Unnamed: 0 int64 | title string | text string | label int64 |
|---|---|---|---|
7,100 | STUDY REVEALS MASSIVE SPENDING: Shocking Welfare Use By Immigrants Cannot Go On! | THE CENTER FOR IMMIGRATION STUDIES IS AMAZING AT GETTING TO THE FACTS IN THE IMMIGRATION BATTLE: They bring to the table a huge set of figures that should shock every American into action on the state AND federal level. The bottom line is that YOU are paying way too much for legal AND illegal immigrants to come to America and live off of your tax dollars! We cannot and should not go on like this! Please read up and share!A new study on the use of welfare benefits by illegal and legal immigrants in the U.S. finds that households headed by immigrants use an average of $6,200 in benefits annually, fully 41 percent higher than the rate used by native born welfare recipients:This study comes on the heels of another study finding that 51 percent of immigrant households are signed up for at least one welfare program. Immigrants are such heavy users of welfare not because they don t work, but because, on average, they have little education and thus earn low wages, said Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS). If we continue to permit large numbers of less-educated people to move here from abroad, we have to accept that there will be huge and ongoing costs to taxpayers. The study, based on the Census Bureau s 2012 Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP), notes that the higher use of welfare benefits because by and large the current wave of immigrants are less educated and have fewer needed job skills and are therefore more apt to apply for welfare benefits.The study found the average immigrant household receives 33 percent more cash welfare, 57 percent more food assistance, and 44 percent more Medicaid dollars than the average native-born applicants. Additionally, the highest amount of welfare is taken by immigrants from Central America and Mexico at $8,251 per household, a rate 86 percent higher than native citizens. The greater consumption of welfare dollars by immigrants can be explained in large part by their lower level of education and larger number of children compared to natives, CIS said in a press release. Over 24 percent of immigrant households are headed by a high school dropout, compared to just 8 percent of native households. In addition, 13 percent of immigrant households have three or more children, vs. just 6 percent of native households. While it is important for Americans to understand the rate of welfare use among immigrants, expressing that use in dollar terms offers a more tangible metric that is tied to current debates over fiscal policy. With the nation facing a long-term budgetary deficit, this study helps illuminate immigration s impact on the problem, said the report s author, Jason Richwine. Richwine also noted that even as illegal immigrants are supposed to be barred from receiving welfare they receive it anyway by applying for benefits for their American-born children, often called anchor babies. Via: Breitbart | 0 |
7,101 | DOJ MONITORS PATRIOT GUN-RANGE OWNER Who Banned Muslims From Her Gun Range | I will close my business before I will make any compromises that could jeopardize the safety and security of the members who shoot here. You can be certain the Feds are more concerned about those peaceful Muslims in America who want to kill me than they are about anything I might say or do that hurts the feelings of islamic (sic) terrorists. -Jan MorganOn Saturday, Breitbart.com s AWR Hawkins said the Department of Justice is monitoring Jan Morgan, the owner of Gun Cave Indoor Firing Range in Hot Springs, Arkansas, who banned Muslims from her business in 2014, citing safety concerns. But Morgan isn t backing down and told Examiner.com Saturday she would close her business before putting her clients safety at risk.The Washington Post said the monitoring is the result of demands by the Council on American-Islamic Relations and the Arkansas chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union. Both groups demanded a federal investigation after Morgan declared her range to be a Muslim-Free Zone. CAIR and the ACLU argue that Morgan s Muslim-free policy violates the public accommodation provision of the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Times said. But Morgan disagrees, saying her range is a private club with dues-paying members.The DOJ confirmed it was monitoring Morgan, the Times added. The agency, however, did not say if it has plans to launch an investigation. CAIR said it was pleased with the action. We welcome this positive development and hope it leads to a thorough investigation of clear violations of the civil rights of American Muslims and those perceived to be Muslim by the gun range owner, said CAIR s civil rights litigation director Jenifer Wicks. But Morgan told Examiner there is a huge difference between monitoring and investigating.In fact, she said at her website, she has been under the watchful eyes of federal law enforcement authorities for a long time as a result of years of death threats from Muslims. The threats, she added, began long before she owned the range. Now, she lives her daily life under a federal microscope. I have nothing to hide, she said. I have no secrets from the federal government. Last year, she added, FBI counter-terrorism agents met with her and said ISIS is in Arkansas. The agency feared I was going to be a target of opportunity, and I was directed to take EVERY SECURITY PRE-CAUTION necessary to protect my life and the lives of all people in my presence at all times, she wrote.Morgan said that like the French cartoonists at Charlie Hebdo, she has had her life threatened many times over her articles. She also acted upon the directive of the ATF to all FFL holders to err on the side of caution and not engage in any firearm transactions with anyone we suspect might use that firearm in the commission of a crime. So, CAIR and the ACLU, do you really think the idea of more monitoring of my daily life is somehow new or a threat to me in any way? she asked on Facebook. Of course the feds are monitoring me, she added. You can be certain the Feds are more concerned about those peaceful Muslims in America who want to kill me than they are about anything I might say or do that hurts the feelings of islamic (sic) terrorists. Morgan told Examiner she is prepared to deal with a federal investigation should one be launched against her. I was prepared to fight this from day one, she said.The bottom line, she added, is this: I will close my business before I will make any compromises that could jeopardize the safety and security of the members who shoot here. On her site, Morgan said she will continue to follow the advise of two agencies within the DOJ to protect and defend my own life, as well as the lives of innocent American citizens in my presence, from any and all threats of violence connected to, and or associated with any and all terrorist organizations. Anything less, she added, would be irresponsible, reckless, and life threatening. Via: Joe Newby, The Examiner | 0 |
7,102 | DISMISSED: Trump Fires Scandal Plagued FBI Director James Comey – What Does It Mean? | 21st Century WireUS President Donald Trump has accepted a recommendation to dismiss FBI director James Comey. Was this a reprisal for the suddenly widened Russia-gate probe into the White House or was there something else at play within the operations of the deep state?Comey was at the center of a political controversy over much of the last year during the US presidential election cycle in 2016, and well into 2017. Throughout 2016, the former FBI director opened, closed and reopened (only to close again) a probe into Hillary Clinton, her email server and looking into accusations leveled at the Clinton Foundation, while also entertaining a dubious Russian probe into the Trump administration alleged connections to Russia that helped mine various stories, including a so-called dossier regarding the newly elected president in early 2017.In recent years, there have been many highly questionable actions under Comey s leadership at the FBI, such as the Orlando nightclub shooting incident who s main suspect was previously interviewed by the FBI, as well as a highly questionable ISIS inspired shooting event in Garland, Texas linked to an FBI informant case run out of Phoenix, Arizona, and the federal agency s dramatic encroachment on public privacy following a suspicious San Bernardino mass shooting. These are only just a few examples Grabien News highlights a list of scandals that were either attached to Comey or perpetuated under his watch: Here are 10 of Comey s biggest embarrassments at the FBI:1. Before he bombed the Boston Marathon, the FBI interviewed Tamerlan Tsarnaev but let him go. Russia sent the Obama Administration a second warning, but the FBI opted against investigating him again.2. Shortly after the NSA scandal exploded in 2013, the FBI was exposed conducting its own data mining on innocent Americans; the agency, Bloomberg reported, retains that material for decades (even if no wrongdoing is found).3. The FBI had possession of emails sent by Nidal Hasan saying he wanted to kill his fellow soldiers to protect the Taliban but didn t intervene, leading many critics to argue the tragedy that resulted in the death of 31 Americans at Fort Hood could have been prevented. 4. During the Obama Administration, the FBI claimed that two private jets were being used primarily for counterterrorism, when in fact they were mostly being used for Eric Holder and Robert Mueller s business and personal travel. 5. When the FBI demanded Apple create a backdoor that would allow law enforcement agencies to unlock the cell phones of various suspects, the company refused, sparking a battle between the feds and America s biggest tech company. What makes this incident indicative of Comey s questionable management of the agency is that a) The FBI jumped the gun, as they were indeed ultimately able to crack the San Bernardino terrorist s phone, and b) Almost every other major national security figure sided with Apple (from former CIA Director General Petraeus to former CIA Director James Woolsey to former director of the NSA, General Michael Hayden), warning that such a crack would inevitably wind up in the wrong hands.6. In 2015, the FBI conducted a controversial raid on a Texas political meeting, finger printing, photographing, and seizing phones from attendees (some in the group believe in restoring Texas as an independent constitutional republic).7. During its investigation into Hillary Clinton s mishandling of classified material, the FBI made an unusual deal in which Clinton aides were both given immunity and allowed to destroy their laptops. 8. The father of the radical Islamist who detonated a backpack bomb in New York City in 2016 alerted the FBI to his son s radicalization. The FBI, however, cleared Ahmad Khan Rahami after a brief interview. 9. The FBI also investigated the terrorist who killed 49 people and wounded 53 more at the Pulse Nightclub in Orlando, Fla. Despite a more than 10-month investigation of Omar Mateen during which Mateen admitting lying to agents the FBI opted against pressing further and closed its case. 10. CBS recently reported that when two terrorists sought to kill Americans attending the Draw Muhammad event in Garland, Texas, the FBI not only had an understanding an attack was coming, but actually had an undercover agent traveling with the Islamists, Elton Simpson and Nadir Soofi. The FBI has refused to comment on why the agent on the scene did not intervene during the attack. It s important to remember that Comey is not the only FBI director who bears responsibility for the controversial aspects of 2013 s Boston Bombing. Under FBI director Robert Mueller Tamerlan Tsarnaev came to the attention of the FBI on at least two occasions prior to allegedly being involved in what many researchers have described as a false flag terror event in Boston. A questionable event that has arguably been used as a pretext to further clamp down on individual rights in the US.We should also be reminded that the FBI has been routinely caught foiling their very own terror plots over the past several years.In recent years, the investigative tactics of various intelligence agencies have come into question, none perhaps more dubious then the Newburgh FBI sting that involved entrapping four men to participate in a fabricated event created by the bureau. Here s a 2011 passage from The Guardian describing how an FBI informant named Shahed Hussain coerced four others into a fake terror plot: The Newburgh Four now languish in jail. Hussain does not. For Hussain was a fake. In fact, Hussain worked for the FBI as an informant trawling mosques in hope of picking up radicals.Yet far from being active militants, the four men he attracted were impoverished individuals struggling with Newburgh s grim epidemic of crack, drug crime and poverty. One had mental issues so severe his apartment contained bottles of his own urine. He also believed Florida was a foreign country.Hussain offered the men huge financial inducements to carry out the plot including $250,000 to one man and free holidays and expensive cars.As defence lawyers poured through the evidence, the Newburgh Four came to represent the most extreme form of a controversial FBI policy to use invented terrorist plots to lure targets. There has been no case as egregious as this. It is unique in the incentive the government provided. A quarter million dollars? said Professor Karen Greenberg, a terrorism expert at Fordham University. The reputation of the FBI has suffered greatly in the recent past as well as over the past couple of decades. Incidentally, the FBI is on record as handling Emad A. Salem, a former Egyptian army officer who was a prized undercover operative thrust into confidential informant status and person who played a key role in the 1993 WTC bombing.All of this has happened under the watchful eye of the FBI SWORN-IN FBI director James Comey sworn in by former DOJ head Eric Holder. (Image Source: thewhitehousespin)Over last summer, 21WIRE observed some curious connections between the Clinton Foundation and FBI director James Comey, as well as his questionable handling of other cases related to the Clinton family. Here s the following passage to consider in light of the new information related to the Clinton investigation: Many will also be unaware that before Comey was installed by the Obama Administration as FBI Director, he was on the board of Director at HSBC Bank a bank implicated in international money laundering, including the laundering of billions on behalf of international drugs and narcotics trafficking cartels.Forbes also points out where Comey was also at the key choke-point during the case involving dodgy auditor KPMG which followed on by the HSBC criminal case: If Comey, and his boss Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez, had made a different decision about KPMG back in 2005, KPMG would not have been around to miss all the illegal acts HSBC and Standard Chartered SCBFF +% were committing on its watch. Bloomberg reported in 2007 that back in June of 2005, Comey was the man thrust into the position of deciding whether KPMG would live or die for its criminal tax shelter violations. Is this just a surface effort by the White House to clean the slate for an agency perpetually embroiled in controversy?More from RT below Trump fires FBI Director James ComeyRT The FBI is one of our Nation s most cherished and respected institutions and today will mark a new beginning for our crown jewel of law enforcement, said President Trump. While I greatly appreciate you informing me, on three separate occasions, that I am not under investigation, I nevertheless concur with the judgment of the Department of Justice that you are not able to effectively lead the Bureau, Trump told Comey in a letter.The letter announcing the termination was hand-delivered to FBI headquarters by Keith Schiller, a Trump security aide, according to several reports citing a White House official.A search for a new permanent FBI Director will begin immediately.The firing of Comey comes days after he testified to Congress on investigations into alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 US election.RT continues here READ MORE FBI NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire FBI Files | 0 |
7,103 | OBAMA ADMINISTRATION Sues Private Business For Saying NO To Dreadlocks…Just The Tip Of The Iceberg! | The Obama EEOC has spiraled out of control to meet the administration s mission of operating a politically correct government.In fact, nearly half of federal agency rulings dismissing employee discrimination claims have been overturned under Obama, costing American taxpayers tens of billions of dollars in settlements. In one year alone this translated into an astounding $51.4 billion that federal agencies paid to settle discrimination claims that often had no merit, according to the government s figuresThe Obama administration is spending taxpayer dollars to sue a private business for not allowing a male employee to have long, matted and knotted hair required to practice an Afrocentric religion in which followers also smoke marijuana ( the spiritual use of cannabis ). Known as Rastafari, it was born in the slums of Jamaica and followers must have dreadlocks, long clumps of ungroomed hair, symbolizing the mane of the Lion of Judah.The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), the federal agency that enforces the nation s workplace discrimination laws, is suing on behalf of a Rastafari prep cook in an Orlando, Florida Walt Disney resort who was ordered to cut his dreadlocks because it didn t comply with the company s appearance standards. Disney isn t the defendant, but rather the Orlando staffing company, Hospitality Staff, that provides workers for central Florida s huge hospitality industry. When Disney complained about the employee s hair, Hospitality Staff management told the prep cook (Courtney Joseph) to cut his hair if he wanted to return to work, even though Joseph explained that he couldn t because he was a practicing Rastafarian and his dreadlocks were part of his religious beliefs.Hospitality Staff violated federal law by firing Joseph over his Rastafarian religious practices, the EEOC charges in a lawsuit filed this week. Such alleged conduct violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits religious discrimination and requires employers to make reasonable accommodations to employees sincerely held religious beliefs so long as this does not pose an undue hardship to the business, according to an agency announcement. The EEOC is asking a federal court to grant a permanent injunction enjoining Hospitality Staff from further engaging in any employment practice that discriminates against workers because of their religious beliefs and requiring the company to reasonably accommodate the religious beliefs of employees in the future. The suit also asks the court to order Hospitality Staff to reinstate Joseph, grant back pay, provide compensatory and punitive damages and award any other relief the court deems necessary and proper.There is no formal, organized leadership in Rastafarianism which makes it difficult to accept as an official religion protected by federal law. Rastafarians believe Haile Selassie, the former emperor of Ethiopia, is God and that he ll help blacks living in exile as a result of the slave trade return to Africa. Jamaican reggae singer Bob Marley, who died in Miami in 1981, was among the best known Rastafarians and more recently a famous rapper known as Snoop Dogg became Rastafari and changed his name to Snoop Lion, according to a mainstream news report. A key belief for Rastas is the notion of death to all white and black oppressors, the story says, adding that the most common outward expressions of Rastafari are Rastas dreadlocks, penchant for smoking marijuana and vegetarian diets. Under Obama the EEOC has spiraled out of control to meet the administration s mission of operating a politically correct government. In fact, nearly half of federal agency rulings dismissing employee discrimination claims have been overturned under Obama, costing American taxpayers tens of billions of dollars in settlements. In one year alone this translated into an astounding $51.4 billion that federal agencies paid to settle discrimination claims that often had no merit, according to the government s figures. In nearly 45% of discrimination claims thrown out by agencies across the U.S. government the EEOC stepped in and revived the cases. The number has increased steadily since Obama became president, according to the EEOC s figures.Read more: Judicial Watch | 0 |
7,104 | Madeleine Albright: ‘I Will Register As A Muslim’ In Solidarity | Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright has pledged to register as a Muslim should Trump succeed in setting up such a registry which he promised on the campaign trail.The 79-year-old former diplomat and Czech immigrant took to Twitter on Wednesday to protest Donald Trump s executive action that bars refugee status of immigration for people from Iraq, Iran, Syria, Libya, Yemen and so forth. Albright, a refugee herself from communist Czechoslovakia (now Czech Republic), wrote:I was raised Catholic, became Episcopalian & found out later my family was Jewish. I stand ready to register as Muslim in #solidarity. Madeleine Albright (@madeleine) January 25, 2017Simply put, Madeleine Albright is a badass.This isn t the first time Albright a Clinton supporter has taken Donald Trump to task.During the campaign, Albright made headlines when she described Trump and his campaign as Putin s useful idiot, a term that is more evident today than ever.Albright also made numerous postings on Twitter defending refugees:There is no fine print on the Statue of Liberty. America must remain open to people of all faiths & backgrounds. #RefugeesWelcome pic.twitter.com/4LvMiZTRJJ Madeleine Albright (@madeleine) January 25, 201719 national security leaders agree: Congress must not make refugees the enemy. https://t.co/DkGPlkrPnW #RefugeesWelcome Madeleine Albright (@madeleine) December 1, 2015Albright s Twitter describes her as a Grateful American, Czech immigrant, mother & grandmother, fmr SecState, passionate democrat, author, prof, bizwoman, pin collector & occasional drummer. As Trump s dystopian view of the world inches closer and closer to reality, the former Secretary of State has taken more hardline stances against Trump than many members of Congress including liberals like Elizabeth Warren.In a world of Rex Tillerson s, we need more Madeleine Albrights.This feminist, liberal badass may look like a small little, old woman, but she has guts and nerves of steel the continue to serve us to this very day. We should all be inspired and follow her lead we should all register along with our Muslim brothers and sisters.Featured image via Flickr | 0 |
7,105 | Uber joins forces with global public transport association | BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Ride-hailing app Uber [UBER.UL] said on Monday it was joining a global public transport association to improve mobility in the cities it operates in, although North America s largest public transit union said there was no place for the U.S. company. Uber s move to join the International Association of Public Transportation (UITP) is part of a drive by Uber to improve its relationships with local authorities after a series of regulatory and legal setbacks. UITP represents public transport providers around the world, including Transport for London (TfL) - which in September stripped Uber of its operating license. Scandal-hit Uber has just had to reassure authorities it is changing the way it does business after the disclosure of a massive data breach cover-up that has prompted investigations from regulators around the world. Andrew Salzberg, Uber s head of transportation policy and research, said aligning the company with public transport authorities was a good way to make Uber a better partner for cities. Uber, currently valued at $69 billion, has been testing a more collaborative approach to regulators under its new CEO Dara Khosrowshahi in a shift away from a more aggressive culture under former CEO Travis Kalanick. One of the big emphases that Dara has made ... is that we want to be better partners for the cities we operate in, Salzberg said. Uber said it would work on a series of training sessions with UITP aimed at connecting people better with public transport. Salzberg said the company also wanted to help reduce congestion on roads by encouraging people to move to shared modes of transport. Alain Flausch, secretary general of UITP, said Uber s decision to join the association was a sign that the company wanted a better relationship with regulators. Flausch said he had told members of UITP that he would check the company stuck to its promises. It s a work in progress and having Uber join is a good sign. Of course they keep their business model but ... they need to be a bit more flexible and open to talking, he told Reuters. However, Larry Hanley, president of the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU), which represents public transit employees in the United States and Canada, said Uber should start being a better partner to the cities it operates in by paying a living wage to their drivers who call those cities home. Public transportation should serve the public good, and until Uber demonstrates that they meet that standard they have no business being a part of the International Association of Public Transport, Hanley said. | 1 |
7,106 | Guards chief rejects Trump 'slander' that Iran behind Saudi missile | DUBAI (Reuters) - The head of Iran s Revolutionary Guards denied on Sunday accusations by Donald Trump that Iran was behind the firing of a ballistic missile at Saudi Arabia from warring Yemen, rejecting it as one of the U.S. president s slanders . Saudi Arabia s air defenses intercepted the missile, bringing it down near the capital Riyadh s airport on Saturday and it did not cause any casualties, state news agencies reported. A shot was just taken by Iran, in my opinion, at Saudi Arabia ... and our system knocked the missile out of the air Trump told reporters on Air Force One en route to Tokyo. But Mohammad Ali Jafari, head of the Revolutionary Guards who are in charge of Iran s missile program, said: Mr Trump has said many baseless things and told many lies and frequently falsely accused Iran and this one of those slanders, Iran s state news agency IRNA reported. We do not have even the possibility to transfer missiles to Yemen. The missiles belong to them and they have increased their range, Jafari added. A Saudi-led coalition has launched thousands of air strikes against Houthi rebels and allied forces loyal to former Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh who have fired dozens of missiles into Saudi territory over the course of a 2-1/2 year war. Regional and Western sources have said Iran is sending advanced weapons and military advisers to the Houthi movement, stepping up support for its Shi ite ally in the country s civil war. Iran rejects accusations from Saudi Arabia that it is giving financial and military support to the Houthis, blaming the crisis on Riyadh. | 1 |
7,107 | House Armed Services chairman: Trump budget not enough for U.S. military | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Republican chairman of the House Armed Services Committee said on Thursday President Donald Trump’s 2018 budget proposal does not include enough funds to rebuild the nation’s military. “It is clear to virtually everyone that we have cut our military too much and that it has suffered enormous damage,” Representative Mac Thornberry said. “Unfortunately, the administration’s budget request is not enough to repair that damage and to rebuild the military as the president has discussed.” | 1 |
7,108 | Sanders, citing email controversy, questions Clinton's electability | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders on Sunday took a jab at rival Hillary Clinton’s electability, pointing to the controversy surrounding her use of a private email server as evidence of potential damage to the front-runner’s campaign. “In terms of what people are going to get slapped with, look at the front pages today in terms of what Secretary Clinton is getting slapped with,” Sanders said on ABC’s “This Week,” referring to Clinton’s use of a private email server while secretary of state. “There is a legal process underway right now,” he said. “And I’m not going to politicize that issue.” Sanders, a senator from Vermont, had previously refrained from invoking the controversy over Clinton’s controversial use of a private email account on a private server. In an early Democratic presidential debate, he declared that the American people were “sick and tired” of hearing about it. But the issue has taken on new urgency in recent days as the two fight in an increasingly tight battle for the party’s nomination. On Friday, the U.S. State Department announced they would withhold seven private email chains from Clinton’s server, saying they contain top-secret information. Throughout the dispute, Clinton has maintained that she did nothing wrong in conducting State Department business outside of an official server, arguing that it was permitted and that there was precedent for the practice. When asked on Sunday whether she thought the call to withhold the email exchanges was political, Clinton shied away from outwardly accusing anyone but questioned the timing of the decision, which came just before Monday’s first-in-the-nation nominating contest in Iowa. “I just have to point out that the timing and some of the leaks that have led up to it are concerning,” Clinton said on ABC’s “This Week.” “The best way to resolve is to do what I asked months ago, release these, let the public see them and let’s move on,” she added. In Iowa, Sanders and Clinton are locked in a statistical dead heat, with Clinton earning 45 percent support of likely caucus-goers compared with 42 percent for Sanders, according to a Des Moines Register/Bloomberg politics. Nationwide, Clinton leads Sanders with 51 percent support to 40 percent, according to a Jan. 27 Reuters/Ipsos poll. (Reporting by Alana Wise; Editing by Jonathan Oatis) SAP is the sponsor of this coverage which is independently produced by the staff of Reuters News Agency. | 1 |
7,109 | China probes former vice-chief of securities regulator for graft | SHANGHAI (Reuters) - A former vice-chairman of China s securities regulator, Yao Gang, is being investigated for taking bribes, the official China Daily said, citing the prosecutors office. Yao was one of the most senior figures arrested in a crackdown on suspected stock manipulation in late 2015, after the mid-year collapse of the Chinese stock market following a long bull run. Yao was subject to coercive measures, which can range from summons and surveillance to detention and arrest, among other actions, the Supreme People s Procuratorate said, without specifying which he faced, the newspaper said on Thursday. In July, China s graft watchdog said Yao would be prosecuted for offences that included taking bribes and destroying the order of capital markets . Yao, 55, was the general manager of Guotai Junan Securities in 1999 before taking a position with the China Securities Regulatory Commission in 2002, the paper said. At the CSRC, he was known as the King of IPOs , overseeing initial public offerings on the Chinese mainland for 13 years, it added. | 1 |
7,110 | OBAMA FIGHTS TO KEEP RADICAL AGENDA ALIVE: Asks Crooked AG Loretta Lynch To Find Way To Challenge Supreme Court Decision That Blocked His Executive Order Amnesty Scheme | This is a good reminder of how important it is to prevent Obama from anointing another radical on the Supreme Court. It might also be a good time for every American to call their representatives in Washington. Keeping another radical Obama appointee off our Supreme Court could literally be the only thing standing between a free America and one that looks more like Venezuela. This is also a reminder for anyone in the Republican party who considers themselves part of the never Trump movement. The Democrat party has never been more serious about, or closer to, fundamentally changing America forever The Obama administration is looking into whether it can challenge the Supreme Court s decision to block President Barack Obama s plan to spare millions of illegal immigrants from deportation, U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said Tuesday. We will be reviewing the case and seeing what, if anything else, we need to do in court, Lynch told Reuters in an interview.Lynch did not say what legal options the Obama administration may pursue following a split decision by the Supreme Court justices last week that left in place a block on the executive action by a lower court.She said any future executive actions Obama may take on immigration would be left to the White House.In a wideranging interview on topics from gun control to the effect of the planned exit of Britain from the European Union, Lynch identified espionage from foreign nationals on U.S. companies as a tremendous problem. The Federal Bureau of Investigation has reported a 53 percent increase in cases of economic espionage between 2014 and 2015 and the majority of cases involve Chinese nationals as culprits.Most recently, Xu Jiaqiang, 30, was charged with economic espionage and theft of trade secrets, for stealing software source code from his U.S. employer with the intent of benefiting the Chinese government. It is a matter of priority for us, Lynch said. When companies or industries are preyed upon by others, be they individuals, be they state actors who literally steal the fruit of their intellectual labors, essentially they are stealing from future generations also. Via: Yahoo News | 0 |
7,111 | BREAKING: MITT ROMNEY Speaks To Reporters Following Dinner With Trump [VIDEO] | https://youtu.be/Ai5ayloRa-0 | 0 |
7,112 | U.N. refugee agency urges Hungary to join EU migrant quota plan | BUDAPEST (Reuters) - The head of the United Nations refugee agency praised the European Union s refugee quota system for member states on Tuesday and urged Hungary to drop its resistance to taking in its fair share of migrants. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban is facing criticism over his continued refusal to change his anti-immigration stance despite a ruling by the European Union s top court this month upholding the bloc s quota system. My impression is there is a very clear intention to limit the number of people coming to Hungary to seek protection, U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said during a visit to Budapest. Grandi said the EU s quota system, introduced at the height of the migrant crisis in Europe in 2015, provided a model for other countries worldwide. This was an EU decision... we agree with that decision, he said. It was a very good example of sharing that responsibility. It could be used globally... Forced displacement is a global phenomenon like climate change. You can only address it through global solutions and solidarity. Grandi, who earlier in the day visited a camp on the Serbian border where migrants are detained while their asylum cases are pending, said razor wire fences and tough legal measures conveyed the wrong message that asylum was a crime. German Chancellor Angela Merkel, whose country took in the bulk of the migrants who entered the EU in 2015-16, has also urged Hungary to implement the EU court ruling. Grandi warned EU states in April not to send asylum seekers back to Hungary until Budapest amended a law that allows it to detain migrants at its border. EU rules allow member states to return refugees to the first safe country they reached on entering the 28-nation bloc. Orban has branded migrants - most of whom are Muslims from the Middle East and North Africa - a threat to Europe s historic Christian identity and a Trojan horse for terrorism , and he has defended the asylum centers on Hungary s border. Grandi said migrants held there were not being mistreated but added that limitations on their freedom of movement while their cases are pending, especially for minors, raised problems. Material conditions, food, medical care water, hygiene is acceptable, he said. The problem is the detention aspect. People are treated well but in a confined situation. | 1 |
7,113 | distracted by election no one resisted the deep states patriot act | by julian rose virtually everything that conventional wisdom teaches about economics is undergoing changes of an almost seismic nature at this time albeit mostly beneath | 0 |
7,114 | EPA inspector general to investigate agency chief's travels to Oklahoma | WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - The frequent travels of the head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Scott Pruitt, to Oklahoma will be investigated following congressional requests, the agency’s Office of Inspector General said on Monday. Pruitt’s many travels to his home state have fueled speculation that he intends to run for the U.S. Senate from Oklahoma. “Administrator Pruitt is traveling the country to hear directly from the people impacted by EPA’s regulations outside of the Washington bubble,” said Amy Graham, an EPA spokeswoman. “This is nothing more than a distraction from the Administrator’s significant environmental accomplishments.” The Office of Inspector General said it would look into the “frequency, cost and extent” of Pruitt’s travels to Oklahoma through July 31, and whether travel policies and procedures were followed. It said the investigation will also aim to determine “whether EPA policies and procedures are sufficiently designed to prevent fraud, waste and abuse with the Administrator’s travel that included trips to Oklahoma.” Pruitt was in Oklahoma on at least 43 of the 92 days of March, April and May, according to copies of his travel records obtained by the Environmental Integrity Project watchdog group and reviewed by Reuters last month. The travel records show Pruitt’s schedule this spring often took him to cities in the U.S. heartland where he held meetings, often with oil and gas industry representatives, made speeches and attended events before flying to Tulsa for extended weekends. The records showed Pruitt paid for some legs of the trips directly related to his visits home, although it was not clear he paid for all such legs. Pruitt has riled environmentalists by raising doubts about climate change and by vowing to sweep away scores of Obama-era regulations to help business. “Pruitt seems to be using these visits to launch his political career,” said Melinda Pierce, legislative director for the Sierra Club, an environmental group that has been deeply critical of Pruitt. “Perhaps he should use polluter money to fund these trips if he’s going to continue doing their bidding.” Before becoming head of the EPA under Republican President Donald Trump in February, he was Oklahoma’s attorney general and repeatedly sued the agency he now runs to block federal environmental rules. | 1 |
7,115 | FORMER GEORGIA CONGRESSMAN AND “DUKES OF HAZZARD” ACTOR DEFENDS THE CONFEDERATE FLAG | Former Democrat Congressman Ben Jones (1989 to 1993) who played the character Cooter on the 1970s TV series The Dukes of Hazzard posted a message on Facebook defending the Confederate flag. Jones now operates a museum and sells merchandise connected with the show, including Confederate related items.To all our friends and fans from Ben Jones, AKA Cooter I think all of Hazzard Nation understands that the Confederate battle flag is the symbol that represents the indomitable spirit of independence which keeps us makin our way we know how. The flag on top of the General Lee made a statement that the values of the rural south were the values of courage and family and good times.Our beloved symbol is now being attacked in a wave of political correctness that is unprecedented in our nation of free speech and free expression. Activists and politicians are vilifying Southern culture and our heritage as being bigoted and racist. We know that this is not the case, and we know that in Hazzard County there was never any racism.Thought the flag has been removed from such places as Walmart, Target and Amazon, it will never be removed form any of our Cooter s stores and museums. We are all the same good people today that we were last week and last year and we are not going to be shamed into turning our backs on our heritage and our convictions.We are not racists. We despise racism and bigotry. And we think the people who are creating this cultural cleansing are the real bigots in this story.When we say our flag stands for heritage, not hate and pride, not prejudice, we mean it. And we believe that old saying, You can t know where you are going if you forget where you came from.Cooter s is going to continue to sell our southern symbols as long as there is a Cooter s. I will fight these people until hell freezes over, and then I will fight them on the ice. | 0 |
7,116 | BREAKING REPORT: German Reporter Embedded With ISIS Reveals Plan For “Nuclear Tsunami” In West…”terrorists plan on killing several hundred million people” | Our open borders should be a tremendous help to them A German reporter who was allowed to embed with ISIS in Syria-Iraq says the terror group is planning a nuclear tsunami. The jayvee team hopes to wipe out hundreds of millions in a nuclear attackISIS claims it is infinitely closer to buying nuke and smuggling it into the United StatesThe terror group controls territory larger than than the United KingdomBarack Obama says he has no strategy to defeat the terror group.Via: Gateway PunditIsrael National News reported: A veteran German journalist who became the first to gain access as an embedded reporter with Islamic State (ISIS) revealed the jihadist terror group plans to bring nuclear annihilation across the globe.They are planning the largest religious cleansing in history. The journalist, Jurgen Todenhofer (75), released his findings in a book called Inside IS Ten Days in the Islamic State, reports the UK s Daily Express on Friday.Todenhofer, who previously was an MP in German Chancellor Angela Merkel s CDU party before turning to journalism in 2000 as a war reporter, spent ten days with ISIS.He was overseen during his visit by Jihadi John, the ISIS terrorist from the UK named Mohammed Emwazi who gained fame in gruesome beheading videos.According to the journalist, the West is unprepared for ISIS. He writes that the terrorists plan on killing several hundred million people. The west is drastically underestimating the power of ISIS. ISIS intends to get its hands on nuclear weapons, says Todenhofer, calling the group a nuclear tsunami preparing the largest religious cleansing in history. Those warnings are made all the more stark by the possibility of a nuclear arms race in the Middle East sparked by the Iran nuclear deal, with rival states such as Saudi Arabia eyeing their own nuclear arsenal leading to a higher proliferation and a higher chance that nuclear weapons could fall into ISIS hands. | 0 |
7,117 | Tillerson plays down tensions with Trump | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson on Sunday minimized tensions with his boss, President Donald Trump, and brushed aside comments from an influential lawmaker, who compared Trump’s undermining of his top diplomat to a public castration. “I am fully committed to his objectives. I agree with his objectives. I agree with what he is trying to do,” Tillerson said of Trump on CNN’s ‘State of the Union’ program. Tillerson’s tenure as secretary of state has been dogged by rumors about rifts with Trump over policy. Earlier this month, Trump undercut Tillerson in a Twitter message, saying the secretary of state was wasting his time trying to negotiate with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker said Trump’s comments were the equivalent of castrating the secretary in public. “I checked. I’m fully intact,” Tillerson said when asked about Corker’s comments on CNN. Tillerson repeatedly declined to answer a question about a report by NBC News that said the secretary of state had called Trump a “moron” during a private meeting in July with U.S. officials. The secretary of state accused CNN moderator Jake Tapper of trying “make a game” out of pressing him on the “moron” comment. “I’m not playing,” Tillerson said. Tillerson has often found himself at odds with the president on a range of issues, from withdrawing from the Paris agreement on climate change to North Korea and, at times, Iran, according to current and former U.S. officials and news media reports. Signs of tensions between Trump and Tillerson have raised questions among in foreign capitals about whether the secretary of state speaks for the administration. Tillerson has batted away rumors that he might resign. Nikki Haley, the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, has been mentioned as a possible replacement to Tillerson should he step down. She said she was happy being in New York, where the United Nations is based, and said that from what she has observed Trump and Tillerson have a constructive relationship. “The secretary puts out as many options for the president as he can. He makes a decision, there’s a mutual respect, and they go forward. And so everything that I have witnessed, all was fine,” she said. Tillerson acknowledged in a separate appearance on CBS’ “Face the Nation” on Sunday that he and the president “don’t agree on everything.” “Sometimes he changes his mind,” Tillerson said. “I will work as hard as I can to implement his decisions successfully.” | 1 |
7,118 | U.S. vote authorities warned to be alert to Russian hacks faking fraud: officials | (Reuters) - U.S. intelligence and law enforcement officials are warning that hackers with ties to Russia’s intelligence services could try to undermine the credibility of the presidential election by posting documents online purporting to show evidence of voter fraud. The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said however, that the U.S. election system is so large, diffuse and antiquated that hackers would not be able to change the outcome of the Nov. 8 election. But hackers could post documents, some of which might be falsified, that are designed to create public perceptions of widespread voter fraud, the officials said. They said that they did not have specific evidence of such a plan, but state and local election authorities had been warned to be vigilant for hacking attempts. On Oct. 7, the U.S. government formally accused Russia for the first time of a campaign of cyber attacks against Democratic Party organizations to interfere with the election process. U.S. officials familiar with hacking directed against American voting systems said evidence indicates that suspected Russian government-backed hackers have so far tried to attack voter registration databases operated by more than 20 states. Tracing the attacks can be difficult but breaches of only two such databases have been confirmed, they said. The officials said there is no evidence that any hackers have succeeded in accessing equipment or databases used to record votes. Many states use systems that would be difficult to hack or defraud, including paper ballots which initially are tallied by machines. U.S. elections are run by state and local officials, not the federal government. On Nov. 8, votes will be cast in hundreds of thousands of polling stations in 9,000 different jurisdictions, according to the National Association of Secretaries of State. The U.S. officials declined to comment on Republican candidate Donald Trump’s contention that the election is being “rigged.” Trump said in the third and final presidential debate with Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton on Wednesday night that he would not say until the election results were known whether or not he would accept the outcome. Trump and his campaign officials have repeatedly said that the potential for voter fraud remains high but they have not provided any evidence. On Thursday, Trump said he would accept the results of the election “if I win.” He said he reserved the “right to contest or file a legal challenge in the case of a questionable result.” Clinton supporters said Trump is unwittingly aiding an effort by Russian President Vladimir Putin to undercut the credibility of the vote. Washington and Moscow are at odds over several issues, from Russian involvement in the Ukraine conflict, the war in Syria and cyber attacks. “Trump does not even know he is being manipulated,” said Michael Morell, a former deputy CIA director who has endorsed Clinton. “Trump is an unwitting agent of Putin.” | 1 |
7,119 | THE HUNT IS ON: How Trump Team Is Smoking Out Leakers To Take Down And Punish | President Trump has made it clear that he will not stop the search for those responsible for leaks at the White House.The hunt that began with the resignation of National Security Advisor Michael Flynn does not stop, now that he is gone. Trump has also vowed that the perpetrator will be punished to the fullest extent of the law, even possibly serving hard time.Via Fox News: Leaks are prevalent in Washington, [but] I think what makes this different is the leak environment has just kicked into hyper drive, Thomas Dupree, former deputy assistant attorney general, told Fox News. In the first few weeks of this administration, we have seen a multitude of leaks on a variety of subjects from national security to immigration, to the conversation that Flynn had with the Russians it s just every direction. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCI7OMB6qQs(Source: Fox News) | 0 |
7,120 | Episode #149 – SUNDAY WIRE: ‘Part II: Another Road to Damascus’ with guests Vanessa Beeley, Ghoufran Derawan | Episode #149 of SUNDAY WIRE SHOW resumes this Sunday August 21, 2016 as host Patrick Henningsen broadcasts 3 HOURS of LIVE power-packed talk radio on ACR LISTEN LIVE ON THIS PAGE AT THE FOLLOWING SCHEDULED SHOW TIMES:SUNDAYS 5pm-8pm UK Time | 12pm-3pm ET (US) | 9am-12pm PT (US)This week s edition of THE SUNDAY WIRE is on the road broadcasting LIVE from London on the banks of the Thames. This week host Patrick Henningsen resumes the helm, covering some of the top US and international news stories this week. In the first hour we re joined by special guest LIVE from Syria, 21WIRE special contributor, Vanessa Beeley, to discuss the latest developments there and her recent incredible interview with the President of Syria s Political Advisor, as well as new revelations of a NATO-backed shadow state in Syria. In the second hour, we ll connect with another LIVE Middle East guest, a Syrian independent producer and filmmaker, Ghoufran Derawan, to talk about her own tragic story and to breakdown the truth about the Syrian Conflict. Finally, in the final segment over overdrive, we ll try to connect with and special guest from Syrian TV to discuss the Battle for Aleppo.HAVE YOUR SHOUT! VOTE & COMMENT: Has Obama-Clinton Foreign Policy Created ISIS? Strap yourselves in and lower the blast shield this is your brave new world *NOTE: THIS EPISODE MAY CONTAIN STRONG LANGUAGE AND MATURE THEMES*Direct Download the Most Recent Episode// <![CDATA[ broadstreet.zone(46707); // ]]>Sunday Wire Radio Show Archives | 0 |
7,121 | Trump administration approves tougher visa vetting, including social media checks | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Trump administration has rolled out a new questionnaire for U.S. visa applicants worldwide that asks for social media handles for the last five years and biographical information going back 15 years. The new questions, part of an effort to tighten vetting of would-be visitors to the United States, was approved on May 23 by the Office of Management and Budget despite criticism from a range of education officials and academic groups during a public comment period. Critics argued that the new questions would be overly burdensome, lead to long delays in processing and discourage international students and scientists from coming to the United States. Under the new procedures, consular officials can request all prior passport numbers, five years' worth of social media handles, email addresses and phone numbers and 15 years of biographical information including addresses, employment and travel history. (bit.ly/2qBSrpv) Officials will request the additional information when they determine “that such information is required to confirm identity or conduct more rigorous national security vetting,” a State Department official said on Wednesday. The State Department said earlier the tighter vetting would apply to visa applicants “who have been determined to warrant additional scrutiny in connection with terrorism or other national security-related visa ineligibilities.” President Donald Trump has vowed to increase national security and border protections, proposing to give more money to the military and make Mexico pay to build a wall along the southern U.S. border. He has tried to implement a temporary travel ban on people from six Muslim-majority nations that a U.S. appeals court refused to reinstate, calling it discriminatory and setting the stage for a showdown in the Supreme Court. The Office of Management and Budget granted emergency approval for the new questions for six months, rather than the usual three years. While the new questions are voluntary, the form says failure to provide the information may delay or prevent the processing of an individual visa application. Immigration lawyers and advocates say the request for 15 years of detailed biographical information, as well as the expectation that applicants remember all their social media handles, is likely to catch applicants who make innocent mistakes or do not remember all the information requested. The new questions grant “arbitrary power” to consular officials to determine who gets a visa with no effective check on their decisions, said Babak Yousefzadeh, a San Francisco-based attorney and president of the Iranian American Bar Association. “The United States has one of the most stringent visa application processes in the world,” Yousefzadeh said. “The need for tightening the application process further is really unknown and unclear.” | 1 |
7,122 | Elizabeth Warren Goes On ‘The View’ And Lets Us Know Her Plans For Trump (VIDEO) | Making an appearance on ABC s The View, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) let the ladies know what she thinks about Trump s latest attacks on her, and what she plans to do about it.Warren explained that the Republican presidential candidates, or for that matter the GOP in general, let Trump walk all over them throughout the primary process. They let him bully them, and unfortunately for them, it worked. Warren also explained that by the time they caught on to his strategy of bullying himself to victory it was far too late, and she s not about to let that happen to Hillary Clinton in the general election. She s speaking up and calling him out now, because there is no time to wait, and there is no time like the present to throw the mud right back in his face.The Massachusetts Senator was also asked about what she thinks of the nicknames given to her by Trump, especially Pocahontas, as well as Scott Brown s call for her to get a DNA test to prove if she is, in fact, part Native American.Warren simply shrugged it off and said she s never used the heritage she was told by her parents that she had to get ahead in life, and that the attacks by both Trump and Brown prove that they ll say and do anything to try to get ahead regardless of facts and reality.As far as her plans for Trump she said: Can they bully me into shutting up? Nope, not happening. Rest assured that it seems as if she s going to keep up the battle against the egomaniac all the way through November.Watch Warren explain herself here:.@SenWarren responds to Trump calling her racist : Can they bully me into shutting up? Nope, not happening. https://t.co/Yo0twn5BcT The View (@TheView) June 28, 2016Featured image via video screen capture | 0 |
7,123 | U.S. top court weighs race challenges to legislative districts | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Supreme Court justices on Monday struggled over how to determine when states have unlawfully considered race in drawing legislative districts as they weighed cases in which Republicans in Virginia and North Carolina were accused of trying to dilute the clout of black voters. Based on two hours of oral arguments in the cases before the eight justices, it appeared that the voters who challenged Virginia’s plan may win but the North Carolina case’s outcome was less clear. Conservative Justice Anthony Kennedy, who sided with the court’s liberals in a ruling last year involving Alabama legislative districts, could again be pivotal. 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. In both cases before the justices, voters accused Republicans of packing black voters, who tend to back Democratic candidates, into certain districts to diminish their voting power and make surrounding districts more white and more likely to support Republicans. In 2015, the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 to throw out a lower court’s decision upholding a Republican-backed state legislature redistricting plan in Alabama that crammed black voters into certain districts in a way critics claimed lessened their influence at the polls. The Supreme Court has never said redistricting cannot be based on nakedly partisan aims like maximizing one party’s election chances. Justice Stephen Breyer, who wrote the ruling in the Alabama case, acknowledged the difficulties in assessing when race has been taken into account appropriately in drawing voting districts. “No one, I think, has a good answer to that question. There is just slightly better, slightly worse,” Breyer said. Fellow liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor said that “it’s real easy” for states to say mere politics motivated their decisions “even though there’s a lot of direct evidence that it really was race.” Conservative justices, often skeptical about considering race in any context, expressed sympathy for the problems states face in trying to avoid lawsuits while also complying with the voting law. “Maybe there’s no way around it, but isn’t this just an invitation for litigation in every one of these instances?” Justice Samuel Alito asked. North Carolina appealed a February federal court ruling that found that Republicans who redrew U.S. House of Representatives districts after the 2010 census took race too much into consideration. Virginia voters who challenged the way 12 state House of Delegates boundaries were drawn by Republicans after the 2010 census appealed an October 2015 federal district court ruling upholding the districts. Rulings in both cases are due by the end of June. | 1 |
7,124 | Republicans Just Added What They Hated The Most About Obamacare To Their Bill | For the years since the debate over the Affordable Care Act began, anti-government Republicans (is there another kind?) have been bitching about the individual mandate that required people to buy insurance.Now it s their turn to come up with an alternative, and while theirs will cover fewer people, their solution is to force everyone to buy it, regardless of whether they can afford the barely subsidized coverage.The addition, which was tacked onto the Republican healthcare bill on Monday, is somewhat different from the individual mandate in the Affordable Care Act, which says that there would be a penalty for people who lack coverage for more than 63 days. In the GOP bill, it s even worse. People would be barred from coverage at all for six months if they have a 63 day gap.Republicans added this provision after economists and health policy experts convinced them that it would be unsustainable to not force people to purchase insurance.Health policy experts across the political spectrum had warned that the initial Senate bill s failure to include some penalty for going uninsured could cause a death spiral in which people go without health insurance while healthy and only buy it when they become sick. In that scenario, insurance premiums shoot up for everyone as insurance markets become flooded with customers who disproportionately require expensive treatments.Source: NBC NewsThe main difference between this and the Affordable Care Act, though, is that the cost of premiums are going to be much higher. According to the Congressional Budget Office, 22 million Americans stand to lose their healthcare coverage if the GOP bill becomes law.By and large, Republicans want to do away with the Medicaid expansion, which allowed poorer people access to insurance, often without paying anything. Everyone who makes under $48,000 a year receives subsidies to help pay for insurance under the Affordable Care Act. Instead with Trumpcare, they want to offer those people a block grant, which would severely restrict medical spending. Instead of subsidies, there will be tax credits.Some who aren t receiving Medicaid or Medicare might see more affordable premiums, but that s only because the coverage will be so much less.Republicans have now chosen to take the most controversial portion of the Affordable Care Act and make it absolutely draconian. If you happen to be one of the 22 million who loses insurance, good luck getting it back.Featured image via Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images | 0 |
7,125 | Pacific trade pact remains top issue for Obama administration | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The successful conclusion of the Trans Pacific Partnership trade talks remains the top legislative item for the United States, a top economic adviser to President Barack Obama said on Tuesday. White House National Security Council adviser Christina Segal-Knowles told a news conference ahead of the Sept. 4-5 G20 summit in China that talks on a trade pact with Europe were still in progress, despite comments from France and Germany that they were in doubt. The Asian talks are stalled in Congress and both Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump have said they would not approve the deal in its current form, if elected president in November. Segal-Knowles said corporate tax issues would be on the G20’s agenda in China, although when asked whether the European Union’s tax ruling on Apple Inc’s deal with Ireland would be discussed, she did not directly address the issue facing the company. | 1 |
7,126 | NBC Chairman SHREDS ‘Demented’ Trump, Rips Ratings For The Apprentice | NBC Entertainment chairman Bob Greenblatt took to his Facebook account to rip demented Donald Trump, calling him pompous and toxic, then took a shot at the ratings of Celebrity Apprentice. That post has since been deleted but Marlow Stern of The Daily Beast took a screen shot. The sad state of affairs thanks to a pompous businessman turned reality-TV star (whose show consistently ran LAST in its time period, by the way) who thinks speaking his mind is refreshing, Greenblatt wrote. It s actually corrosive and toxic because his mind is so demented; and his effect will unfortunately linger long after he s been told to get off the stage. The Donald often brags about the ratings for The Apprentice, just like he bragged about polls until recently when all national polls showed his campaign spiraling downward. Apparently, his ratings were nothing to brag about either.The Daily Beast reports:Greenblatt s Facebook post was a personal response to a recent New York Times op-ed penned by Nicholas Kristof that shows how all across America Donald Trump is mainstreaming hate. The column touches on bullying in schools, and recounts a moment during a high-school physics class in Forest Grove, Oregon, in which a group of white students suddenly began jeering at their Latino classmates and chanting: Build a wall! Build a wall!' (Greenblatt, who is the first openly gay broadcast TV chairman, has long been active in pro-LGBT advocacy, as well as in anti-bullying efforts.)In 2015, Donald tweeted, People don t understand that I left The Apprentice to run for Pres the Apprentice DID NOT leave me. Bob Greenblatt & folks @NBC were GREAT! Donald has claimed many times that The Apprentice was the number one show on television. As television critic Tim Goodman put it at the time, Nobody spins like Trump. Nobody. It s just bloviation. Bloviation is a good word for Donald s presidential run, too. Bloviate is to talk at length, especially in an inflated or empty way. That s him alright.The GOP presidential candidate is going to be a sad panda today after reading Greenblatt s opinion of him.Featured image via screen capture. | 0 |
7,127 | Winning Democrat nomination needs voter coalition: Clinton campaign | NEW YORK (Reuters) - The campaign of Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton on Wednesday called support from a broad coalition of voters - including people of color, women and union households - “critical” for anyone hoping to secure the party’s nomination for the November 2016 election and beyond. Robby Mook, Clinton’s campaign manager, noted support for the former secretary of state among African Americans, Latinos and Asian American Pacific Islanders, women and union households in a memo sent out by the campaign. He also noted that Clinton won white voters in the nominating contests for several states on Super Tuesday, the previous day, in which Clinton won seven states to the four states captured by her rival, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders. “It is also important to note that these constituencies are not only critical to winning the Democratic nomination but will also be central to how a Democrat wins in November, and a candidate that starts with a deep base of support will have an advantage in the general election,” Mook wrote. (Reporting by Luciana Lopez) This article was funded in part by SAP. It was independently created by the Reuters editorial staff. SAP had no editorial involvement in its creation or production. | 1 |
7,128 | Trump identifies 11 potential Supreme Court nominees | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Presumptive Republican U.S. presidential nominee Donald Trump on Wednesday unveiled the names of 11 judges - eight men and three women, all white and all conservative - he would consider, if elected, to replace the late Antonin Scalia on the Supreme Court. Six of them are judges who were appointed to federal appeals courts around the country by Republican former President George W. Bush. The other five serve on various state supreme courts. Scalia’s replacement could tip the ideological balance of the court, which now is evenly divided with four conservative justices and four liberals. Scalia, who died in February, was one of the court’s most conservative justices. “We’re going to choose from, most likely from this list,” Trump said in an interview with Fox News. But Trump said he could deviate from the list and added, “At a minimum we will keep people within this general realm.” All of Trump’s 11 judges are listed as affiliated with the Federalist Society on the influential conservative legal group’s website. The organization is known as a breeding ground for conservative legal thinkers. It is unusual for a presidential candidate to release names of potential Supreme Court or Cabinet nominees before winning an election. But Trump is working to assure conservatives in his own party that, if elected president on Nov. 8, he would not appoint a liberal or moderate to the court. Trump allies had encouraged him to announce the names of potential court nominees to allay fears among conservatives wary of a Trump presidency. Trump’s list includes: Steven Colloton of Iowa, a judge on the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals; Raymond Gruender of Missouri, also a judge on the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals; and Thomas Hardiman of Pennsylvania, a judge on the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals. It also includes: Raymond Kethledge of Michigan, a judge on the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals; William Pryor of Alabama, a judge on the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals; and Diane Sykes of Wisconsin, a judge on the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals. The state supreme court jurists include: Allison Eid of Colorado; Joan Larsen of Michigan; Thomas Lee of Utah; David Stras of Minnesota; and Don Willett of Texas. Democratic President Barack Obama in March named centrist appellate court judge Merrick Garland to fill the vacancy. But the Republican-led Senate has refused to hold confirmation hearings or a vote, insisting that Obama’s successor should get to select Scalia’s replacement. Trump said in a statement that the 11 judges were “representative of the kind of constitutional principles I value” and said he would use the list as a guide for nominating a justice. Willett in the past year has posted several comments on Twitter mocking Trump, even referring to him as “Darth Trump,” a twist on the “Star Wars” villain Darth Vader. Willett last June posted about imagining Trump selecting a Supreme Court nominee. “The mind reels. *weeps—can’t finish tweet*,” Willett wrote, suggesting he was crying at the idea. Asked to comment on Willett’s Twitter remarks, Trump spokeswoman Hope Hicks said, “Mr. Trump’s sole focus is considering the best potential individuals based on their constitutional principles.” Lee is the brother of Republican Senator Mike Lee of Utah, one of the most conservative members of the U.S. Senate. “I don’t know everyone on the list, but those I do know would all be great Supreme Court Justices. Of course, I do believe one name on that list stands head and shoulders above the rest,” said Mike Lee, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee that would consider any nomination. Sykes is the former wife of conservative Wisconsin radio host Charles Sykes, who posted on Twitter that she would make a great justice but added, “I simply don’t believe Trump.” Several of the judges have ruled against abortion and reproductive rights. Sykes, Colloton and Pryor have ruled against the Obama administration regarding religious objections to the contraception coverage requirement of the Obamacare healthcare law. White House spokesman Josh Earnest said at his daily briefing that he would be surprised if any Democrat would describe any of Trump’s picks “as a consensus nominee.” “But the individual President Obama has put forward is somebody that Republicans have described as a consensus nominee,” Earnest said of Garland, adding that it would be wise for the Senate to act on Obama’s nominee. Liberal advocacy group People for the American Way said Trump’s list included “conservative dream justices.” Most of the 11 judges did not respond to requests for comment. “Joan Larsen is working along with the rest of Michigan’s Supreme Court to provide common-sense, rule-of-law justice. That is her focus and will remain her focus,” her campaign spokesman Stu Sandler said. Larsen was appointed to the post and is running for election to a full term. | 1 |
7,129 | French Senate vote is blow to Macron, Conservatives keep majority | PARIS (Reuters) - President Emmanuel Macron suffered his first electoral setback on Sunday when his Republic on the Move (LREM) party won fewer seats than expected in elections for the French Senate. What was at stake was whether Macron s LREM and allies would win enough seats to give him a three-fifths majority vote in both houses of parliament, which he needs for constitutional reforms, including plans to overhaul parliament. The vote, in which about 171 of the Senate s 348 seats were up for grabs, consolidated the Senate s existing conservative majority. But the Socialist party, which was crushed in last June s legislative elections, did well in the vote, provisional results provided by the French Senate showed. The results could complicate Macron s plans for constitutional reforms and come as his popularity is declining, just four months after his election in May. His approval ratings have dropped considerably in opinion polls, dragged down by labor reforms and planned budget cuts, including a decrease in housing aid for students. LREM, which hoped to win 40-50 Senators, ended up securing 23, and will be counting on alliances with lawmakers from other parties to back the government on a case by case basis. The Senate s conservative majority is now composed of some 150 members of The Republicans party, confirming the Senate as a counterweight to Macron, even if the National Assembly, where Macron has a clear majority, has the final say on legislation. Voters clearly showed they wanted a parliamentary counterweight, which is in my view vital to a balanced democracy, Gerard Larcher, the President of the French Senate said in a public address. Macron s LREM was not expected to win a majority partly because of the electoral system. In elections for the Senate, only mayors and regional councilors and not the general public vote and Macron has plans that are unpopular with many local councilors. A number of local officials are unhappy with his plans to cut subsidies to local authorities. Jean Leonetti, a former The Republicans minister said on Twitter: First setback for Emmanuel Macron . It was not immediately clear if Macron will be able to secure a three-fifths majority in both houses of parliament as it might require negotiations with other groups, including some members of The Republicans party. Macron s party would need 180 seats in the Senate to reach the three-fifths majority in both houses of parliament. | 1 |
7,130 | Joe Scarborough Defends President Obama’s Emotional Announcement On Gun Control (VIDEO) | While it s often difficult to notice, Joe Scarborough is one of the remaining few reasonable Republicans. Of course, this has a lot to do with his party s radical shift to its far-right flank, backed with the ascension of Donald Trump. Consequently, certain Republicans such as Scarborough, who at one time sounded radical, sound rational today. To his credit, Scarborough has often sidestepped partisanship to give credit where credit is due.Such was the case Wednesday morning when the host of MSNBC s Morning Joe vocally defended President Obama s executive order on gun control.Scarborough and co-host Mike Barnacle elaborated on the president s announcement, and agreed that expanding background checks for gun sales is an eminently reasonable action to take. Scarborough made sure to underscore for his unhinged conservative viewers that Obama didn t say anything about grabbing any guns. He also validated the president s genuine sadness and anger when mentioning Sandy Hook during his remarks.Via Media Matters:SCARBOROUGH: You see the frustration, don t you, in every press conference after every mass shooting, the president being frustrated by his inability to get anything done even when 90 percent of Americans support stronger background checks.BARNICLE: Absolutely, Joe. And living with the knowledge that you have to provide more information to become a Little League baseball coach than you do to a gun show.SCABOROUGH: Look at this. So if you re driving, a lot of people are listening to us as they drive into work. We re showing a Quinnipiac University poll that actually shows 89 percent of Americans support background checks for gun purchases at gun shows. Eighty-seven percent Republicans, 87 percent. And as other pollsters have told us, up to 80 percent of Republicans in early primary states, who vote in early primary states, support background checks. And, this is not a prediction. I m just going to tell you how it s going to be. There are going to continue to be mass shootings. Terrorists are going to continue to do it over the next decade. And the things that I ve been talking about on background checks and all of us have been talking about and the president has been talking about, Republicans, it s going to be the Republican position within the next two, three, four years. I say Jim VandeHei, one of the things that was most astounding yesterday was the reaction. The Pavlovian reaction from Republicans over a set of actions that really weren t far reaching. And even the White House will tell you, they were modest at best. He hopes he can do something to start the gun show loopholes so terrorist can t walk in and buy guns. But it wasn t even that, and I m not knocking him, it wasn t that sweeping. Nobody got any guns taken away yesterday.And, of course, Joe is correct. According to a recent Quinnipiac poll, 95 percent of Democrats and 87 percent of Republicans support background checks. Back in 2014, 92 percent of gun owners supported expanding the regulation. Yet, when the Manchin-Toomey amendment was proposed back in 2013, the Senate GOP filibustered the legislation in defiance of nearly 90 percent of its voters. Why? Three words: National Rifle Association. The only constituency that matters to the congressional Republicans. It s an almost awe-inspiring dynamic the NRA s extremist agenda is a higher legislative priority for the GOP than 87 percent of Republican voters.Furthermore, the president s order is, as Scarborough said, not that far reaching. Back in 2013, the president announced much more stringent and comprehensive regulations on gun ownership. The president, at the time, tried to resurrect the expired assault weapons ban and close all of the loopholes created by the NRA in 1994. There were bullet control proposals: no more magazines larger than 10 rounds, and no more armor-piercing bullets. Today, however, the president s actions are limited to just the background checks and additional funding for the FBI and ATF. Nothing else. But that won t stop the relentless lies and fear-mongering by the GOP, telling its people that Obama s out to confiscate their guns. As much as I d like it to happen, it won t.Featured image via video screen grab. | 0 |
7,131 | Factbox: Increase defense spending, lower individual tax rate. What a President Kasich would do | (Reuters) - Presidential candidate John Kasich, the governor of Ohio and a former congressman, has positioned himself as a conservative Republican who is nonetheless willing to listen to all sides in order to solve problems. Kasich is challenging outsiders Donald Trump, the Republican front-runner, and U.S. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, who is known for antagonizing his party, as an alternative who can win the party’s support in the July convention ahead of the Nov. 8 election. These policies are drawn from his website, statements made at debates and interviews. Kasich has said it is “silly” to think the United States could round up more than 11 million undocumented immigrants and send them back to their home countries. While he does not support a path to full citizenship for undocumented immigrants, Kasich believes the focus of immigration policies should be keeping families together and creating a path to a legal status for those already in the country who are working and have not committed violent crimes, including establishing a guest worker program. Kasich does believe this should be underpinned by sealing U.S. borders and has said he would support building a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border. “I’m a free trader,” Kasich said in a January presidential debate, saying he supported both the North American Free Trade Agreement and the Trans-Pacific Partnership. He has supported granting the president authority to fast-track trade deals in the past. He has opposed withdrawing from the World Trade Organization. Kasich’s top priority is a balanced budget and he did a national “balanced budget tour” last year; his presidential campaign events often have a clock with numbers ticking upward, tracking the level of national debt. Kasich has pledged to cut taxes for individuals and families and increase the Earned Income Tax Credit, along with eliminating the estate tax. Kasich would also like to lower taxes and create incentives for those who create jobs, including by lowering the top business tax rate to 25 percent from 35 percent. Under Kasich’s tax plan, the highest individual tax rate would be lowered to 28 percent from 39.6 percent. He has said he would launch a “top-to-bottom review” of the Internal Revenue Service to eliminate inefficiencies. Kasich wants to increase defense spending by $102 billion. He has called for a no-fly zone over Syria and a “combat coalition” to fight the Islamic State militant group. He has said the Syrian refugee crisis is a fundamentally European problem, but the United States should play a role. He believes the United States should “pause” accepting Syrian refugees and that there should be stringent checks. | 1 |
7,132 | Saudi-led force admits strike in Yemen's capital hit civilians | RIYADH (Reuters) - A Saudi-led Arab coalition on Saturday conceded that an air raid in Yemen s capital a day earlier had resulted in civilian casualties, blaming the incident on an unspecified technical error . The early morning attack in the Faj Attan area of Sanaa hit a vacant building but caused an adjacent apartment block to collapse, killing at least 12 people, six of them children, residents have said. Coalition spokesman Colonel Turki al-Maliki defended the strike as having a legitimate military target , which he said was a Houthi command and control center. He accused the fighters of using civilians as human shields. A technical error was the reason for the unintentional accident and the house in question was not directly targeted, he said a statement carried by Saudi state news agency SPA. Maliki said the coalition expressed remorse for collateral damage to civilians but did not specify the extent of casualties. However, a senior ICRC official visited the site of the strike on Friday and said, From what we saw on the ground, there was no apparent military target. Yemen s long war involving competing Yemeni factions and regional power struggles has killed at least 10,000 people. Millions more have been forced to leave their homes and face disease and hunger. The Houthis and their ally, former president Ali Abdullah Saleh, control much of the north of the country, including Sanaa. Yemen s internationally recognised government is backed by the Saudi-led military coalition and is based in the south. The United States and Britain provide arms and logistical assistance to the alliance for its campaign. The issue has caused controversy in Britain over the toll on civilians. As well as military targets, air strikes have hit hospitals and ports, exacerbating the humanitarian crisis. | 1 |
7,133 | Families of Japanese abducted by North Korea meet Trump, but want action | TOKYO (Reuters) - Family members of Japanese abducted by North Korea met U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday and welcomed his sympathy for their very sad plight, but said it meant nothing unless it led to action to bring home their loved ones. Trump has incorporated into his attacks on Pyongyang the story of Megumi Yokota, 13 when she was snatched off a lonely beach by North Korean agents 40 years ago, mentioning her in a September speech at the United Nations. For his part, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has said he will not rest until the return of all 13 of those Pyongyang says were kidnapped in the 1970s and 1980s to train spies, making the issue a keystone of his political career. On Monday, Trump met Megumi s mother Sakie, becoming the third president to do so, as well as the relatives of seven other abductees Pyongyang says are dead - like Megumi, who hanged herself, North Korea says. We ll work together and see if we can do something, now the spotlight is on, Trump later told a joint news conference with Abe, calling the abductions a very, very sad thing . Perhaps the regime itself would send them back. I think it would be a tremendous signal if Kim Jong Un would send them back. Megumi s mother and younger twin brothers were later part of a news conference that welcomed Trump s attention, although cautiously, with several members saying decades had passed and nothing had been done, even by Abe s government. It seemed the president listened carefully to all our stories and was impressed, said Koichiro Iizuka, an infant abandoned in a creche when his mother, Yaeko Taguchi, was abducted in 1978. But if this is all that comes of this meeting, it s absolutely outrageous, he added. It s how we face the previous neglect and take action that s important. The families can do little, said Megumi s mother, now 81 and visibly frail. This is an issue of politics, of diplomacy, she said. All we can say is: please help them. | 1 |
7,134 | GOP Election Official Pulls A Gun On An Unarmed Man For Disagreeing With Him While Black (VIDEO) | The Republican Election Commissioner of Jefferson County Arkansas showed how easy it is for a white man in a red state to pull a gun on an unarmed black man, say he felt threatened and walk away scot-free. Stu Soffer, the white man in question, decided to insert himself into an argument when he was told in no uncertain terms by former Democratic Election Commissioner Ted Davis that nobody was talking to him. Davis, who never makes any threatening gestures towards Soffer, was then told to step back by another white guy intervening on first white guy s behalf.Sorry for the lack of names, but by this point all these white guys shouting allegations and preparing for a stand your ground defense start to look alike. And I m a white guy.It s at that point that Soffer pulls a small handgun from his pocket and holds it at his side. He puts it back in his pocket a few moments later but doesn t remove his hand from the pocket until the police arrive several minutes later. Before that happens he can be seen advancing towards Davis at one point and defending his idiocy when a woman calls him out for pulling a gun: I was in fear for my life. I m 74-years-old and I was in fear for my life. It should be noted that the scary black man looks to be about the same age and was unarmed with the exception of a pretty nice three-piece suit. What Soffer probably should have said was, this is Arkansas, where I can kill a black man with my spiffy argument-winner and get away with it. The argument itself was over a public meeting of the election commission, where the meeting was adjourned while a Democrat was speaking, cutting him off mid-sentence.Soffer told the Arkansas Times that he retrieved his gun from his car because he didn t have a good feeling about things; that Davis approached him with a weird look on his face. He said Davis appeared to be in a trance. In other words, the scary black man was black, and in the spirit of how black men were convicted across the south for a century for crimes they didn t commit, Soffer claimed he took steps to protect himself kill a man who was definitely black enough to be black and scary and black.Watch the incident unfold for yourself and see if you think Soffer was justified in his close call with the use of deadly force:Featured image from screen capture | 0 |
7,135 | Factbox: Sweeping U.S. Dodd-Frank financial law created new agencies, rules | (Reuters) - The Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, named for former Democratic lawmakers Senator Chris Dodd and Representative Barney Frank, was signed by former President Barack Obama in 2010 as a response to the financial crisis. Dodd-Frank is the most sweeping financial regulatory statute enacted since the response to the Great Depression in the 1930s. It created new regulatory bodies and directed already-existing agencies to write hundreds of regulations aimed at creating stability in the financial markets. Republican lawmakers, including President Donald Trump, have said that Dodd-Frank is burdensome for financial institutions, and many seek to repeal it in whole or part. Trump signed an executive order on Friday that did not mention Dodd-Frank by name. But White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer told reporters on Friday, “Dodd-Frank is a disastrous policy that’s hindering our markets” and the order would be the first step taken to review the law. Here are some of the Dodd-Frank law’s main provisions: The Financial Stability Oversight Council Dodd-Frank created the FSOC to monitor risk in the financial system and it was granted the power to deem institutions, including non-bank firms such as asset managers and insurance companies “systemically important financial institutions.” These firms are often called “too-big-to-fail” and subject to additional capital requirements. The Office of Financial Research Dodd-Frank created the independent Office of Financial Research within the Treasury Department to provide data and support related to risks in the financial system to relevant government agencies, including the FSOC. This data is used in part to assess whether a firm is a systemically important financial institution. Consumer Financial Protection Board Dodd-Frank created the CFPB, a federal agency that oversees consumer protection in the financial sector, including banks, payday lenders, credit unions, mortgage servicers and other companies. A federal appeals court ruled in October that the bureau’s structure is unconstitutional because its director, currently Richard Cordray, cannot be removed by the president without cause. That ruling was stayed and has not taken effect pending appeal. Volcker Rule A portion of Dodd-Frank known named for former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker prohibits commercial banks from also engaging in proprietary trading and restricts them from investing in hedge and private equity funds. The Volcker Rule also limits the liabilities that can be taken on by the country’s largest banks. The rule was delayed several times and took effect in July 2015. Some large Wall Street banks asked the Federal Reserve to grant them an additional five-year grace period to comply with the rule. Capital Requirements The law’s so-called capital requirements forced banks to fund themselves more by raising money from shareholders than by borrowing. Regulators used a variety of requirements to force banks to cut their reliance on debt, including by imposing tougher rules for riskier assets. The most stringent requirements fell on the biggest banks. Banks say the process has been costly. Living Wills Dodd-Frank required banks with assets of $50 billion or more to submit living wills to regulators. A bank’s living will is a kind of prepackaged bankruptcy plan that will guide its dissolution and liquidation without taxpayer assistance should it collapse. If these living wills are deemed insufficient by regulators, institutions get another chance to submit a new plan. At that point, if regulators again deem a living will insufficient, a bank can face sanctions. Swaps Push-Out Rule The initial swaps proposal prohibited banks active in swaps markets from receiving federal assistance. The rule was narrowed to apply to only swaps entities. A swaps entity is a swap dealer that is registered with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission or Securities and Exchange Commission. The rule does not apply to depository banks that have swaps divisions, which remain eligible to be insured by the federal government. Regulated Institutions A number of Dodd-Frank’s provisions were designed to direct agencies to regulate entities such as private equity funds and hedge funds for the first time. It also required a brand new regulatory regime for over-the-counter derivatives, which imposed capital and margin requirements, central clearing and trading transparency rules on the marketplace. | 1 |
7,136 | It’s Bad Enough Canadian Magazine Puts A Smiling Terrorist On Cover…Why Would They Ask Two Victims To Pose With Him? | So who does Canada believe is the actual victim is here?Have you seen the cover of the new Maclean s magazine? That s Rinelle Harper sitting down she s the Aboriginal woman who was attacked and left for dead in Winnipeg.She became a symbol for racist violence against Aboriginal women though her alleged attacker was himself Aboriginal.That girl on the right is Amanda Lindhout. She was a waitress who decided she wanted to be a war reporter in Afghanistan, Iraq and Somalia; she was kidnapped by Muslim terrorists and tortured and raped repeatedly.So you ve got two innocent women who were brutalized by violence and would never hurt a fly.And then you ve got Omar Khadr standing behind them, with a huge grin on his face.Omar Khadr is a confessed, convicted Al Qaida terrorist. He plead guilty to five charges of war crimes. He murdered Sgt. Christopher Speer, leaving Tabitha Speer a widow, and their two children, Taryn and Tanner, fatherless.Omar Khadr has never renounced Al Qaida or said that he regrets what he did.Here s how Maclean s describes him, though: Omar Khadr was imprisoned in Guantanamo, captured in 2002 by American forces in Afghanistan and charged with war crimes. So, no mention of the murder he confessed to or his conviction for war crimes.Would Maclean s magazine put a smiling, chatty Paul Bernardo on their cover, and say, he s suffered so deeply in prison all because he was charged with crimes. Both are pathological murderers. Why the celebrity treatment?This isn t journalism.This is propaganda.Via: The Rebelh/t Weasel Zippers | 0 |
7,137 | DRAMA QUEEN CHRIS MATTHEWS Claims Republican ‘Fanatics’ Believe We Should Own This One Thing [Video] | MSNBC host Chris Matthews on Thursday accused Republicans of being fanatics does this surprise anyone? He said Republicans support private ownership of tanks and bazookas. The drama queens on the left just can t seem to get off the topic of gun ownership and bans on guns. The Republican platform protects magazines. It protects AR-15s. It protects everything that is even discussed, Matthews said on his show Hardball. They haven t gotten to this bump stock thing yet, this thing that changes the gun into an automatic, he said. But they clearly when they hear something s coming their way, they put it in their platform and say, Leave it alone.' They are fanatics. The Republican Party, as a party, is a fanatic party on guns, he added.Read more: WFB | 0 |
7,138 | Cubans say crestfallen that Trump rolling back detente | HAVANA (Reuters) - Cubans said they were crestfallen to be returning to an era of frostier relations with the United States as the news spread that U.S. President Donald Trump was set to revert parts of the historic detente with Cuba. Trump will on Friday announce a plan to tighten rules on Americans traveling to Communist-run Cuba and significantly restrict U.S. firms from doing business with Cuban enterprises controlled by the military, White House officials said. “It hurts to be going backwards. To roll back the engagement will only manage to isolate us from the world,” said Havana resident Marta Deus, who will try to tune into Trump’s speech in Miami, the heartland of Cuban exiles. Deus recently set up an accountancy firm and courier service, to cater to a private sector that has flourished since a landmark agreement two and a half years ago between former U.S. President Barack Obama and Cuban leader Raul Castro to normalize relations between the former Cold War foes. “We need clients, business, we need the economy to move and by isolating Cuba, they will only manage to hurt many Cuban families and force companies to close,” she said. The 2014 deal sparked widespread euphoria in Cuba and raised hopes for an improvement in its ailing economy. An increased arrival of U.S. tourists thanks to eased restrictions fueled a boom in tourism, especially in Havana, creating demand for more BnBs, restaurants, taxis and tour guides in the fledgling private sector. But critics say the opening failed to improve rights on the island. Trump will justify his partial reversal of Obama’s measures to a large extent on those grounds, the White House officials said, and some Cuban dissidents back his tougher stance, saying repression has worsened since the detente. Cuban authorities have stepped up their detentions of activists, often confiscating their telephones and laptops, but they have also been coming down with a heavy hand on self- employed Cubans who appear to be empowering themselves. “When the Obama administration stopped condemning human rights violations in Cuba, the regime here said ‘look we can do this and nothing happens, so we can continue repressing more forcefully’,” said Jose Daniel Ferrer, who leads the Patriotic Union of Cuba, the country’s largest dissident group. Ferrer said his group had 53 activists currently imprisoned due to their political views. Other dissidents agree repression has worsened but say rolling back the detente, which will hurt ordinary Cubans, is not the solution. “It will probably not have any benefit in terms of human rights,” said Eliecer Avila, the leader of the opposition youth group Somos Mas. The Cuban government has withstood the U.S. trade embargo for more than a half century and will not make any political concessions to the United States due to economic pressure, said Carlos Alzugaray, a retired Cuban diplomat. “I am concerned it will affect the private sector quite a bit and much more than the Cuban government,” he said. Without doubt it will impact those in the tourism industry that have benefited from a threefold increase in U.S. visits in the last two years, although it is unclear just how much. “It’s going to really hurt me because the majority of my clients are from the United States,” said Enrique Montoto, 61, who rents rooms on U.S. online home-rental marketplace Airbnb, which expanded into Cuba in 2015. “With things going to pot, I’ll have to tighten my belt.” This new setback to the Cuban economy will come at a time when it is already wrestling with falling oil shipments from crisis-stricken ally Venezuela and a decline in exports. “This is another blow for Cubans and it will hurt our pockets obviously,” said Martha Garcia, 51. “With the United States, there is no tranquility.” | 1 |
7,139 | Trump ends difficult week by focusing on Hillary Clinton | WINDHAM, N.H. (Reuters) - Republican Donald Trump on Saturday ended a tough week for his campaign in the state that launched him toward the presidential nomination and he did what Republicans have been urging him to do: Keep the focus on Democrat Hillary Clinton. “Her greatest achievement is getting out of trouble,” Trump told supporters. Trump’s victory in the Feb. 10 Republican primary in New Hampshire put him in position to win the party’s nomination, but he trails Clinton in the state by 15 points in the latest WBUR/MassINC poll, 47 percent to 32 percent. Trump came to New Hampshire after a troubled week in which he tangled with fellow Republican leaders and sparred verbally with the parents of a Muslim soldier who died fighting for the United States in Iraq in 2004. Clinton, getting a lift from the Democratic National Convention, took advantage of Trump’s stumbles to surge into the lead in national polls and in many battleground states. Now Trump has begun heeding the advice of Republican officials who say he needs to take the fight to Clinton to give the party a chance to win the White House on Nov. 8. Trump seized on Clinton’s comments Friday that she had “short-circuited” when she said a week ago that FBI Director James Comey had said she had been truthful to the American people in her use of a private email server while U.S. secretary of state from 2009 to 2013. In fact, Comey had concluded that Clinton was “extremely careless” with classified emails. He directly contradicted many of the statements Clinton had made about her use of the server. Trump spent the lion’s share of a campaign speech in a crowded high school gymnasium to go after Clinton on the subject in trying to raise questions about her trustworthiness. “I think the people of this country don’t want somebody who is going to short circuit,” Trump said. Trump also sought to turn the tables on Clinton, who has consistently accused the New York developer of being temperamentally unfit to be president. “She is a totally unhinged person,” Trump said. | 1 |
7,140 | Dick Cheney Just Did The Most Disgusting Thing Since Lying About WMDs In Iraq | What could Dick Cheney, engineer of the wars that will go down in history as criminal at best, possibly do that is worse than lying to the American people about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq in a fraudulent ploy to gain public support for a war we had no exit strategy for? Cheney told CNN Friday that he would be backing Donald Trump just like he would back anyone else who was on the Republican ticket.That s a stark difference of opinion from Cheney s old Oval Office Puppet, George W. Bush or his brother and daddy, all of whom have vowed not to support Trump in the general election and to skip his nomination at the convention this summer in Cleveland. Mittens Romney has also openly stated that he wouldn t support Donald Trump along with House Speaker Paul Ryan and a slew of other high-ranking establishment Republicans.So why is Cheney sticking around while the party goes about the business of trying to hand our nuclear codes to an idiot? Because he s done it already. In 2001, a complete moron walked into the White House, unqualified to order a sandwich, and somehow Dick Cheney gave him a legacy. Sure it s a legacy of poverty and despair; war and death. Financial collapse isn t such a bad way to end an administration, is it?Cheney knows full-well that Donald Trump, if elected, will be looking back at everyone who abandoned him and you can bet your bottom dollar that Dick Cheney will be listed as adviser in some capacity. That s the kind of West Wing we ll be looking at. Whoever will take the job will be the number one contender for almost every position of power. If you re looking for a career in politics that will come to an abrupt end in four years or less, take a spot in the Trump Administration. Not that it will really matter. The cabinet will fill up with people we ve never heard of to whom Donald Trump owes a special favor.One thing is certain: Cheney has definitely hit the low spot in his life if he s reduced to supporting The Donald.Featured image by Bruce Bennett/Getty Images | 0 |
7,141 | Obama says willing to work with Republican Speaker on poverty | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama said on Tuesday that he was willing to work with Republican Speaker Paul Ryan on reforms to address poverty, such as expanding the earned income tax cut (EITC). “I’d welcome a serious discussion about strategies we can all support, like expanding tax cuts for low-income workers without kids,” Obama said, according to prepared remarks for his State of the Union address. | 1 |
7,142 | Gunmen kill four in sectarian attack in Pakistan | QUETTA, Pakistan (Reuters) - Gunmen in southwestern Pakistan killed four members of a Shi ite Muslim Hazara family, including a 12-year-old boy, on Sunday, in the latest sectarian attack on the minority community, a senior police official said. Two men on a motorcycle opened fire on a family of eight while they at a filling station some 30 kilometres (19 miles) north of Quetta, the capital of Pakistan s Baluchistan province. Aside from those killed, two others were wounded. Two female members of the family were unscathed, having remained in their vehicle. This was a sectarian attack, senior police officer Tanveer Shah told Reuters, adding that no group has claimed responsibility for the shooting. Hazaras are frequently targeted by Taliban and Islamic State militants, and other Sunni Muslim militant groups in both Pakistan and Afghanistan. Many Hazaras fled to Pakistan during decades of conflict in neighboring Afghanistan, and nearly half a million now live in and around Quetta. In 2013, three separate bombings killed over 200 people in Hazara neighborhoods, raising international awareness of the plight of the community. More than 20 Hazaras have been killed in similar shootings in Baluchistan in the past two years, police say. The ongoing violence in the province has fueled concern about security for projects in the $57-billion China Pakistan Economic Corridor, a transport and energy link planned to run from western China to Pakistan s southern deep-water port of Gwadar. | 1 |
7,143 | Donald Trump Is Staring Down A Criminal Investigation For Buying Endorsements | The Donald isn t having a very good week at all. His campaign manager was charged with battery for assaulting a lady, multiple protesters are suing him for assault and battery, his communications director quit and told the truth about him, and his supporters won t even be able to bring their guns to the GOP convention in case things get messy. Now, it looks like he will be facing a criminal investigation for buying Ben Carson s endorsement with an illegal job offer.Last month, Ben Carson made it very clear that he did not endorse Donald Trump because he likes him, agrees with his policies, or even thinks he should be President Trump offered him a job in his future administration in exchange for Carson s unwavering servitude. So far, he s been a good little house boy for the billionaire, heaping praise on the 2016 hopeful and even defending Trump s recent comments that women should face punishment for having an abortion.But this latest bought-and-paid-for bromance may cause some complication in Trump s life. Public interest group the American Democracy Legal Fund has filed a complaint with the Department of Justice Criminal Division, asking for an investigation into Trump s actions. Noting that federal law prohibits a candidate from promising a position to any person in exchange for support, the ADLF penned a letter demanding that Trump s illegal actions be investigated:American Democracy Legal Fund ( ADLF ) is a group established to hold candidates for office accountable for possible ethics and/or legal violations. It has recently come to light that Mr. Donald Trump may have willfully offered Dr. Ben Carson an appointment to his administration should he become president in return for supporting his candidacy in violation of 18 U.S.C. 599. ADLF respectfully requests that you investigate this matter and take all appropriate action as soon as possible.Former presidential candidate Dr. Carson endorsed Mr. Trump for the Republican presidential nomination on March 11, 2016. Mr. Trump and Dr. Carson met the day before to discuss and finalize the endorsement. Three days later, on March 14, Dr. Carson gave an interview to Newsmax TV to discuss his recent endorsement of Mr. Trump. During the interview, Dr. Carson stated that he believed Mr. Trump would surround himself with very good people. When asked if he would be one of those people, Dr. Carson responded, I will be doing things as well. When the interviewer asked whether that meant in a Trump administration, Dr. Carson replied, Certainly in an advisory capacity. The interviewer then asked Dr. Carson if that s been determined and followed by asking, When you sat down with [Mr. Trump] that was discussed? Dr. Carson openly admitted, Yes, and said that while they hadn t hammered out all the details, it is very important that we work together. When asked if this meant a cabinet position, Dr. Carson declined to reveal any details about it right now, because all of this is still very liquid. Pursuant to 18 U.S.C. 599, [w]hoever, being a candidate, directly or indirectly promises or pledges the appointment, or the use of his influence or support for the appointment of any person to any public or private position or employment, for the purpose of procuring support in his candidacy shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both; and if the violation was willful, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both. Dr. Carson s comments strongly suggest that Mr. Trump promised him an administration position in return for his endorsement. In his interview, Dr. Carson stated that he would certainly have an advisory capacity within a potential Trump administration. When asked directly whether this role was discussed during their endorsement meeting, Dr. Carson responded, Yes. Dr. Carson s assured answers lead to the reasonable conclusion that Mr. Trump promised Dr. Carson an administration post in order to secure his endorsement in violation of 18 U.S.C. 599.Federal law prohibits a candidate from directly or indirectly promising the appointment of any person to any public or private position in exchange for his or her support. Dr. Carson s comments indicate that Mr. Trump used the promise of a role in his administration to secure Dr. Carson s support for his presidential campaign. For the above stated reasons, we respectfully request that you undertake an immediate investigation of this matter.Trump cares nothing about the law. This is obvious to even the most casual observer after hearing him talk about killing terrorists families, establishing a national Muslim database, and establishing Muslim concentration camp. Trump, a man who promises to pay for his supporters legal defense when they beat up African-Americans at his rallies, is completely detestable. Somehow, it is almost poetic that his illegal interactions with a black man might finally bring him down.Now we must wonder: who else did he buy off?Featured image via Bloomberg Finance | 0 |
7,144 | British PM showed guts and grace in conference speech, minister says | LONDON (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Theresa May showed guts and grace by continuing with her keynote Conservative Party conference speech despite a repeated coughing fit and an interruption by a prankster, business minister Greg Clark told Sky on Thursday. She showed guts and grace, Clark told Sky News. He added that there was huge warmth towards May in the conference hall. May s bid to reassert her dwindling authority was ruined on Wednesday when her keynote speech was interrupted by repeated coughing fits, a prankster, and even letters of her slogan falling off the set behind her. | 1 |
7,145 | Racist NYPD Cops Threaten To Tase Black Children For Walking Down The Street (VIDEO) | Now that Donald Trump is president and Jeff Sessions is Attorney General, racist cops everywhere have free reign to abuse vulnerable groups of people at every turn. The latest incidence of said abuse was caught on tape by Brooklyn College Associate Professor of Sociology Alex S. Vitale, in which New York City police officers were seen telling a group of black students that they would use a taser on them if they didn t move away from the sidewalk. This is a definite abuse of authority, as the NYPD s official rules state that tasers are not to be used on minors.When the children were slow to move away from the sidewalk at the intersection of Bedford and Campus Avenue, one of the officers said, What are you going to do about it? This apparently implies that the cops don t care about the children s rights, and would do as they please. A short time later, one cop asks the kids, do you want to ride the lightning? This appears to be slang for the use of a taser.Professor Vitale acknowledges that the actions of the officers on the video seem [s] like an abuse of authority. Well, it certainly was abusive. Those children were not doing anything wrong. These cops are just looking to hurt black children because they can. They should be fired and charged with criminal offenses. Luckily, the kids involved in this incident weren t harmed, but, so many times, kids have wound up hurt or dead because racist, power-abusing cops decided to hurt them.The NYPD says that the actions of the officers on the tape are going to be investigated internally. Of course, that means nothing, because they are investigating themselves. They ll surely find that they have done nothing wrong, even though there is every indication, when one views that tape, that they ve done EVERYTHING wrong.Welcome to community policing in the age of Trump.Watch the disturbing video below: | 0 |
7,146 | Human rights skirted at Asia summit as Trump rounds off tour | MANILA (Reuters) - Leaders of Asian nations meeting in Manila on Monday skirted around the mass exodus of Rohingya Muslims triggered by Myanmar s military crackdown, disappointing human rights groups who were hoping for a tough stand on the humanitarian crisis. There was no pressure either from U.S. President Donald Trump over the Philippines bloody war on drugs during a meeting on the sidelines of the summit with President Rodrigo Duterte. Trump told reporters that he had a great relationship with Philippines leader, who, a year ago, had branded then-President Barack Obama a son of a bitch for questioning his ruthless campaign. They really hit it off, Duterte s Communications Secretary Martin Andanar told reporters after the meeting with Trump. A draft of the statement to be issued after a meeting of Southeast Asian leaders made no mention of the flight of Rohingya from military operations in Myanmar s Rakhine state that the United Nations has described as ethnic cleansing. One paragraph mentioned fleetingly the importance of humanitarian relief for affected communities in Rakhine state. The statement was drawn up by the Philippines, current chair of the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), which includes Myanmar. It did not use the term Rohingya for the persecuted Muslim minority, which Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi has asked foreign leaders to avoid. The government in mostly-Buddhist Myanmar regards the Rohingya as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh and does not recognize the term. Over 600,000 Rohingya have fled to refugee camps in Bangladesh since military clearance operations were launched in response to attacks by Rohingya militants on Aug. 25. The plight of the Rohingya has brought outrage from around the world and there have been calls for democracy champion Suu Kyi to be stripped of the Nobel peace prize she won in 1991 because she has not condemned the military s actions. Some ASEAN countries, particularly Muslim-majority Malaysia, have voiced strong concern over the issue recently. However, in keeping with ASEAN s principle of non-interference in each others internal affairs, it appeared to have been put aside at the summit. With Myanmar having ethnically cleansed 600,000 Rohingya Muslims in just two months, it s time for ASEAN to transcend its do-nothing approach to atrocities among its members, said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch, in a Twitter message. The ASEAN leaders did agree that they should not take a lull in the dispute over the South China Sea for granted. While the situation is calmer now, we cannot take the current progress for granted, they said in a statement drafted ahead of a meeting with Chinese Premier Li Keqiang. It is in our collective interest to avoid miscalculations that could lead to escalation of tensions. China claims almost all of the sea, one of the world s busiest waterways. Taiwan and four ASEAN nations - Malaysia, Vietnam, the Philippines and Brunei - have competing claims. Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte suggested ahead of the summit that, despite their differences, the leaders should not discuss the South China Sea. We have to be friends. The other hotheads would like us to confront China and the rest of the world on so many issues, he said on Sunday. The South China Sea is better left untouched. At the meeting s formal opening on Monday, he pointed to other triggers for a threat of violence in the region, including terrorism, violent extremism, and piracy on the seas. The menace of illegal drug trade continues to endanger the very fabric of our society, he said. More than 3,900 people have been killed in the war on drugs that Duterte declared when he took office last year. His government says the police act in self-defense, but critics say executions are taking place with no accountability. The United States and the Philippines, a former U.S. colony, have been strategic allies since World War Two. But their relations have been strained by anti-U.S. outbursts from Duterte and his enthusiasm for better ties with Russia and China. However, the animosity of the past appears to have been all-but forgotten, and Duterte - who has been called the Trump of the East for his brash style and coarse language - told the U.S. president: We are your ally. We are an important ally. Trump was criticized earlier this year after he praised Duterte during a phone call for the great job he was doing to counter illegal narcotics. The two leaders seem to have warmed to each other after meeting for the first time on Saturday at a meeting of Pacific Rim leaders in Vietnam. On Sunday, Duterte crooned hit Filipino love song Ikaw (You) at a gala dinner in Manila, saying it was on the orders of Trump. One of the song s verses begins: You are the light in my world, a half of this heart of mine . On the last leg of a marathon Asia tour that has taken him to Japan, South Korea, China and Vietnam, Trump told reporters that he had made significant progress on trade issues. We ve made some very big steps with respect to trade, far bigger than anything you know, he said, describing his trip as fruitful and adding: It was red carpet like nobody, I think, has probably ever seen. | 1 |
7,147 | Virginia governor signs order restoring voting rights for felons | RICHMOND, Va. (Reuters) - Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe signed an order on Friday restoring the voting rights of more than 200,000 convicted felons who have completed their sentences, in a move that could help the Democratic nominee in November’s presidential election. By using his executive powers, the Democratic governor is circumventing the Republican majority in the state General Assembly. Many of the convicts affected by the order are African-Americans or Latinos, two groups that have voted overwhelmingly for Democratic candidates in the past. “Virginia will no longer build walls and barriers to the ballot box - we will break them down,” McAuliffe said in a message on his Twitter account. Advocates of restoring voting rights say it is a way of promoting racial justice, as African-Americans are convicted of crimes and sent to prison at about twice the rate of the overall U.S. population. Stephen J. Farnsworth, a political analyst at the University of Mary Washington in Fredericksburg, said a majority of the convicted felons who regained their voting rights were likely members of minority groups. Of the 5.8 million Americans banned from voting, 2.2 million are African-American, according to the Sentencing Project, a prison reform advocacy group. In three states - Virginia, Florida and Kentucky - more than a fifth of black residents outside of prison are barred from voting. About 13 percent of the U.S. population is African-American. McAuliffe’s order drew immediate criticism from John Whitbeck, chairman of the Republican Party of Virginia, who said the governor should have excluded those convicted of violent crimes. “His decision to issue a blanket restoration, without regard to the nature of the crimes committed doesn’t speak of mercy. Rather, it speaks of political opportunism,” Whitbeck said in a statement. Nationwide, restoration of voting rights is an issue that has drawn support from both Democrats and Republicans as a way to improve reintegration of prisoners into society. About two dozen states have eased restrictions on felons casting ballots over the past two decades, according to the Sentencing Project. But the move carries political implications as well. Virginia is considered a key swing state in the 2016 election, and the governor’s order could tip the balance in favor of the Democratic candidate who wins the party’s nomination. While Democrat Barack Obama took Virginia both in the 2008 and 2012 elections, Republican presidential candidates have a history of dominance in the state. Before Obama’s victories, Republicans carried Virginia in every presidential election since 1952 except one. In 1964, Democrat Lyndon Johnson won in Virginia as he defeated Barry Goldwater in a national landslide. The governor, who said on Friday Virginia has had some of the most restrictive laws in the country for restoration of voting and civil rights, has made the issue a high priority during his administration. Previous efforts have resulted in the restoration of voting rights to 18,000 Virginians, he said. The order will restore the rights of every Virginia felon who completed his or her sentence and all other requirements as of April 22, affecting 206,000 people immediately, the governor said in a press release. Before the order, Virginia felons would have to petition the governor, who had broad discretion in ruling on any request. | 1 |
7,148 | Anthony Bourdain Reveals The ‘ONE Good Thing’ About Trump And It’s HILARIOUS | While Donald Trump is currently freaking out because he hasn t been able to find anyone to perform at his inauguration (which is just a few short weeks away at this point), master chef Anthony Bourdain is making sure he rubs salt in Trump s open wounds.Never one to mince his words, Bourdain first asserted himself as an anti-Trump celebrity when he was asked if he d ever dine with Trump during his presidential campaign. Bourdain s reply was blunt and brutal he said, Absolutely f*cking not. And Bourdain hasn t changed his tone about Trump, not even after the phony business mogul has been elected. In a recent interview with Eater s Helen Rosner, Bourdain further confirmed that he is as anti-Trump as ever. During the interview, Bourdain clearly stated that he was concerned about what Trump s presidency meant for his daughter rightfully so, as any parent should be. But while Trump s presidency means horrible things for many people who aren t rich white men, Bourdain was able to find one silver lining.In stating that he would never attend Trump s White House Correspondents dinner, Bourdain stated that at least Trump would probably put an end to it. He said: I doubt there will be another. Thank god, that s an institution I d like to see die for years. If there s one good thing to come out of the Trump administration, let it be that there will be no more White House Correspondents dinners. It reinforces all the world s worst notions about the hideous, inside-the-beltway, all-in-it-together culture. It brings honor to no one to have Kim Kardashian or Tara Reid sitting there next to a news anchor. What is this all about? F*ck that. If I m gonna make fun of you today, I m not accepting your food tomorrow. I had dinner with President Obama, but I paid. We were offered Air Force One, and I said, There s no way. No way. Well, he s probably right. Not only would there be several empty seats, but the only people who would actually attend would be swamp monsters just like Trump. This is surely going to be one sour reminder to Trump that he is extremely unpopular and will never be accepted in the way that President Barack Obama was embraced by most of America. You can read the rest of Bourdain s anti-Trump interview on Eater.Featured image via Astrid Stawiarz / Getty Images | 0 |
7,149 | Storm Maria pitches Puerto Rico barrio into sunken 'Venice' | CATANO, Puerto Rico (Reuters) - Wading through highways swamped by turbid waters that sloshed over scattered, sunken belongings, residents of this Puerto Rican barrio flooded by Hurricane Maria have begun emerging from their shattered homes. Lying southwest of the capital San Juan, the Juana Matos neighborhood in Catano municipality took a huge hit from Maria after the storm slammed winds of up to 155 mph (249 kmh) into Puerto Rico early on Wednesday, destroying or damaging an estimated 80 percent of housing in the working-class barrio. The storm, the second Category 5 hurricane to batter the Caribbean this month, claimed at least 32 lives across the region, including 15 in Puerto Rico, and shut down power and communications across the island of 3.4 million people. By Thursday, Maria s floodwaters had turned the heart of the predominantly wood-built Juana Matos barrio into a series of waterways more suited to boats than walking. It s like we re in Venice, said 69-year-old steel worker Joaquin Rebollo, looking out across a broad channel that is normally teeming with cars. It was a really bad experience, really bad. I almost died of fright. Pitching the roof off his home and dozens of others in the area, Maria began to work through the wiring around the house as darkness descended across the island. It was like (Maria) was chewing the cables, he said, vividly making as if to bite through power lines with his teeth. Opposite him, residents trudged up to their knees in waters covering what was the main highway connecting Catano with the municipality of Bayamon further south. Rebollo and many neighbors left their homes in the hope the flooding that rose to four feet in some areas would recede. Houses locked for the storm were stripped of roofs or walls. Stranded cars stood half-sunk in driveways and satellite dishes tilted towards the sky to receive signals that had gone. I peeked my head out during the storm and felt the wind - and saw the wood, the roof, and the windows in the air, said Domingo Avilez, 47, who took cover inside a small cement stock room beneath his mother s house when Maria struck. By the end, the stock room was the only room left. Local officials estimate upwards of 2,000 people live in Juana Matos, and many too old or unwilling to evacuate watched from upper floors as the floodwaters turned streets into stagnant canals that seeped through their homes. Well, we re alive, said 75-year-old grandfather Angel Santos from the debris-strewn second floor of his wooden home. These are the works of God, so there s nothing you can do, Santos said, reflecting the faith evident among many Puerto Ricans hit by Maria just days after Hurricane Irma left. Even those on the edge of the flood-prone barrio in homes high enough to avoid shipping huge quantities of water suffered brutal incursions. Magdalena Oliveras, a 52-year-old housewife, showed the twisted metal blinds of her two-meter high washroom window she said had been mangled by a deluge from a nearby building. Lidia Espinal, 57, a longtime Juana Matos resident from the Dominican Republic, suffered a double blow on Wednesday morning before phone lines went down with a call from her homeland to say her younger brother had suffered a fatal heart attack. But Maria s presence meant she could not travel back. I lost everything in my house, the good things, the roof, the windows. The stove is full of water, she said. But the death of my brother taught me that we can t hold on to material things. Because life does not come back. | 1 |
7,150 | JUST RELEASED: Horrifying Cell Phone VIDEO From Inside Lavoy Finicum’s Vehicle Shows What REALLY Happened | The Deschutes County Sheriff s Office says the shooting of Lavoy Finicum was justified. Shocking cell phone footage captured from inside the truck of LaVoy Finicum, the 54-year-old leader in the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge occupation, shows the moments before and after his death last January. InfowarsAfter watching the video below, do you agree?Here s the video the FBI released following the shooting death of Lavoy Finicum:We learned yesterday that FBI agents involved in the traffic stop that led to the killing of one of the armed occupiers of an Oregon wildlife refuge are under investigation for not disclosing they fired shots that missed Robert LaVoy Finicum, authorities said Tuesday.Oregon State Police troopers fired the three rounds that killed the Arizona rancher during a confrontation on a remote road, law enforcement officials said at a news conference in Bend. | 0 |
7,151 | Syria rebels await action from Trump on safe zones, Damascus silent | BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syrian rebels urged President Donald Trump to fulfill a pledge to create safe zones in their country, but analysts doubted he would proceed with a step that could drag Washington deeper into war, hasten Syria’s fragmentation and risk conflict with Russia. Trump told ABC News on Wednesday he “will absolutely do safe zones in Syria” for refugees fleeing violence and that Europe had made a mistake by admitting millions of refugees from Syria. President Bashar al-Assad’s opponents have long demanded safe zones to protect civilians who have fled government air strikes and bombardment of rebel-held areas. But reflecting uncertainties about the announcement, representatives of the insurgents voiced only cautious optimism. “We’ve seen no result on the ground from (U.S.) statements that were made six years ago. So therefore we await action before anything else,” said Fares al-Bayoush, a rebel commander in northwestern Syria. Qatar, which backs the rebels, welcomed Trump’s comments and “emphasized the need to provide safe havens in Syria and to impose no-fly zones to ensure the safety of civilians”. There was no immediate word from Damascus, but it is sure to oppose such a move as Assad has vowed to regain control of all Syria. Iran, which backs militias in Syria including Lebanon’s Hezbollah, would also oppose any U.S. intervention. Russia said it had not been consulted on Trump’s plan, warning that it should not “exacerbate the situation with refugees” and Washington should weigh up “all the consequences”. The creation of safe zones would mark a major shift in U.S. policy. Former U.S. President Barack Obama resisted an idea that would require a commitment to defend such areas from the Syrian government or its foreign allies, including Russia. Trump appears to see safe zones as a way to stem the tide of refugees which he sees as a possible threat to U.S. security. But there are no obvious answers as to how the United States would avoid the problems that have prevented it establishing safe zones in Syria before, including the complication of policing such an area in a war zone dotted with armed groups. “At this stage this is very much in the realm of political maneuvering,” said Yezid Sayigh, a senior fellow and Syria expert at the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut. “I don’t think it is signaling imminent U.S. action.” Trump could order the State Department and Pentagon to produce a plan that would also create “safe areas” in countries surrounding Syria where millions of refugees already live. The Syrian government hopes Trump will end U.S. support for the rebels fighting Assad and refocus U.S. policy solely on fighting Islamic State, perhaps in cooperation with Russia. Trump has indicated he will do both. Almost six years of war has turned Syria into a patchwork of areas, some controlled by Assad, some by rebel groups and others by Kurdish militia or Islamic State militants. Previous discussion of safe zones in Syria has focused on rebel-held areas in the northwest stretching from Idlib province to the Euphrates river. Areas in the southwest at the border with Jordan have also been seen as a possibility. But the complications have grown since the Syrian opposition first called for safe zones, including the deployment of Russia’s air force to Syria. Defending a safe zone from attack by the Syrian government or its Russian and Iranian-backed militia allies would inevitably lead to an escalation, which is one of the reasons Obama had avoided this path in the first place, Sayigh said. Another big challenge would be how to police the area to maintain its neutral status as a safe zone, he added. While much of Trump’s Syria policy remains unclear, Syrian Kurds, who have generally avoided conflict with Assad, look set to remain central to U.S. strategy. The Syrian Kurdish YPG militia controls swathes of northeast Syria, where conflict with the government is rare and the U.S. air force mounts regular air strikes against IS targets. Syrian Kurdish autonomy in northern Syria alarms Turkey, which fears it could increase separatist sentiment among its Kurdish minority. Kurdish groups already govern northern Iraq, where the establishment of a no-fly zone in 1991 helped them on their way to autonomy from Baghdad. The YPG has links to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), a designated terrorist groups in Turkey. Growing Kurdish influence in northern Syria largely explains why Turkey launched a major incursion into Syria last year, helping insurgents from the Free Syrian Army drive both Islamic State and Kurdish militia away from the border. The operation dubbed “Euphrates Shield” has created what Turkish officials call a safe zone that is 100 km (62 miles) long. This week, a new Turkish-trained Syrian police force deployed in the town of Jarablus in that strip of territory. Turkey, which hosts 2.8 million Syrian refugees, has long advocated safe zones in Syria. But underlining the caution with which foreign governments are viewing Trump’s comments, Turkey said it was waiting to see the outcome of a “study” requested by Trump. Aid agencies in the region are concerned. Karl Schembri, Regional Media Adviser in the Middle East for the Norwegian Refugee Council, said that from the group’s experience, “we know that militarily enforced ‘safe zones’ rarely work and can actually put civilians at more risk”. | 1 |
7,152 | Cambodia deports 74 Chinese arrested for telecom extortion scams | PHNOM PENH (Reuters) - Cambodia on Thursday deported 74 Chinese nationals wanted in China on suspicion of extorting money from people there over the internet and by telephone, Cambodian police said. This raises the number of people from China and Taiwan who have been deported this year for suspected telecom scams to 346, Uk Heisela, the head of the Cambodian police told reporters at a press conference at the airport in the capital of Phnom Penh. Several hundred suspected scammers have been arrested in Cambodia, which has emerged as a major center of rackets that have cost the victims billions of dollars. A team of Chinese police arrived at the airport on a China Southern Airlines flight to pick up the suspects, who wore masks and had numbers marked on pink shirts. Uk Heisela said the 74 suspects, including 14 women, had been detained on Oct. 5 in the seaside town of Sihanoukville. Two Indonesians were also deported back to their home country. They tricked victims in China, the civil servants there, such as teachers, medics and artists, Uk Heisela said. In some cases, they had obtained naked pictures of the victims and used them for blackmail, he said. Cambodia is one of China s closest allies in Southeast Asia. More than 400 Chinese and Taiwanese were arrested in Cambodia in August alone for suspected telecom scams. The country s good internet connections and relaxed immigration laws have attracted con artists to carry out crimes. | 1 |
7,153 | Bundy Militia Loses It Over Bag Of D**ks (VIDEO) | Last week, social media was filled with memes mocking the Bundy Militia s plea for snacks. Unfortunately for the imbeciles currently occupying federal land, America had a lot of fun and sent the militants a bunch of stuff that they did not like. Patriot and well-known white supremacist Jon Ritzheimer posted a video on Facebook on Monday complaining about the various items people have sent the militia in lieu of the snacks, tampons and cigarettes the group asked for: It was really mind-blowing to me that people would actually spend their money (on this), he said. This box right here, $17.90 (for shipping). They spend and waste their money on all this hateful stuff to send out here to us and buy this ridiculous stuff. This one was really funny a bag of dicks. Rather than going out and doing good, they just spend all their money on hate and hate. In the video you then see Ritzheimer rage sweep the stuff off of the table and onto the floor. He declares: We re going to clear the table and we re going to continue to do work and do good for our country. We re not going to be deterred, we re not gonna let you and all your junk and hate mail sidetrack us Honestly, we don t know what he s talking about. Americans were just trying to give him a nice bag of d*cks to snack on! They re gummy and delicious, why doesn t he want our gifts?Perhaps the best part of the video was the caption under it. Ritzheimer often exploits his military service to justify his hatred for the Muslim community, but under the video he says: To my family, I love you very much and I am sorry I can t be there with you. Please look at this as a deployment, only this time I m actually serving my country rather than being sent over seas to line the pockets of corrupt politicians. So, what? Now he doesn t believe he honorably served his country while in the military? If that s the case he needs to stop talking about being a former Marine. Our military deserves more respect that some guy who just rolls out his service when it s convienant for him like so many other Tea Party Republicans do.I think that what this patriot really wants is more stuff. So if you have a few extra dollars to spare, maybe you could also send him some mouth watering d*cks to chew on while he is actively fighting against the country he claims to love so much.Watch his angry rant:https://www.facebook.com/scrappyphx.rider/videos/469856286535510/Featured image via video screenshot | 0 |
7,154 | Trump to speak with British prime minister May: White House | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump and British Prime Minister Theresa May will speak in a call scheduled for later on Tuesday, the White House said. The White House gave no other details about the discussion, scheduled for 11:30 a.m. ET. The call comes after the two leaders met in Washington last month. | 1 |
7,155 | Italy police arrest woman mafia boss, 24 others in Palermo dragnet | PALERMO, Italy (Reuters) - Police in the Sicilian capital of Palermo scooped up 25 suspected mobsters on an array of charges on Tuesday, including a woman accused of filling in as boss for her imprisoned husband. More than 200 police, two helicopters and five canine units took part in the early morning roundup of the suspects. They are accused of extortion, handling stolen goods, vandalism and being mafia members, according to the arrest warrant seen by Reuters. With extensive use of wiretaps and ambient recordings, police reconstructed territorial divisions in the city and the internal power struggle that made Maria Angela Di Trapani, 49, a powerful figure inside one of the city s historic clans. Her husband, Salvatore Salvino eyes of ice Madonia, who is in jail for murder. Police said she carried messages from her husband to clan members and organized monthly payments to the families of imprisoned mobsters. She also designated who should be running the mob family s business, or who should be acting boss , on behalf of her husband. In one wiretap, an accused clan member refers to her as the mistress of the house , and the police statement on the arrests said she was the real boss of the Resuttana neighborhood. For all intents and purposes, she acts like a real man, a turncoat told investigators, according to the court documents. The Sicilian mafia, or Cosa Nostra, has been hurt by a series of arrests in recent years, weakening the crime network, especially compared to the Calabrian Ndrangheta. With many bosses in jail, their wives have begun to play larger roles. While Cosa Nostra has been much weakened by the result of judicial investigations, this case shows the continuing ability to use violence, intimidation, and the mafia code to force business and shop owners to pay extortion, the warrant reads. During the two-year investigation, police documented 33 separate crimes and 22 attempts, many successful, to extort shops and businesses, police said. | 1 |
7,156 | Puerto Rico says will default on $779 million of senior debt | SAN JUAN (Reuters) - Puerto Rico on Friday said it will default on $779 million worth of constitutionally backed debt, its most senior bonds, making good on threats that the island would choose paying essential services for its citizens over obligations to creditors. Debt payments totaling just over $2 billion were due on Friday. Governor Alejandro Garcia Padilla told reporters on Friday that overall the U.S. commonwealth territory will not pay $911 million worth of its obligations. The U.S. territory’s finances will soon come under a U.S. federal oversight board after U.S. President Barack Obama signed into law on Thursday a bill giving the island access to a debt restructuring process, and implementing a halt on litigation arising from any defaults on its $70 billion debt load. “Today, Puerto Rico is protected against creditors’ actions,” Garcia Padilla said. The General Obligation (GO) debt, or debt that carries a GO guarantee, is a category of debt that has not been defaulted upon by any U.S. state in decades. Puerto Rico is not covered by Chapter 9 U.S. bankruptcy code which applies to municipalities. Puerto Rico’s Government Development Bank (GDB) said on Friday the island would have just $95 million in cash at the end of the year even after the defaults announced on Friday. Puerto Rico’s benchmark 2035 GO bond rose 0.25 points in price to trade at 67.50 points, pushing the yield down to 12.519 percent. On Thursday Garcia Padilla authorized Puerto Rico, under a locally written debt moratorium law, to suspend some of the $2 billion in debt payments due on Friday. The developments on Friday represent the nadir of a decade-long effort by Puerto Rico to avoid economic collapse. The island is hamstrung by emigration and a 45 percent poverty rate. “Even if the Commonwealth were to devote every last penny in the (accounts) to debt service on July 1, it would still owe holders of the public debt hundreds of millions of dollars,” the GDB said in a statement on Friday. Some of the debt expected to be defaulted upon such as PBA (Public Building Authority) ex-series L bonds will be mostly covered by reserve funds held by the trustee bank. Nearly all of the payments due on the Puerto Rico Infrastructure Financing Authority (PRIFA) Bond Anticipation Notes (BANs) will be covered by reserve funds as well. If some of the debt is covered by insurance policies, some creditors could receive a portion of their payments. The GDB, Puerto Rico’s primary fiscal agent, said the island has only $200 million in its operating account, and another $150 million in revenue that was redirected in recent months away from other debt payments. Even if the island continues emergency measures like suspending vendor payments and withholding contributions to a pension fund that is already insolvent, the operating account will still run out of cash in 30 to 60 days, the GDB said. “We knew this day would come, that they would default, and it is here. It was a good thing they passed PROMESA, even at the eleventh hour,” Ted Hampton, senior credit officer at Moody’s Investors Service, said, referring to the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management and Economic Stability Act (PROMESA). Late on Thursday the island’s legislature approved an $8.9 billion fiscal 2017 budget, which now awaits Garcia Padilla’s signature. In the wee hours of Friday, Puerto Rico released long-awaited audited financial statements for fiscal year 2014, more than a year late. The statements, audited by KPMG, showed, among other things, that Puerto Rico’s largest public pension has exhausted its assets and is now insolvent. Puerto Rico’s pensions have among the largest funding gaps in U.S. history. “When I entered office, Puerto Rico was property of Wall Street,” Garcia Padilla said, adding: “Today, everybody concludes that we have been telling the truth about Puerto Rico’s fiscal condition.” | 1 |
7,157 | Iran says will respond strongly to any action against its military forces: TV | ANKARA (Reuters) - Iran said on Friday it would retaliate against any action targeting its armed forces and accused the United States of violating the spirit of the 2015 nuclear deal reached between Tehran and six major powers. U.S. President Donald Trump is expected later on Friday to take a major step against the nuclear deal, laying out a more aggressive approach to Iranian activities in the Middle East that risks upsetting U.S. ties with European allies. Iran will strongly respond to any action against its military forces, including the Revolutionary Guards Corps, Foreign Ministry spokesman Bahram Qasemi was quoted as saying by state TV. A senior U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said on Friday that steps Trump is reviewing as part of a broader strategy also include imposing targeted sanctions in response to Iran s ballistic missile tests, cyber espionage and backing of Lebanese Hezbollah and other groups on the U.S. list of foreign terrorist organizations. The U.S. administration earlier this year considered, but then put on hold, adding the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Iran s most powerful internal and external security force, to the U.S. list. Qasemi said Iran will continue building up its ballistic missile capability in defiance of Western criticism, with Washington saying the Islamic Republic s stance violates the nuclear deal with the powers. Iran s missile program is only for defensive purposes ... we are determined and serious about expanding it, he said. Qasemi also warned about possibility of pulling out of the deal. Iran always acts based on its interests and will continue to do so. If necessary, we can also withdraw from the deal, Qasemi said. | 1 |
7,158 | UK police arrest four, including soldiers, over suspected far-right terrorism | LONDON (Reuters) - British police arrested four men on Tuesday, including some serving soldiers, on suspicion of belonging to a banned far-right group and planning terrorist acts. The men, aged 22 to 32, were detained on suspicion of being involved in the commission, preparation and instigation of acts of terrorism and of being members of the National Action group. The neo-Nazi organization became the first far-right group to be outlawed in Britain last year after the murder of member of parliament Jo Cox, whose killing the group had praised. The four arrests were made by counter-terrorism officers in the cities of Birmingham, Ipswich and Northampton and in Powys, Wales. The arrests were pre-planned and intelligence-led; there was no threat to the public s safety, West Midlands Police said. The Ministry of Defence (MoD) said a number of serving members of the army had been arrested. These arrests are the consequence of a Home Office Police Force-led operation supported by the army, an MoD spokeswoman said. This is now the subject of a civilian police investigation and it would be inappropriate to comment further. Britain is on its second-highest threat level, severe , meaning an attack is highly likely. Suspected Islamists have killed 35 people this year in London and Manchester, and a man died in June after a van was driven into worshippers near a London mosque. Last month, a senior police chief said the number of referrals to the authorities about suspected right-wing extremists had doubled since the murder of Cox, who was killed in June last year by a loner obsessed with Nazis and white supremacist ideology. | 1 |
7,159 | WATCH DEFIANT MUSLIM REFUGEES Tell British Citizens : “We will come anyway…if you agree or not…we’re coming” | Wow! Just wow Where are you from?Syria.Syria?Why don t you claim asylum in France?France? Because I don t like it.You don t like France? Why not?Because they re shit. Because they re shit government.Okay. You want to come to England?Yes, because they re the best.Why are they the best?Because they treat people very good.So you want to come to England. But that doesn t mean you, and you and you can come to our countryWe would come anyway .If you agree or not, we re coming.It doesn t matter. | 0 |
7,160 | Internet Has Brutal Reminder For Ivanka After She Takes Picture With Elephant At D.C. Zoo | Since the inauguration, Ivanka Trump has spent much of her time desperately working to make people forget that she s complicit in many of her father s worst behaviors. While she doesn t mind exploiting a little nepotism to get her own office in the White House, she actively pretends she s innocent in all of this.Part of her strategy is to promote herself (and her brand) on social media as family-friendly and fun. Along with tweets about her father s policies, she regularly posts pictures of her and her family enjoying vacations and activities. She recently thought this would be a fun picture to add to her Twitter account. Who doesn t love an elephant?Making some new friends in DC! pic.twitter.com/D7j4e0IUHW Ivanka Trump (@IvankaTrump) March 26, 2017There were a few glaring problems, though. The photo op only served to reinforce what a hypocrite she is. Given her unique position to actually influence her family, her silence speaks volumes. A real friend of the elephants might, for example, criticize her brother Donald Trump Jr for murdering wild elephants as part of his routine safari trips.@IvankaTrump Doesn't your family normally kill those things? pic.twitter.com/8tAfVxMR7y Kaj-Erik Eriksen (@KajEriksen) March 27, 2017She might point out to her brother that posing with the severed tail of an elephant he had just killed was a disgusting thing to do and he should wipe that smug grin off of his face.pic.twitter.com/DhVDc6TVvJ Clara Jeffery (@ClaraJeffery) March 27, 2017She might encourage both of her brothers to stop trying to replace their insecurities with dead animals.Yes, @ClaraJeffery This!Ivanka pretends to be humane Her family murder for fun.And she doesn't care. pic.twitter.com/AM3aN2FmX4 Steve Marmel (@Marmel) March 28, 2017She also might take a more active interest in what her father is doing. Trump has shown no interest in murdering elephants individually, but his lack of respect for environmental protections might make him one of their greatest enemies nonetheless. Trump recently proposed defunding every cent of federal funding to combat climate change. Every single cent. His new head of the EPA, a climate science denier, called fighting the devastating effects of climate change a waste of time. Renowned climate scientist Michael Mann put what Trump is doing in the simplest possible terms: It s an all-out assault on Earth. Meanwhile, African elephants continue to slowly circle towards extinction. Plagued by a changing environment, poachers, and human development, their habitat has become a dangerous place to live. The Trump family is a major part of that.Some friend.Featured image via Twitter | 0 |
7,161 | KKK AND BLACK LIVES MATTER Get Into Urine Tossing Fight Outside The GOP Convention [Video] | The video below is a great example of what the Cleveland police officers are dealing with outside of the GOP Convention. Hundreds of protesters got into a chaotic tussle but the police officers (as you can see in the video) were right in the middle to break it up. This is yet another example of what police officers have to deal with urine tossing? Hundreds of protesters and police took over Public Square in downtown Cleveland yesterday. Some of the larger groups dispersed just after 5 p.m., but about 10-20 new protesters arrived with masks on. Heavy law enforcement presence remained for several hours.Cleveland Police Chief Calvin Williams was on hand most of the afternoon to try and keep groups calm. Williams said he was shoved by a person trying to get to another protester, however, there were no arrests and no injuries.It s the largest gathering of protest groups and the largest gathering of police since the beginning of the Republican National Convention.Activists from Black Lives Matter, Westboro Baptist Church and the KKK were in the square and, at one time, were throwing urine at each other.KPLC 7 News, Lake Charles, Louisiana Via: kpictv | 0 |
7,162 | U.S. defense chief urges Pakistan to redouble efforts against militants | ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis met Pakistan s civilian and military leaders on Monday and urged them to redouble their efforts to rein in militants accused of using the country as a base to carry out attacks in neighboring Afghanistan. Mattis, on a one-day visit to Pakistan, said the South Asian nation had made progress in the fight against militancy inside its borders but needed to make more. More than 100 days since U.S. President Donald Trump announced a South Asia strategy that calls for a firmer line toward Islamabad, U.S. officials and analysts say there has been only limited success and it is not clear how progress will be made. U.S. officials have long been frustrated by what they see as Pakistan s reluctance to act against groups such as the Afghan Taliban and the Haqqani network that they believe exploit safe haven on Pakistani soil to launch attacks in Afghanistan. The Secretary reiterated that Pakistan must redouble its efforts to confront militants and terrorists operating within the country, the Pentagon said in a statement. Mattis, who visited Pakistan for the first time as defense secretary, said before the trip that the goal for his meetings with Pakistani officials would be to find common ground . In his discussion with Mattis, Pakistani Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi said the two allies shared objectives. We re committed (to) the war against terror, he said. Nobody wants peace in Afghanistan more than Pakistan. Mattis also met with high-ranking officials from Pakistan s powerful military, including army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa and Lieutenant-General Naveed Mukhtar, the head of the Inter-Services Intelligence spy agency that U.S. officials say has links with Haqqani and Taliban militants. A U.S. defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Mattis conversations had been straightforward and specific. The official said one of the topics of conversation was getting Pakistan to help bring the Taliban to the negotiating table In August, Trump outlined a new strategy for the war in Afghanistan, chastising Pakistan over its alleged support for Afghan militants. But beyond that, the Trump administration has done little to articulate its strategy, experts say. U.S. officials say they have not seen a change in Pakistan s support for militants, despite visits by senior U.S. officials, including Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. We have been very direct and very clear with the Pakistanis ... we have not seen those changes implemented yet, General John Nicholson, the top U.S. general in Afghanistan, said last week. Pakistani officials have pushed back on the U.S. accusations and say they have done a great deal to help the United States in tracking down militants. U.S. official expressed hope relations could improve after a U.S.-Canadian couple kidnapped in Afghanistan were freed in Pakistan in October with their three children. While the Trump administration has used tougher words with Pakistan, it is has yet to change Islamabad s calculus. Some experts say the United States loses clout in Pakistan when it is seen as bullying. While Mattis traveled to the region earlier this year, he did not stop in Pakistan, but visited its arch rival, India, a relationship that has grown under the Trump administration. There is not an effective stick anymore because Pakistan doesn t really care about U.S aid, it has been dwindling anyway and it is getting the money it needs elsewhere ... treat it with respect and actually reward it when it does do something good, said Madiha Afzal, with the Brookings Institution. Mattis brief visit to Islamabad comes a week after a hardline Pakistani Islamist group called off nationwide protests after the government met its demand that a minister accused of blasphemy resign. Separately, a Pakistani Islamist accused of masterminding a bloody 2008 assault in the Indian city of Mumbai was freed from house arrest. The White House said the release could have repercussions for U.S.-Pakistan relations. I think for Pakistan, the timing is very bad. There is talk about progress being made against extremists and here you have a situation where religious hardliners have basically been handed everything they wanted on a silver platter, said Michael Kugelman, with the Woodrow Wilson think tank in Washington. | 1 |
7,163 | U.S. appeals court upholds gag orders on FBI data surveillance | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. federal appeals court on Monday upheld nondisclosure rules that allow the FBI to secretly issue surveillance orders for customer data to communications firms, a ruling that dealt a blow to privacy advocates. A unanimous three-judge panel on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco sided with a lower court decision in finding that rules permitting the Federal Bureau of Investigation to send national security letters under gag orders are appropriate and do not violate the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution’s free speech protections. Content distribution firm Cloudflare and phone network operator CREDO Mobile had sued the government in order to notify customers of five national security letters, or NSLs, received between 2011 and 2013. The FBI’s use of NSLs has drawn increased scrutiny as new transparency laws have let companies publish some of the letters, which has shown the agency may have run afoul of rules restricting their use. Andrew Crocker, an attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which represented the companies in the consolidated case, said no immediate decision whether to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court had been made. He called the ruling disappointing. The Justice Department declined comment. Several major technology firms, including Microsoft and Twitter, have mounted a variety of legal challenges in recent years to U.S. government restrictions limiting what they can disclose, both to affected users and to the public, about the surveillance requests they receive. National security letters are a type of government subpoena for communications data sent to service providers. They are usually issued with a gag order, meaning the target is often unaware that records are being accessed, and they do not require a warrant. Tens of thousands of NSLs are issued annually, and some gag orders last indefinitely. Writing for the panel, Judge Sandra Ikuta said the gag orders meet a compelling U.S. government interest, are sufficiently narrow and allow for appropriate judicial review. Ikuta, appointed by former Republican President George W. Bush, said recent changes to the law passed by Congress in 2015 bolstered oversight of NSL use. In June of last year the U.S. Senate narrowly rejected a Republican-backed proposal to expand the kinds of telephone and internet records the FBI could request under an NSL to include senders and recipients of emails, some information about websites a person visits and social media log-in data. The legislation failed, but lawmakers have said they intend to pursue the expansion again. | 1 |
7,164 | U.S. welcomes Hariri's return to Lebanon: State Department official | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States welcomes Lebanese Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri s return to Lebanon, a U.S. State Department official said on Wednesday. The United States is also encouraged by Hariri s discussions with Lebanese President Michel Aoun and his statement reaffirming his commitment to the stability of Lebanon, the official said. After returning to Beirut for the first time since he quit abruptly on Nov. 4 in a broadcast from Saudi Arabia, Hariri shelved his decision to resign at the request of Aoun, easing a crisis that had deepened tensions in the Middle East. | 1 |
7,165 | Trump, McConnell say they remain united on shared goals | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Wednesday emphasized their plans to cooperate on shared goals, following weeks of tensions between the two Republicans. The White House and McConnell issued statements after media reports that McConnell’s relationship with the Republican president had disintegrated amid repeated attacks by Trump on the Senate leader for, among other things, failing to get a healthcare bill passed. Trump and McConnell “remain united on many shared priorities, including middle class tax relief, strengthening the military, constructing a southern border wall, and other important issues,” the White House said in a statement. It said the two would hold previously scheduled meetings following the August recess to discuss the issues with members of the congressional leadership and the Cabinet. “The President and I, and our teams, have been and continue to be in regular contact about our shared goals,” McConnell said in his statement. He cited support for infrastructure legislation and tax reform, as well as preventing a government default, passing defense bills and implementing an effective strategy against Islamic State. “We have a lot of work ahead of us, and we are committed to advancing our shared agenda together and anyone who suggests otherwise is clearly not part of the conversation,” McConnell said. The New York Times reported on Tuesday that McConnell and Trump were locked in a political “cold war,” especially after an Aug. 9 phone call it said devolved into a shouting match. On that day and the next, Trump assailed McConnell via Twitter, angered by a speech McConnell had given saying Trump had “excessive expectations” of Congress. Trump has kept up the pressure on Congress this week, threatening on Tuesday to shut down the government if lawmakers do not fund the building of a wall along the border with Mexico. Trump also kept up an attack on another senator whom McConnell has defended, Republican Jeff Flake of Arizona, a longtime critic of the president over his trade and immigration policies. | 1 |
7,166 | MA: ILLEGAL ALIEN Accused Of Running $1.5 Million Food Stamp Scam Cuts GPS Bracelet…Manhunt Underway | State police are searching for fugitive accused of running a million-dollar food stamp scam after they say he cut off his court-ordered GPS monitoring bracelet and went on the run just as his high-profile fraud and money laundering trial was set to begin.Martin B. Santiago, 49, of the Dominican Republic was slated to go to trial yesterday. But when he didn t show up to court, state police say investigators realized he had forcibly removed the monitoring device about 6 a.m.Santiago was set to go before a jury for his alleged involvement in a $1.5 million scheme to fraudulently sell food stamps and launder money through his three stores in Lawrence. State police say Santiago was arrested for the scam in June 2015 and had been wearing an ankle bracelet while awaiting trial after posting $75,000 cash bail.Authorities are now turning to the public for help finding Santiago, who they describe as a 5-foot, 11-inch Hispanic man weighing about 190 pounds with black hair and brown eyes. State police say Santiago who is fluent in Spanish and has also gone by Mark Santiago and Martin Billone Santiago has ties to the Lawrence and Methuen areas. | 0 |
7,167 | Trump Is FUMING Over Bad Charlottesville Press, Becomes A Terror In The White House (TWEET) | Once again, Donald Trump is having a completely disappointing, inappropriate reaction to the racially motivated violence that happened in Charlottesville, Virginia last weekend.Apparently, instead of being outraged about the murder of one counter protester and the injuries of several others, Trump is all bent out of shape because he has gotten a lot of negative press coverage for his weak, pathetic response to the incident. According to White House officials, Trump is coming apart at the seams over this, as Robert Costa reported: Person close to Kelly framed it to me this way: POTUS fuming at press, coverage of C ville handling. In no mood for talk about moderation. Seriously, what did Trump expect to happen after he ignored America s pleas to denounce the violence for two whole days, before issuing a scripted, half-ass statement on Monday? Not even the white supremacists Trump targeted in his response believed that he was actually denouncing racism.If Trump wanted positive press coverage, he should have actually done his job and condemned the white supremacist values and bigotry from the start. Speaking up against racism and the violence that broke out of that white nationalist rally was possibly the easiest task a President could ask for, and Trump failed miserably at executing that. Instead, Trump protected and defended the racist attackers, making his approval rating only plummet further and giving the media even more things to criticize.Trump can blame the media all he wants, but it is his own lack of competency that is responsible for his failure as president. He never does the right thing, even when it is blatantly obvious what actions he should be taking. What happened in Charlottesville was an opportunity for Trump to emerge as a different president than most Americans expect him to be, and he completely blew it. There is something very wrong when a leader cares more about his press coverage than the lives of his constituents.Featured image via Branden Camp / Getty Images | 0 |
7,168 | HOW HILLARY DESTROYED This Man’s Life To Hide Her Incompetence In #Benghazi | Does anyone even care that this American man was picked out of thin air to be used as a scape goat to cover for Hillary s incompetence? One day he s an innocent man making third rate videos and posting them on Youtube, and the next day, he s being hauled off to jail for a video he produced that Hillary and her lying staff claimed inspired a terror attack in Benghazi! This could have been any American. Of all the evil things Hillary has done, this has to rank at the top, just below the four dead Americans who she left unprotected to die in Benghazi. Yet, the Benghazi Butcher rolls on without missing a beat, as the mainstream media cheers her on like she s the horse they re betting on at the Kentucky Derby In September 2012 Hillary blamed an awful internet video for the deaths of four American heroes in Benghazi.Hillary Clinton made the statements as the bodies of the four dead Americans were brought back to US soil.She made the public comments just three days after the assault on the compound that killed Ambassador Chris Stevens, Sean Smith, Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty.But thanks to leaked Wikileaks emails we now know that Hillary Clinton wrote Chelsea during the Benghazi attacks telling her Americans were killed by an al-Qaeda like group.Hillary later lied and blamed the attack on a YouTube video. And the director of the YouTube video was later arrested.Nakoula Basseley Nakoula (C) is escorted out of his home by Los Angeles County Sheriff s officers in Cerritos, California September 15, 2012 (Reuters / Bret Hartman)Four years after the deadly Benghazi terrorist attack Hillary Clinton is running for president and Nakoula Basseley Nakoula is broke, destitute and living in a homeless shelter.And ISIS is in control of much of Libya.FOX News reported:Four Americans died in the 2012 terror attack in Benghazi, and those who survived saw their stories of heroism told in a Hollywood movie, but the filmmaker whose work was wrongly blamed for touching off the event lives in obscurity, poverty and fear, FoxNews.com has learned.Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, the Coptic Christian whose short video The Innocence of Muslims was initially faulted for sparking the Sept. 11, 2012 terror attack at U.S. diplomatic compounds in Libya, is now living in a homeless shelter run by First Southern Baptist Church in Buena Park, Calif. He has served time in prison, been shamed publicly by the White House and threatened with death. Hmmm I wonder if Hillary is willing to cough up (pun intended) a few of her secret service agents to help protect the life of this innocent man, who will forever live in the fear of being killed by Muslim extremists. | 0 |
7,169 | BREAKING: 5 People Shot At Anti-Trump Protest…All Are In Critical Condition [VIDEO] | This is 1 of 7 anti-Trump rallies raging across America. Wouldn t it make sense for Obama and Soros to prey on the anger so many Americans are feeling right now over Trump s win?According to social media posts by KOMO-TV and other sources, multiple people were shot Wednesday in Seattle during protests over election results.At least five people have reportedly been shot and all are said to have critical injuries.Seattle Asst. Chief says that a lone suspect was in a crowd near or watching the anti-Trump protests, when an argument of some sort developed. One of the people in the argument stepped away, fired back into the crowd at the person or people with whom he was arguing.At least some of the wounded are believed to be innocent bystanders waiting for a bus. Only one man is seriously injured. The four other injuries are believed to be to the lower extremities.VICTIM UPDATE: All five people shot were taken to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle. Hospital spokeswoman Susan Gregg told The Associated Press that two men and one woman were in critical condition and that two men were in serious condition Wednesday night. Later Wednesday, Gregg said the condition of the woman had been upgraded to serious.Authorities were on the scene within 60 seconds, as police and EMS were staged just down the street due to the protests.The suspect is still at large. Bearing ArmsSEATTLE, WA NOW REPORTED 5 SHOOTING VICTIMS ALL REPORTED W/CRITICAL INJURIES MCI DECLARED #BREAKING https://t.co/7c1rakpPAg https://t.co/DFFUsmar4M Alertpage Inc. (@alertpage) November 10, 2016LIVE on #Periscope: Anti-Trump protest takes to the streets in downtown Seattle #komonews https://t.co/QclXVo02ol KOMO News (@komonews) November 10, 2016Here is a Craig s List ad that was sent to us looking for Hillary supporters to join protesters to join them in NYC: | 0 |
7,170 | Illinois governor backs 'Democratic' state pension-cost plan | CHICAGO (Reuters) - Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner and Republican legislative leaders said on Thursday they will endorse what they called a Senate Democratic approach to curbing the state’s $111 billion unfunded pension liability. But Senate President John Cullerton, a Chicago Democrat, said the plan promoted by the Republican governor goes beyond what he supports because of curbs on collective bargaining. Rauner said the initiative would give workers a choice between having future salary increases count toward their pensions or continuing to receive 3 percent compounded annual cost-of-living increases upon retirement. “This does not go as far as we need to ... But it’s a step in the right direction,” Rauner told reporters at a news conference. He added it would save the state $1 billion annually and affect four of the state’s five pension funds. Illinois has the worst-funded pensions and lowest credit ratings among the 50 states. An impasse between Rauner and Democrats who control the legislature has left the fifth-largest state without a budget seven months into fiscal 2016. Rauner said the so-called consideration approach will be constitutional as long as salary increases are removed from collective bargaining with labor unions. “We apparently still have a fundamental disagreement over the role of collective bargaining in this process, in the sense that I think collective bargaining should continue to exist and the governor does not,” Cullerton said in a statement. An aide to House Speaker Michael Madigan characterized the governor’s track record on pensions as anti-working family. “What he wants to do is destroy middle-class families whether it’s over pensions or wages or injuries on the job site,” said Steve Brown, a spokesman for Madigan. Easing pension costs was made harder after the Illinois Supreme Court last May tossed out a 2013 state law that would have saved as much as $145 billion over 30 years, ruling that public sector workers have iron-clad protection in the state constitution against cuts to retirement benefits. The high court could rule as soon as Friday on a union challenge to a 2014 state law to shore up two of Chicago’s financially struggling pension funds. The city used a consideration argument to defend the law, claiming that pension benefit cuts and higher pension contributions will save the funds from insolvency. Union coalition We Are One Illinois contended the governor’s plan was unconstitutional. “A forced choice between two diminished options is no choice at all and forbidden by the court,” it said. | 1 |
7,171 | EU's Verhofstadt says assumes a Brexit deal can be done with Britain | LONDON (Reuters) - The lead Brexit negotiator for the European Parliament, Guy Verhofstadt, said on Thursday that a Brexit withdrawal agreement could be reached with Britain. That s the assumption that I have and it is towards that that we work, Verhofstadt said after a speech to students at the London School of Economics. And that a withdrawal agreement be done in March 2019 means that there has to be an agreement in fact in October or November because then the agreement will go to the European Parliament and we need four or five months, he said. | 1 |
7,172 | Turkish police officer shoots prosecutor in Antalya: media reports | ISTANBUL (Reuters) - A Turkish police officer shot and seriously wounded a state prosecutor after they argued in his office in the southern province of Antalya on Tuesday, the Dogan news agency reported. The wounded man was flown by helicopter ambulance to hospital from the Korkuteli district of the province, some 50 km (30 miles) northwest of the city of Antalya, the agency said. It said the incident occurred around 3 pm (1200 GMT) when the police officer, whose wife works as a clerk at the court house where the prosecutor s office is located, entered the room and they began arguing. State-run Anadolu news agency also described the attacker as a police officer. | 1 |
7,173 | DICK MORRIS: HOW HILLARY Hired “Secret Police” To Threaten, Smear Bill’s Rape, Sexual Assault Victims [VIDEO] | Secret police ? Sounds like a strong arm tactic you d find a political leader using in a communist country to force your will on other people. Hmmm https://twitter.com/TEN_GOP/status/786697347254419456 | 0 |
7,174 | Belgian judge defers ruling on warrant for ex-Catalan leader: lawyer | BRUSSELS (Reuters) - A Belgian judge made no ruling on Friday on a European arrest warrant issued by Spain for ousted Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont, his lawyer said after a court hearing in Brussels. The Belgian prosecutor demanded the warrant to be exercised, but the case for Puigdemont s defense will be made at a hearing early next month. We will make our case on December 4. The prosecutor has asked for the extradition warrant to be exercised. Nothing has been decided today, Paul Bekaert told reporters outside the main Brussels court. The prosecutor had determined that according to Belgian law Puigdemont and four of his former ministers who traveled with him to Brussels were charged with conspiracy by public officials, Bekaert added. Under the Spanish warrant, all five faced charges of rebellion and sedition. They had left Spain after Puigdemont s regional government was sacked by Madrid for unilaterally declaring Catalonia independent following a referendum on secession that court authorities in Madrid had ruled was illegal. The European arrest warrant system in place since 2004 makes it easier for EU countries to demand the extradition from other EU states of people wanted for crimes, and removes political decision-making from the process. EU countries issue thousands of such warrants each year. The Oct. 1 referendum and subsequent turmoil have plunged Spain into its gravest political crisis since the return of democracy four decades ago. Puigdemont has since said he might consider a solution that did not involve secession. | 1 |
7,175 | ACTOR VINCE VAUGHN DESTROYS The Left With AWESOME Statement On Gun Rights | Boom! Just when you think there isn t a sane person left in Hollywood, actor Vince Vaughn comes out with this brilliant statement on guns. Enjoy! | 0 |
7,176 | Washington protesters vow to fight for civil rights under Trump | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. civil rights activists vowed on Saturday to defend hard-fought gains in voting rights and criminal justice during the presidency of Donald Trump, kicking off a week of protests ahead of the Republican’s inauguration. About 2,000 mostly black protesters ignored steady rain to march and rally near Washington’s Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial, as speakers urged them to fight for minority rights and President Barack Obama’s signature healthcare law, which Trump has vowed to dismantle. The Rev. Al Sharpton, the rally’s organizer and a veteran civil rights leader, said Democrats in Congress needed to be sent a simple message: “Get some backbone.” “We march in the driving rain because we want the nation to understand that what has been fought for and gained, that you’re going to need more than one election to turn it around,” he said. The rally drew fewer people than organizers had initially expected, but Sharpton said afterwards he was satisfied with the turnout, given the rain and temperatures hovering just above freezing. “I really didn’t think we’d get those kind of numbers,” he said in a telephone interview. Trump, a New York real estate developer, won with a populist platform that included promises to build a wall along the Mexican border, restrict immigration from Muslim countries and dismantle Obamacare. His choice of Senator Jeff Sessions, an Alabama Republican, to become attorney general has raised concern among many on the left that Trump could weaken voting rights for minorities and roll back criminal justice reforms. “We will march until hell freezes over, and when it does, we will march on the ice,” said Cornell William Brooks, president and chief executive of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. The rally also included the Hispanic group La Raza, politicians, relatives of African-Americans slain by police, the National Urban League, Planned Parenthood and the Human Rights Campaign, an advocacy group for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender civil rights. The rally came hours after Trump blasted U.S. Representative John Lewis after the Georgia Democrat and civil rights campaigner said Russia’s alleged hacking aimed at helping Trump put his legitimacy into question. Trump replied on Twitter that Lewis should focus instead on his Atlanta district. “All talk, talk, talk - no action or results! Sad!,” he wrote. About 30 groups, almost all of them anti-Trump, have gotten permits to protest before, during and after the inauguration. Thousands of demonstrators have vowed to shut down the inauguration. Washington police and the U.S. Secret Service plan to have some 3,000 extra officers and an additional 5,000 National Guard troops on hand for security. By far the biggest event will be the Women’s March on Washington the day after the inauguration, which organizers say could draw 200,000 people. | 1 |
7,177 | NOT KIDDING: [VIDEO] BOEHNER SELLS AMERICA DOWN THE RIVER WITH STRAIGHT FACE…Cries During Interview About Golf | Funny how Boehner gets so choked up over the little things, but shows no emotion at all when he s giving Obama and the Democrats the keys to the fundamental transformation of America A promotion is running on The Golf Channel about Speaker of the House Rep. John Boehner (R-OH) appearing on the show Feherty on August 3, and Boehner, who has a history of waterworks, gets the tears flowing again. I wanted to make sure that every kid had the same chance I did. An opportunity, Boehner told former PGA golfer David Feherty, with tears forming in his eyes.The spot also shows Boehner talking about a picture of himself and colleagues, and he told Feherty, The three of us are talking about how easily we turn to tears. Via: Breitbart News | 0 |
7,178 | BREAKING: WHY DID OBAMA JUST Break Democrat Ranks, Throw Hillary Under The Bus On FBI Investigation? | Of course, we all know that Obama is not a man of integrity or character. There has to be something in it for him. Did FBI Director James Comey cut a deal with Barack? Why is every other Democrat calling for Comey s head? It s unprecedented for Democrats to break ranks on something this important. Stay tuned President Barack Obama does not believe FBI Director James Comey is attempting to influence this year s presidential vote, Press Secretary Josh Earnest said Monday. The President doesn t believe that he s secretly strategizing to benefit one candidate or one political party, Earnest said. He s in a tough spot, and he s the one who will be in a position to defend his actions in the face of significant criticism from a variety of legal experts, including individuals who served in senior Department of Justice positions in administrations led by presidents in both parties. The White House had no role in Comey s decision to inform Congress he was investigating new emails related to Hillary Clinton s private server, Earnest added.Earnest said he would neither defend nor criticize the decision. He s aiming to preserve the integrity of the review into whether additional emails discovered on a laptop belonging to Anthony Weiner are relevant to an investigation into Clinton s use of a private email server while she was secretary of state.Earnest said that norms about making information public should be followed.Amid outcry about Comey s decision, Earnest called the FBI director a man of integrity and good character. CNN | 0 |
7,179 | Trump faces uphill battle to overcome court's hold on travel ban | (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump faces an uphill battle to overcome a federal judge’s temporary hold on his travel ban on seven mainly Muslim countries, but the outcome of a ruling on the executive order’s ultimate legality is less certain. Any appeals of decisions by U.S. District Court Judge James Robart in Seattle face a regional court dominated by liberal-leaning judges who might not be sympathetic to Trump’s rationale for the ban, and a currently shorthanded Supreme Court split 4-4 between liberals and conservatives. The temporary restraining order Robart issued on Friday in Seattle, which applies nationwide, gives him time to consider the case in more detail, but also sends a signal that he is likely to impose a more permanent injunction. The Trump administration has appealed that order. The San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said late on Saturday that it would not decide whether to lift the judge’s ruling, as requested by the U.S. government, until it receives briefs from both sides, with the administration’s filing due on Monday. Appeals courts are generally leery of upending the status quo, which in this case - for now - is the suspension of the ban. The upheaval prompted by the new Republican administration’s initial announcement of the ban on Jan. 27, with travelers detained at airports upon entering the country, would potentially be kickstarted again if Robart’s stay was lifted. The appeals court might also take into account the fact that there are several other cases around the country challenging the ban. If it were to overturn the district court’s decision, another judge somewhere else in the United States could impose a new order, setting off a new cascade of court filings. If the appeals court upholds the order, the administration could immediately ask the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene. But the high court is generally reluctant to get involved in cases at a preliminary stage, legal experts said. The high court is short one justice, as it has been for a year, leaving it split between liberals and conservatives. Any emergency request by the administration would need five votes to be granted, meaning at least one of the liberals would have to vote in favor. “I think the court’s going to feel every reason to stay on the sidelines as long as possible,” said Steve Vladeck, a professor at the University of Texas School of Law. Trump last week nominated a conservative appeals court judge, Neil Gorsuch, to fill the vacancy, but he will not be sitting on the Supreme Court for at least two months. Gorsuch’s vote, if he is confirmed by the U.S. Senate, could come into play if the case were to reach the court at a later stage of the litigation. Once the case proceeds past the injunction stage of the litigation and onto the merits of whether the order is legally sound, legal experts differ over how strong the government’s case would be. Richard Primus, a professor of constitutional law at the University of Michigan Law School, said the administration could struggle to convince courts that the ban was justified by national security concerns. The Supreme Court has previously rejected the idea that the government does not need to offer a basis for its actions in the national security context, including the landmark 1971 Pentagon Papers case, in which the administration of President Richard Nixon tried unsuccessfully to prevent the press from publishing information about United States policy toward Vietnam. “The government’s argument so far in support of the order is pretty weak,” Primus said. Jonathan Adler, a professor at Case Western Reserve University School of Law, said the administration has legal precedent on its side, with the courts generally deferential to executive action on immigration. However, he said it is unusual for the courts to be asked to endorse “a policy that appears to have been adopted in as kind of haphazard and arbitrary way as this one appears to have been.” | 1 |
7,180 | Florida LGBT rights push reflects changing times | TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (Reuters) - A Republican, a Democrat and a lobbyist for leading businesses in Florida huddled this spring at the state Capitol, mapping out the next move in a campaign to enact the first statewide LGBT anti-discrimination law in the U.S. South. A record number of Republican lawmakers had thrown their support behind proposed protections for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people, and hundreds of companies backed the cause. While the bill has so far fallen short with time running out on the legislative session, its lead backers were heartened by their progress and determined to retool for next year. “We definitely need to ramp up the grassroots,” said Joseph Salzverg, a lobbyist for Florida Competes, a group of more than 450 state businesses supporting LGBT protections. “There’s a lot of Republicans that agree with the policy but are worried about the effect it has back home.” A year after transgender bathroom access erupted as a U.S. culture wars flashpoint, Florida is among the conservative statehouses where LGBT activists see momentum building for affirmative legislation. The nation’s third most-populous state, Florida could offer the next breakthrough in a national movement to advance LGBT civil-rights protections, viewed by advocates as stepping stones to their ultimate goal of federal anti-discrimination law. Only 18 states, mostly concentrated in the U.S. West and Northeast, and the District of Columbia have laws that fully guard against LGBT people being fired from jobs, kicked out of housing or denied services in restaurants, hotels and other businesses. This fight continues even after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in June 2015 that legalized same-sex marriage nationally. Florida’s strategy, years in the making, aims to build bipartisan support with economic arguments and the passage of similar measures locally that show the LGBT protections can succeed. The bill’s backers must convince a Republican-controlled state legislature that all of Florida benefits from LGBT protections. “It’s really about the math of being based here in Florida, but competing on a global market,” said John “J.T.” Tonnison, president of Florida Competes. Tonnison is chief information officer of Tech Data Corp, a technology distributor. In the state capital of Tallahassee this spring, he told legislators about a prized recruit reluctant to relocate from California, concerned about a gay son visiting a state without strong protections. “It sets us apart in a less-than-positive light,” Tonnison said. Local LGBT protections are now in place in communities representing 60 percent of Florida’s more than 20 million residents. In conservative north Florida, the state’s largest city, Jacksonville, recently passed a nondiscrimination policy after a fight that lasted years. Local successes helped convince 19 Republican legislators to join 52 Democrats this year to cosponsor legislation that would add sexual orientation and gender identity to Florida’s civil rights statutes, just shy of a majority in the 160-member legislature. Representative Joe Gruters, an anti-abortion activist who co-chaired President Donald Trump’s state campaign, was among the first Republicans to sign on. Perhaps an unlikely LGBT ally, the first-term lawmaker said the case made by advocates, and a prominent conservative colleague’s support, resonated with him. “I will continue to fight for this, and for any type of right, that treats people fairly,” Gruters said. “It’s going to happen.” By contrast, the Florida Family Policy Council, advocating for conservative social values, decried the legislation as an intrusion on religious freedoms and public safety by allowing men into women’s bathrooms and private facilities. Such LGBT measures are “weapons to punish Christians for simply acting out their faith in the marketplace,” said its president, John Stemberger. “People are trying to force other people to do things,” he added. “Why can’t we just disagree?” But backers see Florida as a model for other states engaged in long-term legislative efforts, including Ohio and Pennsylvania. “Attracting bipartisan support really proves this isn’t an urban versus a rural issue, or a Republican versus Democratic issue,” said Dan Rafter, a spokesman for the advocacy group Freedom for All Americans. Florida, and most other states, avoided fights this year over transgender bathroom access, possibly dissuaded by the national boycotts organized against North Carolina before its recent roll-back of restrictions enacted in 2016. Nonetheless, Florida’s LGBT protection bill never got a hearing during this session, which will end within days. The legislature’s leaders did not comment on what stalled the measure. Supporters are reorganizing for next year with a more pointed message. “Inaction is not neutral,” said Hannah Willard, public policy director for the advocacy group Equality Florida. During the strategy meeting last month at the state Capitol, Republican Representative Rene Plasencia proposed mobilizing business supporters to engage legislators in their hometowns. “We are protecting people’s rights to live freely, to not be disadvantaged economically, because of the personal choice of who they love,” he said. Looking over a list of lawmakers not yet on board, the lead Democrat behind the House bill agreed. “We need to persuade people before they get to Tallahassee,” Representative Ben Diamond said. “That’s the challenge.” | 1 |
7,181 | Ron Paul Blames Obama For A Stock Market Crash That Hasn’t Happened Yet | Ron Paul, who s a retired doctor, not an economist, has a prediction that in the very near future, the stock market will lose half its value. Guess who would be to blame? Why it s the black guy, of course. A 50 percent pullback is conceivable, Paul said on Futures Now recently. I don t believe it s ten years off. I don t even believe it s a year off. According to his calculations, it would cut the S&P 500 Index in half, to 1212, and the blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average would collapse to 10,837.Paul noted that there s a lot of chaos in Washington right now, with an unpredictable president and those who are inclined to tear him apart but if the market takes that big of a tumble, he doesn t see it as Trump s fault. It s all man-made. It s not the fault of Donald Trump in the last week. If the market crashes tomorrow and we have a great depression, he didn t do it in six months. It took more like six or ten years to cause all these problems that we re facing, he said.Source: CNBCSix to 10 years ago, hmmm, who was in office for the vast majority of that time?Paul has spent much of his career as an economic doomsdayer, and sometimes it sounds like he s right, just because, well, broken clocks and all Two years ago, he predicted nearly the same collapse, but he had a solution, which could be anyone s for just $49.50 for sale on his website, of course.As part of an infomercial for Stansberry & Associates Investment Research, Ron Paul warned that a currency crisis of epic proportions would arrive soon and prophesied that life in America was guaranteed to end in disaster as a total breakdown of the stock market would lead to civil unrest and authoritarian clampdowns. Paul said people could avoid and even benefit from the collapse by purchasing Stansberry s Survival Blueprint for weathering the coming catastrophe for $49.50.Source: CNNThe only thing Ron Paul hates more than regulations and the Federal Reserve, is a more diverse society. He s a long-avowed racist who was never a fan of President Obama. In March, Paul s institute ran a blog post that accused Obama of sabotaging Trump.He s also a big believer in the Deep State, which is a shadow government that really runs the United States. According to another blog post, Obama is still part of that deep state.A 50 percent drop in the stock market would be disastrous for our economy, but as I mentioned, Paul is not an economist. He arguably predicted the real estate crash, but so did a lot of economists. Paul, like his buddy Alex Jones, is full of doomsday predictions and he has books to sell. If such a drop happens, you might be able to point fingers at some Obama policies, but it s Trump who s scaring the hell out of everyone, including investors. If we crash, Trump is driving the bus and he will get the blame at least from most people.Featured image via Pete Marovich/Getty Images | 0 |
7,182 | OOPS! NEW BREAKING POLLS SHOWS DONALD TRUMP IS MORE POPULAR THAN JOHN MCCAIN WITH VETS | McCain s war hero status is not in question with the American voter, but his service to our nation as a Senator is clearly an issue Donald Trump leads the GOP presidential field again this week, though controversial remarks about Sen. John McCain may have dented his popularity among RepublicansDonald Trump s rise in the Republican contest for the 2016 presidential nomination doesn t appear to have been slowed much at least not yet by the recent controversy over his criticisms of Arizona Sen. John McCain s war record last weekend. In fact, although Trump s favorable ratings among Republicans have declined, he is still ahead and far ahead when Republicans are asked to choose among the 16 currently announced candidates.In last week s poll, Donald Trump received the highest favorable ratings of any candidate from Republicans, apparently helped by his tough position on illegal immigration. This week, however, Trump s favorable ratings dropped 11 points, and his unfavorable rating has risen 15 points.DONALD TRUMP AND JOHN MCCAINA separate YouGov poll completed Wednesday suggests a reason why the McCain controversy may not have affected Trump as much as some expected. Two out of three Republicans view McCain as a war hero. But fewer say they have a favorable opinion of him. In fact, Republicans in that poll gave both Trump and McCain similar ratings.The differences between the Trump favorable ratings in the Economist/YouGov Poll and the daily poll are not significant.In addition, while a majority of Republicans (54%) think Trump should apologize for this statement about Trump: He s not a war hero. He s a war hero cause he was captured. I like people that weren t captured. OK? Perhaps he was a war hero, but now he s said some very bad things about a lot of people. 32% of Republicans believe he doesn t need to apologize. In fact, more Democrats than Republicans want Trump to apologize.Even more striking, veterans and those currently in the military are more likely to have favorable views of Trump than to have favorable views of McCain. 41% say they have favorable views of McCain, while more than half are favorable to Trump.Veterans are divided on whether Trump owes McCain an apology.While a core of Republicans appear to have coalesced around a Trump candidacy, the New York businessman has yet to cross the threshold of being viewed as a likely winner with many Republicans. More than three times as many Republican-identifying registered voters view Bush as the likely Republican nominee than say Trump is that person. 36% call Bush the likely winner, 11% choose Walker, and just 10% name Trump.Via: YouGov US | 0 |
7,183 | U.S. to fight Islamic State in Syria 'as long as they want to fight': Mattis | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. military will fight Islamic State in Syria as long as they want to fight, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said on Monday, describing a longer-term role for U.S. troops long after the insurgents lose all of the territory they control. As U.S.-backed and Russian-backed forces battle to retake the remaining pockets of Islamic State-held terrain, Mattis said the U.S. military s longer-term objective would be to prevent the return of an ISIS 2.0. The enemy hasn t declared that they re done with the area yet, so we ll keep fighting as long as they want to fight, Mattis said, speaking to reporters at the Pentagon about the future of U.S. operations in Syria. He also stressed the importance of longer-term peace efforts, suggesting U.S. forces aimed to help set the conditions of a diplomatic solution in Syria, now in its seventh year of civil war. We re not just going to walk away right now before the Geneva process has traction, he added. U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin affirmed joint efforts to stabilize Syria as its civil war wanes, including with the expansion of a July 7 truce in the southwestern triangle bordering Israel and Jordan. Mattis said he believed the southwestern zone was working, and spoke hopefully about additional areas in the future that might allow for more refugees to return home. You keep broadening them. Try to (demilitarize) one area then (demilitarize) another and just keep it going, try to do the things that will allow people to return to their homes, he told reporters at the Pentagon. He declined to enter into specifics about any future zones. Russia, which has a long-term military garrison in Syria, has said it wants foreign forces to quit the country eventually. Turkey said on Monday the United States had 13 bases in Syria and Russia had five. The U.S-backed Syrian YPG Kurdish militia has said Washington has established seven military bases in areas of northern Syria. The U.S.-led coalition says it does not discuss the location of its forces. One key aim for Washington is to limit Iranian influence in Syria and Iraq, which expanded during the war with Islamic State. | 1 |
7,184 | North Korea says Trump begged for a war during his Asia trip | SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea said on Saturday that U.S. President Donald Trump s first trip to Asia showed he was a destroyer and he had begged for war on the Korean peninsula. Trump, during his visit, laid bare his true nature as destroyer of world peace and stability and begged for a nuclear war on the Korean peninsula, the foreign ministry spokesman said in a statement carried by the state news agency. Trump had warned North Korea on Wednesday not to underestimate the United States as he wrapped up his visit to South Korea. The North Korean spokesman said nothing would deter Pyongyang from pursuing its nuclear weapons programme. | 1 |
7,185 | Russia says U.S. providing cover for Islamic State in Syria | MOSCOW (Reuters) - The United States is providing de-facto cover for Islamic State units in Syria and only pretending to fight terrorism in the Middle East, the Russian Defence Ministry said on Tuesday. The ministry said the U.S. air force had tried to hinder Russian strikes on Islamic State militants around the Syrian town of Albu Kamal. These facts are conclusive evidence that the United States, while imitating an uncompromising fight against international terrorism for the global community, in fact provides cover for Islamic State units, the defense ministry said. | 1 |
7,186 | MUSLIM MIGRANT Too Sick To Work, With Wife, 8 Kids On Government Dole, Wants To Import 2nd Wife + 12 More Kids | This is probably not an untypical Muslim taxpayer supported family. Once a government makes the decision to open its borders to anyone who cares to come in and to support them, regardless of the size of family, or age of the wife (or in many cases multiple wives), it s very hard to turn off the government spigot Politicians in Denmark have condemned the asylum seeker policy which will allow Daham Al Hasan to rake in thousands in benefits once his huge family is reunited.The 47-year-old fled war-torn Syria two years ago with a wife and eight children before arriving in Denmark.The unemployed migrant, who claims to be too sick to work, has now been granted family reunification for his remaining 12 children and two wives who are still in Syria.The migrant also said the pain was so overwhelming that he could not learn Danish yet.The approval will see the Danish taxpayer fork out 214,128 Danish Kroners ( 21,883) in child support for the family each year.Outraged officials have raised concerns about the policy and suggested the Syrian man is exploiting the country s welfare system.Integration spokesperson for the Conservatives, Naser Khader, said: It is highly problematic that a Syrian refugee can be allowed to call himself sick to avoid working and learning Danish, so he can support 20 children. The politician added it should not be possible for someone who does not intend to work to be given such vast sums and called for Denmark to implement an upper limit for the number of children a person can claim contributions for.Shader said: We need to save and it can t be right that a man, who has not contributed, is granted hundreds of thousands in child support. Via: Express UK | 0 |
7,187 | Turkey orders arrest of former police investigator's parents: Hurriyet | ISTANBUL (Reuters) - An Istanbul prosecutor has issued arrest warrants for the parents of a former police investigator who gave evidence at the trial of a Turkish banker in the United States last week, the Hurriyet newspaper reported on Wednesday. Turkey has called for the arrest of Huseyin Korkmaz after he testified at the trial of Mehmet Hakan Atilla, a former executive of state-lender Halkbank who is accused of helping Iran evade U.S. sanctions. The Istanbul prosecutor s office was not immediately available for comment. U.S. prosecutors have accused Atilla of working with Turkish-Iranian gold trader Reza Zarrab and others to help Iran evade U.S. sanctions through fraudulent gold and food transactions. The case has strained relations between Turkey and the United States, which are NATO allies. Atilla has pleaded not guilty and Halkbank has denied involvement with any illegal transactions. But Zarrab has pleaded guilty and testified for U.S. prosecutors. Korkmaz said he fled Turkey in 2016 fearing retaliation from the government after leading an investigation in 2013 into Zarrab which implicated high-ranking officials. Hurriyet said the Istanbul prosecutor s order to arrest Korkmaz s parents came after his testimony in the U.S. case in which he said he gave documents related to the 2013 investigation to his mother to keep. Last week, Turkish police summoned a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) official over statements made by Korkmaz in the U.S. court, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported. | 1 |
7,188 | Ryan says tax reform outline reflects consensus of lawmakers, administration | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan said on Wednesday he was confident President Donald Trump would push for conservative tax reform and that an outline of a plan to be presented next week reflects consensus between tax writers in Congress and the Trump administration. “On the week of Sept 25, there’s going to be an outline that is released which reflects the consensus of the tax-writing committees - Ways and Means and Finance - and the administration,” Ryan said at a news conference. “Then the tax writing committees are going to take feedback and input and then they’re going to go produce their bills in the weeks ahead. And so this is the beginning of the process.” Asked if he was confident Trump would push for conservative reform, given his cooperation with Democrats last week on the debt ceiling, Ryan said, “Yes.” | 1 |
7,189 | In volatile Kenya, MP and former senator detained over hate speech allegations | NAIROBI (Reuters) - Kenyan police detained a ruling party lawmaker and a former opposition senator on Monday for alleged hate speech, as political tensions simmered following the Supreme Court s decision to annul the presidential election. Both the candidates in that ballot, incumbent president Uhuru Kenyatta and veteran opposition leader Raila Odinga, also ratcheted up the temperature in public speeches on Monday and the opposition said it would boycott the opening of parliament. Politics in Kenya often follows ethnic lines and has in the past erupted into deadly violence, making the authorities sensitive to perceived inflammatory statements. Reported instances of hate speech have risen sharply since the surprise ruling on Sept. 1, the first of its kind in Africa, when the supreme court voided Kenyatta s reelection citing irregularities in the tallying process. Moses Kuria, a member of parliament and Johnson Muthama, a former senator, have been arrested on hate speech allegations, interior ministry spokesman Mwenda Njoka told Reuters by phone. Njoka did not give further details, and police did not respond to queries. Last week, Kuria gave a public speech calling for a manhunt for Odinga s supporters, who had greeted the court ruling with jubilation. Two witnesses described a roadblock set up the next day near where Kuria gave his speech, where ruling party supporters checked the ethnicity of passengers in vehicles to see if they might be opposition supporters. On Sunday, Muthama, a former senator for the opposition Wiper party, gave a speech peppered with insults aimed at Kenyatta. In a televised speech on Monday, Kenyatta said the ruling party might use its majority in the legislature to impeach Odinga if the opposition leader won the new polls, scheduled for Oct. 17. Even if he is elected, we have the opportunity in parliament within two months, three months to kick him out, Kenyatta said in a nationally televised speech. Waikwa Wanyoike, a barrister specializing in constitutional law, said the government s majority fell short of the majority needed in both houses to impeach a president. It s just posturing. It requires a two-thirds majority in both houses ... there also has to be grounds to do it. They can manufacture grounds but it s hard to manufacture the numbers, he said. Odinga, meanwhile, accused the government of a mass sterilization campaign under the guise of giving tetanus vaccinations. Hundreds of thousands of our girls and women between 14 and 49 will not have children because of state-sponsored sterilization sold to the country as tetanus vaccination, Odinga said at a press conference. Odinga cited Kenya s Lancet laboratories as one of his sources. But Dr Ahmed Kelebi, managing director of Lancet, said such claims were based on debunked misinterpretations of their data. After Odinga spoke, a founding member of his opposition alliance, Moses Wetangula, said the opposition would boycott the opening of parliament on Tuesday. (Opposition) members of parliament from both houses will not attend the intended opening of the house because the president is a lame duck president, Wetangula said. He is enjoying temporary incumbency and has got no moral authority whatsoever to officially open parliament. | 1 |
7,190 | Trump considers trade order that could lead to duties: official | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump is considering an executive order to launch a trade investigation that could lead to supplemental duties in certain product categories, a Trump administration official told Reuters. Trump has made reducing U.S. trade deficits a key focus of his economic agenda to try to grow American manufacturing jobs. He has taken particular aim at renegotiating trade relationships with China and Mexico. The new order, if issued, would seek to determine whether U.S. trade deficits for those product lines are the result of dumping of imported products below cost and unfair subsidies by foreign governments, the official said late on Sunday in Washington. That could eventually lead to additional import duties, but any decisions on such punishments would depend on the probe’s findings, not “pre-determined conclusions,” said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the order was still being considered. The official did not specify which product lines could be investigated. “The administration would use the results of that investigation to determine the best path forward, which could include everything from no action at all to the levying of supplemental duties,” the official said. The Axios news website earlier quoted an official saying such an executive order would likely target steel and aluminum, two industries that are battling for more protection from Chinese imports. Axios said it also may target household appliances, where South Korean manufacturers with Chinese factories have gained market share. The Trump administration official did not provide any details to Reuters on timing of the executive order, which would be separate from a March 31 Trump order authorizing a 90-day Commerce Department study of trade abuses and their effect on U.S. trade deficits. TRUMP-XI 100-DAY PLAN News of the additional order comes two days after Trump’s first meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Florida, where the two leaders agreed to launch a 100-day plan for trade talks aimed at boosting U.S. exports to China and reducing the U.S. trade deficit with China. Trump during his election campaign had threatened punitive tariffs on Chinese imports and to declare China a currency manipulator. He has not followed through on either threat thus far. The U.S. steel industry has already won extensive anti-dumping and anti-subsidy duties on imports from China and other countries and the aluminum industry is seeking similar protections. U.S. appliance maker Whirlpool Corp. has also won anti-dumping duties against Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics brand clothes washers made in China. But U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and Trump’s nominee to be the top U.S. trade negotiator, Robert Lighthizer, have said they would work to find new trade remedies to stop unfairly traded imports. Among options they are expected to explore are trade actions under Section 301 of the Tariff Act of 1930, a provision used extensively in the 1980s to raise tariffs and import quotas on certain Japanese products including steel and motorcycles. Section 301 has largely gone unused since the World Trade Organization was launched in 1995. | 1 |
7,191 | 'Mad dog' anti-Trump leaflets, suspected floated in from North Korea, turn up in Seoul | SEOUL (Reuters) - Propaganda fliers presumed to be from North Korea and calling U.S. President Donald Trump a mad dog have turned up across central Seoul, including near the presidential Blue House, according to posts on social media and people who found them. Death to old lunatic Trump! reads one poster, with a North Korean soldier with rifle in hand, crushing what looks to be Trump s head with his tongue dangling out of his mouth. Near the soldier s head is the line: Complete obliteration. Another poster shows Trump with the body of a dog being decapitated by an axe. Blood is shown splattered on the axe in the poster, which states: Let s behead mad dog Trump for the future of a peaceful and warless world and mankind! Both were in color. It is not difficult to find North Korean propaganda posters in South Korea, usually flown by balloon over the highly fortified demilitarized zone. Military images and anti-U.S. threats are common in North Korea propaganda as Pyongyang demands the United States cease what it says is its preparations for invasion. But the new series of fliers posted recently on Twitter and other social media target Trump specifically. Trump last month, in a speech to the United Nations, threatened to totally destroy North Korea if needed to defend itself and allies and called the North s leader Kim Jong Un a rocket man on a suicide mission. I am pretty sure it came from North Korea by balloon, since the prevailing winds during October have been from north to south and we ve been getting reports of others finding them throughout Seoul, said Chad O Carroll, managing director of NK News, a Seoul-based news subscription service, who found the leaflets while jogging in central Seoul. In an apparent jab at Trump s U.N. speech, one of the propaganda posters featured Trump standing behind a podium with a rocket in his mouth painted with the words totally destroy North Korea . Again, Trump is depicted as a dog with a human face and labeled as mad dog Trump . Men in suits with surprised looks on their faces are shown in the poster saying He s gone completely insane and If we let him be, there will be war . Reclusive North Korea, which has carried out a series of nuclear and missile tests in defiance of U.N. sanctions, and the rich, democratic South are technically still at war because their 1950-53 conflict ended in a truce, not a peace treaty. The North regularly threatens to destroy the South and its main ally, the United States. | 1 |
7,192 | Russia's Lavrov says hopes Syrian congress to happen soon | MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Tuesday he hoped that an international Syrian peace congress would take place in the near future. The Russian-sponsored Syrian peace congress scheduled for Nov. 18 was postponed after objections by Turkey, President Tayyip Erdogan s spokesman said over the weekend. Asked whether the congress was postponed, Lavrov told a briefing that the date had not been officially announced. He added that he hoped that the United Nations would support holding the congress. | 1 |
7,193 | Trump invites UK's May to visit 'as soon as possible' | LONDON (Reuters) - U.S. President-elect Donald Trump invited Theresa May to visit him as soon as possible during their first telephone call since his election victory, the British prime minister’s office said on Thursday. May and Trump agreed that the U.S.-British relationship was “very important and very special, and that building on this would be a priority for them both”, a statement said. “President-elect Trump set out his close and personal connections with, and warmth for, the UK. He said he was confident that the special relationship would go from strength to strength,” it added. May, who was appointed prime minister shortly after Britain voted to leave the EU in June, also told Trump that she hoped to strengthen bilateral trade and investment with the United States as the country leaves the bloc. | 1 |
7,194 | Some German parties reject far-right's candidate for parliamentary post | BERLIN (Reuters) - Three of Germany s main parties have raised objections to the far-right Alternative for Germany s (AfD) candidate for the post of parliamentary vice president, highlighting its political isolation despite a strong showing in the Sept. 24 election. The anti-immigrant AfD swept into the Bundestag lower house of parliament with 12.6 percent of the vote, making it the third largest parliamentary group. It is the first far-right party to enter the Bundestag since the 1950s. All parties represented in the Bundestag are entitled to have their own vice president of the parliament, who chairs sessions, sets the agenda and calls lawmakers to order where necessary. But the candidates need to be approved by an absolute majority of all sitting lawmakers. The Greens, the pro-business Free Democrats (FDP) and the radical Left Party spoke out against the AfD s nomination of 75-year-old Albrecht Glaser, who has called Islam a political ideology rather than a religion, and said Muslims should not have the right to freedom of religion as Islam did not respect that freedom. Their objections demonstrated the difficulties the AfD may face in pushing its agenda - ranging from immigration and an insistence that Islam does not belong in Germany to problems it sees in the euro zone. The parliamentary vice presidents are generally elected in the first session of the lower house, which is expected to take place by Oct. 24 at the latest. Chancellor Angela Merkel s conservative bloc has so far not taken a public position on the AfD s choice. Michael Grosse-Broemer, the head of the conservatives parliamentary group, declined to comment on Monday. Carsten Schneider, parliamentary manager of the center-left Social Democrats (SPD), told Reuters TV he did not know Glaser personally, did not want to pre-judge him and would seek to clarify with other parliamentary groups whether they could get to know Glaser in some format first. However, Dietmar Bartsch, head of the Left s parliamentary group, and Cem Ozdemir of the Greens told newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung they would not vote Glaser into the position. Whoever questions the freedom of religion has disqualified themselves, Ozdemir said. A representative of the FDP also expressed doubts about the AfD s choice of Glaser. Glaser was a member of Chancellor Angela Merkel s Christian Democrats (CDU) for 40 years until quitting in 2012 and helping to found the AfD in 2013. Alexander Gauland, head of the AfD s parliamentary group, told Reuters his party was sticking to its choice of candidate. We all share Mr Glaser s opinion so it s completely clear, he said. Gauland provoked outrage by saying during the election campaign that Germans should be proud of their World War Two soldiers. European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker told mass-selling Bild newspaper that Gauland was not conscious enough of the feelings of other European countries who suffered under Nazi rule. I won t accuse the whole AfD or its voters of being total Nazis - that would be simplistic - but if you re head of a group in Germany s Bundestag you need to consider how Germany s neighbors feel. And Gauland doesn t do that, he said. | 1 |
7,195 | Three people die in bomb and gun attacks in Somalia | MOGADISHU (Reuters) - Three people died in Somalia on Wednesday in different attacks, one of which targeted a patrol of peacekeepers near the country s capital, Mogadishu, officials told Reuters. A roadside bomb killed one African Union peacekeeper and wounded another as they patrolled Arbis, a village about 23 kilometers southwest of Mogadishu, according to Wilson Rono, a spokesman for the African Union peacekeeping force AMISOM. A counter-attack by AMISOM killed four al Shabaab fighters, Rono said. Al Shabaab is the Islamist militant group fighting to topple Somalia s western-backed government and replace it with one strictly adhering to Islamic sharia law. The group also frequently targets AMISOM, which is supporting the central government. Abdiasis Abu Musab, al Shabaab s military spokesman, told Reuters the group had killed four AMISOM soldiers and injured two others in the assault We have not lost anyone, Abu Musab said, adding that AMISOM had killed civilian as it responded to the attack. In a second incident late on Wednesday evening, a bomb exploded as it was being prepared in a house in Mogadishu s Karan district, according to Mohamed Osman, a police officer. It killed one man and injured another, Osman said. A female police officer was also killed in Mogadishu s Hodan district by gunmen who quickly disappeared, a police official said. Abu Musab told Reuters al Shabaab was also responsible for that attack. | 1 |
7,196 | Arizona joins rest of U.S. in adding health insurance program for children | PHOENIX (Reuters) - Arizona’s governor signed into law on Friday a bitterly contested proposal that will restore a federal health insurance program for children from low-income families, making it the last of its 49 counterparts to join the program. Arizona opted out of the federal Children’s Health Insurance Program in 2010 over cost concerns as it grappled with a budget crunch. The program aims to help working families who earn too much to qualify for Medicaid health care coverage for the poor, but who cannot afford private health insurance. To qualify for KidsCare, as it’s known in Arizona, a family of four must earn between $33,000 and $49,000 annually. It is estimated to serve about 30,000 children in Arizona. Arizona’s Republican governor, Doug Ducey, signed the legislation over fierce objections from the top two lawmakers in his own party a matter of hours after it cleared the Republican-led legislature. The debate over the program was among the most rancorous of the legislative session and focused on both costs and the fact that the measure was tacked on to a virtually unrelated school voucher bill, prompting concerns that the law would face a legal challenge. Backers said the program is desperately needed to close a gap in affordable health insurance options and to ensure that children are able to grow up healthy. Even though the state is no longer required under the program to contribute funds in exchange for federal dollars, as was the case in 2010, opponents argued that Arizona citizens are still indirectly financing the program by paying for the program through federal taxes. Arizona’s House of Representatives approved the measure on Thursday following heated debate. The law could take effect as early as August. | 1 |
7,197 | Turkish lawyers say decree grants impunity for political violence | ANKARA (Reuters) - A new emergency decree in Turkey could allow vigilantes to carry out political violence with impunity against opponents of the government suspected of involvement in last year s coup attempt, Turkey s main lawyers groups said on Monday. The government defended the emergency decree, issued on Sunday, which it said was intended to ensure that Turks who took to the streets to protect the elected government during the failed 2016 coup would not face punishment. Turkey already granted officials immunity last year from prosecution for their official actions taken to suppress the coup. Sunday s decree extended that immunity to civilians whether they have an official title or not, and whether they have carried out official duties or not . The lawyers groups said the measure was vaguely-worded and could lead to violence. People will start shooting each other in the head on the streets. How will you prevent this? Metin Feyzioglu, the head of the Union of Turkish Bar Associations, said in a video response. So you have brought out an article that leaves civilians killing and lynching each other unpunished and without compensation. Are you aware of what you have done Mr. President? Turkey s main opposition Republican People s Party (CHP) said it would appeal the decree at the constitutional court. In a rare show of opposition, Abdullah Gul, a former president and longtime ally of President Tayyip Erdogan, said the wording of the article was worrisome, adding that he hoped it would be revised to prevent problems in the future. A separate decree on Sunday dismissed 2,756 more people from their jobs, accusing them of links to terrorist organizations. Turkey has already sacked or suspended more than 150,000 police, teachers, lawyers and other professionals from their jobs in the aftermath of the coup. More than 50,000 people have been arrested. In a joint statement, the Ankara and Istanbul bar associations called Sunday s two decrees the last two nails in the coffin of the law . Erdogan says tough measures in the wake of the coup are necessary to root out the perpetrators. His government blames the failed takeover on followers of Fethullah Gulen, a Turkish-born cleric based in the United States, who denies responsibility. The lawyers said the decree granting immunity did not make clear what sort of actions could be seen as furthering the aims of the coup, for which civilians carrying out revenge attacks could now be protected from punishment. The government said the decree covered only the night of the failed military takeover itself, despite the date not being specified in the text. This regulation concerns solely the night of the coup attempt, July 15 2016, and its aftermath, which is the morning of July 16. This does not encompass terror acts that were carried out later, Mahir Unal, the spokesman for the ruling AK Party, told reporters at a televised news conference. What we have done for this country s stability and development is evident. What is also evident is what these people who tell these lies and black propaganda do, he said. | 1 |
7,198 | watch hillary aide rushes to her side to help her climb one step | watch this video fully documented the heavy connection between islam and catholicism also other videos at his website concerning the jesuits which is also fully documented from a professor from germany who lives in south africa
httpswwwyoutubecomwatchvgtlpmcdne | 0 |
7,199 | Economy tops list of worries facing American voters: Reuters/Ipsos | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The economy, terrorism and healthcare ranked as the top three concerns facing Americans casting ballots in Tuesday’s presidential election, according to an early reading from the Reuters/Ipsos Election Day poll. The poll of about 35,000 people found that 25 percent of voters picked the economy as the “most important problem.”. Another 14 percent named “terrorism/terrorist attacks” and 13 percent picked healthcare. By contrast, the economy was the No. 1 concern for 46 percent of American voters in 2012, according to the Reuters/Ipsos national tracking poll four years ago. Almost nobody listed terrorism as a top concern in 2012, and 8 percent listed healthcare as the top worry. A signature Trump issue, immigration, was chosen by 7 percent of voters as the most important issue in Tuesday’s poll. The poll reading will be updated as more poll responses are tallied and more votes are counted across the country. | 1 |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.