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23,000 | Politifact’s Scorecards For Clinton, Kaine Versus Trump, Pence Should Make Every Republican Cry | Following all the idiotic drama of Donald Trump s choosing Mike Pence of Indiana for his running mate, Hillary Clinton s choice of Senator Tim Kaine may have seemed a little lackluster to some. However, Kaine compliments Hillary in a way that many people probably haven t thought of, and their pairing makes Trump and Pence look far worse now than before.Politifact, which Republicans revile because they think facts are pesky, annoying things to be ignored, put out a scorecard with the ratings of 27 statements Tim Kaine has made. It turns out that he has more statements rated True and Mostly True than he does Half True, Mostly False, and False put together. He has no Pants On Fire ratings at all.Compare that to Mike Pence. Politifact has rated 20 statements Pence has made, and of those 20, only four are True or Mostly True. Four! He has six Half True statements and six False statements. His only saving grace here is that he also doesn t have any Pants On Fire ratings.A look at Hillary Clinton s and Donald Trump s Politifact scorecards just drives home the point that the GOP is riddled with people who lie and spread misinformation. Trump, being the master liar he is, has more False and Pants On Fire statements than he does Mostly False, Half True, Mostly True and True statements combined.Hillary, on the other hand, has more True and Mostly True statements than she does Half True, Mostly False, False and Pants On Fire all together, just like her chosen running mate. These two are a good team just on that basis.So is it really any wonder that Hillary introduced her running mate as everything Donald Trump and Mike Pence are not? Of course, she was talking about the policies that Trump and Pence are putting together, but the ability to acknowledge facts and tell the truth is another major way in which Hillary Clinton and Tim Kaine are not, well, anything like any Republican we ve got.In other words, we have two presidential tickets that illustrate Republican honesty versus Democratic honesty, and Democratic honesty wins hands down. Facts don t lie, and unfortunately for the GOP, facts have a liberal bias.Photo of Clinton/Kaine by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images. Photo of Trump/Pence by Alex Wong/Getty Images. Images merged by Rika Christensen | 0 |
23,001 | “RACIST” CONSERVATIVE Viewers Of The O’Reilly Factor Have Raised Over $600K To Help Fund Black College Band’s Trip To Trump Inauguration…Leftist HATERS Go Ballistic! [VIDEO] | Bill O Reilly reacted to the approximate $500,000 (currently up to over $560K) that has been raised for the Talladega College Marching Tornadoes band s trip to participate in the Inauguration Day ceremony for President-elect Donald Trump in Washington.In his Talking Points Memo, he said that much of the money raised for the historically black college was bankrolled by people that mainstream entities often demonize as racist . Generalizing about any group is foolish and dishonest, O Reilly said, calling the impromptu fundraiser a repudiation of race-baiters. O Reilly recalled how college president Dr. Billy Hawkins appearance last week on the O Reilly Factor was not intended as a fundraising announcement, but that subsequent guest Omarosa Manigault mentioned the GoFundMe account.Hawkins has since received threats and derogatory comments for standing firm on sending his students to the District of Columbia.Syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer added that the nationwide response to the appeal by Talladega is what Martin Luther King Jr. Day, and Inauguration Day, is all about. FOXThe haters came out on social media and made outrageous statements like the one below:The sons of two deceased Talladega graduates posted on Facebook that they are returning their parents diplomas in opposition to the school s decision to march. Both of our parents have passed away since receiving this cherished recognition from the College. But we have no doubt that they would be angered and deeply disappointed if they knew of the plans for Talladega College to pay tribute to Donald Trump by participating in his inaugural, Peter, David and Steven Rasmussen wrote. Mr. Trump has demonstrated in innumerable ways, during the electoral campaign and his time as president-elect, that he is the antithesis of all they worked and stood for and of the values they nurtured in their students. NBC | 0 |
23,002 | Biden pledges faster U.S. approval for cancer drug cocktails | DAVOS, Switzerland (Reuters) - U.S. Vice President Joe Biden said on Tuesday that the United States would speed up the approval of promising new drug combinations in his government’s newly announced drive to cure cancer “once and for all”. Biden, who lost his 46-year-old son Beau to brain cancer last year, set out his plans at a World Economic Forum meeting of international cancer experts in Davos, a week after being appointed to lead the initiative by President Barack Obama. So-called combination therapy is increasingly seen as central to fighting tumours, as scientists unlock the different genetic factors driving cancer cell growth, but bringing such cocktails to market can be a slow and costly. Biden said he had hosted a meeting at his home with three unnamed large drug companies and the head of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) at which both sides had pledged to do more to get novel cancer drug cocktails to patients. “The head of the FDA made a commitment that everybody would move much more rapidly in approving combinations,” Biden said. At the same, the pharmaceutical industry executives had all said they were “open to different way of doing business” in order to ensure that promising drugs from different companies were tested together as early as possible, he added. Cancer experts are particularly excited by the promise of new immunotherapy medicines that help the body’s immune system fight tumours and which have been shown to work well when used alongside other drugs. Francis Collins, director of the U.S. National Institutes of Health, described their potential as “breath-taking”. But such immunotherapy drugs are expensive - typically costing well over $100,000 a year per patient - and companies have traditionally been defensive about sharing early-stage medical experiments. Obama’s call to “make America the country that cures cancer once and for all” in the last State of the Union address of his presidency has led to criticism from some scientists of an over-simplified approach to the killer condition. The latest government-led initiative has echoes of former President Richard Nixon’s unsuccessful “War on Cancer” in the 1970s, since when scientists have discovered that cancer is hundreds of different diseases rather than one single disorder, making the notion of a single cure outdated. Biden acknowledged the complexity in Davos. “I’m not naive enough to think or suggest we are going to have a cure for every cancer in the world in the near term,” he said. | 1 |
23,003 | U.S. House Republicans exploring border tax design changes: lawmaker | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives are considering possible changes to the design of their controversial border adjustment tax proposal to accommodate industries worried about being harmed by the provision, a top lawmaker said on Friday. The measure, a centerpiece of the House Republican tax reform blueprint backed by Speaker Paul Ryan, is intended to encourage investment and manufacturing in the United States. But it faces mounting pressure from U.S. retailers, oil refiners and automakers who fear it could result in higher prices for consumer goods including gasoline. Major U.S. exporters on Thursday threw their support behind a border tax, but President Donald Trump has sent mixed signals and some U.S. Senate Republicans question whether it would pass muster under international trade rules. “We are listening carefully and exploring a number of ideas on both design and the transition of this provision to accommodate some of the concerns, valid concerns,” House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady told a conference on tax issues. “I’m confident ... that the design of the border adjustability and the transition of it will allay those concerns,” he added without providing details. He previously said the committee would look at transition rules but has not suggested possible design changes until now. The Texas Republican, whose panel is working on tax reform legislation, is not considering product or industry exemptions but said the committee is engaged in discussions with industries including import-dependent oil refiners. The border adjustment proposal would exempt U.S. corporate export revenues from tax but impose a 20 percent levy on imports by preventing U.S. companies from deducting import costs from their taxable income. Import-dependent companies say the sweeping change could hurt their businesses and customers. “Their concerns about consumer impacts or tax impacts, we don’t want those either,” Brady said. Brady said the policy would tax all products sold in the United States equally while matching the export tax approach of U.S. trading partners. He acknowledged that the change could be phased in over time to help smooth the transition but denied that the proposal would violate international trade rules by penalizing imports or subsidizing exports. Business lobbyists have suggested a number of changes, from a nominal tax to compensate import-dependent businesses to an import tax rate that would vary by country of origin to match the taxes U.S. products face abroad. “We know where we want to go and we’re going to listen to all ideas. But we’re going to end up with a tax code that taxes products at the same equal rate in the United States,” he said. | 1 |
23,004 | WHY DID THE FBI Give Key Clinton Aides Immunity: “This is very strange” | Well, what would Friday be without the latest document dump from the Clinton email investigation? Yesterday afternoon, with the public in distracted anticipation of the coming weekend and Monday s Clinton-Trump debate showdown, the FBI released another 189 pages of interview reports.Along with this document dump comes remarkable news:According to House Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz, the limited immunity was granted in order to persuade Ms. Mills to surrender her laptop computer so the FBI could check whether classified information was stored on it.This is very strange. There was no need to grant concessions to Mills. The Justice Department could have required the production of the computer by simply issuing a grand jury subpoena. And had there been any concern that Mills would not cooperate, would destroy the computer, or would misplace it (as Team Clinton claims to have misplaced so many Hillary devices), investigators could have applied for a search warrant and seized the computer.In normal cases, the Justice Department does not grant immunity in exchange for evidence when it has lawful power to compel production of that evidence.In a normal case, immunity-from-prosecution never enters into this equation. Immunity is a valuable concession that the Justice Department is only supposed to grant if there is no other way to get the evidence in question. Investigators are not supposed to pay for evidence the law empowers them to obtain cost-free. If, for example, a prosecutor surmised that a suspect s hair might match hair recovered at the scene of a robbery, the prosecutor would not offer the suspect immunity from prosecution for the robbery in exchange for the suspect s provision of a hair sample. The prosecutor would issue a subpoena requiring the suspect to provide the grand jury with a hair sample; if there was a match, the grand jury would then indict the suspect for the robbery. As the Associated Press puts it: By including the emails recovered from the laptops in the immunity agreements, the Justice Department exempted key physical evidence from any potential criminal case against [Hillary Clinton s] aides. It makes no sense to have done this unless the Justice Department had already decided it would not prosecute Mills and Samuelson, no matter what the proof showed.Read more: National Review | 0 |
23,005 | Ex-U.S. attorney from California top candidate to head SEC: CNBC | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Former U.S. Attorney Debra Wong Yang is a top contender to head the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission under Republican President-elect Donald Trump, CNBC said on Tuesday. Yang, who was appointed by fellow Republican former President George W. Bush for California’s Central District, was scheduled to meet with Trump on Monday in New York. | 1 |
23,006 | U.S. plays down absence from Moscow talks on Syria, says not 'sidelined' | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States on Tuesday sought to downplay its absence from talks on the Syrian conflict among Russia, Iran and Turkey in Moscow, saying it was not a “snub” and did not reflect a decline of U.S. influence in the Middle East. However, President Barack Obama’s decision to offer only limited support to moderate rebels has left Washington with little leverage to influence the situation in Syria, especially after Moscow began launching air strikes against rebels fighting President Bashar al-Assad. Although Washington has long been a player in efforts to end the Syria civil war and other Mideast conflicts, the United States was forced to watch from the sidelines as the Syrian government and its allies, including Russia, mounted an assault to pin down the rebels in east Aleppo that culminated in a ceasefire deal. Dennis Ross, a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy who was an adviser on Iran and the Middle East to both Democratic and Republican administrations, said the United States had made itself “irrelevant” in Syria. “The opposition finds little reason to be responsive to us and Assad. The Russians and Iran know that there is nothing we will do to raise the costs to them of their onslaught against Aleppo and other Syrian cities,” Ross said. “Russia, having changed the balance of power on the ground, without regard to civilian consequences, has moved to make itself an arbiter.” A spokesman for U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry dismissed suggestions that America’s absence from the meeting indicated a change in influence. “The secretary doesn’t see this as a snub at all. He sees it as another multilateral effort to try to get a lasting peace in Syria and he welcomes any progress towards that,” State Department spokesman John Kirby said on Tuesday. “We would obviously refute any notion that ... the fact that we weren’t at this one meeting is somehow a harbinger or a litmus test for U.S. influence and leadership there or anywhere else around the world,” Kirby said, adding that Washington was still engaged in the region on many other issues. “We are not excluded, we are not being sidelined,” he added. At the meeting on Tuesday, Russia, Iran and Turkey said they were ready to help broker a Syrian peace deal and they adopted a declaration that laid out the principles any agreement should follow. Still, the meetings on Tuesday resulted in a “Moscow Declaration,” reflecting Russia’s growing links with Iran and Turkey, despite the murder on Monday of Russia’s ambassador in Ankara, Turkey’s capital, and reflects Putin’s desire to increase his country’s influence in the Middle East and more widely. It also shows that Russia is fed up with what it considers long and pointless talks with the Obama administration over Syria. A U.S. official acknowledged that the U.S. absence from the evacuation talks on eastern Aleppo was Russia’s way of showing that Moscow, not Washington, was running the show. “The fact is that we have put ourselves in a position where Russia is making efforts to try to work with anybody else so they can isolate us,” the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Reuters. “We let our differences with Turkey over the Kurds and our views over the northern part of Syria create gaps that the Russians have exploited.” Kirby said that in the end, the United States, Russia, Iran, and Turkey would like to see an immediate ceasefire and the “urgent delivery” of humanitarian aid. Ultimately, he said, it was too soon to judge whether the talks were a success. Russian President Vladimir Putin said last week that he and his Turkish counterpart, Tayyip Erdogan, were working to organize new Syrian peace negotiations without the United States or the United Nations. Russia says that if they happen, the talks would be in addition to intermittent U.N.-brokered negotiations in Geneva. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Tuesday he thought that what he called the Russia-Iran-Turkey troika was the most effective forum for trying to solve the Syria crisis. | 1 |
23,007 | Texas School Officials Request For New Name Goes Horribly Wrong (VIDEO) | Students of Robert E. Lee Elementary School in Austin, Texas, along with their parents, have been battling over the school s name for well over a year.As KXAN reported here, an advisory panel heard testimony from people on both sides of the argument in January.Daniel Oppenheimer, whose children attend the school, told KXAN the name should be changed, saying: It s actually an active deterrent for black families and families of color to attend our school. I think that s reason enough why it s worth thinking about changing. Another parent, Jessica Grogan, expressed similar concerns, telling reporters: I d say my main reason is it is alienating to certain families and I feel like it doesn t represent our community values. Watch video from the January board meeting, courtesy of KXAN below.Following the meeting, the Campus Advisory Board recommended that the school board begin taking steps to change the name of the school.Problem solved, right?Wrong, because it s Texas.The school board asked parents and community members to submit suggestions for the new name.The leading suggestions were as follows:Donald J. Trump Elementary: 45 nominations Robert E. Lee Elementary: 34 nominations Russell Lee Elementary: 32 nominations Harper Lee Elementary: 30 nominations Elisabet Ney Elementary: 15 nominationsThere were plenty of others as well, such as Bleeding Heart Liberal Elementary, Communist Elementary and The Illuminati.Among the least controversial suggestions submitted by Texans were Generic School, Elementary School #1, Bee Movie, Schoolie McSchoolface and The Rubber Duckies.Read all 15 pages of suggested names here.While the original plan was to select from the list of top contenders, it s highly unlikely the school board will approve a name like Donald Trump Elementary.It s sad that so many members of this Austin, Texas community chose not to take the issue seriously. As so many students and parents pointed out, a public school has a duty to ensure that no student is discriminated against and all students feel valued and welcome.The school board hasn t said how it plans to proceed with selecting a new name, in light of the submissions received.The best option appears to be limiting community involvement as much as possible.Featured image via Linda Lawrence via Facebook | 0 |
23,008 | Commentary: Trump can't fight Islamic State without wading into Syria's war | Over the course of the U.S. presidential campaign, Donald Trump changed his mind on many issues. But he’s been consistent on one foreign policy question: he wants to end American support for Syrian opposition groups fighting Bashar al-Assad’s regime. Trump argues that the United States should expend all of its efforts on fighting Islamic State instead. "I’ve had an opposite view of many people regarding Syria,” Trump told the Wall Street Journal on Nov. 11, in his first interview after he won the White House. “My attitude was you’re fighting Syria, Syria is fighting ISIS, and you have to get rid of ISIS. Russia is now totally aligned with Syria, and now you have Iran, which is becoming powerful, because of us, is aligned with Syria. … Now we’re backing rebels against Syria, and we have no idea who these people are.” Even if Trump goes ahead with his threat to cut off aid to Syrian rebels fighting the Assad regime – especially those supported by a covert CIA program which provides training and anti-tank missiles – the president-elect will face another major test of his Syria policy soon after he’s inaugurated on Jan. 20. The United States is supporting two military campaigns simultaneously in Syria: one against Assad’s government and the other against Islamic State. Trump has made clear that he doesn’t view the fight against Assad as a U.S. priority. But will Trump continue a separate Pentagon support and training program for the Syrian Democratic Forces, a coalition of rebel groups, which is leading a ground offensive to oust Islamic State from the city of Raqqa, capital of its self-proclaimed caliphate? That campaign started on Nov. 6 with a mobilization of about 30,000 rebels to encircle Raqqa and cut it off from all sides, to deny Islamic State the ability to resupply weapons and fighters. The battle to push the jihadists out of Raqqa could take months. If it falters under a fledging Trump administration, Islamic State would have a safe base from which it would unleash new attacks in Syria and Iraq, and against the West. U.S. military planners pushed for the Raqqa offensive to start soon after the long-awaited invasion to recapture Iraq’s second-largest city, Mosul, from the militants began in mid-October. Pentagon officials say they fear that Islamic State operatives, including some who fled the Mosul offensive, will use Raqqa to plot attacks against Western targets. “There’s a sense of urgency about what we have to do here because we’re just not sure what they’re [jihadists] up to, and where, and when,” the top U.S. military commander in Iraq, Lt. General Stephen Townsend, said at a news conference on Oct. 26 in Baghdad. “But we know that this plot planning is emanating from Raqqa.” Trump says he wants to avoid direct U.S. involvement in the Syrian conflict, which has expanded into a regional proxy war. Russia and Iran, along with allied militias like Lebanon’s Hezbollah, are helping Assad consolidate control and recapture territory he lost to the rebels and jihadist groups. Assad and his backers have rarely fought directly against Islamic State, which controls Raqqa and other parts of eastern Syria. Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United States are backing various rebel factions that are fighting Assad and his allies, and, at times, Islamic State. Under Barack Obama’s administration, the CIA has funneled up to $1 billion a year in weapons, including light arms, ammunition and anti-tank missiles, to Syrian rebel groups fighting the Assad regime that were deemed moderate by U.S. officials. But some of these rebels have been forced into battlefield alliances with jihadists, including al Qaeda affiliated groups. While the offensive against Islamic State in Raqqa began in the waning days of the Obama administration, it needs support from the incoming Trump administration to bear fruit. But the Raqqa operation is already alienating American allies, especially Turkey, which is critical of the Syrian Democratic Forces. The SDF is a coalition of Kurdish, Sunni Arab, Christian and Turkmen rebel groups that is anchored by the People’s Protection Units (known by its Kurdish acronym, YPG), which includes thousands of Syrian Kurdish fighters. Turkish leaders view the YPG and other Syrian Kurdish groups as allies of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (known as the PKK), which has waged an insurgency against the Turkish government since the 1980s, seeking autonomy for Kurdish areas. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan insists that Washington must not allow the YPG to take a leading role in expelling Islamic State from Raqqa, a largely Sunni Arab city. During the presidential campaign, Trump argued the United States should arm and help Kurdish factions, both in Iraq and Syria. “I’m a big fan of the Kurdish forces,” he said in July. If Trump follows through on his praise of the Kurds, that would be good news for the SDF and its largest militia, the YPG. But once in office, Trump would also have to balance the objections of allies like Turkey and Erdogan, its increasingly autocratic president. Among his first top appointments, Trump named Michael Flynn, a retired general and former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, as his national security adviser. Flynn, who once worked as a paid lobbyist for a prominent Turkish businessman, has expressed strong support for Erdogan’s government and argued that Washington should be more sympathetic to its concerns. In late August, Turkey sent several hundred of its special forces into Syria, and began carrying out air strikes to help rebel factions allied with Ankara consolidate control of territory near the Turkish-Syrian border. The Turkish-backed rebels have fought both Islamic State jihadists and occasionally the U.S.-backed YPG militia. In October, Erdogan said he told Obama in a phone call that Turkey was capable of ousting Islamic State from Raqqa on its own. Other Turkish officials argued that the campaign to retake Raqqa should not begin until Iraqi forces complete their offensive against Islamic State in Mosul, which has slowed in recent weeks. But U.S. officials are keen to isolate Raqqa and use Syrian forces to encircle it, mainly because of worries about Islamic State operatives fleeing from Mosul and plotting new attacks against the West. That concern is genuine because the jihadist group – even as it was weakened over the past year, after intensive U.S.-led bombing and defeats by its opponents in Iraq and Syria – has shown a significant ability to adapt and inflict new terror. In the coming months, Islamic State will find new ways to endure an American-orchestrated offensive on Raqqa. It will try to take advantage of the change in U.S. administration. And once he’s in office, Trump will discover that fighting and containing Islamic State inevitably means wading into Syria’s complicated war. | 1 |
23,009 | President Trump to travel to promote tax overhaul legislation | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump, who has been criticized for not doing enough to help pass health care legislation, will do more traveling to try to drum up support for tax legislation, a senior White House aide said on Monday. Specifically, Trump could travel to some Midwest states like Michigan and Wisconsin that he won during the 2016 presidential campaign but are still represented by Democrats in Congress. “In terms of travel, I think you will see him out there more ... in the states where we need votes,” said Marc Short, the White House’s legislative liaison. The Republican effort to repeal Obamacare failed in the Senate last week, leaving party leaders looking ahead to try to tackle an overhaul of the tax code. But it has also left many questioning how taxes will be different, especially if Trump, who suffers from low national approval ratings, does not become more actively involved in pushing for the bill. Short said that unlike the health care, which he called more complicated, the White House has been working to build support for tax reform among national groups aligned with their ideology. His remarks came at a tax panel discussion sponsored by Americans for Prosperity, a group funded by Republican donors Charles and David Koch that organizes supporters across the country to contact their members of Congress in favor of conservative legislation. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, speaking on the same panel, echoed his remarks. “The message is [tax reform] may not be perfect for everything you want, but it’s going to be really really good for the economy and better than what we have,” Mnuchin said. | 1 |
23,010 | WATCH: DIAMOND AND SILK Rip On John Kerry Over Israel Comments (VIDEO) | .@DiamondandSilk have something to say about Kerry and Obama stance on Israel. pic.twitter.com/d3xsU7hMHl Diamond and Silk (@DiamondandSilk) December 29, 2016 | 0 |
23,011 | BLACK RADIO HOST: DEMOCRATS Have “Owned” Blacks Since The “Civil Rights Act”…How Trump Will Be “The White Savior To Black America” | By Jesse Lee Peterson President Donald Trump has issued a blunt warning to Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel about his city s out-of-control violence: If the city doesn t fix the horrible carnage going on, I ll send the feds! Trump s words sent shockwaves across the country.But what s wrong with black men that they can t stop the carnage?Those of you who read my columns know that for the past 27 years I have run a nonprofit, BOND, dedicated to Rebuilding the Family by Rebuilding the Man. I work with all men, but the primary focus has been to get black men to drop their anger so God can guide them, and they can lead their families in the right way.Men are supposed to represent Jesus Christ on earth; the man is the Christ in the family. But the black community is nearly devoid of men who truly exemplify Christ.Black men were not like this prior to the 1960s. They believed in God and took care of themselves and their families. But after Lyndon B. Johnson signed the 1964 Civil Rights Act, Democrats seduced blacks away from God and the Republican Party with programs. They ve owned blacks ever since.Democrats empowered black liberal politicians to run cities like Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Detroit, Atlanta, Baltimore and Memphis. They left these cities in worse shape than when they took office, but the media refused to hold them accountable because of their color and political affiliation.Coleman Young ran Detroit for 20 years. He was racially divisive and allowed the city to be ruined by drugs and crime. A succession of black Democrats followed, including Kwame Kilpatrick, who was sentenced to 28 years in federal prison for mail fraud, wire fraud and racketeering.Dozens of Congressional Black Caucus members have been in Congress for decades and they ve enriched themselves, but they haven t lifted a finger to save their districts.Donald Trump is going to make these people clean up the mess so that decent black people can live in peace. Why couldn t Obama and these black politicians do the same?Liberal blacks argue that it s unfair to expect Obama would stop the violence in just eight years. Some said it would be an infringement on freedoms. Yet blacks living in dangerous neighborhoods already feel like prisoners in their own homes.Comedians Conan O Brien, Trevor Noah and Seth Meyers mocked Trump for threatening to send in the feds. But it s no laughing matter for black families trapped in dangerous neighborhoods. These people wouldn t be joking if LGBT or Muslims were being slaughtered.Trump is going to reinstate law and order because he loves all Americans. His father was his role model. When men and women love their fathers, it s like loving God, and they have real love and a desire to help people.Still, many blacks hate Trump even though he is trying to save them. It reminds me of how Jesus Christ made it possible for us to return to the Father, and yet he was hated for that.To help himself and his family, the black man must recognize that Donald Trump and whites aren t the enemy. The black man s anger was first caused by his impatient mother and grandmother who raised him (the father is rarely in the home). When the black man understands this and repents of his anger, he will be set free. He can then help himself, his family and his community.To read the article in its entirety: WND | 0 |
23,012 | Black Man Beaten By Nazis At Pro-Trump Rally So Naturally Cops Charged HIM With A Crime | When Deandre Harris was beaten by a mix of white supremacist Trump supporters, Nazi Trump supporters, racist Trump supporters, and Trump supporters who don t subscribe to any particular single white power group, at a Nazi rally in Charlottesville, his life was changed forever.Not only was this young man forced to deal with the incredibly shitty reality that white people may at any moment turn on him like rabid dogs, but the harassment kept coming.While police dragged their feet in arresting his attackers, waiting only until social media had identified the majority and had given them no choice in the matter, Harris and his family continued to receive death threats from Donald Trump s very fine people. At the same time, the Nazis worked round the clock to painstakingly compile the video evidence that ultimately led to Harris arrest yes, Harris was arrested. WCPO reports: Deandre Harris, a black man whose brutal beating at the hands of Charlottesville white supremacists was captured on video, is now wanted on charges of unlawful wounding in connection to the Aug. 12 incident.A magistrate, not the police department, issued the warrant, although a news release said police officers had verified other video that led to the arrest. Harris is accused of attacking a man in the group that beat him.Harris attorney, Lee Merritt, who called the charge a clearly retaliatory effort from white supremacists after Harris used social media to identify suspects in the beating, said his client would turn himself in within 24 hours.Journalist Chuck Modi posted video of the attack, which took place in a parking garage near the University of Virginia campus, on Twitter. In the clip, white supremacist marchers some in white polos, some in riot gear beat Harris with signs and poles while he struggles to stand.In case you somehow forgot what happened, here is a refresher.This video is horrifying:Fight broke out. Nazis beat black kid w/sticks at end. I kick one in back 2 help & he runs after me. Kid is safe but bloody #Charlottesville pic.twitter.com/kr11a8zQ0K ChuckModi (@ChuckModi1) August 12, 2017Naturally, the Nazis are celebrating this new turn of events that they apparently helped orchestrate:I would like to thank everyone who helped us with the DeAndre Harris case particularly those who painstakingly compiled the video evidence Hunter Wallace (@occdissent) October 9, 2017You see, since they have gotten Harris charged with a crime, they can move on to their endgame which is apparently getting Harris GoFundMe shut down:We need to stop his go fund me ? I've reported it long ago https://t.co/PBLKI91GaI Joni Job (@jj_talking) October 9, 2017I reported the campaign too ?Chris? (@FireyChris) October 9, 2017Wallace also shared his thoughts on Heather Heyer, the woman who was run down by a Nazi at the same rally:Did you know Heather Heyer was morbidly obese and died of a heart attack? Probably not because that story didn't fit the narrative either https://t.co/3v3wk1QMoq Hunter Wallace (@occdissent) October 10, 2017The evidence the Nazis collected is 5 seconds of video that appears to show Harris hit a Nazi who was trying to jab another protester with a pole. While one would normally assume that acting in defense of another would be something law enforcement would understand, this is the same law enforcement that allowed a Nazi to try to shoot someone and walk away while they watched.Of course they were going to charge Harris with whatever they could. To do otherwise would conflict with the traditionally terrible response Charlottesville has had to Nazis marching in the f*cking street, attacking people, and even committing murder.Daniel Borden, one of the numerous attackers, has also been arrested in connection with the brutal gang assault. No one else has been charged aside from Harris the victim.Featured image via screengrab | 0 |
23,013 | Bolivia's Morales says he'll seek fourth term, spurs protests | LA PAZ (Reuters) - Bolivian President Evo Morales said on Thursday that opposition from the United States convinced him to run for a fourth term in 2019, spurring a second day of protests after the constitutional court eliminated term limits. Morales government earlier brushed off criticism from Washington, which said it was deeply concerned over Tuesday s court decision. Morales himself then took it a step further, saying the U.S. reaction actually convinced him to run. I was not so determined; now I am determined, he said at a public event in the central Bolivian region of Cochabamba. I will be a candidate, sisters and brothers, in 2019. The court ruling is final and cannot be appealed. Groups opposed to the ruling protested in several cities again on Thursday, as opponents clashed with police outside an elections office in the city of Santa Cruz. Bolivia has a constitution and we should respect it, said Olga Flores, who identified as a human rights activist and was among several hundred protesters braving the rain in La Paz. Others chanted Bolivia said no! Morales, a former coca farmer in power since 2006, had previously accepted the results of a referendum in 2016, when 51 percent of voters rejected his proposal to end term limits. He later reversed course, saying that while he was willing to leave office, his supporters were pushing for him to stay. The U.S. State Department disputed that position. Twice in the last decade, the Bolivian people have expressed their opposition to the concept of indefinite reelection for elected officials, the department s statement said. It referred to a vote in favor of the current constitution in 2009 and the 2016 referendum. Morales administration dismissed the criticism. It looks like they are trying to tell us who our candidates should be, the minister of the presidency, Rene Martinez, said. He said right-wing political forces in Bolivia had joined with the United States and the Organization of American States to stop Morales from running again. Historically unstable Bolivia has enjoyed relative calm and prosperity under Morales, the country s first indigenous president. Approval ratings for Morales, a fierce critic of capitalism and ally of embattled Venezuelan socialist leader Nicolas Maduro, hover at around 50 percent. In September, Morales Movement to Socialism party asked the courts to rescind legal limits barring elected authorities from seeking reelection indefinitely. Morales says his first election took place under Bolivia s previous constitution and therefore did not count under the now-defunct two-term rule. | 1 |
23,014 | Exclusive: Top U.S. spy agency has not embraced CIA assessment on Russia hacking - sources | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The overseers of the U.S. intelligence community have not embraced a CIA assessment that Russian cyber attacks were aimed at helping Republican President-elect Donald Trump win the 2016 election, three American officials said on Monday. While the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) does not dispute the CIA’s analysis of Russian hacking operations, it has not endorsed their assessment because of a lack of conclusive evidence that Moscow intended to boost Trump over Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton, said the officials, who declined to be named. The position of the ODNI, which oversees the 17 agency-strong U.S. intelligence community, could give Trump fresh ammunition to dispute the CIA assessment, which he rejected as “ridiculous” in weekend remarks, and press his assertion that no evidence implicates Russia in the cyber attacks. Trump’s rejection of the CIA’s judgment marks the latest in a string of disputes over Russia’s international conduct that have erupted between the president-elect and the intelligence community he will soon command. An ODNI spokesman declined to comment on the issue. “ODNI is not arguing that the agency (CIA) is wrong, only that they can’t prove intent,” said one of the three U.S. officials. “Of course they can’t, absent agents in on the decision-making in Moscow.” The Federal Bureau of Investigation, whose evidentiary standards require it to make cases that can stand up in court, declined to accept the CIA’s analysis - a deductive assessment of the available intelligence - for the same reason, the three officials said. The ODNI, headed by James Clapper, was established after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the recommendation of the commission that investigated the attacks. The commission, which identified major intelligence failures, recommended the office’s creation to improve coordination among U.S. intelligence agencies. In October, the U.S. government formally accused Russia of a campaign of cyber attacks against American political organizations ahead of the Nov. 8 presidential election. Democratic President Barack Obama has said he warned Russian President Vladimir Putin about consequences for the attacks. Reports of the assessment by the CIA, which has not publicly disclosed its findings, have prompted congressional leaders to call for an investigation. Obama last week ordered intelligence agencies to review the cyber attacks and foreign intervention in the presidential election and to deliver a report before he turns power over to Trump on Jan. 20. The CIA assessed after the election that the attacks on political organizations were aimed at swaying the vote for Trump because the targeting of Republican organizations diminished toward the end of the summer and focused on Democratic groups, a senior U.S. official told Reuters on Friday. Moreover, only materials filched from Democratic groups - such as emails stolen from John Podesta, the Clinton campaign chairman - were made public via WikiLeaks, the anti-secrecy organization, and other outlets, U.S. officials said. The CIA conclusion was a “judgment based on the fact that Russian entities hacked both Democrats and Republicans and only the Democratic information was leaked,” one of the three officials said on Monday. “(It was) a thin reed upon which to base an analytical judgment,” the official added. Republican Senator John McCain said on Monday there was “no information” that Russian hacking of American political organizations was aimed at swaying the outcome of the election. “It’s obvious that the Russians hacked into our campaigns,” McCain said. “But there is no information that they were intending to affect the outcome of our election and that’s why we need a congressional investigation,” he told Reuters. McCain questioned an assertion made on Sunday by Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus, tapped by Trump to be his White House chief of staff, that there were no hacks of computers belonging to Republican organizations. “Actually, because Mr. Priebus said that doesn’t mean it’s true,” said McCain. “We need a thorough investigation of it, whether both (Democratic and Republican organizations) were hacked into, what the Russian intentions were. We cannot draw a conclusion yet. That’s why we need a thorough investigation.” In an angry letter sent to ODNI chief Clapper on Monday, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes said he was “dismayed” that the top U.S. intelligence official had not informed the panel of the CIA’s analysis and the difference between its judgment and the FBI’s assessment. Noting that Clapper in November testified that intelligence agencies lacked strong evidence linking Russian cyber attacks to the WikiLeaks disclosures, Nunes asked that Clapper, together with CIA and FBI counterparts, brief the panel by Friday on the latest intelligence assessment of Russian hacking during the election campaign. | 1 |
23,015 | EXPOSED: Trump Staffers Feed Him A Steady Diet Of Fake News (DETAILS) | Trump can t handle the truth, and apparently one of the benefits of being the president is that he never needs to.Politico reported earlier that Trump staffers have been instructed to tell him only what he wants to hear, and that includes a steady diet of fake news. Most recently, staffers handed Trump a photoshopped cover of Time magazine that purports to be about global cooling.The president fell for the fake news, hook, line, and sinker.The photoshopped Time cover that Trump staffers tricked the president with.Trump s inability to tell real news from fake is starting to impact his policy and concern top staffers.Reince Priebus, the former head of the RNC who is currently working as chief of staff in the White House, is reportedly concerned over the president.According to reports from within the White House, he is putting strict rules in place to try to stop Trump from being fooled by fake news. Politico revealed that Priebus is worried made-up stories from alt-right news sites are impacting Trump s already-shaky decision-making abilities.But it s unclear whether or not it s working since Trump seems to go out of his way to get the fake news he wants from Twitter and delivered by other staffers.The situation in the Oval Office is bad enough that Priebus has tried to put controls in place, but there s no way to stop the president. Trump s overarching narcissism and inflated ego means that he only wants to read and watch things that reinforce his point of view.One of the best examples of Trump s fake news addiction is the way that he parrots Fox s cringeworthy morning show, Fox and Friends. More than once, Trump has been busted tweeting his thoughts on a story that s just run on Fox and Friends.Such amazing reporting on unmasking and the crooked scheme against us by @foxandfriends. "Spied on before nomination." The real story. Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 3, 2017According to Politico, staffers have gotten the message. Now they re spoon-feeding Trump exactly what he wants to hear. We deserve better from our president.Featured image via Spencer Platt/Getty Images | 0 |
23,016 | IRS GIVES “After School Satan Club” Tax-Exempt Status in 10 Days…Tea Party Groups Still Waiting | AFTER SCHOOL SATAN CLUB Allowed By School District Is YOUR District Next?The classification is offered to charitable, religious and educational organizations that operate as nonprofits. Under the Obama administration IRS political appointees illegally targeted conservative groups, either making them wait up to seven years for tax-exempt status or denying their application altogether.Judicial Watch uncovered that scandal and has obtained piles of government records showing how the IRS illegally colluded with another federal agency to single out groups with conservative-sounding terms such as patriot and Tea Party in their titles when applying for tax-exempt status.In the meantime, leftist groups like the Satan club got fast tracked. The principle goal of establishing the Satan clubs in public schools throughout Washington State appears to be to counter existing enterprises operated by a Christian-based group. Documents obtained by Judicial Watch include the process of establishing an after-school Satan club at Point Defiance Elementary in Tacoma. The entity behind the club is a nonprofit called Reason Alliance, which is based in Somerville, Massachusetts, and operates in Washington State as the Satanic Temple of Seattle. Its director, Lilith X. Starr, established the Point Defiance Elementary Satanic club, the records show. In its application the club states that its purpose is character development and that adult instructors are vetted by the Satanic Temple s Executive Ministry. Children ages 5-12 will develop basic critical reasoning, character qualities, problem solving and creative expression, according to the Satanic Temple filings included in the documents.The club logo is a pencil with devil s horns. Records obtained by Judicial Watch from the Treasury Department show that the Satanic cult applied for tax-exempt status on October 21, 2014 and received it on October 31, 2014.Read more: Judicial Watch | 0 |
23,017 | U.S. debt to reach 150 percent of GDP in 30 years: CBO | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. debt held by the public will balloon to 150 percent of economic output by 2047 unless tax and spending laws are changed, the Congressional Budget Office said on Thursday, far exceeding the record level just after World War II. The new projections show steeper 30-year debt growth than last year’s long-term forecast by the non-partisan budget analysis agency, and could make it harder for some members of Congress to support a tax reform plan that is partly financed with higher deficits. Last year, the CBO estimated U.S. public debt would grow to 141 percent of gross domestic product by 2046, while the record was 106 percent of GDP in 1946. That level would be reached in 2035, the CBO said. Under this year’s projection, CBO predicts public debt for 2017 to be about 77 percent of GDP, growing to 89 percent in 2027, and 113 percent in 2037. The new forecasts assume that the Affordable Care Act, the healthcare law known as Obamacare that House Republicans failed to replace last week, stays in place for the long term. The projected debt growth reflects CBO’s estimates of the rising costs of caring for a growing population of people over 65, growth in interest costs, and assumptions of slower economic growth due to reduced assumptions about productivity gains. Annual deficits are expected to average 8.6 percent of GDP in the 2038-2047 period versus 2.9 percent expected for 2017 and 4.0 percent for the 2018-2027 period. The long-term projections extend CBO’s assumptions made in its 10-year budget outlook in January, which showed falling deficits for the next two years, but growth thereafter. Net interest costs in 2047 are expected to be 6.2 percent of GDP, compared with 1.4 percent in 2017 and about 1.2 percent in 1967, the CBO said. But the wild card in the CBO 30-year projections are real interest rates. Real interest yields on 10-year Treasury notes are assumed to average 1.5 percent over 30 years, rising to 2.3 percent in 2047. Much higher interest rates, coupled with different assumptions in productivity and healthcare cost growth, could produce significantly different outcomes, CBO said. The CBO said that its debt-to-GDP ratio could range from 85 percent with low rates and strong growth, to 244 percent with weaker growth and higher rates. | 1 |
23,018 | Trump team has differences of opinion on shaping spy agencies: sources | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - There is disagreement within President-elect Donald Trump’s camp about the structure of the top U.S. intelligence agency when he takes office and it is unclear whether his national security adviser will prevail in advocating a reorganization, sources familiar with the matter said on Thursday. At issue is the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), which Congress created after the Sept. 11 attacks to better coordinate the efforts of U.S. intelligence agencies to protect the United States. Trump security adviser Michael Flynn, who as head of the Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Agency under President Barack Obama sometimes clashed with other intelligence agencies, favors restructuring and paring back the ODNI, the sources said. But one source close to the Trump transition cautioned that the outcome is not certain. “There is a general consensus that the ODNI is too big and grown too fast. Some around him (Trump) believe this, but whether they plan to address it or how, I just don’t know,” said the source, who like others requested anonymity to discuss the Trump team’s internal deliberations. Flynn has had a fraught relationship with the ODNI. After complaints over his management style at the Defense Intelligence Agency, he was fired by Director of National Intelligence James Clapper. A senior transition official told Reuters on Thursday that Trump has picked former U.S. Senator Dan Coats as his director of national intelligence - a sign Trump does not plan to try to eliminate ODNI. A U.S. official familiar with Coats’ views suggested he would not move precipitously to overhaul U.S. intelligence agencies. “Any possible reforms to the structure of the intelligence community, he would approach with great caution and responsibility,” the official said. Relations between Trump and U.S. intelligence agencies are extraordinarily rocky even before he is sworn in on Jan. 20. Trump disparaged the spy agencies’ conclusions that Russia was behind hacks of the Democratic National Committee and the campaign staff of his 2016 election opponent Hillary Clinton. Clapper told Congress Thursday he was “even more resolute” that Russia staged cyber attacks, rebuking Trump’s skepticism. Trump was scheduled to be briefed on Friday on an intelligence report that reaches that conclusion. Russia has denied the hacking allegations. “I think the president-elect is more skeptical of the conclusions that are drawn from the raw data rather than the intelligence in the raw data that’s provided,” Trump spokesman Sean Spicer told reporters on Wednesday. Coats, according to another U.S. official familiar with his views, said he knew a lot about Europe and Russia and may well “butt heads with Trump over Russia.” The Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday that Trump is working with top advisers to restructure and reduce the size of the ODNI. That report largely reflects the views of Flynn, said a source familiar with the retired lieutenant general’s thinking who declined to be identified. Trump spokesman Sean Spicer on Thursday rejected the report. “There is no truth to this idea of restructuring the intelligence community infrastructure,” Spicer said. “All transition activities are for information gathering purposes and all discussions are tentative.” A broad intelligence reorganization would require congressional action. Congress created ODNI in a 2004 law that makes it the parent of 16 other U.S. intelligence agencies, ranging from the CIA and the DIA to the eavesdropping National Security Agency and the State Department’s intelligence bureau. Flynn, who served as a top military intelligence officer in Afghanistan and Iraq, is said by those familiar with his views to favor major changes at the CIA as well. Both on the battlefield and at the DIA, Flynn pushed for intelligence personnel to be moved out of compounds and offices and closer to front lines, where Flynn believed they would be more effective intelligence collectors, said the source familiar with his views. Flynn would like the CIA to reorganize itself along these lines, the source said. The CIA was just reorganized last year, however, to bring frontline spies and backroom analysts together in new units focused tightly on specific issues or regions. Republican congressman Mike Pompeo, Trump’s choice for CIA director, is known to share Flynn’s views about the need for restructuring at CIA, the source said. But two other people familiar with Trump transition discussions said Pompeo has not been involved in talks about possible CIA reorganization. | 1 |
23,019 | SUNDAY SCREENING: Overpill (2017) | This week s documentary film curated by our editorial team at 21WIRE. The US has a highly developed pharmaceutical industry offering treatments for all kinds of mental disorders. Millions of Americans are being medicated for ailments as diverse as depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder and many others. Even young children are being put on psychiatric drugs. If parents decline such treatment, social services may intervene. Many patients, who ve been taking these pills for years, insist that they do more harm than good. They have experienced disturbing side effects such as suicidal thoughts, addiction and even neurological damage. A lot of patients were put on their medication as children and by the time they were legally old enough to decide for themselves, they had already become addicted. They testify that breaking their dependency on the drugs is extremely difficult because, like any habit forming narcotic, they cause severe withdrawal symptoms.RTD meets some of the sufferers to hear their stories of battling to shake off prescribed medicines. Father of 5, Josh, was given anxiety medication, it caused Akathisia and Dystonia. Both are physical disorders causing involuntary and uncontrolled body movement and have left him disabled. Olivia s son was prescribed psychiatric drugs to treat Attention Deficit Disorder (ADHD). Olivia soon noticed side effects and refused to continue giving him the pills. He was taken by social services and hospitalised. These stories and more.RTD meets a few of them. Watch this incredible documentary film:. Run time: 49 min Writer & Director: Petr Timofeev Distributor: RT-TV Novosti (2017)SEE MORE SUNDAY SCREENINGS HERE | 0 |
23,020 | This Simple Graph Blows The ‘Media Has A Liberal Bias’ Myth Completely Out Of The Water (IMAGE) | There is a popular belief among Republicans that the mainstream media is in cahoots with liberals. The theory, as they tell it, holds that liberals run the mainstream media, and therefore give favorable political coverage to Democrats and demonize conservatives. The belief is so common, in fact, that Fox News, the country s most watched news network is seen by many as restoring the balance between the two sides. Republicans have Fox and liberals have everything else or so the thinking goes.It s a convenient fantasy if you re a Republican. If the media has a liberal bias then what they report is inherently suspect. When, say, reporters find that there was absolutely no evidence that Hillary Clinton did anything wrong during Benghazi, conservatives can sleep well knowing that it s just because those reporters are covering for her. If Republican lawmakers then waste millions of dollars and thousands of hours on that particular witchhunt, well that s fair game because the mainstream news wouldn t give Americans the full story.A new report done by social media analytics company Crimson Hexagon has taken that conservative narrative and blown it completely out of the water. Running a deep analysis of how much negative vs. positive media coverage each of the still active presidential candidates has received, the team found the exact opposite of what Fox News viewers might expect. Who has been viciously attacked the most during this campaign?Hillary Clinton.Which two candidates received the least amount of positive coverage? Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.Vox turned the data into a simple graph, and the results are startling.Crimson Hexagon looked at hundreds of thousands of online stories published since January of 2015. The data is nothing if not comprehensive. What this means for you and me is that for a year and a half now, we have been more-or-less constantly bombarded with negative stories about Democrats and less so about Republicans. On the flipside, an average American is more likely to hear a positive story about Kasich or Trump than they are about either of the two Democratic options.Trump may complain about how unfairly he is being treated, but from this analysis it s clear that the only ones with legitimate gripes are Sanders and Clinton.This unfair and unbalanced coverage of the election may explain why Hillary Clinton is seeing bafflingly high unfavorability polling, even while Donald Trump, the Republican front-runner, publicly endorses things like waterboarding, religious-based discrimination, and violence towards protesters. America s a sponge and it s been soaking up the negativity for years.This may come as a shock to Fox News viewers, but their media has a liberal bias worldview is built on a lie. How do you convince someone to watch your network and no one else s? Tell them the rest are frauds. Fox has been beating that drum so long that at this point even they can t control the conservative base any more. Chat with a Trump or Cruz supporter and you may soon learn that Fox News is too liberal these days. Too. Liberal.In reality, the mainstream media has very few party loyalties. The only idol they worship is that of ratings and the best ratings come when they are drumming up controversy by promoting scandal. If that means going after Donald Trump, they ll do it. But oftentimes it also means going after Clinton and Sanders for reasons that otherwise objective reporters would see almost immediately as manufactured nonsense. Recently, just to take one egregious example, the Washington Post ran a story that claimed nearly 150 FBI agents were looking into Hillary Clinton s emails. A lot of ink was spilled over it over the next 24 hours making Clinton look very bad. And then someone bothered to track down the source: It was a Republican lawmaker. The story was nothing more than a fabricated hit piece started by a GOPer looking to hurt Clinton and used an all-too-eager Washington Post reporter to do it.Reality may have a liberal bias, but news networks sure don t.Featured image via Regine Mahaux/Getty Images | 0 |
23,021 | Turkey to close air space to Northern Iraq, work with Baghdad on border | ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkey said on Monday it would close its air space to Iraq s semi-autonomous Kurdish region and work to hand control of the main border crossing into the region to the central Iraqi government. The attempt to put the Habur border gate under control of the Iraqi central government signals a change of policy from Ankara, which had previously threatened to close the gate after Kurds in northern Iraq voted for independence. The Habur gate is the main transit point between Turkey and Iraq s semi-autonomous Kurdish Regional Government. The Sept. 25 referendum, in which Kurds in northern Iraq voted overwhelmingly in favor of independence, has alarmed Baghdad, Iraq s neighbors and Western powers, all of whom fear further regional conflict could arise from the vote. Ankara, which has been battling a three-decade insurgency in its own mainly Kurdish southeast, fears an independent Kurdish state on its borders would heighten separatist tension at home. Planes going to or coming from the Kurdistan Regional Government will not be able to use Turkish air space, government spokesman Bekir Bozdag told a news conference following a cabinet meeting where the decisions were taken. The cabinet has decided to start work on handing over the control of Habur border gate to the Iraqi government, he added. Turkey tightened controls at the Habur border gate in the immediate aftermath of the referendum and suspended flights to northern Iraq. It has also held joint military exercises with Iraqi troops on the border. However, it has not yet implemented threats to impose wider sanctions on the Kurdish region or to cut off the hundreds of thousands of barrels of Kurdish oil exported daily via Turkey to world markets. The cabinet decision followed a meeting of Turkey s security council, which was chaired by President Tayyip Erdogan and had advised the cabinet to take such steps. The cabinet also took the advice of the security council and extended for another three months the state of emergency which was imposed after the failed coup attempt in July 2016. The extension for a fifth term will ensure that Turkey will have spent nearly one and a half years under emergency rule. | 1 |
23,022 | U.S. officials meet asylum seekers at Australian-run camp, possibly restarting 'dumb deal' | CANBERRA/PERTH (Reuters) - U.S. officials began taking fingerprints of asylum seekers in an Australian-run camp on the Pacific island of Nauru on Monday, signaling that vetting of applicants for resettlement in what U.S. President Donald Trump called a “dumb deal” has restarted. Australia agreed with former U.S. President Barack Obama late last year for the United States to resettle up to 1,250 asylum seekers held in much criticized processing camps on Papua New Guinea and Nauru. In return, Australia would resettle refugees from El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras. Trump labeled the agreement a “dumb deal” in a Tweet, but said he would stand by it. Interviews with more than half a dozen detainees on Nauru confirmed the U.S. Homeland Security officials arrived on Saturday, with meetings with detainees beginning on Monday. Two asylum seekers, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of fears of jeopardizing their applications to settle in the United States, told Reuters by phone Homeland Security officials did not ask any specific questions. “It was not a normal interview, they just collected fingerprints and took my height and weight,” the Iranian refugee told Reuters. Other refugees showed Reuters appointment slips to meet U.S. officials. Similar biometric data collection would begin at the Australian-run detention center in Papua New Guinea in early April, detainees were told by immigration officials last week. Australia maintains a strict policy of not allowing anyone who tries to reach the country by boat to settle there, instead detaining them in the camps on Nauru and PNG in conditions that have been harshly criticized by rights groups. Some asylum seekers have spent years in the camps, with numerous reports of sexual abuse and self-harm among detainees, including children. One 36-year-old woman told Reuters by phone from Nauru she did not want to be too hopeful about resettlement. “For me, I really don’t believe anything (about) when I get out from this hell,” she said. “I heard too many lies like this in this three and half years.” A spokeswoman for Australian Immigration Minister Peter Dutton declined to comment. The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to a request for comment. The U.S. security interviews with asylum seekers on Nauru were canceled last month amid uncertainty about what constituted “extreme vetting” Trump promised to apply to the 1,250 refugees it agreed to accept. Some asylum seekers said the latest developments gave them hope. “I think the deal will happen, but the question we don’t know is how many people will be taken by the U.S.,” Behrouz Boochani, an Iranian refugee held on PNG’s Manus Island for nearly four years, told Reuters. With mounting international pressure, officials at Manus Island center are increasing pressure on asylum seekers to return to their home countries voluntarily, including offering large sums of money. | 1 |
23,023 | Brazil pension vote put off until February | BRASILIA (Reuters) - The lower house of Brazil s Congress will delay a vote on a bill trimming social security benefits until Feb. 19, Speaker Rodrigo Maia said on Thursday, pushing a decision on the cornerstone of President Michel Temer s fiscal reforms into an election year. Temer had said he hoped for a vote by next week, but he has struggled to rally lawmaker support for the unpopular pension cuts, which many investors consider essential to reining in Brazil s surging public debt. Brazil s currency, the real, weakened to a seven-month low of 3.34 per U.S. dollar and the benchmark Bovespa stock index fell 0.8 percent after Maia s comments. Investors fear that failure to streamline social security could weaken Brazil s recovery from a deep economic downturn, forcing the central bank to raise interest rates from an all-time low and potentially triggering new sovereign rating downgrades in 2018. This raises the possibility that the reform will not be approved next year, given political uncertainty surrounding the presidential elections, said Samar Maziad, a senior analyst at Moody s Investors Service, calling the delay credit negative. Finance Minister Henrique Meirelles said he plans to meet next week with credit rating agencies to discuss the fate of the legislation, adding that he hoped it could be enacted by March. The bill would require Brazilians to work longer before retiring and cut generous pensions for public-sector employees. Lawmakers may be more reluctant to back that as elections approach in October, but Maia suggested they would rise to the challenge. Even though 2018 is an election year, the fiscal crisis is so big that it will be possible to get pension reform approved, he said. Temer s last-ditch effort to sell the bill this year was cut short on Wednesday, when he had to fly to Sao Paulo for surgery to treat a narrowing of his urethra. His office said the surgery was successful and that he would remain in the hospital until Friday to recover. But it forced Temer to cancel meetings to muster votes. It became clear this week that Temer did not have the three-fifths super majority, or 308 votes, needed to pass the bill in the lower house of Congress. While ministers were still working to gather more votes, the government s chief whip in the Senate stunned the administration on Wednesday by saying the vote had to be put off to February. | 1 |
23,024 | [VIDEO] BLACK TWO-TIME OBAMA VOTER LASHES OUT: “I got tricked, I got bamboozled. I voted for him twice. I’m voting for Trump” | The tide is turning and the Democrats are losing passionate black voters to Donald Trump. Minorities are watching jobs and benefits going to foreigners that should be going to Americans first. This kind of rhetoric doesn t bode well for the Democrat party. We taking back America. We taking back America. I stand for him [Trump]. They (illegal aliens and refugees) We don t got no jobs.We got babies too. I got a little girl. I can t hardly support her. No,no, no. But the foreigners driving around in new cars. They ve got the jobs. Obama has failed us. It s time for someone to make a stand. Obama has let me down. I voted for him twice and he broke my heart. We need Donald Trump. Obama has failed. He let us down. We don t have nobody fighting for us. We gotta fight for Obama I mean for Donald Trump not no damn Obama. I m sick of him [Obama]. I got tricked. I got bamboozled twice. Not gonna do it to me anymore, because Donald Trump s the man. He s [Trump] gonna take care of our veterans. He s gonna take care of our military. He s gonna take care of our babies. They talk about black and white?' That s a lie! We built this country together. I love blacks too. Of course I m with blacks. But I gotta keep it real. I m an American not no terrorist. Obama won t even call them terrorists. If you fly a plane into a building. If you blow yourself up and the American people you are a terrorist! White little babies and black little babies don t have food to eat, but you [Obama] gives away $150 billion! | 0 |
23,025 | FAKE NEWS WEEK: How Mainstream Media ‘Fake News’ Led to the U.S. Invasion of Iraq | In response to the establishment media s contrived fake news crisis designed to marginalise independent and alternative media sources of news and analysis, 21WIRE is running its own #FakeNewsWeek awareness campaign, where each day our editorial team at 21st Century Wire will feature media critiques and analysis of mainstream corporate media coverage of current events exposing the government and the mainstream media as the real purveyors of fake news throughout modern history MSM LIES: Judith Miller of the New York Times was a key media operative used to sell the Iraq War to the public. By Timothy Alexander GuzmanThe mainstream media (MSM) has declared war on alternative media websites labeling them Fake News ever since Hillary Clinton lost the election to Donald Trump. The New York Times editorial board expressed their frustration in an article calling for the censorship of alternative and social media Facebook and the Digital Virus Called Fake News, which claimed both social media platforms (Facebook and Google) has not been aggressive enough in blocking fake news sites: Most of the fake news stories are produced by scammers looking to make a quick buck. The vast majority of them take far-right positions. But a big part of the responsibility for this scourge rests with internet companies like Facebook and Google, which have made it possible for fake news to be shared nearly instantly with millions of users and have been slow to block it from their sites. Some of the websites named in a fake news list by Melissa Mish Zimdars, an assistant professor of communication at Merrimack College in Massachusetts including 21st Century Wire, Activist Post, Global Research.ca, Lew Rockwell.com, Natural News.com and ProjectVeritas (who released undercover videos of the DNC attempting to rig the elections) and others have exposed the lies by MSM [mainstream media] propaganda.The MSM has lost its credibility and at the same time lost viewers at unprecedented levels. on April 17, 2016, the Associated Press reported on how the U.S. population viewed the MSM Poll: Getting facts right key to Americans trust in media said that, Just 6 percent of people say they have a lot of confidence in the media, putting the news industry about equal to Congress and well below the public s view of other institutions. Now they want to stop the alternative media from becoming a credible source for news. The New York Times is calling for the censorship of the alternative and social media by blocking misinformation :Blocking misinformation will help protect the company s brand and credibility. Some platforms have suffered when they have failed to address users concerns. Twitter users, for instance, have backed away from that platform because of abusive trolling, threatening posts and hate speech, which the company hasn t been able to control.Mr. Zuckerberg himself has spoken at length about how social media can help improve society. In a 2012 letter to investors, he said it could bring a more honest and transparent dialogue around government that could lead to more direct empowerment of people, more accountability for officials and better solutions to some of the biggest problems of our time. None of that will happen if he continues to let liars and con artists hijack his platform.Just to be clear, there are a number of websites that do spread misinformation including those in the alternative media, but it is fair to say that they never have caused the deaths of millions of people like The New York Times when it comes to U.S. foreign policy. A recent example is the U.S. led war against Iraq in 2003. After the September 11th attacks, the George W. Bush administration made a false accusation that the Iraq government had Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs) which led to a U.S. invasion eventually toppling Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. The U.S. led war turned out to be a calculated plan by The Project for the New American Century (PNAC), a neo-conservative think-tank who wrote the secretive blueprint called, Rebuilding America s Defenses: Strategies, Forces And Resources For A New Century to remove Saddam Hussein and the Ba ath party from power. The blueprint was originally written for the neocon lunatics who served under then-President George W. Bush including Vice-President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to establish an international Security order dominated by the United States. According to the document: In broad terms, we saw the project as building upon the defense strategy outlined by the Cheney Defense Department in the waning days of the Bush Administration. The Defense Policy Guidance (DPG) drafted in the early months of 1992 provided a blueprint for maintaining U.S. preeminence, precluding the rise of a great power rival, and shaping the international security order in line with American principles and interests. PNAC was founded by neoconservatives William Kristol, a political analyst, media commentator (FOX News, ABC News) and the founder and editor of The Weekly Standard and Robert Kagan, an author, columnist, and foreign-policy commentator who is a member of the Council of Foreign Relations (CFR) and a fellow at the Brookings Institution. Kagan is also the husband of Victoria Nuland, the Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs appointed by President Obama who helped orchestrate a coup against the Ukrainian government of the democratically elected President Viktor Yanukovych. The blueprint for regime change in Iraq was planned way before George W. Bush became President in 2001: Indeed, the United States has for decades sought to play a more permanent role in Gulf regional security. While the unresolved conflict with Iraq provides the immediate justification, the need for a substantial American force presence in the Gulf transcends the issue of the regime of Saddam Hussein. However, Judith Miller (who is currently an adjunct fellow at the Manhattan Institute) and The New York Times played a crucial role for the Bush Administration. Miller wrote one of the main articles on Iraq s WMDs that justified the Bush Administration s agenda to topple Saddam Hussein and the Ba ath party. The article was not just fake news telling a lie that deceived the public, it destroyed a sovereign nation. The U.S. war against Iraq killed more than 1.4 million Iraqis (according to www.justforeignpolicy.org estimates) and more than 4,400 U.S. troops and tens of thousands permanently injured. The Iraq War also displaced millions of Iraqis thus creating a refugee crisis in neighboring countries including Syria. The destabilization of Iraq has also created a terrorist recruiting base that has spread throughout the Middle East including Syria.The New York Times published Miller s article on April 21st, 2003 AFTER EFFECTS: PROHIBITED WEAPONS; Illicit Arms Kept Till Eve of War, An Iraqi Scientist Is Said to Assert which claimed that an Iraqi scientist confirmed that the Iraqi government had WMDs:They said the scientist led Americans to a supply of material that proved to be the building blocks of illegal weapons, which he claimed to have buried as evidence of Iraq s illicit weapons programs. The scientist also told American weapons experts that Iraq had secretly sent unconventional weapons and technology to Syria, starting in the mid-1990 s, and that more recently Iraq was cooperating with Al Qaeda, the military officials said.The Americans said the scientist told them that President Saddam Hussein s government had destroyed some stockpiles of deadly agents as early as the mid-1990 s, transferred others to Syria, and had recently focused its efforts instead on research and development projects that are virtually impervious to detection by international inspectors, and even American forces on the ground combing through Iraq s giant weapons plantsOn April, 22, 2003, Miller appeared on the PBS News Hour and spoke about her evidence on what she described as a Silver Bullet from an Iraqi scientist who allegedly worked on Saddam s weapons program:RAY SUAREZ: The task of finding that definitive proof falls in part to specialized teams within the U.S. Military. New York Times correspondent Judith Miller is reporting on the search conducted by units of the 75th exploitation task force. And she joins us now by phone south of Baghdad. Judith Miller, welcome back to the program. Has the unit you ve been traveling with found any proof of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq?JUDITH MILLER: Well, I think they found something more than a smoking gun. What they ve found is what is being called here by the members of MET Alpha that s Mobile Exploitation Team Alpha what they found is a silver bullet in the form of a person, an Iraqi individual, a scientist, as we ve called him, who really worked on the programs, who knows them firsthand, and who has led MET Team Alpha people to some pretty startling conclusions that have kind of challenged the American intelligence community s under previous understanding of, you know, what we thought the Iraqis were doing.RAY SUAREZ: Does this confirm in a way the insistence coming from the U.S. government that after the war, various Iraqi tongues would loosen, and there might be people who would be willing to help?JUDITH MILLER: Yes, it clearly does. I mean, it s become pretty clear to those of us on the ground that the international inspectors, without actually controlling the territory and changing the political environment, would never have been able to get these people to step forward. I mean, you can only do that when you know there is not going to be a secret policeman at your door the next day, and that your family isn t going to suffer because you re talking. And that s what the Bush administration has finally done. They have changed the political environment, and they ve enabled people like the scientists that MET Alpha has found to come forth. Now, what initially the weapons hunters thought they were going to find were stockpiles of kind of chemical and biological agents. That s what they anticipated finding. We now know from the scientist that, in fact, that probably isn t what we re going to find. What they will find, and what they have found so far, are kind of precursors; that is, building blocks of what you would need to put together a chemical or a biological weapon.But those stockpiles that we ve heard about, well, those have either been destroyed by Saddam Hussein, according to the scientists, or they have been shipped to Syria for safekeeping. And what I think the interpretation of the MET Alpha people is, is why he did this. They believe that Saddam Hussein wanted to destroy the evidence of his unconventional weapons programs, and that s what he has done not only since 1995, but also in the weeks and months that led up to the war itself. There was mass destruction. And the scientist who has been cooperating with MET Alpha has actually said that he participated in he kind of watched, you know, a warehouse being burned that contained potentially incriminating biological equipment. So clearly what Saddam Hussein wanted to do was cover his weapons of mass destruction tracks. And that means that the whole shape of the hunt here on the ground for unconventional weapons is changing.The problem with Miller s assertion that Iraq had WMDs is that it relied on an Iraqi exile named Ahmed Chalabi who wanted regime change against Saddam Hussein s government. James Moore of The Guardian wrote, How Chalabi and the White House held the front page how The New York Times has burned its reputation on a pyre of lies about Iraq described Chalabi as a convicted criminal who embezzled millions from his Petra Bank in Amman, Jordan. Moore said the following: Judith Miller, a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter and authority on the Middle East for the NYT, appears to have been the most reliant on Chalabi. In an email exchange with the NYT s Baghdad bureau chief John Burns, Miller said Chalabi had provided most of the front page exclusives for our paper . She later said that this was an exaggeration, but in an earlier interview with me, Miller did not discount the value of Chalabi s insight. Of course, I talked with Chalabi, she said. But he was just one of many sources I used. Miller refused to say who those other sources were but, at Chalabi s behest, she interviewed various defectors from Saddam Hussein s regime, who claimed without substantiation that there was still a clandestine WMD programme operating inside Iraq. US investigators now believe that Chalabi sent these same Iraqi expatriates to at least eight Western spy agencies as part of a scheme to convince them to overthrow Saddam. Mr. Moore mentioned Miller s article which was co-written with Michael R. Gordon and published by The New York Times on September 8th, 2002 titled, THREATS AND RESPONSES: THE IRAQIS; U.S. SAYS HUSSEIN INTENSIFIES QUEST FOR A-BOMB PARTS claiming that Saddam was building a uranium gas separator to develop nuclear material :If spies wanted a trophy to show what happens when their craft is perfectly executed, it would be a story written by Judith Miller on the front page of the New York Times on a Sunday morning in September 2002. She wrote that an intercepted shipment of aluminum tubes, to be used for centrifuges, was evidence that Saddam was building a uranium gas separator to develop nuclear material.The story had an enormous impact, one amplified when national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, secretary of state Colin Powell and vice-president Dick Cheney all did appearances on the Sunday-morning talk shows, citing the first-rate journalism of the liberal NYT. No single story did more to advance the neoconservative cause.Here is the original excerpt from Miller s original September 8th 2002 New York Times article: More than a decade after Saddam Hussein agreed to give up weapons of mass destruction, Iraq has stepped up its quest for nuclear weapons and has embarked on a worldwide hunt for materials to make an atomic bomb, Bush administration officials said today.In the last 14 months, Iraq has sought to buy thousands of specially designed aluminum tubes, which American officials believe were intended as components of centrifuges to enrich uranium. American officials said several efforts to arrange the shipment of the aluminum tubes were blocked or intercepted but declined to say, citing the sensitivity of the intelligence, where they came from or how they were stopped. According to Moore (and many other journalists, researchers and alternative media outlets), Judith Miller s story was completely false and that the the aluminum tubes were covered with an anodised coating, which rendered them useless for a centrifuge, according to a number of scientists who spoke publicly after Miller s story. Moore continued the tubes, in fact, were almost certainly intended for use as rocket bodies. Lastly, Moore quoted what Miller had told him about her sources which lead to the WMD hoax: I had no reason to believe what I reported was inaccurate, Miller told me. I believed the intelligence I had. We tried really hard to get more information and we vetted information very, very carefully. A few months after the aluminum tubes story, a former CIA analyst explained to me how simple it had been to manipulate the correspondent and her newspaper. The White House had a perfect deal with Miller, he said. Chalabi is providing the Bush people with the information they need to support their political objectives, and he is supplying the same material to Judy Miller. Chalabi tips her on something and then she goes to the White House, which has already heard the same thing from Chalabi, and she gets it corroborated. She also got the Pentagon to confirm things for her, which made sense, since they were working so closely with Chalabi. Too bad Judy didn t spend a little more time talking to those of us who had information that contradicted almost everything Chalabi said. The New York Times was clearly embarrassed by Miller s articles after the fact that Miller was wrong all along about the WMDs that led up to the invasion of Iraq. Nothing was ever found. On May 26th, 2004, the editorial board admitted their wrongdoing. The article, FROM THE EDITORS; The Times and Iraq, stated that, We have examined the failings of American and allied intelligence, especially on the issue of Iraq s weapons and possible Iraqi connections to international terrorists which blames U.S. and other intelligence agencies (which do share the blame to an extent).The editorial piece continued We have studied the allegations of official gullibility and hype. It is past time we turned the same light on ourselves. Well, they do turn the light on themselves, sort of: But we have found a number of instances of coverage that was not as rigorous as it should have been. In some cases, information that was controversial then, and seems questionable now, was insufficiently qualified or allowed to stand unchallenged. Looking back, we wish we had been more aggressive in re-examining the claims as new evidence emerged or failed to emerge.The problematic articles varied in authorship and subject matter, but many shared a common feature. They depended at least in part on information from a circle of Iraqi informants, defectors and exiles bent on regime change in Iraq, people whose credibility has come under increasing public debate in recent weeks. (The most prominent of the anti-Saddam campaigners, Ahmad Chalabi, has been named as an occasional source in Times articles since at least 1991, and has introduced reporters to other exiles. He became a favorite of hard-liners within the Bush administration and a paid broker of information from Iraqi exiles, until his payments were cut off last week). Complicating matters for journalists, the accounts of these exiles were often eagerly confirmed by United States officials convinced of the need to intervene in Iraq. Administration officials now acknowledge that they sometimes fell for misinformation from these exile sources. So did many news organizations in particular, this one The New York Times admittance that their journalistic principals had failed was too little and too late. The MSM in particular The New York Times relied on fake evidence from Ahmad Chalabi for years (since 1991 to be exact). The MSM failed the Iraqi people who suffered enormously under a pack of lies that destroyed their country. When Washington uses propaganda or fake news reports against a sovereign nation, the outcome is always regime change that sometimes leads to an all-out war. The MSM has time and time again been guilty of perpetrating fake news stories to assist in Washington s Imperial agenda.The Iraq War was the biggest lie of the 21st century. What other fake news stories will appear on the MSM websites and newspapers in the future regarding Syria, Russia, China, Iran, the Palestinians, Venezuela, Cuba, Ecuador, Nicaragua, and even the U.S. President-elect, Donald Trump?To answer that, we just don t know, but it is up to the alternative media to decipher the fake stories and bring out the truth. It is just a matter of time that the MSM will falsify another story; let s just hope it won t lead to another war in the process.*** Author Timothy Alexander Guzman is an independent researcher and writer with a focus on political, economic, media and historical spheres. He has been published in Global Research, The Progressive Mind, European Union Examiner, News Beacon Ireland, WhatReallyHappened.com, EIN News and a number of other alternative news sites. Areas of specialization include political issues, economic issues, media and history. This article was originally published at Silent Crow News.READ MORE ABOUT MSM FAKE NEWS AT: FAKE NEWS WEEKSUPPORT 21WIRE SUBSCRIBE & BECOME A MEMBER @ 21WIRE.TV | 0 |
23,026 | Thanks To Republicans, Obama Nominee Dies Waiting For Confirmation | It s no secret that Republicans have used their obstructionist tactics to block anything and everything President Obama has tried to do including nominees, from judicial to State Department.In a blatant attempt to hurt his ability to have a legacy, Republicans have targeted nominees, holding them hostage politically unless their demands are met. Some nominees waited hundreds of days for just a hearing, and others have waited even longer for a confirmation.And with that, one nominee, who has waited over 820 days for a confirmation, has died.The New York Times reports that Cassandra Butts, a worker in government and non profit entities, died suddenly at the age of 50 on May 24 of acute leukemia, which she did not know she had until shortly before her death. President Obama and the White House, recognizing her passion for helping others through public service, tapped her to serve as the United States ambassador to the Bahamas.Butts had worked for multiple branches of the government, including lawmakers on Capitol Hill and the White House counsel.Butts sailed through hearings in May 2014, and all seemed on track for a swift confirmation to a seemingly unimportant position, which urgently needed filling. So far, the Bahamas hasn t had a proper ambassador for 1,647 days.But, in typical Washington form, Republicans held up her nomination, not because she wasn t qualified, but because they literally hate President Obama.And it isn t fair to link all Senate Republicans to this hold up. Only two Republicans can be single handedly blamed for this: Tom Cotton and Ted Cruz.Is anyone surprised? Cruz, up in arms over the Iran nuclear deal, placed a hold on the confirmation on all State Department nominations, which of course included Butts.Cruz couldn t get his way, so naturally he unleashed a scorched earth policy on all those even remotely associated with the President.But it was Senator Tom Cotton better known as Tehran Tom by progressive advocates who proved to be a nefarious monstrosity in the whole matter. In seeking to punish the Obama Administration over a Secret Service leak of private information about a member of Congress, specifically targeted Butts and the Norwegian and Swedish ambassador nominees. After making a fool of himself, Cotton lifted the hold on the Scandinavian ambassadors. But he kept the hold on Butts.As the New York Times reports:Cotton eventually released the two other holds, but not the one on Butts. She told me that she once went to see him about it, and he explained that he knew that she was a close friend of Obama s the two first encountered each other on a line for financial-aid forms at Harvard Law School, where they were classmates and that blocking her was a way to inflict special pain on the presidentAnd there you have it. Because Republicans hate the President so much, they upheld a qualified, dignified, and devoted public servant from serving in a position that yields almost no political power.And now she has died, never getting the grace of a confirmation vote.That s how the Republicans have chosen to govern. They should be so proud of all their accomplishments. Featured image via Mark Wilson/Getty Images | 0 |
23,027 | Father of Philippine Islamist militant leaders dies in government custody | MANILA (Reuters) - The father of the leaders of the pro-Islamic State Maute group that seized control of a southern Philippine town in May died while in government custody, authorities said on Sunday. Cayamora Maute was taken to a hospital on Sunday afternoon after his blood pressure rose but he died along the way, the Philippines prison bureau said. The May 23 occupation of Marawi City by the Maute group, led by his two sons and which has pledged allegiance to Islamic State, triggered a brutal urban battle with military forces that entered its fourth month last week. It has raised concern that Islamic State, on a back foot in Syria and Iraq, is building a regional base on the Philippine island of Mindanao that could pose a threat to neighboring Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore too. More than 700 people, including 130 soldiers, have been killed since the militants, aided by foreign fighters from Indonesia, Malaysia and the Middle East, seized control of city of 200,000. Maute had several ailments when he was taken into custody in June, including diabetes and hypertension, Xavier Solda, spokesman at the Bureau of Jail and Management and Penology told reporters. The extent of his involvement in the group is not immediately clear but when he was arrested in June, a military spokesman expressed hope he could persuade his sons to stop fighting and surrender. This is an unfortunate incident for his family, but more so to the victims of terrorism in Marawi and their relatives who are awaiting justice and expecting that Cayamora would answer and atone for his involvement in the Marawi rebellion, Armed Forces Chief of Staff General Eduaro A o said in a statement. Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has extended martial law on the southern island of Mindanao until the end of the year, to give him time to crush the rebel movement. | 1 |
23,028 | U.S. appoints new top official at Havana embassy as tensions flare | HAVANA (Reuters) - The United States said on Thursday it had designated career diplomat Lawrence Gumbiner as the new chief of its Cuba embassy that has been at the center of a diplomatic crisis due to allegations of mysterious health attacks on its personnel. The previous charge d affaires, Scott Hamilton, left Cuba earlier this month after Washington ordered the evacuation of all non-essential staff and all relatives, in order to remain with his family. Gumbiner will arrive at a time of heightened tensions between the old Cold War foes. While the United States has not formally accused Cuba of carrying out what it says are attacks that have caused hearing loss and cognitive issues in its diplomats, U.S. President Donald Trump said last week Havana was responsible. [nS0N1MD016] In an interview with Reuters, Cuban government officials accused him this week of slandering their country. [nL2N1MZ2CH] The tensions over the attacks, some of which involved high-pitched sounds, came after Trump said in June he wanted to partially roll back the historic detente between the United States and Cuba, ordering tighter restrictions on travel and trade with the island. These have yet to be unveiled. [L3N1JD40J] Gumbiner, a lawyer, has served for the past three years as Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in Lima, Peru, according to the website of the U.S. embassy in Havana. Before that, he was deputy permanent representative at the U.S. Mission to the Organization of American States. He has previously held embassy positions in Bogota, Tel Aviv and San Jose. | 1 |
23,029 | Factbox: Women who have alleged inappropriate conduct by Trump | (Reuters) - At least 12 women have accused U.S. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump of sexual advances and groping. Among his accusers are a Miss Utah beauty pageant winner, a businesswoman, a reporter and a receptionist. He has denied the accusations. In a 2005 video that emerged on Oct. 7, Trump boasted about grabbing women by the genitals and kissing them without their consent. In a U.S. presidential debate on Oct. 9, he said he was embarrassed by what he called “locker-room talk” but had not engaged in the conduct he described in the video. Trump has called “absolutely false” the allegations by several women of groping and other misconduct, reported by The New York Times and other news media. At a rally this month, after two more women made accusations of groping, he denounced all the recent allegations by a series of women, calling them fabrications and calling the women “sick.” Following are some of the allegations against Trump: Jessica Leeds, 74, recounted in a video interview posted on The New York Times website on Oct. 12 that Trump grabbed her breasts and tried to put his hand up her skirt on a flight to New York in or around 1980 when she was a 38-year-old traveling businesswoman. In a tweet and in a later speech on Oct. 13, Trump called the Times story a total fabrication. Kristin Anderson, in a video posted on the website of The Washington Post on Oct. 14, said Trump put his hand up her skirt in a crowded New York nightclub in the early 1990s in an unwanted advance, when she had never even met him. “He did touch my vagina through my underwear, absolutely,” Anderson said in the video interview. Jill Harth, a former Trump beauty pageant business associate, filed a $125 million lawsuit in 1997 against Trump alleging that on Jan. 24, 1993, at Trump’s Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago, Trump “forcibly removed plaintiff to a bedroom, whereupon defendant subjected plaintiff to defendant’s unwanted sexual advances.” A Trump spokesperson was quoted on Oct. 7 in The New York Times as saying, “Mr. Trump denies each and every statement made by Ms. Harth.” The lawsuit was dropped in May 1997. Temple Taggart, a former Miss Utah, said that Trump twice kissed her on the lips in greeting while she was a contestant for the Miss USA pageant in 1997, when she was 21 years old. “What he did made me feel so uncomfortable that I ended up cutting my trip short, bought my own plane ticket, flew home and never spoke to him again,” Taggart said at an Oct. 28 press conference in Salt Lake City with her attorney, Gloria Allred. Cathy Heller said that Trump in 1997 tried to kiss her during a Mother’s Day brunch at Mar-A-Lago. Heller, her husband, her three children and her in-laws attended the event. When she was introduced to Trump, “He took my hand, and grabbed me, and went for the lips,” she told The Guardian newspaper. She said she leaned backward to avoid him and almost lost her balance. “And he said, ‘Oh, come on.’ He was strong. And he grabbed me and went for my mouth and went for my lips.” She said she turned her head and Trump kissed her on the side of the mouth. Yoga instructor Karena Virginia, at a news conference in New York City in October, said Trump approached her outside the U.S. Open tennis tournament in 1998. They had never met, and she was 27 years old, she said. She alleged that Trump commented on her legs and then touched her breast before she was able to get into a car and be driven away. Trump campaign spokeswoman Jessica Ditto said the accusation was a publicity-seeking attack coordinated with Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton, and added: “Voters are tired of these circus-like antics and reject these fictional stories.” Mindy McGillivray was cited in an article published in The Palm Beach Post on Oct. 12 that while she was a 23-year-old photographer’s assistant at a Jan. 24, 2003, event at Mar-a-Lago, Trump had grabbed her buttocks. The Palm Beach Post cited a Trump spokesperson as saying, “This allegation lacks any merit or veracity.” Rachel Crooks, formerly a receptionist at a real estate firm, told The New York Times in a report published on Oct. 12 that Trump “kissed me directly on the mouth” in 2005 at Trump Tower in Manhattan when she was 22. In a tweet and in a later speech on Oct. 13, Trump called the Times story a total fabrication. Natasha Stoynoff, a reporter, wrote a first-person account that described Trump kissing her without her consent in December 2005 at Mar-a-Lago while she was working on an article about him and his third wife, Melania, for People magazine. In the account published by People on Oct. 12, Stoynoff said “he was pushing me against the wall and forcing his tongue down my throat.” In a tweet and in a later speech on Oct. 13, Trump said the episode described did not happen. Summer Zervos, who was a contestant on Trump’s reality show “The Apprentice” in 2006, said at a news conference on Oct. 14 in Las Vegas that Trump tried to get her to lie down on a bed with him when she met him in 2007 to discuss a possible job. Zervos said she complied with a request to sit next to Trump, and, “He then grabbed my shoulder and began kissing me very aggressively and placed his hand on my breast.” Trump at a rally in North Carolina denounced the allegations made by a series of women in recent days, calling them fabrications. Ninni Laaksonen, a former Miss Finland, accused Trump of groping her in 2006 when she was representing her country in the Miss Universe beauty contest. Laaksonen told the Ilta-Sanomat newspaper that he had grabbed her behind before she appeared on a television show in New York with other contestants. “He really grabbed my butt. I don’t think anybody saw it but I flinched and thought: ‘What is happening?’,” she was quoted as saying in the newspaper. Jessica Drake, an adult film actor, accused Trump of pressuring her to have sex with him 10 years ago when they met at a golf tournament. After, she said, a man, possibly Trump, called to offer her $10,000 if she would have sex with him, which she declined. Trump’s campaign said the accusations were false. | 1 |
23,030 | Sessions visits U.S.-Mexico border to push migrant crackdown | Nogales, Ariz. (Reuters) - U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions traveled to the U.S.-Mexico border on Tuesday to make his case for increased prosecutions of illegal immigrants, pressuring U.S. attorneys to prioritize cases against criminal migrants. Sessions, a long-time proponent of tougher immigration enforcement, told U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents at the Port of Nogales, Arizona, that more illegal migrants should be prosecuted as criminals. It is normally the role of the Secretary of Homeland Security to meet border agents. But Sessions made the visit to highlight his focus on enforcing federal laws as dozens of U.S. cities try to shield illegal immigrants from stepped-up prosecution and deportation efforts. “Why are we doing this?” the former U.S. senator said. “Because it is what the duly enacted laws of the United States require.” Sessions said that each U.S. attorney would be required to designate a point person on border security prosecutions by April 18. The person in that position, known as a border security coordinator, would be directed to coordinate with the Department of Homeland Security, according to Sessions’ memo. The directive did not go beyond existing laws, but Sessions said his order “mandates the prioritizations of such enforcement” by U.S. attorneys. The Trump administration has threatened to cut off U.S. Justice Department grants to so-called sanctuary cities that fail to assist federal immigration authorities. Police in such cities have argued that targeting illegal migrants is an improper use of law enforcement resources. Sessions has said a failure to deport aliens convicted of criminal offenses puts whole communities at risk. Under U.S. law, anyone who harbors or transports an undocumented immigrant, has crossed the border illegally two or more times, resists an immigration officer’s arrest or commits travel document fraud is subject to criminal prosecution. Other immigrants apprehended for crossing the border illegally face civil procedures, with deportation the only penalty. Sessions’ announcement was the latest move by the Trump administration to deter illegal immigration. President Donald Trump has also called for not releasing migrants with pending court cases, targeting more people in immigration raids and building a wall on the southwest border. Speaking just 50 yards from a border fence on the Arizona-Mexico border, Sessions said that adding more fencing to the border will be a “force multiplier” against illegal migration. He also said the Justice Department plans to add 50 more immigration judges in 2017 and 75 more in 2018. Immigration judges oversee civil immigration cases, but there is a backlog of over 540,000 pending cases due a shortage of judges. | 1 |
23,031 | Trump lawyers aim to delay fraud trial at hearing | (Reuters) - Attorneys for U.S. President-elect Donald Trump will try at a court hearing on Friday to delay a civil trial involving allegations from students that they were defrauded by the now-defunct Trump University. The former students say they were lured by false promises to pay up to $35,000 to learn the New York businessman’s real estate investing “secrets” from his “hand-picked” instructors. Trump owned 92 percent of Trump University and had control over all major decisions, the students’ court papers said. Trump denies the allegations and has argued he relied on others to manage the business. U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel in San Diego has urged both sides to settle in advance of a trial scheduled to begin on Nov. 28. Trump’s lawyers filed a motion last week asking to delay the case until after Trump’s Jan. 20 inauguration, saying the presidential transition was “all-consuming.” They also proposed that Trump’s trial testimony be recorded before trial. The students opposed the request, saying Trump had already provided several hours of deposition testimony that could be presented to a jury. “Any delay would be a slippery slope because President-Elect Trump’s life is only going to get more complicated and unpredictable as time goes by,” they wrote. Curiel is presiding over two cases against Trump and the university. A separate lawsuit is pending, filed by New York’s attorney general who has said over 5,000 students across the country were defrauded out of about $40 million. Trump aroused controversy earlier this year when he said during his campaign that Curiel, who was born in Indiana to Mexican immigrant parents, could not be impartial because of Trump’s pledge to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border. | 1 |
23,032 | THE 1 PERCENTER BABY: Chelsea’s Daughter Is Clearly Not One Of Those ‘Everyday People’ Her ‘Dead Broke’ Granny Is Championing | But then again, with all of the cash flowing into the Clinton Slush Fund from foreign countries no designer should be out of reach for any member of the Clinton crime syndicate Becoming a grandmother has made Hillary Clinton think long and hard about what kind of world she wants to leave behind for future generations a world in which every American will have the same opportunities as nine-month-old Charlotte Clinton-Mezvinsky. In Hillary Clinton s America, for example, every infant child will be swathed in the hippest fabrics from the hottest celebrity fashion barons.The Daily Mail reports:Former first daughter Chelsea Clinton remembered late family friend Oscar de la Renta in a touching tribute at Monday night s CFDA Awards, and revealed that he sent her newborn daughter a special dress soon before he died, which she believes is likely one of the last pieces he ever designed.Chelsea, 35, spoke at the celebrity-packed fashion event about some of her favorite memories of the beloved designer, whom she had known since her father, former US President Bill Clinton s years in the White House.In her speech, she revealed how Mr. de la Renta boosted her self esteem with a dress he sent her as a teenager and made her daughter Charlotte one very lucky little girl by sending her a dress of her own before he passed away.The elite fashion designer, who passed away last year, also designed the stunning dress Hillary wore to Chelsea s wedding ceremony in 2010. It was during a stay at de la Renta s beachfront mansion in the Dominican Republic that Hillary decided to run for president in 2016 as a champion of everyday Americans. This entry was posted in Politics and tagged Chelsea Clinton, Hillary Clinton. Bookmark the permalink.Via: WFB | 0 |
23,033 | U.S. embassy in Kiev critical of Moscow order on Ukrainian documentation | MOSCOW (Reuters) - The United States embassy in Kiev voiced concern on Sunday over Russia’s decision to recognize civil registration documents issued in separatist-held areas of eastern Ukraine, saying that it threatens the Minsk peace process. The order by Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday will enable people from the conflict-hit region to travel, work or study in Russia and drew strong criticism from Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko. The move is “alarming and contradicts the agreed goals of the Minsk agreements”, the U.S. embassy in Ukraine said on Sunday via its official twitter account. Since the February 2015 Minsk peace agreement Ukraine and Russia have been locked in a stalemate periodically broken by fighting that each side has accused the other of instigating. | 1 |
23,034 | Bizarre Late Night Statement Proves Deputy AG Is Just Another Water Carrier For Trump | Donald Trump s administration and White House is the leakiest in living memory. This is because even his own staff knows that he is incompetent, intemperate, childish, narcissistic, and completely unfit for the office he holds. Despite the fact that they all know this, the sycophants around him just keep on doing his bidding and they keep leaking. These leaks seem to be worrying Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein or rather, likely Trump s open rage with regards to them has forced Rosenstein s hand.Instead of defending the integrity of Special Counsel Robert Mueller as Trump and his minions have spent the last few days attacking this decorated public servant, Rosenstein instead decided to issue a bizarre statement late Thursday night that shows that he, too, is now shilling for Trump. The statement attacks the credibility of anonymous sources, saying:Americans should exercise caution before accepting as true any stories attributed to anonymous officials, particularly when they do not identify the country let alone the branch of agency of government with which the alleged sources supposedly are affiliated. Americans should be skeptical about anonymous allegations. The Department of Justice has a long established policy to neither confirm nor deny such allegations.Fired U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara pointed out that Rosenstein should be defending Special Counsel Mueller instead of shilling for Trump:Where is Rod Rosenstein's overdue statement responding to the President's repeated attacks on his appointment of Robert Mueller? pic.twitter.com/y7dwtWTQ4G Preet Bharara (@PreetBharara) June 16, 2017This is beyond strange. The Department of Justice is not supposed to be politicized, but still the people therein serve at the pleasure of the president. More than likely, Trump ordered Rosenstein to do this, since so many damning stories about the Russia investigation are coming out on an almost hourly basis. Trump is reportedly completely obsessed with the Russia story, and still hasn t let go of the idea of somehow getting rid of Special Counsel Robert Mueller. In fact, the only reason Mueller is still there is because White House aides talked Trump off the ledge when he was about to order his firing.Conservative commentator Bill Kristol has an excellent theory as to what is going on with Rosenstein s behavior, and it s terrible for the nation:The Rosenstein statement suggests there must be a heck of a Trump story coming based on alleged information from anonymous foreign officials Bill Kristol (@BillKristol) June 16, 2017In the Age of Trump, the independence of the Department of Justice is definitely shot, and this proves it. While it was clear that Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who was a part of Trump s campaign and one of his staunchest supporters was nothing but a Trump shill, we had all hoped that Sessions recusal from the Russia investigation and Rosenstein s taking over would give the whole situation a bit more credibility, but no.All I can say is thank goodness for Robert Mueller. Hopefully, firing him would be a bridge too far even for Congressional Republicans.Featured image via Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images | 0 |
23,035 | Pressure builds on Trump to back off wiretap accusations | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. lawmakers from both parties said on Sunday they had seen no proof to support the claim by Republican President Donald Trump that his predecessor Barack Obama had wiretapped him last year, adding pressure on Trump to explain or back off his repeated assertion. Several Republicans last week urged Trump to apologize for the allegations he made in a series of tweets on March 4. The maelstrom also caused tension with key U.S. allies and threatens to distract Republicans from campaign promises on health care and taxes. “I don’t know the basis for President Trump’s assertion,” U.S. Senator Susan Collins, a Republican, said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “I do believe he owes us that explanation.” Collins said she supported Trump as president, but she wouldn’t side with him if he “misstated what the facts are.” FBI Director James Comey is expected to be asked about Trump’s claims when he testifies at a rare public hearing on Monday about alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election. Russia has denied the assertion it was involved in hacked emails and other attempts to influence the race. Representative Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee holding the hearing, called Trump’s claims “patently false” and said he expected Comey to say as much on Monday. The Justice Department on Friday delivered documents to congressional committees to help clear up whether the Obama administration spied on Trump. Republican Representative Devin Nunes, who leads the House intelligence panel, said after receiving the material, he saw no evidence of wiretapping. But Nunes, who served on Trump’s transition team, joined the White House in seeking to shift attention away from the controversies by calling for investigations of leaks to the news media. Nunes said on “Fox News Sunday” that leaks to reporters about former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn were criminal and that his panel was probing whether other names were leaked. Trump has been dogged by allegations that his associates had ties to Russian officials. He fired Flynn last month after reports he had discussed sanctions with Russia’s ambassador before Trump took office, without telling other White House officials. “The one crime we know that’s been committed is that one: the leaking of someone’s name,” Nunes said. “Were there any other names that were ... leaked out?” Nunes also said ahead of Monday’s hearing he had seen “no evidence” of collusion between Russia and Trump’s team. But Schiff, the panel’s top Democrat, said there was enough “circumstantial evidence” that he still had questions. Meanwhile, the White House has not backed down on Trump’s surveillance claims. The administration was forced to reassure key ally Britain after White House press secretary Sean Spicer repeated a Fox News analyst’s claim that a British intelligence agency helped Obama wiretap Trump. The British government strongly denied it. The issue led to an awkward moment on Friday at a joint press conference with visiting German Chancellor Angela Merkel when Trump was asked about the wiretap claims by a German reporter. Trump said he and Merkel had “something in common,” apparently referring to reports during the Obama administration that Merkel’s phone was bugged. The quip left the German leader looking bewildered. Senior Republican Representative Tom Cole told reporters on Friday that Trump owed Obama an apology. Representatives Charlie Dent and Will Hurd, also Republicans, made similar comments. “I see no indication that that’s true,” Cole said of the wiretapping charge. Unless Trump produces convincing proof, Cole added, “President Obama is owed an apology.” | 1 |
23,036 | Singapore suspends trade relations with North Korea | SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Singapore has suspended trade relations with North Korea, the latest of Pyongyang s major trade partners to cut commercial ties under toughening U.N. sanctions over its weapons program, a customs notice obtained on Thursday showed. The move comes about two months after the United States imposed North Korea-related sanctions on a number of firms and individuals, including two entities based in Singapore. Singapore will prohibit all commercially traded goods from, or to, the Democratic People s Republic of Korea (DPRK), the city-state s customs said in the notice sent to traders and declaring agents last Tuesday, referring to the country by its official name. The suspension would take effect from Nov. 8, Fauziah A. Sani, head of trade strategy and security for the director-general of customs, said in the notice. Repeated breach of the new prohibitions is punishable by a fine of up to S$200,000 ($147,340.50) or four times the value of the goods traded, imprisonment of up to three years, or both, it added. Singapore is North Korea s seventh largest trading partner. The Philippines, Pyongyang s fifth biggest trading partner, suspended trade with North Korea in September to comply with a U.N. resolution. Tension on the Korean peninsula has escalated as North Korea s young leader, Kim Jong Un, has stepped up the development of weapons in defiance of U.N. sanctions. North Korea has tested a series of missiles this year, including one that flew over Japan, and conducted its sixth and biggest nuclear test in September. Pyongyang maintains a diplomatic presence in Singapore, with an embassy in its financial district. In September, Singapore issued a travel advisory urging citizens to avoid all non-essential travel to North Korea, where it does not have diplomatic representation. In an interview with National Public Radio in May, Singapore s minister of foreign affairs, Vivian Balakrishnan, had said the country was not ready to cut all diplomatic ties with North Korea. In January last year, Singapore-based Chinpo Shipping Company (Private) Ltd was fined S$180,000 for facilitating a shipment of arms to North Korea in violation of U.N. sanctions. (reut.rs/2ARbm14) | 1 |
23,037 | Cruz Trying To Hold Fiorina’s Hand Is More Awkward Than A Middle School Dance (VIDEO) | When Ted Cruz announced Carly Fiorina as his running mate last week, it left many, many people scratching their heads. It d be like a football team getting their finger sizes measured for Super Bowl rings after they ve already been eliminated from making the playoffs. It just didn t make any sense whatsoever. It was clearly a move to try to get media attention (which worked) and in hopes of helping him win the Republican nomination (which it won t).Add to this how awkward of a pairing Cruz and Fiorina make. They go together like orange juice and toothpaste, where the only thing left will be the bitter taste left in everyone s mouths after witnessing their desperation.If you don t believe how awkward they are together, then by all means, witness it for yourselves.Here s Cruz trying to grab Fiorina s hand in the typical politician power pose with their running mate. Or in Cruz s case, his running mate. Carly Fiorina Gives Ted Cruz a Hand (by @VicBergerIV) (Vine by @superdeluxe) https://t.co/au7opXLkro Vic Berger IV (@VicBergerIV) April 27, 2016Now, add that together with the fact that both are heavily disliked amongst not only liberals, but conservatives as well, including many in Washington, and you have a recipe for utter failure. Unfortunately, Cruz is gonna have to learn this lesson the hard way, because common sense and candor are not his forte.Featured image via video screen capture | 0 |
23,038 | McMaster says 'of course' Trump supports NATO Article 5 | TAORMINA, Italy (Reuters) - U.S. National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster said on Saturday that “of course” President Donald Trump backed NATO’s mutual defense doctrine, despite not making an explicit reference to it during a visit to Brussels this week. Speaking at NATO headquarters earlier this week, Trump disappointed allies by not mentioning his support for Article 5, which states that an attack on one member of the alliance is viewed as an attack on all. During his election campaign, Trump appeared to called Article 5 into question by suggesting that NATO members who did not pay their fair share for the alliance may not deserve to benefit from it. “I think it’s extraordinary that there would be an expectation that the president would have to say explicitly that he supports Article 5. Of course he does,” McMaster told reporters at the end of a Group of Seven summit in Sicily. “He did not make a decision not to say it,” McMaster continued. “It was implicit in the speech. There was no decision to not put it in there. It is a matter of fact that the United States, the president, stands firmly behind our Article 5 commitments under NATO.” | 1 |
23,039 | Disgrace: Ted Cruz Using Anti-American Propaganda In Campaign Ad (VIDEO) | Republican presidential candidate Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) said it was terrible that the sailors detained by Iran were videotaped putting their hands up and surrendering. But now Cruz is using that same footage shot by Iran in a new campaign ad.The ad, Have Your Back, uses the footage of U.S. Navy sailors created by the Iranian regime as a backdrop for a promise from Cruz to stand up for them if he is elected president.But if Cruz believes the video is enemy propaganda, why use it in a crass television commercial?It once again hollows out the conservative message that they are the one, true, source of support for the military between the Democratic and Republican parties.The ad also reminds voters just how wrong Cruz was about the initial capture of the sailors. As the situation unfolded, Cruz ran to conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt to complain that the incident showed weakness on behalf of the Obama administration. Our prayers right now are with the sailors and with the families of the sailors, Cruz told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt on Tuesday night. I think what the president should say is that the sailors are coming home and they re coming home right now. Cruz continued: Now, I don t know that he will say that, and the fact that Iran feels emboldened enough to capture two U.S. Navy ships and to take 10 sailors into custody is really a demonstration of the unbelievable weakness of the Obama-Clinton foreign policy. We have a Commander-in-Chief where the bad actors of the world have learned that he will not stand up to them. Remember this is the same Barack Obama who is trying to send Iran 150 billion dollars. A few hours after Cruz stamped and whined his rhetorical feet, the sailors were free. Not because Obama followed the lead of Cruz and other Republicans with a bellicose posture towards Iran, but because the Obama administration has opened up lines of diplomacy between the two countries lines needed in order to avoid conflict. The sailors were home without a single shot fired, without an American put in harms way or an innocent Iranian civilian having to suffer.While Obama was bringing the soldiers home safely, Ted Cruz s ad men were analyzing the situation and looking at the optics for the best way to position their right-wing candidate.Featured image via YouTube | 0 |
23,040 | South Africa’s “FEMALE” Olympian Favored To Win Gold In Women’s 800 Meter Race Tonight THREATENS Other Athletes On Social Media…Should “She” Even Be Competing With Women? [VIDEO] | Should there be a medical test to prove the sex of an olympic athlete, or should the athlete be able to decide where they are more comfortable competing? South Africa s female athlete, Caster Semenya will compete against the world s top female athletes as the overwhelming favorite for the gold tonight at 8 pm.Semenya is apparently under armed guard protection after sending out this taunting threat to anyone who questions his/her gender: You try to give me stress ..I give you heart attack.. ITS A WARNING.. TRY ME.. pic.twitter.com/i5hQsyboBL Caster Semenya (@caster800m) August 13, 2016UPDATE International reports suggest that security has been beefed up for the athlete ahead of her race. Several news outlets are reporting that Olympic officials are concerned about Semenya s welfare and are fearful of unrest from the fans of rival runners spilling over into physical violence.The reports state that journalists have been barred from approaching the athlete and she won t be allowed to conduct any media interviews. She will also be accompanied by Rio Olympics security staff at all times.The International Olympic Committee and Rio organisers have apparently refused to talk about the runner.Last night, the Department of Sport and Recreation would not be drawn into speculation that Semenya had been put under armed guard.There is, in reality, only a silver medal up for grabs in the women s 800m on Saturday.It is likely that on the night of Saturday, Aug. 20, in the Olympic Stadium in Rio de Janeiro, a 25-year-old South African woman named Caster Semenya will win a gold medal. Her victory will come in the 800 meters, a race in which her times have been approaching a decades-old world record thought by many in the sport to be unapproachable. Her performance will be stunning: She is 5 10 and weighs 161 pounds, with muscular arms, broad shoulders and narrow hips. She has a severe jawline, hard and strong, and a competitor s unflinching eyes. In a 2009 article, Ariel Levy of The New Yorker described Semenya as breathtakingly butch. This is not Semenya s first appearance on the global stage; she has been a world-class runner for eight years and won a silver medal in the 800 in London. But now she is dominant, and the alleged but unverified source of that dominance has made her one of the most significant and potentially transformative athletes in Olympic history. Her races in Rio will trigger an emotional debate on gender and sports, one that is far more challenging than the comparatively simple issue of doping. She looks the way she looks, and then she runs away from the field, says Joanna Harper, a medical physicist in Portland and the first transgender woman to consult with the International Olympic Committee on gender and sports. And then, yeah, all hell breaks loose. SISemenya has the condition hyperandrogenism, which naturally increases levels of testosterone. It is argued by some this gives her an unfair advantage over her rivals, who have lower levels and therefore have less musculature and strength.An IAAF ruling that capped tester one levels for female athletes and saw Semenya s performances dip was overruled by CAS last year and her times have returned to unbeatable.The issue is hotly debated, with some saying Semenya s right to compete is paramount and others saying her competitors right to a fair playing field is equally as important.Semenya is focused purely on running, and everyone else is focused on whether she will break the world record of 1:53.28 in the final. Daily TelegraphWatch Caster Semenya speak to a reporter here:In the 2009, tests conducted during the world athletics championships, where Semenya s gender became the subject of heated debate following her victory in the 800m, revealed evidence she is a hermaphrodite, someone with both male and female sexual characteristics.Semenya, 18, has three times the amount of testosterone that a normal female would have. According to a source closely involved with the Semenya examinations IAAF testing, which included various scans, has revealed she has internal testes the male sexual organs which produce testosterone.Only the certainty of an even more savage backlash from South Africa has made the IAAF hesitant about slapping a ban on Semenya and revoking her gold medal.South Africa embraced Semenya after the storm of controversy from Berlin, declaring her our girl . From the day news broke on August 19 that the IAAF had initiated gender verification tests on Semenya, various factions within South African society and politics have attacked the Monte Carlo based IAAF.The African National Congress MP and National Assembly sports committee chairman Butana Komphela has already lodged a complaint with the United Nations High Commission on Human Rights, accusing the IAAF of racism and sexism. There s all sorts of scans you do. This is why it s complicated. In the past you used to do a gynaecological exam, blood test, chromosome test, whatever. That s why they (the findings) were challenged, because it s not quite so simple. So what they do now is they do everything, and then they can say look, not only has she got this, she s got that and the other. The problem for us is to avoid it being an issue now which is very personal: of the organs being a hermaphrodite, of not being a real woman. It s very dramatic. Daily Telegraph | 0 |
23,041 | The Republican Jewish Coalition Loves Trump So Much They FINALLY Condemned Nazis | The Republican Jewish Coalition finally caught on to Donald Trump s extreme views after his latest remarks in defense of the Nazis marching in Charlottesville, Virginia in his name while shouting Blood and soil and Jews will not replace us! The former reality show star turned amateur president lashed out at the media during his press conference while blaming what he called the Alt-Left for the violence which besieged Charlottesville and rocked the nation. There were people in that rally, and I looked the night before, Trump said. If you look, they were people protesting very quietly the taking down of the statue of Robert E Lee. I m sure in that group there were some bad ones. But, the night before, which he mentioned, was when the Nazis took Tiki torches and stormed down the street shouting Nazi-era slogans. Obviously, the Republican Jewish Coalition noticed that, too.First, they sent out a tweet to honor Heather Heyer, 32, the woman murdered by a Trump supporting Nazi, but this fell on deaf ears because they still support Trump.pic.twitter.com/yIMu9TyL5n RJC (@RJC) August 16, 2017Then they released a statement to explain (and this shouldn t have to be explained) that The Nazis, the KKK, and white supremacists are dangerous anti-Semites. There are no good Nazis and no good members of the Klan. But then the statement reads that thankfully, in Modern America, the KKK and Nazis are small fringe groups that have never been welcome in the GOP. Except those fringe groups helped to elevate Trump into power so maybe they haven t been paying attention. The name of the group responsible for the hate-rally is called Unite the Right so that s another clue.The statement calls on Trump to provide greater moral clarity in rejecting racism, bigotry, and anti-Semitism. The statement references Abraham Lincoln who is spinning in his grave as the founder of the Republican party. We state unequivocally our rejection of these hate mongers you can expect no less from the Republican Jewish Coalition, the statement says.Statement by RJC National Chairman Senator Norm Coleman and RJC Executive Director Matt Brooks on behalf of the Republican Jewish Coalition pic.twitter.com/dbgLPxoyc8 RJC (@RJC) August 16, 2017A statement on their site reads:We mourn the loss of life at Charlottesville this weekend, and will continue to pray for all those impacted. Anti-Semitism and all forms of hate are anti-American, anti-Jewish, and antithetical to any sense of decency. We regret that we continue to be faced with these issues, but the RJC will never shy away from our role of standing up to racists, fascists, and Nazis.That s nice but if the coalition rejects hate then they should start with the leader of their party who defended Nazis that marched on American soil. We ll take the group seriously when they finally realize that Trump needs to be ejected from office. He s emboldening the worst in society. And as for Vice-President Pastor Pence, he said today that he supports his boss s language during the presser. That should tell them that the whole damned administration is complicit.Featured image via Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images | 0 |
23,042 | Hungary PM warns against eroding free movement for EU citizens | BUDAPEST (Reuters) - Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said Europe must focus on preserving the free movement of EU citizens as its leaders make plans to overhaul the bloc. Orban, a fierce critic of perceived bureaucratic over-reach from the European Union, said proposals to tighten labor rules and internal border controls jeopardize significant achievements in the European project. While we make grand plans about the future of Europe the Schengen system (of border-free movement within the EU) is crumbling away in our hands, he told state radio. We have free movement of labor and we (some EU leaders) plan to restrict it. | 1 |
23,043 | Iran calls Houthi missile attack targeting Riyadh 'reaction' to Saudi aggression | LONDON (Reuters) - Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said on Wednesday that missile attacks by Yemen s Houthis targeting Saudi Arabian capital Riyadh were a reaction to what he called Saudi aggression. How should the Yemeni people react to bombardment of their country. So they are not allowed to use their own weapons? You stop the bombardment first and see if the Yemenis would not do the same, Rouhani was quoted as saying by Tasnim news agency. Rouhani also said Saudi Arabia had made a strategic mistake by considering the United States and Israel as friends and Iran as an enemy. | 1 |
23,044 | GERMANY’S Anti-Trump, Open Borders ANGELA MERKEL Sees Re-election Poll Numbers Drop…Orders 100,000 Migrants To Be Deported…By Force If Necessary | In what has to be considered an historic about face, German Chancellor Angela Merkel announced that 100,000 migrants who recently arrived in Germany would be deported.For more than a year following the massive tide of humanity that flooded into Germany from Africa and the Middle East, Merkel stoutly defended her open border policy as being consistent with western values. A million migrants later, and a huge voter backlash due to overburdened local governments and a sky rocketing crime rate, Merkel has changed her tune.On November 9, 2016, Germany s Angela Merkel offered Donald J. Trump a public admonishment following his historic win against pro-amensty Hillary Clinton: Sunday Express:Ordinarily, a politician who tried to pull this off would be toast. But Merkel finds herself in a strong position because the alternatives to her are even worse.Recent polls show her coalition of the CDU/CSU comfortably ahead by 11 points over the Social Democratic Party the leading left wing party in Germany by 33-22%. The next strongest party are the Greens who poll at 12% and then the nationalist party AfD at almost 9%. Put simply, the German voter has nowhere else to go now that Merkel has flip flopped on immigration.There is a chance that the left wing parties will poll enough votes to fashion a majority, but given that the Social Democrats are determined to continue with a liberal immigration policy, it isn t likely.Merkel will probably pull off her switcheroo on open borders and win re-election. But she has already accelerated the timetable for a takeover of her country by people with no interest in promoting German or western values and ideas. American Thinker | 0 |
23,045 | Xi says China will continue to open its economy, deepen financial reforms | BEIJING (Reuters) - China will deepen economic and financial reforms and further open its markets to foreign investors as it looks to move from high-speed to high-quality growth, President Xi Jinping said on Wednesday. China will push ahead with market-oriented reforms of its foreign exchange rate as well as its financial system, and let the market play a decisive role in the allocation of resources, Xi said at the opening of a key, twice-a-decade Communist Party Congress. China s open door will not be closed, it will be only be opened wider, Xi said. The government will clean up rules and practices that hinder a unified market and fair competition, support development of private firms and stimulate vitality of all types of market entities, Xi said, while pledging to further open China s services sector to foreign investors. However, while expressing support for market reform and private firms, Xi also called for stronger, bigger state firms. The government will promote strengthening, improvement and expansion of state capital, (and) effectively prevent loss of state assets, deepen reform of state-owned enterprises, development a mixed-ownership economy and cultivate globally competitive world-class firms, Xi said. Xi s comments reiterated a long-standing pledge by party leaders to give a greater role to free-market forces to improve efficiency and put the economy on a more sustainable growth path. But as Xi gears up for his second five-year term, foreign business executives and analysts increasingly believe market liberalization is seen as secondary to his state-centered approach to economic policy and his focus on stability. Other painful reforms that many economists say are needed have also moved slowly under Xi. They include overhauling China s bloated and debt-laden state sector, fixing the fiscal system to tackle local government debt and bringing in new property taxes to ward off housing bubbles. China should also strengthen consumption as a foundation for economic development, Xi said, and will expand the middle class and narrow the gap in development between rural and urban areas. Beijing s campaign to rein in high debt levels and industrial overcapacity will continue as part of supply-side structural reforms, he added. Xi also proposed a goal of developing China into a basically modernized, innovation-driven country by 2035 and a modern strong power by 2050. But analysts said that suggests the government is likely to continue to target moderately high economic growth in coming years, which could see the country s large debt pile climb even further. China s gross domestic income per capita would need to rise by an average of 6.6 percent a year in real U.S. dollar terms from 2017 onwards to become an innovative economy and match the development level of today s South Korea by 2035, ANZ estimated. That growth figure needs to be no lower than 4.9 percent for China to be a modernized economy - the by World Bank s definition of high income countries - all the way to 2050, ANZ added. Nobody knows what is a modernized country , but from the wording of Xi Jinping you can tell what he would like to achieve is for China to be one of the high income countries today like Japan and Australia, said Raymond Yeung, Great China Chief Economist at ANZ in Hong Kong. China is expected to post its strongest economic growth in several years this year, riding on a government-led construction boom, but economists said it is still relying too heavily on credit-fueled stimulus despite policymakers vows to reduce debt risks. Some international agencies and economists have argued Beijing should abandon its arbitrary annual growth targets or lower it to become less reliant on government stimulus and bank credit. Less ambitious growth targets would also give policymakers more room for tougher reforms. Specific economic targets for 2018 are likely to be set during an economic work meeting later this year, but are not expected to be announced until March. The International Monetary Fund warned this year that China s credit growth was on a dangerous trajectory and called for decisive action , while the Bank for International Settlements said in late 2016 that excessive debt growth was signaling a banking crisis in the next three years. For graphic on China's economic report card, click: tmsnrt.rs/2xNmnxD For graphic onChina's leadership, click: tmsnrt.rs/2yw6MG8 | 1 |
23,046 | Pelosi says Trump abused power in interactions with ex-FBI chief | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Democratic leader in the U.S. House of Representatives said on Friday there was no question President Donald Trump abused his power in interactions with former FBI Director James Comey but she said it remained to be see if he had obstructed justice. Speaking to reporters a day after Comey testified to the Senate intelligence panel, House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said it was “beyond the pale” that Trump had asked Comey, then head of the independent law enforcement agency, for his loyalty. “There’s no question he abused power,” Pelosi said. “Whether he obstructed justice, remains for the facts to come forward, and that’s what we want are the facts.” | 1 |
23,047 | Ann Coulter Calls For Assembling ‘Death Squads’ To Kill Undocumented Immigrants (AUDIO) | This is why the right-wing should never have power again.Donald Trump s decision to work with Democrats on legislation that would enshrine the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program into law has angered his anti-immigration supporters.Despite the fact that these children were brought to America through no fault of their own and the fact that America is the only only home they have ever known, right-wingers like Ann Coulter want them deported anyway. And she is so angry over Trump s decision that she is now calling for the creation of death squads to go around the country executing anyone who is an undocumented immigrant or pro-immigration. We have made as clear as you can possibly make it, we want less immigration, Coulter said during an appearance on the Todd Starnes show. Stop dumping the third world on the country. If he continues down this path, well I guess there are three options, she continued. There s the organizing the death squads for the people who ruined America, because there will be no more hope. I guess the other possibility is to well I don t think anyone would mind him being impeached. What s the faction opposing that? And then at least we ll get Mike Pence. But in terms of saving America, maybe a third party. Here s the audio via Right Wing Watch.This is a seriously frightening threat that the American people must reject immediately. Furthermore, federal law enforcement authorities should investigate Coulter. Her words could literally inspire some right-wing nut jobs to actually create these death squads, which would go around terrorizing the nation.Killing immigrants and creating death squads is something that would make Adolf Hitler proud. This is the kind of action that Nazis want in this country and Coulter needs to face serious consequences for even suggesting it as an option. Featured Image: Chip Somodevilla/Getty | 0 |
23,048 | Exclusive: U.S. House to vote on Iran Sanctions Act renewal as soon as November | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Republican leaders of the U.S. House of Representatives plan a vote as soon as mid-November on a 10-year reauthorization of the Iran Sanctions Act, congressional aides told Reuters on Tuesday, setting up a potential showdown with the White House and Senate. The Iran Sanctions Act, or ISA, which expires on Dec. 31, allows trade, energy, defense and banking industry sanctions over Iran’s nuclear program and ballistic missile tests. Its fate is one of the major pieces of unfinished business facing lawmakers when they return to Washington on Nov. 14 for the first time after the Nov. 8 elections. U.S. Representative Ed Royce, the Republican chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, is expected to introduce the 10-year renewal as soon as Congress gets back, aides said. Congressional aides said a “clean” renewal, meaning unchanged from the current legislation, was likely to pass the House. Its fate in the Senate was much less certain, and a White House spokesman would not say whether President Barack Obama would sign it into law. Republicans control majorities in both the House and Senate, and every Republican in Congress opposed the international nuclear deal announced in July 2015, in which Iran agreed to curtail its nuclear program in exchange for relief from crippling economic sanctions. Republicans have since tried repeatedly to pass legislation to clamp down on Iran, accusing Obama of being so eager to burnish his foreign policy legacy that he conceded too much to Tehran in the nuclear talks. Some Senate Republicans want more than a clean renewal of the ISA. They are trying to build support for legislation that would renew it but also do more to punish individual Iranians and businesses over the country’s ballistic missile tests and what they see as its support for terrorism. Some senators have also pushed for a law that would eliminate the president’s right to waive sanctions for security reasons. Obama’s administration had asked Congress to hold off on renewing the ISA, saying it has enough power to reimpose economic sanctions if Iran violates the nuclear agreement even if it expires. White House spokesman Josh Earnest declined to say how Obama would respond to the bill if it passed both houses of Congress and reached his desk. “I won’t prejudge at this point whether or not the president would sign that bill,” Earnest told reporters traveling with the president in Los Angeles. “The president and the Treasury Department retain significant sanctions authority that already has been used to impose costs on Iran for their flagrant violation of their international obligations,” he said. White House opposition to the bill could generate resistance from Democrats in the Senate, making it more difficult for any legislation to garner the 60 votes needed to move ahead. Because Republicans hold only 54 seats in the 100-member chamber, they would need Democratic support to move any bill. Renewing the sanctions bill could also increase frustrations in Iran. Iranian officials have been complaining for months that remaining U.S. sanctions have frightened away trade partners and robbed it of too many benefits it was promised under the nuclear deal. A House Foreign Affairs Committee aide said addressing the ISA before it expires is a “top priority” for Royce. “The Iran Sanctions Act was enacted to curb Tehran’s support for terrorism and its very dangerous weapons proliferation. It should remain in place until the regime stops exporting terror and threatening us and our allies with deadly weapons,” Royce said in a statement sent to Reuters. “That’s why I’ll be introducing a bipartisan, long-term extension of these important sanctions,” he said. | 1 |
23,049 | Trump Campaign Issues Grossly Racist Statement Regarding Birther Conspiracies | The Trump campaign is definitely a racist one, because the guy at the helm of the whole thing, Donald Trump, is a flaming racist. After all, as we all know, Donald Trump s first entrance into mainstream American politics was his very public leading of a charge to prove that President Obama was not born in this country. That issue keeps coming up now, during this campaign, because Trump s surrogates have been all over the television airwaves insisting that he is no longer a birther. However, when Trump himself was asked by the Washington Post whether or not he actually believes that the President is an American, he refused to answer, just giving the standard answer that he no longer discusses the issue.Well, seeing that things were about to get ugly surrounding this, Trump s campaign issued a gross, racist statement full of self-congratulations and outright lies, as if Trump s questioning of the president s birth was in any way a service to the country or in any way appropriate. The statement begins by refusing to admit any wrong doing on the part of Trump and his fellow birthers, and instead suggesting that Trump s racist show me your papers campaign was somehow the right thing to do: In 2011, Mr. Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate. Mr. Trump did a great service to the President and the country by bringing closure to the issue that Hillary Clinton and her team first raised. Then, Trump spokesman Jason Miller, the despicable goon behind this travesty of a statement, closes the whole thing off by acting like the public questioning of the origins of the first black American president is some kind of golf course deal Trump closed: Inarguably, Donald J. Trump is a closer. Having successfully obtained President Obama s birth certificate when others could not, Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States. No, you guys aren t getting off this easy, Miller. The only acceptable response here is to have your candidate say, FROM HIS OWN MOUTH, that he knows that he was wrong, that he is sorry, and that President Obama is an American and a legitimate president. Nothing less will do. Further, you will have to retract this deplorable statement, and admit that everything you have said here is awful, that it was NOT Hillary Clinton s campaign who started or led the birther movement, and that it was Donald Trump himself who gave it legs.I won t hold my breath on any of that, though. After all, Hillary was right: You folks really are a basket of deplorables and you just got even deplorable with this statement.Featured image via Alex Wong/Getty Images | 0 |
23,050 | REPORT: A Sitting Republican Senator Will ENDORSE Clinton If Trump Is GOP Nominee (VIDEO) | If Donald Trump captures the Republican nomination, at least one GOP Senator is planning on doing the unthinkable.In what would be a huge condemnation of the Republican Party, NBC anchor Chuck Todd reported on Tuesday night that a sitting Republican Senator will actually ENDORSE Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton if Trump wins the GOP nomination.Just think about that for a second.For years, Republicans have shifted far to the extreme right. So much so that they have allowed candidates like Trump, Cruz, and Rubio to rise to power within the party. They also hate and have refused to work with President Obama, and have hated Hillary Clinton even longer.Republicans even launched partisan investigations of Benghazi all in an effort to hurt Clinton at the polls.If anyone had told me a year ago that a Republican Senator will endorse Clinton for president in 2016, I would have had a good laugh for days.But as Super Tuesday unfolded last night, Chuck Todd announced he had heard real speculation today from very informed people that at least one Republican Senate incumbent, if given a choice, might publicly endorse Hillary Clinton. Yes, you heard that right. The question of where have all the moderate Republicans gone has now been answered. So terrifying is the prospect that Trump could be president that Republicans are seriously looking at Hillary Clinton as the only choice to prevent insanity from taking over the government.Todd continued by explaining that it must be a Republican who is running in a blue state and that they may not really want to endorse Clinton but they need to do so in order to distance themselves from Trump and the disaster he represents for America and the GOP. An incumbent senator, there s at least one that I ve heard that could end up doing that, making that choice. Not because they want to, but because they need to send that message. Look, there s a bunch of them running for re-election in blue states, okay. That s what s going on here, and on the day that the Republican front-runner might cement his lead. Here s the video via YouTube.In other words, Republicans are beginning to understand that a Trump nomination could spell doom for other Republicans on the ticket, which means the Senate and the House are up for grabs. The Democrats could sweep to power in Congress, not just because Republicans are do-nothing obstructionists, but because their candidate for president is an extremist who is hurling racism, sexism, and hate at every rally much to the amusement of the conservative base.If a sitting Republican senator is truly willing to support Clinton simply for political survival, then it looks like the GOP is about to get their asses handed to them in November like never before. And then they ll definitely have to change their ways if they ever want to occupy the White House again.Featured image via Wikimedia | 0 |
23,051 | BRILLIANT TRUMP ADVISER: “The Extreme Media” Has Gotten Donald Trump Wrong Since He Announced [Video] | What a treat! Laura Ingraham interviewed President Trump Senior Policy Adviser Stephen Miller tonight:Miller has been spot on from the beginning of his tenure as Senior Adviser to Trump He often warmed up the Trump rally crowds with incredibly uplifting speeches. He also gave a great speech about why not to vote for Hillary:Trump spokesperson Stephen Miller just hammers Hillary Clinton! You will love every minute of this!The guy is so dialed in on immigration and what needs to be done to reform it. One million people come into the U.S. yearly! 300K in the 70 s, 500K in the 80 s and now 1 million! NUTS!Ingraham pivots to speak about polls and the media Note that he calls the media the extreme media LOL! Who doesn t love that new term?Ingraham discusses Trump s agenda and the populist movement. It s about trade, immigration, public safety to help ALL Americans.Uplifing everyone is the key!SOME BACKGROUND ON MILLER S RISE TO TRUMP S INNER CIRCLE:When Jeff Sessions first looked at Stephen Miller, he saw potential in the recent Duke University graduate.Miller, then in his early 20s, took up an offer from the conservative author David Horowitz to visit Capitol Hill to introduce him to members of Congress. Horowitz believed that Miller, who penned conservative columns at Duke and in Horowitz Front Page Mag, would be a capable D.C. staffer. A meeting with Sessions was on the top of Miller s Washington wish list. What was supposed to be a 15-minute meeting became an hour-long meeting with the senator, Stephen Boyd, Sessions former communications director who eventually hired Miller. Sen. Sessions immediately saw that Stephen Miller was an extraordinary young man who had a deep grasp of conservative politics. It wasn t only Sessions who saw something in Miller.When Donald Trump takes the oath of office on Friday, the 31-year-old Miller will be one of the president s closest confidants, serving as a senior White House advisor. That title, announced last month, comes after Miller worked as a senior policy advisor for the better part of a year on the Trump campaign. Trump also tasked Miller with writing his speech to the Republican National Convention, and initial reports indicated that Miller would be writing the inaugural address. The Trump camp is now saying that the president-elect wrote that one himself, although New York Magazine poked some holes in that claim.While Sessions did not have an opening for Miller at the time of that first meeting nearly 10 years ago, he told Boyd to put him on his radar. He came out and he said to me, I want you to keep an eye on him and see if he can be a part of our team one day,' Boyd recalled. After working as a press secretary to two House members, Miller was hired as a communications staffer on the Judiciary Committee, where Sessions was the top Republican. I remember setting up a staff and it was Friday afternoon, and I got the go-ahead to hire a press secretary just to work on Judiciary. [Sessions ] directions were very clear and he and I discussed it that it was obvious this was a kid with a lot of talent, Boyd said.Miller would move up the ranks from a Judiciary Committee staffer to press secretary for Sessions office, eventually rising to communications director when Boyd departed to become chief of staff to Rep. Martha Roby, R-Montgomery, in 2012. Miller could not be reached for this story.On the surface, there didn t seem to be much in common between Sessions, who grew up near Selma, and Miller, who was raised in liberal Southern California.The turning point for Miller came after the Sept. 11 attacks, when he was disgusted with how his high school in Santa Monica ridiculed President George W. Bush and how the liberal-leaning faculty banned conservatives like Horowitz and talk show host Larry Elder from speaking at the school but allowed leftists and a Communist to address the student body, according to an interview he gave to the Los Angeles Times. During that dreadful time of national tragedy, anti-Americanism had spread all over the school like a rash, Miller wrote in a 2003 essay, How I Changed My Left Wing High School, which Horowitz published. The co-principal broadcasted his doubts about the morality of the air strikes against the Taliban to the entire school via the PA system. One teacher even dragged the American flag across the floor as we were sending off brave young men to risk their lives for it. It was then that I first took action, writing to prized radio personality Larry Elder. He invited me to discuss these issues on his program, which immediately drew the ire of the teachers, administrators, and even my fellow students. Their resistance only strengthened my resolve. Miller continued his conservative advocacy at Duke, when he gained attention for defending the white lacrosse players accused of raping a black stripper (the players were ultimately exonerated) at a time when public opinion was against them. His position led to appearances on cable news, further raising his profile. Three of our fellow students are being put on trial not because of evidence but because of a DA s incompetence and malice, he wrote in the university s student paper. Sadly, many in the community have shown that they are not fair minded but would rather hunt for witches than search for justice. Miller s writings were one of the main factors in Boyd hiring him. I focused on his material he had written for the other two members of the House. I was very impressed he had a column in college and he was a very good writer, Boyd recalled. I was impressed with his intellect, I was impressed with his grasp of politics. I was impressed with his ability to get the core of the matter and articulate it in a way [the public would] understand. Sessions office later found out that Miller had an uncanny ability to channel the senator s when dealing with the press. Colleagues of Miller s and Sessions told Politico that the two had a mind meld, a quality that Boyd also attested to. Miller has demonstrated an ability to capture the voice of his boss in a way that is very important and also exceeds the ability of most Capitol Hill staff, Boyd said.That voice was mostly flexed on immigration, where explained Sessions views to the public.When his boss was accused by pro-immigration groups of being a demagogue for his opposition to an unsuccessful 2010 bill to grant illegal immigrants amnesty for enrolling in college or enlisting in the military, Miller stuck to the issue instead of responding with another attack. The DREAM Act is a proposal for mass amnesty that would even include those who have committed serious criminal offenses, he told AL.com in November 2010. It would add millions of newly authorized workers at a time when Americans are struggling with high unemployment and recession. Besides being a conduit between the senator and the media, Miller also played a role on policy matters; he was instrumental in helping Sessions derail the Gang of Eight immigration reform bill in 2014 that would have given illegals a pathway to citizenship. Miller helped put together a briefing book for Republicans filled with talking points and data to bolster their case. We had been working on the ideas in it for months, and Stephen put it in the handbook in a very quick time in a very cogent fashion, Sessions told Politico. It was very timely and it impacted the outcome of the vote. Boyd said Miller s involvement on policy was unusual for a communications staffer. It is rare, although in his case I think it speaks to his grasp on the issues and his understanding as they impact the average man and woman, Boyd said. There s no doubt that there was a great trust between Sen. Sessions toward Stephen Miller and they made a great team. Miller s having switched to a high-level position on Trump s team at a relatively young age does not come as a shock to Boyd, who said his former colleague has adeptly articulated Trump s views. I think personally that Miller was one of the first people to really understand the deep frustration that the American working class is feeling, their concerns with open borders and trade policies that hurt them more than they help, and also brought an ability to channel that energy toward president-elect Trump, he said.Steve Bannon, former Breitbart News CEO and Trump s campaign manager who will join Miller in the White House as chief advisor to the president, said Sessions work in the Senate with Miller s input paved the way for Trump s candidacy. Whether the issue was trade or immigration or radical Islam, for many years before Donald Trump came on the scene, Sen. Sessions was the leader of the movement and Stephen was his right-hand man, Bannon told Politico in their June profile of Miller.What started out as the potential of a recent college graduate has turned into high expectations for Miller. | 0 |
23,052 | US-UK DIRTY WAR: ‘Latin American-style’ Death Squads in Iraq Revealed Through Chilcot | Patrick Henningsen 21st Century WireThis week another toxic revelation dripped from the Chilcot Report.According to top British SAS officers, US commander Stanley McChrystal s counter-insurgency black-ops featured a program of relentless violence designed to speed up the process of political cleansing and the so-called reconstruction of Iraq.What is so interesting here, is the Chilcot s choice of language, including the term Latin American-style death squads , which by default implies the United States government was party to war crimes in Central America during the 1980 s a claim which has always been strenuously denied in public, even though the general public and academia recognizes this to be a self-evident fact of America s long-running ugly history of intervention in that region.The Independent report reveals the level of sheer depravity by US command: The mission was an extraordinary set-up: inside the command centre The Machine was the Death Star , on the walls of which were banks of television screens, Kill TV , running live pictures of action taking place and surveillance footage in real time from which suspects could be picked out for future arrest or elimination. The Independent also detailed how reckless and violent practices by the US military caused noticeable divisions and splits between joint US-UK command structures and operations, including political tension between British military command.Through the newly created Office of Special Plans , neoconservatives Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith rolled out their own sub-layer to the US controlled shadow government in Iraq, including the establishment of the Iraqi De Baathification Council which, under the supervision of then US Viceroy Paul Bremer, began dismantling the Iraqi military, security and intelligence agency infrastructures of President Saddam Hussein. And so began the process of the Pentagon s de-Baathification process in Iraq, immediately followed by a hive of violent Gangs and Counter-gangs created by the US and UK covert military and intelligence apparatuses. Front and center in this effort were US operatives John Negroponte and his understudy at the time, Robert Ford, who was later dispatched as US Ambassador to Syria in the run-up to the Syrian Conflict which began in 2011.The legacy of this destructive policy still lingers in Iraq and now in Syria. This unquestionably spawned ISIS and many other terrorist factions in both Iraq and Syria. Only last week, Iraq saw its most deadly car bomb ever, a questionable sectarian attack (a narrative not challenged by the western and international press) which killed 200 innocent civilians, and injured many more. GLADIO REDUX: A map of every car bomb in Baghdad since the US-UK invasion in 2003 (Source: Twitter)Prof Michel Chossudovsky explains this same highly disturbing pattern that generally follows every US intervention overseas, be it overt or covert: The recruitment of death squads is part of a well established US military-intelligence agenda. There is a long and gruesome US history of covert funding and support of terror brigades and targeted assassinations going back to the Vietnam war. As government forces continue to confront the self-proclaimed Free Syrian Army (FSA), the historical roots of the West s covert war on Syria which has resulted in countless atrocities must be fully revealed. Once again, we can see the revelation of the US-UK method of not simply instigating wars, but facilitating dirty wars not only overseas, but also at home, as in the case of Operation GLADIO and numerous other false flag events admittedly staged in North America.As 21WIRE will demonstrate in subsequent reports, this latest Chilcot revelation is only the tip of a much larger, covert iceberg RTHowever, kill or capture operations in and around Baghdad, launched from the Balad base 50 miles (80km) north of the city, were a key if little known chapter in Britain s shadow war, the Independent reports.Despite killing or taking as prisoner up to 3,500 insurgents, the mission against the Sunni insurgency caused deep rifts to the point where a senior commander, himself ex-SAS, demanded to know why the UK Special Forces were helping to run Latin American-style death squads? The mission, under now-famed US General Stanley McChrystal, involved a shift from searching for apparently non-existent weapons of mass destruction (WMD) to man-hunting.Antagonism over the tactics led to UK troops being banned from some operations and a UK SAS commander lodging a complaint with US authorities for talking about British involvement in operations. Another SAS colonel was also ostracized from his regiment after serving under McCrystal.Chilcot does sketch out some of the details of the growing rift, though his report appears to leave out direct references to Special Forces operations. US and UK strategies had, in effect, been on different courses since the UK decision to focus its attention on MND (SE) [Multi-National Division South East, the British run zone] in 2003.As result of this decision, the UK had acquired distinctly different priorities from the US, the 2.6-million-word report argues.It says the UK was then only marginally involved in the central tasks of stabilizing the Iraqi government in Baghdad and managing sectarian divisions, while it had come to see its main task in Basra as one of keeping the situation calm while building the case for withdrawal. From that point on, it appears, the US became increasingly concerned that a wavering UK was chiefly focused on getting out of the unpopular war in the best order it could and as soon as possible.In 2006, a former SAS soldier blew the whistle on some of the tactics used in and around Baghdad. Ben Griffin was later gagged by the UK courts for talking about his experiences, but before he was silenced told the Telegraph, The Americans had this catch-all approach to lifting suspects. The tactics were draconian and completely ineffective. The Americans were doing things like chucking farmers into Abu Ghraib [the notorious prison in Baghdad where US troops abused and tortured Iraqi detainees] or handing them over to the Iraqi authorities, knowing full well they were going to be tortured, he said at the time.It may be of note that the SAS commander s reference to Latin American-style deaths squads appears to ignore the fact that at time of the Iraq war, in July 2003, the UK was itself stepping up training of Colombian paramilitary forces.Commenting on the revelations at the time, human rights NGO Amnesty International warned the Colombian government has not implemented the UN human rights recommendations and military assistance only gives a green light to the army to carry on as before. Support our work by Subscribing and becoming a Member @21WIRE.TV | 0 |
23,053 | Episode #154 – SUNDAY WIRE: ‘The Pro-War Left?’ with guests Jean Bricmont, Vanessa Beeley | Episode #154 of SUNDAY WIRE SHOW resumes this Sunday September 25, 2016 as host Patrick Henningsen broadcasts a 3 HOUR SPECIAL of LIVE power-packed talk radio on ACR LISTEN LIVE ON THIS PAGE AT THE FOLLOWING SCHEDULED SHOW TIMES:SUNDAYS 5pm-8pm UK Time | 12pm-3pm ET (US) | 9am-12pm PT (US)This week s edition of THE SUNDAY WIRE is on the road broadcasting LIVE from the Valley of the Sun. This week host Patrick Henningsen covers this week s top stories internationally. In the first hour we ll be joined by a very special guest, writer, academic Jean Bricmont, and author of Humanitarian Imperialism, to delve deep into the new political fault lines of the Anti-Anti-War Left that has emerged in recent years and as a reaction to the Syrian War and how cynical operatives in the West have used Smart Power to successfully mitigate mainstream opposition to US and NATO-led wars around the world. In the second hour, we ll connect with 21WIRE special contributor Vanessa Beeley who recently returned from Syria with a stunning exclusive the story of the REAL Syria Civil Defense, and also updates on the recent attack on the UN Aid Convoy which has brought Russia and the US to the edge diplomacy, and dangerously close to a world war.SHOUT POLL: Should US/UK/EU-funded White Helmets receive a Nobel Peace Prize?LEARN MORE ABOUT THE WHITE HELMETS: Who Are Syria s White Helmets?Strap yourselves in and lower the blast shield this is your brave new world *NOTE: THIS EPISODE MAY CONTAIN STRONG LANGUAGE AND MATURE THEMES*Direct Download the Most Recent Episode// <![CDATA[ broadstreet.zone(46707); // ]]>Sunday Wire Radio Show Archives | 0 |
23,054 | Obama's prisoner clemency plan faltering as cases pile up | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - In April 2014, the administration of President Barack Obama announced the most ambitious clemency program in 40 years, inviting thousands of jailed drug offenders and other convicts to seek early release and urging lawyers across the country to take on their cases. Nearly two years later the program is struggling under a deluge of unprocessed cases, sparking concern within the administration and among justice reform advocates over the fate of what was meant to be legacy-defining achievement for Obama. More than 8,000 cases out of more than 44,000 federal inmates who applied have yet to make it to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) for review, lawyers involved in the program told Reuters. That is in addition to about 9,000 cases that are still pending at the DOJ, according to the department’s own figures. Only 187 inmates have had their sentences commuted, far below the thousands expected by justice reform advocates and a tiny fraction of the 2.2 million people behind bars in the United States, which has the world’s highest incarceration rate. The administration said it wanted to decide on all the applications before Obama’s term ends next January, when the program will automatically expire. A senior DOJ official told Reuters it is calling on the lawyers’ group — Clemency Project 2014 — to simply hand over the outstanding cases without further vetting, saying it is not working fast enough. So far, the group estimates it has handed over around 200 cases. But criminal justice experts say the administration itself should bear much of the blame. The idea to tap pro-bono attorneys to help vet the cases originated with the DOJ, and critics say it should have prepared its own staff to handle the large volume of applications. “It’s unfair to criticize the volunteer group that you asked to help,” said Rachel Barkow, a criminal law professor at New York University who has studied clemency in U.S. prisons. She estimates that about 1,500 prisoners should be eligible for commutation, saying the 187 granted so far does not “fulfill the promise of the program.” The DOJ declined to comment when asked for its response to such criticism. The delays have left prisoners like Linda Byrnes, 69, in limbo. “I thought clemency was for people like me,” Byrnes told Reuters through an electronic messaging system from a federal prison in Alderson, West Virginia. Byrnes, who has spent 20 years in prison for distributing marijuana and has two years left on her sentence, was recently diagnosed with mouth cancer and has yet to hear whether she has been assigned a lawyer after submitting her application to Clemency Project in August 2014. Obama, who has commuted more sentences than the past five presidents combined, has been a stern critic of harsh U.S. sentencing policies that he says have disproportionately burdened minorities. Federal life sentences have fallen since Obama took office, from 280 in fiscal year 2009 to 153 in 2013, according to the U.S. Sentencing Commission. About three quarters of the sentences were given to minorities and most were for non-violent offences, the report said. Clemency Project 2014 said it does not comment publicly on the individuals it represents. The group vets the applications, writes the petitions and sends them to the Justice Department’s Office of the Pardon Attorney, which oversees all pardons and sentence commutations and makes recommendations for the president’s approval. So far, 25,000 of 34,000 applications received by Clemency Project have been rejected for failing to meet the basic criteria - no record of violence, no significant ties to a gang or drug cartel, good behavior in prison and completion of at least 10 years of sentence. About 10,000 inmates did not go through the Clemency Project and either applied directly to DOJ or through a paid attorney. “It really would be a sad state of affairs if individuals who had asked for a lawyer weren’t considered in time because their petitions never reached the pardon attorney’s office,” a DOJ official told Reuters on the condition of anonymity. (Graphic on the clemency bottleneck: tmsnrt.rs/1VThxVT) A large number of mostly unqualified applications, a shortage of lawyers and the complexity of the cases have slowed progress, said Cynthia Roseberry, project manager for Clemency Project 2014. “There are a lot of gray areas,” said Roseberry, who estimates it takes 30 days for one lawyer to review one case on average. “We’ve got to unpack each of these applicants to see specifically what factors affect them... and so that takes a little more time.” This includes finding pre-sentencing reports for each case, determining if the person would have received a shorter sentence under current law and reviewing prison behavior records. Roseberry said the group was unaware of any request from the Justice Department to hand over the pending applications. Roseberry said the group’s initially slow pace has picked up in recent months. The Justice Department declined to elaborate on its private communication with the lawyers. The Pardon Attorney’s office has brought in personnel from other parts of the department to help to speed up reviews of petitions, the DOJ official said. Roseberry said about 3,000 applicants still need to be assigned to a lawyer, and that it was not certain whether the group will be able to submit all of the applications it has received before Obama leaves office. The group has more than 570 law firms and 30 law schools contributing to the effort. Some rejected prisoners and those who have yet to hear a decision say they believe they would have had a better chance if they had sent their clemency petition directly to the government. Josie Ledezma was sentenced to life for conspiracy to transport cocaine and applied for clemency through Clemency Project 2014. She said she did not hear from them for six months and later learned that her assigned lawyer had shut down her legal practice. In January, nearly one year after applying, she was told Clemency Project 2014 could not help her and encouraged her to apply directly. “I wrote back and asked what was it that made me not qualify, but never got a response,” Ledezma told Reuters through an electronic messaging service for federal prisoners. | 1 |
23,055 | Russia says Iran nuclear deal breakdown would hurt effort to manage North Korea | MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said a possible breakdown of the Iran nuclear deal would send the wrong signal when it came to trying to resolve the situation around North Korea, the RIA and Interfax news agencies reported on Friday. Any attempts to provoke a military scenario for North Korea would lead to catastrophe, the agencies quoted Lavrov as saying in the Russian parliament. | 1 |
23,056 | Louisiana Flood Relief Worker Rips Donald Trump For Doing Nothing To Help Victims | All Donald Trump did is unload some play-doh for a photo-op in flood ravaged Louisiana instead of doing anything tangible to help. And he just got shredded for it.Trump traveled to the state this week in order to boast that he somehow cares about the flood victims because President Obama and Hillary Clinton have yet to make the trip down. However, that s only because Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards asked them not to come because first responders are still rescuing people and their arrival would only divert effort and resources away from those who need it.Trump, however, doesn t care about anyone but himself so he visited anyway. Edwards said that Trump is welcome but he has to volunteer or write a check to help victims.But Trump barely did anything at all, and he certainly didn t write a check.Neva Butkus is a relief worker who has been on the ground in Louisiana working hard to help those in need. And when she found out about Trump s visit she ripped him a new one on Facebook for exploiting people who are hurting in a desperate attempt to save his imploding campaign. Alright, y all. I need to clear some things up as a BATON ROUGE RESIDENT who has spent this entire week running donation centers, organizing volunteer efforts, and will be doing demo work on houses all this weekend, Butkus began. Our Governor has explicitly asked Obama to NOT VISIT at this moment because our first responders are STILL saving people s lives. YES, It has been a week and there is still standing water. Tens of thousands of people are displaced. This is a NIGHTMARE and our governor does not want to shut down interstates that are BRINGING IN SUPPLIES just to escort our President into the city. Butkus pointed out that Donald Trump visited a Republican part of the state so that it would look like he is welcome there in the midst of the natural disaster going on. He is exploiting an opportunity to look as if he is welcomed during a tragedy, she said. Our Governor literally told him, she continued, that Trump is welcome in our state but if he s coming he better be volunteering or writing a sizable check to assist with recovery. A 60 second video of him unloading play-doh from a truck does not count. Indeed, one would think he would at least get a photo-op of himself unloading food or water or something. That s a Trump fail on a spectacular level.And then Butkus really lit Trump up. Trump. Seriously. Where is the check. Like where is the fucking check. My people are drowning. My co-workers and family and friends have lost everything. My friends and co-workers that haven t lost everything are taking off work (my boyfriend is taking PTO) to clean out people s homes and rip out sheet rock and carpet. Give us money or GTFO. I don t want to see you in your suit in AUGUST carrying boxes off a truck like you care about us. Louisiana is an incredible place. Baton Rouge is my home and I have watched people drop EVERYTHING to help one another during this time. The whole country seems to be floored by the generosity and love that our residents show each other during tough times, but to us this is normal. This is Louisiana. And you do not belong here. Here s a screenshot of the full Facebook smackdown.Donald Trump should be ashamed of himself for exploiting a tragedy to make himself look good. And Republicans should be embarrassed for letting him. President Obama s presence in Louisiana would not have done anything to help those in need of assistance. And in the end, Donald Trump s presence did nothing except distract from the rescue and recovery effort that should have been the focus. But as usual, Trump only cares about himself.Featured Image: Screenshot | 0 |
23,057 | Vietnam police arrest ex-politburo member over misconduct | HANOI (Reuters) - Vietnamese police on Friday arrested a former top Communist Party official suspected of misconduct while he was chairman of the main state energy firm, the first former politburo member to face prosecution in decades. Police issued arrest and prosecution orders for Dinh La Thang, 56, for suspected violation of state regulations on economic management, causing serious consequences , the Ministry of Public Security said on its website. Thang is the most senior official so far caught up in a widespread crackdown on fraud in the energy and banking sectors, which has gathered pace since the security establishment gained greater influence in the party last year. Police are investigating two cases related to Thang s tenure as chairman of state oil and gas firm PetroVietnam that involved a loss of investment in local Ocean Bank and suspected wrongdoing at a PetroVietnam subsidiary, PetroVietnam Construction Joint Stock Corp (PVC) (PVX.HN), police said. Thang was not available for comment. The corruption crackdown made global headlines in August when Germany accused Vietnam of kidnapping Trinh Xuan Thanh, a former chairman of PVC, in Berlin after he applied for asylum there. The party has said it aimed to let Thanh go on trial next month. Government critics have voiced suspicions that the corruption crackdown is politically motivated, at least in part, and aimed against those close to former prime minister Nguyen Tan Dung, who lost out in an internal power struggle in 2016. This development represents a major event in Vietnamese politics and reflects a concerted effort by those in the commanding heights of the party to rein in and prosecute instances of large scale corruption and serious cases of malfeasance among high ranking party and state officials, said Vietnam expert Jonathan London of Leiden University. Thang was dismissed from the politburo after the Communist Party found him responsible for financial losses at PetroVietnam. It also stripped him of his role as party head of Ho Chi Minh City to penalise him further. Prosecuting a former politburo member in the one-party state is not unprecedented. In 1979, a former politburo official, Hoang Van Hoan, was handed a death sentence in absentia after he had fled the country. On Friday, police also issued an arrest order for Nguyen Quoc Khanh, a former chairman of PetroVietnam. In September, another former PetroVietnam chairman was sentenced to death for embezzlement among other crimes. Khanh was also temporarily dismissed from his current role at the trade ministry on Friday, the ministry said in a statement. | 1 |
23,058 | Plan to raise California minimum wage to $15 clears key panel | SACRAMENTO, Calif. (Reuters) - A plan to raise California’s minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2022 cleared its first legislative hurdle on Wednesday, putting the state on track to become the first in the nation to commit to such a large pay hike for the working poor. The measure, incorporating a deal Governor Jerry Brown reached with labor leaders and fellow Democrats in the Legislature, was approved on a party-line vote of 12-7 by the Assembly Appropriations Committee, where a previous version of the bill had stalled last summer. One Democrat, Tom Daly, joined six Republicans in opposing the measure, which now advances to the full Assembly for action as early as this week. It would then return to the Senate for a final vote. If enacted, the bill would put California, home to one of the world’s biggest economies, in the vanguard of a growing number of U.S. states and cities that have moved in recent years to surpass the federal minimum wage, which has remained at $7.25 an hour since 2009. Supporters say such measures are necessary to help low-paid workers who have been slipping into poverty due to stagnant earnings and rising living expenses. Opponents say raising the mandatory wage floor puts undue strain on businesses still struggling to rebound from a prolonged U.S. economic slump. The measure would gradually raise California’s hourly minimum wage from the current level of $10 to $15 by 2022 for large businesses and by 2023 for smaller firms. It also would head off a pair of competing ballot initiatives lacking a provision to allow the governor to suspend the increases in hard economic times, a deal breaker for Brown. Raising the minimum wage has cropped up on many Democratic candidates’ agendas ahead of the November elections, and the issue could help galvanize supporters at the polls. But passage is not assured without backing from more moderate Democrats, including business-friendly Assembly members in swing districts who have recently held up bills that were priorities for the party’s progressive wing, including a plan to cut the state’s greenhouse gas emissions. According to the governor’s office, 2.2 million Californians earn the state minimum wage of $10 an hour. The bill would ultimately benefit 5.6 million workers, raising their wages by an average of 24 percent, according to an analysis from the University of California, Berkeley. Retail employees account for 16 percent of affected workers, and restaurant employees 15 percent. | 1 |
23,059 | CNN REPORTER: Victims at Las Vegas Concert Were Likely Trump Supporters [VIDEO] | CNN reporter Jeff Zeleny said on Monday that country music fans who attended the Las Vegas concert Sunday night were likely Trump supporters . Zeleny does what the left has been saying not to do he politicizes this horrific massacre by using identity politics. What would the left do without identity politics? It s their go-to strategy in all situations but is particularly sickening in this tragic one.NOTE: THERE IS SOME MIC TROUBLE DURING THE VIDEO At least 50 people were killed and more than 500 were injured when gunman Stephen Paddock opened fire on country music festival attendees Sunday night from his 32nd floor room at Mandalay Bay Hotel, according to local authorities.Zeleny said Trump, in his remarks about the shooting, took on the role of being a unifier for the country. The president, he left it to his role of being a unifier. He did not talk about the investigation, he did not talk about the suspect, Zeleny said.Trump called on the bonds that unite us during remarks Monday morning. In moments of tragedy and horror, America comes together as one, and it always has, he said. We call upon the bonds that unite us, our faith, our family, and our shared values. We call upon the bonds of citizenship, the ties of community, and the comfort of our common humanity. Zeleny further commented on the personal connections that Trump has to the city of Las Vegas. By saying that he will go to Las Vegas on Wednesday, by visiting this, it is something that puts him in line with what so many presidents before him have done and paid their respects. Of course Las Vegas is a town that he is connected to, and knows well, Zeleny said. His name is emblazoned on the top of a hotel there as well. He campaigned there a lot. Zeleny said, however, that the conversation after the tragedy will soon be focused on politics. The moment here, is what comes after this. This invariably, after today and tomorrow, will become a discussion of politics, of guns. It s not appropriate for that moment today, he said.In the video, it appears CNN had audio problems, which caused the host to interrupt Zeleny several times. | 0 |
23,060 | Protesters in Kentucky claim they were assaulted at Trump rally | LOUISVILLE, Ky. (Reuters) - Protesters at a Donald Trump rally in Kentucky last Tuesday have filed complaints with police claiming they were assaulted by Trump supporters, according to police and protesters. Henry Brousseau, 17, of Louisville, said he went to the Super Tuesday event at the Kentucky International Convention Center in Louisville to protest Trump’s campaign and was punched in the stomach by a woman who was wearing a T-shirt of the Traditionalist Worker Party. “We’re going to see how the police can find out who she is and hopefully we’ll move on from there,” he said in a telephone interview. Another protester, Molly Shah, 36, also of Louisville, said that she, too, had filed a complaint. Alicia Smiley, spokeswoman for the Louisville Metropolitan Police Department, said three complaints were filed on Wednesday and Thursday and were under review. These would mark the latest clashes between Trump supporters, security, and protesters. The day before Trump visited Louisville, black students were removed from a rally in Georgia. A website for the Traditionalist Worker Party describes it as a grassroots political organization that believes, among other things, that “European-American identity is under constant attack.” The Southern Poverty Law Center, a non-profit civil rights and public interest advocacy organization that monitors groups it considers extremist, classifies the Traditionalist Worker Party as a white nationalist hate group, said Ryan Lentz, a writer and researcher for the center. Brousseau, who is white and transgender, said he joined people from Black Lives Matter, Parents for Social Justice, Showing Up for Racial Justice and other groups that went to the Trump rally to protest. Video footage that has been circulated on social and traditional media shows people in Traditionalist Worker Party t-shirts pushing people, notably a young black woman, and taking their protest signs. Trump campaign spokeswoman Hope Hicks said in an email that the campaign does not comment on security matters. The Traditionalist Worker Party did not respond to requests for comment, and its website, tradworker.org, does not say where it is based. Matthew Heimbach, the group’s chairman, wrote in a blog on the website of the Traditionalist Youth Network that the protesters, including those from Black Lives Matter, were the aggressors. And he tweeted, “Its (sic) funny how BLM comes to a Trump event to fight, starts the fight and then loses the fight but plays big victims to the media.” Southern Poverty Law Center’s Lentz said, “Matthew is a figure who is core to the white nationalists and white supremacist culture as it is right now in the U.S.” For more on the 2016 presidential race, see the Reuters blog, “Tales from the Trail” (here). (Editing by Fiona Ortiz and James Dalgleish) This article was funded in part by SAP. It was independently created by the Reuters editorial staff. SAP had no editorial involvement in its creation or production. | 1 |
23,061 | Congress passes bill to temporarily fund government, avert shutdown | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Congress, rushing to beat a Friday midnight deadline, on Thursday passed legislation funding the government through Dec. 22. By a vote of 235-193, the House of Representatives passed the bill and rapidly sent it to the Senate, which then approved it 81-14, sending it to President Donald Trump for signing into law. While a Saturday shutdown of government agencies was averted, Congress and Trump will now have to come up with a deal to keep the government operating beyond Dec. 22. | 1 |
23,062 | Obama Mentions Gun Control After Dallas Shooting — Right-Wingers TOTALLY Lose Their Minds | Following the horrific turn of events in Dallas, Obama addressed the country and mentioned that at some point we are going to have to really think about the powerful weapons that make shootings like this so deadly. Any guess what happened next? Just as expected, right-wingers totally lost their damn minds.The president said he was horrified by the vicious, calculated and despicable attack on law enforcement. After expressing his support for law enforcement, Obama turned his attention to the guns that allow mass shootings like this to take the so many lives in mere minutes.We also know that when people are armed with powerful weapons, unfortunately it makes attacks like these more deadly and more tragic. And in the days ahead, we re going to have to consider those realities as well.Predictably, Republicans went into full-on freak out mode. Within an hour of President Obama s remarks, Ben Carson was throwing a hissy fit on Fox News. Now is definitely not the time to get political, said the failed presidential hopeful turned Trump fanboy. Now is the time to use logic and ask ourselves, why do we have a Constitution? Why do we have a Second Amendment? They re always saying you don t need a high-powered weapon to hunt deer. The Constitution is not about deer hunting. It s about people being able to defend themselves from an overly aggressive government or an external invasion. Carson said that if he were president, he would ask everyone to imagine 24 or 48 hours with no police. What would your life be like? Yes, there are some bad apples and, yes, we will find ways to deal with them but in no way do we indict the entire police force, Carson said.Speaking of the tragic shooting in Dallas that took the lives of five police officers and left six more wounded, Carson said that there are terror cells and professional agitators all over our country looking for opportunities. And these opportunities do arise. They will continue to arise because, you know, there are bad apples in the police force like there are bad apples in everything. There are bad surgeons, the retired neurosurgeon said. But the vast majority of surgeons are wonderful people. So, you know, these opportunities will continue to happen and they will continue to do these things. But I guess the real issue is, you know, the president s going to start saying, see, gun control. Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee took the opportunity to pounce on the president s comments as well, arguing on Fox News that Obama should have addressed the nation more like Ronald Reagan did after the 1986 Challenger disaster. He doesn t need to inject the divisive arguments like gun control at a time of great grief for the nation. And he ought to do for us what Ronald Reagan did after the Challenger disaster, Huckabee said.Colorado Republican Senate candidate Darryl Glenn just had to jump on the bandwagon, saying that Obama needs to be very careful not to get too far ahead of the facts, but you need to be careful not to drive your policy agenda. William Johnson, the executive director of National Association of Police Organizations, was asked on Fox News if police officers feel increasingly under siege and targeted. Absolutely. It s a horrible day. It s a war on cops, Johnson responded. And the Obama administration is the Neville Chamberlain of this war. I think their continued appeasement at the federal level with the Department of Justice, their appeasement of violent criminals, their refusal to condemn movements like Black Lives Matter, actively calling for the death of police officers, that type of thing, all the while blaming police for the problems in this country has led directly to the climate that has made Dallas possible. Speaking about the deaths of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile just hours before Thursday s mass shooting in Dallas, President Obama had tried to strike a balance between the public outrage over the police killings and support for law enforcement. To be concerned about these issues is not to be against law enforcement, he said. When people say black lives matter, it doesn t mean blue lives don t matter. Featured image via Jim Lo Scalzo-Pool/Getty Images | 0 |
23,063 | Do not expect postcard-sized tax return from Republican plan: experts | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Since mid-2016, U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan has carried around a postcard that he has said shows how easy it will be for Americans to file their taxes once Republicans are finished their tax overhaul. And as recently as Thursday President Donald Trump touted Americans being able to file their taxes on a single, little beautiful sheet of paper. With lawmakers finalizing the biggest tax reform in 30 years and the president ready to sign it into law before the end of the year, the moment should be near when Ryan s postcard stops being a rhetorical prop and becomes a reality. Right? It s kind of crazy to say you can file on a postcard when, first, no one is going to put their Social Security number on a postcard. And second, you already have a giant postcard in the form of the 1040EZ, Mark Mazur, a director of the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center, said, citing a 14-line Internal Revenue Service (IRS) tax form. Representatives from the $11 billion U.S. tax preparation industry said that the legislation so far seemed unlikely to render their services unnecessary. I don t think you re going to have millions of people filing their taxes on a cell phone, said Mark Steber, chief tax officer at Jackson Hewitt Tax Service Inc [JAKHT.UL]. I think the demise of the tax business is a bit premature. The IRS would not discuss changes that might come from the proposed tax overhaul. However, the IRS estimates that, despite its efforts to make filing taxes easier, 90 percent of Americans use tax preparation services such as Jackson Hewitt, H&R Block Inc and Liberty Tax Inc or tax software such as TurboTax from Intuit Inc. If Congress enacts the Republican plan into law, it would not affect 2017 tax-year returns filed in 2018. But in 2019, millions of middle-class Americans would no longer gain from a wide range of deductions, credits and other tax breaks. A key driver of this, according to independent analyses, would be a proposed doubling of the standard deduction and a curtailment of the deduction for state and local tax payments. In combination, these two changes would mean that about 29 million people would no longer benefit from itemizing. So they would stop writing off their charitable donations, mortgage interest and state and local tax payments, according to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a think tank. Itemized deductions for medical expenses, investment interest, unreimbursed employee expenses and tax preparation fees could also be dropped by many. Personal exemptions for individual taxpayers, which now take up a lot of space on tax forms, would also be eliminated. Such changes would mean simpler taxes and possibly allow a number of taxpayers to use shorter forms. The IRS expects 24 million people in 2018 to file the longest and most widely used IRS form today, the Form 1040, which is 79 lines long. About 4.6 million people will use the 14-line 1040EZ. Wealthy Americans likely would still itemize under the Republican plan. Owning businesses, homes and other factors could also lead to taxes being more complicated than what filers could describe on a postcard. Even though we re talking about simplification for a large number of taxpayers, there s still many taxpayers who will have complicated tax situations and we ll be there to help them as well, said David Williams, chief tax officer for TurboTax. (Adds first name, title in 4th paragraph) | 1 |
23,064 | Trump chooses fundraiser Scaramucci for ambassador to OECD: official | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Anthony Scaramucci, a Republican fundraiser and founder of Skybridge Capital, is President Donald Trump’s choice to become ambassador to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, a White House official said on Thursday. Scaramucci was an adviser to Trump during the presidential campaign last year and Trump’s transition to the White House. He had been seen as someone headed for a White House position but a job never came to fruition. The OECD position is in Paris. | 1 |
23,065 | Democratic Senator Voted To Confirm Career Racist Sessions And What Happened Next Is PERFECT (SCREENSHOTS/TWEETS) | Apparently, West Virginia Democrat not to be confused with real Democrats Joe Manchin effectively told voter he doesn t want his job anymore when he was the only person supposedly on our side who voted to confirm lifetime racist and embarrassment to humanity Jeff Sessions as Attorney General.Manchin, who reportedly considered switching to Republican just after the 2016 election (though he denies it), has been on the wrong side of history many times in his career. Not only did he vote with Republicans to terminate funding for Planned Parenthood after right-wing activists produced heavily-edited propaganda videos that claimed the women s health organization sells baby parts, but he is so deep in the pockets of the coal industry that the lint is jealous. On top of that, Manchin has been endorsed by the NRA and has supported legislation that sought to prevent the EPA from regulating greenhouse gas. While Manchin has been criticized for all of that in the past, his decision to support a career racist for Attorney General is bringing a sh*tstorm his way that he seems to have failed to anticipate.Shortly after the vote, Manchin s Wikipedia page underwent some renovations most notably the word traitor above his head and a note that he voted with republicans on the horrible Jeff Sessions :Manchin s decision to betray his party, his country and everything decent in the world is not going over well on social media, where pretty much everyone seems to want to set him adrift:@LoganPhares @JalyIV Stop calling yourself a Democrat, your not. We don't support white supremacists. (((BigotsBeGone))) (@kmcbrd2) February 9, 2017Joe Manchin daughter is being investigated by the justice department.. ?? Jeff Sessions will make it go bye-bye.Anymore more questions?? pic.twitter.com/LTg7jey6CN ? ?D.C.Rob ? ? (@DCRobMan) February 9, 2017@LoganPhares @igob4u2 Here's the reason he voted for Sessions!! pic.twitter.com/qafcJ4XG7h Cindy Snowflake (@tcevans87) February 9, 2017.@Sen_JoeManchin is the one Democrat to vote yes on #Sessions so far. You know what this means. We will vote NO on Manchin. Women's March (@womensmarch) February 9, 2017@womensmarch @Sen_JoeManchin Yes we will. This WV girl will not vote for Manchin in the next election. #WhyIResist #ShePersisted Wendy R (@wlr96) February 9, 2017Republicans didn't need @Sen_JoeManchin's vote to approve Jeff Sessions, but he gave it to them as a big F-U to minorities. pic.twitter.com/qikVUnPT23 Benjamin Dixon ? (@TheBpDShow) February 9, 2017@robbystarbuck @rB777ftw @womensmarch @Sen_JoeManchin no he isn't. We do not support this. Wendy R (@wlr96) February 9, 2017@EjoWVgirl @womensmarch @Sen_JoeManchin We all know he doesn't care about WV. This is just his stepping stone. Tara (@Tara515) February 9, 2017@LadyLiberty411 @womensmarch @TheGayHumanist @Sen_JoeManchin shame on you manchin! Leave our party before we throw you out Jellokitty (@jellokitty5) February 9, 2017@womensmarch @janniaragon @Sen_JoeManchin We're coming for you in 2018 and all your GOP buddies. Every seat. Every chamber. #RiseUp Roberta Greenwood (@RobertaG52) February 9, 2017According to Fortune, Trump and Manchin call each other directly on their cell phones, have met at Trump Tower and even flirted with the idea of a Cabinet post. His chumminess with our dictator-in-chief alone is enough for Democrats to tell him to hit the bricks in 2018. Everything else is just extra. Featured image via Getty Images (Spencer Platt)/Wikipedia | 0 |
23,066 | WATCH: 2 GOP Reps. Are COMPLETELY Stumped Over How Many Constituents They’ll Hurt With Trumpcare | The House s plan to repeal and replace the ACA is catching an awful lot of flak from Republicans and Democrats alike. Congressmen Steve King of Iowa, and Leonard Lance of New Jersey, appeared on MSNBC last night to discuss Trumpcare, and Chris Hayes grilled them about how it will affect their constituents. Neither was able to give him a real answer.Hayes asked King: How many people in your district are on the [ACA] exchanges, congressman? King s answer was the answer of someone who neither knows nor cares about his constituents only his power and position: I don t know that number. You may have that in front of you, Chris, but I don t know that number. Hayes pressed Lance on that, too, and Lance tried to pass it off as a small number: I would say roughly 5,000 or so, Chris. The thing is, those numbers are readily available, so there s zero excuse for them not knowing these answers.Furthermore, an interesting picture emerged last night In Lance s New Jersey district, more than 20,000 people have insurance through the ACA, but roughly 38,000 will lose their coverage under the GOP s plan. In King s district, a little over 11,000 people have insurance through the ACA, but over 40,000 stand to lose their coverage if the GOP s plan passes.So they re going to yank coverage away from more people than those who obtained it under the ACA. WOW. As U.S. Representatives, it s these guys job to know this kind of thing about their districts so that they can support or oppose bills based on who they represent. They ve failed miserably.But they d rather put party and ideology above their people. And King even believes that people have no right to health insurance, which means no right to healthcare (because without insurance, most of us can t afford medical care). He also believes that the best decisions are made by lawmakers closest to the people, so he s shucking his responsibility as a U.S. Representative.Both of them are sick for this.Watch both segments below: Featured image via screen capture from embedded videos | 0 |
23,067 | Senate committee issues subpoena for Manafort: statement | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. Senate panel has issued a subpoena to force Paul Manafort, a former campaign manager to President Donald Trump, to appear at a hearing on Wednesday as part of its probe into Russia’s role in the 2016 presidential election. The Republican chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Charles Grassley, and the top Democrat on the panel, Dianne Feinstein, said the subpoena was issued late on Monday after Manafort did not agree to an interview. “While we were willing to accommodate Mr. Manafort’s request to cooperate with the committee’s investigation without appearing at Wednesday’s hearing, we were unable to reach an agreement for a voluntary transcribed interview with the Judiciary Committee,” they said in a statement on Tuesday. They said Manafort was willing to provide only a single transcribed interview to Congress, which would be available to the Judiciary Committee as well as other panels. “As with other witnesses, we may be willing to excuse him from Wednesday’s hearing if he would be willing to agree to production of documents and a transcribed interview,” they said. The panel leaders also said any Manafort interview would not constitute a waiver of his rights and the committee could require that he testify in the future. Earlier, NBC News reported Manafort would speak with Senate investigators within 48 hours, citing a source close to Manafort. It said he was likely to be questioned about a June 2016 meeting in New York with a Russian lawyer. Trump’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr, has released emails that showed he welcomed the prospect of receiving damaging information at the meeting about Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. The Senate panel is one of several congressional committees investigating alleged Russian efforts to tilt the election in the Republican candidate’s favor and possible collusion by Trump’s campaign. Moscow has denied such efforts, and Trump has denied his campaign colluded. | 1 |
23,068 | Zimbabwe accuses American citizen of trying to overthrow government: lawyer | HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwean police on Friday charged an American citizen with a new offence of plotting to overthrow a constitutionally elected government, her lawyer said. Martha O Donovan, who works for Magamba TV, which describes itself as Zimbabwe s leading producer of political satire, had earlier been charged over a tweet that appeared to insult President Robert Mugabe. In a statement to police, O Donovan denied the allegations against her as baseless and malicious . | 1 |
23,069 | U.S. Senate confirms Tillerson as secretary of state | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Senate confirmed Rex Tillerson as President Donald Trump’s secretary of state on Wednesday, filling a key spot on the Republican’s national security team despite concerns about the former Exxon Mobil Corp chief executive officer’s ties to Russia. The vote, mostly along party lines, was by far the closest in at least half a century. Fifty-six senators backed Tillerson, and 43 voted no. Every Republican favored Tillerson, along with four members of the Democratic caucus, Senators Heidi Heitkamp, Joe Manchin and Mark Warner as well as Angus King, an independent. Democratic Senator Chris Coons did not vote. Tillerson’s predecessor in the position, John Kerry, was confirmed by 94 to 3. Condoleezza Rice, the last secretary of state nominated by a Republican, was confirmed by 85-13. Senate Democrats had tried, but failed, to delay the vote on Tillerson because of Trump’s executive order banning immigration from seven mostly Muslim countries and temporarily halting the entry of refugees. They said they wanted to ask Tillerson more questions about the issue after Trump signed the order on Friday, prompting protests and chaos at airports across the country and uncertainty and disruption for travelers around the world. But Republicans hold a majority of 52 seats in the 100-member Senate, and so far have confirmed all of the six Trump nominees who have come up for votes. Senators had also expressed concerns over Tillerson’s ties to Russia after the executive spent years there working for the oil company. Some faulted him for failing to promise to recuse himself from matters related to Exxon Mobil businesses for his entire term as secretary of state rather than only the one year required by law. Tillerson, 64, retired as chairman and chief executive of Exxon Mobil at the end of 2016 after a four-decade career at the company. Republicans and other Tillerson supporters said they thought he would be a strong leader as the country’s top diplomat, citing his experience running a giant corporation operating on six continents. They also said it was important to finalize Trump’s national security team quickly, to address international crises and reassure allies wondering about the new president’s “America First” foreign policy. | 1 |
23,070 | Different this time? Trump candidacy could weigh on Fed thinking | SAN FRANCISCO/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Donald Trump’s rise to de-facto Republican nominee for president poses an unusually high level of uncertainty for investors and businesses, potentially weighing on the economy and the Federal Reserve’s plan to raise interest rates this year. Uncertainty is always present in elections and the Fed has hiked rates during past campaign seasons. (Graphic: tmsnrt.rs/1rD6A1u) But the possibility of the firebrand New York real estate mogul occupying the White House presents a step up in risk because of the unconventional policies he has proposed and a lack of detail on how they will be achieved, economists say. Promising to “make America great again”, Trump has raised fears of a trade war by saying he would slap steep tariffs on Chinese and Mexican imports. He has also vowed to deport all 11 million undocumented migrants in the United States, and suggested, though later retracted, a partial default on U.S. debt. Fed officials say they avoid discussion of domestic politics at rate-setting meetings. Transcripts from previous election-year policy discussions show that political uncertainty is a factor in their thinking, though there is no clear pattern of a loosening or tightening bias in the run-up to elections. In recent comments, some Fed officials have acknowledged that campaign rhetoric could spill over into the economy. “If consumers, because of political rhetoric, are slowing their spending or just pausing a little bit, or capex is slowing down...that I’ve got to take into account,” Dallas Fed President Robert Kaplan told Reuters last Thursday. Asked his view of Trump’s policy proposals, he said, “If I have one, you’ll never know what that is. I will never allow that to seep into my work.” Atlanta Fed President Dennis Lockhart said that it was fair to say the election “could be a factor in this year’s economy.” The Fed kept rates on hold at 0.25-0.5 percent last month and signaled it was in no rush to raise them again soon, citing slowing economic activity despite an improved labor market. Fed policymakers in March forecast two rate hikes this year after raising them last December for the first time in nearly a decade. A Reuters poll of economists released on Thursday showed they have pushed back their expectations for the Fed to raise interest rates again to September from June. Fed Chair Janet Yellen and other Fed policymakers have often cited uncertainty over the economic, financial and policy outlook as a factor in their interest-rate decisions. The VIX measure of stock-market volatility is one approach to measuring uncertainty; querying influential business owners is another. The exact mix of measures the Fed uses is not known. Stanford University professor Nick Bloom’s economic policy uncertainty index, which he presented to Yellen and economists at recently as April last year, is another approach that the Fed considers. The index analyzes newspaper coverage of policy-related economic uncertainty and divergence between economic forecasters’ predictions on the U.S. outlook among other factors. “When uncertainty is high, firms put on pause hiring and investment decisions,” Bloom said in an interview. “If Trump looks like a serious contender and is still making ‘Mexican Wall’ and ‘Trade Rape’ comments we will have the mother of all policy uncertainty spikes running up to the election.” Trump has said he would build a wall on the Mexico-U.S. border and accused China of “raping” the U.S. with unfair trade policies. A rise in the index, Bloom said, would foreshadow declines in production, investment, and employment. Policymakers pay close attention to financial market volatility as well as economic data. The Fed delayed an expected hike last September after China’s sharp economic slowdown caused stock market drops and a tightening in financial conditions. A strong Trump candidacy could similarly upset markets, economists say. A Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Wednesday showed Trump running nearly even with Democrat Hillary Clinton among likely U.S. voters, a dramatic turnaround since he became his party’s presumptive nominee. Traders see a 36.5 percent chance of a Republican taking the presidency, according to futures prices on the Iowa Electronic Market. “If Trump gains in the polls and the market reacts poorly, that (market turmoil) would be a good argument for the Fed to stay on hold,” said Cornerstone Macro economist Roberto Perli, a former Fed board staffer. China and Mexico are the second and third largest trading partners of the United States, respectively. “The trade stuff is anti-growth and harmful to the U.S. outlook,” said Douglas Holtz-Eakin, president of conservative think tank the American Action Forum and a former director of the Congressional Budget Office. “He’s an utterly unpredictable political element at this point,” added Holtz-Eakin, who was also chief economic policy adviser to Senator John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign. Trump, who says his policies will boost U.S. jobs and business interests, has said he likes low rates, but has also said he would replace Yellen when her term expires in 2018 if he wins the presidency. So far there’s little indication Bloom’s uncertainty index is about to spike. It fell to a reading of 98.39 in April, just above where it was in November ahead of the Fed’s well-telegraphed rate hike. Other readings of uncertainty, like the VIX, look similarly benign. Voters go to the polls on Nov. 8. Historically, Bloom’s index jumps just ahead of tight presidential ballots, as well as during times of other policy uncertainty, such as the U.S. debt ceiling debate in 2011. A surge of 90 points in the index could presage a one percent decline in production and declines in employment and investment of about a half a percent each, based on Bloom’s models. <^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Graphic showing past Fed rate moves in election years tmsnrt.rs/1rD6A1u) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^> | 1 |
23,071 | Federal Court Strikes Down North Carolina’s Racist Gerrymandering Law | In another blow to voter and racial suppression, a federal court just stuck down North Carolina s racially designated gerrymandering ploy just weeks after the federal courts stuck down their racist voter ID law.In the case, Covington v. North Carolina, the three judge panel in the Middle District ruled that North Carolina lawmakers (who have a supermajority in both state chambers) unconstitutionally used race as a key factor when redrawing the legislative districts for the state House and state Senate members in 2011.However, because the decision was delivered late into the election season, the ruling will not take effect until the start of the new session in 2017, meaning voters will head to the voting booths in November under the jurisdiction of unconstitutional districts that do not accurately represent the voters in the state.Not only does the decision affect the state legislature districts, but also congressional districts. Even though Mitt Romney won North Carolina by less than two percent against President Obama in 2012, of the 13 congressional districts, Democrats only won three.In 2010, even with the Republican takeover in Congress, and a year before the new districts were drawn, seven Democrats won and six Republicans won.I wonder what changed.Republicans attempt to block blacks and minorities from voting and having adequate representation has suffered another blowback from the courts. No wonder Republicans are so hostile to the judiciary they keep blocking their suppression of the electorate.The court found: | 0 |
23,072 | BOOM! REPUBLICAN Wins Montana Election After “Body-Slamming” Reporter: ‘I’m sick and tired of this!’ | This is just too rich! The Democrats threw tons of money into this race and then the Republican candidate body-slammed an obnoxious reporter. It seemed like the Dems really couldn t lose this one. Bernie s socialist candidate would win in Montana. The Democrats were sure they could run leftists and win in red states NOT SO FAST!Republican businessman Greg Gianforte won Montana s sole House district in a special election Thursday, keeping a seat in Republican hands despite facing assault charges for allegedly attacking a reporter who d asked him about the GOP s health-care bill:The best ever quote from the body-slamming incident is when Gianforte spoke for all Americans: I m sick and tired of this! After he won he commented on the incident in his victory speech I shouldn t have treated that reporter that way, he told supporters at his rally here.Please check out Gianforte s twitter page! It s full of great photos of things he s done. He makes his own sausage and even gave his wife a sausage maker for Christmas. He posts photos of his wild game dinners that look amazing. This guy is a blast! | 0 |
23,073 | Pelosi calls DACA deal a first step toward comprehensive immigration reform | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. House of Representatives Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said on Wednesday that supporting undocumented immigrants brought to the United States as children, the so-called “Dreamers,” was a “first step” toward broader reform. “Comprehensive immigration reform is our goal. We think this is a good first step,” Pelosi told a briefing, referring to legislation that would protect the roughly 800,000 people once covered by the DACA program. She said she hoped Congress could later achieve comprehensive immigration reform to help all undocumented immigrants, but “we have to save the Dreamers now.” | 1 |
23,074 | BREAKING: [Video] COLORADO BAKER WHO REFUSED TO MAKE CAKES With Anti-Gay Message Did Not Discriminate | About 2,000 of the emails I got were of support. There were four hateful, so that s not even 1 percent. Compare that the the hateful onslaught of messages that Memories Pizza in Indiana got from the left after only answered a hypothetical question about gay marriage. They were forced to close down after death threats from the Gay Mafia, yet the media never bothered to report the truth about this business who never refused service to anyone based on their sexual orientation.We ll tell you about this story, because you will likely not hear about it in the mainstream media. Just try however, to refuse to make a cake for a gay couple and the media will descend like buzzards on a fresh carcass. The Colorado Civil Rights Division has ruled that a baker who refused to make cakes with anti-gay messages did not discriminate.Marjorie Silva, owner of Azucar Bakery in Denver, says she got the news on Friday but knows that Bill Jack, a Christian from Castle Rock, Colo., will likely appeal the decision. I m happy that we were not just morally right but legally right, she said in an interview with Yahoo News. Hopefully this will lead to a better world where we are friendly to each other. In March 2014, Jack asked Silva to make him a Bible-shaped cake with anti-gay messages, such as Homosexuality is a detestable sin. Leviticus 18:22. He also wanted the cake to include two men holding hands with a large X over them.She agreed to make the dessert in the shape of a book but declined to include the hateful content.Silva has been inundated with messages of support from LGBT people and their allies since refusing to reproduce the homophobic messages. About 2,000 of the emails I got were of support. There were four hateful, so that s not even 1 percent. So it looks like humanity is going in the right direction and things are changing for good, she said.Via: Yahoo News | 0 |
23,075 | Kerry says has not been contacted by FBI over new Clinton email review | AHERLOW, Ireland (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Sunday he had not been contacted by the FBI about new investigative steps being taken related to Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server when she led the State Department. The FBI on Friday said it was investigating more emails in what the Democratic presidential candidate described as “deeply troubling” behavior 10 days before the U.S. elections. “I haven’t been notified of anything, no, I haven’t been requested of anything, no, I’m not aware of the department being requested, and I have no further comment to make,” Kerry told a news conference in Ireland. “As an American citizen and former nominee of the party, there is a lot I’d like to say about what is going on, but I can’t and I am just going to remain out of this,” he added. Clinton on Saturday challenged FBI Director James Comey to provide a fuller explanation of investigative steps he is taking related to her use of a private email server. Comey had decided in July that the FBI was not going to seek prosecution of Clinton. But on Friday he said the agency was trying to determine whether additional emails contained classified information. Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, who has been reeling for weeks from the release of a 2005 audio tape in which he boasted about groping women, has seized on the FBI move as evidence Clinton is unfit to lead the country. Kerry was in Ireland to accept the Tipperary International Peace Award, joining recipients like former South African President Nelson Mandela, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and former U.S. President Bill Clinton. Kerry is due to travel to London on Monday for talks on Libya that will seek to break a political stalemate over the country’s U.N-backed unity government. | 1 |
23,076 | aig quadruples limits for terrorism insurance to billion | home this month popular ridiculously stupid things men keep doing for women ridiculously stupid things men keep doing for women david g brown
david is a lifelong dissident and intellectual rebel he despises political correctness which replaces real needy victims with narcissistic leftists out for a free meal though still a young man he has watched society descend into its present morass with great sadness combined with a determination to help make things better he tweets when theres something worth tweeting here october girls
forget the movies that set aloof men against loveseeking women it is men who are the hopeless romantics much if not most of the time and they express this extraordinary naivety by engaging in stupid behaviors that their fathers and other male role models should have beaten out of them though feminism demographic trends and socioeconomic realities encourage women to be entitled prima donnas men add to the feedback loop by rewarding modernday princesses
of course there are sensible exceptions to avoiding the following behaviors a time and a place for example can be found for defending a woman most notably your mother or wife from someone elses verbal or physical attack likewise sometimes emergencies or certain serious events mean you should put your priorities aside to help a highquality woman who gives longterm value to your life that said in the vast majority of cases acting in this way is unnecessary timeconsuming resourcedraining and plain selfdestructive for a man
so here are the five things many men perversely and uselessly keep doing for women fighting for them
i lost count long ago of the number of times i have seen a man step in to save a woman from either herself or a slight usually deserved against her a girl will behave like a pork chop at a restaurant club or elsewhere picking a verbal or even physical argument with an employee or fellow patron along comes captainsaveaho who might not even know the girl to protect her honor the expectation of many women that men will do this for them is bad enough let alone when a man does it of his own volition without being requested
in return for risking a physical or similar altercation with other people the white knight invariably gets a smile a few words and perhaps a phone number from this point onwards though the interaction between mr white knight and the entitled damsel who causes her own distress invariably fizzles out and it is not just members of your typical white knight crowd who act this way men who are nominally good with women fall into this trap too confusing it with the opportunity to be alpha and dominate over another male the most common outcome sadly is that a womans very poor behavior is condoned by a man falling over himself to be her medieval champion fighting over them not only is this bickering usually illadvised it is often exactly what she wants
this stupid behavior is only marginally better than fighting for women and the two activities consistently overlap whilst competition in life including between men over women should be largely encouraged swathes of men are effectively scrapping over last sundays leftovers on a saturday three days after the refrigerator stopped working
remember a woman can be attractive but because of her attitude and behavior have very little longterm value for you countless men live with the illusion that if they toil hard enough to get the goodlooking girl it must be worth it thats simply not the case in modern times to boot a lot of sexually thirsty men nowadays are chasing physically lowyield women their fathers and grandfathers would never have noticed
at best the majority of men who fight over women are dueling over the prospect of snaring a girl who one of them will probably fuck a few times if at all and if they do manage to secure the girl for a longterm relationship the pairing usually implodes down the track the man either realizes he wasted his time or suffers greatly in material terms such as by being draped divorce raped
in the meantime the girls being fought over have their egos stroked time and time again unattractive girls see themselves as attractive and attractive girls with foul entitled princess personalities find themselves validated once more everything in these situations is predicated on the men fighting and proving themselves rather than the women reaching an appropriate standard of physical and emotional femininity paying for them what are you getting from the transaction with her and yes everything is transactional in malefemale relationships
unless you are completely sure you have claimed the worlds best girl for yourself and even that belief is probably based on very false or temporary appearances you should ideally be investing less financially in the relationship than she is this may seem counterintuitive especially when a man is sexually valued by women for his status achievements and resources but we are not living in a time when almost every woman is marriageable a man providing for a woman can only justify it if she is of highquality and gives him something back in return on both these counts most men are paying for dud deals
in every longterm relationship i have had i have put less into the relationship financially proportionallyspeaking almost always even the girls gross investment has either approximated mine or surpassed it for dates and during casual relationships too i pay for a womans time about as much as she pays for mine if not less
when relationships end girls can and do play petty games over money or property you may be owed what matters however is how you conduct yourself overall only when a woman has materially invested in you or invests in you should you invest in her when patriarchy returns the malefemale dynamic will alter before that time be sure she does her fair share financially shifting or sacrificing their priorities for them meanwhile he should be do everything else for himself
unlike many other selfdestructive behaviors concerning women this one can be very incremental and hard to spot it is very easy to procrastinate on your work final exams selfdevelopment goals and the rest of your social life when what you feel is a highquality woman comes along in fact nature has basically designed you to do that by throwing your biochemistry into a druglike dependency at the beginning of a courtship in addition to these problems early on men are apt to continue the shelving of their other more personal demands after the relationship is well established
on a topic i will explore in more detail in another article there should be certain hours in many days or simply days in general in which women do not even enter your mind contrast this with your average man who will throw away opportunities to further himself to please his girl and often shes not his girl for much longer as his neglect of himself becomes apparent in her less attracted mind by devoting yourself to a ho you become dispensable to a ho not just psychologically but physically financially and socially as well dont let yourself rot
your body finances education and other forms of selfimprovement need to be your number one focus after all they are the only things you have or dont have hours a day days a year individual girls may come and go but your obligations to yourself remain paradoxically keeping these obligations to yourself are what attract girls in the first place a man who takes proper care of his money career body and social life gets women moving to them for them sucker
this is the one even my leftwing father warned me about but its something a lot of guys are yet to learn like shifting or sacrificing ones priorities moving to a girl for a girl is conducive to throwing your own needs into utter disarray every time i moved to where a girl of mine lived i did so mostly for myself whether to explore a new country for three months or find a new refreshing place to get my work done the relocation benefited me this is qualitatively far different from upending yourself to some new city for the mere chance to thrive and the desire to please a girl
perhaps the saddest thing about the man who moves for his girl is that when he wants even a fraction of the favor he gave her hes often left in the lurch dont make this mistake either she must move to you or you move to her for a lot of reasons that dont revolve around her if the relationship fails and most of them do you leave yourself in an equal or better position than the one you would otherwise be in dont follow the crowd of thirsty males too many men slave away in a female desert girls are not nonexistent but theyre too often lowquality relative to what a man is willing to do for them
snap yourself out of these behaviors and help your friends shake them off too you may not indulge in them regularly but the temptation to perform them at least sometimes is likely to be there more broadly we need to see a seismic shift in the way many men act become part of the solution
so whats just as bad as an entitled woman a man who encourages her entitlement with obsequious validation | 0 |
23,077 | Trump taps climate change skeptic as energy adviser, pushes back on taxes | WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - Donald Trump on Friday picked a prominent climate change skeptic to help him craft his energy policy and pushed back against renewed calls that he release his income tax returns - saying his tax rate is “none of your business.” The presumptive Republican presidential nominee is seeking to build out his policy proposals as he pivots from campaigning for his party’s nomination to a likely general election matchup with Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Among those he has asked for help is U.S. Republican Representative Kevin Cramer of North Dakota, one of the country’s most ardent oil and gas drilling advocates and climate change skeptics. North Dakota has been at the forefront of the U.S. shale oil and gas boom. Trump’s team asked Cramer, who has endorsed Trump, to write a white paper, or detailed report, on his energy policy ideas, according to Cramer and sources familiar with the matter. Cramer said in an interview that his white paper would emphasize the dangers of foreign ownership of U.S. energy assets, as well as what he characterized as burdensome taxes and over-regulation. Trump will have an opportunity to float some of the ideas at an energy summit in Bismarck, North Dakota on May 26, Cramer said. The senator was also among a group of Trump advisers who recently met with lawmakers from Western energy states, who hope Trump will open more federal land for drilling, a lawmaker who took part in the meeting said. A spokeswoman for Trump’s campaign did not comment. Environmental groups, and Clinton’s campaign, quickly attacked Trump for tapping Cramer. “Kevin Cramer has consistently backed reckless and dangerous schemes to put the profits of fossil fuel executives before the health of the public, so he and Trump are a match made in polluter heaven,” Sierra Club Legislative Director Melinda Pierce said in an emailed statement. The Clinton campaign also criticized the move. “Donald Trump’s choice of outspoken climate (change) denier Kevin Cramer to advise him on energy policy is just the latest piece of evidence that letting him get near the White House would put our children’s health and futures at risk,” said campaign spokesman Jesse Ferguson. Trump has been light on the details of his energy policy, though he recently told supporters in West Virginia that the coal industry would thrive if he were president. He has also claimed global warming is a concept “created by and for the Chinese” to hurt U.S. business. Clinton, meanwhile, has advocated shifting the country to 50 percent clean energy by 2030, promised heavy regulation of fracking, and said her prospective administration would put coal companies “out of business.” Trump also took heat on Friday for not releasing his tax returns, something that American presidential candidates have done for decades. Clinton and her rival, Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, have both released their returns. Trump has said the Internal Revenue Service was auditing his returns and he wanted to wait until the review was over before making them public. “It should be, and I hope it’s before the election,” Trump told ABC’s “Good Morning America.” Pressed on what tax rate he pays, Trump refused to say. “It’s none of your business,” he said. The candidate has said there is nothing voters can learn from his tax filings. Tax filings show sources of income, both from within the United States and other countries, as well as charitable giving, investments, deductions and other financial information. The IRS declined to comment on whether Trump or any other presidential candidates were being audited. However, the Trump campaign earlier this year released a letter from his attorneys saying his personal tax returns have been under “continuous examination” from the IRS. This week, Clinton began calling on her probable Republican rival to release his returns. Last August, the former U.S. secretary of state posted the past eight years of tax returns for her and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, on her website. Sanders released his 2014 return in April. Presidential candidates have a long history in the modern era of releasing their tax returns. “In 1976, Gerald Ford did not release his returns, but he did release some information about his taxes,” said Joseph Thorndike, director of the Tax History Project at Tax Analysts, a nonprofit, nonpartisan group that provides tax news and analysis. “That was the last time that a major party nominee hasn’t done it,” he said. (Refiling to change dateline, previous WASHINGTON.) | 1 |
23,078 | Trump on Twitter (Feb 8) - Immigration, Sheriffs, tornadoes | The following statements were posted to the verified Twitter accounts of U.S. President Donald Trump, @realDonaldTrump and @POTUS. The opinions expressed are his own. Reuters has not edited the statements or confirmed their accuracy. @realDonaldTrump : -If the U.S. does not win this case as it so obviously should, we can never have the security and safety to which we are entitled. Politics! [0703 EST] -I will be speaking at 9:00 A.M. today to Police Chiefs and Sheriffs and will be discussing the horrible, dangerous and wrong decision....... [0804 EST] -Our thoughts and prayers are with everyone in southeastern Louisiana affected by today’s severe tornadoes. [0020 EST] -- Source link: (bit.ly/2jBh4LU) (bit.ly/2jpEXYR) | 1 |
23,079 | WOW! DNC WILL KEEP Dirty Harvey’s Money To Fund Future Democrat Campaigns | The Democratic National Committee announced Friday that it is still holding onto most of the money it received from Hollywood mogul and alleged sexual harasser Harvey Weinstein.The DNC will donate just ten percent of the almost $300,000 received from Weinstein, money that will go to organizations close to the Democratic Party: EMILY s List, Emerge America, and Higher Heights, all of which predominately help Democratic candidates running for office. The DNC s response to the Harvey Weinstein matter is shockingly bad even by Washington standards, Alexandra Smith of the conservative opposition research firm America Rising said. Donating a mere 10 percent of the entire Weinstein contribution to another left-leaning political action committee is a complete embarrassment. The mission statement of EMILY s List is: We elect pro-choice Democratic women to office. Emerge America adds ethnic diversity to that same basic mission, proclaiming its intent to increase the number of Democratic women leaders. Higher Heights goal is to help black women get elected; the Center for Responsive Politics notes that it gives exclusively to Democrats.Some Democratic politicians are donating money received from Weinstein to nonprofits helping victims of sexual violence, while others have remained silent on the matter. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) announced he would donate his Weinstein money to several charities supporting women following a Washington Free Beacon report about Democrats inaction. WFB | 0 |
23,080 | TRUMP’S NATIONAL SECURITY SPEECH Reveals Policy Based on 4 Principles Focusing on ‘America First’ | President Trump delivered a speech on national security that ll knock your socks off. He plans on putting America first: America is in the game and America is going to win. His strategy involves four basic principles: protecting the homeland by restricting immigration, pressuring trading partners, building up the military and otherwise increasing U.S. influence globally.What s not to love about that? MAGA!Via Fox News: President Trump on Monday unveiled a national security strategy that enshrines his America First approach into U.S. policy, stressing American strength and economic security and putting rivals like China and Russia on notice. America is in the game and America is going to win, Trump said, making clear that the United States will stand up for itself even if that means acting unilaterally or alienating others on issues such as trade, climate change and immigration.In a 20-minute speech, Trump said the U.S. faces an extraordinarily dangerous world and one of his goals is to make sure the U.S. is leading again on the world stage. America is coming back, and America is coming back strong, he said.Trump, who released his 68-page national security strategy ahead of his speech, said he is making good on campaign pledges that he promised would revitalize the American economy, rebuild our military, defend our borders, protect our sovereignty and advance our values. Trump s national security strategy, a document mandated by Congress, is based on four principles: protecting the homeland by restricting immigration, pressuring trading partners, building up the military and otherwise increasing U.S. influence globally.Trump also took on the rise in North Korea s nuclear aggression and painted China and Russia as U.S. rivals despite his own relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin, which included two telephone calls last week.Bryan Llenas has the rogue regime s reaction. China and Russia challenge American power, influence, and interests, attempting to erode American security and prosperity, the strategy document says. They are determined to make economies less free and less fair, to grow their militaries, and to control information and data to repress their societies and expand their influence. The strategy accuses the two nations of developing advanced weapons and capabilities that could threaten our critical infrastructure and our command and control architecture. While Trump in his address did not mention Russia meddling in U.S. elections, the written strategy also calls out Moscow for using information tools in an attempt to undermine the legitimacy of democracies and says adversaries like Russia target media, political processes, financial networks and personal data. In a shift from the last administration, Trump s strategy also refers to the jihadist terror threat and Islamist terror groups. We will pursue threats to their source, so that jihadist terrorists are stopped before they ever reach our borders, it says.Further, the strategy backs off naming climate change as a major threat. The last such strategy document, prepared by then-President Barack Obama in 2015, declared climate change an urgent and growing threat to our national security. | 0 |
23,081 | IVANA TRUMP SPEAKS OUT AGAINST LEFTIST RAG’S FALSE ACCUSATIONS OF EX DONALD “RAPING” HER | Hmmm Ever wonder why the left fears Trump so much? The Daily Beast s Tim Mak and Brandon Zadrozny woke up on Tuesday to find that CNN completely embarrassed them. After publishing a more-than-1,700-word-long invective on Monday evening reprinting old and disproven allegations against GOP presidential frontrunner Donald Trump by his ex-wife in divorce proceedings Trump s ex-wife herself came out with a statement to CNN standing by her ex-husband, and discrediting the liberal outlet s hit piece which relied heavily on statements she made in divorce proceedings 30 years ago. I have recently read some comments attributed to me from nearly 30 years ago at a time of very high tension during my divorce from Donald. The story is totally without merit. Donald and I are the best of friends and together have raised three children that we love and are very proud of. I have nothing but fondness for Donald and wish him the best of luck on his campaign. Incidentally, I think he would make an incredible president, Ivana Trump, Donald s ex-wife, said in the statement to CNN.Donald and Ivana Trump had three children together Ivanka, Eric and Donald, Jr., Donald s oldest children and now all officials at Trump s company three of Trump s five children.The embarrassing and quick putdown of the Daily Beast story comes just hours after the outlet ran a blistering headline falsely accusing him of rape: Ex-Wife: Donald Trump Made Me Feel Violated During Sex. The sub-headline of the inaccurate article was even worse, directly leveling the false rape allegation: Ivana Trump once accused the real-estate tycoon of rape, although she later clarified: not in the criminal sense. The way they justified dredging up the three-decade-old allegation from divorce proceeding transcript, which was again per Ivana s statement to CNN clearly false? Donald Trump introduced his presidential campaign to the world with a slur against Mexican immigrants, accusing them of being rapists and bringing crime into the country. Mak and Zadrozny wrote as the lead of their article before delving into the lurid, old and disproven details. I mean somebody s doing it! Who s doing the raping? Donald Trump said, when asked to defend his characterization. It was an unfortunate turn of phrase for Trump in more ways than one. From there, they delve into the old allegations: Not only does the current frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination have a history of controversial remarks about sexual assault, but as it turns out, his ex-wife Ivana Trump once used rape to describe an incident between them in 1989. She later said she felt violated by the experience. The incident did come up in the divorce proceedings transcripts and was first reported on widely and publicly by former Texas Monthly and former Newsweek reporter Harry Hurt III in his 1993 book: Lost Tycoon: The Many Lives of Donald J. Trump. So, what did Mak and Zadrozny do? Bring the old story back up of course.For entire story: Breitbart News | 0 |
23,082 | Trump Targets Clean Water And Clean Air Regulations At Environmental Protection Agency | It s official. Donald Trump is literally trying to murder the American people.As humans, we need clean air and clean water to survive as a species. Without them, we would suffocate or die of thirst. Crops and livestock also require clean water and clean air to produce our food supply.This is basic stuff, but Donald Trump doesn t care about the needs of human beings. He only cares about corporate greed and that greed is going to kill millions.Trump has already launched an all-out assault on the Environmental Protection Agency, which works every day fighting for clean water and clean air for the American people.The agency has been ordered to freeze grants and contracts which has halted air and water quality tests.But now Trump is looking to chip away at the bedrock of what the EPA exists to do.According to Vox,Jonathan Swan of Axios got a look at an agency action plan that Trump s advisers have written up for the EPA. Among the initiatives they plan to target: Clean Air Act greenhouse gas regulations for new (NSPS) and existing (ESPS or the Clean Power Plan) coal and natural gas power plants [CAFE] Standards Clean Water Section 404: Waters of the U.S. Rule (wetlands) TMDL (Total Maximum Daily Load) for Chesapeake Bay. By attacking the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts, Trump would be sentencing America to a deadly polluted future the likes of which have not been seen since the EPA was created.Americans look at Beijing in horror as China allows the air in that city to be so thick and poisonous that people need to wear gas masks every day if they go outside.Here s an image of New York in 1973 before the EPA aggressively fought for air standards via the National Archives.And here s one of Los Angeles.If Trump has his way, American cities will once again be choked by smog and our air quality with significantly decrease. One wonders if Trump has investments in gas mask companies.Fresh water has also been a worry among millions of Americans over the years as Republicans continue to make decisions that allow companies like Koch Industries to pollute our waterways. Trump s executive order to let the Keystone XL pipeline move forward is a direct threat to the Ogallala Aquifer, which provides water to millions of Americans in the Midwest and is responsible for creating what is now called America s Breadbasket. The Washington Post reports,In some places the aquifer is buried 1,200 feet deep, but in many places it is at or very close to the surface, often less than five feet below ground That s where concerns about the Keystone XL came in. Its original route traversed 92 miles of the Sand Hills and the Ogallala. TransCanada, which said it would bury the pipeline at least four feet underground, could in many places be putting it in water TransCanada submitted a revised route to the State Department, bypassing the Sand Hills but still passing over some parts of the aquifer.Should a massive oil spill occur, it could seep into the aquifer and poison it. And that would be a disaster even bigger than the lead poisoned water in Flint, Michigan because it would literally affect every American across the country.And these spills can contaminate water for decades. The reason why Flint s water supply was tainted with lead is because Republicans decided to save money by switching the city s water from Lake Huron to the Flint River, which was contaminated by lead decades ago, which is why Flint got it s water from Lake Huron. This is public knowledge, but Republicans ignored that and switched anyway.Trump also wants to expedite oil and gas permits and open up pristine natural lands to fracking and mining, which threatens habitats and our water supply. As we should all know, fracking has already poisoned water supplies in places around the country. Some people can even light their water on fire because of the chemicals fracking companies use. That will increase under Trump.Republicans now control Congress, so they will likely help Trump weaken the Clean Water and Clean Air Acts no matter how much the American people protest.So by letting Trump and the Republicans remain in office we are letting them kill us. Literally.Featured image via Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images | 0 |
23,083 | Trump, France's Macron to discuss Syria and terrorism during Paris visit | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump will discuss Syria and counterterrorism when he meets with French President Emmanuel Macron in Paris later this week, a White House official said on Tuesday. Trump was invited to France to celebrate July 14 Bastille Day festivities. During his trip, Trump and Macron will also hold a bilateral meeting and participate in a joint news conference. “I would characterize the relationship between the two of them as being very positive,” the White House official said. “There are some issues where we see the world a little bit differently, but many issues where we see the world more or less the same.” | 1 |
23,084 | Melania Trump: Reporter ‘Provoked’ Anti-Semitic Threats From My Fans | Donald Trump s wife Melania has made some shocking comments in regards to a barrage of anti-Semitic remarks that Trump supporters directed towards a reporter. After Julia Ioffe did a profile of Mrs. Trump for GQ magazine, her life was threatened and numerous hateful comments were sent her way on social media.Now in an interview, Ms. Trump alleges that Ioffe brought the hate barrage on herself. I don t control my fans, Melania said in an interview with DuJour. But I don t agree with what they re doing. I understand what you mean, but there are people out there who maybe went too far. She provoked them. Ioffe, who is Jewish, received calls from people playing Hitler speeches, told that she should be burned in an oven, be shot in the head, and was sent photoshopped images of her in a concentration camp uniform.The Trump campaign has received overt public support from anti-Semites and white power groups who believe that the candidate will further their goals of racial purity. One white nationalist paid for robocalls for Trump s campaign and was recently selected as a Trump delegate for the Republican Convention in Cleveland, only stepping down when national media began reporting the story.In the same interview, Melania Trump claims that Donald Trump is not Hitler, but he has pushed rhetoric about tracking and barring Muslims that come right out of the same playbook that Hitler utilized against Jewish people.Trump s rhetoric on Mexicans comes from the same place, calling them criminals and rapists, rhetoric which inspired supporters to beat up and urinate on a Latino man in Massachusetts. Those assailants are now headed to prison.Despite the hate from his campaign, Republicans are now stuck with Trump. He turns off many of the voters the party said it needed to be viable nationally, but did enough to blow out all the other nominees. Oh well.Featured image via Flickr | 0 |
23,085 | Canada's Trudeau broke ethics rules with visit to Aga Khan island | OTTAWA (Reuters) - Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau broke some conflict of interest rules when he accepted a vacation last year on the Aga Khan s private island, the ethics watchdog said on Wednesday, the first time a prime minister has been found to have committed such a transgression. While the finding could tarnish Trudeau s popularity half-way into his mandate, he does not face any penalties. Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson said Trudeau contravened a rule on gifts when he accepted the use of the island in March and December 2016, while there were ongoing official dealings with the Aga Khan and the Aga Khan Foundation Canada was registered to lobby Trudeau s office. The vacations accepted by Mr. Trudeau or his family could reasonably be seen to have been given to influence Mr. Trudeau in his capacity as Prime Minister, Dawson said. While Trudeau says the Aga Khan is a family friend, Dawson found the exception for gifts from friends did not apply. Trudeau said he accepted her report and would clear future vacations with the watchdog. I take full responsibility for it. We need to make sure that the office of the prime minister is without reproach, Trudeau said. Trudeau and his family vacationed on the island during the holidays in late December 2016 into January this year. Members of his family visited in March 2016. Trudeau has come under fire from the opposition, who have said the luxury Bahamas vacation was inappropriate and showed the Liberal government is out of touch with average Canadians. The opposition has also accused Finance Minister Bill Morneau of being in a conflict of interest for not putting his assets in a blind trust. He has since said he will do so and has divested his stock in his family business. Trudeau says he has known the Aga Khan, Prince Shah Karim Al Husseini, since childhood. The Aga Khan, the title held by the leader of the Ismaili branch of Shi ite Islam, was a pallbearer at the funeral of Justin s father, former Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau. Trudeau also contravened the rules when he and his family traveled in the Aga Khan s private helicopter last December and when his family traveled on a non-commercial aircraft chartered by the Aga Khan in March 2016, Dawson said. However, she found no evidence Trudeau discussed any parliamentary business with the Aga Khan or his representatives, or participated in any related debates or votes. | 1 |
23,086 | U.S. Senate panel targets Chinese banks with North Korea sanctions | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Senate Banking Committee unanimously backed new sanctions targeting Chinese banks that do business with North Korea on Tuesday, just before President Donald Trump visits Beijing for the first time since taking office. As well as strengthening existing sanctions and congressional oversight, the measure will target foreign financial institutions - in China and elsewhere - that provide services to those subject to North Korea-related sanctions by the U.S. Congress, a presidential order or U.N. Security Council resolution. All 12 Republicans and 11 Democrats on the panel voted for the “Otto Warmbier Banking Restrictions Involving North Korea (BRINK) Act,” clearing the way for its consideration by the full Senate. The bill was named after a U.S. student who died earlier this year after he was imprisoned in North Korea, further chilling already poor relations between Washington and Pyongyang. “For too long, we’ve been complacent about the growing and gathering threat from the North Korean regime,” Republican Pat Toomey, one of the bill’s authors, said after the committee voted. Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen, another author, said that in addition to Chinese banks, Malaysian financial institutions might end up in its sights. Trump is due to wrap up a visit to Seoul on Wednesday with a major speech on North Korea, and then shift focus to China, where he is expected to press a reluctant President Xi Jinping to tighten the screws further on Pyongyang. Some of Trump’s fellow Republicans, as well as many Democrats, have been critical of Trump’s bellicose rhetoric about North Korea, and have called for the use of economic tools like sanctions or more negotiations before talking of war. Washington so far has largely held off on imposing new sanctions against Chinese banks and companies doing business with North Korea, given fears of retaliation by Beijing and possibly far-reaching effects on the world economy. Van Hollen told reporters on Monday ahead of the committee vote that he wished Trump would follow the model of President Theodore Roosevelt and “speak softly and carry a big stick,” adding: “We’re trying to give him a little bigger stick with the sanctions.” Republican and Democratic lawmakers said last week they had reached a bipartisan agreement on the sanctions bill. A companion bill has been introduced in the House of Representatives. The leaders of the Republican-led Senate have not said when the chamber might vote on the legislation. | 1 |
23,087 | Dear America: Stop Supporting Terrorists in Syria, and Around the World | 21st Century Wire says Since 2011 the United States government, led by President Barack Obama, has adopted an open policy of supporting an armed opposition in Syria. While certain officials have only recently admitted to arming and funding these militants, evidence shows that the support has been pouring in through both covert means and official channels from the onset of the conflict. We now know that those commonly referred to in the western media as rebels in Syria are comprised mainly of religious extremists and designated terrorists. Despite this revelation, the US, UK, France, along with Saudi Arabia, Qatar and others have continued to back them, and even go so far as to color them with political legitimacy all in a grand effort to try and achieve regime change in Syria. It s not the first time either that Washington has pursued this same policy of destablization in order to overthrow a foreign government.President Donald Trump has an opportunity to reverse this backwards US policy. Will he capitalize on the opportunity to start anew, or will the US revert back to its old deep state default position? The passage of Hawaii Congresswomen Tulsi Gabbard s recently proposed piece of legislation entitled, Stop Arming Terrorists Act, would be positive move in that direction. Will President Trump champion her bill?The following is an open letter from writer Steven Sahiounie to the US Government To the Government of the United States of America:I am asking my American government to stop supporting terrorists in Syria. The US government, and media, keep calling them moderate rebels , but they are not. They were never moderate, and many are not rebels. By definition, a rebel is rebelling against their own government. However, many of the US backed rebels are not Syrian, and have no family ties to Syria, and have never been a citizen of Syria. For example, how could a Chinese citizen fight in a rebellion against the American government? By what right does a Chinese citizen have to kill and maim in order to change the US government? It is wrong and makes no sense.I would never advocate, or support any armed attack, or rebellion against the American government. There are laws against murdering, raping, kidnapping and maiming people in USA. The same such laws exist in Syria. How could a democracy and a world leader like USA advocate murdering, raping, kidnapping and maiming innocent Syrian people?From the out-set of violence and crimes in Syria in 2011, the US backed rebels used sectarian slogans, and carries out sectarian attacks and massacres. Syria is a secular form of government, as is USA. Why would American leaders support the targeting of minorities in Syria, when the President of America is himself a minority? Why would the US government support the destruction on churches and mosques? American s value religious freedom, and equality of minorities; yet the US backed Free Syrian Army destroyed churches, targeted Christians, attacked Christian villages, as well as targeting Muslim minority sects with similar acts: such as Kessab, Ballouta, Mahardeh, and Maaloula among many others.The US government sent weapons, missiles, special training, equipment, food, medical supplies, communications, and satellite imagery to the Free Syrian Army from 2011 to 2016. Yet, the current exodus of evacuees from East Aleppo has not received even one loaf of bread from USA. While the US backed FSA had many warehouses full of food and medicines they have left behind as they retreated deeper into East Aleppo. Finally, the rebels who agreed to vacate recently have burned all the medical supplies and food storages, which were the gifts of the American taxpayers, so as to prevent the distribution of those supplies to the starving masses who have fled East Aleppo now.American citizens are currently very concerned about Syrian refugees coming to USA who may have had ties to terrorism. The US backed rebels are exactly the type of people the American citizens should be afraid of as possible new neighbors, living in their midst as settled refugees. They are the type of people who would chop off the head of their neighbor because his religion is not exactly the same as theirs. They are the type of people who are willing to take money from a foreign government for the purpose of destroying their own community. They are the type of people who do not value religious freedom, or minority rights. What would happen when the US backed rebels , who may be settled in USA, decide to rebel against the American government? Will the US President and Congress call them freedom fighters ? Or, perhaps America s enemies will fund and support their armed attacks on the US government and civilians?We should all be united in our plea: please stop supporting terrorism in Syria, and around the world.Steven Sahiounie***21WIRE Special Contributor Steven Sahiounie is an American citizen born in Fresno, California. He has been living permanently in Latakia, Syria, which was his father s original hometown. Steven is a freelance journalist and University student studying English Literature. READ MORE SYRIA NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire Syria FilesSUPPORT 21WIRE SUBSCRIBE & BECOME A MEMBER @21WIRE.TV | 0 |
23,088 | WATCH: FRATERNITY BROTHERS BUILD “Make America Great Again” Trump Wall On PRIVATE Property…THUG Students Tear It Down, Disregard First Amendment Right | Many Americans believe it s racist to keep minorities trapped in a system that forces them to rely on Bernie and Hillary s promises of free shit from the government. Does that mean it s okay for them to go around and disassemble Bernie Sanders displays on college campuses?A Tulane University fraternity has caused an uproar this week after building a wall made of sandbags with the message Make America Great Again and Trump plastered across it.Photos of the wall circulated on social media after it was erected on April 7 on the off-campus house of the university s chapter of Kappa Alpha Order.As part of the local chapter s annual tradition, it has pledges build a wall around its private property each spring ahead of its Old South formal ball, according to The Times-Picayune. However, upset students said this time the wall was filled with connotations of hate and ignorance. The wall has since been torn down by unidentified individuals alleged to be Tulane football players.WATCH here:In a video posted to YouTube, individuals can be seen grabbing the sandbags and tossing them into the street while fraternity members look on, one saying this is private property. These connotations most directly mocked the experiences of Latino immigrants and workers throughout our nation, a post on student Ana De Santiago s Facebook read. By writing Trump in large, red letters across the wall, KA changed what was a tradition of building a wall into a tradition of constructing a border, symbolizing separation and xenophobia. This issue not only affects Latinos but all other marginalized immigrant groups in this country.On Wednesday, the university addressed the incident in a statement, saying that while it encourages the free exchange of ideas and opinions , the local chapter s actions sparked a visceral reaction in the context of a very heated and divisive political season, The Times-Picayune reported.In an effort to support the individuals who dismantled the fraternity s Trump wall , Tulane s Latino student advocacy group, Generating Excellence Now and Tomorrow in Education (GENTE), set up a Change.org petition against the university s administration. We the undersigned stand in solidarity with the individuals who took the brave action of dismantling the wall in front of Kappa Alpha Fraternity House, a statement on the petition read. This wall, although a tradition carried on by Kappa Alpha for many years, has been a source of aggression towards students of colour on this campus, and this year, with the addition of the labels Trump and MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN, has become overtly threatening towards Muslim and Latino students. In a statement released to The times-Picayune on Tuesday, the fraternity s national chapter Assistant Executive Director for Advancement Jesse Lyons said its chapter takes KA s values of gentlemanly conduct very seriously. This respect extends to every student of Tulane and every member of the broader community, the statement read. The comment was written on a makeshift wall on our private property, normally used for a game of capture the flag, to mock the ideologies of a political candidate. This had a unintended negative effect and as such it has been dismantled. In other words, they caved, and ceded their First Amendment right to free speech, in order to avoid any controversy created by the Leftist Mafia.*According to the fraternity s website, KA was founded in 1865 and Robert E Lee, who is known for commanding the Confederate Army in the Civil War, is listed as its spiritual founder.In 2010, the national fraternity chapter ordered an official ban on fraternity s members wearing Confederate soldier uniforms to its annual Old South Ball.In a document titled Laws concerning Old South , KA also prohibits the display of the Confederate flag from any chapter house, lodge, or meeting place. Via: Daily Mail*100percentfedup.com | 0 |
23,089 | Sen. McConnell says expects Puerto Rico funding request by mid-October | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell said on Tuesday he expects a funding request from the Trump administration for disaster relief for Puerto Rico by mid-October. McConnell told reporters he met with the island territory s representatives on Tuesday and discussed Puerto Rico s needs after Hurricane Maria. | 1 |
23,090 | Return Manafort's money, Democrats demand of California Republican | SACRAMENTO, Calif. (Reuters) - A California neuroscientist vying to unseat Republican Congressman Dana Rohrabacher stepped up his criticism of the conservative on Tuesday, demanding he return a $1,000 contribution from indicted Trump adviser Paul Manafort. The Orange County seat held by Rohrabacher is key to Democrats’ hopes to increase their numbers in the U.S. House of Representatives in next year’s elections. Neuroscientist Hans Keirstead, a stem cell researcher and entrepreneur from Laguna Beach, is one of seven Democrats aiming to beat him, according to the Federal Election Commission. “We’ve got a Russian-tainted Congressman taking Russian-tainted money from Manafort,” Keirstead said in a telephone interview on Tuesday. “Something has to be put straight here.” Federal investigators probing Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election on Monday charged Manafort, a lobbyist and former Trump campaign manager, with money laundering. Rohrabacher, a senior member of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, has frequently praised Russian President Vladimir Putin and was considered for a role in U.S. President Donald Trump’s cabinet. His Southern California base in Orange County was for decades a Republican stronghold and a center of support for Ronald Reagan. Reliably conservative voters there have sent Rohrabacher to the House for nearly 30 years. But the 48th Congressional district has undergone profound demographic shifts in recent years, and it is now one of nine Republican districts in California that Democrats have targeted. Hillary Clinton beat Trump in the district in 2016, winning 152,000 votes compared to his 146,600. “These are people who care about the environment, care about social issues,” said Drew Godinich, a spokesman for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in California. “Donald Trump and Donald Trump’s Republican Party are no longer a good match for them.” Democrats’ success in the district, however, is far from assured. Despite a tilt toward Clinton for the presidency, voters there chose Rohrabacher over Democrat Suzanne Savary by more than six percentage points in 2016. Through a spokesman, Rohrabacher indicated that he was not at this time prepared to reject Manafort - or the $1,000 donation the political operative made to his 2014 campaign. “The Congressman advises his political opponents and the media to observe the presumption of innocence, still an American principle,” spokesman Ken Grubbs said in an email. | 1 |
23,091 | The Pope Has Some Bad News For The Ambassador Who Set Him Up With Kim Davis | As we all remember last year, Pope Francis made a historic visit and was beloved by pretty much everyone he came in contact with. However, there was a very dark cloud that hovered over his visit once it was discovered that he would be meeting with Kim Davis, the controversial Kentucky County Clerk who refused to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.Well, it looks as though the ambassador who set up the visit, and apparently kept Pope Francis in the dark about the whole thing, is about to be replaced. According The Advocate: Italian Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigan will leave the position of apostolic nuncio, the equivalent of an ambassador, and will be replaced by Archbishop Christophe Pierre, a French-born clergyman who is currently the nuncio to Mexico, Catholic magazine America reports, citing Sandro Magister, a blogger who covers the Vatican.The Vatican is not expected to confirm the news until the Obama administration has agreed to the new nuncio s appointment, the magazine notes, but it adds that reliable sources expect an official announcement before Easter, which falls on March 27 this year. Back in October after the visit with Davis, the Vatican released an official statement declaring that Pope Francis meeting with the County Clerk should not be considered a form of support. Also stating: The brief meeting between Mrs. Kim Davis and Pope Francis at the Apostolic Nunciature in Washington, DC has continued to provoke comments and discussion. In order to contribute to an objective understanding of what transpired I am able to clarify the following points:The Vatican clearly went into crisis mode to very clearly clarify that Pope Francis was not supporting Kim Davis and her bigoted ways, as was originally construed. Now, with the replacement of the man who set the whole meeting up, it has been made extremely clear that this sort of thing isn t about to happen again.Kim Davis is a symbol of hate and bigotry, so to see Pope Francis, who has all too often been a shining symbol of hope and love, meet with Davis, it honestly broke a lot of people s hearts. And while the Pope is still not in favor of same-sex marriage, it s definitely a positive development to see that the responsible ambassador will be replaced. Pope Francis was clearly not pleased.Featured image via Wikipedia/Wikipedia/Wikipedia | 0 |
23,092 | U.S. House clears way for vote to start Obamacare legislation | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A majority of the U.S. House of Representatives on Friday voted to advance legislation instructing committees to write legislation repealing President Barack Obama’s landmark healthcare law. The procedural vote of 235 to 188 clears the way for a vote later on Friday to pass the measure to begin work on repealing Obamacare that already has been approved by the Senate. It strictly followed party lines, indicating solidarity among House Republicans on the issue. | 1 |
23,093 | Senate finance committee to vote on Representative Price on Tuesday | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Republican-majority U.S. Senate Finance Committee will vote on Tuesday on the nomination of Representative Tom Price to head the Department of Health and Human Services, the panel’s chairman, Senator Orrin Hatch, said on Sunday. Price, a Republican, is an orthopedic surgeon who if confirmed would be given the task of carrying out President Donald Trump’s promise to gut former President Obama’s Affordable Care Act, also called Obamacare. Price’s trading in health company stocks while a lawmaker has been questioned by Democrats, but Price says his actions were legal and ethical. Price made his name in Washington as an opponent of Obamacare. For years he has proposed legislation to repeal and replace the 2010 health care law, but his proposal has never been voted on in committee. At a hearing last week before the finance committee, Price minimized the impact he would have on changing the healthcare insurance system if he is confirmed, saying it would be his task to carry out the will of Congress, expressed in legislation. Congress is in the process of working on a repeal of Obamacare and crafting a replacement. Republicans have generally supported Price’s nomination while Democrats have sharply criticized it. At last week’s hearing, the top Democrat on the finance committee, Senator Ron Wyden, said that if Price is confirmed, he would “take America back to the dark days when healthcare was for the healthy and the wealthy.” | 1 |
23,094 | China's Xi tells Trump maintaining peace in Korean peninsula is China's unswerving goal | SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Chinese President Xi Jinping told his U.S. counterpart Donald Trump that it is Beijing s unswerving goal to maintain peace and stability in Northeast Asia and denuclearize the Korean peninsula, the official Xinhua news agency said on Wednesday. Xi made the comments in a phone conversation with Trump, who urged the Chinese leader to exert pressure on North Korea after Pyongyang said it successfully tested a new intercontinental ballistic missile. | 1 |
23,095 | hillary sold weapons to isis wikileaks confirms | email
donald trumps campaign has ended fundraising events meant to support the republican partys getoutthevote efforts in next months elections
aides to the republican nominee told fox news that trump victory the joint fundraising committee for the gop and the campaign held its most recent fundraiser on oct and no more such events were scheduled
the move which was first reported by the washington post cuts off a key money source for republicans hoping to keep hold of both houses of congress
weve kind of wound down trump national finance chairman steven mnuchin told the post but the online fundraising continues to be strong
by contrast the post reported that democrat hillary clintons campaign has scheduled fundraising events between now and nov the former secretary of state was scheduled to make her last personal fundraising appearance tuesday in miami
mnuchin told the paper that the real estate mogul was focusing on making his final pitch to the voters at a campaign events rather than raising money in the final two weeks of the race
we have minimized his fundraising schedule over the last month to emphasize his focus on political events mnuchin said of the candidate unlike hillary who has been fundraising and not out and about he has constantly been out and about
according to the post the republican national committee had collected million through trump victory as of sept
rnc spokeswoman lindsay walters said the organization continues to fundraise for the entire gop ticket
meanwhile politico reported tuesday that the senate leadership fund a super pac with ties to senate majority leader mitch mcconnell rky was putting million into seven senate races deemed crucial in determining the balance of power on capitol hill | 0 |
23,096 | Obama casts early vote for 2016 election during Chicago trip | CHICAGO (Reuters) - President Barack Obama on Friday cast his ballot for the Nov. 8 election during a trip to his hometown of Chicago. Onlookers cheered as Obama, who was a U.S. senator from Illinois prior to becoming president, entered the early-voting facility in downtown Chicago. A smiling Obama shook hands with the poll workers at the site and thanked them for their “outstanding work” before heading to an electronic voting machine. “Now they can’t see me, can they?” Obama asked the workers as he jokingly shielded his machine from reporters standing nearby. Obama has been campaigning for Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton to succeed him in the Oval Office. In 2012, Obama was the first president to vote early. At the time he was running for his second term in the White House. Obama was scheduled to spend the weekend in Chicago. He made the stop at the voting facility in between appearances at two political fundraisers. | 1 |
23,097 | Democratic nomination will likely be won in March: Clinton campaign manager | NEW YORK (Reuters) - Hillary Clinton’s campaign manager said on Tuesday the Democratic nomination for the 2016 presidential election would “very likely” be decided in March, and that the support of black and Hispanic voters would be key to victory. “It will be very difficult, if not impossible, for a Democrat to win the nomination without strong levels of support among African American and Hispanic voters,” campaign manager Robby Mook wrote in a memo titled “March Matters.” “The nomination will very likely be won in March, not February, and we believe that Hillary Clinton is well positioned to build a strong – potentially insurmountable – delegate lead next month,” he said. CNN projected on Tuesday that Clinton lost to U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders in the New Hampshire primary. (Reporting by Amanda Becker; Writing by Luciana Lopez; Editing by Peter Cooney) SAP is the sponsor of this content. It was independently created by Reuters’ editorial staff and funded in part by SAP, which otherwise has no role in this coverage. | 1 |
23,098 | Cholera claims unborn children as epidemic spreads Yemen misery | HODEIDAH, Yemen (Reuters) - One of the latest victims of the cholera epidemic that has killed more than 2,000 people in Yemen had yet to even take her first breath. Her mother Safaa Issa Kaheel, then nine months pregnant, was brought into a crowded clinic in the Western port city of Hodeidah by her husband, who had to borrow the travel fare from a neighbor. My stomach started hurting more and more, said Kaheel, 37, a hydrating drip hooked into her arm. Once there, she was referred by nurse Hayam al-Shamaa for an ultrasound scan which showed her baby had died of dehydration - one of 15 to perish in the womb due to cholera in September and October, according to doctors at the city s Thawra hospital. I felt like death, Kaheel said, her voice strained. Thank god I survived the (delivery), but my diarrhea hasn t stopped. The Red Cross has warned that cholera, a diarrheal disease that has been eradicated in most developed countries, could infect a million people in Yemen by the end of the year. Two and a half years of war have sapped Yemen of the money and medical facilities it needs to battle the contagion, to which aid agencies and medics say the poor, the starving, the pregnant and the young are most vulnerable. The cholera ward is full of children - some writhing in agony, others eerily still. The blanket over one boy too weak to move rises and falls with his shallow breathing. Save the Children said in August that children under 15 represent nearly half of new cases and a third of deaths, with malnourished children more than six times more likely to die of cholera than well-fed ones. Millions of Yemenis are struggling to find food and the baking desert plains around Hodeidah are hotspots both of hunger and sickness. Yemen s war pits the armed Houthi movement against the internationally recognized government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, which is backed by a Saudi-led coalition that has launched thousands of air strikes to restore him to power. At least 10,000 people have been killed in the conflict. The country s health sector has been badly battered while a struggle over the central bank has left public sector salaries for doctors and sanitation workers unpaid. Soumaya Beltifa, spokesperson for the Red Cross in Sanaa, warned that a lack of funds and health personnel were blunting efforts to eradicate the disease, making it unlikely Yemen would be healthy again soon. The cholera epidemic has become a norm, leading to complacency in dealing with the disease, not only by civilians but also from the various (aid) organizations, she warned. | 1 |
23,099 | BREAKING: LIVE WIKILEAKS Announcement About Hillary That Could Swing Election…Live Announcement [3AM EST] | People have a right to understand who it is they re electing, said Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, adding that the information comprised of a variety of different types of documents, from different types of institutions that are associated with the election campaign, some quite unexpected angles that are quite interesting, some even entertaining. WATCH HERE starting at 3 AM EST:Via: Infowars | 0 |
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