffer a drubbing, it will undermine Renzi s standing within the party and underscore the cost it is paying for civil war on the left before the national vote, which is due by May 2018. Although the centre-right is running united, it too has internal divisions. Berlusconi has resisted campaigning alongside Matteo Salvini, the leader of his main ally, the Northern League, whom he has dismissed as a populist. But unlike Renzi, 81-year-old Berlusconi has papered over the differences and kept his focus on his main rival. The Sicilian elections resemble the national vote in one way. In Palermo, as in Rome, the fight is between us and the (5-Star), between our experience and competence ... and their utter poverty and incompetence, he said in Palermo on Wednesday. | 0fake |
CHECK OUT NEW BEN & JERRY’S FLAVOR: Touting America’s Favorite Socialist | In 2016, Ben & Jerry s co-founder, Ben Cohen s net worth was estimated to be $150 Million. In typical liberal fashion, Ben s fine with sitting on an astronomical net worth, he just wants to make sure the government has the ability to take even more from the every day American s paycheck Ben & Jerry s co-founder Ben Cohen announced Monday he has created a new flavor celebrating Benrie Sanders s White House run. Nothing is so unstoppable as a flavor whose time has finally come, Cohen wrote on his Facebook page alongside a picture displaying a pint of Bernie s Yearning ice cream.The new flavor isn t an official Ben and Jerry s ice cream. Jerry and I have been constituents of Bernie Sanders for the last 30 years, Cohen said of the longtime Vermont senator. But he noted that his company with fellow co-founder Jerry Greenfield is not directly involved with the flavor.Who knew the political revolution could taste so sweet? https://t.co/zMMt60MHRe h/t @YoBenCohen #BerniesYearning pic.twitter.com/2v2MSbDMU5 WorkingFamiliesParty (@WorkingFamilies) January 25, 2016 We ve seen him and we believe him, he continued on a website touting the ice cream. When we re out speaking on his behalf people always ask if there s a Ben and Jerry s flavor. There s not, Cohen added. But if I were going to come up with one, this is what it would be. Cohen s website describes Bernie s Yearning as plain mint ice cream beneath a solid layer of chocolate on top. The chocolate disc represents the huge majority of economic gains that gone to the top 1 percent since the end of the recession, the flavor s packaging states. Beneath it, the rest of us.Eating instructions include taking a spoon and whacking the chocolate disc into lots of pieces ; mixing the chocolate pieces around; and sharing the result with your fellow Americans. Via: The Hill | 1real |
SUNDAY SCREENING: National Security Alert: The Pentagon Attack (2009) | 21st Century Wire says Our weekly documentary film curated by our editorial team at 21WIRE.Aside from the collapse of WTC Building 7, a major achilles heel in the official 9/11 version of events is tale of a passenger airliner hitting the Pentagon. The following independent investigative documentary may offer some key insight into this incident, and depending on whether you believe its findings are credible may even prove beyond a doubt that no Boeing passenger airliner struck the Pentagon on September 11, 2001.To date, it remains one of the most compelling presentations illustrating what happened, or more precisely what did not happen on 9/11. Watch: SEE MORE SUNDAY SCREENINGS HERE | 1real |
Russia's countersanctions for Syria will hit the West below the belt | Russia's countersanctions for Syria will hit the West below the belt 08.11.2016 Print version Font Size The West and Russia are entering the third year of the war of sanctions . Washington threatens to impose new sanctions against Russia, this time for Syria. Russia will take "painful measures" in response, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said. Pravda.Ru offers the list of counter sanctions that we made up on the basis of experts' opinions. 1. Russia's first answer would be the abolition of neo-liberal economic policies and transition to a new economic development strategy . This will block channels of Western influence on our country and thus become the most asymmetric, but a tough answer to Western sanctions, said Ruslan Dzarasov, Doctor of Economics, head of the department of political economy at the Russian Economic University named after Plekhanov.The expert noted that "we continue to adhere to the export growth model, taking capital to the West and forming the budget on the basis of financial interests of capital rather than domestic consumers." Russia, the expert said, should introduce a combination of state planning and market sector, "similar to what the USSR was doing during the 1920s .""The state should ensure the financial transparency of corporations, expand the rights of trade unions and workers, strengthen social control over big business, show influence on the formation prices in economy to eliminate price disparity in favor of the mining export sector to the detriment of the manufacturing industry," Ruslan Dzarasov told Pravda.Ru.2. Russia could refuse from saving its reserves in US dollars . Russia does not take the first place in terms of dollar savings in the world, but it could still cause a serious blow on the Western financial system, Valentin Katasonov, Doctor of Economics, Professor at the Moscow State Institute of International Finance, the head of Russian Economic Society named after S.F. Sharapov, told Pravda.Ru."A lot of Russia's liabilities in national gold and currency reserves are nominated in US dollars. Should they are put on the market, the US dollar will suffer greatly ," leading expert at the Union of Oil and Gas Industrialists, Rustam Tankan said. Noteworthy, some privately run Russian companies already abandon the US dollar in their activities. Megafon, one of Russia's three leading cellular providers, converted about 40 percent of dollar deposits in euros and Hong Kong dollars. The company transferred the funds to accounts in major Chinese banks. Norilsk Nickel took similar measures. The Hong Kong dollar is a Chinese foreign clone of the dollar, and the USA is unable to impose any sanctions on this currency . Russia has started abandoning from the US dollar as a reserve currency by opening the Raw Materials Exchange of St. Petersburg, where Russian energy carriers are traded in rubles. 3. Russia could freeze assets of US investors in the Russian economy . "Foreign citizens are the ultimate beneficiaries of our shadow holdings. There are tricky financial mechanisms in the timber industry, for instance," Igor Gerasimov, member of the Committee for Business Security at the Chamber of Commerce, security expert, told Pravda.Ru. The shadow mechanism works as follows. A wood-working company does most of the work, while most of the profit goes to a "general contractor." The latter pays the company a relative price for production, plus a minimum profit. Most of the profit goes to specific individuals, to accounts of foreign companies. Therefore, Russia could adopt laws about the nationalization of natural resources and city-forming enterprises, said Igor Gerasimov.4. The State Duma of the Russian Federation has already discussed a draft law to relieve state-run and privately-owned Russian companies from debts totaling $700 billion . These debts are held by Western banks of the countries that threatened to impose sanctions against Russia.5. Sanctions in the field of high technology will be no less sensitive. "Russian titanium will cease to arrive at European companies, and this will certainly be a very significant act of pressure on our partners," Alexei Mukhin, general director of the Center for Political Information told Pravda.Ru. Boeing and United Technologies, as well as Europe's Airbus Group, purchase most of their titanium from Avisma, a Russian company, which happens to be the world's largest titanium producer . Yet, it goes about only 30 percent of needs. The USA remains entirely dependent on Russia in the field of rocket engines . RD-180 is a six-ton liquid rocket engine with a thrust of more than 400 tons. The USA has been using Russian rocket engines since 2000. US Congress passed the budget, which provided for the allocation of hundreds of millions of dollars to purchase an "unlimited" number of RD-180 rocket engines. 6. Russia's sanctions against Western airlines would lead to their elimination . A great deal of airlines fly across the territory of Russia and save a lot of money on this, chairman of the Federation Council Committee on International Affairs, Andrei Klimov, told Pravda.Ru."If all of a sudden, the Russian authorities try to do something in this field, it will generate huge profits to companies from such countries as the United Arab Emirates, but at the same time it will cause serious financial damage to German, French and other air carriers," - said the expert.7. Many large companies in the West have a strong lobby in legislative authorities. Therefore, the input of targeted sanctions under the pretext of violation of rules and regulations would be a very strong response . Starting from 1 November 2016, Russia banned imports of salt from the EU, the US, Canada, Australia, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Montenegro, Albania and Ukraine. On February 15, 2016 Russia banned imports of soybeans and corn from the United States, including through third countries. Russia still imports various food products from the United States, spending millions of dollars a year (PepsiCo, Starbucks, Cargill, McDonald's), pharmaceuticals (Pfizer), cosmetic products (Procter & Gamble, Johnson & Johnson), plastics, machinery, textiles, footwear, automobiles (Ford, General Motors) as well as products under the "secret code" worth $554 million in the first half of 2016. Lyuba Lulko Read article on the Russian version of Pravda.Ru Is Russia scared of Western sanctions? | 1real |
U.S. Homeland Security probes possible abuse in Twitter summons case | SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - The U.S. Homeland Security Department’s inspector general said on Friday he was investigating possible abuse of authority in a case that triggered a lawsuit against the department by Twitter Inc (TWTR.N). Inspector General John Roth described the probe in a letter to Senator Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat who had asked for an investigation due to concerns about free speech protections. In a lawsuit on April 6, Twitter disclosed that it received a summons in March from the U.S. Bureau of Customs and Border Protection, an agency within Homeland Security, demanding records about an account on the social media platform identified by the handle @ALT_uscis. The account has featured posts critical of President Donald Trump’s immigration policies, leading Twitter to complain in its lawsuit that the summons was an unlawful attempt to suppress dissent. The agency dropped its demand of Twitter the day after the suit was filed. Customs bureau spokesman Mike Friel said on Friday that the bureau requested the inspector general’s review and will fully support it. The people behind the Twitter account have not disclosed their identities, but the use of “ALT” with a government agency acronym has led many to assume government employees were behind the tweets critical of Trump. The lawsuit said the account “claims to be” the work of at least one federal immigration employee. USCIS is the acronym of United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, a component of Homeland Security. Roth’s office is charged with investigating waste, fraud and abuse within Homeland Security. He wrote in his letter that he was looking at whether the summons to Twitter “was improper in any way, including whether CBP abused its authority.” “DHS OIG is also reviewing potential broader misuse of summons authority at the department,” he added. Wyden’s office posted the letter online. A representative for Roth could not immediately be reached for comment. A Twitter spokeswoman declined to comment. | 0fake |
The GOP Has A Plan For Obamacare: Repeal And Let The Sh*t Hit The Fan | Now that they have someone they think is their lord and savior in the White House, House Republicans are starting to come together on their plans to get rid of the Affordable Care Act. They ve been bleating repeal and replace for six years, but the replace part of that has always been a secondary concern (as in, they never really tried to work on it). Now they re solidifying that with a repeal and delay plan.Or, rather, repeal and let the sh*t hit the fan plan. They still have no plan for replacing it, but they just have to repeal now so that s what they re going to do. Then they ll delay actually nullifying it because they think that will keep the whole of the country from descending a dark staircase into chaotic healthcare hell. Rep. Kevin Brady, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, even said: We are not going to rip health care away from Americans. We will have a transition period so Congress can develop the right policies and the American people can have time to look for better health care options. Because Congress can totally agree on everything that needs to happen for Americans to have decent access to decent healthcare. Their delusion on this is deep and complex, too. House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy believes that, once it s officially repealed, fewer people will want to play politics and more will be willing to come to the table and support a Republican solution.Har de har har. The GOP s very narrow majority in the Senate could make that all but a pipe dream. No matter, the House has a plan for that too, according to Lamar Alexander, the chairman of the House s health committee: We re going to begin immediately to repeal Obamacare and reconciliation is the only way to do it. And I believe we will have 51 Republican senators or 52 to vote for that. No, Republicans aren t playing politics at all here.Is it really going to be so bad, though? Well, yes, actually, it probably will be. Experts are warning that this repeal and delay plan is going to cause massive chaos. Sabrina Corlette, who teaches at the Health Policy Institute at Georgetown, said: The idea that you can repeal the Affordable Care Act with a two- or three-year transition period and not create market chaos is a total fantasy. Insurers need to know the rules of the road in order to develop plans and set premiums. If there are problems, they ll just blame Democrats for stalling, for refusing to play ball, for obstructing, or whatever else they think the public will believe if spoon-fed to them. See? They ve solved everything! Except how to replace the ACA. Their only focus is on repealing right now. It s not likely they re actually thinking beyond being able to brag to the masses that they finally got rid of the ACA.Featured image by Zach Gibson via Getty Images | 1real |
Mexicans prefer Clinton to Donald Trump, poll shows | MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexicans favor U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton over Republican Donald Trump by a 10-1 ratio, according to a poll. The poll, conducted by Consulta Mitofsky and released last week, showed that 2.9 percent of Mexicans have a favorable opinion of Trump, compared to 30.4 percent for Clinton. The poll comes almost a month after a meeting between Trump and Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto in Mexico City sparked outrage across the country and led to the resignation of Luis Videgaray as finance minister. Roy Campos, director of the Mitofsky polling firm, said Mexican interest in the U.S. presidential election signified a change from years past. “While in the election of 2008 the interest awakened by [Democratic President Barack] Obama was based on approval ... now the interest is because of fear,” Campos said, adding that Trump is the least popular U.S. presidential candidate among Mexicans in history. When he announced his candidacy last year, Trump said Mexico was sending rapists and drug dealers to the United States and that he would build a wall on the southern U.S. border and make Mexico pay for it. He also has threatened to impose punitive tariffs on Mexico, deport millions of migrants and ditch the North American Free Trade Agreement. The poll, which was conducted between Sept. 2 and 5, surveyed 1,000 Mexicans and had a margin of error of 3.1 percent. | 0fake |
Teenager devastated to find that ‘self esteem’ and ‘selfie stream’ not the same. More soon. | dominic_mcg dominic_mcg | 1real |
NC REPUBLICAN HEADQUARTERS Firebombed By The Terrorists On The Left | Hillsborough police are investigating an apparent firebombing of the Orange County Republican headquarters, an incident that one state GOP official called an act of political terrorism. Police say the incident occurred when a bottle of flammable liquid was thrown through the front window of the office on Ja-Max Dr. The office itself is a total loss, said Dallas Woodhouse, executive director of state GOP. The only thing important to us is that nobody was killed, and they very well could have been. Police said the words, Nazi Republicans get out of town or else were spray painted on the side of an adjacent building. Read more: Charlotte Observer | 1real |
Colombia arrests local director of Portugal's J.Martins on corruption charges | LISBON (Reuters) - Colombian police have arrested the local director of operations for Portuguese retailer Jeronimo Martins on charges of corruption, the company said on Thursday, adding it had reported the executive to the authorities itself. Jeronimo Martins, which is the largest food retailer in Poland and the second largest in Portugal, has been expanding in Colombia for the past four years. Jeronimo Martins Colombia has recently reported to the Colombian authorities the existence of a potential case of private corruption, for personal benefit and harmful to the company, which had been detected by our internal systems, a company spokeswoman said. The director of operations of ARA has been detained following joint actions with the Colombian authorities, she said, declining to provide further details. Jeronimo Martins entered the Colombian market in 2013 and has opened more than 200 stores since under the ARA brand. | 0fake |
U.S. has 'ironclad' commitment to NATO mutual defense: White House | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States has an “ironclad” commitment to mutual defense among the NATO allies, the White House said on Thursday after Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump raised questions about whether he would defend NATO allies if they were attacked. White House spokesman Josh Earnest declined to directly address Trump’s comments to The New York Times but said potential foes should make no mistake or miscalculation about Washington’s readiness to defend its NATO treaty allies. “The U.S. commitment to that pledge is ironclad,” Earnest told a briefing. “The president renewed that commitment just two weeks ago today when he traveled to Warsaw, Poland, to attend the NATO summit.” | 0fake |
Guatemala federal auditor to probe president's pay bonus | GUATEMALA CITY (Reuters) - Guatemala s federal auditor on Tuesday said it will investigate a salary bonus the Defense Ministry gives to President Jimmy Morales that raises his earnings by more than a third, making him one of the best paid leaders in Latin America. The federal comptroller, which audits all government spending, said in a statement it had asked for information on the previously unknown 50,000 quetzals ($7,300) Bonus for Extraordinary Responsibility that is not officially part of the president s salary package. Defense Minister William Mansilla on Tuesday confirmed that Morales had since December 2016 received the payment, which lifts the president s salary to $27,400 a month. The president didn t ask for it. Instead, it was a group decision by the army, Mansilla said in a press conference. A technical board of auditors determined the bonus. The revelation of the unusual salary perk comes at an awkward time for the beleaguered Morales, who managed to retain his immunity from prosecution on Monday. Congress voted overwhelmingly to protect him after the attorney general submitted a request to investigate Morales over suspected financing irregularities during his 2015 election campaign. [nL2N1LS1EV] Last month, Guatemala s attorney general and the U.N.-backed International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG) jointly sought to investigate Morales, a former comedian, over the illegal financing allegation. Two days later, Morales declared the head of the U.N. body persona non grata. Under the leadership of Ivan Velasquez, a veteran Colombian prosecutor, CICIG has caused problems for Morales, first investigating his son and brother then aiming at him. The Defense Ministry on Tuesday posted on its website documents, dated Jan. 1, 2016, that detailed the payment to the president and various other military officials. The considerations (for the bonus) were due to his position and the risks and dangers that (Morales) undertakes, Mansilla said in explaining the army s reasoning for the payment. Former Presidents Alfonso Portillo and Alvaro Colom told Reuters they had not received such a bonus. The president s office did not respond to requests for comment. The salary bonus means that Morales earns 70 percent more than Chilean leader Michelle Bachelet and 130 percent more than Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto, two of the region s best paid top officials. The bonus is also 90 times the $300 minimum wage in Guatemala, where 60 percent of the population lives in poverty. | 0fake |
Iran says Saudi Arabia facing results of its 'wars of aggression' | DUBAI (Reuters) - Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Monday Saudi Arabia was blaming Iran for the consequences of its own wars of aggression , after his Saudi counterpart accused Tehran of threatening regional security. KSA (Saudi Arabia) is engaged in wars of aggression, regional bullying, destabilizing behavior (and) risky provocations. It blames Iran for the consequences, Zarif said on his Twitter account. | 0fake |
In Trump travel ban fight, Justice Kennedy's 2015 opinion looms large | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Justice Anthony Kennedy’s legal reasoning in a 2015 immigration case suggests the U.S. Supreme Court’s frequent swing vote would be skeptical of President Donald Trump’s travel ban on people from seven Muslim-majority countries. The little-noticed case involved an Afghan-born naturalized U.S. citizen named Fauzia Din who argued she had the right for a full explanation from the U.S. government as to why her Afghan husband was denied entry. The justices ruled 5-4 against her. Kennedy wrote in a concurring opinion that in some circumstances the U.S. government’s motives in denying someone entry could be subject to legal review. In their lawsuit challenging Trump’s Jan. 27 ban, the states of Washington and Minnesota cited Kennedy’s opinion. Lower courts have temporarily blocked the ban, but the administration may ask the Supreme Court to revive it. Trump’s executive order barred entry for citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days and imposed a 120-day halt on all refugees, except refugees from Syria who are barred indefinitely. Curbing entry to the United States as a national security measure was a central premise of Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, originally proposed as a temporary ban on all Muslims. He has voiced frustration at the legal challenge to his order. Washington and Minnesota argued that Trump’s order violated the U.S. Constitution by discriminating against Muslims. Trump during the presidential campaign called for a “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.” In the 2015 case, Din, who lives in Fremont, California, sued the U.S. government after her husband, Afghan citizen Kanishka Berashk, was denied a visa in 2009. She objected to the government’s visa denial under a law giving consular officials wide discretion to bar people linked to “terrorist activities.” The high court’s ruling overturned a 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision that said Din was right to insist the government give her more information about the visa denial. Kennedy’s opinion suggested he could be willing to dig into the Trump administration’s rationale for the order, said Mark Haddad, the Los Angeles-based lawyer who represented Din in the 2015 case. “The ostensible reason for the travel ban is security but that’s not a good faith concern if the underlying reason is religious animus,” Haddad said. Kennedy’s opinion showed he is “not prepared to give complete and total deference to the executive branch in the enforcement of immigration laws,” Haddad added. Samuel Alito, one of the court’s most conservative justices, signed onto Kennedy’s opinion. In total, six of the current eight justices suggested in that 2015 case that the government was not immune from scrutiny over immigration-related decisions if there was evidence of a questionable motive. The case brought by Washington and Minnesota, or one of several similar disputes around the country, could reach the high court quickly in the wake of Thursday’s decision by a three-judge panel of the San Francisco-based 9th Circuit upholding a Seattle district judge’s decision to block Trump’s order. The Trump administration would need to win the support of five of the current eight justices to reinstate the order while litigation over the legality of the directive continues. It could also seek to end the litigation by issuing a new order. Neil Gorsuch, Trump’s nominee to fill a lingering vacancy, is awaiting Senate confirmation hearings and is unlikely to be seated on the court for at least two months. The 2015 case, called Kerry v. Din, was cited both by the challenging states and the Trump administration in their court fight. Washington state’s lawyers argued Kennedy’s opinion showed that courts must look at what motivated the government’s decision beyond the words that appear in the order itself. They cited the previous comments by Trump and others expressing a desire to keep Muslims from entering the United States. The administration noted in court papers Kennedy also made it clear that the government is entitled to deference, especially on national security. Anil Kalhan, an immigration law professor at Drexel University’s Kline School of Law in Philadelphia, said there are multiple ways of interpreting Kennedy’s opinion, which could muddy the waters. Kennedy’s opinion “doesn’t necessarily mean he would reach the same conclusion” on Trump’s ban, Kalhan said. In Tuesday’s 9th Circuit oral argument, administration lawyer August Flentje called the executive order “facially legitimate,” meaning there is no need for courts to inquire further into motive. Judge Michelle Friedland immediately pounced: “Haven’t there been allegations here of bad faith?” She said Kennedy’s opinion in the Din case as well as a 1972 Supreme Court ruling in a case with similar themes “envision that’s something we should look at.” The 1972 case involved professors objecting to the U.S. government’s decision not to allow a Marxist academic to speak at a Stanford University conference. The appeals court cited both cases in its Thursday ruling. | 0fake |
The Many "Truths" on Syria: How Our Rivalry Has Destroyed a Country | In Syria, the only “truth” that all parties seem to agree upon is that hundreds of thousands are dead and Syria is shattered.
“The United States has the power to decree the death of nations,” wrote Stephen Kinzer in the Boston Globe.
Kinzer’s article was entitled: “ The media are misleading the public on Syria .” In his piece, the scholar at a Brown University Institute contested that his country’s media misinformation on Syria is leading to the kind of ignorance which is enabling the American government to pursue any policy, however imprudent, in the war-torn Arab country.
The US government can ‘decree the death of nations’ with “popular support because many Americans — and many journalists — are content with the official story,” he wrote.
Kinzer, in principle makes a strong point. His article, however, was particularly popular among those who sees the Syrian government entirely innocent of any culpability in the ongoing war, and that Iran and Russia are at no fault whatsoever; better yet, their intervention in Syria is entirely morally-guided and altruistic.
That said, Kinzer’s assertion regarding the US government’s dangerous meddling in Syria’s affairs, renewed Cold War with Russia and ill-defined military mission in that country, is all true.
Neither is the US, nor its western and other allies, following rules of war nor adhering to a particularly noble set of principles aimed at ending that most devastating war, which has killed well over 300,000 people , rendered millions displaced and destroyed the country’s wealth and infrastructure.
So what is the truth on Syria?
In the last five and a half years, since a regional uprising turned into an armed rebellion—turned into civil, regional and international war—’the truth on Syria’, has been segmented into many self-tailored ‘truths,’ each promoted by one of the warring party to be the one and only, absolute and uncontested reality. But since there are many parties to the conflict, the versions of the ‘truth’ communicated to us via copious media, are numerous and, most often, unverifiable.
The only truth that all parties seem to agree upon is that hundreds of thousands are dead and Syria is shattered. But, of course, each points to the other side for culpability of the ongoing genocide.
An oddly refreshing, although disturbing ‘truth’ was articulated by Alon Ben-David in the Israeli Jerusalem Post last year.
The title of his article speaks volumes: “ May it never end: The uncomfortable truth about the war in Syria .”
“If Israel’s interest in the war in Syria can be summarized in brief, it would be: That it should never end,” Ben-David wrote.
“No one will say this publicly, but the continuation of the fighting in Syria, as long as there is a recognized authority in Damascus, allows Israel to stay out of the swamp and distance itself from the swarms of mosquitoes that are buzzing in it.” Of course, Israel never truly ‘stayed out of the swamp’ , but that is for a separate discussion. | 1real |
Breaking: #EricBolling Out At Fox News | The woman pictured above (SEE MORE BELOW) is a serial accuser of sexual harassment against several men. She gives women a bad name. Notice that Eric Bolling allegedly did something to harass the woman.Eric billing was NEVER found guilty anything but the whispers were enough to bury him. He was one of the best anchors on Fox with his bold style. He supported and defended President Trump throughout the 2016 campaign. We believe he was a great asset to Fox News and see this as a trend of accusations against men the left wants to see taken down. This is a great loss for true conservatives and for Fox News. another reason NOT to watch as the network slides to the left a little more every day Variety reported:Fox News will part ways with host Eric Bolling, a host and contributor whose on-air presence at the 21st Century Fox-owned network had been growing in recent months, after allegations surfaced that he had harassed colleagues there, the network confirmed Friday. Fox News Channel is canceling The Specialists, and Eric Bolling and Fox have agreed to part ways amicably, the network said in a statement. We thank Eric for his ten years of service to our loyal viewers and wish him the best of luck. A Huffington Post report had disclosed allegations that Bolling had sent lewd messages to colleagues via smartphone.Bolling, a former commodities trader and best-selling author, had been a longtime co-host of The Five, and more recently helped launch a new late-afternoon show, The Fox News Specialists. He also anchors the Fox News program Cashin In. Fox News intends to keep Bolling s co-hosts, Eboni Williams and Kat Timpf, as contributors. The show will be replaced at 5 p.m. eastern with an hour of news coverage for the foreseeable future, with rotating anchors holding down the slot.IN CASE YOU DIDN T KNOW: Yesterday, Fox News announced that they were suspending Eric Bolling after accusations that the popular host sent lewd photos to at least three female coworkers two at Fox Business and one at Fox News. Many believe the accusations against Eric Bolling are just more lies in a series of false sexual misconduct allegations levied against Fox News top personalities, like Bill O Reilly and the now deceased Roger Ailes. The woman who attempted to smear Fox News host Sean Hannity quickly dropped her accusations when Hannity took off the gloves announced he would fight accuser Debbie Schulssel with some of the finest and toughest lawyers in the country after she accused the Fox News host of sexually propositioning her as allegations of sexual harassment continue to roil the network.Philly.com Suspended Fox News host Eric Bolling s first public accuser is a major left-wing activist who held a protest sign at President Trump s inauguration accusing the president of being a rapist.Caroline Heldman, an Occidental College professor who appeared on Fox News, reportedly filed a sexual harassment complaint just hours before Fox News announced O Reilly s departure, according to People magazine.Now, she is back to accuse Eric Bolling, a major Trump supporter at the network. Here is Philly.com s report:Hours after Fox News announced it was suspending Bolling, Caroline Heldman, a politics professor at Occidental College and frequent guest on the network from 2008 to 2011, claimed the Fox News host made an unspecified number of unsolicited sexual advances to her. [Bolling] said he wanted to fly me out to New York for in-studio hits and to have fun. He asked me to have meals with him on several occasions, but I found excuses not to go, Heldman wrote in a lengthy Facebook post. Once, he took me up to his office in New York, showed me his baseball jerseys, and in the brief time I was there, let me know that his office was his favorite place to have sex. Bolling s team is denying the accusations. Heldman s social media profiles show her to be a staunch left-wing feminist activist. Big League PoliticsMany brought up #pizzagate in response to my "good people don't vote for rapists" sign at Trump's inauguration. https://t.co/lTDtBEhhgh pic.twitter.com/T2S8UfIF5O Caroline Heldman (@carolineheldman) June 22, 2017Seriously though, the fact that accuser Caroline Heldman would use a picture of themselves with the pal and high-profile, media whore lawyer Gloria Allred at the top of their Twitter account is pretty interesting.Here is Caroline Heldman s Twitter profile:Social media users attempted to accuse Michelle Fields of being one of the women accusing Bolling of sexual harassment. She quickly came to Bolling s defense:False. Im not one of the women in @yashar's story & Eric Bolling was nothing but professional when I worked w/ him. Pls stop spreading lies https://t.co/Jmi3e3vgiV Michelle Fields (@MichelleFields) August 6, 2017 | 1real |
So Let Me See If I Got This Right | Karl Denninger – There are some “five figures” of emails on a laptop that was seized from Weiner as part of a sexting minors across state lines investigation (which, I remind you, if it happened is a felony.)
Huma is married to (but now estranged from) Weiner.
The laptop belonged to Weiner.
Huma claims “she doesn’t know” how the emails got there and that she wasn’t a “regular user” of said laptop.
All of this is very important for several reasons:
1. Everyone involved in the original email investigation said that no other devices on which such material would be found existed. That is, they all stated under penalty of perjury and under oath that they had turned over all such devices they had possession of and access to.
2. If any of those emails are classified then there is a separate and distinct offense involved from any original offense because said device was not in any way authorized to have such material on it, was not under control of the State Department (either directly or by proxy), was not managed under same and in fact it was claimed to not exist by everyone who testified they had turned over all devices on which such material did exist.
3. At no time had Weiner been given classified access by the State Department or any agency clearing people to work with Hillary’s information; while he was at one point a Congressman (until 2011) since that time he has been a private citizen and, it appears, had no legitimate clearance of any sort whatsoever. While he probably can’t be prosecuted for that anyone involved in placing it there sure as hell can be and ought to be!
4. Making the issue far more serious Weiner has been involved in multiple sexual escapades and the current investigation involves potential federal criminal sexual conduct. This makes the presence of such material even more troublesome because one of the primary reasons to restrict classified information and why persons who receive clearances are vetted before clearances are granted is that conduct such as this exposes the person who commits such acts to blackmail as a means of compelling them to release said information to our nation’s enemies!
There are people raising hell about the FBI “releasing” this information 10 days before an election. The better question is why the people who clearly lied about turning over everything in the original investigation are not at this instant under arrest for both perjury and obstruction of justice, including but not limited to Huma and Hillary herself!
That Lynch apparently tried to run interference and block release of this information and so far has refused to issue a warrant for the data, if reports are to be believed, is even more outrageous as that refusal implicates not only herself in attempting to cover up a criminal act but probably implicates Obama as well. Oh by the way, if the device was seized pursuant to a lawful warrant (and it almost certainly either was or was voluntarily turned over by Weiner) and the original search was for “evidence related to sexting” then anything in a place or device that could reasonably hold evidence of said sexting is fair game if found by accident, so Lynch is out of luck here.
Yes, it is outrageous that the FBI was basically backed into a corner and forced to put this out in the public, but consider their position. There are probably a whole bunch of people in both the FBI and the NYPD who know about this; they were investigating what they believed was nothing more than a pervert trading dick pics with a 15 year old girl in North Carolina and none of them were in any way expecting to find, nor were they cleared to investigate and have access to classified information generated from the Secretary of State .
Yet that’s what they found and it didn’t happen by random chance — it happened due to the intentional acts of concealment of those in the Hillary camp including her top personal aide .
What are the odds this stays quiet? Zero !
And before you get on the FBI for this realize that this is almost-exactly like them looking at William Jefferson a number of years ago and stumbling on nearly $100,000 of “cold hard cash” — literally — in his freezer.
That stayed “secret” for about an hour and so would have this.
HILLARY AND HUMA FOR HANDCUFFS — NOW! | 1real |
Bonkers! Watch MSNBC Anchor Lawrence O’Donnell’s Unhinged Outtakes [Video] | Lawrence O Donnell had a really bad night on August 29, 2017. We draw that conclusion based on the clip below showing behind the scenes footage of a furious O Donnell absolutely going bananas in what appear to be breaks in his show.The video, which lasts a full eight minutes, is a collection of clips from one evening given O Donnell s consistent outfit and show the MSNBC anchor fuming about earpiece malfunctions, blasting off obscenities and screaming at his staff. We were able to link it back to the August 29 show.After introducing a clip about President Donald Trump, O Donnell pauses, and during what one can presume was the clip going on air, a sudden flush of anger creeps onto his face. What s going on, why am I losing this, why don t I have sound, he starts, voice rising. Who s asking for a Labor Day rundown in my ear? God dammit, he mutters, shaking his head, before bursting into a brief spasm of fury and slamming his fists on the desk.In the next clip, O Donnell finishes up a segment, and declares: There s insanity in the control room tonight. He then begins to visibly shake with anger, but manages to hold his tongue, and continues reading from the prompter. You have insanity in my earpiece, O Donnell then seethes through tightly drawn lips. Fuckin. The pattern continues in subsequent clips, with O Donnell continuing to complain angrily about someone talking into his earpiece.And then. STOP THE HAMMERING! O Donnell cries suddenly, in response to a knocking sound running faintly in the background.He then stands up and launches into a shouted tirade past the camera. STOP THE HAMMERING UP THERE. WHO S GOT A HAMMER? WHERE IS IT? WHERE S THE HAMMER? GO UP ON THE OTHER FLOOR. SOMEBODY GO UP THERE AND STOP THE HAMMERING. STOP THE HAMMERING. I LL GO DOWN TO THE GODDAMNED FLOOR MYSELF AND STOP IT, KEEP THE GODDAMNED COMMERCIAL BREAK GOING. CALL FUCKING PHIL GRIFFIN, I DON T CARE WHO THE FUCK YOU HAVE TO CALL. STOP THE HAMMERING. EMPTY OUT THE GODDAMNED CONTROL ROOM AND FIND OUT WHERE THIS IS GOING ON. Phil Griffin is the president of MSNBC. Fucking out of control shit, O Donnell adds.In the next and final wild piece, O Donnell complains about the editing of a clip, wringing a piece of paper into a tight roll and throwing it to the ground. Jesus Christ, he then says as he adds a pen to the things he chooses to slam on his desk. Crazy fucking sound coming in my ear, this fucking stupid hammering. It just fucking sucks, O Donnell laments, staring down at his desk. It fucking sucks to be out here with this out of control shit. If the MSNBC anchor needs a sympathetic ear, his best bet may be an unlikely friend: former anchor titan Bill O Reilly, who boasts the most infamous on-camera meltdown in cable news history. | 1real |
Our bad-tempered behaviour is not a cry for help, say old men | Our bad-tempered behaviour is not a cry for help, say old men 15-10-14 ELDERLY men have warned the public not to try making friends with them. As it emerged that many men will spend their declining years alone, aged males confirmed that beneath their crusty, irascible exterior there was only more irascibility. 79-year-old Roy Hobbs said: “Some people seem to think that when I tell them to fuck off I actually mean ‘I crave companionship, come and have some cake’. “What I actually mean is ‘fuck off’. “I spent most of my middle years hiding alone in a shed. Now I’m a widower and the kids have left home I can at last come in the house, because there’s nobody else in it.” Hobbs warned especially against anyone trying to pick him up in a minibus and take him to some kind of community centre. “I’ve got a small hostile dog and a cupboard full of Fray Bentos pies and I am fine with that.”
Share: | 1real |
FLINT RESIDENTS TOLD TO PAY BILLS FOR POISON WATER Or They May Have Their Children Taken Away | You seriously can t make this up. This Democrat run city is officially out of control. We reported before that the EPA knew about this crisis long before they told anyone, yet the media and the Left continues to try to pin the blame squarely on Michigan s Republican Governor. This latest threat is just another black eye for the officials handling the Flint, MI water crisis As the water crisis in Flint deepens, it is becoming apparent that the effects of the lead-infested water are not just a health hazard, but the situation has the potential of ruining many more lives outside of the poison issue. There is no denying that the water in Flint is undrinkable and that it is contaminated with lead and other substances, and it is clear that the government of Flint is responsible for the problem.However, the city s government continues to charge people for the poison water and then threatening to foreclose their home or take their children if they refuse to pay. Michigan law states that parents are neglectful if they do not have running water in their home, and if they chose not to pay for water they can t drink anyway, then they could be guilty of child endangerment.Activists in Flint say that some residents have already received similar threats from the government if they refuse to pay their bills.Flint residents have recently filed two class action lawsuits calling for all water bills since April of 2014 to be considered null and void because of the fact that the water was poisonous. We are seeking for the court to declare that all the bills that have been issued for usage of water invalid because the water has not been fit for its intended purpose, said Trachelle Young, one of the attorneys bringing the lawsuit, in court. Essentially, the residents have been getting billed for water that they cannot use. Because of that, we do not feel that is a fair way to treat the residents, Young added.Recent estimates have indicated that it could take up to 15 years and over $60 million to fix the problem, and the residents will be essentially forced to live there until the problem is solved. Despite the fact that the issue is obviously the government s responsibility, they have made it illegal for people to sell their homes because of the fact that they are known to carry contaminated water. Meanwhile, residents are still left to purchase bottled water on their own, in addition to paying their water bill.Although this problem is finally getting national media attention in Flint, they aren t the only city with contaminated water supplies. In fact, a recent report published by The Guardian showed that public water supplies across the country were experiencing similar issues.This crisis highlights the many dangers of allowing the government to maintain a monopoly on the water supply and calls attention to the fact that decentralized solutions to water distribution should be a goal that we start working towards.Via: DC Clothesline | 1real |
Donald Trump, Mike Pence, Paul Ryan: Your Tuesday Evening Briefing - The New York Times | (Want to get this briefing by email? Here’s the .) Good evening. Here’s the latest. 1. Donald Trump’s plans for a smooth transition to the presidency are in disarray after the abrupt departures of two top aides handling national security and foreign policy matters. Rudolph Giuliani, the former mayor of New York, is a top contender for secretary of state. House Republicans renominated Speaker Paul Ryan as their leader, quieting rumors of an initial revolt. ____ 2. The election has split American society. Writers and photographers for our magazine fanned out across the U. S. and came back with a portrait of a country at odds with itself. Families are contemplating uncomfortable holidays with relatives on the opposite side of the political divide — or even canceling. “I feel like I’ve been living with a lot of people wearing masks, who have been hiding their true selves,” one woman said. ___ 3. Mr. Trump has pledged to repeal the Affordable Care Act. But Medicaid may not shrink all that much. Influential figures in his administration might be willing to establish new conditions for access, but not wholesale cutbacks, our health reporter writes. Above, a free clinic at an arena in Seattle last month. ___ 4. Traffic deaths have been steadily declining over the last four decades. But they spiked last year, and this year is on track to be even worse. Technologies that emerged from the effort to combat distracted driving have apparently added to the problem, adding to what one expert called “cognitive workload. ” ___ 5. Russia began a new air offensive in Syria, just a day after President Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump agreed to bolster cooperation. For the first time in Russia’s naval history, jets taking off from its aircraft carrier, the Admiral Kuznetsov, took part in combat. ____ 6. Publicly, the U. S. has kept its distance from the war in Yemen. But its alliance with Saudi Arabia has left American fingerprints on the air campaign against rebels. The U. S. sells weapons to Saudi Arabia, refuels its planes and trains its pilots. Graffiti on walls across the capital reads, “America is killing the Yemeni people. ” __ 7. Orchestras are basically functioning as charities. Most rely more on donations than ticket sales, a new report says. Many are building educational and cultural programs that appeal to donors. They also feel increasing pressure to curb costs, which can lead to labor disputes like the strike in Pittsburgh, above. ____ 8. Can fruit and vegetables grown without dirt in a greenhouse be organic? That question is roiling the organic farming world ahead of this week’s meeting of the National Organic Standards Board, which advises the federal government. Some farmers argue that organic production is about caring for the soil, which produces broad environmental benefits. Hydroponic growers say their methods can make organic farming even more sustainable. ____ 9. After spending several years rushing to open their doors on Thanksgiving, retailers have been hit with a dose of reality: It may not be worth it. For many stores, it’s just too much of a headache, with online shopping draining customers and the potential for negative publicity for making employees work on a national holiday. ____ 10. Finally, cornbread dressing, ubiquitous in homes across the South on Thanksgiving in place of stuffing, is not just a side dish. Our food writer tried to learn how to make it, and discovered that it’s “a litmus test on class, race, regional loyalties and grandmothers. ” Here’s the recipe she settled on, and recipes for other great Thanksgiving dishes. ____ Photographs may appear out of order for some readers. Viewing this version of the briefing should help. Your Evening Briefing is posted at 6 p. m. Eastern. And don’t miss Your Morning Briefing, posted weekdays at 6 a. m. Eastern, and Your Weekend Briefing, posted at 6 a. m. Sundays. Want to look back? Here’s last night’s briefing. What did you like? What do you want to see here? Let us know at briefing@nytimes. com. | 0fake |
WATCH: TRUMP’S BI-RACIAL, FORMER GIRLFRIEND Of Two Years…”I Would Never Date A Racist” | Kara Young, the biracial model who dated Donald Trump has broken her silence amid the deadly attack in Charlottesville. Trump s former girlfriend says she never heard him say anything racist not once.She told the paper that she s never heard him make any sort of racist comments, but was left horrified by what he said about the deadly attack in Charlottesville. GPSo just to clarify The comments President Trump made after the Charlottesville violence, where he blamed the actions of the KKK, as well as the violent Antifa agitators and Black Lives Matter protesters, (who in many cases should have been charged with domestic terrorism if we had a law-abiding attorney general when Barack Obama was president) actually horrifies a woman who dated Trump for 2 years, and insisted that he was NOT a racist ? What exactly, about his statement horrified Young? Inside Edition During the campaign, the mom-of-two told the TV show Chasing News that the real estate tycoon is not a racist. I would never go out with anybody that was a racist of course not that s crazy, she said at the time. Everyone asks me. The two met at a party in the Hamptons in 1997. At the time, she was a model, gracing the pages of the Victoria s Secret catalog and countless magazines including Playboy in Germany.During the campaign, the mom-of-two told the TV show Chasing News that the real estate tycoon is not a racist. I would never go out with anybody that was a racist of course not that s crazy, she said at the time. Everyone asks me. The two met at a party in the Hamptons in 1997. At the time, she was a model, gracing the pages of the Victoria s Secret catalog and countless magazines including Playboy in Germany.Young and Trump dated for about two years. | 1real |
MP in Hariri's party: Hariri says Saudi not holding him, his family | BEIRUT (Reuters) - A member of the political party of Saad al-Hariri, who resigned from his post as Lebanon s prime minister on Nov. 4 from Saudi Arabia, denied Lebanese President Michel Aoun s claim on Wednesday that Riyadh was holding both Hariri and his family. Okab Sakr, a Shi ite politician close to Hariri and a member of parliament for his political party, told Reuters he had spoken to Hariri on Wednesday. | 0fake |
FBI SAYS DEM PRESIDENTIAL FRONTRUNNER HILLARY Could Face 10 Years In Prison…FBI Furious As Obama Interferes With Investigation | The corrupt covering for the corrupt. Chicago politics at its best Hillary Clinton could be prosecuted in federal court for failing to tell President Barack Obama about her private email server at the time she was running it, according to a veteran FBI agent. Obama said flatly during a 60 Minutes interview on Sunday that No, he did not know Clinton sidestepped security protocols with her a home-brew email setup while she was his secretary of state.The FBI agent who spoke with DailyMail.com has had a 20-year career in federal law enforcement and serves in a supervisory capacity in a domestic FBI field office.He said on Friday that failing to put Obama in the loop could be enough to send her to prison for ten years. Via:Daily MailEver since he opined that the police had acted stupidly prior to the infamous and embarrassing beer summit , Obama has shown himself eager to interfere with ongoing investigations for political reasons. When thuglet Trayvon Martin provided an good example of why jumping and beating down a stranger is a bad evolutionary strategy, Obama jumped on the race-baiting bandwagon saying if he had a son, that son would look like Martin. When the Justice Department was looking into the illegal use of the IRS to harass opponents of the administration, Obama said there is not even a smidgen of corruption. When deserter and failed turncoat Bowe Bergdahl was released by the Taliban, Obama had his hippie parents over for a Rose Garden ceremony even though he was known at the time to be a deserter. Now Obama has interjected himself into the investigation into the fate of top secret documents illegally stored on Hillary Clinton s private server. From his 60 Minutes interview with Steve Kroft on October 11:Steve Kroft: Do you think it posed a national security problem?President Barack Obama: I don t think it posed a national security problem. I think that it was a mistake that she has acknowledged and you know, as a general proposition, when we re in these offices, we have to be more sensitive and stay as far away from the line as possible when it comes to how we handle information, how we handle our own personal data. And, you know, she made a mistake. She has acknowledged it. I do think that the way it s been ginned-up is in part because of in part because of politics. And I think she d be the first to acknowledge that maybe she could have handled the original decision better and the disclosures more quickly. But Steve Kroft: What was your reaction when you found out about it?President Barack Obama: This is one of those issues that I think is legitimate, but the fact that for the last three months this is all that s been spoken about is an indication that we re in presidential political season.Steve Kroft: Do you agree with what President Clinton has said and Secretary Clinton has said, that this is not not that big a deal. Do you agree with that?President Barack Obama: Well, I m not going to comment on Steve Kroft: You think it s not that big a deal President Barack Obama: What I think is that it is important for her to answer these questions to the satisfaction of the American public. And they can make their own judgment. I can tell you that this is not a situation in which America s national security was endangered.Steve Kroft: This administration has prosecuted people for having classified material on their private computers.President Barack Obama: Well, I there s no doubt that there had been breaches, and these are all a matter of degree. We don t get an impression that here there was purposely efforts on in to hide something or to squirrel away information. But again, I m gonna leave it to This can only be seen as an attempt by Obama to tell the federal prosecutors who will ultimately decide what, if any, charges should be made in this case that there is nothing to see here:Those statements angered F.B.I. agents who have been working for months to determine whether Ms. Clinton s email setup had in fact put any of the nation s secrets at risk, according to current and former law enforcement officials.Investigators have not reached any conclusions about whether the information on the server had been compromised or whether to recommend charges, according to the law enforcement officials. But to investigators, it sounded as if Mr. Obama had already decided the answers to their questions and cleared anyone involved of wrongdoing.The White House quickly backed off the president s remarks and said Mr. Obama was not trying to influence the investigation. But his comments spread quickly, raising the ire of officials who saw an instance of the president trying to influence the outcome of a continuing investigation and not for the first time.A spokesman for the F.B.I. declined to comment. But Ron Hosko, a former senior F.B.I. official who retired in 2014 and is now the president of the Law Enforcement Legal Defense Fund, said it was inappropriate for the president to suggest what side of the investigation he is on when the F.B.I. is still investigating. Injecting politics into what is supposed to be a fact-finding inquiry leaves a foul taste in the F.B.I. s mouth and makes them fear that no matter what they find, the Justice Department will take the president s signal and not bring a case, said Mr. Hosko, who maintains close contact with current agents.Several current and former law enforcement officials, including those close to the investigation, expressed similar sentiments in separate interviews over several days. Most, however, did so only on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the case.Contrary to what Hillary s campaign is saying, we now have it on pretty good authority that the FBI is conducting an investigation under the part of the Espionage Act that pertains to gross negligence in the handling of Defense information. That information, at a minimum, is the two Top Secret Keyhole satellite derived documents discovered by the Intelligence Community IG though it could be any of the over 400 emails containing classified information that have been uncovered so far.(f) Whoever, being entrusted with or having lawful possession or control of any document, writing, code book, signal book, sketch, photograph, photographic negative, blueprint, plan, map, model, instrument, appliance, note, or information, relating to the national defense, (1) through gross negligence permits the same to be removed from its proper place of custody or delivered to anyone in violation of his trust, or to be lost, stolen, abstracted, or destroyed, or (2) having knowledge that the same has been illegally removed from its proper place of custody or delivered to anyone in violation of its trust, or lost, or stolen, abstracted, or destroyed, and fails to make prompt report of such loss, theft, abstraction, or destruction to his superior officer Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both. Via: Red State | 1real |
NEW YORK VOTERS GET IT: Protesters Let It Rip On Hillary! [Video] | This is great! Protesters let it rip on Hillary! | 1real |
Egypt Court Sentence Man to Death for Murdering Christian Alcohol Retailer | JAFFA, Israel — An Egyptian man was sentenced to death for murdering a Christian alcohol retailer. [The sentence for Adel Assaliyeh, a Muslim resident of Alexandria, was submitted to the Grand Mufti of Egypt, who has the prerogative on signing off on death sentences. Assaliyeh admitted to killing the victim, Youssef Lamei, saying he had asked him to stop selling alcohol to no avail. Refusing legal counsel, Assaliyeh reportedly didn’t show remorse and said, “If I could, I’d kill all of the alcohol retailers. ” The victim’s son Tony said the defendant threatened him during the trial and said he would murder him too as well as all Coptic Christians. Tony said that the defendant nonchalantly reenacted the murder while citing Islamic rulings permitting the killing of Christians that he had heard on television. Lamei’s assault last month by an initially anonymous man was caught on cameras and shocked the Egyptian public. It also further increased the uncertainties facing the Coptic community. | 0fake |
FACE BOOK’S “Open-Borders” MARK ZUCKERBERG Builds “Oppressive” “Immense” Wall Around Hawaii Home | Breitbart News published a story about our 100 Percent FED Up Facebook page being hidden from the Facebook news feed after we began posting several stories a day on the topic of illegal immigration. After an investigation into our page settings by a Facebook employee, he discovered a core function was missing from our settings. The function that was missing from our page settings is what allows our page to be seen by a specific audience (or not at all). It s really quite ironic that the guy who s been doing everything in his power to make illegal alien a dirty word on Facebook, would build a massive wall around his Hawaiian domicile wouldn t you agree?For years, Kilauea, Kauai resident Gy Hall has enjoyed the view of the ocean and the breeze along Koolau Road. Then, a few weeks ago, a crew started to build a wall which happens to belong to Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. The feeling of it is really oppressive. It s immense, Hall said. It s really sad that somebody would come in, and buy a huge piece of land and the first thing they do is cut off this view that s been available and appreciative by the community here for years. Hall said the wall extends along Koolau Road, near mile marker 20, and is about six-feet tall. He said its projected length and completion are unclear.Multiple attempts by TGI to contact Shawn Smith, former Falk Partners manager, who Hall says sold some of the $200 million, 700-plus-acre property to the billionaire, were unsuccessful Friday Shosana Chantara, a Kilauea resident, voiced her concerns about the breeze that s being obstructed. It s hot behind that wall. Because it s up on a berm, there s not a breath of air on this side from the ocean, Chantara said. You take a solid wall that s 10 or more feet above the road level; the breeze can t go through. Another Kilauea resident, Donna Macmillan, calls the wall a monstrosity. Via: Independent Sentinel | 1real |
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