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FILE: Jan. 18, 2013: Then-Secretary of State HillaryClinton talks at the State Department, in Washington, D.C. (AP)NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! WASHINGTON – The U.S. State Department’s ability to investigate wrongdoing by its staff is under question after a report that the agency tried to cover up several crimes committed has surfaced.Some of the allegations are against then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s security detail who allegedly hired prostitutes, a U.S. ambassador accused of trolling public parks for paid sex and a security official in Beirut committing sexual assaults on foreign nationals.An internal memo from the State Department’s inspector general listed eight examples of wrongdoing by agency staff or contractors.The memo also seems to indicate that the government agency tried to use its authority to stop the investigation and instead, opting to have the official, whose name has not been released, meet with Undersecretary of State for Management Patrick Kennedy in Washington. The official was then allowed to return to his job overseas.State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki told reporters during Monday’s daily briefing that the department’s Bureau of Diplomatic Security has requested a “review by outside, experienced law enforcement officers” who are working with the IG’s office to make “expert assessments about our current procedures.”Rep. Ed Royce, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, called the allegations of misconduct appalling and said he would ask congressional staff members to start an investigation into all of the accusations.However, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid stonewalled reporters Tuesday when asked about the alleged misconduct and possible cover up."I don't know what you're talking about," the Nevada Democrat said. "What are you talking about? ... I don't know what you're talking about."According to the memo first obtained by CBS News, four members of Clinton’s security detail received one-day suspensions.Allegations of misconduct are not new and have plagued the Obama administration for awhile.In April 2012, members of the president’s Secret Service detail were caught in a prostitution scandal involving 12 women they picked up during an official trip to Colombia. The Secret Service was slow to disclose any information and issued only limited public statements in the weeks following the incident in Cartagena.In the end, a dozen agents, officers, supervisors and 12 other U.S. military personnel were implicated in a night of heavy drinking and misconduct.The Secret Service forced eight employees from their jobs. The military canceled the security clearances of all 12 enlisted personnel.Fox News' James Rosen contributed to this report. | 2 |
| March 25, 2021 03:21 PM Things go so much more smoothly when Washington reporters actually like the person functioning as president. And so, President Joe Biden cleared the very low bar that was set for his first press conference on Thursday. It's not that our biggest problems have gone away. Almost 140,000 people have died from the coronavirus since Biden was elected. More than 10 million people remain unemployed. The Border Patrol has gone back to functioning as a full-time child care program for Latin America's poor after Biden opened the border to all of Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. Biden got questions about those things but always with the benefit of the doubt. PBS reporter Yamiche Alcindor asked Biden if she thought the "perception" of him as a "moral and decent guy" (I wonder who might have that perception) is at least in part to blame for the crush of migrants in South Texas. Biden gave a chuckle and said he was "flattered." Remember when reporters asked former President Donald Trump questions like that? Me neither. But I do remember when Trump was asked by NBC's Peter Alexander whether his "impulse to put a positive spin on things is maybe giving Americans a false sense of hope" on the pandemic. Reporters hated Trump so much that they actually thought it was a searing point to ask him if he was in too good of a mood. But they like Biden, so there won't be any of that anymore. Biden talked for about an hour before abruptly telling reporters, "Folks, I'm going," and quickly exiting the room. He made it out alive, but that's easy to do when reporters like you. | 2 |
WASHINGTON — Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer told reporters Tuesday that when President Donald Trump informed him that Jamey Comey would be dismissed as FBI director, Schumer replied it was a “big mistake” to do so and called on the Justice Department to appoint a special prosecutor.“Earlier this afternoon President Trump called me and informed me he was firing director Comey. I told the president, ‘Mr. President with all due respect you are making a big mistake.’ The first question the administration has to answer is, why now? If the administration had objections to the way director Comey handled the Clinton investigation they had those objections the minute the president got into office, but they didn’t fire him then. Why did it happen today?” Schumer said. Schumer went on to say, “We know the house is investigating Russian interference in our elections that benefited the Trump campaign. We know the Senate is investigating. We know the FBI has been looking into whether the Trump campaign colluded with the Russians. A very serious offense. Were these investigations getting too close to home for the president? It is troubling that Attorney General Sessions who had recused himself from the Russian investigation played a role in firing the man leading it. So what happens now?” “If Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein does not appoint an independent special prosecutor, every American will rightly suspect that the decision to fire Director Comey was part of a cover up,” Schumer added. The New York Democrat called Trump’s firing of Comey a “troubling pattern” referencing his previous dismissals of former Acting Attorney General Sally Yates and former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara. “This does not seem to be a coincidence. This investigation must be run as far away as possible from this White House.” The minority leader called on Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein “to appoint a special prosecutor… right now.” Follow Kerry on Twitter | 2 |
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! We no longer have to transport ourselves to a magical alternate reality to ponder what a love child between Richard Nixon and Dick Cheney would look like. Given a Justice Department memo obtained by NBC News, we can conclude that child would look like none other than President Barack Obama.David Frost, in his conversation with President Nixon, asked him if the president could do something illegal. Nixon responded, “I'm saying that when the president does it, it's not illegal.” Vice President Cheney, in the War on Terror, took the strong position that citizenship did not necessarily matter when it came to targeting our enemies.Though Senator and presidential candidate Barack Obama was squeamish about such things, President Obama has taken on a very Nixonian-Cheneyesque view of such things. Now, NBC News has uncovered a Justice Department memo making clear what President Obama’s evolved view on terrorists is — kill ‘em regardless of citizenship and do not worry about such small things as constitutional due process.According to the Justice Department memo, if intelligence confirms an American is involved in a terrorist plot as a ranking member of Al Qaeda and extraction of that American is not possible without putting military lives in jeopardy, the United States should have no hesitation in killing him without making an attempt to arrest him and give him his due process.[pullquote]More On This... Civil libertarians on the left and right are aghast. Conservatives who long thought the president was softening on his commitment against terrorists have cheered. Roles have been reversed.More importantly, this news exposes partisans who have surrendered intellectual consistency for party cheerleading. Some Republicans who would have been happy with President Bush doing this are now upset. Some Democrats who denounced Bush are now cheering on Barack Obama.Perhaps, they should all pay attention to one key part of the newly uncovered memo.As my friend Moe Lane, writing at RedState.com, noticed, the memo includes this fascinating portion:“…the condition that an operation leader present an “imminent” threat of violent attack against the United States does not require the United States to have clear evidence that a specific attack on U.S. persons and interests will take place in the immediate future. Given the nature of, for example, the terrorist attacks on September 11, in which civilian airliners were hijacked to strike the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, this definition of imminence, which would require the United States to refrain from action until preparations for an attack are concluded, would not allow the United States sufficient time to defend itself.”In other words, there need not be immediacy in the definition of “imminent.” As long as a plan is in continuation, the United States could proceed.Hypothetically, a world leader — let us call him Saddam — invites Al Qaeda operatives into his country, which we will call Iraq for purposes of this hypothetical, to design and structure terrorist attacks on the United States. While everyone is focusing on drones and American targets, this memo also begins to justify military and intelligence forces going beyond that in order to stop terrorist attacks. This memo gives a foundation for invasion to stop imminent attacks that are not imminent, in the common sense of the word, but are in active planning.The battlefield has shifted over the past two decades. The president has already killed one American on a battlefield with a drone. His chief role is to keep the nation safe. In the twenty-first century, in the remote caves of Afghanistan and deserts of the Middle East, it is both impractical and unnecessary to strap a speaker to a drone in order to shout down to an American Al Qaeda operative, read him his Miranda rights, then caution him to step back a quarter mile to wait for his arrest while the drone unleashes hell on all his terrorist friends.Just kill them before they kill us. At some point, we must trust that the president and his advisers, when they see a gathering of Al Qaeda from the watchful eye of a drone, are going to make the right call and use appropriate restraint and appropriate force to keep us safe.Frankly, it should be American policy that any American collaborating with Al Qaeda is better off dead than alive. Richard Nixon and Dick Cheney should be proud. | 2 |
Former President George W. Bush put the odds at 50-50 that his brother, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, will run for president in 2016. “I know that he’s wrestling with the decision,” Mr. Bush said in an interview aired Sunday on CBS’ “Face the Nation.” “I’d give it a toss up,” the former president said. “On the other hand … he’s not here knocking on my door, you know, agonizing about the decision.” Speculation has been swirling about Jeb Bush potential to be a strong Republican presidential candidate. “I occasionally fuel the speculation by saying that I hope he runs. I think he’d be a very good president,” Mr. Bush said. “I know this about Jeb. He is not afraid to succeed. In other words, I think he knows he could do the job — and nor is he afraid to fail.” He also said that Jeb Bush fully understands the demands of a presidential campaign and of the Oval Office, having watched the experiences of his brother and their father, former President George H.W. Bush. What’s more, he said that Jeb Bush learned from their father that “you can go into politics and still be a good father.” The priorities of your life don’t have to be compromised,” he said, adding that his brother’s priorities are his family, his country and his faith. “He has seen that you don’t have to sell those out in order to be a politician,” said Mr. Bush. | 2 |
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! President Joe Biden declined to call on U.S. reporters Tuesday after British Prime Minister Boris Johnson took questions from reporters from the United Kingdom during an Oval Office meeting.After a brief conversation with Biden that touched on issues ranging from climate change and transport infrastructure to lifting the ban on British beef, Johnson opened the floor for reporters from his home country."Would it be okay if we have just a couple of questions, just a couple?" Johnson asked, looking over to Biden, who replied, "Good luck."BIDEN REPEATEDLY IMPLIES HE'S NOT IN CHARGE OF WHEN, WHERE HE CAN TAKE QUESTIONS FROM THE PRESSAfter Johnson had taken several questions from British reporters, the press pool was then corraled out of the Oval Office while Johnson was mid-sentence, prompting a flurry of shouted questions from reporters. Biden appeared to briefly answer one shouted question as the pool exited, saying, "The violence is unacceptable." It is not clear what the question was. White House reporters made a formal complaint with the White House about not getting any formal questions while the British press asked away.CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APPBiden has raised eyebrows for repeatedly implying that White House staff controls when and where he is allowed to take questions from the press. He has used phrases that suggest he is being "instructed" on which reporters to call on from a pre-selected list. On several occasions, he has said he is "going to get in trouble" if he answers questions from reporters.The White House has also apparently cut the feed from several Biden events, most recently during a Sept. 13 briefing on wildfires with federal and state officials in Boise, Idaho. | 2 |
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! The Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that the Trump administration acted within its authority when it expanded exemptions to the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) requirement for employers to provide insurance coverage that includes contraception -- in a victory for Little Sisters of the Poor, the Catholic group that has been at the center of the national debate over the mandate.The court ruled 7-2 in favor of the Trump administration and the Catholic charity that cares for the elderly in two related disputes against Pennsylvania, which sued over the validity of a rule from the Trump administration that allowed religiously-affiliated groups and some for-profit companies to opt-out of providing contraception coverage to employees.The majority opinion, written by Justice Clarence Thomas, ruled that the Trump administration's challenged rulemaking was aboveboard, and hailed the work of the Little Sisters of the Poor. U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas participates in taking a new family photo with his fellow justices at the Supreme Court building in Washington, D.C., U.S., June 1, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst - RC15CF6608B0 SUPREME COURT RULES RELIGIOUS SCHOOLS SHIELDED FROM TEACHERS' EMPLOYMENT DISCRIMINATION CLAIMS"For over 150 years, the Little Sisters have engaged in faithful service and sacrifice, motivated by a religious calling to surrender all for the sake of their brother," Thomas wrote. "But for the past seven years, they -- like many other religious objectors who have participated in the litigation and rulemakings leading up to today’s decision -- have had to fight for the ability to continue in their noble work without violating their sincerely held religious beliefs."He added: "We hold today that the Departments had the statutory authority to craft that exemption, as well as the contemporaneously issued moral exemption. We further hold that the rules promulgating these exemptions are free from procedural defects."Little Sisters of the Poor Sister Constance Veit told Shannon Bream on "Fox News @ Night" earlier this year that following the ACA mandate was "unthinkable.""We dedicate our lives to this because we believe in the dignity of every human life at every stage of life from conception until natural death," Veit said. "So, we've devoted our lives -- by religious vows -- to caring for the elderly. And, we literally are by their bedside holding their hand as they pass on to eternal life. So, it's unthinkable for us, on the one way, to be holding the hand of the dying elderly, and on the other hand, to possibly be facilitating the taking of innocent unborn life."The Supreme Court also ruled in favor of religious organizations in an employment discrimination case Wednesday. And last week it came down with a ruling that states could not ban religious schools from receiving money from state-funded scholarship programs that are available to non-religious private schools.Lower court rulings had gone against the administration, with a nationwide injunction putting the exemptions on hold. But the Supreme Court's ruling Wednesday amounts to a huge win for religious conservatives who have been battling the ACA's contraceptive mandate for years."It is outrageous that the Obama administration forced a group of nuns to violate their religious beliefs in the first place," Judicial Crisis Network Vice President and Senior Counsel Frank Scaturro tweeted. "The Court’s decision today upholding that exemption is a victory for freedom of religion and conscience—for the Little Sisters and for everyone. Let’s be thankful that the Little Sisters’ ordeal in court has finally ended."CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS INJURED HEAD IN FALL LAST MONTH, WAS HOSPITALIZEDThomas was joined in his judgment by all the justices except for Sonia Sotomayor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg on Wednesday. Ginsburg raised alarms in her dissent that the ruling could put women's health at risk."Today, for the first time, the Court casts totally aside countervailing rights and interests in its zeal to secure religious rights to the nth degree," she wrote. "Destructive of the Women’s Health Amendment, this Court leaves women workers to fend for themselves, to seek contraceptive coverage from sources other than their employer’s insurer, and, absent another available source of funding, to pay for contraceptive services out of their own pockets."There were two concurring opinions, one written by Justice Samuel Alito and joined by Justice Neil Gorsuch, and another written by Justice Elena Kagan and joined by Justice Stephen Breyer.In her opinion, Kagan said that she believed the Trump administration had the authority to make the religious exemption to the contraceptive mandate, but that she is suspicious about whether the administration fulfilled "administrative law’s demand for reasoned decisionmaking." Loraine Marie Maguire (3rd R), mother provincial of the Little Sisters of the Poor, stands alongside fellow nuns following oral arguments in 7 cases dealing with religious organizations that want to ban contraceptives from their health insurance policies on religious grounds at the Supreme Court in Washington, DC, March 23, 2016. ((SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images))LITTLE SISTER OF THE POOR ON DEFYING OBAMACARE MANDATE: 'WE BELIEVE IN THE DIGNITY OF EVERY HUMAN LIFE'Kagan argues that Pennsylvania could further challenge the religious exemption as "arbitrary and capricious" in lower courts following Wednesday's ruling -- something that the lower courts did not previously rule on because they had decided that the rule was outside of the administration's authority.Alito's concurrence, on the other hand, argues that Thomas' ruling did not go far enough and that the court should have ruled that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) requires the religious exemption."We now send these cases back to the lower courts, where the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the State of New Jersey are all but certain to pursue their argument that the current rule is flawed on yet another ground, namely, that it is arbitrary and capricious and thus violates the APA," Alito wrote.He added: "If RFRA requires this exemption, the Departments did not act in an arbitrary and capricious manner in granting it. And in my judgment, RFRA compels an exemption for the Little Sisters and any other employer with a similar objection to what has been called the accommodation to the contraceptive mandate."SMITH AND VON SPAKOVSKY: SUPREME COURT'S DECISION ON 'FAITHLESS' ELECTORS IS A VICTORY FOR WE THE PEOPLELiberal groups were incensed by the Wednesday decision, which they said was essentially a license to discriminate."This is a shameful decision from the Supreme Court," Bridgitte Amiri, the deputy director of the ACLU's Reproductive Freedom Project, said. "Religious liberty is a fundamental right, but it does not grant a license to discriminate. Denying employees and students coverage for birth control will limit their ability to decide whether and when to have a family and make other decisions about their futures. And it will exacerbate existing inequalities, falling hardest on people with the fewest resources and people of color."Amiri noted that the religious exemption is just that -- an exemption. And most employers will still have to provide birth control in their health care plans under the ACA.CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APPBut pro-life groups nonetheless carried the day, and Marjorie Dannenfelser, the president of the pro-life Susan B. Anthony List, credited President Trump."Today is a major victory for President Trump, who has courageously fought to protect the Little Sisters of the Poor from the Obama-Biden HHS abortifacient mandate," she said. "We commend President Trump for standing strong for the Little Sisters of the Poor – his record stands in stark contrast to that of Joe Biden, who helped launch this assault as Obama’s Vice President nearly a decade ago."The justices this fall will hear a broader challenge to Obamacare, and requests by the current administration and some red-leaning states to invalidate the entire Affordable Care Act. It is a move opposed by the Democratic-led House and a coalition of other states.Fox News' Bill Mears and Julia Musto contributed to this report. | 2 |
New York State Attorney General Letitia James takes a question after announcing that the state is suing the National Rifle Association during a press conference, Thursday, Aug. 6, 2020, in New York. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens)
New York is trying to dissolve the National Rifle Association (NRA), announcing a lawsuit against the gun-rights group.
The state attorney general on Thursday said the NRA engages in "illegal self-dealings" after filing a lawsuit in state court in Manhattan following an 18-month investigation into the organization. "It's clear the NRA has been failing to carry out it's stated mission for many many years. Instead, it operated as a breeding ground for greed, abuse, and illegality," New York Attorney General Letitia James claimed. "Today, we send a loud and strong message, that no one is above the law, not even the NRA."
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NRA President Carolyn Meadows said the group was counter-suing the New York attorney general's office, setting the stage for a drawn-out legal battle that could last for years. "It's a transparent attempt to score political points and attack the leading voice in opposition to the leftist agenda," Meadows said in a statement.
Simultaneously, the Washington, DC, attorney general sued the NRA Foundation, a charitable arm of the organization designed to provide programs for firearm safety, marksmanship, and hunting safety, accusing it of diverting funds to the NRA to help pay for lavish spending by its top executives.
The organization went from a nearly $28 million surplus in 2015 to a $36 million deficit in 2018.
Last May, the NRA announced it was cutting staff and salaries due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic has upended the gun-rights organization during what should be heady times for the group, in the middle of a presidential election, and with gun owners riled up over what they see as an effort by authorities to trample on their Second Amendment rights.
The organization said it had nearly 5 million members as of December 2018. Observers and lawmakers see the gun-rights organization as one of the three most influential lobbying groups in Washington, DC, according to Wikipedia. While departing the White House on a visit to Ohio, President Trump said the NRA should leave New York, suggesting the group should be based in Texas, instead.
We encourage readers who wish to comment on our material to do so through our Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram accounts. God bless you and keep you in His truth. | 2 |
President Donald Trump is scheduled to meet with Democrats on Wednesday to unveil a way to fund a $2 million infrastructure deal. In a last minute move, Trump, however, said infrastructure won't happen until a trade deal is struck. “Before we get to infrastructure, it is my strong view that Congress should first pass the important and popular USMCA trade deal,” Trump wrote in a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer on Tuesday. “It will replace the job killing Nafta, one of the worst trade deals ever entered into by our nation. Once Congress has passed USMCA we should turn our attention to a bipartisan infrastructure package."Trump also told Democrats he expected them to come to the table with a clear list of infrastructure priorities and ways to pay for the deal.“It would be helpful, if you came to tomorrow’s meeting with your infrastructure priorities and specifics regarding how much funding you would dedicate to each,” Trump wrote. “Your caucus has expressed a wide range of priorities, and it is unclear which ones have your support. I had hoped that we could have worked out these priorities following our last meeting, but you canceled a scheduled meeting of our teams, preventing them from advancing our discussions.”Democrats have been open to the idea of working with Trump on an infrastructure deal. They figure if Trump backs a tax increase of some sort other Republicans would get on board with the move. The administration, however, has looked at their latest budget proposal to see what could be cut. They've also considered selling assets as a way of paying for the infrastructure deal, POLITICO reported. It remains unclear how much money the White House would be willing to allocate towards the deal.
**NEW: Pres. Trump tells Democrat leaders tonight.. in so many words.. 'no infrastructure deal without a deal on the USMCA trade deal first.' Full letter from President to Pelosi/Schumer below... @OANN pic.twitter.com/Pvr8PjPAc4— Patrick Hussion (@PatrickHussion) May 21, 2019 | 2 |
Jan. 23, 2014: GOP Rep. Paul Ryan recites the Pledge of Allegiance during an event in San Antonio, Texas. (AP)NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! Top Republicans made clear Sunday they want to improve the country’s immigration system but will not negotiate until U.S. borders are first secured.“This is not trust but verify. This is a verify and trust approach,” Wisconsin GOP Rep. Paul Ryan told ABC’s “This Week.” “Security first, no amnesty, then we might be able to get somewhere.”Ryan’s comments follow GOP House leadership releasing a plan last week that outlines a path toward legal status for some of the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants now in the United States.The plan includes tighter border security but no plan for those living in the U.S. illegally to achieve citizenship, a deal many conservatives consider amnesty.Ryan, a member of House leadership and chairman of the House Budget Committee, also repeated that fellow party members don’t trust that the president will enforce border laws after a deal on immigration is reached.“Those things have to be in law, in practice and independently verified before the rest of the law can occur," he said. "So it's a security force first, non-amnesty approach."Ryan also acknowledged that the possibility of the House passing a bill that could reach the president's desk by the end of the year is still "clearly in doubt."The Democrat-controlled Senate this past summer passed comprehensive immigration reform that included a 13-year path to citizenship for some living illegally in the U.S. But reform legislation has remained stalled in the GOP-led House over the citizenship issue and concern about Senate Democrats dominating should negotiators from both chambers meet to negotiate a compromise deal.President Obama indicated last week that he might be open to legal status first, but restated such a plan cannot lead to two permanent categories of people – citizens and non-citizens.“We think that was a pretty good step,” White House Chief of Staff Dennis McDonough said Sunday on NBC’s “This Week” about the GOP plan. “We feel pretty good that we’ll get this done this year.”Louisiana Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” that Republicans should proceed with immigration reform because it’s the right thing to do, “not because of what some pollster tells us.”Jindal, vice chairman of the Republican Governors Association, disagreed with the 2014 election strategy that Republicans should just let Obama and Democratic candidates stew in the problems associated with ObamaCare.“There are a lot of folks in the Republican Party that would tell you the president is doing so poorly right now in the polls and especially with the flawed implementation and design of the Affordable Care Act that … we should stay out of his way and run 2014 as a referendum on that,” Jindal said. “I’m not one of those people.”He also said the country should change its immigration system to "high wall, broad gate." | 2 |
| July 19, 2021 08:06 AM | Updated Jul 19, 2021, 02:39 PM The Biden administration made its first transfer of a Guantanamo Bay inmate to his home country as the administration pushes to shutter the facility. The Department of Defense announced on Monday morning the transfer of Abdul Latif Nasir back to Morocco. In 2016, the Periodic Review Board process ruled that his detention “no longer remained necessary to protect against a continuing significant threat to the national security of the United States.” ‘I FEEL GOOD’: BIDEN SENDS MESSAGE TO PUTIN ABOUT US ABILITY TO RETALIATE FOR RANSOMWARE ATTACKS At that time, the board recommended he be authorized to return home, but officials were unable to complete the process before the Obama administration ended. The Trump administration reaffirmed the Periodic Review Board process on Jan. 30, 2018, but did not complete Nasir’s repatriation. The review board consists of one senior career official from the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security, Justice, and State, along with the Joint Chiefs Staff and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. Nasir was captured on Dec. 15, 2001, as one of 52 fighters who were caught trying to escape to Pakistan. He was transferred to U.S. custody on Jan. 21, 2002, and was taken to Guantanamo Bay on May 3 of that year, per a U.S. Department of Defense memo from 2008 released by WikiLeaks. He met with Osama bin Laden in 1993 and later received training at multiple al Qaeda training camps where he trained in explosives and poisons. Former President George W. Bush opened the detention center at Guantanamo Bay in 2002, and at its peak, the facility housed nearly 800 detainees, according to NBC News. CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER President Barack Obama promised to shut down the facility during his campaign, though his efforts were ultimately unsuccessful. During his term, however, the number of detainees was reduced from 245 to 41. There are 39 detainees remaining in Guantanamo Bay, and 10 of them are eligible for transfer, according to a Department of Defense spokesperson. | 2 |
President Joe Biden reacts following a bipartisan meeting with U.S. senators about the proposed framework for the infrastructure bill at the White House in Washington, D.C., June 24, 2021. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters) President Joe Biden announced an agreement on a bipartisan infrastructure package Thursday, giving his stamp of approval to a plan spearheaded by ten senators. The new consensus marks the end to many weeks of negotiations and partisan gridlock over the president’s chief legislative priority.
“We have a deal,” Biden said outside the White House shortly after the deal broke. “We have made serious compromises on both ends.” “They have my word, I’ll stick with what they’ve proposed. And they’ve given me their word as well. Where I come from that’s good enough for me.”
The discussed deal, a significantly trimmed down version of Biden’s original 6 trillion dollar proposal, is worth about $953 billion with $559 billion allocated for new spending in transportation expenditures like roads, waterways, and bridges, as well as electric utilities, broadband internet, and other projects.
Prior to the agreement, a major outstanding question was how both parties planned to finance the program, one of the most expensive in U.S. history. Republican Senator Susan Collins said, “We’ve agreed on the price tag, the scope and how to pay for it.” A coalition of 21 senators, including 11 Republicans and 10 Democrats, support the legislation, but it will need to garner 60 votes to override a filibuster and pass through the traditional legislative avenue.
Moderate Democratic Senator Joe Manchin implored more reluctant colleagues in his party to approve the bill in spite of its reduced scope and size. “I would say please don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good,” he told reporters Thursday.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told Biden Wednesday that they are on board with the plan. However, they stipulated that the Democrats will simultaneously pursue a separate package for “human infrastructure” including provisions on elder and child care, climate change, education, etc. through the unconventional reconciliation process, through which a bill only requires a simple majority rather than 60 votes to advance.
If implemented, the “two-track system” Schumer and Pelosi are pushing, which Biden said he supports, will negate GOP efforts over the past couple of months to curtail excessive government spending for Democratic causes. If both prevail, it could signify that Republicans have lost their negotiating power, and that their objections to unprecedented fiscal expenditure will have been in vain.
“We won’t get enough votes to pass either unless we have enough votes to pass both,” Schumer said on the Senate floor Thursday. “When the Senate returns in July, it will be time to take the next step and hold the first votes on the bipartisan infrastructure bill on the floor of the Senate. Senators should also be prepared to consider a budget resolution that will clear the way for the budget reconciliation bill as soon as possible.”
Send a tip to the news team at NR. Recommended NBC's 'Cataclysmic' Olympics-Coverage Flop How can anyone feel good about these Olympics? Joe Biden Doesn’t Know What You’re Talking About To watch Biden at the lectern was to experience shock and dismay interspersed with moments of alarm and dark humor. No wonder he hides from the media. Nikole Hannah-Jones Responds to Our 1619 and Slavery Issue She reacted with a lot of sneering and ad hominem argumentation and nothing of substance. Maskless Super Bowl Marks Our Return to Normalcy This collective moment was a warning to the Covid regime that its strictures won’t stand much longer. The Perfect Storm Is Coming Not learning from the stagflationary past may lead to a stagflationary future. The Afghanistan Debacle Looks Worse and Worse The more we learn about the administration’s withdrawal, the more it becomes clear that its decisions were driven by political considerations and panic. The Latest Nikki Haley Blasts American-Born Skier Competing for China at Beijing Olympics 'Every athlete needs to know when they put their flag on, you're standing for freedom or you're standing for human rights abuses,' said Haley. San Francisco Voters Overwhelmingly Back Recall of Progressive School-Board Members More than 70 percent of voters supported the ouster of school board members Alison Collins, Gabriela López, and Faauuga Moliga. How Georgetown Is Stifling Speech on Campus The university is implementing the academic analog of a SLAPP suit against Ilya Shapiro. McKinsey Website Contradicts Denials of Chinese-Government Work; Rubio Claims ‘Cover-Up’ The consultancy once said it did work for China’s central government, undercutting recent statements. Imagine a Trumpdeau. You Can’t If Trump had gone after the 2020 rioters the way Trudeau is targeting truckers, the institutions and the permanent government wouldn’t have complied. Building Back Stagflation Our elected leaders must accept that inflation is a monster of their own making, and stop fanning the flames with ever-higher levels of government spending. | 2 |
Attorney General Eric Holder was just months into the job when he announced plans to prosecute the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks and other alleged co-conspirators in a New York courtroom, rather than through the Guantanamo Bay military commission process.
It was an audacious idea, but immediately beset by political opposition and public safety concerns. The Obama administration's eventual decision to walk away from the proposal was a stinging defeat for Holder and a reminder of the complexities of the legal fight against terrorism.
Holder, who announced Thursday that he would step down once a successor is confirmed, took office determined to turn the page from Bush administration policies that authorized harsh interrogation techniques against suspected terrorists. But he will leave with a mixed record of national security decisions that have drawn their own scrutiny and disappointed those who felt he didn't go far enough to distance the Justice Department from past practices.
The department points to hundreds of terrorism-fighting successes during Holder's tenure, including prosecutions of plots to explode a bomb in Times Square and on a Detroit-bound airliner.
But also under his watch, the department authorized targeted drone strikes against Americans abroad, subpoenaed journalists' telephone records in leak investigations and defended in court the government's bulk collection of millions of Americans' telephone records.
"It's a complex legacy that I think is somewhat disappointing on national security," said Seton Hall University law professor Jonathan Hafetz, a former senior lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union.
Overall, Hafetz said he believed Holder, attorney general since the start of Obama's presidency in 2009, had been "too supportive of executive power and insufficiently protective of civil liberties."
Stephen Vladeck, an American University law school professor, credited the attorney general for overseeing a large number of terrorism prosecutions. But in a national security world where much is classified, Vladeck said, "the visible stuff doesn't look as good as the stuff we don't see."
"His legacy is one, that, unfortunately is going to be marked by the more visible moments, which aren't as flattering," Vladeck said.
When Holder took over, he quickly signaled a new direction from the previous Republican administration.
During Senate hearings on his nomination, Holder defined waterboarding as torture. He later announced an investigation into CIA interrogation methods of terrorist detainees. The inquiry ended without criminal charges.
He pushed a shift away from the military commission system the Bush administration enacted to prosecute suspected terrorists at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. In November 2009, he said the Justice Department would prosecute five detainees, including professed Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, in federal court in New York and seek the death penalty.
Critics, mostly Republicans, argued the federal courts were ill-equipped for such a trial and they expressed alarm that terrorists would be brought to American soil.
The White House in 2011 shelved the idea, which was seen as a step toward closing the Guantanamo detention facility.
Despite that defeat, Holder remained firm in supporting civilian courts for suspected terrorists, and his Justice Department has won many convictions before American juries.
He has said his position was vindicated by the fact that, in the years since the Guantanamo proposal was spiked, Osama bin Laden's son-in-law was captured, convicted in New York and given a life sentence. The military commission case against Mohammed remains stalled in Guantanamo by pretrial wrangling.
"I have great respect for him, and I know how hard he took not being able to try Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in court," said Laura Murphy, director of the ACLU's Washington legislative office.
Yet civil liberties advocates who appreciated Holder's efforts to afford legal protections for suspected terrorists were nonetheless frustrated when he later defended the administration's legal rationale to kill American-born Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen. They challenged the government's ability to kill one of its citizens without court permission and its refusal, until recently, to release the memo authorizing the strike.
An unmanned U.S. drone killed al-Awlaki in Yemen in 2011. U.S. officials considered him to be an inspirational leader of al-Qaida, and they linked him to the planning and execution of several attacks targeting American and Western interests, including the 2009 attempt on Christmas Day on a Detroit-bound airliner.
The ACLU, in a statement on Holder's departure, cited the case as among those where "we've had profound disagreements" with Holder.
Additional scrutiny came from the administration's crackdown on news media reporting involving national security matters.
The Justice Department secretly subpoenaed phone records from Associated Press reporters and editors — Holder said he removed himself from the case — and used a search warrant to obtain some emails of a Fox News journalist in another leak investigation. Prosecutors have subpoenaed New York Times reporter James Risen in the case of a former CIA officer accused of disclosing government secrets. Holder has since issued new guidelines for media leak investigations.
Holder's successor invariably will face many of the same policy questions: How can Guantanamo be closed, and what will become of the detainees? How should the Justice Department handle potential foreign fighters trying to join extremist groups in Syria? Is there a vehicle for bringing former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden out of asylum in Russia and into a U.S. courtroom?
Either way, said Vladeck, it's challenging from the outside to fully assess Holder's national security record.
"The public's perspective, I think, may be very different from the attorney general's perspective. He knows all the things that never made the front pages." © Copyright 2022 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. | 2 |
WASHINGTON (AP) — Setting the stage for a potentially historic ruling, the Supreme Court announced Friday it will decide whether same-sex couples have a right to marry everywhere in America under the Constitution.
The justices will take up gay-rights cases that ask them to declare for the entire nation that people can marry the partners of their choice, regardless of gender. The cases will be argued in April, and a decision is expected by late June. Proponents of same-sex marriage said they expect the court to settle the matter once and for all with a decision that invalidates state provisions that define marriage as between a man and a woman. On the other side, advocates for traditional marriage want the court to let the political process play out, rather than have judges order states to allow same-sex couples to marry.
Same-sex couples can marry in 36 states and the District of Columbia.
That number is nearly double what it was just three months ago, when the justices initially declined to hear gay marriage appeals from five states seeking to preserve their bans on same-sex marriage. The effect of the court’s action in October was to make final several pro-gay rights rulings in the lower courts.
Now there are just 14 states in which same-sex couples cannot wed. The court’s decision to get involved is another marker of the rapid change that has redefined societal norms in the space of a generation.
The court will be weighing in on major gay rights issues for the fourth time in in 27 years. In the first of those, in 1986, the court upheld Georgia’s anti-sodomy law in a devastating defeat for gay rights advocates.
But the three subsequent rulings, all written by Justice Anthony Kennedy, were major victories for gay men and lesbians. In its most recent case in 2013, the court struck down part of a federal anti-gay marriage law in a decision that has paved the way for a wave of lower court rulings across the country in favor of same-sex marriage rights.
The court is extending the time it usually allots for argument from an hour to two-and-a-half hours. The justices will consider two related questions. The first is whether the Constitution requires states to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. The other is whether states must recognize same-sex marriages performed elsewhere.
The appeals before the court come from gay and lesbian plaintiffs in Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio and Tennessee. The federal appeals court that oversees those four states upheld their same-sex marriage bans in November, reversing pro-gay rights rulings of federal judges in all four states. It was the first, and so far only, appellate court to rule against same-sex marriage since the high court’s 2013 decision.
Ten other states also prohibit such unions. In Arkansas, Mississippi, Missouri, South Dakota and Texas, judges have struck down anti-gay marriage laws, but they remain in effect pending appeals. In Missouri, same-sex couples can marry in St. Louis and Kansas City only.
Louisiana is the only other state that has seen its gay marriage ban upheld by a federal judge. There have been no rulings on lawsuits in Alabama, Georgia, Nebraska and North Dakota. | 2 |
Antivirus software tycoon John McAfee apparently hanged himself in a Spanish jail cell on Wednesday — just hours after a court ruled he would be extradited to face federal charges in the US. Authorities said a preliminary investigation determined there were no signs of foul play, the Spanish newspaper El Pais reported. The 75-year-old eccentric tech entrepreneur was arrested in October and was awaiting extradition in the Barcelona jail when he was found dead by hanging, police sources told El Pais. The newspaper reported McAfee was pulled from his cell in Barcelona and police are investigating the circumstances around his death.
John McAfee has died by suicide.Getty Images John McAfee was awaiting extradition when he was found dead.AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File John McAfee was arrested in October.FRED DUFOUR/AFP via Getty Images “Everything points to suicide,” the newspaper reported, citing justice department officials in the country. A second Spanish newspaper, El Mundo, also reported McAfee had died by an apparent suicide in the jail.
Earlier on Wednesday, the Spanish High Court had agreed to extradite McAfee, who had been charged with a number of federal financial crimes in two districts in the United States. In a statement Wednesday, his lawyer confirmed that McAfee was found dead in his cell and chided US prosecutors for their case against him. “John was and will always be remembered as a fighter,” attorney Nishay Sanan said. “He tried to love this country but the US government made his existence impossible.” “They tried to erase him but they failed,” Sanan wrote. He added that there was no confirmation on the cause of death. McAfee was hit with a 10-count indictment in the Western District of Tennessee in October for allegedly evading taxes on millions of dollars in income. John McAfee died hours after reports surfaced that he would be extradited.Twitter Police are investigating the circumstances around John McAfee’s death.EPA/CHEMA MOYA / POOL He was arrested by authorities in Spain after the indictment was handed down and had been in custody in the country since.
In the Tennessee case, prosecutors alleged McAfee racked up millions of dollars in income through speaking engagements, selling his personal story for a documentary and doing consulting work.
He then skipped paying taxes on all of the income from 2014 to 2018, according to the feds.
John McAfee was pulled from his cell in Barcelona.AFP PHOTO/PDHHO/AFP/Getty Images John McAfee was hit with a 10-count indictment in the Western District of Tennessee.© Xinhua via ZUMA Wire He was also charged in a separate indictment in Manhattan federal court in March for a pump-and-dump scheme involving cryptocurrencies that he was touting on social media. In that case, McAfee and an accomplice allegedly bilked bitcoin investors out of some $13 million in two schemes, including one where they bought up large quantities of “alt-coin,” then inflated the price of it by publicizing it on Twitter.
They then sold off the cryptocurrency at the inflated price and made a $2 million profit, prosecutors said.
McAfee had claimed at an extradition hearing earlier this month that the federal tax evasion charges against him were politically motivated, Reuters reported.
John McAfee skipped paying taxes on all of his income from 2014 to 2018.ADALBERTO ROQUE/AFP/Getty Images John McAfee was charged with a number of federal financial crimes.REUTERS/Darrin Zammit Lupi/File Photo | 2 |
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has approved booster doses of the COVID-19 vaccines of the Moderna and Johnson & Johnson brands, including taking different shots for the booster compared to the initial inoculation.
CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky gave her final approval late Thursday after an advisory panel unanimously endorsed the boosters, marking the final step before the vaccine boosters are made available to the public.
“There are now booster recommendations for all three available COVID-19 vaccines in the United States. Eligible individuals may choose which vaccine they receive as a booster dose,” the CDC announced on its website late Thursday. “Some people may have a preference for the vaccine type that they originally received and others, may prefer to get a different booster. CDC’s recommendations now allow for this type of mix and match dosing for booster shots.”
The latest CDC recommendations align with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) authorization of the Moderna and J&J booster doses on Wednesday. The CDC noted that its latest guidance “should not distract from the critical work of ensuring that unvaccinated people take the first step and get an initial COVID-19 vaccine.”
More than 65 million Americans remain unvaccinated.
The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) met Thursday and voted to recommend booster doses for everyone 18 and older who received a first dose of Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine at least two months earlier. Nearly 15 million people in the United States had received the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine.
For those who received their second dose of Moderna’s vaccine at least six months earlier, ACIP recommended a third shot for those age 65 and over, as well as some individuals at risk of severe illness and those at high risk of exposure to the virus through their jobs. The Moderna booster dose will be 50mg, which is half the strength used for the first two shots.
Those eligible for the Moderna booster are those aged 65 and older, as well as those 18 and older who have underlying medical conditions, live in long-term care settings, or work or live in high-risk settings.
Some committee members questioned whether young, otherwise healthy adults whose only eligibility was their job should get a booster dose.
“I just feel that we’re abdicating our responsibility, not only to allow people to be immunized if they should be immunized, but to protect them from immunizations that they do not need that have adverse events,” said committee member Dr. Sarah Long.
“I can’t say I am comfortable that anyone under 50, otherwise healthy, needs a booster at this time,” she added.
“I echo Dr. Long’s feeling that there are probably many people who are going to get a Moderna booster who don’t need it,” Dr. James Loehr, another committee member, said. “However, given the situation that we’ve already approved of Pfizer and there are enough people who are looking for a booster, I’m inclined reluctantly, to just go ahead and recommend a similar pattern for the Moderna booster. I have much stronger feelings in favor of the Janssen [J&J] booster.”
One advantage in choosing a different booster dose is if someone may be at risk for a rare side effect from a specific vaccine, ACIP member Dr. Helen Keipp Talbot said.
Both the FDA and CDC previously authorized booster doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine in September. Walensky at the time overrode recommendations from ACIP on which population could receive the booster shots.
Ultimately, people as young as 18 who have certain jobs or living situations could get a Pfizer-BioNTech booster, despite concerns from some experts that there was not enough data to support boosters for many younger people.
About 11.6 million people in the United States have received a booster as of Thursday.
Other countries, including Israel and Bahrain, have been offering boosters to a broad population. Citizens of both countries now risk losing their vaccination status granting them access to certain venues if they do not receive their booster doses.
Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report. Follow Mimi Nguyen Ly is a reporter covering world news with a focus on U.S. news. Based in Australia, she has a background in clinical optometry. Contact Mimi at [email protected] | 2 |
The White House on Tuesday began to lay out a public justification for a possible bombing of Syria, saying the nation’s use of chemical weapons is a threat to U.S. interests — a scenario that opens the door to military strikes that wouldn’t require authorization from Congress or the United Nations. Spokesman Jay Carney said President Obama had not decided on military action but was conferring with lawmakers, allies and members of his national security team about the forcefulness needed to punish the Syrian government for violating international law. “It is in the clear national security interests of the United States that the use or proliferation of chemical weapons on this scale not go unanswered,” Mr. Carney said, adding that the attack was of particular concern because it took place “in this highly volatile region.” Mr. Carney did not describe the intelligence that linked Syrian President Bashar Assad to the attack or how it was a direct threat to the U.S., which would give the Mr. Obama latitude in starting a bombing campaign. But he did say the Assad regime is the only force in Syria known to have chemical weapons and the rockets that could deliver them. He also said intelligence agencies are preparing to provide evidence of Mr. Assad’s role in the attack and cited the Chemical Weapons Convention, an international arms control agreement that bans the use of such weapons. The U.S. and 188 other nations have signed the pact; Syria has not. The administration is making its case to a war-weary public and is beginning to meet resistance from Congress, where Democrats and Republicans say the president needs to be more transparent about a military strike on a country that has not attacked the U.S. “Before any action is taken regarding Syria, it is imperative that President Obama make the case to the American people and consult with Congress,” said Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, the second-ranking Republican in the Senate. “He needs to explain what vital national interests are at stake and should put forth a detailed plan with clear objectives and an estimated cost for achieving those objectives.” An Aug. 21 attack near Damascus reportedly killed more than 300 civilians, including women and children, and powerful photos and video later showed bodies laid out shoulder to shoulder with no visible wounds — which the rebels said showed chemical weapons were used. The regime of Mr. Assad has denied that it used chemical weapons, but others, including humanitarian groups and journalists in Syria, say it was undoubtedly a chemical attack. On Monday, Secretary of State John F. Kerry said it was undeniable that the regime had used chemical weapons and called the act a “moral obscenity.” But on Tuesday in Damascus, the state-run Syrian Arab News Agency issued a statement accusing Mr. Kerry of citing “fabricated” evidence and saying he was “jumping over” the work of U.N. inspectors, showing that the U.S. intended to exploit events. Also, Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Muallim said the Assad government was not obstructing the work of U.N.-backed inspectors trying to examine the scene of the attack. But he later announced that a second day of inspections would be pushed back a day. Mr. al-Muallim cited disputes among groups of rebels as the reason for the postponement. He vowed that the Syrian army would carry out its campaign against the rebels despite the threat of foreign strikes, which he said would only serve interests linked with al Qaeda. Despite that defiant talk, pressure continues to build on Syria. The Arab League issued a statement Tuesday saying it holds the Syrian regime responsible for the chemical attack. British Prime Minister David Cameron, who has spoken with Mr. Obama in recent days about a coordinated response, said the allies are not looking to get involved in another war in the Middle East. But he said the international community cannot allow a chemical weapons attack to go unpunished. “This is not about wars in the Middle East,” Mr. Cameron told the BBC. “This is not even about the Syrian conflict. It’s about chemical weapons. Their use is wrong and the world shouldn’t stand idly by. It must be right to have some rules in our world and to try to enforce those rules.” Mr. Cameron said any action by the U.S. or a coalition “would have to be legal; would have to be proportionate.” “It would have to be specifically to deter and degrade the future use of chemical weapons,” he said, adding that Syria has used chemical weapons on at least 10 occasions in the more than 2-year-old civil war. French President Francois Hollande also said his government is prepared to retaliate against Syria for chemical weapons use. In the U.S., however, polling suggests that the public is reluctant to get entangled, and lawmakers are reflecting that. There has been no polling since the chemical weapons attack, but surveys earlier this summer by Pew, NBC News and Gallup consistently show two-thirds of Americans oppose military involvement in Syria. While some say Mr. Obama risks losing credibility if he doesn’t act, others are questioning the U.S. interests at stake and whether Mr. Obama will strike out on his own or go to Congress for permission. A coalition of Republicans and Democrats in the House has crafted a letter to the president telling him they are ready to reconvene and hear his case for military action — but warning him not to act until he seeks permission. “Engaging our military in Syria when no direct threat to the United States exists and without prior congressional authorization would violate the separation of powers that is clearly delineated in the Constitution,” said the letter, led by Rep. Scott E. Rigell, Virginia Republican. Mr. Obama and top aides have begun making calls to congressional leaders to talk over the situation and options, but it was unclear whether that met the definition of consultation that House Speaker John A. Boehner, Ohio Republican, laid out this week. Rep. Edward R. Royce, California Republican and chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, issued a statement Tuesday in which he agreed that chemical weapons use was unacceptable and affected U.S. national security but then issued the same warning that Mr. Cornyn did. “The consequences are too great for Congress to be brushed aside,” he said. Mr. Carney dismissed questions about Mr. Obama’s powers to act unilaterally, saying those were hypothetical at this point. But he did say Mr. Obama is not contemplating an attack that would target Mr. Assad for assassination. “It is not our policy to respond to this transgression with regime change,” Mr. Carney said. On Tuesday, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said U.S. forces are ready to act on any presidential order to strike Syria. “We are prepared. We have moved assets in place to be able to fulfill and comply with whatever option the president wishes to take,” Mr. Hagel said. The latest situation is colored by Mr. Obama’s experience two years ago, when he committed U.S. forces to bomb Libya and provide the air power that helped that country’s rebels oust longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi. Mr. Obama did not seek authorization from Congress for that action. The War Powers Resolution of 1973 allows a president to take military action as long as Congress is notified within 48 hours and the commitment of forces is limited to a set number of days. Members of Congress sued in 2011, arguing that Mr. Obama exceeded his powers under the 1973 law. But Gadhafi was ousted and the country turned over to a new government, leading a judge to toss out the lawmakers’ case as mooted by those events. ⦁ Stephen Dinan contributed to this report. | 2 |
DoubleLine Capital’s Jeffrey Gundlach said Donald Trump, if he’s elected president, would help the U.S. economy recover by going further into debt, just as Ronald Reagan fueled growth in the 1980s.
“Trump is going to win, and Trump is going to increase the deficit,” Gundlach said during a panel discussion Thursday in New York. Reagan “did it by taking three or four decades of stable nonfinancial debt-to-GDP ratio and putting it on a hockey stick higher.”
Gundlach, 56, isn’t endorsing any candidate, according to Loren Fleckenstein, a DoubleLine analyst. The fund manager, who has been predicting a Trump election victory since February, noted that Trump’s campaign slogan, “Make America Great Again,” resembles Reagan’s “Let’s Make America Great Again.”
Under Reagan, the U.S. debt grew to more than $2.3 trillion at the end of 1988 from $807 billion eight years earlier, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The total U.S. debt as of Dec. 31 was $15.1 trillion.
‘Growth Scare’
Markets might not react favorably to a Trump election at first, because the Republican presidential candidate has criticized international trade agreements, according to the fund manager.
“First, I think you’re going to get a global growth scare, trade-based,” Gundlach said. “That could cause a market rollover which to me looks like it’s already under way.”
This retreat in the S&P 500 Index could be “an excellent buying opportunity,” Gundlach added, as the debt binge “will probably stimulate growth, at least temporarily.”
The S&P 500 is down about 0.6 percent since Trump’s victory Tuesday in the Indiana primary. His win prompted his two remaining Republican opponents, Texas Senator Ted Cruz and Ohio Governor John Kasich, to suspend their campaigns.
Oil, Gold
“When I say Donald Trump’s going to win, it’s not that I’m wildly rooting for him, although I don’t dislike Donald Trump,” Gundlach said in an interview with Fox Business Network’s “Wall Street Week” set to air Friday at 8 p.m. New York time. “It’s just like, I think it’s going to happen.”
On the panel discussion, Gundlach said oil prices must get to $60 a barrel to avoid a wave of high-yield debt defaults, a price he doesn’t expect to see soon. He predicted more junk-bond defaults when borrowers are forced to roll over debt in a rising interest-rate environment by 2018 or the following two years.
Gundlach said he continues to be long on gold. Spot gold was trading at about $1,277 an ounce as of 6:48 p.m. Thursday in New York, up 20 percent this year. In January, Gundlach said he expected gold would climb to $1,400. © Copyright 2022 Bloomberg News. All rights reserved. | 2 |
Oct. 23, 2012: President Obama speaks during a campaign event at Triangle Park in Dayton, Ohio. (AP)NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! The Romney campaign accused President Obama of taking the Hispanic community "for granted" after a previously off-record interview was published, showing the president predicting that if he wins it will be because Republicans "alienated" Latinos.The president made the comment during a 30-minute conversation with the Des Moines Register's editorial board. The Obama campaign released the transcript after the editor complained the president's team had "handcuffed" the newspaper by insisting it be kept off record.In the interview, Obama made two pledges for a second term, saying he's confident Washington can strike a "grand bargain" deal on deficit reduction and immigration reform next year. He went on to take a swing at Republicans on the latter issue."And since this is off the record, I will just be very blunt. Should I win a second term, a big reason I will win a second term is because the Republican nominee and the Republican Party have so alienated the fastest-growing demographic group in the country, the Latino community. And this is a relatively new phenomenon," Obama said, likely in reference to the wave of illegal immigration enforcement laws at the state level.The Romney campaign, in response, cast doubt on the president's editorial board comments, pointing to Obama's failure so far to pass comprehensive immigration reform despite pledges in 2008 to do so.More On This... "It's a fascinating glimpse into how President Obama has taken the Hispanic community for granted for the past four years," spokesman Alberto Martinez said in a statement."He's caught making secret promises to an editorial board in Iowa, which also happens to be a promise he made in 2008, a promise he failed to keep, and a promise he doesn't repeat publicly. The whole episode underscores why millions of Hispanics are deeply disappointed with President Obama."Much of the rest of the Des Moines Register interview was fairly policy-focused. Obama discussed his plans for the economy, education and energy development while vigorously defending his term to date.At one point, Obama also told the editors he has "absolutely" no regrets that he didn't more forcefully pursue measures focused on the economy at the time he was pushing for the health care overhaul."The suggestion somehow that if we hadn't pursued ObamaCare, somehow we would have gotten additional stimulus out of the Republicans, for example, that we could have primed the pump more, that's just not borne out by any of the evidence," Obama said, noting Republican resistance at the time. The president also defended the health care bill as a measure aimed at treating the economy.The transcript was turned over and published after editor Rick Green, in a column Tuesday afternoon, revealed that the White House had demanded the conversation be kept out of print. Green said Obama's aides did not give a reason for the "unusual condition" of the call."It was a 'personal call' to the Register's publisher and editor, we were told," Green wrote. "The specifics of the conversation could not be shared because it was off the record."Following the complaint, campaign officials released a transcript to the newspaper, which it then published.Campaign spokeswoman Jen Psaki offered a brief explanation for the move. "This was a call that was meant to be a personal check in with a publisher and an editor, one of whom he hasn't spoken with in four years -- one of whom he'd never spoken with before. They expressed a desire to put this on the record, make it public, we said that's fine," she said.Green had written that, after the off-record conditions were initially made, the newspaper "immediately lobbied his campaign staff in Des Moines for a formal, on-the-record call," but was told the decision "came from the White House.""We relented and took the call. How could we not? It's the leader of the free world on line one. And as we weigh with our editorial board this critical decision about who to endorse, it was necessary for us to discuss the challenges confronting our state, nation and world with the president -- even when handcuffed by rules related to what could be shared," Green said.Green noted that Mitt Romney met with the editorial board "literally" in a barn in Iowa on Oct. 9, and the audio from that conversation was posted online. Green said in Tuesday's column that the initial snub, though, would not impact the newspaper's decision on an endorsement."That would be petty and ridiculous. We take far too seriously what's at stake this election and what our endorsement should say," he wrote. | 2 |
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! Get all the latest news on coronavirus and more delivered daily to your inbox. Sign up here.Dr. Anthony Fauci, the face of the White House coronavirus task force, warned in testimony Tuesday before the Senate Health Committee that reopening the economy before certain "checkpoints" set up in the Trump administration's coronavirus recovery plan are met could bring "serious" consequences."As I have said many times publicly, what we have worked out is a guideline framework for how to open America again,” Fauci said, referencing a set of guidelines the White House has released for states and localities to begin opening their economies. In order to proceed to the first of three stages, states would need to see an uninterrupted decrease in coronavirus cases over a 14-day period."Depending on the dynamics of an outbreak in a particular region, state, city or area, that would really determine the speed and the pace with which one does reenter or reopen," Fauci said. "If some areas – cities states or what have you – jump over those barriers, checkpoints and prematurely open up without having the capability of being able to respond effectively, and efficiently, my concern is that we will start to see little spikes that might turn into outbreaks."CORONAVIRUS: WHAT TO KNOWGOP SEN. ALEXANDER: 'STAYING AT HOME INDEFINITELY IS NOT THE SOLUTION'Fauci warned that prematurely lifting coronavirus restrictions closing schools and businesses and limiting travel would lead to "suffering and death" and "turn the clock back instead of going forward."When asked by Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., what could happen if areas do ignore the "checkpoints," Fauci said, "The consequences could be really serious."Further, when asked by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., if the virus was under control, Fauci said it is not."Right now it depends on what you mean by containment," Fauci said, noting the virus is not completely under control. "So when you look at the dynamics of new cases, even though some are coming down, the curve looks flat with some coming down. So I think we're going in the right direction, but the right direction does not mean we have by any means total control of this outbreak."He added that without proper measures, the U.S. could face a "resurgence" in cases. He said the U.S. should be in a much better place by the fall, but said if adequate measures are not taken, "there will be problems.""The time for magical thinking is over here," Warren said of President Trump's pushes to reopen the economy quickly and optimism that the virus "will go away."The hearing, which features Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), as well as three other top administration health officials, is the biggest congressional hearing since the coronavirus crisis began. It comes as states across the country are plotting their own courses for reopening their economies, with some already opening sectors and others maintaining strict lockdowns. President Trump himself has stressed the importance of getting America back to work, leading to criticism from some Democrats that this approach could be too risky.Fauci did not rip on the Trump administration's response to the pandemic in his planned remarks, instead emphasizing efforts by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to develop vaccines and other medical means to fight the coronavirus.NATIONAL PARK SERVICE TESTS REOPENING, PREPS VISITORS FOR 'NEW NORMAL': HERE'S WHAT TO EXPECT"Hopefully our research efforts, together with the other public health efforts, will get us quickly to an end to this terrible ordeal that we are all going through," Fauci said."NIH is focused on developing safe and effective COVID-19 vaccines and therapeutics, and sensitive, specific, and rapid point-of-care diagnostic tests," Fauci also said in written remarks submitted to the committee. "These efforts will improve our response to the current pandemic and bolster our preparedness for the next, inevitable emerging disease outbreak" FILE - In this April 22, 2020, file photo, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, speaks about the new coronavirus in the James Brady Press Briefing Room of the White House, in Washington. A Senate hearing on reopening workplaces and schools safely is turning into a teaching moment on the fickle nature of the coronavirus outbreak. Senior health officials, including Fauci, scheduled to testify in person before the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee on Tuesday, May 12 will instead appear via video link. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File) FAUCI, OTHER HEALTH OFFICIALS TO TESTIFY BEFORE SENATE PANEL VIA VIDEOCONFERENCE AMID CORONAVIRUS CONCERNSOn one point, Fauci said the government is focusing on several different vaccine candidates, using the hockey term "multiple shots on goal" to describe the increased chances that one would work. Additionally, he said if more than one is successful that would help increase the availability of the vaccines globally.But, Fauci noted, "there's no guarantee that a vaccine is going to be effective."Given the chance to attack Trump in an exchange with Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., Fauci declined to. Kaine pushed Fauci on whether South Korea's success on fighting the coronavirus showed that the U.S. response to the pandemic was inadequate. Fauci noted that there is a "big difference" between the U.S. and South Korea.Fauci appeared remotely due to concerns that he might have been exposed to the coronavirus. Multiple senators also appeared virtually for the hearing, including Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., the chairman of the committee, and Murray, the ranking member."After consulting with Dr. Fauci, and in an abundance of caution for our witnesses, senators, and the staff, all four Administration witnesses will appear by videoconference due to these unusual circumstances," Alexander said in a statement.Alexander, in his opening remarks, emphasized the necessity of testing and also said the government might make an effort to mass-manufacture a vaccine before it’s been proven to work so it can be quickly distributed once it’s officially approved.DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: CORONAVIRUS TESTING AVAILABILITY, SPEED WILL PLAY PART IN FOOTBALL'S RETURN“Those vaccines, those treatments, are the ultimate solution,” he said. “But until we have them, all roads back to work and school go through testing."Murray wasted no time hitting the president in her opening remarks."Families across the country are counting on us for the truth about the COVID-19 pandemic, especially since it is clear they will not get it from President Trump," she said. "Truth is essential... The president isn't telling the truth. We must. And our witnesses must."STEAK 'N SHAKE PERMANENTLY CLOSES NEARLY 10 PERCENT OF ITS RESTAURANTS AMID CORONAVIRUS CRISISShe also criticized the Trump administration's tangible response to the virus, saying it has been marked by delays and insufficient assistance to states and health professionals. Additionally, she advocated for another coronavirus stimulus bill to help ease the burden of the economic shutdowns across the country aimed at slowing the spread of the virus.Fauci, when questioned by Alexander, said it would not be reasonable to expect a vaccine to be ready for back-to-school season this year. Trump has said he would like to have a vaccine by the end of the year."The idea of having treatments or a vaccine ... ready by the fall ... would be something of a bridge too far," he said.RED LOBSTER CUSTOMERS TURNED AWAY DUE TO LARGE VOLUME OF MOTHER'S DAY ORDERSFauci also added that there is a good chance to see further rebounds in the disease, but that he hopes the U.S. will be better prepared to deal with them."I would hope that if we do have the threat of a second wave, we will be able to deal with it very effectively to prevent it from becoming an outbreak. Not only what we've seen now, but much, much less," he said.Admiral Brett Giroir, the Assistant Secretary for Health, emphasized that the U.S. had conducted "more than 9 million COVID-19 tests, a number far greater than any other country and double the per capita tests performed to date in South Korea," a nation that many have held up as the model for handling the coronavirus' effects.He noted that by the late summer and early fall, he expected the U.S. to be able to perform between 40 and 50 million coronavirus tests per month.Fauci got into a dustup with Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., over Paul's criticism of some of the prognostications that have come from public health experts and the push to reopen schools quickly."The history of this will be wrong prediction after wrong prediction after wrong predicition," Paul said, mentioning, among several other examples, Sweden, which left its schools open. "I don't think you're an end-all, I don't think you're the one person that gets to make a decision.""I have never made myself out to be the end-all and only voice in this," Fauci said. "I'm a scientist, a physician and a public health official. I give advice, according to the best scientific evidence."He continued, emphasizing that it is not clear children are generally immune from the harmful effects of the coronavirus: "We should be humble about what we don't know. And I think that falls under the fact that we don't know everything about this virus, and we really got to be very careful, particularly when it comes to children. Because the more and more we learn, we're seeing things about what this virus can do that we didn't see from the studies in China or in Europe."During questioning, self-proclaimed Democratic socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., pushed the witnesses on whether or not a vaccine, once developed, would be broadly available to people regardless of their income."If, God-willing, a vaccine is developed, and if we're able to produce it as quickly as we all hope we can, I imagine that that vaccine would be distributed to all people free of charge, or at least make sure that everybody in America that needs that vaccine will get it regardless of their income?" Sanders asked Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Stephen Hahn.Hahn said that issue was not under his purview as the FDA commissioner, but Giroir said he would advocate within the Trump administration to make sure the vaccine is accessible."They should gain access to it ... I will certainly advocate that everyone is able to receive the vaccine regardless of income or any other circumstance," Hahn said.Democrats, ahead of the hearing, made clear they saw it as an opportunity to separate Fauci from President Trump, whom the medical expert is almost always with when he appears publicly, so that Fauci will feel free to criticize Trump. Critics of the president have argued his response to the coronavirus crisis was wholly inadequate, alleging Trump initially downplayed the threat before letting petty politics get in the way of helping states and then moving too quickly to reopen the economy."Until now, we've mostly heard from the members of the coronavirus task force through the distorted lens of the White House press conference where the president often prevents them from answering fully, interrupts their response, or even contradicts their fact-based evidence," Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said on Monday."This will be one of the first opportunities for Dr. Fauci to tell the American people the unvarnished truth without the president lurking over his shoulder. Dr. Fauci, let it rip," he added.CLICK HERE FOR THE FOX NEWS APPTrump previously blocked Fauci from appearing before a House committee, saying the members of the Democrat-controlled House are "haters."Fauci, like he had previously, avoided criticizing Trump directly on Tuesday, but did issue stern warnings on what could happen if measures to slow the disease's spread are lifted too soon.Under questioning from Sen. Kelly Loeffler, R-Ga., all four witnesses said their relationships with the president are not "confrontational" and said they felt free to give their opinions and advice on the coronavirus pandemic.Fauci was joined by Dr. Robert Redfield, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Hahn and Giroir.Fox News' Chad Pergram and Vandana Rambaran contributed to this report. | 2 |
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| January 08, 2021 08:30 AM The economy shed 140,000 jobs in December, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday, the first losses since April, reflecting renewed economic closures amid a worsening coronavirus pandemic that has infected more than 21.5 million people in the United States and killed more than 365,000. The unemployment rate remained flat at 6.7%. "It has never been more true that the path of the economy depends on the course of the virus, and right now, new Covid outbreaks across the nation are threatening to bring the economy down with it," said Chris Rupkey, chief financial economist at MUFG. Employment in the leisure and hospitality sector declined by 498,000 jobs. Of those losses, 372,000 came from the restaurant industry alone. Those steep losses were offset in part by gains in business services, retail trade, construction, and transportation and warehousing. Since February, the leisure and hospitality industry has shed 3.9 million jobs — roughly 23%. The coronavirus pandemic and restrictions implemented to address surging cases have devastated the entertainment industry, particularly restaurants — a situation made worse by temperatures across much of the country remaining too cold for patrons to enjoy outdoor dining. The U.S. also lost tens of thousands of education jobs as schools remain closed for in-person instruction and states and local governments faced cutbacks. The labor market has so far recovered about half the 22 million jobs lost in the spring due to the pandemic. "Rising COVID-19 caseloads, hospitalizations, and deaths means our health and economic woes are far from over," Elise Gould, a senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute, wrote. "President-elect Biden enters his first term in a disastrous economy." The $900 billion coronavirus stimulus package passed in December likely had little to no effect on December's numbers but could set up for a stronger recovery effort in January — Congress didn't approve the measure until Dec. 21, and President Trump didn't sign the package until Dec. 28. More than one-third of the bill was directed toward loan programs for small businesses that have not been able to weather lockdowns and the recent surges in COVID-19 cases. The measure also included a $300 boost in unemployment benefits, half what Congress provided in the early months of the pandemic, and $600 stimulus checks for individuals, in addition to funds for schools, healthcare facilities, rental assistance programs, and food stamps. President-elect Joe Biden has already called the pared-down spending package a "down payment" on an ambitious recovery program and has said that he was confident of multiple relief packages being passed in 2021. That goal became more attainable Wednesday after both Democratic candidates running in Georgia's Senate runoff elections, Rev. Raphael Warnock and John Ossoff, ousted their Republican incumbents — shifting the balance of power in the upper chamber to an even 50-50 split, with Vice President-elect Kamala Harris's tie-breaking vote nudging the chamber in the Democrats' favor. Ahead of Georgia's election, both Warnock and Ossoff made increased federal relief, specifically $2,000 checks, a key part of their campaigns. Also arriving too late to be reflected in December's numbers was the rollout of Pfizer-BioNTech's and Moderna's vaccines across the U.S. So far, roughly 6 million people have been vaccinated across the country, with 15 million vaccines distributed, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Many consider a successful vaccination campaign to be integral to an eventual return to pre-pandemic economic activity. | 2 |
June 30: U.S. President Barack Obama speaks at a DNC fundraiser in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. (Reuters)NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! Get ready for this year’s “October Surprise” — the news event in the weeks before the presidential election that has the potential to push the remaining undecided voters behind one candidate and decide the outcome.Here’s a sneak peek at the “surprise.”In late October, President Obama announces his campaign is tapped out of money and unable to answer the final round of attack ads from his opponent, Mitt Romney.This scenario is no longer outside the realm of possibility.On a recent conference call with potential donors, President Obama said: “If things continue as they have so far, I’ll be the first sitting president in modern history to be outspent in his reelection campaign.”The president then asked his donors “to meet or exceed what you did in 2008.”That is a pretty high bar to clear.In 2008, Obama shattered all campaign fundraising records by bringing in more than $700 million. His GOP opponent, John McCain, raised only $316 million, giving the Democrat a tremendous advantage.It is a different ball game this time around.At the moment, President Obama’s campaign has $170 million in the bank while his GOP opponent, Mitt Romney, has $144 million.But the Romney money machine is gaining momentum.It raised more money than the Obama campaign in May and June. Romney’s donors also appear to have more money: Only 17 percent of Romney’s donations have been less than $200, compared to 40 percent of Obama’s donations that came in at less than $200.The big money going to Romney also has more ways than ever to avoid limits on donations. Keep in mind this is the first presidential election since the Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United, which opened the floodgates for unlimited contributions to outside groups and created the super-PACs.Since January 2011, the GOP super-PACs have collected $228 million while Democratic super-PACs have deposited only $80 million. “Restore Our Future,” the super-PAC supporting Romney, now has $21.5 million in cash on hand. The super-PAC supporting the president, “Priorities USA,” has only $2.7 million in cash on hand.So the total dollars behind Romney already exceed the total dollars behind the president. And the money differential is showing up in the television advertising wars.The DNC has spent $12 million on advertising so far while the RNC has spent $11 million. But as of July 26, the pro-Romney “Restore Our Future” super-PAC has spent roughly $54 million on TV ads. The conservative American Crossroads/Crossroads GPS groups have spent a total of $94 million on TV ads. That is about five times the spending of all Democratic super-PACs combined.One point of optimism for the Democrats playing in this big money game is that the DNC and Obama campaign are sitting on $135 million in cash, slightly more than the $111.9 million Romney and the RNC have in the bank.But Obama’s campaign is burning through its money at a faster rate than the Romney team.The Obama campaign spent twice as much as the Republicans in June. The incumbent’s campaign purchased more TV ads, paid more than twice as many employees as Romney and spent millions of dollars on public opinion polls, according to FEC filings.In May and June combined, the Obama campaign spent 20 percent more than it took in, records show.The Wall Street Journal reports “some Democrats worry that the overhead built by the Obama camp over the past 15 months will prove impossible to sustain. Unless fundraising picks up, the Obama campaign may enter the season’s final stretch confronting hard choices: paring salaries, scaling back advertising or pulling out of swing states in a bid to control costs, these Democrats say.”In an interview with USA Today, Democratic strategist Mark Mellman said 80 percent of advertising dollars are probably wasted, but there is no way to know it is a waste until the campaign is over.Of course, the Romney campaign is delighting in its fundraising advantage. One incredible fact of this 2012 campaign is that, without spending a dime on ads in swing states, the Romney campaign can still compete because of ads being paid for by pro-Romney super-PACs.“You don’t want to be caught flat-footed and unable to close out a campaign,” Romney pollster Neil Newhouse told USA Today. Indeed.Team Obama is already screaming for help from past donors to stave off any October shock.But will Democrats who once heard that the president might raise $1 billion for this campaign be convinced he is not playing the Shepherd Boy — who cried wolf so often that people stopped believing his calls for help.Right now the numbers show there really is a wolf at the Democrats’ door in the form of surging GOP money.An earlier version of this column originally appeared in The Hill newspaper and on TheHill.com. | 2 |
Donald Trump's newfound desire to help save Chinese jobs has critics of the former real estate mogul alleging that the president is acting in the interests of his family business.The revelation that the Chinese government extended a $500 million loan to a state-owned company pursuing a major development project in Indonesia that will benefit the Trump Organization has ethics experts warning that Trump is likely in violation of the Emoluments Clause of the U.S. Constitution.'See you in court Mr. Trump,' tweeted Norm Eisen, the chief ethics officer under Barack Obama. Donald Trump's newfound desire to help save Chinese jobs has critics of the former real estate mogul alleging that the president is acting in the interests of his family businessEisen and others rained criticism down on Trump for dictating that his Commerce Department look at alternatives to a supplier ban for a Chinese telecommunications company that the U.S. punished for doing business with North Korea and Iran in violation of U.S. sanctions on the rogue nations.Trump says he ordered the review because of a personal pitch from Chinese President Xi Jinping. Easing penalties on the firm, ZTE, would help to grease the skids for a trade agreement with China, Trump tweeted.He this morning tweeted, 'Trade negotiations are continuing with China. They have been making hundreds of billions of dollars a year from the U.S., for many years. Stay tuned!' Eisen suggested in a tweet that Trump appeared to be pursuing a deal with China to boost his own business interests after the South China Morning Post reported Beijing's loan to aid in the development of MNC Lido City.Trump's company has hotels bearing the president's name and a golf course wrapped up in the project.'This is a violation of the Emoluments Clause. A big one. See you in court Mr. Trump,' he tweeted.Rep. Adam Schiff, a California Democrat and constant thorn in the side of the president, said Tuesday on CNN's New Day that the president's desire to help ZTE 'could be related to China doing him this huge business favor,' although he allowed that it could be that Trump is desperate for a nuclear deal with North Korea now that he's left the Iran accord. 'The president now needs a deal with North Korea more than Kim Jong-un,' Schiff asserted.The lawmaker said that Trump may recognize that if he's too tough on trade with China that Xi won't be as helpful with Kim, 'and then he'll end up with two nuclear problems.''I certainly view this as a violation of the Emoluments Clause, yes, and many others, as well,' he added of Trump's company's overseas dealings.Schiff specified that he was talking about other ethical issues he's observed such as 'the constant milking of the federal government, when the federal government when Trump requires the government to patronize Trump-related businesses.'He brought up the $150,000 spent by Secret Service on golf carts at Trump properties to protect the president while he's playing with friends at his courses the Trump Organization owns. 'That's obscene! That should never be permitted,' he said. 'It should never be permitted that there's even a question about whether this foreign transaction is driving U.S. policy. And this is exactly what the Emoluments clause is designed to prevent.'Schiff claimed that when Trump nearly abandoned the one-China policy, Beijing gave Ivanka Trump's brand the trademarks it had been long been fighting to obtain.'I can guarantee you China would not have given those brands if Donald Trump had followed through on his campaign commitment to not recognize one China,' Schiff charged. 'Similarly here, I can't imagine China going forward with this transaction helping a Trump-branded property in Indonesia to the tune of half a billion if the president continued the sanctions on ZTE. Just hard to imagine.' Trump said yesterday that he was asking Commerce to review the penalties on ZTE after it announced that it would shudder U.S operations entirely. Commerce had said that ZTE would be shunned for seven years in the U.S.'ZTE, the large Chinese phone company, buys a big percentage of individual parts from U.S. companies. This is also reflective of the larger trade deal we are negotiating with China and my personal relationship with President Xi,' Trump said on Monday. Trump defended his decision to revisit penalties for Chinese company ZTE for flouting U.S. sanctions on trade with Iran, saying the telecom maker is a big buyer for U.S. suppliers He has faced backlash from both Republican and Democratic lawmakers after he pledged to work with Chinese President Xi Jinping to help ZTE, saying too many jobs in China had been lost ZTE said on May 6, 2018 it applied to the U.S. Commerce Department to suspend a seven-year ban on doing business with U.S. technology exporters Shares of ZTE suppliers rose after Trump's pledges to help ZTE. Acacia Communications Inc, an optical component maker, jumped nearly 9 percentZTE contributed $2.3 billion to the U.S. economy by purchasing components of its devices from 211 U.S. exporters in 2017, a ZTE official told Reuters, accounting for 25 to 30 percent of the purchases the company makes to produce its smartphones and other products. 'ZTE did do some inappropriate things ... the question is are there alternative remedies to the ones we had originally put forward and that's the area we will be exploring very, very promptly,' Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said Monday at a National Press Club event.Trump in a Sunday tweet first indicated that Commerce would pursue alternative punishments for ZTE.'President Xi of China, and I, are working together to give massive Chinese phone company, ZTE, a way to get back into business, fast,' he said. 'Too many jobs in China lost. Commerce Department has been instructed to get it done!'He said in a follow up message, 'China and the United States are working well together on trade, but past negotiations have been so one sided in favor of China, for so many years, that it is hard for them to make a deal that benefits both countries. But be cool, it will all work out!'Trump administration officials handling trade and economic policy were meeting on Tuesday with Chinese Vice Premier Liu to discuss the president's threat to put as much as $150 billion in tariffs on Chinese products over intellectual property violations and dumping. He has separately introduced worldwide tariffs on foreign steel and aluminum in a move that was meant to hit China where it hurts.The U.S. intelligence community was caught flat-footed, Reuters reported, when Trump said he would potentially cut ZTE a break. Intelligence agencies have been warning that the Chinese company could be using its smartphones to spy on U.S. citizens and the federal government.Schiff, the ranking Democrat on the House's intelligence panel, cautioned Trump Sunday, 'Our intelligence agencies have warned that ZTE technology and phones pose a major cyber security threat. You should care more about our national security than Chinese jobs.'And Republican Sen. Marco Rubio, a member of the upper chamber's intel committee, moved Monday to keep the federal government or its subsidiaries or contractors from purchasing communications equipment from ZTE.GOP leader in the Senate John Cornyn and reliable Trump ally Tom Cotton co-signed a previous version of the legislation.Under questioning from Cotton about ZTE and another company, Huawei, in February, FBI Director Christopher Wray said the bureau is 'deeply concerned about the risks of allowing any company or entity that is beholden to foreign governments that does not share our values to gain positions of power inside our telecommunications networks. 'That provides the capacity to exert pressure or control over our telecommunications infrastructure. It provides the capacity to maliciously modify or steal information, and it provides the capacity to conduct undetected espionage,' he said.'So, at a 100,000 foot level, at least in this setting, those are the kind of things that worry us.'Rubio, Cornyn and Cotton's legislation would prevent the U.S. government from buying or leasing equipment Huawei, the largest Chinese telecom maker, as well as ZTE.'I hope this isn't the beginning of backing down to China,' Rubio said on Twitter after Trump's latest announcement. 'We are crazy to allow them to operate in U.S. without tighter restrictions.'The White House said Trump wanted Ross to look at the issue 'consistent with applicable laws and regulations' after Chinese officials raised the matter in various talks.'He's been tough,'Deputy Press Secretary Raj Shah said. 'I mean this President has taken China to task for its unfair trade practices through this Section 301 investigation.'Shah rested his case on the proposed $150 billion of tariffs on China for intellectual property and trade violations that Trump has threatened. 'So he's been tough and he's confronted them,' Shah argued. 'But on this issue specifically, he's asked the Secretary of Commerce to take a look at it. The president's spokesman told reporters, 'This is part of a very complex relationship between the United States and China that involves economic issues, national security issues, and the like.'It's an issue of high concern for China that's been raised with the U.S. -- with the U.S. government and with our administration at various levels,' he acknowledged. | 2 |
WASHINGTON—President Barack Obama hoped the midterm elections would help break the capital’s gridlock. Instead, they became a referendum on his presidency.Voters went to the polls Tuesday deeply frustrated with the political system and handed Republicans a decisive victory. Mr. Obama was a central figure in key races where Republicans criticized his leadership. Most Democratic Senate candidates refused to appear with Mr. Obama on the campaign trail, trying to distance themselves from an unpopular president. Democrats tried to keep the focus on policies of particular importance in their states. Mr. Obama campaigned with just one Democrat running for the Senate—at a rally last weekend in Michigan, where his party’s nominee was widely expected to win. Mr. Obama said during the campaign season that while he wasn’t on Tuesday’s ballot, his policies were. As Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell claimed victory, former Clinton Chief of Staff Thomas "Mack" McLarty discusses the electoral landscape and how that will affect President Obama's remaining time in office. Photo: AP. Midterm Elections 2014 Coverage Republicans sought to make their races about both Mr. Obama and his policies. The president’s health-care law was the top issue in pro-Republican television ads run in four of 11 competitive Senate races this cycle, according to an analysis of Kantar Media/CMAG data by the nonpartisan Wesleyan Media Project. In a Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll released this week, 67% of registered voters said they want to see Mr. Obama change the direction he is leading the country “a great deal” or “quite a bit,” while just 42% approved of the job he is doing. The president now finds himself seeking to rebound with a public that, however they voted Tuesday, is deeply dissatisfied with his leadership. Other presidents have made significant changes after midterm elections. George W. Bush replaced his defense secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, after Republicans lost control of Congress in 2006 midterm elections that were dominated by deep voter disapproval of the Iraq war. Ronald Reagan replaced several top aides with fresh advisers after Democrats took control of the Senate in 1986 and tasked them with repairing his standing with the nation and netting policy accomplishments in his last two years. Bill Clinton bucked the second-term trend when Democrats made gains in the 1998 midterm elections. But his party had suffered brutal losses in 1994, prompting his White House to recalibrate its agenda. Senior Republican strategist Ed Rollins discusses how the midterm elections will shape the 2016 presidential elections. Photo: Getty. Compared with recent predecessors, however, Mr. Obama has faced historically large losses for his party in Congress over his time in office. His first term began with Democrats in control of the House and Senate. In 2010, Democrats lost control of the House when 63 seats switched to the GOP, while six seats changed party in the Senate. Under President Harry Truman, Democrats lost a combined 83 House seats in the 1946 and 1950 midterms. Republicans under President Dwight Eisenhower lost a total of 66 House seats in the 1954 and 1958 elections. It is unclear the extent to which the dynamic in Washington will shift, if it does at all, after the GOP takeover of Congress. “It’s not going to be radically different from prior to the election, which is partisan gridlock,” said Mike McCurry, who was President Clinton’s press secretary during the 1994 midterm elections. For Mr. Obama, Mr. McCurry said, “the thing to do is articulate a very crisp and achievable agenda and go after it.” White House officials have already begun what they call a year-end analysis of how 2014 has gone for Mr. Obama and what his team would have done differently, in everything from policy and politics to communications. Mr. Obama will be increasingly challenged to find a governing strategy that navigates the diverging interests between a second-term president trying to secure a legacy and lawmakers in his own party who face another election in 2016. While Mr. Obama may want to compromise with Republicans. But Democrats hoping to win elections in two years may not believe that is in their best political interest. Ohio Republican Sen. Rob Portman discusses the potential for GOP majority and what the party's agenda will be. Photo: Getty. “If he wants to accomplish something in the last two years it can’t just be within the executive branch, so he has to engage and he has to lead,” said Ken Duberstein, an aide to President Reagan. “Governing is sometimes saying no to your strongest supporters and yes to your strongest opponents.” Mr. Obama isn’t expected to demand a major shake-up inside his administration or dramatically shift his governing approach in response to Tuesday’s results. One of the challenges he confronts immediately is how to balance being a president seeking to work with Congress while also accomplishing policy changes on his own. His first critical test could come when he announces his executive action on immigration, a move he is expected to make after returning later this month from a week-long trip to Asia. The details could set the tone for relations between the White House and Congress over the next two years. The White House recognizes that a move on immigration could alienate Republicans whose support the president will need for other priorities. White House officials are considering how far the president should go in unilaterally changing immigration policy. To minimize GOP backlash, they plan to have the president make clear that if Congress passes immigration legislation he would immediately roll back his executive orders. The president’s legislative priorities include funding for infrastructure projects—which the White House hopes would come from revenue generated through changes to the tax code—cybersecurity and the patent process. His aides hold out hope that Republicans will soften their opposition to raising the minimum wage, and want to leave political space for a deal on immigration, officials said. One of Mr. Obama’s first announcements after Tuesday’s results is expected to be naming a nominee for attorney general. White House officials say they haven’t decided whether to push through the nomination process during the lame-duck session or wait for the new Congress next year. Like many second-term presidents, Mr. Obama is expected to focus heavily on foreign policy. He leaves Sunday for an eight-day trip to China, Myanmar and Australia that is seen as critical to his effort to strengthen U.S. ties to the region. Mr. Obama is also seeking a nuclear deal with Iran and is preparing to mark the end of the U.S. combat mission in Afghanistan at the end of the year. The core of his foreign policy agenda is likely to focus on counterterrorism efforts in the Middle East and North Africa, including the U.S.-led operation against Islamic State. Colin Powell, who served in President Reagan’s national security team after the 1986 midterm elections, said “there are always opportunities” for presidents in foreign policy. “What you need is a strong structure, a process that everybody understands, and then you have to make sure that everybody executes along the line that’s been decided on,” Mr. Powell said in describing his effort to help Mr. Reagan regain his footing. Mr. Obama also plans to focus more on climate change, in particular on an international agreement, a senior administration official said. All the while, Mr. Obama will be cultivating his political legacy, aides said. His goal is to make progress on core Democratic issues, such as gay rights, immigration and economic fairness. He is likely to deliver a speech next year laying out his vision for the next phase of Democrats’ tightening of Wall Street regulations. —Rebecca Ballhaus contributed to this article. Write to Carol E. Lee at [email protected] Copyright ©2022 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8 | 2 |
The Senate approved Jeff Sessions as attorney general Wednesday, installing one of President Trump’s biggest backers at the head of the Justice Department after one of the nastiest confirmation battles in a generation. Only a single Democrat joined Republicans in the 52-47 vote to confirm Mr. Sessions — a startling snub of a man they spent decades working with but whom they now assailed with thinly veiled accusations of racism and xenophobia. Mr. Sessions’ to-do list at the department is already lengthy, with the defense of the president’s extreme vetting executive action and a host of other lawsuits piling up against Mr. Trump’s sanctuary city and regulatory policies. He also will spearhead an immigration crackdown and decide whether to continue to fight some of the legal battles that the Obama administration pursued, including over states’ voter ID and school bathroom policies for transgender students. “I feel it in my bones, I hope and pray I can be worthy of the trust you gave me,” Mr. Sessions said as he read his resignation letter and delivered his farewell speech. As a former U.S. attorney and state attorney general in Alabama, and with 20 years of service in the Senate, Mr. Sessions left little doubt about his legal qualifications for the Justice Department’s top job. But Democrats said they feared Mr. Sessions’ close relationship with Mr. Trump. The attorney general, they said, must be prepared to be a check when the president oversteps legal boundaries. That was particularly true for this presidency, they said. They worried that Mr. Sessions wouldn’t be strong enough in enforcing civil rights laws and that he would be too zealous in following immigration laws. Mr. Trump’s decision last week to fire the acting attorney general, an Obama holdover, after she refused to defend his extreme vetting executive order in court, only heightened the debate. “Many of us worry that Jeff Sessions will not be the independent check on this administration that we need,” said Sen. Thomas R. Carper, Delaware Democrat. Mr. Sessions’ confirmation marked just the seventh Cabinet-level position approved by the Senate, nearly three weeks into Mr. Trump’s tenure. Presidents Obama and George W. Bush had seven nominees approved on their first day in office. Republicans said it is the worst blockade any new president has faced since George Washington. Democrats’ hostility continued Wednesday night, minutes after Mr. Sessions’ confirmation, when they attempted to filibuster Mr. Trump’s nominee for health and human services secretary, Rep. Tom Price. Republicans broke the filibuster on a 51-48 vote, and the Senate will likely hold a final confirmation vote Friday morning. It’s possible that neither Mr. Sessions nor Mr. Price would have been able to win confirmation if Democrats hadn’t triggered the “nuclear option” in 2013, changing the rules to eviscerate the power of the filibuster to block Cabinet picks and federal judicial nominees other than the Supreme Court. Mr. Sessions abstained from the vote Wednesday but was on the chamber floor the entire time. Only a single Democrat, Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, came to speak to him. Sen. Joe Manchin III of West Virginia did offer a thumbs-up as he crossed paths with Mr. Sessions. Mr. Manchin was the only Democrat to vote for him. “I have known Jeff for more than a decade, and he is not only my colleague but I consider him a friend,” Mr. Manchin said. “After working with him in many capacities during my time in the United States Senate, I believe I can work with Sen. Sessions.” Ms. Klobuchar and Mr. Manchin were the only two Democrats to stay in their seats to hear Mr. Sessions’ farewell speech. Democrats’ chief objections dated back to the 1980s, when Mr. Sessions was a U.S. attorney in Alabama. Most controversial was his prosecution of three black voting rights activists who were gathering absentee ballots from black voters. The activists said they were trying to help people vote, but the government said they were farming absentee ballots, gathering unmarked ballots from voters and filling them in. That case was the focus of Mr. Sessions’ 1986 hearing when he was nominated for a federal judgeship — a job he was denied by a Senate vote. Also part of that 1986 proceeding were accusations that Mr. Sessions made racially insensitive remarks — some of which the senator disputed and others that he said were poor jokes. Denied the judgeship, Mr. Sessions would later run for the Senate, taking his seat in 1997 alongside some of the very senators who voted against him a decade earlier. In the two decades since, Mr. Sessions worked with many of those lawmakers and earned a reputation for fierce conservatism but courtly manners. That counted for little among Democrats, though, who said they had too many ideological differences with Mr. Sessions. Sen. Cory A. Booker, a black Democrat from New Jersey, broke with tradition and demanded a chance to testify against his colleague in the Senate Judiciary Committee. The chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus and Rep. John Lewis, a Georgia Democrat and icon of the civil rights movement, also testified. Mr. Lewis, who led the 1965 “Bloody Sunday” march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, said Mr. Sessions represented a return to the days of police beatings. The attacks were too much for some Republicans. “It’s been tough to watch all this good man has been put through in recent weeks,” said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. “This is a well-qualified colleague with a deep reverence for the law. He believes strongly in the equal application of it to everyone.” | 2 |
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! A federal law enforcement source told Fox News that investigators are looking for two men that are persons of interest in Monday's Boston Marathon terror attack and have distributed photos for “law enforcement eyes only.”The FBI is not sharing the photos with the public.A Fox News reporter has seen the photos and called them “clear.”According to the reporter, one of the men has a backpack that appears to match the bag believed to have been used in the attack. The other man also appears to have a bag of some kind.The source asked that the images not be made public for fear of jeopardizing the investigation.More On This... News of the images came as investigators spent Wednesday poring over photos and video footage and piecing together shredded remnants of bombs in an effort to zero in on suspects behind the attack.Even as amateur sleuths analyzed photos of the finish-line crowd and shared their own conclusions, FBI investigators were believed to be doing the same, and there were reports that they were interested in specific images of a person or persons with heavy backpacks. Investigators believe the bombs, at least one of which was likely a pressure cooker bomb laden with explosives and shrapnel, may have been concealed in such a bag. Monday's attack killed three and injured 176, many critically.A mangled pressure cooker lid found atop a nearby building is believed to have been part of one bomb, and it and other pieces were being analyzed at an FBI lab. A battery and several pieces of shrapnel were also recovered and undergoing analysis. Fox News learned that the circuit board suspected of being used to detonate at least one of the bombs has been recovered, and that FBI investigators were also analyzing cellphone tower records to identify positive hits for signs of calls that may have been placed to trigger both explosions remotely.The FBI and Boston Police said no arrests have been made in the Boston Marathon bombing. Earlier, FoxNews.com and several other media outlets, including The Associated Press, reported that a suspect had been arrested in the deadly attack.Investigators believe one, or possibly two, pressure cookers were packed with explosives and shrapnel and hidden in backpacks to be left amid the crowd.According to a FBI and Department of Homeland Security bulletin, the deadly shrapnel that caused the deaths -- including of an 8-year-old boy, and critical injuries to 17 -- included nails, BBs and ball bearings. The other device "was also housed in a metal container, but investigators could not say if that was also a pressure cooker.Pressure cooker bombs have been used in high-profile bombings in India, Pakistan and Afghanistan, and have been touted in the Al Qaeda in Yemen's online propaganda magazine Inspire and in the "The Anarchist Cookbook." The horror unfolded just before 3 p.m., shattering a festive atmosphere several hours after the legendary race began on the city's 238th annual Patriots' Day. In the aftermath, officials found bomb remnants, shrapnel and shredded backpacks believed to have concealed the deadly payloads.Richard DesLauriers, FBI agent in charge in Boston, confirmed at a press conference investigators had found pieces of black nylon from a bag or backpack and fragments of BBs and nails, possibly contained in a pressure cooker. He said the items were sent to the FBI laboratory at Quantico, Va., for analysis.The FBI also plans to reconstruct the devices at their headquarters in Quantico, according to MyFoxBoston.com.Investigators are also examining if the bombs could have been assembled near the scene of the explosions, The Wall Street Journal reports, quoting a law enforcement official. The official says this possibility is being considered because transporting improvised devices over a significant distance could trigger a premature detonation.The officials also say federal agents are working with local police to canvas local hotels and short-term rentals for clues as to where the bombs could have been constructed.Dr. Peter Burke, chief of trauma services at Boston Medical Center, said Wednesday 19 patients (six males and 13 females) are being treated at the facility. Seven people had amputations and two remain in critical condition, including a 5-year-old boy. He said there will be eight 're-operations' at the hospital.One or two patients may be released later today. He credited Boston EMS and first responders for limiting the loss of life.He said beside amputations, doctors have been treating lung injuries, likely caused from the force of the explosion or impact on the ground."The major (injuries) ones that were life-treating were tissue injuries and vascular injuries," he said.Tufts Medical Center said it treated 14 patients, seven of whom have been discharged. None of the patients are listed in critical condition. The hospital said it did not have any amputations nor does it expect any in the future."This is something I've never seen in my 25 years here," Alasdair Conn, chief of emergency services at Massachusetts General Hospital said Monday night; "this amount of carnage in the civilian population. This is what we expect from war."An intelligence bulletin issued to law enforcement and released late Tuesday includes a picture of a mangled pressure cooker and a torn black bag, like the one seen below that was first obtained by MyFoxAtlanta.com, that the FBI says were part of a bomb.It remained unclear if the bombs were the work of a homegrown or foreign threat, but in Washington, both President Obama and Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel called the attack terrorism.“Any time bombs are used to target innocent civilians, it is an act of terror,” Obama said Tuesday morning.Boston Police Commissioner Ed Davis appealed to the public to come forward with any information or photographic evidence that might help authorities zero in on the killers.The Pakistani Taliban, which has threatened attacks in the U.S. because of its support for the Pakistani government, denied any role in the marathon bombings Tuesday.The group's spokesman, Ahsanullah Ahsan, denied involvement in a telephone call with The Associated Press. He spoke from an undisclosed location.Details also emerged Tuesday on the victims of the attack, as scores of victims remained in hospitals, many with grievous injuries.Eight-year-old Martin Richard, who was with his family cheering on runners at the finish line, is among those dead. The boy's 6-year-old sister lost a leg in the attack and his mother suffered a brain injury.Krystle Campbell, of Medford, Mass., 29, was also killed in the blast. Her father said she had gone with her best friend to take a picture of the friend's boyfriend crossing the finish line.William Campbell said his daughter, who worked at a restaurant in nearby Arlington, was "very caring, very loving person, and was daddy's little girl." He said the loss has devastated the family.The Shenyang Evening News, a state-run Chinese newspaper, identified the third victim as Lu Lingzi. She was a graduate student at Boston University.The first two explosions occurred at 2:50 p.m. – nearly five hours after the marathon began – about 50 to 100 yards apart, according to Davis. A third explosion occurred near the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum in the Columbia Point section of Dorchester, several miles southeast of the marathon's finish line, at around 4:15 p.m. Police could not say if it was related to the earlier explosions.Nearly 25,000 people, including runners from around the world, competed in Boston's celebrated 26.2-mile race, attracting huge throngs of onlookers, especially near the finish line.Obama plans to visit Boston on Thursday to attend an interfaith service in honor of the victims. He has traveled four times to cities reeling from mass violence, most recently in December after the schoolhouse shooting in Newtown, Conn.Anyone with information on the bombings is being urged to call Boston authorities at 1-800-494-TIPS.Fox News' Rick Leventhal, Jana Winter, Catherine Herridge and Mike Levine contributed to this report. | 2 |
The hits just keep on coming with Obamacare enrollee tales of disaster, with the latest joke that more people have actually completed an online application to journey to Mars than successfully signed into the White House’s websites for health reform exchanges. The Daily Mail reported that Twitter exploded on Thursday after it was revealed that 202,586 individuals had successfully signed up for the Mars One colony project to populate the red planet as soon as the technology becomes available. By comparison, the analytics firm Compete.com found that only 36,000 have registered for Obamacare via the official government site, Healthcare.gov. The Department of Health and Human Services said that number is wrong — that 51,000 have actually signed up, The Daily Mail reported. But no matter: Both numbers are still low when looked at through the lens of projections. The Associated Press reported earlier this week that a HHS memo indicated that the government had actually set a goal of signing up 500,000 individuals per month, starting with Oct. 1. The glitches over Obamacare enrollment are becoming quite an embarrassment for the White House. Among the latest, as reported by The Daily Mail: Only 712 people in Vermont have been able to successfully enroll in the state exchange — despite the state spending about $9 million of taxpayer dollars to promote the online site. And Alaska continues to suffer a zero percentage rate. Sen. Lisa Murkowski said her state has yet to log in even one enrollee. Meanwhile, CNN reported that the government website to enroll has been spontaneously wiping out some enrollees’ passwords. | 2 |
Move over, CIA. The Army’s new recruitment video takes wokeness to the next level, featuring lesbian moms, a same-sex wedding, equality marches, and more. Described by leftist outlets as a “tear-jerking queer story,” the new animated video is part of a series, “The Calling,” which showcases why five soldiers joined the Army. One video in the campaign features corporal Emma Malonelord, who operates the Patriot missile defense system.“It begins in California, with a little girl raised by two moms,” Malonelord says. “Although I had a fairly typical childhood, took ballet, played violin, I also marched for equality.“I like to think I’ve been defending freedom from an early age,” she continues.After the pride parade, she talks about a tragic accident that left one of her mothers paralyzed, though she did make a recovery to eventually walk down the aisle to marry her other mother. As college graduation approached, Malonelord says she began “feeling like I’ve been handed so much in life, a sorority girl stereotype…but what had I really achieved on my own?”“I needed my own adventures, my own challenge, and after meeting with an army recruiter, I found it,” she adds. “A way to prove my inner strength and maybe shatter some stereotypes along the way.” Needless to say, the video was not confidence inspiring among conservative critics, especially when compared to the type of recruitment videos our adversaries are airing. Our country is so f*cking screwed. pic.twitter.com/x4fgguISoR— The Columbia Bugle ???? (@ColumbiaBugle) May 13, 2021This is a Russian Army recruitment ad. Compare it with the new American Army commercial.None of this fills me with any optimism regarding the #West's future. https://t.co/Cf86lyITND— Koskovics Zoltán (@KoskovicsZ) May 13, 2021 | 2 |
The Seattle Police Department was finally allowed to return to the area around the East Precinct and push out the occupiers from the "Capitol Hill Occupied Protest," formerly known as the "Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone" early Wednesday morning.Mayor Jenny Durkan issued the executive order following multiple shootings inside and near the CHOP, which included the death of a 16-year-old.Due to ongoing violence and public safety issues in the East Precinct/Cal Anderson Park area. Mayor Jenny Durkan has issued an executive order to vacate the area. Seattle police will be in the area this morning enforcing the Mayor’s order. https://t.co/SpVRYIB8eg pic.twitter.com/JAt2AvUTCr— Seattle Police Dept. (@SeattlePD) July 1, 2020Occupiers tried and failed to prevent Seattle police from moving in and taking over the area:Video from earlier this morning as @SeattlePD moved on #CHOP to end occupation. #Q13FOX pic.twitter.com/A9ucQRYBB0— Brandi Kruse (@BrandiKruse) July 1, 2020Just saw a cone thrown at police. Protestors trying to barricade w toppled porta potties. @KING5Seattle pic.twitter.com/6eLOoBpLrO— Michael Crowe (@MichaelReports) July 1, 2020Police have cleared #CHOP to Pike @KING5Seattle pic.twitter.com/0GUSkZkFA0— Michael Crowe (@MichaelReports) July 1, 2020The Seattle Police Department said their officers were in riot gear because "individuals associated w/the CHOP are known to be armed and dangerous/may be associated with shootings, homicides, robberies, assaults &other violent crimes."Shortly after the formation of the CHOP, when officers were ordered to leave the East Precinct following days of clashes with rioters, President Trump tweeted how the Seattle city government needed to take back control of the area. In response, Durkan said her city was "fine."Seattle is fine. Don’t be so afraid of democracy. https://t.co/o26PkJnYhA— Mayor Jenny Durkan (@MayorJenny) June 12, 2020From my time in the CHAZ/CHOP, I knew it would degrade and it was only a matter of time before the situation got really dangerous. It's why I knew the media would trip over themselves by just trying to portray the zone as a block party. While things were peaceful some of the time, there were plenty of other instances, particularly at night, where fights broke out and other crimes were committed. | 2 |
President Trump exceeded his authority when he reversed bans on offshore drilling in vast parts of the Arctic Ocean and dozens of canyons in the Atlantic Ocean, a U.S. judge said in a ruling that restored the Obama-era restrictions. U.S. District Court Judge Sharon Gleason in a decision late Friday threw out Trump’s executive order that overturned the bans that comprised a key part of Obama’s environmental legacy. Presidents have the power under a federal law to remove certain lands from development but cannot revoke those removals, Gleason said. “The wording of President Obama’s 2015 and 2016 withdrawals indicates that he intended them to extend indefinitely, and therefore be revocable only by an act of Congress,” said Gleason, who was nominated to the bench by Obama. A Department of Justice spokesman, Jeremy Edwards, declined comment Saturday. The American Petroleum Institute, a defendant in the case, disagreed with the ruling. “In addition to bringing supplies of affordable energy to consumers for decades to come, developing our abundant offshore resources can provide billions in government revenue, create thousands of jobs and will also strengthen our national security,” it said in a statement. Erik Grafe, an attorney with Earthjustice, welcomed the ruling, saying it “shows that the president cannot just trample on the Constitution to do the bidding of his cronies in the fossil fuel industry at the expense of our oceans, wildlife and climate.” Earthjustice represented numerous environmental groups that sued the Trump administration over the April 2017 executive order reversing the drilling bans. At issue in the case was the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act. Acting Assistant U.S. Attorney General Jeffrey Wood said during a hearing before Gleason in November that environmental groups were misinterpreting the intent of the law written in 1953. He said it is meant to be flexible and sensible and not intended to bind one president with decisions made by another when determining offshore stewardship as needs and realities change over time. In 2015, Obama halted exploration in coastal areas of the Beaufort and Chukchi seas and the Hanna Shoal, an important area for walrus. In late 2016, he withdrew most other potential Arctic Ocean lease areas - about 98 percent of the Arctic outer continental shelf. The bans were intended to protect polar bears, walruses, ice seals and Alaska Native villages that depend on the animals. In the Atlantic, Obama banned exploration in 5,937 square miles (15,377 square kilometers) of underwater canyon complexes, citing their importance for marine mammals, deep-water corals, valuable fish populations and migratory whales. Copyright © 2022 The Washington Times, LLC. | 2 |
The United States has officially become the hardest-hit country in the world by the global coronavirus pandemic, confirming a world-high 82,285-plus coronavirus cases, surpassing China, where it originated.
"I think it's a tribute to our testing," President Donald Trump told reporters Thursday at the coronavirus task force daily briefing.
"We're testing a tremendous number of people," he added, questioning the data coming out of China.
The data is complied by Johns Hopkins University and Worldometer, which culls the data from a variety of sources.
While the data milestone is a potential mark against the U.S. response to the pandemic, it does show the U.S. has been conducting more tests than any country in the world. Vice President Mike Pence announced more than 552,000 tests have been conducted in the U.S. to date. That is a 14.9% rate of positives for every coronavirus test administered, although that includes some people who have had the virus and needed subsequent tests to be cleared of infection.
Also, the U.S. death total of 1,177 is the sixth-highest in the world, suggesting the U.S. healthcare system is helping keep Americans alive at a higher rate than European countries.
"The people that die, the percentage is much lower than I ever thought," Trump said. "That's one of the reasons, I say, we're going to beat this, and we're going to get back to work."
The U.S. confirmed-case death rate is just 1.4%, while the other most-infected countries are far less effective in keeping its infected citizens alive.
At the White House task force's daily news conference on Thursday, officials identified Chicago and Detroit areas as potential new hot spots for the virus in the U.S.
Dr. Deborah Birx, the coordinator of the White House coronavirus response, told reporters officials are concerned about rapid increases in cases in Cook County, Ill., and Wayne County, Mich., according to The Hill. The two counties encapsulate the cities and surrounding communities of Chicago and Detroit, respectively.
"We have integrated all of our information to not only look at where the cases are today, but how they’re moving so we can alert FEMA to where we think the next potential hot spot is," Birx said in the Hill report.
The Seattle area, where many early cases centered around an adult care facility, also remains a hot spot. And rising fast in infections is New Orleans, in part because last month's Carnival festivities there offered a ripe opportunity for the virus to spread widely.
Indeed, New Orleans has the world's highest growth rate for virus cases, with the metro area accounting for some 70% of the roughly 1,800 cases in Louisiana. The transmission rate there has dimmed some hopes that warm climates and more sparsely populated communities would be less susceptible to the coronavirus. And some observers fear the proliferation of cases there could be a prelude to outbreaks in other major Southern cities, like Houston. Confirmed-Case Death Rates by Top 10 Most-Infected Countries U.S. 1.4%. China 4%. Italy 10.2%. Spain 7.4% Germany 0.6%. Iran 7.6%. France 5.8%. Switzerland 1.6%. United Kingdom 5.0%. South Korea 1.4%. On the world stage, only Germany has done a better job with keeping its confirmed-case death rate below that of the United States.
New York state, particularly because of New York City, has been the hardest-hit area in the U.S. with over 37,000 confirmed cases. Only four other countries have more infections than New York state.
U.S. Army leaders said Thursday that two field hospitals are on their way to New York City and will be able to begin treating patients at the Javits Center on Monday.
The Army combat units from Fort Hood, Texas, and Fort Campbell, Kentucky, will include as many as 700 personnel and almost 300 beds. Those medical personnel will also be able to help staff additional beds and medical equipment that are being brought in by state and local authorities.
Gen. James McConville, chief of staff of the Army, said they will begin setting up the units this weekend at the center. Officials expect there will be a couple thousand beds in the center to treat patients that do not have the virus.
An Army combat hospital from Fort Carson, Colorado, who will be heading to Seattle. McConville said advance staff are already there, and are working with local officials to review several potential locations to set up the unit.
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report. © 2022 Newsmax. All rights reserved. | 2 |
The “nuclear option” has been defused — for now — after Republican senators said Tuesday they would drop their blockade of Richard Cordray to be the new head of a consumer protection bureau, ending for now what had appeared to be a major crisis over the filibuster and minority rights in the Senate. “We may have a way forward on this, I feel fairly confident,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid told his colleagues on the chamber floor moments after the GOP relented on the first of seven controversial nominees that the Democrats were prepared to push through the chamber. Soon after, the Senate voted 71-29 to head off a filibuster of Mr. Cordray, with 17 Republicans joining Democrats to advance the nomination. The GOP senators said they were voting in a sign of good faith that they can get a broader deal done — though all of the top Republican leadership voted for the filibuster, suggesting the push for a deal is not universally supported. Mr. Reid says he is prepared to use a short cut, deemed the “nuclear option” because of its partisan toxicity, to change Senate rules to curtain filibusters of executive branch nominees if the GOP obstructs any of the seven nominees. Republicans have said using the short cut, which involves changing the chamber rules through a majority vote rather than the usual two-thirds vote, would ruin the Senate. But by agreeing to let Mr. Cordray’s nomination through, the GOP has bought more time — at least the rest of Tuesday — to negotiate a broader ceasefire that would allow the other nominees through, while still preserving the right to filibuster. The outlines of the deal appear to let through five of the seven stalled nominees, but would push President Obama to replace two of his picks to the National Labor Relations Board with other candidates. Republicans deem the two current nominees unacceptable because they were both recess appointments last year, and are the subject of a Supreme Court case. Sen. John McCain, the Arizona Republican who both sides said is the linchpin of the deal, said it wouldn’t apply to any future nominees, but would defuse the current situation. “I think this will calm things down,” he said. Mr. Reid had been prepared to use a shortcut, deemed the nuclear option because of its partisan toxicity, to change Senate rules to curtail filibusters of executive branch nominees. Republicans have said that using the shortcut, which involves changing the chamber rules through a majority vote rather than the usual two-thirds vote, would ruin the Senate. But by agreeing to let Mr. Cordray’s nomination through, the GOP has bought more time — at least the rest of Tuesday — to negotiate a broader cease-fire that would allow the other nominees through while still preserving the right to filibuster. The potential deal came in the midst of extreme tension in the Senate. As he entered the chamber Tuesday morning, Sen. Mitch McConnell, the Republicans’ floor leader, spotted Vice President Joseph R. Biden in the president’s chair, preparing to swear in a new senator. Mr. McConnell walked to the base of the dais and waved, but he told the vice president he wouldn’t get any closer. “I won’t come up there because I knew you can’t be seen talking to me,” said the Kentucky Republican, who served for decades in the Senate with Mr. Biden before the latter won the vice presidency. Later, however, Mr. Biden came down from the chair and laughed with Mr. McConnell on the floor. GOP senators had blocked Mr. Cordray for two years, arguing they had fears over the newly created Consumer Financial Protection Bureau he was tapped to lead. They figured that by denying the independent agency its head, they could stymie its work. President Obama then issued a recess appointment for the CFPB nominee at the beginning of last year, along with several picks to the National Labor Relations Board. A federal appeals court found the NLRB nominations unconstitutional, and the GOP had been insistent that those and the Cordray nomination not be allowed to proceed because it would give a stamp of approval to Mr. Obama’s recess appointment maneuver. The GOP had been insistent that those nominees and the Cordray nomination not be allowed to proceed because it would give a stamp of approval to Mr. Obama’s recess move. But by this week, Republicans had dropped their objection to Mr. Cordray, focusing instead on the NLRB picks. | 2 |
A 2015 video of Rep. Frederica Wilson, D-Fla., speaking at the dedication ceremony of a new FBI field office in South Florida, directly and fully contradicts White House Chief of Staff John Kelly's key allegations about the Congresswoman, a South Florida Sun Sentinel report reveals.
On Thursday, Kelly described for the White House press corps the 2015 ceremony he attended with Rep. Wilson at the FBI building in Miramar, Florida, named after two heroic agents. The special agents, Benjamin Grogan and Jerry Dove, were slain in the line of duty during a 1986 shootout with bank robbers.
Kelly recalled the event : "A congresswoman stood up, and in a long tradition of empty barrels making the most noise, stood up there in all of that and talked about how she was instrumental in getting the funding for that building, and how she took care of her constituents because she got the money, and she just called up President Obama, and on that phone call, he gave the money, the $20 million, to build the building, and she sat down. And we were stunned, stunned that she'd done it. Even for someone that is that empty a barrel, we were stunned."
But the video released by the Sun Sentinel shows that Wilson never claimed credit for funding for the building. The $20 million used to build the office was authorized in 2009 before Wilson became a member of Congress.
Wilson did, in fact, push legislation to have the building named in honor of the two deceased agents.
But the video shows that she took little credit and instead offered lavish praise for Republicans, including then-House Speaker John Boehner, for taking extraordinary steps to get the legislation passed.
"Today it is our patriotic duty to lift up Special Agent Benjamin Grogan and Special Agent Jerry Dove from the streets of South Florida and place their names and pictures high where the world will know that we are proud of their sacrifice, sacrifice for our nation," she said.
She repeatedly noted the heroism of the deceased agents and praised the FBI for their work.
Wilson responded Friday to Kelly’s allegations to The New York Times: “I feel very sorry for him because he feels such a need to lie on me and I’m not even his enemy.
“I just can’t even imagine why he would fabricate something like that. That is absolutely insane. I’m just flabbergasted because it’s very easy to trace.”
Wilson and the White House have been locked in an ongoing battle over President Trump’s Tuesday call to the widow of a Green Beret Sgt. La David Johnson.
Wilson, a family friend of Johnson’s family for decades, listened on the speakerphone as Trump made his condolence call.
Wilson criticized Trump for comments he allegedly made on the call suggesting the widow’s son knew the risk of death when he signed up for the military.
At his press conference, Kelly acknowledged he advised the president to tell the widow that her late husband “knew the possibilities” of what could happen as a member of the armed forces.
On Friday, rather than acknowledge Kelly’s faulty recollection of Wilson’s 2015 comments, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders insisted the chief of staff was sticking to his claims about Wilson’s 2015 speech. She took umbrage that the press was questioning a “a four-star Marine general, I think that that’s something highly inappropriate.” © 2022 Newsmax. All rights reserved. | 2 |
Comedian Dave Chappelle campaigns for Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang in Charleston, S.C., January 30, 2020. (Sean Rayford/Getty Images) Asked whether men can give birth, most people wouldn’t respond the way the transgenderism-obsessed Left would prefer. Understanding this, the Left is trying to hector, bully, and censor its way toward establishing a ridiculous new conception of gender as a matter of personal choosing rather than biological fact. That project requires changing the language, ignoring science, and discarding common human experience. Now, it appears to require policing comedy, too. For espousing the common-sense view in his new Netflix special The Closer, however, comedian Dave Chappelle is being attacked as a “transphobe” by a small but angry mob of Netflix employees and outside observers who claim Chappelle is doing actual harm to transgender individuals by making jokes about them. These people should avail themselves of the opportunity to not watch Chappelle’s act or to not work for Netflix. Instead, they seem to think Netflix should either pull the special or remove the content they find displeasing.
So far, though, Netflix isn’t yielding, and its polite refusal to entertain the mob’s wishes is providing a model for how corporations should respond to demands that they enforce a far-left orthodoxy of speech codes that swept into the mainstream from the radical campuses where it first caught on. As usual, the Netflix critics claim that their goal is not to control speech but merely to enhance “safety,” which is supposedly diminished by Chappelle’s remarks.
Netflix co-CEOs Ted Sarandos and Reed Hastings have repeatedly defended Chappelle in internal communications to angry employees: “In his special, Chappelle makes harsh jokes about many different groups, which is his style and a reason his fans love his comedy and commentary,” Sarandos wrote. “Stand-up comedians often expose issues that are uncomfortable because the art by nature is highly provocative. As a leadership team, we do not believe that The Closer is intended to incite hatred or violence against anyone.” More in Dave Chappelle Dave Chappelle Goes After Jussie Smollett Patton Oswalt Turns Rat against Dave Chappelle The Dave Chappelle Problem Is Worse Than You Think Wokeness Is Weakening Dave Chappelle Bill Burr’s Dirty Joke about Michelle Obama, and Other Stuff You Can’t Say Defiant Dave Chappelle Netflix Fires Activist Who Opposed Dave Chappelle Episode 373: Chappelle Takes on the Woke Scolds Outrage over Dave Chappelle’s Jokes Reveals That Progressives Know Nothing about Comedy Dave Chappelle Shouldn’t Defend Michael Jackson Hear, hear. As a private corporation, Netflix is free to air or refuse to air material in accordance with whatever standards it deems appropriate. But free speech would not long survive if every private business could be bullied into a single orthodoxy by a small group of extremists. Only an extremist would be outraged by Chappelle’s carefully considered thoughts on transgenderism, and we find it heartening that in at least one case, at least one outfit in the entertainment business still has the courage to reject the activist Left’s increasingly ludicrous thought policing. Something to Consider If you enjoyed this article, we have a proposition for you: Join NRPLUS. Members get all of our content on the site including the digital magazine and archives, no paywalls or content meters, an advertising-minimal experience, and unique access to our writers and editors (through conference calls, social media groups, and more). And importantly, NRPLUS members help keep NR going. If you enjoyed this article and want to see more premium content like this, we have a proposition for you: Join NRPLUS. Become a Member Recommended NBC's 'Cataclysmic' Olympics-Coverage Flop How can anyone feel good about these Olympics? Joe Biden Doesn’t Know What You’re Talking About To watch Biden at the lectern was to experience shock and dismay interspersed with moments of alarm and dark humor. No wonder he hides from the media. Nikole Hannah-Jones Responds to Our 1619 and Slavery Issue She reacted with a lot of sneering and ad hominem argumentation and nothing of substance. Maskless Super Bowl Marks Our Return to Normalcy This collective moment was a warning to the Covid regime that its strictures won’t stand much longer. The Perfect Storm Is Coming Not learning from the stagflationary past may lead to a stagflationary future. The Afghanistan Debacle Looks Worse and Worse The more we learn about the administration’s withdrawal, the more it becomes clear that its decisions were driven by political considerations and panic. The Latest Nikki Haley Blasts American-Born Skier Competing for China at Beijing Olympics 'Every athlete needs to know when they put their flag on, you're standing for freedom or you're standing for human rights abuses,' said Haley. San Francisco Voters Overwhelmingly Back Recall of Progressive School-Board Members More than 70 percent of voters supported the ouster of school board members Alison Collins, Gabriela López, and Faauuga Moliga. How Georgetown Is Stifling Speech on Campus The university is implementing the academic analog of a SLAPP suit against Ilya Shapiro. McKinsey Website Contradicts Denials of Chinese-Government Work; Rubio Claims ‘Cover-Up’ The consultancy once said it did work for China’s central government, undercutting recent statements. Imagine a Trumpdeau. You Can’t If Trump had gone after the 2020 rioters the way Trudeau is targeting truckers, the institutions and the permanent government wouldn’t have complied. Building Back Stagflation Our elected leaders must accept that inflation is a monster of their own making, and stop fanning the flames with ever-higher levels of government spending. | 2 |
President Trump signed a directive Friday ordering the government to end the so-called “catch-and-release” policy at the border, moving to combat what the administration says is a growing “crisis” of illegal immigration. He called for illegal immigrants nabbed at the border to be held in custody, to the fullest extent possible. He also ordered more asylum officers to head to detention centers so they can rule on cases faster, calculating that if they can clear the cases they can send undeserving migrants home without having to release them. In a memo to his attorney general and secretaries of the State, Defense, Homeland and Health and Human Services departments, Mr. Trump also demanded regular updates on progress, and told them to submit requests for any new resources they need. “The safety and security of the American people is the president’s highest priority, and he will keep his promise to protect our country and to ensure that our laws are respected,” White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said. Catch-and-release is the name Border Patrol agents and others involved in the immigration debate have given to the practice of arresting illegal immigrants, processing them and then having to set them free in the U.S., with the order that they return for a deportation hearing some time in the future. They disappear into the shadows and most never bother to show for their hearings, which can be years later. The Bush administration had tried to end catch-and-release by speeding up deportations of Mexicans. But a shift in migration patterns, with a surge in people from Central America — particularly children and families — has caused the issue to raise its head again. U.S. law, court cases and Obama administration decisions have made it much tougher to deport those people, with a host of legal protections built up around them pushing for them to be released from custody if their cases can’t be cleared quickly. Earlier Friday Attorney General Jeff Sessions ordered prosecutors along the southwest border to bring criminal misdemeanor charges against people who jump the border. Mr. Trump’s new memo calls on Mr. Sessions and the other departments to crack down on abuse of the asylum system, after illegal immigrants have learned how to game the system by using “magic words” indicating they fear being sent back home. Before 2013, only about 1 percent of migrants showing up on the border claimed asylum. Now the number is higher than 10 percent, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said this week. “Smugglers themselves are gaming the system, pure and simple. They take advantage of the loopholes in our laws. They know that we cannot prosecute as we need to to stop their behavior,” she said. | 2 |
President Trump wants to appoint Herman Cain, the former Republican presidential candidate, to the Federal Reserve board, but is waiting for the completion of his background check before making a formal announcement. Late Thursday, Trump said Cain would do "very well" at the Fed. Cain's appointment was reported by Axios earlier in the day.MORE FROM FOXBUSINESS.COM... Bloomberg previously reported in January that Trump was considering nominating Cain, the former CEO of Godfather’s Pizza, to the board. Doing so, however, raises the possibility of Capitol Hill testimonies regarding sexual harassment allegations against Cain, which ultimately derailed his 2012 candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination. Cain previously served multiple positions within the Kansas City Federal Reserve between 1989 and 1996. Trump has been a harsh critic of the interest rate policy set by the Federal Reserve. This week, the president reportedly blamed the Fed, and its chair, Jerome Powell, for slowing down the economy once again, despite the central bank recently saying that it foresees no rate hikes in the year ahead. At the end of March, Trump said he would appoint Stephen Moore, a conservative economic analyst and frequent Fed critic, to the board. The White House, however, has not sent the nomination to the Senate. CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX BUSINESS APPIf nominated and approved, Moore and Cain would fill the two remaining vacancies on the Fed’s seven-member board. | 2 |
| December 30, 2019 03:33 PM Bernie Sanders's campaign released letters from three physicians that paint a rosy picture of the 2020 Democrat's health after he suffered a heart attack in the fall. The first letter covering the Vermont senator's health comes from the Senate's attending physician, Brian Monahan. Sanders, 78, is "in good health currently," and the doctor sees no "limitation" of his "scheduled activities." Monahan also wrote that Sanders has been treated in the past for gout, high cholesterol, an inflamed colon, a thyroid disorder, laryngitis, lumbar strain, and skin lesions. Sanders is currently prescribed five medications, which includes aspirin, a cholesterol drug, two heart drugs, and a drug used to treat his thyroid condition. Two other doctors, both from the University of Vermont Medical Center, concluded his "heart function is stable," and that they believe he is capable of enduring the stress of the presidency. "Compared to otherwise healthy men with no known heart disease, [Sanders's] exercise capacity is average for a man his age. Mr. Sanders's level of fitness would be suggestive of favorable outcomes, from a cardiovascular perspective, going forward," wrote University of Vermont Medical Center Director of Cardiac Rehabilitation Philip Ades. In early October, Sanders, 78, was hospitalized in Las Vegas for three days after suffering a heart attack and underwent two surgeries to receive stents. Despite the health scare, Sanders maintained he recovered from the episode. Although the heart attack appeared to cause a momentarily drop in his poll numbers, Sanders has since positioned himself as a top-tier candidate in the Democratic primary race and is currently leading in a number of state primary polls. Earlier this month, a leading 2020 Democratic rival of Sanders, former Vice President Joe Biden, 77, released a report from his physical summarizing his own health. That physician concluded that the former vice president is "fit to successfully execute the duties of the Presidency." Weeks before, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren's doctor wrote in a letter that the 2020 Democratic contender, 70, is "in excellent health." [Read more: 'Lot of issues': Former Obama doctor says Biden 'not a healthy guy’] | 2 |
A visibly shaken and angry President Obama on Thursday attacked the American gun lobby, scolded the media and demanded that Congress take concrete action to stop the rash of recent mass shootings, which he said have “become routine” and are the pure result of inaction by lawmakers in Washington. Speaking in the briefing room at the White House, the president — who offered his 15th statement in the wake of a mass shooting — said the federal government must explain to grieving families why it has virtually nothing to stop tragedies like the one seen on the campus of Oregon’s Umpqua Community College Thursday. “This is a political choice we make — to allow this to happen every few months in America. We collectively are answerable to those families who lose their loved ones because of our inaction,” Mr. Obama said. A 20-year-old gunman killed at least 10 students and wounded 20 others on the Umpqua campus Thursday. His identity and motive have not been revealed. In addition to blasting Congress, the president directed his anger at the gun lobby and the news media. He said he expects Second Amendment activists to again argue we need fewer gun laws, not more. “We need more guns, they’ll argue, fewer gun safety laws. Does anybody really believe that?” he said. “There are scores of responsible gun owners in this country. They know that’s not true.” On media coverage of mass shootings, Mr. Obama said news outlets should highlight that fewer Americans are killed by radical terrorists than by deranged gunmen in America. “I would ask news organizations … tally up the number of Americans who have been killed through terrorist attacks in the last decade and the number of Americans who have been killed by gun violence and post those side by side,” he said. | 2 |
Employers scaled back on hiring in May adding 138,000 jobs, below forecasts for a job gains of 185,000, yet this was enough to push the unemployment rate lower.According to the Labor Department, the unemployment rate fell to 4.3 percent from 4.4 percent, which is the lowest it has been since 2001. The labor force participation rate ticked down to 62.7% from 62.9% the month prior while the jobless rate also declined to 4.3% from 4.4%.Average hourly earnings, a closely-watched metric, rose 0.2% during the month, as expected, putting year-over-year wage gains at 2.5%.Job gains in March were revised down to 50,000 from 79,000 while April’s figures were also lowered to 174,000 from 211,000.Despite the headline miss in May, job creation last month was above the three-month average of 121,000 jobs.“Today’s jobs report reflects that the labor market is tightening, and there’s not as much room for slack as the economy reaches full employment….it’s tough to continue to add 200,000 jobs each month with our unemployment rate below 5%,” said Steve Rick, chief economist at CUNA Mutual Group, reports Fox Business. | 2 |
President Trump retweeted a message criticizing health expert Dr. Anthony Fauci and Democrats over coronavirus social distancing measures. The social media offensive against Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and a core member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force, came after the White House shared an opposition research memo seeking to discredit the top health official. "So based on Dr. Fauci and the Democrats, I will need an ID card to go shopping but not to vote?" said an April tweet by conservative host Mark Young, who co-hosts a podcast with former game show host Chuck Woolery, that was retweeted by Trump. [Click here for complete coronavirus coverage] So based on Dr. Fauci and the Democrats, I will need an ID card to go shopping but not to vote?— Dr. Mark Young (@MarkYoungTruth) April 11, 2020 Trump also shared tweets from Woolery, a conservative and supporter of the president, who said he believes the media, Democrats, doctors, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are all lying about the virus. "The most outrageous lies are the ones about Covid 19. Everyone is lying. The CDC, Media, Democrats, our Doctors, not all but most ,that we are told to trust. I think it's all about the election and keeping the economy from coming back, which is about the election. I'm sick of it," Woolery wrote. The most outrageous lies are the ones about Covid 19. Everyone is lying. The CDC, Media, Democrats, our Doctors, not all but most ,that we are told to trust. I think it's all about the election and keeping the economy from coming back, which is about the election. I'm sick of it.— Chuck Woolery (@chuckwoolery) July 13, 2020 The tweetstorm by the president followed a White House official telling CNN over the weekend that "several White House officials are concerned about the number of times Dr. Fauci has been wrong on things." Fauci has declined to comment on the news on multiple occasions. In an interview with FiveThirtyEight released last Thursday, Fauci said he doesn't believe the United States is properly handling the health crisis, diverging again from the opinion of Trump. Earlier that week, Fauci warned that the U.S. should not fall into a "false complacency" about coronavirus death rates declining. Speaking at a press conference with Sen. Doug Jones, an Alabama Democrat, he also warned citizens against feeling relaxed about the coronavirus even though death rates have fallen. “It’s a false narrative to take comfort in a lower rate of death,” he said then. “There's so many other things that are very dangerous and bad about this virus. Don't get yourself into a false complacency.” There are more than 12.9 million reported cases of the coronavirus across the globe, with more than 569,000 deaths. In the U.S., more than 3.3 million people have tested positive for the coronavirus, with the nation's death toll totaling more than 135,000. More than 40 million people in the U.S. have been tested for COVID-19, according to the latest reading of the Johns Hopkins University tracker. | 2 |
| January 06, 2021 04:41 PM President Trump issued a statement Wednesday calling for “peace” and urging supporters who stormed the Capitol to “go home” but repeating his claims that the presidential election was stolen from him. “I know your pain. I know your hurt. We had an election that was stolen from us,” Trump said in a video shot outside the White House. “It was a landslide election, and everyone knows it — especially the other side. But you have to go home now. We have to have peace.” Members of Congress met in a joint session to count the electoral votes and affirm Joe Biden as the next president of the United States. Trump addressed a large rally of his supporters in which he attacked Republican congressional leaders for not backing his challenge. He also pressured Vice President Mike Pence to “come through for us” by rejecting slates of electors he insisted were chosen fraudulently. As Trump was still speaking, Pence announced he had concluded he had no such authority. Trump offered to lead his supporters on a march to the Capitol. He instead returned to the White House, and fervent backers of the president soon stormed the proceedings. Pence was hustled off by the Secret Service, and the Capitol was locked down. It was the first breach in 200 years. Biden urged Trump to “step up,” go on national television, and call for an end to the violent confrontation. “It's not a protest, it's an insurrection," the president-elect said. Trump called for calm and said he didn't want anyone to get hurt but continued to argue he had been cheated out of his reelection. He also said of the protesters, "We love you. You're very special." Twitter flagged his statement as disputed and said it couldn't be retweeted, replied to, or liked "due to risk of violence." The president's response was unlikely to satisfy his detractors, given that he preceded his call to stand down with the same type of comments that led his supporters to breach the Capitol in the first place. "This is what the president has caused today," Sen. Mitt Romney, a Utah Republican, frequent Trump critic, and 2012 GOP presidential nominee told reporters as chaos unfolded. Sen. Ben Sasse, a Nebraska Republican, said in a statement that the mayhem was a predictable result of the "President’s addiction to constantly stoking division." Pence was less equivocal than Trump. "The violence and destruction taking place at the US Capitol Must Stop and it Must Stop Now. Anyone involved must respect Law Enforcement officers and immediately leave the building," the vice president said. "Peaceful protest is the right of every American, but this attack on our Capitol will not be tolerated, and those involved will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law." Before Trump's supporters outside Congress descended on the Capitol, his supporters inside were mounting challenges to the electoral votes cast by several states. Sen. Ted Cruz, a Texas Republican, led a group of over a dozen senators in support of House Republican efforts to object to the submitted counts. Before the Capitol was locked down, Cruz signed on to an objection to Arizona's slate by Rep. Paul Gosar, a Republican from the state. Trump and his allies have alleged voter fraud and systemic irregularities, but the courts have not agreed with any claims that would alter the outcome of the election. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell rebuked his colleagues for overturn state results "on this extraordinarily thin basis." The Kentucky Republican also rejected the idea that the futility of the effort made it harmless symbolism. The anger of the protesters, who are convinced that Trump is correct in saying that the election was stolen and the country's major institutions had turned a blind eye toward the theft, appeared to support McConnell's argument. The result may be the biggest rift between Trump and GOP congressional leaders since the Access Hollywood tape was released during the 2016 campaign, less than two weeks before the president's term is set to expire. Wednesday's violence comes on the heels of a pair of Georgia Senate runoffs that broke for the Democrats after some Trump supporters urged a boycott of the elections to protest the state's handling of the presidential race. The outcome would hand Democrats control of the chamber once President-elect Kamala Harris is sworn into office. Biden narrowly won Georgia and was awarded its electoral votes. It is among the states where Trump is contesting the results. In addition to his video statement, Trump tweeted, "Please support our Capitol Police and Law Enforcement. They are truly on the side of our Country. Stay peaceful!" He subsequently reminded supporters: "WE are the Party of Law & Order." | 2 |
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! next Sept. 27, 2013: Malala Yousafzai listens as Harvard President Drew Gilpin Faust introduces her to reporters at Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass. (AP Photo/Jessica Rinaldi, File) prev Oct. 10, 2014 - Indian children's rights activist Kailash Satyarthi addresses the media at his office in New Delhi, India. Malala Yousafzai of Pakistan and Satyarthi of India jointly won the Nobel Peace Prize for risking their lives to fight for children's rights. (AP)OSLO, Norway – Malala Yousafzai of Pakistan and Kailash Satyarthi of India won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for risking their lives to fight for children's rights. The decision made Malala, a 17-year-old student and education activist, the youngest-ever Nobel winner.The news set off celebrations on the streets of Mingora, the main town in Pakistan's volatile Swat valley, with residents greeting each other and distributing sweets. At the town's Khushal Public School, which is owned by Malala's father, students danced in celebration Friday, jumping up and down.When she was a student there, Malala was shot in the head by a Taliban gunman two years ago for insisting that girls as well as boys have the right to an education. Surviving several operations with the help of British medical care, she continued both her activism and her studies.Appropriately, Malala was at school in the central English city of Birmingham at the time of the Nobel announcement and was expected to make a statement later Friday.Satyarthi, 60, has been at the forefront of a global movement to end child slavery and exploitative child labor since 1980, when he gave up his career as an electrical engineer. The grassroots activist has led the rescue of tens of thousands of child slaves and developed a successful model for their education and rehabilitation. He has also survived several attempts on his life."Child slavery is a crime against humanity. Humanity itself is at stake here. A lot of work still remains but I will see the end of child labor in my lifetime," Satyarthi told The Associated Press at his office in New Delhi. "If any child is a child slave in any part of the world, it is a blot on humanity. It is a disgrace."Malala's father, Ziauddin Yousufzai, said the decision will further the rights of girls."(The Nobel will) boost the courage of Malala and enhance her capability to work for the cause of girls' education," he told the AP.Pakistani Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan congratulated the nation as well as Malala and her family."(This) has given pride to the whole of Pakistan," he said.The Nobel committee's announcement reflected a delicate diplomatic balance, naming one activist from Pakistan and another from India, two countries that are long-time bitter rivals; one Muslim and one Hindu; both sexes; an elder statesman of child's rights and a youthful advocate who had herself been a victim.Committee chairman Thorbjoern Jagland said it was important to reward both an Indian Hindu and a Pakistani Muslim for joining "in a common struggle for education and against extremism." The two will split the Nobel award of $1.1 million.By highlighting children's rights, the committee widened the scope of the peace prize, which in its early days was given for efforts to end or prevent armed conflicts."It is a prerequisite for peaceful global development that the rights of children and young people be respected," the committee said. "In conflict-ridden areas in particular, the violation of children leads to the continuation of violence from generation to generation."Many around the world praised the Nobel committee for focusing on children."The biggest threat to the Taliban is a girl with a book," said Margot Wallstrom, Sweden's foreign minister and former special representative of the U.N. Secretary-General on Sexual Violence in Conflict.Raised in Pakistan's ruggedly beautiful, politically volatile Swat Valley, Malala was barely 11 years old when she began championing girls' education, speaking out in TV interviews. The Taliban had overrun her hometown of Mingora, terrorizing residents, threatening to blow up girls' schools, ordering teachers and students into the all-encompassing burqas.She was critically injured on Oct. 9, 2012, when a Taliban gunman boarded her school bus and shot her in the head. She survived through luck -- the bullet did not enter her brain -- and by the quick intervention of British doctors visiting Pakistan.Flown to Britain for specialist treatment at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, she underwent numerous surgeries but made a strong recovery. Malala now lives with her father, mother and two brothers in Birmingham and goes to the private Edgbaston High School for girls.She has been showered with human rights prizes, including the European Parliament's Sakharov Award.Yet her memoir, "I Am Malala," published last year, reminded the world that beneath the now-iconic exterior she is still a teenager who likes TV shows such as "Ugly Betty" and the cooking show "MasterChef," who worries about her clothes and her hair and wishes she was taller.The Nobel committee said Satyarthi was carrying on the tradition of another great Indian, Mahatma Gandhi, who remains the most notable omission in the 113-year history of the Nobel Peace Prize."Showing great personal courage, Kailash Satyarthi, maintaining Gandhi's tradition, has headed various forms of protests and demonstrations, all peaceful, focusing on the grave exploitation of children for financial gain," the committee said.India's President Pranab Mukherjee said "the prize should be seen as recognition of the contributions of India's vibrant civil society in addressing complex social problems such as child labor."A.N.S. Ahmed, a well-known sociologist in India, said the award should prod the Indian government to do more in a country where a large number of children must support their families by engaging in dangerous jobs."The award will have a deep impact not just on the Indian government but also on the civil society to work with passion and improve the condition of children by enforcing their rights and shake-up India's government," he said.The founder of the Nobel Prizes, Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel, said the prize should go to "the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses."The committee has interpreted those instructions differently over time, widening the concept of peace work to include efforts to improve human rights, fight poverty and clean up the environment.Former Indian diplomat Lalit Mansingh praised the Nobel committee's decision."(They are) conscious of helping in conflict resolution. The award, especially at a time when India-Pakistan relations are under stress, is a nice gesture," he said.The Nobel Prizes in medicine, chemistry, physics and literature were announced earlier this week. The economics award will be announced on Monday.All awards will be handed out on Dec. 10, the anniversary of Nobel's death in 1896. | 2 |
The Romney and Obama campaigns — both convinced that their man is more trustworthy with the future of Medicare — ramped up the debate this weekend, with operatives trading prickly barbs, the president dismissing Republican plans as “snake oil” and Paul Ryan bringing his 78-year-old mother into the fracas. “This is the first election cycle I can remember for a long time that Democrats are on the defensive with Medicare,” Romney senior adviser Eric Fehrnstrom said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union.” Hoping to turn what has long been a political strength for Democrats into a liability, presumptive presidential nominee Mitt Romney and other Republicans are trying to hammer home charges that Mr. Obama “raided” Medicare by $700 billion in order to pay for other parts of his health care overhaul. Mr. Romney launched the strategy last week, and Mr. Ryan, joined by his mother, Betty Ryan Douglas, continued the line of attack at an appearance Saturday before a crowd of thousands of mostly senior citizens at the Villages, a sprawling retirement community near Orlando, Fla. “When I think of Medicare, it’s not just a program, it’s not just a bunch of numbers, it’s what my mom relies on,” he said. “We want this debate. We need this debate, and we’re going to win this debate.” The Obama campaign pushed back aggressively. During his swing through New Hampshire on Saturday, the president called the Romney-Ryan economic plan “trickle-down snake oil.” “Congressman Ryan he put forward a plan that would allow Gov. Romney to pay less than 1 percent in taxes each year,” the president said. “Their ideas are pretty simple — they’re not hard to explain. They think if we do more tax cuts for the very wealthiest Americans, then somehow prosperity’s going to rain down on all of us.” Team Obama also dispatched deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter to the Sunday talk-show circuit, where she defended the Medicare savings created by the Affordable Care Act by insisting that most of the cuts came from trimming wasteful overpayments to private insurers. “It means they’re going to use taxpayer dollars to give overpayments to insurance companies,” Ms. Cutter said. The Medicare program is always a sticky wicket for politicians, but it has become front and center in the presidential contest ever since Mr. Romney chose Mr. Ryan as his running mate. “Medicare should not be used as a piggy bank for Obamacare,” Mr. Ryan said Saturday. A congressman from Wisconsin, Mr. Ryan is known for putting together a budget that would cut Medicare and turn it into a premium support system that allows seniors to use vouchers to buy private insurance. But now that he is paired up with Mr. Romney, the two are promising to return all of Mr. Obama’s Medicare cuts if elected. While light on the details, they say their plan would offer premium vouchers beginning in 2023 while preserving the option of traditional Medicare. The Republicans emphasize that their plan wouldn’t go into effect until 2023 and would have no effect on benefits for Americans 55 and older. “Our solution to preserve, protect and save Medicare does not affect your benefits,” Mr. Ryan said. “Let me repeat that. Our plan does not affect the benefits for people who are in or near retirement.” The Obama campaign says the Affordable Care Act’s reductions to future Medicare spending are derived largely from cutting overpayments to private insurers who participate in the alternative Medicare Advantage program. The Congressional Budget Office has said Mr. Obama’s cuts extend the life of the Medicare trust funds by eight years, giving the government until 2024 to figure out a long-term solution to the troubled program. “Here is the bottom line: My plan saves money in Medicare by cracking down on fraud and waste and insurance company subsidies, and their plan makes seniors pay more so they can give another tax cut to millionaires and billionaires,” Mr. Obama told voters in New Hampshire. “My plan has already extended the life of Medicare by nearly a decade. Their plan would put Medicare on track to be ended as we know it,” he said. Mr. Obama was referring to Medicare vouchers, which Republicans have proposed as an alternative to traditional Medicare but which Democrats say could leave seniors paying larger portions of their health care costs. The president said Republicans were trying to distract from their own plan by attacking his health care law. “The truth is, I think they know it’s not a very popular idea. You can tell that because now they’re being dishonest about my plans, since they can’t sell their plans,” he said, prompting laughter from the audience. “I mean, they are trying to throw everything at the wall just to see what will stick.” With Florida perhaps the most important swing state in the November election, both campaigns are working overtime to sell their respective visions for the program. Medicare presents an easy opportunity to prey on emotions, as the cost of health care remains a top concern among voters. In a reversal of roles, Republicans are arguing against cutting federal spending after trying to block increased federal spending for the past few years. “There are people out there right now, many of whom are probably watching this program, who are probably shopping for new private health care because their Medicare Advantage program is being cut by this president,” Mr. Fehrnstrom said. Democrats also are taking the opposite tack, focusing on approaching Medicare insolvency — a tune often sung by Republicans. “If they put that savings back into the system, it means Medicare will go bankrupt in just four years,” Ms. Cutter said. | 2 |
Of all the nasty, disgusting smears lobbied against Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh during his confirmation, the insinuations that because he was accused of sexual assault, he must be a pedophile, has got to be one of the dirtiest.The Washington Post has now revived that smear.The Post’s Ann E. Marimow wrote an article on Tuesday titled “Brett Kavanaugh worried that scandal would end his coaching days. Now the Supreme Court justice is back on the basketball court.” It’s a pretty bland article, and Marimow doesn’t make any insinuations about Kavanaugh in the title or text of the article. The sexual assault allegations against him are only mentioned twice – once leading to a quote from Kavanaugh lamenting the possibility that the uncorroborated smears against him would keep him from coaching his daughter’s basketball team and a second time to talk about team members sitting behind him during his first confirmation hearings.But it’s where the Post placed Marimow’s article that is so insidious. The article was posted under the Post’s “Public Safety” tag. Other recent articles published under this same tag include one titled “Child hit by bus in Charles County” and another titled “Incident at Walter Reed was a drill, not an active shooter, Navy says.”So yeah, a story about a man coaching his daughter’s basketball team fits right in.The National Republican Senate Committee director of data and analytics, Logan Dobson, first noticed the placement of the article.“tf is this tag, @washingtonpost,” he tweeted. He followed up that tweet with another showing the other articles recently tagged as “Public Safety.”There is no “public safety” threat over Kavanaugh coaching his daughter’s team. It’s hard to square the tag even if you’re considering the security detail that comes with a member of the Supreme Court, especially one who was deemed guilty by angry activists and a media who hated him before he was accused of anything inappropriate.It should also be noted that no evidence exists to corroborate any claims made against him. In fact, more evidence exists that he never sexually assaulted anyone. Several accusers have been referred for criminal investigation for lying, while the alleged witnesses identified by other accusers have said they don’t remember Kavanaugh ever doing the things of which he was accused.This is not the first time the media has made insinuations against the judge over his coaching duties. In September, a USA Today Columnist claimed Kavanaugh was a ”credibly accused sex offender” (he is not) and should not coach young girls on the basketball court, heavily implying that Kavanaugh is a pedophile. USA Today heavily edited the article to remove those insinuations, and attached an editor’s note that read:“Supreme Court nominee Judge Brett Kavanaugh has told members of the Senate Judiciary Committee he loves coaching his daughters’ girls basketball teams, but said in testimony Thursday “thanks to what some of you on this side of the committee have unleashed, I may never be able to coach again.” The intent of this commentary was to address that question. The column was re-edited to more closely reflect that intent and labeled to reflect it as the writer’s opinion.”The paper never apologized for the original wording of the column. | 2 |
Conversations! Glorious conversations! What more can you ask for?
The other day, former CBS News darling Katie Couric was speaking at an event organized by something called "TheWrap." Specifically, at its "Power Women Breakfast" in New York. (That is exactly the kind of event I'd expect Couric to be at, and I don't even know what it is.)
She was asked about the scandal swirling around her anti-gun-documentary — specifically, the fact that she deceptively edited a gun rights group's response to a question to make the members seem like dangerous idiots.
I wrote about all that in a recent column, so there's no need to repeat myself beyond noting that Couric and her producer are guilty of outright deception. But I thought her response was amusingly revealing.
"I can understand the objection of people who did have an issue about it," Couric said. (The "it" here is the deliberate falsifying of the truth). "Having said that, I think we have to focus on the big issue of gun violence. It was my hope that, when I approached this topic, that this would be a conversation starter."
Well, OK then.
After all, who denies that starting conversations — or, as they often call them in academia, "dialogues" — is the highest aspiration there is?
For instance, a Central Michigan University professor claimed last year that she was punched in the face at a Toby Keith concert for being a lesbian. She later admitted that she actually punched herself, but said it was worth it because she wanted to start a dialogue.
As the Washington Examiner's Ashe Schow recently chronicled, this sort of thing is common on college campuses. Students and professors initiate or exacerbate a hate-crime hoax or a false rape accusation. The orchestrators are perfectly happy to pretend the fraud is real and demonize anyone who casts doubt on the claims.
Then, when the facts come to light, instead of apologies we're saturated with a fog of pomposity and self-justification: We were just trying to start a conversation. Raising awareness of the larger issue is more important than the mere facts.
That was the excuse offered by a herd of academics on the 10th anniversary of the Duke University lacrosse rape hoax. Professors there had taken out ads suggesting the exonerated attackers were racists. In response to criticism, they insisted that they just wanted to get a good discussion going.
We've heard similar prattling about the University of Virginia rape hoax and many other fabricated events on college campuses (and off) going back decades. I started writing about such instances of "lying for justice" 20 years ago, and it has only gotten worse.
I don't think people appreciate how pernicious and widespread this crowdsourced totalitarianism really is. Routine lies in the service of left-wing narratives are justified in the name of "larger truths," while actual truth-telling in the other direction is denounced as hate speech or "triggering."
Even when liberals call for an "honest conversation" about this, that or the other thing, what they really mean is they want everyone who disagrees with the prevailing progressive view to fall in line.
Almost invariably, when I hear calls for "frank talk," "honest dialogue" or a new "national conversation," I immediately translate it as, "Let the next chapter of indoctrination begin." It's a way of luring dissenters from political correctness out into the open so they can be smashed over the head with a rock.
Remember, behind every obvious double standard is a hidden single standard. For instance, earlier this year, The New Yorker's Jane Mayer came out with a book attacking libertarian philanthropists Charles and David Koch called "Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right." When asked by NPR's Steve Inskeep what the nefarious supervillains of her screed were really up to, she ominously explained, "What they're aiming at is changing the conversation in the country."
Well, so are left-wing billionaire George Soros and his minions. So is Mayer herself. So are all of these campus fraudsters and activists. And so is Katie Couric. But when someone on the other side of the ideological chasm questions the official narrative, they must be demonized or otherwise silenced. Why? Because the last thing progressives want is to start an honest conversation. They want to have their conversations — and only their conversations.
Jonah Goldberg is a syndicated columnist and author. He explores politics and culture for National Review as a senior editor. He is the author of "Liberal Fascism" and "The Tyranny of Cliches: How Liberals Cheat in the War of Ideas.” For more of his reports, Go Here Now! | 2 |
NEWS AND OPINION: They’re first in the nation, and don’t you forget it. The New Hampshire Republican Party is ferocious about its traditional status as host of the nation’s first presidential primary, which can make and break candidates and create a media ruckus. So, naturally, there’s a First in the Nation Republican Leadership Summit which began Friday — and the GOP giants can’t wait to get there. The sold-out event in Nashua is “an electrifying two-day conference,” say the organizers, who credentialed over 100 journalists to cover it. Attending, in no particular order: Sens. Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Rand Paul and Lindsey Graham; Govs. Scott Walker, Chris Christie, John Kasich and Bobby Jindal; Jeb Bush, Rick Perry, Carly Fiorina, Mike Huckabee, Donald Trump and John Bolton. Among media and polling folks: Fred Barnes, Joe Scarborough, Stephen Hayes and Frank Luntz; among assorted politicians: Sen. Kelly Ayotte, Rep. Peter T. King, George Pataki, Scott Brown, Bob Ehrlich, Betsy McCaughey, John Sununu and Jim Gilmore. On the Republican Richter scale of fame, this big group is pretty electrifying. Yes, C-SPAN will be there live, beginning at high noon Friday and continuing through early Saturday night. Eager Democrats are lying in wait, however. Also journeying to Nashua for the big event: that would-be Democratic National Committee Chair Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who staged her own press conference just down the street from the GOP’s snazzy hotel, her talking points at the ready. “Republicans running, or considering a run, for the White House in 2016 have stumbled all over themselves to brandish their conservative credentials, and their out-of-touch policies leave everyday Americans behind,” says Mrs. Wasserman Schultz. “This group of Republicans is pushing policies that will benefit the wealthy at the expense of hardworking Granite State families and would turn back the clock on women’s health and LGBT equality. The Granite State and the country deserve better.” Needless to say, Hillary Rodham Clinton arrives in the Granite State on Monday for a cozy two-day visit. CONSERVATIVES ON ALERT Not to be outdone and ready to rumble, 24 hours after the first-in-the nation GOPers vacate their event site, a feisty group of New Hampshire conservatives moves in. Literally. On Sunday, the 603 Alliance — activists loyal to founding principles and intent on discovering the genuine conservatives in the presidential bunch — will stage a daylong Grassroots Summit. In the very same Nashua hotel, of course. They have big plans. “On April 19, in the city of Nashua, New Hampshire, the live-free-or-die state, there is going to be a loud bang very much like the shot heard around the world made on April 19, 1775 in Massachusetts,” the group sternly predicts in a statement. Past elections, they say, have taught them that “splitting their votes among numerous conservative candidates enables the moderate establishment to cruise to victory, and that only a consolidating effort on their parts will result in a victory for a conservative candidate.” They have a plan, and will reveal it with fanfare. And some interesting speakers will be along, including Sharon Angle, who ran for the U.S. Senate seat in Nevada; author Trevor Loudon and Aaron Day, chairman of The Atlas Society. “We welcome all — Republicans, undeclared voters, Libertarians, Constitutionalists, Free Staters, even Democrats if they support our organization’s principles,” the group notes. RAND’S PRO-LIFE RATIONALE “Now some have said to me, ‘Well, you’re big on all this liberty stuff, why do you want to restrict a woman’s right to choose?’ And I say, ‘Well, you know what, the government does have some role in our lives. One of the main roles the government has is to restrict you from harming another individual.’ Which gets us back to the original debate: When life begins, there is a role for state. So it’s not that I’m against people choosing things. I’m in fact one of the biggest believers in choice and liberty. But you can’t have liberty if you don’t protect where your liberty originates from — and that’s your right to life.” — Sen. Rand Paul, to the Susan B. Anthony List Summit on Thursday. MR. BOEHNER, REFEREE “We’ve got a lot of good candidates out there, and they’ll sort — they’ll sort this out themselves. I’ve been a Jeb Bush supporter for a long time — a longtime friend of mine, colleague, and I think he’d do a great job. But we’ve got a lot of good candidates, and they’re going to have to go sort this out themselves.” — House Speaker John A. Boehner, on the burgeoning field of presidential hopefuls, to Fox Business Network anchor Maria Bartiromo ABOUT THAT GYRO GUY “Despite the clear liberal agenda of postal worker Doug Hughes flying a gyrocopter into restricted Washington, D.C., airspace to protest for campaign finance reform, the broadcast networks avoided linking the dangerous stunt to left-wing politics or the Democratic Party,” says Kyle Drennan, an analyst for NewsBusters.com who has a long memory. “Such avoidance stood in stark contrast to media eagerness to falsely blame conservatives and the Republican Party for deadly acts of violence in recent years, including a man flying a plane into an IRS building in 2010, the shooting of former Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords in 2011 and the Colorado movie theater shooting in 2012,” Mr. Drennan notes, adding, “while network coverage treated the stunt as a serious security breach in the nation’s capital, none of the reports attempted to connect the reckless action to heated Democratic rhetoric on the topic.” WEEKEND REAL ESTATE For sale: The Cristman Barn, Ilion, New York. Historic 1884 hay barn on 33 acres in Finger Lakes region, completely renovated and converted to award-winning family residence; 10,600 square feet on two floors; six bedrooms, eight baths, stone walls and fireplace, open floor plan with atrium, multiple beams, wood flooring. Commercial-grade kitchen, formal dining room, hearth room, balcony, gym, reading and game areas. Overlooks stocked fishing ponds, hiking trails. Priced at $650,000 through SuziChase.com; check under “my listings,” about midpage. POLL DU JOUR • 60 percent of Americans say they prefer to use “environmentally friendly” cleaning supplies; 50 percent of Republicans, 60 percent of independents and 63 percent of Democrats agree. • 59 percent overall say the “organic” label on food is just an excuse to charge more; 67 percent of Republicans, 58 percent of independents and 50 percent of Democrats agree. • 47 percent overall say it’s easy to live green; 42 percent of Republicans, 45 percent of independents and 50 percent of Democrats agree. • 44 percent are concerned about the state of the planet for future generations; 34 percent of Republicans, 43 percent of independents and 54 percent of Democrats agree. • 20 percent agree with the statement “I am green”; 14 percent of Republicans, 23 percent of independents and 23 percent of Democrats agree. • 17 percent say they are an environmentalist; 10 percent of Republicans, 19 percent of independents and 22 percent of Democrats agree. Source: A Harris Poll of 2,244 U.S. adults conducted March 11-16 and released Thursday. Talking points, drivel and gibberish to [email protected]. | 2 |
House Republicans used to be against amnesty and for spending cuts. But now on both issues, Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) has entirely capitulated to liberal Democrats. Yesterday, House Republican leaders released the official text of Boehner's latest proposal to raise the debt limit. And it was just as terrible as conservatives thought it would be. Boehner's plan would increase spending by over $8 billion over the next 10 years. Most of that spending would go towards restoring the military pension cuts Boehner agreed to earlier this year. The rest would go to higher Medicare reimbursement rates for doctors. Not a cent of any of this new spending would be paid for until 2023 when Congress would supposedly extend sequester cuts to some mandatory budget programs for another year. Just as Boehner wants conservatives to believe that if they give illegal immigrants amnesty now, the federal government will begin enforcing immigration law tomorrow, he also wants conservatives to believe that if we raise federal spending now, we can pay for it by cutting spending ten years from now. No honest person with half a brain believes either scenario will ever play out as advertised. Instead, House Republicans should take Reps. Raul Labrador's (R-ID) advice, and just bring a clean debt limit hike to the House floor. While the military pension cuts should be undone, House Republicans must find a more honest pay for. | 2 |
News September 22, 2020 9:11 AM U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit Judge Amy Coney Barrett, a law professor at Notre Dame University, poses in an undated photo obtained from Notre Dame University, September 19, 2020. (Matt Cashore/Notre Dame University/Reuters) President Trump is said to be zeroing in on Amy Coney Barrett as a nominee to fill Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s seat on the Supreme Court, though the president has said he is considering five candidates, according to reports.
Barrett, a Midwestern Catholic and favorite of pro-life advocates, had separate meetings with Trump and White House counsel Pat Cipollone on Monday, sources told Bloomberg. Many inside the White House, as well as Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell, would support the nomination of Barrett, a judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals based in Chicago, the report said.
Trump has vowed to name a woman as nominee and told reporters earlier that he was looking at five women but had “one or two” of them in mind as finalists. He confirmed Barrett is one of the women under consideration. Barrett was one of Trump’s finalists in 2018 when he instead nominated Brett Kavanaugh and she has gained the president’s support as a “smart, hard-nosed, conservative jurist” who would come across well during televised confirmation hearings, Bloomberg reported. The president believes Barrett will be strong on conservative issues including abortion, gun rights and health care when they come before the Court.
A distant second choice is Appeals Court Judge Barbara Lagoa, a Cuban-American from Florida who could help the president gain support in the battleground state. Though the president is less confident in Lagoa’s conservative credentials as she received 27 Democratic votes when she was confirmed to her position in the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals.
Trump said he “may” meet with Lagoa later this week when he is in Florida.
Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Joan Larsen, Fourth Circuit Judge Allison Jones Rushing and deputy White House counsel Kate Todd make up the rest of Trump’s list, though they have not received serious consideration.
“We’ll make a decision — probably Saturday, but Friday or Saturday,” Trump told reporters. Send a tip to the news team at NR. Recommended RNC Should Take a Lesson from Mike Pence The RNC censure resolution was morally repellent, while the former vice president took a stand for the truth. NBC's 'Cataclysmic' Olympics-Coverage Flop How can anyone feel good about these Olympics? Nikole Hannah-Jones Responds to Our 1619 and Slavery Issue She reacted with a lot of sneering and ad hominem argumentation and nothing of substance. Joe Biden Doesn’t Know What You’re Talking About To watch Biden at the lectern was to experience shock and dismay interspersed with moments of alarm and dark humor. No wonder he hides from the media. Why Were Authorities So Evasive About the Synagogue Gunman's Motive? Why were President Biden and the FBI so reluctant to say that the synagogue gunman was motivated by antisemitism and jihadism? The Afghanistan Debacle Looks Worse and Worse The more we learn about the administration’s withdrawal, the more it becomes clear that its decisions were driven by political considerations and panic. The Latest Maskless Super Bowl Marks Our Return to Normalcy This collective moment was a warning to the Covid regime that its strictures won’t stand much longer. Russian Figure-Skating Prodigy Will Compete at Olympics Despite Failed Drug Test The IOC has decided it will not hold a medal ceremony for any event in which Valieva places in the top three while the matter remains under investigation. The IRS Wants Your Picture The agency’s plans for facial recognition might be abandoned for now, but its lust for data is never satiated. Why America’s Government-Debt Problem Endures Any meaningful change requires enough Americans deciding that they really do want less government in their lives, and then acting accordingly. ‘Blame America first,’ &c. On Jeane Kirkpatrick, today’s Russia debate, Edward Snowden, Ukraine’s right to exist, and more. | 2 |
A New Hampshire Senate debate moderator apologized to Republican candidate Scott Brown on Thursday for incorrectly disputing him on state geography. WMUR reporter James Pindell asked Mr. Brown, a former Massachusetts senator, what he thinks is going “right” and “wrong” in Sullivan County, which lies on the western border of New Hampshire, Fox News reported Friday. Mr. Brown responded with a number of economic challenges that faced areas of the state north of Concord. “Geography plays a role along the southern border. We have more jobs, we have more opportunity, infrastructure, and other opportunities up north are difficult,” Mr. Brown said. “One of the biggest opportunities is tourism. One of the biggest opportunities are ski areas and trails for snowmobiles — I support those efforts.” Mr. Pindell then interrupted Mr. Brown, reminding him that the question was about Sullivan county. “I think you were talking about the North Country,” he said. But Mr. Brown responded “I’m talking about any place past Concord, actually, and the challenges of our state.” Mr. Brown went on to list more economic challenges facing northern counties when Mr. Pindell interrupted him again. “Sullivan County is west of Concord. It’s not north of Concord, Senator Brown. So what do you see as going well and what’s not going well there,” Mr. Pindell said. Mr. Brown stuck with his answer, maintaining that “the challenges are the same in every county in our state.” The state Democratic Party posted a video of the tiff, calling Mr. Brown “clueless” in the description online. Later that night, Mr. Pindell admitted that Mr. Brown’s geography was indeed correct in a tweet, noting that Mr. Brown was referring to Mt. Sunapee, a ski resort in Sullivan County north of Concord. Mr. Pindell also apologized on air after the debate. “I said that Sullivan County was west of Concord, not north of Concord. The truth is, it’s both. So on this point, Scott Brown was right, I was wrong, and I apologize to Scott Brown and to both campaigns,” Mr. Pindell said. | 2 |
The Associated Press The White House’s new communications director, Anthony Scaramucci, Tweeted on Wednesday evening that he believes the leak of his financial disclosure form is a “felony” and that he will be contacting the FBI and Justice Department seeking an investigation.
In the Tweet, Scaramucci tagged White House chief of staff Reince Priebus and included a hashtag: “#swamp.” UPDATE: Scaramucci has since deleted this tweet and sent another, saying that it is “wrong” to interpret his first message the way Axios did, writing, “Scaramucci appears to want Priebus investigated by FBI.”
Wrong! Tweet was public notice to leakers that all Sr Adm officials are helping to end illegal leaks. @Reince45 pic.twitter.com/AB0reseuX1
— Anthony Scaramucci (@Scaramucci) July 27, 2017 Asked if he is accusing Priebus of leaking his financial disclosure, Scaramucci tells me "I am not."
— Andrew Beatty (@AndrewBeatty) July 27, 2017
Politico’s Lorraine Woellert wrote late Wednesday:
The incoming White House communications director earned $4.9 million from his ownership stake in SkyBridge in addition to more than $5 million in salary between Jan. 1, 2016, and the end of June, when he joined the Export-Import Bank, according to a financial disclosure filed with the Office of Government Ethics.The disclosure form hasn’t been previously reported.
According to the Politico report—which Josh Dawsey of Politico’s White House team contributed to—Scaramucci also has a number of high-worth assets. Woellert goes on:
In his disclosure, Scaramucci listed assets worth as much as $85 million. He has several real estate investments, including single-family rental homes on Long Island. A minority stake in the New York Mets is worth as much as $5 million. He also is an investor in Juice Press, a chain of snack and smoothie shops in the Northeast. Scaramucci earned $200,000 in income from a majority stake in Hastings Capital Group, according to his financial disclosure. That ownership share also will be sold as part of the SkyBridge deal with RON and HNA. As a contributor to Fox News, Scaramucci earned about $88,000, according to his financial disclosure. He has three mortgages with U.S. Bank for a total liability of $2.5 million to $7 million.
Scaramucci’s decision to tag Priebus in the Tweet has set off a firestorm on Twitter and among some members of the media.
https://twitter.com/jonathanvswan/status/890410288180318208 In case there's any ambiguity in his tweet I can confirm that Scaramucci wants the FBI to investigate Reince for leaking.
— Ryan Lizza (@RyanLizza) July 27, 2017
https://twitter.com/Cernovich/status/890403577163784193 Why is Reince mentioned in this tweet??!?!?!? https://t.co/2NOLW8sIgY
— Zeke Miller (@ZekeJMiller) July 27, 2017
Uhhhhh what? Why is @Reince copied? https://t.co/jN0UMB8CPq
— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) July 27, 2017
https://twitter.com/jonathanvswan/status/890415106668072960 When Reince Priebus told everyone he was close with Scaramucci, people "literally laughed," one White House official told me last week.
— Josh Dawsey (@jdawsey1) July 27, 2017
https://twitter.com/Cernovich/status/890410280596918272
Tensions between Scaramucci and Priebus are raw as ever, I’m told tonight. There’s a reason Mooch tagged Reince on FBI leak tweet.
— Philip Rucker (@PhilipRucker) July 27, 2017
A White House spokeswoman, Lindsey Walters, has not responded to a request for comment from Priebus via text message from Breitbart News late Wednesday evening.
Scaramucci’s hiring by the president as the communications director—a decision the president made without informing Priebus until after it was made—was seen as a blow to Priebus’s standing in the West Wing. What’s more, the president and Scaramucci have both made clear that Scaramucci reports directly to the president—not to Priebus, the chief of staff. Reportedly, Priebus vehemently opposed Scaramucci’s hiring in the West Wing.
Scaramucci has made clear he intends to root out leakers in the White House. He has already terminated one suspected leaker, a White House press aide named Michael Short. Short denies leaking, but news broke earlier this week that Short was being terminated. After Short originally denied the reports on-the-record, it came out that his termination was being processed by the White House counsel’s office. At that point, to avoid being terminated, Short resigned.
Short was not the only suspected leaker and Priebus ally who has lost a job this year. Deputy White House chief of staff Katie Walsh—Priebus’s old chief of staff from his RNC days—was terminated earlier this year after reports surfaced that she was a leaker.
UPDATE 1:14 A.M.
Scaramucci deleted his original Tweet early Thursday, and replaced it with this one:
Wrong! Tweet was public notice to leakers that all Sr Adm officials are helping to end illegal leaks. @Reince45 pic.twitter.com/AB0reseuX1
— Anthony Scaramucci (@Scaramucci) July 27, 2017 | 2 |
The Florida county election chief who came under considerable fire for incompetence and possible corruption during this month’s recount battles reportedly resigned Sunday. Brenda Snipes, the election supervisor for heavily Democratic Broward County, submitted her resignations just hours after submitting final, contentious tallies in the state’s governor and U.S. Senate races, both of which Republicans won by razor-thin margins. “It is true. She did send it,” Burnadette Norris-Weeks, an attorney who works as a counsel to the Supervisor of Elections Office, told the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. According to Ms. Norris-Weeks’s knowledge of an early draft of the letter, Ms. Snipes told officials in the state capital of Tallahassee that she wanted to spend more time with her family. Broward County was the slowest of Florida’s major counties to complete election returns, missing several legally-mandated deadlines and losing about 2,000 ballots that had been included in the election-night count but not in the machine recount. Republicans from former Gov. Jeb Bush, who appointed her in 2003, to Sen. Marco Rubio and Gov. Rick Scott, had all called for her resignation. Some Republicans said the heavily-Democratic county was dragging its feet and mishandling ballots in order to “find” enough votes to elect the two Democrats — Sen. Bill Nelson and gubernatorial hopeful Andrew Gillum, both of whom lost by fractions of one percentage point. According to the Sun-Sentinel, it’s not clear when the resignation would take effect, but the letter was sent within hours of the county submitting its mandated recount totals — after the deadline. The recounts did not produce the kind of numbers the Democrats had hoped and by Sunday evening, Mr. Nelson had joined Mr. Gillum in conceding defeat. | 2 |
Stocks gained after the Federal Reserve on Wednesday lowered its benchmark interest rate by a quarter percentage point. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell to session lows, down more than 200 points following the decision, before charging into positive territory. The S&P 500 fell as much as 0.7 percent and the Nasdaq was down as much as 1 percent.Ticker Security Last Change Change % I:DJI DOW JONES AVERAGES 34517.89 -220.17 -0.63%SP500 S&P 500 4410.65 -7.99 -0.18%I:COMP NASDAQ COMPOSITE INDEX 13914.659411 +123.51 +0.90% The Federal Reserve cut its benchmark interest rate by 25 basis points to a range between 1.75 percent and 2 percent after its July reduction was its first in a decade. The central bank cited weakening exports and low inflation as reasons for the cut. "Job gains have been solid, on average, in recent months, and the unemployment rate has remained low," the central bank's monetary policy committee said in a statement. "Although household spending has been rising at a strong pace, business fixed investment and exports have weakened. On a 12-month basis, overall inflation and inflation for items other than food and energy are running below 2 percent."Wednesday's decision came a day after the Federal Reserve Bank of New York took the unusual step of injecting $53 billion into markets to quell a spike in interest rates. Bank of America, Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo all opened lower before reversing into positive territory following the Fed's decision.Ticker Security Last Change Change % BAC BANK OF AMERICA CORP. 47.28 -0.64 -1.33%C CITIGROUP INC. 66.27 -1.16 -1.72%JPM JPMORGAN CHASE & CO. 151.60 -2.26 -1.47%WFC WELLS FARGO & CO. 57.74 -0.56 -0.96% On the earnings front, FedEx was under pressure after reporting disappointing first-quarter results and slashing its full-year outlook due to higher costs, a slowing economy and lower revenue from severing ties with Amazon. Online-pet-food supplier Chewy.com was lower following its quarterly report.Ticker Security Last Change Change % FDX FEDEX CORP. 230.59 -1.61 -0.69%CHWY CHEWY INC. 53.31 +1.17 +2.24% Oil prices fell for a second straight day after Saudi Arabia's energy minister on Tuesday said half of its lost crude production had been restored. West Texas Intermediate crude oil was down 2.17 percent and Brent crude oil was lower by 1.64 percent to $58.05 and $63.49 a barrel, respectively.MORE FROM FOXBUSINESS.COM In European trading, all of the major averages were little changed.In Asia, Japan's Nikkei slipped 0.2 percent after the Japanese government reported exports fell for a ninth month in August, declining 8.2 percent in August from a year earlier.CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ON FOX BUSINESSFOX Business' Ken Martin contributed to this report. | 2 |
Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. said the White House is “ready to compromise” after the midterm elections but that a Republican victory on Tuesday wouldn’t force the administration to undergo a wholesale overhaul in how it does business. He appeared to indicate that the onus would be on Republicans regardless of the outcome of the elections on Tuesday. “I don’t think it would change anything, in terms of what we’re about,” he told CNN. “We know what we have to get done the last two years. Going into 2016, the Republicans have to make a decision whether they’re in control or not in control. Are they gonna begin to allow things to happen? Or are they gonna continue to be obstructionists? And I think they’re gonna choose to get things done.” He also said he doesn’t see the White House drastically changing the way it does business after the midterms should Republicans take control of the U.S. Senate. “I think we have to be more direct and clear about exactly what it is we’re looking to do, and look, we’re ready to compromise,” he said. “I think they’re gonna be inclined, because the message from the people — and I’m getting it all over the country — is they’re tired of Washington not being able to do anything.” For his part, Mr. Biden did predict that Democrats will hold onto their tenuous majority in the Senate — where he could theoretically be called on to break ties if the balance ends up 50-50. As for 2016, Mr. Biden said he would “absolutely” run for president even if former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton — who has a big advantage in most public polling among would-be Democratic candidates — enters the race, but said he hasn’t made up his mind yet about a possible run. “There’s plenty of time to make that decision,” he said. “There really is. I mean, look, everybody talks about how, you know, everything is gonna be gone by the summer. And I don’t see that at all.” | 2 |
A woman in the crowd holds up a “Take It Back” sign as she attends a political rally with former U.S. President Barack Obama for California Democratic candidates during in Anaheim, California, U.S., September 8, 2018. (REUTERS/Mike Blake ) Making the click-through worthwhile: Why you shouldn’t quite buy the hype about the Democrats winning control of the Senate this November, NBC finds a convenient scapegoat for #MeToo concerns, and a bit of intrigue about a disputed recount in Massachusetts.
Why the Democrats’ Senate Chances Are Overhyped
The past week brought another round of buzz that Democrats could win control of the Senate. The Washington Post declares this morning, “Republicans have grown increasingly worried about losing control of the Senate.” Roll Call’s Stuart Rothenberg pronounces “the Senate is now in play.” Even Fox News concurs, “for Republican leaders seeking to maintain control of the Senate, some races are becoming a little too close for comfort.”
But Josh Kraushaar’s column at National Journal is called “Against the Grain,” and it’s apt because he regularly enjoys puncturing the balloon of the political conventional wisdom.
He’s not quite so convinced about the latest Democratic optimism.
If Republicans can defeat two of the six vulnerable Democratic senators up for reelection, they’ve locked down their majority for another cycle. Strategists from both parties agree that Republicans have pulled ahead in North Dakota, where Sen. Heidi Heitkamp is facing a spirited challenge from Rep. Kevin Cramer. Public polls show Missouri’s and Florida’s contests as pure toss-ups, while Indiana remains highly competitive. Democrats have the momentum in West Virginia and Montana, but the conservative nature of those electorates give Republicans an outside chance.
If North Dakota already leans in their direction, Republicans would need just one more of these red-state races to clinch a majority—regardless of what happens with the several seats they have to defend. Even if Republicans fall short, Democrats would still need to win a GOP-held seat on deeply conservative turf, either in Tennessee or in Texas.
Take another look at those vulnerable Democratic seats. While Florida should be a close race, incumbent Bill Nelson hasn’t led a public poll since June. Missouri’s looking very similar, with several surveys showing ties or small leads for Republican Josh Hawley; incumbent Claire McCaskill hasn’t led a public survey since May. We haven’t had a public poll of North Dakota since June, but that one had Republican Kevin Cramer up by four. And note, this is with the political wind at Democrats’s back, at least nationally.
(There’s mixed evidence of whether undecided voters tend to break to the challenger. A Washington Post analysis pooh-poohed that conventional wisdom in 2014, but then later that year Republican Senate candidates across the map overperformed their final polling averages,sometimes by double digits.)
If Republicans win in Florida, Missouri, and North Dakota, it means the drama ends early on Election Night, at least for control of the Senate. Democrats can assure themselves that Indiana’s Joe Donnelly, West Virginia’s Joe Manchin, and Montana’s Jon Tester are in stronger shape than expected. But there’s another shoe that hasn’t dropped yet. All of these incumbents have to vote for or against Brett Kavanaugh to be the next justice on the Supreme Court. A “yes” vote probably frustrates the Democratic grassroots in their states; a “no” vote outrages and energizes the grassroots Republicans. Now let’s go through the vulnerable Republican seats. A new poll of Arizona’s Senate race out this morning put Republican Martha McSally up by three points over Kyrsten Sinema; the previous poll put McSally up by one. Nevada’s Senate race has only seen one recent survey, and that put Democrat Jacky Rosen up by one point.
Progressives are really excited about Beto O’Rourke in Texas, and he’s no doubt performing much better than the typical Democrat in Texas. But he still hasn’t, you know, led a poll. If O’Rourke wins, it will indeed be a huge deal. But if Cruz wins this closely, I wonder if Democrats will be kicking themselves over the national hype and attention paid to O’Rourke throughout the summer. If you’re aiming to pull off a huge upset, sometimes the best option is to be under the radar for as long as possible to let the incumbent get complacent. Ask Dave Brat or Scott Brown. In fact, building strength under the radar while the incumbent puts in minimal effort is a big part of how O’Rourke won his House seat. No doubt Team Cruz will be pulling out all of the stops between now and November.
And while Tennessee Democrats have reason to cheer over Phil Bredesen’s two-point lead over Republican Marsha Blackburn in the latest poll, I can remember 2006, when Harold Ford Jr. was on the cover of Newsweek, under the headline “Not Your Daddy’s Democrats“one week before Election Day. Newsweek declared Ford had “Republicans running scared,” yet he was the only Democrat to lose a competitive Senate race that year, as Bob Corker beat him by three points. In other words, the last time Democrats enjoyed a big blue-wave midterm election, Tennessee bucked the trend.
There’s no doubt that there are some disappointments for the GOP this cycle. There’s not yet any sign that Minnesota or Michigan have gotten really competitive.
NBC: Hey, We Can’t Have Any Sexual-Harassment Commentary Around Here!
Right, right, because if there’s any institution that’s covered itself in glory since the #MeToo movement arose, it’s NBC.
Norm Macdonald’s appearance on “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” was hastily canceled Tuesday after the comedian stirred controversy with remarks about the #MeToo movement and the treatment of Louis C.K., Chris Hardwick and Roseanne in recent scandals.
“Out of sensitivity to our audience and in light of Norm Macdonald’s comments in the press today, ‘The Tonight Show’ has decided to cancel his appearance on Tuesday’s telecast,” NBC said in a statement. “Tonight Show’s” decision to drop Macdonald came even after he apologized for his comments later in the day.
In an interview with Hollywood Reporter, Macdonald said he was “happy the #MeToo movement has slowed down a little bit.” He further opined: “It used to be, ‘One hundred women can’t be lying.’ And then it became, ‘One woman can’t lie.’ And that became, ‘I believe all women.’ And then you’re like, ‘What?’ Like, that Chris Hardwick guy I really thought got the blunt end of the stick there.”
NBC might tolerate Matt Lauer’s secret-door-lock-button and predation for years, and throw roadblocks in front of Ronan Farrow, but boy, they sure as heck come down hard on Norm Macdonald.
Then again, Norm Macdonald might be used to getting a raw deal from NBC. Back in 1998, Macdonald was fired from Saturday Night Live, and the rumor was that an NBC executive who was friends with O. J. Simpson found Macdonald’s relentlessly scathing O. J. jokes intolerable. (Because if there’s any demographic NBC couldn’t afford to offend, it’s the O. J. Simpson fanbase!)
Ironically, in 2017, Macdonald said he saw Simpson slightly differently: “I’m not completely sure he’s guilty anymore. I’m almost completely sure, but I’m not completely sure.”
Recount Intrigue among Massachusetts Democrats? What Are the Odds?
Keep your eyes on the Massachusetts third congressional district, as the state is stepping in after problems with the regular recount process in the Democratic primary:
A recount to settle the tightly contested Democratic primary in the Third Congressional District will take place over the next week under the watchful eye of Secretary of State William Galvin, who said Monday he was taking over the election departments of Lawrence and Lowell due to understaffing in one city and the irregular certification of primary ballots in the other.
Galvin ordered the district-wide, hand recount of almost 89,000 ballots after Andover’s Dan Koh, who is currently sitting in second place 122 votes behind the leader Lori Trahan, filed the requisite signatures by last Friday’s deadline.
The state’s chief elections officer, Galvin said the recount must be completed by Sept. 17 in order for him to have enough time to print ballots and get them to overseas and military voters ahead of the Nov. 6 general election.
This is a pretty heavily Democratic district, scoring a D+9 in the Cook Partisan Voting Index, but who knows whether the recount fight will stir up bad blood on the Democratic side. Meanwhile, Republican candidate Rick Green is unveiling a funny new ad this morning, depicting himself swimming across the Merrimack River in Lowell, Mass., while his brother waits in traffic on Rourke Bridge. Green is a former aerospace engineer with NASA and founder of 1A Auto, an auto-parts manufacturer. Plus, apparently, he’s a pretty good swimmer.
ADDENDUM: Deroy Murdock with a sobering thought:
Perhaps the absence of the fear and loathing that legitimately followed 9/11 has let us shift our energies from repelling a largely exterior threat to devouring each other instead. As America’s civil discourse devolves into a bloodless civil war between two sides that increasingly loathe each other, maybe this is — ironically — a luxury. Seemingly freed of the dangers posed by al-Qaeda, ISIS, and their ilk, we now have moved on to clobbering our fellow Americans. | 2 |
Holiday snowmen in the White House Rose Garden. (Reuters photo: Yuri Gripas) Narrow political victories can lead to significant changes, so let’s do a better job of understanding one another. Now that the 538 electors have voted — and, with only the most minor of exceptions, for the expected candidates — we can marvel at how such a huge difference in public policies can be made by just a few votes, the 77,744 votes by which Donald Trump beat Hillary Clinton for the 46 electoral votes in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. Trump’s narrow victory means a significantly more conservative Supreme Court, a rollback of Obamacare and reams of regulations, abandonment of policies disfavoring fossil-fuel usage — and hundreds of consequences that can only be guessed at.
This isn’t the first time this has happened. If Al Franken had not been ruled the winner of the 2008 U.S. Senate race in Minnesota by 302 votes, there would have been no 60th vote to push through Obamacare in 2010. And let’s not start re-litigating the count in Florida in the 2000 presidential race.
Our political system is one that produces big policy consequences from little, even microscopic, vote margins. This has been strengthened in recent decades by increasing partisan polarization. A half-century ago, political scientists said we should have one clearly liberal and one clearly conservative party — and boy, did they get their wish.
But binary choices, with sharply varying consequences, tend to be characteristic of two-party politics. And we have a two-party politics, which incentivizes each party to aim for more than 50 percent of the vote. That helps bind together a disparate country, but it also emphasizes what divides us.
And often neither party gets to 50, as with 15 of the 41 Democratic-Republican presidential contests since 1856 (and one 50 percent candidate, Samuel Tilden in 1876, lost by one electoral vote).
Thomas Dewey’s Hollywood celebrity supporters didn’t run ads begging electors to vote against Harry Truman.
Democrats have been especially unhappy this year because, like Republicans in 1948, they had pretty good reason to think they’d win. But Thomas Dewey’s Hollywood celebrity supporters didn’t run ads begging electors to vote against Harry Truman. Only now has understandable disappointment led to utter derangement.
Christmastime and the holiday season may be a good time to provide some suggestions for how commentators and citizens can go forward at a time when, even more than usual, narrow margins seem to be producing widely different outcomes.
One suggestion is inspired by social-media accounts of how distraught Clinton-supporting parents are explaining Trump’s victory to their disappointed (but probably less distraught) children.
And that is to back up and do the explanation the other way. Explain beforehand to your children — or to your friends or just yourself — how a good person could support the candidate you, for good reasons of your own, oppose. What values are other good people trying to advance? Why do they think their choice would be good for the country?
Going through this exercise won’t change your mind. But it could change your view. And it also might be a good idea for pundits like me to make a point of doing this more often. Good people do disagree. It’s one of our jobs to understand why. A second suggestion is directed at the punditocracy especially — and maybe to people beyond. And that is that it’s a good time to stop playing team ball. Over much of the past 20 years, there’s been a close alignment between the views of liberal commentators and elected Democrats and those of conservative commentators and elected Republicans.
That’s less likely in the near future. There’s clearly a gulf between Trump’s views and those of many conservatives and elected Republicans. And with no incumbent Democratic president, liberals will have no single leader setting an agenda.
#related#Back when I started reading about politics, National Review was ambivalent about Richard Nixon, and The New Republic was repeatedly critical of John F. Kennedy. Both magazines did less cheerleading and had more interesting things to say than many counterparts have had lately. Let’s have more of that now.
The third suggestion is: Don’t get strung out on process arguments — for example, the recent brouhaha about the Electoral College. Everyone knows that if Trump had a plurality in the popular vote and Clinton a majority of electoral votes, Democrats would have argued that Democratic electors should vote for her. It’s an illustration of one of my long-standing rules of politics: All process arguments are insincere.
Attentive readers may object that I haven’t always followed this advice myself. Let me know if I fail to do so going forward.
— Michael Barone is a senior political analyst for the Washington Examiner, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, and a longtime co-author of The Almanac of American Politics. © 2016 Creators.com | 2 |
| January 07, 2021 11:59 AM Sen. Chuck Schumer, who will become the majority leader within a few weeks, called on Vice President Mike Pence to invoke the 25th Amendment and remove President Trump from office. He said Congress should also impeach the president. Schumer, a New York Democrat, joined a growing list of Democrats who say Trump should not be in office a minute longer following a violent and deadly siege of the Capitol on Wednesday that they blame on him. “What happened at the U.S. Capitol yesterday was an insurrection against the United States, incited by the president. This president should not hold office one day longer,” Schumer said in a statement issued Thursday. “The quickest and most effective way — it can be done today — to remove this president from office would be for the vice president to immediately invoke the 25th Amendment. If the vice president and the Cabinet refuse to stand up, Congress should reconvene to impeach the president.” Democrats have started discussing a second impeachment of Trump, that, if successful, would prevent him from seeking the presidency again. Trump was impeached last year, but the Senate did not convict him of the two charges. If they were to convict him a second time around, he would be banned from the presidency if he intended to run again. Schumer will soon control the Senate floor. Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, controls the House chamber, and many of her caucus members are clamoring for a second impeachment of Trump. Trump delivered an impassioned speech near the Capitol on Wednesday, telling thousands of supporters the election was stolen. He told protesters to go to the Capitol, although he did not call for violence. He called on them to “cheer on” the lawmakers contesting the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s victory. The protesters marched to the Capitol, and a large group broke through police barriers, broke through doors and windows, and stormed the second floor and two chambers. A woman was shot and killed by police, and three others died from medical emergencies. Lawmakers were evacuated, and the building was locked down for hours. | 2 |
Hope Hicks to resign: President Trump losing trusted adviser President Trump's top communications adviser's decision comes one day after her appearance in front of the House Intelligence Committee; chief White House correspondent John Roberts and chief intelligence correspondent Catherine Herridge report.NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! White House communications director Hope Hicks, one of the president's longest and most loyal advisers dating back to the beginning of his presidential campaign, said Wednesday she is resigning from the administration to explore new opportunities.“There are no words to adequately express my gratitude to President Trump,” Hicks said in a statement. “I wish the president and his administration the very best as he continues to lead our country.”A former model, Hicks, 29, is Trump’s longest serving aide, having worked with him before he announced his candidacy, through the campaign and into the second year of his administration.“Hope is outstanding and has done great work for the last three years,” Trump said in a statement provided by the White House. “She is as smart and thoughtful as they come, a truly great person. I will miss having her by my side but when she approached me about pursuing other opportunities, I totally understood. I am sure we will work together again in the future.”Hicks informed the president on Wednesday that she had made her final decision to leave the administration, a source said. Hicks’ exact departure is to be determined but will be sometime in the next few weeks, the White House said.“Hope Hicks is loved & admired by all who know her,” the president’s daughter and adviser, Ivanka Trump, tweeted. “It’s with a heavy heart, but tremendous gratitude, that I wish her well in her next steps.”The announcement came a day after Hicks acknowledged to a House intelligence panel that she occasionally told "white lies" for Trump but has not lied about anything relevant to the Russia investigation.Hicks joined the White House after the campaign, and was promoted to communications director over the summer. The White House credited her with leading strategic messaging for the tax reform effort and working with White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders to stabilize the press and communications teams.“When I became chief of staff, I quickly realized what so many have learned about Hope – she is strategic, poised and wise beyond her years,” chief of staff John Kelly said in a statement.Kelly added: “She became a trusted adviser and counselor and did a tremendous job overseeing the communications for the president’s agenda including the passage of historic tax reform. She has served her country with great distinction. To say that she will be missed, is an understatement.”Hicks famously avoided publicity throughout her tenure. As a press aide, she never went on camera but preferred working behind the scenes. It wasn’t until recently – during the scandal over White House Staff Secretary Rob Porter’s past domestic abuse allegations – that Hicks found herself in the spotlight.At the time of the scandal, Hicks had been dating Porter, who has also resigned. It was then revealed that Hicks was involved in drafting the initial response to the revelation of Porter’s past.Sanders told reporters Wednesday afternoon that Hicks already had considered leaving the administration before the Porter fiasco."She's been thinking about it before that," Sanders said.She also said Hicks' resignation did not have to do with her testimony before the House Intelligence Committee.Hicks also has been of interest to investigators in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe over her involvement in drafting the statement after news broke of Trump’s eldest son, Donald Trump, Jr., meeting with a Russian lawyer who promised dirt on Hillary Clinton during the campaign. Hicks was with the president on Air Force One while they were writing the initial statement.The White House has had trouble keeping someone in the communications director role. Jason Miller initially was chosen for the job, but ultimately turned it down citing family reasons.Mike Dubke briefly served in the role but resigned in May after just three months on the job. Anthony Scaramucci resigned from the role in July after just 11 days on the job after Kelly became chief of staff.Hicks stepped into the role after Scaramucci’s departure.“Hope Hicks is a world class person and is going to go on to have an unbelievable career. She did an incredible job,” Scaramucci tweeted Wednesday. “The best is yet to come.”There was no immediate word on her successor.Fox News' Serafin Gomez contributed to this report. The Associated Press also contributed to this report. | 2 |
House Speaker designate Nancy Pelosi (D, Calif.) speaks to reporters after meeting with President Donald Trump at the White House in Washington, D.C., December 11, 2018. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters) Representative Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.), who is expected to be elevated to Speaker of the House Thursday, has refused to rule out the possibility of indicting President Trump while he is in office.
Asked whether special counsel Robert Mueller should respect Department of Justice guidelines that suggest a sitting president can not be indicted, Pelosi seemed to suggest that guidance could be ignored in certain circumstances. “I do not think that that is conclusive. No, I do not,” Pelosi told NBC’s Savannah Guthrie during an interview that aired Thursday on “Today.”
“Let’s just see what Mueller does. Let’s spend our time on getting results for the American people,” she added when asked directly if Mueller can indict a sitting president.
Mueller’s team is currently investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election and possible coordination with the Trump campaign. Mueller has indicted multiple high-ranking Trump campaign officials on crimes seemingly unrelated to Russian interference and he is expected to release a report to Congress detailing his findings as soon as mid-February. The relevant Justice Department guidance, drafted in 2000 by the office of legal counsel, states: “The indictment or criminal prosecution of a sitting President would unconstitutionally undermine the capacity of the executive branch to perform its constitutionally assigned functions.”
In making the case that the guidance in question might be ignored, Pelosi pointed out that it there is no existing legislation prohibiting the indictment of a sitting president.
“It’s not the law,” Pelosi told Guthrie. “Everything indicates that a president can be indicted after he is no longer president of the United States.”
“A president who’s in office? Could Robert Mueller come back and say I am seeking an indictment?” Guthrie responded.
“I think that is an open discussion,” Pelosi said. “I think that’s an open discussion in terms of the law.”
Pelosi, who served as the first female Speaker of the House from 2007 to 2011, is expected to reclaim the gavel in a Thursday afternoon leadership vote. The veteran California lawmaker has attempted to avoid the question of Trump’s impeachment in the weeks leading up to the leadership vote but has pledged to thoroughly investigate the president using Congressional subpoena power.
Send a tip to the news team at NR. Recommended NBC's 'Cataclysmic' Olympics-Coverage Flop How can anyone feel good about these Olympics? Joe Biden Doesn’t Know What You’re Talking About To watch Biden at the lectern was to experience shock and dismay interspersed with moments of alarm and dark humor. No wonder he hides from the media. Nikole Hannah-Jones Responds to Our 1619 and Slavery Issue She reacted with a lot of sneering and ad hominem argumentation and nothing of substance. Maskless Super Bowl Marks Our Return to Normalcy This collective moment was a warning to the Covid regime that its strictures won’t stand much longer. The Perfect Storm Is Coming Not learning from the stagflationary past may lead to a stagflationary future. The Afghanistan Debacle Looks Worse and Worse The more we learn about the administration’s withdrawal, the more it becomes clear that its decisions were driven by political considerations and panic. The Latest Nikki Haley Blasts American-Born Skier Competing for China at Beijing Olympics 'Every athlete needs to know when they put their flag on, you're standing for freedom or you're standing for human rights abuses,' said Haley. San Francisco Voters Overwhelmingly Back Recall of Progressive School-Board Members More than 70 percent of voters supported the ouster of school board members Alison Collins, Gabriela López, and Faauuga Moliga. How Georgetown Is Stifling Speech on Campus The university is implementing the academic analog of a SLAPP suit against Ilya Shapiro. McKinsey Website Contradicts Denials of Chinese-Government Work; Rubio Claims ‘Cover-Up’ The consultancy once said it did work for China’s central government, undercutting recent statements. Imagine a Trumpdeau. You Can’t If Trump had gone after the 2020 rioters the way Trudeau is targeting truckers, the institutions and the permanent government wouldn’t have complied. Building Back Stagflation Our elected leaders must accept that inflation is a monster of their own making, and stop fanning the flames with ever-higher levels of government spending. | 2 |
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! As he touched down in St. Petersburg on Thursday morning, President Obama greeted his host Vladimir Putin with a handshake and a smile.But the cordial greeting belies the tinderbox the two leaders are sitting on, as they posture and deliberate over a potential U.S. strike on Syria -- one of Russia's closest Mideast allies.Putin escalated concerns about the fallout from any strike when he indicated in an interview published Wednesday that his country could send Syria and its neighbors in the region the components of a missile shield if the U.S. attacks.U.S. Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, testified this week that the Russians might even replace any military assets the U.S. destroys in a strike.The warnings raise the possibility of a supposedly "limited" strike on Syria turning into a proxy tit-for-tat between Russia and the U.S.More On This... Rep. George Holding, R-N.C., went further during a hearing on Syria on Wednesday, pressing military officials on what the U.S. would do "if Russia decided to strike at us in that theater.""We can certainly say that Russia would have options to strike us in that theater in retaliation for us striking their ally," he warned.Dempsey declined to engage in that discussion, saying only that "Russia has capabilities that range from the asymmetric, including cyber, all the way up through strategic nuclear weapons. And again, it wouldn't be helpful in this setting to speculate about that."Secretary of State John Kerry, though, said the Russians have made clear they don't intend to go to war over a strike on Syria.Perhaps more likely is that Putin's government would continue to aid and prop up the Assad regime, undermining any gains made by a U.S. strike."Putin will live up to what he says," Fox News military analyst retired Lt. Col. Ralph Peters said." If we destroy Syrian military technology, Putin will replace it."Putin said in a published interview this week that he'd reconsider the status of a suspended S-300 missile defense contract."We have a contract for the delivery of the S-300s. We have supplied some of the components, but the delivery hasn't been completed," he said. "We have suspended it for now. But if we see that steps are taken that violate the existing international norms, we shall think how we should act in the future, in particular regarding supplies of such sensitive weapons to certain regions of the world."The possibility for Russia stepping up its role in the region makes Obama's visit to Russia all the more critical. Though the president has nixed a formal one-on-one sitdown with Putin during the G-20 summit, he is expected to speak with the Russian leader on the sidelines. Though he said Wednesday that U.S.-Russian relations have "hit a wall," he said he'd continue to engage Putin."It is not possible for Mr. Assad to regain legitimacy in a country where he's killed tens of thousands of his own people," Obama said. "So far, at least, Mr. Putin has rejected that logic."Obama added: "I'm always hopeful, and I will continue to engage him."Obama's challenge to change Putin's mind comes as China warns that any military action against Syria will push up oil prices and hurt the world economy.Speaking in St. Petersburg Thursday, Chinese Vice Finance Minister Zhu Guangyao said that "Military action would have a negative impact on the global economy, especially on the oil price -- it will cause a hike in the oil price," before citing estimates that a $10 rise in oil prices could push down global growth by 0.25 percent. Guangyao also urged a U.N.-negotiated solution to the chemical weapons standoff. Like Russia, China is a major arms supplier to Syria and holds veto power over any Security Council resolution.The White House went out of its way to say Obama would not hold bilateral discussions with the Russian leader while in St. Petersburg. Instead, Obama will formally meet on the summit's sidelines with the leaders of France, China and Japan, though a senior administration official said the two presidents will have a chance to speak.Russia's resistance is a key reason why the U.N. Security Council so far has not gotten on board with U.S. calls for action in response to the alleged chemical weapons strike against Syrian rebels on August 21.Putin has been among the loudest critics on the international stage of Obama's push for a military strike in Syria. He reportedly blasted the push on Wednesday as an "act of aggression." He has said in recent interviews that a strike would be illegal if the United Nations does not support it.The president said Wednesday there was far more than his own credibility at stake in responding to the chemical weapons attack."I didn't set a red line, the world set a red line," he said. "The world set a red line when governments representing 98 percent of world population said the use of chemical weapons are abhorrent." He added that Congress set its own red line when it ratified the treaty.With Obama in Europe, his top national security aides were to participate Wednesday in public and private hearings at the Capitol to advance their case for limited strikes in retaliation for what the administration says was a deadly sarin gas attack by Assad's forces in the eastern suburbs of Damascus.The Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted 10-7 with one abstention to authorize the use of force against Syria Wednesday, the first in a series of votes as the president's request makes its way through Senate and House committees before coming before the two chambers for a final vote, probably sometime next week.The Associated Press contributed to this report. | 2 |
The 28th president was a despicable racist unworthy of his office. Yet his removal comes in the context of a greater culling.circa 1916: The 28th President of the United States Woodrow Wilson (1856 - 1924). (Photo by Tony Essex/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)First things first: Woodrow Wilson was a deplorable bigot and one of the worst presidents in American history. He re-segregated the federal government, glamorized the Ku Klux Klan, screened The Birth of a Nation at the White House, and opposed Reconstruction and black suffrage (Dylan Matthews has more on Wilson’s racism). In common with many progressive intellectuals of his time, he was a champion of eugenics. He sank the United States into the pointless carnage of World War I. He viewed the Constitution as outmoded and sought to snap its restraints on executive power.Ideally there wouldn’t even be an perpetually congested bridge in Northern Virginia named after him, let alone a prestigious college of public policy. Yet now that college, the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University (Wilson’s former employer), has announced that it’s changing its name. Here’s part of the statement from the university’s board of trustees:The Princeton University Board of Trustees voted today to remove Woodrow Wilson’s name from the University’s School of Public and International Affairs, which will now be known as the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs. We have taken this extraordinary step because we believe that Wilson’s racist thinking and policies make him an inappropriate namesake for a school whose scholars, students, and alumni must be firmly committed to combatting the scourge of racism in all its forms.Student protests at Princeton in November 2015 called attention to Wilson’s racism, and we responded by forming an ad hoc committee, chaired by Brent Henry ’69, to study Wilson’s legacy at Princeton. The committee recommended valuable reforms to increase Princeton’s inclusivity and recount the University’s history more completely, but it left the names of the School and College intact. Student and alumni interest in those names has persisted, and we revisited them this month as the American nation struggled profoundly with the terrible injustice of racism.And fair enough. This was an internal Princeton matter, and after a deliberative process, they reached the conclusion they thought was best for their university. The problem arises when we zoom out the camera and examine the political context. Some conservatives have been relishing Princeton’s decision, seeing it as an example of the left tripping over its own standard. You want to erase every racist from history? Well, what about that PROGRESSIVE Woodrow Wilson? And what about FDR too? Didn’t he throw Japanese Americans into concentration camps?To which the mob in charge of the canceling is one day going to respond: okay, sure. See you at the FDR Memorial. This isn’t some kind of informed revisionist history effort, swimming in a greater tradition, self-consciously opting for Croly and Dewey, say, over Washington and Jefferson. It isn’t about left versus right at all, or big government versus small, or America’s founding versus attempts by progressive intellectuals to transcend it. As George Will noted over the weekend, not using your intellect is the entire point. This is a cultural revolution. All you need is a single modern yardstick and the will to demolish anything that doesn’t measure up to it. Think too hard and you’ll spoil the fun.Bet you won’t come after Wilson and FDR! Does anyone seriously doubt that they will?Last week, rioters in Madison destroyed a statue of an abolitionist who died trying to end slavery. The Emancipation Memorial in D.C., which depicts Abraham Lincoln alongside a kneeling freed slave, was prevented from defacement only by armed guard. This is a fool’s game and conservatives shouldn’t be trying to play it. Wilson was a lout, yes, but of far greater issue right now is the mindless, heedless, bloodthirsty, braying mob, which is destroying indiscriminately, which is sowing fear at businesses and universities, which has no legitimate authority, which is addled by, as Elizabeth Powers puts it, “the deconstructionist temperament.”Rather than taking scalps of our own, what the right needs is an arms-linked defense of our history, culture, art, and institutions, imperfect though all that might be.about the authorMatt Purple is a senior editor at The American Conservative. | 2 |
Time magazine taps Donald Trump as “Person of the Year,” and is announcing the news on the Today show.
Trump has had a rocky relationship with the magazine. Despite a cover story featuring photos of the president-elect with a bald eagle, other Time covers declared his campaign a “meltdown” as he struggled in the general election.
Time Magazine’s Nancy Gibbs said on the Today show that it wasn’t a hard choice to choose Trump.
“When have we ever seen a single individual who has so defied exceptions, broken the rules, violated norms, beaten not one but two political parties on the way to winning an election he entered with 100-1 odds against him?” she asked.
Trump called into the Today show to discuss the decision, calling it a “great honor,” noting that he grew up reading the magazine.
Hillary Clinton was selected as the number two person of the year. | 2 |
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Sweeping changes to U.S. surveillance laws are now in effect after being signed by President Barack Obama Tuesday. In a rare shift of alliances, the USA Freedom Act passed Tuesday with both the support of the president and House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., strongly opposed the legislation, saying it makes the U.S. less secure by taking away tools from our "warfighters."
The law overhauls controversial government surveillance programs, most notably the NSA's bulk collection of Americans' phone records.
Under the new legislation, the NSA will slowly lose the power to collect and store those records over the next six months.
But the government can still get a warrant to gain access to the data connected to specific numbers by going through the phone companies, which typically store the records for 18 months.
The USA Freedom Act would continue other post-September 11 surveillance provisions that are considered more effective than the phone data collection program.
Those include the FBI's authority to gather business records in terror and espionage investigations and to more easily eavesdrop on suspects who are throwing away cell phones to avoid surveillance.
"We're in a new world. We are in the second decade of the 21st century, and we have to have the tools, living within that original Constitution, we have to have the tools in order to keep the country safe," Charles E. Allen, principal at the Chertoff Group, said.
For now, the vote ends the fight on Capitol Hill between privacy and security-minded lawmakers. Still, some lawmaker worry the USA Freedom Act doesn't go far enough. | 2 |
A federal judge in Manhattan landed another blow to the Trump administration’s immigration policies Friday, blocking efforts to punish cities for protecting immigrants from the feds by blocking grants to local law enforcement.
The decision handed down by Judge Edgardo Ramos said the effort was unconstitutional because it violated the 10th Amendment and its separation-of-powers requirements.
The judge also determined the policy was “arbitrary and capricious.”
“As we argued, local law enforcement has the right to decide how to meet their local public safety needs — and the Trump administration simply does not have the right to require state and local police to act as federal immigration agents,” New York state Attorney General Barbara Underwood said in a statement. “The Trump administration’s attempt to withhold these vital funds was nothing more than a political attack at the expense of our public safety.”
New York was supposed to receive nearly $9 million from the grant program in 2017.
But the money was withheld after local officials refused to cooperate with new federal immigration policing requirements. Nearly half of that money would have flowed to New York City.
Underwood and five other AGs filed suit in July, challenging the policy.
It’s the latest in a series of federal rulings against President Trump’s controversial immigration policies.
A federal appeals court in California ruled earlier this month that Trump must continue a program that protects children brought to the US by their parents, known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals.
A separate federal court in San Francisco last week also blocked Trump’s efforts to deny asylum to immigrants crossing the southern border illegally. | 2 |
GOP presidential front-runner Donald Trump on Sunday flatly denied that he’s “tapping into the anger” of voters across the country — a charge that has been made by his Republican primary rivals, political pundits of all stripes, and even President Obama. In an interview with ABC News, Mr. Trump said his campaign is built not on anger but on the idea that, with the proper leadership, the nation’s problems can be solved quickly. “People are angry. They are angry,” the billionaire real estate mogul said. “I’m not tapping into the anger, and some people have said I’m doing that, and certainly I’m not doing it intentionally. I just know it can be turned around, it can be turned around quickly. But I’ll tell you what — if you have another four years of, like, a Hillary [Clinton], that kind of mentality and thinking, we’re not going to have a country left.” Mr. Trump remains far ahead of his Republican primary rivals. The latest Real Clear Politics average of polls shows Mr. Trump with the support of 36.5 percent of likely Republican voters, with Texas Sen. Ted Cruz coming in second, with 17.8 percent. Mr. Cruz is, however, on Mr. Trump’s heels in the crucial state of Iowa, which holds its caucuses on Feb. 1. Still, Mr. Trump continues to boast about his sizable lead in national surveys. “It’s a very strong domination and it’s a very big lead,” he said. | 2 |
Surging inflation and supply chain disruptions are hampering the global economic recovery from the coronavirus pandemic, the International Monetary Fund warned on Tuesday. The Washington-based IMF projected in its latest World Economic Outlook that global domestic gross product will grow by 5.9% this – 0.1 percentage point lower than its July estimate. The IMF expects global growth to remain at 4.9% next year."Pandemic outbreaks in critical links of global supply chains have resulted in longer than expected supply disruptions, feeding inflation in many countries," Gita Gopinath, chief economist at the IMF, wrote in an accompanying blog. "Overall, risks to economic prospects have increased and policy trade-offs have become more complex."BIDEN'S PROPOSED 39.6% TAX HIKE WOULD HIT THESE INDIVIDUALS, FAMILIES The supply disruption drag on GDP is even more pronounced in advanced economies, the IMF said – including the U.S. The organization slashed its growth estimates for the U.S. to 6%, down a full percentage point from July. It marked the biggest reduction suffered by any G7 nation. The IMF also reduced its growth outlooks for both Spain and Germany by 0.5 percentage points and decreased Canada's by 0.6 percentage points. The downward revision reflects a rise in COVID-19 infections from the highly contagious delta variant, supply chain constraints that have led to shortages around the world and the following surge in inflation – all of which have weighed on economic growth. "Rapid spread of Delta and the threat of new variants have increased uncertainty about how quickly the pandemic can be overcome," the report said. "Policy choices have become more difficult, confronting multidimensional challenges — subdued employment growth, rising inflation, food insecurity, the setback to human capital accumulation, and climate change — with limited room to maneuver."G-7 LEADERS HAMMER OUT A GLOBAL MINIMUM TAX FOR MULTINATIONAL COMPANIESInflation has accelerated as the economy recovers from last year's brief but extremely severe recession.Consumer prices have climbed dramatically over the past few months, an increase that Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has attributed to pandemic-induced disruptions in the supply chain, a shortage of workers that's pushed wages higher and a wave of pent-up consumers flush with stimulus cash. In the U.S., consumer prices jumped 5.4% in July from a year earlier, the largest jump since August 2008, according to the Labor Department's consumer-price index. Prices cooled slightly in August, but remained high at 5.3% from a year earlier. The inflation spurt has raised pressure on the Federal Reserve to tighten the ultra-easy monetary policy put in place during the pandemic, though Chairman Jerome Powell has maintained that it's likely transitory. GET FOX BUSINESS ON THE GO BY CLICKING HERE"Although central banks can generally look through transitory inflation pressures and avoid tightening until there is more clarity on underlying price dynamics, they should be prepared to act quickly if the recovery strengthens faster than expected or risks of rising inflation expectations become tangible," the IMF said.As a whole, the IMF expected the world's advanced economies to grow by 5.2% this year, compared with an average growth expectation of just 3% for low-income nations."These divergences are a consequence of the ‘great vaccine divide’ and large disparities in policy support," Gopinath said. "While over 60% of the population in advanced economies are fully vaccinated and some are now receiving booster shots, about 96% of the population in low-income countries remain unvaccinated." | 2 |
The U.S. economy created the fewest number of jobs in more than five years in May, hurt by a strike by Verizon workers and a fall in goods producing employment, pointing to labor market weakness that could make it difficult for the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates. Nonfarm payrolls increased by only 38,000 jobs last month, the smallest gain since September 2010, the Labor Department said on Friday. Employers hired 59,000 fewer workers in March and April. The government said the month-long Verizon strike had depressed employment growth by 34,000 jobs.The goods producing sector, which includes mining and manufacturing, shed 36,000 jobs, the most since February 2010. Even without the Verizon strike, payrolls would have increased by a mere 72,000.The Verizon workers, who were considered unemployed because they did not receive a salary during the payrolls survey week, returned to their jobs on Wednesday. They are expected to boost June employment. The jobless rate fell three-tenths of a percentage point to 4.7 percent in May, the lowest since November 2007. The decrease in the unemployment rate was in part due to people dropping out of the labor force.Economists polled by Reuters had forecast payrolls rising 164,000 in May and the unemployment rate falling to 4.9 percent. Fed Chair Janet Yellen has said monthly gains of roughly 100,000 jobs are needed to keep up with growth in the work-age population. The U.S. central bank has signaled its intention to raise rates soon if job gains continued and economic data remained consistent with a pickup in growth in the second quarter.Yellen said last week that a rate increase would probably be appropriate in the "coming months," if those conditions were met. Data on consumer spending, industrial production, goods exports and housing have suggested the economy is gathering speed after growth slowed to a 0.8 percent annualized rate in the first quarter.The Fed hiked its benchmark overnight interest rate in December for the first time in nearly a decade.There is still no sign of meaningful wage growth. Average hourly earnings rose five cents, or 0.2 percent, last month. That kept the year-on-year rise at 2.5 percent.Economists say wage growth of between 3.0 percent and 3.5 percent is needed to lift inflation to the Fed's 2.0 percent target. There are, however, signs that inflation is creeping higher as the dampening effects of the dollar's past rally and the oil price plunge dissipate.There was little change in other measures of labor market slack. A broad measure of unemployment that includes people who want to work but have given up searching and those working part-time because they cannot find full-time employment held steady at 9.7 percent in May.The labor force participation rate, or the share of working-age Americans who are employed or at least looking for a job, fell 0.2 percentage point to 62.6 percent.The gains in May were broadly weak, with the private sector adding only 25,000 jobs, the smallest since February 2010. Mining employment maintained its downward trend, shedding 10,000 positions. Mining payrolls have dropped by 207,000 since peaking in September 2014, with three-quarters of the losses in support activities.Manufacturing employment fell by 10,000 jobs. The Verizon labor dispute reduced information sector jobs by 34,000.Retail payrolls rose 11,400 after shedding jobs in April for the first time since December 2014. Temporary help jobs fell 21,000.(Reporting by Lucia Mutikani; Editing by Paul Simao) | 2 |
Obama commutes Chelsea Manning's prison sentence The former Army intelligence analyst convicted of releasing classified military and national security information will be released on May 17th; Kevin Corke has the details for 'Special Report'NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! Top Congressional Republicans condemned Tuesday the decision by President Barack Obama to commute former Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning’s 35-year prison sentence for leaking classified documents.House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., blasted the decision, calling it “outrageous.”“Chelsea Manning’s treachery put American lives at risk and exposed some of our nation’s most sensitive secrets. President Obama now leaves in place a dangerous precedent that those who compromise our national security won’t be held accountable for their crimes,” Ryan said in a statement.Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said the decision was a “grave mistake.”"It is a sad, yet perhaps fitting commentary on President Obama’s failed national security policies that he would commute the sentence of an individual that endangered the lives of American troops, diplomats, and intelligence sources by leaking hundreds of thousands of sensitive government documents to Wikileaks, a virulently anti-American organization that was a tool of Russia’s recent interference in our elections."Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla, went on further to echo the statements of Ryan and McCain.“It is shameful that President Obama is siding with lawbreakers and the ACLU against the men and women who work every day to defend our nation and safeguard U.S. government secrets.”OBAMA COMMUTES CHELSEA MANNING’S SENTENCE FOR LEAKING ARMY DOCUMENTSSenate Majority Whip John Cornyn, R-Texas, told Fox News that while pardons are a Constitutional tool in the president's repertoire, Obama is "undermining our ability on criminal justice reform by granting clemency at an alarming rate."According to ABC News, Defense Secretary Ash Carter was one of the U.S. officials who were also opposed to the White House’s decision to commute Manning’s sentence.Manning is more than six years into a 35-year sentence at the military prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas for leaking classified government and military documents to the anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks. Her sentence is now set to expire May 17.Manning was known as Bradley Manning at the time of her 2010 arrest, but revealed after being convicted of espionage that she identifies as a woman.Manning accepted responsibility for leaking the material to WikiLeaks to raise public awareness about the effects of war on civilians, and has said she was confronting gender dysphoria at the time of the leaks while deployed in Iraq.She attempted suicide twice last year, according to her lawyers, citing her treatment at Leavenworth.Chase Strangio, an American Civil Liberties Union attorney representing Manning, said the president's action "quite literally save Chelsea's life."WILL WIKILEAKS’ JULIAN ASSANGE MAKE GOOD ON HIS OFFER TO TURN HIMSELF IN AFTER MANNING CLEMENCY?In a conference call with White House reporters, an official said the decision to grant a commutation to Manning was not influence anyway by Julian Assange or WikiLeaks. A separate White House official said that more commutations should be expected before Obama leaves office.The U.S. Army declined to comment on the announcement when asked by The Associated Press.WikiLeaks said earlier this week that Assange would accept extradition to the U.S. if Obama granted clemency to Manning.Commutations reduce sentences being served but don't erase convictions. Pardons generally restore civil rights, such as voting, often after a sentence has been served.Most of the other people receiving commutations were serving sentences for nonviolent drug offenses.Fox News’ Chad Pergram and the Associated Press contributed to this report. | 2 |
For most U.S. congregations, in-person worship has returned to mid-March levels despite a nationwide rise in coronavirus cases, a new report says. A study from LifeWay Research, a publishing arm of the Southern Baptist Convention, found 71% of churches led by mainline Protestant or evangelical ministers met for in-person worship as recently as July 19. On March 15, 95% of U.S. churches were meeting in-person as the coronavirus seeped its way into the Pacific Northwest and New York City. It’s a striking rise since the middle of April, when only 4% of churches were meeting for in-person services. Still, the numbers, published Friday, come as coronavirus surges across the country: On Monday, the pastor of a north Alabama Baptist church said more than 40 congregants, including himself, tested positive for COVID-19 after holding in-person services over several days last week. LifeWay’s study, which counts pastors not congregants, inflates the influence of smaller churches and should be read as a snapshot, said John Dyer, a dean at Dallas Theological Seminary. “After opening, many churches are closing again,” Mr. Dyer said Monday. “Many of the largest churches of 1,000+ are not meeting.” Nevertheless, church attendance as a whole has rallied back this summer, as governors lifted bans on gatherings and other measures throughout May and June. The majority of churches leading the way appear to be in the South, Midwest and West, says LifeWay. “Resuming in-person worship services has not been reverting to worship as usual,” said Scott McConnell, executive director of LifeWay Research. “Churches are making efforts to make the environment safe, but these efforts are often second-guessed by those who either want more precautions or less restrictions.” LifeWay’s results, culled from over 440 interviews with pastors, also underscore the tether between charitable offerings and in-person attendance. The largest drops in giving were seen by pastors in the Northeast, where in-person attendance is lowest. “Our attendance has dipped a little over time from what it normally would be, but summer attendance is always lower anyway,” the Rev. Guy J.D. Collins at St. Thomas Episcopal Church in Hanover, New Hampshire, said in an email Monday. “There is definitely Zoom fatigue, and Zoom has been much harder on young children.” Still, only 34% of churches surveyed say offerings in 2020 are below 2019 numbers. However, for a small number of churches (13%) the drop in giving has been over 50%. While only 35% of the churches surveyed are requiring mask use, 99% of churches overall took at least one or more precaution, including adding services to spread parishioners out or conducting temperature checks. The study shows the pandemic also has impacted congregation’s members, with roughly half (48%) of pastors reporting a member lost a job. Yet 83% of pastors also reported a new member joining the church or attending service — either virtual or in-person — during the pandemic. More pastors of mainline congregations, such as Lutherans or Methodists, show hesitancy (57%) in rejoining for in-person worship than pastors who lead evangelical churches (82%). An article published Monday in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion attributes the divide to a high opinion of “hyperpartisan” politics arising from “Christian nationalism” — the belief that Christian values are essential to American identity. Christian nationalism “is positively associated with Americans’ frequency of engaging in incautious behaviors,” such as not washing hands, refusing to wear a mask or attending public gatherings, say sociologists Samuel L. Perry and Andrew L. Whitehead and psychologist Joshua B. Grubbs. | 2 |
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President Donald Trump AP The Trump administration notified the United Nations on Monday that it will formally withdraw the US from the Paris Agreement, marking the first step in a one-year process to exit the global pact to fight climate change.
The move would leave the US as the only country outside the accord, a decision President Trump promised early in his term to unfetter America’s domestic oil, gas and coal industries.
“What we won’t do is punish the American people while enriching foreign polluters,” Trump said at a shale gas industry conference in Pennsylvania on Oct. 23, referring to his planned withdrawal from the agreement.
The US had signed onto the 2015 pact during the Obama administration, promising a 26-28 percent cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2025 from 2005 levels.
Trump campaigned on a promise to rescind that pledge, saying it would unfairly hurt the US economy while leaving other big polluters like China to increase emissions, but he was bound by UN rules to wait until Monday to file the exit papers.
Climate change, he asserted, was a “hoax” cooked up by the Chinese to damage the US.
The State Department gave the letter to UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, starting the clock on a process that would be completed just one day after the 2020 presidential election, on November 4, 2020.
Protesters gather outside the White House in 2017 to protest President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw the Unites States from the Paris climate change accord.AP
All of the top Democratic presidential hopefuls seeking to unseat Trump in next year’s election have promised to re-engage the in the Paris Agreement if they win.
But Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris Accord could still leave a lasting mark, said Andrew Light, a senior fellow at the World Resources Institute and former adviser to the climate envoy under President Obama.
“While it serves the political needs of the Trump administration, we will lose a lot of traction with respect to US influence globally,” he said, adding it could take time for the international community “to trust the US as a consistent partner.”
Until its formal exit, the US will continue to participate in negotiations over the technical aspects of the agreement, represented by a small team of career State Department officials.
The US and China, the world’s two largest carbon emitters, have recently been leading negotiations of the Paris “rule book” that outlines transparency and reporting rules for signatories.
With Reuters | 2 |
President Donald Trump will give a speech on Islam in Saudi Arabia and will attend the opening of a center promoting moderate Islam, national security adviser H.R. McMaster revealed on Tuesday.
The speech will mark the beginning of Trump’s tour across the Arab world, which begins on Friday and will be his first as president. It follows key in-person meetings this year with allied heads of state in the Muslim world to discuss the eradication of radical Islamic terrorism, notably Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and Jordanian King Abdullah II. McMaster revealed that Trump will address leaders from 50 Muslim-majority countries, though he did not note which would specifically attend as he seeks to “deliver an inspiring but direct speech on the need to confront radical ideology and the president’s hopes for a peaceful vision of Islam to dominate across the world.”
In addition to his remarks, Trump will also “participate in the founding of a new center intended to fight radicalism and promote moderation” in Saudi Arabia, a country known for its strong links with radical Islam.
Trump has already met with a number of Arab leaders to discuss the threat presented by ISIS, including King Abdullah of Jordan and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, who thanked Trump for their alliance against terrorism’s “satanic ideology.”
During the presidential campaign, Trump repeatedly criticized Hillary Clinton for her ties to Saudi Arabia, noting that the Clinton Foundation had received hefty sums from Saudi donors and encouraging Clinton to return the money.
“So Hillary thinks they are funding ISIS, but still takes their money. And you know their views on gays. And you know their views on women. I think she should give back the $25 to $35 million she’s taken from Saudi Arabia. And she should give it back fast,” he said at the time.
However, Trump also supported retaining Saudi Arabia as an ally and suggested Riyadh should develop nuclear weapons as a deterrent to regional rival Iran.
In January, Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir said the country’s leadership felt “optimistic about the incoming administration” and Trump’s positions on American influence, containing Iran and fighting the Islamic State.
Following a successful meeting between Donald Trump and his senior adviser in March, the Saudi Arabian Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman described Trump as a “true friend of Muslims,” adding that he respected and supports Trump’s proposed travel ban for people from seven terror prone Muslim majority countries.
You can follow Ben Kew on Facebook, on Twitter at @ben_kew, or email him at [email protected]. | 2 |
Some press groups condemned the attack by protesters against Fox News reporter Leland Vittert in Washington, D.C. but others remained silent – despite speaking out against the arrest of a CNN reporter one day earlier.Vittert was reporting in Lafayette Park, D.C. and covering protests sparked by the death of George Floyd. Vittert and his crew were accosted and chased out of the area by protesters early Saturday morning, footage captured by the Daily Caller News Foundation shows. (RELATED: CNN Correspondent Arrested Live On-Air During Minneapolis Riots) Many of the groups contacted by the Daily Caller previously publicly issued statements condemning Friday’s arrest of CNN correspondent Omar Jimenez and his crew. The two events, while both suppression of press, do have a noteworthy difference. The CNN crew was arrested by police, and the Fox News crew was attacked by protesters. First Amendment Coalition and Freedom of the Press Foundation did not respond to requests for comment from the Daily Caller. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) told the Daily Caller that it did not have “have a specific statement in that specific incident” when asked for its thoughts regarding the attack against Vittert. CPJ wrote that it is “investigating several reported attacks on journalists covering protests around the country and urges police and protesters alike to refrain from targeting journalists so that they can safely cover these newsworthy event.” When asked for clarification regarding whether CPJ specifically condemns the attack on Vittert, the group wrote that it is “investigating,” adding they “do not make statements without doing our own reporting first.” CPJ condemned the CNN reporter’s arrest shortly after the incident occurred Friday morning. It also issued a general statement condemning all attacks against journalists. “It’s difficult to imagine what police needed as ‘confirmation that these individuals were members of the media’ beyond Omar Jimenez showing his press badge while he spoke into a CNN camera surrounded by his producer and crew,” CPJ Program Director Carlos Martinez de la Serna said, according to its website. “Journalists have a responsibility to report on matters of public interest, such as protests, and should be able to freely cover these events without fear of retaliation from authorities. These arrests ring of intimidation and are simply outrageous.” CPJ also issued a tweet condemning the arrest, had its advocacy director partake in a Newsy interview and retweeted numerous comments on the incident. WATCH: The Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) president explained that it had not yet issued a public statement regarding the Vittert attack because they “missed this one.” “I would just say we missed this one,” Patricia Gallagher Newberry, president of SPJ, told the Daily Caller when asked for comment on the protesters’ attack. The group added that it was working on a statement “that essentially calls on police and protesters to remember that journalists play a particular role in these news happenings and that we are there to tell the story.” “We are going to double down on our position which is journalists should be free to do their jobs, they should not be impeded from doing their jobs they most certainly should not be attacked by protesters or police as they seek to do their jobs,” Newberry said, adding that SPJ stands “with journalists at this time when they’re being, yet again, vilified in America for simply doing their jobs.” Newberry then specifically condemned the protesters’ actions against Vittert, calling the attack “inexcusable.” (RELATED: Minneapolis 3rd Police Precinct On Fire After Officers Evacuate Building Amid George Floyd Riots) “He’s being taunted, he’s being called the f-word, he’s a journalist on the street trying to cover the story … he’s trying to do his job like every other journalist in America,” Newberry told the Daily Caller. “He, from what I could see of the video that I watched, he reacted exactly as he should have. He did not engage, he did not spit back any vitriol to his taunters, he walked away, he sought protection.” “He behaved in an extremely responsible and ethical manner in the face of a great challenge to his safety … It’s not right for police to attack journalists, it’s not right for protesters to attack journalists. Not cool, what the protesters there in D.C. did to Mr. Vittert.” SPJ issued a general open letter to protesters and police Saturday evening urging them to allow journalists to do their jobs in covering the protests. SPJ asks police officers to let journalists do their jobs in covering the #GeorgeFloyd protests. Take a moment and think before you take action against a journalist there to do their job. Treat us with the same respect and dignity that you would want. https://t.co/OgzaluO7X3 pic.twitter.com/m8rXB5N223 — Society of Professional Journalists (@spj_tweets) May 30, 2020 SPJ previously specifically condemned Jimenez’s arrest and wrote that it “demands answers from the Minnesota State Patrol.” “Mr. Jimenez and his team were clearly doing nothing but their job – even politely offering to move to wherever police wanted them to go – but were handcuffed and taken into custody anyway,” Newberry said in the CNN arrest incident. “This is clearly a violation of the First Amendment and the Minnesota State Patrol owes them and the American people an explanation of why this occurred. This happened on live TV where we could all see. Sadly, it happens much more often than we know in this country and is not documented on live TV.” Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press (RCFP) condemned all attacks against reporters in a response to the Daily Caller. “No reporter should be harassed for doing their job and bringing us the news,” RCFP Executive Director Bruce Brown said. “Our attorneys are ready to assist any reporter who needs legal support.” RCFP confirmed that it did specifically condemn the attack against Vittert when pressed further by the Daily Caller. “Yes, Reporters Committee condemns the harassment and attacks on the Fox News reporter Leland Vittert,” RCFP wrote. The group “strongly” condemned the CNN arrest in a lengthy public statement on its website Friday. “We strongly condemn the Minnesota State Patrol’s arrest of a CNN news crew covering the protests in Minneapolis, who responded professionally and appropriately to the situation,” RCFP wrote. “The First Amendment protects newsgathering, and prohibits the government from using police power as a pretext for interfering with press freedoms. Arresting journalists to prevent reporting on a public demonstration is not acceptable.” “News coverage of protests like the one in Minneapolis is essential to informing the public and understanding the concerns of our communities. While we are relieved that the news crew was ultimately released, we expect the Minnesota State Patrol to provide a full explanation as to why these reporters, who identified themselves as journalists, were taken into custody.” | 2 |
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump look to rebound from weekend setbacks with victories in Tuesday's Michigan primary, the first big industrial state to be contested in the 2016 presidential race.Squeezed between high-profile Super Tuesday and high-stakes primaries next week in Florida and Ohio, Tuesday's contests are unlikely to dramatically reshape either party's primaries. But with 150 Republican and 179 Democratic delegates at stake, the races offer an opportunity for the front-runners to pad leads and rivals to catch up.In addition to Michigan's primaries, both parties will hold their primary in Mississippi Tuesday, with Republicans also caucusing in Idaho and voting in the Hawaii primary.But Michigan is the night's crown jewel in terms of delegates. Fifty-nine are at stake in the Republican race, while 130 will be awarded on the Democratic side.While Trump has stunned Republicans with his broad appeal, he's forged a particularly strong connection with blue-collar white voters. With an eye on the general election, he's argued he could put Midwestern, Democratic-leaning industrial states such as Michigan and Wisconsin in play for Republicans.A Monmouth University poll released Monday showed Trump winning 36 percent of likely GOP primary voters, 13 percentage points ahead of Texas Sen. Ted Cruz. Ohio Gov. John Kasich, who said Michigan was part of his "home court" last week, polled a close third with 21 percent of the vote, while Florida Sen. Marco Rubio placed fourth with 13 percent of the likely vote.Victories by Cruz in Kansas and Maine have threatened to make the Republican race a two-man sprint to the finish. But Kasich and Rubio are holding out hope they can win their winner-take-all home states March 15.Entering Tuesday, Trump leads the Republican race with 384 delegates, followed by Cruz with 300, Rubio with 151 delegates and Kasich with 37. Winning the GOP nomination requires 1,237 delegates."It's not just the whole country that's watching Michigan — now the world's beginning to watch," Kasich said Monday during a campaign stop in the state. "You can help me send a message about positive, about vision, about hope, about putting us together."Rubio sought a boost in Tuesday's contests from Mitt Romney, the 2012 GOP nominee. Romney has recently become an outspoken critic of Trump and recorded a phone call on Rubio's behalf in which he warns Republicans that if the real estate mogul wins the nomination, "the prospects for a safe and prosperous future would be greatly diminished."Romney has not endorsed a candidate in the GOP primary, but clearly says in the phone recording that he's speaking on behalf of the Rubio campaign. A Romney spokeswoman said the former Massachusetts governor has offered to help Rubio, Kasich and Cruz in any way he can.During a stop at a catfish restaurant on Monday in Mississippi, Cruz said the current vacancy on the Supreme Court means Republicans can't take a chance on Trump."He's been supporting left-wing politicians for 40 years," Cruz said.On the Democratic side, Clinton boosted her delegate lead over Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders over the weekend, as a win in Saturday's Louisiana primary canceled out wins for Sanders in the Kansas, Nebraska and Maine caucuses. The Monmouth University poll gave Clinton a 13-percentage point lead over the self-described democratic socialist among likely voters.Ahead of Tuesday's two Democratic contests, Clinton had accumulated 1,130 delegates and Sanders 499, including superdelegates. Democrats need 2,383 delegates to win the nomination.In an effort to boost his standing in Michigan, Sanders has repeatedly accused Clinton of being disingenuous when she asserted that he opposed the bailout of carmakers General Motors and Chrysler during the Great Recession.Sanders defended his voting record on the issue again during a Fox News town hall in Detroit Monday night."What I did not vote for was the bailout of Wall Street. … She did vote for that,” Sanders said, referring to Clinton’s time as a New York senator.Sanders and Clinton both voted in favor of an auto bailout bill in 2008, but it failed to clear the Senate, prompting then-President George W. Bush to announce about a week later that the federal government would step in with $17.4 billion in federal aid to help the carmakers survive and restructure. The last $4 billion was contingent on the release of the second installment of the Wall Street bailout funds.Sanders did vote for a 2009 motion to block the release of those funds, though the measure was defeated by 45 Democrats, including Clinton, and a handful of Republicans.The Associated Press contributed to this report. | 2 |
The Democratic National Committee announced Thursday it will hold its 2016 nominating convention in Philadelphia, where it will officially put forward its candidate who will try to succeed President Obama’s two terms in office. The City of Brotherly Love beat out Brooklyn, New York and Columbus, Ohio to host the event, to be held the week of July 25. The DNC signed the final contract with Philadelphia Thursday morning. “There is clearly no better city to have this special event than Philadelphia. The role of Philadelphia in shaping our nation’s history is unmatched,” said Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Florida Democrat and chairwoman of the DNC. Former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell said the convention is expected to cost $84 million, and expressed confidence they could raise the funds. In choosing Philadelphia, Democrats bypassed holding their convention in the perennial swing state of Ohio, or New York, where former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, the presumptive front-runner for the Democratic nomination, could house her campaign. New York Mayor Bill de Blasio had promoted Brooklyn as an ideal spot, but his recent high-profile clashes with the city’s police department could have served as a point of tension as Democrats try to unify and rally behind their candidate. Ms. Wasserman Schultz, though, said the decision was based solely on logistics, security, and resources. Columbus Mayor Marcus B. Coleman said the city would try to land a political convention in 2020. Democrats last month announced the timing of their convention, which will be held the week after Republicans hold their in Cleveland. Republicans and Democrats held their conventions in back-to-back weeks in 2012, but the GOP held theirs in Tampa the last week of August and Democrats held theirs in Charlotte the first week of September. In 2008, Democrats held their convention the last week of August in Denver and Republicans held theirs the first week of September in Minneapolis.• This article is based in part on wire service reports. | 2 |
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! The horrific mass shooting at two New Zealand mosques that left 49 people dead was live-streamed on Facebook and shared across social media, sparking a scramble by tech giants to remove the sick footage.The gunman reportedly broadcast 17 minutes of the attack.“Police alerted us to a video on Facebook shortly after the live stream commenced and we quickly removed both the shooter’s Facebook and Instagram accounts and the video. We're also removing any praise or support for the crime and the shooter or shooters as soon as we’re aware,” Facebook said in a statement.49 KILLED AND DOZENS, INCLUDING YOUNG CHILDREN, INJURED IN NEW ZEALAND MASS SHOOTINGS TARGETING MOSQUES"Our hearts go out to the victims, their families and the community affected by the horrendous shootings in New Zealand," the company added.The company also deleted the shooter's accounts on Facebook and Instagram, which Facebook owns. Content praising or supporting the shooter is being deleted as soon as Facebook becomes aware of it.Facebook uses a combination of technology, reports from the platform's users and specialist reviewers with the company to remove content that violates the social network's policies.“Since the attack happened, teams from across Facebook have been working around the clock to respond to reports and block content, proactively identify content which violates our standards and to support first responders and law enforcement," said Mia Garlick, a spokeswoman for Facebook New Zealand, in a statement released Friday afternoon. "We are adding each video we to find to an internal data base which enables us to detect and automatically remove copies of the videos when uploaded again. We urge people to report all instances to us so our systems can block the video from being shared again.”JACKSONVILLE MASS SHOOTING: CHILLING TWITCH LIVESTREAM RECORDS HORRIFIC ATTACKThe Associated Press reports that the footage was widely available on social media hours after the horrific attack.The New York Times reports that before the shooting, a person that appears to be the gunman posted links to a white nationalist manifesto on Twitter and the controversial online forum 8chan.Twitter has suspended the account in question, according to a source familiar with the matter. The company is also working to remove footage of the shooting from its service, noting that both are in violation of the company's policies.YouTube, which is owned by Google, is also working to remove footage from its platform.“Our hearts are broken over today’s terrible tragedy in New Zealand. Please know we are working vigilantly to remove any violent footage,” said YouTube, in a tweeted statement.SOCIAL MEDIA GIANTS CLAMP DOWN ON SICKENING VIRGINIA SHOOTING FOOTAGE"Shocking, violent and graphic content has no place on our platforms, and we are employing our technology and human resources to quickly review and remove any and all such violative content on YouTube," said the video sharing site, in a statement obtained by Fox News.According to a source familiar with the situation, YouTube has removed thousands of videos related to the mass shooting.The tech giant uses smart detection technology to scan its platform for violent extremist videos, most of which have fewer than 10 views when they are removed. Users are also encouraged to flag any content they think violates YouTube's guidelines.The footage highlights the challenges facing social media firms in swiftly clamping down on vile that can be quickly shared across their platforms.This is not the first time that a shooting has been live streamed. Last year, chilling live stream footage that showed the deadly shooting at a Madden 19 NFL tournament in Jacksonville surfaced on social media.CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APPIn 2015, Facebook and Twitter, along with video sharing site YouTube, rushed to remove shocking video footage of the shooting of two television news journalists.Fox News' Gillian Turner contributed to this article.The Associated Press contributed to this article. Follow James Rogers on Twitter @jamesjrogers | 2 |
Congress spent the weekend insisting that it will reach a deal to raise the federal government’s borrowing limit by Thursday but making scant progress even as all sides tried to reassure itchy financial markets ahead of the stock market opening Monday. Most of the action Saturday and Sunday was negative: Republican senators filibustered Senate Democrats’ proposal for a 15-month debt-ceiling holiday, and those Democrats in turn said they couldn’t accept Republicans’ compromise to reopen the government and extend the debt limit while making minimal changes to Obamacare. The best lawmakers could muster were promises of more talks in the few days left until Thursday, when the Treasury Department says it will run out of maneuvering run and will bump into the $16.7 trillion debt limit. “I had a productive conversation with the Republican leader this afternoon. Our discussions were substantive and we’ll continue those discussions,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat, who was closing down a rare Sunday session. He pronounced himself “optimistic about the prospects for a positive conclusion.” Meanwhile, the government shutdown neared the two-week mark amid growing protests over the closure decisions the Obama administration has made. During a protest on the Mall on Sunday, veterans and other supporters broke down the barriers around the World War II Memorial and tried to carry them to the White House in a challenge to the National Park Service’s decision-making. On Saturday, talks between President Obama and House Republicans collapsed. Republican lawmakers said they concluded that the White House was negotiating in bad faith. Mr. Reid and his Republican counterpart, Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, stepped into the breach, saying they would try to finalize a deal. Mr. McConnell said one was already at hand — the proposal from Sen. Susan M. Collins, Maine Republican, to delay an Obamacare tax on medical devices and impose stricter checks on those receiving government subsidies under the Affordable Care Act. Her proposal would repeal the Affordable Care Act’s tax on medical devices — a repeal that’s popular on both sides of the aisle — and would impose eligibility tests to weed out fraud among those receiving taxpayer aid from Obamacare. But the chief holdup for Democrats is that her plan would extend current funding for six months, including leaving in place the budget sequesters, which kick in again Jan. 15. Democrats want just a six-week extension of funding to raise spending. To do that, they must cancel the sequesters. Ms. Collins had been negotiating her deal with a bipartisan group of about dozen of her colleagues, and Mr. McConnell issued a statement saying Democratic leaders should seize on it as the basis for talks. “It’s time for Democrat leaders to take ‘yes’ for an answer,” the Kentucky Republican said. But the six Democratic senators in those negotiations issued their own statement saying there was no deal, just talks. “We have been involved in productive, bipartisan discussions with Senator Collins and other Republican senators, but we do not support the proposal in its current form,” the Democrats said. “There are negotiations, but there is no agreement.” With the stock exchanges open Monday, Democrats and Republicans were waiting to see how investors would react to the lack of a deal, and the short time frame to reach one. The prospect of a short-term deal proffered by House Republicans on Thursday sent the market soaring, and it remained high Friday as talks proceeded. On Sunday, International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde said failure to reach a deal could cripple the U.S. recovery and plunge the world economy back into recession. She told policymakers that they need to find a way to do two potentially contradictory things: Cut spending so they control their deficits in the long run, but don’t sap the economy by cutting too deeply. “The pace of consolidation has to be sensible in order to protect that growth, which is generating jobs and which is helping in all sorts of ways. But hurry up to deal with entitlement that will come up and haunt you in a few years’ time,” she told NBC’s “Meet the Press” program. “So it’s a balanced approach.” She also warned that even if the U.S. continues to shift money to make payments on its debt, cuts elsewhere in government funding would be a problem. Republicans want to see those long-term entitlement cuts, while Democrats want to see the short-term immediate spending. The Senate was in session Saturday and Sunday, though it held just one show vote. Republicans were filibustering Democrats’ plan for a 15-month-long debt ceiling holiday, which likely would have meant at least a $1 trillion increase in government borrowing. House lawmakers, meanwhile, were in session only Saturday and didn’t take action on any shutdown or debt bills. Republican House leaders have not put their own debt plans on the floor for a vote, as they struggle for unity, but they remain a major hurdle to any deal. Sen. Bob Corker, Tennessee Republican, warned Democrats not to overplay their hand. “Now, I think the Democrats are on the verge of being one tick too cute as they see the House possibly in disarray. They now are overreaching, and I think that what we’ve got to do is get this back in the middle of the road, act like adults, deal with these issues in an appropriate way,” Mr. Corker told “Fox News Sunday.” | 2 |
Many of my conservative colleagues have succumbed to Biden Derangement Syndrome. It's the corollary to the Trump Derangement Syndrome that has plagued most of my progressive friends. If the report that Biden will appoint Janet Yellen as his Treasury Secretary bears out conservatives can exhale. And celebrate.
I wrote here recently in America Rises Up to Crush the Left: "Biden, suave but nobody's patsy, will domesticate his party's left by throwing a sop or two to Cerberus. Big Reveal: The left was and is an imaginary hobgoblin."
Full disclosure. "An imaginary hobgoblin" was an allusion to H.L. Mencken's In Defense of Women, wherein he wrote: "Civilization, in fact, grows more and more maudlin and hysterical; especially under democracy it tends to degenerate into a mere combat of crazes; the whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary."
Still true. Don't fall for it. Yet Biden is selecting distinguished, capable candidates to populate his White House and Cabinet. With a distinguished woman about to be put in charge of the most important economic office in the world Mencken's "defense of women" is nicely fulfilled.
In that column I wrote that Biden pacified his left wing during the campaign and will surely pacify it further upon taking the reins. So, let's leave the delicious theatricality of pearl-clutching terror in anticipation that Joe Biden is the second coming of Hugo Chavez. He's not.
The mere mention of Bernie Sanders, among others, as a possible secretary of labor is just the kind of "sop to Cerberus" that I also predicted. The Department of Labor, since FDR's distinguished New Deal architect Frances Perkins, has been an agency with modest influence. Moreover, mentioning Sanders is politic, not serious. President Biden cannot afford to create a Senate vacancy that could readily be won in the ensuing special election by the wildly popular Vermont governor, the Republican (yet still Honorable!), Phil Scott.
All of the names being floated for the Big Four federal agencies – State, Treasury, Defense and Justice – are consistent with my observation that "America elected a calm and pragmatic social democrat, Joe Biden, not a Democratic Socialist delightful kook. … And he will preside over a center right Congress and center right states."
Biden's short list of leading Treasury secretary candidates provides powerful evidence of Biden's pragmatic, pro-labor yet capitalist-friendly philosophy. Biden, like FDR, is a social democrat, not a socialist, and does not buy into the socialist class warfare nonsense that pits workers against the middle class. What does the Treasury appointment tell us?
Exhibit A: "the dog that did not bark in the night." Sen. Elizabeth Warren was actively jockeying to be Treasury secretary. She wasn't even on the Whisper List. Warren, a doctrinaire progressive, is probably the Democratic Party's loony left's favorite figure other than "democratic" socialist Bernie. Her name's absence is telling. Joe Biden is no Trojan Horse for the tiny but loud Bolshevik wing of the Democratic Party.
Exhibit B: The top of Biden's short list held superb choices. Per Politico's Transition Playbook: "Janet Yellen as a potential Treasury Secretary, after Lael Brainard of the Federal Reserve Board initially seemed to have a lock on the position." For Biden, as well as those of us (even Republicans!) committed to equitable prosperity, picking out Yellen and Brainard was a "can't lose" choice for America.
The Washington Post's contrarian Robert Samuelson, in December 2017, plausibly gave credit to Yellen for the original strong Trump-era economy. Samuelson: "Under Yellen, the economy has made huge progress. Here's the record since she became Fed head in February 2014: Payroll employment has expanded by nearly 10 million jobs; the unemployment rate has dropped from 6.7 percent to 4.1 percent. … Yellen leaves a solid legacy, built on professional competence, integrity and dignity."
As for Brainard, The New York Times recently, convincingly, extolled her. "Jerome H. Powell, the Fed's chair, often praises Ms. Brainard's intellect in private conversations and has placed her in key roles at the central bank, including tapping her to play a major part in devising and overseeing the Fed's emergency lending programs. Ms. Brainard joined calls with staff members and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, the Fed's partner in planning those efforts, 21 times in April alone."
We shall soon find out these, and more of, Biden's, appointments. Yellen to Treasury and Brainard to chair the Fed after Powell fulfills his term would maximize President Biden's chance of creating a climate of great job creation. Both women have proven capability, integrity and grace under pressure, giving Biden Derangement Syndrome sufferers more great reasons to climb down from the ledge.
Ralph Benko, co-author of "The Capitalist Manifesto" and chairman and co-founder of "The Capitalist League," is the founder of The Prosperity Caucus and is an original Kemp-era member of the Supply Side revolution that propelled the Dow from 814 to its current heights and world GDP from $11T to $88T. He served as a deputy general counsel in the Reagan White House, has worked closely with the Congress and two cabinet agencies, and has published over a million words on politics and policy in the mainstream media, as a distinguished professional blogger, and as the author of the internationally award-winning cult classic book "The Websters' Dictionary: How to Use the Web to Transform the World." He has served as senior adviser, economics, to APIA as an advocate of the gold standard, senior counselor to the Chamber of Digital Commerce and serves as co-founder of and senior counselor to Frax.finance, a stablecoin venture. Read Ralph Benko's reports — More Here. © 2022 Newsmax. All rights reserved. | 2 |
On Friday, a planned Donald Trump rally in Chicago was canceled after protestors swarmed the event venue. In a statement released by the Trump campaign, they said that the decision to cancel the rally was made after meeting with law enforcement.
According to the Chicago Police, this isn't true, and no threats were issued. Specifically, the police say they were "not consulted" until after the rally was canceled.
The Chicago Police Department said it was informed shortly before 6:30 p.m. that the Trump campaign had canceled the event. Police were not consulted before this decision was made, according to spokesman Anthony Guglielmi, and he said police did not issue any public safety threats or safety risks before the cancellation.
Strange. | 2 |
Sentencing Reform California voters just encouraged judges to show no mercy. | 6.6.2018 12:15 PM Patrick Tehan/TNS/Newscom
Residents of Santa Clara County, California, voted yesterday to recall Aaron Persky, the superior court judge widely criticized for sentencing Stanford student Brock Turner to just six months in prison.
Turner was convicted in 2016 of sexually assaulting an incapacitated woman. Prosecutors had sought a six-year sentence, but Persky thought Turner probably wasn't a danger to others and was concerned a lengthier prison stint would adversely impact him.
This outraged Stanford law professor Michelle Dauber—whose daughter is friends with Turner's victim—and so Dauber launched a now-successful campaign to have Persky recalled from office. The point of the recall was to hold "white, privileged men accountable," Dauber told The New York Times.
The prison component of Turner's sentence was indeed lenient. But a simple fact has often been absent from this conversation: The six-month sentence wasn't Persky's idea, but rather the recommendation of the probation department. And even if Turner should have spent more time behind bars, he is still registered as a sex offender and likely will be for the rest of his life. He will have trouble finding a place to live, holding a job, and interacting with young people. Sex offenders are treated as pariahs and must obey onerous restrictions, even in cases where they pose almost no risk to others.
But even people who can't muster any sympathy for Turner should still be concerned about what message Persky's recall will send. I understand why members of the Stanford community were upset about the lenient treatment of Turner, and it's easy to imagine white privilege had something to do with it. (The California Commission on Judicial Performance, it must be noted, found no "clear and convincing evidence of bias" in Persky's decision-making.) But this recall is likely to encourage judges to be tougher in general lest angry voters come for them too. This was a blow to leniency for all criminal defendants.
Evidence already exists that judges impose harsher sentences around election time. According to a 2015 Brennan Center study, "The pressures of upcoming re-election campaigns affect judicial decision-making in criminal cases, making judges more likely to impose longer sentences, affirm death sentences, and even override sentences of life imprisonment to impose the death penalty." When judges are subjected to normal political considerations, they unsurprisingly behave like politicians, for whom being tough on crime is usually a winning stance.
That's one reason LaDoris Cordell, a retired California judge and self-described liberal feminist, vehemently opposed the recall effort, according to The Times: Ms. Cordell wears her liberal stripes proudly, but she said she is worried the recall effort could influence judges who might otherwise show leniency in criminal sentencing, undermining a longtime goal to decrease the prison population. The impulse toward harsher sentencing, she said, is reminiscent of the measures that have fed large increases of prison populations, like California's three-strikes law, which imposed an automatic life sentence for a third felony conviction. Progressives who support criminal justice reform, the repeal of mandatory minimum sentencing, an end to mass incarceration, and rehabilitation should pause before cheering the recall of Judge Persky. The window to punish Turner has shut. The next person to come before a California judge might be a far less privileged defendant, hoping for mercy and less likely to get it. | 2 |
Former vice president Joe Biden speaks during a campaign stop in Los Angeles, Calif., March 4, 2020. (Mike Blake/Reuters) Former vice president Joe Biden further cemented his path to the Democratic nomination by sweeping all three primaries on Tuesday night, winning by over a million total votes in Arizona, Florida, and Illinois to further his delegate lead over Senator Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.)
Biden won the biggest prize of the night, Florida, in a blowout over Sanders, capturing every county and more than doubling Sanders’s vote count. Despite typically polling well with Latinos across the U.S., Sanders saw consistently low support among Florida’s large Hispanic population, after drawing ire for favorable comments about Cuba and its former dictator, Fidel Castro. Illinois and Arizona were also poor showings for Sanders, who lost by over 20 percent in Illinois, and was down 12 percent in Arizona with 88 percent of precincts reported Wednesday morning.
The projected delegate count for the night showed Biden hauling in 249 to Sanders’s 116, with the former vice president’s overall lead widening to nearly 300 delegates, 1,147-861.
“We’ve moved closer to securing the Democratic Party’s nomination for president,” Biden said in a victory speech address streamed online from his home in Wilmington, Del. He also made a pitch for Sanders voters, saying “I hear you. I know what is at stake. And I know what we have to do.”
“Our goal as a campaign, and my goal as a candidate for president, is to unify our party — and to unify our nation,” Biden stated.
The other state which was supposed to vote Tuesday, Ohio, postponed its primary after Ohio Governor Mike DeWine declared a “health emergency” over the coronavirus outbreak, which has upended campaigning for both candidates.
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George Papadopoulos, the former Trump campaign adviser recently sentenced to two weeks in jail for lying to investigators, says Attorney General Jeff Sessions was “quite enthusiastic” during the 2016 campaign about the prospect of a summit between President Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin. Mr. Papadopoulos said that at a roundtable of campaign officials in 2016, he told the table he had a connection who could establish a summit between Mr. Trump and Mr. Putin. President Trump, then a candidate, nodded at him and didn’t seem committed, but Mr. Sessions seemed “quite enthusiastic” about the prospect of a Trump-Putin summit, Mr. Papadopoulos said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.” Mr. Sessions has testified that he pushed back on the idea. “All I can say is this was a meeting from about two years ago — my recollection differs from Jeff Sessions’,” Mr. Papadopoulos said. On Friday, Mr. Papadopoulos was sentenced to two weeks in prison for lying to investigators probing Russian interference in the 2016 election. He pleaded guilty in October 2017 to lying to federal investigators about his contacts with Joseph Mifsud, a London-based professor who supposedly told him in 2016 that Russia had damaging information on Hillary Clinton, Mr. Trump’s Democratic opponent. Mr. Papadopoulos said Sunday he had no recollection of sending an email about the possible dirt to John Mashburn, a Trump campaign and White House official who has reportedly testified to congressional investigators he thought he got such an alert about possible Clinton dirt from Mr. Papadopoulos. “If I did send an email, and especially if others were copied on it, I’m sure that evidence would have [been] introduced by now,” Mr. Papadopoulos said. “If that email was sent, even if I deleted it, if that’s what people believe I did, there would be a copy somewhere else.” He said he has no idea if special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation will reveal that there was actual collusion between Russian officials and the Trump campaign. “All I can say is that my testimony might have helped move something towards that, but I have no idea,” he said. Mr. Trump himself has repeatedly said there was “no collusion.” | 2 |
It's been a whole 11 days since President Joe Biden signed a $1.9 trillion spending bill, so naturally the White House is already planning the next, even bigger spending package.
The New York Times reported Monday that Biden's advisors are prepping a $3 trillion hike in federal spending. The money would go to infrastructure projects, climate change initiatives, community colleges, and a variety of other Democratic priorities. The plan may also include higher taxes on businesses and wealthy individuals, but it seems unlikely that the tax increases would offset such a massive spending binge. And that means Biden's plan is almost certain to add to the $28 trillion (and rapidly growing) national debt.
This is the big-time spending package that Biden has been promising since last year's presidential campaign. The pandemic bill passed earlier this month was merely a prelude.
The numbers here are simply staggering. Consider the fact that in 2019, the last full budget year before the pandemic, the federal government spent a grand total of $4.4 trillion. Combined with the bill that already passed in March, this plan represents nearly $5 trillion in new spending.
Though the specifics of the proposal are in flux, it seems to bear some similarities to the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan (ARP) that Biden signed into law earlier this month. That bill was ostensibly a COVID-19 relief measure, but only a small percentage of the money was actually directed toward dealing with the pandemic. The upcoming $3 trillion package will be called an infrastructure bill, but the Times says only about $1 trillion would be directed toward such traditional infrastructure items as roads, bridges, ports, and improvements to the electric grid.
The rest of the package will probably be packed with progressive policy items—stop me if you've heard this before—including a new paid family leave program, free community college, and universal pre-K education. The estimated $3 trillion price tag does not include the cost of extending temporary tax cuts, such as the child tax credit expanded by the ARP.
The Times reports that Biden is aiming to raise the top individual income tax rate from 37 percent to 39.6 percent, and that he may propose lowering the threshold for that top rate to $400,000. Currently, it applies to individuals who earn more than $500,000 annually and couples who earn at least $600,000. Biden's team has been kicking around ideas like raising the corporate income tax rate from 21 percent to 28 percent and imposing a higher capital gains tax on individuals who make over $1 million annually.
The corporate tax hike alone would kill 159,000 jobs and reduce long-term economic growth, according to an analysis by the nonpartisan Tax Foundation. Raising the federal corporate tax rate to 28 percent would make the average state-and-federal tax burden for American businesses 32.34 percent—the highest rate in the developed world.
As significant as the tax increases might be, the mounting national debt probably represents the more serious consequence of the Biden administration's plans. Before ARP passed, this year's budget was estimated to be $2.2 trillion. It may be close to twice that high now, before any further borrowing for an infrastructure bill is included.
Thanks to a splurge of federal spending before and during the COVID-19 pandemic, the national debt is now larger than the entire American economy. On its current trajectory—that is, even without any additional new spending—the debt is projected to grow to double the size of the economy within the next 25 years. Even if outlandish amounts of debt don't trigger a major fiscal crisis in the years to come, merely making the interest payments on it will reduce long-term economic growth and Americans' standard of living.
Politically, Biden's proposal will be a major political test for both parties in Congress. With slim congressional majorities, Democrats will have to convince potentially vulnerable members from purple districts and states to support a massive spending bill packed with progressive agenda items. Republicans, meanwhile, have abandoned pretty much any interest in making fiscal policy a political battleground and have retreated into nonstop culture wars.
Speaking on the Senate floor Monday afternoon, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R–Ky.) warned that Biden's "so-called infrastructure proposal" might "actually be a Trojan horse for massive tax hikes and other job-killing left-wing policies." That seems like an apt description of what Biden's advisors are preparing. | 2 |
The New York Times on Oct. 24 published an article by tech columnist Kevin Roose about The Epoch Times. The article was published on the front page of the NY Times’ Sunday edition on Oct. 25.
Roose worked on this article about The Epoch Times for at least eight months. The result, however, is disappointing. Instead of attempting to give a fair portrayal of The Epoch Times as an up-and-coming media outlet, Roose resorts to factual errors, innuendo, and misrepresentations in an attempt to smear a competing media outlet.
Furthermore, previous social media comments made by Roose and NY Times media columnist Ben Smith (who contributed to Roose’s article) about The Epoch Times, in which they appear to discuss a collective effort against The Epoch Times, raise questions about the intent behind this article (see the section “Personal Bias” below).
At the heart of the article is the NY Times’ apparent discontent with the fact that The Epoch Times has become—in the NY Times’ own words—“one of the country’s most powerful digital publishers.” The article could easily have been written as a success story of a group of Chinese Americans who cherish their First Amendment rights and have succeeded in growing a large independent media outlet.
Instead, Roose relies on words such as “secretive” and attempts to tie us to an unrelated outlet, in order to call into question the quality of our award-winning journalism.
Roose takes particular issue with our critical position on the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and its ongoing human rights abuses. He downplays accounts of the abuses taking place, claiming they “veer into exaggeration.” This unusual defense and appeasement of the CCP is morally questionable. For years, the NY Times has sought expanded access to the Chinese market and accepted millions in advertising revenue from Chinese state-owned media entities.
Factual Errors and Misrepresentations
Roose included a number of glaring factual errors, despite having been informed of their inaccuracy before publishing.
For example, Roose writes that “perhaps the most audacious experiment was a new right-wing politics site called America Daily.”
The Epoch Times has no connection with this media organization, as was pointed out to Roose in response to his questions via email.
Roose himself provides no evidence to back up this claim, instead pointing to a former Epoch Times employee who worked for America Daily. This involvement, however, came after this employee had left The Epoch Times; it has no connection to The Epoch Times.
It makes no sense to hold The Epoch Times responsible for the actions of a former employee working for a different media company. At the same time, this shows the lengths that Roose went to in an attempt to make The Epoch Times look bad by tying it to unrelated entities.
Roose in his article also uses innuendo to imply that The Epoch Times’ growth on Facebook was somehow the result of “click farms.” Roose provides no evidence for that claim, however. As stated to Roose in an email in response to his questions, The Epoch Times “utilized Facebook’s own promotional tools to gain an increased organic following, not through ‘bots’ or ‘fake accounts’” as Roose incorrectly suggested.
Roose also writes in his article that The Epoch Times has “been one of the most prominent promoters of ‘Spygate,’ a baseless conspiracy theory involving claims that Obama administration officials illegally spied on Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign.”
This is an intentional misrepresentation of The Epoch Times’ reporting on the topic of the FBI’s 2016 Crossfire Hurricane probe. The Epoch Times has indeed been a leader in its reporting on the topic, which has been cited by other media—including the NY Times. Furthermore, the topic remains under investigation by U.S. Attorney John Durham.
Roose also claims that “publications and shows linked to The Epoch Times have promoted the QAnon conspiracy theory and spread distorted claims about voter fraud and the Black Lives Matter movement.” Notice how he writes “publications and shows linked to” The Epoch Times. Unable to attack The Epoch Times directly, Roose cites these “linked” entities without even saying what he’s referring to.
In reality, The Epoch Times has never “promoted the QAnon conspiracy theory” nor has it published inaccurate information about “voter fraud and the Black Lives Matter movement.”
Selectively Quoting
Roose in his article exclusively cites disgruntled former employees to attack The Epoch Times, ignoring positive comments that interview subjects made.
For example, Roose interviewed Chinese dissident Guo Wengui for his article, but his comments weren’t included. In a YouTube video, Guo says he told Roose (who, Guo said, suggested the article would be about Guo, only to present him with questions about The Epoch Times during the interview) that The Epoch Times is “excellent” and “brilliant.”
He also praised The Epoch Times for its fearless reporting in Hong Kong in the face of CCP intimidation.
“I respect them very much. Epoch Times is standing in the streets of Hong Kong with their cameras, directly pointing to the CCP, livestreaming. Do you think that’s easy?” Guo said he told Roose.
Guo also questioned Roose: “Why don’t you go after the CCP? … What kind of mainstream media are you?”
None of Guo’s comments made it into Roose’s article. Is it common for the NY Times to only include quotes from people who speak negatively about a topic they cover? How is this not an example of severe bias?
Personal Bias
Social media posts by Roose indicate he had his mind made up about The Epoch Times before he ever reported on us. In a now deleted series of tweets published in November 2019, he mocked The Epoch Times and its critical position on communism.
In a separate series of tweets in December 2019, Roose and three other journalists suggested they should have received “a bounty” from Facebook for getting the company to ban Epoch Times advertisements.
Roose joined in the fun by commenting, “god we would all have so many vacation homes by now.”
While the tone of the tweets is jovial, three of the four journalists—Roose, Smith, and NBC News reporter Ben Collins—have been involved in public attacks on The Epoch Times. Smith also contributed to Roose’s article.
Roose’s use of “we” in this comment, and the mere fact that journalists from competing outlets would celebrate together a misfortune suffered by The Epoch Times, raises this question: Have they engaged in a coordinated and premeditated campaign against The Epoch Times?
Moreover, where do the NY Times editors stand on this expression of bias and possible collaboration?
Downplaying China’s Human Rights Abuses
In his article, Roose seeks to downplay the ongoing persecution of the spiritual discipline Falun Gong in China. The persecution has been extensively documented by human rights groups as well as government bodies such as the U.S. State Department. Instead of citing any of this publicly available information, Roose seeks to diminish these human rights abuses.
Roose also ignores a large body of evidence showing that the CCP kills prisoners of conscience, especially Falun Gong practitioners, for their organs, and instead describes it as an “accusation.”
This plays right into the hands of the CCP, which for years has worked to influence American media outlets.
Articles like this are extremely valuable for the CCP, as it can use them for its internal propaganda efforts to justify its ongoing persecution campaigns. The NY Times itself translated a previous article about The Epoch Times by Roose into Chinese. Follow | 2 |
House Democrats are threatening to subpoena the White House in their fight for more documents related to President Trump’s July phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. The chairs of the House Intelligence, Oversight and Foreign Affairs committees sent a memo to the White House demanding the key documents they need. “Over the past several weeks, the committees tried several times to obtain voluntary compliance with our requests for documents, but the White House has refused to engage with — or even respond to — the committees,” they wrote. Last week, the administration released both a transcript of the phone call, the whistleblower complaint and the inspector general’s report on the matter. The administration has until Friday to comply with the requests before the committee chairs send out the subpoena. The summer phone call, during which House Democrats say Mr. Trump pressured the Ukrainian president to investigate Democratic presidential front-runner Joseph R. Biden and his son Hunter, has united Democrats on Capitol Hill and is now at the center of an impeachment inquiry launched by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi last week. The flurry of subpoenas shows how quickly the Democrats have escalated their impeachment inquiry. So far, the three committees have subpoenaed Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, scheduling depositions for State Department staffers, and Rudolph W. Giuliani, the president’s personal attorney. Wednesday’s action marks the first time Democrats have threatened to subpoena the White House. Democrats’ subpoena comes on the same day Steve Linick, the State Department’s inspector general, is scheduled to brief lawmakers about “urgent” material he says is relevant to the Ukraine investigation. Details on what Mr. Linick intends to reveal remain scant. | 2 |
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! The State Department denied Tuesday it ever concluded that the deadly consulate attack Sept. 11 in Libya was an unplanned outburst prompted by an anti-Islam movie, despite public statements early on by some in the Obama administration suggesting that was the case.Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., reacting Wednesday to the latest claims, said he's just "at a loss" for why administration officials ever tried to connect the attack to the film in the first place."From the very beginning, everyone knew this was a terrorist attack. I mean, there's no question, and that's why this has been totally bizarre," said Corker, who recently returned from Libya.The Obama administration used the film explanation for more than a week after assailants killed the U.S. ambassador to Libya and three other Americans. Most notably, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Susan Rice, said in several TV interviews five days after the attack that it appeared to be "spontaneous" violence spinning out of protests of the film.State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland backed up Rice's statements in a press briefing a day later: "I would simply say that ... the comments that Ambassador Rice made accurately reflect our government's initial assessment."More On This... And White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, as late as a week after the attack, said that based on initial information, "we saw no evidence to back up claims by others that this was a preplanned or premeditated attack."Carney then went on to suggest again the violence was related to the film: "Based on the information that we have now, it was -- there was a reaction to the video -- there was protests in Cairo, then followed by protests elsewhere, including Benghazi, and that was what led to the original unrest."The new comments from the State Department further highlight the disconnect in the attack's aftermath between what administration officials were saying publicly and what intelligence officials suspected early on -- that the attack was an act of terrorism, more coordinated than a protest that got out of hand.New documents further suggest internal disagreement over appropriate levels of security before the attack, which occurred on the 11th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terror attacks on the U.S.Briefing reporters ahead of a hotly anticipated congressional hearing Wednesday, State Department officials provided their most detailed rundown of how a peaceful day in Benghazi devolved into a sustained attack that involved multiple groups of men armed with weapons such as machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars over an expanse of more than a mile.But asked about the administration's initial -- and since retracted -- explanation linking the violence to protests over an anti-Muslim video circulating on the Internet, one official said, "That was not our conclusion." He called it a question for "others" to answer, without specifying. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to speak publicly on the matter, and provided no evidence that might suggest a case of spontaneous violence or angry protests that went too far.The attack has become a major issue in the presidential campaign, featuring prominently in Republican candidate Mitt Romney's latest foreign policy address on Monday. He called it an example of President Obama's weakness in foreign policy matters, noting: "As the administration has finally conceded, these attacks were the deliberate work of terrorists."The administration counters that it has provided its best intelligence on the attack, and that it refined its explanation as more information came to light. But five days after the attack, Ambassador Rice gave a series of interviews saying the administration believed the violence was unplanned and that extremists with heavier weapons "hijacked" the protest and turned it into an outright attack.She has since denied trying to mislead Congress, and a concurrent CIA memo that was obtained by The Associated Press cited intelligence suggesting the demonstrations in Benghazi "were spontaneously inspired by the protests at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo" and "evolved into a direct assault" on the diplomatic posts by "extremists."Alongside defining the nature of the Benghazi attack, Congress is looking into whether adequate security was in place.According to an email obtained Tuesday by Fox News and other news organizations, the top State Department security official in Libya told a congressional investigator that he had argued unsuccessfully for more security in the weeks before Ambassador Chris Stevens, a State Department computer specialist and two former Navy SEALs were killed. But department officials instead wanted to "normalize operations and reduce security resources," he wrote.Eric Nordstrom, who was the regional security officer in Libya, also referenced a State Department document detailing 230 security incidents in Libya between June 2011 and July 2012 that demonstrated the danger there to Americans.Nordstrom is among the witnesses set to testify Wednesday before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. According to the panel's chairman, Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., and the head of a subcommittee, Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, the State Department refused repeated requests to provide more security for U.S. diplomats in Libya."You will note that there were a number of incidents that targeted diplomatic missions and underscored the GoL's (government of Libya) inability to secure and protect diplomatic missions," Nordstrom's email stated."This was a significant part of (the diplomatic) post's and my argument for maintaining continued DS (diplomatic security) and DOD (Department of Defense) security assets into Sept/Oct. 2012; the GoL was overwhelmed and could not guarantee our protection."Sadly, that point was reaffirmed on Sept. 11, 2012, in Benghazi," he added.Nordstrom said the incidents demonstrated that security in Libya was fragile and could degrade quickly. He added that Libya was "certainly not an environment where (the diplomatic) post would be directed to `normalize' operations and reduce security resources in accordance with an artificial time table."Nordstrom also said diplomats in Libya were told not to request an extension of a 16-member special operations military team that left in August, according to an official of the Oversight panel. The official was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and thus spoke only on the condition of anonymity.The State Department has said it never received a request to extend the military team beyond August, and added that its members were replaced with a security team that had the same skills.Democrats on the Oversight committee were sharply critical of Issa, the chairman, calling his investigation "extremely partisan.""The chairman and his staff failed to consult with Democratic members prior to issuing public letters with unverified allegations, concealed witnesses and refused to make one hearing witness available to Democratic staff, withheld documents obtained by the committee during the investigation, and effectively excluded Democratic committee members from joining a poorly-planned congressional delegation to Libya," a Democratic memo said.It said in the previous two years, House Republicans voted to cut the Obama administration's requests for embassy security by some $459 million.The Democratic memo said Nordstrom told committee investigators that he sent two cables to State Department headquarters in March and July 2012 requesting additional diplomatic security agents for Benghazi, but that he received no responses.He stated that Charlene Lamb, the deputy assistant secretary for international programs, wanted to keep the number of U.S. security personnel in Benghazi artificially low and that Lamb believed the Benghazi facilities did not need any diplomatic security special agents because there was a residential safe haven to fall back to in an emergency.Issa had a phone conversation Monday with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton about the committee's investigation.The FBI is still investigating the attack. Clinton also has named a State Department review panel to look into the security arrangements in Libya.The Associated Press contributed to this report. | 2 |
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! Chief Justice of the United States John Roberts on Wednesday issued a highly unusual and forceful rebuke to Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., calling his threatening remarks directed at Associate Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh "irresponsible" and "dangerous" -- prompting Schumer's office to slam Roberts and accuse him of bias.The extraordinary back-and-forth began hours earlier at a pro-choice rally hosted by the Center for Reproductive Rights, when Schumer ominously singled out President Trump's two Supreme Court picks: "I want to tell you, Gorsuch. I want to tell you, Kavanaugh. You have released the whirlwind and you will pay the price!" Schumer warned. "You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions."Roberts replied in his remarkable written statement, obtained by Fox News: "This morning, Senator Schumer spoke at a rally in front of the Supreme Court while a case was being argued inside. Senator Schumer referred to two Members of the Court by name and said he wanted to tell them that 'You have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price. You will not know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.'"Roberts continued: "Justices know that criticism comes with the territory, but threatening statements of this sort from the highest levels of government are not only inappropriate, they are dangerous. All Members of the Court will continue to do their job, without fear or favor, from whatever quarter."Schumer spokesman Justin Goodman quickly responded by accusing Roberts of bias, further escalating the confrontation. Goodman insisted that Schumer was addressing Republican lawmakers when he said a "price" would be paid -- even though Schumer had explicitly named Kavanaugh and Gorsuch.READ ROBERTS' STATEMENT“Women’s health care rights are at stake and Americans from every corner of the country are in anguish about what the court might do to them," Goodman said in a statement to Fox News. “Sen. Schumer’s comments were a reference to the political price Senate Republicans will pay for putting these justices on the court, and a warning that the justices will unleash a major grassroots movement on the issue of reproductive rights against the decision."He added: “For Justice Roberts to follow the right wing’s deliberate misinterpretation of what Sen. Schumer said, while remaining silent when President Trump attacked Justices [Sonia] Sotomayor and [Ruth Bader] Ginsberg last week, shows Justice Roberts does not just call balls and strikes.”That was an apparent reference to Trump's call for those liberal justices to recuse themselves from some cases due to alleged bias. ("I just don’t know how they cannot recuse themselves to anything having to do with Trump or Trump-related," Trump said. Ginsburg, who has publicly defended Kavanaugh and Gorsuch as "very decent" and "very smart," previously called Trump a "faker," and Sotomayor sharply criticized the administration in a recent dissent.)Video of Schumer's remarks had quickly circulated on social media, with Republicans and prominent liberals casting the comments as a clear threat against two sitting Supreme Court justices. Schumer, they said, had gone far beyond merely requesting that justices recuse themselves as he stood in front of the Supreme Court Building.Late Wednesday, Trump used Schumer's own words to condemn him."There can be few things worse in a civilized, law abiding nation, than a United States Senator openly, and for all to see and hear, threatening the Supreme Court or its Justices," Trump wrote on Twitter. "This is what Chuck Schumer just did. He must pay a severe price for this!"Trump also tweeted: "This is a direct & dangerous threat to the U.S. Supreme Court by Schumer. If a Republican did this, he or she would be arrested, or impeached. Serious action MUST be taken NOW!"Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., said he would introduce a resolution to censure Schumer."I would call on Schumer to apologize, but we all know he has no shame," Hawley wrote. "So tomorrow I will introduce a motion to censure Schumer for his pathetic attempt at intimidation of #SupremeCourt."Even left-wing Harvard Law School professor Laurence Tribe tweeted: "These remarks by @SenSchumer were inexcusable. Chief Justice Roberts was right to call him on his comments. I hope the Senator, whom I’ve long admired and consider a friend, apologizes and takes back his implicit threat. It’s beneath him and his office.""The American Bar Association is deeply troubled by today’s statements from the Senate Minority Leader threatening two sitting justices of the U.S. Supreme Court over their upcoming votes in a pending case," the ABA said in a statement. "Whatever one thinks about the merits of an issue before a court, there is no place for threats -- whether real or allegorical. Personal attacks on judges by any elected officials, including the President, are simply inappropriate. Such comments challenge the reputation of the third, co-equal branch of our government; the independence of the judiciary; and the personal safety of judicial officers. They are never acceptable."During Kavanaugh's contentious confirmation battle in late 2018, a mob of left-wing protesters banged on the doors of the Supreme Court Building, many of them complaining about his possible future abortion rulings.SCOTUS APPARENTLY AT ODDS OVER ABORTION LAW DURING ORAL ARGUMENTSSchumer noted at the rally that an upcoming Supreme Court case, June Medical Services LLC v. Russo, is the first "major" abortion case since President Trump's court picks have been on the bench.The dispute, dealing with restrictions over who can perform abortions, involves a Louisiana law similar to one in Texas that the court ruled unconstitutional in 2016, before either Trump justice was on the Supreme Court and before conservatives held a 5-4 majority.Schumer did not specifically explain what "price" the justices would face. During the rally, however, Schumer did go on to describe how Republican lawmakers could be impacted politically."We will tell President Trump and Senate Republicans who have stacked the court with right-wing ideologues that you’re gonna be gone in November, and you will never be able to do what you’re trying to do now ever, ever again!” he said. Earlier in his address, Schumer had accused Republican legislatures of "waging a war on women" and said reproductive rights are "under attack in a way we haven't seen in modern history."The case before the court is part of a larger effort by red states to pass laws regulating abortion to test how supportive the new justices will be of precedents such as Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey, which formed the basis for abortion being legal.The law in question requires abortion doctors in Louisiana to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital in case a patient experiences complications during or after a procedure. Those backing the law argue that it regulates abortion providers similarly to how other medical providers are regulated by the state while also ensuring doctors are competent. Opponents say that it is targeted at abortion providers with the goal of shutting them down, citing a 2016 case out of Texas in which the Supreme Court invalidated a very similar law.NYT QUIETLY 'UPDATES' KAVANAUGH BOMBSHELL TO NOTE THAT ACCUSER DOESN'T EVEN REMEMBER ALLEGED EPISODEThe court's opinion in the 2016 case, Whole Women's Health v. Hellerstedt, said the law placed an undue burden on women seeking abortions because it would significantly reduce the number of available facilities in the state.During Wednesday's oral arguments, Kavanaugh and Roberts questioned whether Lousiana might be different from Texas in terms of the practical effect the law would have."Assume all the doctors who currently perform abortions can obtain admitting privileges, could you say that the law still imposes an undue burden, even if there were no effect?" Kavanaugh asked.Roberts suggested other states may have different standards that might be constitutional.Gorsuch did not speak during the arguments.Wednesday's statement was not the first time Roberts has felt compelled to issue an unusual public rebuke of a sitting officeholder, and he has demonstrated his willingness to take on Republicans and Democrats alike. In 2018, Roberts defended the judiciary after Trump railed against what he called an "Obama judge."“We do not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges or Clinton judges,” Roberts said at the time, in a statement also released by the court’s public information office. “What we have is an extraordinary group of dedicated judges doing their level best to do equal right to those appearing before them.”CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APPRoberts, writing on the eve of Thanksgiving, concluded: “That independent judiciary is something we should all be thankful for.”Trump quickly shot back: "Sorry Chief Justice John Roberts, but you do indeed have ‘Obama judges,' and they have a much different point of view than the people who are charged with the safety of our country.”Fox News' Bill Mears, Shannon Bream, Tyler Olson, and Ronn Blitzer contributed to this report. | 2 |
The media afforded former Vice President Joe Biden 37 days of silence in regards to a sexual assault allegation against him.Biden was directly asked about former Senate staffer Tara Reade’s accusation that he sexually assaulted her in the early 1990s for the first time Friday. Before that moment, Biden had only rejected the accusation through a spokesperson, despite numerous public interviews in the five weeks since Reade publicly accused him. The presumptive 2020 Democratic presidential nominee denied sexually assaulting Reade on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” on Friday. Moments before he was set to be interviewed, Biden issued a written statement denying the assault. Full Biden statement: pic.twitter.com/CNUHFJhaAL — Philip Wegmann (@PhilipWegmann) May 1, 2020 Biden’s public denial follows mounting pressure from both some Democrats and Republicans for the former vice president to officially address Reade’s allegation. Reade’s public sexual assault allegation was levied March 25 and the media did not ask the former vice president a single question on the matter until May 1. Tara Reade first made her sexual assault allegation against Joe Biden on March 25. It’s an embarrassment to the national media that it took until May 1 for him to be asked about it https://t.co/aTXq4Y5pKG — Peter J. Hasson (@peterjhasson) May 1, 2020 The media’s avoidance is not for a lack of availability to Biden. In fact, Biden faced 142 questions across 19 interviews since Reade’s allegation came to light, The Washington Free Beacon noted in an analysis April 29. (RELATED: CNN Failed To Uncover Footage From Its Own Archives That Could Back Up Biden Accuser’s Allegations) This equals nearly four hours of speaking time, many of which came on big networks. Some of these interviews came after major media publications finally began to consistently report on Reade’s allegation. Not a single interviewer asked Biden about the alleged sexual assault. The New York Times published an investigation into Reade’s allegation April 12. The Biden campaign used this investigation in talking points reportedly sent to top Democratic supporters. The talking points read that “a thorough review by the New York Times has led to the truth: this incident did not happen,” according to Buzzfeed. The NYT pushed back on the talking points, noting that its investigation did not reach a conclusion either way. Publications began to cover Reade’s allegation more aggressively after evidence began to surface that could corroborate her story. One of these pieces of evidence was an unearthed video from CNN’s “Larry King Live” that appeared to show Reade’s mother talking about problems her unnamed daughter had with a “prominent” senator. | 2 |
| October 04, 2021 12:47 PM President Joe Biden condemned activists cornering Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema in a bathroom over the weekend and filming the encounter but dismissed the tactics as common and "part of the process." “I don’t think they’re appropriate tactics, but it happens to everybody,” Biden said of the people who confronted Sinema on Sunday. “The only people it doesn’t happen to is people who have Secret Service standing around them. It’s part of the process.” ACTIVISTS FOLLOW SINEMA INTO BATHROOM, VIDEOTAPE OUTSIDE HER BATHROOM STALL In the video, activists from Living United For Change urged Sinema, a lecturer at Arizona State University’s School of Social Work, to support Biden’s Build Back Better plan, a sweeping social spending proposal that Democrats aim to pass through the budget reconciliation process. The legislation needs every Democratic vote to pass, including Sinema’s. The senator is under pressure from Democratic groups over her opposition to the $3.5 trillion price tag of Biden’s plan. Sinema met with Biden to discuss the bill last week but has not committed to supporting it. In a statement on Monday, Sinema criticized the ambush, which also captured her students on camera. “After deceptively entering a locked, secure building, these individuals filmed and publicly posted videos of my students without their permission — including footage taken both my students and I using a restroom,” Sinema said. CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER “Yesterday’s behavior was not legitimate protest,” she added. “It is unacceptable for activist organizations to instruct their members to jeopardize themselves by engaging in unlawful activities such as gaining entry to closed university buildings, disrupting learning environments, and filming students in a restroom.” | 2 |
Hundreds of people line up outside a Kentucky Career Center hoping to find assistance with their unemployment claims in Frankfort, Ky., June 18, 2020. (Bryan Woolston/Reuters) The economy added 1.4 million jobs in August and new jobless claims fell below one million last week as the U.S. labor market hints at a gradual recovery from the economic devastation caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
A total of 881,000 initial unemployment claims were filed during the week ending August 29, the Labor Department said Thursday, beating economists’ projections of 950,000 new claims. Last week marks a decrease of 130,000 new claims from the prior week’s 1.011 million initial claims. Continuing claims also fell dramatically by 1.24 million, sinking to 13.254 million.
During the week ending Aug. 22, the total number of people receiving state unemployment benefits also fell by 1.24 million to about 13.3 million.
The Labor Department also changed its methodology for Thursday’s data release from one that used seasonal adjustments, since those adjustments do not apply as much during the pandemic. The adjustments likely caused the department to overstate initial weekly claims.
Meanwhile, however, those receiving benefits from the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program ticked up to more than 759,000 last week, a rise of more than 151,000.
The number of unemployment claims being filed weekly, while decreased from their level during the height of the U.S. coronavirus outbreak in April, is still far higher than the roughly 200,000 claims filed weekly in February, before lockdown and stay at home measures caused businesses to shutter, many permanently.
Send a tip to the news team at NR. Recommended RNC Should Take a Lesson from Mike Pence The RNC censure resolution was morally repellent, while the former vice president took a stand for the truth. NBC's 'Cataclysmic' Olympics-Coverage Flop How can anyone feel good about these Olympics? Nikole Hannah-Jones Responds to Our 1619 and Slavery Issue She reacted with a lot of sneering and ad hominem argumentation and nothing of substance. Joe Biden Doesn’t Know What You’re Talking About To watch Biden at the lectern was to experience shock and dismay interspersed with moments of alarm and dark humor. No wonder he hides from the media. Why Were Authorities So Evasive About the Synagogue Gunman's Motive? Why were President Biden and the FBI so reluctant to say that the synagogue gunman was motivated by antisemitism and jihadism? The Afghanistan Debacle Looks Worse and Worse The more we learn about the administration’s withdrawal, the more it becomes clear that its decisions were driven by political considerations and panic. The Latest Maskless Super Bowl Marks Our Return to Normalcy This collective moment was a warning to the Covid regime that its strictures won’t stand much longer. Russian Figure-Skating Prodigy Will Compete at Olympics Despite Failed Drug Test The IOC has decided it will not hold a medal ceremony for any event in which Valieva places in the top three while the matter remains under investigation. The IRS Wants Your Picture The agency’s plans for facial recognition might be abandoned for now, but its lust for data is never satiated. Why America’s Government-Debt Problem Endures Any meaningful change requires enough Americans deciding that they really do want less government in their lives, and then acting accordingly. ‘Blame America first,’ &c. On Jeane Kirkpatrick, today’s Russia debate, Edward Snowden, Ukraine’s right to exist, and more. | 2 |
A Palestinian man walks amidst rubble from buildings damaged during Israeli bombardment, in Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip, on May 20. Photo: mohammed abed/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images As we went to press, it looked like Israel and Hamas would put down their arms—for now. The truce comes less than two weeks after the terrorist group commenced its 4,000-rocket barrage on Israeli civilians—the most intense since it took over the Gaza strip in 2007. Israel’s leadership wouldn’t have approved a cease-fire if it hadn’t accomplished most of what it wanted through air strikes, but the question now is what lessons the region’s players take from the short war and the world’s response. The cease-fire has no strings attached, so neither Hamas nor Israel won a strategic victory. Israel says Hamas suffered the destruction of its tunnel network and the death of many military leaders. The group may lack the capacity to launch another major war on Israel, which it wants to annihilate, for some time. Israel’s casualties were more limited because of its Iron Dome anti-missile technology. Yet Hamas inflicted a blow to Israeli democracy by showing that it could foment ethnic violence among Arab and Jewish Israelis, both of whom rioted during the conflict. That’s a tragedy, especially after Arab parties have advanced in recent years within Israel’s democracy. Meanwhile Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran saw that Democratic support for Israel in the U.S. has declined. We credited President Biden this week with not trying to dictate Israel’s security decisions, but he soon bent rhetorically to his party’s left, saying Wednesday he “expected a significant deescalation today.” The progressives who are increasingly driving Democratic social and economic policy want to drive Mideast policy as well. Rep. Rashida Tlaib, whom President Biden praised on a Michigan trip this week, accused fellow Democrats of “taking orders from Netanyahu ” the day before. Sen. Bernie Sanders is trying to block a U.S. arms sale to Israel. Wavering American support could increase the risk of military clashes, as regional actors perceive that the Jewish State is militarily constrained when attacked. Israeli leaders have at least partly priced in the erosion of bipartisan backing in the U.S. This could lead it to lean more on China or Russia, which would not be good for the U.S. or Mideast peace. The vaunted two-state solution was out of reach before this conflict, and communal violence in Israel made it more so. The first goal for the U.S. should be to support its allies and contain the region’s radicals to reduce the chance of a major war. Journal Editorial Report: Paul Gigot interviews Clifford May on the causes of the conflict. Image: Fatima Shbair/Getty Images Copyright ©2022 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8 Appeared in the May 21, 2021, print edition. | 2 |
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! New York Mayor Bill de Blasio is facing a firestorm of criticism in the wake of the execution-style murder of two city police officers, as police union officials and ex-city leaders accuse him of stoking an atmosphere that made officers a target of "hate."From his opposition to stop-and-frisk policies during his mayoral campaign to more recent comments about how he wanted his biracial son to be careful around police, the mayor's record on law enforcement is now front and center in an increasingly nasty war of words.The fallout has even prompted a petition on Moveon.org calling for de Blasio's resignation -- so far, it has gathered nearly 60,000 signatures.The accusations started flying almost immediately after authorities announced Saturday that officers Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu were fatally shot by a gunman who later killed himself. The suspect, 28-year-old Ismaaiyl Brinsley, had posted on Instagram that he was "putting wings on pigs" and suggested he was motivated by the deaths of Eric Garner and Michael Brown at the hands of police officers."There's blood on many hands," Patrolmen's Benevolent Association President Patrick Lynch said late Saturday. "... That blood on the hands starts on the steps of City Hall in the office of the mayor."More On This... Lynch and other officer organizations roundly condemned those who "incited" protests over the Garner and Brown deaths, and pointed the finger at the mayor's office. That night, a widely circulated video showed officers turning their backs on the mayor as he walked down a hall where the officers had been pronounced dead.Some, including the mayor, have suggested the union criticism goes too far. In a statement, de Blasio's office reportedly said it is "unfortunate" that at this time of tragedy, "some would resort to irresponsible, overheated rhetoric that angers and divides people."The temperature of the debate might be dialed down a bit in the coming days.De Blasio, speaking at a police event Monday afternoon, urged all sides to "put aside" political debates and protests for the time being -- and focus on the families of the victims."These families are now our families, and we will stand by them," de Blasio said, calling the murders "an attack on every single New Yorker." He said the political debate will be dealt with "in due time."Shortly afterward, at a press conference alongside de Blasio, NYPD Commissioner William Bratton said he spoke with leadership of all the police unions, and claimed they have agreed on "standing down" until after the funerals. "I want to thank them for that action," he said.On the night of the murders, de Blasio spoke in support of the police force and called the murder "an attack on everything we hold dear."But the murder of Ramos and Liu nevertheless has blown open a rift with the police force unlikely to heal soon. The police unions already were at odds with de Blasio over, among other issues, his handling of the response to the Garner case -- Garner died in a struggle with police after being approached for selling loose cigarettes, but no officer was charged.The de Blasio administration allowed days of demonstrations and drew criticism from union leaders for his comments during that period -- including saying his family had to "train" their biracial son how to act around police."I don't put the blood of these police officers on the mayor's doorstep," former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani told Fox News on Monday. "I lost police officers, Bloomberg lost police officers. What I do hold him responsible for is letting those demonstrations get out of control. ... He's guilty of creating an atmosphere of police hatred in certain communities." He accused de Blasio, President Obama and others of fueling an "atmosphere of hate" toward officers.Deputy U.S. Attorney General James Cole on Monday rejected such criticism."We have supported our police officers and our law enforcement personnel from the time I have gotten here," Cole said.According to The New York Times, even before the murder of the officers, union leaders sent around a letter letting officers request de Blasio not attend their funerals if they died in the line of duty.Outside the union ranks, several former top-ranking New York officials -- including Giuliani -- have started putting pressure on de Blasio.Former Gov. George Pataki tweeted: "Sickened by these barbaric acts, which sadly are a predictable outcome of divisive anti-cop rhetoric of #ericholder & #mayordeblasio. #NYPD"Former NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly told ABC's "This Week" that de Blasio ran an "anti-police campaign" last year, and said his comments about having to train his son "set off this latest firestorm" with the officers.Fox News' Lucas Tomlinson and The Associated Press contributed to this report. | 2 |
President Trump speaks during a press conference in Washington, D.C., February 15, 2019. (Carlos Barria/Reuters) A group of former Republican lawmakers urged Congressional Republicans to block President Trump’s emergency declaration in an open letter released Monday.
Five former Senators and 19 House members signed the letter, which was first published by Politico, calling on Congress to support a joint resolution ending the national emergency Trump declared earlier this month.
“We who have signed this letter are no longer Members of Congress but that oath still burns within us,” the former lawmakers write. “That is why we are coming together to urge those of you who are now charged with upholding the authority of the first branch of government to resist efforts to surrender those powers to a president.”
Trump resorted to a national emergency declaration after Republicans on a specially-designated conference committee failed to secure the $5.7 billion he had long demanded for the construction of a border wall as part of a broader spending package.
The former lawmakers, all of whom served between 1967 and 2013, embraced a common critique of the national emergency declaration, pointing out that the expansion of executive authority would eventually be wielded against Republicans by a Democratic administration.
“What will you do when a president of another party uses the precedent you are establishing to impose policies to which you are unalterably opposed?” they ask. “There is no way around this difficulty: what powers are ceded to a president whose policies you support may also be used by presidents whose policies you abhor.”
The House will vote this week on a resolution to end the national emergency, which has thus far received the support of only one Republican, Representative Justin Amash of Michigan.
Send a tip to the news team at NR. Something to Consider If you enjoyed this article, we have a proposition for you: Join NRPLUS. Members get all of our content on the site including the digital magazine and archives, no paywalls or content meters, an advertising-minimal experience, and unique access to our writers and editors (through conference calls, social media groups, and more). And importantly, NRPLUS members help keep NR going. If you enjoyed this article and want to see more premium content like this, we have a proposition for you: Join NRPLUS. Become a Member Recommended NBC's 'Cataclysmic' Olympics-Coverage Flop How can anyone feel good about these Olympics? Joe Biden Doesn’t Know What You’re Talking About To watch Biden at the lectern was to experience shock and dismay interspersed with moments of alarm and dark humor. No wonder he hides from the media. Nikole Hannah-Jones Responds to Our 1619 and Slavery Issue She reacted with a lot of sneering and ad hominem argumentation and nothing of substance. Maskless Super Bowl Marks Our Return to Normalcy This collective moment was a warning to the Covid regime that its strictures won’t stand much longer. The Perfect Storm Is Coming Not learning from the stagflationary past may lead to a stagflationary future. The Afghanistan Debacle Looks Worse and Worse The more we learn about the administration’s withdrawal, the more it becomes clear that its decisions were driven by political considerations and panic. The Latest Nikki Haley Blasts American-Born Skier Competing for China at Beijing Olympics 'Every athlete needs to know when they put their flag on, you're standing for freedom or you're standing for human rights abuses,' said Haley. San Francisco Voters Overwhelmingly Back Recall of Progressive School-Board Members More than 70 percent of voters supported the ouster of school board members Alison Collins, Gabriela López, and Faauuga Moliga. How Georgetown Is Stifling Speech on Campus The university is implementing the academic analog of a SLAPP suit against Ilya Shapiro. McKinsey Website Contradicts Denials of Chinese-Government Work; Rubio Claims ‘Cover-Up’ The consultancy once said it did work for China’s central government, undercutting recent statements. Imagine a Trumpdeau. You Can’t If Trump had gone after the 2020 rioters the way Trudeau is targeting truckers, the institutions and the permanent government wouldn’t have complied. Building Back Stagflation Our elected leaders must accept that inflation is a monster of their own making, and stop fanning the flames with ever-higher levels of government spending. | 2 |
Former President Donald Trump is known for a lot of things, but one of his special powers is his ability to make the entire corporate media act in concert to bring embarrassment upon themselves.
For nearly a year, almost every major news outlet declared that it was a debunked, fringe conspiracy theory to even discuss the idea that the coronavirus pandemic began as a leak from a laboratory in Wuhan, China. It so happened that Trump was the most visible person pressing the case of the “lab leak theory,” which meant that the media felt compelled to push back extra hard. Now, a year later, the very same news organizations are allowing that the lab leak hypothesis is indeed plausible. So, what changed? Practically and factually, the only real difference today, versus a year ago, is that Trump is no longer in the White House, so journalists are safe to entertain competing ideas again. This is as stark a reversal of reporting on a story of worldwide interest as there has been in decades. And it is clearly attributable to the innate need of many in the media to oppose everything Trump did or said, their practice of following each other’s narratives, and their unwillingness to be the one who breaks away from the pack. CNN’s Chris Cillizza, who once infamously tweeted that journalists don’t choose sides, gave away the game with a piece titled “Anthony Fauci Just Crushed Donald Trump’s Theory on the Origins of the Coronavirus.” In that May 5, 2020, piece, Cillizza wrote that “Fauci’s view on the origins of the disease matters a whole lot more than Trump’s opinion about where it came from.” And he quoted Fauci from a National Geographic interview in which Fauci threw cold water on the lab leak theory and endorsed the belief that the virus evolved in nature and then jumped to humans. Case closed, right? The rest of the media certainly thought so. In an earlier March 2020 story, which was edited more than a year later to make it less strident, Vox wrote that the lab leak theory was “a dangerous conspiracy theory” that “won’t die.” Why exactly it was dangerous to discuss how the pandemic began remains unclear. Vanity Fair chipped in with an item that included the headline “The Discussion is Basically Over,” regarding the virus origin. This venerable publication ascribed advancement of the lab leak theory to Trump’s “cold war” with China and his desire to implicate the communist government. None other than The New York Times, in February 2020, blistered Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., for daring to “ask the question to see what the evidence says.” The Times accused Cotton of repeating a “fringe theory” put forward by “those who see China as a threat.” That would, presumably, include Trump. On that same day, The Washington Post piled on Cotton for “repeating a coronavirus conspiracy theory,” even though he said, truthfully, that “we don’t know where it originated.” The Post suggested it was unnecessary to ask China about the virus’ origin because the lab leak hypothesis had been “repeatedly debunked by experts.” So, a year later, let’s check in with those “experts” and our friends in the media. Earlier this month, Fauci was asked if he still believed the virus developed naturally. “I am not convinced about that,” he said. “I think we should continue to investigate what went on in China.” Also this month, The New York Times related the position of a group of scientists calling for “further inquiry” into the origin of the virus, since the lab leak theory is one of the explanations that is still “viable.” Again, this is the same newspaper that called such talk by a U.S. senator a “fringe theory” a little more than a year ago. At CNN, they are now acknowledging that a lab leak is a “possibility” and the theory “reasonable,” while noting a new Wall Street Journal report that several researchers in Wuhan fell ill mysteriously in November 2019. CNN is also now suddenly disturbed that the communist Chinese are curiously uncooperative with investigative efforts. What about Cillizza, who previously celebrated that Fauci had “crushed” the lab leak theory? Well, now he says, “The origins of the virus remain not fully known.” And finally, just this week, The Washington Post weighed in with a timeline titled “How the Wuhan Lab-Leak Theory Suddenly Became Credible.” But naturally, it was all Trump’s fault again because his “administration’s messaging was often accompanied by anti-Chinese rhetoric that made it easier for skeptics to ignore its claims.” The Wall Street Journal story about the sick Wuhan researchers came after most of the radical shift in media perspective had occurred. So what had happened earlier to change everyone’s thinking?
According to the media’s favorite statistician, Nate Silver, not a whole lot. “[T]he evidence seems murky and inscrutable either way and I’m not sure it has *changed* that much,” he tweeted. So it doesn’t take much scrutiny to realize that these media figures are admitting their biases in plain view. It didn’t matter what was being said last year as much as who was saying it. If Trump or another Republican promoted the lab leak theory, it had to be wrong. But now that their villain is no longer in the White House, the media are free to consider all possibilities. And—what do you know? —today all their stories are pretty much identical to each other again, even if their new pack narrative directly contradicts their groupthink of a year ago. Have an opinion about this article? To sound off, please email [email protected] and we’ll consider publishing your edited remarks in our regular “We Hear You” feature. Remember to include the URL or headline of the article plus your name and town and/or state. | 2 |
Congress early Thursday morning certified President-elect Joe Biden’s election victory after two Republican-led challenges to swing state electors were shot down.
The certification of Biden’s 306 electoral college votes was delayed for hours after lawmakers were forced into lockdown when an angry pro-Trump mob wreaked havoc on the Capitol building Wednesday. Before confirming Biden’s win, objections to his victories in Arizona and Pennsylvania were brought up — and subsequently squashed — during the joint-session of Congress. Other planned objections were dropped by several Republican Senators after Wednesday’s unrest.
The violence at the Capitol resulted in the shooting death of a woman, over 50 arrests and widespread destruction.
Vice President Mike Pence and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi officiate the Electoral College votes the Capitol today.AP
Biden called the chaos “an unprecedented assault unlike anything we’ve seen in modern times,” in a Wednesday address.
The president-elect also said the lawlessness at the Capitol didn’t represent the “true America” but was instead the work of a “small number of extremists.” | 2 |
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! After lunch on Monday, a man walked into a grocery store in Boulder, Colorado and shot 10 people to death. One of those slain was a police officer called Eric Talley. Eric Talley had seven children. His youngest child was just five years old. Your heart breaks for his family.Police responded quickly to the massacre and they arrested a 21-year-old suspect. Here's how CNN described the scene.LUCY KAFANOV, CNN: We know that the suspect is in custody. He was injured. They have not released any details about who he was, but we did see footage of a White man. He was wearing shorts. No shoes, no shirt. He seemed to be bleeding down his leg and he was handcuffed. In other words, CNN told you: "We don't really know anything about what just happened, but we do think a 'White man' did it." That was CNN's first observation. What they cared about most was the gunman's race. To CNN, that was the all-important thing; not the 10 people lying dead or the grieving children they left behind. No, the shooter's skin color.BOULDER MASS SHOOTING VICTIMS: WHAT WE KNOWSo this is what "wokeness" is. This is how you see the world when you've been so corrupted by ideological mania that you consider even a mass shooting a perfect opportunity to push your race-based political agenda. He was a White man. That's all you needed to know.Then we learned the suspect's name: Ahmad Al Aliwi Alissa. That fact raised an immediate problem for the race mongers. Does Ahmad Alissa qualify as a White man? No.Honestly, you may be wondering, who cares? He just shot 10 people. That's the only fact that matter. By the way, for what it's worth, Ahmad Alissa looks pretty pale to us, too, not that decent people ought to care one way or the other about his race. But to the bigots in charge of America's increasingly convoluted and politicized system of racial classification, his race is the only thing that mattered. They decided that people called Ahmad Al Aliwi Alissa cannot be White men no matter what they look like. People with names like that are oppressed. Therefore, they're not White.Now, that's insanity, but it's where we are right now. It's where they've taken us. So, of course, once we learned his name, the entire storyline had to be rewritten immediately. Amy Siskind is a former finance ghoul who now sends angry tweets for a living. Siskind is highly popular in the so-called progressive community online. Her first assessment of the crime was this: "[I]t was almost certainly a [W]hite man (again). If he were Black or Brown he would be dead." That was Amy Siskind's hot take and lots of people agreed with her.TWITTER LIBERALS RUSH TO BLAME BOULDER SHOOTING ON 'WHITE MEN' BEFORE SUSPECTED PUBLICLY IDENTIFIEDThen the shooter's identity emerged and of course, Siskind had to change her view immediately. Please don't mention his name, Siskind instructed her followers. We wouldn't want to, "glorify the killer with the attention of having his name widely known." It's pretty amazing to be able to watch this happen in real time. The great thing about Twitter, despite all the downsides, is that you get to see how the lies are manufactured.Kamala Harris' niece, someone called Meena Harris, also weighed in on the race of the gunman. White men, she wrote, are the greatest terrorist threat to our country. Then police announced it was actually a guy called Ahmad. So Meena Harris had to correct herself, but she kept up the racial attacks because that's what she does. Meena Harris had assumed that Alissa was White, she wrote, "based on his being taken into custody alive and the fact that the majority of mass shootings in the U.S. are carried out by [W]hite men.KAMALA HARRIS' NIECE SLAMMED FOR TWEET ASSUMING COLORADO SHOOTER WAS WHITE MAN: 'THIS IS WILD'So, Ahmad Alissa, if you're following along, wasn't White, but White men are still bad. Got it.You may not even have noticed because you hear things like this every single day. You hear them constantly. And if you step back, you've got to wonder how long the rich and the powerful -- people like Amy Siskind and Meena Harris and countless others -- can continue this, can keep attacking a single racial group before our country breaks apart. We may find out in the end because no one seems to be stopping them. No one even mentions it.But to those who were interested in Monday's tragedy, the question remains: Who was this Ahmad Al Aliwi Alissa? Here's what we know: Apparently, he's an immigrant from Syria who came here as a child and is now a naturalized American citizen. He's political, but likely not a QAnon sympathizer. He's not a right-winger. In fact, his social media posts seem to track pretty consistently with CNN's prime-time editorial views.BOULDER SHOOTING SUSPECT AHMAD AL ALIWI ALISSA: WHAT WE KNOWA former classmate told the Denver Post that Alissa saw himself as an oppressed victim of racism in high school. He would "talk about being Muslim and how if anyone tried anything, he would file a hate crime [report]." Three years ago, he was charged with violently assaulting a classmate. The New York Times reported that , Alissa's name was "previously known to the FBI based on an ongoing investigation into one of his associates." Then the Associated Press reported that Alissa may have been delusional. Of course, he was delusional. He apparently shot 10 people. As of right now, that's pretty much all we know. There aren't that many facts.However, that did not prevent the usual tragedy buzzards from circling the crime scene and speculating in the most destructive possible ways about what might have happened. Here, for example, is yet another retired left-wing federal agent yapping away on MSNBC about how actually this was an act of racism modeled on the massage parlor shootings last week in Atlanta. JIM CAVANAUGH, FORMER ATF SPECIAL AGENT IN CHARGE AND MSNBC ANALYST: Is this just a guy copycatting the hate crime, the vicious hate crime in Atlanta -- and it is a hate crime, by the way, and we should be all saying it publicly, whether or not the prosecutors charge it.Jim Cavanaugh, ladies and gentlemen, has literally no idea what he's talking about. No clue whatsoever. He is making all of it up. But MSNBC put him on television anyway. Now, we work in TV so we can confirm that is shockingly reckless behavior. The other channels don't care, though. They do it all the time.ILHAN OMAR FACES BACKLASH FOR TWEET ABOUT BOULDER MASSACRE SUSPECT'S RACERep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn, specializes in shocking recklessness. It's what she does. After the mass killings in Atlanta last week, none of which seem to have anything whatsoever to do with the race of anyone involved. Omar tried her best to make Americans hate each other even more. That's how she's repaying the country that rescued her from a refugee camp in Africa.Law enforcement, Omar said, with zero evidence of any kind, works to protect "the humanity of [W]hite mass murderers." What does that even mean? We have no idea, though obviously it is bristling with racial hostility. So MSNBC just rolled with it. JOANATHAN CAPEHART, MSNBC: Scapegoating is the evil cousin of White supremacy, and together they reinforce the notion that White is always in the right ... Yhe indifference to lives not White must stop. The disregard for the fear of White terror must stop ... We must not be cowed by the terror unleashed by White men drowning in the deep end of racism, xenophobia and misogyny.Oh, that's good for the country. White supremacy! That's the culprit, no matter what color the criminal was. It doesn't matter what the criminal's color was because it's systemic racism. Like carbon monoxide, it's an invisible poison. That is suddenly a very common view on the left.CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APPIt's certainly Barack Obama's position. More than any other contemporary American leader. Barack Obama is a racial arsonist. He emerges at our most vulnerable moments to deepen the wounds that divide us. He sows hate. Why does Barack Obama do this? It would take a psychiatrist to answer that question fully, though it seems obvious that deep loathing of some kind plays a role. It must. Tuesday, Obama took a break from being one of the richest men in the world to issue a statement blaming "racism and misogyny" for Monday's killings. So a guy who appears to be White shoots a group of White people and Barack Obama calls it racism. How exactly does that work? Can you speak slowly and tell us? Well, the former president didn't say, but he didn't need to. Barack Obama had managed to divide Americans a little more than they were yesterday. And so, from his perspective, mission accomplished.This article is adapted from Tucker Carlson's opening commentary on the March 23, 2021 edition of "Tucker Carlson Tonight." | 2 |
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! A U.S. official accused Chinese leaders of "grandstanding" during contentious bilateral talks in Alaska Thursday, according to a report. "The Chinese delegation ... seems to have arrived intent on grandstanding, focused on public theatrics and dramatics over substance," the official, who asked to remain anonymous, told reporters in Anchorage, according to Reuters. "They made that clear by promptly violating protocol."He added that "exaggerated diplomatic presentations often are aimed at a domestic audience." The official said the two sides had agreed on two-minute opening statements that ended up going for more than an hour.CHINA SLAMS US ON HUMAN RIGHTS, LEAVES OUT ABUSES AGAINST UYGHURS, TIBETANS, HONG KONG In return, Chinese state media called the U.S. "inhospitable" and claimed U.S. officials had spoken for too long. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, far right, speaks as Chinese Communist Party foreign affairs chief Yang Jiechi, left, and China's State Councilor Wang Yi, second from left, listen at the opening session of US-China talks at the Captain Cook Hotel in Anchorage, Alaska, Thursday, March 18, 2021. (Frederic J. Brown/Pool via AP) China had been looking for a reset in relations with the U.S. after tensions with the Trump administration, but U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken made it clear that the Biden administration would take a tough stance with Beijing.Blinken said the U.S. would bring up its "deep concerns" about issues related to the government’s repression of Uyghurs in Xinjiang, as well as anti-democracy efforts in "Hong Kong, Taiwan, cyber attacks on the United States [and] economic coercion of our allies" during the first official talks of the Biden administration. CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APPChina, for its part, accused the U.S. of meddling in the country’s domestic affairs, claimed the United States has a human rights problem and said the U.S. military uses its might to suppress other countries. A Biden official called a second meeting Thursday evening "substantive, serious, and direct," saying both sides were able to outline their interests and priorities, Reuters reported. A third meeting is scheduled for Friday morning. | 2 |
President Donald Trump railed against special counsel Robert Mueller and the media Thursday morning, the one-year anniversary of his appointment. Despite the disgusting, illegal and unwarranted Witch Hunt, we have had the most successful first 17 month Administration in U.S. history – by far! Sorry to the Fake News Media and “Haters,” but that’s the way it is! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 17, 2018 Congratulations America, we are now into the second year of the greatest Witch Hunt in American History…and there is still No Collusion and No Obstruction. The only Collusion was that done by Democrats who were unable to win an Election despite the spending of far more money! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 17, 2018 May 17 marks the one-year anniversary of Mueller’s appointment as special counsel to investigate Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. Mueller and his team have indicted several Russians for interference in the election and have delved in the personal finances of former Trump campaign officials. It also appeared that the special counsel attempted investigate whether President Donald Trump obstructed justice at any point in his time in office. | 2 |
While President Barack Obama claimed that he found out about Hillary Clinton's private email from news reports (Presidents: they're just like us!), White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said today that the president and Clinton had indeed exchanged emails using Clinton's private address.
“The president, as I think many people expected, did over the course of his first several years in office trade emails with his secretary of state,” Earnest said. “I would not describe the number of emails as large, but they did have the occasion to email each other.”
Earnest then attempted to explain away Obama's earlier comments, saying that just because the president claimed he had no idea about Clinton's email address does in fact not mean that they had not exchanged emails.
“The point that the president was making is not that he didn’t know Secretary Clinton’s email address, he did,” Earnest said. “But he was not aware of the details of how that email address and that server had been set up or how Secretary Clinton and her team were planning to comply with the Federal Records Act.”
Now, call me crazy, but shouldn't the President of the United States be concerned with the possibility that his Secretary of State is potentially violating federal law? Given that Pres. Obama possesses degrees from some of the most prestigious universities in the country, I'm assuming he's capable of reading an email address. It's quite strange to me that neither he nor anyone else connected with Clinton's State Department bothered to question why she was using a non-governmental email address during her tenure.
This story may stink to high heaven, but I have a feeling it's only just beginning. | 2 |
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! The Obama administration granted a license letting Iran access the United States financial system despite officials’ pledges that they would prohibit it, according to a draft report from the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations.“On Feb. 24, 2016, the Treasury Department issued a specific license to Bank Muscat to authorize the conversion of Iran’s rials to euros through ‘any United States depository institution …,’” the draft report said. “Even after the specific license was issued, U.S. government officials maintained in congressional testimony that Iran would not be granted access to the U.S. financial system.”“The Obama administration during the negotiation of the Iran deal misled the American people,” said Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio), subcommittee chairman. “I think they did so because they were desperate to get a deal.”When the nations involved in the Iran nuclear agreement implemented the deal, Iran had $5.7 billion in assets at Bank Muscat in Muscat, Oman, maintained as Omani rials, according to the subcommittee. Iran wanted to access that money, and using the U.S. financial system to convert it “was the most efficient means, even though U.S. sanctions prohibited it,” according to the report.Government officials tried to convince two U.S. banks to execute the conversion. They both declined, citing the complexity and the unwanted appearance involved in processing an Iranian transaction, according to the report.Without a compliant American bank, a senior State Department official said he believed Bank Muscat and Iran eventually used European banks to convert the funds, said the committee.Portman said his subcommittee began investigating the transaction last summer. In an interview with an unnamed senior State Department official, the panel said, the official acknowledged that the administration “’exceeded our JCPOA commitments’ because there was nothing in the JCPOA that required the issuance of the specific license,” according to the report. (JCPOA is the acronym for the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran.)A former administration official disputes the subcommittee's conclusion, saying the Treasury Department never authorized Iran to access U.S. investments or markets, conduct commercial transactions in U.S. dollars or open correspondent accounts at U.S. banks.“This specific license cannot be described as ‘granting access to the U.S. financial system,’” the former official said. “This specific license was in fulfillment of JCPOA commitments to give Iran access to pools of its money held overseas. It was aimed solely to allow the movement of Iran’s own funds stranded at an Omani bank into euros at a European bank, where Iran could then make use of them.” | 2 |
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