Unnamed: 0 int64 | title string | text string | label int64 |
|---|---|---|---|
5,300 | New Russian ambassador to U.S. calls for resumed military contacts | MOSCOW (Reuters) - Moscow and Washington should re-establish direct contacts between their military and foreign policy chiefs, Russia’s new ambassador to Washington, Anatoly Antonov, said on Wednesday. “The time has come to resume joint meetings of Russia’s and the United States’ foreign and defence ministers in a ‘two plus two’ format,” Antonov said in an interview published on the Kommersant business daily’s web site. Military contacts between Moscow and Washington were frozen in 2014 due to the Ukraine crisis. Antonov also called for meetings between the heads of Russia’s Federal Security Service and Foreign Intelligence Service and the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation and Central Intelligence Agency. A “working cooperation” between Russia’s Security Council and the U.S. National Security Council could also help fight terrorism, cyber threats and help strategic stability, he said. Antonov, a former deputy foreign minister, is subject to European sanctions over his role in the conflict in Ukraine. (This story has been refiled to remove an extraneous word in first paragraph) | 1 |
5,301 | Abe hails 'fresh start' to Japan-China ties after Xi meeting | DANANG, Vietnam (Reuters) - Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Chinese President Xi Jinping hailed a fresh start to the relationship between the countries after a meeting that saw them agree to work more closely on North Korea. The leaders met on the sidelines of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in the Vietnamese resort city of Danang. Ties between China and Japan, the world s second- and third-largest economies, have been plagued by a long-running territorial dispute over a cluster of East China Sea islets. At the end of the meeting, President Xi said this is a meeting that marks a fresh start of relations between Japan and China. I totally feel the same way, Abe told reporters. Abe said he has proposed visiting China at an appropriate time, which would then be followed by a Xi visit to Japan. At the meeting, the two countries agreed to deepen their cooperation on North Korea and to hold a trilateral summit with South Korea at the earliest possible date. With the North Korea situation at an important phase, the role China ought to play is very big, Abe said. China and Japan have also agreed to accelerate talks for an early implementation of a communication mechanism between their military forces, Abe said. He also proposed that Japan and China cooperate in doing business in third countries. China s statement about the meeting, released by the official Xinhua news agency, cited Xi as telling Abe that stable relations were in both sides interests, and that they must make unremitting efforts to continue improving ties. The two countries must take constructive steps to appropriately manage and control disputes that exist between the two countries , Xi added. | 1 |
5,302 | Trump says he is close to picking new FBI director, Lieberman among top candidates | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump said on Thursday he was close to selecting a new FBI director and that former senator and Democratic vice presidential candidate Joe Lieberman was among the top candidates. Speaking to reporters at the beginning of a meeting with President Juan Manuel Santos of Colombia, Trump said: “We’re very close” to picking an FBI director. Asked if Lieberman was one of his top candidates, Trump said: “He is.” | 1 |
5,303 | Three U.S. Army Special Forces soldiers killed in Niger: New York Times | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Three U.S. Army Special Forces soldiers were killed and two were wounded in an ambush in Niger on Wednesday while on a routine patrol with Nigerien troops they were training, the New York Times reported, citing U.S. military officials. Earlier, a spokesman for U.S. Africa Command said a joint U.S.-Nigerien patrol had come under hostile fire in southwest Niger. | 1 |
5,304 | new earthquake strikes central italy | washington free beacon october
cnn commentator angela rye on wednesday blamed the failure of republicans to repeal and replace obamacare for the newly announced doubledigit premium increases in the presidents signature health care law
its not just hillary clinton that needs to tackle this but also congress rye said on cnns new day the reason we are in the position that we are in right now frankly alisyn is because republicans fell short of their promise to repeal which is what they said they wanted to do and replace
host alisyn camerota stopped rye before she got any further and reminded her that president obama had promised premiums would go down
most states will see health care premiums under the affordable care act increase by an average of percent according to data released this week by the obama administration indiana will see its rates slightly go down but other states like arizona will see costs skyrocket by percent members of the administration have been quick to soften the blow of the increase by reminding people that a majority of those on the obamacare exchanges would be receiving tax credits to help pay for the now more expensive health insurance plans | 0 |
5,305 | THE LEFT LOSES AGAIN: Third Quarter Economic Estimate Explodes! | The news that the forecast for the third quarter GDP is set to expand to 4.0 will be bad news for the Democrats who are trying to take down President Trump. It will be ignored by the mainstream media who are focused on statues and protests.This should be great news for Trump s economic team of brilliant and successful businessmen but even greater news for ALL Americans! MAGA!REUTERS REPORTED: The U.S. economy is on track to expand at a 4.0 percent annualized pace in the third quarter with inventory investment contributing 1.12 percentage points to growth, the Atlanta Federal Reserve s GDP Now forecast model showed on Thursday.Last Friday, the government said its first reading on the gross domestic product in the second quarter was a 2.6 percent growth pace, which was 0.2 point below Atlanta Fed s final estimate.A PRO-GROWTH PRESIDENT FINALLY!President Trump has unleashed the beast ! Pro-growth and less regulation within industry in America has allowed our economy to nearly double the GDP within the president s first year Amazing!The coal industry is back along with the steel industry. Ripping away unnecessary regulations is the key to growth. Trump knows how to get America back to work and how to help industry do that.WHILE THE LEFT PROTESTS PRETTY MUCH EVERYTHING TRUMP WINS!When President Trump was campaigning to Make America Great Again, so many of us understood that this meant bringing back growth to our economy. A successful America is great for everyone! Those who don t have a political agenda understand this is a win-win no matter who you are.THIS IS EXACTLY WHY TRUMP WON! | 0 |
5,306 | Donald Trump Was Tweeting Again Last Night; He’s Furious About The Russian Leaks | Donald Trump was away for a bit over a week, which seemed to take his mind off the American media. He returned, however, to find a media firestorm over a story that is only getting worse; his son-in-law Jared Kushner is a person of interest in the FBI s investigation into Russian collusion, and the only defense, according to Trump, is that the media is fake. It is my opinion that many of the leaks coming out of the White House are fabricated lies made up by the #FakeNews media. Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 28, 2017Whenever you see the words sources say in the fake news media, and they don t mention names . Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 28, 2017Whenever you see the words sources say in the fake news media, and they don t mention names . Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 28, 2017 .it is very possible that those sources don t exist but are made up by fake news writers. #FakeNews is the enemy! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 28, 2017The response is to a story that surfaced on Friday night saying that Kushner may have tried to set up a private channel between Russia and the Trump administration, before Trump took office.The White House was trying to figure out how to respond to reports that Mr. Kushner had spoken in December with Russia s ambassador, Sergey I. Kislyak, about establishing a secret channel between his father-in-law s transition team and Moscow to discuss the war in Syria and other issues. The Washington Post first reported on the suggestion on Friday, and three people informed about it confirmed it to The New York Times.Source: New York TimesRather than deny the validity of the story, though, Trump, like always attacked the messenger. Yes, the story does attribute anonymous sources, but if you recall, Richard Nixon was taken down by an anonymous source.Featured image via Mark Wilson/Getty Images. | 0 |
5,307 | WATCH: Penn Jillette’s Newest Card Trick PERFECTLY Illustrates How Trump Runs His Campaign | Penn Jillette doesn t want Donald Trump to run for president, and apparently, neither does Bloomberg News. They asked Penn to create a new card trick representing Trump s campaign, and it apparently only took him a few seconds to do so, because that s how much of a disaster Trump s campaign is.He starts with a deck of cards and it seems like an ordinary, pick a card, stick it back in the deck and I ll find it card trick. He then explains how all the shuffling cards while talking around is misdirection, and uses that as an analogy for many of Trump s outlandish statements.The video even shows Trump making some of his idiotic statements and lies, like his repeated attacks on the Khan family, his misogynistic blood coming out of her wherever slam of Megyn Kelly, and his claim that he wouldn t lose support even if he shot someone in the middle of 5th Avenue.But it s the trick itself, and the ending that are the real gems of the video. Watch below:Trump s campaign isn t a train wreck waiting to happen, it s a flat-out train wreck, especially given the week he s had. Come November, his campaign will end the same way this card trick does.Featured image via screen capture from embedded video | 0 |
5,308 | Ohio judge rules in favor of 17-year-olds wanting to vote | CLEVELAND (Reuters) - An Ohio judge ruled Friday teenagers celebrating their 18th birthday before November’s election are entitled to have their votes for presidential nominees counted in next week’s state primary. “Plaintiffs are entitled to a judgment that the secretary abused his discretion,” Franklin County Common Pleas Judge Richard Frye said in his ruling about Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted. Husted reversed an earlier decision to appeal, saying he would not after hearing the case would only be heard a day before the election, leaving the state little time to properly carry out the election. “Even if we were to prevail, there is no effective way to responsibly make the changes necessary to implement an orderly election,” he said. Nine teenagers from across the state claimed in a lawsuit this week that Hustle’s interpretation of state law that eliminated their voting rights was incorrect. The judge said his decision affected “potentially thousands of other 17-year-old voters still eager to participate at next week’s primary election.” He said no secretary of state between 1981 and 2012 had ever adopted the reading of state law he was now overturning. Husted in December modified the state’s election manual to say 17-year-olds are allowed only to nominate candidates but are prohibited from voting for presidential delegates because they are elected, not nominated, according to the lawsuit. The teenagers argued Husted’s interpretation contradicts state law and a previous ruling by the state Supreme Court that allows 17-year-olds who will be 18 by the election to vote in primaries. Alexis Brossart, a 17-year-old student at Milford High School outside Cincinnati, was excited to vote until she got a letter last week saying she could not pick a presidential nominee. “I registered in February. Ever since February, I’ve been excited to vote,” Brossart told Reuters. The attorney for the nine teenagers said they were galvanized when they heard their votes would not count. “It has caused them to think about their voting rights and get more engaged in the process,” Rachel Bloomekatz said. A similar lawsuit filed in federal court by the campaign of Democrat presidential contender Bernie Sanders was halted on Friday when U.S. District Magistrate Judge Elizabeth Preston Deavers stayed the matter until the state court finding. In the Ohio primary, 66 delegates are at stake for the Republicans and 159 for the Democrats. | 1 |
5,309 | Supreme Court tosses Republican-drawn North Carolina voting districts | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday ruled that Republicans in North Carolina unlawfully took race into consideration when drawing congressional district boundaries, concentrating black voters in an improper bid to diminish their statewide political clout. The justices upheld a lower court’s February 2016 ruling that threw out two majority-black U.S. House of Representatives districts because Republican lawmakers improperly used race as a factor when redrawing the legislative map after the 2010 census. The decision came in one of a number of lawsuits accusing Republicans of taking steps at the state level to disenfranchise black and other minority voters who tend to back Democratic candidates. The justices found that the manner in which the North Carolina voting district boundaries were sketched violated the U.S. Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection under the law. The ruling may offer a roadmap for challenging similarly drawn districts nationwide. The justices unanimously upheld the lower court on one of the districts and split 5-3 on the other, with three conservatives dissenting. “The North Carolina Republican legislature tried to rig congressional elections by drawing unconstitutional districts that discriminated against African-Americans and that’s wrong,” said North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper, a Democrat took office in January. Critics accused Republicans of cramming black voters into what the NAACP civil rights group called “apartheid voting districts” to diminish their voting power and make surrounding districts more white and more likely to support Republicans. Both districts are held by the Democrats. Of North Carolina’s 13 representatives in the U.S. House, 10 are Republican. “I don’t know how any legislature can perform this task when the rules change constantly from case to case, often after the fact,” Robin Hayes, chairman of the state Republican Party, said of redistricting. Democrats have accused Republicans of taking a number of actions at the state level, also including laws imposing new requirements on voters such as presenting certain types of government-issued identification, in a bid to suppress the vote of minorities, the poor and others who generally favor Democratic candidates. Republicans have said the laws are needed to prevent voter fraud. Race can be considered in redrawing boundaries of voting districts only in certain instances, such as when states are seeking to comply with the federal Voting Rights Act. That law protects minority voters and was enacted to address a history of racial discrimination in voting, especially in Southern states. Eric Holder, who was U.S. attorney general under President Barack Obama and now heads the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, a group backing Democrats in redistricting fights, welcomed the decision. “Today’s ruling sends a stark message to legislatures and governors around the country: Racial gerrymandering is illegal and will be struck down in a court of law,” Holder said, referring to altering political boundaries to give a party an unfair advantage. The ruling was a rebuke to North Carolina Republicans but the districts in question have already been re-drawn. The new districts already have been challenged in court. The Supreme Court has never said legislative districts cannot be mapped based on plainly partisan aims like maximizing one party’s election chances. North Carolina Republicans said one of the two districts, called the 12th congressional district, was drawn on purely partisan grounds to benefit Republicans at the expense of Democrats, and the other was drawn to comply with the demands of the Voting Rights Act. The split among the justices was over the 12th district. Conservative Justice Samuel Alito wrote in dissent that the court should have followed an earlier precedent in which a previous version of the same district was challenged. “A precedent of this court should not be treated like a disposable household item — say a paper plate or a napkin — to be used once and then tossed in the trash,” Alito wrote. Writing for the court’s majority, liberal Justice Elena Kagan countered that evidence at trial “adequately supports the conclusion that race, not politics, accounted for the district’s reconfiguration.” Conservative Clarence Thomas, the court’s only black justice, joined Kagan’s ruling. Justice Neil Gorsuch, who had not yet joined the court when it heard arguments in the case in December, did not participate. The justices last week rebuffed a Republican bid to revive a strict North Carolina voter-identification law that a lower court found deliberately discriminated against black voters. The Supreme Court in 2013 struck down a key part of the Voting Rights Act in a ruling driven by its conservative justices. Since then it has faulted some Republican redistricting efforts for racial reasons. In 2015, the Supreme Court ruled that Alabama’s Republican-backed legislature improperly crammed black voters into certain districts. The justices on March 1 ordered a lower court to reassess whether Virginia’s Republican-led legislature unlawfully tried to dilute the power of black voters. The justices threw out the lower court’s decision upholding 12 state legislature districts. | 1 |
5,310 | Factbox: Trump names executives, labor officials to manufacturing jobs council | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump on Friday said he was launching a manufacturing jobs initiative and named a group of U.S. business executives and labor union officials to help with the effort, the White House said in a statement. Participants include: Bill Brown, CEO of Harris Corp Michael Dell, CEO of Dell Technologies John Ferriola, CEO of Nucor Corp Jeff Fettig, CEO of Whirlpool Corp Mark Fields, CEO of Ford Motor Co Ken Frazier, CEO of Merck & Co Inc Alex Gorsky, CEO of Johnson & Johnson Greg Hayes, CEO of United Technologies Corp Marillyn Hewson, CEO of Lockheed Martin Corp Jeff Immelt, CEO of General Electric Co Jim Kamsickas, CEO of Dana Inc Klaus Kleinfeld, CEO of Arconic Inc Brian Krzanich, CEO of Intel Corp Rich Kyle, CEO of Timken Co Thea Lee, Deputy Chief of Staff of AFL-CIO Andrew Liveris, Chief Executive of Dow Chemical Co Mario Longhi, CEO of U.S. Steel Corp Denise Morrison, CEO of Campbell Soup Co Dennis Muilenburg, CEO of Boeing Co Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla Motors Inc Doug Oberhelman, former CEO of Caterpillar Inc Scott Paul, Alliance for American Manufacturing Kevin Plank, CEO of Under Armour Inc Mike Polk, CEO of Newell Brands Inc Mark Sutton, CEO of International Paper Co Inge Thulin, CEO of 3M Co Richard Trumka, President of the AFL-CIO Wendell Weeks, CEO of Corning Inc | 1 |
5,311 | Ohio's 'dirty little secret': blue-collar Democrats for Trump | CANTON, Ohio (Reuters) - If Donald Trump wins the Republican Party nomination, his path to the White House will run through this working-class city with a knack for picking presidents. No Republican has ever won the White House without Ohio. And nowhere better reflects the challenges and opportunities Trump faces in his 2016 presidential quest than Canton, a once-booming industrial city that, like Ohio and the rest of America’s rust belt, is going through profound economic and demographic change. Canton, a gritty northeastern Ohio city where the once-dominant steel industry has been in decline for 20 years, is the heart of Stark County, a political bellwether that, save twice, has picked every winning presidential candidate since 1964. The real-estate mogul’s primary wins in Michigan and in Mississippi on Tuesday, in the face of blistering attacks from the party’s establishment, expanded his lead in the White House nominating race and demonstrated his broad appeal across many demographic groups in the Republican Party. But here, in predominately white Canton, the birthplace of professional American football, he will need to show cross-over appeal in the general election and win over not just Republicans but working-class Democrats and some independents, to beat a Democrat, illustrating the challenge he will face in Ohio and potentially other Midwestern “rust belt” states. A more immediate test looms next week in the state’s Republican primary, where polls show Trump narrowly leads Ohio Governor John Kasich, who casts himself as a pragmatic, statesman-like alternative to Trump. If Trump wins Ohio and Florida — states rich in the delegates who select their party’s nominee at July’s Republican National Convention - he would almost certainly lock up his party’s nomination. Sitting in a steel workers’ meeting at their Canton union hall, Curtis Green, the chapter’s vice president, described Trump’s support among a growing number of members as their “dirty little secret.” “I view him as a radical and a racist and I don’t want to be affiliated with that,” Green said. “But if you say what you mean, a lot of guys see that in Trump and they respect that. He doesn’t dance around the issues, he takes them head on. There are a fair amount of our members who do support Donald Trump.” If Trump just wins the states that Republican nominee Mitt Romney won in 2012, he would have only 206 electoral college votes, short of the 270 needed to win the White House. The fight over electoral college votes has turned recent elections into pitched battles over a dozen or so states. Ohio is often at the center. The state, which has not voted for the loser in a presidential election since 1960, is seen as a microcosm of American swing voters — from culturally conservative “Reagan Democrats” who defected from their party to support Republican Ronald Reagan in the 1980s to suburban soccer moms and upwardly mobile Hispanics. To offset the growing proportion of blacks and Hispanics in the voting age population, Trump must turn white voters out in greater numbers than Romney in cities such as Canton. His performance in primary states where Democrats and independent can vote, as well as Republicans, suggests Trump could attract large numbers of these voters in a general election. Reuters interviews here with more than two dozen voters show why. In this city of 72,500 people, Trump’s denunciation of free trade, political correctness and illegal immigrants is resonating among some traditionally Democratic blue-collar steel workers. “The labor unions, who usually support the Democrats, a lot of our members, and a lot of their families, are supporting Trump,” said Keith Strobelt, a political director for the United Steelworkers local union in Canton. Strobelt does not support Trump. Canton’s local United Steelworkers union has 1,800 members - down from 6,700 at its peak 30 years ago. Its leadership has not officially endorsed a candidate, thought it has praised Democrat Senator Bernie Sanders. Some rank-and-file members, however, say they better identify with Trump’s broadsides against illegal immigration and tirades against trade with China and Mexico. “It could be that several hundred of our members will back Trump,” Strobelt said. “A lot find him refreshing. He says a lot of things they say around their dinner tables.” But in a general election, Trump faces formidable odds in Canton, as he does across Ohio and the Midwest. Canton and the region is changing in ways that favor Democrats, reflecting the Republican Party’s broader problems with a U.S. electorate that is becoming less white and less culturally conservative. In 2000, Canton was nearly 75 percent white, with an African American population of 20 percent, and an Hispanic population of just over 1 percent. Its biggest employer was the Timken Company, a giant ball bearing and high custom steel manufacturer that was the dominant economic force in Canton for much of the 20th century. By 2010, according to Census data, Canton was 69 percent white. Its black population had increased by 3 percent, its Hispanic residents to nearly 3 percent. Tuesday’s primary in neighboring Michigan showed how volatile this election has become, with Trump’s potent appeal among disaffected whites stretching beyond the South. In the Democratic race, Sanders won most of the state’s white working-class countryside and small towns in an upset over front-runner Hillary Clinton. In Canton, like elsewhere in the “rust belt” heartlands stretching from the Midwest to the Great Lakes region and parts of the Northeast, manufacturing has been hollowed out since the 1970s, due in part to foreign competition. In 1990, Ohio had over 1 million manufacturing jobs; today, just 680,000, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Ohio has shed nearly 200,000 manufacturing jobs since the 2007-2009 Great Recession. A different type of worker, more white collar and upscale, has moved into the Canton area. The top two employers are now the Aultman Hospital and Mercy Medical Center, highly competitive health care providers. “While Trump might pick up blue collar Democrats, and older folks who are disillusioned with the political process, the flip side is he could lose more upper-status voters in Ohio,” said John Green, a political science professor at the University of Akron, close to Canton. “Republican Party leaders in Ohio are wringing their hands. There is a perception that Trump helps among blue collar voters - but could alienate white collar voters.” Jane Timken, the vice-chair of the Stark County Republican Party and the wife of TimkenSteel’s chief executive, said the local party was encountering people who had never voted Republican before but were supporting Trump. But, she said, there was concern Trump might turn off other voters, especially independents who account for one fifth of Ohio’s voters. There is no polling to predict which way Canton and Stark County will vote in November’s general election. But after a long era of mixed local government, the city council, after elections last year, is now made up of entirely Democratic Party members, although the current mayor, a former Democrat, won office as an independent. In Canton, there are nearly 6,000 voters registered as Democrats, compared to just over 1,100 Republicans according to the Stark County Board of Elections. In 2006, there were 12,000 registered Democrats and 4,400 Republicans. Democratic strategists say that despite the demographic changes, Trump could still prevail. Mary Anne Marsh, a Democratic strategist, cites Trump’s dominant performance in the Republican primary in Massachusetts on March 1. Although not a rust belt state, Trump won big in heavily blue collar, union cities. “Trump put together a coalition in Massachusetts that elects Democratic governors. He won among Catholics, a week after picking a fight with the Pope. I absolutely think he can put the rust belt into play,” she said. | 1 |
5,312 | North Korean nuclear test prompts global condemnation | LONDON (Reuters) - North Korea s biggest nuclear test to date was condemned around the world on Sunday, with several leaders calling for new sanctions and U.S. President Donald Trump saying appeasement would not work. The explosion of what North Korea said was an advanced hydrogen bomb came just days after it fired a missile over Japan. Trump, who said after last week s missile launch that talking to Pyongyang is not the answer , tweeted that Sunday s test showed North Korea s words and actions continue to be very hostile and dangerous to the United States . U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin said he would put together new sanctions to potentially cut off all North Korea s global trade. German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron said they planned to tighten European Union sanctions. This latest provocation by the ruler in Pyongyang has reached a new dimension, the German government said in a statement after Merkel and Macron discussed the issue by phone. Britain s foreign minister Boris Johnson said: They (North Korea) seem to be moving closer towards a hydrogen bomb which, if fitted to a successful missile, would unquestionably present a new order of threat, adding that there were no palatable military solutions. British Prime Minister Theresa May said the U.N. Security Council should urgently look at new measures. Russia struck a cautious tone. In the emerging conditions it is absolutely essential to keep cool, refrain from any actions that could lead to a further escalation of tensions, Russia s foreign ministry said, adding that North Korea risked serious consequences . Later on Sunday, Russian President Vladimir Putin met his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping in China where they agreed to appropriately deal with the crisis, Chinese state news agency Xinhua said. The two leaders agreed to stick to the goal of denuclearization on the Korean Peninsula and keep close communication and coordination to deal with the new situation, Xinhua said. Earlier, China urged North Korea to stop wrong actions and said it would fully enforce U.N. resolutions on the country. As North Korea s most important trading partner, the position of China - a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council - will be closely watched. A Japanese government source said there would be pressure on Beijing to impose an oil embargo. They will probably act eventually but ... it is possible that will not be before their October (party) convention, the source said. Russia does not have real influence on North Korea. It s China that matters. Trump said North Korea had become a great threat and embarrassment to China and that Beijing had tried but failed to solve the problem. What he called South Korea s talk of appeasement would not work as they (the North Koreans) only understand one thing! The International Atomic Energy Agency, which has no access to North Korea, called the nuclear test, Pyongyang s sixth since 2006, an extremely regrettable act that was in complete disregard of the repeated demands of the international community . | 1 |
5,313 | WATCH: We Found Donald Trump’s Campaign Theme Song (VIDEO) | Way back in 1998, when Fox s MadTV was still on the air, an actress/singer named Nicole Sullivan performed a three-minute comedy sketch that so accurately predicts the Donald Trump campaign, we just had to write about it.For the sketch, Sullivan adopted the character of Darlene McBride, a huge-haired country music singer, who is promoting her upcoming Take Back America tour.As the video opens, Sullivan s character can be seen strumming her guitar, while belting out the words to her new song, Take Back America. Take back America to 1955, she sings. Take back America to when god was still alive. As the music fades into the background, McBride is seen sitting at a mirrored dressing table, dressed in camo, an American flag displayed proudly on the shoulder of her military fatigues. Truer words were never spoken, or sung, she says.She then introduces herself. Hi, I m Darlene McBride. You know I love this country, the way it used to be, simple-minded, with simple values, simple people. But then the big government, the Supreme Court and those bleeding heart liberals just couldn t leave well enough alone. And now look at it? A big, ugly melting pot just boilin over on what used to be a nice, white stove. From there, McBride goes on to talk about her upcoming tour, where she says she ll be coming to a city near you, to sing traditional songs with traditional values. She then provides the audience with a few samples tunes that you can hear during the tour.For starters, there s a little ditty called The Lord Loves the NRA. The lord loves the NRA, he told me so the other day. He spelled it out in bullets in the sky. He s sitting up in heaven with his AK 47. He s a rough-and-ready, macho kind of guy. Then there s the song called The Back of the Bus.Leading into that one she says Excuse me Mr. Negro, but I ve got a question to ask you. She then breaks into the song, asking in the lyrics, What s so bad about the back of the bus? Next up is a song called Nothing Would Be Finer. Nothing would be finer than to drop a bomb on Chiner in the morning. She also has a song about illegal immigration called Hey Senorita.To be fair, all of the songs in this sketch would work for any GOP candidate, not just Trump. The NRA lovin , republican-Jesus fearin racists and warmongers that vote for them would likely never realize they were listening to a musical parody of themselves.Watch the MadTV video below, courtesy of Migrainemaker on YouTube.While the sketch might seem like it was written to mock today s Teapublican Trump supporters, it s actually 18 years old.It goes to show, no matter how much time passes, the republican party does not change. It s the same today as it was almost twenty years ago, and will most likely be twenty years from now.Featured image credit: video screen capture, MadTV via Migrainemaker on youtube | 0 |
5,314 | no title | obama himself denied any knowledge of the server i should believe him because he said we could keep our same doctor and its called affordable care act yup i should believe him | 1 |
5,315 | FREAK OUT: Republicans Will HATE That This Famous Liberal Actor Is Going To Play Ronald Reagan | Comedian and actor Will Ferrell has been cast as former President Ronald Reagan in an upcoming movie. The former Saturday Night Live cast member is known to be a liberal, and was a supporter of President Obama. Now he will be portraying arguably the biggest icon of the conservative movement.Sources tell Variety Ferrell is attached to star as President Ronald Reagan in the Black List script Reagan. Penned by Mike Rosolio, the story begins at the start of the ex-president s second term when he falls into dementia and an ambitious intern is tasked with convincing the commander-in-chief that he is an actor playing the president in a movie.The script was so popular following its announcement on the Black List, an annual catalog of the top unproduced scripts in Hollywood, that a live read was done recently done in March starring Lena Dunham and John Cho.Ferrell s iconic portrayal of George W. Bush on SNL was a key part of the cultural zeitgeist, cementing the image of Bush as a slow-witted, unintelligent buffoon with large segments of the public. Ferrell s version of Bush, along with Phil Hartman s interpretations of Reagan and Bill Clinton, is often seen as one of the best such parodies in the show s history. Ferrell also appeared as Bush on Broadway, in the production You re Welcome, America. Ferrell has also appeared in several movies that have progressive themes that also lampoon conservatives. The Other Guys cast Wall Street raiders as the bad guys, ripping off police pensions; The Campaign lampooned right-wing billionaires who meddle in politics, like the Koch Brothers; and Get Hard again showcased the elite 1% as heartless bad guys, while the working class character is the ultimate hero. Several of Ferrell s films are directed by Big Short director Adam McKay, which of course is another film about the super-rich soaking the rest of America.Ferrell also starred in one of the most popular videos posted on YouTube by the Obama campaign (over 5 million views), where he promised to do anything in exchange for a vote to re-elect the president:Featured image via YouTube | 0 |
5,316 | Trump Whines Pathetically On Twitter Because His Crazy ‘Healthcare’ Bill Is Dead In The Water | Well, it seems that despite the efforts of notoriously crafty Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, the GOP s massive tax cut for the rich healthcare bill is dead for now. Senator John McCain (R-AZ) is out for emergency surgery we wish him well, of course and Senator Susan Collins (R-ME) and Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) were already hard NO! votes. Then, late Monday night, Senators Mike Lee (R-UT) and Jerry Moran (R-KS) came out against the bill as well. Each Senator had his or her own reasons for opposing McConnell, but those reasons matter not for now. The votes to pass this disastrous piece of legislation simply are not there.Of course, upon hearing that he was, once again about to be humiliated on one of his signature campaign promises, Donald Trump took to Twitter to fume about the bill s failure in the Senate. He tweeted that he wants to simply repeal the Affordable Care Act now and rip healthcare away from millions. He also said the unthinkable in this hyper-partisan environment: Work with Democrats. Here is his tweet:Republicans should just REPEAL failing ObamaCare now & work on a new Healthcare Plan that will start from a clean slate. Dems will join in! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 18, 2017Now, we all know that McConnell knows that Trump is a fool, and he will likely not heed anything Trump has to say. But this just goes to show two things: 1) Republicans cannot govern their way out of a paper bag, even when they control the entire government, and 2) Trump, once again, shows poor impulse control on Twitter, as well as a woefully inept understanding of the workings on the legislative branch of the government he now supposedly runs.Either way, these tweets are whiny, pathetic, and like something you d see from a child. Oh well. Elect a child, expect tantrums.Featured image via Mark Wilson/Getty Images | 0 |
5,317 | LIB PROFESSOR AND HARVARD GRAD SAYS PEDOPHILIA IS NOT A CRIME…Read Why… | Perhaps if one of her children or a close relative was sexually abused by a pedophile, she may not be so generous with her assessment of these criminals Margo Kaplan is not very popular today. In the Monday edition of the New York Times, the Rutgers-Camden law professor, an NYU and Harvard graduate, takes to the op-ed pages to argue that we ve got it all wrong when it comes to pedophilia. She writes that pedophiles don t necessarily turn out to be child molesters and that pedophilia is not a choice, i.e. a pedophile might be born that way. We reached her in her office in Camden to discuss.You really lit up the comments section of the op-ed page today. Yes, but I have to be honest. I am getting more emails of support than I ever expected. I m shocked. I expected to get maybe 95% negative emails, but I ve gotten so many positive ones. The online comments, though, are pretty uniformly negative, and a lot of people haven t even read the article.I know your pain. Who are you getting these positive emails from?A lot of people I don t even know. There s a former prosecutor, a judge, a nurse. Individuals with family members who have pedophilia.How much of the population has pedophilia?We re not entirely sure, but the estimates are around one-percent of the male population, and those in the female population are assumed to be much smaller. As far as the number of people with pedophilia who do sex offend and who do not, there are a lot of assumptions but very little data, because we have very little treatment, very little information.Why is that?There is so much stigma. There is very little reason to come forth and identify as a pedophile. There are no large scale studies, no large treatment programs, no big research studies on this. I contacted the National Institutes of Health, and they don t spend any money on pedophilia.But you are basically saying, hey, let s take it easy on pedophiles. Well, but I am not saying that about sex offenders. I say that they remain responsible for their conduct. We need to treat pedophiles before they offend. People see the word pedophile and think sex offender. People choose to sex offend children. They do not choose to be pedophiles.Since you say there are so many misconceptions, why don t you tell us what a pedophile really is.A person with an intense and recurrent sexual attraction to prepubescent children, children who have not yet entered any form of puberty. And according to the DSM [Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders], it constitutes a mental disorder when you act on it, but not just that. It also constitutes a mental disorder if it causes marked distress or interpersonal difficulty, and, as you can imagine, pedophilia will cause this.In your article, you open by saying that as a pedophile s numerical age increases into teenage years and then adulthood, the numerical age of those he is attracted to does not. Are most pedophiles really starting that young?For many individuals, it is really an onset in adolescence, similar to how many sexual attractions happen. Individuals who are heterosexual, you realize you are attracted to the opposite sex when you are a kid. For a pedophile, you get older, but you keep being attracted to little kids, and many people start to realize this during adolescence. So imagine trying to deal with that during adolescence in addition to the other confusing feelings that you re having.If America is totally off course on this issue, is there any country that is getting it right? We re not that unique. But Germany is ahead of the curve. They have a large scale treatment program called Prevention Project Dunkenfeld, which is probably the first large scale treatment project that also includes non-offenders. They have billboards everywhere: Do you have attraction to children in ways that you shouldn t? You are not responsible for your attraction, but you are responsible for your behavior. OK, so as a guy with two young kids, how do I protect them? There s no easy answer to that, but you want to protect them from sex offenders. Most people who offend are not actually pedophiles. It s interesting: When you talk about pedophiles, people think about the children. And they re right. But what about the children who are struggling with this disorder? We need to help them, too.But you can understand if maybe I ll just try to keep them away from pedophiles anyway. I can understand that. We need to prevent pedophiles from sexually offending and to do that, we need to refocus on early intervention, treatment and prevention. It s not always going to work. No treatment of any mental disorder will always work. Depression treatment, schizophrenia treatment they don t always work. But we don t throw our hands into the air and wait until the consequences of those conditions become bad before we do something. With pedophiles, we ve already thrown our hands into the air. We should not be taking this tactic. The dire consequences only make it more important that we reach out and treat early.Via: Phillymag.com | 0 |
5,318 | Brazil police raid homes of two lawmakers in bribery probe | BRAS LIA (Reuters) - Brazilian police raided the offices and homes of two members of Congress on Wednesday in the country s latest corruption probe as the government makes a last-ditch effort to vote on an overhaul of the national pension system. Dubbed Operation pia, the probe centers on alleged bribery of civil servants and politicians in return for rigged bids on road work totaling 850 million reais ($258 million) in the state of Tocantins in central Brazil. Federal police said in a statement they were serving 16 search warrants and delivering subpoenas to eight people in connection with the probe. Dulce Miranda and Carlos Gaguim, lawmakers from Tocantins, are implicated in the investigation, police said. Gaguim denied any wrongdoing, noting the accusations against him are baseless. Miranda s representatives said she would cooperate with the investigation. President Michel Temer has said the lower house of Congress would vote by Tuesday on his proposed pension reform, which many consider crucial to reining in Brazil s surging public debt, or the debate will have to wait until next year. | 1 |
5,319 | MARK STEYN ON CNN EXTORTION: Wolf Blitzer Has Put A Horse’s Head In Some Guy’s Bed | Mark Steyn joined Tucker Carlson tonight to discuss the threat from CNN to the guy who made the video of President Trump wrestling with the CNN logo (see below) Wolf Blitzer Has Put A Horse s Head In Some Guy s Bed Mark SteynOUR PREVIOUS REPORTS ON THE CNN EXTORTION: The hosts of New Day dug a deeper hole for CNN on Wednesday when they said that the network would not identify the Reddit user behind the viral video of President Trump wrestling a man with CNN s logo imposed over his face because he apologized. CNN had previously written that it had decided not to publicly identify the man because he was a private citizen who showed remorse, but reserves the right to publish his identity should any of that change: THAT S BLACKMAIL!Sooo if this guy behaves according to CNN then they won t out him to the world Nice threat!In case you missed it Here s our previous report on this viral video: CNN reported that they declined to expose a private citizen who made the WWE video of President Trump wrestling with a CNN logo if the guy promises not to do it again: CNN reserves the right to publish his identity should any of that change. This is blackmail right?#FraudNewsCNN #FNN pic.twitter.com/WYUnHjjUjg Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 2, 2017The hysterical video has been seen over 1 million times after it was tweeted out by President Trump. It was produced by a Reddit user who is private:Soon after the CNN statement, twitter was abuzz over the fact that CNN was extorting this private citizen:DONALD TRUMP JR RETWEETED THE THREAT:CONGRESSMAN SCOTT TAYLOR TWEETED OUT:@CNN U basically coerce apology & threaten release of identity if something changes? Pretty sure a line is crossed here. #CNNBlackmail https://t.co/k4W9AepP6W Scott Taylor (@Scotttaylorva) July 5, 2017#CNNBLACKMAIL IS TRENDING WORLDIWIDE!What CNN thought was a gotcha moment turned putto backfire on them. It s being reported that the private Reddit user who made the WWE video is only 15-years old! | 0 |
5,320 | Factbox: Gorsuch fight puts long-held Senate tradition at stake | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republicans are poised to repeal a U.S. Senate rule that allows minority-party Democrats to block confirmation of Supreme Court nominees, including President Donald Trump’s choice of Neil Gorsuch for the lifetime post. The expected rule change, amid deepening partisanship in a chamber known as “the world’s greatest deliberative body,” is raising questions over whether there could be a future move to prohibit “filibusters” on legislation. Here is how the filibuster has been used and what curtailing it could mean: It is a procedural move, often by a minority of senators, to block legislation or Supreme Court nominations that typically enjoy the support of majority-party senators, in this case, Republicans. According to Senate historians, “filibuster” comes from a Dutch word meaning “pirate.” The practice became popular in the 1850s and was also used by House of Representatives members, until that body became so large with an expanding U.S. population as to require stricter rules governing floor debates. Senate Democrats have gathered more than the 41 votes they need in the 100-seat chamber to mount a filibuster against Gorsuch, a conservative appeals court judge. The first U.S. president is said to have observed that the Senate was created to cool legislation from the hot-tempered House just as a saucer was used to cool hot tea. The filibuster is just such a coolant. When a bill or Supreme Court nomination hits the Senate floor, senators who oppose it can talk until at least 60 senators band together to limit debate. That gives a minority of senators huge power. If a bill or a nomination fails to draw the needed 60 votes, it is effectively killed. The all-time record for a Senate filibuster speech - 24 hours, 18 minutes - was set by the late segregationist Senator Strom Thurmond, who tried unsuccessfully in 1957 to kill a civil rights bill. This week, Democratic Senator Jeff Merkley delivered the eighth-longest speech, against Gorsuch, that was 15 hours, 26 minutes. It is Senate slang for banning filibusters through a rules change by the majority party. In recent years, as filibusters have added to Senate gridlock, there have been threats to execute the nuclear option. Groups of senators, known as “gangs,” have sometimes defused the threats. In 2013, Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid deployed the nuclear option when he became fed up with Republican filibusters against then-President Barack Obama’s nominees. He changed Senate rules to ban filibusters against the president’s judicial and executive-branch nominees but left it in place for Supreme Court appointees. Now, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Republican, is thought to be ready to expand the ban to Supreme Court nominees. McConnell has told reporters he will not broaden the ban on filibusters to legislation and does not believe Republican senators would want to do that. Some political scientists think Democrats have more to gain than Republicans by ending filibusters on legislation. “My sense has always been that Democratic policy priorities have suffered more from the filibuster than Republican priorities,” said George Washington University political science professor Sarah Binder. That is because Democrats are more likely than Republicans to back an expansion of government programs, which generally requires legislation. But Binder said she could imagine Democrats or Republicans trying to score a major win on an issue central to their constituencies. For Democrats: No filibuster could mean trying to pass another major healthcare or campaign finance reform or new gun controls. For Republicans: Some sort of major deregulation of an industry or changes to “entitlement” programs such as Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid. | 1 |
5,321 | Scott Baio Tries To Push Hillary’s ‘Body Double’ Conspiracy And Fails MISERABLY (TWEETS) | Yesterday, Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton was forced to leave the 9/11 memorial in New York City after falling ill.Although there was a perfectly reasonable explanation for why the former Secretary of State had to leave the event early (she was diagnosed with pneumonia), anti-Clinton conspiracy theorists have been working overtime to smear Clinton s name after she reappeared out of her daughter Chelsea s apartment not too long after being pushed into a car by her security team. This had wannabe online detectives going nuts and analyzing the photos, which lead to the #HillarysBodyDouble hashtag being created on Twitter and who else would love to jump on this bandwagon more than Donald Trump lover Scott Baio?!Baio, who has had it out for Clinton for some time, did his best to further the conspiracy theory, and got a bit of karma in the process. Not only did Baio fail miserably in making Clinton look bad, but he managed to make HIMSELF look like a complete dumba** in the process. In a tweet, the actor mentioned an actress who is known for her amazing Clinton impersonations, calling her out: Does anyone know the whereabouts of this woman today? Was she in NYC? Lol TwitterThe woman Baio is talking about is Teresa Barnwell, whose website hillaryclintonimpersonator.com boasts the actress ability to be a near spitting image of the former Secretary of State. Here s a screenshot of her homepage:Teresa BarnwellBut of course, just like his favorite presidential candidate, Baio hadn t bothered to actually check the facts and do his research (sound familiar?). If he had only checked Barnwell s Twitter account that day, he would have known not to ask. The actress tweeted Baio back, shutting his whole conspiracy down: I m in Los Angeles today. Not in NYC! TwitterWhat an idiot. It s great that Barnwell personally responded to Baio, and told him to shut the f*ck up in her own special way!Featured image via screenshot | 0 |
5,322 | GOP ‘Moderate’ Under Attack From The Far Right Will Not Seek Re-election | We recently reported on how the far right is waging war against a dying breed: Congressional Republicans who at least attempt to be compassionate and reasonable in their policy-making. At the top of the list for these far right lunatics antics has been Rep. Charlie Dent (R-PA), who is the co-chair of the moderate Tuesday Group in the House Republican conference. Dent has obviously been feeling the pressure from his less reasonable comrades, as he will not seek re-election in the 2018 midterms.This really isn t that surprising. Increasingly, the ultra conservative Freedom Caucus has gained power in the House Republican conference, and they and their followers have absolutely no problem ousting people who won t fall in line with their extreme far right agenda. It was this group that unseated former House Speaker Eric Cantor, and forced the most recent former House Speaker, John Boehner, to resign. So, perhaps Dent has the right idea here. He says of his decision: I ve worked to instill stability, certainty and predictability in Washington. I ve fought to fulfill the basic functions of government, like keeping the lights on and preventing default. Regrettably, that has not been easy given the disruptive outside influences that profit from increased polarization and ideological rigidity that leads to dysfunction, disorder and chaos. This, of course, is likely a nod toward those who are directly attacking and threatening Dent and other members of his Tuesday Group caucus. They see no way out when it comes to sustained political attacks by Trump minions and other nationalist types with alarming far right views.Now, as for how this helps us on the left? Den t district is a swing district. If we get our act together and run a good candidate in a good race. Get your act together, Democrats. As the GOP eats their own, these so-called moderates who aren t even bothering to run again out of fear of getting primaried by the far right can become Democratic seats. They are in swing districts, not solid red ones. The best way to #RESIST is to make sure we have a Democratic House of Representatives.Featured image via Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images | 0 |
5,323 | PHONY HILLARY Breaks Out Fake Southern Accent During Speech to Grads [Video] | HILLARY HAS A TRACK RECORD OF BEING A BIG PHONY She s been caught on numerous occasions breaking out a fake southern accent. It s just too funny! Here she is at the CUNY graduation spewing bs and faking her accent:Bitter Hillary Clinton giving commencement speech at CUNY during #ComeyTestimony: "I wish I was flying in from the White House!" pic.twitter.com/9dSqvwGtq5 Josh Caplan (@joshdcaplan) June 8, 2017 In case you missed her past takes on a fake Southern accent:MEMPHIS: She s just like one of you Ha! Hillary Clinton breaks out the very phony Southern accent during a speech in Memphis. This always cracks me up because I m from the South and we can spot a phony a mile away. Pandering to her base is what Clinton does best. Just like Obama, she plays to the crowd she s speaking to by adopting their accent or acting like she s just one of them. This folksy style is cringe inducing for anyone with half a brain but she IS speaking to a group of Democrats soooooo SOUTH CAROLINA: Hillary Clinton sat down for a Chair Chat with the Chairman of the Democratic Party of South Carolina. During the interview, as in many of her speeches to people who live in the South, she put on a Southern accent that is absent from her speeches to Northerners. We made a mashup of some of the most painfully pandering moments, and ranked the intensity of her accent with cowboy boots (1 = lowest, 5 = strongest). | 0 |
5,324 | PERFECT TIMING! New Film Delves Into The Dirt On The Clinton’s Fundraising Scams | A new movie about the Clinton Grifters couldn t be coming-out at a better time the day before the Democratic convention! The book that raked through the complex web of political, campaign fundraising, and political practices of Bill and Hillary Clinton last year and muddied Clinton s presidential campaign launch is coming to the big screen just in time to cause Clinton trouble in the general election. Clinton Cash is set to premiere the day before the Democratic convention in Philadelphia, and is based on the book by the same title by author Peter Schweizer.Schweizer is joined by fellow producer Stephan K. Bannon of conservative outlet Breitbart news on the project.A trailer for the film, which is directed by M.A. Taylor., features images of blood dripping down piles of cash, Bloomberg News reported.The trailer kicks off with clip of Clinton complimenting foreign governments for rooting out corruption even as Schweizer, who is interviewed as part of the film, says the Clintons created a model for massive self enrichment that allows you to go into so-called pub service but get extremely rich at the same time. The book s release in May prompted a series of investigations by major news outlets into the fundraising practices of the Clinton foundation, which had accepted major contributions from corporations and foreign governments.It also probed hefty speaking fees earned by the Clintons from foreign and domestic corporations after Bill Clinton left the White House, the foundation s charity work, and Clinton s time at the State Department.Read more: Daily Mail | 0 |
5,325 | After threats, EU lawmakers seek 'protection' on Malta visit | BRUSSELS (Reuters) - European Union lawmakers have asked for protection when they visit Malta this week to probe accusations of high-level corruption on the island, citing death threats made against some members of the EU parliament. The legislature passed a motion this month voicing concerns about democracy and the rule of law in the EU s smallest state, following the killing of a journalist who had accused some political leaders of graft and money laundering. A group of seven MEPs will visit Malta on Thursday and Friday. In a letter seen by Reuters, Manfred Weber, the German leader of the center-right bloc, wrote to European Parliament President Antonio Tajani on Wednesday asking him to remind the Maltese authorities of their duty to protect the delegation and allow them to carry out their duty free from fear . The stark terms of the letter underscored the depth of feeling in Brussels about recent developments in Malta. It also reflected Tajani s call on Monday for the Polish government to ensure the safety of MEPs after a far-right protest there over an EU parliament motion about democracy in Poland. Centre-left Maltese Prime Minister Joseph Muscat says Malta does not tolerate crime and promised justice for the murdered journalist, who had leveled personal accusations against him as well as against members of the center-right opposition party. Sven Giegold, a German member of the EU parliament s Greens party and a leading campaigner on financial crime who will be part of the delegation, told Reuters he was not very worried but added: I hope the security will be guaranteed. Weber, an ally of German Chancellor Angela Merkel, wrote that there were serious concerns about the independence of the Maltese police and referred to MEPs being threatened with their lives for speaking out in defense of the rule of law in Malta . One of his group s members, Maltese center-right MEP Roberta Metsola, has faced public death threats on social media after speaking on the issue, parliamentary officials said. Mr Weber can rest assured that, as in previous occasions, Malta will offer maximum hospitality to the MEP delegation , a spokesman for the Maltese government told Reuters. | 1 |
5,326 | Russian serviceman in Chechnya kills four servicemen, then is killed, TASS reports | MOSCOW (Reuters) - A Russian serviceman in the Caucasus region of Chechnya killed four other servicemen on Monday, then he was killed by the members of an alert unit, TASS news agency cited a Federal National Guard Troops Service spokesman as saying. A man who opened fire was a senior lieutenant of National Guard Troops, TASS reported. | 1 |
5,327 | BREAKING: ISIS May Have Stolen Passport Machine, Making Unlawful Entry To U.S. Easy | At $200 a pop even a poor jihadi can find a new home in America U.S. intelligence officials are warning that the Islamic State terrorist group may have seized an official government passport printing machine and a trove of blank passports in Syria and could be printing fake passports that would allow some of its followers to infiltrate the U.S. border.The terror group has reportedly been able to print legitimate-looking Syrian passports since taking over the city of Deir ez-Zour last summer, home to a passport office with boxes of blank passports and a passport printing machine, according to a Homeland Security Investigations Intelligence Report issued to law enforcement last week and reviewed by ABC news.Another passport office was located in Raqqa, Syria, where the terror group has long maintained its de facto capital. Since more than 17 months [have] passed since Raqqa and Deir ez-Zour fell to ISIS, it is possible that individuals from Syria with passports issued in these ISIS controlled cities or who had passport blanks, may have traveled to the U.S., the report says, ABC reported.FBI Director James Comey admitted the U.S. intelligence community was concerned about the problem in testimony before Congress on Wednesday. The intelligence community is concerned that they [ISIS] have the ability, the capability to manufacture fraudulent passports, which is a concern in any setting, Mr. Comey said.Fake Syrian passports have already been discovered in Europe, most notably two used by suicide bombers in the Paris attacks last month.According to the source that provided the passport information to homeland security officials, Syria is awash in fake documents. The source further stated that fake Syrian passports are so prevalent in Syria that Syrians do not even view possessing them as illegal, the report says, according to ABC. The source stated fake Syrian passports can be obtained in Syria for $200 to $400 and that backdated passport stamps to be placed in the passport cost the same. The report included one example in which law enforcement officials said that a Syrian passport discovered in Turkey was printed with a designator number indicating it had been printed in an ISIS-controlled area earlier this year.The last page of the report warns, If ISIS ability to produce passports is not controlled, their operations will continue to increase and expand outside of their operational controlled areas. Via: Washington Times | 0 |
5,328 | HUH? NYT EDITOR Blames “Republican Rage Machine” for Current Political Climate [Video] | Talk about projecting! On Fareed Zakaria s CNN show, former New York Times editor Jill Abramson decries false equivalency between Democrats and Republicans, saying Republicans are disproportionately responsible for the divisive political climate. HUH? This angry shrew is showing just how much she is blinded by hate!ED LUCE: It s very hard to imagine how civility can ensue when people don t even meet each other or live near each other who hold different positions or let their children marry or wish their children to marry people of different views. So that s my concern, there is no public square.FAREED ZAKARIA: Jill, you ve written that you think that while all this is true, this is not a situation where both sides are equally at fault.JILL ABRAMSON: I do think that both sides are not equally at fault, and that there s been a bit of a false equivalency at work, especially in the discussion over the past couple of days. I think that in terms of political leadership right now that both President Trump and the congressional leadership on the Republican side are extremely divisive and that they are really benefiting from a kind of rage machine that operates in this country.This woman must have been in a coma for the past couple of years!Does she NOT remember the horrible attacks on conservatives during the 2016 campaign? Does she not remember the 2016 Inauguration? Oh, how about Berkeley?There are just way too many examples of the left s unhinged violence and rhetoric. From the leaders of the Democrat Party to the George Soros sponsored Antifa thugs, we can say without any hesitation that this woman and all others who refuse to see the problem are seriously delusional and blinded by their hate. | 0 |
5,329 | Charles Koch Has The Sads Because He Thinks He Should Have More Influence Over Elections | Charles Koch, the billionaire CEO of Koch Industries has spent hundreds of millions of dollars on political campaigns because of Citizen s United, but he still thinks he should have even more influence.During an interview with the Financial Times, Charles Koch whined that even as he spends tons of money trying to shape the political landscape to his will he still doesn t have as much influence as he expected to have in 2016.Koch says he presented of list of his wishes to Republican candidates, who basically ignored them, which is why he is pouting now. (It) doesn t seem to faze them much, Koch said. You d think we could have more influence. It is hard for me to get a high level of enthusiasm because the things I m passionate about and I think this country urgently needs aren t being addressed. In other words, Koch has the sads because he hoped Republicans would automatically be his puppets and support and enact all of his demands.The billionaire polluter actually gave the candidates a freaking LIST of things he wants them to do if they win the presidency and now he thinks he needs even more influence because the candidates didn t seem to give two shits about it.According to Politico, the Koch brothers are poised to spend nearly $1 billion on the 2016 election, in what should be seen as a blatant effort to buy the White House and Congress.Among the many aims on their agenda is the destruction of labor unions, abolishing the minimum wage, dismantling environmental protection laws, and repealing Obamacare while opposing any effort to bring affordable healthcare to the American people. And those are just a few things that the Koch brothers want to do to this country.Charles Koch attempted a run for president in the 1980s, but he failed miserably. Instead, he decided to focus on buying the government instead.But despite his massive influence on Republican politics, Koch is complaining that he still doesn t have enough power over the candidates. In reality, the American people are the ones who should be complaining about not having enough influence over elections, which the Kochs believe they are entitled to buy.If the Koch brothers are wondering why most of the American people see them as villains, this is why.Featured Image: Flickr | 0 |
5,330 | More than 30 rescued in Afghan raid on Taliban prison | LASHKAR GAH, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Afghan and foreign special forces raided a Taliban prison in southern Helmand province on Sunday and rescued at least 30 people, according to army and provincial officials. Those rescued in the raid in Helmand s Nawzad district included four children under the age of 12 and two policemen, the officials said. Twenty of the people had been arrested by the Taliban in connection with helping the government or were family members of Afghan army and police. The reasons for the jailing of six of those rescued was still being investigated, said Abdul Qadir Bahadurzai, a deputy spokesman for the army s 215th Maiwand military corps. The Taliban said in a statement that the people rescued were criminals accused of robbery, kidnapping, personal disputes and other crimes and were awaiting trial. There wasn t anyone belonging to the enemy in that prison and there wasn t enough security for it, Taliban spokesman Qari Yousuf Ahmadi said in the statement. | 1 |
5,331 | USA Today Just Uncovered A Bunch More Trump Lawsuits And The Number Is Mind Blowing | Donald Trump is someone who abuses the judicial system to help enrich himself. In fact, USA Today has uncovered that Trump is or has been involved in an eye-popping 4,000 lawsuits.USA Today has been covering this for a while. As of May, they had uncovered over 100 lawsuits. In June, that number went up to over 3,500. Now, he s up to more than 4,000 and many are as frivolous as you might imagine.Trump is an argument for why rich people should pay more in taxes. Every single lawsuit that Trump engages in to protect his business costs taxpayers money and he spends a hell of a lot of taxpayer money in the courts. He uses them to renegotiate his bills, to defend his refusal to pay taxes, to iron out personal beefs (and we all know how he racks those up) and whatever floats his litigious boat on any given day.Here s a breakdown:The bulk of the cases involve his casinos. There are 1,863 casino cases and overwhelmingly, Trump is the one suing.There are 79 cases involving branding or trademark disputes.There are 206 contract dispute cases and in more than 2/3 of them, Trump is being sued.There are also 130 employment cases, and in the vast majority, he s being sued.61 of them are related to his golf resorts.191 of them are either Trump suing the government or the government suing him.There are six cases involving his presidential campaign, including a class action suit over bulk text messages directed toward people who never signed up.Surprisingly, there are only 12 defamation cases, despite the fact that he constantly threatens to sue.He s a defendant in 694 personal injury cases and a plaintiff in one.There are 621 real estate lawsuits, where he is generally the defendant.Yes, Hillary Clinton is also involved in several lawsuits (about 900), but overwhelmingly, she is being sued by federal prisoners, political activists and other people looking to sue the government. It s not because she s Hillary Clinton, per se, it s because she was a high ranking member of the government.Trump, though, should not get anywhere near the White House. We cannot have him nominating judges. We already know how that could turn out. Trump is incapable of taking his own personal feelings and his own personal business dealings out of anything, and that s not what we need as the leader of the free world.Featured image via Ron Jenkins at Getty Images. | 0 |
5,332 | SWEDISH WOMAN Sexually Assaulted In Broad Daylight By 9 Migrants…Ex-Boyfriend LOSES IT Over Out-Of-Control Migrants…Feminists Attack Victim…Call Her “Racist” [VIDEO] | Swedish resident, Rosa Vidarsdottir tells a harrowing story on Facebook of out-of-control, animal-like migrants who, in broad daylight in front of several people, performed sexual acts on themselves and begged her to partake in their disgusting public display. Rosa s former boyfriend, who goes by The Daddy Monster on Twitter was absolutely enraged about what happened to her and blames politicians in Sweden for allowing this kind of barbaric 14th century behavior to exist in his former homeland.Watch here:My ex was just assaulted by 9 migrants during lunch and was rescued by her boss that saw what happened. #migpol pic.twitter.com/uQV9bGeJDz The Daddy Monster (@pissedfather666) July 29, 2016Here is Rosa s most recent Facebook post (translated) where she explains what happened to her, and brilliantly responds to the so-called feminists who are calling her a racist for exposing these sexual deviant migrants. Her actual post in Swedish language can be found below: I was last Friday 29/7 molested by 9st. Migrants in peterlee centre in the middle of the breezeway on the avenue between hotels highlands and thimons patisserie ? this happened in broad daylight at about 12.30 times in front of several witnesses.One of them begged and begged to get a blow job Another wanted to get laid, one just sat on the grass with his hand down his zipper and jerking off The other whistled and shouted after me miscellaneous compliments This was so scary j vla and gross.My boss saw this happen when he was standing inside the thimons and would order his lunch so he got rushed to my rescue..Of course I called the police and told them about the incident. The police seem to know this gang for apparently they ve molested several other girls at different ages. Now last Wednesday actually when they gave up on the 2st. 13-Year-old girls.Now after I have been contacted by a lot of people, even people who were there around when this happened. They think they have seen the gang, think they know who they are and where they live.A big thank you to you all, the police have been taking part of all of the info that added.To your fabulous feminists who sent threatening messages to me yesterday where you accuse me of racism and saying that this is fiction and then writes that this was right for me.. Well what shall I say to you..Maybe a thank you would be at his place because you just proved my point that you aren t real feminists. You are something else entirely, and you ll get a whole speech in your honor shortly.You other girls and women who have heard of you and sending warmth, love and caring through messages, even though we don t know each other. ? thank you from my heart.What j kla lucky that I wasn t alone but had a colleague, who were in the vicinity. Because I hadn t had a chance against 9 guys alone ?Now, it didn t go so far as to a physical harassment which is fortunate, because they didn t have time to touch me thank God, but that they said if I was going to suck their dicks and they said that they wanted to bang me and their dominant Body language was provocative enough and unpleasant behavior and it said a lot about their mentality.Now I know how the two girls felt earlier in the week, now I know how women in general, have felt when they have been confronted by men in the group who tells them what they want to do with them sexually.I ve never been through anything like this in my entire life. Don t ever want to be with it again.I ve read about this stuff, and feel pity for the women, which is the reason why I ve written a lot about these atrocities and tried to highlight the problem because I felt and believe that you have to do something in order to increase the security of people, but especially for women, and Now, this has also happened to me personally. ?I didn t, I thought that I will stop by for a jog around the lake after work at night, through to stop the bike to the gym in the evening, stop by to go for long walks at night, I would have eliminated any risk for assault or molestation For not in my wildest dreams I would have been able to believe that a guy like that could happen during the day, in the middle of the day and also in front of people.This is not an okay behavior.It s not ok at all. | 0 |
5,333 | trump hillary clinton may be most corrupt person ever to run for president | email
the second presidential debate flew off the rails on sunday night when donald trump invoked accusations of sexual misconduct against bill clinton and suggested that hillary clinton could be in jail if hes elected in november threatening to appoint a special prosecutor to look into her private email server
abcs martha raddatz one of the debate moderators asked trump whether his behavior exposed in the shocking video released friday in which he bragged about groping and kissing women without permission was consistent with his current behavior
as i told you that was lockerroom talk trump said i am not proud of it i am a person who has great respect for people for my family for people of this country and im not proud of it
trump then said if you look at the history of politics in this country no one had been so abusive of women as former president bill clinton the husband of the democratic nominee whom trump suggested intimidated those women
three women who had previously accused bill clinton of sexual misconduct held a press conference with trump earlier sunday and each was seated in the front row at the debate
mine were words his were actions trump said
so dont tell me about words he continued i am absolutely i apologize for those words but it is things that people say bill clinton he was impeached he was no longer allowed to practice law he had to pay an fine to one of the women paula jones who is here tonight that when hillary brings up a point like that brings up words i say years ago i think its disgraceful and i think she should be ashamed of herself if you want to know the truth
donald trump if i win im going to instruct my attorney general to investigate clinton httpstcorapuickl httpstcoiwgvuleetr
cnn politics cnnpolitics october the former secretary of state responded by saying that so much of what he just said is not right but that he was doing it because of his floundering campaign
i am reminded of what my friend michelle obama advised us all she said when they go low you go high
and look if this were just about one video maybe what hes saying tonight would be understandable she said but everyone can come to their own conclusions about whether or not the man in the video or the man on the stage respects women but he never apologizes to anyone for anything
she mentioned that trump had not apologized to the khans a couple who lost a son a muslim us soldier during the iraq war trump engaged in a lengthy backandforth with the khans after they appeared at the democratic national convention in july
clinton also said trump had not apologized to a reporter whose disability he mocked in front of a camera a federal judge who trump said couldnt do his job fairly because he was of mexican descent and president barack obama whose birthplace trump tried to discredit in a multiyear campaign
he owes the president an apology he needs to apologize to our country and he needs to take responsibility she said
trump responded by repeating the false claim that the clinton campaign started the rumors casting doubt on obamas birthplace in he added that she owed an apology for the emails you deleted
if i win i am going to instruct my attorney general to get a special prosecutor to look into your situation trump said because there have never been so many lies so much deception and were going to have a special prosecutor
clinton said everything trump said was absolutely false but she was not surprised
oh really trump interjected
clinton then mentioned the difficulty in factchecking trump to which he capped off the exchange by saying youd be in jail during his potential administration | 0 |
5,334 | Mexico's ruling party presidential hopeful trails leftist: poll | MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Former Mexico finance minister Jose Antonio Meade, who resigned to seek the presidential nomination of the ruling party, is lagging far behind in public support ahead of next year s election, according to a newspaper poll published on Wednesday. Meade, who is widely expected to receive the nomination of the centrist Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), came in third in two scenarios polled by Mexican newspaper El Universal, while leftist Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador maintained a strong lead in both instances. The survey found that 31 percent of respondents would vote for Lopez Obrador, who leads the National Regeneration Movement (MORENA) party, followed by the conservative National Action Party s (PAN) Ricardo Anaya, leading a coalition of parties, with 23 percent. Meade came in third with 16 percent. When Mexico City Mayor Miguel Angel Mancera was entered into the mix for the coalition, Obrador had 32 percent support, followed by Mancera with 22 percent and Meade with 15 percent. The poll was conducted from Dec. 1 to Dec. 4, after Meade resigned to seek the presidency. Meade, who has served in both PRI and PAN administrations, has a reputation for honesty that PRI officials hope will help the party recover from a spate of corruption scandals. But he remains unknown to much of the Mexican public. A victory for the combative and nationalist-leaning Lopez Obrador, who promises to revive economic growth by battling graft, could stoke tensions with the Trump administration just as the United States, Mexico and Canada seek to seal a renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement. Support for MORENA and the PAN slipped 1 percentage point from the previous poll in November, while support for the PRI held steady at 16 percent, according to El Universal. The survey by pollster Buendia & Laredo included 744 face-to-face interviews and has a +/- 4.1 percent margin of error. | 1 |
5,335 | Northern Ireland political talks stall as time runs out | LONDON/BELFAST (Reuters) - The chances of Northern Ireland s political parties restoring a power-sharing agreement are not positive and Britain will have to impose a budget early next month if talks cannot be salvaged, the minister for the region said on Wednesday. Northern Ireland has been without a regional administration since its collapse in January, raising the prospect of direct rule being reimposed from London, potentially destabilizing a delicate political balance in the British province. Britain will need to draw up a budget - a move one of the region s smaller parties said would effectively constitute direct rule - if an executive is not formed by the week starting Nov. 6, James Brokenshire said. If I had given evidence to this committee last week I might have indicated some momentum, more progress. That progress stalled at the end of last week, Brokenshire told a parliamentary committee, adding London would also have to pass legislation by Oct. 30 to enable an executive to be formed. Unless there is a renewed spirit of compromise then the outlook for imminent resolution is not positive. Former U.S. President Bill Clinton, who played a central role in brokering the 1998 peace deal that ended three decades of sectarian bloodshed in Northern Ireland, used a brief trip to Dublin this week to travel to Belfast and meet the main parties. But the main impediment in the talks between the pro-British Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) and Irish nationalists Sinn Fein remains disagreement over improved rights for Irish language speakers, an issue that has dogged negotiations for months. Sinn Fein s leader in Northern Ireland, Michelle O Neill, described Brokenshire s budget comments as not helpful in the sense that it clearly signifies that would be the end of this phase of negotiations. Considerable challenges remain, she said. The Irish government, which is co-facilitating the talks, has said Northern Ireland needs a devolved government to give it a greater say in Britain s negotiations to leave the European Union, set to have a bigger impact on the province than on any other part of the United Kingdom. Ireland s foreign minister last week said reverting to direct rule from London for the first time in a decade would be a devastating blow for reconciliation in the province. Brokenshire said while he has no desire to do so, all options - including direct rule - must be considered if no agreement can be reached. We are on a glide path to greater and greater UK government intervention, Brokenshire said. We can t go on much longer. | 1 |
5,336 | State of Hawaii asks judge to clarify Trump travel ban ruling | (Reuters) - The state of Hawaii on Thursday asked a federal judge in Honolulu to clarify a U.S. Supreme Court ruling this week which reinstated parts of President Donald Trump’s revised travel ban. In a court filing, the state of Hawaii said the U.S. government intended to violate the Supreme Court’s instructions by improperly excluding from the United States people who actually have a close family relationship to U.S. persons. | 1 |
5,337 | BREAKING WIKILEAKS: Hillary Email Exposes Her Hate For The “Everyday Americans” She Built Her Entire Campaign Around [Video] | WIKILEAKS released more e-mails and guess what Hillary detests everyday Americans . Is anyone except the left surprised by that? After all, it has been proven with these e-mails that she s very much an elitist who admittedly can t relate to regular folks .Why in the heck would we EVER want a president who detests everyday Americans ? Hillary built her entire campaign on being the champion of everyday people | 0 |
5,338 | someone just donated million to bail out everyone arrested at standing rock | by watching the hawks rt tyrel ventura is joined by independent journalist derrick broze to talk about his horrific experiences at the dapl protest subscribe | 0 |
5,339 | Pakistan police arrest dozens from Islamist party blocking entrance to capital | ISLAMABAD/LAHORE, Pakistan (Reuters) - Pakistani police have arrested dozens of members of a hard-line Islamist party that has blocked a main entrance to the capital since last week, a provincial spokesman said, in the latest confrontation between religious activists and authorities. Hundreds of supporters of the Tehreek-e-Labaik Pakistan party have blocked a main road to Islamabad since Friday, threatening violence if their demand that the minister of law be sacked is not met. The group blames the minister, Zahid Hamid, for changes to an electoral oath that it says amounts to blasphemy. The government puts the issue down to a clerical error. Pakistan s blasphemy law has become a lightning rod for Islamists, especially since 2011 when the liberal governor of Punjab province, Salman Taseer, was murdered by a bodyguard for questioning the law that mandates the death penalty for insulting Islam or the Prophet Mohammad. A spokesman for the Punjab provincial government, Malik Muhammad Ahmed Khan, told Reuters the protests were a serious inconvenience for people and disturbing public life in the province that surrounds Islamabad. The Punjab government has detained dozens of Tehreek-e-Labaik s activists from various districts, he said. Labaik spokesman Ejaz Ashrafi said in a statement police arrested hundreds of its workers in a countrywide swoop, mainly in the party s base in Punjab. Interior Minister Ahsan Iqbal late on Monday urged the protesters to call off the sit-in, saying he hoped the government wouldn t be forced to take extreme steps . One security source said the protesters detained several policemen, seized their weapons and mistreated them. The abduction of the police is a heinous crime, Iqbal said in a statement. Police have accused the protesters, who are occupying the main artery between the capital and the nearby city of Rawalpindi, of throwing stones at them. Fearing violence, the government has blocked several roads with shipping containers to corral the protesters, but that has caused hours-long traffic jams. Minister of state for interior affairs Talal Chaudhry said the government had refused to accept the demand to sack the minister, and instead had ordered police to block any more Labaik supporters or leaders from joining the protest. In 2007, a confrontation between authorities and supporters of radical preachers at an Islamabad mosque led to the death of more than 100 people when commandos stormed the complex. We re still trying to resolve this issue through dialogue but the situation is becoming intolerable, Chaudhry, told reporters. If this cannot be resolved, the roads will have to be cleared. | 1 |
5,340 | What Trump Just Said About The LGBT Community Will Make Conservatives Go Crazy (VIDEO) | In a stunning reversal, Donald Trump said that he will strengthen the rights of the LGBT community and bring people together. His new stance comes just days after he said that as president, he would strongly consider overturning Obergefell vs Hodges, the Supreme Court decision that found that same-sex couples have a legal and constitutional right to marry. I m a lesbian, we ve had some great progress for the gay and lesbian community, NECN reporter Sue O Connell told Trump. When President Trump is in office, can we look for more forward motion on equality for gays and lesbians? Here is Trump s response: Well, you can. We re going to bring people together, and that s your thing, and other people have their thing. We have to bring all people together and if we don t we re not going to have a country anymore. Now that s one big flip-flop because in addition to Trump saying he would appoint judges to overturn Obergefell vs Hodges, he has stated in the past time and time again that he only supports marriage between a man and a woman. He has said: I m not in favor of gay marriage. I don t feel right about marriage equality. Trump has even gone as far as to compare same-sex relationships to choosing the wrong kind of golf putter! He said: It s like in golf. A lot of people I don t want this to sound trivial but a lot of people are switching to these really long putters, very unattractive. It s weird. You see these great players with these really long putters, because they can t sink three-footers anymore. And, I hate it. I am a traditionalist. I have so many fabulous friends who happen to be gay, but I am a traditionalist. In trying to rationalize the irrational, it s most likely that Trump is pandering to New Hampshire voters for the primary, 67% of whom support gay marriage. Whatever his reasoning, his new position is going to upset his bigoted right-wing conservative following.Featured image via video screen capture | 0 |
5,341 | Abu Dhabi Crown Prince offers condolences to exiled son of slain Yemeni ex-leader in UAE | DUBAI (Reuters) - The Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi offered his condolences to the son of slain former Yemen president Ali Abdullah Saleh at his residence in Abu Dhabi, according to his official twitter account. The account tweeted a picture of Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces visiting Ahmed Ali at his residence in the United Arab Emirates capital. Ahmed Ali, a former commander of Yemen s elite Republican Guards, once served as Yemen s ambassador to the UAE before it joined ally Saudi Arabia to make war against the Houthis. | 1 |
5,342 | As China's leaders gather, market reform hopes fade | BEIJING (Reuters) - President Xi Jinping s rule in China has been marked by a muscular stance in many areas from corruption to foreign policy - but investors and business leaders hoping that the nation s most powerful leader in decades will drive market reforms are girding for disappointment. As he gears up for his second term, hoped-for market liberalization is increasingly being viewed as secondary to Xi s state-centered approach to economic policy and his focus on stability. The Communist Party Congress beginning on Wednesday in Beijing is expected to see Xi consolidate his power and is unlikely to see a change in his priorities. Party spokesman Tuo Zhen told reporters at a briefing on Tuesday that China will persist with opening up and expanding market access. But foreign executives and analysts question whether these kinds of comments will mean a lot on the ground. I don t see market opening coming. It s all about discipline and control, said one senior China-based American executive, who declined to be identified. China s State Council Information Office referred questions on market reforms to the country s economic planning agency, the National Development and Reform Commission, which did not respond to a faxed request for comment. Some Chinese policy insiders said that they don t expect any significant speeding up. We will not rush on reforms. The pace of changes will not change dramatically, said one advisor to the Chinese government who was speaking on condition of anonymity. Xi s sweeping anti-corruption campaign and his move to personally take charge of economic policymaking had initially been seen by China analysts as early signs that he would use his consolidated power to push tough reforms through entrenched bureaucracies. The party s 2013 pledge under Xi s then-new administration to let the market play a decisive role in the economy had also given hope to those pushing for reform. But many analysts and business leaders now see Xi s faith in markets as tenuous, and that 2013 reform pledge as a mere holdover from his predecessors. A lack of follow-through over the past several years on repeated State Council vows to open markets to the world have left foreign businesses with promise fatigue , as the European Union Chamber of Commerce in China put it last month. Those delays coincide with the passage of a raft of new national security and cyber security laws and regulations that China s trading partners complain will put them at a disadvantage. For the past 20 or 30 years it was economic development at all costs, and I think we are seeing a new paradigm now where national security is dominant and economic issues are channeled through that lens, said Jude Blanchette, who studies the party at The Conference Board s China Center for Economics and Business in Beijing. Blanchette said true market reforms in Xi s second term would mean walking back much of the control he has fought to acquire, an unlikely prospect. Other painful reforms that many economists say are needed have also moved slowly under Xi. They include overhauling China s debt-laden state sector, fixing the fiscal system to tackle local government debt, bringing in new property taxes to ward off housing bubbles, and allowing farmers to sell their land more freely. Capital controls, including restrictions on some outbound investment deals, have helped stabilize the yuan, but at the cost of hampering China s ambition to internationalize the currency. Chinese reform advocates say the government has been avoiding potentially disruptive changes due to concerns over economic and social stability and resistance from vested interests, such as powerful state-run companies. If there are no such reforms, the conflicts will keep accumulating while risks will be even higher, which could destroy our prospects to move forward, said Jia Kang, director of the China Academy of New Supply-Side Economics, a Beijing-based think tank. In 2015, Xi espoused his own state-led supply side structural reform doctrine, an effort in part to tame an explosion of debt by cutting capacity in heavy industries, and reduce risk from bad bank loans. While Xi can tout continued robust economic growth - the government had set a 2017 GDP growth target of around 6.5 percent but it now looks like it will be closer to 7 percent - it is still reliant on credit and investment as opposed to more sustainable consumption. And expanded state control over the economy is at the center of key Xi initiatives, including the Made in China 2025 plan, which funnels billions of dollars into robotics, semiconductors, and other industries deemed strategic. Despite government talk this year about opening some restricted sectors to overseas investment, some foreign business groups express scepticism, even as U.S. President Donald Trump is expected to seek some concessions for American businesses during his planned visit to Beijing in early November. Until we see the equity cap lifted from 49 percent to 50 percent or higher with foreign banks, or until we see foreign insurance companies able to fully access the market, we re just having the same conversation we had five years ago, said Jacob Parker, vice president of China operations at the U.S.-China Business Council. Xi has also reasserted that state-owned enterprises (SOEs) should be the commanding heights of the economy. Foreign experts on Chinese markets point to government efforts to merge state companies into even larger champions as proof of how the state s vision of reform does not necessarily mean increased use of free markets. In recent years, Beijing has required state firms to reassert their Communist Party committees hold on corporate decision-making. A 2015 blueprint for SOE reform made no mention of the 2013 pledge for the decisive role of the market. One senior western diplomat in Beijing told Reuters it has become increasingly clear that the top priority for Xi remains strengthening the primacy of the party and stability. When further opening up comes into conflict with that priority, the argument for stability tends to win, the diplomat said. | 1 |
5,343 | France to discuss possible new Rafale sale with Egypt's al-Sisi: Le Maire | PARIS (Reuters) - France will discuss the possible sale of more Rafale aircrafts with Egyptian leader Abdel Fattah al-Sisi during his visit to Paris this week, Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire told Europe 1 radio on Tuesday. Under the previous government, France had concluded several major military agreements with Egypt, including the sale of 24 Rafale combat aircraft, a multi-mission frigate and two Mistral warships in contracts worth some 6 billion euros. The 2015 Rafale contract - the first export contract for the jet - included the option of selling another twelve aircrafts. If there can be new contracts, so much the better. That will be discussed today by the President of the Republic (Macron) and the president (Sisi), said Le Maire, when asked by Europe 1 radio to comment on reports that the sale of the extra 12 aircrafts was on the table but that his ministry was reluctant because of the payment terms asked for by Egypt. It is normal that Bercy (the French finance ministry) would want to make sure Egypt should be able to pay its plane orders, Le Maire said. Sisi is in Paris until Oct 25. As far as human rights are concerned, of course we ll discuss that. I have no doubt that the President of the Republic will mention the issue of human rights when he has lunch with his Egyptian counterpart, added Le Maire. Rafale-maker Dassault Aviation declined to comment. France and Egypt have nurtured closer economic and military ties in recent years, and with Sisi s rise to power that relationship has improved with both sides concerned by the political vacuum in Libya and the threat from jihadist groups in Egypt. But human rights organisations at home and overseas have accused France under Macron of remaining silent in the face of increasing violations of freedoms by Sisi s government, as the 2018 presidential elections approach. | 1 |
5,344 | Factbox: Trump fills top jobs for his administration | (Reuters) - U.S. President-elect Donald Trump has formally named Republican Representative Ryan Zinke of Montana, a former Navy SEAL commander, as his pick for interior secretary, the Trump transition team said in a statement on Thursday. The following is a list of Republican Trump’s selections for top jobs in his administration; all the posts but those of national security adviser, the White House chief of staff, White House director of the National Economic Council and White House strategist require Senate confirmation: Sessions, 69, was the first U.S. senator to endorse Trump’s presidential bid and has been a close ally since. Son of a country store owner, the Alabama senator and former federal prosecutor has long taken a tough stance on illegal immigration, opposing any path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. U.S. Representative Pompeo, 52, is a third-term congressman from Kansas who serves on the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee, which oversees the CIA, National Security Agency and cyber security. A retired Army officer and Harvard Law School graduate, Pompeo supports the U.S. government’s sweeping collection of Americans’ communications data and wants to scrap the nuclear deal with Iran. Ross, 79, heads the private equity firm W.L. Ross & Co. His net worth was pegged by Forbes at about $2.9 billion. A staunch supporter of Trump and an economic adviser, Ross helped shape the Trump campaign’s views on trade policy. He blames the North American Free Trade Agreement with Canada and Mexico, which went into force in 1994, and the 2001 entry of China into the World Trade Organization, for causing massive U.S. factory job losses. Mattis is a retired Marine general known for his tough talk, distrust of Iran and battlefield experience in Iraq and Afghanistan. A former leader of Central Command, which oversees U.S. military operations in the Middle East and South Asia, Mattis, 66, is known by many U.S. forces by his nickname “Mad Dog.” He was once rebuked for saying in 2005: “It’s fun to shoot some people.” DeVos, 58, is a billionaire Republican donor, a former chair of the Michigan Republican Party and an advocate for the privatization of education. As chair of the American Federation for Children, she has pushed at the state level for vouchers that families can use to send their children to private schools and for the expansion of charter schools. Perry, 66, adds to the list of oil drilling advocates skeptical about climate change who have been picked for senior positions in Trump’s Cabinet. The selections have worried environmentalists but cheered an oil and gas industry eager for expansion. Perry, who also briefly ran in the 2016 presidential race, would have to be confirmed by the Senate to head the Energy Department, which is responsible for U.S. energy policy and oversees the nation’s nuclear weapons program. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY ADMINISTRATOR: SCOTT PRUITT An ardent opponent of President Barack Obama’s measures to stem climate change, Oklahoma Attorney General Pruitt, 48, has enraged environmental activists. But he fits with the president-elect’s promise to cut the agency back and eliminate regulation that he says is stifling oil and gas drilling. Pruitt became the top state prosecutor for Oklahoma, which has extensive oil reserves, in 2011, and has challenged the EPA multiple times since. U.S. Representative Price, 62, is an orthopedic surgeon who heads the House Budget Committee. A representative from Georgia since 2005, Price has criticized Obamacare and has championed a plan of tax credits, expanded health savings accounts and lawsuit reforms to replace it. He is opposed to abortion. The final leadership role of Kelly’s 45-year career was head of the U.S. Southern Command, responsible for U.S. military activities and relationships in Latin America and the Caribbean. The 66-year-old retired Marine general differed with Obama on key issues and has warned of vulnerabilities along the United States’ southern border with Mexico. Carson, 65, is a retired neurosurgeon who dropped out of the Republican presidential nominating race in March and threw his support to Trump. A popular writer and speaker in conservative circles, Carson previously indicated reluctance to take a position in the incoming administration because of his lack of experience in the federal government. Carson is the first African-American picked for a Cabinet spot by Trump. Zinke, 55, a first-term Republican representative and a member of the House subcommittee on natural resources, has voted for legislation that would weaken environmental safeguards on public lands. He has taken stances favoring coal, a fossil fuel that suffered during the Obama administration. The League of Conservation Voters, which ranks lawmakers on their environmental record, gave Zinke an extremely low lifetime score of 3 percent. Puzder, chief executive officer of CKE Restaurants Inc [APOLOT.UL], which runs the Carl’s Jr. and Hardee’s fast-food chains, has been a vociferous critic of government regulation of the workplace and the National Labor Relations Board. Puzder, 66, has argued that higher minimum wages would hurt workers by forcing restaurants to close, and praises the benefits of automation, so his appointment is likely to antagonize organized labor. Cohn, 56, president and chief operating officer of investment bank Goldman Sachs, had widely been considered heir apparent to Lloyd Blankfein, CEO of the Wall Street firm. Trump hammered Goldman and Blankfein during the presidential campaign, releasing a television ad that called Blankfein part of a “global power structure” that had robbed America’s working class. Retired Lieutenant General Flynn, 57, was an early Trump supporter and serves as vice chairman on his transition team. He began his Army career in 1981 and was deployed in Afghanistan and Iraq. Flynn became head of the Defense Intelligence Agency in 2012 under President Barack Obama but retired a year earlier than expected, according to media reports, and became a fierce critic of Obama’s foreign policy. Tillerson, 64, has spent his entire career at Exxon Mobil Corp, where he rose to serve as its chairman and CEO in 2006. A civil engineer by training, the Texan joined the world’s largest energy company in 1975 and led several of its operations in the United States as well as in Yemen, Thailand and Russia. As Exxon’s chief executive, he maintained close ties with Moscow and opposed U.S. sanctions against Russia for its incursion into Crimea. McMahon, 68, is a co-founder and former chief executive of the professional wrestling franchise WWE, which is based in Stamford, Connecticut. She ran unsuccessfully as a Republican for a U.S. Senate seat in Connecticut in 2010 and 2012, and was an early supporter of Trump’s presidential campaign. Chao, 63, was labor secretary under President George W. Bush for eight years and the first Asian-American woman to hold a Cabinet position. She is a director at Ingersoll Rand, News Corp and Vulcan Materials Company. She is married to U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Republican from Kentucky. Mnuchin, 53, is a successful private equity investor, hedge fund manager and Hollywood financier who spent 17 years at Goldman Sachs before leaving in 2002. He assembled an investor group to buy a failed California mortgage lender in 2009, rebranded it as OneWest Bank and built it into Southern California’s largest bank. Housing advocacy groups criticized the bank for its foreclosure practices, accusing it of being too quick to foreclose on struggling homeowners. Haley, 44, has been the Republican governor of South Carolina since 2011 and has little experience in foreign policy or the federal government. The daughter of Indian immigrants, she led a successful push last year to remove the Confederate battle flag from the grounds of the South Carolina state capitol after the killing of nine black churchgoers in Charleston by a white gunman. Recently re-elected to serve as Republican National Committee chairman, Priebus will give up his party post to join Trump in the White House, where the low-key Washington operative could help forge ties with Congress to advance Trump’s agenda. The 44-year-old was a steadfast supporter of Trump during the presidential campaign even as the party fractured amid the choice. CHIEF WHITE HOUSE STRATEGIST, SENIOR COUNSELOR: STEVE BANNON The former head of the conservative website Breitbart News came aboard as Trump’s campaign chairman in August. A rabble-rousing conservative media figure, he helped shift Breitbart into a forum for the alt-right, a loose confederation of those who reject mainstream politics and includes neo-Nazis, white supremacists and anti-Semites. His hiring signals Trump’s dedication to operating outside the norms of Washington. As White House chief of staff, Bannon, 63, will serve as Trump’s gatekeeper and agenda-setter. | 1 |
5,345 | ALERT: #Cleveland, Ohio Lunatic Shooting Randomly…One Confirmed Dead [Video] | THIS MAN IS OUT THERE DRIVING AROUND FILMING MURDERS! We do not have all of the details as this is breaking. We just want everyone to be safe! We will not show the video of the horror of this man murdering an elerly man but have provided a video below to identify him. Please beware if you are in Cleveland! A lunatic is out there shooting people at random on Facebook live! Please stay indoors! He says he has killed 15 people so far but only one was confirmed. Please be safe!HORROR VIDEO: Steve Stephens live on Facebook saying he just killed 13 people in Cleveland and is about to kill his 14 victim. STAY SAFE! pic.twitter.com/wxHPgy8pVT Tennessee (@TEN_GOP) April 16, 2017 Steve Stevens is the man doing this: | 0 |
5,346 | Trump tightens grip on U.S. Republican nomination | NEW YORK (Reuters) - Front-runner Donald Trump showed signs of tightening his grip on the Republican U.S. presidential nomination on Wednesday when chief rival Ted Cruz acknowledged his own only hope of wresting control is a contested convention. Trump delivered a crushing defeat of Cruz in Tuesday’s New York Republican nominating contest while Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton broke rival Bernie Sanders’ string of state victories with a definitive win of her own. Rebounding from a defeat in Wisconsin two weeks ago, Trump set himself up for another big night on April 26, when the Northeast U.S. states of Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Delaware, and Maryland hold primaries. “Ted Cruz is mathematically out of winning the race,” Trump tweeted on Wednesday. “Now all he can do is be a spoiler, never a nice thing to do. I will beat Hillary!” Trump, 69, predicted some “amazing weeks” ahead for his campaign. Cruz, at a news conference on the sidelines of a Republican National Committee meeting in Hollywood, Florida, said neither he nor Trump will amass the 1,237 delegates needed to win the nomination without a contested convention in Cleveland starting on July 18. “What is clear today is that we are headed toward a contested convention. Nobody is able to reach 1,237. I’m not going to reach 1,237, and Donald Trump is not going to reach 1,237,” said Cruz, a U.S. senator from Texas. New York boosted Trump’s delegate tally to 845, while Cruz has 559 and Kasich 147, according to the Associated Press. Next Tuesday’s contests offer 172 delegates for Republicans. CLINTON LEADS TRUMP -POLL If Trump, a New York billionaire, and Clinton, a former U.S. secretary of state, go on to secure their respective parties’ nominations, a Reuters/Ipsos national opinion poll shows Clinton with a sizeable lead if the Nov. 8 election were held today. In the latest poll of likely general election voters, 45 percent said they would support Clinton while 35 percent would support Trump if the two were running against each other. The April 15-19 poll surveyed 1,334 people and had a credibility interval of 3.1 percentage points. A former reality TV star, Trump has adopted a more measured tone in recent days and appears to be trying to heal wounds inflicted by a campaign that has alarmed many in the Republican establishment. He sent campaign advisers to the party meeting in Florida that began on Wednesday. “There’s only two issues left for Republicans: Will Trump get 50 percent of the delegates prior to Cleveland, and if not, how close will he be? New York gives him a nice boost, but it will take weeks before we know the answer,” said Ari Fleischer, who was White House spokesman under President George W. Bush. Cruz, 45, came in third in New York. Ohio Governor John Kasich, 63, a long-shot candidate, sought to use his second-place showing in New York as proof he is emerging as Trump’s central challenger. Trump won at least 89 delegates in New York, while Kasich got at least three, according to the AP. Cruz did not win any, prompting Trump adviser Sarah Huckabee Sanders to urge him on CNN on Wednesday to “get out of the way” once the math of delegate counts makes it impossible for him to prevail. The win by Clinton, 68, makes it nearly impossible for Sanders, 74, to overtake her commanding lead in delegates needed to secure the nomination. Clinton clinched at least 175 out of 291 New York delegates, while Sanders won at least 106, according to the AP. A U.S. senator from Vermont, Sanders has vowed to fight until the Democrats’ nominating convention in Philadelphia starting on July 25. Democratic strategist Jim Manley said Clinton has the delicate task of trying to attract Sanders supporters drawn to his leftist campaign promises, while switching focus to the task of beating the eventual Republican nominee. “She runs a risk. If she goes too far to the left she’s going to upset independents and others that she’s going to need in the general,” Manley said. | 1 |
5,347 | U.S. Border Patrol Chief Morgan asked to leave agency | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Border Patrol Chief Mark Morgan has been asked to step down as the agency moves toward tougher enforcement of immigration laws under the Trump administration, a Department of Homeland Security official told Reuters on Thursday. Morgan, a longtime former Federal Bureau of Investigation official, is expected to leave his post by the end of the month, a spokesman for U.S. Customs and Border Protection said. President Donald Trump announced a broad plan to crack down on border security on Wednesday, including directing the construction of a wall along the border with Mexico. The border patrol union, which endorsed Trump’s presidential campaign and applauded his executive orders, had been critical of Morgan for supporting former President Barack Obama’s plans to safeguard certain undocumented immigrants from deportation. The executive board of the National Border Patrol Council called Morgan arrogant and a “disgrace to the Border Patrol” in an opinion piece published by conservative website Breitbart News on Nov. 30. Unlike many border patrol officers, Morgan did not climb the chain of command within the agency but spent most of his career with the FBI. Acting U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Kevin McAleenan issued a statement thanking Morgan for his service. “On behalf of the men and women of U.S. Customs and Border Protection and the U.S. Border Patrol, I want to thank Mark Morgan for his unwavering dedication to our border security mission, and recognize his life-long career in service to the nation,” the statement said. | 1 |
5,348 | Racist Trump Supporter Is An Embarrassment To His Own Son Who Publicly Denounces Him | Carl Paladino s racism against President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama is so bad that his own son just publicly denounced him.Last week, Paladino, who served as a Trump campaign official, wrote a wish list full of hate against the Obamas. Obama catches mad cow disease after being caught having relations with a Herford, Paladino wrote. [Obama] dies before his trial and is buried in a cow pasture next to Valerie Jarret, who died weeks prior, after being convicted of sedition and treason, when a Jihady cell mate mistook her for being a nice person and decapitated her, he continued.Of Michelle Obama, he said: I d like her to return to being a male and let loose in the outback of Zimbabwe where she lives comfortably in a cave with Maxie, the gorilla. The racist outburst caused much outrage , and even Paladino s own son could no longer sit silent.Ellicott Development Company CEO William Paladino released a statement condemning his father on Christmas Eve. Ellicott Development takes pride in being a culturally diverse company with over 535 hard-working dedicated employees. We value and respect our employees, friends, partners and all of our commercial and residential tenancies and we do not condone the statements made about the President of the United States and his wife. They were disrespectful and absolutely unnecessary. However, many people pointed out in the comments that Carl Paladino is still the Chairman of the Board at Ellicott and that it s not enough to condemn his remarks if he is still allowed to hold onto his position. Therefore, a boycott has been called for against Ellicott and any business, government, and bank connected to them.Carl Paladino doesn t appear to be bothered by the condemnation either, suggesting that his son is only publicly breaking with him while privately supporting him. There is no reason for the company and its 550 employees to suffer from my politic, especially with the hate spewed by the activists who are devoid of any understanding of our history, our government and our constitution, the elder Paladino wrote in an email to the New York Post.What Carl Paladino said about the Obama family is disgusting and he should be expelled from any remaining position he has with Ellicott and a stronger condemnation needs to be released from the company. But let s all remember that Carl Paladino worked for Donald Trump s campaign, which means Trump condoned Paladino s racism. That s not surprising, of course, considering Trump pandered to white supremacists throughout his campaign and has some working in his new administration.Featured Image: Screenshot | 0 |
5,349 | Turkey opens military base in Mogadishu to train Somali soldiers | MOGADISHU/ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkey opened its biggest overseas military base on Saturday in Somalia s capital, cementing its ties with the volatile but strategic Muslim nation and building a presence in East Africa. More than 10,000 Somali soldiers will be trained by Turkish officers at the base, a senior Turkish official said ahead of a ceremony in Mogadishu attended by Turkish military chief of staff Hulusi Akar. The opening of the $50 million base signals ever-closer ties between Turkey and Somalia. Turkey s relations with the Horn of Africa date back to the Ottoman Empire, but President Tayyip Erdogan s government has become a close ally of the Somali government in recent years. At the opening ceremony on Saturday, Somali Prime Minister Hassan Ali Khaire thanked the Turkish government for opening the training school and said it would help the government reconstruct its national force not based on clan...not from a particular place, but well-trained forces that represent the Somali people. He noted that the military school was Turkey s biggest overseas. The facility can train and house 1,000 soldiers at a time and also has sports courts and a running track. Erdogan, whose roots are in political Islam, is an outspoken defender of Muslims, particularly those in need of humanitarian aid, such as Syrian refugees and Myanmar s Rohingya. Analysts say that, in the aftermath of the Arab Spring, as Turkey s foreign policy forays close to home have floundered, Ankara has found a willing partner in Somalia. It s a country where Turkey could make a difference without necessarily having to compete with regional or global powers, said Sinan Ulgen, a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Ankara s initial focus on aid, as opposed to security assistance or overt backing of political parties, helped build trust, he added. Turkey s vast aid effort at the height of the 2011 famine endeared it to many Somali people, and it has continued to pour in aid, much of it from private companies. It has built schools, hospitals and infrastructure and provided scholarships for Somalis to study in Turkey. Erdogan has visited Mogadishu twice, and when he made his first trip there in 2011 he became the first non-African leader to visit the war-ravaged nation in 20 years. Rapidly growing trade between the two nations has followed. In 2010, Turkish exports to Somalia totaled just $5.1 million. By last year, they had ballooned to $123 million. In the space of six years Turkey has gone from Somalia s 20th-largest source of imports to its fifth-largest. Turkey really has won the hearts and minds of Somali people, Information Minister Abdirahman Omar Osman told Reuters this month. Somalia s government has also been a vocal backer of the Erdogan government in its bid to quash Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen s influence abroad. The Somali cabinet immediately ordered schools and a hospital in Mogadishu linked to Gulen to be shut in the aftermath of last year s failed coup, which Erdogan has repeatedly blamed on the cleric. Gulen denies involvement. Somalia s government has a number of foreign backers, including the United Nations, the African Union, and the United States, who are assisting it in building a functional national army capable of taking on the fight against the militant al-Shabaab group. The militants were driven out of Mogadishu in 2010, but their deadly attacks remain one of the main obstacles to stability in the chaotic Horn of Africa country, which lies along one of the world s busiest shipping routes. The Somali government has praised Turkish investment for improving infrastructure in the country, and the information minister singled out Turkey s new move into security support. We are very happy they are giving us modern facilities for our security forces, he said. This is something that Somalia has never seen even though countries like the U.S. and UK are giving us millions. The difference is the camp Turkey built is an institution that will remain for the next 50 or 100 years. The Turkish official who spoke to Reuters before the opening said the base was in line with Ankara s priority of expanding its weapons sales to new markets . | 1 |
5,350 | IS ANYONE SURPRISED? Hillary Tells Grads What Helped Her “Get Over” The Election Loss That She Really Hasn’t Gotten Over | Hillary Clinton told a group of graduates how she coped with her election loss Is anyone surprised that she hit the wine bottle to get over it? The only problem is that she just gave an interview full of bitter reasons why she feels she beat Donald Trump (see below). This woman is still in denial and still believes she s got a chance to run for ANYTHING!Hillary Clinton just made the claim that she beat President Trump in the 2016 election. The bitter and delusional Clinton is a woman who can t let the loss go In a lengthy interview in New York Magazine, Clinton made the claim that she beat both Sanders and Trump in the 2016 election: I beat both of them, she said, evidently referencing her popular vote win over Trump. | 0 |
5,351 | Passage of September 11 lawsuit bill an 'abject embarrassment': White House | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House said on Thursday that Congress’s passage of a law allowing Sept. 11-related suits against Saudi Arabia was “an abject embarrassment” and that the administration was willing to talk to lawmakers about narrowing the measure’s impact. “I think what we’ve seen in the United States Congress is a pretty classic case of rapid onset buyer’s remorse,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest told a briefing, noting that 28 senators had written a letter expressing concern about the measure within minutes of voting to override President Barack Obama’s veto. | 1 |
5,352 | WALMART WILL MELT CLASS RINGS WITH CONFEDERATE FLAG: [Video] Refuses To Fulfill Order For Arkansas Woman…Will Refund Payment | An Arkansas woman who went to pick up the class ring she ordered from Walmart left disappointed, after store officials told her the retailer s new policy barred them from turning the item over because it bore an image of the Confederate flag.Elaine Glidewell told KFSM someone from the store in Fort Smith called her to pick up the ring she d ordered for her nephew, but when she arrived on Tuesday, a clerk told her she couldn t have it. The ring had been ordered before Walmart stopped selling items bearing images of the flag, in the wake of controversy that stemmed from a racially-charged shooting in South Carolina. I wanted to cry, Glidewell told KFSM, adding that the store clerk said the ring would be melted. Glidewell said she paid $320 for the ring and was going to present it to her nephew, who recently graduated. He had expressed interest in a design that bore a Rebel mascot that incorporates the Confederate battle flag. She got her money back, but no ring. They wouldn t let me have the ring. It had a note on it, was in a plastic bag, it said do not sell. It was signed by the store manager, Glidewell said.Brian Nick, spokesman for Walmart, told FoxNews.com Glidewell was denied the ring because her transaction came after the retailer made a business decision to stop selling items with the Confederate flag on it.Via: FOX News | 0 |
5,353 | Alabama Supreme Court allows impeachment of governor to proceed | (Reuters) - The Alabama Supreme Court ruled on Saturday that impeachment proceedings against Governor Robert Bentley can start next week, halting a court order that had blocked hearings stemming from his relationship with a former aide. Bentley, a 74-year-old Republican, has battled impeachment efforts over the last year and has defied calls from political leaders that he stand down. The 7-0 decision by the high court allows impeachment proceedings to begin in the House of Representatives’ Judiciary Committee on Monday even as justices consider new filings in the case. Bentley, who is in his second term, is accused of inappropriate use of state resources. His troubles began last year when recordings surfaced of him making suggestive remarks to a former adviser, Rebekah Mason, before his wife of 50 years filed for divorce in August 2015. Bentley has denied having a physical affair with Mason, who is married. She resigned as questions about the pair’s relationship began to dominate Alabama politics. In its ruling, the Supreme Court stayed a temporary restraining order issued by a circuit court judge on Friday. The order had halted the impeachment process until hearings could be held on Bentley’s claim that lawmakers did not give enough time to present an adequate defense. Judiciary Committee Chairman Mike Jones hailed the decision, saying in a statement, “This is a great day for the Constitution of Alabama.” The Judiciary Committee will make a recommendation to the full House on whether to impeach Bentley. Ross Garber, an attorney for Bentley, said his legal team would submit briefs to the Supreme Court by 1 p.m. CDT on Monday, the deadline set by the justices. “It’s disappointing to hear the Committee will plow forward while the Supreme Court is considering the case,” he said in a statement. A state court on Friday had rejected Bentley’s request to block the Judiciary Committee from releasing evidence about wrongdoing stemming from his relationship with Mason to be used for impeachment proceedings. The committee’s report accused Bentley of ordering state law enforcement officers to track down copies of an embarrassing recording that suggested an affair with Mason. It also accused him of retaliating against an official who discovered the relationship. On Wednesday, the Alabama Ethics Commission also found that Bentley probably violated ethics and campaign finance laws. Bentley said after the ethics commission findings that he had no intention of resigning. | 1 |
5,354 | FINALLY! FBI Uses Mystery Method To Unlock Terrorist’s Phone | Finally! This ends the court battle so we ll see what happens with the phone The FBI says it successfully used a mysterious technique without Apple s help to break into an iPhone linked to the gunman in a California mass shooting.The surprise development effectively ends a pitched court battle between Apple and the Obama administration.The government told a federal court Monday without any details that it accessed data on gunman Syed Farook s iPhone and no longer requires Apple s assistance. Farook and his wife died in a gun battle with police after killing 14 people in San Bernardino, California, in December.Apple did not immediately comment on the development.A U.S. magistrate last month ordered Apple to provide the FBI with software to help it hack into Farook s work-issued iPhone. The order touched off a debate pitting digital privacy rights against national security concerns.VIA: THE BLAZE | 0 |
5,355 | New Poll Is DEVASTATING News For Trump – It’s Worse Than His Slipping Approval Rating | A new Politico/Morning Consult poll is out, and it shows that Trump s approval rating among registered voters is continuing to occupy the dregs of presidential approval ratings. It was conducted during his allegedly successful foreign trip, showing that pretending to be presidential by traveling abroad for conferences and summits didn t serve to impress voters.What s worse (better?), though, is the number of people who want him impeached. That number jumped five points over the last week. One week ago, only 38 percent of voters wanted to see him impeached. Morning Consult s founder and chief researcher, Kyle Dropp, says: If President Trump was hoping his foreign trip would shift the conversation away from scandals, he may be out of luck Over the last week, support for beginning impeachment proceedings among voters rose from 38 percent to 43 percent. While it s true that most Democrats want to see Trump impeached, and most Republicans don t want to see him impeached, the fact that this number is rising shows just how growing segments of America view Trump as unfit to serve. In fact, of those who want Trump impeached, a majority see Trump as unfit to serve and should be removed from office, regardless of whether he committed an impeachable offense or not. Trump went to Europe and made complete fools out of us by calling Germany bad, very bad, and threatening to cut off German cars, despite the fact that most German cars sold here are built here. He literally shoved Montenegro s prime minister out of his way, he scolded our NATO allies like a bunch of children over something he does not understand, and he s withdrawing us from the Paris climate agreement.Couple that with his ongoing obsession with the media including continuing to call them the enemy because they keep calling him out on his stupidity and his lies and his sheer comfort with being a lying ignoramus on the world stage, and yes. He s wholly unfit to serve.Congress probably won t bow to any political pressure on this. Trump s list of impeachable offenses (like obstructing an official investigation a la Richard Nixon) has to be extensive and inexcusable for the GOP-controlled Congress to draw up articles of impeachment. But when they find themselves backed into that corner, they ll have to listen to the growing public outcry this poll demonstrates.Featured image by Aaron P. Bernstein via Getty Images | 0 |
5,356 | Congressman Conyers has not thought about resigning: lawyer | (Reuters) - Democratic Representative John Conyers, facing sexual misconduct allegations, has not thought about resigning, his lawyer said on Thursday after the top Democrat in the U.S. House of Representatives called on the congressman to step down. “It is not up to Nancy Pelosi,” attorney Arnold Reed told reporters in Detroit, Michigan, referring to the House Democratic leader. “Nancy Pelosi did not elect the congressman, and she sure as hell won’t be the one that tells the congressman to leave. That decision will be completely up to the congressman. He’s not thought of that,” Reed said. | 1 |
5,357 | Iran justice ministry says no decision yet on British-Iranian aid worker | LONDON (Reuters) - The head of Iran s justice ministry was quoted on Friday as saying Tehran would decide the fate of a detained British-Iranian aid worker sentenced to five years in jail and that he could not confirm Western media reports relating to her case. Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a project manager with the Thomson Reuters Foundation, was arrested in April 2016 at a Tehran airport as she was heading back to Britain with her two-year-old daughter after a family visit. She was convicted of plotting to overthrow Iran s clerical establishment, a charge denied by her family and the Foundation, a charity organization that is independent of Thomson Reuters and operates independently of Reuters News. Zaghari-Ratcliffe s husband Richard Ratcliffe told the Guardian newspaper and other British media on Thursday that her lawyer had said that her case had been marked as being eligible for early release. Iran s judiciary cannot confirm any of the claims in Western media about this case, Iran s semi-official Tasnim news agency on Friday quoted Gholamhossein Esmaili, the head of the justice department in Tehran province, as saying. When a decision is made, it will be announced by the Islamic Republic s judiciary or through diplomatic channels. British foreign minister Boris Johnson traveled to Iran this month to lobby for her release. Esmaili was also quoted by Tasnim as saying that a second case had been brought against Zaghari-Ratcliffe - the first such acknowledgement from a justice ministry official. Her family said in October that the second case carried charges that could bring mean another 16 years in prison, including joining and receiving money from organizations working to overthrow the Islamic Republic and attending a demonstration outside the Iranian Embassy in London. Besides serving her current sentence, she has also another ongoing case against her in court... We do not know if she would be found guilty or not, Esmaili was quoted as saying. Tasnim said Esmaili also dismissed reports of a swap deal, but did not make clear which reports he was referring to. The release of dual national prisoners in Iran in recent years has been mainly done through prisoner swaps. Iran refuses to recognize dual nationals and denies them access to consular assistance. It has arrested at least 30 dual nationals during the past two years, mostly on spying charges. | 1 |
5,358 | erb trump vs clinton is finally here | well heres a good from the podesta wiki files this time it has podesta himself and some others trying to decide who should sober hillary up oh boy its from aug wikileaks hillary clinton needed someone to sober her up at in the afternoon hillary clinton campaign aides had a frantic email exchange in august over who should call the candidate to sober her up some at around in the afternoon according to documents published by wikileaks clinton campaign chairman john podesta emailed communications aide jennifer palmieri with a question at around pm should i call her and talk this through or better to leave with you podesta wrote im worried shell get on with cheryl mills and well end up in a bad place palmieri wrote back more than two hours later with a response i think you should call her and sober her up some | 0 |
5,359 | Saudis pledge $100 million to African anti-jihadist force: Mali | DAKAR (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia has pledged $100 million to a new regional military force battling jihadist groups in West Africa s Sahel region, force member Mali said on Monday. The contribution would be a major boost to the cash-strapped force and bring pledged commitments to more than half the roughly $500 million the G5 Sahel says it needs for its first year of operations. The G5 Sahel - composed of the armies of Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Burkina Faso and Chad - launched its first military campaign in October amid growing unrest in the Sahel, whose porous borders are regularly crossed by jihadists, including affiliates of al Qaeda and Islamic State. Those groups have stepped up attacks on civilian and military targets, including tourist attractions in regional capitals, raising fears the zone will become a new breeding ground for militants. Mali s foreign ministry said Saudi Arabian authorities made the pledge during a visit to the kingdom late last month by Malian Foreign Minister Abdoulaye Diop. Saudi Arabia s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Sunni Muslim kingdom is competing with its main rival, Shi ite power Iran, for influence across West Africa and other parts of the Muslim world. Donors from both countries have given money to mosques and other causes there. France, the G5 s most vocal foreign backer, has pressed Saudi Arabia to take concrete actions to fight Islamist militants. French President Emmanuel Macron asked Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to contribute to the G5 when he saw him in Riyadh last month. The European Union, France, the United States and each of the G5 countries have also promised to fund the force. | 1 |
5,360 | German SPD says outcome uncertain for impending government talks | BERLIN (Reuters) - A senior member of Germany s Social Democrats (SPD) said her party would start talks next week with Chancellor Angela Merkel s conservatives on forming a governing coalition, a move that could end a political impasse in Europe s largest economy. The SPD voted on Thursday to open discussions with the conservatives despite having earlier pledged to go into opposition after suffering its worst election result in the post-war era in September. The consultations - between Merkel, her Bavarian ally Horst Seehofer and SPD leader Martin Schulz, as well as the parliamentary leaders of the three parties - will begin in Berlin on Wednesday evening. The result of the talks remains open and a grand coalition between the SPD and conservatives was no foregone conclusion, Andrea Nahles, the SPD s parliamentary leader, told Deutschlandfunk radio on Friday. It s no more and no less than having talks, Nahles said. It s not automatic that we ll end up in a grand coalition - rather tough discussions will be necessary, and I don t know what the conservatives are prepared to work with us on. Merkel, who has been at the helm in Germany for 12 years, hopes the SPD will agree to a re-run of the grand coalition that has governed Germany for the last four years. She was forced to turn to the SPD after talks with the environmentalist Greens and liberal Free Democrats (FDP) on a three-way alliance collapsed. Her conservative bloc has welcomed the SPD s decision to start initial talks. They would still need to decide later whether to proceed to full-blown coalition talks. The majority of Germans (70 percent) expect a grand coalition to form, a Forsa poll for broadcaster ZDF showed on Friday. It found almost half of Germans (47 percent) would be happy with such an alliance. Around a third (36 percent) disapproved of another conservative alliance, which would make the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) the biggest opposition party. The SPD gained two points in the Forsa poll to 23 percent; the conservatives shed a point to 32 percent. Merkel s conservatives and the SPD both saw their vote share shrink in September elections, complicating the coalition arithmetic. Their coalition remains in place as a caretaker government. Nahles said the SPD had not set any conditions for joining a coalition with the conservatives, adding: You don t go into negotiations with a huge backpack full of red lines. But she said the SPD had laid out key points, including getting rid of Germany s two-tier public and private health system - an idea the conservatives oppose. Seehofer, leader of Bavaria s arch-conservative Christian Social Union (CSU) - the sister party to Merkel s conservatives - said his party would not agree to that, telling magazine Der Spiegel he could not imagine how such a system could be implemented without causing profound injustices . Seehofer also rejected Schulz s idea to create a United States of Europe by 2025, saying that would certainly remain a utopia . On the issue of immigration - which was behind the collapse of the talks between the conservatives, Greens and FDP - Nahles said the SPD needed to take the bull by the horns . Speaking at the SPD party congress on Friday, she said Germany needed an immigration law but also a realistic recognition of the difficulties that some municipalities face in integrating refugees. | 1 |
5,361 | Turkey's Erdogan links fate of detained U.S. pastor to wanted cleric Gulen | ANKARA (Reuters) - President Tayyip Erdogan suggested on Thursday that Turkey could free a detained U.S. pastor if the United States handed over a Muslim cleric living in Pennsylvania whom Ankara has blamed for a failed military coup last year, an idea that Washington appeared to dismiss. Turkey has been seeking the extradition of Fethullah Gulen, a former ally of Erdogan whose supporters are blamed for trying to overthrow Erdogan s government in July 2016. Gulen has denied any role in the coup attempt, in which 250 people were killed. U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, have said the Turkish government has yet to provide enough evidence for the U.S. Justice Department to act. Thousands of people have been detained in a crackdown since the failed coup, including American Christian missionary Andrew Brunson, who ran a small church in Izmir on Turkey s western coast. Brunson has been held since October. Turkish media has said the charges against him include membership of Gulen s network, considered a terrorist organization by the Turkish government. The United States has said that Brunson has been wrongfully imprisoned and has called for him to be released. In a speech to police officers at the presidential palace in Ankara, Erdogan appeared to link the fate of the two men. Give us the pastor back , they say. You have one pastor as well. Give him (Gulen) to us, Erdogan said. Then we will try him (Brunson) and give him to you. The (pastor) we have is on trial. Yours is not - he is living in Pennsylvania. You can give him easily. You can give him right away. A decree issued in August gave Erdogan authority to approve the exchange of foreigners detained or convicted in Turkey with people held in other countries in situations required by national security or national interests . Asked about Erdogan s suggestion of a swap of Gulen for Brunson, State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said, I can t imagine that we would go down that road. We have received extradition requests for him (Gulen), she told a daily State Department briefing. I have nothing new for you on that. We continue to call for Pastor Brunson s release. She said U.S. diplomats were able to visit Brunson on September 18, and added, We continue to advocate for his release. He was wrongfully imprisoned in Turkey, and we d like to see him brought home. | 1 |
5,362 | TransCanada gets presidential permit for Keystone XL pipeline | (Reuters) - TransCanada Corp (TRP.TO) said on Friday the U.S. Department of State issued a presidential permit for the construction of the Keystone XL oil pipeline, a project blocked by former President Barack Obama. President Donald Trump will make an announcement on the pipeline at 10:15 a.m., White House spokesman Sean Spicer said in a post on Twitter. Trump signed an executive order to advance the project, which will link Canadian oil sands to U.S. refiners, soon after taking office in January, saying it would create thousands of jobs. Obama had said the pipeline would do nothing to reduce fuel prices for U.S. motorists and would contribute emissions linked to global warming. A senior administration official told Reuters that Trump will make the announcement alongside TransCanada Chief Executive Russell Girling and Sean McGarvey, president of North America’s Building Trades Unions. “Our Government has always been supportive of the Keystone XL pipeline and we are pleased with the U.S. decision,” a spokesman for Canada’s minister of natural resources said. “The importance of a common, continental energy market cannot be overstated,” he added. The move marks the beginning of lengthy process, which will involve getting approvals from state regulators. The project could also face legal challenges. TransCanada tried for more than five years to build the 1,179-mile (1,897-km) pipeline, until Obama rejected it in 2015. The company resubmitted its application for the project in January, after Trump signed the executive order smoothing its path. Expedited approval of projects is part of Trump’s approach for a 10-year, $1 trillion infrastructure package he promised on the campaign trail. The multibillion-dollar pipeline would bring more than 800,000 barrels per day of heavy crude from Canada’s oil sands in Alberta into Nebraska, linking to an existing pipeline network feeding U.S. refineries and ports along the Gulf of Mexico. | 1 |
5,363 | GSK, other drugmakers bet on post-Brexit UK science | LONDON (Reuters) - Britain won a vote of confidence from its economically important life sciences sector on Wednesday as several major drug companies committed to invest in the country under the government s industrial strategy plans after Brexit. The move is welcome news for Prime Minister Theresa May, who has struggled to win over large sections of industry as Britain prepares to leave the European Union. Thanks to the strength of UK universities and the presence of two major pharmaceuticals companies in GlaxoSmithKline and AstraZeneca, the drugs industry has been a bright spot in the British economy for many years. But the highly regulated sector faces potential obstacles to trade as a result of Brexit unless London and Brussels manage to align regulatory regimes for medicines. In a bid to soften the blow, the government has backed a report by immunologist and geneticist John Bell designed to boost the pharmaceutical sector via fresh public-private collaborations. That has paved the way for the Life Sciences Sector Deal, which will see GSK invest 40 million pounds ($54 million) of new money in genomic research, including a plan to sequence DNA from all 500,000 volunteer participants enrolled in UK Biobank, the world s most detailed biomedical database. GSK s head of research Patrick Vallance said the deal showed Britain remained an attractive place for drug discovery, but he cautioned: The UK needs to recognize going forward that science is an international endeavor, not a parochial endeavor. Other investments by pharma companies include plans by Johnson & Johnson and the Medicines Co to work on new clinical trials and genetic research by AstraZeneca. U.S. drugmaker Merck & Co had already announced plans to expand UK research operations under the deal last week. In all, the government said the deal brought together existing and future commitments by 25 global organizations. Other companies in discussions with the government about investments include Philips, Roche Diagnostics, Siemens, GE Healthcare and Toshiba Medical Systems. As a key part of the deal, the government said it was committed to increasing investment in R&D to 2.4 percent of GDP by 2027 and 3 percent over the longer term. | 1 |
5,364 | Iran hardliners, pragmatists show unity in response to Trump | LONDON (Reuters) - A tough line from President Donald Trump has been met by a show of unity from both sides of Iran s political divide, uniting hardliners who cast the United States as an implacable enemy with pragmatists who seek rapprochement with the West. Iran, which has kept up a steady drumbeat of angry statements for days, lashed out again on Tuesday, threatening to teach the Americans new lessons and keep all options on the table if Washington blacklists its Revolutionary Guards. Trump, who has accused his predecessor Barack Obama of being too soft on Iran, is expected to announce a hardening of policy this week, likely to include decertifying a landmark 2015 deal that lifted international sanctions in return for curbs on Tehran s nuclear programme. Such a step would stop short of pulling out of the agreement, leaving that decision to Congress. Trump is also expected to designate Iran s most powerful security force, the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), as a terrorist organisation. The IRGC has a vast economic empire in Iran, and blacklisting it could make it more difficult for Iranian businesses to access the global financial system. It seems the Trump administration understands only swear words, and needs some shocks to understand the new meaning of power in the world, said Iranian armed forces spokesman Masoud Jazayeri, who is also a Revolutionary Guards commander. The Americans have driven the world crazy by their behaviour. It is time to teach them a new lesson. Several Iranian newspapers ran the same photo on the front page on Tuesday: the urbane, U.S.-educated Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif laughing and hugging the commander of the IRGC, Major-General Mohammad Ali Jafari, in a striking display of unity between the two main factions of Iran s leadership. We have a similar stance but different ways of saying it, the papers quoted Jafari as saying. Iran s moderate president Hassan Rouhani won re-election less than five months ago after a campaign in which he called for better ties with the outside world and reform at home, openly criticising the influence of the IRGC which he accused of backing his hardline opponent. But the moderates and hardliners tend to rally together in public when threatened from abroad. The Americans are too small to be able to harm the Revolutionary Guards, Ali Akbar Velayati, the top adviser to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was quoted as saying by ISNA. We have all options on the table. Whatever they do, we will take reciprocal measures. U.S. sanctions on the IRGC could affect conflicts in Iraq and Syria, where Tehran and Washington both support warring parties that oppose the Islamic State militant group (IS). Russia, Iran s ally that is also fighting IS in Iraq and Syria, said on Tuesday that it does not consider the Revolutionary Guards to be a terrorist organisation. The Iranian nuclear deal, backed by European countries, China and Russia, lifted broad international sanctions over Iran s nuclear programme that had been tightened during the Obama years and had caused severe damage to Iran s economy. But Washington still maintains separate unilateral sanctions over Tehran s ballistic missile programme and over allegations that it supports terrorism. The lingering U.S. sanctions have slowed Iran s re-emergence into the world economy, making global banks reluctant to take on business with Iranian firms despite the nuclear deal. The United States already blacklists some individuals and entities for supporting IRGC activities, but not the Guards themselves. Designating the Guards as terrorists could make it more difficult for Iranian businesses to take advantage of the lifting of the international sanctions, since banks are required to verify that their clients are not on terrorism blacklists. Iran s rial has dropped against the U.S. dollar in recent days in a sign of concern about Trump s policy. The rial was quoted in the free market around 40,400 to the dollar, currency exchangers in Tehran told Reuters, compared to 39,200 last week. Several exchangers said they had stopped selling dollars from Monday and were waiting to assess the trend in the market. The government told Iranians on Tuesday it would not let the decisions of the mentally unstable Trump affect the market. Trump might say some things by the end of the week, but this should not create chaos in the market. Iran is a stable country, and nothing will happen, government spokesman Mohammad Baqer Nobakht said in a weekly news conference. Iran s Central Bank governor, Valiollah Seif, was also quoted as saying by Tasnim news agency that Trump s words might have an emotional impact on the foreign exchange market, but it would not be long-term . Washington aims to put more pressure on the IRGC, especially over its missile programme. Trump said in September that recent IRGC missile tests illustrated the weakness of the nuclear deal. Iran says the nuclear deal does not require it to restrict its missile programme. Zarif, the Iranian foreign minister, said Iran purposefully excluded military capabilities from the pact, as it is not intended as leverage or a bargaining chip in future negotiations . In an article published in the Atlantic magazine on Monday, Zarif added: No party or country need fear our missiles ... unless it intends to attack our territory. | 1 |
5,365 | For some Syrians in U.S., strikes turned Trump from villain to hero | DEARBORN, Mich. (Reuters) - Syrian-Americans on Friday hailed the U.S. missile attack on a Syrian air base as a blow for human rights, but said they were wary of both President Donald Trump’s motives and what comes next. Many who had been angered by Trump’s efforts to ban Syrians, along with visitors from several other Muslim-majority nations, welcomed what they saw as his new role as the avenger of civilians killed in this week’s chemical weapons attack. “We needed to take some action, show some backbone,” said Judy Asghar, 35, an American born to Syrian immigrants who lives in Dearborn, Michigan, epicenter of one of the largest Arab-American communities in the United States. Some called Thursday night’s military action overdue, voicing disappointment with then-President Barack Obama’s refusal to attack the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad following a 2013 chemical weapons attack. “I was very glad that it finally happened, something that should have happened years ago,” Ali Homsi, 59, a civil engineer who moved to the United States from Syria as a student in 1978, said in a telephone interview. Homsi lives in Tempe, Arizona, but still has family in Syria. Many highlighted the human rights abuses that have characterized the six-year civil war and what they see as the impunity of Assad’s government and pro-Assad forces. “No one’s been enforcing that up until yesterday,” Shireen Jasser, a Houston social worker whose father immigrated to the United States from Syria, said by phone. “We’re just thankful to President Trump for making this swift decision,” said Jasser, president of her city’s chapter of the Syrian American Council. The Washington-based group advocates “a free, democratic, and pluralistic Syria through American support.” U.S. officials said the air base targeted on Thursday was the launching point for Tuesday’s poison gas attack, which killed at least 70 people, many of them children. Some Syrian-Americans and Syrians in the United States said Trump’s response to the chemical attack transformed him in their eyes. “A lot of Syrian-Americans are now cheering the president, are elated,” said Dr. Mohammad Kabbesh, 45, a physician who grew up in Damascus but now lives in Sacramento, California, said by phone. Syrian refugee Motaz al Afandi, 49, of Texas said that if Trump pursues aggressive action toward Assad, he could end up solving the refugee problem. “If we get rid of Al-Assad, we won’t need to be refugees anymore,” said al Afandi, who runs a tow truck business in the Dallas area and sought asylum in the United States with his wife and three children after fleeing his country’s conflict. Still, some who cheered the military action said the travel ban first launched in January had left them with mixed feelings about Trump, and they reserved judgment as they awaited his next steps. “We’re partway there,” said Youmun Alhlou, 23, of San Jose, California, who works as a legal specialist at Google and whose parents immigrated to the United States from Syria. Others questioned whether the White House was using the humanitarian crisis as an excuse for more overseas wars. “It’s part of the plan to invade more countries for various reasons, whether its oil or power,” said Amir Alshakarna, 31, of Southfield, Michigan, who became an American citizen last year and works for his family’s construction company. “The Trump who did the travel ban, that’s the real Trump.” Asghar of Dearborn said Trump could be using military might to distract from the stumbles seen during his first months in office. Those include the failure to persuade Congress to repeal and replace Obamacare, legal challenges to Trump’s travel ban and continuing investigations into alleged Russian meddling in the election, which Russia has denied, and into potential Trump associates’ ties to Russia. “If this is all we do, it will mean very little except good politics for Trump,” Asghar said. “Americans seem to love presidents who bomb people.” | 1 |
5,366 | larken rose on the immorality of voting | podcast play in new window download embed
whatever side of whatever political divide you are on these times will pass the question is what will emerge on the other side do we want a world of hatred and division where people are divided and ruled by psychopaths and warmongers or a world where love brings us together to create the world we want to live in its not the powersthatshouldntbes choice to make its ours so what world do you want to live in | 0 |
5,367 | AFGHANISTAN: Trump Surges Into the Graveyard of Empires | By ramping up US troop levels in Afghanistan, Trump is alienating many supporters. (Photo: DoD/USAF Tech Sgt Brigitte N Brantley. Source: Wikicommons)Miles Elliot 21st Century WireOn Monday night, US President Donald Trump made a speech in which he outlined his long-awaited new strategy for the war in Afghanistan. As predicted by 21WIRE in July, Trump will undertake a fourth US surge in Afghanistan, building up US troop levels in the country just like Bush and Obama did before him.However, to say that he outlined a new strategy in his speech is being very kind to Trump. He did very little outlining and what he did present does not exactly qualify as new, or as a strategy.One of the most notable features of his speech was his refusal to disclose troop numbers or timescales for their deployment. Granted, publicising those aspects of the US presence in Afghanistan did not create a win for Obama; the former president promised to pull out all the troops by 2014, but left office in January 2017 with over 8,500 US military personnel still stationed in the country. For Trump to keep such details from the American public, particularly the troop numbers, goes against basic democratic principles of transparency and accountability. As Finian Cunningham says: America s overseas wars are not just expanding under Trump; they are going secret and unaccountable. Furthermore, simply sending more troops and beefing up military deployments to Afghanistan is not a new strategy. George W Bush deployed a quiet surge to Afghanistan in 2008, and Obama presided over two separate surges in early and late 2009, none of which won the war. See 21WIRE s recent article which points out fundamental flaws and problems with the US strategy and modus operandi in Afghanistan; doubling down on these flaws with more personnel, money and weapons may only amplify them.The war was probably unwinnable from the outset anyway. There is a reason Afghanistan is referred to as the Graveyard of Empires. Justin Raimondo s latest article responding to Trump s announcement alludes to it: So I studied Afghanistan in great detail and from every conceivable angle, [Trump] claims. Really? Did he study it enough to realize that no one has ever conquered Afghanistan? Did he contemplate the storied history of that unforgiving land, which caused even Alexander the Great to turn back? Or for a more lighthearted approach, the following tweet plays on the seeming endlessness of the Afghan war in American political life.I made this political cartoon in 2010. Enjoy! https://t.co/fSosAGURCW pic.twitter.com/jyfQIZOFzY Matt Bors (@MattBors) August 22, 2017Another interesting feature of Trump s speech was its focus on Pakistan, which he sharply criticized for harboring terrorists and allowing them safe havens . However, as Michael Krieger points out in his excellent analysis: Guess which country he didn t mention? The greatest sponsor of Islamic radicalization the world has ever seen: Saudi Arabia. This once again proves that Trump represents the same old tired thinking that s been running the U.S. economy and society into the ground for decades. This is now a 100% establishment Presidency, which will be completely defined by establishment thinking. In other words, imperial collapse is coming. It seems an obvious point that talking about combating terrorism without addressing its primary causes and sources of support is somewhat foolish. However, it appears that Trump and his administration need a reminder.By far the most striking aspect of Trump s announcement, however, is that it represents a 180 U-turn, totally reversing the attitude he had to US involvement in Afghanistan since before he even began campaigning to become President. The following is just one of many tweets dating back quite a few years in which Trump complains about the US being in Afghanistan.When will we stop wasting our money on rebuilding Afghanistan? We must rebuild our country first. Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 7, 2011Trump s announcement is already alienating much of his political base, especially supporters who wanted him to prioritize American jobs and infrastructure over globalist projects such as trade deals and foreign wars. More than that, it is unlikely to be popular with the overall US electorate, who are on the whole opposed to continuing the war. On the other hand it is no surprise that the announcement is gaining praise from neocons and lawmakers such as Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI).Does it even need to be said that the US has had troops deployed to Afghanistan for 16 years? This might make Afghanistan one of the only truly inter-generational wars the US has fought.Met a man today who served in Afghanistan 16 yrs ago -now says his son serves there. Let that sink in as you support perpetual war Brian J. Karem (@BrianKarem) August 22, 2017There is of course a question as to how much of this plan is coming from Trump himself as opposed to from his advisers, deep state handlers or other influences. As Finian Cunningham argues below, there is reason to believe that Trump has been compromised by the deep state . Many even believe that soft coup has occurred and that Trump is no longer really in charge. Yet others question whether Trump had any authenticity to begin with; on the left especially some people perceive Trump to be thoroughly dishonest and merely a representative of robber-baron, capitalist fascism .These issues are part of the larger question of Trump s authenticity, but unfortunately we can t provide those answers here. Whatever one s position on this, however, none of the possible options lets the President off the hook. In all cases, he is the man responsible, it s his name on the door, and it is his responsibility to either make good on his promises to the American people or at the very least to keep them informed. In light of his announcement on Afghanistan, neither one appears to be happening.SEE ALSO: AFGHANISTAN: Forgotten, But Not GoneMore on this from RT US Army soldiers in Afghanistan. The country has been called the Graveyard of Empires for being notoriously hard to conquer (Photo: US Army. Source: Wikicommons)Finian Cunningham RTIf one moment stands out as the clearest signal yet of US President Trump turning his back on supporters, it was his announcement this week to re-escalate American military intervention in Afghanistan.His signature campaign promise of putting America First and ending the folly of overseas wars launched by previous administrations was shredded on prime time television when he gave orders for thousands of more US troops to be sent to Afghanistan. The already 16-year war in that country America s longest will now go on indefinitely longer.The Huffington Post headlined: Trump s vague new Afghanistan strategy continues an endless war. Not only that, but this president is refusing to give any public information on force numbers or timescale. America s overseas wars are not just expanding under Trump; they are going secret and unaccountable.This surge in militarism is precisely what candidate Trump said he would not do when he campaigned for votes among blue-collar workers in the Rust Belt states, vowing instead to channel US economic resources to revive forgotten communities at home. Recall his blustering inauguration speech on January 20 when he bemoaned the American Carnage, at home and abroad.As the Huffington Post writes: When Obama was still in office and overseeing a massive troop presence in Afghanistan, Trump repeatedly bashed the operation as a waste of money and called for a quick withdrawal from the country. How s that for a U-turn? This is at a time when support among Trump s voter base in the Rust Belt states has plummeted. There is weakness in the heartland, reported NBC, because workers fear Trump is reneging on past commitments to revitalize their livelihoods. Their concern is that this president is too interested in giving tax breaks to corporations and kowtowing to the Pentagon.Ironically, Donald Trump likes to portray himself as an alpha-male who is his own boss. It is abundantly clear now that Trump is a mere manikin who sits in the White House taking orders from his generals.When Trump ousted Stephen Bannon, his staunchest ally in the White House, it was under the orders of the military figures who are now dominant in his administration. Trump s chief of staff, former Marine General John Kelly, wanted Bannon out because of his contrarian views.When Bannon gave a surprise interview last week contradicting the militarist policy on North Korea that was the last straw. Bannon said there was no military option in solving the North Korea standoff, which flew in the face of what the Pentagon has been advising Trump, with all options on the table. Only days later, he was kicked out.Bannon has now returned to edit Breitbart News, the nationalistic website which has in the past served as a media booster for Trump. Following the announcement on Afghanistan, Breitbart News declared: Trump reverses course and blasted his speech a flip-flop, as reported by Politico.Bannon had been a vigorous counsel to Trump against overseas militarism and in particular about Afghanistan. He is thought to have been the primary influence behind Trump s economic nationalism of America First.It is no coincidence that Trump decided to get rid of Bannon while huddled with military generals and intelligence chiefs at Camp David last weekend. Then three days after his departure from the White House, Trump delivers his U-turn on re-escalating the military involvement in South Asia, exactly as the Pentagon top brass had been urging.With little or no policy achievements so far, Trump is emerging as a blowhard who is all too willing to toe the line to survive even if that means stabbing his supposed allies in the back. This is a president who has a big mouth and big ego, and not much else. All the promises to his voter base are being seen to be cruel hoaxes, perpetrated by one who is always denouncing others over hoaxes.The rise of the generals in Trump s administration, alongside a weak-kneed figurehead president, should surely be cause for concern for its sinister constitutional implications. But disturbingly, the drift toward a military government in the US hardly causes a public ruffle; indeed, it is actually welcomed by prominent news media.In an editorial last weekend condemning The Failing Trump Presidency, the New York Times seems to be oblivious in its endorsement of military control over the White House.It states: One measure of the despair caused by Mr. Trump s behavior is that we find ourselves strangely comforted by things that in any normal presidency would be cause for concern Americans accustomed constitutionally and politically to civilian leadership now find themselves relying on three current and former generals John Kelly, the new White House chief of staff; H. R. McMaster, the national security adviser; and Jim Mattis, the secretary of defense to stop Mr. Trump from going completely off the rails. Last week, too, when the five Joint Chiefs of Staff roundly rebuked Trump over his ambiguous comments on racial violence, the US media widely saw that intervention by the Pentagon as a welcome disciplining of the president.It s a sobering reality-check on how the supposed radical, populist president who promised to return governing power to the ordinary citizens is now firmly in the vice of a corporate-military cabal.Look at Trump s cabinet. Apart from the three generals, Kelly, McMaster and Mattis, the other key posts are run by an ex-oil CEO, Rex Tillerson at the State Department, and former Wall Street executives, Steven Mnuchin as Treasury Secretary, Gary Cohn as national economic adviser, and Wilbur Ross as Commerce Secretary.This combination of military and industrial corporatism at the executive level of government is a definition of a fascist state. Combine that with a malleable megalomaniac who is willing to betray his allies and voter base, and that makes for a dangerous cabal.Trump s readiness to go to war in Venezuela, North Korea, and Iran and to give license to the Pentagon to step up its air force slaughter in Iraq, Syria, and Yemen are all signals of how far this presidency has degenerated.But it is Trump s brazen backtracking on Afghanistan that most transparently shows his unscrupulous character and just how much the Pentagon has taken control over this presidency.Last November, the American people voted for a radical change, one that would deliver economic revival and jobs at home, while implementing more peaceful foreign relations.Today, Americans have got the opposite of what they were calling for when they elected President Trump. The implications are blatant and disconcerting. American democracy no longer exists, if it ever did. The will of the people has been subverted by the will of the military-industrial complex. Trump is but a pathetic puppet who is taking orders from the generals and his oligarchic friends in Wall Street.The so-called exceptional nation the one that never tires of proclaiming its lofty democratic virtues to the rest of the world has degenerated into a military-corporatist state. Trump s betrayal is complete and stands out as one of the biggest cons in modern political history.READ MORE AFGHANISTAN NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire Afghanistan FilesSUPPORT 21WIRE SUBSCRIBE AND BECOME A MEMBER @ 21WIRE.TV | 0 |
5,368 | Chile left-wing candidates could form alliance, threatening market rally | SANTIAGO (Reuters) - Chile s stock market has priced in a victory of conservative presidential candidate Sebastian Pinera, even though progressive candidates could form an alliance in a December runoff, traders and analysts said. The IPSA stock market index has surged 27 percent this year and is on track for its best year since 2010, spurred by a rebound in prices of top-export copper and polls that have shown Pinera ahead in the race. Pinera, a wealthy businessman and supporter of free-market policies, is expected to come in first by a wide margin in November s first-round vote, but he is unlikely to win an absolute majority. That would result in a close runoff against the leading progressive candidate. The majority is left of center, said Kenneth Bunker, a political scientist at Universidad Central de Chile. A Pinera victory depends on division within the left. The most recent GfK Adimark poll shows Pinera, who has consolidated the support of the country s political right, leading at 34 percent of the vote. Center-left Senator Alejandro Guillier is second with 16 percent, well ahead of several candidates promising to continue President Michelle Bachelet s socially progressive policies. Hard-left candidate Beatriz Sanchez, who has proposed billions of dollars in new taxes on mining companies, was third at 15 percent. As campaigning officially began last week, Guillier appealed for unity, saying in a radio interview that he would share his policy platform with rivals on the left to try to align their positions. No one doubts that in the second round we will all be together, Guillier said at a rally. While Chile remains one of Latin America s most business-friendly countries, public debt has grown as falling copper prices hit government revenue, and Bachelet critics say she has not prioritized growth. Last month, her top economic officials resigned in part over the government s rejection of a $2.5 billion copper and iron project on environmental grounds. Investors are particularly attentive to candidates proposals related to mining, Chile s most important industry. Guillier and Pinera have both pledged to streamline the mine permitting process, though Guillier has suggested modifying free-trade accords to promote domestic mineral processing. In a banner year for emerging markets, the IPSA has outpaced most regional peers. Brazil s Bovespa Index has surged 24 percent, Peru s leading index is up 20 percent, and Colombia s COLCAP index is up 9 percent. Only Argentina s Merval, up 49 percent, has surged more. The industrial and raw materials sectors have led Chile s market gains, surging 55 and 41 percent year to date, respectively. Lithium miner Sociedad Quimica y Minera de Chile SA has risen 77 percent in the past 9 months, while shipping firm Compania Sud Americana de Vapores SA is up 97 percent. In recent client notes, Credit Suisse and J.P. Morgan have said the so-called Pinera effect has passed and that now might be the time for traders to take profits or wait for election results. Hugo Rubio, president of brokerage BTG Pactual Chile, said a Pinera loss would cause a double-digit drop in the stock market, though the full extent would depend on the candidate. It s a risk the markets don t seem to be alive to at this stage, said Edward Glossop, emerging markets economist at Capital Economics in London. The risks are to the downside. | 1 |
5,369 | Bernie Sanders Releases Mini-Documentary On Florida’s Migrant Workers (VIDEO) | Today, Senator Bernie Sanders released a new commercial on his efforts to help migrant workers in Florida. The advertisement stars a woman from Mexico named Udelia Chautla who narrates the commerical, which is more of a mini-documentary, about her experiences with low wages and abuse as a laborer in Florida s tomato fields. There were cases of bosses abusing workers, Chautla said in Spanish. They would not provide workers with water or restrooms. The bosses would get angry because some of the men wouldn t want to keep working and start hitting them It affected my children because I didn t have enough to buy food. The entire advertisement will air on Univsion this Thursday in Florida, Chicago, and Arizona, ahead of primaries in those states. // < ![CDATA[ <span class="mceItemHidden" data-mce-bogus="1"><span></span>(function(d, s, id) { var js, <span class="mceItemHidden" data-mce-bogus="1"><span class="hiddenSpellError" pre="" data-mce-bogus="1">fjs</span></span> = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.3"; <span class="hiddenSpellError" pre="" data-mce-bogus="1">fjs</span>.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);}(document, 'script', '<span class="hiddenSpellError" pre="" data-mce-bogus="1">facebook-jssdk</span>')); // ]]>How many more Immokalees are there? How many fields or factories are there? We have to ask ourselves who benefits from Posted by Bernie Sanders on Saturday, March 5, 2016 In 2008, I traveled to the tomato fields of southern Florida and met with migrant workers who were paid starvation wages for backbreaking work and were being ruthlessly exploited, wrote Bernie Sanders on his campaign website. After the visit, I invited leaders of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers to Washington to testify during a Senate committee hearing regarding abusive labor practices. As a result of the tremendous grassroots effort of this coalition, working conditions in Immokalee improved and workers received a wage increase. In 2011, Bernie Sanders wrote an article on what he saw in Immokalee. In the United States of America, millions of workers are being forced into a race to the bottom. As poverty increases and the middle class shrinks, they are seeing their standard of living decline, he wrote. They are working longer hours for lower wages, and are losing their health insurance, pensions and other benefits. What we have in the tomato fields of Florida are workers who are living on the lowest rung of the ladder in that race to the bottom. We must address their plight not only from a moral perspective, but with the understanding that if we look the other way, and accept the terrible exploitation they are suffering, every American worker is in danger as that race to the bottom accelerates. If any state in the country needs a Bernie Sanders, it is the state of Florida. According to data compiled by Bloomberg, 3 of the 10 cities in the country with the greatest income inequality are in Florida; Miami, Tampa Bay, and Gainesville. The wealthiest 5 percent of households in Florida earn 24 percent of all income earned in the state. Nearly a quarter of African-Americans in the state can t legally vote because Florida is the only state in the country other than Iowa to place a lifetime ban from voting on convicted felons. South Florida is already facing many threats caused by climate change, with some scientists predicting rising sea levels will flood Miami by 2100. Meanwhile, Florida s Republican Governor Rick Scott has banned state agencies from even using the phrases global warming and climate change in their correspondence.Whether its environmental concerns or growing levels of poverty and wealth disparity, many of the problems focused on by Bernie Sanders campaign are exemplified in Florida. This is the same state that brought us Jeb Bush, Senator Marco Rubio, and elected Governor Rick Scott, who even Republicans have called the state s worst governor ever, so it should be no surprise Scott is being seriously considered for Donald Trump s running mate. Hopefully, the campaigns of Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton can resonate with voters in the state to swing Florida s electoral votes in the direction of Democrats for the 2016 general election because Florida will once again likely be key in determining who the next president of the United States will be.Featured Image Courtesy of Flickr | 0 |
5,370 | Madrid representative in Catalonia apologizes for police violence during independence vote | MADRID (Reuters) - The Spanish government s official representative in Catalonia apologized on Friday for the violent response by Spanish police to protesters who were attempting to vote in a banned independence referendum in the region on Sunday. When I see these images, and more so when I know people have been hit, pushed and even one person who hospitalized, I can t help but regret it and apologize on behalf of the officers that intervened, Enric Millo said in a television interview. It was the first apology by a Madrid government official over the clashes and could be seen as a conciliatory gesture to Catalan leaders who plan a unilateral declaration of independence of the region from Spain. The police action, which according to Catalan health authorities around 900 injured, has been widely condemned by human rights groups as excessive force on a civilian population. | 1 |
5,371 | Pence says decision to fire Comey not connected to Russia probe | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Vice President Mike Pence said on Wednesday FBI Director James Comey was fired to restore confidence in the law enforcement agency and not because of any connection to its probe of possible Russian meddling in the U.S. presidential election. “That was not what this was about,” Pence told reporters at the U.S. Capitol when asked whether President Donald Trump’s decision to fire Comey was related to the Russia investigation. “The president took strong and decisive leadership here to put the safety and security of the American people first.” | 1 |
5,372 | Reporter Reveals The Real Reason Trump Fired Bannon From WH Post And It’s Petty As Hell (VIDEO) | News that one of Trump s closest advisor, Steve Bannon, had been ousted from his position within the National Security Council, only further reinforced the disturbing amount of chaos happening within the White House. People are fired abruptly. People resign abruptly. And the reasons why are always obscured through a mountain of lies.In Bannon s case, the official White House line was that he had only been placed in his role to keep an eye on disgraced former national security advisor Michael Flynn.sr WH official tells me Bannon was only on NSC to keep an eye on Flynn & "de-operationalize NSC from Rice" & that he never went to a meeting Rosie Gray (@RosieGray) April 5, 2017Unfortunately for Trump, the cover story was so hamfisted that it began falling apart almost immediately. In their rush to spin the story, top placed anonymous sources all began using the oddly specific word de-operationalize to describe Bannon s role suggesting this was a talking point being crafted from the White House itself. The excuse that Bannon was there to watch Michael Flynn is even worse. Trump has repeatedly stood by Flynn, so claiming he wanted Bannon to watch him means he knew Flynn was a crook but put him in the job anyways. Not a good look.What s the real reason Bannon was slapped down? A source close to Trump told White House correspondent John Roberts that Trump had grown increasingly jealous of Bannon sharing his limelight. We are also told, though, that the president wasn t particularly happy with the way Bannon had been grabbing the limelight and that may have also played into all of this. The other, other shoe drops. @johnrobertsFox: The president wasn t particularly happy at the way Bannon had been grabbing the limelight pic.twitter.com/P3PIXNwL0n Tom Namako (@TomNamako) April 5, 2017Which is kind of like life imitating art because for months people have been noting that the best (and perhaps only) way to stop severely unqualified Bannon from having influence in the White House would be to appeal to Trump s massive ego.Memo to all magazine editors: Put Bannon on the cover with big headlines referring to him as "The Real President." https://t.co/tMHXB5ZpVN Jeet Heer (@HeerJeet) February 7, 2017And Politico reported in February that Trump was already furious that Bannon was getting some of the credit for his administration s actions. It s an issue that s been nagging at him for months.Hilariously, Saturday Night Live seized upon this unique opportunity to piss off Trump by referring to a grim reaper clothed Bannon as President Bannon, playing up the fact that Trump wasn t really in charge.Apparently, this childish play on Trump s narcissism actually worked. Trump would never go after Bannon because he s unqualified and overtly racist, or that he once described himself as Satan and Darth Vader. But Trump would certainly go after Bannon for getting too much attention. And he just did.Featured image via Mark Wilson/Getty Images | 0 |
5,373 | NuStar's St. Eustatius terminal damaged by Irma, no restart date set | HOUSTON (Reuters) - Nustar Energy s oil terminal in the Caribbean island of St. Eustatius suffered damage to several tanks and other equipment due to Hurricane Irma, but all the U.S. firm s employees are safe and no oil spills were registered, it said in a statement. NuStar s Statia terminal has the capacity to store 13.03 million barrels of crude and products. The company also said that no restart date has yet been set, and that it will be working on Thursday to restore power at the facility. Despite the damage and major clean-up effort, we feel like we fared very well considering the significant power of this storm, it said. | 1 |
5,374 | RUDY GIULIANI SLAMS HILLARY After She Refuses The Endorsement Of This One Group…This’ll Make You Sick! | What in the world has become of the Democrat Party? Hillary snubs the largest police union in America and then her VP candidate promotes Black Lives Matter in his speech to the Urban League. Is the Democrat Party the new party of lawlessness? Rudy Giuliani weighs in on this and jumps all over Hillary:Rudy Giuliani joined the Fox and Friends Weekend co-hosts today to react to the revelation that Hillary Clinton has snubbed the largest police union in the country.Giuliani said the fact that Clinton isn t seeking the endorsement of the National Fraternal Order of Police is indicative of a shift among Democrats. The Democratic Party has become an anti-law enforcement party, Giuliani said. And this is the best demonstration of it. He accused the Democrats of stoking the flames of anti-police sentiment across the country, leading to the rise of groups like Black Lives Matter and an increase in violence against law enforcement officers. It comes right from the top, it includes Hillary, Giuliani said. You don t even go talk to and seek the endorsement of one of the major police unions in the country? He noted that Democrats didn t allow uniformed police officers on the floor of the DNC, calling the party s treatment of law enforcement outrageous. | 0 |
5,375 | This Trump Ad Got Pulled Off The Air Because It Broke The Law (VIDEO) | A campaign ad for Donald Trump attacking rival Republican presidential candidate John Kasich has been pulled off the air in Ohio for violating federal election law.The ad, John Kasich All Talk No Action Politician, is designed to cut into the lead of Kasich, the current sitting governor in the state and the odds-on favorite to win the Republican primary coming up there.But it won t be seen on TV, and it is because the people employed by Trump s presidential campaign are very inept at their jobs.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iibsiauLgOoNew Day for America, the super PAC supporting Mr. Kasich, sent complaints to stations about the ad, saying that it was falsely attacking Ohio Gov. John Kasich, and that it did not comply with federal regulations for political advertising. No disclaimer appears at the end of the advertisement paid for by Donald Trump, Matt Carle, executive director of New Day for America, wrote in the complaint. Consequently, this advertisement is in violation of the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971, and it must be removed from the air. It is amazing in this day and age, when almost any sort of political advertising is allowed for the highest bidder, that an ad would get pulled like this.As the New York Times explains:The Federal Election Commission says that political ads must include a clearly readable written statement that appears at their end for a period of at least four seconds with a reasonable degree of color contrast between the background and the disclaimer statement.This is a standard thing to do for any real, serious presidential campaign, but it is a symptom of the sort of basic failure that happens every day with Trump.His campaign often issues conflicting positions on basic issues, contradicting what is said in a speech with a press release or a statement by a campaign spokesperson on TV. They issue inaccurate press releases, with wrong or misspelled names and locations, and the candidate himself has often misstated the dates and times when instructing his supporters on where and when they should be voting.Trump is already months into his campaign and still making amateur hour screw-ups. He has such a lead on the rest of the Republicans, this won t hurt. But if he makes these kinds of mistakes in the fall against the Democrats, it will weaken his already shaky campaign.Featured image via YouTube | 0 |
5,376 | GAFFE OF THE DAY: VA Gov. #TerryMcAuliffe Blames “Too Many” Guns for Shootings: “We lose 93 million Americans a day to gun violence” [Video] | VIRGINIA governor Terry McAuliffe decided to get political today when he spoke out during the presser for the Virginia shooting of Congressman Steve Scalise. Leave it to a political hack like McAuliffe to bring gun control into the discussion: There are too many guns on the street. We lose 93 million Americans a day to gun violence. CONFUSION: VA Gov. Terry McAuliffe: There are too many guns on the street. We lose 93 million Americans a day to gun violence. pic.twitter.com/36EUPl4Jsb Josh Caplan (@joshdcaplan) June 14, 2017Leave it to this uneducated political snake to make this all about politics and gun control. He eventually corrected himself to say that it s just 93 people a day who are victims of gun violence. How many are saved BECAUSE they are armed with a gun? Lives were saved today because the Capitol Police were armed. That s all thanks to Steve Scalise who is a leader in Congress and gets protection. It they hadn t been there, who know how many would have been killed!McAuliffe is a Clinton crony who has always been a snake in the grass. He will do anything to get ahead politically. He s been involved in a questionable redistricting in his state and prior to the 2016 election he made it possible for thousands of felons to vote. | 0 |
5,377 | China's U.N. envoy says North Korea, U.S. rhetoric 'too dangerous' | UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Reacting to remarks by North Korea s foreign minister on Monday, China s U.N. Ambassador Liu Jieyi told Reuters the escalating rhetoric between North Korea and the United States was getting too dangerous and the only solution was negotiations. North Korea s Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho told reporters that President Donald Trump had declared war on North Korea and Pyongyang reserves the right to take countermeasures, including shooting down U.S. bombers even if not in its air space. We want things to calm down. It s getting too dangerous and it s in nobody s interest, Liu told Reuters. We certainly hope that (the United States and North Korea) will see that there is no other way than negotiations to solve the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula ... The alternative is a disaster. | 1 |
5,378 | presstvhuge blast kills in pakistans balochistan | iranian products on display in kiev thu oct am irans export capabilities exhibition in kiev press tv
lena savchukpress tv kiev
the ukrainian capital kiev is hosting iran export capabilities exhibition many iranian companies have attended the event to showcase their products and services and find business partners in ukraine loading | 1 |
5,379 | California deal could make state first with $15 minimum wage | SACRAMENTO (Reuters) - California Governor Jerry Brown announced a deal with legislative and labor leaders on Monday to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2023, saying the nation’s most-populous state would lead the way toward higher pay for the working poor. The proposal, which still must gain support from business-friendly moderate Democrats, would make California the first to raise the statewide minimum wage to $15 an hour - the highest in the nation - while giving the governor the right to opt out if the economy falters. “I’m hoping that what happens in California will not just stay in California but will be exported to the rest of the country,” Brown said at a news conference in Sacramento. Raising the minimum wage has cropped up on many Democratic Party candidates’ agendas ahead of the November elections and the issue could help mobilize Democratic voters to the polls. According to the governor’s office, 2.2 million Californians currently earn the state minimum wage of $10 an hour. The idea of raising the minimum wage, which at the federal level has remained at $7.25 an hour for more than six years, has been opposed by Republicans and some business groups, who say it would harm small businesses and strain government budgets. If passed, Brown’s plan would commit the state, home to one of the world’s biggest economies, to raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2022 for large businesses and 2023 for smaller firms. It would also head off a pair of competing ballot initiatives championed by labor leaders to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour without allowing the governor to halt increases in bad times, a deal-breaker for Brown. But passage of the proposal is not guaranteed without support from more moderate members of the Democrat-controlled legislature. Absent from the press conference was Anthony Rendon, speaker of the state Assembly, where the bill was expected to face opposition. “This deal was placed on my desk over the weekend,” said Rendon, who supports the measure but said he was not involved in negotiations over it. “I don’t know how many folks are in support of the bill or how many are against it.” Democratic presidential hopeful U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders has called for raising the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2020. Economic consultant Christopher Thornberg, founding partner at Beacon Economics, said increasing the minimum wage would not reduce poverty because low paid workers were most at risk of losing their jobs when employers cut positions. “These are the people that businesses will say, ‘If I’m going to pay $15 bucks an hour, I’m not going to hire them,’” Thornberg said. Fourteen states and several cities began 2016 with minimum wage increases, typically phasing in raises that will ultimately take them to between $10 and $15 an hour. | 1 |
5,380 | Media Says Trump Cannot Use Anonymous Sources, But They Can! | 21st Century Wire says Is there any wonder people are sick of the mainstream media?In stunning showing of arrogance, the mainstream media attacked President Donald Trump earlier in the week for basing his wiretapping claims on anonymously sourced reports. They must have forgotten that they too have relied on the very same reporting technique when covering some of the most contentious issues of the past few years.The hypocrisy is almost enough to turn your stomach. Stuart J. Hooper breaks it down in the following video report: READ MORE TRUMP NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire Trump FilesSUPPORT 21WIRE SUBSCRIBE & BECOME A MEMBER @21WIRE.TV | 0 |
5,381 | What Trump Wants To Do To Your Children Would Break The Law | Donald Trump recently gave a speech to the American Legion about the plans he has in mind for the children of America, and if he got his way it would affect every single one of them. But it would also break the law.Trump, playing to an audience with obvious military ties, brought up the idea of enforcing patriotism on children as part of the school curriculum.Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump signaled Thursday plans to seek nationwide changes to school curricula with the goal of promoting American pride and patriotism in America s schools. In a Trump administration, I plan to work directly with the American Legion to uphold our common values and to help ensure they are taught to America s children, Trump said, speaking at the American Legion s annual convention in Cincinnati.While the candidate argued that We want our kids to learn the incredible achievements of America s history, its institutions and its heroes, doing so from the presidency would, in fact, break the law.Military Times, in their coverage of Trump s remarks, points this fact out:The comments suggested a federal government intervention in the programs of locally run schools, which is prohibited under federal law.The comment is also ironic, as Trump has repeatedly claimed that he is opposed to Common Core because it supposedly imposes a top-down federal program in schools. In reality, the Common Core seeks to raise educational standards by rewarding local schools for improvements in their curriculum devised in the way they see fit, not as a top-down federal mandate.It is also unclear what brand of patriotism Trump would decide to enforce on American children. Throughout the campaign, he has advocated the idea that in his view certain races and faiths particularly the Latino race and Muslim religion are inferior and not worthy of Constitutional protections, when the actual Constitution makes no such distinctions. How could someone with that view seriously define patriotism for American children in all 50 states?Featured image via Flickr | 0 |
5,382 | WATCH: Republican Lawmaker Gets Relentlessly Booed And Heckled For Obamacare Repeal Vote | The boos rained down after a Republican congresswoman thought she could get away with voting to strip millions of Americans of their healthcare.GOP Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers made an appearance at a Martin Luther King Jr. Day rally to spew bullshit about unity and how change and progress have come to Washington DC because of Donald Trump.That didn t sit well with the crowd, who showered Rodgers with boos and jeers after someone in the audience literally shouted Bullshit! in response to her claims that she will work hard for the people in her district.Chants of Save our healthcare! then drowned out Rodgers, who fled the stage as someone called her a liar. Here s the video via YouTube.Rodgers ignored the anger of her constituents and tried to drone on but soon left the stage. Considering that Rodgers is literally sentencing millions of people to death by voting to repeal the Affordable Care Act, she s lucky the crowd let her leave and didn t tar and feather her in the public square.Afterwards, she then released a bullshit statement claiming that Republicans are working on a smooth transition to repeal and replace Obamacare so people don t lose their coverage. No one who has coverage because of Obamacare today, will lose that coverage the day it s repealed we re committed to a smooth and stable transition for those currently receiving care, Rodgers said.A spokesperson for Rodgers later added, The Congresswoman looks forward to keeping the lines of communication open when discussing how to ensure a smooth and stable transition out of Obamacare to put in place a 21st Century health care system. Most Americans oppose repealing Obamacare without a suitable replacement or don t want it repealed at all.But Republicans voted to repeal Obamacare last week without having any plan at all to replace it with, and they STILL don t have a plan, despite how many times they claim to be working on one.Featured image via screenshot | 0 |
5,383 | Two-thirds of Germans see persistent east-west divisions: poll | BERLIN (Reuters) - Twenty-seven years after German reunification, nearly two-thirds of Germans still see persistent divisions between those in the former communist East and the West, a sort of Berlin Wall in the head , a new poll for Bild newspaper showed on Monday. Conducted by pollster INSA, the survey showed 64.6 percent of those polled believed Germans saw such divisions, compared to 22.9 percent who felt they had been overcome. The poll - released a day before Germany s reunification holiday - showed that 74 percent of Germans in the former East saw the invisible barrier , compared to just 62.3 percent of those who lived in the former West Germany. The lingering divisions became evident in the German national election on Sept. 24, in which voters dealt mainstream political parties their biggest defeats in the post-war era, while the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party won 12.6 of the vote and moved into parliament for the first time. {nL5N1M40IH] Support for the AfD and its take your country back platform was particularly strong in eastern Germany, fueled by anger about Chancellor Angela Merkel s decision to open the doors to a million mostly Muslim migrants in 2015. Malu Dreyer, the Social Democratic premier of the western state of Rhineland-Palatinate, said the election results were a wake-up call for the big political parties about the continuing unmet concerns of east Germans. We under-estimated how much transformation pressure the east Germans had, and how much they had to accomplish to make reunification a reality, she told broadcaster Bayrischer Rundfunk on Monday. Reunification didn t impact the daily lives of most West Germans. Iris Gleicke, the German government s commissioner for eastern German affairs, said unemployment was down and average income had increased sharply in the region since reunification, but population decline remained a problem. Gleicke said glamorization and demographic changes had strengthened regional trends, with per capita gross domestic product falling behind that of the west by 27 percent, and industrial productivity lagging by 20 percent. She called for more efforts to ensure essential services in the east and to guard against the rise of far-right extremism. Where the government is not present anymore, gaps are necessarily filled by those who are up to no good, she said. Separately, Research Minister Johanna Wanka announced a new project on Monday to examine how many Nazis were able to continue working in East Germany s education and research institutions after World War Two. | 1 |
5,384 | How to Blow $700 Million: Al Jazeera America Finally Calls it Quits | 21st Century Wire says Al Jazeera America will go down in history as one of the biggest failures in broadcast media history.Ever since the US and its allies began plotting to overthrow Libya and Syria, Al Jazeera has deteriorated from a promising international news network in 2003 into what it has become in 2016 a full-blown agit prop media shop for the US State Department and the Pentagon. In fact, US Military Central Command (CENTCOM) for the Middle East region is located in Qatar s capital of Doha, conveniently located just down the road from Al Jazeera s headquarters. Nice and cozy.Al Jazeera s role in promoting regime change and the destablization of Syria is now recorded history, as are its many shameful exhibitions of media fakery.The Qatari royals tried to expand propaganda operations into North America, but no matter how much money they threw at it (and those royals just love throwing money at things to try and get them to work), no one cared about it, much less watched it. I know this will be a massive disappointment for everyone here who has worked tirelessly for our long-term future. The decision that has been made is in no way because AJAM has done anything but a great job, reads a company email from CEO Al Anstey, obtained by Politico.Indeed, they tried everything it seems, just short of paying Americans to watch their programs Al Jazeera America to close down https://t.co/EmFjBw9uC1 pic.twitter.com/HDea8ujTPt Al Jazeera America (@ajam) January 13, 2016In 2012, the Qatari-owned Al Jazeera purchased Current TV from Al Gore for an inflated $500 million. Wait, it gets worse MONEY FOR NOTHING: Gore got fat off the AJAM deal.In addition to the $500 million which Doha blew on buying Gore s lemon, Current TV, the Qataris have spent at least $50 million per year between 2012 2015, along with many millions spent on advertising AJAM on other network slots, online ads, along with billboards and print media promotions. This was the Qataris easy ticket on to US cable and satellite networks. Boy, did Gore pull a fast one there. In total, you would be looking at $700 million for the whole party. At its apex, AJAM would be lucky to pull in 30,000 viewers during prime time which really amounts to a nothing market share.With all that money, and considering the hundreds of staff and media executives and producers they employed, it s safe to say that someone(s) did not have a clue what they were doing.What a colossal joke.On the bright side, the Qataris can always blame the collapse in oil prices for their lack of spare cash to fund their propaganda mills.READ MORE MAINSTREAM MEDIA EPIC FAILS AT: 21st Century Wire MSM Watch | 0 |
5,385 | U.S. obtained evidence after election that Russia leaked emails: officials | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. intelligence agencies obtained what they considered to be conclusive evidence after the November election that Russia provided hacked material from the Democratic National Committee to WikiLeaks through a third party, three U.S. officials said on Wednesday. U.S. officials had concluded months earlier that Russian intelligence agencies had directed the hacking, but had been less certain that they could prove Russia also had controlled the release of information damaging to Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. REUTERS RECOMMENDS: Amazon, Forever 21 kick the tires at American Apparel Child monks in the Indian Himalayas The timing of the additional intelligence is important because U.S. President Barack Obama has faced criticism from his own party over why it took his administration months to respond to the cyber attack. U.S. Senate and House leaders, including prominent Republicans, have also called for an inquiry. At the same time, President-elect Donald Trump has questioned the U.S. intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia tried to help his candidacy and hurt Clinton’s. Russia has denied the hacking allegations. A U.S. intelligence report on the hacking was scheduled to be presented to Obama on Thursday and to Trump on Friday, though its contents were still under discussion on Wednesday, officials said. They said the post-election intelligence gave the Obama administration greater certainty about the full role of the Russian government in the hacking and leaks of documents than it had on Oct. 7, when the U.S. intelligence agencies had said they were “confident” Russia orchestrated the hacking. The additional intelligence also informed U.S. President Barack Obama’s decision to retaliate on Dec. 29 by expelling 35 suspected Russian spies and sanctioning two Russian spy agencies, four intelligence officers and three companies, a decision that capped four months of debate at the White House about how to respond, the officials said. The officials declined to describe the intelligence obtained about the involvement of a third-party in passing on leaked material to WikiLeaks, saying they did not want to reveal how the U.S. government had obtained the information. In an interview with Fox News, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said he did not receive emails stolen from the DNC and top Hillary Clinton aide John Podesta from “a state party.” Assange did not rule out the possibility that he got the material from a third party. Trump on Wednesday sided with Assange and again questioned the U.S. intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia tried to help his candidacy and hurt Clinton’s. Concern by U.S. officials over the hacking first spiked in August, when intelligence agencies concluded that Russian intelligence, with the direction of President Vladimir Putin, had been trying to disrupt and discredit the presidential and congressional elections. Obama in August rejected recommendations from some of his advisors to disclose the Russian link and take some limited covert action as “a shot across Putin’s bow to knock it off,” one official with knowledge of the matter said. Instead, Obama warned Putin privately, arguing that a similar private message to Chinese President Xi Jinping had reduced Chinese hacking into U.S. agencies and companies. In October, Obama again declined to take action, arguing such a move could be seen as an effort to help Clinton and discredit Republican Trump, one that could stain a Clinton presidency, one official said. Obama took public action on the issue only after Trump was elected and began disparaging the intelligence community’s reporting on the Russian hacking, another official said. | 1 |
5,386 | Two children sue over Trump effort to roll back Clean Power Plan | (Reuters) - Two children, backed by the Clean Air Council environmental group, sued U.S. President Donald Trump and two of his Cabinet members on Monday to try to stop them from scrapping a package of pollution-reduction rules known as the Clean Power Plan. The lawsuit, filed in federal court in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, says the United States is “relying on junk science” and ignoring “clear and present dangers of climate change, knowingly increasing its resulting damages, death and destruction.” It was the latest legal action that green advocates have taken to combat Trump administration efforts to roll back environmental regulations through rule changes at agencies like the U.S. Department of Interior and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The two young plaintiffs, aged 7 and 11, are identified only by their first and last initials in the court papers, which allege that both are suffering from the effects of a rapidly warming climate. Trump has called climate change a hoax and said in June he would withdraw the United States from a global pact to combat it - calling the deal’s demands for emissions cuts too costly for the U.S. economy. The lawsuit asks the court to prevent the EPA, Trump and the U.S. Department of Energy, along with Energy Secretary Rick Perry and EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt, from rolling back any rules that “increase the frequency and/or intensity of life-threatening effects of climate change.” EPA and Energy Department representatives declined to comment. A White House spokeswoman did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Pruitt said on Oct. 10 he wanted to scrap the Clean Power Plan, put in place under former Democratic President Barack Obama. On Sept. 29, Perry asked federal regulators to provide price incentives to help keep coal and nuclear power plants open, as a way to address “risks” to the resilience of the electrical grid. By including the children, the Clean Air Council seemed to model its case after Juliana v. U.S., a pending federal case in which a group of teenagers sued the U.S. government for violating their constitutional rights by causing climate change. “The Clean Air Council case is taking the legal theories pioneered in Juliana and applying them to a narrow set of facts related to specific rollbacks of the Trump administration,” said Meg Ward, a spokeswoman for Our Children’s Trust, a group leading the Juliana suit. | 1 |
5,387 | Claire McCaskill Blasts Trump As A ‘Bloviated God Damned Fool’ | Claire McCaskill is very clever. Instead of outwardly calling Trump a phony bloviated god damned fool outright, she disguised it as something former Democratic president Harry Truman would have said. And all while saying that, she smacked down historian Newt Gingrich.After the former Speaker of the House made a tweet equating Truman to Trump, McCaskill, a Clinton supporter, really let him have it.For a history guy,you don t know much about Harry Truman.He d call out Trump as a phony bloviating god damned fool. https://t.co/p8EXLfGvTl Claire McCaskill (@clairecmc) August 12, 2016Aside from McCaskill s accurate description of Trump, Gingrich really should brush up on his Truman history. Before being tapped to the Vice Presidency, Truman was a United States Senator for 10 years and the elected presiding judge of Jackson County, Missouri for 8 years before that. Not only that, he wasn t a millionaire he was a farmer, a haberdasher, and had deep connections to political mob bosses.Truman was no outsider. And Trump isn t an outsider. As a billionaire real estate mogul who has touted Bloomberg, the Clintons and Putin as his friends, it s hard to consider him an outsider, which is why McCaskill s assessment is spot on.Sadly, politicians (especially on the Republican side) have been pussyfooting around calling Trump out for what he really is. But Claire McCaskill is not shy when it comes to voicing how she really feels.Between Nancy Pelosi basically saying Trump is spewing B.S., Elizabeth Warren lambasting him as a pathetic, two-bit dictator and now this, the women are grabbing the reins and honing in the conversation, and it s about time.Gingrich should stick to what he knows best staying out of the way and losing, like his dreamboat candidate Donald Trump.Thank you, Senator McCaskill, for saying what we re all thinking, and thank you for killing two birds with one stone.Featured image via Aaron S. Bernstein/Getty Images | 0 |
5,388 | Leglise-Costa named as new French ambassador to EU | PARIS (Reuters) - France has appointed Philippe Leglise-Costa as its new permanent representative to the European Union (EU), replacing Pierre Sellal in a crucial role dealing with matters such as Brexit and the EU s budget. The experienced Leglise-Costa was EU adviser to former Socialist President Fran ois Hollande, when current President Emmanuel Macron was deputy chief of staff. It s a key position, said government spokesman Castaner, commenting on the appointment. He is certainly the one who knows European topics the best. | 1 |
5,389 | Trump Just Asked The Most Unqualified Person Ever To Join His NAFTA Renegotiation Team | Trump, who keeps promising to either scrap our trade deals, or at least aggressively renegotiate them, is mulling over all the people he could add to his NAFTA renegotiating team. He s apparently not looking for anyone who has diplomatic negotiating experience though, since he thinks negotiating is negotiating. Noooo he actually wants Ron Burkle, co-owner of the Pittsburgh Penguins, on this team because he believes Burkle is great at negotiating.The Penguins were visiting the White House in the tradition of champion sports teams, where Trump praised Burkle s negotiating abilities and said: Ron, how about negotiating some of our horrible trade deals that they ve made? Here s what I want, I want to get him. Oh, I would love to have Ron Burkle. And it s great to have you Ron. But I really mean that, if you want to get involved in negotiating NAFTA, I like it. Because we re renegotiating NAFTA, Ron. The U.S. is entering its fourth round of NAFTA talks, with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau s visit to the U.S. tomorrow overlapping that. Trump hates NAFTA in part because he wants trade deals that are heavily even unfairly weighted in our direction. He has threatened to walk away from these talks because he s not getting what he wants.Worse, like the Paris Agreement and the Trans-Pacific Partnership, he thinks terminating our involvement in international agreements is the best way to get his idea of a good deal: I happen to think that Nafta will have to be terminated if we re going to make it good. Otherwise, I believe you can t negotiate a good deal. Said the desert to the grain of sand. This is a man who has bankrupted so many businesses and hurt so many people that way that it s astonishing anyone thinks he s a great businessman. But hey, he made out nicely, so who cares what happened to everyone else?This is how he sees our international agreements, including NAFTA. He doesn t understand international diplomacy at all and doesn t care to so honestly, is it any wonder he wants the co-owner of a hockey team to work on this? He s going to destroy our economy if he doesn t get other countries to destroy us with nukes first.Featured image via Win McNamee/Getty Images | 0 |
5,390 | Exclusive: McCain backs Trump criticism of F-35, says president can't cancel it | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John McCain said on Monday he backed President-elect Donald Trump’s criticism of the costs of Lockheed Martin’s F-35 fighter jet program, but said a president does not have the authority to cancel it because funds have already been appropriated. In an interview with Reuters, McCain, a leading Republican voice on national security and outspoken critic of Pentagon cost overruns, said, however, that Trump would have the power to reduce future purchases of the new-generation fighters if he decides to do so. “He can reduce the buy over time, next year, as we look at it again,” McCain said. “But right now, the acquisition … of lots of them is already taking place, and I’m happy to say at fixed-price contract. The president, I’m sure, can examine it.” | 1 |
5,391 | Mike Pence Cancels ANOTHER Trump Event, Campaign Imploding (IMAGE) | Donald Trump s lewd comments about sexually assaulting women in a 2005 leaked audio tape are wreaking havoc on his presidential campaign. Not only are prominent Republicans distancing themselves from him, but even his own running mate, Mike Pence, looks like he s about to jump ship.First, Pence pulled out of a Wisconsin rally, where Donald Trump said Pence would be taking the place of House Speaker Paul Ryan, who also canceled following the tape s release. Now, Pence has canceled a New Jersey fundraiser for Trump that was supposed to take place today signaling a trend of upcoming disruptions in Trump s campaign schedule. There were supposed to be 250 people at this event, who all paid $50 to attend.This isn t surprising, considering how strongly Pence opposed Trump s disrespectful, misogynistic comments in the 2005 recording. Trump s running mate released a statement that said: As a husband and father, I was offended by the words and actions described by Donald Trump in the eleven-year-old video released yesterday. I do not condone his remarks and cannot defend them. This cancellation is even more questionable considering that on Trump s campaign website, a message showed that all Mike Pence events had been canceled:Trump website The site was later updated with two new events for today in North Carolina instead of New Jersey but this is certainly a strange move for a campaign. Trump spokeswoman Hope Hicks has not yet returned comment on whether Pence would actually be attending the North Carolina events we wouldn t be surprised if he skipped those, too.It could very well be that Trump s degrading, rape-like comments about how he interacts with women were the final straw for the Republican party, and the final straw for Pence. It s bad enough that Pence and Trump have previously disagreed on several policies and issues but now it seems that Trump has crossed the line and Pence can t stand to represent him any longer.Featured image via Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images | 0 |
5,392 | Anti-Trump protest leaders say preparing for long fight | BOSTON (Reuters) - The protests in major U.S. cities against Republican Donald Trump’s surprise presidential election victory have been impromptu affairs, quickly organized by young Americans with a diverse array of backgrounds and agendas. But as they look out at the next four years with Trump in the White House while his party controls both houses of Congress, activists are starting to prepare for what they hope will be the nation’s strongest protests since the Occupy Wall Street movement. Rallies scheduled for Saturday in New York and Los Angeles, and a protest planned for Washington on Jan. 20, when the New York businessman succeeds President Barack Obama, will be just the beginning, activists said in a series of interviews. The Rev. Al Sharpton, a civil rights leader from New York, said anti-Trump protesters should borrow a page from the playbook that Republicans used to oppose Obama’s policies. That movement started organically, later developed as the Tea Party movement and eventually resulted in the election of Trump, said Sharpton, whose National Action Network plans to launch a new organizing effort at its New York headquarters on Saturday. “We are not going to be as ugly as them, but we are going to be just as persistent,” Sharpton said. “This is not going away.” Sizable protests sprung up this week in about a dozen major U.S. cities, including Boston, Baltimore and San Francisco. Demonstrations in Portland, Oregon, and Berkeley, California, turned violent, with protesters setting fires and clashing with police. Trump initially dismissed the crowds on Twitter, calling them “professional protesters, incited by the media,” but later reversed course, saying he admired their “passion.” T.J. Wells, who had volunteered to work for Democrat Hillary Clinton’s failed presidential campaign, said his decision to organize a Thursday night protest at Washington’s Trump International Hotel near the White House was spontaneous. “I literally shared it with a few friends, and within a few hours I had a couple hundred people show up,” said Wells, who is 27 and lives in the Washington suburb of Bethesda, Maryland, where he works in human resources. He said he hoped it would be the first of many such demonstrations. “From Inauguration Day to the time he’s out of office, we have to make sure that if there’s something he’s going to pass that the majority of Americans who voted for Hillary Clinton are not OK with, that we are forceful about that,” Wells said. Some 59.5 million people voted for Trump, fewer than the 59.7 million who cast ballots for Clinton, but Trump’s strong showing in swing states, including Michigan, earned him a decisive victory in the Electoral College that ultimately picks the president. Opponents have cited Trump’s history as a leader of the “birther” movement that claimed wrongly that Obama had not been born in the United States, his promises to deport the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants in the country and his calls to register Muslims. Members of the ANSWER Coalition, a broad-based U.S. protest group, have marched in this week’s protests and aim to draw tens of thousands to an anti-Trump Inauguration Day rally, said Walter Smolarek, an organizer. “The people are going to fight back against the Trump agenda from day one,” Smolarek said. He said the group planned to continue to protest throughout Trump’s four-year term. Since his victory on Tuesday, Trump has taken a more measured public tone than he had during the campaign. That has some civil-rights advocates ready to wait and see what Trump does before joining in protests. “I don’t think that Donald Trump responds very well to protests, to be honest with you,” said Brent Wilkes, national executive director of the League of United Latin American Citizens. He said he was willing to see whether Trump would be more moderate in his actions than he had been in the campaign, adding: “If he doesn’t, we’ll be out there in the streets.” | 1 |
5,393 | MELANIA TRUMP IN RARE ONE-ON-ONE INTERVIEW: Watch Her DESTROY Leftist MSNBC Hack On Immigration…”I Followed The Law!” | Melania Trump has been taking a relatively low key position in her husband s bid to become our next President. She s more than just arm candy for Donald Trump. She s a tough business woman who s proud to have come to America as an immigrant and earned her citizenship the LEGAL way. Watch her no-nonsense interview here with leftist MSNBC hack host, Mika Brzezinski, who does everything in her power to provoke her and condemn her husband: I followed the law, Trump said in an interview with Mika Brzezinski aired Wednesday on MSNBC s Morning Joe, in discussing the hoops she had to jump through in order to become a citizen of the United States. I never thought to stay here without papers. I had a visa, I traveled every few months back to the country to Slovenia to stamp the visa. I came back, I applied for the green card, I applied for the citizenship later on after many years of green card. So I went by system, I went by the law. And you should do that, you should not just say let me stay here and whatever happens, happens. Trump, who immigrated to the United States from Slovenia in 1996, said that she and her husband are prepared for people to call him names for expressing his viewpoints. I m a full-time mom, and I love it. So, I decided not to be in the campaign so much, but I support my husband 100 percent, she said of her role in the campaign itself. We have thick skin, and we know that people will judge him and people will call names. They don t give him enough credit. From June that he announced, they don t give him enough credit, she said, leading Brzezinski to ask her what she thought about people who felt he insulted Mexicans with his comments that the country is sending rapists and murderers across the border in his announcement speech. Via: Politico | 0 |
5,394 | IMF's Lipton says Ukraine risks going backwards | KIEV (Reuters) - Ukraine risks reversing progress made under a $17.5 billion aid-for-reforms programme from the International Monetary Fund, IMF first deputy managing director David Lipton was quoted as saying on Friday, urging the government to improve anti-graft efforts. There are risks of going backwards, Lipton told online newspaper Ukrainska Pravda in an interview during a visit to Kiev to meet Ukrainian authorities. We certainly agree that the creation of an anti-corruption court is an important next step. We encourage the government to do that. | 1 |
5,395 | Trump, under fire on many fronts, expands campaign team | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Donald Trump, under pressure to show a more presidential image, elevated a top adviser on Thursday and said he planned to hire additional staff to prepare for the possibility of a long fight for the Republican nomination. The developments came as Trump tries to rebound from a loss in Wisconsin on Tuesday to U.S. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, a defeat that punctured the billionaire businessman’s aura of inevitability and made it more likely the nominee will be picked in a floor fight at the Republican National Convention in July. The Republican front-runner’s stumble in Wisconsin exposed a variety of weaknesses. Trump alienated many female Republican voters by saying that women who have an abortion if the procedure were banned should be punished, a position he later backtracked on. He also appeared to have been outmaneuvered in the scramble for delegates in Louisiana. Although Trump beat Cruz in that state on March 5, Cruz may end up with more delegates from Louisiana than Trump. Trump announced that he has assigned all functions related to the nomination process to veteran political operative Paul Manafort, who was hired to manage the process of corralling delegates who will pick the nominee. “The nomination process has reached a point that requires someone familiar with the complexities involved in the final stages,” Trump said. Trump also canceled plans for a campaign swing through California in coming days in order to concentrate on New York, which has suddenly emerged as a must-win state for him on April 19. He has a big lead in his home state. A Trump campaign statement said that he will add to his team as the Republican National Convention nears and that he would announce new hires in the weeks ahead. The expansion of Trump’s campaign means his team will grow beyond the close-knit group of advisers who have been at his side since he jumped into the presidential race last June. Trump said he plans to open a Washington office next week. While there has been speculation that Trump might make Manafort his campaign manager, the candidate’s statement made clear that current campaign manager Corey Lewandowski and deputy manager Michael Glassner would remain in their positions. Lewandowski has been charged with simple battery for grabbing a reporter who tried to ask Trump a question in Florida a month ago. Trump, famously loyal to people he trusts, has rejected calls that he fire Lewandowski. | 1 |
5,396 | In a first, Myanmar's 'ethnic cleansing' unites Suu Kyi's party, army and public | YANGON (Reuters) - If there s one thing that unites Aung San Suu Kyi s party, the army that once tried to crush her, and the majority of people in mostly Buddhist Myanmar, it is their vehement dislike of the Rohingya Muslims, seen as a threat to national security. We don t love the military, but we are together on this one, said Nyan Win, a top official of Suu Kyi s National League for Democracy (NLD), who the country s former junta had detained for nearly three years. Our sovereignty can t be violated and that is why we are united. These people are illegal immigrants, that s for sure. But the international community never mentions that, said Nyan Win, 75, who chairs the ruling NLD s media team and is one of the most influential members of the party. But even as the United Nations has called the army crackdown on the Rohingya ethnic cleansing , western diplomats - from countries competing with China for influence in the Southeast Asian nation - say abandoning Suu Kyi or reimposing sanctions could risk Myanmar s democratic transition. Though Rohingya families have lived in Myanmar for generations, they are denied citizenship and access to basic civil rights such as freedom of movement, decent education and healthcare. Attacks by Rohingya militants on security posts last month triggered an army operation that has killed more than 400 people, destroyed over 6,800 houses and sent nearly 400,000 Rohingya fleeing to Bangladesh. Rohingya refugees and rights groups say the army has launched a campaign aimed at driving them out. Suu Kyi, who holds the title of State Counsellor and is de facto head of government, has said the militant Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) is responsible for the burning of homes, civilian deaths as well as a huge iceberg of misinformation on the strife in Rakhine. Revered when she was under house arrest for some 15 years, the Nobel peace winner has been criticized by fellow Nobel laureates and some leaders across the world. A petition drive is under way to revoke her Nobel prize. Malala Yousafzai, a fellow Nobel Peace Prize laureate, called on her to condemn the shameful treatment of the Rohingya, saying the world is waiting for her to speak out. Shame on you Malala! You know nothing about real situation in our country, Myanmar Internet user Nann Wint War wrote in a tweet. There is no Rohingya, only Bengali terrorists in Rakhine, said the tweet, a reference to Rohingya that suggests they come from Bangladesh. Suu Kyi s government launched a media campaign aimed at shoring up public support for the operation. In Facebook and Twitter posts, it has shown off support for non-Muslims displaced by the violence and blamed the international community for distributing fake news about alleged rights abuses. Hard Evidence Please! , Suu Kyi s spokesman, Zaw Htay, said in a tweet last week reacting to a BBC News report that Rakhine Buddhist villagers set Muslim houses on fire. You wrote you just saw it, share your #Evidence. Aung Shin, an NLD spokesman, said only Myanmar citizens understand the situation in Rakhine as foreign countries made their assumption based on questionable facts they obtained. Many in Myanmar fear the Rohingya present a threat to the Buddhist Rakhine majority in Rakhine State. Sixteen non-Muslims were killed and nearly 30,000 have also been displaced, fleeing to larger towns. The conflict in Rakhine has stoked communal tensions across the country. A mob armed with sticks and swords, threatening to attack a mosque in central Myanmar, was only dispersed on Sunday after police with riot shields fired rubber bullets. Muslims have voiced fear that other mosques will come under attack and have asked for tighter security. Thiri Thant Mon, managing director at Yangon-based investment advisory firm Sandanila, said many in Myanmar think the international community has wrongly directed its attention to the Rohingya fleeing Myanmar, instead of the suffering of Rakhine Buddhists in one of its poorest states. The entire population here just feel misunderstood. They feel like we are not bad people. It s not us, it s them who are killing us and why aren t you talking about it? said Thiri Thant Mon, who herself does not identify with such views. The Rohingya issue has put Suu Kyi in an awkward position politically, the diplomats said. The military still controls much of the state apparatus even after the 2011 transition to democracy. It portrays itself as the true guardians of nationalism and Buddhism. They say that could be a reason for Suu Kyi s reticence. If she speaks out on such a sensitive issue, the situation will explode, making it harder for her to solve the problem in Rakhine, said Nyan Win, the NLD executive. We can accept them as humans but we cannot let them move around freely, which violates our sovereignty, he said, adding the Rohingya belong in camps for displaced people in Rakhine due to security reasons. We can t give them freedom of movement because they are not our citizens. | 1 |
5,397 | Cuts to homeowner tax breaks could cost Republicans in 2018 races | SACRAMENTO, Calif. (Reuters) - Laura Russo is just the kind of voter the Republicans need, but the party’s proposed tax overhaul, which includes limits on the deductions for mortgage interest, state taxes and property taxes, is pushing her away. “I would be dramatically affected,” she said. An airline pilot and single mother of two, she says that like many in her affluent Loudoun County, Virginia, neighborhood she stretched to buy her home. She fears it will become harder to sell that house or pay her other tax bills if President Donald Trump signs the plan into law. Russo, 52, said she had voted for the Republican in every presidential race since 1992 until last year when she picked Hillary Clinton. She still voted for Barbara Comstock, the Republican who represents her district in Congress. “I will not do that again,” she said. “The tax bill is the straw that broke the camel’s back.” Russo is one of thousands of homeowners in Republican-leaning areas who could be hit by the elimination or reduction of tax breaks for homeowners, a Reuters analysis of federal mortgage and tax data shows, potentially opening those districts to a Democratic challenge in the November 2018 mid-term elections. The plans are expected to affect mainly the Democratic-leaning “blue states” such as California, New Jersey and New York where homes are expensive, mortgages are huge and state and local taxes tend to be high. But while these blue states will be hardest hit, county level data also shows there is a significant number of Republican enclaves in districts expected to be hotly contested in next year's polls that will feel the pain. Republican leaning pockets in blue or swing states, such as Orange County, California, or Loudoun County, Virginia, tend to have high property values – and thus the higher mortgages. Many of these areas also tend to have higher state and local income taxes. Larry Sabato, director of the non-partisan Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, estimates that there are 16 counties where 2018 races will be toss-ups between Republican incumbents and Democratic challengers. Reuters data shows that almost half of those counties have an above-average share of new mortgages worth more than $500,000, which is a proposed cap for tax deductions. The results are similar for districts selected as 50-50 ones by The Cook Political Report, a non-partisan newsletter that analyzes U.S. elections. Among those on Cook’s list is a district in Harris County in the deep-red state of Texas. Even though the state has no income tax, thousands of residents of the district, which includes Houston, deduct taxes owed in other states because of work or business done there, and property taxes - the nation’s sixth-highest. Democrats need 24 more seats to win lower house majority from the Republicans, who now control the White House and both houses of Congress. Nancy Pelosi, the House Minority Leader, said in a fundraising note Democrats were rushing out “rapid-response ads” targeting swing voters to capitalize on the concerns, while Kevin Brady, Republican chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, said on CNBC on Tuesday his party’s leadership was working on ways to mollify Republicans in blue states. That concern is felt on the ground too. Will Estrada, chairman of the Republican party in Loudoun County, said he firmly believed the tax plan would deliver savings to most people. But he said that if Democrats are right and many middle class voters face higher bills, “the GOP is going to be toast in 2018.” The bill passed by the U.S. House of Representatives on Nov. 16 let homeowners who take out new mortgages deduct only the interest paid on the first $500,000 of a mortgage. It also ends deductions for state and local income taxes, and caps deductions for property taxes at $10,000. The Senate’s plan, passed on Saturday, would keep the mortgage interest deduction as is, on any mortgage up to $1 million, but agrees with the House on state, local and property taxes. The two houses of Congress are now reconciling the two versions. The Reuters data analysis shows that 37 percent of the total mortgages issued in Orange County in 2016 were above $500,000 and 26 percent in Loudon County. Both include districts represented by Republicans and have some of the highest rates of expensive mortgages in the country. Comstock, who retained her Virginia seat by 3 percentage points, voted for the House bill, but later asked for changes on deductions, saying through a spokesman that she sought “the best possible tax package for all of her constituents.” In Orange County, Republican Representative Darrel Issa voted against the House version, in part, because of how it will affect homeowners. Neither California Republican Dana Rohrabacher, who also voted against the bill, nor Issa would comment on a possible backlash from voters. Home buyers in expensive areas count on the mortgage interest deduction to make their payments manageable, said Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the National Association of Realtors, which opposes any changes to the deductions. Yun says his analysis suggests curbing the mortgage interest deduction would lead to as much as an 8 percent drop in housing values nationwide, and cutting property tax deductions could lead to a further drop of up to 3 percent because it would make buying and selling homes more costly. “Not just in high cost states like Illinois and California, but relatively speaking in places like Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, which were critical in swaying the presidential election,” he said. Other economists think the impact may be smaller. As refinancing of mortgages becomes less popular and consumers begin paying debt down faster, the market would rebalance, said Richard Green, director of the Lusk Center for Real Estate at the University of Southern California, who forecasts a 5 percent decline in home values. California’s Placer County northeast of Sacramento, where the median home sells for more than $440,000, remains a Republican enclave. But local Republicans have noticed that each year fewer residents vote Republican and their web page bears the slogan, “Keep Placer Red.” To do that, the party will have to keep the loyalty of Republicans like Rudy Coscia, a 36-year-old plastic surgeon who just took out a $900,000 mortgage to buy a four-bedroom house in Granite Bay for $1.1 million. Coscia is counting on mortgage interest and property tax deductions as he is also making payments on $200,000 worth of medical school loans and $400,000 he borrowed to get his practice started. “They’re hurting their base,” he said. “You’d think they’d be trying not to hurt the people who voted for them.” | 1 |
5,398 | U.S. says air strikes in Somalia kill six al Shabaab fighters | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. military said on Wednesday it had carried out air strikes in Somalia against an al Qaeda-allied Islamist group and killed six militants. The group, al Shabaab, is fighting to topple Somalia s Western-backed transitional federal government and impose its own rule on the Horn of Africa country. The U.S. military s Africa Command (AFRICOM) said in a statement it had carried out three air strikes on Wednesday at 2:15 a.m. local time (2315 GMT Tuesday). The operation occurred in southern Somalia, about 260 kilometers (162 miles) south of the capital, Mogadishu, the statement said. Al Shabaab has lost control of most of Somalia s cities and towns since it was pushed out of Mogadishu in 2011. But it retains a strong presence in parts of the south and center and carries out gun and bomb attacks. | 1 |
5,399 | Civil rights groups sue Missouri to stop voter ID law | (Reuters) - Civil rights groups have sued Missouri to prevent its new voter identification law from interfering with a local special election next month, saying the measure could disenfranchise voters. The lawsuit seeks a court order blocking the law from remaining in effect during the July 11 special election for an alderman in St. Louis. The lawsuit was filed on Thursday in the Cole County Circuit Court in Jefferson City by the American Civil Liberties Union and the Advancement Project on behalf of the NAACP and the League of Women Voters of Missouri. Missouri has failed to provide necessary mandated funding for voter education, free voter IDs and birth certificates and training for poll workers since the new voting law came into effect on June 1, the ACLU said in the lawsuit. “Voters were promised that this law was not about disenfranchising the most vulnerable in our state,” said Tony Rothert, legal director of the ACLU of Missouri. “The state’s lack of funding and implementation of this law tells another story.” Maura Browning, a spokeswoman for Missouri Secretary of State John Ashcroft, who is named in the lawsuit, declined to comment on Friday. Ashcroft is on a tour around the state defending the law and explaining it to residents, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch said. The law had been misrepresented by the media, Ashcroft said, according to the newspaper. The law, a ballot measure approved by voters in November, mandates stricter measures around showing a photo identification to cast a ballot. “It is beyond unacceptable that the state of Missouri has launched a photo ID requirement while not even being prepared, trained, or properly funded for it,” Denise Lieberman of the non-profit Advancement Project said in a statement. “Missouri’s highly restrictive photo ID law was designed to make it harder for people to vote.” Numerous states, mostly Republican-led, have moved to make voting laws more stringent in recent years, saying the measures are necessary to stamp out fraud and voting irregularities at the polls. Opponents, including many Democrats, say the laws are discriminatory, particularly against minorities. | 1 |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.