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BREAKING: New Law Stops Hillary In Her Tracks, She Is Now Officially Ineligible To Run |
As if Hillary Clinton was not already facing enough legal trouble, new information has surfaced that the former Secretary of State could actually be legally ineligible to run for President of the United States.
In fact, Clinton could be ineligible to hold any kind of federal office.
This week, Cornell Law Library Former United States Attorney General Michael Mukasey spoke out to say that Clinton’s personal email server “disqualifies” her from the race. To support his argument, he cited federal law Title 18. Section 2071.
The law reads as follows:
(a) Whoever willfully and unlawfully conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates, or destroys, or attempts to do so, or, with intent to do so takes and carries away any record, proceeding, map, book, paper, document, or other thing, filed or deposited with any clerk or officer of any court of the United States, or in any public office, or with any judicial or public officer of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.
(b) Whoever, having the custody of any such record, proceeding, map, book, document, paper, or other thing, willfully and unlawfully conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates, falsifies, or destroys the same, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both; and shall forfeit his office and be disqualified from holding any office under the United States. As used in this subsection, the term “office” does not include the office held by any person as a retired officer of the Armed Forces of the United States. | 1real |
Clarion: Syrian Christian Militia Condemns Turkey for Bombing Kurds - Breitbart | This story originally appeared at the Clarion Project: By Ryan Mauro, The Syriac Military Council, a Christian militia in Syria opposed to the Assad regime, condemned Turkey for bombing its U. S. Kurdish allies who are fighting ISIS. The Christians accused Turkey of continuing the genocidal and campaigns of the Ottoman Empire. The statement reads in part: “This attack came at the 102nd commemoration of the Syriac Assyrian, Armenian and Greek genocide ‘Sayfo,’ while Turkey is continuing the same policies against the people living in the Middle East, trying to overthrow the democratic project that our people are working together to reach a political and administrational system based on pluralism, justice, equality and democracy. ” Turkey’s airstrikes killed 40 Kurdish fighters in Iraq and 30 in Syria. The Kurds in Syria belonged to the People Defense Units (YPG). The Syriac Military Council (MFS) and its female wing, the Beth Nahrin Women Protection Forces, are allied with the YPG Kurds in a U. S. alliance named the Syrian Democratic Forces. The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) is a coalition and it is leading the fight against ISIS as it prepares to attack Raqqa. Despite historical ethnic tensions, the SDF was able to recruit so many Sunni Arabs that a top U. S. commander estimates that 60% of the fighters are Arab and 40% are Kurds. Read the full story at Clarion. | 0fake |
Warren Buffett, in Annual Letter, Offers Hymn to U.S. Economy - The New York Times | Warren E. Buffett, the billionaire investor, on Saturday lauded the “miraculous” qualities of the United States economy in highlighting another stellar year for his company, Berkshire Hathaway. Mr. Buffett, whose record of beating the stock market over the past 50 years is unparalleled, is known for being persistently optimistic about the prospects of the American economy. But his usual hymn to the dynamism of the American economy in his annual letter to Berkshire Hathaway shareholders that was released on Saturday morning reached new heights. “Americans have combined human ingenuity, a market system, a tide of talented and ambitious immigrants, and the rule of law to deliver abundance beyond any dreams of our forefathers,” Mr. Buffett wrote. He was a vocal supporter of Hillary Clinton during last year’s presidential campaign and he did not mention President Trump in his letter. But his celebration of the American economy’s ability to deliver growth stands in stark contrast to President Trump’s darker descriptions of the country’s economic prospects. That Mr. Buffett went out of his way to give credit to a “tide of talented and ambitious immigrants” was also worthy of note in light of the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigrants. Last year was another outstanding one for the man known widely as the Oracle of Omaha. Berkshire Hathaway’s stock price was up 23 percent in 2016, about double the return on the Standard Poor’s 500 index. Berkshire’s operating companies, which include the insurance firm Geico, the railroad company BNSF and numerous others, also performed well in an improving economy, with operating earnings increasing to $17. 5 billion in 2016 from $17. 3 billion in 2015. Mr. Buffett’s investment letters, which accompany Berkshire’s report, are highly anticipated. After all, he is 86 years old, sitting on a mountain of $85 billion in cash and, as a recent documentary about his life made clear, showing little sign of slowing down. Mr. Buffett also revealed in his letter that a recent bet on Apple had paid quick dividends. He owns a 1. 1 percent stake in the company that he purchased at a total cost of $6. 7 billion. His 61 million shares are now worth over $8 billion. Over the years, Mr. Buffett has had a complicated relationship with Wall Street. He has been a withering critic of the culture of high pay, group think and excessive fees yet he has also swooped in to buy big stakes in investment firms when they hit rough times. In his 2016 letter, Mr. Buffett took special aim at hedge funds, which in recent years have faced persistent outflows of investor money because of poor performance, stubbornly high fees and a broad move toward cheaper, passive options like index funds and funds. Underscoring his thesis that, over time, highly paid hotshots lose out to a cheap index fund, Mr. Buffett presented the latest results of a bet he made nine years ago. Since then, a standard S P index fund overseen by Vanguard is up 85 percent, easily outpacing the hedge funds’ return of 22 percent. Annually, the gap is just as wide: 7 percent for the index fund and 2. 2 percent for the hedge funds. As usual, Mr. Buffett did not mince words in expressing his astonishment as to how elite investment professionals could register such mediocre returns while raking in steep fees. “I’m certain that in almost all cases the managers at both levels were honest and intelligent people. But the results for their investors were dismal — really dismal,” he wrote. “And, alas, the huge fixed fees charged by all of the funds and involved — fees that were totally unwarranted by performance — were such that their managers were showered with compensation over the nine years that have passed. ” | 0fake |
AWESOME! President Trump To The Crazed Media: “We do it with a piece of paper”…LOL! [Video] | Judge Jeanine Pirro interviewed President Trump on the press and the Comey firing. The interview is fantastic! The interview begins with a discussion on James Comey and the FBI. Pirro says and Trump agrees that people are caught up on the Comey issue . Trump speaks about Spicer and Huckabee and how it s hard to keep up with his schedule. Trump is very forthcoming about his day to day dealings with the press and world leaders. The newsmaker from the interview is Trump s comment about possibly not doing press conferences with the White House press: We do it with a piece of paper with a perfectly accurate beautiful answer Bill Hemmer in for Tucker Carlson gets a great interview with Judge Pirro We love the proposal from Trump that caused media heads to spin Too funny! He trolls the press beautifully! | 1real |
Soldier Headed Home from Deployment Says United Airlines Charged Him $200 for ’Overweight’ Military Bag | A National Guard soldier headed home from a deployment to Afghanistan says he was charged a hefty fee to check his military bag. [First Lieutenant John Rader said United Airlines made him pay $200 to check a bag on his flight to Austin, Texas, from El Paso, the final leg of his trip home from his deployment to Afghanistan, because it was overweight, Fox News reported. “I was told point blank that I’d have to pay $200 for the overage or find another bag to siphon stuff off with,” Rader told FOX 7. “Well, I didn’t have another bag so I was caught in a bind. ” Some of the things in his bag included Kevlar vests, two helmets, and boots. Rader said he was initially required to serve a deployment, but he volunteered to extend his deployment to 21 months. United says military can check up to five bags as long as they are each 70 pounds or less, according to the airline’s website. Delta has a similar policy, while American and Southwest allow military to check their bags for free provided that they are 100 pounds or less. Rader said he tried to work it out with the ticket agent so he would not have to pay the fee but was told his bag was too heavy for the military benefit. “There was no empathy to the situation. I’m not looking for sympathy, but some form of empathy in the situation. There was none of that. It was just cold. I had to either pay or leave the bag,” Rader said. He added that another soldier on his flight also had to pay a fee. United Airlines released a statement apologizing for the incident: “We are disappointed anytime a customer has an experience that doesn’t meet their expectations, and our customer care team is reaching out to this customer to issue a refund for his oversized bag as a gesture of goodwill. ” | 0fake |
WATCH: Elizabeth Warren Sets The Internet On FIRE By Dancing Through The Streets At Boston Pride | Donald Trump has chosen to ignore Pride month, but the same can not be said of all politicians. Sen. Elizabeth Warren set the internet on fire this weekend when she was caught on video literally dancing through the streets at the Boston Pride parade.The Massachusetts Democrat celebrated LGBT Pride along with tens of thousands of others at the 47th annual Boston Pride parade and the scene could not have been any more perfect. And this is a prime example of exactly why she has become a liberal icon. I love pride, Warren says in the short video she posted. It may be my single most favorite day of the year because it s the day that we all come together and celebrate. Go pride. It is worth noting that not only has Trump chosen to ignore Pride month, but he has decided it isn t even worth a passing mention after the Supreme Court ruled in favor of marriage equality and after the deadly massacre at Pulse. That pretty much says it all right there, doesn t it?He claims to be an inclusive leader and has said that he stands by the LGBT community, but clearly, that is not the case. Actions speak louder than words, and so far, he has offered neither this month.Warren, on the other hand, is the polar opposite of Trump and that couldn t make us any happier. Her joy at this weekend s event was absolutely infectious and the internet just can t get enough of her. (Or her rainbow feather boa!) This is exactly why we liberals love her so much!You can see the video of Sen. Warren dancing along the route of the parade, here:I LOVE the Boston Pride Parade. It shows our Commonwealth and our country at its best. pic.twitter.com/0ea0moLb5g Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) June 11, 2017Featured image via video screen capture | 1real |
Belgian judge defers ruling on warrant for ex-Catalan leader: lawyer | BRUSSELS (Reuters) - A Belgian judge made no ruling on Friday on a European arrest warrant issued by Spain for ousted Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont, his lawyer said after a court hearing in Brussels. The Belgian prosecutor demanded the warrant to be exercised, but the case for Puigdemont s defense will be made at a hearing early next month. We will make our case on December 4. The prosecutor has asked for the extradition warrant to be exercised. Nothing has been decided today, Paul Bekaert told reporters outside the main Brussels court. The prosecutor had determined that according to Belgian law Puigdemont and four of his former ministers who traveled with him to Brussels were charged with conspiracy by public officials, Bekaert added. Under the Spanish warrant, all five faced charges of rebellion and sedition. They had left Spain after Puigdemont s regional government was sacked by Madrid for unilaterally declaring Catalonia independent following a referendum on secession that court authorities in Madrid had ruled was illegal. The European arrest warrant system in place since 2004 makes it easier for EU countries to demand the extradition from other EU states of people wanted for crimes, and removes political decision-making from the process. EU countries issue thousands of such warrants each year. The Oct. 1 referendum and subsequent turmoil have plunged Spain into its gravest political crisis since the return of democracy four decades ago. Puigdemont has since said he might consider a solution that did not involve secession. | 0fake |
WATCH: Reporter Calls Kellyanne Conway And Her Lies ‘The Darkness’ – Her Reply Is INSANELY Ironic | Everyone knows by now just how fast and loose Kellyanne Conway is with her words. She pioneered alternative facts. She claimed that the U.S. had never gone as long without a Treasury Secretary as we did with Trump. She made up an entire terrorist attack. She said that microwaves turn into cameras. And somehow, people still want to talk to her.Some in the press have started seeing her as the darkness, because she s such a purveyor of misinformation. That word, darkness, refers to the Washington Post s front page motto, Democracy dies in darkness. Michael Wolff, a reporter for the Hollywood Reporter, told her: I m going to tell you, when they say democracy dies in darkness, you re the darkness. So the Washington Post (and Wolff) is calling her and other purveyors of lies out in their front-page motto. Conway s response was to first say, I m not the darkness! Then she said: It s what I tell small children: Just because somebody says something doesn t make it true, and it s a great lesson for everyone. Miss Bowling Green Massacre is defending herself against accusations of lies by pointing out that people lie. The irony! It hurts! But it gets even better: You can turn on the TV more than you can read in the paper because I assume editors are still doing their jobs in most places and people literally say things that just aren t true. Yes, primarily Fox News and those that like Trump. And herself. Someone needs to get Glass House here to say all of this again while looking in a mirror.Watch below:.@MichaelWolffNYC: Democracy dies in darkness. You re the darkness. @KellyannePolls: I m not the darkness. https://t.co/dChswXBtLh pic.twitter.com/2CnvLshNpH CNN (@CNN) April 12, 2017Featured image via video screen capture | 1real |
E.T. Williams: ‘Anti Trump Protesters, Your Revolution is Fake’ | 21st Century Wire says As anti-Trump protests continue at college campuses across America, many are still trying to make sense of what exactly the students are protesting for, beyond venting their frustration about the results of another democratic election in America. Doctor of Common Sense E.T. Williams disagrees, The anti-Trump protesters are no damn revolutionaries, they are lawless idiots. Watch: | 1real |
Turkey wants former police investigator repatriated from U.S.: sources | ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkey s justice minister has told his U.S. counterpart that a former Turkish police investigator who testified at the trial of a Turkish banker in New York this week is wanted by Ankara and should be swiftly returned, ministry sources said on Friday. Huseyin Korkmaz gave evidence at the New York trial of a Turkish banker who is charged with helping Iran evade U.S. sanctions, in a case which has strained ties between NATO allies Turkey and the United States. It has been requested by our judicial offices that (Korkmaz) be temporarily arrested with the aim of being repatriated, based on alleged crimes, Justice Minister Abdulhamit Gul said in a letter to U.S. Justice Secretary Jeff Sessions, according to the sources at his ministry. We expect that the request is met on positive terms and the previously mentioned person be repatriated as soon as possible. The Turkish government has said followers of U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, who it blames for last year s failed military coup, are behind the case brought in the United States. Gulen has denied any role in the coup attempt. I want to point out that a fugitive, a terror suspect facing serious allegations, taking part in this case in your country as a witness is big enough a scandal, Gul said, adding that the case could cause irreparable damage to relations if action was not taken. Korkmaz told the trial at Manhattan federal court this week that he feared he would be tortured if he returned to Turkey, where he led an investigation involving Turkish officials and Mehmet Hakan Atilla, the bank executive on trial in New York. Gul s letter repeated Turkish allegations of contact between members of the judiciary who have handled the case and members of the Gulen network. Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu has said the cases showed the extent to which Gulen had infiltrated American state institutions, including its judiciary. Needless to say, those claims are ridiculous, Acting U.S. Attorney, Kim H. Joon said last month in response to such accusations. The case has been handled by career prosecutors concerned only with U.S. law, not Turkish politics, Kim said, adding: They re not Gulenists. Prosecutors have accused Atilla, an executive at Turkey s state-owned Halkbank, of working with Turkish-Iranian gold trader Reza Zarrab and others to help Iran evade U.S. sanctions through fraudulent gold and food transactions. Atilla, 47, has pleaded not guilty. Zarrab, 34, pleaded guilty and testified for U.S. prosecutors. Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan, who has governed Turkey for almost 15 years, has dismissed the case as a politically inspired attempt to bring down the Turkish government. | 0fake |
Why did Mexico invite Donald Trump for a visit? (+video) | President Enrique Peña Nieto has invited both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton to meet in Mexico. In a surprise move, Mr. Trump has accepted the offer, hours before he will give an immigration policy speech in Arizona.
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump steps off his plane after arriving for a campaign rally at Crown Arena in Fayetteville, N.C. on Tuesday, Aug. 9, 2016. Trump will fly to Mexico Wednesday on invitation of President Enrique Peña Nieto.
The Republican presidential candidate is taking up Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto on an offer extended to both US presidential candidates by making a quick visit to Mexico on Wednesday, just hours before he is expected to a deliver major immigration speech in Arizona.
"I have accepted the invitation of President Enrique Pena Nieto, of Mexico, and look very much forward to meeting him...," said Mr. Trump in a Twitter post on Tuesday night.
Trump's ascent to the nomination owes much to his antagonism of the United States' southern neighbor: launching his campaign with remarks that belittled immigrants from Mexico, and claiming that they have contributed to international humiliation for the US.
"They're not sending us their best," he said in his June 2015 speech announcing that he was seeking the Republican presidential bid. "They're sending people that have lots of problems and they're bringing those problems. They're bringing drugs, they're bringing crime, they're rapists, and some, I assume, are good people but I speak to border guards and they tell us what we're getting."
"When do we beat Mexico at the border?" he continued. "They're laughing at us, at our stupidity. And now they're beating us economically. They are not our friend, believe me, but they're killing us economically."
In March, Mr. Peña Nieto criticized Trump's "strident" tone, likening his brand of populism to that of fascist leaders like Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini. He later told CNN that there was "no way" that Mexico would ever pay for the construction of a border wall, as Trump has insisted it should.
On Tuesday, Peña Nieto seemed to preempt criticisms over the invitation, writing on Twitter that he believed in dialogue "to promote the interests of Mexico in the world and, principally, to protect Mexicans wherever they are." The purpose of the visit, he wrote, was to discuss bilateral relations – a preferred topic for a president who has made attracting foreign investment a priority.
His comments in March aside, the Mexican president has been characteristically circumspect in his remarks about the US elections, describing them as a matter to be decided internally.
"I have never made any remark or rating about any of the candidates today in the democratic competition of the United States," he said in July, according to local media. "Any point or statement that I have made has been taken out of context.... I have always expressed absolute respect for the process."
In April, The Christian Science Monitor noted that despite the vast expense and formidable array of practical obstacles involved in building walls along the border, politicians in the US continue to use the idea to soothe anxieties over immigration:
The value of the wall, some experts say, is much more as a political idea than an actual structure. The border wall remains a powerful symbol for people on both sides of the immigration debate – either as a sign of security taken seriously or of fear and misunderstanding run amok. “It’s something that has gained a lot of political value, the idea that you can wall the United states off from the rest of the rest of the world, particularly in this case, Mexico,” says Rachel St. John, author of “Line in the Sand: A History of the U.S.-Mexico Border.”
Trump's visit comes as he appears to retreat from his earlier insistence that he would marshal a "deportation force" to expel all of the country’s roughly 11 million undocumented immigrants. In recent meetings with Hispanic supporters, the candidate suggested that he might be open to letting some of those people stay – though his staff has appeared to contradict that in subsequent interviews.
New Jersey governor Chris Christie, a close Trump adviser who visited Peña Nieto in Mexico City in 2014, was among those pushing the Republican candidate to take the trip, a source close to the campaign told the Associated Press.
This report contains material from the Associated Press. | 0fake |
Bannon departure tips trade scales in favor of White House 'globalists' | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The departure on Friday of Steve Bannon, the White House’s top economic nationalist, will likely tip the trade policy scales in favor of the Trump administration’s “globalist” faction, which could soften the stance toward two of Trump’s favorite targets: China and the North American Free Trade Agreement. But after news that Trump had fired Bannon from his post as chief strategist, trade experts said it may take some time for National Economic Council Chairman Gary Cohn, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue to start winning more debates on trade policy. Bannon and White House Trade and Manufacturing Office director Peter Navarro were often allied in taking hardline anti-China stances over currency manipulation, steel tariffs and other trade issues, often opposed to Cohn, Mnuchin and Perdue, according to lobbyists who been involved in the debates. The Cohn-led group proved more influential in the administration’s decisions in April not to label China a currency manipulator and to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement instead of terminating it. More recently, they have pushed for a delay in a decision on the imposition of broad steel tariffs. With Bannon gone, “there’s not a replacement for that voice in internal debates,” said a senior administration official who was not authorized to speak publicly on the issue. “Without Steve constantly pushing back on every policy idea coming from the so called “globalists,” it’s easy to see how they could have a chance to start winning more policy battles,” the official said. In the short term, the trade policy trajectory won’t change much, said Derek Scissors, a China trade expert at the American Enterprise Institute, a pro-business conservative think tank in Washington. Many of Trump’s views on trade pre-dated Bannon’s arrival on his campaign in any case. The U.S. Trade Representative’s office announced on Friday that it will proceed with a planned investigation into whether China is misappropriating U.S. technology and intellectual property through unreasonable investment rules. Scissors said Bannon’s departure will show in what decisions the administration makes following a year-long study of the issue. “It’s about the final choices on do we go forward with these very difficult sanctions on the Chinese or do we look to make a tradeoff on a security issue, and Bannon would have been in the first camp,” Scissors said. The struggle for influence in Trump’s White House “has been something of a battle between the finance guys and the economic nationalists, and the most important economic nationalist just left,” Scissors added. The offices of USTR Robert Lighthizer and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, who have been pushing for stronger trade policies to reduce U.S. trade deficits with China, Mexico and other countries, declined to comment on Bannon’s departure, referring policy questions to the White House. But industry lobbyists, who have been whipsawed by economic policy twists over trade and an ill-fated border tax proposal, were skeptical that much would change. Two lobbyists on the sidelines of NAFTA talks in Washington said that even without Bannon, they will assume the status quo on trade policy as long as fierce China critic Navarro is in the White House. Bonnie Glaser, senior adviser for Asia at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the administration’s efforts to develop an effective strategy to retaliate against China’s unfair trade practices will survive, largely because there is a widely held view in the administration and the corporate sector that China’s trade practices are a problem. “I doubt this effort will evaporate, though it may evolve,” she said. | 0fake |
Donald Trump Vows to Bolster Nation’s Military Capacities - The New York Times | PHILADELPHIA — Donald J. Trump on Wednesday called for a vast expansion of the military, including 90, 000 new soldiers for the Army and nearly 75 new ships for the Navy, requiring up to $90 billion a year in additional spending. But Mr. Trump did not match those numbers with details about how the country would raise the money, other than a promise to take steps like reducing wasteful spending, which military budget analysts said would be insufficient. Mr. Trump, in a speech at the Union League of Philadelphia, also vowed to order the military to devise a new plan to defeat the Islamic State “immediately upon taking office. ” The plan would come within 30 days from “my generals,” he added, without mentioning that those generals are the same ones who came up with the current strategy, which they believe is working. The speech was the latest effort by Mr. Trump’s campaign to demonstrate to voters that he can lay out detailed policy prescriptions to problems confronting the nation. It also seemed to be directed at the conservative foreign policy establishment, coming a day after Mr. Trump released a letter from about 90 retired military officials endorsing his campaign. He lamented the shrinking of the military and warned that enemies were preparing to capitalize on perceptions of American weakness around the world. “Our adversaries are chomping at the bit,” Mr. Trump said. “We want to deter, avoid and prevent conflict through our unquestioned military strength. ” With the speech, Mr. Trump also moved to refocus his campaign on critiques of Hillary Clinton, his Democratic rival. Espousing a foreign policy “tempered by realism,” Mr. Trump portrayed Mrs. Clinton, the former secretary of state, as unsuited to lead the nation’s armed forces. “Unlike my opponent, my foreign policy will emphasize diplomacy, not destruction,” Mr. Trump said. “Hillary Clinton’s legacy in Iraq, Libya, Syria has produced only turmoil and suffering and death. ” But it was the size of the military, and the amount that the United States spends on its defense, that lay at the heart of Mr. Trump’s speech. In addition to increasing the Army to 540, 000 soldiers and adding the Navy ships, Mr. Trump proposed buying dozens of new fighter aircraft for the Air Force. To pay for the expansion, Mr. Trump said he would call on Congress to reverse the cuts to military spending made as part of the budget sequester in 2013, which was the result of a compromise reached between Democrats and Republicans. The new spending, Mr. Trump said, would not cost taxpayers an additional penny. He said he would eliminate wasteful government spending, increase energy production and trim the federal work force, including the military bureaucracy. He also suggested that he would collect unpaid taxes, which he said amounted to $385 billion. Asked about the plan, Todd Harrison, a military budget expert with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said, “Good luck. ” “Everyone comes in saying they want to reduce wasteful spending,” Mr. Harrison said. “Folks have tried that again and again, and they have largely not been successful. ” Although Mr. Trump said little about how much his plan would cost, the new military spending would probably amount to $80 billion to $90 billion a year, experts said. The additional soldiers alone would cost around $9 billion. Mr. Trump’s call for ending the sequester on military spending is unlikely to gain traction in Washington. Republicans have long pushed for lifting these limits — a proposal Democrats will consider only with comparable relief on domestic spending. And on Tuesday night, in a sign of the likely stalemate, Senate Democrats filibustered a military appropriations bill because it would have allowed for bursting through the caps on military spending without also doing the same for domestic spending. Mr. Trump’s remarks came before he was to appear Wednesday night at a Commander in Chief Forum televised from the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum in New York and focused on security and veterans issues. Mr. Trump was questioned after Mrs. Clinton. Earlier on Wednesday, he described Mrs. Clinton as “reckless” and “totally unfit to be our commander in chief. ” Mr. Trump was turning the tables on a frequent line of attack from Mrs. Clinton and trying to lay the blame for the bloodshed in the Middle East at her feet, a critique that most experts have said is grossly oversimplified and misleading. “Sometimes it seemed like there wasn’t a country in the Middle East that Hillary Clinton didn’t want to invade, intervene in or topple,” he said. “She’s and very unstable. ” The Clinton campaign fought back after the speech by highlighting the endorsement of more retired generals and admirals, saying Mrs. Clinton had gotten greater support “than any Democrat due to her proven record of diplomacy and steady leadership on the world stage. ” In a foreign policy speech in April, Mr. Trump offered much the same thrust as in Wednesday’s address — presenting an at times paradoxical approach of using fiery oratory to promise a military buildup and the immediate destruction of the Islamic State, while also rejecting the and interventionist instincts of George W. Bush’s administration. Mr. Trump also echoed other themes that he has used during his campaign, calling on allies to pay more for American military protection. “Early in my term, I will also be requesting that all NATO nations promptly pay their bills,” he said. “Only five NATO countries, including the United States, are currently meeting their minimum requirements to spend 2 percent of G. D. P. on defense. ” He also accused the Obama administration of agreeing to bad deals with Iran. “Our president lied to us,” Mr. Trump said of President Obama, saying the nuclear deal with Iran put the country “on a path to nuclear weapons. ” But Mr. Trump’s fiercest criticism was saved for Mrs. Clinton. He accused her of being complicit in an array of foreign policy stumbles, and of deleting her emails as secretary of state to hide her participation in a “pay for play” scandal in which Clinton Foundation donors were granted special access. Damning his rival with false praise, Mr. Trump — in one of his speech’s biggest applause lines — also said that maybe Mrs. Clinton did have some wisdom to impart. “Hillary Clinton has taught us really how vulnerable we are in cyberhacking,” he said. “It’s probably the only thing that we’ve learned from Hillary Clinton. ” | 0fake |
How Do You Tell a Better Story in Sports? - The New York Times | The modern N. B. A. era began in the 1980s with two if only narratives. The rivalry between Larry Bird and Magic Johnson was transmitted to the public through sportswriters who typecast Bird as the white country bumpkin who gritted his way to excellence and Johnson as the black, savant who whipped up his talents into the best show on the hardwood. The cities of Boston (parochial and solemn) and Los Angeles (flashy and morally suspect) were featured in supporting roles that echoed the best and worst traits of the main characters. The reality behind “Bird versus Magic” was mostly irrelevant. What mattered was that the choice you were supposed to make between them was laid out as as possible. In recent years, there has been a movement to replace these hoary old sports stories with an atomized landscape of numbers, stats and transactional analysis — and its adherents harbor a healthy amount of scorn for anyone who thinks differently. The move toward dispassionate stats is for the greater good sportswriting and fandom are too often unctuous and absurd and lend themselves to blanket moralizing in which the athlete is reduced to some lesson about life itself. If he does not hustle to first base on a ground ball, he becomes a for the insufficient work ethic of his entire generation. If he happens to be an immigrant or from a racial minority, he becomes a for his entire people. Despite the growing influence of the rationalists — the analysts and wonks who want to tear this all down — the mainstream sports industrial complex, especially in the loftier parts of the media, doesn’t share their vision. Narrative, with all its lies, still dominates. This has been a summer filled with silly sports schlock, spurred by NBC’s Olympic Games coverage, which carried on its tradition of dramatically lit, reels: a young athlete learns to swim after meeting a dolphin at a water park in Tarzana, Calif. a towheaded future equestrian rider falls in love with a horse in Darien, Conn. and so on. But the season’s story time had already started on July 4, when Kevin Durant, one of the most beloved players in the N. B. A. announced that he would be leaving the Oklahoma City Thunder for the Golden State Warriors. The expected take quake was set off, split along the usual lines. The new rationalists pointed out that Durant is a man and argued that nobody has any right to criticize any decision a man makes for himself and his family — before they quickly pivoted to their charts showing how Durant would change the Warriors’ expected win total. The traditionalists chanted their odes to loyalty, competitiveness and Larry Bird and Magic Johnson, who each played their entire careers with one team. In Oklahoma City itself, the reaction played out much as it had in Cleveland when LeBron James left. Fans ripped up Durant jerseys and delivered weepy testimonials to the powerful bonds between a city and its star athlete. Overnight, Durant went from fan favorite to just the latest in the N. B. A. ’s litany of “selfish” players like Allen Iverson, Dennis Rodman or LeBron James, people who have come to embody everything that’s wrong with America. The next episode in this melodrama came in early August, when the Thunder and their other great player, Russell Westbrook, agreed to a contract extension. (People had speculated that he would leave too.) There were a lot of reasonable fiscal reasons for Westbrook’s decision — within the N. B. A. ’s byzantine rules, it helped him maximize the money he could make over the rest of his career — and none of Westbrook’s other rumored destinations, whether Boston or New York or Los Angeles, guaranteed the success that Durant will surely enjoy with the Warriors. But Westbrook, who has mostly stayed quiet about Durant’s exit, will now be the living embodiment of every traditional thing that fans, callers and screaming TV heads have demanded from athletes. He is staying with the team with which he began his career, saving the relevance of professional basketball in Oklahoma. He is also spurning, at least for now, the impulse to join a superteam with other superstars. Westbrook has decided to go it alone, and every Dennis from Dumont or Paulie from Passaic who calls in to WFAN and asks the host Mike Francesa how he can possibly raise a son in a world where disloyal athletes strut around unpunished has a new hero. Durant’s departure for Golden State seemed to be a bellwether moment, not only in the potential fortunes of two basketball teams but also in the way that sports news is transmuted into fable that has its own relatable and lesson. The old, familiar moralizing, mainly delivered in rants about loyalty or cowardice or traditions by a on ESPN or Fox Sports, was met with a swift and forceful response by the rationalists. During the night of Durant’s announcement, in fact, it felt as if the counterreaction beat the reaction, as hundreds of rationalists tweeted against an opinion that hadn’t even yet been aired. Sean Newell, writing for Vice Sports (I am also a correspondent at Vice) voiced their frustration when he wrote: “No one in the world should care where Kevin Durant plays basketball, and they certainly shouldn’t care enough to scream about it on ESPN. But sportswriters, even though their job is to report on topics, write fiction. ” The problem with Newell’s critique is that nearly everyone who watches the N. B. A. except a small population of analytics wonks and insiders, really does care where Kevin Durant plays basketball. The zealotry of those in pursuit of some objective “truth” in sports, I’ve started to think, might be turning the entire spectacle into something that can no longer be recognized by a vast majority of fans. If you excise both fandom and the metaphorical weight of how the actions of an athlete might reflect on your own life, then what, exactly, are we watching? And why? The impulse to expunge all this and turn watching sports into an accounting exercise filled with insider jargon reflects some of the elitism that has entered our national political conversation. While neither the stakes nor the messages are analogous, the mechanism through which they are conveyed feels very much the same. It is, in essence, a between those who believe themselves to be in the know and the simps who lap up everything they watch on cable news. But not all narratives, whether political or athletic, are fictions, and there are still emotional and existential lessons that can be summoned by the sight of men and women chasing a ball around a field. There is ample ground between the current approach to N. F. L. news, for example, which amounts to treating it as either a stock ticker of microtransactions or a perpetual machine, and the attitude given expression earlier this month by John Miller, chief marketing officer for NBC’s Olympic Games coverage, to explain why his network relegated several key Olympic events to tape delay. “More women watch the Games than men,” Miller said, “and for the women, they’re less interested in the result and more interested in the journey. ” A defense of sports narratives does not have to accept Miller’s retrograde thinking. That it so often has is not proof that every telling is corrupted, but rather that the authors have mostly failed. Durant versus Westbrook will be next year’s dominant N. B. A. motif because it brings in the full breadth of the rich, if at times overblown, metaphors that have always driven the best sportswriting: loyalty versus the individual versus the empire and solidarity with the underdog versus the cynical efficiency of the superteam. The personalities of both players, on court and off, should be enough to compel our attention, supplemented by all the data analysis you could ever want. Even if we should balk at any easy moralizing, there’s no need to sacrifice a good story in the process. | 0fake |
Factbox: How Senate, House Obamacare overhaul bills compare | (Reuters) - After weeks of discussions behind closed doors, the U.S. Senate unveiled a draft of its healthcare bill on Thursday that would overhaul the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare. The House of Representatives narrowly passed its healthcare bill last month. If the Senate passes its bill, the House will either have to vote on the Senate version of the legislation or the two chambers will have to reconcile their differences in a conference committee. Obamacare extended coverage to some 20 million additional Americans through both subsidized private insurance and an expansion of Medicaid. Since its passage in 2010, Republicans have campaigned on repealing the program and argued that the law is too costly and represents undue government interference in Americans’ healthcare. Here is how the two bills compare on their main provisions: Under Obamacare, more than 30 states, including about a dozen states with Republican governors, expanded the Medicaid government health insurance program for the poor and disabled. Both bills would roll back the expansion and significantly overhaul the program, which provides insurance to nearly 70 million people. SENATE: The draft legislation would phase out Obamacare’s expansion of Medicaid over three years, from 2021 to 2024. It would then overhaul the program and reduce its federal funding more than the House bill would, beginning in 2025. HOUSE: The bill would allow the Medicaid expansion to continue until Jan. 1, 2020. After that date, expansion would end, and people who enrolled in the expansion could not re-enroll once they leave. Medicaid funding would be capped on a per-person basis. SENATE: The bill would repeal most Obamacare taxes beginning after Dec. 31, 2016, including the 3.8 percent net investment income tax on wealthy Americans. The tax on branded prescription brands would be repealed in 2018, and the legislation would delay the so-called Cadillac tax on high-cost employer-provided insurance. It would also provide more generous tax credits for the purchase of private health insurance for people between zero and 350 percent of the federal poverty level based on income. Under Obamacare, those between 100 and 400 percent of the federal poverty level were eligible for tax credits. HOUSE: The bill would repeal most Obamacare taxes retroactively after Dec. 31, 2016, and delay the Cadillac tax to 2026. It would provide flat age-based tax credits for the purchase of private health insurance ranging from $2,000 to $4,000 per year that would be capped at upper-income levels. Both bills would repeal the penalties associated with the individual mandate that nearly everyone purchase health insurance or else pay a fine, and the mandate that employers provide insurance to employees. SENATE: The legislation would maintain the popular Obamacare provision that young adults be allowed to stay on their parents’ health insurance until age 26. It would also prevent insurers from discriminating against those with pre-existing conditions, but would give states flexibility to opt out of so-called essential health benefits, such as maternity care and prescription drug coverage, that experts said could make it harder for some sick people to find affordable plans. The bill would also allow insurers to charge older Americans up to five times more than younger Americans. HOUSE: The bill would allow young adults to remain on their parents’ insurance until age 26. It would allow states to opt out of essential health benefits and Obamacare’s requirement that insurers charge sick and healthy people the same rates. It would also let insurers mark up premiums by 30 percent for those who have a lapse in insurance coverage of about two months or more. Insurers could charge older Americans up to five times more than younger Americans. | 0fake |
COULTER: The ‘Resistance’ Goes Live-Fire - Breitbart | The explosion of violence against conservatives across the country is being intentionally ginned up by Democrats, reporters, TV hosts, comedians and celebrities, who compete with one another to come up with the most vile epithets for Trump and his supporters. [They go right up to the line, trying not to cross it, by, for example, vamping with a realistic photo of a decapitated Trump or calling the president a “piece of s — ” while hosting a show on CNN. The media are orchestrating a bloodless coup, but they’re perfectly content to have their shock troops pursue a bloody coup. This week, one of the left’s foot soldiers gunned down Republican members of Congress and their staff while they were playing baseball in Virginia. Democratic Socialist James Hodgkinson was prevented from committing a mass murder only by the happenstance of a member of the Republican leadership being there, along with his Capitol Police protection. Remember when it was frightening for the losing party not to accept the results of an election? During the third debate, Trump refused to agree to the election results, saying he’d “look at it at the time. ” The media responded in their usual style: A ‘HORRIFYING’ REPUDIATION OF DEMOCRACY — The Washington Post, Oct. 20, 2016, DENIAL OF DEMOCRACY — Daily News (New York) Oct. 20, 2016 DANGER TO DEMOCRACY — The Dallas Morning News, Oct. 20, 2016, ONE SCARY MOMENT IT ALL BOILED DOWN TO … DEMOCRACY — Pittsburgh Oct. 21, 2016, “(Shock) spiked down the nation’s spinal column last night and today when the Republican nominee threatened that this little election thing you got there, this little democratic process you’ve got here, it’s nice, it’s fine, but he doesn’t necessarily plan on abiding by its decision when it comes to the presidency. ” — Rachel Maddow, Oct. 20, “Trump’s answer on accepting the outcome of the vote is the most disgraceful statement by a presidential candidate in 160 years. ” — Bret Stephens, editorial page editor at The Wall Street Journal, “I guess we’re all going to have to wait until Nov. 9 to find out if we still have a country — if Donald Trump is in the mood for a peaceful transfer of power. Or if he’s going to wipe his fat a — with the Constitution. ” — CBS’s Stephen Colbert, Oct. 19, 2016, “It’s unprecedented for a nominee of a major party to themselves signal that they would not accept — you know, respect the results of an election. We’ve never had that happen before. … This really presents a potentially difficult problem for governing … ” — MSNBC’S Joy Reid, Oct. 22, 2016, “This is very dangerous stuff … would seriously impair our functioning as a democracy. … This is about as serious as it gets in the United States. ” — CNN’s Peter Beinart, Oct. 20, 2016, “Obviously, it’s despicable for him to pretend that there’s any chance that he would not accept the results of this election it would be — in 240 years you’ve never had anybody do it. … ” — CNN’s Van Jones, Oct. 20, 2016, Then Trump won, and these very same hysterics refused to accept the results of the election. Recently, Hillary announced her steadfast opposition to the winning candidate using a military term, saying she’d joined the “Resistance. ” Imagine if Trump lost and then announced that he’d joined the “RESISTANCE. ” He’d be accused of trying to activate militias. Every dyspeptic glance at an immigrant would be reported as fascistic violence. But the media seem blithely unaware that the “Resistance” has been accompanied by nonstop militaristic violence from liberals. When Trump ripped up our Constitution and jumped all over it by failing to concede the election three weeks in advance, CNN ran a segment on a single tweet from a random Trump supporter that mentioned the Second Amendment. Carol Costello: “Still to come in the ‘Newsroom,’ some Trump supporters say they will refuse to accept a loss on Election Day, with one offering a threat of violence. We’ll talk about that next. ” In CNN’s most fevered dreams about a violent uprising of Trump supporters, they never could have conceived of the level of actual violence being perpetrated by Americans who refuse to accept Trump’s win. (See Hate Map.) It began with Trump’s inauguration, when a leftist group plotted to pump a debilitating gas into one Trump inaugural ball, military families were assaulted upon leaving the Veterans’ Inaugural Ball, and attendees of other balls had water thrown on them. Since then, masked, armed liberals around the country have formed organizations to beat up conservatives. In liberal towns, the police are regularly ordered to stand down to allow the assaults to proceed unimpeded. The media only declared a crisis when conservatives fought back, smashing the beta males. (“Battle for Berkeley! ”) There is more media coverage for conservatives’ “microaggressions” toward powerful minorities — such as using the wrong pronoun — than there is for liberals’ physical attacks on conservatives, including macings, concussions, and hospitalizations. And now some nut Bernie confirms that it’s Republicans standing on a baseball field, before opening fire. In the media’s strategic reporting of the attempted slaughter, we were quickly told that the mass shooter was white, male and had used a gun. We were even told his name. (Because it was not “Mohammed. ”) But the fact that Hodgkinson’s Facebook page featured a banner of Sanders and the words “Democratic Socialism explained in 3 words: ‘We the People’ Since 1776” apparently called for hours of meticulous by our media. Did reporters think they could keep that information from us forever? The fake news insists that Trump’s White House is in “chaos. ” No, the country is in chaos. But just like Kathy Griffin and her Trump decapitation performance art — the perpetrators turn around in innocence and blame Trump. | 0fake |
The ‘P’ in PBS Should Stand for ‘Plutocratic’ or ‘Pentagon’ | The ‘P’ in PBS Should Stand for ‘Plutocratic’ or ‘Pentagon’ Posted on Oct 27, 2016 ( WikiMedia )
In a television commercial that the Public Broadcasting System (PBS) ran for years, “PBS NewsHour” host Gwen Ifill declared that she loved her job because it allowed her to “ask not only all of my questions but also and more importantly all of your questions .” This assertion was and remains absurd, just like her network’s regular fundraising claim to be free of corporate sponsors.
The claim has long been contradicted by the string of corporate-image commercials (purchased by leading financial, defense, auto, insurance and rail corporations) that appear before the network’s nightly “NewsHour” broadcast—along with a list of corporate-sponsored foundations and superwealthy individuals who pay for the show, along with “regular viewers like you.”
Consistent with those commercials and despite its name, the news and commentary one finds on PBS is in rich tune with the narrow capitalist parameters of acceptable coverage and debate that typify the more fully and explicitly for-profit and commercialized corporate media. As progressive journalist David Sirota suggested two years ago , reflecting on recent investigations showing that supermoneyed, right-wing capitalists such as the Koch brothers and Texas billionaire John Arnold had (along with more liberal software mogul Bill Gates) influenced PBS content through multimillion-dollar donations, the “P” in PBS often seems to more properly stand for “Plutocratic,” not “Public.”
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None of this should be surprising to anyone familiar with the distinctively big-business-dominated history of U.S. broadcast media . Because the United States fails to provide anything like adequate funding for public broadcasting, both PBS and National Public Radio (a regular vehicle for neoliberal business ideology) depend upon foundations, corporations and wealthy individuals to pay for much of their programming. Beneath their standard claims to have no interest in shaping public media content, these private funders have bottom-line agendas, meaning that their contributions come with strings attached—strings that undermine the integrity of the “independent” journalism they bankroll. (For what it’s worth, between 1994 and 2014, the “NewsHour” was primarily owned by the for-profit firm Liberty Media . Liberty Media was run by the conservative and politically active billionaire John Malone, who had a majority stake in MacNeil/Lehrer Productions, the show’s producer.)
The Pentagon Broadcasting System?
What might seem more surprising, perhaps, is the remarkable extent to which the “P” in PBS often seems to stand for “Pentagon,” or perhaps “Presidential,” when it comes to foreign policy content. Whatever the global issue of the day or week, “NewsHour” anchors and their invited “experts” can be counted on to report and reflect in accord with the doctrinal assumption that Washington always operates with the best of intentions. They almost uniformly treat the U.S. as a great, benevolent and indispensable force for freedom, democracy, security, peace and order in a dangerous world full of evil and deadly actors.
The show’s invited commentators are drawn primarily from the nation’s imperial establishment. They are commonly current or retired insiders from within the Pentagon, the White House, the “intelligence community” and/or the nation’s elite network of foreign policy think tanks: the Council on Foreign Relations (the granddaddy of all U.S. ruling-class think tanks ), the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the Aspen Institute, the Atlantic Council, the Rand Corp. and the Hoover Institution, to name a handful. “NewsHour” anchors and guests generally agree that the United States’ officially designated enemies are malevolent bad guys who need to be contained, controlled and even attacked by the ultimate good guy, Uncle Sam.
Not surprisingly, the long and ongoing record of U.S. imperial arrogance and criminality (more on that below) is swept down George Orwell’s memory hole even as new entries are added to the ugly registry. When reported by the “NewsHour,” horrific crimes committed by the U.S. military are always treated as well-intended mistakes. Along with the rest of the mainstream U.S. media, the “NewsHour” “insist[s] that Russia deliberately bombs hospitals, etc., whereas if we do it, it is, of course, an accident .”
There’s some room for disagreement between and among the show’s invited experts—including the show’s semi-loopy foreign policy authority, Margaret Warner—about specific U.S. foreign policy tactics, strategies and actions. There’s no space for serious debate about the immorality, lawlessness or imperial nature of that policy. On the rare occasions “NewsHour” anchors seem to challenge guests from the White House or Pentagon on foreign policy matters, it is generally to ask why the U.S. isn’t going harder at the officially certified bad guys.
America as Umpire, Not Empire
The foreign policy coverage and commentary doesn’t get much better in the documentary division of PBS. A recent documentary (first aired nationally last week) shown by PBS bears the risible title “American Umpire”—an obvious World Series season play on what the filmmakers see as the preposterous notion of an American empire. It is narrated by ex-Marine and former “NewsHour” host and producer Jim Lehrer. Developed by the right-wing Hoover Institution and “targeted for PBS” (the organization’s own revealing phrase), “American Umpire” takes the doctrinal “American exceptionalist,” U.S.-good-and-civilized-rest-of-world-dangerous-and-bad narrative to absurd lengths.
It provides extensive “expert” commentary from such former imperial operatives as Madeline Albright (the onetime U.S. secretary of state who led the charge to criminally bomb Serbia and who went on CBS’ “60 Minutes” to say that the death of more than half a million Iraqi children killed by Washington-led “economic sanctions” was “a price worth paying” for the advance of U.S. foreign policy goals), Condoleezza Rice (George W. Bush’s neoconservative national security adviser before and during the arch-criminal U.S. invasion of Iraq), Gen. Jim “Mad Dog” Mattis (an Iraq invasion commander and a former chief of the U.S. Central Command, who two years ago told a San Diego audience that “it’s fun to shoot people”), George Schultz (the Reagan-era secretary of state who called the Sandinista government in Nicaragua “a cancer in our own land mass” that must be “cut out”) and Karl Eikenberry (a retired Army lieutenant general who commanded U.S. forces in Afghanistan 10 years ago).
With further commentary from a handful of mostly conservative academicians—above all the nationalist Texas A&M historian Elizabeth Cobbs ( author of a book on which the documentary is based), “American Umpire” portrays 20th and 21st century U.S. foreign policy as nothing more than a noble effort to selflessly provide welcome and fair rules and discipline on the rest of a childish, dangerous and reckless planet (think “Lord of the Flies”) that lacks the exceptional historical experience bequeathed to U.S. leaders by the nation’s far-seeing Founding Fathers. The only substantive criticism of U.S. foreign policy in “American Umpire” is the complaint, voiced by numerous interview subjects, that America harms itself to the benefit of others (the Europeans above all) by taking upon its shoulders too much of the burden of benevolently policing the planet. We are just too good for our own good.
Our Real Task
There is not space here to discuss in responsible detail the epic historical deletions and distortions this narrative imposes. The omissions are staggering. They range from the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Filipinos resisting U.S. imperial invasion and occupation at the last century’s outset to the restoration of de facto slavery in Haiti and the Dominican Republic after World War I; the unnecessary atom bombing of Hiroshima and, even worse, of Nagasaki (really the first shots of the Cold War ); the toppling of more than 50 governments by U.S. coups and invasions since the end of World War II; the liquidation of perhaps as many as 5 million Southeast Asians in the so-called Vietnam War between 1962 and 1975; the Cold War-era sponsorship of Third World fascism from Chile to South Africa and Indonesia; the attempted assassinations of Fidel Castro and numerous CIA-directed terror bombings in socialist Cuba; the near instigation of global thermonuclear war on at least three occasions; the development and sponsorship of Osama bin Laden and other radically arch-reactionary, jihadist Muslim, paramilitary forces to fight the Cold War against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan; the “Highway of Death,” when U.S. warplanes engaged in an aerial traffic jam as they rushed to slaughter tens of thousands of surrendered Iraqi troops retreating from Iraq in 1991; the coordination and sponsorship of a mass-murderous civil war on peasants, workers and intellectuals (with a death toll well into the many hundreds of thousands) in Central America during the 1970s and 1980s; the disastrous U.S. invasion of Iraq (responsible for at least 1 million Iraqi deaths); the calamitous U.S. toppling of the Libyan Gadhafi regime; the calamitous destabilization of the Syrian regime; the U.S. funding and encouragement of civil war in central Africa; the enablement and protection of a vicious right-wing coup in Honduras in the spring and summer of 2009; the criminal U.S. global war of terror, replete with rampant “targeted assassinations,” torture, illegal renditions, endless drone war and special-forces killing operations across the Muslim world and other places as well.
“American Umpire” hides these horrific transgressions and the imperial calculations behind much of U.S. foreign policy past and present. As numerous key U.S. planning documents reveal over and over, the goal of that policy was to maintain and, if necessary, install governments that “favor[ed] private investment of domestic and foreign capital, production for export, and the right to bring profits out of the country.” Given the United States’ remarkable possession of half the world’s capital after World War II, Washington elites had no doubt that U.S. investors and corporations would profit the most. Internally, the basic, selfish, national and imperial objectives were openly and candidly discussed. As the “liberal” and “dovish” imperialist, top State Department planner and key Cold War architect George F. Kennan explained in Policy Planning Study 23, a critical 1948 document: “We have about 50% of the world’s wealth, but only 6.3% of its population. … In this situation, we cannot fail to be the object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of disparity. … To do so, we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and day-dreaming. ... The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better.”
The necessity of dispensing with “human rights” and other “sentimental” and “unreal objectives” was especially pressing in the “global south.” Washington assigned the vast periphery of the world economic (capitalist) system—Africa, Latin America, Southeast Asia and the energy-rich and thus strategically hypersignificant Middle East—a less than flattering role. It was to “fulfill its major function as a source of raw materials and a market” ( actual State Department language ) for the great industrial (capitalist) nations (excluding “socialist” Russia and its satellites). It was to be exploited both for the benefit of U.S. corporations/investors and for the reconstruction of Europe and Japan as prosperous U.S. trading and investment partners organized on properly capitalist principles that were hostile to the Soviet bloc.
“Democracy” was fine as a slogan and benevolent, idealistic-sounding mission statement when it came to marketing this core, underlying, ultra-imperialist U.S. policy at home and abroad. Because most people in the “Third World” had no interest in neocolonial subordination and subscribed to what U.S. intelligence officials considered the heretical “idea that government has direct responsibility for the welfare of its people” (what post-World War II U.S. planners called “communism”), Washington’s real-life commitment to popular governance abroad was strictly qualified, to say the least. “Democracy” was suitable to the U.S. as long as its outcomes comported with the interests of U.S. investors/corporations and related U.S. geopolitical objectives. It had to be abandoned, undermined and/or crushed when it threatened those investors/corporations and the broader imperatives of business rule to any significant degree. As President Richard Nixon’s coldblooded National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger explained in June 1970, three years before the U.S. sponsored a fascist coup that overthrew Chile’s democratically elected leftist President Salvador Allende, “I don’t see why we need to stand by and watch a country go Communist because of the irresponsibility of its own people.”
The selfish imperial cynicism of U.S. foreign policy continues to this day, into the post-Cold War and post-9/11 era. As leading Dutch political scientists Bastiaann van Apeldoorn and Nana de Graaff write in their important new volume , “American Grand Strategy and Corporate Elite Networks: The Open Door Since the End of the Cold War,” “From the end of the 19th nineteenth century onward, American grand strategy has pursued a liberal expansionism aimed at the creation of a global hegemony premised upon open, “free” markets, to which global capital—and, above all, U.S. transnational capital—has full access. … The global Open Door has continued to define the ends of the American grand strategy throughout the post-Cold War era.” Because—as during and before—the Cold War’s end, Washington’s commitment to “democracy” and “human rights” is conditional and hypocritical: The noble principles are fine insofar as they serve the free-market hegemony of global and especially U.S. transnational capital. They are dispensed with, even as U.S. policymakers trumpet them, when they do not. | 1real |
Four killed in Canada helicopter crash | (Reuters) - Four people were killed on Thursday when a helicopter belonging to utility Hydro One crashed in central Ontario, the company said in a statement. Hydro One did not provide details on its four employees who were killed in the crash, saying names would not be released until next of kin had been notified. The company, which is based in Ontario, said emergency services were on site in the Tweed area of rural central Ontario, some 250 kilometers (155 miles) from Toronto. It said it had notified the appropriate oversight groups. The Ontario Provincial Police said in a statement that officers responded to the crash shortly after 12:30 pm ET (1730 GMT), and were joined by emergency response services, including a forensic identification unit. Police said Canada s Transportation Safety Board would investigate. A woman named Kim Clayton tweeted that Hydro One staff had been working on power lines on her property before the crash. On Wednesday a small airplane carrying 22 passengers and three crew members crashed after taking off in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. | 0fake |
[Video] DUMB AND DUMBER Star BASHES TRUMP…Use Worst Examples Of Female Leaders To PROMOTE Hillary | Jeff Daniels channels his role as ACN s Will McAvoy from HBO s The Newsroom to respond to question about Trump vs Hillary. The only problem with Daniels answer is, he s using two embarrassingly incompetent female leaders in current times to support his belief that America is ready for a woman (Hillary) President.In the video, actor Jeff Daniels mentions German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Germany has lost their patience with open borders Merkel, as she continues to put citizens of Germany at risk by allowing over 1 million mostly male, Muslim refugees to flood the nation of Germany. A poll published on Tuesday shows that just under two-thirds of Germans do not want Merkel to run for office again in elections next year. He also references Brazil s female President Dilma Rousseff as a success story that America should look at when considering electing a female President. Here s the latest breaking story on Brazil s female President: Brazil s once-lauded model of leftist government appeared to come to an abrupt end Thursday, when lawmakers suspended President Dilma Rousseff in an extraordinary repudiation of her administration and the Workers Party that has ruled the country for 13 years.Vice President Michel Temer quickly assumed control of Latin America s largest country, signaling that he will take Brazil in a more free-market-friendly direction in an attempt to shore up its sagging economy and win over a skeptical public. A member of the centrist PMDB party, Temer introduced a conservative-leaning, all-male cabinet Thursday that swings Brazil toward the right.Hey Jeff, thanks for proving to your fans that you re really not acting in your Dumb and Dumber movies:For anyone who thinks Jeff Daniels is just acting in the video above, watch Daniels share his views on our Second Amendment with over-the-top gun-control advocate Piers Morgan here: | 1real |
BARACK OBAMA’S NSA Susan Rice Ordered Spies To Provide “Detailed Spreadsheets” Of Trump Calls…”That’s A Felony”…Brother Of CBS News President Also Involved [VIDEO] | While Obama hangs out in Tahiti, his NSA director Susan Rice and her deputy director Ben Rhodes, brother of David Rhodes CBS News president, appear to be two of the key figures behind the surveillance of Donald Trump s campaign. What was Hillary s role in this massive scandal? Why is the media not questioning her? Does anyone really believe she had nothing to do with this? Meanwhile, not surprisingly at CBS News you can find the latest headline:The CBS News headline is followed up by two paragraphs citing the Washington Post (one of the news publications who sat on the Susan Rice spying story). The story is clearly a distraction from the real news, which is that Susan Rice and the CBS News president s bother were behind the surveillance of Trump s campaign. Apparently, CBS News thinks that an alleged secret meeting between a DONOR of President Trump and a Russian close to Putin with an agenda that remains unclear is somehow supposed to be relevant or important to the American people in the midst of a spying case that makes President Nixon look like an amateur:WASHINGTON The United Arab Emirates arranged a secret meeting in January between an American businessman supporting then President-elect Trump and a Russian close to President Vladimir Putin as part of an apparent effort to establish a back-channel line of communication between Moscow and the incoming president, The Washington Post reports.Citing U.S., European and Arab officials, the Post said the UAE agreed to broker the meeting in part to explore whether Russia could be persuaded to curtail its relationship with Iran, including in Syria, a Trump administration objective that would be likely to require major concessions to Moscow on U.S. sanctions. The full agenda remains unclear, the newspaper said.Daily Caller Former President Barack Obama s national security adviser Susan Rice ordered U.S. spy agencies to produce detailed spreadsheets of legal phone calls involving Donald Trump and his aides when he was running for president, according to former U.S. Attorney Joseph diGenova. What was produced by the intelligence community at the request of Ms. Rice were detailed spreadsheets of intercepted phone calls with unmasked Trump associates in perfectly legal conversations with individuals, diGenova told The Daily Caller News Foundation Investigative Group Monday. The overheard conversations involved no illegal activity by anybody of the Trump associates, or anyone they were speaking with, diGenova said. In short, the only apparent illegal activity was the unmasking of the people in the calls. Also on Monday, Fox News and Bloomberg News, citing multiple sources reported that Rice had requested the intelligence information that was produced in a highly organized operation. Fox said the unmasked names of Trump aides were given to officials at the National Security Council (NSC), the Department of Defense, James Clapper, President Obama s Director of National Intelligence, and John Brennan, Obama s CIA Director.Joining Rice in the alleged White House operations was her deputy Ben Rhodes, according to Fox.Critics of the atmosphere prevailing throughout the Obama administration s last year in office point to former Obama Deputy Defense Secretary Evelyn Farkas who admitted in a March 2 television interview on MSNBC that she was urging my former colleagues, to get as much information as you can, get as much intelligence as you can, before President Obama leaves the administration. Farkas sought to walk back her comments in the weeks following: I didn t give anybody anything except advice. Col. (Ret.) James Waurishuk, an NSC veteran and former deputy director for intelligence at the U.S. Central Command, told TheDCNF that many hands had to be involved throughout the Obama administration to launch such a political spying program. The lawyers and counsel at the NSA surely would be talking to the lawyers and members of counsel at CIA, or at the National Security Council or at the Director of National Intelligence or at the FBI, he said. It s unbelievable of the level and degree of the administration to look for information on Donald Trump and his associates, his campaign team and his transition team. This is really, really serious stuff. Michael Doran, former NSC senior director, told TheDCNF Monday that somebody blew a hole in the wall between national security secrets and partisan politics. This was a stream of information that was supposed to be hermetically sealed from politics and the Obama administration found a way to blow a hole in that wall. That s a felony, he told TheDCNF. And you can get 10 years for that. It is a tremendous abuse of the system. We re not supposed to be monitoring American citizens. Bigger than the crime, is the breach of public trust. We re looking at a potential constitutional crisis from the standpoint that we used an extremely strong capability that s supposed to be used to safeguard and protect the country, he said. And we used it for political purposes by a sitting President. That takes on a new precedent. For entire story: Daily Caller | 1real |
Roberta Peters, Soprano With a Dramatic Entrance, Dies at 86 - The New York Times | Roberta Peters, the coloratura soprano who at 20 was catapulted to stardom by a phone call, a subway ride and a Metropolitan Opera debut — her first public performance anywhere — all in the space of five hours, died on Wednesday at her home in Rye, N. Y. She was 86. The cause was Parkinson’s disease, her son Bruce Fields said. Ms. Peters, who would sing with the Met 515 times over 35 vigorous years, was internationally renowned for her high, silvery voice (in private, she could hit a high A, two and a half octaves above middle C) her clarion diction in a flurry of languages her attractive stage presence and, by virtue of the fact that she and television came to prominence at about the same time, her wide popular appeal. “As a coloratura,” Cue magazine wrote of Ms. Peters in 1960, “she has no peer. ” In addition to the Met, with which she appeared regularly from 1950 to 1985 — one of the longest associations of any singer with a major opera company — Ms. Peters was heard at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, Cincinnati Opera, the Vienna State Opera, Covent Garden and elsewhere. Her roles include the Queen of the Night in Mozart’s “The Magic Flute,” Rosina in Rossini’s “The Barber of Seville,” Gilda in Verdi’s “Rigoletto” and Oscar (a pageboy played by a soprano) in his “Un Ballo in Maschera. ” But her most significant role was undoubtedly Zerlina in Mozart’s “Don Giovanni. ” Enlisted to sing that part in 1950 as a substitute, Ms. Peters was propelled, with no rehearsal, onto the Met stage and into a stellar career. Known for taking meticulous care of her voice, she continued to sing in recital until well into her 70s, a good two decades past the de facto retirement age in her line of work. At midcentury, when it was more customary to encounter opera stars on television than it is today, she was seen on a string of shows, including “The Voice of Firestone,” “The Mike Douglas Show” and in particular “The Ed Sullivan Show,” on which she appeared scores of times in the 1950s and ’60s. Later in her career, she performed in operetta and musical theater. One thing that allowed Ms. Peters to sing so long was a prudent awareness of what her voice could and could not do. Possessed of a light, fleet instrument, she confined herself to coloratura and soubrette roles, steering clear of heavier fare. Critics sometimes faulted Ms. Peters’s singing for a certain lack of intensity, but her flageolet tones made an airy counterweight to the vocal heft of Maria Callas and Joan Sutherland, whose style was becoming the norm for sopranos at midcentury. “I would love to sing Tosca,” Ms. Peters told The Los Angeles Times in 1986. “And Salome. Those are my dream roles. But I won’t do them, at least not in this life. They would kill me, vocally. ” Another thing that kept Ms. Peters singing was her impeccable technique: From the age of 13, she had trained for an operatic career as an athlete trains for the Olympics. For years, her weekly regimen included not only voice and foreign language lessons but also instruction in ballet, acting and fencing, as well as a strength and conditioning program under the direct supervision of Joseph Pilates, the originator of the Pilates exercise method. Although Ms. Peters’s voice teacher, William Herman, did not want her to sing in public until she was thoroughly groomed, he insisted that she make a deep study of the operatic literature. By the time she was 19 and auditioned for the Met, she knew the scores of 20 operas cold. Providentially, as things fell out, “Don Giovanni” was one of them. Roberta Peterman, an only child, was born on May 4, 1930, and grew up near Jerome Avenue and 170th Street in the Bronx. Her father, Solomon, was a shoe salesman her mother, the former Ruth Hirsch, a milliner. As a girl, Roberta, in the words of her family, had “a real voice on her. ” When she was 13, her grandfather, the maître d’hotel at Grossinger’s, the redoubt of Jewish life in the Catskills, asked the celebrated tenor Jan Peerce (né Jacob Pincus Perelmuth) who was singing there, to hear her. Impressed, Mr. Peerce arranged for Roberta to study with Mr. Herman, whose students included the Metropolitan Opera coloratura Patrice Munsel, who died last year. Leaving school permanently after she completed junior high, Roberta took six lessons a week from Mr. Herman on a scholarship. He also arranged for supplementary instruction in French, Italian, German, dance and drama. Mr. Pilates, meanwhile, did his part by standing regularly on Roberta’s abdomen (he weighed 174 pounds, she 119) to help her develop the musculature essential for breath control. All this proved so effective that at 16, Roberta was offered a $ role in “Street Scene,” a musical with music by Kurt Weill and lyrics by Langston Hughes that would open on Broadway in 1947. Though the salary would have been welcome in a family of modest means, Roberta, with the support of her parents, turned it down: She had set her sights on opera and would not be deterred. In late 1949, Ms. Peters (she had shortened her surname at her teacher’s suggestion) was taken on by Sol Hurok, the impresario. He soon arranged an audition with the Met’s new general manager, Rudolf Bing. On Jan. 23, 1950, the Ms. Peters stood on the stage of the old Metropolitan Opera House on Broadway and 39th Street in Manhattan. There, in the darkened hall, she sang “Der Hölle Rache” (“Hell’s Vengeance”) the Queen of the Night’s aria from “The Magic Flute,” which, with its fiendish series of high F’s, is among the canonical texts of the coloratura repertory. Somewhere out in the darkness was Mr. Bing. “It was the first audition I had done for anyone, and I was so scared,” Ms. Peters told The Chicago Tribune in 1993. “When it was over he asked if I would sing it again. Then he asked me to do it again. Well, I sang it four times, not knowing that he had silently brought in conductors Fritz Reiner, Fausto Cleva and Fritz Stiedry to hear me. ” Signed to a Met contract, Ms. Peters was scheduled to make her debut with the company as the Queen of the Night in January 1951. But on Nov. 17, the soprano Nadine Conner, scheduled to sing Zerlina in a Met “Don Giovanni” that night, fell ill. At 3 p. m. Mr. Bing telephoned Ms. Peters and told her to report to the opera house in time for an 8 o’clock curtain. Ms. Peters, who had planned to watch the performance with her mother from the section that night, informed her parents that they now had box seats. The family, then living at Broadway and 71st Street, rushed to the street and hailed a taxi. When the cab became stuck in traffic, they jumped out and took the subway. At the opera house, there was no time for real rehearsal: Ms. Peters’s only preparation to play Zerlina, the country girl who catches Don Giovanni’s roving eye, took the form of hurried consultations with the stage director, Herbert Graf, and the conductor, Mr. Reiner. She was hustled into a costume the other singers would help her hit her marks onstage by gently propelling her wherever she needed to be. “Are you nervous?” the baritone Paul Schöffler, that night’s Don Giovanni, asked her before the curtain. “No, numb,” Ms. Peters replied, and on she went. “The delightful surprise of last night’s performance of ‘Don Giovanni’ at the Metropolitan was the emergency debut of little Roberta Peters in the part of Zerlina,” The New York ’s review the next day said. “The voice came through the big house as clear as a bell, the notes equally bright and focused and the phrasing that of a true musician. And the girl — she is all of 5 feet 2 — turned in a very smooth job of acting, too. ” From then on, Ms. Peters was in great demand, both at the Met, where she sang her planned Queen of the Night on Jan. 12, 1951, and around the world. As if her debut had foreordained as much, she developed something of a specialty as an substitute for indisposed singers. Ms. Peters was by all accounts one of opera’s least divalike divas. She was exceptionally game — not hesitating, for instance, to don a chicken suit for an episode of “Captain Kangaroo” in 1975. (One is to picture Maria Callas in similar confines.) She appeared in several memorable TV commercials. In one, for Chock Full o’Nuts, Ms. Peters sang the company’s signature jingle in mellifluous Italian. In another, for American Express — part of its “Do you know me?” campaign — she hailed a cab by singing out “ !” in a descending major third, from G to E flat. She had dramatic roles in several movies, including “Tonight We Sing” (1953) based on Mr. Hurok’s life, and on TV shows including “Medical Center,” on which, in 1975, she played a dying singer. The closest thing to drama in Ms. Peters’s personal life was her very brief marriage to the great baritone Robert Merrill, whom she wed on March 30, 1952, and from whom she was divorced on June 26, 1952. (Ms. Peters later said that she had fallen in love with the voice rather than the man.) But they remained friends, and sometime partners, ever after. Ms. Peters’s second husband, Bertram Fields, a hotelier and investor whom she married in 1955, died in 2010. In addition to her son Bruce, she is survived by another son, Paul, and four grandchildren. Her many recordings include works by Mozart, Rossini, Verdi, Cole Porter and Gilbert and Sullivan. For all the acclaim that cloaked Ms. Peters, and for all the laurels heaped upon her — including a National Medal of Arts in 1998 — perhaps nothing could match the electricity of that November night, when a from the Bronx stepped onto the Met stage an unknown and came back as Roberta Peters. An ovation followed, and flowers along with it. Afterward, Ms. Peters took a taxi all the way home. | 0fake |
Five migrants wounded as shots fired in Calais brawl | LILLE, France (Reuters) - Five migrants were wounded on Saturday when shots were fired during a brawl in the northern French port of Calais, the local prefect s office said. Gunshots were exchanged between groups of Afghans in the late afternoon, it said. A police source said the incident occurred during what was probably a dispute between migrant smugglers. The shots were fired near the local Secours Catholique charity on the outskirts of Calais. Three migrants were being treated in a Calais hospital and a fourth, who was more seriously wounded, had been transferred to a hospital in Lille. A fifth was treated at the scene. Calais is a magnet for migrants aiming to reach Britain, a short distance across the Channel. Last year, authorities cleared the makeshift Jungle camp in Calais, but people hoping to get into Britain by crossing the Channel in trains or ferries are steadily returning. Authorities estimate at 500 and associations at 700 the number of migrants from Ethiopia, Eritrea and Afghanistan still in Calais. | 0fake |
Graft probe into Mexico president's ally poses tricky challenge ahead of elections | MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - With a tight general election looming next year, Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto faces a tough choice on whether to pursue a graft probe involving a prominent ally and Brazilian construction firm Odebrecht. Mexico s top prosecutor, acting Attorney General, Alberto Elias Beltran, on Friday fired the federal attorney general responsible for electoral crimes, adding fuel to a case that may complicate the president s efforts to shake off allegations of corruption in the run-up to the July 2018 presidential vote. The dismissal of top electoral prosecutor, Santiago Nieto, came two days after he accused Emilio Lozoya, the former boss of state oil firm Pemex, and a longtime ally of President Pena Nieto, in a newspaper interview of writing to him to ask to be declared innocent of funneling Odebrecht cash to political campaigns. In Brazil, Odebrecht has admitted to paying bribes in several countries in Latin America, including Mexico. President Pena Nieto s party, the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), has been the dominant force of Mexican politics for the best part of a century, but has long been a byword for corruption. Mindful that the issue of corruption has become central to the 2018 election, the unpopular PRI has overseen the arrest of various former state governors, but Lozoya poses a more difficult challenge, given his proximity to the president. If they investigate (Lozoya) deeply, I think it would be the end of the party in power. If they don t, they stir up more public anger, said Paulo Diez, an anti-corruption lawyer who has taken on the government in high-profile graft scandals. Four days after becoming acting Attorney General, Alberto Elias Beltran dismissed Santiago Nieto on the grounds he had broken the office s code of conduct for public officials, his office said on Friday. The dismissal was attacked by the conservative National Action Party (PAN) and the leftist Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), opposition parties which questioned the impartiality of Pena Nieto s government. Santiago Nieto told newspaper Reforma on Wednesday that Lozoya s letter was a bid to secure impunity and that Odebrecht money had entered political campaigns. Nieto s office confirmed the letter s existence, as well as the investigation into the former Pemex chief executive, when contacted by Reuters. Lozoya said in a press conference that he is innocent of all accusations and that he did not funnel cash to President Pena Nieto s campaign. President Pena Nieto has also previously denied Odebrecht bribes made their way into his party s coffers. Lozoya s lawyer, Javier Coello, denied his client had written seeking leniency interviews. Coello also shared with Reuters a letter sent to Santiago Nieto, in which Lozoya asked to be informed of any criminal investigation into him, and to be called to testify if needed. That letter did not mention any appeals for clemency. Odebrecht has admitted to U.S. and Brazilian prosecutors that it paid $10.5 million in bribes in Mexico. Details of the payments have not been made public, though in August, Brazilian and Mexican media reported that Lozoya had asked Odebrecht executives for bribes in 2012 in return for contracts, citing testimony from Odebrecht employees. On Monday this week, Attorney General Raul Cervantes stood down, telling Senators his office had concluded investigations into Odebrecht. However, the details have yet to be published. | 0fake |
العراق يمنع الكحول | العراق يمنع الكحول شبكة فولتير | 26 تشرين الأول (أكتوبر) 2016 français Español italiano Deutsch أقر البرلمان العراقي بجلسة مغلقة في 22 أكتوبر 2016، تعديلا على قانون البلديات، يقضي بحظر بيع واستيراد وإنتاج الكحول
اعتمد هذا الحظر لارضاء الإسلاميين عشية إطلاق تحرير الموصل المحتلة من قبل داعش .وينص القانون على غرامات من 8 إلى 20 ألف دولار لكل مخالف
بانظر إلى أن هذا القانون تمييزي بحق المسيحيين الذين يستخدمون النبيذ في إحياء القداس، فقد قرروا رفع دعوى ضد نص القانون أمام محكمة فدرالية
ترجمة
سعيد هلال الشريفي | 1real |
Public vs. Media on War | (128 fans) - Advertisement -
A new poll from an unlikely source suggests that the U.S. public and the U.S. media have very little in common when it comes to matters of war and peace.
This poll was commissioned by that notorious leftwing hotbed of peaceniks, the Charles Koch Institute, along with the Center for the National Interest (previously the Nixon Center, and before that the humorously named Nixon Center for Peace and Freedom). The poll was conducted by Survey Sampling International.
They polled 1,000 registered voters from across the U.S. and across the political spectrum but slanted slightly toward older age groups. They asked:
"Over the last 15 years, do you think U.S. foreign policy has made Americans more or less safe?"
What, dear reader, do you say?
If you say less safe, you not only agree with dozens of top U.S. officials the week after they retire, but you agree with 52.5% of the people polled. Those who said "more safe" add up to 14%, while 25.2% said "about the same" and 8.3% just didn't know.
Well, at least all these humanitarian wars to spread democracy and eliminate weapons and destroy terror have benefited the rest of the world, right?
Not according to the statistics that show terrorism on the rise during the war on terrorism, and not according to 50.5% of poll respondents who said U.S. foreign policy has made the world less safe. Meanwhile 12.6% said "more safe" while 24.1% said it was about the same and 12.8% didn't know. - Advertisement -
Asked about four wars in particular, registered U.S. voters said each of them had made the U.S. less secure, by a margin of 49.6% to 20.9% on Iraq, 42.2% to 18.9% on Libya, 42.2% to 24.3% on Afghanistan, and 40.8% to 32.1% on bombing ISIS in Syria.
These answers should not immediately be taken to prove that the U.S. public is universally wise and well informed, and (not coincidentally) at odds with U.S. media. Not only is that margin pretty slim on ISIS, but 43.3% of those polled said ISIS was the greatest threat the United States faces. Meanwhile 14.1% named Russia, 8.5% North Korea, 8.1% the national debt, 7.9% domestic terrorists, and bringing up the rear with the correct answer of global warming as the greatest threat were a grand total of 4.6% of those polled.
A survey of U.S. news reports would certainly suggest a point of agreement here between the public and the media. But here is where it gets interesting. Although the public believes the hype about danger emanating from these foreign forces, it does not favor the solution it is endlessly offered by the media and the U.S. government. When asked if, compared to last 15 years, the next president should use the U.S. military abroad less, 51.1% agreed, while 24.2% said it should be used more. And 80.0% said that any president should be required to get congressional authorization before committing the U.S. to military action, while 10.2% rejected that radical idea that's been in the U.S. Constitution since day 1.
The U.S. public may look quite depressingly ignorant in a quick survey of Youtube videos, but check this out: Asked if the U.S. government should deploy U.S. troops on the ground in Syria 51.1% said no, compared to 23.5% who said yes. Only 10% said yes on Yemen, while 22.8% said no -- however, 40.7% said the U.S. government should keep "supporting" Saudi Arabia in that war.
Good majorities also oppose Japan acquiring nuclear weapons, Germany acquiring nuclear weapons, or the U.S. defending Taiwan against a Chinese attack. (Who invents these scenarios?) - Advertisement -
This moderately encouraging survey of public sentiment stands in stark contrast to U.S. media coverage of wars in general and Syria in particular . The New York Times' Nicholas Kristof is ready for a bigger war as are columnists in the Washington Post and USA Today , as well as, of course Chuck Todd and other televised talking head. Meanwhile Hillary Clinton's comment to Goldman Sachs that a "no fly zone" would require "killing a lot of Syrians" has received dramatically less press than her brave calls for creating a humanitarian no fly zone, and the steady depiction of that proposal as "doing something" -- in contrast to the only other option: "doing nothing."
The public, however, rejects the only "something" that's on offer and just might leap at the opportunity to try something else, if anyone ever proposed anything else . View Ratings | Rate It http://davidswanson.org David Swanson is the author of "When the World Outlawed War," "War Is A Lie" and "Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union." He blogs at http://davidswanson.org and http://warisacrime.org and works for the online ( more... ) | 1real |
Cubs’ Jake Arrieta on Nats-Giants Brawl: ‘I Thought it was Awesome’ | Not everyone thought that the brawl between the Nationals and the Giants, headlined by outfielder Bryce Harper and reliever Hunter Strickland, was necessarily a great look for major league baseball. [But, don’t count Cubs pitcher Jake Arrieta among them. While appearing on the Bernstein and Goff Show on 670 The Score in Chicago on Tuesday, Arrieta said he felt that the brawl was “awesome” and “refreshing”: I don’t think anybody is right or wrong. I thought it was awesome. Every once in a while, it’s refreshing to see two teams emotionally charged getting after it. And when something like that happens versus continuing to chirp and talk about it, why don’t you go out there and see somebody? That’s exactly what happened in the game yesterday. Bryce and Hunter went out there, they were a few punches, they landed one apiece, I believe. And then Samardzija comes out of left field and smashes into Morse. I’m pretty sure Harper was lucky that they collided, because Samardzija was coming in to do some damage. Arrieta elaborated further: If two guys want to go see each other, let them be in the middle, let them throw some punches, then break it up. I don’t like to see any sucker punches. I do think in the heat of battle if you’re getting hit on the hip with 98, then you should be able to go out and see somebody. I think the umpires handled it well. They let them exchange for a moment, then they tried to break it up. What I don’t like to see is a lot of chirping and guys just talking crap to each other. If you got something wrong with a guy, go see him. And then they’ll break it up and continue to play the game. One of the most interesting aspects of the brawl between the Nats and the Giants was the fact that Giants catcher Buster Posey didn’t try to stop, or interfere with Harper as he ran out to fight his pitcher. Arrieta liked how Posey handled the situation and hoped his catchers would do the same: If it’s my catcher, I want him to wait and give me an opportunity to do a little damage. I don’t want it broken up right away. If it happens, I’ll let you know. I’ll be ready. You know, I like my chances toe to toe with just about anybody. I know Willson (Contreras) would probably beat whoever charges the mound to the mound, but I’ll tell him and Miggy (Montero) ‘Hey, give me 10, 15 seconds to get some work in and then come out and see me.’ Hardball Talk’s Bill Baer took exception to Arrieta’s perspective on the fight: Unfortunately, Arrieta is wrong for championing continued violence in baseball. Eventually, someone is going to be seriously hurt or killed because a baseball man had his feelings hurt. It’s not good for the game, especially if a star like Harper is involved and gets injured either by the pitch or by joining the fracas. It’s not good for kids watching, who learn that violence is an acceptable response to a perceived slight. It’s great for sportswriters, though, who get something to talk about for a couple days. So, uh, thanks, I guess. The only thing at risk of being killed during this brawl was the art of proper punch throwing. The art of throwing a helmet also took a hit, given that Bryce Harper stood directly in front of Strickland and yet, somehow, threw his helmet perpendicular to him. As for “the kids,” baseball has embraced violence as an acceptable response to perceived slights for over a hundred years. If baseball hasn’t ruined the youth of America yet, chances are it won’t. Follow Dylan Gwinn on Twitter: @themightygwinn | 0fake |
The Ossetians: From Nomads and Warriors to the Artists of the Caucasus - Anastasia Stepanova | Taming the corporate media beast The Ossetians: From Nomads and Warriors to the Artists of the Caucasus
A people that miraculously survived in the mountains after the Tatar-Mongolian invasions of the Middle Ages, today the Ossetians are renowned for being the creative intelligentsia of the Caucasus and the custodians of an unusual form of Christianity RBTH
For Alik Pagayev, an Ossetian who manages a troupe at the Narty Theater in Vladikavkaz, creativity is in the blood of his people.
”I was born in a mountain village and we had this joke: 'Throw a balalaika out of your window, anyone who catches it can play it,” he says.
Vladikavkaz, the capital of North Ossetia, a small republic on Russia’s southern edge bordering Georgia, is called the “Caucasian St. Petersburg.” No other city in the North Caucasus has so many creative people: artists, photographers, designers and performers.
Creative abilities, however, are not the only national trait of the Ossetians. Pagayev says that every Ossetian has military skills and talents for working with horses in their blood. Creative abilities are not the only national trait of the Ossetians. Alik Pagayev says that every Ossetian has military skills and talents for working with horses in their blood. Source: Anastasia Stepanova
Open-mindedness to new cultures
The Ossetians are descended from Iranian-speaking nomads – the Scythians and the Sarmatians. In historical writings from the 2nd century A.D. these tribes were known for their serious military and political might.
By the 11th century A.D. the medieval kingdom of Alania had been established in the region. Its inhabitants were famous for their military skills: The main army consisted of the cavalry. Despite their glorious reputation, the Alans could not fight off the Tatar-Mongolian invasion and in the 14th century they were practically destroyed as a people. Only few hundred Alans remained in the mountains. However, the nation managed to survive and later it successfully assimilated in Russia.
According to a 2010 census, today there are almost 700,000 Ossetians in the world, most of whom live in Russia. Most Ossetians live in North Ossetia (459,600 people), while in Moscow there are 7,900 Ossetians and in St. Petersburg slightly over 3,000.
While 45,900 Ossetians live in the disputed territory of South Ossetia (recognized by just three nations, with the rest of the world continuing to see it as part of Georgia), they also live in Russia’s other Caucasian republics. In Kabardino-Balkaria there are more than 9,000 Ossetians, in the Stavropol Territory there are almost 8,000 and there is even a separate Ossetian village in Karachay-Cherkessia with 3,100 inhabitants. There are also Ossetian diasporas in other countries. In Turkey the fraternity counts 37,000 members and in Georgia – 14,300 outside South Ossetia.
”The Caucasus started to become a part of Russia in the 18th century. Our republic was one of the first,” explains Anna Kabisova, a photographer and photojournalist. osetia_woman_working.jpg ”The Ossetians are Christians. So it is easier for them, in comparison to the Muslim republics, to find common ground with the Russian population.” Source: Archive photo, 19th century
”The Ossetians perceived these changes as a salvation since it is difficult to survive in the mountains and the intelligentsia understood that it was important to develop. A step towards Russia implied opportunity. Back then many Ossetians went to study in St. Petersburg. That is how this place acquired many artists, sculptors and then its own influential art school, its own distinguishing style,” she said.
In her view, such open-mindedness to new cultures is also a national trait. ”The reason lies in religion. The Ossetians are Christians. So it is easier for them, in comparison to the Muslim republics, to find common ground with the Russian population.”
Pies, beer and offerings to the gods
Actually, the Christianity found in the republic is not entirely traditional. Pagan beliefs are also strong here. The Ossetians have dozens of popular religious celebrations with various rituals. There are symbolic peace sacrifices, for example, slaughtering a chicken or a sheep for guests at a feast.
The famous Ossetian national pies are sacred food. These round, thin pies with meat, cheese and potatoes in the Ossetian worldview represent the sun. During a holiday each family places three pies on the table. They also have local breweries. anna_kabisova_b.jpg ”The Caucasus started to become a part of Russia in the 18th century. Our republic was one of the first,” explains Anna Kabisova, a photographer and photojournalist. Anna Kabisova
For many occasions women brew beer according to the national recipe. The Ossetians have their own Oktoberfest. Each October Vladikavkaz holds an Ossetian beer festival/competition, to which Ossetians come from Russia and other countries. The drink, in its aspect and taste, is similar tokvas, the Russian malt drink, and is around 1.5-2 percent alcohol.
The beer is brewed in a large cauldron over a fire. Its main ingredients are the typical ones: hops, malt. But there are also special ones such as lamb ribs and sugar – there are many different recipes.
Not merchants
”Ask me what I hate doing most and I'll respond: trading,” says Alik Pagayev, describing the national character. "The Ossetians don't have an entrepreneurial spirit. We have many talented artists, good athletes, especially in freestyle wrestling, horse breeders, but commerce is really not our thing.” ”Ask me what I hate doing most and I'll respond: trading,” says Alik Pagayev, describing the national character. Source: Archive photo, 19th century
Pagayev also says that tolerance and tact are two other national traits.
”I worked in [the neighboring republic of] Kabardino-Balkaria for three years and could not get used to the fact that they speak their national language. I would go to someone's house and they would speak their own language. I wouldn't understand anything and someone would have to translate the general meaning of the conversation.
”In Ossetia it's not like that. If there’s even one guest among us, we speak Russian. A friend of mine from Chechnya would often visit us and once he heard people speaking Ossetian on a street in Vladikavkaz. He was surprised because he had thought that we always speak Russian.” vladikavkaz_lori- 39468-a6_b.jpg Vladikavkaz, the capital of North Ossetia, a small republic on Russia’s southern edge bordering Georgia, is called the “Caucasian St. Petersburg.” Source: Lori/Legion-Media
In fact, Pagayev explains, there are some young people who do not even know their national language, which he says is sad.
”Our language must be preserved. At home my children speak only Ossetian. If I hear them speak Russian, I tell them, 'You'll speak Russian where you have to, but at home speak your native language,'” he says.
Another important national trait is learning, he explains: ”People always wonder: A young guy from a remote mountain village goes to study in St. Petersburg or Moscow and in two years he fully integrates, speaks Russian without an accent and produces good results in his studies. This is an important trait. I think this is what helped our people survive the difficult times.” | 1real |
Clinton says U.S. presidential election an 'alternative reality' | LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Democrat Hillary Clinton said on a late-night television show on Monday that sometimes she feels she is in an “alternative universe” in the U.S. presidential race against Republican Donald Trump. “I do feel sometimes like this campaign has entered into an alternative universe,” Clinton said on ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live. “I have to step into the alternative reality, answer questions about am I alive, how much longer will I be alive.” Clinton was for the first time responding to allegations made by Trump and some of his backers that she is suffering health problems that could be problematic in the White House should she win the Nov. 8 election. Both Clinton and Trump have released notes from doctors declaring them physically fit for the presidency. Kimmel asked Clinton to open a jar of pickles as a test of her strength. She did so successfully. “This has become one of their themes. Take my pulse while I’m talking to you – make sure I’m alive,” Clinton said to Kimmel of the health rumors. Clinton said that sometimes Trump’s remarks about her – such as a recent charge that President Barack Obama and Clinton co-founded the Islamic State, which he later said was sarcasm – go beyond personal attacks and become harmful to U.S. national security. “There’s enough evidence now that when Trump talks the way he talks it actually helps the terrorists,” Clinton said. “I think it’s crazy, but I think it’s also harmful.” Clinton said she had begun preparing for the three presidential debates scheduled in September and October. “I want to take it seriously,” Clinton said. “But you’ve got to be prepared for, like wacky stuff that comes at you and I am drawing on my experience in elementary school.” Clinton brushed off the possible release of an additional 14,900 emails that the FBI found when investigating her use of a private email server as secretary of state. “My emails are so boring,” Clinton said. “What’s a few more?” The U.S. State Department has already reviewed some 30,068 emails from her 2009-2013 tenure and released most of them, amounting to some 55,000 pages. | 0fake |
HILLARY JUST FOUND A FRIEND AT THE DEBATE…You know what they say about flies #HillaryClintonFly | TWITTER IS ABUZZ OVER THE FLY THAT LANDED ON HILLARY S FACE:This is so strange Obama and Hillary both have had a fly land on them like this. It s just very odd and very telling the fly looks for garbage HummmHaHa!!! Someone has already made a Twitter page named: Hillary Clinton Fly | 1real |
Trump Has Made His Supreme Court Nomination. What Happens Next? - The New York Times | President Trump on Tuesday night named Judge Neil M. Gorsuch, a federal appeals court judge in Denver, to replace Justice Antonin Scalia on the United States Supreme Court. But there’s a long way to go before the new nominee is confirmed. Judge Gorsuch will immediately face a public and private gantlet of scrutiny, and could end up at the center of fevered political maneuvering. Just 51 votes are needed to confirm him, but one big question looms: Will the Senate Democrats filibuster the nomination? That would require 60 votes to overcome. Expect the task to drag on for months: Elena Kagan was confirmed 87 days after she was nominated, in 2010 Sonia Sotomayor’s confirmation in 2009 took 66 days, and Samuel Alito Jr. was confirmed 82 days after his nod, in 2006. Events would have to unfold very smoothly for the nominee to be confirmed by April 26, the date of the last scheduled arguments in the current court term, which typically ends in late June. The next term begins in October. Here’s what to expect in the nomination process. The nominee must fill out an elaborate questionnaire, which the Senate will examine. He will be asked to list every client he has ever represented, sources of income, speaking fees, travel destinations, media interviews, writings — everything short of where he went to summer camp. The questionnaire often runs hundreds of pages long. The F. B. I. will immediately begin a background check, and the staff members of senators on the Judiciary Committee will start their own investigations. As others pore over documents, the nominee will be calling and meeting with as many senators as possible. The meetings typically take 15 minutes to an hour, said Stephen Wermiel, a constitutional law professor at American University. The senators are typically looking to learn about how the nominee thinks and what makes the tick, while the nominee is trying to learn what concerns the senators might have, Mr. Wermiel said. There will most likely be political jostling over how the confirmation hearing is conducted. Democrats and Republicans will haggle over issues such as when it will occur, how many rounds of questioning will unfold, how long the rounds will last and how many outside witnesses will be allowed. Republicans will likely try to minimize the length of the hearings, Mr. Wermiel said. The nominee will probably undergo mock questioning from advisers in what is known politely as a “murder board. ” It’s similar to the practice sessions presidential candidates go through with their staff before squaring off in a televised debate advisers try to anticipate the questions that senators will ask. “Ideally, their goal would be that a nominee goes in there facing no question that he had not already heard in one of those sessions,” Mr. Wermiel said. Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. once called the hearings a “Kabuki dance. ” Justice Kagan called them a “vapid and hollow charade. ” Nonetheless, the televised hearings will be conducted by the 20 members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which is made up of 11 Republicans, including Ted Cruz, Orrin Hatch and Lindsey Graham and nine Democrats, including Dianne Feinstein, Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken. Its chairman is Chuck Grassley, a Republican. There’s an art to the questioning, since nominees must be careful not to take positions on issues that might come before the court. For example, if a nominee directly expressed a preference to overturn Roe v. Wade, the ruling that legalized abortion across the nation, the judge may have to be recused from a future case. So committee members typically ask more roundabout questions, hoping to read the tea leaves about how the nominee’s judicial philosophies would apply to issues. “It’s this sort of odd dance in which the Senators are trying to elicit some sense of how the nominee thinks about important constitutional questions, but they can’t really ask the things that they want to ask,” Mr. Wermiel said. Recently, the hearings have lasted for three or four days. Expect the senators to question the nominee for a few days, plus an additional day for outside witnesses. At least a week after the hearings, the committee will vote on sending the nomination to the full Senate. A simple majority is needed, but there’s a twist: By tradition, Supreme Court nominations are sent to the Senate even if the nominee is rejected by the committee. Then it’ll be in the hands of all 100 senators, where Republicans hold a advantage over Democrats (two independents caucus with the Democrats). Both Democrats and Republicans will have difficult decisions to make with vast political consequences. If the Democrats filibuster the nomination, Republicans would need 60 votes to end the filibuster, requiring some Democrats to join the Republicans. That is, unless Republicans use the nuclear option, a rare maneuver to end the filibuster. Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, has not ruled out the possibility, but is considered to be a strong believer in the traditions of the Senate, including the right of the minority party to filibuster. In 2013, Senator Harry Reid, a Democrat and the majority leader at the time, used the tactic to push through the Obama administration’s judicial and executive nominees. Furious Republicans vowed that Democrats would regret it once control of the Senate flipped. Mr. McConnell was among those who condemned the tactic at the time. But he said in November that any Republican retaliation by using the nuclear option themselves could backfire. “I don’t think we should act as if we’re going to be in the majority forever,” he said. | 0fake |
Obama’s “CLOCK BOY” Comes Back To Texas…After Spending 9 Months Doing THIS… | After 9 Months Of Hard-Core Islam Muslim Clock Boy Returns To TX Still Plans To Sue State He Misses For $15 MILLIONCAIR s poster child for how to use Islam to get everything you want in politically correct America comes home Obama boot camp?Ahmed Mohamed, the teen known as Clock Boy, may be back in Texas within days. After nine months of living in his new homeland, Qatar, he reportedly feels homesick. Late Friday, the Dallas Morning News reported Mohamed plans to return to Texas early in the week for an extended visit. The teen s uncle, Aldean Mohamed, said: He miss[es] Texas, and he miss[es] Irving. Breitbart Texas reported on Ahmed Mohamed s earlier yearnings to return to the Lone Star State in December. The uncle also indicated his nephew will catch up with family in the Dallas suburb of Irving and has events lined up with some tech companies. The Dallas newspaper did not disclose any information with whom the teen will meet.Ahmed Mohamed was the 14-year-old Irving Independent School District high school freshman detained last September for bringing to class a makeshift clock-in-a-box which school officials and police initially believed was a hoax bomb. No charges were filed once the situation sorted itself out, but the teen served three days of suspension before his family decided to withdraw him from the school district.A subsequent media firestorm ensued in which mainstream news outlets insisted Islamophobia was behind Mohamed s detainment. Breitbart Texas maintained it was the result of rigid public school zero tolerance policies and a month later, the Associated Press agreed.Last October, Mohamed accepted a fully-funded education scholarship from the Qatar Foundation, an organization with reputed ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, over an invitation to the one of the world s most prestigious private research universities, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). This year, MIT ranked #1 across twelve fields of study with other disciplines placing in the Top Five internationally.Fueled by the progressive narrative of victimization, Mohamed traveled to Google s Northern California headquarters, toured the Qatari educational system he now attends, made a Saudi-funded pilgrimage to Mecca, rubbed shoulders with Sudanese Islamic autocrat Bashir, appeared in a Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) promo video with Executive Director Nihad Awad, a supporter of the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas, and attended CAIR s 2015 Champions for Justice gala in Arlington, VA. Then, Mohamed visited the White House for Astronomy Night where he met President Obama alongside other invited students.Previously, the Commander-in-Chief tweeted the teen should bring his cool clock with him but that was not possible. The family did not retrieve it until late October despite the Irving Police Department s requests for them to do so a month earlier.While in Washington, D.C., Uncle Aldean, Ahmed, and his father Mohamed Elhassen Mohamed rallied with uber-left California U.S. Rep. Mike Honda, who pushed for a DOJ probe into the Irving school district and police department regarding the legality of the teen s detainment.TIME Magazine listed Mohamed on their 30 Most Influential Teens of 2015; yet, by December, with the Christmas season shrouded by Islamic State attacks in Paris, State Department travel alerts, and Syrian refugees at U.S. borders, sympathy waned for the Islamophobia poster child. Breitbart News reported that the same liberal media that championed Mohamed s every move, lost interest.According to the Dallas Morning News, Uncle Aldean Mohamed said the family still plans to sue the Irving ISD over Ahmed s arrest. After they left for Qatar, the Mohamed family demanded a total of $15 million $10 million from the City of Irving and $5 million from the school district and threatened a lawsuit if they did not receive it. In a 10-page letter to the Irving City Attorney and a similar 9-page letter to Irving ISD s attorney, the family claimed Islamophobia among their clock related incident allegations. Via: Bretibart News | 1real |
Facebook, Google, Twitter asked to testify on Russian meddling | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Executives from Facebook, Alphabet Inc’s Google and Twitter have been asked to testify to the U.S. Congress in coming weeks as lawmakers probe Russia’s alleged interference in the 2016 U.S. election, committee sources said on Wednesday. A Senate aide said executives from the three firms had been asked by the Senate Intelligence Committee to appear at a public hearing on Nov. 1. The leaders of the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee said the panel would hold an open hearing next month with representatives from unnamed technology companies in an effort to “better understand how Russia used online tools and platforms to sow discord in and influence our election.” Representatives for Facebook and Google confirmed they had received invitations from the Senate committee but did not say whether the companies would attend. Twitter did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The House panel did not immediately identify any companies, but a committee source said lawmakers expected to hear from the same three firms the Senate had asked to testify. The requests are the latest move by congressional investigators to gain information from internet companies as they probe the extent of Moscow’s alleged efforts to disrupt last year’s U.S. election. Lawmakers in both parties have grown increasingly concerned that social networks may have played a key role in Russia’s influence operation. Facebook revealed this month that suspected Russian trolls purchased more than $100,000 worth of divisive ads on its platform during the 2016 election cycle, a revelation that has prompted calls from some Democrats for new disclosure rules for online political ads. On Wednesday, Trump attacked Facebook in a tweet and suggested the world’s largest social network had colluded with other media outlets that opposed him. The president has been skeptical of the conclusions of U.S. intelligence agencies that Russia interfered in the election and has denied his campaign colluded with Moscow. The salvo prompted a lengthy rebuke from Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg, who said both Trump and liberals were upset about ideas and content on Facebook during the campaign. “That’s what running a platform for all ideas looks like,” Zuckerberg wrote on his personal Facebook page. Other internet firms besides Facebook are also facing rising scrutiny over how Russia may have leveraged their platforms. Twitter is expected to privately brief the Senate panel on Thursday. Republican Senator James Lankford, who has received classified information about Russia’s interference as a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said on Wednesday that the country’s attempts to sow discord in U.S. domestic affairs had not abated. Russian internet trolls over the weekend fueled the debate ignited by Trump over whether NFL players should have the right to kneel during the national anthem, Lankford said. Also on Wednesday, the Daily Beast, citing unnamed sources, reported that a Facebook group named “United Muslims of America” was a fake account linked to the Russian government and that it was used to push false claims about U.S. politicians, including Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. The group bought Facebook ads to reach targeted audiences, promoting political rallies aimed at Muslims, the website reported. The Senate and House intelligence committees are two of the main congressional panels probing allegations that Russia sought to interfere in the U.S. election to boost Trump’s chances at winning the White House, and possible collusion between Trump associates and Russia. | 0fake |
Trump floats idea of using NATO in fight against Islamic State | WASHINGTON - Republican Donald Trump said on Thursday that if elected president Nov. 8 he would be open to drawing NATO forces into the fight against Islamic State militants in a new mission for an alliance he has called obsolete. Trump made the comments in an interview with ABC News. The presumptive Republican presidential nominee has for months raised questions about the money the United States pours into NATO, which he says needs to be reconfigured to take account of today’s threats. “I like the idea of using NATO and also neighbors that aren’t in NATO and take them out. You gotta take them out,” Trump said. Under President Barack Obama, the United States has relied heavily on U.S. airstrikes to attack Islamic State targets in Syria and Iraq. Republicans have criticized this policy as not enough to stop the militants. Trump said the idea of using the Cold War-era alliance would be to ease the load on American forces. “I don’t want to get too much of ours involved. I want NATO to be involved,” Trump said. “We spend a tremendous amount of money on NATO. We take care of countries that frankly should be taking care of themselves in terms of economically.” Trump’s comments came amid an uproar over a meeting between former President Bill Clinton and Attorney General Loretta Lynch at a time when Clinton’s wife, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, is under federal investigation. The private meeting took place on Lynch’s plane after she landed in Phoenix on Monday night and Bill Clinton was leaving the airport after a rally he held for his wife earlier that day. Hillary Clinton is under an FBI investigation for her use of a private email server when she was President Barack Obama’s first-term secretary of state. Trump told conservative radio talk show host Mike Gallagher that the meeting was proof of his charge that the U.S. political system is “rigged” in favor of political elites. “It’s unheard of,” Trump told ABC News. “You have this massive investigation on emails and they’d have a meeting like this.” Lynch, appointed to her position by Obama more than a year ago, said she did not discuss the email investigation or other pending matters before the Justice Department with Bill Clinton. “When I was landing at the airport, I did see President Clinton at the Phoenix airport as I was leaving and he spoke to myself and my husband on the plane,” Lynch told reporters. “Our conversation was a great deal about grandchildren. It was primarily social and about our travels. He mentioned the golf he played in Phoenix and he mentioned travels he had to West Virginia...But there was no discussion of any matter pending for the department or any matter pending before any other body,” Lynch said. The Federal Bureau of Investigation is investigating Hillary Clinton about her email use and has already interviewed some of her aides. The investigation into whether laws were broken as a result of the server kept in her New York home has overshadowed Clinton’s campaign. Obama is preparing to campaign with Hillary Clinton for the first time in her 2016 White House bid. They are to appear together in Charlotte, North Carolina, on Tuesday. A Reuters/Ipsos poll this week showed Clinton 11 points ahead of the billionaire businessman At the White House, spokesman Josh Earnest made clear that Obama believes an impartial investigation is crucial and noted that Lynch had said the conversation was benign. “I think the bottom line is simply that both the president and the attorney general understand how important it is for the Department of Justice to conduct investigations that are free of political interference,” Earnest told reporters. U.S. Senator John Cornyn of Texas, the No. 2 Senate Republican, cited the incident in renewing his call for an independent counsel to take over the Clinton probe from the FBI. | 0fake |
At least 25 wounded in Israeli retaliation strikes in Gaza | GAZA (Reuters) - Israel s military said its aircraft bombed militant targets in Gaza on Friday 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 in response to rockets fired earlier from Gaza at Israeli towns. Witnesses said most of the wounded were residents of a building near the camp. At least one Palestinian was killed in clashes with Israeli troops earlier on Friday and dozens wounded in day of rage protests against U.S. President Donald Trump s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel s capital. | 0fake |
Video: Underwater Handgun Takes Fishing to the Next Level of Fun | Daily Wire | Video: Underwater Handgun Takes Fishing to the Next Level of Fun By: Chase Stephens November 23, 2016
For some people, fishing is a long, boring day of sitting and staring endlessly at a rod and reel that may never get a bite. But what if you could get down with those mocking water-breathers and have high-noon shoot-out with them the way nature intended?
Well, that's just what some Florida boys thought when they decided to take their modified Glock 9mm pistol into the Gulf of Mexico to help deal with the infestation of Lionfish.
TheSickest provides some more details on the Lionfish overpopulation problem and the boys' creative way to address it:
"Lionfish are an invasive species with no natural predators who’s females lay a staggering two million eggs a year. The intersection between ammunition-happy Americans and the determent of an overpopulated species is where the the use of this new sporting phenomenon was birthed.
Lionsfish were never intended to be in the Gulf of Mexico, and while its speculated that their transplant may be linked to a hurricanes back in the 90’s, because of their rapid reproductive nature the waters have become flooded by their presence.
A single Lionsfish consumes 80% reef’s edible baitfish within five weeks of arriving on that reef – incredibly damaging to plant that is the cornerstone of the underwater ecosystem. The issue has gotten to a point where entering the Florida coast at any time can mean running across thousands of Lionsfish, just posted up chilling.
The good news is that the introduction of the gun has the potential of bringing hunters and otherwise uninterested fishers to the gulf for a fun filled time of shooting underwater, an activity that actually looks like a blast."
The video below shows just how fun it can be:
"Shooting invasive Lionfish over 100ft underwater with customized Glock 9mm handgun in the Gulf of Mexico," the video description states. "The project started to see if we could shoot a gun underwater and it evolved into much more with the right people involved. Lionfish are an invasive species that need to be eradicated. All weapons modifications done under supervision of Airborne Arms Inc license holder "07-Manufacturer of Firearms other than Destructive Devices" with support of Lone Wolf Glock Parts. www.lonewolfdist.com"
Exit video of another group of fisherman who've combined skiing with barbarian weaponry to help deal with Peoria, Illinois' Asian carp problem:
| 1real |
Snubbed Federal Reserve nominee a warning as Trump struggles to fill key posts | NEW YORK (Reuters) - Allan Landon prepared for his job at the Federal Reserve for two-and-a-half years during the Obama administration before his nomination sank into the partisan quicksand of Washington D.C., a swamp which has only deepened under President Donald Trump, leaving more vacancies than ever at the top of the U.S. federal government. Former U.S. President Barack Obama nominated Landon as a Fed governor in early 2015. With the community-banking experience sought by the Republicans who controlled Congress and a non-partisan background, he should have avoided any political pitfalls on the way to Senate confirmation. Landon, a former Bank of Hawaii chief executive, began preparing for the job immediately after the White House’s initial phone call in mid-2014. He sold assets, stepped back from university lecturing and corporate boards, met Fed Chair Janet Yellen and U.S. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew, and even attended a Senate confirmation hearing to study for his own. But his confirmation hearing never came. Neither the Republican Senator who chaired the key committee, Richard Shelby, nor his staff met with Landon, he said in an interview. While not bitter, he was left disillusioned by an increasingly political nomination system that can block promising candidates from public service, leaving top jobs unfilled at agencies and departments across Washington. “Along the way you run into some things that are hard to understand if you are outside the system,” Landon, 69, told Reuters from his home in Park City, Utah. “It requires a level of trust and confidence, and when you wait two years you conclude that maybe that really never existed.” Republican party control of both the White House and the congressional committees that approve nominees has not solved these problems during the Trump administration. A dearth of nominations by Trump, hearings delayed by Democrats, and disinterest by prospective candidates has left most of the 577 key federal government positions requiring Senate confirmation unfilled. According to the nonpartisan Partnership for Public Service, an organization whose mission is to inspire a new generation of civil servants, Trump had nominated 277 people to these top government positions by Wednesday, compared to 433 nominees at this point in Obama’s first presidential term, and 414 in that of President George W. Bush. Obama and Bush each had more than twice as many nominees confirmed at this point than does Trump, who has 124. Big staffing vacancies remain at the U.S. departments of State, Justice and Defense, and some high-profile names have backed down after having been nominated. Three vacancies remain at the Federal Reserve, which has not had a full slate of seven board governors for more than a decade. “It’s a brutal, long road and it seems to be getting worse,” former Philadelphia Fed President Charles Plosser said of the nomination process. As part of his vetting in late 2014, in which he and his wife almost leased a home in the trendy Penn Quarter neighborhood of Washington D.C., Landon said he “felt an obligation to help” when he realized the sitting Fed governors were doing the jobs of two or three people. “You wish there were a more certain path to the job,” he said. (For a graphic of the Fed's doves and hawks, click here) | 0fake |
Trump’s sweep is another humiliating defeat for media and political elites | Donald Trump’s sweeping victories Tuesday night move the Manhattan billionaire a step closer to winning the Republican nomination for president and to pulling off the most improbable political feat in modern American history. But Trump’s story is about more than a first-time candidate’s stunning rise. It is also about the humiliating defeat suffered by an increasingly isolated political and media class who still do not understand the causes and scope of Trump’s populist revolt.
In his book “Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010,” Charles Murray wrote about the rise of a new American upper class and the “narrow elites” who shape America’s economy, culture and government. The number of players who dominate the direction of media, politics and finance is surprisingly concentrated for a country as sprawling and diverse as the United States. And yet almost all of these “influencers” across Manhattan and Washington were incapable of blunting Trump’s meteoric rise. Time and again over the past year, Washington insiders and media moguls misread the mood of working-class voters and their attraction to the populist message championed by Trump.
On Tuesday, that message which undermines Republican orthodoxy on trade, taxes and immigration resonated with GOP primary voters so strongly that Trump cruised to lopsided victories in Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Delaware and Maryland.
So why did these “narrow elites” miss the mark so badly when the topic turned to Trump? Because most of them are hopelessly isolated from the other 300 million or so Americans who inconveniently share their country.
Murray writes that most members of the narrow elite don’t watch much television. If they watch any news programs, it is probably the PBS NewsHour (or Morning Joe!). Powerful influencers have also watched other television shows over the past decade like “Mad Men,” “House of Cards,” “Breaking Bad,” “Game of Thrones” and “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” While such critically acclaimed shows are often consumed by narrow elites in frantic fits of binge watching, the other 300 million Americans view television a bit differently.
Murray reports that the average American watches about 35 hours of television a week. Since 2004, Trump has starred in 14 seasons of “The Apprentice.” And if you’re a member of the narrow elite that holds sway over media coverage or government policy, chances are good that you saw few episodes of “The Apprentice” or “Survivor.”
But millions of Americans did, and perhaps that kind of mass consumption is why Trump will beat Don Draper at the polls every time.
History may not repeat itself, but it does rhyme when the topic turns to TV careers and Republican politicians. From 1956 to 1962, Ronald Reagan hosted General Electric Theater and had his image beamed into more than 20 million homes every week. The successful run on TV gave Reagan a connection with American voters that his movie career never could. By the time Reagan ran for governor of California in 1966, the GE host was a household name. Reagan’s landslide victory shocked elites in and out of the political class and launched a conservative revolution that would last a generation.
50 years later, that revolution is being undone by another TV star who has been underestimated by elites while being elevated by working-class voters. The question now is whether Trump can prove his critics wrong again by winning the nomination and then defeating Hillary Clinton in the fall. The odds may be long for the New York developer and reality star, but no longer than the ones he faced last June when he first sought the GOP nomination. | 0fake |
President Obama Makes Fun Of Donald Trump And It’s HILARIOUS (VIDEO) | In his final 2016 White House Correspondence Dinner, a sharp tongued President Obama unleashed a scathing but hilarious barrage of humor on Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump and pretty much everyone who had ties to the GOP. The president drew many laughs in front of journalists, celebrities, and politicians, both Democrats and Republicans. However, one person wasn t there: Donald Trump. The president said of Trump s absence:I m a little hurt that he s not here tonight. We had so much fun the last time. And it is surprising. You got a room full of reporters, celebrities, cameras, and he says no. Is this dinner too tacky for the Donald? What could he possibly be doing instead? Is he at home eating a Trump steak, tweeting out insults to Angela Merkel? What s he doing?The president also had lots of fun with how the Republicans have reacted to the fact that Donald Trump is their most likely nominee. The president said:The Republican establishment is incredulous that he s their most likely nominee. Incredulous, shocking. They say Donald lacks the foreign policy experience to be president. But in fairness, he has spent years meeting with leaders from around the world. Miss Sweden, Miss Argentina, Miss Azerbaijan. And there s one area where Donald s experience could be invaluable. And that s closing Guantanamo. Because Trump knows a thing or two about running waterfront properties into the ground.The president also took a shot at the media for their lopsided coverage of Trump s campaign which often times has been absurd in term of the amount of free press he s received. The president told the audience full of reporters and journalists, I hope you re all proud of yourselves. Let s hope that when all is said and done, the ascendancy of Donald Trump doesn t go beyond November and we can all breath a sigh of relief when we no longer see Trump s face plastered all over the media.Watch video here: [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PcIrak9gdn8]Featured image via video screenshot. | 1real |
Will Hillary’s ‘Secret Weapon’ Be A Game Changer For The Campaign? | So Bill Clinton wants a third term so much that he s coming out to battle Trump. Bringing Bill Clinton in to fight Hillary s battles could be a double edged sword. She might gain some momentum but it s hard to believe that Trump won t come after them with some zingers. The problem with the zingers is that they might earn Hillary some sympathy from the voters. I say that she should fight her own battles but don t you know Bill would love to be sitting in the White House a year from now A new and more combative phase of Hillary Clinton s presidential campaign opens next month when she sends her husband out to stump for her in important early states.Waiting for him will be businessman Donald Trump, the Republican front-runner.The former president has been a low-key figure since Mrs. Clinton entered the race for the Democratic nomination in April, offering private advice and helping her raise money at closed-door fundraisers. In January, the campaign intends to showcase him in public forums in Iowa and New Hampshire, two states where the front-runner is locked in a tight race against Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.Speaking to supporters recently, Mrs. Clinton described her husband as a secret weapon. Throwing Mr. Clinton into the mix could further escalate the rhetoric between the Trump and Clinton campaigns. In the 2008 presidential race, the former president would bristle at criticism directed at his wife and got in hot water when he suggested Barack Obama s victory in the South Carolina primary was less significant because of the large African-American vote.This past week saw back-and-forth volleys over whether comments Mr. Trump made about Mrs. Clinton were sexist. He said Mr. Obama schlonged her in the 2008 race and said her brief absence from a recent Democratic debate stage, when she was reportedly using the restroom, was disgusting. In an interview with the Des Moines Register, Mrs. Clinton said Mr. Trump has demonstrated a penchant for sexism. That drew a response from Mr. Trump on Twitter: Hillary, when you complain about a penchant for sexism, who are you referring to. I have great respect for women. In capital letters he then wrote, BE CAREFUL! Asked what Mr. Trump meant, his campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, said: Mr. Trump speaks for Mr. Trump and his tweets speak for themselves. And he s very clear about what those tweets say. Another Trump spokeswoman, Katrina Pierson, suggested in an interview with CNN that the Trump campaign intends to make Mr. Clinton s behavior an issue should Mrs. Clinton pursue this point. Mr. Clinton, during his presidency, paid $850,000 to settle a sexual harassment case brought by Paula Jones stemming from an encounter when he was governor of Arkansas. His affair with then-White House intern Monica Lewinsky led to his impeachment by the U.S. House in 1998. He was acquitted by the Senate the following year. Hillary Clinton has some nerve to talk about the war on women and the bigotry toward women when she has a serious problem in her husband, Ms. Pierson told CNN. Representatives for Mr. Clinton and the Clinton campaign declined to comment.Mrs. Clinton holds a commanding lead among Democrats nationally, but polling shows the contests in Iowa and New Hampshire are up for grabs. Losses in both states could potentially alter the dynamics of a race she is dominating.In a conference call with supporters this past week, Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta said that Mrs. Clinton was in a dog fight in New Hampshire.Via: WSJ | 1real |
BREAKING: MASSIVE CYBER ATTACK ON ALL FEDERAL EMPLOYEE INFO | This data breach could affect every federal agency. Chinese hackers?The federal government is notifying millions of employees as it works to assess the impact of a massive data breach involving the agency that handles security clearances and employee records.A foreign entity or government is believed to be behind the cyber attack. U.S. officials are investigating whether Chinese hackers were involved, Reuters reported, citing a source familiar with the matter. The FBI is working with our interagency partners to investigate this matter. We take all potential threats to public and private sector systems seriously, and will continue to investigate and hold accountable those who pose a threat in cyberspace, an FBI spokesman told CNBC.A congressional aide familiar with the situation, who declined to be named because he was not authorized to discuss it, says the Office of Personnel Management and the Interior Department were hacked. A second U.S. official who also declined to be identified said the data breach could potentially affect every federal agency.The OPM plans to notify approximately 4 million individuals whose personally identifiable information (PII) may have been compromised in the breach, the agency said in a release. Since the investigation is on-going, additional PII exposures may come to light; in that case, OPM will conduct additional notifications as necessary, the release said.Read more: cnbc | 1real |
Fueled by Small Donations, Donald Trump Makes Up Major Financial Ground - The New York Times | Donald J. Trump all but erased his enormous disadvantage against Hillary Clinton in the span of just two months, according to figures released by his campaign on Wednesday, converting the passion of his core followers into a flood of small donations on a scale rarely seen in national politics. Mr. Trump and the Republican National Committee raised $64 million through a joint digital and mail effort in July, according to his campaign, the bulk of it from small donations. All told, Mr. Trump and his party brought in $82 million last month, only slightly behind Mrs. Clinton’s $90 million, and ended with $74 million on hand, suggesting he might now have the resources to compete with Mrs. Clinton in the closing stretch of the campaign. “She’s been doing this for 20 years,” said Steven Mnuchin, a New York investor who is Mr. Trump’s finance chairman. “We’ve been doing it for two months. ” More than of the $64 million had come online, Mr. Mnuchin said. The new figures indicate a major shift in Mr. Trump’s campaign, which until recent months was largely funded by hat and sales and by Mr. Trump’s wallet. And they suggest that Mr. Trump has the potential to be the first Republican nominee whose campaign could be financed chiefly by supporters pitching in $10 or $25 apiece, echoing the success of Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont during the Democratic primary. The numbers released by the Trump campaign Wednesday are preliminary official figures — including money spent on direct mail, which is typically expensive, and a precise breakdown of total cash raised in small increments — will become available when Mr. Trump and Mrs. Clinton file formal reports with the Federal Election Commission this month. Moreover, Mr. Trump’s surge is coming very late in the campaign, at a point where advertising rates climb and the chance to invest in a digital and campaign infrastructure is long past. And Mrs. Clinton’s own operation is rapidly expanding as well. In a Twitter post on Wednesday, a spokesman for Mrs. Clinton said that her campaign and a joint operation with the Democratic National Committee had $102 million on hand, not including cash held directly by the party. But Mr. Trump’s announcement suggests that after months of dithering and false starts, he has begun to exploit an opportunity: marrying his powerful credibility among Republicans with targeted particularly online, where Mr. Trump’s website features buttons soliciting $50, $25 and even $10 contributions. At the end of May, Mr. Trump reported barely more than $1. 3 million in cash, alarming Republicans, who feared a financial rout by Mrs. Clinton. Mitt Romney, the party’s 2012 nominee and a wealthy man in his own right, was never able to stoke intense enthusiasm among small donors and relied disproportionately on big ones. During July of that year, for example, Mr. Romney and the Republican National Committee reported raising a total of just $19 million from contributions of less than $200. Mr. Trump was able to ramp up quickly in part through a digital operation set up by the R. N. C. since that campaign. Even before Mr. Trump was the nominee, the party built out its email list and tested ways of targeting small donors. With that in place, party officials unleashed a desire by Republicans to donate to a candidate who has bluntly attacked lobbyists and big donors. While Mr. Trump accepted online donations during the primary season, he did not send out an email solicitation until late June — which brought in $3 million alone, an indication of the well of money available to him. The campaign has also raised money by promising to match small donations out of Mr. Trump’s pocket, a tactic available only to wealthy candidates. “There was always that potential, but you didn’t have candidates who were as uniquely positioned in the same way that Trump is,” said Patrick Ruffini, a Republican strategist who ran digital at the Republican National Committee under President George W. Bush. But Mr. Trump’s surge also emphasizes the complication for Republicans in having him at the head of their party. He is relying more on in part because he has faced opposition from some of the party’s biggest patrons, such as Meg Whitman, a California business executive, who said Monday that she was so disgusted with Mr. Trump that she would vote for Mrs. Clinton. To bolster his Mr. Trump and his team are now working to assuage the broader pool of affluent Republican donors and . In recent weeks, Mr. Trump has laid off his criticisms of the party’s donor class and scheduled an array of formal events for Republican donors in money centers like Florida and New York. Moreover, even as his name and followers are helping fund Republican efforts around the country, Mr. Trump is feuding with the party’s senior leadership, pointedly refusing to endorse prominent Republicans facing primary opponents, such as the one challenging Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, the House speaker. And it is the Republican National Committee that is providing much of the technical expertise that has allowed Mr. Trump to quickly increase his some Republican officials said. Even as relations fray between Mr. Trump and some fellow Republicans, the party and Mr. Trump each needs the other. And Mr. Trump, as the nominee and the tent pole for the party, may have the upper hand. “Under normal circumstances, the party would have money as leverage,” Mr. Ruffini said. “They could cut off to a candidate who misbehaves. And that leverage has been taken completely away. ” | 0fake |
MSNBC’S CHRIS MATTHEWS DEFENDS VA SHOOTER: “He did understand inequality” [Video] | Chris Matthews tried his best to create sympathy for the loser who shot random Republicans. Can you believe it? MSNBC host Chris Matthews got political in his defense of Alexandria shooter James T. Hodgkinson: We don t know what sadness was in this guy s life ,,,,Blah, Blah, Blah INEQUALITY!Matthews had the unbelievable gaul to bring up sympathy for this guy making an excuse for his heinous act by using class warfare inequality is exactly the twisted thinking that caused this loser to shoot people:Hodgkinson was a hater of Republicans and President Trump. He volunteered for Sen. Bernie Sanders during the 2016 election. His deranged view of conservatives lead to the shooting.Check out the word salad ramble of Matthews trying to somehow justify what would make someone shoot Republicans: Howard, you and I know each other. You know what goes into somebody s we can say wacky behavior because they re dead. We don t know what sadness was in this guy s life what his prospects were. Something that made him mad at the world so he focused on Republicans. He did understand inequality as an issue. Bernie Sanders wrote about that in the paper the other day. There s nothing wrong with the issue. It s a great issue to fight for if you re a progressive. But he got it into his head that he was going to get better equality of incomes in this country by killing people. That s not going to happen. | 1real |
Shine Brightly in the Consuming Fire of Divine Love | By Les Visible on October 27, 2016 Visible Origami — Oct 26, 2016 Dog Poet Transmitting……. I would like, within the limitations of my ability, to talk a little about Bhakti Yoga today; which for me is the only legitimate fast track to the divine that exists for the present and the least dangerous of all the options out there. My life keeps going by and I step in and out of it. These days I spend a great deal of my time in reflection, as well as preparation for my ongoing journey. It might be awhile yet and it may be right around the corner, either is fine with me. I have come to understand that loving the divine is so very, very much easier, once all the distractions that the greatest majority of us live with; are in pursuit of, or which predominates over all of the esoteric alternatives are… gone. Without my even being aware of it, at first, nearly all of the usual human attractions and compulsions just slipped out the door and haven’t returned. I find myself watching life behind some kind of glass. It’s a movie that is being screened in the mind but once the film in the projector has been changed, ordinary life becomes irrelevant and one can immerse themselves in more important considerations. One still goes to the supermarket. One still eats and excretes. One sleeps and awakens in the dream. One drives and walks and watches and listens to all of the sounds of the world around them but the effect of all of it has changed. Last night (as happens a couple of times a month) I laid in my bed and did not sleep most of the night. So I did as I usually do and repeated, “I love you.” over and over and over On this night there was an atmosphere of static and confusion and I could not seem to break through it. Images of the past spiraled through to haunt me over mistakes made and opportunities missed. The Voice entered and said, “Do not occupy your mind with thoughts of what is past. These have all been paid for through your suffering. They are not relevant anymore.” Try telling that to the monkey mind. However, the point is that regardless of the static and confusion and the seeming distance between myself and the divine, I did not allow any of these distractions to deter me from the continuous repetition of, “I love you.” I felt the obstacles that hung in the air. I felt all the barriers that occasionally come and go and are sometimes not there at all and I just kept at it. I studiously ignored whatever it was that was interfering with my efforts and I told myself that I would not allow anything to intrude, no matter how much it did intrude; no matter what the difficulty might be I would persevere and I did. I fell asleep at some point. I awoke this AM and said, “Good morning Lord.” It is another day and I do not want to forget that every day given to me is an opportunity to celebrate the almighty, no matter how far away the almighty might ‘seem’ to be and no matter how difficult the effort might become. The path of Love is not an easy cruise to some literal or metaphorical Caribbean island. Though we paint it as the only sure and certain route here, this does not mean it is also an easy route. There is bound to be opposition. In times of material darkness there are agents of that darkness who seek to hinder and hamper our efforts and often- these days- no real efforts are even made. The world seems to be swept away in a tidal waves of garbage and noxious dreams that spin themselves out of perverted daylight. Humanity is there to be found in the midst at all times but it takes a concerted determination to rise and greet it at every turn where it seeks to appear. To me, this is the real work… to move through the murk of this gray-scale existence and reach out to every hungry and troubled heart with some portion of the sunlight we are all given for the purpose of sharing. If we are cheap with our sunlight, the amount of sunlight given will decrease and further decrease until we find ourselves in darkness. I refer you to the parable from Jesus the Christ where he gave the example of the three men to whom a certain amount of talent were given . So it is when you are kept awake in the night and you strive and reach for unity with the ineffable and you get nowhere… you continue and continue as if, at any moment, you will achieve that unity and you will not cease until you do; even if it is a thousand times a thousand nights, even if you are in prison or confined in even greater distress in the houses of the rich. You do not deter. You do not immerse yourself in comforting distractions. One day the sun will rise in your heart and there will be no further static or confusions. The love of God is a consuming fire and fortunate is the one so consumed. It is important to understand that such a Love will demand everything of you and such a Love will try and test you to discover the level of your dedication and sincerity; “Many are called but few are chosen.” I am reminded of that short but powerful poem by Stephen Crane, “The Wayfarer . ” The reality of this great and singular quest is precisely as the poem describes and there have been many souls who have discovered the truth of it as they went surging forward in all their temporary and unchallenged zeal, right up until they saw that every blade of grass was not a blade of grass. Imagine in your own life and in your own mind, how often you forget about the ineffable and how often petty and incidental concerns arise in your thoughts to take you away. Later you can often not remember what these concerns were but you can certainly remember that they were of small importance, since you often cannot even remember what they were. When we look back on our lives we can’t recall how we got where we got at all. Life is filled with things of small importance. For me, it is critical to remember that there are forces that are actively engaged in steering us wrong and placing obstacles in our way and it is even more critical to recall certain clues such as this one from “The Lord’s Prayer.” “Lead us not into temptation.” Every agency that places obstacles and lures upon our path are not entities of the dark side. Lord Ganesha is portrayed with two items. One of them ensnares us and one of them frees us. Regardless of whatever religious schematic you may consider the nature and ruling power of the universe through, the similarities are glaring for the objectively minded. Unfortunately for many we live in a time of punishing subjectivity. It tends to influence the way we think and feel and behave. It takes a strong and inspired heart to break free and a steadfast intention to continue to that point. The rate and intensity of contention between and among us seems to increase by the day, according to the divide and conquer philosophy that guides the game plans of those who serve the Prince of Darkness. In this time of the harvesting of souls, it is of critical importance to both sides of the equation in this truly important time… in what direction we are swayed. I can truthfully say that recent years, until the beginning of this one, have been extremely difficult for me. Strangely enough, during some of the most difficult and inexplicable events, I just moved through it as if it were of no consequence at all, even though they were life and circumstance changing and might have caused me no end of grief …but it all seemed like a passing dream to me. I didn’t get angry. I was filled with wonder that it happened and uninformed as to the meaning of any of it. It passed and I moved on from one situation to another, to the one I find myself in and it’s all behind me there and of no present relevance. I could have gotten angry, or fearful, or despairing or depressed but none of this occurred and I do not chalk this up to any great strength or fortitude on my part. It is as if the ineffable has been slowly but surely slipping ever deeper into my life and every challenge and trauma was just one more act on the part of the ineffable to distract me from the reality of the almighty taking up residence in my life. I realize now that it is not what happens to you that is most meaningful but it is how you react to it. Once you have stilled the reactive mind you are closer to your real home than you might imagine. Loving God will draw the divine to you because the almighty is helpless before the sincere love of any soul. It has been said in many Eastern texts that the ineffable is the slave of Love. We must consider that this implies being a willing slave because the almighty is not subject to anything that the almighty does not choose to be subject to. Love the divine with all your heart and soul and mind and the Lord will return it in kind. This is what I believe and this is what I am inspired to speak of. Let this Love permeate your existence and see every event in your life as a blessing and it will surely prove to be so. Remember that every incident in your life, no matter how insignificant it may seem, is a particular dealing of the ineffable with your soul. End Transmission……. | 1real |
‘You’re tweeting about me a lot.’ James O’Keefe BLASTS Joy Reid for saying he’s not a real journalist | ‘You’re tweeting about me a lot.’ James O’Keefe BLASTS Joy Reid for saying he’s not a real journalist Posted at 12:41 pm on October 28, 2016 by Sam J.
Is Joy being racist and implying that illegal voters are black?
Shameful. James O'Keefe fundraising via right wing email newsletters to keep sending his goons to "watch" black voters. 1/2 pic.twitter.com/z5Eb9zdcBN
— Joy Reid (@JoyAnnReid) October 28, 2016
Looking through this original newsletter, not seeing anything about watching black voters.
There’s a piece about illegal voters but nothing about the color of their skin.
And she seems awfully fixated on James O’Keefe, who apparently she said isn’t a real journalist. . @JoyAnnReid remember when you said I wasn't a real journalist @ #DNC ? Funny, because for not being "real" you're tweeting about me a lot. https://t.co/nlE6o1CB4B
— James O'Keefe (@JamesOKeefeIII) October 28, 2016
Felt the burn over here. Trending OOPS-a-daisy! Watch Team Hillary FREAK over NYT piece on her 'gay marriage flip-flop', from #PodestaEmails21
All the newsletter really says is that they will not back down, nothing specific about race or skin … and clearly plenty of people feel that James is a real journalist. Or as real as any journalist can be in this current atmosphere. @JamesOKeefeIII @organic2016 @JoyAnnReid If you don't tow their line, you're not real to them.
— Gun Talk News (@GunTalkNews) October 28, 2016
Awww, is there some special club? @JamesOKeefeIII of course @JoyAnnReid can't kill the message, nor wants to face the truth, in this case, she attacks the messenger.
— (((Val Washington))) (@ValeriaPugliesi) October 28, 2016
Or she tried to, yes. @JamesOKeefeIII @JoyAnnReid Joy Reid doesn't care about the truth, only cares about getting Hillary elected
— Les_Deplorabes (@Chicago_Land_) October 28, 2016
From the WikiLeaks and various O’Keefe footage that would be MOST of the media, not just Joy, but point taken. @JamesOKeefeIII They are Scared of you! American People hate MSM now and they will pay for their corruption far past this election!
— Anne (@AnneFisher84) October 28, 2016
It would seem they are more afraid of the truth than any one journalist … honestly it’s hard to tell up from down in this crazy election but to Anne’s point, the traditional media does seem to be a bit discombobulated. @JamesOKeefeIII We know for sure that @JoyAnnReid isn't a journalist, nor objective.
— Nick Carroll (@NickFromHouston) October 28, 2016
And ironically she is trying to call out James for being what she appears to be.
Democrats DO like to project. | 1real |
Not Just Hillary, Entire Obama Administration Exposed for Using Private Email to Avoid FOIA Requests |
By Jack Burns
Wikileaks is helping President Obama keep his 2008 campaign promise — to be the most transparent administration in U.S. history — whether he likes it or not. And, once again, we’re learning more about the inner sanctum of the administration and its communication practices. As FBI Director James Comey announced Friday, a new investigation into Hillary Clinton’s email scandal has been launched, just days before the presidential election. Comey’s move drew fire instantly from the Democrats who claim Comey is attempting to sway the election in Donald Trump’s favor. While many are focused on Comey’s actions and renewed investigation, Wikileaks has uncovered what may prove to be a systemic problem of executive branch accountability not merely limited to the former secretary of state’s emails.
According to former State Department official Tom Nides, in a 2015 email to John Podesta (Clinton campaign manager), everyone in Obama’s cabinet and every White House staffer uses their personal email for government business. Nides should know as he worked under Hillary Clinton in the State Department from 2011 to 2013, according to one source .
While keeping email hidden from the public may seem like no big deal to folks who simply don’t care, ALL correspondence which is related to governmental business is the property of the federal government and is supposed to be accessible by anyone wishing to inquire within the archive of records.
The Federal Records Act defines a record as anything, “regardless of whether it exists in physical, digital, or electronic form, is a record as defined in subsection (a) shall be binding on all Federal agencies.” This includes all communication of state agents (like the POTUS) who work in the executive branch of government, as well.
But the Obama administration, according to Nides, has long since avoided the Federal Records Act by using private Gmail accounts. Nides wrote Podesta and said, “There is only one thing that needs to be done on this email thing. (Which I am sure nobody wants to do). Get a state dept career lawyer to go through all the emails and pull the official ones.” That admission seems to be on the level with what is expected for compliance with the Federal Records Act. But it was Nides’ next admission which is the talk of many major media outlets.
Nides wrote, “Btw you know as well as I every god damn cabinet officer and WH staff uses their [sic] gmail account!” The former Department of State employee revealed what many already suspected. The Obama administration is anything but transparent. Just ask Tom Fitton, president of Judicial Watch. His organization routinely sues the Obama administration in federal court using the Freedom of Information Act as warrant for inquiry, and says the administration stonewalls his efforts at every turn. Fitton’s organization gave the Obama administration a failing grade on transparency and says his administration is even less transparent than when Bush was president.
Fitton wrote in 2015 , “There are about 18 lawsuits, 10 of which are active in federal court, and about 160 Judicial Watch FOIA requests that could be affected by Mrs. Clinton and her staff’s use of secret email accounts to conduct official government business. In our various FOIA lawsuits, our lawyers have informed attorneys for the Obama administration that Hillary Clinton’s account and any other secret accounts used by State employees should be secured, recovered and searched.” JW actively seeks out those files through official methods, using FOIA and the Federal Records Act, but has been met with delay after delay from FOIA requests to the Obama administration.
While the Obama administration is on its way out, groups like Judicial Watch aren’t going anywhere, and presumably have all the time in the world to FOIA their way into digging up those deleted Clinton emails, as well as securing Gmail accounts from the Obama administration cabinet and staffers. This story is definitely a long way from being over.
It’s no wonder why so many free thinkers are now questioning the story lines they’re being told. With the president and all his men (and women), hiding their communications within their Gmail accounts, the truth is never going to be told, at least not the real truth. And by the time organizations like Judicial Watch are successful in obtaining the electronic communications records that rightly belong to the people, it will be way too late to hold anyone accountable for breaking both the Federal Records Act and the Freedom of Information Act. Julian Assange, we salute you. Thank you for forcing the Obama administration to be transparent. Keep up the valiant work! Delivered by The Daily Sheeple
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Contributed by The Free Thought Project of thefreethoughtproject.com .
The Free Thought Project is dedicated to holding those who claim authority over our lives accountable. | 1real |
Newt Gingrich Just PRAISED Japan For What They Did To Us At Pearl Harbor (TWEET) | On the 75th anniversary of the bombing of Pearl Harbor in Hawaii many have been remembering all those who lost their lives on that fateful day. It was what brought the United States into WWII and the date, as FDR said, will live in infamy. Yet, as most treat December 7, as a solemn day, Newt Gingrich just tweeted out what sounded like praise for what the Japanese did to us that dreadful day.Gingrich tweeted out: 75 years ago the Japanese displayed professional brilliance and technological power launching surprises from Hawaii to the Philippines. 75 years ago the Japanese displayed professional brilliance and technological power launching surprises from Hawaii to the Philippines Newt Gingrich (@newtgingrich) December 7, 2016 Professional brilliance and technological power launching surprises ?? Really? That s what Gingrich thinks of when he think of the attacks on Pearl Harbor. How the Japanese surprised attacked us?2.403 Americans died during the attack at Pearl Harbor, with 1,178 wounded.Gingrich thinks that is professional brilliance ?This tweet is absolutely disrespectful to all those who lost their lives and their families. There really couldn t be a more weird and awkward tweet to put out on the day we remember Pearl Harbor.And while relations with Japan have since been mended, we must never think what they did that day was at all brilliant. For goodness sake, someone please take away Gingrich s Twitter privileges. He clearly is out of his mind, much like his pal Donald Trump.Featured Photo by National Archive/Newsmakers | 1real |
Kevin Shenkman: Ending Democracy as We Know It in Southern California? - Breitbart | Kevin Shenkman could be described as one of the most prolific and successful civil rights lawyers of his generation, after almost pushing dozens of Southern California communities to change their election systems under the California Voting Rights Act of 2001 (CVRA) over the past few years. [To many in those communities, however, Shenkman is a villain, a from Malibu who is creating racial divisions where they do not exist — and making millions in the process. He is, according to local podcaster Stephen Daniels, “the most hated man in Santa Clarita. ” And he is “hated” there — and elsewhere — because he wins. Shenkman scored his latest victory last Wednesday evening, when the Oceanside City Council voted to approve a proposal to move from an system, where every council member is elected by the voters as a whole, to a district system, where voters are only represented directly by one member, from a particular geographic area. The change was prompted by a March 22 letter from Shenkman, claiming that the city’s system prevented minority groups from winning elections, and warning of a lawsuit to follow. Residents of Oceanside were shocked, and angry, at the charge. The city has had several Latino council members, including one who has served on the council for the last 16 years. It also recently had an mayor. Shenkman claimed in his letter to the city that Oceanside’s 65. 2% white majority engaged in “bloc voting” to exclude Latinos, and cited Linda Gonzales, who lost a city council race last year. Gonzales opposed Shenkman’s effort, and told Breitbart News that she believes lost her election fairly. She added that Shenkman never asked her permission to use her name. Nevertheless, the council members capitulated to Shenkman’s threat, after the city attorney advised them last Wednesday that no city or school board had ever successfully defended an election system from a CVRA challenge in court. Score another win for Shenkman. His law firm, Shenkman Hughes, boasts on its website that he “has never lost a case, and has no intention of breaking that winning streak. ” Curiously, in his extensive bio on the website, which touts his work in “all aspects of intellectual property law, including litigation of patent, copyright, trademark, and trade secret matters,” as well as other areas of civil litigation, he omits any mention of his voting rights cases (as of this writing). Shenkman’s path to law, and voting rights, are rather unconventional. Today, he lives in Malibu, one of the wealthiest communities in the state, whose population is over 90% white. But as he told the Talk of Santa Clarita podcast in January, he grew up in the Detroit area. There, he said, he was a “bad kid,” committing “the occasional little criminal misdemeanor kinda thing, maybe the occasional felony that I never got caught for. ” He had “some interaction with the justice system,” and formed a bond with his attorney, who inspired him to pursue a legal career. Shenkman graduated from Rice University with a B. S. in mechanical engineering (which he describes as “completely useless”) and went to Columbia Law School. He is married, with four daughters. He told Talk of Santa Clarita that if he were still practicing patent law, “I would have shot myself by now,” calling it “ boring. ” Shenkman’s Facebook profile photo is an image of a giant metal fist: the Joe Louis monument in Detroit, Michigan. (His cover photo is the same image: “Fuck your FB rules,” he explains in a comment to a relative.) His timeline features a photograph of Trayvon Martin, the black teenager who was killed while fighting neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman in Florida in 2012, who was later acquitted. He is a Democrat, and gave $1375 to the Los Angeles County Democratic Central Committee in 2014, according to the Federal Elections Commission. He has also contributed to Democrats at the state and local levels, according to the California Secretary of State. The public record also suggests that Shenkman has had a colorful career as a plaintiff’s attorney, filing class action suits on behalf of consumers — and sometimes acting as the plaintiff himself. Currently, Shenkman and his law partner are plaintiffs in a class action suit filed last year against AutoZone, claiming that the auto parts dealer had not informed them that it was changing its rewards program so that a $20 credit on purchases over $20 would expire after one year. In 2014, he represented consumers in successful class action claims against restaurant chains that falsely advertised Kobe beef during a period when Japanese beef imports were banned. In 2011, Shenkman personally filed a consumer class action suit against Chipotle Mexican Grill, claiming that employees had misled him into believing the restaurant’s pinto beans were vegetarian, when they are actually made with bacon. In his lawsuit, he cited his vegetarianism and Jewish faith (though Jewish dietary laws, which require that food be certified kosher by a rabbi, would not have permitted him to eat at Chipotle at all). That case was dismissed in 2015, more than four years later, according to court documents. He also reportedly sued the Chinese chain Panda Express, claiming it failed to disclose that it adds chicken powder to its vegetarian entrees. That same year, he was the plaintiff — identified as an “avid runner” in media reports — in class action suits filed against coconut water companies Vita Coco and One World Enterprises, claiming they had exaggerated the hydration benefits of their products. Both cases were dismissed court documents indicate that he accepted a token settlement of $2, 000 in the Vida Coco case as part of a related nationwide class action settlement. Following those adventures in consumer litigation, Shenkman found a new issue to litigate: minority voting rights. Specifically, Shenkman turned his attention to the CVRA, a law signed in 2002 by Democratic Governor Gray Davis — who was later recalled by the California electorate — that made it easy for activists to sue towns, school boards, and other local government bodies with voting. In addition, the CVRA allows plaintiffs to “prove” that “racially polarized voting occurs” simply by showing that a member of a minority group might have won an election if not for being outvoted by members of the majority (usually white). The CVRA is a law with a contentious history. Over a decade ago, in the Sanchez v. City of Modesto case, a state court found the CVRA unconstitutional. But that ruling was overturned on appeal in 2006, and the U. S. Supreme Court declined to take up the case, keeping the law intact. Among other questionable provisions, the CVRA includes incentives for lawyers to sue by allowing successful plaintiff’s attorneys to recover their fees from the defendants, while preventing successful defendants from doing the same. For activist groups and ambitious lawyers, the CVRA is a scheme but for local governments, it is a scenario. They must pay their own legal fees, win or lose, and if they lose they must also pay the legal costs — often exorbitant — of the other side. For the first several years that the CVRA was in force, just two attorneys made “all of the roughly $4. 3 million” that resulted from settlements under the law, according to the Associated Press. Those two attorneys just happened to be the two lawyers who drafted the law, including San civil rights lawyer Robert Rubin. At some point, Shenkman apparently recognized the political and financial opportunity that the CVRA presented in Southern California. “Like everything else, it just fell on me,” he told Talk of Santa Clarita, recalling an early conversation with Antelope Valley Democratic Party activist Darren Parker. In 2012, Shenkman began suing cities and school districts throughout the region — most notably the city of Palmdale, which was likely seen as an easy target because of its population are minorities, while its city council is largely white. Palmdale fought back, and the subsequent court fight set the template for other confrontations between Shenkman and his targets. At first, the city was defiant, fighting Shenkman in court and holding elections that a judge later declared were illegal. In the end, however, after being worn down by years of litigation and appeals, Palmdale agreed to a settlement that required it to pay $4. 5 million. (Curiously, one of the plaintiffs’ other lawyers was R. Rex Parris, the mayor of the neighboring city of Lancaster, which still uses the election system.) Since the Palmdale case, Shenkman told Voice of OC last year, he has been inundated with calls from potential plaintiffs. Some of Shenkman’s potential plaintiffs are local politicians. He told Voice of OC that he also works with the Southwest Voter Registration and Education Project, a Latino organization (with a Los Angeles office) which he reportedly represented in at least one case. Shenkman uses the Palmdale case to push other cities into immediate compliance. In his letter to Oceanside, for example, he wrote: “As you may be aware, in 2012, we sued the City of Palmdale for violating the CVRA. After an trial, we prevailed. After spending millions of dollars, a remedy was ultimately imposed on the Palmdale city council, with districts that combine all incumbents into one of the four districts. ” Shenkman and his supporters argue that districts increase the chance that minority candidates will win elections, presuming people vote as racial blocs. Shenkman told Talk of Santa Clarita that the system had been created in the early 20th century to “freeze out” minorities. elections, according to Shenkman and to the few advocates who spoke in favor of districts at the Oceanside city council meeting, are also theoretically less expensive, lowering the barrier to entry for candidates. And with fewer constituents per public official, districts might allow more direct interaction between local voters and their elected representatives. (In Santa Clarita, Shenkman pushed for cumulative voting, in which voters can vote more than once for their preferred candidates, telling Talk of Santa Clarita that the system would be more likely than districts to elect Latinos to the city council.) Many residents, however, seem to prefer the system. One reason, frequently cited by the opponents of Oceanside’s proposed district system, is that every single member of a local government body under an system is accountable to each voter. Some, like Hans von Spakovsky of the Heritage Foundation, also argue that small communities share too much in common to be divided politically in ways that encourage politicians to favor their local neighborhoods over others. And many communities reject the idea that they are racist — or that they use “bloc voting” to exclude minorities, as Shenkman alleges. They also dislike the drawing of districts using racial criteria, arguing it creates new divisions in the community — a frequent refrain among the opponents in Oceanside. More than the particular form of government, what many communities resent is the way they are being compelled to accept districts — through legal threats and accusations of racism. Oceanside Councilmember Jack Feller, who voted against the new system, told the Los Angeles Times that he felt “disgusted … that this is being forced on us. ” If Palmdale was an attractive target, Oceanside was a poor one. Just over a third of its residents are Latino, and there has been at least one Hispanic representative on the city council for the last two decades. At the council meeting on Wednesday evening, many of the most vociferous opponents of the new plan were Hispanic. But the Palmdale case loomed large in the minds of the council members, who voted — narrowly — to surrender. Gonzales, the candidate whose name Shenkman used in his letter to the city, told Breitbart News that she felt he had exploited her for his own purposes. She said that she had reached Shenkman by telephone, and found him rude, until she explained who she was. At that point, she said, he expressed sympathy for her recent election loss. She told him she had lost because she was running against veteran incumbents, not because of racism. “I told [Shenkman] that I agree we need to get more Latinos involved in the government, and in our democracy, and in our Constitution,” but without special districts, Gonzales recalled. “He didn’t want to talk to me after that. ” And she added: “They’re working against the people they’re trying to help. ” That is a common sentiment in the communities Shenkman has confronted. In Palmdale, when Shenkman sued to stop city council elections in 2013, the city accused him of “attempting to stop an election where at least one minority candidate is essentially guaranteed to win a seat on the City Council,” given the field of candidates. The city attorney opined that Shenkman’s legal team was “only interested in gouging the taxpayers to line their pockets. ” Shenkman later defended his payout to the Los Angeles Times: “We did very well on the Palmdale case. But people who criticized us don’t realize the enormous risk that we took. ” (It is not clear what “risk” Shenkman was referring to, since — as noted above — the CRVA does not allow successful defendants to recover costs. He told Voice of OC: “I was not paying my mortgage in order to pay the experts. And the court reporters’ fees, and other stuff. Hundreds of thousands of dollars in costs. ” Other lawyers, he said, might not have been “crazy enough” to try.) Shenkman also told Talk of Santa Clarita that he “embraced” the financial rewards of his voting rights cases, admitting that he posted a photograph of the check he received from Palmdale on his Facebook page with the caption: “Picture me rollin’ bitches. ” He has, at times, described his highly lucrative voting rights campaign in more idealistic, even terms. In a speech in 2013, he said: “Other people have introduced me as just being the bad guy. They call [me] the the ambulance chaser, some other names that are probably not even as nice as that. And all for seeking to allow racial and ethnic minorities … to have a say in their city governments, their school boards. ” He later admitted, however, to “extorting” local governments, in an interview with Voice of OC: “That’s all true … taking advantage of easy targets — yeah. There are a lot of easy targets, but they should change. If they change their election system, I wouldn’t need or have the opportunity to sue them. ” Since the Palmdale case, Shenkman has overturned election systems throughout Southern California, most of which had been in place for many decades, without complaint. The Orange County Register called the changes a “historic upheaval,” citing “dozens” of local agencies that had been forced to change from to district voting. Not even liberal cities are safe. Last year Shenkman sued the City of Santa Monica, which prides itself on its “progressive” politics, and which has a Latino mayor. Shenkman’s client in Santa Monica is Maria Loya, who has run unsuccessfully for local office. She is married to Oscar de la Torre, who claims he lost a race for city council in November 2016 because of the system. (De la Torre came sixth in a race where the top four won seats Mayor Tony Vazquez won the number of votes.) He is on the board of the Pico Neighborhood Association, which is also a plaintiff in the case. (In addition to Shenkman, one of the other lawyers for the plaintiffs is none other than CVRA Robert Rubin himself another is Mayor Parris of Lancaster, once again.) Shenkman told Talk of Santa Clarita that the Democrats on the Santa Monica city council are “hypocritical. ” He added: “[T]hey’re saying the same things” as the city of Palmdale . Last year, however, Shenkman’s lawsuit nearly derailed negotiations between Santa Monica and his home town of Malibu over the creation of a separate Malibu school district, something local activists in Malibu fervently desire. Initially, Shenkman was on Malibu’s negotiating team. But when Shenkman filed his lawsuit, without warning, Santa Monica cut off talks. “[T]his legal action could jeopardize our ability to move forward in a productive manner,” the school board president said in a press release, reported at the time by the Santa Monica Daily Press. A group called Advocates for Malibu Public Schools, which had initially joined Shenkman’s lawsuit as plaintiffs, withdrew from the case, and Shenkman resigned as a member of the negotiating team, saying his involvement had become a “distraction. ” Given Shenkman’s unsparing style, perhaps Santa Monica should not have been surprised. When voters in the San Fernando Valley town of Glendale rejected a district system by a margin in a 2015 referendum, Shenkman sued the school district. When the San Bernardino County town of Upland agreed to a settlement with Shenkman, which involved hiring demographers to draw districts that favored Latinos, they still had to pay legal fees. And when the Orange County city of Fullerton created districts, Shenkman went back to court to challenge the new boundaries. Shenkman has a brash style of speaking, and is not shy to express contempt for his legal and political opponents. On Talk of Santa Clarita, Shenkman referred disparagingly to local Latino politicians with whom he disagreed — in explicitly racial terms: “I don’t think very highly of the crowd in Santa Clarita who are Latino by name only,” he said, singling out Republican Assemblyman Dante Acosta ( ) as “one that comes to mind. ” Shenkman also made an astonishing allegation about a former State Senate candidate, Democrat Johnathon Ervin: Shenkman: And the Democrats that were up [for election] were horrible candidates. Daniels: Mmm. Shenkman: I mean, Johnathon Ervin is a horrible candidate. Daniels: Why do you say that? Shenkman: He’s got so many problems, man. First of all, the guy takes bribes, OK? Daniels: Ugh. Shenkman: You know — Daniels: Hey man, you’re a lawyer. I mean, don’t you at least want to say, “allegedly”? Shenkman: No. He added, later in the interview, that he had received death threats, and threats to his family, as a result of his work on voting rights. But he was undeterred, and said he has many requests from local activists to confront their cities. In discussing the cities he has taken on, Shenkman seems to adopt an imperious tone, confident that he can shape outcomes to his will. When asked by Daniels about whether Santa Clarita could avoid a lawsuit by appointing a Latino member to the council, he said that it would depend on whom they appointed: I think it very much depends on who they appoint. And right now, as the council stands, there are four white, conservative Republicans of a similar mind. And that is not what the City of Santa Clarita is. I would love to see the city council have the kind of maturity to appoint someone who does not share all of their views … Maybe the fifth person should bring some diversity of ideas. Shenkman also vowed on Talk of Santa Clarita to depose the current Santa Clarita city council — which he claimed was elected unlawfully — eventually: “Any time a city fights us to the bitter end, that’s the approach that we take. ” Ironically, Shenkman’s own town of Malibu has an election system — the very system Shenkman is destroying elsewhere — and an apparently city council. But not enough minorities live there: only 6. 1% of the population is Hispanic, and only 1. 2% is black. Ironically, that means the CVRA might not apply to Malibu. But perhaps the greatest irony is that for all of Shenkman’s legal work over the past five years, the new district systems are little better at electing minorities to office than the old systems. Last month, the Times observed: “A voting law meant to increase minority representation has generated many more lawsuits than seats for people of color. ” It added: “Of the 22 cities that have made the move to district elections since June [2016] only seven saw an overall gain in Latino council members. ” And the reasons for poor Latino representation had nothing to do with racism, the Times reported: A number of factors likely contributed to the low numbers, including historically low turnout by Latino voters and a lack of candidates with the means to run, experts said. Also, even in cities with large Latino populations, some residents can’t vote because they are too young, are here illegally or are not citizens. The threat of legal action has forced cities to switch to council districts, but in some cases the move hasn’t resulted in more minority representation because the city already is and drawing districts where minorities predominate is difficult. Shenkman told the Times that he had filed about ten lawsuits — and that, in the newspaper’s words, he “couldn’t remember how many warning letters he has sent to local governments. ” That campaign has upended local government in Southern California, and divided communities by race in ways that may linger for generations, but it has achieved almost nothing else — except making Kevin Shenkman richer. There are only two ways to stop Shenkman. One is to meet his challenge in court. Since 2013, the legal landscape has changed: the Supreme Court tossed part of the federal Voting Rights Act in 2013, in Shelby County v. Holder. In doing so, the Court emphasized the importance of evidence in determining whether there is racial discrimination in any particular jurisdiction. The Court could, theoretically, toss out the California Voting Rights Act for vagueness, since its evidentiary standards are so low that it allows virtually any candidate to challenge an election loss as racist. Given the wide impact of the CVRA across the state over the last few years, the Court might have also a greater interest in hearing a challenge than it did a decade ago. The confirmation of Justice Neil Gorsuch might also offer hope to defendants. But realistically, few local communities have the money to gamble on a Supreme Court win. That leaves one last recourse: the state legislature. The communities of Southern California could approach their elected representatives, Democrat and Republican, and ask them to amend the CVRA to require higher standards of proof of racism, or at least to remove the monetary incentives that reward lawyers like Shenkman for their exploits. On most issues, Democrats in Sacramento might not be inclined to listen to conservative cities in the Inland Empire or San Diego County. But Shenkman is pursuing liberal Santa Monica, too. There could be bipartisan interest in protecting local government from outside lawyers who can squeeze taxpayers with arguably frivolous lawsuits. Until then, Shenkman will keep going. As he said in 2013: “The law is the law. ” Shenkman did not reply to requests for comment. Joel B. Pollak is Senior at Breitbart News. He was named one of the “most influential” people in news media in 2016. He is the of How Trump Won: The Inside Story of a Revolution, is available from Regnery. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak. This article has been updated to include a reference to state and local campaign contributions. | 0fake |
'Grand slam!' Father-son film is smash hit for families | Print Gappers team photo from “Every Boy Needs a Hero”
Just in time for the start of the 2016 Major League Baseball World Series, WND Films has acquired the father-son baseball movie, “Every Boy Needs a Hero,” for immediate release on DVD.
“We’re confident that “Hero” is a grand-slam movie that will build up families across America and restore luster to the game,” said Joseph Farah, WND founder and CEO.
Starring Burgess Jenkins, of “Remember the Titans” and “Nashville,” and Gregory Alan Williams, of “Miracles from Heaven,” this award-winning movie brings the love of baseball to hearth and home. It also features a powerful music soundtrack by three-time Grammy winner Michael Omartian.
Get “Every Boy Needs a Hero” now at the WND Superstore! From the producers of “Alone Yet Not Alone,” the movie is a powerful tale of restoring and strengthening relationships between fathers and their children.
According to Dr. Ted Baehr, founder of Movieguide, “ ‘Hero’ is an excellent movie about God turning a man’s heart to his son and a son learning to forgive his father.”
Dr. Baehr added, “The opening is powerful. The ending is heartrending. The drama, the acting, the jeopardy work well throughout the whole movie. This is one of the few movies that Movieguide can actually say go see it.” Keith Harris and Nick Edwards as Wynn and Sammy Heller
“Hero” opens with Joe (played by Burgess Jenkins) coaching his son David’s baseball team, the Gappers, to the state championship. Seven years later, after pursuing his dream job, Joe returns to town. He had left to pursue fame and fortune to support the family. His wife, Hannah, is stricken with cancer, while David is angry that Joe left them. After Hannah’s funeral, Joe moves back into the house, but David remains bitter. Meanwhile, David is coaching the now hapless Gappers; the team loses more than it wins. Joe steps in to get other fathers involved with their sons and turn the team of losers into winners, hoping this gesture will help Joe reconcile with David. Unfortunately, the league rules have softened dramatically, making it nearly impossible to train the team properly: practice times are limited, coaches can’t make players take laps around the field, everyone gets a “participation” trophy. The beloved American pastime has become so boring that few parents show up for games, let alone practices. So, Joe starts his own league to turns things around.
From the director of “Isaiah 9:10 Judgment” and the producer of “Alone Not Yet Alone” comes “Hero,” a beautiful tale of the significance of the father-child relationship that’s and set around America’s pastime, baseball.
One of the fathers Joe pursues for the new league is the warden of the local prison, Mr. Redding (played by Gregory Alan Williams). Redding’s career mirrors that of Joe. He’s been offered a big job in Washington, D.C. Like Joe, he’s lured by fame and fortune at the expense of his relationship with his son and family. In contrast, another Gapper teammate has a father who’s actually a prison inmate under Redding. Unlike many of the absent fathers outside the prison walls, the inmate father has a great desire to practice baseball with his son, but he cannot due to prison rules. Justin Miles and Burgess Jenkins as David and Joe Finn in the film, “Every Boy Needs a Hero”
What makes “Hero” particularly compelling today is that it addresses the growing crisis of absentee fathers and its impact on baseball itself.
Watch the trailer:
Washington Times reporter Bradford Richardson wrote in his article, “Study blames absent fathers for decline in black baseball players,” that the Austin Institute, a Texas-based think tank focused on family and societal issues, has commissioned a study titled, “Called Out at Home,” which shows a correlation between the decline of black fatherhood and the drop in black participation in baseball.
From the director of “Isaiah 9:10 Judgment” and the producer of “Alone Not Yet Alone” comes “Hero,” a beautiful tale of the significance of the father-child relationship that’s and set around America’s pastime, baseball.
Richardson writes:
Kevin Stuart, executive director of the Austin Institute, said fathers are natural teachers of baseball because “it takes two to play catch.”
There is a “long-standing connection between fatherhood and baseball,” Mr. Stuart said, pointing to famous father-son tandems who have played in the Major Leagues and the prominence of father-son relationships in popular baseball movies such as “Field of Dreams.”
Baseball, he said, was made to be played by fathers and sons.
“Baseball seems to fall somewhere in the middle, where what’s really necessary, or what appears to us to be necessary in order to really improve skills, is at least one other person deeply and personally committed on a regular basis to working with you,” Mr. Stuart said.
Anecdotal evidence seems to corroborate the study’s connection between fatherhood and baseball.
Famous father-son tandems – including Ken Griffey Sr. and Ken Griffey Jr., Prince Fielder and Cecil Fielder, and Tony Gwynn Sr. and Tony Gwynn Jr. – have talked about how the game was handed down from one generation to the next.
“Hero” received a powerful endorsement from renowned Christian author Stormie Omartian:
“For such a time as this, ‘Hero’ is an important movie about the estranged relationship between a father and his son, who learn how to reconcile using faith and baseball,” Farah said.
Baehr concluded, “‘Hero’ is a wonderful, faith-filled sports drama. It will touch your heart, your mind and your soul.” Gapper team dads from the film, “Every Boy Needs a Hero” | 1real |
Sesame Seeds for Knee Osteoarthritis | Sesame Seeds for Knee Osteoarthritis VN:F [1.9.22_1171] Close Transcript Transcript: Sesame Seeds for Knee Osteoarthritis
Below is an approximation of this video’s audio content. To see any graphs, charts, graphics, images, and quotes to which Dr. Greger may be referring, watch the above video.
Ever since the 1920s, doctors have been injecting arthritis patients with gold. Evidently, “gold-based medicines have been in use for thousands of years,” and remarkably, are still in clinical use as so called disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs—meaning they can slow the progression of rheumatoid arthritis.
Unfortunately, such drugs can be toxic, even fatal, causing conditions such as gold lung, a gold-induced lung disease. “Although its use can be limited by the incidence of serious toxicity,” injectable gold has been shown to be beneficial. But maybe, some researchers suspected, some of that benefit is the sesame oil that’s injected, which is used as the liquid carrier for the gold.
Sesame seeds contain anti-inflammatory compounds, with names like sesamin and sesamol, which researchers suspect “may serve as a potential treatment for various inflammatory diseases.” But, these were in vitro studies. First, we have to see if it has an anti-inflammatory effect in people, not just cells in a petri dish. But, there haven’t been any studies on the effects of sesame seeds on inflammatory markers in people with arthritis, for example—until now.
“Considering the high prevalence of osteoarthritis…and since until now there has not been any human studies to evaluate the effect of sesame in [osteoarthritis] patients, this study was designed to assess the effect of administration of sesame [seeds] on inflammation…” And, they found a significant drop in inflammatory markers. But, what effect did it have on their actual disease?
Fifty patients with osteoarthritis of the knee were split into two groups; standard treatment, or standard treatment plus about a quarter-cup of sesame seeds a day, for two months. Before they started, they described their pain as about 9 out of 10—where zero is no pain, and 10 is the maximum pain tolerable. After two months, the control group felt a little better—pain down to 7. But, the sesame group dropped down to 3.5—significantly lower than the control group.
The researchers conclude that sesame appeared to have a “positive effect,”“improving clinical signs and symptoms in patients with knee [osteoarthritis].” But, the main problem with this study is that the control group wasn’t given a placebo. It’s hard to come up with a kind of fake sesame seed. But, without a placebo, they basically compared doing nothing to doing something. And, any time you have patients do something special, you can’t discount the placebo effect.
But, what are the downsides? I mean that’s the nice thing about using food as medicine—only good side effects. Though the results are mixed, there have been studies using placebo controls that found that adding sesame seeds to one’s diet may improve our cholesterol and antioxidant status. And, the amount of sesamin found in as little as about one tablespoon of sesame seeds can modestly lower blood pressure a few points within a month—enough, perhaps, to lower fatal stroke and heart attack risk by about 5%; potentially saving thousands of lives. Please consider volunteering to help out on the site. Close Sources Video Sources | 1real |
Obama To U.S.Military On Putin: “he did not take my warnings” On Syria…Encourages Russians To “get a little smarter” | Sarah Palin can hear Putin s knees knocking from her front porch President Obama addressed news that Russian President Vladimir Putin was sending Russian military advisers into Syria to bolster the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad.Obama explained during a town hall event with members of the military that he warned Putin years ago not to support the tyrannical dictator. I remember a conversation I had with Mr. Putin four or five years ago where I told him that was a mistake he did not take my warnings and as a consequence things have gotten worse, he said.Obama said historically, Russia provided a lot of financial support to Assad and sold Syria weapons, even as the dictator continued to alienate his regime from the people. The bad news is that Russia continues to believe that Assad, who is their traditional partner, is somebody that is worthy of continuing support, Obama said.Obama acknowledged that Putin was now sending more military advisers to Assad as well as more military equipment. The strategy that they re pursuing now by doubling down with Assad, I think is a big mistake, he said. You can t continue to double down on a strategy that is doomed to failure. Obama said that the United States would continue talking with Russia to convince them that their actions were bad for Syria. He signaled that diplomacy was the primary vehicle for restoring order in Syria, encouraging the Russians to get a little smarter. They are threatened in may ways more than we are by ISIL. They ve got a large Muslim populations that historically have caused a lot of problems inside of Russian, he said.Via: Breitbart News | 1real |
G.O.P. Lawmakers Like What They See in Trump. They Just Have to Squint. - The New York Times | WASHINGTON — Republican congressional aides have set their iPhones to flutter every time President Trump hurls a thunderbolt on Twitter. Senators nod politely at his false claims of mass voter fraud during private White House meetings. The congressional morning briefing literature now includes a rundown of overnight and social media missives from the commander in chief. “It doesn’t take that long to read ’em,” said Senator Bob Corker, Republican of Tennessee. After three weeks in the White House, Mr. Trump has made clear that he is going to continue promulgating conspiracy theories, flinging personal insults and saying things that are plainly untrue. And the House and Senate seem to have made a collective decision: They will accommodate — not confront — his conduct as long as he signs their conservative proposals on taxes, regulations and health care into law. “There’s a widely held view among our members that, yes, he’s going to say things on a daily basis that we’re not going to like,” said Senator John Thune of South Dakota, the Senate Republican, “but that the broad legislative agenda and goals that we have — if we can stay focused on those and try and get that stuff enacted — those would be big wins. ” Such accommodation is coming at a price, attracting incredulous or angry constituents to town hall meetings, leaving members when presented with the latest presidential provocation and testing the capacity of now perpetually clogged phone lines on Capitol Hill. Some of this would have happened under any Republican president — lawmakers were quick to note the ferocity of protests under President George W. Bush. But much of it is unique to Mr. Trump, whose rampaging presidency has spurred uncommon civic engagement even in districts. “What is your line in the sand?” a retired Utah teacher demanded last week of Representative Jason Chaffetz, the Republican chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, who slogged through a forum back home. But at least for now, that is a price Republicans seem willing to pay. In effect, congressional Republicans have sought to compartmentalize Mr. Trump’s presidency, adopting a approach. They reach for the more appealing offerings, such as the Supreme Court nominee, Judge Neil M. Gorsuch, and avert their gaze from less appetizing or, to some, downright indefensible elements (America is not so different from Vladimir V. Putin’s Russia) which would have surely drawn relentless rebukes if uttered by President Barack Obama. Some lawmakers take comfort knowing that the president’s behavior last year didn’t hurt their campaigns, and they have used the electoral result as a justification unto itself, suggesting — as Mr. Trump has constantly — that his campaign success validates his approach. “He’s a unique personality, to be sure,” acknowledged Senator John Cornyn of Texas, the Republican whip. “But he’s gotten this far the way he is, and I think that probably leads him to think, well, it’s working for him so far, so why change?” And Republican lawmakers do not mind? “As long as we’re able to get things done,” Mr. Cornyn said. Individual Republican senators have criticized the president in mostly isolated cases, none more vocally than Senator John McCain of Arizona, who blasted the president’s comparison between Mr. Putin’s extrajudicial killings and American conduct, and recently expressed concerns about a military raid in Yemen that resulted in the death of an American commando and multiple civilians. Often, the president has taken note — in brushback pitches that serve as warnings, if not to Mr. McCain, then to lawmakers who might emulate him. “He’s been losing so long he doesn’t know how to win anymore,” Mr. Trump wrote of Mr. McCain on Twitter on Thursday morning, calling to mind Mr. Trump’s suggestion during the campaign that Mr. McCain was not a war hero because he had been captured in combat. Hours later, Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader, went to the Senate floor and lamented the attacks on Mr. McCain and other Republicans. Senator Orrin G. Hatch, Republican of Utah, then followed — and seemed far less bothered. “I personally wish he would choose his words a little more carefully,” Mr. Hatch said of the president. “On the other hand, I kind of find him refreshing, that he doesn’t take any guff from anybody. ” Privately, lawmakers and members of their staffs have pleaded with Mr. Trump’s inner circle for more discipline from the president and his White House. “We might talk to the vice president, but certainly not for public attribution,” Mr. Cornyn said of Vice President Mike Pence, who joins Senate Republicans once a week at their regular luncheons in the Capitol. By and large, though, Republicans in Congress are treating Mr. Trump as an individual to be worked around in his own administration. “I think we can get a lot done with the people around him,” Mr. McCain said, dismissing policy pronouncements from Mr. Trump that often differ from “the day before. ” Practically patting Mr. Trump on the head, Senator Lamar Alexander, Republican of Tennessee, said, “If he pays attention to people like General Kelly when he’s doing a travel restriction and if he appoints people like Neil Gorsuch when he’s making appointments, he’ll be rewarded for that by all the praise, and maybe he’ll do more of it. ” (Former Gen. John F. Kelly is the Homeland Security secretary.) In hopes of repairing their relationship with Congress after the botched rollout of the travel ban, Mr. Trump’s aides have aggressively courted congressional Republicans. In addition to Mr. Pence with his weekly visits, Marc Short, Mr. Trump’s chief legislative liaison, has already become ubiquitous in the Capitol. And powerful senators are enjoying significant attention: Mr. McCain, the Armed Services Committee chairman, said he had already had three conversations with Michael T. Flynn, the national security adviser, and a breakfast with Jim Mattis, the defense secretary. Mr. Hatch, who is chairman of the Finance Committee, had a meeting with Mr. Trump in the White House. And Mr. Alexander, the chairman of the health and education panel, was invited to the White House last Thursday for lunch with Mr. Trump. Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, said there was “a high level of satisfaction” with the new White House, insisting that members cared little about “the daily tweets. ” The deflection is bicameral. When a reporter recently noted that the House speaker, Paul D. Ryan, had often declined to weigh in on the “tweet of the day,” Mr. Ryan lit up. “You got my talking points down already!” he said, before gently fielding a question about Mr. Trump’s attacks on the federal judge who halted his travel ban. “Look, he’s not the first president to get frustrated with a ruling from a court,” Mr. Ryan said with a shrug. While the détente between an president and its leaders on Capitol Hill may seem wholly transactional, some Republicans say the fury on the left toward Mr. Trump along with the denunciations from many news outlets has helped forge his bond with the voters that he and congressional Republicans share, particularly in the House. When the president addressed congressional Republicans at their retreat in Philadelphia last month, Mr. Trump’s aside about news coverage — “nothing fair about the media,” he said with a sneer — earned perhaps the most enthusiastic applause. “While it may upset The New York Times, Hollywood, the cast of ‘Hamilton’ and the groups marching in the streets, it is not upsetting to the constituents that elected these members and senators,” Sam Geduldig, a Republican lobbyist, said of Mr. Trump’s behavior. “There is a feeling that if those groups are against you, you’re doing the right thing. ” More skeptical Republicans believe that lawmakers are deluding themselves if they treat Mr. Trump as a normal president — quirky but tolerable, like a colorful uncle at Thanksgiving dinner. “They’re mostly ignoring him, humoring him occasionally while the rest of the family gets along fine, enjoys the turkey and watches the game,” said William Kristol, the former editor of The Weekly Standard. “But he’s not just a bit player or a guest. He’s the president. ” And in the Capitol, he can never be ignored for long. Strolling to a meeting last week, Mr. Corker was asked about the latest Trump controversy: The president had just attacked the retailer Nordstrom for dropping his daughter Ivanka’s accessories and clothing line. The senator flashed a broad smile. “Did he really?” he asked. | 0fake |
Nikki Haley Gets Crucified On Twitter After Bragging About Shameful Act | Donald Trump and the people in his administration have precious little to brag about nowadays, but you can t manage to convince them of this fact. The proof is in the pudding, so they say or in this case, in the tweets.Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina who Trump decided to promote to United Nations ambassador, took to Twitter on Wednesday to boast about something that is downright shameful: stripping half a billion dollars from the U.N. s peacekeeping budget. Just 5 months into our time here, we ve cut over half a billion $$$ from the UN peacekeeping budget & we re only getting started. pic.twitter.com/LA7IKqupff Nikki Haley (@nikkihaley) June 29, 2017Twitter was quick to let her know that this is nothing to brag about and that she probably should have kept her mouth shut.Yeah, who needs peacekeeping, anyway? Only liberal snowflakes care about preventing genocides and atrocities and human rights violations. Charles Johnson (@Green_Footballs) June 29, 2017I forget, which book has the part where Jesus says ignore others who need help so you can give a tax break to the wealthy ? Greg (@gwiss) June 29, 2017Blessed are the peacemakers, unless they cost @nikkihaley money in her quest to destroy the UN. Anita Creamer (@AnitaCreamer) June 29, 2017And this is something to be PROUD about?? Alp Ozcelik (@alplicable) June 29, 2017What the HELL is wrong with u??? Willie Garson (@WillieGarson) June 29, 2017Who needs peace anyway?! taylor nicholson (@taybytheway) June 29, 2017I have checked five times to see if this was a parody account. Kibblesmith (@kibblesmith) June 29, 2017Why is that something you d ever brag about? David Pepper (@DavidPepper) June 29, 2017No wonder you were booed.JFC, have you no shame, woman? What values do you have? Certainly not liberty and justice for all. Jessica ? (@NoFascistsPls) June 29, 2017To brag about cutting funding for PEACE KEEPING EFFORTS is horrific.You are truly unAmerican Jessica ? (@NoFascistsPls) June 29, 2017I can t believe how many morally treasonous people there are in the trump administration. And people support this shit. It is a disgrace Jessica ? (@NoFascistsPls) June 29, 2017Sweet. Let me know how the world instability and mass genocide translates to America s jobs, healthcare, and standing in the world. ? Marcia Gaines (@gainesm) June 29, 2017?Peace, huh, good god What is it good for Absolutely nothing Say it again ? Mark Zohar (@markzohar) June 29, 2017Today s sign of the apocalypse Dylan? (@dylanparks) June 29, 2017Or: You thought we already hated peace? You ain t seen nothing yet. Oreo (@OreoDCW) June 29, 2017.@nikkihaley Girl, I went to Vacation Bible School, and this statement would earn you one hot Jesus F. Ana Gasteyer (@AnaGasteyer) June 29, 2017pic.twitter.com/IRerzI17fn Meg Yarbrough (@meg_yarbrough) June 29, 2017Seriously, what kind of person thinks stripping funds from peacekeeping is a good thing? There is something very wrong anybody who can boast about something like this.Featured image via Twitter | 1real |
(VIDEO)ICE PROTECTING OBAMA: WON’T RELEASE NAMES OF CRIMINAL ILLEGALS RELEASED INTO AMERICA | 1real | |
Report Rebuts Russia’s Claims of Restraint in Syrian Bombing Campaign - The New York Times | WASHINGTON — Russian military officials have vociferously denied that their airstrikes have killed civilians in Syria, going so far as to say that eyewitness accounts that a major hospital was bombed last year in the brutal fight to retake Aleppo were mere fabrications. But a new analysis that draws on satellite images, security camera videos, social media and even footage from the Russian television network has challenged Moscow’s claims that its airstrikes on behalf of the Syrian military were an exercise in prudent restraint. The analysis shows that the hospital, contrary to claims by a Russian general, was bombed multiple times. It indicates that Russian aircraft used incendiary munitions and cluster bombs, despite the Kremlin’s denials, and concludes that Syrian forces used chlorine gas on a far greater scale than is commonly believed. The analysis is presented in a report, “Breaking Aleppo,” which is to be made public on Monday by the Atlantic Council, a policy research center. The report comes as President Trump has signaled an interest in forging better connections with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, which could include working more closely with the Russian military in Syria. “Throughout the entire length of the battle for Aleppo, there have been multiple claims of violations of human rights and multiple denials,” said Eliot Higgins, a senior fellow at the Digital Forensic Research Lab of the Atlantic Council. “What we have been able to present now is a wealth of evidence confirming the targeting of civilian structures, namely hospitals, which in certain cases has been denied by the Russian Ministry of Defense,” he added. “We have been able to confirm the use in civilian areas of a variety of indiscriminate weapons. ” Syrian forces, backed by Hezbollah fighters, Iran’s paramilitary Quds Force and Russian air power, took Aleppo in late December. The capture of the city was an important milestone that gave the government of President Bashar control over all of Syria’s major cities and strengthened Moscow’s hand in discussions over the country’s future. But while the Atlantic Council report acknowledges that his victory in Aleppo has solidified Mr. Assad’s hold on power, at least for now, it argues that the ruthless strategy and tactics used by the Syrian and Russian governments would make the Syrian president “a poor if not harmful partner” in efforts to defeat the Islamic State and other extremist groups. Experts at the Atlantic Council have long urged the United States to do more to protect civilians in Syria and support the moderate opposition. In the report, the group employs hard evidence, including satellite images from DigitalGlobe, a commercial satellite company, fresh accounts from Syrian activists on the ground and photography published by Russia’s Defense Ministry. Much of the analysis of the photos and social media was done by Mr. Higgins, a researcher who founded the investigative website bellingcat. com. A reconstruction of one key episode — the July 16 bombing of another hospital, known as M2, in the Maadi district — was carried out by Forensic Architecture, a research organization at Goldsmiths, University of London, which was asked to take an independent look at the video and photographic evidence of the bombing. Aleppo was divided in July 2012 between and areas. With the support of Russia, the Assad government began a major offensive in September of last year to take the city. Fragile and temporary were used by the Syrians and their allies to prepare fresh offensives, which, despite Russian and Syrian denials, often targeted civilian areas. One claim that the Atlantic Council report challenges was issued by Lt. Gen. Sergei F. Rudskoi, the head of the operations directorate of the Russian general staff, who insisted in October that no damage had been done to the hospital in a Russian bombing raid. To buttress his case, General Rudskoi displayed satellite photos that he said had been taken between Sept. 24 and Oct. 11. Eyewitness accounts to the contrary, he added, were “mere fakes. ” But a comparison of DigitalGlobe satellite photos taken on Sept. 25 and Oct. 13, the Atlantic Council report notes, shows the emergence of a large bomb crater near the hospital, also known as M10, and damage to the hospital building. Security camera videos from inside the hospital offer corroborating evidence of an Oct. 3 attack, as does a photo from the street by a local resident. The report concludes that there were several reasons to think the attacks on the medical centers were deliberate, including the large number of strikes, the Assad government’s knowledge of the terrain, and the Syrian government’s practice of confiscating medical supplies from humanitarian aid convoys. The M2 hospital was damaged by air and artillery strikes at least a dozen times between June and December. Other photographic evidence points to the use of incendiary munitions and cluster bombs. The television channel, Russia Today, provided some of the evidence in video footage it showed in June that had been taken at a Russian air base near Latakia, Syria. (The version of the report that was later uploaded to YouTube deleted the images of the weapons being mounted on a Russian warplane.) When a Russian team later entered eastern Aleppo to clear away unexploded ordnance, a photograph published by the Russian Defense Ministry showed the remains of cluster bombs, the Atlantic Council report notes. A variety of reports from victims and video on YouTube indicate that Syrian government attacks with chlorine gas increased in the final phase of the battle for Aleppo. One video “showed a chlorine gas cylinder with its labels intact,” the report said. The use of chlorine bombs by the Syrian government, Mr. Higgins said, continued even after reports confirming their use were made by the United Nations and an international watchdog organization in The Hague that enforces the ban on the use of chemical agents in war. | 0fake |
Cosby And Trump Start Support Group For Wrongfully Accused Billionaires | Topics: Donald Trump , Bill Cosby , Sexual Assault , Roger Ailes , support groups , billionaire Monday, 31 October 2016 When translated Bill Cosby's shirt says: "If you can see this notice, you consent to unconscious butt sex."
Donald Trump, the man who heaped blistering criticism on Bill Cosby for drugging and raping women without a prenup, is now joining forces with the embattled comedian.
B.L.A.M., or Billionaire's Lives Also Matter, is the new support and counseling organization that has also become the latest vessel of reality denial for Donald Trump the former reality TV star.
Trump explained his turnaround on Bill Cosby and also the creation of the new support group when he talked to CNN's Jake Tapper last night.
"You know Bill was saying all along that these women were lying and just trying to find ways to sue or get money from him, and now I understand. Now that crooked Hillary and the rigged media have set these women up to falsely accuse me of sex--uh, kissing and touching them, it's really stressful for me, of course I can take it--and these women all of the sudden have lawyers and the press on their side, I mean they have more rights than the people they are wrongfully accusing, and meanwhile everybody says, 'Well Trump and Cosby are billionaires, maybe they did it, but their lives are so good and so what if some bimbo or old hag says they did this or that twenty five years ago.' But it never happened Jake, none of it, all lies."
The CNN Host and Anchorman Jake Tapper squinted in disbelief as Trump bellowed on.
"And so, Jake, that's why we need our own support group, because billionaire's lives do matter. People have no idea how it feels, what's happened to us--I mean they can't relate because most people aren't' billionaires.
Tapper followed up to Trump's incoherence, asking:
"Aren't you guys just avoiding culpability by denying the accusations of a hundred plus women between you and Cosby, and then creating a support group for the so called 'wrongfully accused?'"
"Excuse me, Excuse me Jake," Trump started before Tapper even finished. "People are always talking about how the victims have to be heard and treated with kid gloves, well what about us? We're victims--and I can't even describe how it felt to hear Bill and Roger [Ailes] tell their stories, and I thought 'Oh my God, that's my story' and if I had a heart, I would have cried then, but my shallowest reaction instead was to try and monetize the situation, and so the first meeting of B.L.A.M. will be a pilot for a new reality show by the same name."
The Spoof's own legal analysts say Donald Trump, Bill Cosby, and Roger Ailes would be exposing themselves to even more lawsuits if they were foolish enough to air Billionaires Lives Also Matter. It's also highly unlikely that Trump's former partner NBC would pick up such a show, some say Trump will air the show himself if there are no takers for B.L.A.M.
Could this be the start of Trump TV?
Bill Cosby later released a statement to the press that read, "The dingy doo in da dingy bop, dee boop dee boop dee doo doo, buh razbatax" Make XRhonda Speaks's day - give this story five thumbs-up (there's no need to register , the thumbs are just down there!) | 1real |
Despite flaws, paperless voting machines remain widespread in the U.S. | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - One in four registered voters in the United States live in areas that will use electronic voting machines that do not produce a paper backup in the November presidential election despite concerns that they are vulnerable to tampering and malfunctions, according to a Reuters analysis. The lack of a paper trail makes it impossible to independently verify that the aging touch-screen systems are accurate, security experts say, in a year when suspected Russian hackers have penetrated political groups and state voting systems and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has said the election may be “rigged.” Election officials insist the machines are reliable, but security experts say they are riddled with bugs and security holes that can result in votes being recorded incorrectly. A Reuters analysis of data from the U.S. Census Bureau, the Election Assistance Commission and the Verified Voting Foundation watchdog group found that 44 million registered voters, accounting for 25 percent of the total, live in jurisdictions that rely on paperless systems, including millions in contested states such as Georgia, Pennsylvania and Virginia. The picture has improved gradually since the 2008 presidential election, when 31 percent of U.S. voters lived in areas that used paperless touch-screen systems. In 2012, 27 percent lived in jurisdictions that used paperless systems. “Clearly we still have a long way to go to ensure that all Americans have access to a form of voting technology they can trust,” said Alex Halderman, a University of Michigan computer-science professor who has helped to uncover security flaws on touch-screen systems. (Graphic showing different types of voting systems across the U.S. -- tmsnrt.rs/2cZiKQ5) Most of these machines are nearing the end of their expected life span, making them more vulnerable to problems. And Congress has not authorized money for upgrades since 2002, just after the disputed 2000 presidential recount battle in Florida highlighted flaws in aging punch-card and lever-voting systems. In some states, a divide has emerged between poorer areas that continue to use paperless touch-screen systems and wealthier areas that have bought new optical scan systems that process paper ballots, which many experts say are a better way to ensure accurate elections. In Virginia, for example, counties that still use touch-screen systems have a poverty rate of 23 percent, while those that have switched to optical-scan systems have an average poverty rate of 11 percent. “I would have liked to have had the new machines, but the county says we don’t have the money,” said Patsy Burchett, the top election official in rural Lee County, which has been hit hard by the decline of the coal and tobacco industries and is the poorest county in the state. “These machines are on their last legs,” she said. U.S. election officials have known about the shortcomings of touch-screen systems since shortly after they were widely adopted in the early 2000s, when researchers showed that vote results could be manipulated with tools as simple as a magnet and a Palm Pilot-style handheld device. The systems have produced questionable results in some elections. In Florida, more than 18,000 iVotronic machines did not record a vote in a 2006 congressional race in which the margin of victory was less than 400 votes. In Fairfax County, Virginia, electronic machines subtracted one vote for every hundred cast for one candidate in a 2003 school-board race. More than 4,400 electronic ballots in Carteret County, North Carolina, were lost and never recovered in the 2004 presidential election. Since 2008, states such as Maryland have traded in their touch-screen machines for optical-scan systems. Others like California and Ohio have added printers to their touch-screen machines which produce a backup paper trail, while Washington and Colorado moved to mail-in ballots. Absentee balloting is also cutting into the use of paperless systems. In 2012, for example, roughly 1 in 10 voters who lived in areas that used paperless systems cast absentee ballots. Election officials say the touch-screen machines that remain in use are more secure now than they were a decade ago whether they are fitted with printers or not, thanks to extensive testing and better poll-worker training. They say that a hacking incident is unlikely because the machines are not connected to the Internet. “Voters should have confidence in whatever systems are being used in their jurisdiction because election officials have taken the necessary steps to secure these systems and ensure the integrity of the process,” said Matthew Masterson, a commissioner with the U.S. Election Assistance Commission. Although there has so far been no confirmed major incident of U.S. voting machines being hacked, security experts say that those aiming to manipulate votes could spread a virus through memory cards, with no Internet connection needed. The best way to stop that is to switch to paper-based systems, they say. With 55 percent of all U.S. registered voters living in areas that use systems that are no longer in production, according to the Reuters analysis, election officials must rely on a dwindling supply of spare parts. Virginia Beach, Virginia, for example, pulled 32 of its 820 Accuvote TSX touch-screen machines in a 2014 election after residents complained that the machines were registering votes for candidates they didn’t support. The city has since purchased a new optical-scan system. Lacking fresh federal funds, some states have opted to upgrade on their own. Louisiana aims to switch to an iPad-based system by 2019, while Los Angeles and Austin, Texas, are designing systems from scratch. Others see no reason to switch. In Georgia, Secretary of State Brian Kemp said he hasn’t asked the state legislature for money to replace its fleet of paperless AccuVote TS touch-screen machines. “It’s working just fine and all these so-called experts that are making these accusations about our system haven’t seen it,” he said. | 0fake |
FBI FILES REVEALED: VALERIE JARRETT’S FAMILY TIES TO COMMUNISM RUN DEEP | I m sure the apple doesn t fall far from the tree in this case. Many of us have known about the father-in-law but this digs deeper into Valerie Jarrett s own family. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) files obtained by Judicial Watch reveal that the dad, maternal grandpa and father-in-law of President Obama s trusted senior advisor, Valerie Jarrett, were hardcore Communists under investigation by the U.S. government.Jarrett s dad, pathologist and geneticist Dr. James Bowman, had extensive ties to Communist associations and individuals, his lengthy FBI file shows. In 1950 Bowman was in communication with a paid Soviet agent named Alfred Stern, who fled to Prague after getting charged with espionage. Bowman was also a member of a Communist-sympathizing group called the Association of Internes and Medical Students. After his discharge from the Army Medical Corps in 1955, Bowman moved to Iran to work, the FBI records show.According to Bowman s government file the Association of Internes and Medical Students is an organization that has long been a faithful follower of the Communist Party line and engages in un-American activities. Bowman was born in Washington D.C. and had deep ties to Chicago, where he often collaborated with fellow Communists. JW also obtained documents on Bowman from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) showing that the FBI was brought into investigate him for his membership in a group that follows the communist party line. The Jarrett family Communist ties also include a business partnership between Jarrett s maternal grandpa, Robert Rochon Taylor, and Stern, the Soviet agent associated with her dad.Jarrett s father-in-law, Vernon Jarrett, was also another big-time Chicago Communist, according to separate FBI files obtained by JW as part of a probe into the Jarrett family s Communist ties. For a period of time Vernon Jarrett appeared on the FBI s Security Index and was considered a potential Communist saboteur who was to be arrested in the event of a conflict with the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). His FBI file reveals that he was assigned to write propaganda for a Communist Party front group in Chicago that would disseminate the Communist Party line among the middle class. It s been well documented that Valerie Jarrett, a Chicago lawyer and longtime Obama confidant, is a liberal extremist who wields tremendous power in the White House. Faithful to her roots, she still has connections to many Communist and extremist groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood. Jarrett and her family also had strong ties to Frank Marshal Davis, a big Obama mentor and Communist Party member with an extensive FBI file.JW has exposed Valerie Jarrett s many transgressions over the years, including her role in covering up a scandalous gun-running operation carried out by the Department of Justice (DOJ). Last fall JW obtained public records that show Jarrett was a key player in the effort to cover up that Attorney General Eric Holder lied to Congress about the Fast and Furious, a disastrous experiment in which the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco Firearms and Explosives (ATF) allowed guns from the U.S. to be smuggled into Mexico so they could eventually be traced to drug cartels. Instead, federal law enforcement officers lost track of hundreds of weapons which have been used in an unknown number of crimes, including the murder of a U.S. Border Patrol agent in Arizona.In 2008 JW got documents linking Valerie Jarrett, who also served as co-chairman of Obama s presidential transition team, to a series of real estate scandals, including several housing projects operated by convicted felon and Obama fundraiser/friend Antoin Tony Rezko. According to the documents obtained from the Illinois Secretary of State, Valerie Jarrett served as a board member for several organizations that provided funding and support for Chicago slum projects operated by Tony Rezco.Via: Judicial Watch | 1real |
YES! JUDGE JEANINE HAMMERS Hollywood Lefty Rosie O’Donnell [Video] | 1real | |
Myanmar says bodies of 28 Hindu villagers found in Rakhine State | YANGON (Reuters) - Myanmar government forces found on Sunday the bodies of 28 Hindu villagers who authorities suspected were killed by Muslim insurgents last month, at the beginning of a spasm of violence that has sent 430,000 Muslim Rohingya fleeing to Bangladesh. The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) insurgent group denied killing the Hindus saying it did not attack civilians. The latest violence in western Myanmar s Rakhine State began on Aug. 25 when ARSA militants attacked about 30 police posts and an army camp, killing about 12 people. The United Nations has described as ethnic cleansing a sweeping government offensive in the north of Rakhine State in response to those attacks. The government of Buddhist-majority Myanmar has said more than 400 people have been killed, most of them insurgents. It rejects accusations of ethnic cleansing, saying it is fighting terrorists. Members of the small Hindu minority appear to have been caught in the middle. Some have fled to Bangladesh, complaining of violence against them by soldiers or Buddhist vigilantes. Others have complained of being attacked by the insurgents on suspicion of being government spies. The government said a search was mounted near Ye Baw Kya village in the north of Rakhine State after a refugee in Bangladesh contacted a Hindu community leader in Myanmar. The refugee said about 300 ARSA militants had marched about 100 people out of the village on Aug. 25 and killed them. Twenty of the dead were female and eight were male children, the government said. They forced eight female villagers to convert to the Islamic religion and took them to Bangladesh, the government said. A government spokesman, Zaw Htay, said the security forces were investigating. Access to the area by journalists as well as human rights workers and aid workers is largely restricted and Reuters could not independently verify the report. An ARSA spokesman said he believed Buddhist nationalists trying to divide Hindus and Muslims were behind the lies that ARSA militants had killed the villagers. ARSA has internationally pledged not to target civilians and that remains unchanged no matter what, the spokesman, who is based in a neighboring country and identified himself only as Abdullah, told Reuters through a messaging service. The violence in Rakhine State and the exodus of refugees is the biggest crisis the government of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi has faced since it came to power last year as part of a transition away from nearly 50 years of harsh military rule. Bangladesh and aid organizations are struggling to help the Rohingya refugees there, while aid agencies fear a humanitarian crisis is unfolding in the north of Rakhine State, where rights groups say nearly half of all Muslim villages have been torched. The United States and the United Nations have called for an end to the violence, unfettered humanitarian access to the conflict zone and for the right of those who have fled to go home safely. Suu Kyi has faced a barrage of international criticism for not speaking out more forcefully against the violence or doing more to rein in security forces over which she has little power. The chairman of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), of which Myanmar is a member, issued a statement urging all parties to avoid worsening the situation on the ground and calling for a viable and long-term solutions to the root causes of the conflict . Muslim-majority Indonesia and Malaysia have expressed concern about the situation, with Malaysia in particular being critical of Myanmar. In a rare show of disagreement in the 10-member grouping, Foreign Minister Anifah Aman later said Malaysia disassociated itself from the statement as it misrepresented the reality of the situation and did not identify the Rohingya as one of the affected communities. Myanmar objects to the term Rohingya, saying the Muslims of Rakhine State are not a distinct ethnic group but illegal immigrants from Bangladesh. This month, Malaysia summoned Myanmar s ambassador to express displeasure over the violence in Myanmar. It also expressed grave concerns over such atrocities which have unleashed a full-scale humanitarian crisis . | 0fake |
It Was the Rise of the Davos Class That Sealed Americas Fate : | It Was the Rise of the Davos Class That Sealed Americas Fate
Hillary Clintons embrace of neoliberalism was disastrous. The only answer now is to take on the billionaires
By Naomi Klein
November 10, 2016 " Information Clearing House " - " The Guardian " - They will blame James Comey and the FBI. They will blame voter suppression and racism. They will blame Bernie or bust and misogyny. They will blame third parties and independent candidates. They will blame the corporate media for giving him the platform, social media for being a bullhorn, and WikiLeaks for airing the laundry.
But this leaves out the force most responsible for creating the nightmare in which we now find ourselves wide awake: neoliberalism. That worldview fully embodied by Hillary Clinton and her machine is no match for Trump-style extremism. The decision to run one against the other is what sealed our fate. If we learn nothing else, can we please learn from that mistake?
Here is what we need to understand: a hell of a lot of people are in pain. Under neoliberal policies of deregulation, privatisation, austerity and corporate trade, their living standards have declined precipitously. They have lost jobs. They have lost pensions. They have lost much of the safety net that used to make these losses less frightening. They see a future for their kids even worse than their precarious present.
At the same time, they have witnessed the rise of the Davos class, a hyper-connected network of banking and tech billionaires, elected leaders who are awfully cosy with those interests, and Hollywood celebrities who make the whole thing seem unbearably glamorous. Success is a party to which they were not invited, and they know in their hearts that this rising wealth and power is somehow directly connected to their growing debts and powerlessness.
For the people who saw security and status as their birthright and that means white men most of all these losses are unbearable.
Donald Trump speaks directly to that pain. The Brexit campaign spoke to that pain. So do all of the rising far-right parties in Europe. They answer it with nostalgic nationalism and anger at remote economic bureaucracies whether Washington, the North American free trade agreement the World Trade Organisation or the EU. And of course, they answer it by bashing immigrants and people of colour, vilifying Muslims, and degrading women. Elite neoliberalism has nothing to offer that pain, because neoliberalism unleashed the Davos class. People such as Hillary and Bill Clinton are the toast of the Davos party. In truth, they threw the party.
Trumps message was: All is hell. Clinton answered: All is well. But its not well far from it.
Neo-fascist responses to rampant insecurity and inequality are not going to go away. But what we know from the 1930s is that what it takes to do battle with fascism is a real left. A good chunk of Trumps support could be peeled away if there were a genuine redistributive agenda on the table. An agenda to take on the billionaire class with more than rhetoric, and use the money for a green new deal. Such a plan could create a tidal wave of well-paying unionised jobs, bring badly needed resources and opportunities to communities of colour, and insist that polluters should pay for workers to be retrained and fully included in this future. It could fashion policies that fight institutionalised racism, economic inequality and climate change at the same time. It could take on bad trade deals and police violence, and honour indigenous people as the original protectors of the land, water and air.
People have a right to be angry, and a powerful, intersectional left agenda can direct that anger where it belongs, while fighting for holistic solutions that will bring a frayed society together.
Such a coalition is possible. In Canada, we have begun to cobble it together under the banner of a peoples agenda called The Leap Manifesto , endorsed by more than 220 organisations from Greenpeace Canada to Black Lives Matter Toronto, and some of our largest trade unions.
Bernie Sanders amazing campaign went a long way towards building this sort of coalition, and demonstrated that the appetite for democratic socialism is out there. But early on, there was a failure in the campaign to connect with older black and Latino voters who are the demographic most abused by our current economic model. That failure prevented the campaign from reaching its full potential. Those mistakes can be corrected and a bold, transformative coalition is there to be built on.
That is the task ahead. The Democratic party needs to be either decisively wrested from pro-corporate neoliberals, or it needs to be abandoned. From Elizabeth Warren to Nina Turner, to the Occupy alumni who took the Bernie campaign supernova, there is a stronger field of coalition-inspiring progressive leaders out there than at any point in my lifetime. We are leaderful, as many in the Movement for Black Lives say.
So lets get out of shock as fast as we can and build the kind of radical movement that has a genuine answer to the hate and fear represented by the Trumps of this world. Lets set aside whatever is keeping us apart and start right now.
Naomi Klein is the author of This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs the Climate . She tweets @NaomiAKlein | 1real |
A Week of Whoppers From Donald Trump
| All politicians bend the truth to fit their purposes, including Hillary Clinton. But Donald J. Trump has unleashed a blizzard of falsehoods, exaggerations and outright lies in the general election, peppering his speeches, interviews and Twitter posts with untruths so frequent that they can seem flighty or random even compulsive.
However, a closer examination, over the course of a week, revealed an unmistakable pattern: Virtually all of Mr. Trumps falsehoods directly bolstered a powerful and self-aggrandizing narrative depicting him as a heroic savior for a nation menaced from every direction. Mike Murphy, a Republican strategist, described the practice as creating an unreality bubble that he surrounds himself with.
The New York Times closely tracked Mr. Trumps public statements from Sept. 15-21, and assembled a list of his 31 biggest whoppers, many of them uttered repeatedly. This total excludes dozens more: Untruths that appeared to be mere hyperbole or humor, or delivered purely for effect, or what could generously be called rounding errors. Mr. Trumps campaign, which dismissed this compilation as silly, offered responses on every point, but in none of the following instances did the responses support his assertions.
Tall Tales About Himself
Mr. Trumps version of reality allows for few, if any, flaws in himself. As he tells it, the polls are always looking up, his policy solutions are painless and simple and his judgment regarding politics and people has been consistent and flawless. The most consistent falsehood he tells about himself may be that he opposed the war in Iraq from the start, when the evidence shows otherwise.
1He said a supportive crowd chanted, Let him speak! when a black pastor in Flint, Mich., asked Mr. Trump not to give a political speech in the church.
FOX NEWS INTERVIEW, SEPT. 15.
There were no such chants.
2I was against going into the war in Iraq.
SPEECH IN FLORIDA, SEPT. 19.
This is not getting any truer with repetition. He never publicly expressed opposition to the war before it began, and he made supportive remarks to Howard Stern.
3He said any supportive comments he made about the Iraq war came long before the war began.
FOX NEWS INTERVIEW, SEPT. 18.
He expressed support for the war in September 2002, when Congress was debating whether to authorize military action.
4He said he had publicly opposed the Iraq war in an Esquire interview pretty quickly after the war started.
FOX NEWS INTERVIEW, SEPT. 18.
The Esquire interview appeared in the August 2004 edition, 17 months after the war began.
5Before the Iraq invasion, he said, he had told the Fox News anchor Neil Cavuto something pretty close to: Dont go in, and dont make the mistake of going in.
FOX NEWS INTERVIEW, SEPT. 18.
Not remotely close. He told Mr. Cavuto that President George W. Bush had to take decisive action.
6He said that when Howard Stern asked him about Iraq in 2002, it was the first time the word Iraq was ever mentioned to me.
FOX NEWS INTERVIEW, SEPT. 18.
Mr. Trump expressed alarm about Saddam Hussein and the situation in Iraq in 2000 in his own book.
7You see whats happening with my poll numbers with African-Americans. Theyre going, like, high.
SPEECH IN NORTH CAROLINA, SEPT. 20; MADE SAME CLAIM IN OHIO, SEPT. 21.
Polls show him winning virtually no support from African-Americans.
8Almost, it seems, everybody agrees with his position on immigration.
REMARKS IN TEXAS, SEPT. 17.
Most Americans oppose his signature positions on immigration.
9He has made a lot of progress with Hispanic and black voters, and you see that in the polls.
FRED DICKER RADIO SHOW, SEPT. 15.
No major poll has shown him making up significant ground with black or Hispanic voters.
10He was never a fan of Colin Powell.
FOX NEWS INTERVIEW, SEPT. 18.
In his book The America We Deserve, he named Mr. Powell as among the best and brightest in American society.
11Mr. Trump said that after The Times published an article scrutinizing his relationships with women, All the women came out and said they think Donald Trump is terrific.
FOX NEWS INTERVIEW, SEPT. 18.
Only one woman who was quoted in the article came to his defense after its publication.
12Unlike other people who only raise money for themselves during presidential campaigns, he also raises money for the Republican Party.
FOX NEWS INTERVIEW, SEPT. 15.
Every presidential nominee forms a joint fund-raising agreement to share money with his or her national party.
Unfounded Claims About
Critics and the News Media
Its not just Mrs. Clinton whom Mr. Trump belittles and tars with inaccurate information. He also distorted the facts about his Republican critics, including President George Bush and Gov. John Kasich of Ohio. And he claimed that Lester Holt, the NBC anchor moderating the first presidential debate, is a Democrat but Mr. Holt is a registered Republican.
13In the primaries, Mr. Kasich won one and, by the way, didnt win it by much that was Ohio.
FOX NEWS INTERVIEW, SEPT. 19.
Mr. Kasich crushed him in Ohio, winning by 11 percentage points.
14Lester Holt, the NBC anchor and debate moderator, is a Democrat.
FOX NEWS INTERVIEW, SEPT. 19.
Mr. Holt is a registered Republican, New York City records show.
15The presidential debate moderators are all Democrats. Its a very unfair system.
FOX NEWS INTERVIEW, SEPT. 19.
Only one, Chris Wallace of Fox News, is a registered Democrat.
16He said it hasnt been reported that Mrs. Clinton called some Trump supporters deplorable.
SPEECH IN NORTH CAROLINA, SEPT. 20.
It would be difficult to find a news organization that didnt report her remark.
Inaccurate Claims About Clinton
Mr. Trump regularly dissembles about his opponent, attributing ideas to Mrs. Clinton that she has not endorsed, or accusing her of complicity in events in which she had no involvement.
17Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy. I finished it.
REMARKS IN WASHINGTON, SEPT. 16.
Mrs. Clinton and her campaign never publicly questioned President Obamas birthplace; Mr. Trump made it his signature cause for five years.
18Mrs. Clinton had the power and the duty to stop the release of unauthorized immigrants whose home countries would not accept their deportation after they were released from prison.
NUMEROUS SPEECHES, INCLUDING IN COLORADO, SEPT. 17, AND FLORIDA, SEPT. 19.
The secretary of state does not have the power to detain convicted criminals after they have served their sentences, and has little power to make foreign countries accept deportees.
19Mrs. Clinton has not criticized jihadists and foreign governments that oppress and kill women, gay people and non-Muslims. Has Hillary Clinton ever called people who support these practices deplorable and irredeemable? No.
SPEECH IN FLORIDA, SEPT. 19.
She has denounced jihadists and foreign countries on the same grounds, if not necessarily using the same words.
20Do people notice Hillary is copying my airplane rallies she puts the plane behind her like I have been doing from the beginning.
TWITTER, SEPT. 20.
He did not invent the tarmac rally or the campaign-plane backdrop.
21Mrs. Clinton destroyed 13 smartphones with a hammer while she was secretary of state.
SPEECHES IN FLORIDA, SEPT. 15 AND SEPT. 19.
An aide told the F.B.I. of only two occasions in which phones were destroyed with a hammer.
22He said Mrs. Clinton is calling for total amnesty in the first 100 days, including a virtual end to immigration enforcement and for unauthorized immigrants to receive Social Security and Medicare.
SPEECH IN COLORADO, SEPT. 17.
She has not proposed this.
23Mrs. Clinton is effectively proposing to abolish the borders around the country.
NUMEROUS SPEECHES, INCLUDING IN TEXAS, SEPT. 17.
She is not even proposing to cut funding for the Border Patrol.
24Hillary Clintons plan would bring in 620,000 refugees in her first term alone, and would cost $400 billion.
NUMEROUS SPEECHES, INCLUDING IN NORTH CAROLINA, SEPT. 20.
She endorsed admitting 65,000 Syrian refugees this year, on top of other admissions. Mr. Trump is falsely claiming that she wants to do this every year and is estimating the cost accordingly.
Stump Speech Falsehoods
Some warped or inaccurate claims have become regular features of Mr. Trumps stump speech. He routinely overstates the scale and nature of the countrys economic distress and the threats to its national security, and exaggerates the potential for overnight improvements if he were elected.
25Our African-American communities are absolutely in the worst shape that theyve ever been in before ever, ever, ever.
SPEECH IN NORTH CAROLINA, SEPT. 20.
No measurement supports this characterization of black America.
26Fifty-eight percent of black youth are not working.
NUMEROUS SPEECHES, INCLUDING IN FLORIDA, SEPT. 16, AND COLORADO, SEPT. 17.
This misleading statistic counts high school students as out of work. Black youth unemployment actually was 20.6 percent in July.
27Many dangerous refugees are being welcomed by the Obama administration. Hundreds of thousands of people are being approved to pour into the country. We have no idea who they are.
NEW HAMPSHIRE SPEECH, SEPT. 15.
The Obama administration has admitted more than 10,000 Syrian refugees, using an extensive screening process.
28We have cities that are far more dangerous than Afghanistan.
NUMEROUS SPEECHES, INCLUDING IN FLORIDA, SEPT. 16; COLORADO, SEPT. 17; NORTH CAROLINA, SEPT. 20; OHIO, SEPT. 21; AND A FOX NEWS INTERVIEW ON SEPT. 21.
No American city resembles a war zone, though crime has risen lately in some, like Chicago. Urban violence has fallen precipitously over the past 25 years.
29Ford plans to cut American jobs by relocating small-car production to Mexico, and may move all production outside the United States.
FOX NEWS INTERVIEW AND NEW HAMPSHIRE SPEECH, SEPT. 15.
Mark Fields, Fords chief executive, said it was not cutting American jobs.
30We have a trade deficit this year with China of approximately $500 billion.
NORTH CAROLINA SPEECH, SEPT. 20.
He has made this claim repeatedly, but the trade deficit with China is significantly smaller.
Esoteric Embellishments
Mr. Trump often dissembles on subjects of passing interest, like the news of the day or the parochial concerns of his local audiences. But his larger pattern of behavior still holds: These misstatements, too, accentuate the grievances of his supporters, and cast his own ideas in a more favorable light.
31Senator Bernie Sanders fell victim to a rigged system with the superdelegates.
SPEECHES IN NEW HAMPSHIRE, SEPT. 15, AND NORTH CAROLINA, SEPT. 20.
Mr. Sanders did not lose the Democratic nomination because of superdelegates. Mrs. Clinton beat him in pledged delegates, too.
| 0fake |
Republican Convention Night 4: What You Missed - The New York Times | Night 4 of the Republican National Convention was Donald J. Trump’s night: He was introduced after a speech by his daughter Ivanka. Mr. Trump’s speech — and the balloons that follow his acceptance of the Republican nomination — kicked off the final phase in his quest for the presidency. Some of the highlights of the night: • A taste from our main story on Mr. Trump’s speech (and check out what we in it): • Ivanka Trump offered a softer, less harsh portrait of her father in a speech introducing him. She said that as a daughter and an employee of the Trump Organization, she “witnessed his empathy and generosity. ” She said Mr. Trump is “ and gender neutral. He hires the best person for the job, period. ” And she pledged that Mr. Trump will fight for “equal pay for equal work,” noting that at Mr. Trump’s company, there are “more female than male executives” and that “when a woman becomes a mother, she is supported, not shut out. ” Her father, she promised, will be “your greatest, your truest and your most loyal champion. ” _____ • “I am proud to be gay. I am proud to be a Republican. ” Peter Thiel, the billionaire Silicon Valley venture capitalist and entrepreneur, took the Republican Party to task over what he called “fake culture wars. ” He recalled that when he was a kid, the great debate was defeating the Soviet Union, but “now we are told that the great debate is about who gets to use which bathroom. ” Focusing on these debates, he said, “distract us from our economic decline, and nobody in this race is being honest about it except Donald Trump. ” Fact Check: Among Mr. Thiel’s claims was that “our government is broken. Our nuclear bases still use floppy disks. ” That, in fact, is true, according to a report by the General Accounting Office this year. According to the report: “Department of Defense uses floppy disks in a legacy system that coordinates the operational functions of the nation’s nuclear forces. ” _____ • Jerry Falwell Jr. the evangelical leader of the top Christian university, made both a and populist case for Mr. Trump, calling him a “ billionaire” who he has known for over 20 years. His evangelical argument for Mr. Trump centered on a plank in the platform to repeal a tax law banning churches from political organizing, as well as a pledge to appoint “conservative, justices” to the Supreme Court. And he included perhaps a thinly veiled message to Senator Ted Cruz, who spoke last night and declined to endorse Mr. Trump: “If you are a conservative, a decision not to vote or to vote for a third candidate is a de facto vote for Hillary Clinton. ” _____ • With the playful tone of a wedding toast, Tom Barrack, a billionaire businessman and longtime friend of Mr. Trump, used most of his speech to share stories and memories. He told the crowd that he had “nothing negative to say about Hillary” and “only amazing things to tell you about Donald. ” His personal anecdotes revealed a unseen side of the Mr. Trump that few other speakers touched on during the convention. _____ • Joe Arpaio’s support for Mr. Trump might be boiled down to this: You had me at illegal immigrant. Mr. Arpaio is the Arizona sheriff who became famous for his aggressive, tactics in that state. And Mr. Trump started his campaign more than a year ago by focusing on the danger that illegal immigrants pose to Americans. On Thursday, Mr. Arpaio said his experience at the border convinced him that “we have terrorists coming over our borders, infiltrating our communities and causing massive destruction and mayhem. ” He said Mr. Trump was the only candidate willing to confront that issue. _____ • Representative Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee struck a mostly optimistic note amid remarks that focused on problems. She proclaimed that electing Mr. Trump would return the country to greatness and spoke broadly about Mr. Trump’s leadership qualities and record as a businessman who “has seen challenges” and “learned his lessons. ” And with a turn of phrase, linked his real estate successes to the potential of a Trump presidency: “Not only can they change a skyline, they can change the world. ” _____ • Mary Fallin, the governor of Oklahoma, the pattern of pessimism, but she said that Mr. Trump is the one to provide optimism — even if some Republicans might not agree with everything he says. “As Ronald Reagan said, ‘the person who agrees with you 80 percent of the time is a friend and ally,’ ” she said. • Reince Preibus, the chairman of the Republican National Committee, hammered Mrs. Clinton for a lack of personal and professional ethics. She “lied over and over and over and over” about her email server, he said. “Perhaps worst of all, Hillary Clinton has perfected the art of politics for personal gain. She reads ethics rules as carefully as Americans read their junk mail. ” He accused Mrs. Clinton of using her position as secretary of state to “grease the wheels for Democrat lobbyists, special interests and political insiders connected to the corrupt Clinton machine. ” With Mr. Trump, he said, “help is coming. ” | 0fake |
Britain's May presses Northern Ireland leaders to restore power-sharing government | LONDON (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Theresa May has spoken with the leaders of Northern Ireland s two main parties to press them to restore a power-sharing government that collapsed in January. Northern Ireland s Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) and its nationalist rivals Sinn Fein have failed so far to agree on how to reform the devolved administration, limiting the province s influence in Brexit negotiations. A government spokeswoman said on Wednesday that May had made separate phone calls to DUP leader Arlene Foster and the leader of Sinn Fein in Northern Ireland, Michelle O Neill, to make clear the importance of restoring a power-sharing executive to Northern Ireland as soon as possible . They discussed key outstanding issues that remain for both parties and the prime minister encouraged both leaders to come to an agreement soon in the interests of everyone in Northern Ireland. | 0fake |
The Art of the Swindle | Predators, by and large, do not attack the strongest prey in the wild. They instead target the vulnerable, the very young, and the very old—the prey that is least able to defend itself. Trump University, the defunct real-estate education program created by presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump, pursued a similar approach, according to its former employees in legal documents unsealed Tuesday. The Art of the Upsell: How Donald Trump Profits From 'Free' Seminars “Based upon my personal experience and employment, I believe that Trump University was a fraudulent scheme, and that it preyed upon the elderly and uneducated to separate them from their money,” said Ronald Schnackenberg, a sales manager at Trump University in 2006 and 2007. Those declarations and other internal Trump University documents depict an aggressive, ethically dubious business model that targeted potential customers’ financial fears and socioeconomic anxieties and offered Trump’s personal brand as the solution—a strategy later echoed in his presidential campaign.
In his declaration, Schnackenberg recounted meeting a couple after a live event in New York City in 2007. Apparently swayed by the presentation, they expressed an interest in purchasing a $35,000 Trump Gold Elite program, the most expensive tier available. “I did not think it was an appropriate program for them because of their precarious financial condition—they had no money to pay for the program, but would have had to pay for the program using disability income and taking out a loan based upon equity in his apartment,” he testified. “Trump University reprimanded me for not trying harder to sell the program to this couple.” A different salesperson closed the deal with them. “I was disgusted by this conduct and decided to resign,” Schnackenberg said. Schnackenberg made the declaration in September 2012—about three years before Donald Trump announced his presidential bid—as part of a class-action lawsuit against the businessman by former Trump University customers. The declaration and other trial documents remained under seal until Tuesday after federal judge Gonzalo Curiel—a newfound target of Trump’s stump-speech anger—ordered many of them to be made public Friday in response to a public-interest motion by the Washington Post. For a Trump University employee, failure simply meant the abstract loss of potential profit. For a Trump University student, however, failure could mean financial ruin.
Official scripts and guidelines in Trump University’s sales playbooks harnessed this fear to drive prospective buyers towards the product. During one-on-one sessions after the $1,500 second-tier seminar, the playbook encouraged salespeople to assess each customer’s fears, goals, and financial status, then “close the deal” on the next tier of seminars. “When you introduce the price, don’t make it sound like you think it’s a lot of money, if you don’t make a big deal out of it they won’t,” the playbook advises. “If they can afford the gold elite don’t allow them to think about anything besides the gold elite.” The Trump Gold Elite package, which included a series of retreats, a three-day “in-field mentorship,” and a free trial on foreclosure-tracking software, cost $35,000. If the customer hesitated, the playbook offered a sample text to “push them out of their comfort zone” by criticizing their financial status. “It’s time for you to be 100% honest with yourself,” the suggested text read. “You’ve had your entire adult life to accomplish your financial goals. I’m looking at your profile and you’re not even close to where you need to be, much less where you want to be. It’s time to fix your broken plan, bring in Mr. Trump’s top instructors and certified millionaire mentors and allow us to put you and keep you on the right track. Your plan is BROKEN and WE WILL help you fix it.” The playbook also includes rebuttals to common concerns about spending up to $35,000 on a series of seminars. For example, if customers want to try real-estate investing on their own, salespeople were told to pepper them with technical questions about their business plan, apparently to undermine their self-confidence.
“How are you going to locate the properties? How are you determining ARV? All cash offer? Where is your financing coming from? How will you negotiate price? Terms? What about exit strategies?” the playbook offers as suggested dialogue. “One mistake on any one of these and you’re broke, beaten, and worse off than you are now.” “You can ask them questions so they realize they don’t have a chance for long term or short term success,” the playbook then reminds the employee. Amidst this sea of imagined dangers, the salesperson would then pivot to pitch Trump University as a lifeboat. “The risk isn’t spending 35K – it’s entering into the world of REAL ESTATE without specialized knowledge, guidance and trained professionals in the field holding your hand,” the playbook’s rebuttals said. “WE are the safe decision.” The playbook frequently tells Trump University employees to lean on the instructors’ and mentors’ wisdom as a selling point. But Jason Nichols, a Trump University sales executive who worked for the company in 2007, challenged this depiction in his declaration to the court. “The Trump University instructors and mentors were a joke. Most of them were not experts in real estate and did not [have] experience in the real estate techniques they were teaching,” Nichols said. “They were unqualified people posing as Donald Trump’s ‘right-hand men.’ They were teaching methods that were unethical, and they had little to no experience flipping properties or doing real estate deals. It was a façade, a total lie.”
Other rebuttals suggested by training materials likewise appealed to customers’ insecurities while invoking Trump’s success. What if customers say they want to invest that $35,000 fee in property instead? “You have no specialized knowledge or system to fall back on,” the playbook suggests. “Mr. Trump doesn’t use his own money to invest and look at his success!” Or a customer might say they have enough information to invest on their own. “But what we’re offering is a proven system from Mr. Trump to help you close multiple deals every month, with a millionaire mentor by your side making sure you don’t make any mistakes, and creating the most amount of profit per deal,” the playbook counters. “Let me ask you a question; are you capable of making one or two mistakes on your own?” (In parentheses, the salesperson is instructed to smile while saying these lines.) The scripts and rebuttals emphasize the risk of not taking part in the program while evading its inherent risks. What if the customer doesn’t want to go into debt by purchasing the seminars? “Every single company goes into debt when they are first starting out, EVERY SINGLE BUSINESS!” the playbook says. “The profits pay off the debt and before you know it, your new real-estate business will start making amazing returns.” Corinne Sommer, the former manager of Trump University’s events departments, recalled how instructors in the second-level seminars, which cost roughly $1,500 to attend, would ask customers to call their credit-card companies to triple or quadruple their credit limit and max out their credit cards for real-estate investments.
“While Trump University’s advertisements claimed it wanted to help consumers make money in real estate, in fact, based upon my experience, I believe that Trump University was only interested in selling every person the most expensive seminars they could possibly buy on credit,” Sommer testified. “I recall that some consumers had showed up who were homeless and could not afford the seminars, yet I overheard Trump University representatives telling them, ‘it’s ok; just max out your credit card.’” Not everyone proved unhappy; the filings also included testimony from many graduates of Trump University who professed themselves delighted with the decisions they’d made. Trump University came to an end five years before Trump’s presidential campaign officially began. But both products rely on a similar three-part strategy. The first part is an emphasis on insecurity. For Trump University’s sales team, that meant focusing on the customer’s personal financial shortcomings when closing a deal. For Trump himself, it manifests as stump speeches bemoaning the decline in American manufacturing, the peril of illegal immigration, the rise of China and ISIS, and how “we don’t win anymore.” These insecurities may or may not be grounded in reality. But the solutions to them often aren’t. Trump University promised an easy path to wealth and success in the real-estate market just as the housing bubble was about to burst. (“Let’s get you enrolled today so you can start building a real estate empire,” reads one suggested line from the playbook.) Trump’s campaign solutions are even more grandiose, ranging from a giant wall on the U.S.-Mexico border to a military so large and strong “we’ll never have to use it.” The third part is Trump, or, perhaps more accurately, Trump’s personal brand, in all its coiffed and gilded glory. Decades of effort invested in making a surname synonymous with business acumen and extravagant wealth imbued Trump University with a legitimacy it could not otherwise acquire. Trump himself also relies on this on the campaign trail—not the name recognition, but its association with “winning.” For both Trump and Trump University, the goal is for prospective customers and potential voters alike to think his success can rub off on them, too. But that payoff may never come. “I do not believe that Trump University taught Donald Trump’s investing ‘secrets,’” one former Trump employee testified. “Donald Trump came from a wealthy family and had resources at his disposal to purchase real estate—that is the secret—one the average consumer could not replicate.” | 0fake |
Anti-Gay Conservative ‘Christian’ Group Gets OWNED By J.K. Rowling On Twitter | These assholes were taken to the woodshed and they deserved it.After British diver Tom Daley failed to make the final round of the men s 10m platform, a right-wing Christian group called Christian Voice cheered on Twitter and used the occasion to claim that being gay somehow prevents athletes from being successful.Turning gay doesn t seem to have done Tom Daley any favours at #Rio2016 https://t.co/tdbT0Y5acx Christian Voice (@UKCV) August 20, 2016Well, Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling refused to let that slide and slammed them on her Twitter feed. Can t decide which is more offensive in this tweet, the stupidity or the spite. https://t.co/ksqZp17drc J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) August 20, 2016And then the rest of Twitter piled on.@jk_rowling @UKCV I m a (moderately conservative) evangelical minister, and I m horrified by that tweet. What were they thinking? Alistair May (@AlistairMay) August 20, 2016 @jk_rowling I m trying to think back to my Sunday school lessons that taught hate your neighbour, oh no wait, there was t one. Karla (@KarlaGeorge) August 20, 2016That people turn gay and that it affects diving. That s two stupids vs one spite. A gold medal to stupidity, silver to spite. @jk_rowling Cave Art Films (@Cave_Art_Films) August 20, 2016 @UKCV Talk us through how one turns gay . Stewart McDonald MP (@StewartMcDonald) August 20, 2016@UKCV a married lesbian couple won gold for GB in the hockey yesterday, just fyi Jonjon (@JonjonSpencer) August 20, 2016 @UKCV Guess what! Kate Richardson-Walsh has been chosen as the flag bearer for GB in the closing ceremony. ?? Jonjon (@JonjonSpencer) August 21, 2016@UKCV People don t turn gay. Also, delete your account. Jessica Klingelfuss (@jessklingelfuss) August 20, 2016 @jk_rowling I think it s the fact they spend their time thinking about who other people find attractive. Weirdos. Huw (@ed_son) August 20, 2016@UKCV I m sure Jesus loves you. The rest of us think you re a plank. General Woundwort WC (@hedgenettle) August 20, 2016 @jk_rowling @UKCV I ve just looked at these tweets and am shocked. I m embarrassed to be a human. Michael Luxton (@JefferyCupcakes) August 20, 2016@UKCV except the medal he s already won. And the Olympic Record he broke yesterday. Keir Shiels (@keirshiels) August 20, 2016And there are many more where those came from as Twitter users are still ripping these so-called Christians a new one for their bigotry.Featured Image: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images | 1real |
White House unveils measures to help inmates find work after prison | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Obama administration on Friday rolled out a series of education and work training initiatives focused on helping convicted criminals avoid returning to prison, part of President Barack Obama’s legacy-shaping effort to overhaul the U.S. criminal justice system as he prepares to leave office. The measures include a program that will link 67 colleges and universities with 141 correctional facilities to provide education and training to about 12,000 inmates. The program will offer federal Pell grants to prisoners, with an emphasis on inmates set to be released within five years of starting classes. “The bottom line is that our communities are less safe when the stigma of incarceration prevents Americans from truly ever shedding their prison jumpsuit,” White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett said on a call with reporters. “When people leave prisons and can’t turn their lives around, they too often end up back behind bars,” she said. Other programs unveiled on Friday will offer $31 million in grants for organizations to offer occupational training and apprenticeship opportunities for young adults and more than $5 million to organizations that help inmates prepare for employment. Obama’s top cabinet members for justice, education, labor and housing praised the reentry initiatives as common-sense reforms that should have been in place long ago. “All the little things that people take for granted generate tremendous obstacles for people who are coming out of the criminal justice system,” Attorney General Loretta Lynch said at a panel hosted by the left-leaning Center for American Progress think tank. Obtaining photo identification or being considered for job opportunities were two examples. “In order to compete, you have to be allowed in the arena,” she added. Hiring people with a criminal history “is not an act of charity, it is an act of enlightened self-interest,” Labor Secretary Thomas Perez said, commending Maryland’s largest private employer, the Johns Hopkins Hospital, for employing so many people with criminal backgrounds. Despite bipartisan support for reform of mandatory minimum sentences for some non-violent federal drug offenders, legislation addressing the issue has stalled in Congress. Jarrett said the White House remains hopeful that criminal justice reform will be approved by lawmakers. “We would like to see those bills move forward as quickly as possible,” she said. “We are going to do everything we can to work with members on both sides of the aisle to make sure it comes to fruition.” | 0fake |
GERMANY CRISIS ESCALATES: Muslim Migrants Masturbating in Pools, Defecating In Showers And Pool, Storm Women’s Locker Rooms | What a great place to take the whole family!Welcome to the liberal utopia of Germany Things are so bad authorities are posting no defecating in the shower signs.Via Instapundit:The migrants have also tried to storm them women s locker room. Der Bild reported (translated) via Vlad Tepes:Outrageous accusations coming from the Zwickau Townhall: According to B der GmbH, (Baths Inc.) refugees are masturbating and defecating into the water. And they also harass women in the Sauna and have tried to storm the women s changing rooms.All this and more is written in a report from January 19th. Rainer Kallwait, ordinance department leader for B der GmbH, wrote the report for the safety related services of B der GmbH. The city administration has confirmed the authenticity of the report.Kallweit writes of a memo from Johannisbad Swimming Pool. In it it says, among other things: One asylum seeker masturbated in the whirlpool and ejaculated into the water. It is recorded on surveillance camera. And, The swimming pool supervisor threw him out. The asylum seeker came back with comrades to get his cell phone. Together the visitors , hooting and jeering, took a selfie in the whirlpool. The day before 8 foreign men were in the Sauma . The local people felt harassed. When women are in the Sauna, asylum seekers are now told that the Sauna is closed. In general refugees only have free access to the swimming pool. They would have to pay for the use of the Sauna. But they won t do that, according to B der GmbH: When they were prompted to pay up at the register, they turned around, laughed and left. Similar can be read in a memo of Gl ck-Auf-Schwimmhalle , Halle, in Kallwait s report. A group of youths, single men and children with guardians visited said pool in Halle on January 9th. Since none of them could swim, they used the kids pool. The users contaminated the pool by way of emptying their intestines. Local guests immediately left the pool. Here s another sign telling migrants to not grab women s butts at the pool.Via: Gateway Pundit | 1real |
ENTIRE HIGH SCHOOL FOLLOWS KAEPERNICKS Lead In Disrespecting The National Anthem | It seems that Colin Kaepernick has become more of an influence in our youths life then any of us would have hoped for. On one hand it is amazing that an entire high school football team wanted to protest social injustices, but on the other following a move that shows nothing but disrespect to this country and the men and women that have fought for it for so long is a travesty.Recently converted muslin-Colin Kaepernick from the San Francisco 49ers decided he wanted to protest oppression of the black man in America by sitting during the National Anthem. The move is spreading like an oozing wound, and unfortunately his job a role-model and mentor has been compromised.The coach of the Garfield Seattle High School football team should be ashamed of himself for not only allowing this type of action but for joining in on it!The coach stated that they will continue this action before every game until they tell us to stop. High schools across this nation are doing the same and it is heartbreaking to watch our youth be so very misguided.Garfield High School (Seattle) student-athletes taking a knee during the National Anthem yesterday. #Seattle pic.twitter.com/o362ugXMd2 HauteHoopla (@HauteHoopla) September 17, 2016This country needs more authority figures teaching our children what the National Anthem really means. It literally is a protest for injustices, its a hymn for those that have died for us to have our freedom, its a song that will forever remember every single action taken to create this beautiful country, and as such should be stood for. This basketball coach in the video below explains it beautifully. Thankfully there are a few like him left.H/T [ Young Cons. ] | 1real |
SIT DOWN AND SHUT UP! Senator Whack-Job Warren Gets Rebuked After Ignoring Senate Rules…Makes Desperate Last Ditch “Race Card” Play Against Jeff Sessions [VIDEO] | Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell shut down Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren during a Senate floor speech on Tuesday, accusing the Democrat of violating Senate rules by criticizing their colleague and attorney general nominee, Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions.Warren was warned early on in her remarks by Montana Sen. Steve Daines, the Republican overseeing the floor speeches, after she quoted Coretta Scott King, the late widow of Martin Luther King, Jr.Warren quoted King asserting that Sessions had exhibited so much hostility to the enforcement of voting rights laws for blacks.Daines struck his gavel and reprimanded Warren, who is one of a handful of Democrats who plan an all-night Senate floor session to oppose the Trump nominee. The senator is reminded that it is a violation of Rule 19 of the standing rules of the Senate to impute to another senator or senators any conduct or motive unworthy or becoming a senator, Daines said.Around 20 minutes later, McConnell interrupted Warren s speech to invoke Rule 19. The senator has impugned the motives and conduct of our colleague from Alabama as warned by the chair, said McConnell. Senator Warren, quote, said Senator Sessions has used the awesome power of his office to chill the free exercise of the vote of black citizens. I call the senator to order under the provisions of Rule 19. Warren protested. Mr. President, I am surprised that the words of Coretta Scott King are not suitable for debate in the United States Senate. I ask leave of the Senate to continue my remarks. McConnell objected to Warren s request and Daines ordered her to take her seat.Warren appealed the ruling and called for a quorum vote to delay the proceedings.Despite Democrats protest speeches, Sessions is expected to be approved as attorney general on Wednesday. Daily CallerIt s a sickening game Democrats play with the character of other people who don t agree with them and their radical views. They have no problem impugning the good name of Senator Jeff Sessions, who has an impeccable record of service to our nation, as long as he has been completely discredited by the time he takes office. | 1real |
Egypt FM to head to Ethiopia after Nile dam talks stall | CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt s Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry will visit Addis Ababa next week for talks with his Ethiopian counterpart, a foreign ministry spokesman said, in a bid to end a standoff over a multi-billion dollar dam project on the Nile river. The dispute, which also involves Sudan, centers on control of a share of the waters of the Nile that stretches 6,695 km (4,184 miles) from Lake Victoria to the Mediterranean and is the economic lifeblood of all three countries. Cairo says the dam would threaten water supplies that have fed Egypt s agriculture and economy for thousands of years. Ethiopia says the Grand Renaissance Dam, which it hopes will help make it Africa s largest power exporter, will have no major effect on Egypt. It accuses Cairo of flexing its political muscle to deter financiers from backing other Ethiopian power projects. Delegations from Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia met in Cairo in November to approve a study by a French firm commissioned to assess the dam s environmental and economic impact. But negotiations stalled when they failed to agree on the initial report with each blaming others for blocking progress. Sudan s Irrigation Minister Moataz Moussa said Egypt was unwilling to accept amendments to the report put forward by Khartoum and Addis Ababa. Sudan and Ethiopia had expressed concern over several points, especially the proposed baseline from which the study would measure the dam s impacts, Moussa said in November. Another source of disagreement is whether Ethiopia plans to complete construction before negotiations over water flows have finished. It s clear they don t want to reach conclusions quickly. We believe they probably want to start filling the dam and complete construction while there are still some ongoing discussions, said Mahmoud Abou Zeid, Arab Water Council Chair and former Egyptian irrigation minister. He said this would violate an agreement signed by all three countries in Khartoum in 2015 meant to ensure diplomatic cooperation and stem fears of a resource conflict. Cairo fears the 6,000-megawatt dam, being built by Italy s largest construction firm, Salini Impregilo SpA, and due for completion next year, will reduce the flow it depends on for drinking water and irrigation. Egyptian officials say safeguarding the country s quota of Nile water is a matter of national security. No one can touch Egypt s water ... (which) means life or death for a population, President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said last month. | 0fake |
EXCLUSIVE – Islamic State Supporters: ‘Soon We’ll Attack the Snake’s Head and Destroy Iran’ | Writing in an encrypted chat room, Islamic State sympathizers and militants celebrated the deadly attacks on the parliament building in Iran and the tomb of the country’s Shiite revolutionary founder. [Breitbart Jerusalem obtained access to correspondence posted in a closed chat group that utilizes the encrypted Telegram messaging service. The group serves as an internal Twitter of sorts for IS jihadists and sympathizers, and has been used in the past to issue IS communications. IS claimed responsibility for the attacks on Iran, which took place during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan and appeared orchestrated in a manner to cause maximum civilian casualties. Writing in the encrypted Telegram group, IS member Abou Obaida Alsameraii exclaimed, “We thank Allah, ask his forgiveness and thank him for facilitating our attack and our hits. We are counting on Allah as we strike Allah’s enemies. This is a land of heresy, a capital of impurity, prostitution and profanity called Tehran. Today we attacked them in the depths of their land. We won’t let them only attack us. We did this to defend our Sunni nation and we are punishing our enemies. Today we attacked their parliament, attacked their temple and their cemeteries and soon we’ll attack the snake’s head and destroy Iran with the help of Allah. ” Another Telegram member who goes by the name “Prince of the Jihad and Death as a Martyr” wrote, “May your jihad be blessed and may your fight be blessed, you lions of the Islamic State, princes of jihad and those who die as martyrs. Today our brothers, with their bodies, struck and attacked the heretic capital of Tehran. With their blood, they’ve written a chapter in history, a new history. What was before today’s attack will never be the same. This is a new era and a new stage in which we will witness more hits from our brothers against the countries of heresy. ” Abi Abdullah Aljazrawi wrote, “Allah is great, Allah is great, Allah is great. Thanks to Allah. We worship Allah to thank him for causing the infidels and criminals to taste the attacks of our brothers. We swear to Allah that we will break them yet, that there will be more of these. We say to them, there will yet be soldiers who shake their lands. We swear to Allah that they will see the strength of our brothers, the mujahedeen. They will see what their mercenaries in Iraq and Syria have not yet seen. We will shake their lands. ” Abi Dajana Alhomsi wrote, “Allah is great. We strike in Syria, Iraq and infidel countries in Europe and those who stand at the head of American terror and today we strike the heresy of Iran as we struck not so long ago in Saudi Arabia and against the supporters of the Gulf states of prostitution. We swear to Allah that the country of Caliphs will spread in spite of the opposition. This will be a Caliphate in the way of the prophet, a Caliphate that does not compromise with the enemy or give mercy to evil. We swear to Allah that we will show them the strength of our mujahedeen, they will see power that they have never realized. ” Abi Rahman Aljazrawi wrote, “They accused our country and our Caliphate of being agents of Saudi Arabia, America and Iran. Everyday we prove to everyone that we are walking the path of the prophet. We are the agents of Islam and all these bastards have no value according to our religion as long as they do not return to the righteous path and as long as the Christians do not pay, with submission, the poll tax. We swear to Allah that we go with justice and Allah is the one supporting us and will bring us victory. You would love for us to be your agents and supporters. We are soldiers of Allah on Earth and we will tear up your roots and return to Islam. ” | 0fake |
Chinese, Vietnamese Communist parties have 'shared destiny': Beijing | BEIJING (Reuters) - China and Vietnam s Communist parties have a shared destiny and there is great potential for bilateral economic cooperation, a senior Beijing official said on Tuesday on a visit to Vietnam, which has clashed with China over the South China Sea. Although both nations are under Communist rule, they are deeply suspicious of each other and relations have been strained over the past few years because of disputes in the strategic South China Sea. China has appeared uneasy at Vietnamese efforts to rally Southeast Asian countries over the busy swathe of sea as well as at its neighbor s growing defense ties with the United States, Japan and India. In July, under pressure from Beijing, Vietnam suspended oil drilling in offshore waters that are also claimed by China. However, Hanoi and Beijing have also tried to prevent tensions from getting out of control, and senior officials from two countries make fairly regular visits to each other. Liu Yunshan, a member of the Chinese Communist Party s elite Standing Committee that runs the country, told Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc in Hanoi, in the first such high level visit since relations deteriorated in July, that the two parties constitute a community of shared destiny with strategic significance , China s official Xinhua news agency reported. The sound and stable development of the bilateral ties will help to solidify the ruling position of the two parties, which is in the interests of the two parties and people of the two nations, Xinhua cited Liu as saying. The two economies are highly complementary, with huge potential for practical cooperation, the report quoted him as saying. Phuc told Liu that two countries should strive to maintain peace and stability in the South China Sea and avoid all activities that could increase tension, the Vietnamese government news website reported. He also urged China to have substantial discussions soon with Southeast Asian nations to reach a code of conduct in the disputed sea, the report said. While both the Chinese and Vietnamese reports made no direction mention of the South China Sea by Liu, they quoted him as suggesting the two countries properly manage and control their divergences, so as to create favorable environment for bilateral cooperation . China claims nearly all the South China Sea, through which an estimated $3 trillion in international trade passes each year. Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Taiwan also have claims. | 0fake |
Shocking! Hillary’s Henchwoman Sold Up the River To Save Her Bacon! | This is a Daily News Brief for all of the civil servants out there who are just “doing their job”. I was (up until recently) one of those people.
I learned first hand that no matter how good you are at your job, how much you save the taxpayer, and how many times you’ve saved your boss or the “higher ups” from getting in trouble, when you need them to stick their neck out for you, they just hang you out to dry.
Huma Abedin is learning that firsthand now too… and Donna Brazile…The loyalty you feel in your heart to your country, or county is not reciprocated to you in your time of need. The Powers That Shouldn’t Be don’t give a rats patoot about you. I hope this Daily News Brief serves as a wake up call to all those who serve.
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Sources:
Now Huma Is Just ‘One of My Staffers’ After Close Aide Gets Left Behind on Ohio Campaign Trip While Hillary Keeps up Her War on the FBI in Defiance of White House Backing for Comey
CNN Cuts Ties With Donna Brazile After Hacked Emails Show She Gave Clinton Campaign Debate Questions
The Globalization Of Media: A Failing Strike Force
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Prime Minister Trudeau says Canada will not abandon NAFTA talks | MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Thursday Canada will not walk away from talks to rehash the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) despite a U.S. proposal to include a clause that could terminate the pact in five years. Speaking at a news conference with Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto in Mexico City as a fourth round of talks to renegotiate NAFTA was held near Washington, Trudeau said he was committed to a “win-win-win” deal. “We will not be walking away from the table based on the proposals put forward,” Trudeau said, in response to a question about whether the so-called sunset clause was a poison pill for the talks. | 0fake |
Trump's lawyers say tax returns show little income from Russian sources | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A review of President Donald Trump’s tax returns from the past 10 years showed no income from Russian sources outside of a few exceptions, and indicated he did not owe money to Russian lenders, his lawyers said in a letter released by the White House on Friday. The letter, dated March 8, said the tax returns did not reflect any Trump income from Russian sources, aside from money earned during the 2013 Miss Universe pageant in Moscow and the 2008 sale of a Florida estate to a Russian billionaire. Trump’s businesses also may have earned “immaterial” amounts of money from Russians over the years through ordinary sales transactions, including condominium rentals or sales, hotel rooms, rounds of golf, or sales of Trump-licensed products, Sheri Dillon and William Nelson, attorneys at Morgan Lewis and Bockius, said in the letter. The tax returns also did not reflect any payments by Trump or his businesses to Russian lenders, any Trump investments in Russian firms or any investment by Russians in Trump’s companies, the letter said. Morgan Lewis, a global law firm with 30 offices in cities around the world including New York and Moscow, was named Russia Law Firm of the Year in 2016 by London-based Chambers and Partners, a firm that ranks lawyers and law firms. The release of the letter by Trump’s long-time attorneys came as the president sought to calm the furor caused by his firing this week of FBI Director James Comey, who was leading an investigation into possible collusion between the Trump presidential campaign and Russia to influence the U.S. election. Comey’s firing on Tuesday and the White House’s shifting explanations about the rationale for the move have raised concerns among Democrats and others that the White House was trying to blunt the FBI probe. Trump and the White House have denied any such motive, but Trump told NBC on Thursday that the Russia probe was on his mind when he made the decision to fire the FBI director. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said on Tuesday he wanted to know more about Trump’s business dealings with Russia and intended to examine whether any connections existed between Russia and the Trump campaign or the president’s associates. The White House welcomed the fact-finding effort by Graham and a subcommittee he chairs. “He has no business in Russia; he has no connections to Russia,” White House spokesman Sean Spicer told reporters, adding that the president had directed his law firm to send Graham a certified letter stating as much. | 0fake |
White House Posts ’Hire American’ Executive Order - Breitbart | President Donald Trump’s White House has released the text of his new “hire American” Executive Order, which orders a reform of the nation’s many programs to help raise Americans’ wages and salaries. [“To create higher wages and employment rates for workers in the United States, and to protect their economic interests, it shall be the policy of the executive branch to rigorously enforce and administer the laws governing entry into the United States of workers from abroad, including section 212( a)(5) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U. S. C. 1182( a)(5)),” says the “Buy American, Hire American” Executive Order. The memo ordered officials to develop new rules and regulations for the many federal programs which keep a population of up to 1. 8 million visas workers in the United States. The order does not give a deadline for the process but says: Sec. 5. Ensuring the Integrity of the Immigration System in Order to “Hire American. ” (a) In order to advance the policy outlined in section 2( b) of this order, the Secretary of State, the Attorney General, the Secretary of Labor, and the Secretary of Homeland Security shall, as soon as practicable, and consistent with applicable law, propose new rules and issue new guidance, to supersede or revise previous rules and guidance if appropriate, to protect the interests of United States workers in the administration of our immigration system, including through the prevention of fraud or abuse. (b) In order to promote the proper functioning of the visa program, the Secretary of State, the Attorney General, the Secretary of Labor, and the Secretary of Homeland Security shall, as soon as practicable, suggest reforms to help ensure that visas are awarded to the or petition beneficiaries. The White House also released a statement from Steve Miller, one of Trump’s senior advisors and one of the White House’s strongest advocates for and immigration reform. “This historic act of leadership from President Trump makes unequivocally clear that this Administration will serve and protect the American worker — fighting for fair trade and immigration policies that promote rising wages and employment for our hardworking citizens,” said the statement attributed to Miller. The new policy was praised by reformers. even though there’s a big gap between a Trump directive and actual government policy amid intense industry pressure for cheaper labor. “The president’s Executive Order is a shot in the arm for America’s struggling workers, and must now be followed up with legislation that makes permanent changes to our immigration system so it truly benefits America and its citizens,” said a statement from Dan Stein, president of the Federation for American Immigration Reform. He continued: Employers should be required to hire American workers who meet minimum job requirements and the foreign workers they do hire must be required to be paid a fair, market wage. We cannot achieve the goal of ‘hiring American’ while maintaining a policy that allows them to bypass Americans in favor of foreign guest workers. GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley, chairman of the Senate’s judiciary committee, praised the directive, saying: The program was designed to fill gaps in America’s workforce with foreign workers, but as we’ve seen in recent years, the program has been abused and exploited at the expense of American workers and foreign workers. We’ve seen companies use the program to fire American workers and replace them with foreign counterparts. The visa lottery system makes this problem worse by rewarding visas randomly, instead of prioritizing foreign workers with greater experience, skill, and qualifications. I’ve introduced bipartisan legislation with Senator Durbin to address these problems, and I’ve expressed to President Trump the need to take action to restore the integrity in the Program. I’m grateful that President Trump has taken my suggestions to heart by taking steps today to protect American workers and preserve limited visas for truly qualified, foreign workers. Industry officials rolled with the punch. A statement from Mark Zuckerberg’s FWD. us group praised the new directive but also asked for even more foreign workers. The statement said: We are hopeful today’s announcement will do what FWD. us has long advocated improve our high skilled immigration system. We should do so in a targeted manner by increasing the wage floor, treating companies (50 employees and 50% or more of domestic workforce ) differently and banning their ability to do placement. immigrants create new American jobs, raise wages for workers, and contribute enormously to growing our economy. Finally, congress should expand the number of visas offered while reforming the system to protect American workers. Read the directive here. The annual inflow of foreign contract workers is huge, adding up to roughly 1 million or workers, either in or jobs. The imported contract workers are not immigrants, not citizens, nor green card holders, but are temporary workers slated to return home after several years. Generally, employers do not have to interview Americans before hiring foreigners for the U. S. jobs. Many of the contract workers stay for several or more years, ensuring the resident population of and contract workers is much larger than the annual inflow and may reach a resident population of 1. 8 million. The Economic Policy Institute pegs the resident population at 1. 4 million. Many workers stay for just one season, filling jobs as landscapers or beach workers, waiters and foresters, fish processors and farm workers. These temp programs get a lot of criticism, partly because some employers cheat their foreign workers, but they are supported by many local politicians who are trying to help donors and influential business leaders. This seasonal inflow has sharply reduced the number of Americans teenagers working during the summer. Most of the workers stay for several or more years, ensuring the resident population of contract workers is must larger than the annual inflow. For example, the annual inflow of is roughly 110, 000, but the resident population is almost one million, according to a recent estimate by Goldman Sachs. The federal government releases little data on the many different programs, but the available evidence says the national population of contract workers is up to 1. 5 million. That population is roughly twice the population of 800, 000 Americans who graduate from college with skilled degrees each year. Several sites, including here and here, show numbers of outsourcing visas requested by companies and . The sites also show where the requested workers will work, their job titles and their supposed wages. For example, the sites show the number of visas for foreign pharmacists sought by CVS and other companies and the number of visas for architects and industrial designers sought by “job shop” firms which outsource their imported workers to other U. S. companies. The inflow of contract workers forces down wages paid to Americans and immigrants, partly because the inflow reduces wage pressure on and employers. Moreover, many of the contract workers rationally and decently will take jobs are low wages because their employers can promise to eventually reward them with the massively valuable deferred bonus of a green card and then U. S. citizenship. Each year, companies request and receive 140, 000 green cards for their employees and their families, further boosting the supply of professionals in the labor market. Employers say they need the foreign workers because they can’t hire enough Americans for jobs, even at wages of $12 per hour or higher. But critics — and much evidence — say the programs are rife with corruption, including fake resumes, fraudulent visa applications, payments, workplace and hiring discrimination against Americans, as well as false claims by lobbyists and corporates that too few Americans want to work at companies such as Goldman Sachs or Facebook or in the New York fashion industry. A 2016 report by the National Academies of Science showed that programs, plus the must large inflow of legal immigrants, annually transfers roughly $500 billion from American employees over to investors and employers. | 0fake |
Explosion in southeast Turkey kills two soldiers: CNN Turk | ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Two Turkish soldiers were killed on Monday in the southeastern province of Hakkari after an improvised explosive device detonated, Turkish broadcaster CNN Turk said. The bomb was set off as a Turkish army truck drove past it near the Iraqi border. | 0fake |
NOT-SO-SLICK WILLY: Bill Clinton Tries To Joke Around About Hillary’s E-mail Scandal…Not Funny [Video] | 1real | |
Critics to the White House: Call Orlando What it Is | The horrific attack in Orlando, Florida, showed once again that ISIS is here in America. Judging by President Barack Obama's response on Sunday, the message may not have reached the Oval Office.
"This is an open investigation. We've reached no definitive judgment on the precise motivations of the killer," the president said. "The FBI is appropriately investigating this as an act of terrorism."
But what kind of terrorism? President Obama did not use the words "Muslim" or "Islamic terrorism," even though the killer shouted, "Allahu Akbar!" and called 911 to say he was from ISIS. Islamic State radio calls Orlando mass shooter Omar Mateen "one of the soldiers of the caliphate in America."
Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., warns there will be more attacks in part because of the president's reluctance to call the Orlando tragedy what it is.
"And it's not stopping," Sessions told Fox News Sunday. "We see apparently today more of these attacks, and it's a real part of the threat that we face and if we can't address it openly and directly and say there is an extremist element within Islam that is dangerous to the world and has to be confronted, we need to slow down and be careful about those we admit into the country."
FBI Director James Comey says ISIS has created a "terrorist diaspora" that flows out of Syria and Iraq to the West, bringing "hardened fighters, looking to kill people."
A Wall Street Journal editorial pleaded, "Can we finally drop the illusion that the jihadist fires that burn in the Middle East don't pose an urgent and deadly threat to the American homeland?"
And National Review warned, "The...Islamic terrorists' war on us has returned to American shores, and it will continue here as long as we refuse to exercise the tactics necessary to stamp it out."
Former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton told Fox News "The fact is that this is war and not law enforcement."
"The problem is Barack Obama and his administration for its entire length in office have not been at war with Islam. They have tried to treat this solely as a law enforcement matter, not as a struggle with an ideology that despises our entire way of life," Bolton said.
"This attack is not the equivalent of a junked-up attack on the corner grocery store. This is an act of war against the United States," he said. | 0fake |
‘Planet Nine’ Can’t Hide Much Longer, Scientists Say | Planet Nine’s days of lurking unseen in the dark depths of the outer solar system may be numbered. By Mike Wall
The hypothetical giant planet, which is thought to be about 10 times more massive than Earth, will be discovered within 16 months or so, astronomer Mike Brown predicted.
“I’m pretty sure, I think, that by the end of next winter — not this winter, next winter — I think that there’ll be enough people looking for it that … somebody’s actually going to track this down,” Brown said during a news conference Wednesday (Oct. 19) at a joint meeting of the American Astronomical Society’s Division for Planetary Sciences (DPS) and the European Planetary Science Congress (EPSC) in Pasadena, California. Brown said that eight to 10 groups are currently looking for the planet.
At the “next one of these [DPS-EPSC meetings], we’ll be talking about finding Planet Nine instead of just looking for it,” added Brown, who’s based at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) in Pasadena.
That would be a pretty quick path from hypothetical planet to confirmed world. The existence of Planet Nine was seriously proposed for the first time just in 2014, by astronomers Scott Sheppard and Chadwick Trujillo, of the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington, D.C., and the Gemini Observatory in Hawaii, respectively.
Sheppard and Trujillo noted that the dwarf planet Sedna, the newfound object 2012 VP113 and several other bodies far beyond Pluto share certain odd orbital characteristics, a coincidence that would make sense if their paths through space had been shaped by an unseen, giant “perturber” in the region.
Researchers say an anomaly in the orbits of distant Kuiper Belt objects points to the existence of an unknown planet orbiting the sun. Here’s what we know of this potential “Planet Nine.”
Credit: by Karl Tate, Infographics artist
The researchers suggested that this putative planet is perhaps two to 15 times more massive than Earth and lies hundreds of astronomical units (AU) from the sun. (One AU is the Earth-sun distance, about 93 million miles, or 150 million kilometers.)
This interpretation was bolstered in January of this year by Brown and fellow Caltech astronomer Konstantin Batygin, who found evidence of a perturber’s influence in the orbits of a handful of additional distant objects. This “Planet Nine,” as Batygin and Brown dubbed the putative world, likely contains about 10 Earth masses and orbits on a highly elliptical path whose aphelion (farthest distance from the sun) is about 1,000 AU, the researchers said. (For perspective, Pluto gets just 49.3 AU from the sun at aphelion.)
The evidence for Planet Nine’s existence has continued to grow over the past nine months, as several different research teams have determined that the orbits of other small, distant objects appear to have been sculpted as well.
One team, led by Renu Malhotra of the University of Arizona, discussed four such objects at the DPS/EPSC meeting Wednesday. And Brown’s team, led by Elizabeth Bailey of Caltech, announced at the meeting on Tuesday (Oct. 18) that Planet Nine appears to have tilted the orbits of all eight “official” planets by 6 degrees relative to the sun.
The ongoing Planet Nine research also includes efforts to pin down where the world might be in the sky these days. This is a key part of the discovery effort, since a blind search for an object so far away, and with such a huge and elliptical orbit, has little chance of success in the near term, Brown has said.
It’s likely that Planet Nine is currently at or near aphelion, located perhaps 1,000 AU from the sun, in a patch of sky measuring about 400 square degrees, Brown said. (For comparison, the full moon viewed from Earth covers about 0.5 degrees of sky.)
Astronomers have said Planet Nine is perhaps four times wider than Earth, and such an object would be easily visible with professional-grade equipment if it were relatively close to Earth, Brown explained. In addition, planets on highly elliptical orbits spend most of their time near aphelion, since they’re traveling most slowly on this part of their path, he said.
An object four times bigger than Earth that’s located at 1,000 AU would have a magnitude of about +25 on astronomers’ brightness scale, Brown added.
“This is well within reach of the giant telescopes,” he said. “The Subaru telescope, I think, on Mauna Kea, [in Hawaii]— the Japanese national telescope — is the prime instrument for doing the search. But there are a lot of other people who have clever ideas on how to find it, too, that are trying with their own telescopes.”
So which research team will ultimately find Planet Nine? Brown said he isn’t sure, and he stressed that getting credit for the historic discovery should be a secondary concern for astronomers.
“There are a lot of people looking, and we are trying as hard as we can to tell people where to look,” he said. “We want it to be found.”
Follow Mike Wall on Twitter @michaeldwall and Google+ . Follow us @Spacedotcom , Facebook or Google+ . Originally published on Space.com .
Source: Space.com
| 1real |
NBC to Broadcast 2018 Olympics Live in All Time Zones - The New York Times | When the Olympics are held in Pyeongchang, South Korea, in 2018, NBC will be broadcasting the Winter Games live across all time zones for the first time, the network announced on Tuesday. The move addresses the number of people who have instant access to results and events through social media and internet streams, including NBC’s own live coverage online. “That means social media won’t be ahead of the action in any time zone, and as a result, none of our viewers will have to wait for anything,” Jim Bell, president for NBC Olympics production and programming, said in a statement. “This is exciting news for the audience, the advertisers and our affiliates alike. ” On most nights, in addition to morning and afternoon coverage, broadcasting will still begin at 8 p. m. Eastern. That coverage will be followed, coast to coast, by local news and a variant of the broadcast the network will call “Prime Time Plus” — a nod to the West Coast audience — rather than declare it a slot. With many major events taking place in the morning on the East Coast, which is 13 hours behind Pyeongchang, sports such as figure skating and snowboarding will air in prime time. NBC’s delayed broadcasts during past Games were the subject of some criticism as digital audiences grew. Previously, viewers in the Pacific and Mountain time zones would receive events on a or delay so that they fell within each region’s slot. Viewership figures, however, highlighted the shrinking interest in the television broadcast of the Olympics. For the 2016 Games in Rio de Janeiro, TV audience figures averaged 25. 4 million over 17 nights, a decrease of 18 percent from the 2012 London Games. Online viewership, the network said at the time, increased 29 percent for the Rio Games compared with 2012. In deals in 2011 and 2014, NBCUniversal’s parent company, Comcast, bought exclusive broadcast and digital rights to the Olympics through 2032 for about $12 billion. Last month, the network announced that the Bob Costas would be replaced by Mike Tirico, who will be the program host during the 2018 Games. The opening ceremony in Pyeongchang will be held Feb. 9, and the event will run through Feb. 25. | 0fake |
U.S. senator calls for GAO probe to protect babies born drug-dependent | NEW YORK (Reuters) - The ranking Democrat on the U.S. Senate subcommittee on children and families wants a congressional watchdog agency to investigate whether states are complying with a federal law meant to protect newborns in drug withdrawal and help their families. In a letter sent this week to the U.S. Government Accountability Office, Senator Robert Casey of Pennsylvania asked that the probe examine what steps Congress or the Obama Administration could take “to improve compliance and save the lives of vulnerable infants.” The request comes in response to a Reuters investigation in December that identified the preventable deaths of 110 babies whose mothers used opioids during pregnancy and were subsequently sent home to families ill-equipped to care for them. A 2003 federal law calls on states to require that healthcare workers notify child protection services when a baby is born affected by illegal substance abuse or has symptoms of drug withdrawal. Such reports are not to be used as evidence of abuse, the law says, but rather to help develop a “plan of safe care” for the newborns after they leave the hospital. Reuters found that no more than nine states and the District of Columbia appear to follow the law. Even so, no state had lost federal funding from failing to abide by the provision. More than 27,000 newborns in the United States were diagnosed with drug withdrawal syndrome in 2013 – five times the number diagnosed with the condition in 2003. “Reuters’ groundbreaking report on the condition of children born with opioid dependencies should be a call to action for all members of Congress,” Casey said in a separate statement. Cathleen Palm, executive director of the Center for Children’s Justice, a Pennsylvania non-profit advocacy group, supported Casey’s action. “By GAO and Congress saying we want states to tangibly tell us what they are doing, it’s going to force them to really look at it,” Palm said. “It just feels like we’re about to get a whole lot more motivated about these babies and their families.” Mark Weber, a spokesman for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees compliance with the law, said the agency will “work with the GAO when an inquiry is made.” The Reuters investigation, “Helpless & Hooked,” can be found at reut.rs/1NSc7uC | 0fake |
New Hampshire Republican Calls For Executing Hillary By Firing Squad (AUDIO) | Trump s supporters are bloodthirsty monsters.By now it is crystal clear that Hillary Clinton needs the most Secret Service protection the government can provide because conservatives are obviously too crazy to be ignored.One such conservatives is New Hampshire Republican State Rep. Al Baldasaro, who is also Trump s adviser on veteran s affairs.On Tuesday, Baldasaro echoed other conservatives by calling for executing the former Secretary of State via firing squad for imaginary crimes conservatives think she is guilty of committing even though there is no evidence that she ever committed a crime. House panels found nothing during their investigation of Benghazi and they couldn t find anything in their investigation into her emails either.Even the FBI couldn t recommend prosecution because there was nothing to go on.But Baldasaro and other conservatives don t care. They think they are judge, jury, and executioner. Hillary Clinton to me is the Jane Fonda of the Vietnam, Baldasaro told a right-wing radio host. She is a disgrace for the lies that she told those mothers about their children that got killed over there in Benghazi. She dropped the ball on over 400 emails requesting back up security. Something s wrong there. Again, even the House committee headed by REPUBLICANS could not find any evidence that Hillary Clinton failed to respond to attacks in Benghazi in which four Americans were killed, including Ambassador Chris Stevens.In fact, even Stevens own family does not blame Clinton.But regardless of the facts, Baldarsaro wants blood. He accused Clinton of committing treason and said she should be shot. This whole thing disgusts me, Hillary Clinton should be put in the firing line and shot for treason. Here s the audio via BuzzfeedIn addition to right-wingers calling for Hillary to be shot, hanged, and imprisoned despite the fact that she has not committed a crime, Trump s delivery boy Chris Christie held a mock trial at the RNC Convention on Tuesday evening and charged her with crimes and let the crowd deliver verdicts. They chanted Lock her up and guilty. And this is all despite the fact that Christie himself is embroiled in a legal scandal of his own, which Hillary reminded him of on Twitter.Conservative hatred of Hillary Clinton has reached fever pitch and is extremely dangerous if left unchecked. Calling for the assassination of a political candidate is disgraceful and Donald Trump needs to tell his supporters that they are going too far. Because it is only a matter of time before a conservative gun nut actually attempts to put those calls into action.Featured image via YouTube | 1real |
Senate confirms top EPA enforcement official | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Senate on Thursday confirmed the Environmental Protection Agency’s third high-level official after Administrator Scott Pruitt, approving Susan Bodine to become the agency’s top enforcement official. Bodine will serve as assistant administrator for EPA’s Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance, leading the agency’s enforcement actions against polluters. In September, two senators threatened to hold up her confirmation out of concern that she was serving as special counsel to Pruitt while she waited out the confirmation process, a possible violation of a federal law, and because she was slow to respond to Senate Democrats’ oversight queries. Democratic Senator Tom Carper of Delaware said on Thursday that he was “satisfied” with the responses she and EPA officials sent, clearing the way for her confirmation. | 0fake |
Assassination attempt at Reno Trump rally? | Assassination attempt at Reno Trump rally? What other surprises lurk in the final hour? November 5, 2016 RENO, Nev. ( INTELLIHUB ) — An assassination attempt was potentially a narrow miss at a Trump rally Saturday night. Right Side Broadcasting/YouTube
The attempt, of some type, occurred at 9 p.m. and caused a commotion throughout the crowed, just before Republican Presidential Nominee Donald J. Trump was rushed off stage by Secret Service.
The suspect was removed and detained.
Watch what happened: WATCH: Donald Trump rushed off stage by Secret Service agents during event in Reno, Nevada. https://t.co/PXCTYaDaeJ pic.twitter.com/Zf8ORObAQt
— ABC News (@ABC) November 6, 2016
Watch the full rally here:
“Nobody is going to stop this movement. Nobody,” a man said who took the mic during the chaos.
“Trump, Trump, Trump […],” the crowed cheered.
“Nobody said it was going to be easy for us, but we will never be stopped,” Trump said as he retook the stage minutes later to a cheering crowd.
It was also reported that at least two people in the crowd ‘saw a gun.’
#Trump2016 | 1real |
Emperor OctoTrumpus™ appoints special prosecutor to take down SNL | Monday, 14 November 2016 Poor old Kate runs foul of the Trumphole already with libelous version of Hallelujah
It seems Kate McKinnons heart warming redention of Cohens anthem for sanity Hallelujah is the last straw for the Emperor. He has ordered a full congressional investigation into SNL and their libelous so called humour.
Alec Baldwin seems to be the main target, but all Trumphole impersonators are included in the arraignment deposition. He has already sent confederate KKK vigilante force to arrest him but it appears as though he has already fled the country with the Clintons as part of the massive Canadian migration .
Kate McKinnon recently named Americas latest national treasure has already made a deal to move to a much more civilised country with her agents are in discussions with Kim Jong-ill to move to North Korea.
Satire writers everywhere are bracing for the worst with an underground resistance movement located in secret nuclear bunkers being mooted as their 'last stand'. Make Jung in the Jungle's day - give this story five thumbs-up (there's no need to register , the thumbs are just down there!) | 1real |
BUSTED: THE ULTIMATE COMMUNIST ORGANIZER…Evidence Shows George Soros Behind Ferguson Race Riots | George, Barack and Hillary the axis of evil Professional race activists Deray McKesson and Johnetta Elzie (ShordeeDooWhop), pictured here in Baltimore, helped whip up the Ferguson mobs. This year Fortune Magazine named these two professional activists two of the world s greatest leaders.Many conservatives rightly smelled a rat in the supposed organic race-riot movement that sprang up so quickly in Ferguson, Missouri in August 2014 after the shooting death of robber Michael Brown. After burning the Ferguson and Dellwood, Missouri business districts to the ground the radical left has relentlessly sought to recreate the same discord and disinformation in various locations around the U.S. Ferguson #BlackLivesMatter protest leaders have been flown to New York, South Carolina, Milwaukee, Selma, and more recently to McKinney, Texas and Hillary s campaign relaunch in New York.Thankfully, every day patriots and online conservative investigators still fight to shine truth, anywhere the movement tries to sow its twisted seeds to foment anger, feed bitterness, and breed division.Much has been printed about the paid protesters and Soros connections.** Nearly half of the roughly 500 businesses operating in Ferguson and adjacent communities, such as Dellwood and Jennings, suffered property damage or lost revenue as a result of the coordinated Ferguson protests and riots.In May black Ferguson activists staged a protest at the office of MORE (Missourians Organizing for Reform and Empowerment) to complain that the group s white leaders collected tens of thousands of dollars in donations off of the Black Lives Matter movement without paying the Black participants their fair share. It was during these protests that Ferguson activists admitted that fellow protesters were making MORE THAN $5,000 a month to disrupt cities, damage property and attack police!In response to these protests MORE released a list of names and amounts paid out to protesters and protest groups who agitated and harassed police night-after-night in Ferguson last fall and winter.The list of over 80 groups and individuals was posted on Twitter by an irate protester. Via Weasel ZippersOne of the protest leaders who showed up in Ferguson shortly after Michael Brown s death was DeRay McKesson from Minneapolis. DeRay and fellow activist Johnetta Elzie (ShordeeDooWhop) were nationally recognized and celebrated by the liberal media as two of the top stars of the violent protest mob.We now know that DeRay McKesson has been working with and for Soros-funded groups since he was in junior high school. We know this because DeRay released his resume online this past weekend.DeRay says he s been living off of savings for the past nine months as he s turned up in Ferguson, Baltimore, New York City, Milwaukee, Selma, McKinney and this past weekend he was at Hillary Clinton s campaign relaunch in New York state.DeRay and Charles Wade, Solange Knowles s stylist, the founder of Op Help or Hush have known each other for three years. Wade and McKesson were regular Ferguson protesters. That means the two have been affiliated well before Michael Brown went on his crime spree. DeRay has used his capacity, as Charles calls it, to push the movement s agenda far and wide.DeRay has long been known for his skill at community organizing .He served as president of his class at Bowdoin College, as well as president of Bowdoin Student Government. While at Bowdoin, DeRay reportedly grew close to Bowdoin President Barry Mills, whose wife, Karen Gordon Mills, served in the Obama Administration. DeRay just happened to stay on the couch of an unnamed Bowdoin alum when he first descended on Ferguson.After graduating from Bowdoin, DeRay worked for the Harlem Children s Zone, run by none other than Bowdoin alums Druckenmiller and Geoffrey Canada. Coincidentally, Geoffrey served on the Open Society Institute s board.Throwback, meeting HCZ's Geoff Canada. pic.twitter.com/ocyw6Yo57q deray mckesson (@deray) February 16, 2015DeRay also worked for the movement linked Teach For America, another radical Soros-funded group.But DeRay s ties to Soros and community organizing seemingly date back even further, to McKesson s teen years, at least. Suffice it to say, DeRay has been tied to Soros for more than a decade, through many programs.Perhaps DeRay s long and numerous apparent ties to Soros explain how he was so quickly dispatched to Ferguson, Missouri to take control of the protesters and become the powerfuls approved and promoted voice on the ground. As DeRay said, People will come out into the streets to confront a system that is corrupt. Yet, DeRay seems to be molded, directed, and funded by some of the most powerful men in that very system. It looks as if someone may be pulling the strings behind the scenes to foment rage as this astroturf anti-police movement spreads from Ferguson to other points in America.Via: Gateway PunditAND LAST BUT CERTAINLY NOT LEAST...Here s Deray throwing his support behind Hillary on Twitter! What a surprise | 1real |
America’s Most Popular ‘Legal’ Drug is Responsible for 25% of ALL Cancer | Home / Health / America’s Most Popular ‘Legal’ Drug is Responsible for 25% of ALL Cancer America’s Most Popular ‘Legal’ Drug is Responsible for 25% of ALL Cancer John Vibes October 29, 2016 Leave a comment
There are many factors contributing to the massive rise in cancer cases in the US, but according to a new study from the American Cancer Society, cigarette smoke is by far the leading cause. The study found that roughly 25% of all cancer deaths could be attributed to cigarette smoking.
Although cigarette smoking has waned somewhat in recent years, nearly 40 million adults in the U.S. currently smoke cigarettes. The CDC says cigarette smoking is the leading cause of preventable disease and death in the U.S., responsible for more than 480,000 deaths annually.
According to the study :
We estimate that at least 167 133 cancer deaths in the United States in 2014 (28.6% of all cancer deaths; 95% CI, 28.2%-28.8%) were attributable to cigarette smoking. Among men, the proportion of cancer deaths attributable to smoking ranged from a low of 21.8% in Utah (95% CI, 19.9%-23.5%) to a high of 39.5% in Arkansas (95% CI, 36.9%-41.7%), but was at least 30% in every state except Utah. Among women, the proportion ranged from 11.1% in Utah (95% CI, 9.6%-12.3%) to 29.0% in Kentucky (95% CI, 27.2%-30.7%) and was at least 20% in all states except Utah, California, and Hawaii. Nine of the top 10 ranked states for men and 6 of the top 10 ranked states for women were located in the South. In men, smoking explained nearly 40% of cancer deaths in the top 5 ranked states (Arkansas, Louisiana, Tennessee, West Virginia, and Kentucky). In women, smoking explained more than 26% of all cancer deaths in the top 5 ranked states, which included 3 Southern states (Kentucky, Arkansas, and Tennessee), and 2 Western states (Alaska and Nevada).
Smoking is one of the leading causes of illness and death in the world. The use of tobacco has become more widespread than ever and the substance itself is far more dangerous than it has ever been before.
Today, cigarettes are mass produced and treated with thousands of additives and chemicals. Carcinogenic, poisonous chemicals and toxic metals can all be found in modern tobacco products. These chemicals are present for many reasons ranging from taste and preservation to being purposely addictive. There are over 4000 of these chemicals in cigarettes and all of them are not revealed to the public. They are protected under law as “trade secrets” — meaning they can add anything they want in there without our knowledge.
The financial advantage alone should be enough of an argument to quit smoking. In most states, cigarettes are now over 6 dollars a pack, more than half of which is taxes. So people are literally paying the government and rich multinational corporations an average of 10 dollars every day, for a product that destroys their bodies. It is true that there are addictive chemicals in cigarettes but their strength and power has been blown way out of proportion.
The psychological addiction is always much stronger than the physical addiction even with harsh narcotics like heroin and especially with nicotine. All you have to do is stop and get through a few days without it. Soon enough the smell and taste will no longer be desirable to you and you will be happy to have that extra 6 dollars a pack in your pocket. It will be easier to breathe, you won’t get sick as often and you will overall be in better spirits. Quitting cigarettes is one decision that you can make that will drastically improve your life in a number of ways and it will give the elite less control of your money and your health. John Vibes is an author and researcher who organizes a number of large events including the Free Your Mind Conference. He also has a publishing company where he offers a censorship free platform for both fiction and non-fiction writers. You can contact him and stay connected to his work at his Facebook page. John is currently battling cancer naturally , without any chemo or radiation, and will be working to help others through his experience, if you wish to contribute to his treatments please donate here . Share | 1real |
Italy national election likely set for March 4: parliamentary source | ROME (Reuters) - Italy s parliament will be dissolved between Christmas and the New Year with national elections likely set for March 4, a parliamentary source in contact with the president s office said on Wednesday. The source said the vote could also be held on March 11, with a final decision due to be taken shortly. A national election must be held by May, but most political parties are keen to hold elections as soon as possible. While the centre-right is seen winning most seats at the forthcoming ballot, opinion polls suggest it will not win an absolute majority, making a hung parliament the most likely outcome. | 0fake |
SPINELESS GOP PROVES MAJORITY Means Nothing …Senator Schumer Brags About Not Funding Border Wall: “Budget Deal Reflects Democrats’ Principles” | Wow! Republicans had a chance to stand up to the Democrats and fight for the border wall, as well as other issues that got President Trump and many Republican members of Congress elected. The swamp monsters first attempt at backing our president and his efforts to make America Great Again however, proved to be an epic failure. Meanwhile, Democrats who are the minority party in both the House and Senate are gloating over the power they still wield over our spineless leadership in the GOP Top Capitol Hill negotiators reached an agreement on a huge $1 trillion-plus spending bill that avoids a government shutdown, aides said on Sunday.The deal means virtually all the day-to-day-operations of the federal government will be funded until September.It was a victory for Trump, who got an extra $15billion to strengthen the military and another $1.5billion to enhance border security.However, he lost out on the funding he needed for the US-Mexico-border wall, a promise that was one of the cornerstones of his presidential campaign.Details of the agreement were expected to be made public Sunday night, said aides to lawmakers involved in weeks of negotiations. The House and Senate had until midnight Friday to pass a measure to avert a government shutdown. Daily Mail White House Budget Director Mick Mulvaney said earlier in April that the shutdown fight was the first real test of whether or not the Democrats specifically in the Senate are interested in negotiating, interested in compromising. The White House last week dropped its demand for immediate funding for the border wall after Democrats said it would result in a government shutdown because they would not vote for any bill that included it. The White House also dropped its threat to stop paying federal subsidies to insurance companies that offer lower-cost coverage to low-income Americans. Trump had threatened to stop paying the subsidies to force Democrats to support legislation to replace the Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare.Here s a look at the trillion dollar budget that was passed by Republican majority Congress and Democrat minority. We ve highlighted budget items where Democrats and RINO s in Congress came together to vote against promises President Trump made to voters who elected him. Once those two major stumbling blocks to a deal were removed, negotiators had just a few remaining issues to resolve over the weekend.While Republicans hold majorities in the House and Senate, the GOP needs Democratic votes in both chambers to pass the funding bill. In the closely divided Senate, the GOP has a slim majority of 52 seats in a chamber where 60 votes are required to pass the legislation. In the House, Republican leaders need help from Democrats because some conservatives will oppose any bill that increases spending.Democrats used that leverage to get concessions from the White House on the border wall and Obamacare while also getting extra money for medical research and other domestic programs. At the same time, Democrats agreed to beef up defense and border security, allowing the White House to claim at least a partial victory. USA Today | 1real |
FEEL THE BERN! Watch Bernie Sanders’ Supporters Embarrassed By Their Own Hypocrisy In Hysterical “Gotcha” Video | Roger Simon of PJ Media asks Bernie Sanders supporters at a recent rally why they re supporting him. They all seem to be in agreement that one of the primary reasons for supporting Bernie is because they believe he will stick it to the billionaire s in America. Because in the end, it s all about getting more free stuff and someone s gotta pay for it right?Watch their priceless reactions when they find out who s funding the rally they re attending: | 1real |
Sarah Palin Gets Annihilated On Twitter For Whining About Elizabeth Warren Using ‘Fight Like A Girl’ Line | At least Elizabeth Warren isn t a quitter like Sarah Palin.After all, Sarah Palin could have remained in office as Governor of Alaska and continued to build a political career. Instead, Palin quit halfway through her term to pursue reality stardom and has become nothing more than a desperate grifter who relies on donations to her super PAC to maintain her lifestyle.That s not fighting like a girl, it s conning like a conman.Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, however, is still fighting for women and the poor and middle class in Congress and could very well run for president in 2020. Warren has been fighting for the American people for years and has become a symbol of the women s movement.That s why Warren posed with the Fearless Girl statue on Tuesday and posted the image on Twitter with the caption, Fight like a girl. Fight like a girl. pic.twitter.com/qGTn46jS9W Elizabeth Warren (@elizabethforma) April 18, 2017And of course, Sarah Palin whined about it by crying to Breitbart.Palin claimed that she s a legit fighter for women and accused Warren of urging women to claim victimization when asked about her use of the phrase. I don t know. Coming from liberals who urge women to claim victimization, Fight like a girl just doesn t sound the same as when legit fighters for equality say it, mean it, live it, and will never give it up. Basically, Palin thinks fighting like a girl means never speaking up when you re being treated like shit.Women in this country have had to deal with rape culture, discrimination, and pay inequality for far too long, not to mention all the attacks on reproductive rights coming from right-wingers like Palin herself.How can one claim to fight like a girl when one doesn t even bother to fight for women rights to make their own choices about their own bodies?As usual, Palin is nothing more than a complete hypocrite who is bitching about a phrase she has never lived up to.Even Twitter users slammed Palin for attacking Warren.@SarahPalinUSA Sorry Sara but you didn t create the quote , you stole it and claimed it as yours #GovernorQuitter Joey Mitchell (@JoeyM728) April 19, 2017@SarahPalinUSA Before you know it, she ll be hanging out in Alaska claiming that she can see Russia from her backyard. Michelle Mantell (@mich101564) April 19, 2017@SarahPalinUSA Are you truly this stupid? This comment was not created by you! It s been around for decades and you stole it from someone else. SAD! Michael Fishel (@SparkyWhoRuns) April 19, 2017@SarahPalinUSA I think you should engage Warren in a public debate then. You won t. She would eat you alive and you know it, Mrs Word Salad. E-Man (@ebruce2) April 19, 2017@SarahPalinUSA Rather have a senator that works than have a quitter anyday .. LMFAO TheStuPadaso (@The_Stu_Padaso) April 19, 2017Featured Image: Flickr | 1real |
Factbox: Trump makes picks to fill security, legal posts | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican U.S. President-elect Donald Trump on Friday announced his selections for his top security posts, including the head of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), his national security adviser and attorney general. An official with Trump’s transition team told Reuters that Trump had chosen retired General Michael Flynn as national security adviser, U.S. Senator Jeff Sessions to serve as attorney general, and U.S. Representative Mike Pompeo to lead the CIA. All three accepted, the official said. Below are details about his selections: Sessions, 69, was the first U.S. Senator to endorse Trump’s presidential bid and has been a close ally since. A conservative from Alabama, he is serving his fourth term in the chamber, where he is a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee with oversight of federal courts, immigration, crime and terrorism. The son of a country-store owner, he is a former Army Reserve captain and served as the U.S. Attorney for Alabama’s Southern District under former President Ronald Reagan and later as Alabama’s Attorney General. Although he was confirmed by the Senate for his U.S. Attorney post in 1981, he was denied a federal judgeship in 1986 when a Senate panel failed to advance his nomination amid allegations he had made racially-charged remarks, which he denied. Sessions must secure confirmation by the U.S. Senate to lead the Justice Department as attorney general, but he would only need to win majority support in the chamber, which is controlled by Republicans. Sessions has long taken a tough stance on immigration, opposing any path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. During the Republican George W. Bush administration, he blasted a bipartisan effort to create a guest-worker program for illegal immigrants backed by Bush. NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: RETIRED LIEUTENANT GENERAL MICHAEL FLYNN Flynn, 57, was an early supporter of Trump and serves as vice chairman on his transition team. A former director of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), he began his U.S. Army career in 1981 and served deployments in Afghanistan and Iraq. He later worked in the Office of the Director of Intelligence. Once a registered Democrat, Flynn became head of the DIA in 2012 under President Barack Obama and but retired a year earlier than expected according to media reports and became a fierce critic of Obama’s foreign policy. He went on to launch his own consulting firm that has come under scrutiny for its ties to a Turkish businessman. He told the Wall Street Journal on Thursday that he would sever ties with the firm to serve Trump. Flynn has said the United States should work more with Russia on global security issues. In an August interview with the Washington Post, he defended a paid speech for state-run Russian Television. Pompeo, 52, is a third-term congressman from Kansas who serves on the U.S House Select Intelligence Committee, which oversees the CIA, National Security Agency (NSA) and cyber security. Pompeo also was a member of the House Select Committee on Benghazi investigating the 2012 attack on a U.S. compound in Libya. The California native graduated first in his class from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and served as a platoon leader in the U.S. Army before leaving military as a captain to attend Harvard Law School. In 1996, he moved to Kansas to launch an aircraft parts company. The firm’s decision to open a factory in Mexico came under fire when Pompeo later ran for public office. Pompeo defended his work, saying the company had created jobs in the state. His ties to Koch Industries, owned by billionaire conservative donors Charles and David Koch, has also drawn scrutiny. He won re-election in the Nov. 8 election with 61 percent of the vote, according to Kansas’s unofficial election results online. Pompeo has been critical of former U.S. intelligence contractor Edward Snowden who leaked National Security Agency information, saying in a 2014 letter that his telecast appearance at an event undermined the ideals of “fairness and freedom.” (This version of the story was refiled to remove extraneous “to” in headline) | 0fake |
Narendra Modi Bolsters India’s Ties With U.S., Thanks (Partly) to Donald Trump - The New York Times | WASHINGTON — After decades of mistrust and fitful reconciliation efforts, India and the United States made a turn toward cooperation on Tuesday, and Donald J. Trump can claim at least some of the credit. India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, making his second visit to the White House in two years, announced a crucial step toward ratification of the Paris agreement to limit greenhouse gases, bringing the accord close to full implementation. The two sides also announced that they intended to complete a deal in which India will buy six nuclear reactors from Westinghouse by June 2017, fulfilling an agreement struck in 2005 by President George W. Bush. The price is still under discussion, but more difficult issues like liability have been resolved. “We continue to discuss a wide range of areas where we can cooperate more effectively in order to promote jobs, promote investment, promote trade and promote greater opportunities for our people, particularly young people, in both of our countries,” President Obama said in the Oval Office during the meeting. Mr. Modi responded with his own praise of the burgeoning partnership. When President Obama visited India in January 2015, Mr. Modi referred to him as “Barack” and thanked him for his “deep personal commitment” to their friendship. In the Oval Office on Tuesday, Mr. Modi referred to the president as “my friend Obama. ” “The United States is well aware of the talent that India has,” Mr. Modi said in Hindi. “We and the United States can work together to bring forward this talent, and use it for the benefit of mankind and use it for the benefit of innovations and use it to achieve new progress. ” Mr. Modi has made clear that he intends to set aside decades of standoffishness — rooted in India’s colonial experience — to cement closer ties with Washington, in part because the next American leader may not share President Obama’s enthusiasm for India. The news media in India has extensively chronicled comments by Mr. Trump that critics have said were racist, his “America First” views and his unorthodox campaign. While Mr. Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, has said little about India, his vows to tighten immigration policies worry Indian officials. “Modi wants to get as much as he can out of Obama’s last months in office,” said Ashley J. Tellis, a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. For the Americans, the most important part of Mr. Modi’s visit was his announced intention to formally join the Paris climate change agreement by the end of this year. So far, countries representing about 50 percent of global emissions have announced that they will submit legal paperwork to the United Nations documenting their compliance with the deal. The pact will become binding when at least 55 countries representing 55 percent of global emissions formally join. The inclusion of India, the world’s emitter after China and the United States, would guarantee that the deal will go into effect before the next American president takes office. Mr. Trump has vowed to “cancel” the Paris climate agreement if elected, something Mr. Obama is eager to prevent. Once the accord enters into legal force, no nation can legally withdraw for four years. “If the Paris agreement achieves ratification before Inauguration Day, it would be impossible for the Trump administration to renegotiate or even drop out during the first presidential term,” said Robert N. Stavins, the director of the environmental economics program at Harvard. Mr. Obama and Mr. Modi also announced a separate agreement to cut the use of hydrofluorocarbons, potent chemicals produced by coolants in refrigerators and . India and the United States have been at odds on the details of such a deal, but the agreement announced on Tuesday means both governments now expect in October to sign on to an international accord to phase out the chemicals. Phasing out the chemicals could reduce by 25 percent the expected warming of the planet by the end of the century. “This is the most significant step the international community could take” to reduce climate warming, Brian Deese, a senior adviser to Mr. Obama, said in a call with reporters. The two sides also announced joint efforts for the United States to invest in India’s renewable energy development, including the creation of a $20 million finance initiative. The last time Mr. Modi visited, in September 2014, he was invited to dinner but announced that he was observing a religious fast. So Mr. Obama had the awkward task of eating before a guest who sipped only water. This time, at a working lunch, Mr. Modi ate. On Wednesday, Mr. Modi will become the fifth Indian prime minister to address both houses of Congress. The two countries finalized a deal that allows their forces to help each other with crucial supplies, and the United States formally recognized India as a major defense partner, which should allow India to buy some of the most sophisticated equipment in the United States arsenal. India’s increasing willingness to form military partnerships with the United States is, in part, a result of its deepening worries about China. Recent patrols by Chinese submarines in the Bay of Bengal have unnerved New Delhi, and a 2014 visit to India by the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, did nothing to soothe Indian sensibilities, as Chinese troops made an incursion into border territory that India claims as its own. China’s refusal in the months since to resolve the territorial claims at the heart of the standoff has quietly infuriated Indian officials. Another reason Washington and New Delhi have grown so close is the increasingly testy relationship between the United States and Pakistan, India’s longtime rival. Although Pakistan is formally an ally of the United States, American officials have made clear that India has displaced Pakistan in American interests and hearts. “We have much more to do with India today than has to do with Pakistan,” Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter said in April. “There is important business with respect to Pakistan, but we have much more, a whole global agenda with India, agenda that covers all kinds of issues. ” | 0fake |
Lawsuits Against Monsanto’s Roundup® | By Catherine J Frompovich When I published the article, “Glyphosate Contaminates the Global Ecosystem: The Damning New PAN Report”, I mentioned a law firm as a resource because of the lawsuits it has... | 1real |
WATCH: SNL’s Church Lady Returns To Hilariously Mock Ted Cruz And Donald Trump | Fresh off of being compared to Satan by John Boehner and dropping out of the 2016 presidential race, Saturday Night Live piled on by bringing back a familiar character to mock Ted Cruz.Dana Carvey returned for a special appearance as the Church Lady and the first guest was none other than Ted Cruz played by Taran Killiam, whom the Church Lady introduced as Satan.Cruz corrected the Church Lady, claiming that Boehner always has nicknames for him like buster or son of a gun. I believe the phrase was Lucifer in the flesh, Church Lady responded. A little bit different than buster.' Church Lady then asked why the 2016 race didn t work out for him. I suppose the American people weren t ready for a candidate with strong Christian values, Cruz explained. Someone like me who follows the righteous path and lives his faith every blessed moment. Has anyone ever told you that you re just a little preachy, Church Lady pointed out before noting that Cruz loves himself too much. There it is, Church Lady said noting Cruz s face. That s that happy superior face because we love Jesus more than anybody. Cruz said that he believes everything that happened is part of God s plan. Was it part of God s plan for you to get humiliated by an orange mannequin? That s an odd plan for God to have for you, Church Lady replied.Killiam s Cruz then mentioned that he s been told to go to hell so many times that he s thinking about turning evil and going there to check it out before letting out a creepy and awkward laugh. As he left, Church Lady told him that she would see him in hell.Church Lady then introduced Donald Trump as her next guest and promptly asked him if he ever reads the Bible.Trump, as played by Darrell Hammond, launched into how he enjoyed reading Corinthians Part Deux and Too Genesis, Too Furious. He then attempted to quoted from the Bible. Love thy neighbor as thyself and like a good neighbor State Farm is there, Trump said. He also said he loved the part where Game of Thrones character Jon Snow comes back from the dead. That s great Bible, Trump declared, leading the Church Lady to say her famous line, Well, isn t that special. Here s the video via NBC.The way Republican candidates have obsessed with religion over the course of this election, it was definitely an appropriate time for the Church Lady to return.Featured image via screenshot | 1real |
Trump hotels reach deal with unions, ending labor board cases | (Reuters) - Hotels in Las Vegas and Washington owned by U.S. President-elect Donald Trump reached agreements with their workers’ unions that will end a series of cases alleging the hotels violated federal labor law, the Trump Organization and unions said on Wednesday. More than 500 food and beverage and housekeeping employees at the Trump International Hotel Las Vegas entered into a four-year collective bargaining agreement effective Jan. 1 that guarantees annual raises and pension and healthcare benefits, Trump Hotels and Unite Here Culinary Workers Union Local 226 said in a joint statement. Under the agreement, the union will withdraw a series of cases filed with the U.S. National Labor Relations Board against the hotel, union spokeswoman Bethany Khan said. Those cases had been expected to be an early test of how Trump, who as president will have influence over the NLRB, would handle concerns over conflicts of interest raised by his business holdings. Trump takes office on Jan. 20. Alan Garten, general counsel of the Trump Organization, said in an interview the company was moving to resolve legal disputes that could raise concerns about conflicts. “(It is) certainly better to avoid distraction, but we’re going to continue to move forward on matters where we think we’re in the right,” Garten said. Trump Hotels also agreed to permit workers at the Trump International Hotel Washington D.C., which opened in October, to organize, the company said on Wednesday. Last week, Democrats in the U.S. Congress called on Trump to divest from the Washington hotel, which is in a building leased from the federal government, saying the lease would pose a conflict of interest because he would essentially be both its landlord and tenant once he is sworn in. Eric Danziger, chief executive of Trump Hotels, called Unite Here Local 25, the union organizing workers at the hotel, which is down Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House, an “important partner” in a statement. “We share mutual goals with the union, as we both desire to ensure outstanding jobs for the employees, while also enabling the hotel to operate successfully in a competitive environment,” he said. As part of the agreement, the Trump Organization will end its appeal of a November NLRB decision that said it violated workers’ rights to organize at the Las Vegas hotel. The Trump Organization still faces a pending case at the NLRB claiming it required thousands of U.S. employees to sign unlawfully broad confidentiality agreements. | 0fake |
MEDIA IGNORES TRUMP’S FIRST Record-Breaking Christmas Season…Retail Sales Of $600 BILLION: “This is literally the best season since before the recession” | The Stock Market is setting record after record and unemployment is at a 17 year low. So many things accomplished by the Trump Administration, perhaps more than any other President in first year. Sadly, will never be reported correctly by the Fake News Media! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 23, 2017CBS News reported on the retailer s record-breaking holiday season without ever mentioning President Trump:Total retail sales this holiday season added up to a record $598 billion dollars up $33 billion from last year.Not surprisingly, the AP also failed to mention President Trump: Experts have issued rosy forecasts for the season. Shoppers seemed to be in the mood with unemployment at a 17-year low and consumer sentiment at its highest level since 2000. Shoppers have been spending at a pace not seen since the Great Recession, says Craig Johnson, president of retail consulting group Customer Growth Partners. The Wall Street Journal reported sales were up for retailers like Macy s and Wal-Mart. The Wall Street Journal even mentioned that spending was up in all income categories, as shoppers were encouraged by rising wages and low unemployment, but failed to attribute any of the retailer s success to President mention Trump:Retailers are enjoying some extra Christmas cheer.Fueled by high consumer confidence and a robust job market, U.S. retail sales in the holiday period rose at their best pace since 2011, according to Mastercard SpendingPulse, which tracks both online and in-store spending.Sales, excluding automobiles, rose 4.9% from Nov. 1 through Christmas, compared with a 3.7% gain in the same period last year, according to the Mastercard Inc. unit, which tracks all forms of payment. E-commerce continued to drive the gains, rising 18.1%. Overall, this year was a big win for retail, Ms. Quinlan said.That newfound buoyancy is a relief to retailers from department-store giants like Macy s Inc. to mall favorites like Gap Inc. that struggled through a difficult year of store closures, declining foot traffic and bankruptcies by chains including the Sports Authority, Toys R Us and Payless Shoes.Investors, who have abandoned many retail stocks even as the broader stock market surged, have started to return. Shares of Macy s and Gap, for example, have jumped 24% and 18%, respectively, in the past month, compared with a 3% gain in the S&P 500. Wal-Mart Stores Inc. has rallied 40% on the year and, like online nemesis Amazon.com Inc., is trading near all-time highs. Unlike in past years, when spending was driven by high-income shoppers, this holiday season a broader swath of the population opened their wallets, encouraged by rising wages and low unemployment, analysts and economists said. Fewer people are living paycheck to paycheck, said Chris Christopher, executive director of economic-research firm IHS Markit. There is a lot more spending from the lower- and middle-income groups, while the upper-income groups are splurging. Fox Business News reported the amazing Christmas season sales, but neglected to mention President Trump s positive effect on the economy:Retailers are finally enjoying some Christmas cheer.Fueled by high consumer confidence and a robust job market, U.S. retail sales in the holiday period rose at their best pace since 2011, according to Mastercard SpendingPulse, which tracks both online and in-store spending.Sales, excluding automobiles, rose 4.9% from Nov. 1 through Christmas Eve, compared with a 3.7% gain in the same period last year, according to the Mastercard Inc. unit, which tracks all forms of payment. E-commerce continued to drive the gains, rising 18.1%. It started with a bang in the week leading up to Black Friday, said Sarah Quinlan, a senior vice president of marketing insights at Mastercard. She added that retailers benefited this year from Christmas Day falling on a Monday, giving shoppers a full weekend to scoop up last-minute purchases. Dec. 23 ranked next to Black Friday in terms of spending, according to Mastercard.Via: Gateway Pundit | 1real |
Melissa McCarthy Just Took On Sean Spicer’s ‘Hitler Moment’ And It’s F*cking Perfect (VIDEO) | In case you were unaware, Sean Spicer has spent much of the week attempting to justify his claim that Adolf Hitler wasn t as bad of a guy as everyone says because he drove people to concentration camps sorry, Holocaust centers rather than just gas them in town like Assad does. We didn t use chemical weapons in World War II, Spicer, apparently under the impression that Passover needed a little bit of Holocaust denial from the White House press secretary, said Tuesday. You know, you had someone as despicable as Hitler who didn t even sink to using chemical weapons. I think when you come to sarin gas, he was not using the gas on his own people the same way that Assad is doing, Spicer later said in an attempt to clarify his remarks, forgetting about all those gas chambers in what he calls Holocaust centers (or, of course, the mobile execution vans). Spicer continued to apologize throughout the week, but for some inexplicable reason found himself unable to undo the damage he did when he decided that Hitler wasn t such a bad guy after all.Spicer s Hitler week had all the makings of a perfect Saturday Night Live sketch, and Melissa McCarthy did not disappoint. Dressed as Spicer in his Easter Bunny costume (if you didn t know, he played the role of the egg-delivering Easter hero during the Bush years)McCarthy s Spicer admitted that he finally made a mistake with the Hitler gaffe. Everybody was like boo hoo, well what about the Holocaust centers?' Yeah, I know they re not really called Holocaust centers Duh, I know that. I m aware, Spicer added. I clearly meant to say, concentration clubs, ok? Let it drop. It would be really great if the nitpickers could try and see the big picture and didn t focus on every little slur and lie I say, Spicey said. That d be nice. We won t ruin any more of it for you. Watch it below:Featured image via screengrab | 1real |
Macron's promise of new France-Africa ties raises heckles | OUAGADOUGOU (Reuters) - France s President Emmanuel Macron told African youths on Tuesday that he belonged to a new generation of French leaders who would build partnerships with the continent rather than tell it what to do. But a youth protest against him, stones pelting one of his delegation s vehicles and a botched grenade attack on French troops hours before his arrival in Burkina Faso s capital Ouagadougou showed the hostility that still lingers after decades of an often tense France-Africa relationship. Macron was also subjected to rowdy student questions at the university after his speech in Ouagadougou, and was sometimes left fruitlessly hushing as he struggled to get his answers heard above the crowd. In his speech, peppered with references to African nationalists such as Nelson Mandela and Burkina s revolutionary leader Thomas Sankara, Macron promised a break with a past in which France often seemed to call the shots to former colonies. I am from a generation that doesn t come to tell Africans what to do, Macron said, prompting applause. I am from a generation for whom Nelson Mandela s victory is one of the best political memories. The 39-year-old is on a three-day visit to Burkina Faso, Ghana and Ivory Coast aimed at boosting cooperation in education, the digital economy and migration. I will be alongside those who believe that Africa is neither a lost continent or one that needs to be saved, he said. The grenade attack missed the French soldiers but wounded three civilians hours before Macron arrived. No group claimed responsibility. Stones were thrown at a delegation convoy, however Macron was far away from it at a meeting with his Burkina counterpart, Roch Marc Kabore in the presidential palace. Dozens of local youths clashed with security forces in the center of the capital throwing stones. Police responded with teargas. Protesters burnt T-shirts with images of Macron and carried slogans including Down with new-colonialism and French military out of Burkina . It was not the first time a French president has promised to break with past French politics on the continent. Macron s predecessor Francois Hollande declared while visiting Senegal in 2012 that the time of La Francafrique is over , referring to a shadowy network of diplomats, soldiers and businessmen who manipulated African leaders for decades after independence. But it comes at a tense time, when French troops are being sucked deeper into a years-long battle to quell Islamist militancy in the Sahel region. France has 4,000 troops deployed there, and there are mixed feelings about their presence - highlighted in a bitter row between France and Mali over the deaths of 11 Malian troops being held captive by Islamist militants in a French air strike. The French are pinning their hopes on the so-called G5 Sahel force being set up by regional country s with French and American backing. It launched a campaign on Oct. 28 amid growing unrest in the desert reaches of the region, where jihadists allied to al Qaeda or inspired by Islamic State roam undetected. Macron earlier told journalists G5 had been too slow to get established. He said he would call for greater co-operation between Europe and Africa to tackle human trafficking and he touted a European initiative to rescue African migrants from being enslaved in Libya. The exchange with heckling students was typical Macron, who during his presidential campaign often managed to turn initially hostile crowds in his favor by answering questions head on. You speak to me like I m a colonial power, but I don t want to look after electricity in Burkina Faso. That s the work of your president, he retorted to one hostile questioner. (Refiles to remove extraneous repeated references to capital) | 0fake |
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