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8,000 | Obama BURNED Trump With The Truth About His Campaign And Chance Of Winning (VIDEO) | President Obama was asked during a press conference what his thoughts were on the likelihood of a Donald Trump presidency. Pulling no punches, he laid out exactly why Donald Trump will never be president: I continue to believe Mr. Trump will not be president, and the reason is because I have a lot of faith in the American people, and I think they recognize that being president is a serious job. It s not hosting a talk show or a reality show, it s not promotion, it s not marketing, it s hard. And a lot of people count on us getting it right, and it s not a matter of pandering and doing whatever gets you in the news on a given day. Source: The HillWhile President Obama maintained his normally cool demeanor and smooth delivery, he still managed to deliver what can only be described as a hell of a sick burn to Trump and the people that support his carnival barker shenanigans. Trump has no qualifications for being president, and Obama knows it. Most of the American people know it. His only supporters are about a third of the Republican fringe who run on pure emotion and are otherwise clueless about civics, and how government works.President Obama didn t restrict his criticism only to Trump. He also took the opportunity to dig hard at Marco Rubio with a blistering comment about his flip flopping in order to pander to the Trump effect: The other countries around the world, they kind of count on the United States being on the side of science and reason and common sense. There is not a single candidate in the Republican primary that thinks we should do anything about climate change, that thinks it s serious. Well that s a problem. Source: The HillFeatured image via video screen capture | 0 |
8,001 | BREAKING: FEMALE #SanBernardino Shooter Pledged Allegiance to ISIS Before Massacre [VIDEO] | How long do you think our President has known about this? Anyone else sick of this Muslim Sympathizer In Chief? The mysterious Pakistani woman who with her husband gunned down 14 Wednesday at a Southern California holiday party pledged her allegiance to ISIS before the massacre, according to a government source, in what appears to be concrete evidence that the rampage was at least inspired, if not directed, by the terrorist group.Tashfeen Malik posted the pledge to ISIS leader and self-proclaimed caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi before the attack, in which she and her husband, Syed Rizwan Farook, stormed a San Bernardino party for his co-workers before escaping, Fox News confirmed through a law enforcement source who said the post was recovered despite the pair s attempts to erase their digital trail. The couple died hours later in a shootout with police, and in the aftermath the 29-year-old Pakistani woman has remained largely a name without a face. No confirmed pictures of her have surfaced, and few details have emerged.The pledge, posted on Facebook under another name and then deleted, was reported by The Associated Press, citing federal sources. It provided a fresh clue to Malik s identity and motivation. The aura of mystery surrounding Malik has given rise to suspicions she may have been the radicalizing force who turned her new husband from an aloof county restaurant inspector into her cohort in carnage, an Islamist fanatic capable of murdering co-workers who had embraced him for years. Tashfeen remains the biggest mystery, said a leader of the area s Pakistani-American Muslim community. She s the one no one knows anything about and has little to no presence on the Internet or having interacted with others in the Muslim community. Tashfeen remains the biggest mystery. She s the one no one knows anything about and has little to no presence on the Internet or having interacted with others in the Muslim community. Southern California Pakistani-American leaderThe aura of mystery surrounding Malik has given rise to suspicions she may have been the radicalizing force who turned her new husband, Syed Rizwan Farook, from an aloof county restaurant inspector into her cohort in carnage, an Islamist fanatic capable of murdering co-workers who had embraced him for years. Usually it s ISIS supporters trying to radicalize young girls online as they try to find new wives, but this may be the first case I know of where the opposite happened, said Ryan Mauro, a national security analyst for Clarion Project, which tracks international terrorism.Mauro noted that Farook s older brother, who shares his name, served in the U.S. Navy, which would seem to indicate that Farook s radical leanings did not come from within his own family. It is possible that she radicalized him or that suspected terrorists inside America he was communicating with are responsible for the radicalization, which led him to be attracted to a more hardline Salafi girl, Mauro said.What is known is that Malik met Farook online and that the two became engaged after Farook traveled to Saudi Arabia in September 2013. Malik applied for a K-1 visa at the American embassy in Islamabad in May, 2014 and two months later Farook again traveled to Saudi Arabia, met her there and brought her to the U.S. on a K-1 visa, a 90-day visa given to fianc s planning to marry Americans.They were married on Aug. 16, 2014, in nearby Riverside County, Calif. according to their marriage license. The marriage and passage of criminal and national security background checks using FBI and Department of Homeland Security databases resulted in a conditional green card for Malik in July 2015, two months after she gave birth to their baby daughter.Malik and Farook, an American citizen born in Chicago and raised in Southern California by parents of Pakistani descent, lived with their daughter and his mother, Rafia Farook, in a Redlands, Calif., apartment described by one investigator as an IED factory and ammo arsenal. Via: FOX News | 0 |
8,002 | Detroit school system's manager to step down this month | DETROIT (Reuters) - Detroit Public Schools’ emergency manager Darnell Earley is stepping down later this month, Michigan Governor Rick Snyder said on Tuesday. Earley, who has drawn criticism from the teachers union and black state lawmakers for the crumbling state of the city’s schools, will leave the school district on Feb. 29, the governor said in a statement. Earley, who had formerly presided over the city of Flint and its now lead-contaminated water system, has served as manager of the Detroit schools since January 2015. The school system is drowning under $3.5 billion of debt, including $1.7 billion of bonds backed by property taxes. Detroit Public Schools is suffering from declining enrollment. Heavy pension and debt obligations have left the district in danger of running out of cash in April. The governor said if the state Senate passes legislation reorganizing the school and tackling the debt soon, the school system could revert to some form of local control. If the debt is not addressed, the system will be “virtually insolvent” by April, Snyder said. A November report by Earley said a bankruptcy by Detroit’s school system could shift liabilities for pensions and bonds to the state and local governments. The governor, whose approval is needed for the system to file for bankruptcy, is unlikely to support such a move. Snyder said on Tuesday that Earley has done a “very good job under some very difficult circumstances,” restructuring the school system, cutting costs and working to stabilize student enrollment. The governor said he will appoint a transition leader before the end of the month to set in place his plan to restructure the system to address the district’s academics and finances. The Michigan black legislative caucus last week asked Snyder to fire Earley. Also last week, the union for Detroit public school teachers sued the district, demanding Earley’s immediate removal and a return of local control with a plan to repair the district’s crumbling buildings. Ivy Bailey, interim president of the Detroit Federation of Teachers, called Earley’s departure a “step in the right direction.” Under Earley’s leadership as emergency manager of Flint, the city switched its water supply from Detroit to the Flint River in April 2014. It switched back last October after tests found high lead levels in blood samples from Flint children. Lead is a neurotoxin that can damage the brain and cause other health problems. Earley has said he is not to blame for the problem since the decision was made before his tenure. | 1 |
8,003 | WHILE #UnFitHillary Rests And Parties With Donors…Key Swing State Polls Show Trump’s HARD WORK Is Paying Off | Wow! These are not good numbers for Hillary in states where Democrats have been winning for decades!Heading to Youngstown, Ohio now- some great polls. #AmericaFirst pic.twitter.com/cGwDLSOFUt Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 5, 2016 | 0 |
8,004 | Donald Trump’s Alma Mater Just Told Him To Go F*ck Himself | Donald Trump likes to brag that he attended the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, but while he is proud of that, the students and faculty are embarrassed that he is an alumni.In an open letter, students and faculty both past and present condemned Trump for his hateful and bigoted rhetoric and expressed outrage that he is humiliating the school by associating it with his ignorance and intolerance and rejected his use of the school name in his campaign.Here s the full letter via Medium:At the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, students are taught to represent the highest levels of respect and integrity. We are taught to embrace humility and diversity. We can understand why, in seeking America s highest office, you have used your degree from Wharton to promote and lend legitimacy to your candidacy.As a candidate for President, and now as the presumptive GOP nominee, you have been afforded a transformative opportunity to be a leader on national and international stages and to make the Wharton community even prouder of our school and values.However, we have been deeply disappointed in your candidacy.We, proud students, alumni, and faculty of Wharton, are outraged that an affiliation with our school is being used to legitimize prejudice and intolerance. Although we do not aim to make any political endorsements with this letter, we do express our unequivocal stance against the xenophobia, sexism, racism, and other forms of bigotry that you have actively and implicitly endorsed in your campaign. The Wharton community is a diverse community. We are immigrants and children of immigrants, people of color, Muslims, Jews, women, people living with or caring for those with disabilities, and members of the LGBTQ community. In other words, we represent the groups that you have repeatedly denigrated, as well as their steadfast friends, family, and allies.We recognize that we are fortunate to be educated at Wharton, and we are committed to using our opportunity to make America and the world a better place for everyone. We are dedicated to promoting inclusion not only because diversity and tolerance have been repeatedly proven to be valuable assets to any organization s performance, but also because we believe in mutual respect and human dignity as deeply held values. Your insistence on exclusion and scapegoating would be bad for business and bad for the American economy. An intolerant America is a less productive, less innovative, and less competitive America.We, the undersigned Wharton students, alumni, and faculty, unequivocally reject the use of your education at Wharton as a platform for promoting prejudice and intolerance. Your discriminatory statements are incompatible with the values that we are taught and we teach at Wharton, and we express our unwavering commitment to an open and inclusive American society.In addition, the authors of the letter spoke to NBC about their decision to write it. It was important for us to speak out against Trump because, as we have seen in many moments throughout history, silence is an act of complicity. This open letter speaks on behalf of Wharton students, alumni and faculty who wish to speak out against hate and stand in solidarity with all members of our diverse community both at Wharton and across America. In short, Donald Trump just received a giant middle finger from the school and it s a safe bet that past faculty regret that he was ever allowed to step foot in their classrooms. Because every time Trump opens his mouth he makes it hard to believe that he could have ever actually earned a degree anywhere in the first place.Featured Image: Mark Lyons/Getty Images | 0 |
8,005 | ATLANTA: PANDEMONIUM As World’s Largest Airport Goes DARK…Airport Evacuated…1,161 Flights Canceled [VIDEO] | There has to something more to this story than what we re being told. If there isn t more to this story, then Atlanta Airport officials and Georgia Power are going to have some explaining to do A complete power outage at the nation s busiest airport, the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, grounded flights Sunday afternoon, threatening to cause a holiday travel nightmare for fliers across the country just over a week before Christmas.Thousands of passengers were stranded and flights were grounded or delayed as a power outage crippled Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson Airport the world's busiest airport pic.twitter.com/WpWQLGu5GD EAGLE WINGS (@NIVIsa4031) December 17, 2017Georgia Power said that repairs are well underway at the airport and power is expected to be restored around midnight on Sunday, and the airport tweeted that Power on Concourse F is back ON! Washington Examiner s Byron York tweeted only two hours ago, that no one seems to know why the power outage happened.The Atlanta airport story is huge. By far the nation's largest airport, it just goes dark, operations shut down. Thousands stranded, in very difficult situations. And nobody seems to know why. Byron York (@ByronYork) December 17, 2017 We are working with great urgency w/ @Georgia Power to restore power through rest of airport, the tweet read.According to FlightAware.com, 1,161 flights have been canceled at Hartsfield-Jackson as of 8:20 p.m. ET.Delta passengers were not happy with how things were being handled, especially the passengers who were stuck on the tarmac for several hours, unable to disembark from the planes:Oh. My. God. Just left ATL airport last night at midnight after 15 hours of travel. If I had been stuck against my will in my plane on tarmac..Gives me anxiety just thinking about it. That s A LOT of ppl in tight space. SidNey (@OhGoSquid) December 18, 2017Fox News reported on the outage:Power outage at Atlanta airport causes 'pandemonium,' grounds flights https://t.co/Och4XslbLi pic.twitter.com/VX5lnpZMFQ Fox News (@FoxNews) December 17, 2017Georgia Power said in a statement Sunday evening that the issue may have involved a fire which caused extensive damage in a Georgia Power underground electrical facility. The airport said power had been restored to one of its six concourses around 7:30 p.m., about seven hours after the initial outage, and Georgia Power said it expects to have power fully restored to the airport by midnight.CNBC News reporter Ethan Kraft reports that Chick-fil-A s CEO Dan Cathy will coordinate meals for thousands of stranded passengers at the airport:Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed says he spoke with Chick-fil-A CEO Dan Cathy to coordinate meals for thousands of stranded passengers at #ATLairport, who have been in the dark since 2p ET Ethan Kraft (@ethan_kraft) December 18, 2017Fire crews were able to extinguish the fire and had begun assessing damage and beginning repairs, but they had not yet been able to ascertain the cause of the blaze, the utility said. FOX NewsNBC News Airport officials said a large portion of the facility had been affected and that repair teams had been working to address the situation since around 1:30 p.m. ET.Not everyone is buying the fire story however. This Twitter user believes that terror threat is the cause for the evacuation:The #atlairport has been evacuated, passangers are standing outside on the tarmac, no one is allowed to leave. I think a high level #Hivite was trying to get away, or they've disrupted a major terror attack. It's not being reported by @CNN (headquarters in Atlanta) #MediaBlackOut Sarah Ruth Ashcraft (@SaRaAshcraft) December 17, 2017Many citizens are questioning the story they are being told about a simple power outage, and wondering why, in the largest airport in the world, there isn t any back up power?https://twitter.com/tonyabonya/status/942576639887663104Officials with the Atlanta Police Department told WSB-TV the airport is evacuating travelers inside.A spokesperson told The Associated Press that no areas outside the airport were affected by the outage. However, flights at Chicago airports O Hare International and Midway both have canceled flights but it s not yet clear if they were canceled due to Atlanta s outage. Dealing with the power outage at the Atlanta airport was actually insane and I'll post other scary videos later. But the staff was having to slide down the escalators to help people and it was amusing. Finally in the car headed home. #atlantaairport #atl #atlantaA post shared by sarahmanleyy (@sarahmanleyy) on Dec 17, 2017 at 2:54pm PSTDelta Airlines, which is headquartered in Atlanta, said it had canceled approximately 900 mainline and Delta Connection flights. Passengers should check the status of their flights, the airline said. Pending full resumption of power, Delta anticipates a near-full schedule Monday in Atlanta, though some delays and cancellations can be expected, the airline said on its website.The airline said it would issue a waiver to those who were traveling through Atlanta with the airline on Dec. 17 or 18. The airline also said it would give travelers a refund if they would like to cancel their trip because their flight was canceled or delayed more than 90 minutes.Those arriving for their flights were met with long lines and a pitch dark airport. No escalators, elevators or information screens were operational.Brian Moote, 36, the morning host of an Atlanta radio show, said he was returning home on a flight from Dallas when the power went out in the airport. Moote said he and his fellow passengers had been stuck in their plane on the tarmac for nearly six hours, beginning at around 12:30 p.m. ET. | 0 |
8,006 | Influential Shi'ite cleric Sadr says Americans should leave Iraq | BAGHDAD (Reuters) - An influential Shi’ite cleric said on Sunday American nationals should leave Iraq, in retaliation for the new travel curbs imposed by the U.S. administration on the Iraqis. ``It would be arrogance for you to enter freely Iraq and other countries while barring to them the entrance to your country ... and therefore you should get your nationals out,’’ Moqtada al-Sadr said on his website, commenting on U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision. The Iraqi government has so far declined to comment on the executive order signed by Trump on Friday, which suspends the entry of travelers from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for at least 90 days {nL1N1FH1XY]. | 1 |
8,007 | BLACK WOMAN IN CHARLESTON WARNS “There’s gonna be a race war against ‘Cracka’s'” | All the progress that s been made with race relations in America since the civil rights era has been ignored by so many angry blacks who ve bought into the carefully orchestrated Obama, Sharpton and Holder race war funded by their friend, George Soros. Since the liberal mainstream media wants to use the horrific massacre in Charleston to attack conservatives, disparage white people and act as if Dylann Roof s actions represent a normalcy, I thought it only fair to bring up the case of a black woman from Charleston, Sista Solove, who this week essentially asserted that white supremacy is leading us towards a race war against crackas. She made the statement on Wednesday while speaking with Breitbart Texas editor Brandon Darby outside the Mother Emmanuel American Methodist Church in Charleston.When he asked her what she thinks will ultimately result from Roof s actions, she replied, The real question is if it were the other way around, what would that be? https://youtu.be/_o-rzGRSu8sIf a black person if a nigga killed nine crackas, he would be dead. We wouldn t even be talking about his raggedy ass. Okay. But this cracka is, Oh, he s mentally ill. Oh, ya know, pray for him. Oh, they ve got support systems for him.No, it s an agenda, and there s going to be a race war because it continues to happen. You cannot go pray. You can t be a child at a playground. You can t wear a hoodie with Skittles. You can t be black.What s a good nigga supposed to do, Massa? What s a good nigga supposed to do not to get shot? That s a good question, ain t it?The reason Roof happens to be alive to this day is because he complied with police orders and did not resist arrest. This places him in stark contrast to the likes of, say, Mike Brown and Eric Garner.The comment about a child at a playground referred to 12-year-old Tamir Rice, who died in an unfortunate incident after a bystander reported a male sitting on a swing and pointing a gun at people. The gun turned out to be fake, though according to reports, Rice reached for it when the cops told him to put his hands up.And as for the comment about how you can t wear a hoodie with Skittles, that referred to Trayvon Martin, who was justifiably shot by George Zimmerman after he attacked the guy for no legitimate reason whatsoever.Anyway. Sista Solove then delivered what Breitbart contributor Lee Stranahan accurately described as the academic Marxist message of white privilege that underscores the current Black Lives Matter movement :It s called white privilege. You don t understand where our anger comes from. No one gets it. Our history comes from our family telling us, Oh, you can t be black. Don t do this, don t go to that fountain, don t do this and we re still dealing with this shit. What are we going to do with the anger? What are we going to do with the anger? What do we do?Via: DownTrend | 0 |
8,008 | President Trump Travels to Orlando for Private School Visit Angering Teachers Unions: ‘Shows hostility towards public schools’ | The trip to Orlando included the new Education Secretary who s a big school choice advocate. The teachers unions aren t happy and made a few comments against the trip to the Catholic School in Orlando. You d think they d be so happy that we have a president who s very interested in helping ALL American children receive a great education. Nope, the teachers unions are freaking out! Their cash cow might be at risk The president of the teachers union makes a six figure income! What s wrong with Trump trying to FINALLY focus on the kids? Trump visited St. Andrew Catholic School in Orlando, dropping in on a fourth-grade classroom and shaking hands with students who said they were learning about the history of Florida. When one girl said she wanted to own her own business, he said with a smile that she s gonna make a lot of money. But don t run for politics. The president, who was joined by his new education secretary Betsy DeVos, a longtime charter schools advocate, described St. Andrew as one of the many parochial schools dedicated to educating disadvantaged children. Education is the civil rights issue of our time, said Trump, repeating a line from his address to Congress this week. Teachers unions were quick to criticize the visit, saying it showed hostility by Trump toward public schools and an intention to turn education into a profit-making industry. Trump said he would ask lawmakers to pass a bill that would fund school choice for disadvantaged young people, including minority children. He did not offer any details.Read more: big story | 0 |
8,009 | Beloved NBA Coach Openly Calls Trump A Dangerous Liar (DETAILS) | San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich is no fan of Donald Trump. He sharply criticized Trump in the run-up to the election, and now that Trump is officially in office, he seems to have no interest in giving the Orange One so much as an inch. In a recent interview, Popovich openly called Trump a liar, and specifically criticized his activities when he went to speak to the CIA especially Trump s speaking about the size of his crowds in front of a wall representing fallen operatives. He also said that the massive women s march was great. Popovich said: That message is important, and it could have been a whole lot of groups marching. And somebody said on TV, What s their message? Well, their message is obvious. That our president comes in with the lowest [approval] rating of anybody who ever came into the office. And there s a majority of people out there, since Hillary [Clinton] won the popular vote, that don t buy his act. Popovich then went on to criticize Trump s bigoted remarks against any number of groups of Americans during the campaign and since: He could talk to the groups that he disrespected and maligned during the primary and really make somebody believe it. But so far, we ve got [to] a point where you really can t believe anything that comes out of his mouth. You really can t. The coach then moved on Trump s speech at the CIA, and called him emotionally immature and a liar: That s worrisome. That s worrisome. I d just feel better if somebody was in that position that showed the maturity and psychological and emotional level of somebody that was his age. It does boggle the mind how somebody can be so thin-skinned. It s all obvious it s about him. If anything affects him, if it s Saturday Night Live or Hamilton or she got 3 more million votes than you. They re illegal.' It doesn t matter what it is, there s a pattern there. And that s dangerous. I d like to have someone with gravitas, but he got there through the Electoral College, which is part of our system, and I hope he does some good things. Hopefully, people with megaphones continue to speak out against Trump and his dishonest, autocratic administration. If we hold their feet to the fire, we just might survive the next four years.Featured image by Alex Wong via Getty Images | 0 |
8,010 | Trump’s Wealthcare Plan Set To FAIL As Yet Another Republican Breaks Ranks | One after another, Republicans are breaking ranks with their party and saying they just can t throw their support behind the GOP s appalling excuse for a healthcare plan. With so many conservatives jumping ship, it is starting to look more and more likely that the American Health Care Act is set to fail.Bloomberg reporter Steven Dennis reported on Friday that Sen. Dean Heller (R-NV) issued a statement saying he cannot support the Republican bill to repeal and replace Obamacare in its current form. It is estimated that the AHCA would result in 24 million people losing their insurance coverage by 2026, with 14 million of these people finding themselves without health care by the end of the year.Heller said he agrees with Nevada Gov. Brian Sandoval, who recently joined with Ohio Gov. John Kasich, Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson and Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder to argue that the GOP plan would be disastrous in states that had expanded Medicaid. Heller said that he just can t support the AHCA in its current form. ! HELLER does not support the American Health Care Act in its current from, agrees with Gov. SANDOVAL. Steven Dennis (@StevenTDennis) March 17, 2017It is looking like the AHCA, even if it manages to pass the House, will crash and burn in the Senate. Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) said on Thursday that she will not support the bill as it is written. Several other Republican senators have criticized the bill, including Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR), Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA) and Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT). As much as the GOP would like to believe otherwise, Republicans aren t necessarily just going to fall in line and vote in favor of the bill.Senate NO votes on AHCA as written: COLLINS PAUL HELLER Major critics include: CASSIDY COTTON LEE CRUZ + MURKOWSKI says won t defund PP Steven Dennis (@StevenTDennis) March 17, 2017Featured image via Alex Wong/Getty Images | 0 |
8,011 | Did Hillary Clinton Seriously Criticize Bernie Sanders’ Grandchildren? (VIDEO) | The short answer? I don t think so, but it s possible.The other day on Morning Joe, the Democratic presidential frontrunner said the following during a phone-in interview with the MSNBC morning show hosts: I guess at the end of the day, for me you know, people talk about their extraordinary grandchildren, but I actually have one and we re going to do everything we can to give her opportunities. And we re going to do everything we can to give her opportunities. But it s not enough.And I think too many people are forgetting what are some of the biggest determinants as to what happens to your children and grandchildren. The first being what kind of country we are and whether we re still providing the opportunities to realize your promise and potential and what kind of world s going to be out there waiting.And I feel passionately that just because we had it in the past, doesn t mean we re going to keep it in the future. You shouldn t have to be the granddaughter of a former president to have your American Dream realized. I think every kid should have a chance to live up to her god-given potential. A debate has erupted online in which Bernie Sanders supporters are suggesting that Clinton s remarks about how she actually has a grandchild is a not-so-subtle jab at the fact that Sanders has seven grandchildren through his current wife of 27 years, Jane O Meara Sanders, whose three children were from her previous marriage.To be clear, Clinton launched into a long answer to a question from Mika Brzezinski that began with something about the contrast between her and the other Democratic candidates plural. But there was a long section preceding her grandchildren remarks about what she intends to do and what her qualifications are. Then the thing about the grandkids. So, there wasn t an explicitly Sanders-oriented context for her remarks.But if this was, in fact, a cut at Sanders, it s confounding as to why she would make such an esoteric remark. What does she gain with Democratic voters by implying that her grandchild is legitimate, while Sanders grandchildren somehow aren t? I mean, how many primary voters know that much about Sanders family? I ve been following Sanders career for ten years now, and I had no idea he was even married until recently much less that he had three step-kids and seven step-grandchildren. I also didn t know until today that three of his grandkids were adopted from China.One blogger, Shane Ryan, observed that Sanders, during his stump speeches, often refers to his grandkids as extraordinary. I tried to confirm this, but didn t turn up any transcripts or pullquotes to verify it. So, chances are if true very, very, very few people know that Sanders uses the word extraordinary to describe his grandkids, making Clinton s jab if intentional even more obscure.Is Clinton capable of lashing out when backed into a corner? Sure. Is it possible she intended to randomly criticize Sanders grandkids via some sort of twisted political calculation? Absolutely. But it d be terrible politics. You don t mention families much less criticize the origins of an opponent s children. The topic is off limits. By doing so, she d only make herself look like terrible human being.One thing enemies and fans alike can agree upon: she s smart enough and experienced enough to understand blowback. Seriously, what kind of Democratic primary voter would get her attack and then vote against Sanders because his seven grandkids aren t biological, while Clinton s grandchild is blood-related? It seems like there s more risk than reward in such a gambit.So what do you think?[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0iaI3YRCiw] Featured image via video screen grab. | 0 |
8,012 | Saudi-backed military alliance to help G5 Sahel fight: minister | PARIS (Reuters) - A Saudi-backed Islamic military coalition will provide logistical, intelligence and training to a new West African counter-terrorism force that is struggling to get off the ground, Saudi Arabia s foreign minister said. The announcement by Adel al-Jubeir signals the involvement in the Sahel of a Muslim military alliance widely seen as a vehicle for countering the growing influence of Riyadh s rival Iran. Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates on Wednesday agreed to provide about $150 million to the G5 Sahel force, which is composed of the armies of Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Burkina Faso and Chad, a sign that Gulf Arab states are upping their influence in the region. The Sunni Muslim kingdom is seeking to check the ambitions of Shi ite power Iran to expand its clout in West Africa and across the Muslim world. Speaking in an interview with France 24 television, Adel al-Jubeir said his country s contribution would go much further by using the platform of the recently-established Islamic Military Counter Terrorism Coalition to support the G5 Sahel. Because of our commitment to fighting terrorism and extremism we made the commitment to provide 100 million euros to these forces and we made this commitment also to provide logistics, training, intelligence and air support through the Islamic military coalition to this effort, Jubeir said. Some 40 Muslim-majority nations met in Riyadh at the end of November to begin fleshing it out details of the alliance first conceived two years by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, but that until now has yet to take any decisive international action in its mandate to fight terrorism. The crown prince has said he would encourage a more moderate and tolerant version of Islam in the ultra-conservative kingdom and wants the coalition, which will have a permanent base in Riyadh, to help combat terrorist financing and ideology. We will be hosting a meeting of this new group to coordinate this military support to those (G5) countries, Jubeir said, referring to a meeting the Islamic Alliance, adding that Riyadh would also provide humanitarian assistance. The G5 Sahel launched a symbolic military operation to mark its creation in October amid growing unrest in the Sahel, whose porous borders are regularly crossed by jihadists, including affiliates of al Qaeda and Islamic State. However, France, which has 4,500 troops in the region, has been dismayed to see the militants score military and symbolic victories in West Africa while the G5 force has struggled to win financing and become operational. After a meeting in Paris on Wednesday, the French and Malian leaders said they hoped the G5 would secure its first victories by the middle of 2018 to prove its worth and ensure more concrete support from the United Nations. In Rome, a defense ministry official said Italy will send several hundred troops to Niger, a member of the G5 Sahel, next year to help train local forces battling jihadi militants. Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni signaled the initiative on Wednesday, telling the G5 meeting in France that Italy would divert some of its forces in Iraq to Niger, a country that straddles an expanse of the Sahara desert. Niger has requested help with training men involved in border controls and we will certainly be setting up a mission there, the defense ministry official said, declining to be named. The official declined to confirm a report in la Repubblica newspaper that some 470 men would be sent to Niger to help with both training and surveillance, saying full details of the operation had not yet been finalised. Despite agreement on principles, members of the Saudi-backed alliance have voiced different priorities slowing its implementation. Critics say the coalition could become a means for Saudi Arabia to implement an even more assertive foreign policy by winning the backing of poorer African and Asian nations with offers of financial and military aid. | 1 |
8,013 | Germany seeks to calm Poland's outrage over minister's call for 'resistance' | BERLIN/WARSAW (Reuters) - Germany on Saturday sought to defuse a diplomatic row with Poland, saying a call by the German defense minister to support a democratic resistance in the neighboring country had been taken out of context. The Polish government, whose judiciary reform has been met with youth protests and legal action from the European Union, had accused German Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen of interference after she called for supporting the healthy democratic resistance of the young generation in Poland. But a spokesman for von der Leyen said the comments had been misinterpreted and the minister had instead praised Poland s achievements since the fall of communism and called for a more inclusive approach to European integration. The defense minister s quote was changed in social media and ripped out of context, a spokesman for von der Leyen told Reuters on Saturday. Mrs von der Leyen has emphasized that the EU is an inclusive process, which is about securing and consolidating the common values of the EU and dealing with all positions. The Polish reform of the courts would give nearly a free hand to the ruling conservatives in picking the country s top judges. It has triggered protests by thousands of young people and others over the summer and an infringement procedure from the European Union. It comes as some European leaders call for letting some member states in the wealthier, Western part of the bloc push ahead with further integration without the others following suit. During the show broadcast Thursday on ZDF television, von der Leyen highlighted significant efforts undertaken by the Baltic states and Poland to live in freedom and to be part of the European Union. Precisely this healthy democratic resistance of the young people, also there in Poland, must be supported, she said. Polish Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski called on von der Leyen to withdraw her words. This is one of the most explicit statements, which I am not sure whether it is a warning or an admission by the German side of interfering into our internal affairs, Waszczykowski told the wpolitice.pl right-wing news portal. The Polish defense ministry said it would summon the defense attache from the German embassy for an explanation. Von der Leyen is part of the conservative team trying to negotiate a new coalition government with the pro-business Free Democrats and the environmental Greens. Earlier this year she sparked outrage among the armed forces after she decried what she called weak leadership in the military. | 1 |
8,014 | HILLARY’S THUGS Spray Paint 20 Cars Outside Trump Rally [Video] | Several attendees left Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump s Saturday rally in Bangor to find their parked cars vandalized with white spray paint.A Bangor police spokesman said officers were seeking witnesses and reviewing video in the criminal mischief case at the New York City billionaire s us-against-them speech blasting a rigged system at the Cross Insurance Center.More than 20 cars parked between the Bangor Raceway and Buck Street were hit with lines of white paint. Attendees said the owners of some of the cars appeared to drive off without noticing without the vandalism.Paul Foster, a painter and Trump supporter from Eastbrook whose van was painted, said the rally couldn t have been more peaceful, but he blamed the vandalism on Trump opponents, saying there ain t no thinking about it, I know so. Trump supporters in Bangor, ME >> leave the rally to find their cars spray painted. pic.twitter.com/jW5UzkdkoB #BasketOfDeplorables (@betioserrano) October 15, 2016Read more: GP | 0 |
8,015 | Trump moves to quickly fill his top Cabinet ranks | NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. President-elect Donald Trump said he expected to have most members of his Cabinet announced next week, interviewing more candidates at Trump Tower for top jobs in his administration as he prepares to take office on Jan. 20. Trump is still weighing who to choose as secretary of state. The Republican president-elect said on Thursday he had chosen retired Marine Corps General James Mattis as defense secretary and would make a formal announcement on that on Monday. “We have tremendous people joining the Cabinet and beyond the Cabinet. You’ll be seeing almost all of them next week,” Republican Trump, who has never previously held public office, said in an interview that aired on Friday on Fox News. Even without his full foreign policy team in place, Trump had more phone calls with foreign leaders, breaking tradition by speaking with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen, the first such contact by a president-elect since President Jimmy Carter adopted a one-China policy in 1979. Trump also invited Philippines leader Rodrigo Duterte to the White House next year during a “very engaging, animated” phone conversation, according to a Duterte aide. Duterte has sparred with Democratic President Barack Obama and insulted him. Obama canceled a planned meeting with him in September. A statement issued by Trump’s transition team made no mention of an invitation. Domestically, Trump plans to move quickly after taking office on his goals to overhaul taxation, healthcare and immigration laws, Vice President-elect Mike Pence said in an interview published by the Wall Street Journal on Friday. Top priorities include curbing illegal immigration, abolishing and replacing President Barack Obama’s signature healthcare program, and filling a vacancy on the Supreme Court, Pence told the newspaper. Asked what he would do on his first day in office, Trump told Fox News he may address his campaign pledge to build a wall on the southern border with Mexico, though he did not go into specifics. “We could do the wall, we’re going to do some repealing, we’re going to do some executive orders that we think are inappropriate,” Trump told Fox, referring to the possibility of reversing executive orders issued by Obama, a Democrat, during his eight-year term. CEOs TO ADVISE ON POLICY On Friday Trump named an advisory panel led by the chief executive of Blackstone, the world’s biggest alternative asset manager, stacked with executives from some of America’s largest companies, such as Wal Mart Stores Inc, Boeing Co and International Business Machines Corp. On Thursday he claimed success in persuading Carrier Corp, an Indiana an air conditioner maker, to keep about 1,000 jobs in the United States rather than move them to Mexico. But that drew criticism from former Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, a Trump supporter who had been reported to be under consideration for a Cabinet job. “When government steps in arbitrarily with individual subsidies, favoring one business over others, it sets inconsistent, unfair, illogical precedent,” she wrote in an opinion piece on the Young Conservatives website youngcons.com. “Instead, we support competition on a level playing field, remember? Because we know special interest crony capitalism is one big fail,” she wrote. The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump had an investment of up to $250,000 in 2014 in United Technologies Corp., the parent company of Carrier. Trump is weighing who to put in charge of the Department of Homeland Security, which enforces immigration law and plays a key role in preventing terror attacks; a director of national intelligence; and several Cabinet posts dealing with energy and the environment. On Friday, Jay Cohen, former under secretary of Homeland Security for science and technology and a retired Navy rear admiral, told reporters in Trump Tower that he interviewed for a position he would not reveal. “Cyber security was discussed, and I believe that President-elect Trump understands fully the magnitude of that challenge,” Cohen said. Trump has narrowed the field for secretary of state to four candidates, including the 2012 Republican presidential nominee, Mitt Romney, who attacked Trump throughout the 2016 campaign but spoke glowingly of the president-elect after having dinner with him earlier this week. “There was actually good chemistry,” Trump said on Fox. | 1 |
8,016 | Nigeria NGOs slam civil society bill as grave threat to freedoms | ABUJA (Reuters) - A bill proposed by Nigerian lawmakers to regulate non-governmental organizations (NGOs) threatens freedoms by handing the government sweeping powers over civil society, an array of groups said on Wednesday. In a public hearing in Nigeria s capital of Abuja, representatives from several NGOs called for the bill to be killed, describing it as extremely dangerous , crippling for civil society and potentially endangering to life. For organizations that engage in human rights advocacy, government accountability, and the promotion of democracy, interference in their operations portends grave risks to both their work and on the lives of their personnel, said Nigerian NGO Spaces for Change in a statement. Nigeria s Policy and Legal Advocacy Centre (PLAC) warned that there is no doubt that the first victims of the bill would be NGOs that are traditionally active in the area of ensuring accountability and transparency of government to its citizens. The sponsor of the bill in the House of Representatives, Nigeria s lower parliamentary chamber, has alleged that some NGOs were using donated funds to support the activities of armed militants and insurgents such as Boko Haram in the country s northeast, according to Nigerian media reports. The sponsor, Umar Jibril, has not made public any evidence supporting his allegations. The draft law, which passed a second reading in the lower house of parliament and is being publicly debated ahead of a final reading and vote, would regulate NGOs funding, activities and foreign affiliation in the name of national security, and have control over NGOs assets. The bill would also create an NGO Regulatory Commission, with which civil society bodies would need to register or be in breach of the law. The commission would have discretion over which groups can register, and all must re-register every two years. At present setting up an NGO is a simpler process, with many groups registering with the corporate affairs commission as a not-for-profit organization. While the constitution guarantees Nigerians assembly and association rights, the Freedom House rights watchdog says Nigeria, Africa s most populous democracy, is only partly free. In a 2017 report, Freedom House said the country had a broad and vibrant civil society but government forces continued to commit gross human rights violations with impunity, including extrajudicial killings, arbitrary mass arrests, illegal detentions, and torture of civilians . NGO representatives at the public hearing described how, by giving the regulatory commission discretion to approve projects, lives could be at stake in emergencies, such as when funds are urgently needed for vaccines during an outbreak of disease. Others criticized as vague the bill s repeated justification of maintaining national security, saying it was open to broad interpretations that could give the government ample opportunity for misuse of state power without accountability. An Amnesty International statement said the bill will keep Nigerians from freely sharing their opinions, holding open discussion forums or organizing people to protest. | 1 |
8,017 | Trump to visit Asia in November, North Korea in spotlight | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Donald Trump will travel to Asia in November for the first time since becoming president, stopping in Japan, South Korea, China, Vietnam and the Philippines on a trip expected to be dominated by the North Korea nuclear threat. Joined by his wife Melania, Trump will travel Nov. 3-14. His visit will include attending two major summits, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Vietnam and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations conclave in the Philippines. Trump s attendance at the Manila summit had been in doubt until recent days, with officials saying he was reluctant to show support for Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, who has been responsible for a number of anti-American outbursts. A U.S. official said Asian leaders who met Trump at the United Nations General Assembly in New York last week helped persuade him to attend in unity with key Asian allies. An Asian diplomat welcomed Trump s decision to visit Manila because that reassures the region that Asia policy is not just about North Korea, it s about Southeast Asia as well. The diplomat said Trump s decision to withdraw from the Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal early this year had raised questions about the administration s commitment to the region. But visits by senior officials, including the secretaries of state, defense and commerce, and Trump s planned trip, showed Washington intended to remain engaged. Philippine Foreign Secretary Alan Peter Cayetano said Duterte was looking forward to meeting Trump, adding that the relationship between the two countries was so resilient that ties would always recover, regardless of disagreements. Trump, who has been locked in an increasingly bitter war of words with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, will have the opportunity to bolster allied resolve for what he calls the complete denuclearization of Pyongyang. He has denounced Kim as a rocket man on a suicide mission for test launches of ballistic missiles and for nuclear weapon tests. He has warned North Korea would face total devastation if it threatens the United States. Kim has blasted Trump as mentally deranged. The president s engagements will strengthen the international resolve to confront the North Korean threat and ensure the complete, verifiable, and irreversible denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, the White House said in announcing the trip. Trump s visit to China will reciprocate a trip to the United States made in April by Chinese President Xi Jinping. Trump has applied heavy pressure on China to rein in North Korea. While his efforts have had limited success thus far, he went out of his way to thank Xi on Tuesday for his efforts. I applaud China for breaking off all banking relationships with North Korea - something that people would have thought unthinkable even two months ago. I want to thank President Xi, Trump said at a news conference with Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy. Speaking in Beijing, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson told China s top diplomat State Councilor Yang Jiechi that the two presidents had established a very regular and close working relationship . Yang described Trump s visit as of great importance to the bilateral relationship. Let us concentrate on cooperation and properly manage our differences in a spirit of mutual respect and mutual benefit, he said to Tillerson. At the same time, Trump s national security team is conducting a broad review of U.S. strategy toward China in search of ways to counter Chinese trade practices and open up market access, a senior administration official said. The United States also considers Chinese entities behind the theft of intellectual property and cyber attacks and wants to find ways to address these concerns, the official said. There was no definite timetable for concluding the review. We re looking at all of it, the official said. | 1 |
8,018 | Russian bombers strike Islamic State targets in Syria: RIA | MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian Tu-22M3 long-range bombers struck Islamic State targets near the town of Albu Kamal in Syria on Saturday, RIA news agency reported, citing Russia s Defence Ministry. Command centers and weapon depots were among the targets hit by the bombers which flew over Iran and Iraq. | 1 |
8,019 | BREAKING: GUN USED BY 5 TIME DEPORTED ILLEGAL ALIEN BELONGED TO FEDERAL AGENT | Just another interesting discovery in a story that has already exposed a very corrupt government that favors illegal aliens over American citizens The gun used in the seemingly random slaying of a woman on a San Francisco pier belonged to a federal agent, a law enforcement official briefed on the matter said Tuesday.The official, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the case and spoke on condition of anonymity, said a police check of the weapon s serial number shows it belonged to a federal agent. The official declined to elaborate further.The San Francisco Police Department, which is investigating the case, declined to comment.The revelation was the latest dramatic twist in a tragic case that has become a new flashpoint in the country s debate over immigration policies.The suspected gunman, Juan Francisco Lopez Sanchez, has been deported to his native Mexico five times and is suspected of living in the United States illegally when Kathryn Steinle, 32, was gunned down last week while on an evening stroll with her father along San Francisco s popular waterfront area.Federal officials transferred Sanchez to San Francisco s jail in March to face a 20-year-old marijuana charge after Sanchez completed his latest prison term for illegally entering the country.The San Francisco sheriff, citing the city s sanctuary city policy, released Sanchez in April after prosecutors dropped the drug charge, despite an Immigration and Customs Enforcement request to hold him for federal authorities so deportation proceedings could begin.Sanchez pleaded not guilty Tuesday to first-degree murder.He told two television stations who interviewed him in jail that he found the gun used in Steinle s killing wrapped in a shirt on the pedestrian pier she was walking on. Sanchez said the gun went off in his hands, and his public defender, Matt Gonzalez, said Tuesday that the San Francisco woman s death appeared accidental. San Francisco Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi has defended Sanchez s release and the city law requiring it to ignore ICE detainer requests. The sheriff said ICE could have obtained a warrant or court order to keep Sanchez in custody. ICE knew where he was, Mirkarimi said Monday. He said he will continue to ignore ICE detainer requests.State and federal Republicans, meanwhile, said they would look into the matter.Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson, who chairs the Senate s homeland security committee, criticized federal officials and demanded to know why Sanchez was not deported. Does that make any sense to you? Johnson demanded to know at a hearing Tuesday. Because I ll tell you it doesn t make any sense to the American public. Republican state Sen. Jeff Stone said he would introduce legislation in Sacramento to require cities to comply with ICE detainer requests.At Sanchez s arraignment Tuesday, prosecutor Dianna Garcia argued against releasing Sanchez on bail, saying, This was an act of random violence, shooting an innocent victim in the back. The judge set bail at $5 million, which Gonzalez said will keep Sanchez jailed pending trial.A downcast Sanchez spent most of the hearing with his head bowed, appearing to fight back tears while the judge explained the charged to him. Sanchez was aided by a Spanish-language interpreter and entered his plea in Spanish.Outside court, his attorney said Sanchez has a second-grade education and a non-violent criminal record.He could face life in prison if convicted.Via: FOX Carolina | 0 |
8,020 | WATCH: GOP Senate Candidate Kept Referring To President Obama As An ‘Animal’ | The presumed nomination of Donald Trump has given a new flavor to the 2016 GOP field. Or, perhaps I should say that the presumed nomination of Trump has given new courage to people who have spent far too many years (in their opinions) hiding their racist views.Carlos Beruff, who is running for Marco Rubio s Senate seat in Florida, is one of those previously silenced people whose racist views have been liberated by the Trump campaign, and he let his racist flag fly high at a St. Johns County GOP meeting on Thursday. His favorite nickname for the President? Animal. Unfortunately, for seven and a half years this animal we call president, because he s an animal, OK seven and a half years, has surgically and with thought and very smart, intelligent manner, destroyed this country and dismantled the military under not one, not two, but three secretary of defenses, he said. And they ve all written books about it. Sooner or later, you re going to find, this was a plan, he wants us to be just another country. I don t want to be another country. I want to be the United States of America, the greatest country in the world, he added, garnering a round of applause.Here s the video:Beruff has more than racism in common with Trump. Like Trump, he s a successful land developer and like Trump, he sees the government as standing in the way of him and more riches. If he was to be elected, there would be conflicts of interest from every direction:Today he s one of the wealthiest developers in Southwest Florida, building more than 2,500 homes in three different counties. And as his business grew, so did his political influence fueled by campaign contributions to then Florida Governor Charlie Crist. Crist appointed him to three civic boards. The Southwest Florida Water Management district, the State College of Florida, the Manatee-Sarasota Airport Authority.In 2010 Beruff then shifted his allegiance to Governor Rick Scott, who appointed him to his health panel and reappointed him to positions already held.His role as developer has been no less controversial. For example, Long Bar Pointe, a 500-acre development that environmentalists say could cause irreparable damage to the shoreline.More than 6,500 opponents signed a petition against the Long Bar Pointe development. Ultimately, the county voted Beruff s proposal down and now Beruff is suing the county government for its actions.Source: My Sun CoastBeruff, though, is even more extreme than Trump. He wants to ban not just Muslims, but all immigration from the Middle East. That would even include the Christians who are being persecuted by ISIS.Fortunately for Floridians and the nation, Beruff is unlikely to win. Right now, he s at one percent.Featured image via Carlos Beruff Facebook page. | 0 |
8,021 | Does Myanmar violence amount to human rights crimes? | (Reuters) - Myanmar stands accused by rights groups of ethnic cleansing and human rights violations after violence broke out in the northwestern state of Rakhine, triggering an exodus of about 400,000 Rohingya Muslims to southern Bangladesh. At least 400 people have been killed, and thousands of homes and villages have been torched, since the military launched a counteroffensive against Rohingya insurgents in late August. Myanmar does not recognize the roughly 1.1 million Rohingyas as citizens, leaving them effectively stateless. The following are questions and answers on the violence: The military says it is protecting Myanmar against attacks by the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), which it has labeled a terrorist group and accuses of killings and destruction in Rakhine state. Human rights monitors and fleeing Rohingya say the army and ethnic Rakhine Buddhist vigilantes have mounted a campaign of arson aimed at driving out the Rohingya. Rights groups say an independent investigation is required to determine possible abuses or violations by various parties. Yes, according to United Nations officials and rights groups. Top U.N. officials have said the violence in Myanmar is a case of textbook ethnic cleansing . The U.N. has in the past defined ethnic cleansing as rendering an area ethnically homogeneous by using force or intimidation to remove persons of given groups from the area. Ethnic cleansing is not recognized as a separate crime under international law. But allegations of ethnic cleansing as part of wider, systematic human rights violations have been heard in international courts against individuals - including former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, who was convicted of genocide. Phil Robertson, deputy director for Asia at Human Rights Watch (HRW), said initial investigations in Myanmar were indicative of an ethnic cleansing campaign . When an army is burning people out of their villages all over northern Rakhine state and using violence against civilians, it results in the kind of incredible refugee flows we re seeing, he added. Myanmar has denied allegations of ethnic cleansing. ARE WE SEEING GENOCIDE, WAR CRIMES, CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY? Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan has said the killing of hundreds of Rohingya amounted to genocide, but rights groups have so far stayed away from these labels, because all three categories are clearly defined and covered in international law. For the ongoing violence to be considered war crimes, the parties involved would have to be at war. Currently, experts say, Myanmar is not technically at war because it only has one party - the military - that is organized enough to carry out intensive fighting operations. We have not yet been able to determine whether a state of war is present in Rakhine state, said HRW s Robertson. Crimes against humanity and genocide could be taking place even in the absence of war, but, under U.N. definitions, there would need to be proof of other conditions such as broader, systematic attacks against the Rohingyas. Human rights groups have accused Myanmar of laying anti-personnel mines along the border with Bangladesh to prevent Rohingya refugees from returning to Rakhine state. Because the crisis is not currently defined as a war, this cannot be considered a war crime, according to experts. However it would violate other international human rights laws, even though Myanmar is not party to the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty. For nations that are not parties to the treaty, the use of anti-personnel mines violates customary international law, because the weapons are inherently indiscriminate and cause disproportionate long-term harm to civilians, said Richard Weir, a legal expert at HRW. A Myanmar military source told Reuters that landmines were laid along the border in the 1990s to prevent trespassing and the military had since tried to remove them, but that none had been planted recently. In international law, an individual can be held criminally responsible for when a state or military commits war crimes or crimes against humanity. Rights groups have called for an independent investigation of abuses by all parties, including ARSA. Many believe the government and the military should be held responsible. Myanmar is systematically violating the rights of the Rohingya ... and both the government and the military now need to suffer serious consequences for this, said HRW s Robertson. This depends on the findings of an independent investigation, if the Myanmar government allows one to take place, experts say. Rights groups have called for the U.N. Security Council to also reprimand Myanmar in other ways, for instance, by imposing sanctions such as an arms embargo. They have also urged countries, including the United States and Australia, to suspend bilateral military ties. The 1991 Nobel Peace Prize winner has faced widespread international criticism for not doing enough to protect the Rohingya community. Suu Kyi has no direct control over the military, which remains powerful under Myanmar s army-written constitution. But she is Myanmar s foreign minister and de facto civilian leader and has defended the military operation. It s premature to speculate, said Robertson, adding that individual responsibility should be based on an impartial investigation. The International Criminal Court (ICC), based in The Hague, Netherlands, has the jurisdiction to prosecute crimes of genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. Myanmar is among the countries, which also include the United States and China, that are not signatory to the treaty that created the ICC, so it is not obligated to cooperate. But if the U.N. Security Council were to refer a case to the court then Myanmar, being a member of the U.N., would be subject to its jurisdiction. Ad hoc tribunals and commissions have been set up in the past to hear cases of mass human rights violations. For instance, the United Nations established the International Criminal Tribunals for Yugoslavia and Rwanda to deal with crimes that took place there. Rights groups say they are protected by various U.N. human rights treaties, primarily the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which Myanmar voted for in 1948. The document includes provisions for the right to life and right to a nationality - particularly relevant to the Rohingyas, who are effectively stateless. (Story amends headline.) | 1 |
8,022 | Kenya president: dialogue with opposition must wait until court cases done | NAIROBI (Reuters) - Kenya s President Uhuru Kenyatta said on Monday that he expects the opposition to challenge his victory in the Oct. 26 repeat presidential election in court and that any dialogue must wait until that process is done. My victory today is just part of a process that is likely to once again be subjected to a constitutional test through our courts ... I will submit to this constitutional path regardless of the outcome, Kenyatta said in his acceptance speech. Those who are going to ask me: Are you going to engage in dialogue? ... Let them (the opposition) first and foremost exhaust all their constitutional options. | 1 |
8,023 | WATCH: Angry White Actors Have Silent Meltdown As Meryl Streep Wipes The Floor With Trump | As Meryl Streep delivered a smack down for the ages aimed at Donald Trump, conservative actors Mel Gibson and Vince Vaughn could be seen sitting together silently seething.During the Golden Globes on Sunday, Streep took aim at Trump without mentioning his name, specifically pointing out his attack on a disabled reporter as an example of his bullying. There was nothing good about it, Streep said of Trump s campaign. But it was effective, and it did its job. It made its intended audience laugh and show their teeth. It was that moment when the person asking to sit in the most respected seat in our country imitated a disabled reporter someone he outranked in privilege, power, and the capacity to fight back. It kind of broke my heart. When the powerful use their position to bully others, we all lose. Most Americans across the country and most of those in attendance cheered. Mel Gibson and Vince Vaughn, however, did not.Gibson and Vaughn were caught on camera having a silent meltdown as Streep spoke.Here s the video via YouTube:The footage of their reaction only lasts a few seconds but it perfectly represents the reaction most Trump supporters had last night while watching Streep s speech.And Twitter users couldn t resist commenting about it.When you re the only two conservatives in a room where Trump is getting his ass dragged pic.twitter.com/Bt5okJX71l Jesse Berney (@jesseberney) January 9, 2017when you look up and want to drop a racial slur but realize meryl streep is a white woman pic.twitter.com/ShOHwPydw2 Kenny (@PhillyCustoms) January 9, 2017The Conservative table was not feeling Meryl s speech. #GoldenGlobes pic.twitter.com/zdxDFhCZ1r Jillian??Sederholm (@JillianSed) January 9, 2017Give some credit to Gibson and Vaughn though. At least they didn t throw a hissy fit about it like Donald Trump did.Seriously, Donald Trump LITERALLY lost his shit when he heard Streep s speech.Meryl Streep, one of the most over-rated actresses in Hollywood, doesn t know me but attacked last night at the Golden Globes. She is a .. Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 9, 2017Hillary flunky who lost big. For the 100th time, I never mocked a disabled reporter (would never do that) but simply showed him . Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 9, 2017 groveling when he totally changed a 16 year old story that he had written in order to make me look bad. Just more very dishonest media! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 9, 2017Gbson and Vaughan may have looked angry, but at least they had the class to remain silent.Featured image via screenshot | 0 |
8,024 | Fear Of Being Defeated By Elizabeth Warren In 2020 Has Trump FREAKING OUT | Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) has been the object of some serious concern in the White House due to her potential as a 2020 presidential challenger, despite the fact she has said she will not run.The White House is teaming up with the Republican National Committee (RNC) to dig up whatever they can on Warren and whatever they can fabricate so they can circulate condemning memos to reporters.Meanwhile, aides in the White House are keeping tabs on Warren s criticism of Trump and have used the media to aggressively hit back. Last month The Hill published the Senator s criticism of America s largest non-nuclear bomb being dropped in Afghanistan, the White House quickly scrambled with a rebuttal an unusually high level of concern over one senator. As somebody who is probably, in the hearts and minds of liberal activists, a leader of the party, that voice carries some weight, and we have to respond, said a White House official who wishes to remain anonymous.In an effort to put down the Senator, Trump brought back his favorite and most offensive Warren insults last month, referring to her as Pocahontas while delivering a speech to the National Rifle Associate. I have a feeling that in the next election, you re going to be swamped with candidates, said Trump. It may be Pocahontas, remember that. Many see Warren as a likely 2020 presidential candidate, and when Trump can t find legitimated faults with his adversaries, he cowardly resorts to racial insults as attempts to make them look bad. Warren has abstained from engaging in name calling, despite what the Trump administration has to say about her. Elizabeth Warren is the perfect foil for the Trump administration, says former Trump aide Sam Nunberg. I always thought she would be the new Rosie [O Donnell]. Our base hates her; we think she s a joke. She s somebody to galvanize us. It was very smart for the president to bring her up at the NRA. The White House claims they are focused on governing but believe they also need to brand the Massachusetts Senator as out of touch and unfit for the presidency, while she holds a 56 percent approval rating nationwide in a recent survey by Morning Consult.It seems the White House isn t very good at hiding the fact they are seriously afraid of Warren s momentum and her potential to reach the blue-collar voters who backed Trump. Luckily, Trump s racist name calling makes him look bad, not her.Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images | 0 |
8,025 | Trump trade officials prefer tri-lateral NAFTA deal: U.S. senators | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Trump administration’s top trade officials hope to keep the North American Free Trade Agreement as a trilateral deal in negotiations with Canada and Mexico to revamp the 23-year-old pact, senators said on Tuesday. Several members of the Senate Finance Committee said Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and new U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer told them in a closed door meeting that they would prefer the current three-nation format but left open the possibility of parallel bilateral agreements with Canada and Mexico. “Their preference is trilateral,” Democratic Senator Debbie Stabenow told reporters after the meeting. Republican Senator Charles Grassley of Iowa said from the meeting it sounded to him as if a trilateral deal was more likely “unless there’s problems” with that approach. “If trilaterally you aren’t getting anyplace, I suppose then you do it bilaterally,” Grassley said. Ross, who has floated the idea of doing two bilateral trade deals with Canada and Mexico, declined to confirm the administration’s preference for a trilateral approach. “Right now it is a trilateral deal and we shall see what comes in the future but the important thing is to get to the substance,” Ross told reporters after leaving the meeting, adding that talks would be “long and complicated.” The meeting was one of several on Capitol Hill this week involving Lighthizer, who was sworn in as U.S. trade representative on Monday, that are required for the Trump administration to trigger the start of the NAFTA negotiating process with a 90-day consultation period. Farm state senators said they also warned Ross and Lighthizer not to take actions that would damage agricultural exports to Canada and Mexico. “We made it pretty clear that’s a priority, that we don’t want to see ag hurt,” said Senator John Thune, a South Dakota Republican. “NAFTA by and large has been good for agriculture, and we’re seeing some disruptions in the ag marketplace today because of uncertainty about where this is headed.” Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon, the Finance Committee’s top Democrat, said Ross and Lighthizer assured him they would push to drop NAFTA’s dispute-resolution mechanism. Trump has complained that the mechanism is biased against the United States. | 1 |
8,026 | Trump Threatened To Make The 13-Year-Old Girl He Raped Disappear And Kill Her Family: Witness | In case you haven t heard, Donald Trump is due in federal court next month just after he may be elected President to answer charges that he raped a 13-year-old girl in 1994 and threatened to harm her and her family if she told anyone about it.The victim, Jane Doe, is seeking $75,000 in damages. The lawsuit was originally filed in California but was thrown out because the original complaint did not state any specific civil rights violations. She refiled in New York in June, dropping some of the harder-to-prove claims and replacing them with two new witnesses. Both witnesses claim they worked as party planners for Trump s pedophile friend Jeffrey Epstein, who threw them some cash to attract adolescent women to the billionaire s mansion.One witness says she lured Jane Doe to a party by promising her cash and modeling contracts but instead the 13-year-old child was forced to have sex with Trump and Epstein, both of whom knew how young she was. I personally witnessed four sexual encounters that the Plaintiff was forced to have with Mr. Trump during this period, including the fourth of these encounters where Mr. Trump forcibly raped her despite her pleas to stop, Tiffany Doe says, adding that she also witnessed Doe and a 12-year-old girl named Maria being forced to perform oral sex on Trump, with the 2016 GOP nominee physically abusing both children afterward all of this as part of her job duties that required her to personally witness and supervise encounters between the underage girls that Mr. Epstein hired and his guests. Both Trump and Epstein threatened to hurt Doe if she told anyone about the horrific assaults, with Trump adding a very Trump-like threat: I personally witnessed Defendant Trump telling the Plaintiff that she shouldn t ever say anything if she didn t want to disappear like the 12-year-old female Maria, and that he was capable of having her whole family killed. Epstein was convicted in 2008 of soliciting an underage girl for prostitution and served 13 months in prison but Trump went on to find himself one goose-step away from being the leader of the free world.While this might seem unbelievable, Trump hasn t exactly hidden his lust for children over the years, going on about how hot Paris Hilton was when she was 12, creeping on underage models in their dressing rooms, and repeatedly talking about how much he wants to have sex with his daughter, Ivanka.You can read the allegations below: Donald Trump & Jeffrey Epstein Rape Lawsuit and Affidavits by davidbix on ScribdFeatured image via Getty Images/win McNamee | 0 |
8,027 | HuffPo Just Dropped The Mic On Internet Polls Saying Trump Crushed Hillary In Last Night’s Debate | The earliest actual poll to come out of last night s debate was a CNN/ORC poll showing that 62 percent of respondents believed Hillary had won the debate. However, there are a ton of polls that were conducted online that say Trump won in a landslide. How can that be?Here s The Huffington Post to answer that question:Are polls like this an accurate measure of how the electorate responded to Monday s debate? Huffington Post (@HuffingtonPost) September 27, 2016Why is this obvious joke of a poll so damning for all the online polls claiming Trump destroyed Hillary? Because this shows how online polls are meaningless. CNN actually contacted people. Anybody and everybody can answer an online poll. The results generally skew heavily to one side or the other, depending on the outlet s usual audience and which organizations/social media channels post poll links.There s also the fact that Trumpkins from both 4chan and Reddit were stuffing last night s poll boxes, proving how easy it is to manipulate online polls.Of course, the Trumpkins aren t happy with HuffPo at all for blowing those delusions out of the water:@HuffingtonPost someone s upset that #Trumpwins Jim (@Jimbags12) September 27, 2016@HuffingtonPost are middle schoolers doing reporting for you guys? Timothy j. sims (@Timothyjsims2) September 27, 2016Hope no one at Clemson got triggered for seeing this racist tweet. @HuffingtonPost pic.twitter.com/0KxxsNnMh5 Michael Benson (@KeyMrB) September 27, 2016@HuffingtonPost Please vote Hillary or else Bill Clinton will do things to me ? pic.twitter.com/CsOON8nF3Y Pneumonia WarMachine (@z3no_of_citium) September 27, 2016And, obviously, we can always count on Trump himself to only tout the polls that say he won, because anything that doesn t show him as the winner, as the god he wants to be, is biased and unfair, and, well, who cares about those outlets anyway:I won every poll from last nights Presidential Debate except for the little watched @CNN poll. Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 27, 2016The #1 trend on Twitter right now is #TrumpWon thank you! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 27, 2016Such a great honor. Final debate polls are in and the MOVEMENT wins!#AmericaFirst #MAGA #ImWithYouhttps://t.co/3KWOl2ibaW pic.twitter.com/sfCEE3I5pF Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 27, 2016He tweeted a story from the Daily Mail, too, that carries a headline saying, Majority of snap polls show Trump won debate by a landslide despite CNN s overwhelming victory for Hillary in biggest official survey. They actually looks like they re calling the results of the CNN poll into question with screencaps of every online poll in existence.Self-selecting polls aside, the result is pretty damn clear. Hillary won.Featured image by Drew Angerer/Getty Images | 0 |
8,028 | Myanmar says U.S. official barred from Rohingya conflict zone | YANGON (Reuters) - Myanmar said on Friday a visiting U.S. official would not be allowed to go to a region where violence has triggered an exodus of nearly 400,000 Rohingya Muslims that the United Nations has branded a textbook example of ethnic cleansing . The Rohingya have fled from western Rakhine state to neighboring Bangladesh to escape a military offensive that has raised questions about Myanmar s transition to civilian rule under the leadership of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi. U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Patrick Murphy will voice Washington s concerns about the Rohingya and press for greater access to the conflict area for humanitarian workers, the State Department said. Myanmar officials said he would meet government leaders in the capital, Naypyitaw, and attend an address to the nation by Suu Kyi on Tuesday. He would also visit Sittwe, the state capital, and meet the governor of Rakhine, the state government secretary, Tin Maung Swe, told Reuters, but the north of the state, where the conflict erupted on Aug. 25 would be off limits. Not allowed, Tin Maung Swe said, when asked if Murphy would be going to Maungdaw district, at the heart of the strife that began when Rohingya insurgents attacked police posts and an army camp, killing a dozen people. While nearly 400,000 refugees have poured across the border into Bangladesh, fears have also been growing of a humanitarian crisis on the Myanmar side, but access for aid workers and reporters has been severely restricted. Myanmar insisted on Friday it was not barring aid workers but a government spokesman said authorities on the ground might have concerns over security. Rights monitors and fleeing Rohingya say the army and Rakhine Buddhist vigilantes have mounted a campaign of arson aimed at driving out the Muslim population. A Reuters photographer on the Bangladesh side of the border said he could see huge banks of dark smoke billowing up over Myanmar territory on Friday, while international aid organizations said the refugees kept coming. There s really no sign that this flow of people is going to dry up, Chris Lom of the International Organisation for Migration, said from the Bangladeshi border district of Cox s Bazar. There are still, we believe, thousands of people waiting to take boats across to Cox s Bazar. U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and the U.N. Security Council have urged Myanmar to end the violence, which he said was best described as ethnic cleansing. Myanmar rejects the accusations, saying its security forces are carrying out clearance operations to defend against the insurgents of the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army, which claimed responsibility for the Aug. 25 attacks and similar, though smaller, attacks in October. Russia s U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said on Friday that while Moscow was concerned we cannot discard the fact that it was triggered by terrorist activities. We re talking to the Myanmar government, of course, he told reporters. We are concerned with what is happening. ... We are looking forward to an early cessation of the violence and to elevating the humanitarian situation of the population. The government has declared Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army a terrorist organization and accused it of setting the fires and attacking civilians. Ethnic cleansing is not recognized as a separate crime under international law but allegations of ethnic cleansing as part of wider, systematic human rights violations have been heard in international courts. Rights group Amnesty International said evidence pointed to a mass-scale scorched-earth campaign across the north of Rakhine that was unmistakably ethnic cleansing. The evidence is irrefutable the Myanmar security forces are setting northern Rakhine state ablaze in a targeted campaign to push the Rohingya people out of Myanmar, said Tirana Hassan, the group s crisis response director. The group said it had detected 80 big fires in Rohingya areas since Aug. 25. While the extent of damage could not be verified, due to access restrictions by the government, they are likely to have burned down whole villages . It said it also had credible reports of Rohingya militants burning the homes of ethnic Rakhine and other minorities. About 30,000 non-Muslims have also been displaced. U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said on Thursday he had spoken with Suu Kyi and that she said she was working to get aid to areas in Myanmar affected by violence. The generals still control national security policy but nevertheless, Suu Kyi has been widely criticized abroad for not stopping or condemning the violence. The campaign against the Muslim insurgents is popular at home. The U.N. refugee agency said the Rohingya arriving in Bangladesh were suffering real hardship, and some of the most difficult conditions seen in any current refugee situation . With the influx increasing daily, UNHCR is appealing for an initial amount of $30 million for the emergency humanitarian response in Bangladesh until the end of year, an agency spokesman said in Geneva. Bangladesh says all refugees must go home and has called for safe areas in Myanmar. Myanmar has ruled that out and says it will accept anyone who can verify their citizenship. Most Rohingya are stateless. Thousands of people demonstrated after Friday prayers in the Bangladeshi capital, Dhaka, to denounce the treatment of the Rohingya. One protest leader said they were demanding a U.N. peacekeeping force and that Myanmar face charges in an international court. | 1 |
8,029 | North Korea's Kim Jong Un fetes nuclear scientists, holds celebration bash | SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korean leader Kim Jong Un hosted a massive celebration to congratulate his nuclear scientists and technicians who steered the country s sixth and largest nuclear test a week ago, its official news agency said on Sunday. The United States and its allies had been bracing for another long-range missile launch in time for the 69th anniversary of North Korea s founding on Saturday, but no fresh provocations were spotted while the North held numerous events to mark the holiday. Throughout last week, South Korean officials had warned the North could launch another intercontinental ballistic missile in defiance of U.N. sanctions and amid an escalating standoff with the United States. Washington told the U.N. Security Council on Friday to call a meeting on Monday to vote on a draft resolution establishing additional sanctions on North Korea for its missile and nuclear program. Japanese Defense Minister Itsunori Onodera said it was vital to put pressure on North Korea through additional sanctions, including blocking or slowing its fuel supplies. If we put firm pressure on North Korea such that it realizes it cannot develop missiles, it will accept dialogue and we can progress with diplomatic efforts, Onodera told public broadcaster NHK on Sunday. Unless we firmly apply pressure, North Korea will not change its direction. KCNA said Kim threw a banquet to laud the nuclear scientists and other top military and party officials who contributed to the nuclear bomb test last Sunday, topped with an art performance and a photo session with the leader himself. KCNA did not specify when the banquet had been held, but analysts said it had likely been on Saturday. Photos released on Sunday by KCNA showed the young leader breaking into a broad smile at the People s Theater with two prominent scientists: Ri Hong Sop, head of North Korea s Nuclear Weapons Institute, and Hong Sung Mu, deputy director of the ruling Workers Party of Korea s munitions industry department. Ri and Hong have played vital roles in the North s nuclear program, appearing at close distance to Kim during field inspections and weapons tests, including the latest nuclear test. Ri is a former director of Yongbyon Nuclear Research Center, North Korea s main nuclear facility north of Pyongyang, where Hong also worked as a chief engineer. North Korea had said the latest test was an advanced hydrogen bomb. There was no independent confirmation but some Western experts said there was enough strong evidence to suggest the reclusive state has either developed a hydrogen bomb or was getting very close. KCNA said on Sunday the scientists and technicians brought the great auspicious event of the national history, an extra-large event through the perfect success in the test of H-bomb . Kim praised the developers in his own remarks as taking the lead in attaining the final goal of completing the state nuclear force in line with his parallel pursuit of nuclear and economic development. The recent test of the H-bomb is the great victory won by the Korean people at the cost of their blood while tightening their belts in the arduous period, Kim was quoted as saying. Ri and Hong s roles have also been noted overseas, prompting the United Nations, the United States or South Korea to blacklist them. Aside from the elite, rank-and-file North Koreans also commemorated the anniversary on Saturday by visiting the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun, which houses the embalmed bodies of founding father Kim Il Sung and his son and successor Kim Jong Il. KCNA said service personnel and civilians, including children, laid floral baskets and bouquets at the statues of the deceased leaders across the country, while enjoying art performances and dancing parties. | 1 |
8,030 | California lawmakers send governor bill authorizing farmworker overtime | SACRAMENTO, Calif. (Reuters) - California would become the first U.S. state to require farmers to pay overtime to field workers and fruit pickers under a bill approved by the legislature on Monday and sent to Democratic Governor Jerry Brown for his approval. The bill, which passed on a mostly party-line vote, would phase in overtime pay for farmworkers from 2019 to 2022. Small farms that employ 25 or fewer workers would have an additional three years to phase in the pay. If signed into law by Brown, California, the largest U.S. agricultural producer, would the first state in the country to require farmers to pay overtime to laborers who work more than eight hours a day or 40 hours a week. The governor has not said if he will sign the measure. The bill is the culmination of decades of lobbying and pressure by the United Farmworkers Union. The Democratic-controlled legislature rejected a version of the same bill earlier this year, but supporters amended it to phase in the overtime rules more slowly. Opponents said that requiring farmers to pay overtime could damage the state’s agricultural economy, where workers toil up to 60 hours a week during the harvest season but can go for months without pay other times of the year. They predicted that farmers would be forced to cut workers’ hours to just 40 hours a week to avoid having to pay time-and-a-half or double-time overtime. Supporters, mostly Democrats, said the issue was one of fairness to farmworkers, who are among the few U.S. hourly workers not paid overtime. “For me, it is a vote about my conscience,” said Democratic Assemblyman Eduardo Garcia. “We will be improving the lives of people.” | 1 |
8,031 | CAUGHT ON TAPE: RNC Committeeman Urges Republicans To Rally Against Trump [Video] | Is the Republican establishment is in panic mode over Trump s staying power in nationwide GOP polls? Instead of sitting around gnashing their teeth, perhaps they should let the voters decide you know,try something new and actually listen to the American people Your thoughts?A Republican National committeeman delivered a call-to-arms against Donald Trump during a closed-door GOP meeting on Thursday, urging his colleagues to take a forceful stand against those who he said are destroying the party s brand.At a breakfast at the RNC winter meeting, Holland Redfield, an RNC committeeman who represents the minority-rich Virgin Islands, rose to address party Chairman Reince Priebus. In the five-minute impromptu speech, a video recording of which Redfield provided to POLITICO, Redfield did not explicitly mention Trump s name. But he made clear that angry voices in the party pose a grave threat to the GOP s future, and expressed alarm at what he described as crushing pressure to play nice. You can argue with me, but we re almost terrorized as members of our party. Shut up. Toe the line, embrace each other, and let s go forward. I understand that. But there is a limit to loyalty. I am loyal to this party by speaking out on these very issues, he said at the private breakfast meeting.At one point, Redfield essentially argued that those in the room have been held hostage by Trump s threat to run as a third-party candidate if the party hierarchy treats him unfairly. Read more: Politico | 0 |
8,032 | project veritas ive known the president since he was a community organizer in chicago | realism about the jihad threat in oklahoma oklahoma state rep john bennett ventures where few dare to tread october robert spencer
in an age of nearuniversal denial and willful ignorance at the highest levels about the ideological roots nature and magnitude of the jihad threat it is as unusual as it is refreshing to find lawmakers at any level who are willing to approach the problem honestly state representative john bennett of oklahoma a marine and combat veteran of iraq and afghanistan is one of an alltoorare breed
on tuesday bennett held an interim study on the current threat posed by radical islam and the effect that shariah law the muslim brotherhood and jihadist indoctrination have in the radicalization process in oklahoma and america in his request to hold this study he explained this will be a study of the current threat posed by radical islam and the effect that shariah law the muslim brotherhood and jihadist indoctrination have in the radicalization process in oklahoma and america
this kind of study should have been held not just in the oklahoma house of representatives but in the us house and senate as well that such an idea is inconceivable is an indication of the fix were in and the situation is only marginally better in oklahoma nowadays the misinformation and disinformation about what were up against is so universal that anywhere the truth is told about this threat there is significant pushback from the allies and enablers of jihad and islamic supremacism
and so it was in tulsa on tuesday the interim study featured testimony by former fbi agent john guandolo and chris gaubatz whose exploits as an undercover agent infiltrating the hamaslinked council on americanislamic relations cair are chronicled in the eyeopening book muslim mafia
gaubatz and guandolo presented evidence including land records showing that the islamic society of greater oklahoma city isgoc is owned by the muslim brotherhood group the north american islamic trust nait that both cair which has an active chapter in oklahoma city and isgoc are muslim brotherhood organizations and that cair has extensive ties to the jihad terror group hamas which styles itself the muslim brotherhood for palestine they pointed out that since imad enchassi the imam of isgoc is a palestinian and has all these ties to the muslim brotherhood he likely also has links to hamas
guandolo and gaubatz did not base their case on innuendo and hearsay they laid out fbi evidence muslim brotherhood documents and more demonstrating that the claims they were making were based on solid evidence
predictably however the mainstream media which we now know beyond any shadow of a doubt is simply and solely a propaganda arm for the left and the democratic party focused entirely on the presence of adam soltani of cairok and enchassi the tulsa world ran a piece with the hysterical headline state representative brands cairok its director and a local imam as terrorists it quoted soltani raging against bennett rep bennett is shamefully wasting taxpayer money to promote his own biased agenda this hearing was a new low for rep bennett as his guests presented a biased narrative that achieves nothing more than demonizing and marginalizing the oklahoma muslim community
the world magisterially told its readers that cair is a muslim civil liberties and advocacy group working to enhance the understanding of islam it didnt see fit to mention that cair is an unindicted coconspirator in a hamas terror funding case so named by the justice department there was not a word in the world report about how cair officials have repeatedly refused to denounce hamas and hizballah as terrorist groups several former cair officials have been convicted of various crimes related to jihad terror cairs cofounder and longtime board chairman omar ahmad as well as its chief spokesman ibrahim hooper have made islamic supremacist statements ahmad denies this but the original reporter stands by her story a california chapter distributed a poster telling muslims not to talk to the fbi and a florida chapter distributed pamphlets with the same message cair has opposed virtually every antiterror measure that has been proposed or implemented and has been declared a terror organization by the united arab emirates
but the tulsa world and other mainstream media outlets that covered bennetts study did not see fit to inform their readers of any of that instead predictably enough they portrayed the hearing as a baseless exercise in racebaiting and fearmongering conducted by a politician up for reelection
john bennett and the people of oklahoma deserve better there are legitimate questions about cair and isgoc bennett dared to raise them tuesday for that he is being subjected to a media lynching that is cynically designed to obscure the genuine concerns he raised yet ever since a member of isgoc beheaded a coworker in these concerns are more urgent than ever
the media enablers of jihad must be decisively repudiated please email the speaker of the oklahoma house jeff w hickman politely and courteously expressing your support for john bennett and requesting that his hearing be just the first of a series his email is email protected and his phone number is
john bennett has yet again stuck his neck out for freedom in these hard times those who are willing to do that have to hang together | 1 |
8,033 | USDA chief says farmers looking ahead to possible Cuba markets | LIMA (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack said Tuesday that farm officials want to lay the groundwork so American agricultural exporters can seize new opportunities in Cuba if the trade embargo on the country is lifted. The normalization of trade relations would allow U.S. farmers to use lower transportation costs to edge in on the European Union’s food exports to Cuba, Vilsack said. President Barack Obama has been using his executive powers to chip away at the half-century-old trade embargo, imposed on the communist-ruled nation in 1960, but cannot lift it without approval from Congress that is unlikely under current Republican leadership. “There are still preliminary steps that can be taken to prepare for that day,” Vilsack said in an interview in Peru. “When it happens, the United States will be in a very good position to reclaim a portion of the market we’ve lost.” Vilsack cited soybeans, rice, poultry and biofuels as new markets U.S. farmers could tap in Cuba, which in turn could sell organic products to its former Cold War foe. The Obama administration is asking Congress for $1.5 million for on-the-ground studies into challenges to agricultural trade in Cuba, from pests to a diplomatic void left by decades of hostile relations. “We have not had people on the ground,” Vilsack said. “We need to develop relationships with the people in Cuba so we know who to do business with and who actually makes the deals.” Vilsack, who visited Cuba last month, said state agricultural commissioners and secretaries have also been traveling to the island on trade missions. “They have been down to Cuba and they have come back with small contracts for commodities,” Vilsack said. Vilsack said farmers were the most excited about the reopening of relations with Cuba, once a global sugarcane powerhouse. The U.S. would aim to meet 50 percent of Cuba’s food and agricultural needs if trade resumes fully, up from less than 15 percent now, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said in a statement to Reuters after the interview. Vilsack also said he was optimistic Obama would persuade Congress to pass the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal before the end of his term, despite the recent surge in anti-trade rhetoric in presidential campaigns. “The president is very committed to getting it done and he intends to work as long and hard as he needs to ultimately get it passed,” Vilsack said. | 1 |
8,034 | ‘A Gimmick’: It Just Dawned On Republicans That Trump Is Full Of Sh*t About The Wall | While on the campaign trail, reality show star Donald Trump vowed that he would build a wall on the U.S. southern border, and that Mexico would pay for it. Chants rang out from his supporters at each rally to Build that wall! but his promise is now crumbling before his fans eyes. Firstly, it s an expensive endeavor, one that is expected to cost up to $38 billion. And Mexico will not pay for it. We will. Taxpayers will be footing the bill for his wall. Yet, the president-elect now says that it will be built, and Mexico will pay for it later. And now, even Republicans know that he s full of it.A number of Republicans interviewed by CNN suggested that Trump s claim amounted to wishful thinking, saying they believe the alleged billionaire would ultimately backtrack on one of his central campaign promises. I doubt that they re going to pay for it, said Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch. There s a lot he could do if he wanted to (force Mexico s hand). In all honesty, I don t think that s going to happen. Rep. Mike Coffman, a Colorado Republican, said, I never thought that would happen. I thought it was a gimmick. Trump will face a backlash if he fails to keep his promise. I m for building a wall, said Rep. Mo Brooks. And I m for Donald Trump keeping his promise to the American people that Mexico pay for it. The Alabama lawmaker added that that he would be disappointed if Trump failed to deliver.Oh, those crazy fiscal conservatives. :House GOP sources tell CNN that Trump s transition team has urged Republican leaders to include funding for the wall in a spending package that must pass by April 28 in order to keep the government open. The price tag is uncertain, but some similar proposals have been projected to cost upwards of $10 billion. We re going to get reimbursed, Trump told The New York Times. But I don t want to wait that long. But you start, and then you get reimbursed. Sure we will, Sport. Just like his contractors were reimbursed while still waiting for that check that will never happen.Mexico will not pay for the wall. Hillary Clinton will not be locked up. The swamp is being filled up with terrifying creatures. Trump supporters were played for suckers and the rest of us will be paying for their hot mess with our tax dollars.Photo by Win McNamee via Getty Images | 0 |
8,035 | Trump names interim consumer agency head, likely sparking showdown | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump has designated White House Budget Director Mick Mulvaney acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau until a permanent director is nominated and confirmed, the White House said on Friday. The action came hours after Richard Cordray submitted his formal resignation and named a deputy director as his replacement, setting the stage for a political and legal battle over the regulator’s leadership. “The president looks forward to seeing Director Mulvaney take a common sense approach to leading the CFPB’s dedicated staff, an approach that will empower consumers to make their own financial decisions and facilitate investment in our communities,” the White House said in its statement. Democratic lawmakers are eager to preserve the regulator for as long as possible while Republicans want to put in place new leadership to chart a drastically different course. The six-year-old bureau has policed consumer financial markets, drafting aggressive rules curbing products like payday loans, while issuing multimillion dollar fines against large financial institutions like Wells Fargo. But Republicans have consistently complained the agency is too powerful and lacks oversight from Congress on its operations, and they are eager to take control. Mulvaney, who has criticized the bureau in the past, said, “I look forward to working with the expert personnel within the agency to identify how the bureau can transition to be more effective in its mission, while becoming more accountable to the taxpayer.” The succession plan has never been tested, with Cordray as its first and only full-time director. Cordray had previously announced plans to resign by the end of November. In a statement to staff, he said that Leandra English, the CFPB’s chief of staff, had been named deputy director and would take over as acting director of the agency upon his exit. However, the White House had already said it planned to name its own interim leadership at the regulator. Trump has pushed to ease regulations on businesses, including the financial sector, a stance seemingly at odds with Cordray’s more aggressive regulatory approach. Earlier this month, White House deputy press secretary Raj Shah said that the administration “will announce an acting director and the president’s choice to replace Mr Cordray at the appropriate time.” There are competing theories in Washington as to who can name Cordray’s replacement. Democrats point to language in the Dodd-Frank law that created the CFPB, stipulating the deputy director replaces the director when he or she leaves. But others say a separate law governing federal vacancies gives Trump power to name someone elsewhere in the administration to that role temporarily, while the White House identifies a full-time nominee who would be confirmed by the Senate. | 1 |
8,036 | Trump's Interior Department shortlist vexes employees, green groups | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President-elect Donald Trump’s shortlist of candidates to lead the U.S. Department of Interior has employees and environmental advocates fearful of a shift in the agency’s direction, from one focused on preserving public lands to one that would open them up to more drilling and mining. The outcome will have implications for industry access to millions of acres of national parks, reserves and tribal territories stretching from the Arctic to the Gulf of Mexico and the viability of President Barack Obama’s efforts to keep the United States in line with international agreements to reduce the impacts of climate change. Republican Trump, a New York real estate businessman who has never previously held public office, has leaned toward right-wing loyalists for the Cabinet since winning the Nov. 8 election. He is considering oil drilling advocates like Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin, Alaska’s former governor Sarah Palin and Lucas Oil co-founder Forrest Lucas to run the Interior Department, media reports and Reuters sources said. Other contenders are several politicians from Western states who favor easier development of public lands. Any of those picks could trigger battles with environmental groups and cause internal strife at an agency where many workers see themselves as land stewards after nearly eight years of conservation-minded policies under Democrat Obama. “Public lands have been set aside to ‘preserve and protect’ cultural and scientific resources for future generations,” said Geoff Goins, a National Park Service ranger at the Bandelier National Monument in New Mexico, adding that with Trump coming in, “people are concerned about their jobs.” Other Interior Department employees interviewed by Reuters said they were worried the agency’s environmental mandate would be weakened under Trump, and green advocates said they were bracing to resist those changes. “Climate change is a major focus of conservation concern for national parks,” said one National Park Service employee in the Northwest who asked not to be identified. “If (Trump’s administration) gets in the way of scientists...we are all in deep trouble.” During the election campaign, Trump tweeted that “the concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive” - a view that is at odds with most but a few scientists who study the impacts of rising global temperatures and extreme weather. Maureen Finnerty, chair of the Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks, an organization of more than 1,200 current and former National Parks employees, said it was ready to launch a public relations campaign against Trump if he pursues an anti-environmental agenda. “We will be vigilant and hope for the best,” she said. The Interior Department employs more than 70,000 people across the United States and oversees over 20 percent of federal land. Under Obama, the Interior Department played a big role in efforts to curb the effects of climate change by limiting fossil fuel development in some areas. Outgoing Interior Secretary Sally Jewell banned coal mining on public lands, canceled leases for drilling in the Arctic and Atlantic coasts, expanded wildlife protection and cracked down on industry methane emissions. The Obama administration planned on using forest restoration on federal lands as a way to help the United States meet its long-term goals under the 2015 Paris agreement within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The agreement outlines how countries will deal with lowering greenhouse gas emissions starting in 2020. Trump has given mixed messages on his plans for Interior. In an interview with Field and Stream magazine in January, Trump said: “I want to keep the lands great... We have to be great stewards of this land.” But he has advocated strongly for boosting energy development on federal lands and has criticized Obama’s use of environmental regulation to check oil and gas development. He picked renowned climate change skeptic Myron Ebell to run his transition at the Environmental Protection Agency. U.S. Representative Kevin Cramer of North Dakota said Trump could consider hiring as his energy secretary Harold Hamm, an oil and gas driller and a pioneer of developing shale oil resources. One potential Interior Department head is Oklahoma Governor Fallin, who met with Trump on Monday. She has been an ardent supporter of Oklahoma’s drilling industry and has blocked attempts to ban hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, a controversial drilling technology. Fallin’s spokesman confirmed she is being considered for the post, but said there has been “no offer given.” Also on the shortlist is Palin, who made famous the motto “Drill, Baby, Drill” when she was the vice presidential running-mate to Republican John McCain in 2008, and former Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, a Trump supporter without experience in public lands policy. Governor Butch Otter of Idaho, venture capitalist Robert Grady and U.S. Representatives Cynthia Lummis and Rob Bishop of Wyoming and Utah are also potential candidates for the job. All declined comment. (Refiles to correct typographical error National Park Service instead of National Parks Service.) | 1 |
8,037 | Trump’s Biggest KKK Fan Is Back, And He Just LOVED Those Anti-Muslim Tweets This Morning | Just in case you needed any more proof that Donald Trump s racist tweets were a thinly-coded message to his alt-right, anti-Muslim, and white supremacist followers, a former Grand Wizard of the KKK has jumped on board today in praise of President Hates-a-Lot.It wasn t enough that the KKK endorsed Trump during his campaign to stop his multitudes of followers from voting for him, so it s hard to say whether Duke s full-throated endorsement of today s disgusting display of racism will be any different. But for the average American, seeing the former Klan leader get behind Trump so vigorously should make them more than a little sick.To even go to Duke s page on Twitter is to subject yourself to a blinding cover photo, all white, with a blue-eyed Aryan baby in the upper corner, and the words It s Okay To Be White across the middle. The phrase is part of a hate campaign that Doctor Duke has been pushing across America, a play on the notion that there is some kind of war on white people happening.But the tweet itself is disturbing:Trump retweets video of crippled white kid in Europe being beaten by migrants, and white people being thrown off a roof and then beaten to death, He's condemned for showing us what the fake news media WON'T. Thank God for Trump! That's why we love him! David Duke (@DrDavidDuke) November 29, 2017By invoking God in his message, Duke is trying the age-old tactic of pretending that white supremacy has its roots in Christianity, an angle that KKK members have tried to use for generations.Sadly, it works on some followers of both Duke s and of Donald Trump s. It seems there s quite a bit of crossover between the two racist groups. That s no surprise: The KKK were absolutely instrumental in getting Trump elected.The bottom line is, both men know exactly what they re doing when they send messages like that to their followers. Trump s racist retweets were already disgraceful enough. But continuing to leave them on his Twitter feed even after seeing praise from a Loyal White Knight like David Duke is just rubbing salt in the wound.Featured image via William Thomas Cain/Getty Images | 0 |
8,038 | Yemen's Houthi group says fires missile toward Abu Dhabi nuclear reactor | DUBAI (Reuters) - Yemen s Houthi group has fired a cruise missile toward a nuclear power plant in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates, the group s television service reported on its website on Sunday, without providing any evidence. There were no reports of any missiles reaching the UAE. The Iran-aligned Houthis control much of northern Yemen and had said Abu Dhabi, a member of the Saudi-led coalition fighting against them since 2015, was a target for their missiles. The missile force announces the launching of a winged cruise missile ... toward the al-Barakah nuclear reactor in Abu Dhabi, the website said. It gave no further details. The Barakah project, which is being built by Korea Electric Power Corporation (KEPCO) (015760.KS), is expected to be completed and become operational in 2018, the UAE energy minister has said. It is the second time this year the Houthis have said they have fired missiles toward the UAE. A few months ago they said they had successfully test fired a missile toward Abu Dhabi. | 1 |
8,039 | About 100,000 Kurds have fled Kirkuk since Monday: Kurdish officials | BAGHDAD (Reuters) - About 100,000 Kurds have fled Kirkuk, fearing unrest, since Monday s takeover of the region by Iraqi forces, officials from the semi-autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) said on Thursday. About 18,000 families have taken shelter in the cities of Erbil and Sulaimaniya, the governor of Erbil Nawzad Hadi told reporters. One of his aides told Reuters the total number of people was about 100,000. | 1 |
8,040 | feds born to illegals in year | judge warns of dangers of appointed judiciary unelected and unaccountable rule on their empathetic feelings published mins ago about archive bob unruh joined wnd in after nearly three decades with the associated press as well as several upper midwest newspapers where he covered everything from legislative battles and sports to tornadoes and homicidal survivalists he is also a photographer whose scenic work has been used commercially print
a member of the increasingly divided and disputatious alabama supreme court is warning that judges need to be elected and thus accountable to the voters or their decisions end up being based on their empathetic feelings instead of the law
alabamas judges are elected and accountable wrote justice tom parker this week federal judges as recently noted by chief justice roberts in his dissent in obergefell v hodges a case in which five lawyers on the united states supreme court announced a fundamental right to samesex marriage are unaccountable and unelected
he pointed out that three of the four dissenting us supreme court justices in obergefell noted on eight different occasions that the five lawyers who decided obergefell were unelected chief justice roberts said on two occasions that those unelected five lawyers were consequently unaccountable
parker previously commented that the five lawyers failed to base their decision on legal reasoning history tradition the courts own rules or the rule of law but upon their empathetic feelings
obergefell is the product of unelected and unaccountable judges he said
he was arguing over a decision by the state court on its next move in a case brought by chief justice roy moore who was suspended for his actions regarding a marriagebased case that the court was reviewing when the obergefell case which created samesex marriage nationwide was announced
moore who is challenging the punishment insisted that the state court justices who previously were involved in his case recuse themselves they did with the exception of the acting chief justice who was allowed to work with the governor to pick a panel of retired judges to hear moores arguments
parker said active judges should have been included in the panel because retired judges too are unelected and unaccountable
unelected and unaccountable judges are empowered to impose their agenda instead of faithfully applying the rule of law parker warned obergefell is not the first case concerning samesex marriage to prove this principle true before the united states supreme court decided obergefell the constitutionality of state laws defining marriage as between one man and one woman had been litigated before numerous courts throughout the united states
dont miss phyllis schlaflys book now available autographed at the wnd superstore who killed the american family
before obergefell states passed laws affirming traditional marriage in of those states the traditional marriage laws were challenged in the courts as unconstitutional of the state laws affirming traditional marriage that were challenged in the courts of those laws were struck down by the judiciary as unconstitutional each of the courts that struck down the traditional marriage laws as unconstitutional was composed of judges who were unelected and thus unacountable
he explained what happens when activist judges are held to account citing the situation that developed in iowa
the supreme court of iowa was one of the unelected courts that struck down iowas traditional marriage law as unconstitutional the judges of the supreme court of iowa are appointed by the governor of iowa however although the judges are initially appointed they must stand for retention elections once their initial term expires
he explained that after the iowa legislature adopted onemanonewoman marriage as law in april in a decision largely viewed as judicial activism the supreme court of iowa unanimously overruled the democratic will of the people of iowa and held the law unconstitutional
the very next year three of the judges who had concurred in varnum had to stand for a retention election all three were removed from office by vote of the people of iowa this was the first time since iowa adopted its retentionelection system that any judge had ever failed to be retained the people of iowa held accountable those judges who failed to uphold the rule of law
mathew staver chairman of of liberty counsel which is representing moore said huge questions remain of impropriety regarding the judicial systems handling of moores case
chief justice moore is merely asking for the same thing any citizen is entitled to receive equal justice under the law he wants his case to be heard by an objective and fair panel of judges who will adhere to the rule of law he said
the people of alabama have increasingly called upon their judges to be accountable at every turn this case presents new twists and turns that have never occurred in the history of alabama never has there been a requirement that replacement judges all be retired we hope this case moves quickly to a final and just resolution the court of the judiciary violated the law when it suspended chief justice moore for life even though it lacked the vote never before under the unanimity requirement of coj rule has any judge ever been suspended for the rest of the term a sexting judge gets six months and a judge who writes a fourpage order that is not unethical or unlawful gets suspended for life this is not right
supporters of moore also have filed an ethics complaint against lyn stuart who has been acting as alabamas chief justice
she is accused of violating multiple cannons of ethics in her mishandling of the cases surrounding chief justice roy moore
the complaint comes from the sanctity of marriage alabama organization
if the judicial inquiry commission really cares about ethics fairness and upholding the integrity and impartiality of the alabama judiciary they will no doubt take our complaint seriously as will organizations which filed ethics complaints on chief justice moore said tom ford a spokesman for the group
the complaints the group said outline how acting chief justice lyn stuart has repeatedly failed to avoid impropriety or the appearance of impropriety failed to perform the duties of her office impartially failed to avoid conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice that brings the judicial office into disrepute and failed to conduct herself at all times in a manner that promotes public confidence in the integrity and impartiality of the judiciary
parker was not the first to cite the dangers of the judiciary
daniel horowitz senior editor at conservative review told wnd that the nation is going through a social transformation without representation
it is the unelected branches of government that are deciding our most important issues whether its the bureaucrats whether its the courts and as it relates to even religious liberty even property rights immigration our voting rights who gets to vote he said
horowitz tackles the topic of social transformation without representation in his book stolen sovereignty how to stop unelected judges from transforming america
how did we get here horowitz asked rhetorically and the sad reality is nobody ever voted for this this was all foisted upon the people by unelected judges the legal profession and unelected bureaucrats that is social transformation without representation which as scalia warned is something much worse than even taxation without representation that served as the impetus for our first american revolution
samesex marriage was mandated for the nation in by the bare majority made up of anthony kennedy ruth ginsburg stephen breyer sonia sotomayor and elena kagan john roberts clarence thomas samuel alito and the late antonin scalia opposed it
the majority found in the constitution a right to samesex marriage overturning millennia of established legal precedent regarding marriage as well as the will of tens of millions of voters in dozens of states
it elicited remarkably harsh criticism of the five justices in the us supreme court majority
for one two of the justices in the majority kagan and ginsburg were asked to recuse themselves from the case because they had openly advocated for samesex marriage apparently violating standards to preserve judicial impartiality without their votes the case would have gone the other way
they refused
then there was the us supreme courts own opinion just two years earlier in the defense of marriage act case in which the court said states have exclusive power over marriage
and there also are those who point out that the constitution doesnt mention marriage but does dictate that everything not mentioned in the document is left to the states and the people
as wnd reported ginsburg who voted in favor of samesex marriage has performed samesex wedding ceremonies and made supportive public statements justice elena kagan also has performed samesex weddings and promoted gay rights at harvards law school while she was at its helm
critics contend the two justice appear to be violating judicial ethics rules that require recusal from a case in which there is even the appearance of a conflict of interest
the foundation for moral law asked the justices to excuse themselves from the case but they refused to acknowledge the request the foundation explained that canon a of the code of conduct for united states judges provides a judge should not make public comment on the merits of a matter pending or impending in any court usc sec a mandates that a justice shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned
rabbi jonathan cahn author of the new york times bestseller the harbinger and the inspiration behind the isaiah judgment movie has criticized the supreme courts assumption that it has the authority to redefine marriage
at a prayer event in washington he said the justices of the supreme court took up their seats in a hearing on whether they should strike down the biblical and historic definition of marriage that the event should even take place is a sign this is america of george washingtons warning a nation at war against its own foundation
washington warned the smiles of heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right which heaven itself hath ordained
justices can you judge the ways of god there is another court and there is another judge where all men and all judges will give account he warned
if a nations high court should pass judgment on the almighty should you then be surprised god will pass judgment on the court and that nation we are doing that which israel did on the altars of baal he said
see jonathans cahns message at washington man of prayer event at the capitol
the united states conference of catholic bishops is calling samesex marriage an intrinsic evil
and officials from several counties in tennessee have adopted statements opposing the supreme court
wnd also reported when dozens of top legal scholars from the likes of washington lee boston college kansas state notre dame university of texas villanova vanderbilt hillsdale university of nebraska catholic university and regent university issued a statement encouraging all state and federal officials to treat the supreme courts recent creation of samesex marriage as anticonstitutional and illegitimate
it cannot be taken to have settled the law of the united states said the statement from the american principles project
we call on all federal and state officeholders to refuse to accept obergefell as binding precedent for all but the specific plaintiffs in that case to recognize the authority of states to define marriage and the right of federal and state officeholders to act in accordance with those definitions to pledge full and mutual legal and political assistance to anyone who refuses to follow obergefell for constitutionally protected reasons to open forthwith a broad and honest conversation on the means by which americans may constitutionally resist and overturn the judicial usurpations evidence in obergefell | 1 |
8,041 | Basketball Great LeBron James Delivers STINGING Ohio Blow To Trump | Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump wants to pretend that he s for the working man, that he understands their struggles. The truth is, though, that Trump is a rich, spoiled brat who has never known poverty or what it is like to worry where his next meal or rent check was coming from. That s the reality for many average Americans, and he doesn t have a clue about it. One person who understands this is Cleveland Cavaliers basketball great LeBron James.James wrote a passionate op-ed in Business Insider, in which he laid out the reasons he is endorsing and supporting Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. James writes: As a kid, I didn t have much money. It was just my mom and me, and things were rough at times. But I had basketball. That gave me a family, a community, and an education. That s more than a lot of children in Akron can say.If basketball has taught me anything, it s that no one achieves greatness alone. And it takes everyone working together to create real change.When I look at this year s presidential race, it s clear which candidate believes the same thing. Only one person running truly understands the struggles of an Akron child born into poverty. And when I think about the kinds of policies and ideas the kids in my foundation need from our government, the choice is clear.That candidate is Hillary Clinton. This is especially significant because Ohio is a state where James is pretty much worshipped, and it is also a state that is seen as essential for winning the presidency. This is an opinion that holds a lot of weight there.LeBron James embodies the American dream, as does Hillary Clinton. Hillary was raised by a mother who began working at the age of 14 because she was abandoned by her parents and had to leave the home of grandparents who never wanted her and look at all Hillary became. LeBron James was a poor kid raised by a single mom who became one of the most revered sports stars in the country. In contrast, Donald Trump never worked for anything he has. He inherited it. He s really good at being a spoiled, entitled rich kid who has never cared about anything but himself and his brand. Do we really want that as president? I certainly don t.Thanks, LeBron. #ImWithHer, too.Featured image via David Liam Kyle/NBAE via Getty Images | 0 |
8,042 | Togo forces fire on protesters, seven wounded | LOME (Reuters) - Security forces in Togo fired bullets and teargas on Thursday, wounding at least seven people as they sought to break up violent protests against the 50-year ruling family dynasty in the West African banking and transport hub. Activists have been demonstrating since August against President Faure Gnassingbe s refusal to give a clear date for stepping aside and to allow opposition parties to flourish in the region s only country that still does not accept presidential term limits. A Reuters cameraman saw trucks carrying armed paramilitary gendarmes drive into crowds and fire volleys of teargas. Protesters in the Lome suburb of Be, flanked by rundown buildings and palm trees, set up barricades, burned tyres and threw stones at the security forces. We ve received seven people wounded by bullets so far, said a doctor at the Social Medical Centre in Be, where some were being wrapped in bandages. The former French colony of 8 million people is home to several large firms, including Ecobank and regional airline ASKY, and has undergone major port upgrades as the president has sought to turn the resource-poor nation into a commercial hub. But a history of repression and the monopoly of power by one family - Faure took power in 2005 upon the death of his father Gnassingbe Eyadema, who had ruled for 38 years - threaten its stability. Ghassingbe s opponents says reforms announced last month, in response to August s protests, will still allow him to run the West African country until 2030. | 1 |
8,043 | High-Ranking Democrat DEMANDS Investigation Into Open Corruption At Trump Foundation | Recently, news broke that the Trump Foundation openly and blatantly broke IRS corruption rules about self-dealing. In a tax filing obtained by a watchdog group and reported on by the Washington Post, Trump s charity admits to self-dealing both recently and in past years.It s very likely Trump intends to use the powers of the presidency to enrich himself personally, and he s said as much himself.So it should come as no surprise to him that Democratic members of Congress are demanding an investigation and further paperwork related to this scandal. Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD), a Ranking Member in the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, released a letter demanding additional documentation concerning the admitted self-dealing occurring at the Trump foundation. The letter reads, in part,I am writing to request additional information on the apparent admission of the Donald J. Trump Foundation to multiple instances in which the organization appears to have violated the legal prohibition against using charitable funds to benefit its leaders, their family members, or other disqualified individuals commonly known as self-dealing. According to press reports, the Foundation spent more than a quarter-million dollars of charitable funds to settle various lawsuits involving the President-elect s for-profit companies.The Foundation also reportedly used $20,000 of charitable funds to purchase a six-foot tall portrait of the President-elect, and at the time the Foundation was predominately funded by other donors.The Foundation also previously paid a 10% excise tax to the IRS for reportedly providing an illegal $25,000 political contribution to the campaign of Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi. At the time, Ms. Bondi was considering whether to investigate allegations of fraud against Trump University and decided not to pursue the case after receiving the contribution.You can read the letter in its entirely here (PDF).This doesn t paint a pretty picture. It s clear that Donald Trump believes he is above the law, and that s before he was elected president. It s up to all of us to hold him accountable for his actions by supporting the leaders calling him out for his corruption and sticking up for the American people.Featured image via Alex Wong/Getty Images | 0 |
8,044 | Turkey's Erdogan calls Iraqi Kurdish referendum illegitimate | ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday called the Iraqi Kurdish independence referendum illegitimate and said Russia and Turkey agreed that the territorial integrity of Iraq and neighboring Syria must be preserved. Erdogan spoke after face-to-face talks in Ankara with President Vladimir Putin. The Russian leader gave no opinion of the vote, saying Moscow s position had been set out by the foreign ministry which said it respected the Kurds national striving but supported the sovereignty, unity and territorial integrity of Iraq. Both Turkey and Russia have strong commercial ties with the semi-autonomous Kurdish region of north Iraq but Turkey - with a large Kurdish population of its own - bitterly criticized Monday s referendum, threatening economic sanctions and a military response. The Kurdish referendum has no legitimacy in terms of the Iraqi constitution and international laws, Erdogan said in his comments at the presidential palace. No one has the right to throw our region in the fire. In this delicate period after the referendum, we have to prevent the Kurdish Regional Government from making bigger mistakes. Turkey has been battling an insurgency in its mainly Kurdish southeast for more than three decades and fears the vote in northern Iraq could fuel separatism within its own borders. Both Erdogan and Putin said they would continue to work together to address the conflict in Syria, where they have supported opposing sides in the struggle between President Bashar al-Assad s government and rebels who fought to overthrow him. The de facto conditions for ending the fratricidal war in Syria, the final destruction of terrorists and Syrians return to a normal life have been created, said Putin, whose support for Assad helped turn the tide of the six-year conflict in favor of the president. Putin said he and Erdogan confirmed their commitment to four de-escalation zones across Syria, including the northwestern province of Idlib, home to about 2 million people and largely controlled by former Nusra Front militants. Erdogan said last week that Turkish troops will deploy inside Idlib, which is on Turkey s southern border, while Russia would maintain security outside the province. Warplanes conducted a tenth consecutive day of air strikes on the Idlib area on Thursday, targeting insurgent-held towns, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. Opposition rescue workers said on Wednesday that Russian and Syrian jets had killed at least 150 civilians in the air raids. Russia says it is only attacking jihadists. Russian media, citing the defense ministry, said 37 Nusra members including five field commanders were killed in a rocket attack in Idlib. The presidents said they wanted to see progress in two major projects, the TurkStream gas pipeline from Russia to Turkey and the Akkuyu nuclear power plant being built in Turkey with Russian collaboration. We place great importance on the realization of these projects swiftly, Erdogan said. We have observed during out talks that there are some disruptions, we will fix them quickly. | 1 |
8,045 | THROWING GAS ON RACIAL FIRE? VA Police Confirm….Governor Terry McAuliffe LIED About Weapons Being Hid Around Charlottesville By White Nationalists | Will the mainstream media report about this?Contradicting statements by Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, the Virginia State Police say they did not find caches of weapons stashed around Charlottesville in advance of last Saturday s deadly white nationalist rally.In an interview Monday on the Pod Save the People podcast, hosted by Black Lives Matter activist DeRay Mckesson, McAuliffe claimed the white nationalists who streamed into Charlottesville that weekend hid weapons throughout the town. They had battering rams and we had picked up different weapons that they had stashed around the city, McAuliffe told Mckesson.McAuliffe s comments were picked up by other news outlets and spread through social media. But Corinne Geller, a spokesperson for the Virginia State Police, says that no such stashes were found. The governor was referring to the briefing provided him in advance of Saturday s rally and the extra security measures being taken by local and state police, Geller tells Reason. As a safety precaution in advance of August 12, such searches were conducted in and around Emancipation and McIntire Parks. No weapons were located as a result of those searches. The Virginia State Police also disputed McAuliffe s claims that Virginia State Police were underequipped to deal with the heavily armed militia members at Saturday s rally. The governor was referencing the weapons and tactical gear the members of various groups attending the rally had on their persons, Geller says. I can assure you that the Virginia State Police personnel were equipped with more-than-adequate specialized tactical and protective gear for the purpose of fulfilling their duties to serve and protect those in attendance of the August 12 event in Charlottesville. McAuliffe claimed in an interview with The New York Times that law enforcement arrived to find a line of militia members who had better equipment than our State Police had. In longer comments that were later edited out of the Times story, McAuliffe said that up to 80 percent of the rally attendees were carrying semi-automatic weapons. You saw the militia walking down the street, you would have thought they were an army, he said. Reason | 0 |
8,046 | Norway, Germany to develop missile based on NSM technology | OSLO (Reuters) - Norway and Germany have agreed to develop a common missile for their navies based on Kongsberg Gruppen s Naval Strike Missile (NSM), the Norwegian defense ministry said on Friday. It did not say how long the development was expected to take. | 1 |
8,047 | South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley Says We’ve Never Passed Racist Laws In This Country | We ve never passed racist laws in this country, says the woman who is the governor of a former slave state where Jim Crow laws flourished and the Confederate flag flew until July 2015.It s most definitely the most ridiculous thing Nikki Haley has ever said, and it comes just a day after she delivered the Republican response to the State of the Union Address.Only six months have gone by since Haley called for removing the Confederate flag off statehouse grounds after a racist gunman murdered nine African-American parishioners at a black church in Charleston.The flag has been a symbol of white supremacy and slavery since the Civil War and actually flew on the statehouse itself after a law was passed mandating it. That s why it took a vote of the South Carolina House and Senate to remove it for good.So, it s pretty damn mind-boggling to hear Haley claim that we ve never passed racist laws in this country.According to Talking Points Memo, Haley responded to criticism of her speech by Donald Trump, who called her weak on immigration. And let s just say it didn t go well. When you ve got immigrants who are coming here legally, we ve never in the history of this country passed any laws or done anything based on race or religion. Let s not start that now. We ve gone too far than to go back into a race and religion issue. I ve been through those fights. That s not worth it. Yes, she really claimed that there have never been racist laws in the history of this nation, even though Haley lives and works in a state that seceded from the Union because they feared their pro-slavery laws would be abolished by President Lincoln.As Gawker points out, South Carolina also had many Jim Crow laws on the books, including making it illegal for any white man to intermarry with any woman of either the Indian or negro races until 1967, and banning restaurants from serving white and colored passengers in the same room, or at the same table, or at the same counter until 1954.Racism is even present in our own Constitution as the Founding Fathers made it the law that African-Americans could only count as three-fifths of a person when determining the number of congressional seats each state has every ten years.In addition, there s the Indian Removal Act of 1830, the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, literacy tests for voting, Operation Wetback of 1954, and the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II, just to name a few. To see more, click here.Either Nikki Haley doesn t know the history of America and our legal system, or she is whitewashing it. Conservatives must be proud.Featured Image: Flickr and Flickr. | 0 |
8,048 | Hillary Clinton calls for U.S. to bomb Syrian air fields | NEW YORK (Reuters) - In her first interview since her stunning presidential election defeat by Republican rival Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton on Thursday called for the United States to bomb Syrian air fields. Clinton, in an interview at the Women in the World Summit in New York, also called Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election a theft more damaging than Watergate. MORE FROM REUTERS Exclusive: Mexico opens up its heroin fight to U.S., U.N. observers Macau billionaire's aide pleads guilty in U.N. bribe case Slideshow: Top photos of the week Asked whether she now believes that failing to take a tougher stand against Syria was her worst foreign policy mistake as secretary of state under President Barack Obama, Clinton said she favored more aggressive action against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. “I think we should have been more willing to confront Assad,” Clinton said in the interview, conducted by New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof. “I really believe we should have and still should take out his air fields and prevent him from being able to use them to bomb innocent people and drop sarin gas on them.” Clinton noted that she had advocated for a no-fly zone in Syria after leaving government, something that Obama opposed. Her remarks came two days after a poison gas attack in Syria that killed at least 70 people, many of them children. The U.S. government believes the chemical agent sarin was used in the attack. The United States and other Western countries blamed Assad’s armed forces for the worst chemical attack in Syria in more than four years. Trump said on Thursday that “something should happen” with Assad after the attack, as the Pentagon and the White House studied military options. When asked about Russian interference in the presidential election she lost as the Democratic candidate in November, Clinton called for a bipartisan investigation. “I don’t want any Republican candidate to be subjected to what I was subjected to....I don’t want anybody running campaigns to have their communications stolen,” she said. U.S. intelligence agencies have said that Russia provided hacked material from the Democratic National Committee to WikiLeaks through a third party. Russia has denied the hacking allegations. “It was a more effective theft even than Watergate,” Clinton told Kristof before an audience of about 3,000 people at New York’s Lincoln Center, referring to the U.S. political scandal of the 1970s that led to the resignation of President Richard Nixon. “We aren’t going to let somebody sitting in the Kremlin, with bots and trolls, try to mix up our election. We’ve got to end that and we have to make sure that is a bipartisan, American commitment.” Representative Devin Nunes, a Republican, earlier on Thursday stepped aside from the congressional inquiry into Russian meddling in the U.S. presidential election because he is under investigation for disclosing classified information. Representative Mike Conaway, the second-ranked Republican on the House of Representatives intelligence committee, will now lead the probe. Clinton attributed her White House loss to both Wikileaks and FBI Director James Comey’s sending a bombshell letter to Congress only days before the election announcing he was reinstating an investigation into her emails. Asked whether it was bittersweet to watch the stumbles of the Trump administration in its early days, she declined to agree. “I don’t take any pleasure in seeing the kind of chaotic functioning,” Clinton said. Clinton said she has no intention of another run for public office and said she is writing a book that, in part, delves into just what derailed her attempt to become America’s first woman president. “For people who are interested in this, the nearly 66 million people who voted for me, I want to give as clear and as credible an explanation as I can.” | 1 |
8,049 | OSCE watchdog slams Unites States, Russia for "foreign agent" media laws | VIENNA (Reuters) - The OSCE s media watchdog said on Thursday moves by the United States and Russia to force some foreign media to register as foreign agents were unacceptable and dangerous. Russia s lower house of parliament this week approved a law allowing Moscow to force foreign media to describe news they provide to Russians as the work of foreign agents and to disclose their funding sources. Earlier on Thursday Russia named nine U.S. government-sponsored news outlets likely to be labeled foreign agents . U.S. intelligence officials accuse the Kremlin of using Russian media organizations it finances to influence U.S. voters. Washington has required Russian state broadcaster RT to register a U.S.-based affiliate company as a foreign agent . Branding media entities as foreign agents is a dangerous practice, as it can narrow the space for freedom of the media, said Harlem Desir, media freedom chief of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). The OSCE, which also oversees election monitoring, is one of the few security forums which brings Russia and the United States to the same table. It has a 700-strong observer mission monitoring the conflict in Ukraine. I call on both the Unites States and the Russian Federation to reconsider and refrain from requiring media entities to register as foreign agents , Desir said in a statement, labeling both countries moves as not acceptable . The Kremlin denies meddling in the U.S. election and has said the restrictions on Russian broadcasters in the United States amount to an attack on free speech. The new media law in Russia is retaliation, it says. | 1 |
8,050 | State Dept. OKs possible sale of $1 billion in military vehicles to Britain | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. State Department has approved the possible sale to Britain of Joint Light Tactical Vehicles and accessories with an estimated worth of $1.035 billion, the Pentagon said on Monday. Britain has requested a possible sale of up to 2,747 of the vehicles, the Defense Security Cooperation Agency said in a statement. The principal contractor of this sale will be Oshkosh Corp unit Oshkosh Defense LLC, it said. | 1 |
8,051 | Trump says U.S. deal with Russia on Syria will save many lives | HANOI (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump said on Saturday that an agreement with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Syria would save many lives after the two met at a summit of Asia-Pacific leaders. We agreed very quickly, Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One as he flew from the APEC meeting in the resort city of Danang to Vietnam s capital Hanoi. It s going to save tremendous numbers of lives. The Kremlin earlier said Trump and Putin had agreed on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit that a political solution was needed on Syria and that they would continue efforts to fight Islamic State. We spoke intermittently during that roundtable. We seem to have a very good feeling for each other and a good relationship considering we don t know each other well, Trump said, adding that he and Putin had two or three very short conversations. Trump said Putin had reiterated that he did not meddle in last year s U.S. presidential elections, which brought Trump to the White House. Trump said a good relationship with Russia was important. In fact it would be a great thing ... because he could really help us in North Korea. We have a big problem with North Korea and China is helping us, Trump said. If Russia helped us in addition to China that problem would go away a lot faster. Trump said Chinese President Xi Jinping was a good man who wants to do right, but he wanted Xi to ratchet up more pressure on North Korea. | 1 |
8,052 | Delusional Obama On How Divided America Has Become: At least it’s not a Civil War [Video] | It turns out we re not as divided as people make us out to be Really? | 0 |
8,053 | Unlocking iPhone would leave millions exposed, Apple to tell Congress | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Unlocking an iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino shooters would leave hundreds of millions of Apple Inc (AAPL.O) device owners vulnerable to cybercriminals and other hackers, the company’s top lawyer is expected to tell U.S. lawmakers on Tuesday. In written testimony to the U.S. House of Representatives Judiciary Committee released on Monday, Apple General Counsel Bruce Sewell reiterated the tech giant’s stance that the FBI’s request to help access the phone “would set a dangerous precedent for government intrusion on the privacy and safety of its citizens.” | 1 |
8,054 | IRONY: Trump Calls Chelsea Manning A ‘Traitor’ For Criticizing President Obama, Get HUMILIATED By Twitter | Donald Trump s hypocrisy was thrown square into his face.For eight years, Trump and conservatives repeatedly called President Obama weak, not to mention just about every other negative word in the book.But now Trump has the gall to call someone a traitor for criticizing President Obama exactly the same way Trump criticized him all these years.Just before President Obama left office, he commuted the sentence of Chelsea Manning, an army whistle-blower who was sentenced to serve 25 years in prison for leaking classified documents.Manning has been a critic of Obama, but despite that, President Obama signed off on the commutation anyway. He didn t expect thanks or loyalty in return.But Trump says it is treason to not kiss a president s ass after the president does something nice for you, which gives us a glimpse of what he will expect when it comes time for him to issue pardons and commutations.Ungrateful TRAITOR Chelsea Manning, who should never have been released from prison, is now calling President Obama a weak leader. Terrible! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 26, 2017And Trump just revealed himself as a hypocrite since he has also called Obama weak several times in the past, and the Internet response was humiliating.@realDonaldTrump shut the fuck up talia jane (@itsa_talia) January 26, 2017@realDonaldTrump Just like you always have. The people know Obama. The people love Obama. Worry about America and not your ego. Tony Posnanski (@tonyposnanski) January 26, 2017@realDonaldTrump FYI pic.twitter.com/b7CJlZVDlO Simon Cullen (@Simon_Cullen) January 26, 2017@realDonaldTrump Yes, because having her sentence commuted means Manning should be 100% LOYAL and NEVER criticize Obama! Christoph Rehage (@crehage) January 26, 2017@realDonaldTrump Ur standing up for Obama?, never thought i d see the day after how you and your band of nazi warriors degraded him 8 years Diva (@sammypolsen12) January 26, 2017.@realDonaldTrump Notice Obama isn t tweeting about it? Sometimes you do the right thing without expecting praise. It s called leadership. Nick Jack Pappas (@Pappiness) January 26, 2017@realDonaldTrump Whistleblowers protect us from those who keep harmful secrets. Our next hero will be the one who gives us your tax returns. Nick Jack Pappas (@Pappiness) January 26, 2017@realDonaldTrump #alternativefacts pic.twitter.com/jghEFlN5Lr Lil Kim Ms. G.O.A.T (@killerbee805) January 26, 2017.@realDonaldTrump Well, you also called President Obama weak, does that make you a traitor too? Al x Young (@AlexYoung) January 26, 2017.@realDonaldTrump Let s work on getting your emotions under control when someone makes you mad. You re leader of the free world now, hun! Bess Kalb (@bessbell) January 26, 2017@realDonaldTrump haven t you called Obama a weak leader repeatedly on numerous occasions? AJ Joshi (@AJ) January 26, 2017By Donald Trump s own logic, he is also a traitor for repeatedly calling President Obama weak. And the way he is dismantling this country piece by piece, Trump should be arrested and charged for treason against America. The hypocrite would not last a day in prison.Featured image via Andrew Harrer-Pool/Getty Images | 0 |
8,055 | In 2017, America’s liberal abortion agenda looks a lot like Nazi Eugenics | 21st Century Wire says Here s an unusual, but extremely thought-provoking political take on the events of last week in Charlottesville in the context of America, and western society as a whole.What you are about to read will be considered very controversial by many people. This is an uncomfortable topic which generally no one enjoys talking about. Many readers may not want to hear it. You may not want to hear it either. It s a caustic conversation for sure. You might think the author is being over-dramatic, or maybe you won t But it s a discussion which at least half of America wants to have.The publication, The Blaze, touts itself as Christian conservative and regularly exaggerate and politicizes its content, and frequently applies a moralistic or evangelical spin to it. For those reasons, it would be convenient for some to simply dismiss the article below because of its source. However, the fundamental comparison presented should be seriously considered and really should be discussed more in mainstream forums. In 2017, any challenging commentary regarding the topic of abortion is fiercely opposed by progressive gatekeepers, and women s rights activists who will often cite the 1973 US Supreme Court decision of Roe vs Wade as a cue to end any debate on the issue. This subject is also suppressed in most public and academic forums and it s strictly off-limits in the liberal mainstream corporate media. But society cannot continually sweep this under the rug America has to have this conversation, because it goes to the heart of the question. What kind of society do we live in ? . By Matt WalshIt was interesting timing. On Monday, CBS published an article touting Iceland s miracle cure for Down syndrome. Iceland is on pace to virtually eliminate Down syndrome through abortion, the headline read. Of course, it leaves out an important word. Iceland is eliminating Down syndrome people not Down syndrome itself by killing anyone who has the condition. Many countries, including our own, have discovered an identical treatment plan.The next day, Oregon was the beneficiary of similarly sanitized headlines. The governor of Oregon signed legislation expanding reproductive health access, the media reported. But the reports are misleading. The law actually forces all residents in the state to pay for abortions for anyone who wants them, including illegal aliens. The bill has nothing at all to do with reproduction. Its goal is precisely to stop reproduction. Or at least to prevent the products of reproduction from ever seeing the light of day.I said the reports of these atrocities are interestingly timed because they come amidst a national panic over neo-Nazism. We are right to be disgusted and horrified by the few dozen white supremacist losers who carried Tiki torches through Charlottesville on Saturday. And we are right to demand justice for the woman who was killed by a skinhead terrorist during that same rally. But we are ridiculous for acting as if these racist nerds represent some threat to our national existence. Until there is even a shred of proof to the contrary, I am going to remain confident that the vast, vast, vast majority of our citizens do not sympathize with Nazism outright. Even one neo-Nazi is too many. A whole parade of them is a travesty. But we ought not lose our grip on reality. A little perspective is all I m suggesting.Now, the reader may have noted the conspicuous qualifier in the previous paragraph. The majority of our citizens do not sympathize with Nazism outright. Many, however, sympathize with some of the primary goals and most brutal tactics of the Nazi party. Though they may not think of it in those terms, they still celebrate the achievement of eliminating medical conditions by killing the babies who have it, and they applaud governments that expand reproductive health access by forcing helpless citizens to fund the mass extermination of human beings. They may not march through the streets waving swastikas around, but they look with indifference or approval at our own version of the Nazi death camp. Indeed, with all due respect to the skinheads who only play pretend Nazi, the spirit of the Nazi movement really lives on in the abortion industry. Planned Parenthood may not hang the Nazi flag on the doors of its clinics, but it has enough blood on its hands to impress even the most prolific concentration camp executioner.I made this point yesterday, and I was informed even by some conservative folk that it is utterly inappropriate and insensitive for me to make such comparisons, especially when a woman was just killed by a neo-Nazi. Well, I feel terribly for that woman s family and I hope for the swiftest and harshest judgment allowed under the law to be done upon her murderer. But I also feel terribly for the 17,000 or so human beings who were executed in abortion clinics since Saturday, and the 60 million who ve been exterminated since 1973. I don t think there is ever an inappropriate time to acknowledge them, particularly when so many of us have dedicated ourselves to never acknowledging them, and especially during a week when the very people who support the continued legalization and tax funding of abortion death camps are running around accusing everyone else of condoning Nazism.I m sorry, but I just cannot physically stomach a You should be more forceful in condemning Nazism lecture from someone who has spent the last 40 years demanding that we applaud while millions of people have their skulls crushed by abortionists. Even less can I tolerate someone who wants to protect the innocent by tearing down historical statues, but cries about human rights violations when someone vandalizes a building where actual human beings are butchered and sold for parts.I do not pretend that all of the political goals of the pro-abortion left line up completely with the political goals of Nazis in 1940 s Germany. There are some striking similarities particularly the politicization of public health, the focus on environmental conservation, and the total disregard for free speech but that is not the point. I say that abortion enthusiasts have the spirit of Nazism because that spirit is, more than anything, one of brutality, moral indifference, and absolute disregard for human life. It is a spirit that leads to mass exterminations and bloodshed on a scale that can hardly be fathomed. It is a spirit that compels a people to strive for collective perfection by killing the undesirables. Nazis exterminated the disabled, just as we do. And they killed Jews and Poles and Catholics and many other groups. Our focus is not racial cleansing but economic. We kill poor children, unwanted children, defective children; children who, we ve decided, will be more trouble than they re worth. They are a burden on society, we say, echoing Nazi propaganda almost verbatim.And we build facilities which we dedicate to carrying out this cleansing. The Nazi death camp was never abolished, you see. It was simply relocated and rebranded. Today we call it a reproductive health clinic, but what happens inside more closely resembles Auschwitz than it does your pediatrician s office.So, yes, speak out against those ridiculous bigots who ve latched onto Nazism in their desperate quest for purpose and attention. But if you want to oppose what they stand for, you need to look beyond them and towards that Planned Parenthood clinic you drive by every day on the way to work. And if those Nazi wannabes in Charlottesville intend to be the ones in our country who best emulate their Nazi role models, it must be said that they are lagging far behind, especially in terms of body counts. Right now the tally is about 60 million to one, last I checked.They have a lot of catching up to do.This article was originally published at The Blaze. To see more from Matt Walsh, visit his channel here.READ MORE ALT RIGHT NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire ALT RIGHT FilesSUPPORT 21WIRE SUBSCRIBE & BECOME A MEMBER @ 21WIRE.TV | 0 |
8,056 | Trump Team Getting Approval On White Nationalist Nominees From The Worst Lying Troll On The Web | There s a man who s been permanently banned from Twitter for threats and harassment, and was once known as the most hated man on the Internet, who s working behind the scenes to advise, and even approve of, some of Trump s nominees. That man is Charles Chuck Johnson (not to be confused with Little Green Footballs Charles Johnson), and he s used his platform to spread racist hate and outright lies.And Forbes reports that he s working to help pick Trump s administration.One of the least reputable, most hateful, vengeful trolls on the entire planet is helping Trump s transition team with various nominees. And not just any nominees the worst nominees. The far-right, white nationalist, anti-Semitic, misogynistic nominees. The ones known to be alt-right, which is the most laughable term for that crowd ever.Johnson fancies himself a debunker of frauds, but he s no stranger to lies and severely unethical behavior himself. He s the man who claimed that the Sony hack, which happened at the hands of North Korea, was actually an inside job. This is the man who tweeted that he needed help in taking out DeRay McKesson, which is what got him permanently banned (he claims he was just asking for info for reporting purposes, but the wording is highly suspicious).He has a history of relentlessly attacking, and even doxing, elitist journalists, left-wing activists, lying women and thuggish black men, and anyone he thinks has screwed him over in some way. You know, typical troll stuff that puts people in real-life danger.Johnson also worked for Steve Bannon at Breitbart, and Bannon is a known white nationalist. Bannon is the one that turned Breitbart from a heavily right-wing news site into a conspiracy site that pushes the white nationalist agenda. So, in a way, it makes sense that Johnson would be advising Trump s transition team.It was Johnson himself who first said that he was involved with vetting nominees, which sounds pretty far-fetched on the surface and could have been a way for him to puff himself up. Given his history of self-promotion, that wouldn t have been surprising.However, multiple sources close to Trump s team confirmed to Forbes that Johnson actually is working behind the scenes with the transition team, and possibly with people as high in the chain as Peter Thiel, who was one of Trump s biggest campaign donors (Johnson denies this).It is sick and disgusting that someone who s made a name for himself by spreading lies and doxing people is working on a presidential transition like this. It s also par for the course, which just makes us want to barf.Featured image via screen capture | 0 |
8,057 | HOLLYWOOD IS SECRETLY Throwing Their Support Behind Trump | American Psycho author, Bret Easton Ellis let the cat out of the bag on Twitter. Even the Hollywood millennials were coming out in support of Trump:And then there s this guy from the UK who says he s, genuinely scared that he [Trump] may become potus. Many on the thread (including 100% FED UP!) reminded this UK citizen he should be more concerned about the Islamization of the UK than a President Trump in the US: | 0 |
8,058 | natural tips to make your teeth sparkling white | keywords digestive enzymes heal hemorrhoids fast hemorrhoid recipe liver and hemorrhoids natural remedies for hemorrhoids heal hemorrhoids fast
you are not alone there are more than million reported cases per year in the usa alone hemorrhoids are often caused from straining during bowel movements obesity and are especially prevalent in pregnancy mild to excruciating discomfort is the number one symptom especially during bowel movements or when sitting other very unpleasant symptoms include itching and bleeding the older you get the more likely you are to experience them they are very rare in the under year age bracket common between and become very common for the over crowd hemorrhoids related to digestive problems
hemorrhoids are often a sign of inefficient digestion decreased liver function andor not having enough digestive enzymes to properly digest your food it can also indicate inflammation in the small intestines hemorrhoids occur when the bowel and liver are stagnate symptoms become apparent due to swollen and inflamed veins around the anus and rectum sorry this can be caused by chronic constipation straining and putting pressure on the lower bowel
during digestion we produce enzymes in our mouth and stomach which break down the foods and help to absorb nutrients when enzymes are not sufficient to break foods down it sits in the stomach and ferments this leads to gas bloating and fermentation liver health is crucial to prevention
the liver is most active between am when it is processing wastes cleansing eliminating lymphatic drainage and regenerating if the liver is not working optimally due to health issues allergies drug side effects or poor eating habits then it may be overtaxed
often people will wake up during the time the liver is most active am and feel thirsty and hot because the liver is working over time so this can be why you get up nightly to get a drink of water how to heal hemorrhoids fast
step optimize liver and kidney function consider taking an all natural electrolyte powder supplement which can be added to water these powders are available in health food stores and contain the basic electrolytes sodium potassium magnesium and calcium make sure they dont contain artificial colors or other unhealthy additives
increase your fluid intake throughout the day especially if you exercise and lose hydration through sweat eating right for prevention eat smaller meals a day rather than large ones limit sugar salt tea coffee alcohol and soda in the morning drink a z glass of warm water with teaspoon apple cider vinegar tsp honey and either fresh lemon juice or drops of high quality lemon essential oil lemon increases digestive juices cleanses the bowels and helps the liver to detoxify lemon also has the ability to clean out the diverticuli pockets in the bowels and reduce stagnation hydrate well to preventing drying out the bowels which can cause constipation eat greens such as radicchio and endive to promote digestion drink peppermint dandelion burdock or chamomile herbal teas add healthy oils into your diet including avocados fish oil virgin olive oil flaxseed oil nuts and seeds these are all good lubricants allowing stools to pass more easily add vegetables fruits and other healthy fibrous foods avoid drinking liquids minutes before or after eating to avoid diluting digestive enzymes cut down on wheat dairy processed and refined foods as well as excessively spicy foods additional preventative measures
consider doing a gentle liver detoxification and overall cleanse every months to promote better digestion and keep your bowels moving properly probiotics can help the digestive tract balance of good flora as bloating is often contributed to fermentation constipation and inflammation which lead to hemorrhoids and bowel issues taking slippery elm supplements before meals can be helpful as well as taking vitamin c bioflavinoids rutin and magnesium supplements may reduce hemorrhoids and cleanse the bowel heal hemorrhoids fast recipe add drops each of lavender and tea tree melaleuca essential oil tbs of fractionated or melted virgin coconut oil place these in a small glass container like a oz mason jar
for each application to the affected area take a cotton makeup remover pad and dampen with water before use squeeze excess water and then dip into your remedy jar wipe with this soothing mixture after each time you use the restroom and you will get instant relief and often clear up the issue in less than hours you can heal hemorrhoids fast
sammy clove is a freelance writer aromatherapist and writes for morocco all natural hair method you can visit her blog at allnaturalhealthreviewsorg please share heal hemorrhoids fast so your friends can thank you you might also like | 0 |
8,059 | Paris climate deal cannot be renegotiated: EU Commissioner | BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The Paris climate agreement cannot be renegotiated as U.S. President Donald Trump has suggested it can, European Commissioner for Climate Miguel Arias Canete said on Friday. “The agreement is fit for purpose. The Paris agreement is here to stay and the 29 articles of the Paris agreement are not to be renegotiated,” he told reporters after a meeting with his Chinese counterpart. Trump said during his announcement on Thursday of a U.S. withdrawal from the pact, that his administration would begin negotiations either to re-enter the Paris accord or to have a new agreement “on terms that are fair to the United States”. Canete also said that the EU would seek a partnership with U.S. companies or states that supported the Paris agreement. | 1 |
8,060 | Glitch briefly removes 'Muslim ban' proposal from Trump website | NEW YORK (Reuters) - Some of the most controversial proposals Donald Trump made while running for U.S. president disappeared from his campaign website on Thursday, but a spokesman said what some observers took as a softening of Trump’s policies was due to a technical glitch. The link to Trump’s Dec. 7 proposal titled: “Donald J. Trump statement on Preventing Muslim Immigration,” in which he called for “a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States” vanished temporarily from the website but later reappeared. So too did a list of Trump’s potential Supreme Court justice picks as president and certain details of his economic, defense and regulatory reform plans. “The website was temporarily redirecting all specific press release pages to the home page,” Trump spokesman Steven Cheung said in an email. Links to Trump’s policy proposals, including the Muslim ban, were working again by 3:30 p.m. EST (2030 GMT). The links, which had redirected readers to a campaign fundraising page, appeared to have been removed around Election Day on Tuesday, when Trump won a historic upset against Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, according to a website that records historic snapshots of web pages. In an appearance on CNBC on Thursday, Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal praised Trump for removing the Muslim ban proposal from his website and also said Trump had deleted statements offensive to Muslims from his Twitter account. The prince could not be reached for comment after the links were restored. Several tweets attacking Muslims that Trump sent while campaigning for president remained in his feed on Thursday, including a March 22 tweet in which Trump wrote: “Incompetent Hillary, despite the horrible attack in Brussels today, wants borders to be weak and open-and let the Muslims flow in. No way!” After initially praising the removal of the Muslim ban proposal at a news conference with other civil rights leaders on Thursday, Samer Khalaf, president of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, said in a follow-up interview the group was hoping to see better behavior from Trump. “False hope just came over us,” Khalaf said, but “we didn’t really think it was monumental that they took down the language.” Khalaf said Trump’s policies were more important than any statements. “He’s elected, he said some horrible things, now we have to see what his policies are. If they’re good policies we’re going to commend him for it. If they’re horrible policies we’re going to challenge him on it.” Despite the temporary glitch, most of Trump’s core policy positions had remained on his website, including his central immigration promise to build an “impenetrable physical wall” on the border with Mexico and make Mexico pay for its construction. It was not the first time the Trump campaign blamed technical difficulties for changes to its website. The campaign this year also replaced the part of the site describing Trump’s healthcare policy with a different version. When contacted about it by Reuters in September, the campaign put the original page back up. | 1 |
8,061 | LIBERAL RAGS LIKE USA TODAY Working Overtime To Destroy Trump…Here’s Proof Americans Aren’t Listening | IF YOU HAVEN T FIGURED IT OUT YET THE LIBERAL MAIN STREAM MEDIA IS WORKING OVERTIME TO LITERALLY DESTROY TRUMP The American people are rebelling against the lies and distortions from liberal rags like USA Today and other local news organizations. In this day of social media pushing the news, it s great that people can get the truth from other sources like Twitter or Facebook.Trump now leads in Nevada, Colorado, Iowa, Ohio and North Carolina all states Barack Obama won his first term according to Real Clear Politics averages. THEY TRY TO DESCRIBE TRUMP BUT END UP DESCRIBING HILLARY CLINTON TO A TEE! IT S HYSTERICAL!WHO MAKES UP THESE EDITORIAL BOARDS ANYWAY?It didn t go so far as to endorse Hillary Clinton or, for that matter, libertarian Gary Johnson but what USA Today wrote Thursday night about Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump made it clear who the publication s editorial board does not, under any circumstance, want in the White House next year.In its 34 years of existence, USA Today has had a no-endorsement policy. In a historic first that breaks 34 years of tradition, the board decided this election season to revisit its no-endorsement policy then threw it out and penned a scathing critique of the GOP nominee that read more like an anti-endorsement.Trump, they wrote, is unfit for the presidency. From the day he declared his candidacy 15 months ago through this week s first presidential debate, Trump has demonstrated repeatedly that he lacks the temperament, knowledge, steadiness and honesty that America needs from its presidents, the board wrote. Whether through indifference or ignorance, Trump has betrayed fundamental commitments made by all presidents since the end of World War II. THIS DESCRIBES HILLARY TO A TEE:The editorial calls him her erratic, ill-equipped to be commander in chief and a serial liar. Via: WaPo | 0 |
8,062 | Togo leader must quit now for protests to stop: opposition head | DAKAR/LOME (Reuters) - The leader of Togo s main opposition alliance said on Friday that President Faure Gnassingbe must quit power immediately or protests against his family s 50-year ruling dynasty would continue. Thousands of people have taken to the streets in the past three days to demand that Gnassingbe step aside, in the most serious challenge to his family s stranglehold on power since the death of his father in 2005. Police used tear gas to disperse protesters who were burning tires in Lome s opposition stronghold of Be on Friday, a Reuters correspondent said. He has to leave now. We will not accept him staying on any longer, Jean-Pierre Fabre, head of the National Alliance for Change, told Reuters by telephone. The Togolese are tired ... We will continue to protest. It was not immediately possible to reach Gnassingbe s office. Text messages and phone calls were restricted and the internet has suffered outages. A short government statement on state TV merely acknowledged the protests and said that 10 people had been injured in them, of which eight were security forces and two protesters. But unrest was less widespread than in previous days and traffic had resumed in some areas of the seaside capital amid a heavy police and paramilitary presence. By evening there were no further reports of protests, which seemed to have died down, a Reuters witness said. The president s father Gnassingbe Eyadema seized power in a coup in 1967 and ruled for 38 years before his death. In response to protests, he introduced a 1992 constitution that brought in notional multi-party democracy and limited presidential terms to two. Ten years later, lawmakers scrapped the term limit so Eyadema could run for another term. When he died in 2005, the military installed his son instead of the national assembly head as was legally required, triggering protests in which at least 500 people were killed. Fabre, a French-educated former economics lecturer and newspaper editor, lost to Gnassingbe in disputed presidential polls in 2010 and 2015. He told Reuters that another election would not be fair unless major reforms were made. Gnassingbe s government this week sought to appease its opponents by tabling a draft bill to reform the constitution and reintroduce a two-term limit, but opposition leaders reject it because it could still enable Gnassingbe to rule until 2030. The president, who has encouraged investment to try to turn his tiny nation into a business, banking and shipping hub modeled on Singapore or Dubai, has a mandate due to expire in 2020. But Fabre said even that was too late for him to leave. We can t accept that. This is a question of liberty, he said. The resistance is now organizing itself ... We are very numerous. The U.N. Special Representative for West Africa and the Sahel Mohamed Ibn Chambas urged Togo to respond to people s legitimate expectations . He also called on all parties to preserve peace and security . Chambas, who met with Gnassingbe on Thursday, has delayed his departure and is staying in Togo for further discussions, his spokesman said. I remain convinced that all parties want to move forward on the reforms ... in order to reach a consensus to respond to the legitimate expectations of the Togolese people, Chambas said in a statement. Since Gambian autocrat Yahya Jammeh was forced out after losing an election last December, West African countries have become unanimous in accepting two terms as the limit on presidential office the only exception being Togo. Security forces appear to have avoided bloodshed so far this week, but Amnesty International condemned security forces for firing tear gas at and beating peaceful protesters, and for an unjustified attack on internet freedom. | 1 |
8,063 | Hillary’s Campaign Account Hasn’t Tweeted Since Nov. 7, And Now It’s BEAUTIFULLY Trolling Donald Trump | Trump and his minions and cronies twist reality so badly it s amazing they can even see straight enough to write anything pretty much anywhere. Yesterday, and into today, Trump has been going on about being investigated and screaming about why Hillary Clinton and the Democrats aren t. Today, one of Hillary s campaign accounts, @TheBriefing2016, decided to troll Trump a little over this. Their last tweet is dated Nov. 7, 2016.And it s absolutely glorious. It pokes Trump over the fact that he s under investigation for obstruction of justice, and possibly for other crimes that may include collusion with Russia. This is what they did:??? pic.twitter.com/uGXCchcW08 The Briefing (@TheBriefing2016) June 15, 2017They know the answer is yes, he s still here, unfortunately. He still has a White House full of possible Russian agents (possibly including himself), he s still trying to claim that he s completely innocent and all the facts point that way, and he s still generally making a fool of himself over both his fake news nonsense and his smear campaign against his enemies. Two days ago, the Washington Post broke the story that Special Counsel Mueller is actively investigating Trump for obstruction of justice over his decision to fire James Comey just as the FBI s Russia investigation began escalating. Trump has called the Post fake news many times, and in his diatribe from yesterday and into today, he basically admitted that they re telling the truth about the investigation.Furthermore, one Democratic Congressman has drawn up an article of impeachment against Trump as well. The charge? Obstruction of justice.The funny thing is that the GOP keeps saying Trump had no intent of impeding the FBI s investigation when he s basically admitted otherwise. Paul Ryan also made sorry excuses about he didn t know when responding to Comey s testimony about his termination and his conversations with Trump during the time he served as FBI Director.We re pretty sure most of the rest of us would get convicted and thrown in jail if we said, Sorry, I didn t know, after breaking the law, because ignorance of the law generally isn t seen as a valid excuse. But Trump, because he s a Republican president and the Republicans are desperate right now, gets away with everything.Yes, he s still here. We re hoping that doesn t last too much longer.Featured image via Jason Kempin and Sean Gallup/Getty Images | 0 |
8,064 | the character assassination of baseball legend ty cobb | cop fired after shooting own yearold daughter at a halloween party home breaking news breaking podesta told mills dump all those emails on day news of clintons private email server broke breaking podesta told mills dump all those emails on day news of clintons private email server broke jay syrmopoulos november comment
washington dc in what could prove to be the proverbial nail in the coffin of hillary clintons presidential ambitions an email released by wikileaks this morning the th batch of emails from clinton campaign chair john podesta reveals potential criminal intent to violate a court order for subpoenaed documents
john podesta sent the message only hours after the new york times reported that clinton might have violated federal records requirements by using the server according to the latest batch of podesta emails released by wikileaks
the email in question sent by podesta on march reveals the clinton campaign chair directing cheryl mills hillarys attorney and chief of staff to destroy emails that had already been subpoenaed
the email exchange between podesta and mills came suspiciously on the same day that news broke regarding clintons use of a private email server
after news of clintons private email server became public podesta wrote to mills not to sound like lanny but we are going to have to dump all those emails so better to do so sooner than later podesta told mills mills responded think you just got your new nick name
it doesnt take a rocket scientist to figure out exactly what podesta meant by dump the emails when taking into account the fact that this was transpiring just as news of the private server was breaking what this email does is provide insight into the coverup process and exposes a willful intent to break the law additionally it reveals exactly how swiftly the clinton camp moved to obscure the truth from both investigators and the public alike
according to a report by the new york post
in december hillary clinton now the democratic presidential nominee turned over about pages of workrelated email to the state department but that fact wasnt revealed until the times reported on her use of the private server
on march a week after the podestamills exchange clinton addressed the email scandal and announced she had deleted about personal emails
the emails reference to lanny is likely in reference to lawyer lanny davis who served as special counsel to thenpresident bill clinton as well as spokesperson for the president and the white house on matters regarding campaignfinance investigations and other legal issues
interestingly zero hedge reports that a search for lanny davis reveals a suspicious exchange between clinton campaign manager robby mook and podesta from march just days after the above mentioned exchange in which mook tells podesta
we gotta zap lanny out of our universe cant believe he committed her to a private review of her hard drive on tv
hillarys team was apparently upset that bill clintons special counsel was engaging in a transparent course of action and moved to zap lanny out of our universe
while it isnt clearly spelled out exactly which emails podesta is referring to in his email the fact that he wrote better do so sooner than later on the day news broke publicly regarding clintons email server strongly indicates that the actions were a responsive measure meant to obscure any investigation into the matter
clintons entire narrative regarding her private email server has seemingly unraveled and her methodical plan to strategically impede the state departmentfbi investigation by deleting the evidence is now on full display for the public to see
hopefully wikileaks next upcoming podesta email dumps can provide even further context to this already damning email of course hillarys spin doctors are hard at work thinking up a new narrative to work around this latest revelation regarding the willful attempt by clintons team to usurp a federal investigation
mainstream media is trying to censor this information so please share this story to overcome corporate censorship and to expose the truth share google t mohr
thank god the whole lot of them will go down together liers the lot of them proven today | 1 |
8,065 | Democrats grill U.S. high court nominee over Trump concerns | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch said on Wednesday presidents must obey court orders and expressed uncertainty about language in the Constitution barring U.S. government officials from taking payments from a foreign country as Democrats grilled him on issues involving President Donald Trump. Gorsuch, the conservative appeals court judge from Colorado nominated by Trump on Jan. 31 to a lifetime job on the nation’s highest court, sparred with Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats on the third day of his confirmation hearing. He completed his testimony on Wednesday night. The committee will complete its deliberations on Thursday by hearing testimony from outside witnesses. Gorsuch seems assured of winning committee approval, moving his nomination to the full Republican-led Senate. His challenge then would be to gather enough Democratic votes to avoid a prolonged floor fight with the potential, if it gets rocky, of changing how the Senate works. While Gorsuch’s confirmation process looked to be proceeding smoothly, Democrats pressed him on matters swirling around Trump, even asking him about the standards for impeachment. Gorsuch’s expected Senate confirmation would restore a conservative majority on the court and hand the Republican president his biggest achievement in office. Senator Patrick Leahy cited comments by Trump adviser Stephen Miller after courts blocked the president’s executive action temporarily banning people from several Muslim-majority nations from entering the United States. On Feb. 12, Miller challenged the authority of courts to rule on the issue, saying the president’s power to enforce the ban should not be questioned. “I’m a judge now. I take that seriously. And you better believe I expect judicial decrees to be obeyed,” Gorsuch said. “That’s the rule of law in this country,” Gorsuch added. Gorsuch declined to say how he would approach an alleged violation of the U.S. Constitution’s Emoluments Clause, which prevents American officials from accepting any gifts or favors from foreign governments without congressional approval. “The question is: What exactly does that mean?” Gorsuch said, noting there was ongoing litigation on the matter. “I have to be very careful about expressing any views.” Trump has been sued by ethics lawyers, who say his businesses have accepted payments from foreign governments in violation of the Emoluments Clause. On the basis for which an official can be impeached, Gorsuch said historically the focus had been on “high crimes” rather than “misdemeanors.” He said the number of criminal misdemeanors on the books had increased substantially since the U.S. Constitution was written in the 18th century. A unanimous ruling on Wednesday by the Supreme Court justices whom Gorsuch would join, if confirmed, rejected legal reasoning he used as an appellate judge in a 2008 ruling against an autistic child who sought a public education more tailored to his needs. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of another autistic student who argued he was denied an adequate education. Democrats have called Gorsuch’s earlier decision an example of how he rules against everyday Americans while favoring corporate interests, an assertion the nominee and his Republicans supporters reject. Gorsuch said he was bound by court precedent in the 2008 decision, adding it would be “heartbreaking” to suggest he would like ruling against disabled students. He sidestepped answering whether he thought a series of contentious past cases had been decided correctly, including those on abortion, gun rights, political spending and religious rights. “What worries me is you have been very much able to avoid any specificity, like no one I have every seen before,” Senator Dianne Feinstein, the panel’s top Democrat, told Gorsuch. Feinstein asked Gorsuch to explain a document dating from his work in former President George W. Bush’s Justice Department related to 2005 anti-torture restrictions. The document asked whether aggressive interrogation techniques used by Bush’s administration had yielded valuable intelligence or stopped a terrorist incident, and Gorsuch had written “yes.” Gorsuch said he was merely doing what he was told by the administration. “My recollection of 12 years ago is that was the position that the clients were telling us,” he said. Feinstein expressed concern about women’s rights and preserving legalized abortion, and asked Gorsuch about his views as an “originalist” seeing the Constitution’s meaning as unaltered since its enactment despite centuries of societal change. “No one is looking to return us to horse-and-buggy days,” Gorsuch said. Regarding the Constitution’s promise of equal protection under the law, Gorsuch said it did not matter that some of the drafters of the language “were racists, because they were, or sexists, because they were.” Republicans hold 52 seats in the 100-member Senate. The Senate has a 60-vote hurdle for confirmation of Supreme Court justices, meaning Gorsuch would need backing by eight Democrats. If Democrats stand together, Republicans could change Senate rules to allow confirmation by a simple majority vote. A committee vote is expected on April 3. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell has said Gorsuch would be confirmed before lawmakers’ mid-April recess. If confirmed, Gorsuch would replace conservative Justice Antonin Scalia, who died in February 2016. | 1 |
8,066 | U.N. extends Syria round to Dec. 15, presidency not yet on table | GENEVA (Reuters) - The United Nations said on Thursday that it was extending a round of Syria talks in Geneva until Dec. 15 aimed at shaping a political solution to end the war, but that the presidency had not yet been discussed. U.N. mediator Staffan de Mistura said that the talks would focus in particular on a new constitution and U.N.-supervised parliamentary and presidential elections, as well as on 12 core principles that he declined to enumerate. We have not discussed the issue of the presidency. We have been discussing the 12 principles. You will see they are of a broad nature but they have an impact on everything in the future constitution, he told a news conference. These are essential because they do refer to what could be a shared vision of the kind of Syria that the Syrians want to live in, he said. Syria s opposition has always said that President Bashar al-Assad must step down, but his negotiators have refused to discuss the issue, and his recent successes on the battlefield have strengthened his hand. I want to believe that that issue should come up from the Syrians through U.N.-supervised elections, de Mistura said. With more than two weeks ahead, the round was effectively just beginning, he said, noting that the government negotiators had arrived late and might take a few days out to consult and refresh in Damascus before returning to Geneva around Tuesday. On Thursday he began shuttling between the two sides, installed in separate rooms off the same corridor, but he said having contact in person was less important than meeting on the substance, and the atmosphere was professional and serious on both sides. He said the talks had solid diplomatic backing, with recent support from Russian President Vladimir Putin, U.S. President Donald Trump, and Assad, as well as a telephone call from U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson at the start of the round. The defeat of Islamic State in its main strongholds in Syria had also produced a moment of truth . All this takes place against quite a backdrop. It s just not a normal round of talks, de Mistura said. Have you seen how people are talking to each other, how those who were involved in the conflict for the first time are taking positions that are in the direction of a political dialogue? And for the first time in eight rounds of Syria talks presided over by de Mistura, the opposition is represented by a unified negotiating team, raising the possibility of direct talks between the two sides. | 1 |
8,067 | House seen passing Russia sanctions bill limiting Trump's power | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. House of Representatives is expected to vote overwhelmingly on Tuesday for a bill that would slap new sanctions on Russia, Iran and North Korea, potentially complicating President Donald Trump’s hopes of pursuing improved relations with Moscow. The bipartisan measure aims to punish Russia for its 2014 annexation of Crimea from Ukraine and for alleged interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. The measure’s fate in the Senate is uncertain after a key senator said the deal announced over the weekend may not be final. Republican Senator Bob Corker, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, told reporters that negotiators had a “very good weekend” but any announcement “seemed somewhat premature.” “We’re about there, there’s still some procedural issues we’re discussing but, you know, I think it worked out very, very well. We’ve still got a couple of things to talk about on North Korea,” Corker said. If the Republican-led Senate passes the measure, Trump will need to decide whether to sign the bill or veto it. Rejecting it would carry a risk that his veto could be overridden by lawmakers. The Trump administration has objected to a provision in the sanctions bill that the president obtain congressional approval before easing any sanctions on Moscow. “He’s going to study that legislation and see what the final product looks like,” White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders told reporters on Monday, when asked whether Trump would support it. An earlier version of the bill, including sanctions on Russia and Iran, passed the Senate by 98-2 on June 15. A North Korea sanctions bill passed the House by 419-1 in May and House lawmakers were becoming increasingly impatient with the Senate’s failure to take up that legislation. House members saw the Iran and Russia sanctions bill as a chance to finally get the North Korea measure through the Senate. Trump’s relationship with Russia has been an issue during the first six months of his presidency as investigations continue into whether his associates colluded with Russian hackers to influence the election on his behalf. Russia denies interfering in the U.S. election. Trump has denied his campaign colluded with Moscow, calling the probes politically motivated and repeatedly criticizing them. In a series of tweets early on Tuesday, Trump lashed out at both U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Andrew McCabe, acting director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Without offering evidence, Trump cited “Ukrainian efforts to sabotage” his presidential campaign in order to aid his former Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton. Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and senior White House adviser, will visit Capitol Hill for a second straight day to be interviewed about his contacts with Russian officials during the 2016 campaign and the presidential transition. Trump on Tuesday praised Kushner, saying he had done “very well yesterday in proving he did not collude with the Russians.” | 1 |
8,068 | unescos antiisrael bias | hillary clinton hits unfavorability high of higher than trump october
remember last week when hillary clinton was shopping around for white house drapes and the popular wisdom was that she was inevitable that was fun wasnt it now she hit an unfavorability rating high of percent thats higher than trump
it also means that the candidate who claims shes going to bring americans together is disliked by most of the country
clinton is seen unfavorably by percent of likely voters in the latest results a new high trump is seen unfavorably by essentially as many percent marking the depth of these views percent see clinton strongly unfavorably and percent say the same about trump unusual levels of strong sentiment
the extent of partisan antipathy in this poll produced for abc by langer research associates is remarkable ninetyseven percent of trump supporters see clinton unfavorably percent strongly so ninetyfive percent of clinton supporters see trump unfavorably again percent strongly so
but remember hillary is inevitable
now the clinton campaign has decided to go after the fbi under the assumption that people like hillary more than the fbi that may be a slight misjudgment and by slight i mean huge because not only is the fbi more popular than hillary so are major landfills ufo cattle mutilations and a number of international war criminals | 1 |
8,069 | MAJOR Trump Donor Says Rape is Just ‘Regret’ | Very few people with significant money or power in this country are voting for Donald Trump. Even the Koch brothers are publicly backing off supporting the toxic, self-described billionaire. One Silicon Valley billionaire is happy to be on the Trump train, even after the allegations of sexual assault surfaced. Perhaps that s because PayPal cofounder Peter Thiel, who is also a Facebook investor and a $1.25 million Trump donor, doesn t really think sexual assault is a big deal.In 1995, Thiel wrote a book called The Diversity Myth: Multiculturalism and Political Intolerance on Campus. If you think that sounds like a Trump-esque screed against political correctness, you d be right.The book isn t just about saying offensive words or about cultural appropriation. According to The Guardian s article on it, Thiel complained that in many cases, complaints of date rape were just regret by the victims.In a case about a 17-year-old Stanford freshman who said she was raped in a dorm room while drunk, Thiel and his cowriter and PayPal partner, David O. Sacks, wrote: Although [the alleged perpetrator] was clearly guilty of serving alcohol to an underage woman and taking advantage of her resulting lack of judgement, there was no sexual assault Understandably, however, the woman regretted the whole incident afterwards. This argument has never made sense to me. In rape cases, the benefit of the doubt always goes with the accused rapist. A rape victim opens herself up to slander, to character assassination and to accusations exactly like the one above. Wouldn t the more logical response to regret to be to deny it ever happened?Thiel also believes that rape necessarily involves physical injuries, which would mean that those influenced by date rape drugs would likely have no claim, at least in his perfect world. It is ludicrous to believe that anyone who had been forcefully violated would not know it and bear physical marks. Then, there s this, because you know, men are always the victims: The purpose of the rape crisis movement seems as much about vilifying men as about raising awareness.' Thiel s book, as described in The Guardian, goes on to complain about the many ways whites, and white men in particular, are victimized and vilified in this country. Is it any wonder he is supporting Donald Trump?Featured image by Alex Wong via Getty Images. | 0 |
8,070 | Madeleine Albright SLAMS Trump For Muslim Ban, Makes STUNNING Suggestion That Could Save Us All (VIDEO) | Donald Trump s executive order to ban travelers from Muslim-majority countries has been met with an onslaught of criticism.One of the people continuing to speak out against Trump is former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who slammed Trump in an interview with Chris Cuomo earlier today. Criticizing Trump s ban and the team that helped move it forward, Albright made a suggestion that could save America from this doomed, terrifying presidency: It would be helpful if the people at the top of our government actually read the Constitution. Because clearly, Trump knows nothing about it. Albright smacked down Trump s unprepared plan , stating that what he was doing was actually putting America in danger instead of making America Safe Again. She said: It has actually created more danger. Because there are countries that are now, in fact, not able to cooperate with us in terms of intelligence sharing or generally mistrust, and there s going to be tit for tat, where we have troops in Iraq and we have to worry how they are going to be treated. Albright also stated that Trump created chaos and turmoil not only within the U.S., but on an international level as well. I think it s one of the worst decisions. And then blaming a whole religion for this is truly outrageous and un-American. I think the question is, there s danger in the world, no question about it, but all the facts that you have been presenting in terms of who are the ones that commit terrorist attacks, it s not people that come from those seven countries. Albright posed the critical question: why weren t the countries that are actually a danger on the banned list? She stated that Trump s ban was not based on facts because no refugee has actually attacked the U.S. in over 40 years. Trump didn t even put the countries that the 9/11 hijackers came from on the list. Albright said: There are lots of questions that have not been answered. Part of what really bothers me is that this country is based on diversity and respecting diverse opinions. What is happening is that this administration is making decisions based on the decisions of people that are uninformed about what is going on in the world. Albright herself was a refugee, having escaped then-Czechoslovakia shortly after Nazi occupation started. Her parents were Jewish and she lost many family members due to the Holocaust. Albright condemned Trump for leaving Jews out of his Holocaust Remembrance Day proclamation. She said: I think that it was really unbelievable, in terms of what day it was issued, on Holocaust Memorial Day, and not to understand the suffering. By the way, that one of the things people remember about the United States is that during the 1930s a ship of Jews was turned away from America. Is that the things we want to remember is how we turn people away from this country when they need help? You can watch Albright crush Trump below:Just a few days ago, Albright stood in solidarity with Muslims and said she was ready to register as Muslim. We need more voices like Albright s to fight the tyranny that America has just come under.Featured image via Jessica Kourkounis / Getty Images | 0 |
8,071 | Brazil's Temer sent for tests, treatment for urinary obstruction | SAO PAULO (Reuters) - Brazilian President Michel Temer went to an army hospital on Wednesday for tests and treatment after his doctor identified a urinary obstruction causing him pain, the presidential office said in a written statement. | 1 |
8,072 | One-time Trump adviser Page to meet businessmen, politicians in Moscow: RIA | MOSCOW (Reuters) - Carter Page, previously described as a foreign-policy adviser to U.S. president-elect Donald Trump, has arrived in Moscow to meet with businessmen and politicians, RIA News agency reported on Thursday. “I am going to meet with influential businessmen and thought leaders,” RIA quoted Page as saying. | 1 |
8,073 | FL Pastor ‘Accidentally’ Shoots Wife In The Head While Cleaning Gun | According to Pastor Darrell Reid, he was cleaning his gun inside the home he shared with his wife of 35 years on Monday, when the gun accidentally went off, shooting her in the head.Reid s wife, Katie, was rushed to Apopka Hospital, where she was pronounced dead a short time later.According to the Christian Post, the couple met when they were 12 years old. They ran a church called Happy Hill Ministries out of their home, located in Zellwood, Florida.It appears that the couple s outward appearance of happiness wasn t quite the reality.WKMG reports that police were called to the pastor s home on 23 separate occasions over the past three years.Reid was arrested multiple times for violent crimes. According to WKMG, the pastor was most recently charged with aggravated battery with a deadly weapon, but the charge was never prosecuted. He was also charged with resisting a police officer with violence in 2012. That charge was also never prosecuted.WKMG reports:A close family friend who didn t want to be identified told News 6 the couple had a violent relationship.Reid s attorney, on the other hand, told the Orlando Sentinel that the couple seemed very close, noting that they always came to court together. A neighbor said that while he couldn t imagine that Reid intentionally killed his wife, he also has a hard time understanding how you can accidentally shoot someone while cleaning a gun.Judging from his criminal background, Reid was someone who should never have been allowed to posses a gun. Police had been called to the couple s home almost two dozen times. He was charged with multiple violent crimes, yet his status as a white, Christian minister no doubt helped him walk away from those crimes unpunished, time and time again.According to the website smartgunlaws.org:Florida law does not explicitly authorize or require the removal or surrender of firearms at the scene of a domestic violence incident.Police are currently investigating the accidental shooting death of 62-year-old Katie Reid.In the meantime, Darrell Reid remains free and likely in possession of a gun.Featured image via Happy Hill Ministries | 0 |
8,074 | MEDIA IGNORES Time That Bill Clinton FIRED His FBI Director On Day Before Vince Foster Was Found Dead | In its 109-year history, only one F.B.I. director had been fired until Tuesday, when President Trump fired James B. Comey. In July 1993, President Bill Clinton fired William S. Sessions, who had been nominated to the post by President Ronald Reagan in 1987. Mr. Clinton said his attorney general, Janet Reno, reviewed Mr. Sessions s leadership and concluded in no uncertain terms that he can no longer effectively lead the bureau. Mr. Sessions had been cited for ethical lapses, including taking free trips on F.B.I. aircraft and using government money to build a $10,000 fence at his home. Mr. Sessions was asked to resign, and was fired when he refused to do so. Despite the president s severe tone, he seemed to regret having to force Mr. Sessions from his post, The New York Times wrote about his dismissal:WASHINGTON, July 19 President Clinton today dismissed William S. Sessions, the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, who had stubbornly rejected an Administration ultimatum to resign six months after a harsh internal ethics report on his conduct.Mr. Clinton said he would announce his nominee to replace Mr. Sessions on Tuesday. He was expected to pick Judge Louis J. Freeh of Federal District Court in Manhattan; officials said Judge Freeh had impressed Mr. Clinton favorably on Friday at their first meeting.Mr. Clinton, explaining his reasons for removing Mr. Sessions, effective immediately, said, We cannot have a leadership vacuum at an agency as important to the United States as the F.B.I. It is time that this difficult chapter in the agency s history is brought to a close. Defiant to the EndBut in a parting news conference at F.B.I. headquarters after Mr. Clinton s announcement, a defiant Mr. Sessions his right arm in a sling as a result of a weekend fall railed at what he called the unfairness of his removal, which comes nearly six years into his 10-year term. Because of the scurrilous attacks on me and my wife of 42 years, it has been decided by others that I can no longer be as forceful as I need to be in leading the F.B.I. and carrying out my responsibilities to the bureau and the nation, he said. It is because I believe in the principle of an independent F.B.I. that I have refused to voluntarily resign. Mr. Clinton said that after reviewing Mr. Sessions s performance, Attorney General Janet Reno had advised him that Mr. Sessions should go. After a thorough review by the Attorney General of Mr. Sessions s leadership of the F.B.I., she has reported to me in no uncertain terms that he can no longer effectively lead the bureau. Similarly, Mr. Trump fired Mr. Comey on the recommendation of his attorney general, Jeff Sessions. (No relation to William S. Sessions.) There are no United States statutes that discuss the president s authority to remove the F.B.I. director. NYT s Vince Foster: What the Media Won t Tell You Major media outlets reported Wednesday on the Supreme Court hearing of California lawyer Allan Favish s case that government photographs of Vincent Foster s death scene be released for public viewing. The media report that no fewer than five investigations have found that Foster committed suicide because he was depressed. But despite 10 years of denial by the major media, the Foster case has not closed as the Supreme Court hearing Wednesday demonstrated. The case won t close because of the failure of authorities to make full disclosure and to conduct a full investigation into the case, including a complete autopsy.Vince Foster was not only deputy White House counsel but also the personal attorney to Bill and Hillary Clinton.On the night of Foster s death, top Clinton aides made a frantic effort to enter and remove documents from his West Wing office. In the days that followed, federal investigators were stymied in their investigation of Foster s office and strange death.Since Foster s July 1993 death, the facts of his death have been obfuscated by friends of Bill and Hillary in the major media, but here s the undeniable truth:There weren t five investigations into Foster s death, as the media report. The Park Police, best known for their meter and horse patrols around Washington, were put in charge of the initial death inquiry of the most important federal official to die suspiciously since President Kennedy. The Park Police, contradicting standard procedure, declared the death a suicide before launching their inquiry.Later, Robert Fiske, selected by Clinton s counsel Bernie Nussbaum and Janet Reno, quickly confirmed the Park Police probe as a suicide.But when Ken Starr entered the investigation, he reopened the case. His chief prosecutor in the case, Miquel Rodriguez, later quit the Starr investigation, claiming that Starr s staff was engaging in a cover-up of Foster s death.Rodriguez, a Harvard-educated federal prosecutor, argued that one of the Polaroid photos taken of Foster at the crime scene indicated an additional wound on Foster s neck never noted on the autopsy report. Favish s suit before the Supreme Court is seeking to release this photo, among others.No fewer than three of the paramedics on the scene indicated in reports or testimony that the crime scene was consistent with a murder scene, not a suicide.A careful FBI microscopic investigation of Foster s shoes found not a trace of soil or grass stains on them, though he supposedly walked several hundred yards through wooded Fort Marcy Park to where his body was found. [Years later, Starr s investigation found plenty of soil and grass stains. Rodriguez charged that the shoes were tampered with to produce such evidence. ]According to the FBI report on Vince Foster s death (below) blonde hairs were found on the body of Vince Foster, but were never investigated:Foster was found with little blood around his body and despite claims that he fired the gun into his mouth, practically no blood was found on the front of his shirt.Foster was found with a 1913 revolver no one in his family could claim, with two serial numbers, made from the parts of three or more guns. None of Foster s fingerprints were found on the gun.For years, detail after detail emerged questioning the official ruling.Significant questions were raised about the unusual gun a .38 Colt revolver made from the parts of three guns with two serial numbers found conveniently in Vince s hand.The Park Police said one of the serial numbers indicated the gun was vintage 1913 and had no pedigree.Foster family members insisted neither Foster nor his father ever owned the old revolver.The NCIC keeps records of all law enforcment inquiries of serial numbers.On March 23, 2001, the FBI responded to requests made by a man names Craig Brinkley:Serial number 356555, one of the numbers on the gun, was never searched, not by the FBI, the Park Police or by that investigation by Ken Starr.Serial number 355055 was found on the frame of the gun. Brinkley believes that was the gun s real nnumber.That number was indeed searched by the Park Police, on the evening of Foster s death, more exactly at 22:45 EDT on July 20, 1993.Interestingly, searches were conducted on the same serial number no fewer than three times earlier that year, before Foster s death, on March 3, March 7 and April 29.Was someone checking to see that this gun had a clean predigree and was untraceable?The bullet from the gun that supposedly killed Foster was never found, despite intensive searches.Despite claims to the contrary, no one who knew Foster, including Hillary, Web Hubbell and his own wife, saw signs of depression.A so-called suicide note was found in an office briefcase that had been searched and found to be empty after Foster s death. The note was torn into 27 pieces. Yet an FBI examination found no trace of Foster s fingerprints on the note and a top Oxford handwriting expert found the note to be an obvious forgery.Despite the enormity of the case, Foster s autopsy lasted an astounding 45 minutes. The coroner in the case had previously been overruled in other cases he declared suicides that were later found to be murders.All of the X-rays taken during the autopsy are missing.Complete crime scene photos don t exist. The Park Police said all the photos were accidentally overexposed. A series of close-up Polaroids, which Favish is suing for, remain. This is just a brief summary of the dozens of inconsistencies in the case. Two New York homicide investigators who looked into the case concluded that Foster s body had been moved to the crime scene and that murder could not be ruled out.Despite overwhelming evidence of a cover-up, the media won t question the official ruling.Ken Starr, who could find no criminal wrongdoing on the part of the Clintons during his intensive probe, confirmed a ruling of suicide. Starr even hired O.J. Simpson s defense expert to prove his case.On August 23, 2016, The Daily Mail revealed that FBI agents reported interviews documenting that Hillary Clinton s stinging humiliation of her friend and mentor Vince Foster in front of White House aides triggered the suicide of Vince Foster were missing from where they should be filed at the National Archives.On the first visit, archivist David Paynter provided the box of records that he said contained the FBI reports of interviews conducted by FBI agents on Foster s death. On a second visit, archivist James Mathis provided what he said were those same documents.While the box contained dozens of FBI reports concerning Foster s death including interviews with the medical examiner, U.S. Park Police officers, and White House aides about the contents of Foster s office the reports on Hillary Clinton s role in his death were absent.After filing a Freedom of Information request with the National Archives, Martha Murphy, the archives public liaison, reported that she directed a senior archivist to conduct a more thorough review of the relevant FBI files, including those that had not been previously made public in response to FOIA requests. He examined all eight boxes but found no interviews by any investigator that detail either a meeting between Hillary Clinton and Vince Foster or the effects of a meeting between Hillary Clinton and Vince Foster on Vince Foster s state of mind, Murphy reported in an email.After firing Republican FBI Director William S. Session, President Bill Clinton temporarily replaced him with Floyd I. Clarke and then on September 1, 1993 he Louis Freeh became the FBI Director. Right from the start, the Freeh FBI was drenched in controversy. The screw-ups were legion from the exposure of fraudulent FBI crime lab results to the wrongful blaming of an innocent man for the bombings at the Atlanta Olympics to the bloody standoff and shootout at Ruby Ridge. | 0 |
8,075 | Cummings And Chaffetz Reveal ‘MAJOR PROBLEM’ For Trump: Appears Flynn Committed A Felony (VIDEO) | Reps. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) and Elijah Cummings (D-MD) dropped a bombshell on Tuesday morning. During a press conference, they announced what Cummings described as a major problem for the Trump administration: it looks like former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn committed a felony. We received a response from the White House refusing to provide any of the documents we requested, Cummings said. The White House has refused to offer a single piece of paper in response to this committee s bipartisan request. According to the congressman, classified military documents have revealed that Flynn failed to disclose payments he received from foreign governments before he became Trump s National security advisor. This is a major problem, Cummings said. I believe these documents should be declassified to the fullest extent possible without compromising sources or methods, he added.Cumings also noted that Flynn s illegal actions could land him in prison for up to five years. Chaffetz said that if these documents are correct, then Flynn s actions were clearly illegal and there will be consequences. As a former military officer, you simply cannot take money from Russia, Turkey or anybody else, Chaffetz said. And it appears as if he did take that money, it was inappropriate, and there are repercussions for it as a violation of the law. The congressmen, who both serve as senior members of the House Oversight Committee, said that so far, they haven t seen a shred of evidence to suggest that Flynn actually followed the law and got permission from the federal government before taking cash from multiple foreign governments.You can watch video of their press conference, here:Featured image via Win McNamee/Getty Images | 0 |
8,076 | HAS FACE BOOK SIDED WITH MUSLIM JIHADISTS AGAINST FREE SPEECH? Muhammed Cartoon Contest Winner Is Removed From Social Media Site | Bosch Faustian, a former muslim and winner of the Draw Muhammed contest hosted by Pamela Gellar claims he has been removed from Facebook:I have been removed from Facebook. Bosch Fawstin (@BoschFawstin) May 7, 2015We currently in a dark place in America. The parameters of free speech are now being determined by those on the left, and we are allowing them to do so. Here is the winning cartoon drawn by Bosch Fawstin: | 0 |
8,077 | Sean Spicer Baffles Reporters, Claims Trump Isn’t Responsible For Hiring Flynn (VIDEO) | On Tuesday, White House Propaganda Minister Sean Spicer once again baffled reporters and other thinking individuals by once again saying the dumbest thing imaginable.Asked why the White House refuses to provide documents related to former National Security Advisor and registered foreign agent Michael Flynn s hiring, Spicer took the tried-and-true route of blaming President Obama.Spicer explained that the Trump White House isn t responsible for anything related to Flynn s hiring because the documents were filled out during the Obama administration and those are not documents that the White House would ever possess. Everything that the White House has been asked to do, the only documents that were made available to [Congress] that they asked for were the ones that the Department of Defense had, Spicer said, explaining that he doesn t feel that the White House has an obligation to provide the information Congress has requested. How about these calls made where [Flynn] was working during the transition on behalf of a future President Trump? CBS s Major Garrett asked. Aren t those things that you should have some responsibility or obligation to provide if you can? It s a question [of] if you can, Spicer said. To ask for every call a national security adviser made is pretty outlandish. Those calls were made on behalf of the Trump transition were they not? Garrett asked. Spicer, of course, told him that Trump isn t responsible for anything that happened before January 20 even if it was done by a member of the Trump transition team. When? Spicer asked. We started this administration on Jan. 20. All the information that they re talking about occurred prior to him being at the White House. Working for the transition! Garrett pressed. Not at the White House! Spicer snapped. Everything that is being questioned occurred prior to Jan. 20th. Trump and his White House are absolutely responsible for Flynn which is not good, as even Hillary Clinton witch hunter, Congressman Jason Chaffetz, admits that Flynn likely committed crimes.Watch this all happen below:Featured image via screengrab | 0 |
8,078 | YOU’RE HIRED! HOW THIS BRILLIANT Surgeon Will Destroy Obama’s Legacy [VIDEO] | Ben Carson says he s still ironing out his role in the incoming administration of President-elect Donald Trump, but one thing s certain: He ll have a role in helping craft the replacement plan for Obamacare. I think the replacement obviously must come first and it must be something that is very appealing and easy to understand. And then, only then, would you dismantle what s in place, the retired neurosurgeon said in an interview.Asked if he intends to be involved in designing that plan, Carson said, Yes, of course. Watch Dr. Carson explain his role in helping to reshape a health care policy for Americans:https://youtu.be/tdPM7HKkjBICarson, who ran against Trump in the Republican presidential primary, burst onto the national scene in 2013 when he rebuked Barack Obama s health care law at the National Prayer breakfast, while the president sat a few feet away. He declined to say whether he was in line for a Cabinet role such as secretary of health and human services, or a broader advisory role.Trump ran his campaign on a pledge to replace Obamacare with a simpler and less expensive plan. But he s provided no details on what that plan would look like or how he d handle the millions of people who have obtained insurance under the law. But the election of a Republican Congress ensures that he ll have the best chance since Obamacare passed in 2010 to make that campaign pledge a reality. Politico | 0 |
8,079 | Trump wins Christie backing, marches toward Super Tuesday | FORT WORTH, Texas (Reuters) - Republican candidate Donald Trump on Friday won the surprise endorsement of New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, the most prominent mainstream Republican to get behind the former reality TV star’s White House campaign. Christie said the billionaire front-runner has the best chance of beating Democrat Hillary Clinton in the Nov. 8 U.S. presidential election - although Clinton has yet to secure her party’s nomination. The endorsement gives Trump a further lift before next week’s Super Tuesday nominating contests. It comes just a day after he took a battering from his two main rivals at a televised Republican debate. Trump’s unorthodox candidacy has stirred controversy and shaken the Republican Party at its roots, but an increasing number of senior Republicans are becoming resigned to the idea he will be their candidate in November. Trump is “rewriting the playbook,” said Christie, 53, who until two weeks ago was himself a rival for the Republican nomination. Christie dropped out after failing to muster much support for his candidacy. Trump, 69, who has never held public office, has campaigned as a political outsider. He is riding a wave of voter anger at the slow economic recovery, illegal immigration and what he says is America’s diminishing role in the world. “The best person to beat Hillary Clinton in November on that stage last night is undoubtedly Donald Trump,” Christie told a news conference on Friday, a day after the last Republican candidates’ debate before Super Tuesday. The debate marked a new, more aggressive approach for U.S. Senator Marco Rubio, 44, who has emerged as the Republican establishment’s challenger to Trump. The other main challenger at the debate was U.S. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas. Trump has unsettled mainstream Republicans by winning three straight nominating contests - in New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada. Polls show he is likely to win big in key primaries on Tuesday. “Since I started this whole thing I’ve been practically Number 1,” Trump said on Friday at a rally in Texas. The 11 Republican nominating contests on Tuesday have a total of almost 600 delegates at stake, and could set Trump up to clinch the presidential nomination. Reuters/Ipsos polling data on Friday showed Trump ahead nationally in the Republican race with support at 44.2 percent, followed by Cruz at 20.7 percent and Rubio in third place at 14 percent. On the Democratic side, former Secretary of State Clinton is battling U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont. Clinton and Sanders have been in a dead head over the past week, the Reuters/Ipsos data shows. Trump has vowed to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexican border to halt illegal immigration, called for a temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States and promised to take a tough stance on trade against China. He was combative at a rally on Friday. He mocked Rubio, referred to violent Islamist militants as “these animals” and promised to defend Americans’ constitutional right to bear arms. “We’re going to build up our military, we’re going to knock out ISIS. We’re going to knock out ISIS fast,” he said, referring to the Islamic State militant group. Wielding a water bottle as a prop, Trump made fun of Rubio for an awkward incident in which the senator grabbed for a drink of water off camera during an important televised speech in 2013. Rubio and Cruz ganged up on Trump at Thursday’s debate in Houston in a last-ditch bid to keep him from winning in states on Super Tuesday. Rubio on Friday again took aim at Trump. “He’s a con man who’s taking advantage of people’s fears and anxieties about the future, portraying himself as some sort of strong guy,” Rubio told reporters in Oklahoma. “He’s not a strong guy. He’s never faced real adversity before.” PredictWise, a research project that analyzes opinion polls and betting markets, said Trump would comfortably win among Republicans in all but one of the 11 Super Tuesday states that it measured. Cruz, 45, is likely to win in his home state of Texas, PredictWise said. Rubio’s home state of Florida is not part of the Super Tuesday contests. PredictIt, based out of Victoria University in Wellington, New Zealand, on Friday gave Trump a 73 percent chance of winning the nomination compared with a peak 75 percent chance two days earlier. Trump’s swipes at rival candidates and heated exchanges with journalists and others have for months bolstered his standing in nominating contests and opinion polls. In a post on Twitter, Trump took aim at Rubio, a first-term senator, for his debate performance. “Lightweight Marco Rubio was working hard last night. The problem is, he is a choker, and once a choker, always a chocker (sic)! Mr. Meltdown.” Republican strategist Doug Heye said Christie may have opened the door for more mainstream Republican endorsements of a man whose chances of winning the White House were seen as next to nil a year ago. “If you’re the Trump campaign this is obviously very good news and it gives permission for others to endorse. But it also makes it hard (for Trump) to make the outsider argument,” he said. Glenn Hubbard, who had been an adviser to the campaign of former Florida Governor Jeb Bush and was chair of the Council of Economic Advisers during the George H.W. Bush administration, said he planned to keep up steady criticism of Trump on economic issues. “I think it is time for serious people to stand up and be counted. The next few weeks come very quickly,” said Hubbard, who published a column in the Boston Globe on Friday criticizing Trump. Hubbard, now dean of the business school at Columbia University, told Reuters he worried Trump’s comments already hurt the country’s image abroad and would hobble his ability to govern if elected. (Additional reporting by Steve Holland, Clarece Polke, Howard Schneider and Susan Heavey in Washington and Melissa Fares and Chris Kahn in New York; Writing by Alistair Bell; Editing by Howard Goller and Leslie Adler) 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 |
8,080 | Patrick Henningsen LIVE with guest Ray McGovern – Podesta Emails Leaked, Not ‘Hacked’ | Join Patrick every week at 21WIRE.TV for news, views and analysis on all top stories domestically and abroad THIS WEEK: Episode 3 Did the Russians Do It? The 4th Estate become a fifth column, as The Washington Post loses the plot scapegoating Russia over Wikileaks rather than face up to the Democratic Party s own electoral debacle. Also, how Podesta Emails likely LEAKED to Wikileaks from inside the US, not hacked by the Kremlin. And will Trump drain the swamp, or simply fill it up again? Host Patrick Henningsen talks to Ray McGovern, former CIA Analyst and founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) about these and many more topics. Listen: This program broadcasts LIVE every Wednesday night from 8pm to 9pm, right after the Savage Nation, on Independent Talk 1100 KFNX over the terrestrial AM band across the greater Phoenix and central Arizona region, and live over global satellite and online via www.1100kfnx.comREAD MORE WIKILEAKS NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire Wikileaks Files | 0 |
8,081 | Trump postpones New Hampshire rally over shooting, still plans major speech | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump will postpone a campaign rally planned for Monday evening in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, because of Sunday’s Orlando shooting, his campaign said. But Trump will go ahead with a major speech at St. Anselm’s College in Portsmouth scheduled for Monday afternoon, the campaign said in a statement, adding that he would hold a rally in the city in the near future. “He looks forward to returning to New Hampshire and discussing the serious threats facing all Americans and his solutions for making this country safe again,” the statement said. | 1 |
8,082 | UNHINGED FEMINIST PROTESTERS MAKING ‘P*SSYHATS’ To Wear At The Anti-Trump March | As the Pussyhat Project s flier helpfully points out:We love the clever wordplay of pussyhat and pussycat, but yes, pussy is also a derogatory term for female genitalia. We choose this loaded word for our project because we want to reclaim the term as a means of empowerment.The group goes on to point out their view that identifying people with female genitalia as females is considered a form of oppression, saying that in this day and age, if we have pussies we are assigned the gender of woman. Women, whether transgender or cisgender, are mistreated in society. Read more: Breitbart | 0 |
8,083 | i declare myself a conscientious objector | well finally we have the big global businessbank goldman sachs officially endorsing hillary clinton for president they have been giving her money and paying for speeches for some time now get ready for hillarys actual policies to kick in if and when she gets elected ironic gs has been a target of political activism for years now they can bank on hillary protecting them goldman sachs endorses hillary clinton for president hes with her on sunday former secretary of state hillary clinton earned the endorsement of goldman sachs ceo lloyd blankfeinan endorsement she had been working toward for years as was revealed by wikileaks hillary clinton spent the run up to her presidential campaign giving speeches to goldman sachs and other wall street banks where she praised their talents and explained her positions on financial regulation on october clinton told goldman sachs that doddfrank had to be done mostly for political reasons because congress needed to look like it was doing something about the crisis she said theres nothing magic about regulations too much is bad too little is bad how do you get to the golden key how do we figure out what works and the people that know the industry better than anybody are the people who work in the industry the antibernie antithesis | 0 |
8,084 | BREAKING: HUGE LEGAL VICTORY FOR AMERICANS Who Were Told To Stop Speaking Out Against Obama [VIDEO] | A big slap in the face to an overreaching government who is more worried about protecting the reputations of our tyrannical president in public than our most basic right to free speech The Thomas More Law Center (TMLC), a national public interest law firm based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of the plaintiffs in August 2014, challenging the enactment of the ordinance which restricted the plaintiffs right to demonstrate and display signs calling for the impeachment of President Obama and the end to illegal immigration on city overpasses over designated highways.U.S. District Judge David Godbey for the Northern District Court of Texas entered the consent judgment, marking the first time that the City of Dallas admitted its ordinance was an unconstitutional restriction on freedom of speech and freedom of assembly.Erin Mersino, TMLC Senior Trial Counsel handling the case, commented, It is a good day for free speech. Overpasses for America and Valerie Villarreal may now resume their important demonstrations without fear of being fined or retaliated against by the City. We re asking our readers to consider making a donation (in any amount) to this amazing law firm who does so much to protect our freedoms from a tyrannical government: Donate to the Thomas More Law Center by clicking HEREIn November 2014, just three months after TMLC filed their initial lawsuit against the city, the Dallas City Council voted to repeal the ordinance. During the repeal process, however, the City refused to acknowledge that the ordinance unconstitutionally attacked Free Speech that criticized President Obama and the flood of illegal immigration encouraged by the Obama administration s complete disregard of federal immigration laws. The judgment entered by the District Court, however, specifically declares that the Dallas ordinance was a violation of Overpasses for America s First Amendment rights to free speech and free assembly. The judgment also awarded nominal damages as requested by the Plaintiffs in recognition of the City of Dallas violation of the Overpasses members Free Speech and Freedom of Assembly rights, and provided a settlement amount for attorneys fees and costs.Before the enactment of the City s ordinance, the North Dallas Chapter of Overpasses for America had held over 75 demonstrations on the pedestrian overpasses in Dallas, without a single traffic incident. Nevertheless, the City Council moved forward with the restrictive ordinance under the guise that it was necessary for public safety.Overpasses for America is a nonpartisan grassroots movement that calls for accountability among our nation s leaders.Overpasses for America demonstrators frequently use pedestrian overpasses to spread their messages and to reach a large and diverse audience. Several cities, however, have sought to silence these concerned citizens.Richard Thompson, President and Chief Counsel of TMLC, stated: The concerns of a majority of Americans on crucial public issues have little impact on the Washington political establishment.That s why it s so important to defend the free speech rights of grassroots organizations like Overpasses for America, whose members feel it s their patriotic duty to get their message out and mobilize their fellow citizens. TMLC is currently representing two plaintiffs in a case challenging a similar ordinance in the Town of Campbell, Wisconsin that case is currently pending before the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals.Here is the incident that took place in Campbell, WI:Here are members of the Overpasses For America group defending their free speech right in front of the Campbell, WI City Council:Via: Thomas More Law Center | 0 |
8,085 | Trump Voter PANICKING After Realizing Border Wall Will Put Her House In Mexico (VIDEO) | D Ann Loop of Brownsville, Texas lost much of her land ten years ago when the Bush administration decided to put up a border fence that stretched across what used to be much of her property.Loop and her husband found themselves effectively locked out of the United States, as even their home ended up on the Mexico side of the fence. Their only access is a locked gate.The couple fought to keep their land and lost in court, placing all of their property on the southern side of the fence and their nightmare is about to become very real for potentially thousands of people.You see, recently Texans along the border learned that The Donald was forcing them out of their homes for much less than they are worth. If they choose to stay in their homes, some of them have discovered they will soon be living among the criminal hordes down south. I was very angry, I just kept saying, how can they do that? How is that possible in the United States that they can do this? Loop says. They put up a fence in front of our land and then keep us in here lock us in. I didn t understand. I was very I was floored and flabbergasted. You hear that, folks? Floored and flabbergasted. It left us no property on the U.S. side of the border wall, including my house, she says. Everything was behind on the Mexican side of the U.S. border fence. You punch your code in or you come behind the border wall, there is a feeling of isolation, her husband, Ray Loop, added.Thousands of land owners Trump voters and otherwise along the Texas border will soon find themselves suffering buyer s remorse for the snake oil they purchased from our huckster-in-chief.Trump voter Pat Bell was fine with The Donald until she learned that his stupid wall placed her in danger of living like the Loops. While she opposed the wall because fences and walls don t work (she was fine with the other hatred espoused by Trump and his supporters, of course), she is finding herself negatively impacted by Mr. 45 s policies. Absolutely I would go to the people who are in charge and, you hate to say I would get a lawyer, but if it comes to that issue, you would, she says.Trump voters are perfectly fine with banning an entire religion from entering the country and building a wall to keep all those dirty brown rapists to the south from entering the country even gutting social programs but the second Trump s terrible policies begin to affect them, they will cry about how unfair their lives are.Watch a report on the Loops predicament below:Featured image via screengrab | 0 |
8,086 | Three dead bodies pulled from sea near Spain after migrant boat sinks | MADRID (Reuters) - Spanish rescue services pulled three drowned men from the Strait of Gibraltar after rescuing one man from a half-sunken, rickety boat and another from the open sea, an emergency services spokeswoman said on Wednesday. The men are believed to be from a boat that was carrying migrants attempting to cross into Europe, the spokeswoman said. One of the rescued men said there were six people aboard originally, she said. The search continues for the sixth person. Conditions in the Strait of Gibraltar - a narrow strip of water that connects the Atlantic Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea - are currently dangerous with bad weather and big waves, she said. Tens of thousands of migrants attempt the treacherous crossing of the Mediterranean Sea from Africa every year in unseaworthy boats, leading to thousands of deaths by drowning. Migrant drownings have topped 3,000 on Mediterranean Sea routes for the fourth straight year, the International Organization for Migration said on Tuesday. Migrants seeking a better life in Europe have sought new routes through Spain in an effort to get around European Union actions to curb migration in the central and eastern Mediterranean. Almost 10,300 people arrived in Spain by sea in the first seven months of 2017, the IOM said in September, four times as many as in 2016. | 1 |
8,087 | U.S. Senate advances compromise gun control measure | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Senate on Thursday advanced a compromise gun control plan to stop people on some terrorism watch lists from buying guns, in the wake of the June 12th mass shooting in Orlando, Florida. While the measure, spearheaded by Susan Collins, a Republican from Maine, cleared one procedural hurdle, it was not clear if the Senate would move further ahead on it. Passing the bill in the House of Representatives could also be an uphill battle. | 1 |
8,088 | Trump likely to visit China during November Asia trip: U.S. official | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump is likely to make a stop in China in November during his first official visit to Asia, a U.S. official said on Tuesday, a trip that will come amid tensions over North Korea’s nuclear tests. Washington and its allies have said there is a growing urgency for China, North Korea’s top ally and trading partner, to apply more pressure on its already isolated neighbor to get it to back down on its nuclear weapons and missiles programs. Chinese President Xi Jinping had invited Trump to visit China during their meeting in April in Palm Beach, Florida. The two leaders also met on the sidelines on the G20 summit in July. Trump is set to attend the U.S.-ASEAN summit and the East Asia summit in the Philippines in November, as well as the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Vietnam. China’s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment on Trump’s potential visit. Japanese public broadcaster NHK cited unnamed diplomatic sources saying that Trump was also considering visiting Japan and South Korea during his Asian tour in November. In February, Trump accepted Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s invitation to visit Japan by the end of the year. “The February agreement is still valid. We would definitely like to make it happen sometime within this year. But no specific timing has been fixed yet,” a Japanese Foreign Ministry official said. Also, the Japanese daily Yomiuri Shimbun said on Wednesday Japan, the United States and South Korea are in final stages of talks to hold a trilateral summit on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly in New York. The newspaper, citing unnamed government sources, reported the meeting between Trump, Abe and South Korean President Moon Jae-in could take place on Sept. 21 and would focus on bolstering cooperation in response to North Korean provocation. On Monday, the U.N. Security Council unanimously voted to step up sanctions on North Korea, with its profitable textile exports now banned and fuel supplies capped. After several days of negotiations on the resolution, Washington dropped several measures to win the support of Russia and China, including a bid for an oil embargo and the blacklisting of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and the national airline. In Hong Kong, former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon told the South China Morning Post the results of a U.S.-led investigation into alleged Chinese intellectual property theft would be announced before the Beijing summit to reset bilateral trade. The far-right architect of Trump’s 2016 election victory, Bannon told an investor conference, organized by a unit of China’s largest brokerage, that Trump and Xi had a rapport that should enable them to work out differences, said an attendee at the meeting which was closed to the press. Bannon, who was let go by Trump last month, told a private lunch gathering in Hong Kong that he still “speaks with President Donald Trump every two to three days,” the Wall Street Journal reported. | 1 |
8,089 | ABC News suspends top journalist over inaccurate Flynn reporting | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - ABC News said on Saturday it had suspended Brian Ross, its chief investigative correspondent, over an error in his reporting about former national security adviser Michael Flynn which sent U.S. stocks, the dollar and Treasury yields lower on Friday. “We deeply regret and apologize for the serious error we made yesterday ... As a result of our continued reporting over the next several hours ultimately we determined the information was wrong and we corrected the mistake on air and online,” ABC News said in a statement. “Effective immediately, Brian Ross will be suspended for four weeks without pay,” added ABC News, owned by the Walt Disney Co. Flynn pleaded guilty on Friday to lying to the FBI about his contacts with Russia, and he agreed to cooperate with prosecutors delving into the actions of President Donald Trump’s inner circle before he took office. Soon after, ABC News reported that Flynn, citing a confidant, was prepared to testify that Trump directed him to make contact with Russians when he was a presidential candidate. Wall Street’s main indexes all fell by more than 1 percent after the report. ABC News later issued a correction that the source clarified that Trump had assigned Flynn and a “small circle of senior advisers” to find ways to improve relations with Russia and other hotspots during the presidential campaign. “It was shortly after the election, that President-elect Trump directed Flynn to contact Russian officials on topics that included working jointly against ISIS,” ABC News said. | 1 |
8,090 | BILDERBERG: More Secret Meetings with Trump Advisors, US Senators | Mark Anderson The Truth HoundThe danger-ridden, tyrannical goal of creating an all-consuming corporate-ruled world superstate dubbed One World Ltd. -incrementally advanced since Bilderberg first met in Holland in 1954 under the auspices of Jesuit-trained European consolidator Joseph Retinger and his agent, Prince Bernhard of The Netherlands explains why Bilderberg goes to such lengths to keep the details of its inner-workings so secret, while functioning as an off-the-grid world networking and planning forum for private governance benefitting the banking and general corporate classes. A core tactic is to parallel but eventually supersede the nation state itself, thereby canceling effective, genuine nationhood altogether.Bilderberg s gatherings, for the record, consist of about 140 mainly North American and European corporate moguls (including select big media), government ministers, treasury officials, parliament members, high-technology leaders, certain royalty (including Bernhard s daughter, Netherlands Queen Beatrix) and central bankers who annually skulk into the world s top hotels, in order to cross-pollinate to pursue One World Ltd. and related financial and political dealings.McMASTER, TWO U.S. SENATORS ATTENDINGIt s highly notable that President Donald Trump s National Security Advisor, H.R. McMaster, is listed as an attendee for this year s Bilderberg meeting June 1-4 in Chantilly, Va., at Westfields Marriot. Other U.S. officials attending who are currently serving in public office are Senators Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Tom Cotton (R-Ark.). While Graham jetted to last year s Bilderberg meeting in Dresden, Germany, Cotton evidently is attending his first-ever Bilderberg meeting.SEE ALSO: BILDERBERG: What s The Big Deal?The 65th Bilderberg gathering this year has 131 participants from 21 countries having confirmed their attendance. The entire attendee and official topic lists (but not necessarily complete) can be found at this link [note on this list the large amount of serving Trump Administration officials, and this year s Bilderberg features more active duty US officials than any other previous meeting].McMaster, Graham and Cotton all share a neo-conservative ideology of aggressively patrolling the world, in conjunction with the UK and the EU, to push Western democracy and monopoly capitalism, while fostering hostility toward Iran, Russia and Syria, for the benefit of Zionism, among other things. This fits the Bilderberg credo of using one might say leasing U.S. military power and other influence to control the natural resources and economic machinery of as many nations as possible, while co-opting or overthrowing those nations that stand firm with their own sovereignty.The Virginia gathering marks Bilderberg s first North American meeting in five years. Last year in Germany, according to the group s officially shallow press release, they discussed (in their own words): Artificial Intelligence, Cybersecurity, Chemical Weapons Threats, Current Economic Issues, European Strategy, Globalisation, Greece, Iran, Middle East, NATO, Russia, Terrorism, United Kingdom, USA and U.S. Elections.The group s press releases, a marvel of revealing simplicity, typically present bluntly-worded topics, such as Russia, Iran United Kingdom, European Strategy and so on. Such topics are clearly indicative of Bilderberg s objectives and concerns for maintaining Western hegemony over Russia and its allies, Iran and Syria, which could include war or the risk of war with Iran and does include targeting Syria under the guise of fighting ISIS Continue this story at The Truth HoundNOTE: The May 24 North American premiere of Bilderberg, the Movie, produced by researcher and author Daniel Estulin and covered exclusively by The TRUTH HOUND among national mainstream and alternative news outlets, stressed one point that cannot be overstressed: The Bilderberg Group above all is in pursuit of One World Ltd. On that note, the movie s promotional flyer asked: What do people who have $1,000,000,000,000,000 talk about in private? While the Estulin movie itself, of course, could not be filmed, videographer Ron Avery shot footage of Estulin s question-and-answer session immediately afterwards. WATCH: READ MORE BILDERBERG NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire Bilderberg FilesSUPPORT OUR WORK BY SUBSCRIBING & BECOMING A MEMBER @21WIRE.TV | 0 |
8,091 | Hannity BLOWS UP At Ted Cruz In Heated Interview: ‘You Gotta Stop!’ (AUDIO/TWEETS) | Fox host Sean Hannity lost his cool during a radio interview with Ted Cruz yesterday, as the GOP candidate tried to dodge answering questions that might actually be helpful to voters.Hannity, who is a Trump supporter, brought up the way Cruz s campaign handled delegates, stating that it baffled many (and possibly being annoyed that Cruz was more prepared to win over delegates than Trump). Cruz completely avoided answering the question, and actually told Hannity he didn t think people cared about that. Hannity pushed back, insisting that millions of his followers wanted to know because they find this whole process confusing. Once again, the GOP s least likable Republican dismissed Hannity s question, claiming that the only people who cared were on Trump s team. Cruz must have gotten Hannity s blood boiling, because then the Fox host blew up. He said: Senator, why do you do this? Every single time no, you gotta stop! Every time I have you on the air, and I ask a legitimate question, you try to throw this in my face. I m getting sick of it. I ve had you on more than any other candidate on radio and TV. So if I ask you a legitimate question to explain to the audience, why don t you just answer it? Cruz s response was equally testy as he shot back, Sean, can I answer your last question without being interrupted? Then he made a half-ass attempt to respond to Hannity s question, but insisted that as I travel the country, nobody is asking me this, other than the Trumpsters and the people repeating it. Hannity wasn t satisfied and continued to press the Texas Senator, stating that it s a simple question, it s not a Trump question. You could tell that both men had gotten under each other s skin, because at one point in the interview, Hannity said to Cruz: Senator, I don t know why you re mad. And Cruz insisted that he wasn t mad, he was just annoyed that they were talking only about the nonsense instead of policy.Here s the intense interview, via The Sean Hannity Show:The interview clearly left Hannity with a bad taste in his mouth, because when the interview was over he took to Twitter to blast the candidate:TwitterTwitterTwitterHannity is known for giving pretty mild interviews to Republicans, but he was obviously no match for Cruz s ability to annoy anyone he comes in contact with.Featured image via Gerardo Mora / Getty Images | 0 |
8,092 | Risk of Afghan civilian casualties could damp support for U.S. strikes on militants | KABUL (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump s plans to step up air strikes on Islamist militants in Afghanistan risk increasing civilian casualties and stirring resentment, despite an initial welcome by Afghan officials and international allies. Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has avoided vocal criticisms of errant air strikes, but in previous years they sparked intense friction and soured ties between his predecessor, Hamid Karzai, and the international coalition in Afghanistan. With the U.S. set to resume a more active role in the war, many analysts expect a rise in the U.N.-documented first-half figure of 232 civilian casualties from international and Afghan air operations, a spike of 43 percent from a year earlier. The issue about air strikes is part of a broader package of concerns, said one Western official. I don t hear Western diplomats saying, How many bombs should we drop? I hear them saying, Why are we bombing? What are we doing here, in general? During the 16 years since a U.S.-led campaign toppled the Taliban from power in 2001, resentment has repeatedly been fueled by coalition missteps that undermined hard-won progress on the political or military fronts. The exact contours of Trump s plan remain uncertain, but officials of several coalition nations told Reuters they feared more civilians could be harmed, despite avoiding the subject in public remarks. Additional airstrikes can be a double-edged sword for leaders looking to stem Taliban offensives, said Christopher Kolenda, a former U.S. Army officer who served in Afghanistan and worked on American military strategies for the conflict. Better air support for Afghan forces on the ground will limit gains Taliban can make, and that s helpful in negotiations, he said. The downside is if this creates a rise in civilian casualties, then you run a high risk of creating a cascade of negative perceptions among Afghans. There is no question Ghani cares deeply about protecting Afghan civilians, Kolenda added, but domestic political challenges and future elections make it inevitable that he will have to address any rise in civilian casualties. By the government s count, civilian casualties have dropped in recent years, a spokesman for Ghani said. The Afghan government and its international partners main aim is to provide a secure environment for its people, Shah Hussain Murtazawi told Reuters, adding that Afghan forces coordinate with foreign troops to protect non-combatants. Even as overall civilian casualties by pro-government forces dropped this year, casualties from aerial operations spiked 43 percent in the year s first half, the United Nations says. In the first six months, the U.N. recorded 29 civilian deaths and 85 injuries from Afghan air force strikes, and 54 deaths and 31 injuries in strikes by international warplanes. The prospects of more air strikes provoked mixed feelings in areas hardest hit, where many leaders fear attacks by Taliban or Islamic State, but also worry about the threat to residents. Air strikes will not bring long-term security, said Abdul Jabbar Qahraman, a lawmaker from the restive southern province of Helmand. They can defeat enemies when Afghan forces are under a huge attack, but they can also promote hatred between locals and government. In the eastern province of Nangarhar, where Islamic State made its greatest gains before being targeted by joint Afghan-U.S. offensives, the governor s spokesman, Attaullah Khogyani, agreed. Air strikes are important and helpful in many situations, but if they cause civilian casualties repeatedly that may hurt government legitimacy. U.S. Air Force aircraft dropped 503 weapons in August, in the most monthly air strikes since August 2012. American warplanes are also more likely to launch air strikes this year, with the Air Force dropping weapons during one of roughly every four close air support sorties, up from one in every eight last year, and one in every 14 in 2015. International advisers have also pushed the Afghan Air Force to take a greater role in the air war, boosting the number of civilians killed or injured by Afghan bombs and rockets. Pressure will probably grow for Ghani to ensure the Afghan forces take measures to protect civilians, Kolenda added. Civilian casualties is one of many problems that is damaging the legitimacy of the government, he said. | 1 |
8,093 | Macedonia's largest opposition party appoints new leader | SKOPJE (Reuters) - Macedonia s main opposition party, the rightist VMRO-DPMNE formally replaced its leader Nikola Gruevski on Saturday and appointed Hristijan Mickoski, a technocrat, as his successor. Gruevski, 47, resigned earlier this month following an election defeat last year and unrest that rocked the small Balkan country in April. In his speech to the party s convention on Saturday, Gruevski said that a key reason for VMRO-DPMNE s fall from power was his refusal to yield to what he described as international and domestic pressure to accept a compromise in a dispute with Greece. Macedonia, which won independence in 1991 from then-federal Yugoslavia, has made little progress towards EU and NATO membership due to a long-running dispute with Greece which claims Macedonia s name represents a territorial claim to its province with the same name. We wanted a fair compromise and a name solution, but not under dictate, Gruevski said. Gruevski s successor Mickoski, 41, a relative novice in politics, became VMRO-DPMNE Secretary General earlier this year. He served in Gruevski s government as the general manager of ELEM, Macedonia s state-owned power plants managing company. (This story corrects spelling to Mickoski in paras 1 and 6.) | 1 |
8,094 | Factbox: Dakota Access Pipeline's long journey | (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Tuesday allowing the Dakota Access Pipeline to go forward, after months of protests from Native American groups and climate activists pushed the Obama administration to ask for additional environmental review for the controversial project. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in December turned down the request for an easement for the Dakota Access Pipeline to build under the Missouri River. Most of the pipeline has been constructed already, with the short stretch under the Missouri River remaining unbuilt. The following is a timeline of the project: December 2014 Energy Transfer Partners LP applies to the North Dakota Public Service Commission to build a 1,172-mile (1,885 km), 570,000-barrel-per-day pipeline to deliver crude oil from North Dakota’s Bakken shale fields to Patoka, Illinois, crossing South Dakota and Iowa, kicking off a year of public hearings in North Dakota. January North Dakota regulators approve the pipeline unanimously. April 29 U.S. Army Corps of Engineers holds a hearing for Native Americans on the pipeline. July 25 The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers approves three easements for water crossings for the pipeline at Sakakawea, the Mississippi River and Lake Oahe, which is an ancestral site for the Standing Rock Sioux tribe. July 27 The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe sues the Army Corps of Engineers in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, citing violation of multiple federal statutes that authorize the pipeline’s construction and operation, and seeks an emergency order to halt construction. The tribe also alleges the pipeline threatens their environmental and economic well-being and would damage and destroy sites of historic, religious and cultural significance. The Sioux Tribe say because the pipeline goes underneath Lake Oahe, approximately half a mile upstream of the tribe’s reservation, leaks from the pipeline would be directly in the tribe’s ancestral lands. Sept. 3 Private security guards hired by Energy Transfer Partners use attack dogs and mace after violence erupted at a private construction site along the pipeline route. Six people are reportedly bitten by dogs, a scene captured on video and broadcast widely. Sept. 6 Brian Cladoosby, president of the National Congress of American Indians, which represents more than 500 tribes, speaks to nearly a dozen of President Barack Obama’s Cabinet-level advisers at a Sept. 6 meeting of the White House’s three-year-old Native American Affairs Council. Cladoosby delivers an impassioned request: Stand with Native Americans who have united with the Standing Rock Sioux tribe and block construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline. Sept. 9 U.S. District Judge James Boasberg in Washington rejects a broad request from Native Americans to block the project. But herules that no construction activity on the Dakota Access may take place between Highway 1806 and 20 miles to the east of Lake Oahe. Construction activity to the west of Highway 1806 may proceed. The tribe appeals the decision. Sept. 9 Less than an hour after Boasberg’s decision, the U.S. Justice and Interior Departments and Army makes an unprecedented move and orders a stop to construction near Lake Oahe until the Army Corps of Engineers reviews its previous decisions and decides if it needs to conduct a fuller environmental and cultural review. Sept. 13 Energy Transfer Partners tells employees in a letter, provided to media, that it is committed to completing the project, citing that the pipeline is 60 percent complete and that it has already spent $1.6 billion so far on equipment, materials and the workforce. Oct. 9 The U.S. Court of Appeals of the District of Columbia Circuit says an administrative injunction related to the emergency motion of the Standing Rock Tribe would be dissolved, citing that Dakota Access has rights to construct on private land up to Lake Oahe. Oct. 11 Environmental activists across four states disrupt the flow of millions of barrels of crude from Canada into the United States in a rare, coordinate action that targets several key pipelines simultaneously. The protest group, the Climate Direct Action, say their move is in support of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. As a safety precaution, companies operating the pipelines shut off sections of the lines for several hours while they investigate. Oct. 25 Government-to-government tribal consultations begin across six regions on how federal government decision-making on infrastructure projects could better include tribal concerns. Nov. 8 Energy Transfer Partners says it has built the pipe to the edge of Lake Oahe and reiterates its intentions to complete the project. Nov. 9 Following the surprise victory of Donald Trump in the U.S. presidential election, climate activists and the Standing Rock Sioux say they still hope President Obama will be able to kill the pipeline definitively. Analysts say the line is more than likely to go through. Nov. 14 The U.S. government, in a joint notice issued by the Department of the Interior and the Army Corps of Engineers, delays a final decision on permitting. They say the permit had followed all legal requirements, but more consultation with Native American tribes is needed. Nov. 18 Energy Transfer Partners’ CEO Kelcy Warren tells the Associated Press that the pipeline would not be re-routed. Nov. 20 About 400 activists gather on a bridge between the camp protest and the construction path; law enforcement officers respond by using tear gas and water cannons on them in freezing temperatures. Nov. 26 The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers tells protesters they need to leave the Oceti Sakowin Camp, the primary protest camp located on federal land, by Dec. 5. They later say they have no plans to enforce this order. Nov. 28 North Dakota Governor Jack Dalrymple issues an evacuation order for the Oceti Sakowin camp, citing harsh weather on the way. Officials the next day tell Reuters they plan on blockading the camp so supplies cannot get in. They later back off that plan and say they may just issue fines, but retreat from that idea as well. Nov. 30 A group of U.S. veterans announce they will bring more than 2,000 service members to North Dakota to stand as human shields between the protesters and law enforcement. They begin arriving over the next several days. Dec. 4 The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers denies Energy Transfer Partners’ request for an easement to run under Lake Oahe, sparking a celebration amongst protesters. ETP says it will continue to fight for the line. The incoming Trump administration has said it supports Dakota Access, along with other pipeline projects. Jan. 18 The Army Corps says it will publish a notice in the Federal Register stating its intent to prepare an environmental impact statement for the easement at Lake Oahe. ETP files a motion asking a court to bar the action in an effort to move the pipeline forward. Jan. 24 President Trump, who previously owned stock in Energy Transfer Partners, signs an order aimed at moving the pipeline, along with an unrelated pipeline, Keystone XL, to go forward. | 1 |
8,095 | OOPS: Trump Judicial Nominee Didn’t Tell Congress About Marriage To White House Attorney | This is a major conflict of interest that should automatically disqualify him.When the Senate Judiciary Committee voted along party lines to approve Donald Trump s nomination of Brett Talley to a federal judgeship in Alabama, they did so without knowing that Talley is married to White House lawyer Ann Donaldson, who is the chief of staff to White House counsel Donald McGahn.That s a pretty big detail to leave out of a disclosure form.According to the New York Times,Mr. Talley was asked on his publicly released Senate questionnaire to identify family members and others who are likely to present potential conflicts of interest. He did not mention his wife.District judges often provide the first ruling when laws are called into question, decisions that can put them at odds with the White House and its lawyers. Last month, for example, judges in Hawaii and Maryland temporarily blocked Mr. Trump s travel ban.Mr. Talley also did not mention his wife when he described his frequent contact with White House lawyers during the nomination process.Talley has also never tried a case in his life, making him even more unqualified to be a judge. In fact, the American Bar Association judged Tally as unqualified for the position in a very rare unanimous decision.The Senate could hold a confirmation vote as early as Monday, and it is important that they reject Talley, especially since he lied to them by omission.If Republicans confirm Talley, they will be telling future nominees that it s okay to lie to Congress in order to get an important job. That should not be allowed to happen. Trump and Republicans often claim that immigration should be based on merit. Well, becoming a federal judge should definitely be based on merit, not based on who you re married to and whether you ll be a rubber stamp for a corrupt administration.Featured Image: Win McNamee/Getty Images | 0 |
8,096 | Obama speaks up for protester but is derided by Trump | FAYETTEVILLE, N.C.,/HERSHEY, Pa. (Reuters) - President Barack Obama chastised supporters at a rally for Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton in North Carolina on Friday, as tensions spiked when a supporter of Republican opponent Donald Trump began protesting. But that didn’t stop Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, campaigning a few states away at the time, from telling a completely opposite version of what happened, condemning Obama for screaming at the protester. The incident happened in clear view of reporters covering the rally in Fayetteville, North Carolina, where a predominantly African American crowd was jammed into a gym at a state university to hear Obama stump for Clinton. Obama had just said Trump was unfit to lead the country when he was interrupted by a white-haired white man in a beret and suit jacket with what appeared to be military patches, who stood up in the stairwell of the bleachers, waving a Trump campaign sign. The crowd turned its attention to the protester, screaming and booing at the man. Obama repeatedly told the irate crowd to “focus” and to “settle down.” “Everybody sit down and be quiet for a second!” Obama said. “You’ve got an older gentleman who is supporting his candidate,” he said as the protester was led away. “We live in a country that respects free speech,” he said. “It looks like he might have served in our military – we’ve got to respect that.” In Trump’s version, Obama scolded the protester, not the crowd. “He was talking to the protester, screaming at him, really screaming at him,” Trump said. “By the way, if I spoke the way Obama spoke to that protester they would say, ‘He became unhinged,’” Trump said. | 1 |
8,097 | Abbas says Jerusalem is eternal Palestinian capital, dismisses U.S. peace role | RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said on Wednesday that Jerusalem was the eternal capital of the State of Palestine in response to U.S. President Donald Trump s announcement that he was recognizing the city as Israel s capital. In a pre-recorded speech played on Palestine TV, Abbas rejected Trump s announcement which included a decision to move the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, a move he said was tantamount to the United States abdicating its role as a peace mediator. | 1 |
8,098 | Ted Cruz Continues To Market In Totally Full Of Sh*t Myths About The So-Called Liberal Media (VIDEO) | Arguably the most popular myth in the Pantheon of Republican fiction is the idea that there s somehow a liberal media conspiracy to suppress conservatism and elevate liberalism. Horseshit.But that hasn t stopped slippery dickface Ted Cruz from furthering the myth whenever possible. During an interview with Howard Kurtz, Cruz responded to a question about the candidate s base and its distrust of the mainstream media. I especially like the part about how Cruz s face scares small children. Which is probably true.Via Crooks & Liars:HOWARD KURTZ: When you bash the media, and you have been treated unfairly at times portrayed as somebody who scares little children, but isn t that in your interest to do that? Your base loves that. They don t like the mainstream media.TED CRUZ: There is a reason they don t like the mainstream media because they are partisan liberal democrats.KURTZ: Every single journalist?CRUZ: Almost without exception.KURTZ: Almost without exception?CRUZ: Almost without exception they have a partisan agenda. And we understand let s take a substantive issue: police officers. If you have one police officer somewhere who does something he shouldn t have, the press will breathlessly report on this terrible, horrible police officer and all the democratic politicians will jump in and demonize and vilify the cops.Let me ask you something? How come the press doesn t tell stories of heroism?The great news is we don t live anymore in a world of three networks that have a stranglehold on information. We have got the internet. We have got the Drudge Report. We have got talk radio. We have got social media. We ve got the ability to go directly around, and directly to the people.Yes, Cruz believes every single journalist is a liberal with an agenda and therefore the news media is part of a liberal conspiracy. I suppose that might be true if you completely overlook the fact that the most popular cable news network in American history is decidedly conservative. Or that 50 percent of broadcast radio is controlled by conservative screechers. Or that most news media outlets are owned by conservative multinational corporations with little interest in liberal politics. Or that one of those corporations, NewsCorp, owns literally hundreds of news media outlets around the world. Even the so-called liberal cable news network, MSNBC, is anchored by a four-hour morning show, hosted by a conservative Republican former congressman.The GOP persecution complex is powerful as powerful as toddlers who think toe-monsters are living under their beds.Featured image via video screen grab. | 0 |
8,099 | Chinese media upbeat on U.S. ties ahead of Trump visit | BEIJING (Reuters) - China and the United States have common interests but the relationship needs careful handling, Chinese state-run media said on Wednesday ahead of U.S. President Donald Trump’s visit to Beijing. North Korea and trade are expected to dominate Trump’s trip, with the U.S. leader likely to push Chinese President Xi Jinping to do more to rein in Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile programs and address China’s large trade surplus with the United States. The ruling Communist Party’s official People’s Daily said in a commentary that as China becomes strong, it won’t repeat “old fashioned zero-sum thinking” in handling ties, but will work with the United States to construct a cooperative and mutually profitable relationship with no conflict. “In realizing the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, and protecting peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula, China and the United States have common interests,” it said. “The two sides should respect one another’s interests, maintain close communication and consultation, and make unremitting efforts to promote a thorough resolution of the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue.” Trump heads to China later on Wednesday after visiting Japan and South Korea in the first legs of his marathon Asian tour. Trump’s attempt to make a surprise visit to the heavily fortified border separating North Korea and South Korea was aborted on Wednesday after dense fog prevented his helicopter from landing at the doorstep of the North Korean nuclear standoff. The China Daily, in an editorial which preceded the announcement of the abortive Trump trip to the border, said Trump not going to the Demilitarised Zone (DMZ) and North Korea not recently carrying out any nuclear or missile tests was a “hopeful sign that both prefer to find a peaceful solution to their predicaments”. China has promised a “state visit plus” for Trump, and while having not released any details, Beijing is attaching great importance to the visit. Trump is expected to go to the Forbidden City, possibly guided by Xi. “Such hospitality is rarely seen in modern China,” influential tabloid the Global Times, published by the People’s Daily, said in its editorial. “Beijing’s enthusiasm reflects the most positive part of the attitude that the diversified world holds toward the U.S., and the realistic international outlook of the rising China.” | 1 |
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