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Donald J. Trump named Dr. David J. Shulkin as his nominee to run the Department of Veterans Affairs at his Wednesday press conference at Manhattan’s Trump Tower. [“He’s fantastic. He’s fantastic. He will do a truly great job,” said Trump, who called the press conference to discuss his plan to transfer control of his business operations to his two eldest sons, Eric and Donald Jr. and a Trump Organization executive. “You’ll be very impressed with the job he does. ” The incoming president said he interviewed more than 100 candidates for the VA job, “some good and some not so good. ” Trump said improving the VA was one of the key commitments he made in the 2016 campaign. “Veterans have been treated horribly,” he said. “They wait for 15, 16, 17 days — cases when they go in with a minor, easy form of cancer and they can’t see a doctor,” he said. “By the time they see a doctor, they’re terminal,” he said. If Shulkin takes over the VA, it will be a promotion for the internist with more than 20 published academic papers. Sulkin is one of the few holdovers from President Barack Obama’s administration, where he currently serves as the chief executive of the strong Veterans Health Administration, the nation’s largest integrated health care system with more than 1, 700 sites of care, serving nine million Veterans each year. The VA also conducts medical research and is the largest employer of medical graduate students in the country. “VA is at a historic crossroad and will need to make bold reforms that will shape how we deliver IT services and health care in the future, as well as improve the experiences of Veterans, community providers, and VA staff,” Shulkin said at his June 22 testimony before Congress. “Throughout this transformation, our number one priority has and will always be the Veteran — ensuring a safe and secure environment for their information and improving their experience is our goal. ” In addition to naming Shulkin, Trump again talked about the partnerships he is forming between the VA and the Cleveland Clinic, the Mayo Clinic, and other elite private medical institutions to improve the medical care veterans receive. Shulkin was confirmed by the Senate in June 2015 as the VA’s Undersecretary for Health. Before joining the Obama administration, Shulkin held leadership positions in private medical companies and hospitals and was the founder of DoctorQuality, which developed and sold software allowing medical professionals to identify, track, and analyze medical adverse events and other events relevant to lessons learned and exposure to regulatory reporting. | 0 |
What Donald Trump Just Did Is Going To Have Social Conservatives In A State Of Complete Shock 14th, 2016
This is NOT what most social conservatives were expecting. Like millions of other Americans, I greatly celebrated when Donald Trump pulled off a miracle on election night. But within a week of his stunning election victory, many social conservatives already feel like they are being stabbed in the back. On Sunday, 60 Minutes aired a post-election interview with Trump in which he explained that his stance on gay marriage is that it is “settled” and that he has no plans to try to overturn the Supreme Court decision legalizing it. According to CNN , this answer “could leave conservatives worried”…
For the first time since winning the election, Donald Trump has weighed in on two of the most controversial social issues the Supreme Court has taken on ever: gay marriage, and abortion.
His answers could leave conservatives worried.
Trump indicated he’s “fine” with the high court’s opinion legalizing same-sex marriage and called it “settled,” but committed to appointing justices who want to change the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling affirming abortion rights.
CNN’s article didn’t fully capture the flavor of what Trump actually said. A Mediaite article contained more extended quotes…
“It’s irrelevant because it was already settled. It’s law. It was settled in the Supreme Court,” Trump said bluntly on 60 Minutes .
“I mean, it’s done…” he continued. “These cases have gone to the Supreme Court. They’ve been settled, and I’m fine with that.”
You can see Trump making these comments for yourself right here . It is simply not accurate for Trump to say that gay marriage is “settled” while Roe v. Wade is not. In the legal world, nothing is ever really “settled”.
Just like Roe v. Wade, Trump could publicly commit to appointing Supreme Court justices that would overturn the legalization of gay marriage.
And without a doubt, the people that elected him were counting on him to do something about it.
But the truth is that he doesn’t want to do something about it.
Donald Trump is “fine” with gay marriage, and so that political battle is now officially over.
For social conservatives, gay marriage is one of the Big Three. Abortion and Israel are the other two “red line issues”, and since the election Donald Trump has also had some extremely disturbing remarks about Israel.
In fact, Trump just told the Wall Street Journal that a peace agreement that would permanently divide the land of Israel into two states would be “the ultimate deal” and that he is very interested in trying to make that happen “for humanity’s sake” .
Could it be possible that social conservatives have been betrayed again?
Could it be possible that Donald Trump was just another politician that was willing to say anything to get elected?
So far Trump has not appointed any prominent evangelical Christians to any important posts, but it is being reported that Trump is considering “an openly gay man to represent the US at the United Nations”…
is considering a woman to run the Republican Party and an openly gay man to represent the US at the United Nations, moves that would inject diversity into a Trump team.
The incoming president is considering Richard Grenell as United States ambassador to the United Nations. If picked and ultimately confirmed by the Senate, he would be the first openly gay person to fill a Cabinet-level foreign policy post. Grenell previously served as US spokesman at the U.N. under former President George W. Bush’s administration.
And let us not forget that Trump has already publicly sided with the transgender community in the bathroom wars …
Trump, who has spent his life in liberal New York City, referred to LGBT Republicans at the Republican National Convention and said during his campaign that transgender people should use whatever bathroom they feel comfortable using.
So did Trump just use social conservatives to get elected just like George W. Bush did?
Now that the election is over, Trump is even calling the Clintons “good people” …
Clinton “did some bad things,” he said, but added that ultimately the Clintons are “good people.”
“I don’t want to hurt them, I don’t want to hurt them,” he said. “They’re, they’re good people. I don’t want to hurt them. And I will give you a very, very good and definitive answer the next time we do 60 Minutes together.”
Is he serious?
That is like calling the Nazis “good people”. Hillary Clinton is the most corrupt politician that seen, and no politician in America has done more to promote abortion than she has.
Perhaps he has a different definition of “good” than the rest of us do.
Of course a whole lot of social conservatives will get really upset when they read this article and at least a few will post comments staunchly defending Donald Trump and his positions on these issues.
I don’t care who it is – when our politicians come out in favor of gay marriage, men using women’s restrooms or permanently dividing the land of Israel, they deserve to be rebuked.
Let’s see if all of Donald Trump’s new evangelical friends are willing to challenge him on these things.
My guess is that they will not be.
This is yet another sign that “social conservatives” and evangelical Christians have fallen into great apostasy. These days people just believe whatever they want to believe, and they are doing whatever is right in their own eyes.
On Monday, we learned that one of the most popular Christian bloggers in the entire country has come out as a lesbian.
Doyle Melton’s brand new book is an Oprah Book Club selection, and she separated from her husband not too long ago. And of course it turns out that there was a very good reason for separating from her husband. She has decided that she is no longer a heterosexual at all, and she has just announced that she is now dating female soccer star Abby Wambach …
A Christian mommy blogger has announced she is dating retired soccer star Abby Wambach.
Glennon Doyle Melton posted a smiling picture of herself and Wambach on Sunday, with the caption: ‘Oh my God, she is so good to me. She loves me for all the things I’ve always wanted to be loved for. She’s just my favorite. My person.’
Both are newly single.
But of course Donald Trump is “fine” with that, and so is much of the evangelical Christian world.
In my new book , I warned about the great apostasy that is coming, and the election of Donald Trump is not going to change that. In fact, there is no possible way that America will ever be “great again” until we turn from our evil ways .
If we continue to murder millions of babies in our abortion mills, judgment will come to America.
If two-thirds of all Christian men continue to look at pornography on a regular basis, judgment will come to America.
If we continue to greatly celebrate things that God says are an abomination, judgment will come to America.
If divorce rates in the church continue to be about the same as they are in the world, judgment will come to America.
If we continue to have 20 million new cases of sexually-transmitted disease every year, judgment will come to America.
The name of God is blasphemed in almost all of our movies and television shows, and yet Christians still sit there and watch them every night. America is among the world leaders in adultery, drug addiction, alcoholism, registered sex offenders and teen pregnancy, and we produce more pornography than the rest of the planet combined.
America is not great right now, and it never will be again unless we get our hearts right with God.
And at this moment, there are very serious doubts about whether Donald Trump is going to take us in the right direction as a nation. | 1 |
David Duke Launches 2 New Powerful TV Spots Across Louisiana! November 5, 2016 at 11:02 am
Thanks to all those who are donating these closing downs for our latest important ad buys for the campaign. Thanks to those who have contributed and those will do so now in the closing days of the election! | 0 |
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Republican National Committee spokesman Sean Spicer told CNN’s Michael Smerconish Saturday that Huma Abedin signed an OF-109 disclosure form when she left the State Department in 2013, signifying she understood the “legal obligation” to “turn over all classified information and to further safeguard any further information that could be disclosed.”
“Let’s put this in context,” Spicer told Smerconish. “Hillary Clinton initially said she turned over everything that was relevant. The only thing she didn’t were emails regarding yoga and Chelsea’s wedding.”
“We know that to be false.”
“Further, when Huma Abedin left the State Department they have to file a form of OF-109,” he continued. “It’s a separation agreement that states simply people understand when leaving government that they are maintaining no classified information, they understand their legal obligation to protect further classified information and safeguard any potential disclosures of that.” | 0 |
The United Nations Economic and Social Council voted late last week to place Saudi Arabia on the Commission on the Status of Women for a term beginning in 2018, despite that country’s appalling record on the treatment of women. [Hillel Neuer, director of the UN Watch, expressed his outrage in a statement Friday: “Electing Saudi Arabia to protect women’s rights is like making an arsonist into the town fire chief,” said Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch. “It’s absurd. ” “Every Saudi woman,” said Neuer, “must have a male guardian who makes all critical decisions on her behalf, controlling a woman’s life from her birth until death. Saudi Arabia also bans women from driving cars. ” According to UN Watch, the United States forced a formal vote, against China’s wishes, instead of allowing the normal practice of allowing regional groupings to select the nations on the commission by themselves, in secret. However, the vote was still held behind closed doors, meaning it is not yet clear precisely which countries voted to honor one of the world’s foremost abusers of women’s rights. Neuer calculates, based on the voting math, that at least five European Union member states would have had to vote for Saudi Arabia for it to win a seat on the commission. The U. S. State Department’s most recent human rights report on Saudi Arabia (largely prepared by the outgoing Obama administration) notes that despite being allowed to participate in municipal elections in 2015, the state of women’s rights in the kingdom remains generally abysmal: Women continued to face significant discrimination under law and custom, and many remained uninformed about their rights. … The law does not provide for the same legal status and rights for women as for men, and since there is no codified law, judges made decisions regarding family matters based on their interpretations of Islamic law. Although they may legally own property and are entitled to financial support from their guardian, women have fewer political or social rights than men, and society treated them as unequal members in the political and social spheres. The guardianship system requires that every woman have a close male relative as her “guardian” with the legal authority to approve her travel outside of the country. A guardian also has authority to approve some types of business licenses and study at a university or college. Women can make their own determinations concerning hospital care. Women can work without their guardian’s permission, but most employers required women to have such permission. A husband who verbally (rather than through a court process) divorces his wife or refuses to sign final divorce papers continues to be her legal guardian. In 2015, Saudi Arabia reduced a Sri Lankan woman’s sentence for adultery from execution by stoning to three years in prison. Joel B. Pollak is Senior at Breitbart News. He was named one of the “most influential” people in news media in 2016. He is the of How Trump Won: The Inside Story of a Revolution, is available from Regnery. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak. | 0 |
After all the allegations of rampant voter fraud and claims that millions had voted illegally, the people who supervised the general election last month in states around the nation have been adding up how many credible reports of fraud they actually received. The overwhelming consensus: next to none. In an election in which more than 137. 7 million Americans cast ballots, election and law enforcement officials in 26 states and the District of Columbia — and — said that so far they knew of no credible allegations of fraudulent voting. Officials in another eight states said they knew of only one allegation. A few states reported somewhat larger numbers of fraud claims that were under review. Tennessee counted 40 credible allegations out of some 4. 3 million primary and general election votes. In Georgia, where more than 4. 1 million ballots were cast, officials said they had opened 25 inquiries into “suspicious voting or activity. ” But inquiries to all 50 states (every one but Kansas responded) found no states that reported indications of widespread fraud. And while additional allegations could surface as states wind up postelection reviews, their conclusions are unlikely to change significantly. The findings unambiguously debunk repeated statements by Donald J. Trump that millions of illegal voters backed his Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton. They also refute warnings by Republican governors in Maine and North Carolina that election results could not be trusted. And they underscore what researchers and scholars have said for years: Fraud by voters casting ballots illegally is a minuscule problem, but a potent political weapon. “The old notion that somehow there are all these impostors out there, people not eligible to vote that are voting — it’s a lie,” said Thomas E. Mann, a resident scholar at the Institute of Governmental Studies at the University of California, Berkeley. “But it’s what’s being used in the states now to impose increased qualifications and restrictions on voting. ” In a year that unfolded amid wild fraud claims, the reports from election officials were strikingly humdrum. “Nothing at all, really,” said Jim Tenuto, the assistant executive director of the Illinois State Board of Elections. “We only had one,” said Laura Strimple, Nebraska’s assistant secretary of state. “It hasn’t been confirmed. ” “We haven’t received any complaints to our office or any word of suspicious activity, and we would definitely hear it,” said Matt Roberts, the spokesman for Arizona’s secretary of state. Some state officials qualified their estimates, saying they had not yet reviewed all questionable ballots, or that voter fraud was a local matter that was usually — but not always — reported to them. Ohio officials declined to offer totals, saying they were still assessing complaints Pennsylvania and Mississippi officials said they did not track fraud cases. Many Republicans insist significant problems persist, and that much fraud goes undetected. The conservative Heritage Foundation has published online what it calls an incomplete list of voter fraud and other violations dating to 1982, roughly 450 cases involving both voters and public officials. Properly written, laws requiring voters to display IDs “could increase the fairness of the election process for everyone, regardless of party,” Hans von Spakovsky, the manager of the foundation’s Election Law Reform Initiative, said. advocates note that the current system caught those violations — and that the numbers, less than one per state per year — constitute a tiny sliver of the millions of votes cast in any election cycle. No one doubts that election fraud has occurred and needs to be monitored. Election outcomes have been changed by officials who altered vote tallies, and in theory hackers could pick winners by playing havoc with voter rolls, voting machines or electronic reporting networks. But voter fraud, in which someone deliberately casts an invalid ballot or a ballot under someone else’s name, is exceedingly rare. Its prevalence is at the heart of the debate on restrictions like voter ID. Critics say that cracking down on abuses that barely exist can cost hundreds of thousands of people or more — often the poor and minorities — their ability to vote. For example, a federal court in 2014 found that in Wisconsin an estimated 300, 000 voters who had already registered did not have any of the required IDs. Federal courts have altered or nullified the strictest laws, saying they suppress turnout among minorities, who are most likely to lack a required ID. This year has set new benchmarks for accusations about tainted elections. In Maine, Gov. Paul LePage, a Republican, this month certified state elections, in which Mrs. Clinton won, but refused to call the vote count accurate. (Maine’s secretary of state says no voter fraud was detected.) In North Carolina, Gov. Pat McCrory, also a Republican, charged that fraud in more than half the state’s 100 counties contributed to his defeat by the state attorney general, Roy Cooper. Mr. McCrory conceded on Dec. 6. But for three weeks before that, he and others repeatedly accused Democrats of concocting illegal absentee ballots and relying on votes by criminals, the dead and voters. The accusations proved largely spurious. Of more than 4. 7 million ballots cast, election officials uncovered 25 apparently invalid votes by felons whether they knew they were ineligible to vote is unclear. State and county election boards, all led by Republican majorities, threw out most of the remaining challenges. dead voters actually had died after casting early votes voters turned out to be people with similar or identical names. Mr. Trump falsely asserted on Twitter that he would have won the popular vote — Mrs. Clinton received some 2. 8 million more votes — “if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally. ” But even Republican leaders who once disavowed Mr. Trump’s fraud remarks have fallen silent. In October, the House speaker, Paul D. Ryan, countered Mr. Trump’s claims by noting through a spokeswoman that he was “fully confident” of an honest vote. Asked this month about Mr. Trump’s claim that Mrs. Clinton won the popular vote with illegal ballots, Mr. Ryan demurred. “I don’t know. I’m not really focused on these things,” he told CBS News’s “60 Minutes. ” Reince Priebus, the Republican National Committee chairman and Mr. Trump’s chief of staff, went further. “I don’t know that it’s not true,” he said on CBS’s “Face the Nation. ” “It’s possible. ” Bogus fraud claims are not new. “You call up and say there are busloads of people being dropped off in multiple parishes, and we have to check it out, even though we hear it every election,” said Meg Casper, the spokeswoman for Louisiana’s secretary of state. “We call up the precinct office and they say, ‘No, we haven’t seen anything like that. ’” Still, almost every election has some irregularities, including last month’s. In Walterboro, S. C. records showed that a woman cast an absentee ballot, but voted again on Election Day. “She indicated that she was concerned her absentee ballot wouldn’t count,” said Chris Whitmire, a spokesman for the State Election Commission. In North Dakota, said the deputy secretary of state, Jim Silrum, “one of our county auditors was called the day after the election by a voter who said: ‘Hey, my name is . I’m from Minnesota but I voted in the election and to do that I filled out an affidavit. Can you make me a Minnesotan again? ’” In New Hampshire, said Brian W. Buonamano, an assistant attorney general, officials are examining four to six unconfirmed complaints — “voting more than once, lying on your affidavit, things like that. ” In Kentucky, a voter hotline recorded 18 complaints of “general election fraud” upon investigation, none were deemed credible. In Idaho, a single voter was found to have cast another ballot in Oregon. In Delaware, “one voter voted absentee ballot in Suffolk County and then went to Kent County, changed his address, and voted again,” said Secretary of State Elaine Manlove. “First time that’s ever been reported to me. ” Colorado, where most residents vote by mail, has sequestered 20, 000 ballots for review — some lacking signatures or the ID that voters are required to mail in, most with signatures that don’t match those on file. But “we’re not saying there are 20, 000 cases of fraud,” said Lynn Bartels, a spokeswoman for Secretary of State Wayne W. Williams. Indeed, she said, a ballot cast by Mr. Williams’s daughter was once rejected because of a mismatched signature. Voting experts say the vast bulk of mismatches arise from handwriting changes or signatures poorly entered on touchpads. As for noncitizens casting invalid ballots, Mr. Trump was right: It did happen. Not millions of times, but at least once. Tennessee is still investigating one allegation of noncitizen voting. And in Oregon, an American citizen registered her noncitizen husband to vote, which he did — until he discovered it was illegal. The man reported his mistake to county election officials, the secretary of state’s office said. He asked that his ballot not be counted. | 1 |
I cannot possibly count how many times I have been sought out by some mom with an urgent, hard, particular shine in her eye who wants to know, needs to know, how and what I feed my children. As I am in fact a woman, a restaurant chef and a parent of two, it’s an understandable mistake. Let me disappoint straight away: My priority has never been having kids who eat it is about having kids who sleep. Nobody wants to get home from a restaurant job at 1:30 in the morning, stir themselves a medicinal, soporific negroni, shower off the greasy stink of a commercial kitchen and finally hit the pillow around 3 a. m. only to hear the cracking thunder of her alert and chipper darlings at 6:30 a. m. I decided I could tolerate all the Cheddar Goldfish and the years of plain buttered pasta as long as they slept till 11 a. m. I was also a little jumpy about making the dinner table some weird proxy outlet for ego trips or power trips. Once, on a summer vacation to Corsica, my mother forced one of my brothers to stay at the dinner table until he finished his plate of oily, slick ratatouille — a texture that made him gag — and in the end, he not only never ate it, but the struggle went on for a full 48 hours, escalating to such heights that the boy went missing the next day, was not found by dark, was not found by midnight and was only returned by the local gendarmes the following evening. I was anxious for him, and also for her. She was not equipped to make five different dinners for five different kids at their varying stages of a developing palate, nor to tolerate it. And I knew a guy who would bring his daughter to my restaurant all the time — dressed exclusively in black and black leggings — and incessantly advertise his suffocating pride at the fact that she “loved” the monkfish liver at Prune and the sea urchin at, as I recall, Le Bernardin. I know I was supposed to be impressed, but it made me squirm. I prefer the family dinner table to be pretty pleasant for everyone at it, including the and lonely parents who most often find themselves home solo — either by dint of divorce, single parenting or (one parent stays late at work while the other is tasked with getting home in time to feed the little people) — and who find themselves with only 20 or so urgent minutes to get the job done, not to mention a stubborn kid who won’t eat, well, ratatouille, for example. If you find yourself in the bland, boring, beige phase, when different textures cannot butt up against another on the same plate, or one speck of parsley can contaminate the whole dinner, I encourage you to find all the white foods you can actually love — cauliflower, chicken, fish, rice, apples, bread, eggs, banana — and go at them with deft ambidexterity: a plain piece of swordfish for those who will run away from home otherwise, and a lively piquant pan sauce — in this case lemony, capery piccata — for those who will drink themselves to an early death if they don’t have something adult and interesting at the table to eat. In other words, sauce, but at all times, on the side. Unless we are discussing real food scarcity or a diagnosed medical condition, I wish I had encouraged all those moms who have cornered me over the years to fix themselves a small bowl of something acidic and buttery and lively and herbaceous and drop it on the dinner table and take it a little easier over the and phases of their otherwise perfectly healthy kids. My kids did not die from too many meals of plain buttered pasta, or plain buttered chicken, or plain buttered swordfish, or plain buttered cauliflower. And they were not harmed by mercury or pesticides or hidden corn syrup because I always shopped right. They were not kids to brag about, necessarily, from a culinary perspective, nor were they easy to take to more ambitious friends’ houses or better restaurants for the longest time. I had to disappoint a lot of mothers along the way who thought I had the magic answer. But we’ve lately rounded the corner, as one likes sushi and they both like ramen and broccoli and one asks for hot sauce and creamed spinach while the other has started craving the tart brightness of lemon juice — affording me an experience I thought I had forsaken long ago, that of hearing the sound in the whole world: “Mama, I think this is the best swordfish you have ever made. ” Which is outranked only by the No. 1 greatest sound of all time: the stretch of silence of my champion sleepers. Recipe: Swordfish Piccata | 1 |
O’FALLON, Mo. — For much of the year, Democrats viewed Jason Kander as a perfect Senate candidate running in the wrong state. A charismatic former military intelligence officer and Missouri’s current secretary of state, Mr. Kander, 35, faced an entrenched Republican incumbent in a place where Donald J. Trump seemed destined to win. Then Mr. Kander released a television ad last month in which he put an assault rifle together blindfolded while reciting a script about gun rights, and started assailing his rival, Senator Roy D. Blunt, on his lobbyist ties. Suddenly, it was game on. Mr. Kander’s poll numbers soared. So did the panic among Republicans trying to save Mr. Blunt, and possibly their Senate majority. Mr. Kander’s ascent is the starkest demonstration of the volatile and at times confounding dynamics of the battle for control of the Senate, with at least six races in a statistical dead heat just over two weeks before Election Day. Surprisingly, Democrats have improved their chances in places like Missouri and North Carolina, where they seemed to have no shot just six months ago, while they have all but given up in Ohio and pulled their money out of Florida, where prospects had seemed bright. Republicans continue to cling to hope in New Hampshire, Nevada and Pennsylvania, despite what looks like faltering support for Mr. Trump in those states. In several cases, individual state dynamics, candidate quality and a spending spree have had as much to do with the shifting prospects as the top of the ticket. “With two weeks to go, control of the Senate is up for grabs,” said Nathan Gonzales, editor of The Rothenberg Gonzales Political Report. “If Republicans can break even in the tossup states, they have a chance to maintain control. But if the landscape shifts just a couple of points against Republican candidates, Democrats will capture the majority. ” In perhaps the oddest quirk of a decidedly erratic year, Mr. Kander may be benefiting from Mr. Trump’s message. Mr. Blunt, who has served in Congress since 1997 and whose family is chockablock with lobbyists, is the archetypal boogeyman Mr. Trump has attacked in his assault on Washington insiders. Mr. Kander often finds Trump and Clinton supporters at his campaign events — people who fight among themselves, he said, even as they share support for him. “There are people who will choose to vote for Donald Trump because they want to shake up that conversation,” Mr. Kander said in an interview in St. Louis. “They are not going to go to that next line on the ballot and vote for somebody who they know is exactly who Donald Trump is talking about. ” Until 2004, Missouri was an even more reliable presidential bellwether state than Ohio. But growing homogeneity outside its larger cities has made it more reliably Republican on the presidential level. Still, it remains a state where voters have a tendency to pick Democrats for other statewide offices. “The misconception about Missouri is that it is a red state,” said Ken Warren, a professor of political science at St. Louis University. “They don’t like Democrats at the top of the ticket because they are seen as from out of town. But most of our statewide offices are held by Democrats. ” It is a reality that Mr. Blunt seems to be just starting to confront, much to his party’s chagrin. “It’s a competitive race, like Missouri races usually are,” he said in an interview at the local Republican headquarters here, where he nibbled on a bagel grabbed off a buffet, the sort of campaign sustenance typical of the exhausting final weeks on the road. “I’m confident of where we are. But not overly confident. ” As of Mr. Blunt led Mr. Kander 46 percent to 44 percent, a drop since August. Democrats need to gain five seats to retake control of the Senate — four if Hillary Clinton wins the presidency, which would give Tim Kaine, her vice president, a tiebreaking vote. Both parties now, surprisingly, view Missouri as a crucial state in that battle. “I’m the 51st vote,” Mr. Blunt warned a small group of female Republican voters here on Thursday, casting himself as the critical piece of a majority. “If Mrs. Clinton gets elected, the last place to have an impact on the court is the Senate,” he said, referring to the United States Supreme Court. (It actually takes 60 votes to bring a Supreme Court nomination to the Senate floor.) In an extremely costly year for Senate races over all, Missouri has become the state, with $15 million in ads pouring into its race. Two weeks after Mr. Kander’s gun ad in September, political action committees and other outside groups dropped more than $8 million into the state on the two candidates, quadruple what they had spent in the previous two weeks, according to filings with the Federal Election Commission. Mr. Kander has benefited from being a sui generis blend: At once, he is a Democrat, a veteran, a lawyer who wears the outsider label, and the opponent of an incumbent who is the embodiment of Washington longevity. He has focused on trying to turn Mr. Blunt’s experience into a liability. He has also homed in on the senator’s tangled family ties. Mr. Blunt’s wife is a lobbyist, and his three adult children are registered lobbyists as well. Mr. Kander’s ads and those of outside groups have suggested, among other things, that Mr. Blunt took votes to enrich industries that his family represented. For his part, Mr. Blunt and those groups supporting him have tried to cast Mr. Kander, who was a state representative before becoming secretary of state in 2013, as a toady for Mrs. Clinton and President Obama, who are both unpopular here. One ad shows his face morphing into theirs with the tagline: “Fresh face. Same old liberal thinking. ” “Senator Blunt genuinely sees everything through the lens of partisan politics,” Mr. Kander said. (Actually, Mr. Blunt is widely viewed as a consummate in Congress.) Mr. Kander’s military service is a boost, too, in a state with many veterans. Mr. Blunt’s draft deferments have also come up during the campaign, and he recently brought in another Republican senator, Joni Ernst, who has served in the military, to support him at a veterans’ event. “ goes a long way here,” Professor Warren said. “Superpatriotism is a big thing in Missouri. ” Missouri’s contest is indicative of the circumstances in many Senate races. While Mr. Trump is weak in Pennsylvania, for instance, the incumbent, Senator Patrick J. Toomey, has managed to keep the race close by dint of his own record and a Democratic candidate who has been less exciting than her party anticipated. At the same time, in a battle over an open seat in Nevada, Mr. Trump has been a drag on the Republican candidate, United States Representative Joe Heck, not because Mr. Heck supports Mr. Trump but because his support for the Republican nominee has waned. “In most cases Trump is responsible” for Republican weaknesses, said Jennifer Duffy, senior editor for The Cook Political Report, “but there are quirky things going on. ” It is the sort of year that produces voters like Michael Brown, a Vietnam veteran and conservative Republican who came to a small discussion last week with Mr. Kander in Cape Girardeau. Mr. Brown will not vote for Mr. Trump, he said, but remains undecided about the Senate race. “This year is the toughest vote I’ve ever cast,” he said. | 1 |
The American Medical Association defines an “alcoholic” as someone who: Has a prolonged period of frequent, heavy alcohol use. Is unable to control drinking once it has begun. Has withdrawal symptoms when the individual stops using alcohol. Needs to use more and more alcohol to achieve the same effects. Has a variety of social and/or legal problems arising from alcohol use.
By that definition, Hillary Clinton is an alcoholic . Exhibit A
In an email to Hillary’s campaign chairman John Podesta on August 8, 2015, Director of Communications for Hillary’s campaign Jennifer Palmieri wrote, referring to Hillary:
“I think you should call her and sober her up some.”
Here’s a screenshot of the email released by WikiLeaks : Exhibit B
On Feb. 23, 2015, Hillary’s spokesman Nick Merrill sent an email (presumably to Hillary’s campaign staff) with the subject: “HRC Clips” (news clips on Hillary Rodham Clinton). The news clips that day included an article by Benjamin Bell for ABC News titled, “One Thing That Might Surprise You About Hillary Clinton,” which Merrill reproduced in its entirety in his email.
Bell’s article was an interview with New York Times national political reporter Amy Chozick, on whether Hillary Clinton would announce she’s running for the presidency. One of the questions Bell asked Chozick was: “Covering [Hillary] Clinton, what is one thing that has surprised you about her?”
Chozick answered:
“Hmm. She likes to drink. We were on the campaign trail in 2008 and the press thought she was just taking shots to pander to voters in Pennsylvania. Um, no.”
Here’s a composite screenshot of the relevant part of Merrill’s email, from WikiLeaks : Exhibit C
According to the National Enquirer , “top staffers” of Hillary’s campaign told the Enquirer “they even began this year’s presidential campaign by secretly planning a stint in rehab for Hillary.” But any rehab therapy “quickly failed amid the pressures of the campaign” and “the effort of making a deal over an FBI probe into her e-mail scandal”.
A source said, “The stress of her political career, the never-ending scandals and her worsening health plunged her into a life-threatening booze hell. She turned to drink to drown her fears. Hillary tries to hide her problem, like she lies about so many things.” A “close friend” of Hillary added, “ Hillary has been drinking heavily for years to forget her miserable marriage to serial cheater Bill. She’s also hit the bottle to cope with other stress, as well as the boredom of flying all over the world when she was Secretary of State.”
One “Hillary insider” told the Enquirer that Hillary “has blackouts and wakes up wondering where she is and what she has done ” and that “She’s not fit to be President”.
Certainly, Hillary must be drunk when she obscenely ground against the twerking black woman (see below) because no sane person in her then position as U.S. Secretary of State would behave like this in public.
~Eowyn
Dr. Eowyn’s post first appeared at Fellowship of the Minds | 0 |
Here are the week’s top stories, and a look ahead. 1. A reminder to start off: If you live in the U. S. Canada or Mexican cities along the U. S. border, make sure you’ve set your clocks and watches forward an hour. (Europe switches March 26.) As the change may affect your sleep routine in the coming nights, this quiz assessing what kind of sleeper you are can help you adjust. Or you can try these tips. _____ 2. The time change signals spring’s imminent arrival, but springlike weather has arrived more than three weeks earlier than usual in some parts of the U. S. Research shows a strong link to climate change. The new chief of the Environmental Protection Agency, Scott Pruitt, said carbon dioxide was not a primary contributor to global warming, contradicting the consensus scientific view on climate change. We also looked at President Trump’s conflicting views on the subject. _____ 3. Can Paul Ryan get to 218? That’s how many votes the House speaker will need to send the Republicans’ replacement plan for the Affordable Care Act to the Senate. Some rebellious members of the party say it will be “dead on arrival. ” Here’s our look at the causes of the revolt, our assessment that the bill would hurt supporters of Mr. Trump the most and a nonpartisan panel’s conclusion that it would give tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office’s official judgment on the plan’s cost and impact is expected Monday, and it could make or break the bill. _____ 4. The Trump administration unexpectedly ordered 46 holdover U. S. attorneys to quit. One, the powerful Manhattan prosecutor Preet Bharara, above, was fired after refusing to do so. Mr. Trump’s allies outside the government had been calling for the dismissal of appointees from President Barack Obama’s administration. Separately, Michael Flynn, Mr. Trump’s ousted national security adviser, acknowledged that he worked as a foreign agent last year representing the interests of the Turkish government in a dispute with the U. S. _____ 5. Celebrities are thought to be covered in figurative stardust, but it turns out there is a sprinkling of the real stuff around all of us. An international team concluded that space dust is found on buildings, parking lots, sidewalks and park benches. The team’s leader? A noted Norwegian jazz musician who became so fascinated by these micrometeorites that he refocused his life. _____ 6. In other science news, some of the alarm over the Zika virus is receding, more than a year after it was declared a global health emergency. But for families of Zika babies, like several we followed in Brazil’s impoverished northeast, the disastrous effects are only deepening. If you want to help those coping with Zika, here’s how. _____ 7. The ouster of South Korea’s president, being celebrated above in Seoul, is reshaping the geopolitical map of East Asia. Stability and North Korea’s recent missile tests will be high on the agenda as Secretary of State Rex Tillerson visits the region this week, with stops in Beijing, Seoul and Tokyo. But some global allies fear that the Trump presidency’s harsh language toward minorities, the news media, migrants and the European Union, as well as his praise for authoritarian leaders, is eroding Washington’s moral authority. Hawaii is suing to block Mr. Trump’s revised travel ban. _____ 8. The F. B. I. is hunting for the source who gave WikiLeaks a huge cache of documents revealing tools and techniques the C. I. A. uses to break into smartphones, computers and even smart TVs. The likeliest culprit is a disaffected insider. We have a handy guide for how to protect your devices from being breached. One scholar says the documents actually show that the C. I. A. finds encrypted communications apps very difficult to break into. Above, the agency’s headquarters in Langley, Va. _____ 9. The longest streak of job growth in U. S. history has continued into the first full month of Mr. Trump’s term. The Labor Department said the economy added 235, 000 jobs in February. U. S. stock indexes reacted positively, but declined over all for the week. Apprenticeship programs to train American workers will be a topic when Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and Mr. Trump meet on Tuesday. We investigated how many profitable Fortune 500 companies pay no taxes. Some even got rebates. _____ 10. Among our favorite features this week: The Times Magazine’s music issue, exploring which songs best capture our moment. You can listen to the tracks and enjoy a bonus podcast. And have you ever seen a pink lake or what looks like a piece of cosmic ravioli? _____ 11. The Jewish holiday of Purim began Saturday night, and Hindus are celebrating their spring festival of colors, Holi. The unofficial sports holiday — a. k. a. March Madness — begins today, with the selection of men’s and women’s college basketball teams in the N. C. A. A. tournament. Meanwhile, Russia’s centennial of its revolution will not be honored. _____ 12. The good news: Chance the Rapper contributed $1 million to Chicago’s public school system the cast of “Hamilton” donated their salaries from an evening performance to support women and an man who has collected paper and aluminum products for decades gave $400, 000 to a children’s home in Georgia. Also : the two children who interrupted their father during a TV interview, and the girl headed for the Scripps National Spelling Bee. Have a great week. _____ Photographs may appear out of order for some readers. Viewing this version of the briefing should help. Your Weekend Briefing is published Sundays at 6 a. m. Eastern. And don’t miss Your Morning Briefing, weekdays at 6 a. m. Eastern, and Your Evening Briefing, weeknights at 6 p. m. Eastern. Want to look back? Here’s Friday’s Evening Briefing. What did you like? What do you want to see here? Let us know at briefing@nytimes. com. | 1 |
Rep. Ro Khanna ( ) of Silicon Valley vows that he will go to jail to protest the presidency of Donald Trump as part of the “California Resistance” to the new administration. [In an interview with Randy Shandobil of the “This Golden State” podcast, Khanna, a American whose parents immigrated from India, referred to Gandhi’s campaign of civil disobedience against British rule in the subcontinent. “Resistance, for me, is something — I think of my grandfather. He spent four years in jail during Gandhi’s independence movement in the 1940s to fight for India’s freedom … Donald Trump, as much of a step backwards as that was, has a term … four years in a democracy is a far easier challenge than the one my grandfather had. ” Khanna served in the Obama administration before challenging Rep. Mike Honda ( ) in an unsuccessful bid for the Silicon Valley seat in 2014. He came back again in 2016 and won. Asked what Khanna would do if federal agents came to his district, the 17th district of California, looking for immigrants to deport, Khanna said he would risk arrest. “I think there is a point of civil disobedience. I hope it won’t come to that … if it came to a point where I thought there was a deep moral injustice, where they were rounding up folks who are going and living their lives, and have been in this country, and they’re splitting families, and there is moment of moral leadership needed, then I think I would. ” Khanna said that Democrats had managed to “resist” in 2004 when George W. Bush won and Republicans controlled Congress and proposed privatizing Social Security. The result, he proudly said, was that Rep. Nancy Pelosi ( ) had led Democrats to power in 2006. He praised Silicon Valley CEOs who had stood up for social issues in recent years, even if they had to seek common ground with the Trump administration on economic issues. Shandobil challenged Khanna, noting that he shared some common stances with Trump, including support for term limits, opposition to the Partnership, and reform of the visa system. (Shandobil also asked Khanna to react to some of Trump’s more controversial policies, erroneously claiming Trump wants to “register all Muslims. ”) Khanna said that his agreement with Trump on certain issues was coincidental and had nothing to do with supporting his presidency. “California has to be a laboratory for resistance,” Khanna said, citing the “innovative, progressive policies” of the state. He called Trump an “aberration” who did not have a mandate to change the country’s policies, because he did not win the popular vote. Khanna added that stopping Trump from deporting illegal immigrants would be his top priority. “There was no accommodation with British imperialism,” he said, referring to his grandfather’s activism. “Anything worth fighting for, whether it was the freedom movement in India, or the civil rights movement, it never accommodates with principles that are abhorrent. ” He said that Democrats should not resist everything Trump did just for the sake of resisting, but should oppose specific policies. He claimed that Republicans had done otherwise, opposing Obama even when they agreed with his policies. Joel B. Pollak is Senior at Breitbart News. He was named one of the “most influential” people in news media in 2016. His new book, See No Evil: 19 Hard Truths the Left Can’t Handle, is available from Regnery through Amazon. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak. | 0 |
DUBLIN — The Tobun family never missed a rental payment on their modest brick rowhouse in eight years. But in February, the couple, who have two young children, received a letter warning that they would have to leave their home when the lease expired. Forty of their neighbors got the same notice. When they went to investigate, the tenants, in the suburb of Tyrrelstown, discovered a trail that led all the way to Wall Street. After Europe was ravaged by a financial and economic crisis, the giant investment bank Goldman Sachs snapped up huge swaths of distressed debt in Ireland, including the loans of Tyrrelstown’s developer in 2014. The developer now wants out of the rental game and is selling the properties. As the owner of the loans, Goldman will reap a large portion of the proceeds. Goldman has nothing to do with the actions here. But because American banks have played such a large role in Europe’s housing recovery — and have made huge profits in the process — they have become the main target of a growing backlash among homeowners and renters. “Somehow, these funds have gotten involved in our community,” Funke Tobun said. “They’re profiting, but it’s the people who are being made to suffer. ” Wall Street has become the biggest new landlord in Europe, as American financial firms have swept into cities, suburbs and towns to take to advantage of the fallout from the worst economic downturn since World War II. In the last four years, Goldman Sachs, Cerberus Capital Management, Lone Star Funds, Blackstone Group and others from America have bought more than 223 billion euros’ worth of troubled real estate loans around Europe, nearly 80 percent of the total sold. The firms have made the usual calculation: buy distressed investments on the cheap during tough times, betting that the outlook will eventually turn and riches will follow. And the firms are paying little or no tax, by employing complex strategies that often involve subsidiaries with no operations or staff. The huge profits and dubious tax strategies have made Wall Street a major object of frustration and anger, as people grapple with evictions and higher mortgage payments. In some cases, the Wall Street firms are passive players, the money men behind the landlords, developers or banks that are exerting force. In other cases, they are direct participants taking action. Despite the controversy, the firms — and their purchases — have played a vital role in the cleanup of Europe’s mess. In places like Ireland and Spain, governments and banks for years fostered reckless, property booms. When the bubbles burst, the countries were saddled with bad loans and their economies faltered. Wall Street stepped in, buying mortgages on commercial properties, rental developments and even individual homes. The cash helped mend national finances, halt plunging property values and clean up banks’ books. “Investment by foreign capital has helped restart the system and accelerate the adjustment and recovery,” a spokesman for Goldman, Sebastian Howell, said. But the recovery has been uneven, leaving homeowners and renters with few options after they run into trouble. Homeowners who have fallen behind are being pressured to accept harsher terms that could tilt them toward foreclosure. Residents are being plied with fees that make it harder to stay in their properties. And even tenants who have not missed rental payments are being forced out at a time when rising property values make it difficult to find affordable housing. Whether or not Wall Street is directly involved, activists are invoking the firms to fire up the masses. “It’s important to remember that these funds are not mainstream banks or charities,” said David Hall, director of the Irish Mortgage Holders Organization, a nonprofit that helps troubled homeowners. “They sell to make profit and they exit. ” Protesters have occupied empty apartments in Barcelona whose mortgages had been bought by Blackstone, and rallied around tenants in Madrid who were served eviction recently by a subsidiary. In Ireland, homeowners seeking protection have demonstrated outside Parliament. The deals are now getting a second look. The Spanish authorities are putting in place protections for tenants and homeowners. The Irish finance minister introduced legislation in October to tighten oversight of Wall Street’s tax arrangements. In Tyrrelstown, tenants have asked the government to intervene, so they can remain in their homes. After receiving their lease termination notices, several families moved into a hostel. “They couldn’t stand the pressure,” Mrs. Tobun said. “They were scared of ending up homeless. ” For decades, Tyrrelstown was a blank slate on the northwestern edge of Dublin, acres of rolling fields with just a few homes dotting the landscape. When Ireland joined the euro currency union in 1999, it all changed. Foreign capital flooded the country, and the economy soared. With seemingly endless growth in this Celtic Tiger, banks made freewheeling loans to property developers like Rick and Michael Larkin, the brothers behind Twinlite, the developer that built Mrs. Tobun’s home. The brothers undertook one of Ireland’s most ambitious developments. More than 2, 000 homes were erected over vacant land that had at one point been targeted for a landfill. With three floors, modest kitchens and tidy backyards, the properties attracted teachers, police officers and other tenants to an increasingly multicultural enclave. By 2006, the Larkins had added a sprawling retail center to Tyrrelstown along with a $40 million luxury hotel, with 155 rooms, a fusion restaurant and an boardroom. At a ceremony, Bertie Ahern, then Ireland’s prime minister, promoted the construction as “a vote of confidence by its developers in the future of our economy. ” Similar developments sprouted up across the country. By 2006, bank lending for development had grown in Ireland to more than €95 billion, from €5. 5 billion in 1999. Construction comprised a quarter of the country’s economic activity. Then the global financial crisis struck in 2008, and the Irish economy began to crumble. Despite warning signs, the Larkins kept building, unveiling plans for a €100 million, indoor ski slope and center. As the crisis deepened, city planners rejected the project. Many developers and homeowners could not pay their loans, leaving banks saddled with huge portfolios of troubled debt. Banks began frantically looking for ways to reduce their loads, even trying to get rid of the loans of borrowers like Twinlite that had not fallen behind. The government helped accelerate the process, setting up the National Asset Management Agency to package and sell off bad loans, a role that was expanded after Ireland’s bailout in 2010. Wall Street firms saw opportunity, with loans selling at up to 70 percent off their face value. The firms bought nearly €100 billion worth of Irish distressed debt. Twinlite’s loans in Tyrrelstown were among those picked up in the frenzy by Beltany Property Finance, a Goldman affiliate. Twinlite said it opposed the sale and sued the issuing bank, unsuccessfully, to have it halted. After that, Tyrrelstown residents faced two options: buy their properties or lose their homes.. The County Council, to which Tyrrelstown residents had appealed for help, told Mrs. Tobun that a home loan might be available to purchase her property.. But Mrs. Tobun, who nets €1, 000 a month caring for older people, could not afford the €16, 000 down payment. Her husband, who drives a taxi, could expect to earn €40 on a shift, compared with almost €150 before the crisis. Her worst fear, Mrs. Tobun said, was that her family might wind up among the growing ranks of the homeless. Ireland is now enjoying a robust recovery. But growth has been fueled partly by financial maneuvering, and the real underlying gains are far from even. More than 5, 000 people have been left homeless by the crisis, with the government subsidizing many in shelters. Mrs. Tobun does not have many options. She does not want to move farther out, since it would mean changing schools for her son who has special needs. A nearby rental is too expensive. Rents in Ireland have risen around 20 percent since the crisis as home construction dried up after the bust. Still, the effort showed that her home and the others in Tyrrelstown were worth much more as empty sales properties than as rentals. In a statement, the Larkin family denied that Goldman’s subsidiary exerted pressure to end the leases or sell. The statement said a company wanted to exit the residential rental business, given regulatory changes and improving market conditions. For Tyrrelstown residents, the battles have been an ordeal. After receiving a notice in May, Gillian Murphy and her partner, Damien Moore, refused to move from the home they had rented for six years. One of their three children has autism, and switching schools would put him at the bottom of the list for programs elsewhere. Soon after the family received the notice terminating their lease, two men working for the entity arrived at their home and began taking pictures. “Everyone is petrified of these people because we don’t know who they are or what the purpose is,” Ms. Murphy said. Before last year, few people in Ireland had heard of Cerberus Capital. Like other Wall Street players, Cerberus came into the country quietly, creating a local subsidiary under a different name and setting up a complex and extensive web of interconnected businesses. There are the 13 subsidiaries in Dublin, all with Promontoria in their names. They have no employees and no offices. They are all registered to the same address on Grant’s Row, a letterbox near Parliament. Those subsidiaries, in turn, are subsidiaries of holding companies in the Netherlands, more than 110 of which had the Promontoria name. The structure has helped Cerberus profit in Ireland. Through the subsidiaries, Cerberus bought around €17 billion worth of loans on properties in Ireland and Britain in two years, for just under €6 billion euros. In Ireland alone, Cerberus has been earning hundreds of millions of euros in interest and other income. The setup, promoted by the Irish government along with other tax strategies, allows for a bit of tax magic that can make those profits seem to disappear. To buy the debt, Cerberus’s Dutch Promontoria companies lent Cerberus’s Irish Promontoria firms money at a high interest rate. The Irish businesses ended up paying roughly the same amount in interest that was earned on the real estate investments. Since the interest was deductible, Cerberus cut its tax bill drastically. One Irish subsidiary, Promontoria Eagle, which bought distressed loans in Northern Ireland and Britain, earned interest income in 2014 of 111 million British pounds on the deal, or around $140 million. After deducting interest charges and management and audit fees, taxable profit was only £7, 788. The resulting tax charge in Ireland: just £1, 947. Corporate filings for five other Irish subsidiaries of Cerberus, provided by DueDil, a corporate intelligence firm, show the same pattern: taxable profit and tax charges reduced to nearly identical numbers. Portfolios with up to £1 billion worth of loans wound up with tax charges of less than £2, 000. Other Wall Street firms employed a similar method. Beltany, the Goldman subsidiary, earned interest income of €44 million on debt portfolios in Ireland at the end of 2014. After lowering taxable profit to €1, 000, it netted a tax charge of €250, filings show. Lone Star collected interest income of more than $970 million at the end of 2014. Its taxable profit was just over $11 million, resulting in a tax charge of less than $1 million. “Wall Street firms have made a lot of profit from other people’s misfortunes, and on top of that they’ve systematically structured things so they pay almost no tax,” said James Stewart, a finance professor at Trinity College, Dublin. “So what’s their contribution to society?” Cerberus and Lone Star declined to comment. Goldman said that Beltany followed Irish law and that the interest it collected was subject to United States tax. On a warm summer day, 20 people crowded into a basement in central Dublin. The dimly lit room had recently been converted into makeshift headquarters for the Hub, a operation that enlisted volunteer accountants and lawyers to help people who were facing eviction. David Walsh, a former firefighter living in Ballybunion, on the west coast of Ireland, drove six hours to attend the meeting. Two years ago, Lone Star’s Irish affiliate had scooped up the mortgage on his family’s the Ballybunion BB, for a fraction of the original cost. He was angered that he had not been allowed to buy back his loan at the cheap price the fund received. Soon after, he said, the affiliate mounted an effort to increase his mortgage payments. In the crisis, his bookings had slumped badly, and his original bank had agreed to lower his monthly payments to €800 from €2, 000. “They phoned me every day of the week and at night saying we have to increase the payments,” Mr. Walsh said of the Lone Star affiliate. When the Hub’s lawyers questioned the legality of Lone Star’s ownership of his mortgage, Mr. Walsh diverted his loan payments into an escrow fund as a form of protest until the issue could be resolved. “The amount of harm being done to vulnerable people is immense,” he said. Mr. Walsh was threatened with foreclosure, which he continues to fight. A broader rebellion has barreled ahead in Spain, where Blackstone, Goldman and other American firms bought residential properties, including subsidized rentals. While rentals represent a small piece of their portfolios, the companies ignited a firestorm when they began evicting squatters, in an effort to improve property values. The activist group P. A. H. organized protests around Spain and outside Blackstone’s New York headquarters. Blackstone and Goldman said they had evicted just a small number of squatters and aimed to keep renters in the properties . Goldman said its policy was to help certain distressed tenants avoid eviction. The perceived invasion has prompted a political reassessment. Some Spanish regional authorities have passed laws intended to clamp down on Wall Street’s involvement. Catalonia now requires firms to offer cheap alternative housing to tenants. The local authorities can also buy back homes or expropriate them if they are left empty for three years. So popular was the movement that Ada Colau, its main leader, was elected mayor of Barcelona last year. “The opacity and distance of a fund that is based much farther away makes it a lot harder to hold it responsible,” she said. In Ireland, the Tyrrelstown episode has become a rallying cry. Housing advocates and lawmakers across the political spectrum are urging stricter oversight. Along with new legislation intended to close tax loopholes and restrict mass evictions, lawmakers are considering requiring banks and financial firms to follow a code of conduct and provide alternatives for troubled homeowners. But for Mrs. Tobun and other Tyrrelstown residents, such changes may offer little relief. Recently, she and her neighbors received word that their rents would rise sharply in the new year, after their current contracts expire. She said she and most of the 40 tenants affected would be unable to pay. The new rents will be closer to current market prices, but many residents suspect that the increase is a tactic being used to flush them out so the properties can be sold. In response, the Tyrrelstown community is planning another series of demonstrations. “This is a fight between David and Goliath,” Mrs. Tobun said. “They want us out by force. All we can do is protest. ” “We believe in miracles,” she added, “but I don’t know how we’re going to win. ” | 1 |
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Republicans in Congress and perhaps across the nation are suffering today from a case of buyers remorse after Trump begins back peddling on several of his campaign promises, before he even takes office.
Over the last few days, he backed off on his claim that he’ll repeal Obamacare by saying he’d just tweak it. He’s seemed to have changed his mind on prosecuting Hillary Clinton and he’s no longer talking about banning Muslims. While “drain the swamp,” which referred to Washington’s culture of corruption, was one of his later campaign slogans, he’s filling his cabinet posts with Washington insiders and corporate lobbyists. He’s even appearing to change his mind about his signature issue, the wall between the United States and Mexico .
One piece of Trump’s campaign rhetoric was actually something that would make people’s lives better and it’s something that Republicans are going to hate. His proposal for student loans is radical, in that it’s not a gift to Wall Street and it’s even more liberal than anything President Obama has proposed. In a rally just a month ago, Trump said about student loans:
“We would cap repayment for an affordable portion of the borrower’s income, 12.5 percent, we’d cap it. That gives you a lot to play with and a lot to do,” Trump said at a rally in Columbus, Ohio, on Thursday. “And if borrowers work hard and make their full payments for 15 years, we’ll let them get on with their lives. They just go ahead and they get on with their lives.”
“Students should not be asked to pay more on the debt than they can afford,” Trump said. “And the debt should not be an albatross around their necks for the rest of their lives.”
Source: Washington Post
Trump’s proposed debt forgiveness program is actually pretty similar to Obama’s . Instead of a 12.5 percent cap, Obama introduced a cap of 10 percent of a graduate’s income. Trump’s program, though, would leave graduates with five fewer years of debt. Trump’s would forgive debt after 15 years while Obama’s would forgive after 10. In that one significant way, Trump’s program is even more liberal than Obama’s and if he carries it out, Congressional Republicans may have no choice but to turn on their party’s President.
The American Enterprise Institute is a Washington think tank who issues a lot of the marching orders of Republicans. They were the driving force behind the Iraq war and of failed trickle down economics. This is what they have to say about student loan debt forgiveness:
“They are way off on their numbers,” said Jason Delisle, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank. “If you were going to give loan forgiveness in 15 years, you’re going to forgive a lot more debt than you’re going to make up for in the form of the higher payments they’re proposing, by a lot. I don’t even need to run the numbers. It’s so obvious.”
Really, it’s not obvious. Forgiving student debt would be a big boost to the economy because it would 1.) incentivize people to become more educated and 2.) put more money back into the economy because graduates would be free to buy more. Not that Republicans care about that, though. They prefer that graduates owe their lives to Wall Street banks and in turning his back on that, Trump is violating literally everything his party stands for. | 0 |
North Korea May Provide It’s Own Election Day Bombshell November 07, 2016 North Korea May Provide It's Own Election Day Bombshell
South Korea’s military is on high alert over concerns that North Korea will launch a missile as U.S. voters head to the polls on election day, reports Yonhap News Agency. Military officials suggest that the North may attempt another launch one of its Musudan intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM), a potential threat to U.S. forces in Guam. The American strategic assets stationed in Guam could be used to back up U.S. and South Korean troops on the Korean peninsula were the North to attack its southern neighbor. South Korea’s military noted that Pyongyang may want to present a show of force to demonstrate that it will continue its nuclear and ballistic missile programs despite pressure from the U.S. and the international community.
“Doing a major test would be a way of trying to intimidate the incoming president,” Victor Cha, senior adviser and Korea chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, previously told CNN, “North Korea chooses particular windows that they know will gain maximum attention from the world, and the US in particular.”
North Korea has historically attempted to stir up trouble around U.S. elections, CNN explained, citing a recent CSIS study on North Korea and its provocations.
“We are closely watching every move by the North Korean military at its Punggye-ri nuclear test site and other possible missile-launching sites. The military is fully prepared to respond to any provocative acts by the North,” an official from South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) revealed to reporters.
ROK JCS Chairman Gen. Lee Sun-jin told troops to arm themselves with a “fight tonight” spirit.
READ MORE: NORTH KOREA MOVING FASTER THAN EXPECTED ON MISSIBLE DEVELOPMENT
U.S. officials have also indicated that the North may attempt another missile launch prior to or during the election. It is unclear, however, whether the North is prepared to carry out such a test.
North Korea has conducted eight Musudan IRBM tests with only one success. The two most recent tests were failures which damaged some of the Korean People’s Army’s launch equipment.
“While there has been speculation of a North Korean satellite launch or nuclear test occurring during the run-up to the US Presidential election, the evidence from commercial satellite imagery of the Sohae Satellite Launching Station and the Punggye-ri nuclear test site suggests it’s possible but unlikely,” 38 North, a blog run by the U.S.-Korea Institute at SAIS, argued.
The U.S.-based think tank did, however, note that there has been some activity around the North Portal at the Punggye-ri nuclear test site and that North Korea could conduct a nuclear test on short notice.
Pyongyang has not made any public threats, but that does not preclude the possibility of an election day surprise from North Korea. Article by Doc Burkhart , Vice-President, General Manager and co-host of TRUNEWS with Rick Wiles Got a news tip? Email us at Help support the ministry of TRUNEWS with your one-time or monthly gift of financial support. DONATE NOW ! DOWNLOAD THE TRUNEWS MOBILE APP! CLICK HERE! Donate Today! Support TRUNEWS to help build a global news network that provides a credible source for world news
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In Milwaukee, I lived two lives. On the East Side was the liberal Catholic school I attended for nine years on the North Side was everything else. The North Side is where I grew up, more specifically, in the 53206 ZIP code, where 62 percent of adult males have spent time behind bars, among the highest rates in the nation. It’s not too far from the area you might have seen last weekend, with cars burning and police officers in riot gear. I was not surprised by the unrest that followed the death of a man who was shot by a black officer as he fled on foot a few miles from where I used to live. I can’t imagine that anyone in the area was, so long have we watched this darkness form. Like many others, I saw it coming. When I read about Ferguson and the racial divides in St. Louis County, Mo. I could only think of my hometown and my neighborhood, wondering when I’d see my house as a backdrop for YouTube footage of soldiers securing an American city. I heard the cries of anguished youth in Baltimore and wondered, in a dark moment, how they could dare to complain because we in Milwaukee had it worse. On the North Side that shaped me, there was a resentment, a reflexive skepticism that it took me awhile to understand as a son of Nigerian immigrants. But with experience, I got it. The only white people I saw in my neighborhood staffed the library. Parents tried to teach their children, in the most visceral ways they could imagine, to stay out of trouble. That’s the main objective of parenting in Milwaukee’s poorest ZIP code, in a city where the heart of the black middle class was paved over to build Interstate 94. The idea of working hard to get ahead within the system was seen as a fool’s game there, laughable. These days, scrolling the Facebook pages of people who live in Wisconsin’s suburbs, you will inevitably find some variant of this question: Why don’t they do more to better themselves? Many of the people asking are too young or lacking in curiosity to know the answer: The state, through a variety of racist policies — some of which John Eligon and Robert Gebeloff explore in their story about segregation in Milwaukee — trained a group of humans to believe that their very presence was resented, and that even if they built better lives for themselves, it might be paved over so that people from the suburbs could drive downtown. Like most people, many black parents on the North Side passed these feelings to their children. The narrative was different on the East Side. There I saw a practiced obliviousness among parents and children that I also did not fully understand. There we hoped to be doctors and lawyers, or in my case, a journalist. On many days, I felt as if I were being shuttled between two different cities, two different worlds. The cloistered shell of liberalism to the east and the infectious anger of the streets to the north never intersected, never touched. In the East, the future was expected. It was a birthright, a source of frenetic energy. In the North, reckoning was expected. It was inevitable, a source of pride and loathing. No matter your defenses, it would surely come, and punish the hopes that lie outside your black body. Memories of my East Side life are soft, a flood of inconsequential smiles and vague encouragements offered by people living protected lives. I attended school with kids too young to hear about what I had already experienced. Memories of my North Side life are sharp, like the screwdriver in my back when I wouldn’t let a boy “borrow” my bike. Like my mother’s words after the thief’s father pretended to call for him, then slammed the door because his son couldn’t be bothered. My North Side memories are also hot, like the summer, when the balance of power tilts irrevocably toward the ones who spend the most time in the streets, with the largest alliances. When those boys became men, they’d become crews. They’d have with the ones a few blocks over, and someone might die for the pride that began here. Life on the North Side was what mattered TODAY. It was my brother and I walking down the middle of a vacant street with baseball bats, looking for the one who beat up our little brother because he won a basketball game, and that was important TODAY. It was preteen girls begging teenage boys to come through the side door of some garage, because those teenagers were so buff, and they could finally have him, and he could take them, because that’s what mattered TODAY. It was when the police were called and your friend, who had a robber’s gun in his mouth, had his complaint dismissed because he was probably a drug dealer, and then you sat at the door holding knives all night to protect his family. It’s when the police tore apart an entire car in a search, because the passengers were dancing, leaving you on the curb, as cars drove by and people gawked — one more piece of your pride TODAY. My parents came from Nigeria to Milwaukee in 1985. They saw a land of opportunity. They had gone to college in Nigeria. Their families had always been allowed to pursue their dreams. Their hard work had always paid off. And mine did, too. I’m 29 years old. I am an editor for The New York Times. Does that make me more or less of a credible voice? In this national discussion about how we equalize opportunity in this Crow era, in all of the ways that matter right now, am I even black? Or are these questions just survivor’s guilt? Maybe it’s just pitiful angst that has no answer and doesn’t need any. Or maybe the angst can lead to answers. Before I started writing this essay, I spoke to Mandela Barnes, a state legislator who represents a district in Northwest Milwaukee, about the city and the violence. I imagined a teenager on the North Side, politically active, moderate in many ways, dedicated to helping our people. Someone maybe like me, trying to figure out how to do something that would address all the injustice. Considering the minimal loss of life from the week’s unrest, and the relatively contained property damage, what do you say to a kid who says “this worked, attention is now being paid to our situation, and my friends in other cities should do the same thing?” I asked him: How can you convince that teenager to take a different path when his or her friends are riding a pipeline to prison? “As frustrating as things can be, you never want to destroy your own,” Mr. Barnes said. “Literally burning up your own home is not the route. There are other ways to make your voice heard. ” Honestly, I have my doubts. They are new, and I am nearly consumed by them. Maybe that’s just the North Side of me. Or maybe that’s just me. | 1 |
Hillary To Be Indicted After Election: Trump Responds To FBI Investigation Clinton scrambles following FBI announcement on new email evidence Infowars.com - October 28, 2016 Comments
Alex Jones breaks down the FBI’s Friday announcement on the reopening of the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private email server as new evidence surfaces.
The new data was reportedly uncovered during a separate investigation into Anthony Weiner – the husband of Clinton ally Huma Abedin.
FBI Director James Comey cited “recent developments” for the bureau’s decision in a letter to committees and lawmakers today.
“In previous congressional testimony, I referred to the fact that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) had completed its investigation of former Secretary Clinton’s personal email server. Due to recent developments, I am writing to supplement my previous testimony,” Comey wrote.
“In connection with an unrelated case, the FBI has learned of the existence of emails that appear to be pertinent to the investigation. I am writing to inform you that the investigative team briefed me on this yesterday, and I agreed that the FBI should take appropriate investigative steps designed to allow investigators to review these emails to determine whether they contain classified information, as well as to assess their importance to our investigation.”
These new revelations could undoubtedly spell trouble for Clinton as Trump has vowed to fully investigate her actions upon winning the election. NEWSLETTER SIGN UP Get the latest breaking news & specials from Alex Jones and the Infowars Crew. Related Articles | 0 |
Clinton Cash, the groundbreaking documentary film exposing the Clinton Foundation’s global corruption, has been viewed more than 2 million times in the opening week of its global online premiere. [Views of the film on Breitbart News’ YouTube channel and the Philly Blunt pirated YouTube version have exceeded a combined viewer count of more than 2 million views however, that number doesn’t include an accounting of those who’ve watch the recently released director’s cut of the film, attended watch parties, watched the film during its debut over the weekend on One America News Network, or viewed it via myriad other pirated formats. Initial reaction to Clinton Cash was overwhelming, with more than 170, 000 viewers watching the film within the first three hours of it’s worldwide release. The film, directed by M. A. Taylor and written and produced by Breitbart News Executive Chairman Stephen K. Bannon, was promoted — and praised — by both sides of the political spectrum. Indeed, for the first three days of the Democratic Party’s coronation of Hillary Clinton as their presidential nominee, Clinton Cash was sitting atop Facebook’s trending topics list. Much of the viral online explosion of the Clinton Cash documentary was the result of Bernie Sanders supporters, who flocked to their respective Facebook accounts and urged their followers and fans to watch and share the groundbreaking movie. The film is based on the explosive New York Times bestselling book Clinton Cash, authored by Government Accountability Institute President and Breitbart Senior Peter Schweizer, which first exposed the speaking fees to Bill Clinton and donations to the Clinton Foundation from foreign contributors, which coincided with favors for those closest to the Clintons and their foundation donors while Hillary Clinton served as Secretary of State. The paperback version of Clinton Cash was released on Tuesday, July 26. Next month, on August 8, the Clinton Cash graphic novel will be available for audiences everywhere and is sure to capture the imagination of millennial audiences for generations to come. You can the graphic novel here. Follow Jerome Hudson on Twitter: @jeromeehudson | 0 |
B y BAR executive editor Glen Ford B arack Obama tried to woo Republicans into a “Grand Bargain” that would have gutted Social Security. Bill Clinton let loose the banks. But Donald Trump’s destruction of the Republican Party will allow Hillary Clinton to “gather the whole of the ruling class under the same party banner, in one Big Tent, where the grandest of bargains can be conceived and achieved without crossing an aisle.” The rich are about to get their best deal yet. “The exodus from the GOP has suddenly transformed the Democratic Party into the primary political instrument of the ruling class.” When Donald Trump took a wrecking ball to the Republican Party he provided the unexpected catalyst for completion of the corporate project begun by Bill Clinton, Al Gore and other white Democrats in the 1980s, with the founding of the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC). To counter relentless attrition of whites to the GOP in their home states, these beleaguered, mostly southern Democrats sought national corporate funding to turn their party decisively to the right. They reckoned, correctly, that a steady stream of corporate capital would allow them to control the new wave of Black voters and politicians that had been mobilized by Rev. Jesse Jackson’s two presidential campaigns, while strengthening the hand of the South in national Democratic Party calculations. Bill Clinton became the first DLC president in 1992, and moved swiftly and methodically to narrow the ideological differences between the duopoly parties. He completed much of Ronald Reagan’s agenda, claiming it as his own; destroyed welfare “as we knew it”; vastly expanded the mass Black Incarceration regime; pushed NAFTA through Congress over the objections of majorities in his own party; engineered the corporate monopolization of broadcast media; and removed the last safety straps from Wall Street banks. “Clinton arranged the deployment of thousands of foreign jihadists to Bosnia and Kosovo.” In foreign affairs, Clinton initiated what was to become the doctrine of “humanitarian” military intervention, dismantling and partially occupying the socialist nation of Yugoslavia. In the process, Clinton arranged the deployment of thousands of foreign jihadists to Bosnia and Kosovo, thus keeping operational the network created by the U.S., Saudi Arabia and Pakistan during the previous decade in Afghanistan. In Africa, Clinton conspired with Uganda and exiled Tutsi rebels to overthrow the Hutu majority government in Rwanda, setting off a bloodbath in 1994, followed two years later by an invasion of Congo that has killed more than six million people — and still counting. Barack Obama was the second DLC president (although he lies [3] about his membership). He, too, moved with unseemly haste to reach a “Grand Bargain” with the GOP — not of necessity, since he had won a huge electoral mandate with the overwhelming financial backing of Wall Street, but as a matter of ideological principle. In January of 2009, before even taking the oath of office, Obama told the editorial boards of the New York Times and the Washington Post that all “entitlements,” including Medicare and Social Security, would be “ on the table [4] ” for cutting in his administration. Obama’s first project, now considered the centerpiece of his legacy, was to resurrect the rightwing Heritage Foundation’s corporate health insurance scheme, adopted by Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole in 1996, and made into state law by Republican Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, in 2006. Obama’s Affordable Care Act was, literally, written by lobbyists for the insurance and drug industries, and is now collapsing like a poorly constructed house at the end of its mortgage. “For the better part of two years Obama debased himself, all but begging the Republicans to consummate his ‘Grand Bargain.’” With the Democratic majority in Congress in no mood to tamper with Social Security and Medicare, Obama tried to maneuver the targeted entitlements into a financial crisis trap. He named two dependable reactionaries, Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles, as co-chairmen of his National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility, also called the Commission on Deficit Reduction. They dutifully recommended $4 trillion in budget cuts, mostly to social programs, including cuts to Social Security. Although the full commission did not endorse the chairs’ recommendations, and the Congress failed to pass bills modeled on the document, Obama used the Simpson-Bowles formula as a basis for negotiating what he hoped would be a “bipartisan” (GOP plus Obama and a minority of Democrats) massacre of entitlements. For the better part of two years Obama debased himself, all but begging the Republicans to consummate his “Grand Bargain.” Congressional Black Caucus chairman Emanuel Cleaver, of Kansas City, called the deal a “ Satan’s Sandwich [5] ,” but Obama continued to pursue a political marriage made in hell until the 2012 reelection campaign clock called a halt to the spectacle. “A de facto super-party of the bourgeoisie.” The quest for a Grand Bargain was Barack Obama’s failed attempt to best Bill Clinton in erasing the distinctions between the two major parties – to create a de facto super-party of the bourgeoisie. It was the Republicans who ran away from the altar. And the Democrats did eat much of the Satan’s Sandwich, through sequestration and austerity that ravaged social programs by other means. Why did the Republicans reject the deal? Although both halves of the duopoly ultimately answer to Wall Street, the Republicans, like any other party, have an institutional interest in winning office. It is true that Obama had crafted a deal that any Republican would love, but it was still his deal, and he planned to run for reelection as an historical dealmaker. Probably just as importantly, the Republican Party is the White Man’s party, meaning, white supremacy is its organizing principle, central to its identity among much of the masses. To embrace Obama, no matter how advantageous to their big business patrons, was a hug too far for the GOP. Racism doomed the Grand Bargain – Hallelujah! A New, Bigger Bargain Recently released Wikileaks emails reveal Hillary Clinton speaking to bankers at Morgan Stanley in 2013, a year after the debacle. “The Simpson-Bowles framework and the big elements of it were right,” she said. Thanks to Donald Trump’s demolition of the Republican Party, the conditions have been created for Hillary Clinton, as DLC President #3, to achieve what #1 and #2 could not: gather the whole of the ruling class under the same party banner, in one Big Tent, where the grandest of bargains can be conceived and achieved without crossing an aisle. With most of the ruling class and its attendants having vacated the building, the Republican Party has been reduced to Donald Trump and his “deplorables,” as Hillary calls them. Trump’s opposition to corporate trade deals violated the Holy Grail against prohibiting capitalists from moving money and jobs around the world as they see fit, and his reluctance to support regime change as an inherent right of American exceptionalism has frightened and outraged the military industrial complex, the national security establishment, and all sectors dependent on the maintenance of empire. “An inherently unstable arrangement.” Clinton’s Big Tent is not a temporary, election season dwelling. It is how she plans to govern. The exodus from the GOP has suddenly transformed the Democratic Party into the primary political instrument of the ruling class, while at the same time the party nominally represents most of the folks who are abused and misused by that ruling class. It is an inherently unstable arrangement, and will soon be wracked by splits, as a post-Trump GOP attempts to lure its fat cats back and the darker and poorer constituencies consigned to the latrine area of Hillary’s high class tent break to the Left for air. But in the interim, Clinton will have a unique opportunity to cut grand austerity deals with all the “big elements” of Simpson-Bowles, to renege on her corporate trade promises, and to wage war with great gusto in the name of a “united” country. Ever since the Democratic National Convention it has been clear that the Clintonites are encouraged to consider everyone outside of their grand circle to be suspect, subversive, or depraved. Their inclusive rhetoric is really an invocation of a ruling class consensus, now that Trump has supposedly brought the ruling class together under one banner. In Hillary’s tent, the boardrooms are always in session. Source URL: http://blackagendareport.com/hillary_big_tent_grand_bargain | 1 |
Mariah Carey suffered through a performance train wreck in Times Square on New Year’s Eve as malfunctions left her at a loss vocally during her hit song “Emotions,” struggling to reach notes and to sync the lyrics and music. The trouble continued when she gave up on another of her numbers, “We Belong Together,” while a recording of the song continued to play, a confirmation that she had been . But on Sunday, a dispute erupted between Ms. Carey’s representatives and producers of ABC’s “Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve With Ryan Seacrest,” on which the singer was performing. Ms. Carey’s manager, Stella Bulochnikov, charged that the show’s producers had been aware of technical problems but did not fix them — and chose to continue showing Ms. Carey’s messy performance “to get ratings. ” “I will never know the truth, but I do know that we told them three times that her mike pack was not working and it was a disastrous production,” Ms. Bulochnikov told Us Weekly magazine on Sunday. “I’m certainly not calling the F. B. I. to investigate. It is what it is: New Year’s Eve in Times Square. Mariah did them a favor. She was the biggest star there, and they did not have their” act together. Dick Clark Productions, which produced the show, issued a statement on Sunday night saying that Ms. Carey’s performance woes had nothing to do with the production, and that any suggestion that the company “would ever intentionally compromise the success of any artist is defamatory, outrageous and frankly absurd. ” “In very rare instances, there are of course technical errors that can occur with live television,” the statement said, adding that an initial investigation suggested that the production company “had no involvement in the challenges associated with Ms. Carey’s New Year’s Eve performance. ” A veteran audio producer, Robert Goldstein of Maryland Sound International, a company that has worked on the Times Square event for years, also said in an email that there had been no malfunctions with the sound equipment he oversaw. “Every monitor and device worked perfectly,” Mr. Goldstein said. “ I can’t comment beyond that and don’t know what her nontechnical issue may have been. ” A spokeswoman for Ms. Carey said on Sunday that the singer was not at fault for her performance. “Unfortunately there was nothing she could do to continue with the performance given the circumstances,” the spokeswoman, Nicole Perna, told The Associated Press. It was a rare meltdown on national television by one of the recording artists of all time. Ms. Carey, a pop phenomenon in the 1990s who won five Grammys out of 34 nominations over the years, was the final act on ABC’s “Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve With Ryan Seacrest. ” She had just finished “Auld Lang Syne” when her star turn began to spiral out of control. “We can’t hear,” she said in the opening seconds of “Emotions” after she sashayed down the stage before more than one million people who had gathered to watch the ball drop in Manhattan. Standing still with her left hand on her hip while music played, Ms. Carey told the audience that there had not been a proper sound check before her performance. Then she said, “We’ll just sing,” and noted proudly of her song, “It went to No. 1. ” But she could not manage the notes that followed, and she either forgot lyrics or did not want to deliver a subpar performance. “We’re missing some of these vocals, but it is what it is,” she said. “Let the audience sing. ” ABC quickly cut to shots of the Times Square crowd as Ms. Carey tried to perform some of her choreography. She continued suggesting fixes from the stage, and at one point seemed to defend herself. “I’m trying to be a good sport here,” she said. When the number ended, the crowd cheered her on. “That was — ” she said, pausing for effect, “amazing. ” She seemed to recover at first with “We Belong Together,” but there appeared to be another malfunction, and Ms. Carey again stopped singing. But this time, the prerecorded number kept playing. “It just don’t get any better,” she said, and then left the stage. The cause of the problem was not immediately clear. After the performance, Ms. Carey posted a mildly profane slang phrase on Twitter with an “upset” emoji, then wrote: “Have a happy and healthy new year everybody! Here’s to making more headlines in 2017. ” An ABC spokesman said on Sunday that the network would not comment on the problems with Ms. Carey’s performance. | 1 |
Thanks to WikiLeaks, we now have direct email evidence of the collusion between the MSM and Hillary Clinton. | 0 |
The United States Justice Department has opened an investigation into doping by dozens of Russia’s top athletes, two people familiar with the case said Tuesday. The inquiry escalates what has been a roiling sports controversy into a federal criminal case involving foreign officials. The United States attorney’s office for the Eastern District of New York is scrutinizing Russian government officials, athletes, coaches, antidoping authorities and anyone who might have benefited unfairly from a doping regimen, according to the people, who did not have authorization to speak about the inquiry publicly. Prosecutors are believed to be pursuing conspiracy and fraud charges. Federal courts have allowed prosecutors to bring cases against foreigners living abroad if there is some connection to the United States. That connection can be limited, such as the use of an American bank. A report published by the World Agency in November accused Russia of systematic doping. The chemist identified as a linchpin in that operation — Grigory Rodchenkov, the longtime head of Russia’s antidoping laboratory — told The New York Times this month that he worked for years, at the direction of the Russian government, to help the country’s athletes use banned, substances in global competition and go undetected. Dr. Rodchenkov is among the people under scrutiny by the United States government, said one of the two people with direct knowledge of the case. Russian officials have responded to the accusations with both defiance and contrition. While often emphatically dismissing the claims as a Western conspiracy intended to discredit Russia, they have sometimes struck a more conciliatory tone, perhaps seeking to win the favor of sports officials in control of their country’s ability to compete in the coming Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. The Russian Sports Ministry acknowledged doping problems in a statement last week after Dr. Rodchenkov’s claims were published in The Times. It did not specify what those problems were. Then, writing in The Sunday Times, a British newspaper, the Russian sports minister, Vitaly Mutko, said that Russian officials, coaches and athletes had made “serious mistakes,” but he stopped short of outlining them or admitting to any state involvement. In their inquiry, United States prosecutors are expected to scrutinize anyone who might have facilitated unclean competition in the United States or used the United States banking system to conduct a doping program. Elite Russian athletes have competed in several major sporting events in the United States, like the Boston Marathon and international bobsled and skeleton championships in Lake Placid, N. Y. The inquiry, which originated with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, would have to clear several hurdles before charges could be filed. Even if prosecutors are able to establish jurisdiction, securing the cooperation of Russian authorities in pursuing evidence and witnesses — and in ultimately delivering any charged defendants to the United States — would be all but impossible. It is rare for the United States government to take on sports doping cases. In February 2012, the United States attorney in Los Angeles, André Birotte Jr. dropped a criminal investigation into Lance Armstrong and his Postal Service cycling team that had explored whether Mr. Armstrong and others defrauded sponsors by operating a doping program. The United States Agency, not a government entity, pursued the case. Mr. Armstrong was ultimately stripped of his seven Tour de France titles and barred from cycling for life for what Usada called “the most sophisticated, professionalized and successful doping program that sport has ever seen. ” But prosecutors for the Eastern District in Brooklyn have taken on sports corruption cases before. For several years, the office has been investigating corruption within FIFA, world soccer’s governing body. That case, announced last May, has so far resulted in charges against 40 soccer officials and business executives, as well as two corporations. More than a third have pleaded guilty. Highly international in scope, the FIFA case has implicated people of two dozen nationalities, and it has required the cooperation of various foreign authorities — especially the Swiss — in making arrests, ruling on extradition requests and sharing information about bank transactions. While the Eastern District’s FIFA investigation and Russian doping investigation are independent inquiries, there is an overlap between the two matters. Prosecutors from the business and securities fraud section and the organized crime division are involved in both, and certain public figures have overlapping ties to Russian sports and global soccer. Mr. Mutko, Russia’s minister of sport, is a member of FIFA’s ruling council, a position he has held since 2009. He was appointed in 2008 to his current role in Russian government by President Vladimir V. Putin. In his account to The Times, Dr. Rodchenkov, who oversaw Russia’s antidoping lab in Moscow for a decade, said he often took direct orders from Mr. Mutko’s deputy, Yuri Nagornykh, especially leading up to the Sochi Olympics in 2014. In Sochi, Dr. Rodchenkov said, he staged an elaborate operation to destroy Russian athletes’ tainted urine samples on orders from the government. In a news conference last Friday, Mr. Nagornykh disputed Dr. Rodchenkov’s claims. “There’s no doping program in Russian sport,” he said. “There was none and will be none. ” In the wake of the report last fall, which cast shadows on not just the Moscow laboratory but also Russia’s antidoping agency, Dr. Rodchenkov said that Mr. Mutko had summoned him to the sports ministry’s headquarters and requested his resignation. Dr. Rodchenkov fled to the United States, fearing for his safety, he said. Bradley D. Simon, a criminal defense lawyer of Simon and Partners in New York, confirmed that he was representing Dr. Rodchenkov but declined to comment on the Justice Department investigation. Currently living in Los Angeles, Dr. Rodchenkov, 57, has said he has no intention of returning to Russia. “I have no choice,” he said in a recent interview. “I am between two flames. ” | 1 |
The man in American politics and one of the political mentors of President Donald Trump told Breitbart News Monday the president needs to stay focused on his program in his first address to a joint session of Congress. [“He needs to stick to the agenda,” said Roger Stone, who was one of the first advisers to join Trump’s campaign and remains one of his closest confidantes. “Avoid with his critics — just stick to the agenda — and make at least one good reference to fake news,” Stone said. Less than two months in, Stone said he is impressed by Trump’s performance in the White House. “I think he is doing great. ” Stone spoke to Breitbart News at a book signing for his latest work: The Making of the President 2016: How Donald Trump Orchestrated a Revolution at Washington’s Hotel. The diverse crowd of men of influence, conservative operatives, and Capitol Hill staffers was a pretty strong signal that it is very important in Washington that Stone knows you bought his book. The event was organized by David Urban, the man who led Trump’s campaign in Pennsylvania. “Roger’s always been on the cutting edge,” Urban said. “He is always the guy you want on your team and I think the president was glad to have him on the team this year. ” Standing under a portrait of Lincoln’s trusted aide and biographer John Hay, Stone told the crowd that one of the insights in his book about the 2016 campaign is its similarity to the 1948 race between Republican New York Gov. Thomas Dewey and President Harry Truman. “The more I thought about it, Hillary Clinton is really Tom Dewey without the mustache: Cold, aloof, overconfident,” he said. “While Trump is barnstorming Democratic strongholds in Michigan and Wisconsin and Western Pennsylvania — Hillary’s in Chappaqua in her pajamas looking at the swatches to pick out fabric for her Oval Office curtains,” he said. Like Truman, Trump is a closer, he said. “Donald Trump is the greatest closer in American politics,” he said. “It was really a Herculean, superhuman effort. He drove himself — largely without sleep — on the basis of good data that said we could expand the map, we could win Michigan, we could win Wisconsin, we could win Pennsylvania and thus elect a man that I believe is destined to be one of our greatest presidents. ” Stone, who was a White House aide to President Richard Nixon and later introduced Nixon to Trump, told Breitbart News: “Both Nixon and Trump have obvious advantages and nobody is perfect, everyone has a flaw, but in terms of his intelligence, in terms of his speaking out for people who have been forgotten within our system, in terms of his executive ability, and in terms of his toughness and his pragmatism — n all those ways he is like Nixon. ” Like Nixon, Trump is going to figure how to deal with the Washington and Republican establishments. “I did look at a White House staff list yesterday and I had to stop myself — I actually recognized a name,” he said. “His greatest danger is not from the liberal Democrats. It’s from establishment Republicans, who like the status quo and might seek to undermine his program — unless of course, they determine that their program is so popular that they better get on board quick and claim they were for it the whole time. ” | 0 |
RAGING INFERNO: Tens Of Thousands Evacuated As Officials Suspect Arson In Wildfires Spreading Across Israel On Wednesday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attributed the fires to "natural and unnatural" causes and some Israeli officials referred to an "arson intifada", a reference to previous Palestinian uprisings against Israel. 24, 2016 Tens of thousands of residents were ordered to leave Israel’s third largest city on Thursday as wildfires tore across central and northern Israel, and the country’s chief of police said politically motivated arson may be behind some of the blazes. Television pictures in Israel today showed a wall of flames raging through central neighborhoods of Haifa , a city of around 300,000 in the north of the country, engulfing a petrol station that firefighters were rapidly dousing with water. The fires have been burning in multiple locations for the past three days but intensified on Thursday, fueled by unseasonably dry weather and strong easterly winds. Education Minister Naftali Bennett, the leader of a far-right party, said whoever set the fires could not have been Jewish, hinting Arabs or Palestinians were behind them. Police gave no indication of who was to blame but did say they had reason to believe arson was responsible in some cases. Wildfires burning in Haifa, Israel: “There was arson and a lot of non-arson,” Police Chief Roni Alsheich told reporters. “It’s likely that where it was arson, it goes in the direction of nationalistic,” he said, suggesting a political motive, before adding: “I don’t want to disturb the investigation.” He said there had been some arrests but gave no details. On social media, some Arabs and Palestinians celebrated the fires and the hashtag #Israelisburning was trending. On Wednesday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attributed the fires to “natural and unnatural” causes and some Israeli officials referred to an “arson intifada”, a reference to previous Palestinian uprisings against Israel. With fires burning in the forests west of Jerusalem, around Haifa, on central and northern hilltops and in parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank, the government sought assistance from neighboring countries to tackle the conflagration. Israel Wildfires Burning Out Of Control: Greece, Cyprus, Croatia, Turkey and Russia offered help, with several aircraft already joining efforts to quell the blaze, dropping fire-retardant material to try to douse the heaviest fires and stem their spread. A thick haze of smoke hung over Haifa, which rises up from the Mediterranean Sea overlooking a large port. Schools and universities were evacuated, and two nearby prisons transferred inmates to other jails, a prisons service spokesman said. Patients were moved out of a geriatric hospital. A lack of rain combined with very dry air and strong easterly winds have spread the fires this week across the center and north of the country, as well as parts of the West Bank. Hundreds of homes have been damaged or destroyed but no deaths or serious injuries have been reported. Bennett, the leader of the Jewish Home party which supports settlements in the West Bank where Palestinians seek statehood, said on Twitter that arsonists were disloyal to Israel, hinting that those who set the fires could not be Jewish. “Only those to whom the country does not belong are capable of burning it,” he said in a tweet in Hebrew. Haifa’s mayor said he feared for the city and called on residents with water sprinklers to turn them on to help keep the flames at bay. Those leaving their homes were urged to go to sports stadiums and other safer locations. “Each neighborhood is situated among forests and while we are proud of this, at the moment it is a problem,” Yona Yahav told Israel’s Channel 2. “There are some four major fire locations at the moment.” משתתף עכשיו בהערכת מצב עם הכוחות בשטח בחפ״ק בחיפה pic.twitter.com/So4BdYBRB6
— Benjamin Netanyahu (@netanyahu) November 24, 2016 Highway 443 , which links Jerusalem and Tel Aviv as it cuts through a southern flank of the West Bank, was temporarily closed to morning rush-hour traffic as flames reached the city of Modi’in, about half way between the two conurbations. Local weather forecasters have said the tinder-dry conditions – it has not rained in parts of Israel for months – and strong winds are set to continue for several days and they see little prospect of normal seasonal precipitation arriving. “Meteorology is not responsible but it is conducive to the spread of these fires,” said Noah Wolfson, the chief executive of weather forecasting company Meteo-Tech. “The atmosphere will remain very dry, at least until Monday or Tuesday.” source SHARE THIS ARTICLE Geoffrey Grider NTEB is run by end times author and editor-in-chief Geoffrey Grider. Geoffrey runs a successful web design company, and is a full-time minister of the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. In addition to running NOW THE END BEGINS, he has a dynamic street preaching outreach and tract ministry team in Saint Augustine, FL. NTEB #TRENDING | 1 |
The largest school district in Canada has canceled all future trips to the U. S. A. over fears that some of its students may be impacted by President Donald Trump’s travel order putting a temporary moratorium on travel from a list of countries. [The Toronto School District announced its new policy on March 23 saying that no student or staff trips would be planned for the U. S. until further notice, according to The Washington Post. School officials made the decision despite the fact that Canada is not on the list of seven countries identified by President Obama’s administration and as adopted by the Trump administration as dangerous due to rampant terrorism and deeply entrenched terror networks. “We strongly believe that our students should not be placed into these situations of potentially being turned away at the border,” Toronto School District Director of Education John Malloy said in a statement released on Thursday. The district did allow that all the trips already planned will go ahead as intended, but that future trips are on hold. “We do not make this decision lightly, but given the uncertainty of these new travel restrictions and when they may come into effect, if at all, we strongly believe that our students should not be placed into these situations of potentially being turned away at the border,” the statement reads. “The TDSB remains committed to ensuring that fairness, equity, and inclusion are essential principles of our school system and are integrated into all our policies, programs, operations, and practices, including school trips. ” The district also warned that if any student’s identification is questioned at the U. S. border, the trip will be canceled on the spot and all students will be taken back home. “Rest assured, we will continue to monitor this situation very closely and should we receive additional information or clarification with regards to what students could expect at the U. S. border, we may revisit these decisions,” the statement concludes. “However, based on all the information we currently have available to us, we feel this is the right action to take at this time. ” The Toronto school system serves over 289, 000 students in 451 elementary schools, 110 secondary schools, as well as five adult education centers. The Toronto schools aren’t the only Canadian schools to cancel trips to the U. S. The Greater Essex County District School Board of Windsor, Ontario, also recently canceled trips over the border. Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston or email the author at igcolonel@hotmail. com. | 0 |
Hillary-FBI situation too confusing? Here’s a compilation of news clips that explain why the FBI had to reopen the Clinton email case.
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NBC is reportedly “freaking out” because the network’s talent Megyn Kelly has already been a “ratings disaster. ” “They didn’t pay her $15 million for this. They are now worried that her numbers will be bad when she joins the 9 am hour of Today,” a source reportedly told Radar Online. “If Kelly tanks at 9 am she will also bring down Kathie Lee Gifford and Hoda Kotb at 10 am. ” The debut of Kelly’s Sunday Night With Megyn Kelly, with its Vladimir Putin interview, could not even beat out a rerun of 60 Minutes. Her second show got clobbered as well. As Radar Online noted, Kelly’s interview with Erin Andrews “was destroyed by 60 Minutes, which scored 7. 66 million total viewers. Kelly got a paltry 4. 35 million people to tune in to her program. ” Already in desperation mode, NBC is reportedly “scrambling” to land big “gets” like Kathy Griffin or Adrianna Grande because, according to the source, the network seems to have already determined that “people are not tuning in to watch Megyn without huge guests. ” After reportedly being rejected multiple times, Kelly finally found a producer for her daily morning show just last Friday. Veteran producer Jackie Levin agreed to produce the show, which is set to debut in September. NBC News reportedly had trouble locking down an executive producer for Kelly’s daily show for months. According to one television insider, though “NBC and Megyn Kelly would like you to believe” her show did not have an executive producer because “there are just so many great people lining up for the job,” it was “quite the opposite. ” According to the insider’s source, Kelly and NBC had “approached some big names and they have all said no. ” Kelly reportedly wanted Bill Geddie, Barbara Walters’ longtime producer, to run her morning show. But he reportedly turned her down in addition to other top names because “no one wants to take the gig and most of the blame if Kelly flops at NBC. ” NBC News Chairman Andrew Lack has reportedly been busy lowering expectations for Kelly to the network’s affiliates. When news of NBC’s hiring of Kelly broke, one executive reportedly said that “the degree of difficulty” would be “extremely high” for Kelly and if she does not succeed, “she could end up fading into obscurity,” especially since her trial run at Fox News for a show was panned and got terrible ratings. | 0 |
RALEIGH, N. C. — Coursing beneath the boisterous chanting of the ’s name Tuesday night — that single syllable that will now forever conjure more than just a gilded real estate empire — were the more nuanced hopes, fears and expectations of the Americans who shocked the world, and even themselves, by electing Donald J. Trump president of the United States. It was a combination of emotions that felt as novel and raw as the candidate himself. In interviews around the country, many supporters said they hoped for great things under a President Trump — though many also said they had no idea what they were in for. And nearly all of them agreed that Mr. Trump had, like many good businessmen before him, found a way to expertly tap a well of hidden demand — in this case, for a champion among what he called the nation’s “forgotten men and women. ” “There’s a great deal of mistrust between the people and their government in Washington, and that’s why you’re seeing a result like this,” said Ken Merrifield, 53, the mayor of Franklin, N. H. “It’s a revolution. ” On Tuesday evening at an election party here, Dennis M. English Jr. stood in the crowd in a tailored suit, clutching a fat celebratory cigar. He jabbed a fist in the air as Fox News recorded victory after victory for Mr. Trump. “This isn’t all white people!” yelled Mr. English, who is black. “Minorities are voting for Trump, I’m telling you!” (Exit polls showed 87 percent of Mr. Trump’s vote came from whites 2 percent came from blacks.) Mr. English is the director of a state office that helps businesses owned by minorities compete for government contracts. In his work, he said, he had toured some of the most depressed counties in eastern North Carolina. Before Mr. Trump, he said, it seemed that few politicians were addressing the grievances of people who were economically wounded by deals that hastened the downfall of the textile industry. “We need to get those jobs back,” Mr. English said. “You’ve got to be on the ground. I’m talking thousands of people who are walking around those counties unemployed. ” In Wisconsin, Beth Schmidt, chairwoman of the Rock County Republican Party, said she woke up Wednesday morning feeling happy but a little stupefied. “As a Republican, I should be bouncing off the walls,” she said. “But I don’t know what to think. ” Ms. Schmidt, a mother of three adult children, is fervently against abortion. She feels that welfare is necessary, but that it has become overused. She was not one of Mr. Trump’s earliest supporters, instead favoring Marco Rubio or Carly Fiorina in the primary season. But she “moved forward” in the general election, deciding to vote for Mr. Trump in the end. She is convinced that Mr. Trump will surround himself with smart and experienced people. “I think that you’re going to see that he will, surprisingly, bring people together,” she said. “I’m going to pray for this. As time goes on, people are going to see a different Trump. ” To Mark Harris, a businessman from Georgia, Mr. Trump’s indecorous outbursts and often crude behavior were a price worth paying for the he believed Mr. Trump would bring to government. “A lot of the American people can put aside him being rough around the edges to take the chance on the change that he talked about,” he said. Mr. Harris, 49, a retailer in one of Atlanta’s northern suburbs, could hardly contain his glee over Tuesday’s outcome. It was, he said, an unrestrained rejection of politicians, lobbyists and the news media. “The American people are sick and tired of the government in Washington, D. C.,” he said. But he also had a warning for Mr. Trump: Break your promises at your peril. “In four years’ time, we’ll see if he’s smart enough to be able to go through with what he’s promised the American people,” Mr. Harris said. “If he’s able to put into motion what he has proposed over this election, he will win in four years, hands down. ” At the same time, some supporters seem to have installed a sort of decoder of the Trumpian style, harboring a sense that some of his most audacious promises — like the plan to build a southern border wall, and make Mexico pay for it — are perhaps not best taken literally. Joseph Connor, of Bergen County, N. J. said it was the general principles in Mr. Trump’s message that were more important, particularly the idea of getting government out of the way of commerce. “I think it’s time to shed regulation and let Americans do great things in the world,” said Mr. Connor, who works in finance and belies the stereotype of Trump voters as working class and rural. “And I see that in Trump. ” At Republicans’ election night party in Phoenix, a pair of friends, Linda M. Wright and Susan Cheatham, pumped their fists and thanked Jesus for Mr. Trump’s victory. “He’s not going to raise our taxes,” said Ms. Wright, 58, of Phoenix. “He’s going to protect our borders,” said Ms. Cheatham, 53, of Scottsdale. “He won’t take our weapons away,” Ms. Wright said. “He will appoint Supreme Court justices who will protect our Constitution,” Ms. Cheatham said. “Yeah, protect the Constitution — that’s key,” Ms. Wright concluded. They agreed that Mr. Trump represents their version of America: a place that loves God and cares for its military. “Nobody has the right to come into our country and steal it from me,” Ms. Wright said. “If you don’t like our country, don’t move here. Don’t come here and try to impose your religion on us. ” “Yeah,” Ms. Cheatham said, “Shariah law. ” With his proposal to ban Muslims from entering the United States and to deport all of the nation’s illegal immigrants (positions that he seems to have since altered) Mr. Trump’s campaign was bound to speak to the country’s white nationalists: In Louisiana on Tuesday, David Duke, the former Ku Klux Klan leader who mounted an unsuccessful Senate bid, celebrated Mr. Trump’s victory. “The great mass of his supporters, the overwhelming white vote, they also have a right to respect their heritage, their values,” he said. “I believe he’s really an advocate of Western Christian civilization. ” But Mr. Duke rejected the idea that racism was part of Mr. Trump’s message. So did Bridg Webb, 21, who was walking into a celebratory Republican rally at the football stadium of the University of Utah on Tuesday. On the way, Mr. Webb said, someone drove by him and shouted, “Nazis!” That, he said, was exactly what Mr. Trump’s opponents — in the news media, on the left, in urban centers — failed to grasp about voters like him. “I’ve been called a bigot I’ve been called a white supremacist,” he said. “I pride myself on being a good guy. I go out of my way to help people. All these things are so unfair, and it’s all because I said I like Donald Trump. ” Mr. Webb grew up in a Mormon family in Elk Ridge, Utah, a community outside the conservative city of Provo. Though it is a safe place, and though Utah is humming along with 3. 4 percent unemployment, Mr. Webb said he felt creeping fears about the threat of terrorism after attacks in San Bernardino, Calif. and Orlando, Fla. He worried the American economy would not have a stable job for him. He hopes to become a police officer, and he worried that Mrs. Clinton would pass gun restrictions that could disarm law enforcement. Mr. Trump, he said, was a balm for those fears. Supporters like Jeanne Koval, 57, and her husband, Alan, 59, see themselves as part of a global movement against corrupt governments run by insiders. The couple, who hail from Fenton, Mich. were playing the slots on the Las Vegas Strip on Tuesday night. Ms. Koval, a nurse, compared her support for Mr. Trump to the support that the Filipino nurses she works with have shown for the president of the Philippines, Rodrigo Duterte. “They were tired of the corruption, and they want someone who can get something done,” she said. Neither could specifically say what change they wanted Mr. Trump to make, but they voiced concern about rising health care costs and jobs going overseas. Ms. Koval said her parents’ health care premiums recently increased $600 a month. In Utah, Olivia Blackham, who was adopted from Guatemala as a baby, voted for Mr. Trump in her first presidential election. She did so in large part because, she said, she believed America’s immigration system was broken. Ms. Blackham said she had been frustrated after working with refugees who received free health care while her friends and family had to pay high premiums and hundreds of dollars for prescriptions. She said she believed Mr. Trump could fix that. “I’m really passionate about getting it straight,” she said. But as the reality set in that Mr. Trump would become the 45th president of the United States, Ms. Blackham, 34, expressed a lingering uneasiness. “I think it’s going to be scary,” Ms. Blackham said. “We’re in for a change. ” | 1 |
Hurricane Matthew was downgraded to a cyclone early Sunday morning as it hit North Carolina and Virginia with a weakened but still powerful punch. Dispatches from our reporters on the ground a live storm tracker map and answers to reader questions will be updated below. ■ The storm’s death toll in the United States has climbed to at least 17. Gov. Pat McCrory of North Carolina said on Sunday morning that his state’s toll had risen to eight. Officials in Georgia confirmed three deaths on Saturday. At least six fatalities in Florida have been attributed to the storm. Nearly 900 people have died in Haiti, according to a Reuters report based on information from civil protection and local officials. ■ Bands of heavy rain are leading to flooding in parts of eastern North Carolina, according to the National Hurricane Center, which may result in flooding and flash flooding elsewhere in the region. Forecasters warned that areas along the Neuse River in Goldsboro, N. C. could experience flooding worse than the devastating inundation that followed Hurricane Floyd in 1999. The river was projected to hit 30. 9 feet around 2 a. m. on Monday, surpassing the record of 28. 9 feet caused by Floyd. ■ In Georgia, the storm created a record surge at Tybee Island, near the state’s border with South Carolina. The surge reached 12. 5 feet, according to the Chatham County Emergency Management Agency, which exceeded the previous high of 12. 2 feet, set during Hurricane David in 1979. ■ To cover the storm and its aftermath, The New York Times has journalists deployed along the its path. Follow our correspondents on Twitter. The storm’s assault on North Carolina extended into Sunday, and the governor said at least seven people had been killed in the state. “I wouldn’t assume that there aren’t people clinging for life right now in houses that are underwater that we have yet to reach, especially in areas,” Gov. Pat McCrory told reporters in Raleigh, the state capital. “That’s what my major concern is. ” Heavy rain was still pounding parts of the state as the governor spoke, and Mr. McCrory said floodwaters could rush through North Carolina for days. The fallout, he said, “is going to be a prolonged event. ” “This is still an extremely dangerous situation,” Mr. McCrory said. “And I cannot stress it more especially in the areas of Rocky Mount, Kinston, Greenville, Goldsboro and other eastern towns, cities. We’re going to have major issues with rivers and flooding. ” Mr. McCrory said 58 boat crews had rescued nearly 900 people by Sunday morning. More than 4, 000 people were in shelters on Sunday, Mr. McCrory said, and about 760, 000 homes and businesses were without electricity. Parts of Interstate 40 and Interstate 95 were shut down. — ALAN BLINDER The storm lashed South Carolina’s Lowcountry with rain and sent the sea surging upward. It turned roads into rivers and ripped trees from the inundated ground before making landfall north of Charleston. More than 430, 000 people around the state had been left without power as of late Saturday. Gov. Nikki Haley of South Carolina said on Sunday that she had lifted evacuation orders for four counties, including Charleston. But residents in four other counties — Beaufort, Georgetown, Horry and Jasper — were still urged to stay away. “We had a lot of rain, for many hours,” said Capt. Bob Bromage, the public information officer for the Sheriff’s Department in Beaufort County, southwest of Charleston. “We had flooding, we may have had some surge that we’re not aware of yet, we have downed trees, we have reports of downed trees on houses already. ” — JESS BIDGOOD, in Charleston The American Red Cross has published a list of safety tips for homeowners returning to property damaged in hurricanes. Once cleanup begins, taking photographs of damaged or destroyed property before it is discarded provides a record for use in making insurance claims, says Ann Carrns, who writes the Your Money Adviser consumer finance column for The Times. Gov. Rick Scott of Florida said on Saturday that the state had suffered “unbelievable amounts of beach erosion,” as well as damaged roads, flooding and felled trees. But Mr. Scott, who flew along the coastline to survey storm damage, said the storm’s consequences could have been far worse. “The first thing we can say is we are all blessed that Matthew stayed off our coast,” he said. “I worried the whole time that even though the track was off our coast, that it would turn in and have a direct hit at some point. ” State and local officials said they were trying to expedite recovery. “We’re going to ride each other hard,” said Lenny Curry, the mayor of Jacksonville. “We’re going to ride our utilities, we’re going to ride all of our workers to get this community back together as quickly and as safely as possible. Still, Mayor Charlie Latham of Jacksonville Beach asked for patience. “We’re working diligently, and to be honest with you, we’re doing our very best just to get people home and provide safe access,” Mr. Latham said. — ALAN BLINDER, in Orlando In Haiti, the Bahamas and Florida, the storm left behind stories of disaster and of disaster narrowly averted. Here are some of them » John Schwartz, a New York Times reporter who covers climate change and the environment, is answering reader questions about the storm. He rode out his first hurricane, Carla, in his hometown, Galveston, Tex. at age 4. He has covered the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, as well as other storms for The Times. Ask your hurricane questions here. Why do weather agencies and the news media keep getting the forecasts so wrong and overstate the severity of hurricanes? Is this some kind of insurance liability issue, where they are afraid of getting sued if they don’t paint a ‘doomsday’ picture? — Jim The conservative approach isn’t about liability, Jim, it’s about saving lives. The storm track that Matthew has followed has been well within the range of possibilities that the National Hurricane Center has been talking about all along. This is still a dangerous storm, and just because some stretches of the Florida coast have not been hit as catastrophically as was possible, that does not mean the rest of Florida or Georgia or South Carolina are in the clear. Marshall Shepherd, the director of Atmospheric Sciences Program, University of Georgia, has been fiercely defending the warnings on Twitter, and I’ll let him do the talking here: Chris W. Landsea, science and operations officer for the National Hurricane Center, said that while the storm has weakened somewhat, it is now spread over a larger area, and “a larger hurricane can cause more storm surge,” and a larger wind field the wind damage, in other words, can be felt over a larger area. So a slightly weaker but larger storm is “kind of a wash, as far as impacts,” he said. | 1 |
Good morning. We’re trying something new for our readers in Asia and the Pacific region: a morning briefing to your day. What do you like? What do you want to see here? Email us with your feedback at asiabriefing@nytimes. com. Here’s what you need to know: • Donald J. Trump’s plans for a smooth transition to the presidency are in disarray after the abrupt departures of two top aides handling national security and foreign policy matters. Vice Mike Pence, who was placed in charge of the transition after Gov. Chris Christie was removed, plans to join Mr. Trump in New York to speed the naming of a cabinet. Rudolph W. Giuliani, the former mayor of New York, is a top contender for secretary of state. _____ • Mr. Trump’s holdings present an array of potential conflicts of interest, complicated further by his decision to have his children serve on his transition team and run his businesses. As president, he will be exempt from a federal ethics rule prohibiting government workers and members of Congress from actions that could benefit their financial interests. Some American families are facing uncomfortable holidays — or deciding to skip gatherings — because of relationships strained by the country’s political divide. _____ • President Obama made some of his strongest comments since last week’s election. In Greece on the first leg of his last official international trip, he warned of a rise in “a crude sort of nationalism” and of “tribalism that is built on ‘us’ and a ‘them’ ” — an apparent reference to Mr. Trump’s appointment of Stephen K. Bannon, a nationalist, as chief strategist. _____ • In South Korea, pressure is mounting on President Park to step down as a campaign by Moon her losing rival in the 2012 presidential election, builds. Ms. Park’s new lawyer requested time to review the case, delaying official questioning in the scandal. _____ • Two politicians in Hong Kong plan to appeal a court ruling that bars them from taking office for using their oaths of office to insult China. The judge said he would have ruled against them even without Beijing’s reinterpretation of the city’s Basic Law, adding to concerns for other lawmakers who altered their oaths as a form of protest. _____ • A security firm discovered preinstalled software in some Android phones that was sending text messages, contact lists and other data to a server in China every 72 hours. The scope of the issue is not clear. The software provider, Shanghai Adups Technology, said its code runs on 700 million phones, cars and other smart devices. • Google and Facebook are taking aim at purveyors of fake news after criticism that misinformation may have influenced the 2016 election. • Technologies that emerged from the effort to combat distracted driving have added to the problem, U. S. safety experts say, contributing to a surge in highway deaths. • Fintech, the emerging industry that combines finance and technology, is looking for its Silicon Valley. Berlin, Singapore and Sydney, Australia, are in the race, but Hong Kong may have the inside track. • Indian banks in major cities are marking customers’ fingers with indelible ink to prevent repeat visits to exchange devalued bank notes. Our reporter explains how Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s currency ban was meant to work. • Wall Street was mixed, and oil was higher. Here’s a snapshot of global markets. • Russia resumed airstrikes on areas of Aleppo, Syria, ending three weeks of relative calm in the city. [The New York Times] • President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia fired his economy minister, citing a “lack of trust,” after the official was accused of soliciting a $2 million bribe in a huge oil deal. [The New York Times] • Mongolia has appealed to the International Monetary Fund for help with a financial crisis that has driven its currency, the tugrik, to an low. [Bloomberg] • China executed a farmer convicted of killing a village official, despite months of public outcry over the inciting incident, the loss of his home. [The New York Times] • Hizbul Mujahedeen, a militant group, has emerged as the face of the independence movement in Kashmir. Above, women mourned a teenager’s death. [The New York Times] • a Japanese robot equipped with artificial intelligence, has flunked the University of Tokyo entrance exam for a fourth year, leading its makers to concede that the limits of its skills. [Asahi Shimbun] • Lake Baikal, one of the most pristine bodies of freshwater in the world, has been invaded by algae caused by an influx of untreated sewage. [The New York Times] • Tuesday was Election Day in Beijing, but despite urging voters to “treasure democratic rights,” the government bullied and detained activists and candidates. [The New York Times] • Jackie Chan finally received an Oscar. The Hong Kong native, known for comedic timing and martial arts expertise, received an honorary award for his long career as an actor, director and producer. • Toshiro Mifune, the flinty Japanese movie star best known in the West for his roles in Akira Kurosawa films, was posthumously honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. • Xi Jinping wants China to bring back the revolutionary greeting of “comrade,” but its meaning has changed a bit after it was adopted as a term of affection among the country’s gay men and lesbians. The movie adaptation of the book “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” was released in the United States 15 years ago this week. If the title sounds odd to American readers, that’s because in the U. S. the stone was a sorcerer’s. Book and movie titles differ often in adaptation — and not always because producers think sorcery is more enticing than philosophy. In some cases there’s a practical reason. “Schindler’s List” was first published in book form as “Schindler’s Ark. ” Oskar Schindler actually did keep a list, and book publishers changed the title later. Other cases are simply random. While it would have been a stretch for the movie “Blade Runner” to carry “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” the film’s title doesn’t actually appear in Philip K. Dick’s book. It was lifted from a different novel, Alan E. Nourse’s “The Blade Runner. ” American movie titles are often altered when they are released overseas to resonate with local audiences. That’s why “Up in the Air” became “Mileage, My Life” in Japan and “Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs” turned into “It’s Raining Falafel” in Israel. A movie critic there summed up the criteria film studios used. “They are looking for something catchy or funny,” he said, “even if it is ridiculous. ” Evan Gershkovich contributed reporting. _____ Photographs may appear out of order for some readers. Viewing this version of the briefing should help. Your Morning Briefing is published weekday mornings. What would you like to see here? Contact us at asiabriefing@nytimes. com. | 1 |
From the moment Dawn Fitzpatrick stepped onto the American Stock Exchange trading floor as a clerk in 1992, she sensed that the odds were against her. Surrounded by men in jackets barking trade orders, she stood out in her pleated skirt and twin sweater set. Traders around her began wagering over how long Ms. Fitzpatrick, then 22, would last. “The floor was definitely not a place for people who were cute, prim and proper,” Ms. Fitzpatrick said in a recent interview. Those who bet against her lost. Ms. Fitzpatrick began her career at O’Connor Associates, the Chicago firm that was later acquired by UBS as the Swiss bank’s internal hedge fund. She rose to lead the firm and become one of Wall Street’s most powerful women. Now, largely unknown outside the industry, Ms. Fitzpatrick faces her biggest and most public challenge yet: working for George Soros, the estimable octogenarian investor and philanthropist. Last Monday, she started as chief investment officer of Soros Fund Management, which manages around $26 billion of Mr. Soros’s personal and family wealth. In taking the job, she follows in the footsteps of finance legends including Keith Anderson, a of BlackRock, and Stanley Druckenmiller, the billionaire investor. Even Steven Mnuchin, the new Treasury secretary, was once brought in to open a lending business. Mr. Soros himself is perhaps the finance world’s most famous investor. In 1992, he made a $1 billion bet against the British pound. The trade came to be known as one that “broke the Bank of England” when Mr. Soros’s heavy selling of the country’s currency helped prompt the government to devalue the pound. But since Mr. Druckenmiller left the firm in 2000, Soros Fund Management has churned through eight chief investment officers. It’s a remarkable turnover for the top of any company, even among hedge funds, which are known for a cutthroat culture. It’s even less typical in the sleepy world of family offices, where employees manage the assets of a single clan, which is how the Soros funds are now structured after years of accepting outside investor money. And Soros is not just another family office designed to maximize wealth. There is a direct link between the money that is made at Soros and its founder’s philanthropic endeavors. Mr. Soros, now 86, is an outspoken supporter of Democrats including Hillary Clinton, and travels the world seeking to promote democracy. The $1 billion that Mr. Soros made betting against the British pound, for example, helped to support scientists in Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union. Though Ms. Fitzpatrick is registered as a Republican, she appears unfazed that her investing acumen will in turn support Mr. Soros’s activism. “If we do a good job in terms of generating returns, the impact the money created can have is tremendous, and that’s really motivating,” she said. Yet Ms. Fitzpatrick, 47, takes over at Soros at a moment of global uncertainty. Impending elections in France and Germany threaten to upset the status quo across Europe. The United States is only beginning to absorb the implications of Donald J. Trump’s young presidency. Markets around the world are holding steady but seem liable to drop on any given day. Ms. Fitzpatrick is bullish. She believes stocks in the United States, having hit record highs, can rise higher still. But she attributes this optimism to what she says are fundamentally healthy companies, not investor giddiness over the Trump presidency. “In reality, if we had Hillary Clinton as our president, I think we’d be here or higher,” Ms. Fitzpatrick said. At the height of the financial crisis of a decade or so ago, Ms. Fitzpatrick faced the biggest decision of her career. She had risen to become chief investment officer at O’Connor, then a unit of UBS, and now had to steer the firm through a period of market upheavals that would leave some of the biggest names on Wall Street bankrupt. In the summer of 2008, Ms. Fitzpatrick received a call from Richard S. Fuld, then the chief executive of Lehman Brothers. Mr. Fuld acknowledged that Lehman’s stock was tumbling, but he told Ms. Fitzpatrick it would recover and asked her not to pull the billions of dollars that O’Connor had with the bank’s prime brokerage, a division that lends stock and cash to clients for trading, in exchange for housing some of the funds’ capital. Ms. Fitzpatrick had a quandary. If she maintained her balance and Lehman managed to survive, she would keep a relationship with a critical Wall Street partner. But if she kept her balance and Lehman went bankrupt, she would lose billions of dollars for UBS O’Connor’s clients. “She did something no one else did,” recalled Michael Meyer, a former UBS O’Connor employee who was there at the time. “She quickly assessed the situation with him and said: ‘Dick, your stock is trading at $22. If the stock goes to $15, I’m taking half out, and if the stock reaches $10, I’m taking it all out,’” Mr. Meyer recalled. Ultimately, of course, Lehman failed, triggering some of the worst convulsions of the financial crisis and costing many investors billions. Ms. Fitzpatrick was able to avoid the worst of it, and saved the firm from getting trapped in years of bankruptcy proceedings. Other hedge funds that didn’t pull their money were stuck in losing market positions, unable to use their money to make new trades. Though the episode left her shaken, it was the kind of quick thinking she had prepared for. Born and raised in Irvington, N. Y. Ms. Fitzpatrick was the middle child among five siblings who grew up in a on a street bustling with young families. She spent much of her childhood competing with taller, stronger brothers and sisters who excelled at sports like basketball. By her own description, Ms. Fitzpatrick was “short and scrawny. ” Her father, she said, still jokes that she is the “runt of the litter. ” Eventually she found her stride. She turned to running, something she continues to do today, usually at 5 a. m. (She still holds the record for the 3, 000 meter run at her high school.) A neighbor, Marty Atlas, nurtured her early interest in the markets, showing a teenage Ms. Fitzpatrick how stock tables worked. Even as a girl, her investing prowess was evident. “I remember her playing Monopoly with all these other kids, and she ended up with all the hotels,” Mr. Atlas said. Ms. Fitzpatrick quickly zeroed in on her goal for after college: Wall Street. “It was the one place where you could succeed beyond your wildest dreams,” she recalled. After graduating from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School with a bachelor of science degree in 1992, Ms. Fitzpatrick landed a job with O’Connor Associates as part of a junior group of American Stock Exchange clerks. She moved on to trade options for O’Connor at the Chicago Board Options Exchange. There, groups of traders gathered in pits to buy and sell major trading contracts, yelling out their orders while gesticulating madly. Ms. Fitzpatrick, once again an outsider on a trading floor, mastered the jargon and the hand signals. It was in Chicago that Ms. Fitzpatrick learned just how cruel markets could be. In December 1994, an economic crisis was looming in Mexico that resulted in a swift and drastic devaluation of the Mexican peso. Ms. Fitzpatrick was covering a pit where locals — traders who made bets with their own money — were exposed on the wrong side when the American Depository Receipts of Mexican companies moved suddenly. They lost everything. “Basically overnight, these guys who I would stand next to from 9:30 a. m. to 4 p. m. every day lost their homes, lost their marriages, just everything in a flash,” Ms. Fitzpatrick said. “It really left an indelible mark on me. ” In the course of her career, Ms. Fitzpatrick has tangled with regulators. While chief investment officer of O’Connor, Ms. Fitzpatrick oversaw the firm’s $5. 3 million settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission over charges that from 2009 to 2011 it had bought stocks in companies’ public offerings while also taking the opposite position, those same stocks. The bank denied wrongdoing. More than 23 firms were slapped with similar charges. “Dawn would see possible risks, multiple layers, beyond anyone else in the room,” said Ross Margolies, the founder of Stelliam Investment Management, which Ms. Fitzpatrick and O’Connor seeded in 2007. “It was almost like she was playing a game of chess. ” In the world of finance, women can find themselves at a disadvantage, their careers stymied by overt sexism and implicit bias alike. The paucity of senior positions held by women in banks and other financial firms, which a recent Financial Times survey put at less than 26 percent, would seem to underscore that belief. As the first female chief investment officer at Soros, Ms. Fitzpatrick becomes a woman with few peers most everyone managing such a large pot of money on Wall Street is a man. Ms. Fitzpatrick said that, on the whole, she has not felt discriminated against because of her gender in the workplace. At UBS, Ms. Fitzpatrick kept a pair of Christian Louboutin shoes under her desk but often walked around the office barefoot, a display of her confidence. “Clearly, there are single moments in time when I would have rather been a guy,” she said. “But those tended to be offset by the times when I thought it was an advantage to be a woman. ” Ms. Fitzpatrick says women have innately useful qualities when it comes to money management. “One of the things I believe women have more of is humility in their investments,” she said. “We’ll cut losers quicker, in a more effective way, than generally men will. ” Indeed, some studies suggest that women are more successful risk managers than men. Yet Ms. Fitzpatrick has also caught herself masking her femininity to keep up with her male colleagues. Days after giving birth to her second child, she was on a flight to London for a meeting wearing several layers of Spanx, the tightfitting undergarments meant to conceal extra pounds. “From my perspective, perceptions matter, and it was important for me that I was there,” she said. “I didn’t want them to think I was anything but focused. ” Such ambition can be a distraction, too. A few years later, in the summer of 2008, Ms. Fitzpatrick was so consumed by her work that she didn’t realize she was pregnant for several months. The financial crisis was beginning to unfold, and the markets were swinging violently. She was often sick to her stomach, and was also getting heavier, but she figured her discomfort was a result of her stress. Plenty of her peers were having visceral reactions to the crisis. “The fall comes, and I’m nauseous, and I’m gaining weight, and it doesn’t even cross my mind that I could be pregnant,” Ms. Fitzpatrick said. Today, Ms. Fitzpatrick maintains the long hours and relentless travel schedule common among financial executives. It keeps her away from her three children and her husband more than she would like. But she lives in Irvington, the town where she grew up, and her two sisters and her parents still live nearby. They help with the children. She admits, however, that her relentless drive is “not necessarily a virtue for everyone. ” In her new role, Ms. Fitzpatrick oversees assets that Soros Fund Management invests directly, as well as more than a handful of outside hedge fund managers and private equity firms. It is similar to the role Ms. Fitzpatrick played at UBS O’Connor several years ago. And during her last year at the Swiss bank, she held a more strategic role, managing teams across all of UBS’s asset management unit, and overseeing more than half a trillion dollars. It was a prestigious job, but one that removed her from the trading and market strategizing that associates say she loves most. Now, “she will basically be able to sit down with those managers whom they’ve allocated money to, and really be able to speak the language,” said Rich Cunningham, a managing director at Barclays Investment Bank. Among the new challenges she will face is all that turnover at Soros. Ted Burdick, the previous chief investment officer there, stepped down after just eight months on the job, though he remains with the firm. Others who have held Ms. Fitzpatrick’s role have been caught up in the internal politics of the firm, and at times clashed with Mr. Soros himself. Ms. Fitzpatrick may be at less risk because, unlike some previous chief investment officers, she will be reporting to the family office’s board of directors, rather than just Mr. Soros, who is the chairman of the board. And yet Mr. Soros, one of history’s best traders, still can’t help but sometimes want to manage his own money. Last year, as Britain prepared to vote on whether to exit the European Union, Mr. Soros stepped back into his engagement, placing wagers that would be affected by the June referendum. The “Brexit” outcome, a surprise to many, triggered significant market swings, and Mr. Soros benefited from a position that predicted shares of Deutsche Bank would fall, among other trades. Later in the year, however, Mr. Soros lost around $1 billion wagering that Mr. Trump would lose the presidential election. Beyond his occasional trading, there could be a disconnect between Mr. Soros and his new chief investment officer. Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in January, Mr. Soros mixed his views on politics and finance to deliver a bleak economic prognosis. Yes, investors were bullish, thanks to the belief that Mr. Trump would dismantle regulations and reduce taxes. But, he said, Mr. Trump would fail to achieve those policy goals. “I don’t think the markets are going to do very well,” Mr. Soros said. Ms. Fitzpatrick, however, says that although she is more bullish on the stock market than her boss, they are not out of sync on the big picture. “As an investor,” she said, “you have to continuously evolve and learn. ” | 1 |
The line can be so fine, even with all the work Angelique Kerber has done on herself and her game. And as she hoisted her second Grand Slam singles trophy of the year (and of her career) on Saturday at the United States Open, it seemed appropriate to wind back the tape eight months to the Australian Open. In the first round there, she faced a match point in the tiebreaker against the unseeded Misaki Doi of Japan and escaped only when Doi’s shot hit the tape and fell back on Doi’s side of the net. “What would happen had she not won that match point?” Mary Joe Fernandez, the United States Fed Cup captain, asked on Saturday, shortly before Kerber went out and played her latest remarkable match under major pressure to defeat the Karolina Pliskova, in the Open final. Lose to Doi in January, and Kerber would not have gone on to win her first major title at the Australian Open, where she beat Serena Williams in a thriller. Lose to Doi in January, and Kerber might never have found the state of mind necessary to experience this remarkable midcareer renaissance at 28. Such tiny margins can have such big consequences. But the results were there for all to see down the stretch on Saturday in Arthur Ashe Stadium as Kerber, the No. 2 seed, won a very fine match in style, rallying from a break of serve down in the third set to defeat an opponent who had overpowered her, in the Cincinnati final just last month. “You saw it in the match,” Kerber’s coach, Torben Beltz, said of the changes in his pupil. “If she’s a break down, she never gives up. I think she never gives up. She’s the fighter she was before, but right now she believes more in herself. You really see that she doesn’t want to lose and wants to go for her shots. She has more and that’s very important for her. ” Already guaranteed to become No. 1 in the world this week for the first time, Kerber will ascend to the top spot as a United States Open champion as well. After she had finished off her victory, reached up to embrace the Pliskova and then climbed up to hug Beltz and others in the players’ box, she descended to her courtside chair, put a towel to her face and sobbed at length. “It was everything, I think, because of all the pressure in the last few months,” Kerber said. “To win here is very special for me. Everything starts for me here in 2011. This Grand Slam is really, really special. ” In 2011, Kerber arrived in New York with a world ranking of 92 and made a most unexpected run to the semifinals before losing to the eventual champion, Sam Stosur, in three sets. Though she had considerable success in the seasons that followed, breaking into the top 10, she never managed until this year to break through to that same stage of a Grand Slam tournament. Now she has won two major titles and reached this year’s Wimbledon final, where she lost to Williams, and she also secured a silver medal in singles at the Summer Olympics last month. It all adds up to a phenomenal and unexpected season and further proof that it is possible to make a breakthrough at an advanced tennis age. The most recent previous example: Flavia Pennetta, who won her first major singles title at the United States Open last year at 33. Pennetta, an effervescent Italian, has since retired, but Kerber has every intention of continuing to ride her wave. Always a great defender and counterpuncher with a capacity to hit the shot, Kerber has made her big move by getting fitter and even quicker, by attacking with more frequency and by making subtle improvements to her still vulnerable serve. She won 51 percent of her points at the Open and 53 percent against Pliskova despite Pliskova’s best efforts to attack on her returns. Kerber will be the oldest player in the history of the WTA rankings to become No. 1 for the first time. She is the first German woman to win the United States Open since Steffi Graf, Kerber’s childhood idol and occasional mentor, in 1996. Graf sent her a text before the match, which at 2 hours 7 minutes turned out to be as grueling as it was entertaining. It was hot (close to 90 degrees) and muggy (63 percent humidity) but Kerber and Pliskova, both Open finalists, kept hustling and taking chances right through the tape. In the end, Kerber won it with great defense, tracking down Pliskova’s big power in the corners. She won it by being steadier (she made 17 unforced errors to Pliskova’s 47). She won it with clever, sliced serves at the right moments. But above all, she won it by going for it. “She’s grown as a player,” Fernandez said. “She’s improved. She doesn’t just play defense anymore. She plays aggressively. I think her forehand down the line is one of the best in the game. She threads the needle beautifully. ” She proved quite the seamstress again at in the final set with Pliskova still pressing her. Pliskova hit a deep backhand crosscourt. It was not an obvious opportunity, but Kerber chose to seize it anyway. She went airborne and nailed a forehand down the line. It landed in the corner for a winner, and Kerber, eyes wide, pumped both fists and went back to the increasingly familiar business of winning Grand Slam titles — of staying on the right side of that very fine line between contender and champion. | 1 |
Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has arrived in Washington for a long day of talks with his American counterpart President Donald Trump, which the pair will follow with a casual visit to Trump’s estate in Florida. [A senior Trump administration official told reporters Thursday that Abe’s stay in Florida will involve some business discussions, but will largely consist of “a fair bit of golf” and a chance for Trump and Abe to bond personally, and in so doing strengthen the bilateral relationship between America and Japan. On Friday, the official said, Abe will “have a conversation [with Trump] that’s going to cover a very wide range of subjects dealing with the bilateral relationship, the security piece of the relationship, as well as the economic, and also talking about matters of mutual interest regionally and globally as well. ” The two will join other senior officials for a “working lunch” and end the day in Florida. “Prime Minister Abe is well acquainted with President Trump’s priorities, which you could sum up in three words: jobs, jobs, jobs,” the senior official noted, responding to reporters’ questions on the content of their talks by noting that economics will likely take up most of their time. While regional national security threats, like China’s colonization of the South and East China Seas, are priority issues for the two world leaders, the official stressed that Japan’s territorial claim in the East China Sea “is really something that I would not expect to see addressed in this visit. ” The meeting will take place following an unexpected phone conversation between Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping, the first such conversation between the two world leaders. While the Chinese government has been repeatedly threatening Japan to cease seeking support abroad against the Chinese colonization of the Senkaku Islands, reports indicate the topic did not surface when Trump and Xi spoke, the two instead agreeing on the Chinese position dismissing the sovereignty of Taiwan, the “One China” policy. The official added that President Trump “believes he can get the measure of the people through more informal settings” and will likely “from time to time” invite other world leaders to spend time with him at . Abe was the first world leader to meet with Trump in November following his election victory and has expressed extreme confidence in the Trump White House. He has also taken the lead globally in forging bonds with new populist leaders, spending a weekend at the humble home of Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte last month. Duterte appreciated the visit enough to lend the Prime Minister what Philippine officials described as the president’s “favorite mosquito net. ” While Trump has long maintained a reputation for being a fan of golf, Japanese media have suggested that it was Abe’s suggestion that led to the scheduling of a golf summit. “During a phone conversation late on Jan. 28, Abe told Trump that he would like to play golf with the president one day,” the Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun reported on Friday. “Trump suggested they play a round a day after their Feb. 10 meeting in Washington. ” Asahi notes that Abe’s grandfather, Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi, also played a game of golf with his American counterpart, Dwight Eisenhower. ” Abe appeared to confirm the Asahi report that golfing was his idea before boarding his plane in Tokyo. “He [Kishi] once told me, ‘When I saw President Eisenhower become upset about missing a putt right in front of me, I felt the distance between us had suddenly grown much closer,’” Abe told reporters. “I hope to build a strong relationship of trust (with Trump) outside of work. ” That relationship, the Japanese publication Mainichi Shimbun notes, appears to weigh heavily on the Abe administration. The newspaper quotes a senior official saying that Abe described the use of leisure to build a “close friendship” with Trump as “the only option available,” despite criticism from opposition party officials that Abe should stick to business with the U. S. president. | 1 |
In a year that brought its political and cultural troubles, it’s heartening to note how diverse kinds of dance made culture itself seem bright. Take Odissi (from the state of Odisha, on India’s east coast) which, though one of the world’s oldest dance genres, came close to extinction in the century. Now, however, it often seems astoundingly vital: No dance idiom is more overwhelmingly sensuous. Even in a year that was remarkable for premieres and revivals in ballet and modern dance, the beauties of Odissi were, again, a revelation, in late October in New York. Thanks to Mark Morris’s “Sounds of India,” part of the White Light Festival, the troupe Nrityagram Dance Ensemble (led by Surupa Sen and Bijayini Satpathy Ms. Sen is also the choreographer) danced at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater. (The live music was played by men.) In Odissi, a woman’s hourglass figure becomes the source of glory and profundity. Shoulders and pelvis can tilt in subtle opposition to the waist, and to each other, with sculptural tensions that flood the theater. The arc of an arm, moving in alignment with neck and spine, opens up infinity. The Nrityagram program included the world premiere of the duet “Lalita Lavanga” and the North American premiere of the solo “Aali. ” The Nrityagram artists have been visiting New York for over a decade, but the impact of their dancing still comes as the best kind of shock. So, too, does Alexei Ratmansky’s “Serenade After Plato’s Symposium,” to the Leonard Bernstein score of that name. This had its premiere with American Ballet Theater in May (at the Metropolitan Opera House) and returned in October (to the David H. Koch Theater). Mr. Ratmansky has already made the finest ballets of this century: notably “Concerto DSCH,” for New York City Ballet in 2008, and “Pictures at an Exhibition,” for that company in 2014. Here he surpassed even those works. This “Symposium” explores several of the finest levels of civilization — philosophical discussion about love, the beauties of a violin concerto, the human variety of classical dancing. The major revivals of 2016 cast even more light than the year’s premieres. Here, too, Mr. Ratmansky led the way. The production he presented in Zurich of the 1895 Mariinsky “Swan Lake,” as choreographed by Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov, was the staging the world needs of this often coarsened central classic. (The opera house in Zurich, seating about 1, 000, stands behind Lake Zurich, on which swans swim in view of Alpine mountains: a more perfect location for this classic is hard to imagine. The house’s intimate acoustics did wonders for Tchaikovsky’s score.) Every act brought fresh revelations, from Petipa’s Act I ensemble waltz, lost for decades, to the amazing touches of pathos with which Odette’s energies vacillated in Act IV. And no Black Swan! Odile, as always intended by the ballet’s makers, wore a tutu of many colors. And in November, the illustrious Sara Mearns danced the New York premiere of Mr. Ratmansky’s ballerina solo “Fandango” (created for Wendy Whelan in 2010 at the Vail International Dance Festival, to Boccherini music). Ms. Mearns blazed her musicality electrified. If I had to choose one 2016 performance by one dancer, this would be the one. — ALASTAIR MACAULAY The Oscar Wilde quote on Indiana Woodward’s Instagram account could be about her dancing: “Be yourself everyone else is already taken. ” Ms. Woodward, who turns 23 this month, isn’t just another rising member of New York City Ballet but also a dancer with the kind of freedom of expression that causes your breath to catch in your throat. Her performances over the past year, most memorably as the winged sprite in “La Sylphide” and as the female protagonist in Lauren Lovette’s “For Clara,” demonstrate things you just can’t teach: spirit, generosity, the meeting of artistry and artlessness. A member of the corps de ballet since 2012, Ms. Woodward was born in Paris. She has a look and verve similar to those of Violette Verdy, the beloved City Ballet principal who died this year, but Ms. Woodward is also a ballerina of her time. As the Sylph, Ms. Woodward radiated a mischievous warmth with jumps that hovered in the air. In the effervescent “For Clara,” she was more herself, epitomizing strength, independence and joy. She flies through choreography with glee, as if she were running barefoot through a forest. Many blocks downtown, there was another original at work this year: Eiko, the dance artist and subject of Danspace Project’s Platform 2016: “A Body in Places. ” For part of it, Eiko, 64, performed a series of intimate solos, in East Village locations, that braided together painstakingly slow movement and stillness with spurts of abandon. During one performance at Middle Collegiate Church on Second Avenue, a thrashing Eiko darted through the sanctuary’s front doors and landed on the sidewalk. It had been raining, and like an East Village Mary Poppins, she pounced into a puddle. The combination of such vulnerability and daring as strangers — some truly mystified — stared had the effect of transforming her seemingly frail body into something otherworldly. Eiko and Ms. Woodward may be generations apart and practicing vastly different dance forms, but each moves as if there were no tomorrow. — GIA KOURLAS Some dances have a way of pulling you into their present, letting you lose track of time, or giving you no other choice. In Beth Gill’s “Catacomb,” performed at the Chocolate Factory in May, that pull was inexorable. I remember less about the details of the work itself than I do about the moment it ended — a startling return to reality. What had just happened? Where had I gone? It was in the same small, unadorned space in Long Island City, Queens, that Ms. Gill first presented her Bessie “Electric Midwife” in 2012. Like the inverse of that luminous, orderly piece, “Catacomb” was dark, tangled, subterranean, yet still pristine in its structure. Ms. Gill has worked for years with many of the same collaborators, and the depth of those connections showed, in the seamless meeting of Jon Moniaci’s macabre score, Thomas Dunn’s otherworldly lighting and the dancers’ careful manipulation of tension and weight. Also playing tricks with the passage of time, calling up spirits from the past, the choreographers Ishmael and Miguel Gutierrez brought us “Variations on Themes From Lost and Found: Scenes From a Life and Other Works by John Bernd. ” Part of Danspace Project’s essential “Platform 2016: Lost and Found,” a meditation on dance artists lost to AIDS, “Variations” reimagined the work of the choreographer (and occasional composer) John Bernd, who died in 1988, at 35, of complications from the illness. Mr. Bernd’s exuberant movement and harmonious songs — along with his simple, expressive line drawings, projected over the altar of the sanctuary at St. Mark’s Church — came surging back to life through seven audacious dancers, many of whom weren’t yet born when he died. Even while confronting themes of absence and loss, the evening felt like a celebration and, to those of us who didn’t know Mr. Bernd, an introduction long overdue. — SIOBHAN BURKE Before this year, I would not have suspected Lar Lubovitch of harboring radical tendencies. But for two weeks in September and October, this choreographer purged the Joyce Theater of its sometimes stifling air of safety. And he did it generously, by creating a platform for the work of other dancemakers, a series called “NY Quadrille. ” The platform was more than metaphorical — a new stage with seating on multiple sides — but the crucial change seemed less a matter of perspective than of permission: a license to take risks. RoseAnne Spradlin’s “X” went the farthest many audience members impatient with its endurance test (and missing its humor) left early. I’ve found other pieces by this bold artist more compelling, and I could say the same about the “Quadrille” contributions by Pam Tanowitz and Tere O’Connor. (Loni Landon seemed out of place.) But all three offered highly intelligent, questioning, choreography of a variety particular to New York. Good for the Joyce. For me, the most moving dance show of the year — one of the most moving I’ve ever seen — was at the Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival in the Berkshires in July. I had been looking forward to “And Still You Must Swing,” as a collaboration among Dormeshia Derick K. Grant and Jason Samuels Smith: three of the world’s greatest tap dancers. They were joined by the contemporary choreographer Camille A. Brown and a jazz trio. As a tap show, it was more than I hoped for: a return to tap’s deepest and richest rhythmic roots, entirely up to date, pushing the art forward. But the week of its premiere was also the week of more killings of black men by police officers, and the show — unintentionally but unavoidably in honest improvisation — reflected the feelings of its dancers, all . There was shared pain and also shared delight in one another’s company and gifts. The power of dance as a channel of expression — as a method of survival — has seldom been clearer. — BRIAN SEIBERT More highlights from the year, as chosen by our critics: Movies, Television, Pop Albums, Pop Songs, Classical Music, Theater, Art, Podcasts and Performances | 1 |
Two court bailiffs were shot and killed by a prisoner who managed to grab a law enforcement officer’s gun inside a Michigan courthouse on Monday afternoon, and the prisoner himself was then killed, a county sheriff said. The shooting followed a struggle as officials were trying to transfer the prisoner from a holding cell to a courtroom where he was to appear before a judge, said Paul Bailey, the Berrien County sheriff. The prisoner broke free, shot and wounded a sheriff’s deputy, then fatally shot the two bailiffs before shooting another person who was standing in a courthouse hallway, Sheriff Bailey said. The prisoner was then shot and killed, apparently by officials who rushed to the hallway. “It’s a sad day,” Sheriff Bailey said, noting that he had known the bailiffs for decades they had worked in other law enforcement roles before taking the courthouse jobs. Officials said they were uncertain how the inmate had grabbed a gun — and did not yet know whose weapon he grabbed — but said that routine procedures had been followed for bringing jail inmates to court appearances in Berrien County, in the southwest part of the state. Sheriff Bailey later identified the prisoner as Larry Darnell Gordon, 45, and the bailiffs who were killed as Joseph Zangaro, 61, and Ronald Kienzle, 63, The Associated Press said. Standing behind Sheriff Bailey during an evening news conference, Gov. Rick Snyder called the shooting an “awful act,” and urged residents to stand together in Michigan and elsewhere. “I ask that all Michiganders put your prayers out, your thoughts and prayers,” Mr. Snyder said. “This is a particularly tough time for law enforcement. ” The courthouse is in St. Joseph, a community of about 8, 200 people on Lake Michigan and the seat of Berrien County. | 0 |
PARIS (AP) — Facebook says it has targeted 30, 000 fake accounts linked to France ahead of the country’s presidential election, as part of a worldwide effort against misinformation. [advertisement | 0 |
WASHINGTON — Roger J. Stone Jr. an adviser to President Trump for decades, has acknowledged that he had contact on Twitter with Guccifer 2. 0, the mysterious online figure that is believed to be a front for Russian intelligence officials. It is the first time that someone associated with Mr. Trump has confirmed any type of contact with Guccifer 2. 0, which claimed to be a Romanian hacker and took credit for the hacking of the Democratic National Committee. But Mr. Stone insisted in an interview that the contact had been brief and involved nothing more than the exchange of a few direct messages, well after the party committee had been hacked. “Even if he is a Russian agent, my cursory exchange with him happens after he releases the D. N. C. stuff,” Mr. Stone said on Saturday. “There’s only one exchange with him. I had no further exchanges. ” Mr. Stone said the exchange took place after he had published an article on Aug. 5 on the Breitbart News site about the hacking, which the American government has tied to a Russian effort to meddle in the election. After Guccifer 2. 0 had been suspended by Twitter, Mr. Stone posted a message against “censorship,” and he later had what he called an “innocuous” exchange over direct message. “You would need a time machine in order to collude, and, as I said yesterday, Putin has not yet perfected a time machine,” he said, referring to the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin. Mr. Stone had exchanges about the direct messages with the website The Smoking Gun in at the time, he said he did not recall the messages. On Friday, two days after the website published an article on the messages, Mr. Stone released screen grabs from his Twitter account to publications, including The Washington Times. It was unclear how The Smoking Gun had become aware of the messages. American officials have said that Mr. Stone is one of several Trump advisers under scrutiny over their ties to Russia. In August, Mr. Stone wrote on Twitter that John D. Podesta, Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman, would soon go through his “time in the barrel. ” Weeks later, WikiLeaks began publishing a trove of Mr. Podesta’s hacked emails, the daily release of which was seen as damaging to the campaign. While Mr. Stone said last summer that he had communicated with Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks founder, he later clarified that he had been in contact through an intermediary. WikiLeaks has said it did not receive the email trove from the Russians. Mr. Stone, a subject of fascination in Republican politics for decades, parted company with the Trump campaign in the summer of 2015. He still advises Mr. Trump at times, and shares the president’s view that Democrats’ allegations of collusion between the campaign and Russia are a smear. He denied any knowledge of what the hackers were up to before their attacks. “This is a witch hunt,” Mr. Stone said. “It’s the worst form of McCarthyism. Seems as if you’re not for nuclear war with the Russians over Syria, then you must be a traitor. ” American intelligence agencies believe that Guccifer 2. 0 was an online persona used by Russia’s military intelligence service, the GRU, to spread emails and other information stolen from the Democratic National Committee. In an assessment of Russian election meddling released in January, American intelligence agencies said they had “high confidence” that Guccifer 2. 0 was a persona through which Russian intelligence officials sought “to release U. S. victim data obtained in cyberoperations publicly and in exclusives to media outlets and related material to WikiLeaks. ” The report, though strongly worded, offers little direct evidence, allowing questions to fester about the precise origins of Guccifer 2. 0, and what was known by Mr. Stone and others who dealt with the hackers. During the campaign, Guccifer 2. 0 used social media to invite individual reporters and Republican operatives to request specific caches of documents. Not long after, reports began circulating that Russia was behind the hacks, and that the materials were being spread as part of a campaign to undercut the candidacy of Mrs. Clinton. Still, that did not stop journalists and Republican operatives from dealing with Guccifer 2. 0, and Mr. Stone was hardly alone in having contact with the hackers. | 1 |
Times reporters provided analysis and fact checks of Donald J. Trump’s news conference. Donald J. Trump made an important concession about Russia. He criticized American intelligence officials. He sparred with reporters and denounced “fake news. ” And that was all before he arrived at the ostensible reason for holding his first formal news conference since July: his plans to extricate himself from the operations of his vast business holdings. Here are the highlights from the whirling, hourlong news conference inside Trump Tower. ■ Mr. Trump said that after his briefing on Friday with American intelligence officials, he now thought Russia was behind the effort to hack his election opponents. “As far as hacking, I think it was Russia,” Mr. Trump said. ■ However, later in the news conference, Mr. Trump wavered slightly when pressed on the matter. “But you know what, it could have been others also,” he said when asked why he had been so critical of American intelligence officials. ■ He harshly criticized the publication of unverified reports that claimed Russia has salacious information about his behavior and finances. “I think it was disgraceful, disgraceful that the intelligence agencies let any information that turned out to be so false and fake out,” he said. Explaining his Twitter post comparing the United States to Nazi Germany, he said of the leaks: “That’s something that Nazi Germany would have done and did do. ” Mr. Trump added that BuzzFeed, which published the memos in their entirety, is “a failing pile of garbage” that would suffer the consequences for publishing the uncorroborated report. ■ Mr. Trump said he was untroubled by other intelligence reports that have been made public, which said Russia preferred him over Hillary Clinton and that President Vladimir V. Putin ordered the election meddling to benefit him. “If Putin likes Donald Trump, guess what, folks: That is called an asset, not a liability,” he said. He added that a strong relationship could allow the two nations to work together on difficult international issues. ■ When asked whether he had a message for Mr. Putin, Mr. Trump said: “He shouldn’t be doing it. He won’t be doing it. Russia will have much greater respect for our country when I am leading it. ” He added: “There’s no reset button. We’re either going to get along or we’re not. ” But he did not address a question about whether he or anyone on his campaign staff had had contact with Russia during the campaign. ■ Mr. Trump swatted away allegations included in the uncorroborated reports. He said that, when traveling, he warns his aides and bodyguards, “Be very careful, because in your hotel rooms and no matter where you go, you’re gonna probably have cameras. ” He also added, apparently referring to a detail in the report about supposed sex videos with prostitutes, “I’m also very much of a germaphobe, believe me. ” ■ Discussing the topic the news conference was intended to address, Mr. Trump said he would not divest from his vast business holdings as he takes office. Instead, the will turn over the operations and control of those holdings to a trust controlled by his eldest sons, Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. ■ The said that he had considered letting the Affordable Care Act “implode” on its own and letting Democrats take the political hit he said would follow. But he said he had decided on a more forthright strategy: repeal and replace “almost simultaneously. ” Mr. Trump was short on details but clearer in his intention to try to keep Democrats responsible. “We don’t want to own it politically,” he said. ■ Mr. Trump said that he had asked David J. Shulkin, a current under secretary at the Department of Veterans Affairs, to lead that agency after his team had interviewed “at least 100 people” in the search for a secretary. ■ Near the end of the news conference, Mr. Trump got into a shouting match with Jim Acosta of CNN, who tried to press the into taking a question. “Since you were attacking our news organization, can you give us a chance?” Mr. Acosta asked. To which Mr. Trump replied: “Your organization’s terrible,” and “don’t be rude,” before dismissing the request once and for all: “You are fake news. ” (CNN was the first to report that Mr. Trump and President Obama had been briefed by intelligence officials on the uncorroborated documents, but the network did not publish them.) ■ Sean Spicer, the incoming White House press secretary, spoke first to address the publication of the unverified reports by BuzzFeed on Tuesday. Mr. Spicer called the reports a “frankly outrageous and highly irresponsible” attack on Mr. Trump and a “sad, pathetic attempt to get clicks. ” Mr. Spicer said the documents were not an intelligence report and were categorically false. ■ Vice Mike Pence followed Mr. Spicer and amplified his condemnation of news reports by BuzzFeed and other news outlets, which he said were “irresponsible” and aimed at discrediting Mr. Trump’s legitimate election victory. ■ Mr. Trump began by thanking news organizations that did not report what he called “the nonsense that was released. ” He said he has “great respect for freedom of the press, and all of that. ” ■ Mr. Trump said that the document “was released by maybe the intelligence agencies, who knows, which would be a tremendous blot on their record. ” ■ He went on to cast blame on the Democratic National Committee for the hacking. He praised the Republican National Committee for having better defenses and commended Reince Priebus, his incoming chief of staff, who was the committee chairman. ■ Mr. Trump reiterated his description of the report printed by BuzzFeed as “fake news,” saying he did not think Mr. Putin had compromising information about him or the Republican Party. “I’ll be honest, if he did have something, he would have released it,” he said. ■ He denied that he has any business dealings in Russia: “I tweeted out that I have no dealings with Russia. I have no deals in Russia. I have no deals that could happen in Russia because we’ve stayed away. And I have no loans with Russia. As a real estate developer, I have very, very little debt. ” ■ Mr. Trump said he had requested that the intelligence agencies produce a “major report” on “hacking defense” to be delivered 90 days after he takes office, including an examination of “this situation” with Russia and other incidents of hacking. ■ Sheri A. Dillon, a lawyer for Mr. Trump, took the stage to describe how her client would turn over his business assets to a trust. “ Trump wants there to be no doubt in the minds of the American public that he is completely isolating himself from his business interests,” she said, adding that Mr. Trump’s sons will make all decisions for the company “without any involvement whatsoever” from Mr. Trump. She said Mr. Trump would resign from all positions he holds with the Trump Organization, as would his daughter Ivanka. ■ Ms. Dillon said that the Trump Organization would be allowed to make no new foreign deals during the presidency and that any new domestic deals would be subject to strict restrictions. “He will only know of a deal if he reads about it in the paper or sees it on TV,” Ms. Dillon said, referring to Mr. Trump. She also said an ethics adviser would be appointed to the management team of the Trump Organization. ■ Ms. Dillon argued that selling Mr. Trump’s business would prove more difficult and create more ethical quandaries than the plan that the Trump Organization had chosen. A totally blind trust, she said, would likewise be impossible under the circumstances. And, she added, “ Trump should not be expected to destroy the company he built. ” ■ Ms. Dillon laid out what amounts to the Trump administration’s interpretation of the Constitution’s Emoluments Clause, which prohibits government officials from taking payments or gifts from a foreign government. “No one would have thought when the Constitution was written, that paying your hotel bill was an emolument,” she said. To avoid any appearances of violations, Ms. Dillon said Mr. Trump had pledged to donate to the United States government all profits made by his hotels from payments by foreign governments. ■ Mr. Trump was flanked by a table piled high with manila folders that he said contained paperwork that he had signed turning over control of the Trump Organization to his sons. ■ Mr. Trump joked that if his sons failed to do a good job managing the company during his time in office, he would turn to them and say, “You’re fired. ” ■ In other comments about his businesses, Mr. Trump said he had been offered deals worth $2 billion worth in Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, “over the weekend” but had turned them down. ■ Asked about his tax returns, Mr. Trump said he was still not releasing them “because they are under audit. ” He said that the American people did not care about the documents anyway. “The only one that cares about my tax returns are the reporters,” Mr. Trump said. ■ Mr. Trump said he was looking forward to his inauguration. “It’s going to be a beautiful event,” he said. “We have great talent, tremendous talent. ” And, he added, “massive crowds” as well. ■ Asked to address criticism that his cabinet choices have presented an abundance of conflicts of interest, Mr. Trump simply praised his appointments. “I think we have one of the great cabinets ever put together,” he said. ■ Mr. Trump said he expected to announce “big news” in the next few weeks about companies that would build factories in the Midwest. ■ Mr. Trump said Carrier’s decision to keep jobs in Indiana sent a clear signal to other companies thinking of moving production overseas. “The word is now out,” he said, repeating a call for a “major border tax on these companies that are leaving. ” ■ About that wall: “I don’t feel like waiting a year, a year and a half I want to start building,” he said. He reiterated that Mexico would reimburse the cost, but he added cryptically that it probably wouldn’t be in the form of “a payment. ” ■ Turning to the Supreme Court, Mr. Trump said he expected to announce a nominee to fill the court’s vacant seat two weeks or so after he takes office. ■ Mr. Trump was asked how he would reform the news media he criticizes frequently. “I don’t recommend reforms,” he said. “I recommend people that have some moral compass. ” He added, “I will tell you, some of the media outlets that I deal with are fake news, more so than anybody. ” | 1 |
patrick martin & barry grey, wsws.org Political warfare explodes in Washington 31 October 2016 J ust a week before Election Day, the crisis gripping the American ruling class and its state, marked by intractable and bitter internal conflicts, has erupted into open political warfare. Last Friday’s letter from Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey to Congress announcing new “investigative steps” in the probe of Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, itself a manifestation of the crisis, has brought the underlying tensions to the boiling point. It has exposed raging conflicts within the FBI and, more broadly, the national security apparatus as a whole. Comey’s cryptic letter acknowledged that the FBI has not actually reviewed a new batch of emails that “appear to be pertinent” to its previous investigation into Clinton’s use of a private email server for official business while she was secretary of state. The agency, he wrote, “cannot yet assess whether or not this material may be significant.” This astonishing admission makes all the more extraordinary Comey’s decision to make the discovery of the new emails a public issue only eleven days before the election. In a rapid-fire series of developments this weekend, Justice Department officials revealed that they had opposed Comey’s decision to send the letter, arguing that it violated a longstanding principle that no Justice Department or FBI action that might impact on a candidate should be announced within 60 days of an election. The Clinton campaign and congressional Democrats lashed out at Comey for the timing of the letter. At a campaign rally in Daytona Beach, Florida, Clinton said Comey’s action is “not just strange, it’s unprecedented.” She also tweeted that “FBI Director Comey bowed to partisan pressure,” suggesting that the letter was an effort to appease congressional Republican leaders opposed to Comey’s determination last July that there was no basis for criminal charges against Clinton over her use of a private email server. Democratic Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid sent a letter to Comey suggesting that he had violated the law forbidding government employees to use their official positions to influence the result of an election. “I am writing to inform you that my office has determined that these actions may violate the Hatch Act,” he wrote. “Through your partisan actions, you may have broken the law.” He added that Comey had “demonstrated a disturbing double standard for the treatment of sensitive information, with what appears to be clear intent to aid one political party over another,” because he had made public the renewed FBI interest in Clinton’s emails, but was silent on what Reid called “explosive information” supposedly connecting Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump to Russian government officials. Here Reid was resorting to the Russia-baiting that has been the Clinton campaign’s main response to the publication by WikiLeaks of tens of thousands of emails and other documents sent or received by campaign chairman John Podesta, including devastating information on Bill Clinton’s use of the Clinton Foundation to obtain lucrative speaking engagements with corporations and business associations. Campaign spokesmen have refused to discuss the contents of the emails, claiming that they were hacked by Russian government agents and then handed over to WikiLeaks to damage Clinton and help Trump. NBC News reported Sunday that the FBI has now obtained a search warrant to go through all 650,000 emails found on the laptop of former congressman Anthony Weiner, the estranged husband of Clinton’s closest aide, Huma Abedin. Weiner is under FBI investigation for allegedly sending sexually explicit text messages to an underage girl. The Wall Street Journal gave details, in a story posted on its web site Sunday afternoon, of the explosive internal crisis within the FBI that led to Comey’s letter to Congress. By this account, there has been a fierce battle within the FBI and between the FBI and the Justice Department not only over the Clinton email investigation, but over separate investigations involving four FBI field offices (New York, Washington DC, Los Angeles and Little Rock, Arkansas) into the operations of the Clinton Foundation. AG Lynch: A Democrat apparatchik like the rest of the top tier of the Democratic party mafia, and typical of the Black misleaders that ice African American radicalism in a conflicted age. More than eight months ago, FBI agents presented plans for a more aggressive investigation of the foundation to career prosecutors in the Justice Department, only to have the proposal blocked on the grounds that there was insufficient evidence. The FBI offices nonetheless continued their investigations, which were intensified after the Clinton email investigation was wound up in July. The Journal report suggests that either a substantial faction within the FBI was convinced that top FBI officials were covering up criminal activities on the part of Hillary and Bill Clinton, or the FBI dissidents were politically motivated to use agency resources to undermine Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, or both. When top officials in the FBI and Justice Department opposed these efforts, open rebellion followed, expressed in leaks to the Wall Street Journal centrally targeting FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, whose wife was an unsuccessful Democratic candidate for state senate in Virginia last year. According to some press reports, Comey sent his letter to Congress last week because he was convinced the information would become public anyway through further leaks by FBI subordinates. The open warfare engulfing Washington on the eve of a presidential election reveals that the entire political system and the state apparatus itself are riven by tensions and conflicts so deep and bitter that they cannot be contained within the traditional framework of bourgeois elections. Fueling these tensions is the convergence of crises on the economic, geopolitical, internal political and social fronts. The US and world economy remain mired in stagnation more than eight years after the 2008 Wall Street crash, and there are growing fears that central bank policies designed to buttress the banks and drive up stock prices are leading to a new financial disaster. The economic crisis is fueling social anger and alienation from the entire political system, as reflected in different ways in the mass support for the anti-Wall Street campaign of the self-styled “socialist” Bernie Sanders and the “America first” pseudo-populist campaign of Donald Trump. Twenty-five years of unending war and fifteen years of the “war on terror” have failed to secure US hegemony in the Middle East and only heightened fears within the ruling elite that US imperialism is losing ground to rivals such as Russia and China. The disarray of US policy in Syria, in particular, has led to bitter conflicts and recriminations over US policy, and demands for a major escalation of military violence, not only in Syria, but throughout the Middle East. These are combined with calls for a more aggressive confrontation with Russia and China. The great danger is that these conflicts are being fought out behind the backs of the working class by different factions of the same reactionary ruling class. Unless the working class intervenes as an independent political and revolutionary force, fighting for its own interests in opposition to all parties and factions of the capitalist class, the crisis will inevitably result in ever more right-wing policies at home and ever wider wars abroad, leading inexorably to a new world war. The capitalist two-party system offers only two reactionary alternatives: the fascistic billionaire Trump, who demands a vast increase in military spending and authoritarian methods of rule, and the multimillionaire Clinton, the favorite of Wall Street and the military-intelligence apparatus, who would continue and escalate the right-wing policies of the Obama administration. All factions of the ruling elite agree on concealing the implications of the world capitalist crisis from working people. Hence the degraded character of the bourgeois election campaign, with any serious discussion of the social crisis and the war danger drowned out by media sensationalism over a succession of sex scandals and anti-Russian propaganda. The Socialist Equality Party entered the 2016 elections to prepare the working class for the political convulsions that have already begun, even before the ballots are counted on Election Day. Our candidates, Jerry White for president and Niles Niemuth for vice president, have consistently warned that the capitalist campaigns are aimed at concealing the crisis and disarming working people. The SEP election campaign is not fundamentally about votes, but about building a political leadership in the working class for the great struggles to come. —Patrick Martin and Barry Grey The FBI intervenes in the 2016 election
Dateline: 29 October 2016
I n an extraordinary and unprecedented action, the Federal Bureau of Investigation has stepped into the 2016 presidential campaign only 11 days before Election Day, sending a letter to Congress announcing new “investigative steps” related to Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server.
The three-paragraph letter by FBI Director James Comey to eight congressional committees on Friday is remarkably vague. It states that “in connection with an unrelated case, the FBI has learned of the existence of emails that appear to be pertinent to the investigation” of Clinton’s personal email server, which, Comey notes, he had previously told Congress was “completed.”
He states that he has agreed to “allow investigators to review these emails to determine whether they contain classified information, as well as to assess their importance to our investigation.” He acknowledges that the FBI “cannot yet assess whether or not this material may be significant.”
The obvious question that arises is why, given the fact that the FBI has no idea whether these additional emails contain any significant information relative to the Clinton email case, the agency should make them a public issue within days of the election. Media commentators noted that the letter violates a longstanding informal FBI ban on making politically sensitive announcements within 60 days of a US election.
Following the report of Comey’s letter, the news media, citing unnamed federal law enforcement officials, said the emails in question were found on a laptop computer shared by Clinton aide Huma Abedin and her husband, former Representative Anthony Weiner.
Weiner is under FBI investigation for allegedly sending sexually explicit text messages to an underage girl. Abedin announced her separation from Weiner earlier this year after the latest episode involving Weiner and sexually explicit Internet activity became public.
Comey’s letter was hailed by Donald Trump and Republican Party spokesmen as tantamount to an official reopening of the FBI investigation and rescinding of the decision announced by Comey in July that no charges would be brought against the Democratic presidential candidate.
Clinton spoke to the press briefly Friday evening, demanding that the FBI provide more information about the substance of what it was reviewing, including whether there was any connection to her use of a private email server. She pointed out that more than 15 million people have already voted and that many millions more will be going to the polls over the next week as early voting continues. In response to questions, she indicated that the FBI has not contacted her and that she first learned of the letter through the media.
It is at this point impossible to determine with precision the motivation behind Comey’s letter and the political forces for which he is speaking. However, his attempt to present the letter as a politically disinterested response to the discovery of new information lacks any credibility.
This direct intervention into the election by the top police-intelligence agency can only be an expression of deep crisis and profound tensions within the American ruling class and the state. The election as a whole has been dominated by the growth of social anger and antiestablishment sentiment, yet it has ended in a contest between two right-wing representatives of the richest 1 percent who are despised by huge sections of the electorate.
It has plumbed the depths of political debasement on the part of both candidates—the fascistic billionaire Trump seeking to channel discontent along the most right-wing, chauvinist and racist channels; the multimillionaire Clinton relying on sex scandals and a McCarthyite attack on Trump as an agent of Russian President Vladimir Putin to bury incriminating revelations of corruption and lying and to swing public opinion behind a policy of military escalation and confrontation with nuclear-armed Russia.
The entire process has been surrounded by an aura of violence and a breakdown of public confidence in the political system. It has unfolded under conditions of deepening economic crisis, mounting international tensions and worsening crises for US imperialism around the world, i.e., the ongoing debacle of Washington’s war for regime change in Syria, the signs of disarray in the anti-Chinese “pivot to Asia,” the emergence of open conflicts with imperialist “allies” in Europe, particularly Germany.
The convergence of these crises is generating bitter conflicts within the American ruling class over policy questions, magnified by fears of a rising tide of social opposition at home.
Whether the intention of Comey’s letter was to inflict fatal damage to Clinton’s candidacy, shore up endangered Republican majorities in the Senate and House, or fire a shot across the bow against an incoming Clinton administration, it makes clear that the next administration will be mired in crisis from the day it takes office.[if gte mso 9]><xml><w:WordDocument><w:View>Normal</w:View><w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom><w:PunctuationKerning/><w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/><w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid><w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent><w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText><w:Compatibility><w:BreakWrappedTables/><w:SnapToGridInCell/><w:WrapTextWithPunct/><w:UseAsianBreakRules/><w:DontGrowAutofit/></w:Compatibility><w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel></w:WordDocument></xml><![endif][if gte mso 9]><xml><w:LatentStyles DefLockedState=”false” LatentStyleCount=”156″></w:LatentStyles></xml><![endif][if gte mso 10]><style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:”Table Normal”; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:””; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:”Times New Roman”; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} </style><![endif][if gte mso 9]><xml><o:shapedefaults v:ext=”edit” spidmax=”1026″/></xml><![endif][if gte mso 9]><xml><o:shapelayout v:ext=”edit”><o:idmap v:ext=”edit” data=”1″/></o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]
One former Justice Department official suggested that Comey was under intense pressure from within the FBI over his previous declaration that no competent prosecutor would bring charges against Clinton over her use of the private server. If true, this means that sections of the federal police agency are in open revolt against the candidate who may shortly become their nominal “commander-in-chief.”
The FBI intervention on the eve of the 2016 election represents an acceleration of a trend in US politics that first came to the surface in the series of Republican-led investigations into the Bill Clinton administration, culminating in his impeachment in 1998. This was followed by the stolen election of 2000, when the Supreme Court intervened and by a 5-4 majority halted the recounting of ballots in Florida in order to award the White House to George W. Bush, the loser in the popular vote.
The two-party system in the United States has always been an instrument of class rule, dominated by corporate America. The unprecedented growth of social inequality over the past four decades has widened the gulf between the political system and the great majority of the population. More and more, official political life revolves around palace intrigues, in which the media and the military-intelligence apparatus play critical roles. The methods of scandalmongering, calculated leaks and political stink bombs prevail.
One thing is clear: none of these strokes and counterstrokes between rival capitalist factions has anything to do with defending the democratic rights and social interests of working people. As far as the capitalist two-party system is concerned, the American people are merely an object of manipulation, to be stampeded by demagogy and scandal.
Patrick Martin PLEASE COMMENT AND DEBATE DIRECTLY ON OUR FACEBOOK GROUP CLICK HERE ABOUT THE AUTHOR The authors are senior editorial writers for wsws.org, a socialist organization. They naturally endorse their party, the Social Equality Party (SEP), as a solution to the existing political crisis. The SEP is a Trotkyist formation. The Greanville Post does not endorse any political faction. Note to Commenters Due to severe hacking attacks in the recent past that brought our site down for up to 11 days with considerable loss of circulation, we exercise extreme caution in the comments we publish, as the comment box has been one of the main arteries to inject malicious code. Because of that comments may not appear immediately, but rest assured that if you are a legitimate commenter your opinion will be published within 24 hours. If your comment fails to appear, and you wish to reach us directly, send us a mail at: [email protected]
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Independents Tilt Decisively to Trump October 31, 2016 Daniel Greenfield
Independents are the largest political group in the country. Larger than either Democrats or Republicans. And they're tilting toward Trump and the GOP.
Adding in ideology, the tracking poll shows Clinton going from 95 percent support among liberal Democrats early in the tracking poll to 88 percent now, while Trump's gone from 89 percent among conservative Republicans to 94 percent now.
Independents -– sometimes swing voters in past elections, albeit inconsistently –- also merit attention. They've gone from a scant 6 points in Clinton's favor in the first four nights of tracking, 44-38 percent, to a substantial Trump lead now, 34-51 percent, Clinton-Trump.
A key element here is the partisan preferences of independents who emerge as likely to vote: They were 2 points more likely to lean toward the Republican Party rather than the Democratic Party at the start of tracking, but are 10 points more apt to do so now.
Hillary Clinton tried to win over independents by positioning her brand as a moderate centrist who can work with Republicans and can get things done while portraying Trump as dangerous and irresponsible. It certainly worked to a degree.
Trump's pitch was that he's not a conventional Republican and he can overturn a rigged system. The drain the swamp speech was a key element. The latter is more likely to ultimately appeal to people who identify as none of the above because they're disgusted with both parties. | 0 |
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By now, we all know that the Secret Service had to rush GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump off the stage at a rally in Reno, Nevada on Saturday night. It turned out to be nothing – just a protester with a sign. At the time it all looked pretty chaotic and frightening, but it turned out that Trump was just fine. The “gun” turned out to be an anti-Trump poster. The man turned out to be a Republican who just wanted the opportunity to protest what Trump had done to his party with a “Republicans against Trump” sign. There was no threat.
Those facts don’t matter to the Trump team, though, as campaign manager Kellyanne Conway went on CNN’s State of the Union and insisted to host Jake Tapper that it was indeed a very real attempt on Trump’s life.
First, Tapper inquired as to why Trump’s people were “retweeting misinformation that this was an assassination attempt.” Conway responded:
“It’s scary. All the coverage is usually about our protesters wreaking havoc and making people feel afraid. And it certainly goes both ways. I’m with Mr. Trump and the Secret Service routinely. They do an amazing job.
I also want to point out because some people are spreading misinformation about the protester. He had canvassed for Hillary Clinton and he had donated to her campaign. So, this is a Democratic plant or operative trying to disrupt our rally. And I think people saw a nimble resilient Donald Trump who would be nimble and resilient as president as well.”
Tapper called Conway on her bullshit, though, and shot back:
“Except it wasn’t an assassination attempt. It was apparently a local voter, a Republican who says he is supporting Hillary Clinton. He has given money to Hillary Clinton. He has canvassed for Hillary Clinton. But he says he’s a Republican. But most importantly, he was not trying to assassinate anyone.”
This was not an assassination attempt, but why is your campaign spreading that it was?”
Conway waffled, saying, “That’s really remarkable. That that’s what the storyline is here.”
Of course, she then did what Trumpkins backed into corners always do, and tried to start changing the subject to the imagined sins of Hillary Clinton. She insisted that the only reason Beyonce, Jay Z and other A-List stars were on the trail with Hillary was that nobody wanted to go to Hillary rallies. Finally, Conway said she’d consider changing the assassination lie if CNN went on the record against “all the storylines, all the headlines, all the breathless predictions of the last two weeks that turned out not to be true.”
Tapper said to that:
“I never reported anything along those lines.”
And irritable Conway insisted:
“CNN certainly has. You’ve got to be honest here.”
Tapper continued, “We’ve been saying all along that Donald Trump has a path to the presidency.”
Conway then interjected with her trademark “WOW!”
Tapper plowed on, though, and nailed the humiliation home, and actually laughed in her face, saying:
“You can say ‘wow’ all you want, I’ve never said that the race was over. We can replay as many tapes as you want.”
Tapper was right to hammer Conway like this. Trump’s entire campaign has been one big con job, built upon fear, ignorance, bigotry, incompetence, and lies. It’s about time someone called them out for what they really are.
Watch the exchange below:
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PARIS — An attack on a soldier at Orly Airport near here on Saturday is being treated as a possible act of terrorism, according to the Paris prosecutor’s office. The assailant, the prosecutor said, had carried out a burst of violence over a period of two hours before being fatally shot. The Paris prosecutor, François Molins, said the motives of the assailant — identified as Ziyed Ben Belgacem — were unknown. But the prosecutor added that Mr. Belgacem had a lengthy police record, including arrests for robbery and offenses, and had served time in prison. He was known to the authorities, Mr. Molins said, but primarily as a criminal. The shooting at Orly prompted a partial evacuation of the airport, the diversion of all flights and a security sweep to determine whether the assailant had left any explosives at the airport’s two terminals, officials said. Incoming flights were diverted to nearby Charles de Gaulle Airport. The chain of events began when Mr. Belgacem was stopped by the police at 6:55 a. m. in the Paris suburb of after he was spotted driving at a high speed with his headlights off, Mr. Molins said at a news conference on Saturday evening. After he pulled over, Mr. Belgacem fired a pistol loaded with birdshot and fled. One police officer was slightly injured. Mr. Belgacem then drove to a bar in where he fired his gun again but did not injure anyone. When he exited the bar, he left his cellphone there. He fled in his car, but abandoned it a few miles away. He then carjacked another vehicle and drove about eight miles to the airport. There he spotted a unit patrolling the airport, Mr. Molins said. At 8:22 a. m. Mr. Belgacem, carrying his pistol, tossed a container of gasoline on the floor. He grabbed one of the soldiers and held his gun to her head. Mr. Molins said the soldiers reported that he yelled: “I’m here to die in the name of Allah. Whatever happens, people are going to die. ” As Mr. Belgacem grappled with the soldier, he wrested her rifle from her. At that instant, the two other soldiers fired three bursts from their weapons, killing him. Mr. Molins said the antiterrorism unit of the prosecutor’s office and the French Intelligence Service had opened an investigation. Mr. Belgacem was carrying cigarettes, 750 euros in cash, or about $800, a lighter and a Quran at the time of the attack, Mr. Molins said. Cocaine, a machete and some foreign currency were later found at his home. Mr. Belgacem’s brother, father and cousin were questioned by the police, Mr. Molins said. While in prison during 2011 and 2012, Mr. Belgacem was identified by intelligence officials as someone who had become radicalized. After his release, he remained on the authorities’ radar, and his house was searched in the wake of the terrorist attacks in Paris in November 2015, Mr. Molins said, although no action was taken against him. The episode at Orly was reminiscent of an attack in February near the Louvre in which a man with two long knives attacked soldiers patrolling in the Carrousel du Louvre, an underground shopping mall. The man injured a soldier before being shot several times. The attack on Saturday came amid a heated presidential election campaign in France, with the first round of voting to take place on April 23. Any terrorist attack so close to the election, political analysts suggest, could be an opportunity by the candidates of the far right, Marine Le Pen, and the center right, François Fillon, to berate the current Socialist government and by association Emmanuel Macron, the candidate, who was previously the economy minister, for failing to protect the French people. While both Ms. Le Pen and Mr. Fillon posted Twitter messages about Saturday’s attack, they used the episode primarily as an opportunity to praise French soldiers and, in Ms. Le Pen’s case, to underscore some of her campaign themes. She said in her post: “Violence has overwhelmed France, a consequence of the laxity of successive governments. But there is the courage of our soldiers. ” Mr. Fillon limited his Twitter message to praise the “women and men” of what is known as Operation Sentinel, the soldiers who “work for our security and have once again proved their courage and efficiency. ” The unit attacked at the airport was part of Operation Sentinel, whose 7, 000 soldiers patrol public areas, including airports, tourist attractions and train stations. The west terminal at Orly reopened by 1 p. m. the Paris airport authority said. Flights gradually resumed at the south terminal, where the attack took place. | 1 |
Pokémon Go has attracted hordes of players within days of its release. The mobile game has also attracted concerns about just how vulnerable our personal data can be in the hands of seemingly benign applications. In the last few days, security bloggers noticed that the game, which is free to download and made by Niantic Inc. in partnership with the Pokémon Company and Nintendo, requested permission not only to use a player’s smartphone camera and location data but also to gain full access to the user’s Google accounts — including email, calendars, photos, stored documents and any other data associated with the login. Critics quickly called the game a “huge security risk” that was invading people’s privacy, and Senator Al Franken, a Democrat, on Tuesday expressed concerns about the issue. Niantic has said the expansive permission requests were “erroneous” and that Pokémon Go did not use anything from players’ accounts other than basic Google profile information. Niantic also said it was working on a fix to change the permissions to a level that would be “in line with the data that we actually access. ” The flap highlights how clicking “yes” to whatever requests pop up when installing an app on a mobile device can compromise privacy, sometimes in insidious ways. In disclosures, some apps say they will hand over data to law enforcement officials or other private parties to respond to legal requests, for example, or even on their own volition. “A number of these games are not only making money on the front end by selling you the game or things within the game, they’re also collecting data about your habits and what you’re doing on your phone, and selling that to marketers,” said Andrew Storms, vice president of security services at the security company New Context. “You’re pretty much giving the rights to all your information to this company. ” So what can be done to minimize the security risks that come with some apps? Here’s a refresher on how to safeguard private information. Ari Rubinstein, a Silicon Valley security engineer, recommends paying close attention to the scope of access that apps request during installation — or to look up the details online — and say “no” if the demands make you uncomfortable. If you are unsure about the permissions you have already granted, check them on iOS by clicking on Settings and scrolling down for a list of apps that you can examine and change individually. On Android, click Settings and click Apps under the Device Settings, then choose an app and select Permissions. Permissions are not the only things to worry about you also need to know what kinds of data an app is collecting from your phone. Information about those is typically contained in an app’s privacy policies, which are often available within the settings of an app, or searchable online. If you cannot find the disclosures, or you are unable to understand their legalese, consider holding off until you learn more. As for Pokémon Go, while the game may not be digging through emails, it is capable of tracking your location. And like those of many apps, its privacy policy allows it to give any data it has about you to law enforcement officials or private parties in response to legal requests or even to whatever it may deem an unethical or legally actionable activity. It can also share nonidentifying information about you with other companies for what it says are “research and analysis, demographic profiling, and other similar purposes. ” Because apps often use platforms like Facebook and Google to authenticate accounts, Mr. Rubinstein suggests regularly checking the access you have granted through the settings of these systems. With Facebook, go to your account settings and click on Apps to examine and revoke access. With Google, go to Privacy and Security Settings and click on Connected Apps and Sites to see or change the apps connected to your account. “Most likely users have apps that they never use that put them at a similar risk” to that from the Pokémon app, he said. | 1 |
Migrants who arrive in Germany without identification papers or a passport may soon have their mobile phones confiscated so that authorities can determine their country of origin. [The number of migrants arriving in Germany with no form of identification has been on the rise, especially among underage migrants, or those who claim to be underage. The Federal Agency for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) has had a hard time determining the age or country of origin of the migrants, but that may change as the government looks to allow them to examine the migrants’ mobile phones Die Welt reports. Hesse Prime Minister Volker Bouffier is the politician behind the idea and met with German Chancellor Angela Merkel Thursday to discuss its implementation. Prime Minister Bouffier, who is also a member of Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) said that the searching of phones by BAMF, “should be possible with this new legislation, we believe this is imperative. ” Bouffier made it clear that he does not want the legislation to give carte blanche to officials to search all migrants mobile phones, but only in cases in which BAMF cannot clearly identify the person’s age or place of origin. Chancellor Merkel said that the authorities should be allowed to have the ability to check mobile phones and that it may already be possibly legal. An undercover investigation last year by journalist Abdullah Khan revealed the extent of how many migrants come to Germany without papers and often use it to their advantage. Mr. Khan spent several months working at the migrant reception centre and said, “Many pose as minors travelling alone, because word has spread that they will qualify for more benefits. … To lie about their age, many people use false passports and other identity documents. ” The journalist described encountering a migrant who claimed originally to be from Afghanistan but spoke in Urdu, the language most commonly used in Pakistan and when confronted presented an obviously forged Afghan passport. Searching mobile phones may also help determine asylum seekers that could have links to radical Islamist groups like the Islamic State. Earlier this month the terror group offered to cover smuggling costs for migrants who promised to join them and wage jihad in Europe. Dutch researchers Joris van Wijk and Maarten Bolhuis have said that it is virtually impossible for governments to determine which asylum seekers may have links to radical Islamists because many are told by terrorist groups to act as normally as possible and not to arouse any suspicion. | 0 |
Ancient manuscript tells of ancient giant race visiting Earth.
The Qumran caves in the West Bank have been considered a veritable treasure trove for historians, particularly those specialising in ancient literature and mythology. Sixty years ago, archaeologists unearthed an ancient book in these caves which is referred to as ‘The Book of Giants’. This text gives the details about an ancient race of otherworldly creatures who existed and eventually died out on Earth.
At this current time, there is very little that historians can deduce about the authorship of ‘The Book of Giants’. However, it has been noted that there are remarkable crossovers between this mysterious text and other known ancient manuscripts such as the Mesopotamian epic of Gilgamesh and the apocryphal Book of Enoch. [Mahway] mounted up in the air like strong winds, and flew with his hands like eagles […he left behind] the inhabited world and passed over Desolation, the great desert […]and Enoch saw him and hailed him, and Mahway said to him […] hither and thither a second time to Mahway […]The Giants await your words and all the monsters of the earth. If […]has been carried […] from the days of […]their […] and they would be added […] we would know from you their meaning […] two hundred trees that from heaven came down… The Book of the Giants describes the creatures as ‘two hundred trees from heaven’ which came down and populated the planet Earth. They are described as a corrupt and debased species, prone to hideous acts of violence and unnatural acts with animals and human beings. After a period of years, one of the giants Mahway, started to experience prophetic dreams. These dreams saw a tablet bearing the names of everyone on Earth being submerged beneath the water. When the tablet rose again, all but three of the names had been washed away by the waves. This particular passage has been interpreted as referring to the survival of Noah and his family after the great flood.
It was when Mahway shared these visions with his fellow giants that they realised the futility of attempting to resist the forces of heaven. They decided to seek out Enoch and ask him to plead to God on their behalf. Enoch is an ancient Jewish mythological figure believed to be the great-grandfather of Noah. He has a reference in the Book of Genesis where he is described as having a special, personal relationship with God. He lived for an astonishing three hundred and sixty-five years before simply disappearing with God one day. Enoch interceded on behalf of the Giants and delivered a damning judgement to them from God. However, he promised them that there was some hope for their redemption.
It is assumed that the Giants were washed away in the great flood that devastated the world several generations after that. What the race did in the interim is still a matter of great mystery. Another mystery is what this giant race could have been. The fact that they are described as coming down from heaven strongly suggests that there were of an extra-terrestrial origin, which has led some to speculate that the ‘giants’ may have been the heavily mythologised race of ancient aliens called the Nephilim.
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EXPOSED: Blocks Of George Soros Funded Anti-Trump Protest Buses For Paid Agitators Caught On Tape The video was taken at 3:30pm on South Canal Street in Chicago on Saturday. As our reader points out, hundreds of the participants that took part in the downtown Chicago protests from November 12 were bused in using these vehicles. Other arrived by train. Video reveals that the “spontaneous” anti-Trump protesters are actually paid agitators bused in courtesy of the George Soros machine
EDITOR’S NOTE: Video taken on the ground in Chicago yesterday show block after block of buses that are being used to bring in professional agitators to protest Donald Trump’s landslide victory over Hillary Clinton. Who is paying for all these buses bringing in all these protesters? Why, it’s our old friend George Soros, of course. And he is playing his favorite card, the race card. Soros, you will recall, spent millions busing in agitators to fuel the race riots in Ferguson , Baltimore and Chicago .
From Zero Hedge: Earlier today we showed that, contrary to USA Today’s claims that the anti-Trump protests across the nation are “spontaneous, involving people from all walks of life”, according to Wikileaks documents at least two of the people profiled by USA Today have a history of being professional agitators for the Democratic party, whose task is to stir up popular protests and – in extreme cases – unleash rioting, such as the following clip showing the latest day of violent protests in Portland revealed.
As our reader notes , “I have a video of 5 city blocks on the West side of Chicago lined with busses from Wisconsin (Badger Bus Lines) bringing in protestors. The Sears tower is visible in the background.”
The video was taken at 3:30pm on South Canal Street in Chicago on Saturday. As our reader points out, hundreds of the participants that took part in the downtown Chicago protests from November 12 were bused in using these vehicles. Other arrived by train. source Police repeatedly charge anti-Trump protesters as Portland chaos continues https://t.co/h3Y24Ykb9h pic.twitter.com/vPPD10sQbw | 0 |
Dispatches from STEPHEN LENDMAN A previous article explained the so-called battle for Mosul is a hoax. It’s about shifting thousands of US-supported ISIS fighters to Syria, along with perhaps letting Turkish forces move in to control evacuated areas. In Moscow, Russian and Syrian foreign ministers expressed concern. Sergey Lavrov said Moscow will “take measures to prevent terrorists moving from Mosul to Syria with their heavy arms, which, of course, will seriously worsen the situation in the Syrian republic.” .. “We think that it is important not to let this happen…We cannot let the terrorist leave Mosul (for) Syria with the aim to re-direct their activity.” .. Syrian Foreign Walid al-Muallem said the US-led “coalition has never fought Daesh. On the contrary, it is destroying the infrastructure of the Syrian economy, and recently destroyed a huge number of bridges on the Euphrates River…They want to move Daesh from Mosul into Raqqa.” .. Assad close political and media advisor Bouthaina Shaaban explained Washington’s dirty scheme, ignored by media scoundrels, saying redeploying ISIS fighters from Mosul to Syria would represent a “huge danger to our sovereignty, to our country.” .. “Russia and Syria are looking at this issue extremely seriously. We’re not going to sit and watch…The way they encircle Mosul shows they would like these terrorists to move into to Syria…They’re navigating terrorism from one place to another, limiting terrorism in one place, directing it to another place. That’s the absolute truth of what is happening in our region.” .. Washington and its rogue allies pay lip service alone to fighting terrorism while actively supporting it. So-called “moderates” aren’t so “moderate,” Shaaban explained. “There are no ’Syrian moderates.’ “ .. They’re cold-blooded cutthroat killers, imperial death squads, serving US imperial interests, actively supported by its coalition partners wanting Assad toppled, Syrian sovereignty destroyed, an Israeli rival eliminated, and Iran isolated ahead of repeating the same scenario against its government. .. Aided by Russia, Iran and Hezbollah fighters, Syria is engaged in the “most challenging issue for humanity in the 21st century,” Shaaban stressed – the struggle to defeat the scourge of US created and supported terrorism, threatening everyone everywhere unless challenged and eliminated. .. America intends stopping at nothing to advance its imperium – its goal, unchallenged dominion over planet earth, its resources and populations – a world unfit and unsafe to live in. Beginning with the Bill and Hillary Clinton co-presidency’s Balkan wars, culminating with the 1999 rape of Yugoslavia, all sovereign independent states have been targeted for regime change – the 9/11 false flag used as pretext to wage phony war on terrorism. ..
Syria is in the eye of the storm. Conflicts continue raging in all countries America attacked after that staged incident – effectively declaring war on humanity. Will nuclear war on Russia, China and Iran follow Hillary’s likely ascension to power next year? Her rage for wanting their sovereign governments eliminated risks ending life on earth. PHOTO: US vehicles operating in the Mosul area, purportedly deployed to annihilate ISIS fighters. NOTE: ALL IMAGE CAPTIONS, PULL QUOTES AND COMMENTARY BY THE EDITORS, NOT THE AUTHORS ABOUT THE AUTHOR STEPHEN LENDMAN lives in Chicago. He can be reached at [email protected] . His new book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.” ( http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html ) Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com . =SUBSCRIBE TODAY! NOTHING TO LOSE, EVERYTHING TO GAIN.= free • safe • invaluable If you appreciate our articles, do the right thing and let us know by subscribing. It’s free and it implies no obligation to you— ever. We just want to have a way to reach our most loyal readers on important occasions when their input is necessary. In return you get our email newsletter compiling the best of The Greanville Post several times a week. Print this post if you want. Share This: | 0 |
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On Thursday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “O’Reilly Factor,” White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer stated of the American Health Care Act, “tomorrow, it’s time to vote. ” And that “this is the only train leaving the station that’s going to be repealing Obamacare, and giving us an alternative to replace it. This is the train that’s leaving the station. ” Spicer said, “My understanding, he’s going to get it. The president’s been working the phones. He’s had meetings throughout the day. His team’s been up and down Capitol Hill, here at the White House. … And tomorrow, it’s time to vote. ” He further stated the AHCA is “finally going to be the repeal and replace that they’ve waited for for a long time. ” Spicer added that Trump is “not at all” disappointed with the AHCA, and the president “continues to make tremendous progress” on getting votes for the bill. Spicer later said, “I think, at the end of the day, this is the only train leaving the station that’s going to be repealing Obamacare, and giving us an alternative to replace it. This is the train that’s leaving the station. ” Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett | 0 |
Tweet Widget by Hugh Esco
The author, a reader and colleague of BAR, offers a corrective to our use of the word “jihad,” a term that, in “an Islamic conception, has nothing to do with ‘holy war.’” In this “appeal,” Mr. Esco warns: “When we fail to interrupt this abuse of human language, We lend support to registration programs and internment camps, to islamaphobic attacks and imperial wars of aggression.” Confusing Jihad with Hirabah Won't Build a More Peaceful World by Hugh Esco
“No one seems to use of phrases like ‘Christian Terrorists,’ although there is plenty of evidence in our history and contemporary experience to support the use of such a phrase.”
Black Agenda Report led the way by banning the perjorative use of “illegal” to describe workers in this country without documentation. This publication did so in an article years ago comparing its use to that of the n-word. Many other media outlets including those in the mainstream have since followed suit, so that these days the word is only heard in those venues intent on expressing their contempt for our fellow workers in this divisive way.
This is my appeal that Black Agenda Report and the readers who look to this publication for thought-leadership decide for ourselves that FOX news does not need our help creating a hostile world for our Muslim neighbors who respect a messenger who in his final sermon instructed the faithful, "Treat others justly so that no one will be unjust to you."
Fringe white supremacist groups have long shown a willingness to use violence to advance their political agenda and to justify their tactics by misquoting the Bible and claiming a Christian Identity. Still no one seems to paint all Christians as equally heinous, to treat their claims of Christian faith with any seriousness or to adopt the widespeard use of phrases like “Christian Terrorists,” although there is plenty of evidence in our history and contemporary experience to support the use of such a phrase.
Yet it serves the monied interests who profit from war to create fear by conflating the actions and strategies of small sectarian militias who misquote the Quran to advance their secular agenda with the beliefs of 1.6 billion Muslims who actually seek to practice its precepts.
“The Arabic word ‘jihad’ most often translates as ‘struggle.’”
For Muslims around the world an Islamic conception of jihad has nothing to do with “holy war,” a concept put forward in 1095 by the Catholic Pope Urban II to justify the crusades against Muslims. The Arabic word most often translates as “struggle,” and is used forty-one times in the
Quran, thirty-one times to speak of what the context reveals is a “jihad al-nafs,” or an inner struggle in the path of the Divine, what Islamic scholars have called “the greater jihad.” It is the sort of lifetime commitment to personal integrity that supports being good partners to spouses, good parents to children, good neighbors, to be civically engaged to create a better world for our communities.
The Quran includes ten references to “jihad al-qital,” referred to as the “lesser jihad” by the scholars and theologians. Jihad al-qital is an external militant struggle, ordained by legitimate civil authorities and constrained by rules-of-engagement respecting the distinctions between combatants and others. It includes an expectation that the lives of captured combatants will be spared. Jihad al-qital bears more in common with the Christian concept of just-war, than with the
scorched earth policies of the crusades which burned the libraries of Byzantium, or the Jewish tribes annihilation of all the indigenous peoples of Canaan, along with their livestock and shrines.
We create a communications disconnect when we turn jihad into a pejorative, one where Muslims and non-Muslims wind up talking past each other.
“We'd never let Timothy McVeigh define Christianity for us. ”
We also empower Al-Qaida and ISIS and similar organizations and their allies among the elites of the United States, when we let them appropriate this key Islamic concept to describe their terrorist activities. We'd never let Timothy McVeigh define Christianity for us.
When we fail to interrupt this abuse of human language, this hate speech, this disrespect for the faith of 1% of our fellow US citizens and roughly a quarter of our global neighbors, we first show our ignorance but worse share responsibility for creating an atmosphere which lends support to the attacks being suffered on a regular basis by our Muslim neighbors, both here at home and abroad. We lend support to registration programs and internment camps, to islamaphobic attacks and imperial wars of aggression.
If we need an Arabic word to describe terrorism, that word would be hirabah, which translates as “unlawful warfare.”
Nuclear blackmail is hirabah. Drone strikes are hirabah. Cluster munitions are hirabah. White phosphorous is hirabah. Wars of imperialism, aggression and occupation are hirabah. Wars for oil are hirabah.
And distorting language to tell people that words mean the opposite of what they mean is also a form of cultural warfare, and ought to be unlawful, but is perpetrated daily by elected officials, agencies of our own government, the war industry funded think tanks, FOX-News and other Islamophobes in the media. Sectarian militias and FOX news ought not be given the power to redefine the 'sixth' pillar of Islam for the non-Muslim world.
“Wars of imperialism, aggression and occupation are ‘hirabah.’”
And they certainly do not need our help doing it. In that final sermon referenced above, the Muslim Prophet also prohibited usurious loans and instructed those with accumulated wealth to give every year to the state specified percentages for distribution to the needy. No wonder the disaster capitalists want us to be afraid of our Muslim neighbors.
If fearing our neighbors serves the interests of disaster capitalists, it is highly unlikely to do us any good.
Jihad, even in its lower form, shows its practitioners to be more civilized that the imperial purposes to which our tax dollars are put in imperial wars of aggression and occupation. Jihad al-nafs is an islamic principle to which all the worlds' people, with or without faith, should aspire.
So-called 'jihadist terrorist' is an oxymoron, one which creates a disconnect for those who understand Arabic and Islamic teachings. We ought to say 'sectarian militia' when that is what we mean. Doing so is as essential to our learning to respect our immigrant neighbors as was our rejection of the pejorative use of 'illegal'. Getting the language right is a key early step to creating peace with our Muslim neighbors in the global community. It will help us take the next step of ending our imperial occupations. FOX news is not a legitimate source for a vocabulary useful to our struggle, our jihad for a just future. But respect for the faiths of others can move us in the right direction. Hugh Esco is a founding officer of the Georgia Green Party who works by day in IT, and on nights and weekends for a world worthy of passing on to the next generation. He can be contacted at [email protected] | 1 |
TORONTO — The world’s leading antidoping officials on Monday called for Russia to be barred from this summer’s Rio Games after a damning report confirmed a Russian ’s claims of cheating at the 2014 Sochi Olympics. The request by antidoping officials was extraordinary, if not unprecedented, in the history of the Olympics. President Vladimir V. Putin responded defiantly as the possibility emerged that the Russian flag would not appear at the opening ceremony on Aug. 5 in Rio de Janeiro. While announcing that the Russian sports officials named in the report would be “temporarily suspended,” Mr. Putin on Monday asked for “fuller, more objective information that is based on facts. ” “Today we see a dangerous relapse of politics intruding into sports,” he said in a statement. Dr. Grigory Rodchenkov, Russia’s former antidoping lab director, told The New York Times in May that he covered up the use of drugs by Russian Olympians at the Sochi Games, and that he did so under orders from the government and with the aid of Russia’s intelligence service. In a report of nearly 100 pages, Richard McLaren, a Canadian lawyer retained by the World Agency to investigate Dr. Rodchenkov’s claims, presented proof that a doping program was executed during the Sochi Olympics, and well before and afterward. With evidence dating to 2011, the report said athletes were given cocktails of drugs, and incriminating urine samples were routinely covered up. Beyond interviews, the report was informed by forensic evidence, metadata and emails retrieved from computer hard drives. The investigative team gained access to 95 doping samples of Russian athletes from Sochi that had been stored in Switzerland 11 were chosen at random for analysis. All of them showed signs of tampering, the report said, including scratches on the inside of the bottle caps and abnormal levels of table salt in urine, which Dr. Rodchenkov said he added to make certain recorded chemistry measurements of the tainted and clean samples matched. Investigators confirmed that a man identified as a member of Russia’s intelligence service — Evgeny Blokhin, with whom Dr. Rodchenkov conducted the covert overnight operation in a storage closet at Sochi — had a security badge to access the Sochi lab. That security clearance identified him as a sewage and pipes engineer, the inquiry found. The International Olympic Committee, which has the sole authority to ban an entire national delegation, called the actions outlined in the report a “shocking and unprecedented attack on the integrity of sport,” pledging to pursue “the toughest possible sanctions available against any individual or organization implicated. ” Top Olympic executives were next due to meet in Rio, two days before the Olympics begin on Aug. 5, but the I. O. C. said Monday that it had scheduled a meeting for Tuesday to discuss “provisional measures and sanctions. ” Officials are now under intense pressure from antidoping officials and athletes to bring stiff sanctions against Russia, less than three weeks before the Games begin. Discussing his findings in an interview in a Toronto hotel ballroom, Mr. McLaren said that the conclusions of his inquiry met standards. He confirmed that his team had communicated with the United States Department of Justice, which in May opened its own inquiry into Russian doping. Mr. McLaren said his inquiry had established “beyond a reasonable doubt” that Russia’s ministry of sport, its antidoping organization and the country’s federal security service were involved in an elaborate cheating scheme that stretched far beyond what had been alleged. “The surprise result of the Sochi investigation was the revelation of the extent of State oversight and directed control of the Moscow laboratory in processing, and covering up urine samples of Russian athletes from virtually all sports before and after the Sochi Games,” Mr. McLaren wrote in the report. The evidence showed that the subversion of doping controls had occurred in 30 sports, including 20 Olympic summer sports and Paralympic sports. Craig Reedie, the president of the global antidoping organization that commissioned the report, was not present at the Toronto announcement, but in a statement he expressed concern that, in addition to the Sochi Games, there was a “serious manipulation of the doping control process” at the 2013 track and field world championships in Moscow and the 2013 World University Games in Kazan, with additional measures to circumvent doping controls at the 2012 London Games. Dr. Rodchenkov said he created a mixture of steroids and liquor — known as “the Duchess” cocktail among Russian sports officials, according to the report — that was provided to athletes ahead of competition. That combination promoted speedy absorption of the drugs, to minimize the period of time during which they could be detected. “In the face of such evidence of subversion of antidoping processes,” Mr. Reedie said on Monday, “WADA insists upon imposition of the most serious consequences to protect clean athletes from the scourge of doping in sport. ” Mr. Reedie, who is also an executive board member of the Olympic organization, noted that the Russian Olympic Committee was not untainted by the findings, and that cheating had extended to “all sport disciplines whose urine samples were being analyzed by the Moscow lab. ” Some sports officials spoke up in defense of Russia on Monday, articulating the hope that “all countries and athletes will be present” at the Games, as Brazilian sports minister Leonardo Picciani said. The International Olympic Committee has defended the integrity of the Russian Olympic Committee in recent weeks. But some of the key actors in the government scheme who were named in the report also had Olympic committee roles. Russian officials emphatically dismissed Dr. Rodchenkov’s claims after they were published in May. Still, Russia’s track and field team was banned last month from competing at the Games by the International Association of Athletics Federations, the sport’s governing body, after Mr. McLaren had privately given a preliminary report on his investigation. Russia is contesting the track and field ban with the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Switzerland, and the hearing is expected to take place on Tuesday. “This is not just about what we in North America call track and field and what others in the world call athletics,” Mr. McLaren said, confirming Dr. Rodchenkov’s claims that cheating pervaded Russian sport — affecting results at both the Winter and Summer Olympics and leaving who have finished behind Russian athletes with questions. Mr. McLaren said in the report that he had not had enough time to identify athletes who might have benefited from manipulated test results. The antidoping agency said it was interested in commissioning further investigation, provided the funding was available. The report identified several Russian officials who had engaged in sophisticated planning dating back years. Lead among them was Yuri Nagornykh, Russia’s deputy minister of sport and a Russian Olympic Committee executive, who had denied the accusations after The Times’s report last spring. Mr. McLaren’s report also named Irina Rodionova, the deputy director of the center of sports preparation of national teams of Russia, confirming that Ms. Rodionova provided Dr. Rodchenkov with information on which anonymous, coded urine samples belonged to each athlete, and thus informing whose urine he swapped into each bottle. The antidoping adviser to Russia’s sports minister, Natalia Zhelanova, was also identified as a key liaison in the scheme “as early as 2012,” having sent emails about covering up drug positives from her government account, the inquiry found. Asked about the allegations last week in Moscow, Ms. Zhelanova denied wrongdoing. But about Ms. Rodionova’s involvement, she said: “That doesn’t surprise me,” while insisting that the work of Ms. Rodionova was independent of the sports ministry. She gestured toward the offices of Ms. Rodionova, steps from the sports ministry’s palatial yellow headquarters and sharing a courtyard where cars are parked. After hearing Mr. McLaren’s remarks on Monday, Paul Melia, Canada’s top antidoping officer, said the only appropriate response was to keep the Russian flag from flying in Rio. “I was anticipating the worst,” he said. “Yet when I listen to the evidence, I’m shocked and devastated. ” Nearing the end of a day filled with reaction to his report, Mr. McLaren said he been skeptical of the allegations two months earlier. “Some of it was described in a way I thought was fanciful and couldn’t happen,” he said, referring to the hole in the wall through which Dr. Rodchenkov said urine bottles had been passed starting around midnight each night. “Now I know it did happen. ” Dr. Rodchenkov remains in the United States but has declined interview requests as government investigations into Russian doping continue. Bryan Fogel, a filmmaker who has been collaborating with Dr. Rodchenkov on a documentary about doping and who facilitated his travel from Moscow to Los Angeles last fall, said he felt vindicated. “He knows he was telling the truth, so the report’s conclusions were not a surprise,” Mr. Fogel said. “The relevant authorities now have all of his evidence. ” Ahead of Rio, the impact of that evidence is continuing. “The Olympic brand is under intense scrutiny,” Mr. Melia said. “This is a seminal time. ” | 1 |
Saturday at a town hall in her home district in Los Angeles, Rep. Maxine Waters ( ) who has called for impeachment several times, told President Donald Trump she is coming for him. Discussing President Trump firing FBI Director James Comey, Waters said,” He always went around the country talking about he was a good man, he had faith in him, that he was going to do a good job until he got too close to him. Donald Trump, I’m coming for you. ” Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN | 0 |
Get Ready For Civil Unrest: Survey Finds That Most Americans Are Concerned About Election Violence By Michael Snyder, on October 26th, 2016
Could we see violence no matter who wins on November 8th? Let’s hope that it doesn’t happen, but as you will see below, anti-Trump violence is already sweeping the nation. If Trump were to actually win the election, that would likely send the radical left into a violent post-election temper tantrum unlike anything that we have ever seen before. Alternatively, there is a tremendous amount of concern on the right that this election could be stolen by Hillary Clinton. And as I showed yesterday, it appears that voting machines in Texas are already switching votes from Donald Trump to Hillary Clinton . If Hillary Clinton wins this election under suspicious circumstances, that also may be enough to set off widespread civil unrest all across the country.
At this moment there is less than two weeks to go until November 8th, and a brand new survey has found that a majority of Americans are concerned “about the possibility of violence” on election day…
A 51% majority of likely voters express at least some concern about the possibility of violence on Election Day; one in five are “very concerned.” Three of four say they have confidence that the United States will have the peaceful transfer of power that has marked American democracy for more than 200 years, but just 40% say they are “very confident” about that.
More than four in 10 of Trump supporters say they won’t recognize the legitimacy of Clinton as president, if she prevails, because they say she wouldn’t have won fair and square.
But many on the left are not waiting until after the election to commit acts of violence. On Wednesday, Donald Trump’s star on the Walk of Fame was smashed into pieces by a man with a sledgehammer and a pick-ax…
Donald Trump took a lot of hits today, and not just in the Presidential race. With less than two weeks to go before America decides if the ex- Apprentice host will pull off a surprise victory over Hillary Clinton, Trump’s star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame was destroyed early Wednesday morning by a man dressed as a city construction worker and wielding a sledgehammer and pick-ax in what looks to be a Tinseltown first.
And there were two other instances earlier this year when Donald Trump’s star was also vandalized. One came in January, and the other happened in June …
This is of course not the first time the GOP candidate’s star has been attacked or defaced since Trump announced his White House bid in summer 2015. The most extreme measure was a reverse swastika being sprayed on the star at 6801 Hollywood Blvd in late January. In June this summer, a mute sign was painted on Trump’s star in a seemingly protest against the antagonistic language and policies some have accused Trump of promoting and reveling in during the campaign. In both cases, Trump’s star was quickly cleaned and back as new within a day.
We have seen anti-Trump violence on the east coast as well. Earlier this month, someone decided to firebomb the Republican Party headquarters in Orange County, North Carolina. On the building next to the headquarters, someone spray-painted “Nazi Republicans get out of town or else” along with a swastika.
There have also been other disturbing incidents of anti-Trump violence all over the nation in recent days. A recent Lifezette article put together quite a long list, and the following is just a short excerpt from that piece…
On Oct. 15 in Bangor, Maine, vandals spray-painted about 20 parked cars outside a Trump rally. Trump supporter Paul Foster, whose van was hit with white paint, told reporters, “Why can’t they do a peaceful protest instead of painting cars, all of this, to make their statement?”
Around Oct. 3, a couple of Trump supporters were assaulted in Zeitgeist, a San Francisco bar, after they were allegedly refused service for expressing support for Trump, GotNews reports. “The two Trump supporters were attacked, punched, and chased into the street by ‘some thugs’ that a barmaid called out from the back.” Lilian Kim of ABC 7 Bay Area tweeted a photo of the men, in which one was wearing a Trump T-shirt and the other was wearing a “Blue Lives Matter” shirt.
On Sept. 28 in El Cajon, California, an angry mob at a Black Lives Matter protest beat 21-year-old Trump supporter Feras Jabro for wearing a “Make America Great Again” baseball cap. The assault was broadcast live using the smartphone app Periscope.
There is a move to get Trump supporters to wear red on election day, but in many parts of America that might just turn his supporters into easy targets. Let’s certainly hope that we don’t see the kind of violent confrontations at voting locations that many experts are anticipating.
Of course there are also many on the right that are fighting mad, and a Hillary Clinton victory under suspicious circumstances may be enough to push them over the edge.
For example, this week former Congressman Joe Walsh said that he is “grabbing my musket” if Donald Trump loses the election…
Former Rep. Joe Walsh appeared to call for armed revolution Wednesday if Donald Trump is not elected president.
Walsh, a former tea party congressman from Illinois who is now a conservative talk radio host, tweeted, “On November 8th, I’m voting for Trump. On November 9th, if Trump loses, I’m grabbing my musket. You in?”
And without a doubt, many ordinary Americans are stocking up on guns and ammunition just in case Hillary Clinton is victorious. The following comes from USA Today …
“Since the polls are starting to shift quite a bit towards Hillary Clinton, I’ve been buying a lot more ammunition,” says Rick Darling, 69, an engineer from Harrison Township, in Michigan’s Detroit suburbs. In a follow-up phone interview after being surveyed, the Trump supporter said he fears progressives will want to “declare martial law and take our guns away” after the election.
Today America is more divided than I have ever seen it before, and the mainstream media is constantly fueling the hatred and the anger that various groups feel toward one another.
Ironically, Donald Trump has been working very hard to bring America together. In fact, he is solidly on track to win a higher percentage of the black vote than any Republican presidential candidate since 1960 .
If Hillary Clinton and the Democrats win on November 8th, things will not go well for Hillary Clinton’s political enemies. The Clintons used the power of the White House to go after their enemies the first time around, and Hillary is even more angry and more bitter now than she was back then.
And the radical left is very clear about who their enemies are. This is something that I discussed on national television earlier this month …
As I write this, it is difficult for me to even imagine how horrible a Hillary Clinton presidency would be.
But at this point that appears to be the most likely outcome .
Out of all the candidates that we could have chosen, the American people are about to put the most evil one by far into the White House.
Perhaps Donald Trump can still pull off a miracle and we can avoid that fate, but time is rapidly slipping away and November 8th will be here before we know it. | 1 |
Wealthy Father Nervously Waits For Response After Sending Donations To Son’s Top College Choices Close Vol 52 Issue 42 · Local · College · Parenting
AUSTIN, TX—Anxiously wondering what kind of impression he was leaving on university admissions officials, wealthy father Gordon Fring was said to be waiting restlessly for responses this week after mailing donations to his son’s top college choices. “I sent in contributions to eight different schools all over the country and haven’t heard anything back yet,” said Fring, who added that while he submitted large sums to each of the private universities, he knew that thousands of other high school seniors’ well-off parents had done the exact same thing, so at the end of the day, it was just a crapshoot. “I really hope I get positive news from Duke. My son’s wanted to go there forever, and I feel really good about the amount of cash I sent them, so hopefully I have a decent shot. Fingers crossed.” At press time, sources reported that Fring had become excited after receiving an envelope from Vanderbilt, only to quickly grow dejected upon opening it and finding a simple form letter thanking him for his gift. Share This Story: WATCH VIDEO FROM THE ONION Sign up For The Onion's Newsletter
Give your spam filter something to do. Daily Headlines | 0 |
Poroshenko apologizes to Lukashenko for threat to shoot down civilian plane November 11, 2016 - Fort Russ News - PolitRussia - translated by J. Arnoldski - Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has apologized to Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko for the incident with the civilian Belavia airliner . During a telephone conversation, the Ukrainian leader also informed Poroshenko that the perpetrators of the incident will be punished. The two heads of state agreed that their countries’ relevant services will soon hold consultations on security issues to prevent such incidents in the future. On October 21st, a Belavia civilian flight was forced to return to the Zhulyany airport near Kiev after being threatened by Ukrainian fighter jets. After landing, the SBU detained one of its passengers, the chairman of the board of the Civil Union international public organization, Armen Martirosyan, who was soon after released. Minsk expressed its protest against the incident to Kiev. A memo sent to Kiev said “the Belarusian side expects an official apology and demands compensation for all losses and expenses caused by the Ukrainian side’s actions.” Ukraine’s security services initially denied that fighter jets threatened the civilian plane, but the Belarusian side published the transcript of the conversation between the crew commander and dispatcher. Afterwards, Belavia reported that Ukraine agreed to pay “small compensation” for the incident. The passenger over whom Kiev landed the plane has filed a lawsuit against Ukrainian authorities. Follow us on Facebook! | 0 |
Zach Cartwright | November 6, 2016
One of the most prolific Twitter users in the world is being denied his favorite medium of communication in the days before the election.
According to the New York Times, Donald Trump’s social media usage is being stymied by top campaign aides, in an effort to keep the Republican presidential nominee from straying off message as voters prepare to cast their ballots. Calling the revocation of Trump’s sole control over the @realDonaldTrump account an “essential move” prior to Election Day, the Times reported that Trump’s tweets are now being closely screened by top communications aide Hope Hicks , who approves every tweet before it’s fired off into the world.
Trump’s tweeting has previously landed him in rough waters, such as a flurry of tweets fired off at 3 AM about former Miss Universe Alicia Machado, who the billionaire reality TV host once referred to as “Miss Piggy” in reference to her weight gain following the pageant, and “Miss Housekeeper” in reference to her Latina upbringing. Trump also encouraged his 13 million followers to “check out” a sex tape allegedly featuring Machado. The tweets came after a debate with Hillary Clinton, who brought up her rival’s treatment of the beauty queen near the end of the 90-minute debate. Using Alicia M in the debate as a paragon of virtue just shows that Crooked Hillary suffers from BAD JUDGEMENT! Hillary was set up by a con.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 30, 2016 Did Crooked Hillary help disgusting (check out sex tape and past) Alicia M become a U.S. citizen so she could use her in the debate?
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 30, 2016
Trump has frequently used his account on the popular social media platform to attack his political rivals on both sides of the aisle. In 2012, Trump tweeted his doubts that President Barack Obama was born in the United States, and to peddle fears about the Ebola virus. He’s also tweeted insulting remarks about prominent women in society, given unsolicited advice to celebrities about their relationships, and fired off insults at random people. An 'extremely credible source' has called my office and told me that @BarackObama 's birth certificate is a fraud.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 6, 2012 How amazing, the State Health Director who verified copies of Obama’s “birth certificate” died in plane crash today. All others lived
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 12, 2013 . @ariannahuff is unattractive both inside and out. I fully understand why her former husband left her for a man- he made a good decision.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 28, 2012 Everyone knows I am right that Robert Pattinson should dump Kristen Stewart. In a couple of years, he will thank me. Be smart, Robert.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 22, 2012 I have never seen a thin person drinking Diet Coke.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 14, 2012
Trump will likely be able to wrest control of his social media accounts back from his campaign staff on November 9.
Zach Cartwright is an activist and author from Richmond, Virginia. He enjoys writing about politics, government, and the media. Send him an email at [email protected] | 0 |
WASHINGTON — Out with almonds, in with Doritos. At the stroke of 12:01 p. m. on Friday, as soon as Donald J. Trump is sworn in as president and Barack Obama relinquishes the office, dozens of federal workers will swing into action at the White House to replace one commander in chief’s creature comforts — favorite snacks, clothes, toiletries, artwork and furniture — with those of his successor. The process, months in the planning but mere hours in its militarylike execution, unfolds mostly away from public view as Americans and the world focus on the pageantry of Inauguration Day: the presidential oath and address at the Capitol, a parade down Pennsylvania Avenue, the balls. For the roughly 100 people who work in the White House and the employees on hand to help them with perhaps the world’s moving day, the official events double as useful distractions that keep the exiting president and his family and the incoming occupants during the work. “It’s very busy — you are on your feet constantly, making sure things are going in the right place and in the right way, and there is very little time to spare,” said Betty Monkman, a White House curator for more than three decades who helped supervise the changeover in 2001, when Bill Clinton was moving out and George W. Bush was coming in. “The housekeeper and maids are all getting the clothes in the closet and cosmetics and toiletries in the bathrooms, the kitchen staff is preparing the food. There is a lot going on. ” Mr. Obama and his wife, Michelle, who plan to move to a house less than two miles from the White House so they can remain in Washington while their younger daughter, Sasha, completes high school, have already begun moving personal items to their new home. Moving trucks, including one from a company specializing in storing and moving fine art, have been parked outside the house in the District’s upscale Kalorama neighborhood, and workers have been photographed carrying large cartons inside. But much of the work at the White House cannot take place until the transfer of power occurs just after noon, when two moving trucks pull into the driveway that circles the South Lawn — one to deliver the new president’s possessions and the other one to cart off those belonging to the departing chief executive. Nostalgia mixes in with the frenzy. “It’s an emotional time,” said Anita McBride, who served as chief of staff to Laura Bush, including during the 2009 handoff to the Obamas. On the morning of the inauguration, before the departing president hosts his successor for a midmorning tea, members of the White House residence staff — butlers, maids, cooks, groundskeepers and others — typically gather in the East Room to say goodbye to the couple they have served, often for the better part of a decade. “It can be teary,” Ms. McBride said. The changes range from the mundane to the significant. Mr. Obama, whose family’s obsession with healthy eating has been well documented, keeps a large bowl of apples on a table in the Oval Office and a supply of almonds for his nibbling over briefing books. Mr. Trump, a aficionado, is known to prefer not only Doritos but also Lays potato chips. The chief usher is in charge of briefing the kitchen staff of any such requests in advance so the pantry on the ground floor of the White House can be appropriately stocked. Mr. Trump’s team declined to comment on what requests he has made for stocking the kitchen or redecorating the house for his first days there, and it is not clear how much time the incoming president — who is most comfortable in the familiar confines of his lavish penthouse apartment at Trump Tower, with its accents — plans to spend there. His wife, Melania, who met Jan. 3 at the White House with the usher and curator, plans to live in New York for the first months of Mr. Trump’s presidency so the couple’s elementary son, Barron, can finish the year at his private school in Manhattan. The White House empties of all but a skeleton crew of political appointees during the inauguration on Capitol Hill. Amy Zantzinger, a social secretary for Ms. Bush, recalls walking out the White House gate just before noon on that day in 2009 as Michael Smith, the Obamas’ decorator, was coming in. “Mrs. Obama’s priority that day was getting the girls’ rooms settled in time for bedtime that night,” Ms. Zantzinger said about the first daughters, then 7 and 10. A transition official close to Mrs. Trump, speaking on the condition of anonymity because she was not authorized to talk about the process, said she was working closely with an interior designer to redo parts of the White House residence. (The official also would not address reports that Mrs. Trump, a former model, would install a “glam room’’ for makeup and hair preparations.) She has enlisted Jessica Boulanger, a senior vice president of communications at the Business Roundtable who has an interest in fashion design, on a volunteer basis to help her establish an East Wing team. Mr. Trump is planning to swap the curtains in the Oval Office — currently a deep shade of red — for those used by a previous president, according to a person familiar with the exchange. At the White House, aides have been plotting the move for weeks. They compiled briefing books for the incoming first family with color photographs and architectural drawings of all the rooms in the residence, including what furniture and artwork are available. Curators, who keep computerized inventories of artifacts that are in the permanent collection of the White House and those that have been brought in as gifts or personal items, police the process to ensure that exiting presidents do not leave with anything that does not belong to them. It does not always go seamlessly. Bill and Hillary Clinton had to return nearly $50, 000 worth of gifts they took with them when they left the White House in 2001. These were eventually determined to be the property of the National Park Service, which oversees the White House. “The Clintons were partying up until 3 a. m. the night before, so it was much more of a frantic turnaround for the residence staff to move in the Bushes’ stuff,” Ms. McBride said. When it came time for Mrs. Bush, a librarian, to transition out of the White House, she added, she made sure the process was orderly, starting in the summer of 2008 when she began gradually moving belongings to the family’s ranch in Crawford, Tex. The newly president and first lady typically return to the White House after a lunch at the Capitol and are greeted by the chief usher, who makes sure they are comfortable for a few moments before they head out again to a viewing stand on Pennsylvania Avenue to watch the inaugural parade. “They’ll come and go quickly, which is just as well,” Ms. Monkman said, “because there is still so much to do. ” | 1 |
The Clintons and Trump in the New York of the One Percent Posted on Nov 2, 2016 Hillary and Bill Clinton smile outside. ( Karen Murphy / (CC BY-ND 2.0) )
In an essay in The New York Times Magazine, columnist Maureen Dowd sheds light on Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump’s climb through New York’s high society.
“We are in the final days of the first presidential contest between two New Yorkers in 72 years,” Dowd writes. “On election night, the party and the wake will both be held in Manhattan. Hillary will hold hers at the Javits Convention Center, with its literal glass ceiling”.
Dowd examines the Clintons’ move from Washington D.C. to New York after Bill left the presidency:
With Hillary’s Senate bid underway, the Clintons held out their tin cup. They had been fund-raising in the city nonstop since 1990, but the asks intensified as they started their foundation in 2001 and rubbed shoulders with all the new wealth on Wall Street, which was driven by hedge funds and technology funds. With book deals and lucrative speeches and Bill’s role as an adviser to Ronald Burkle’s private-equity firm, Yucaipa, the Clintons worked their way out of the debt accrued by legal bills from a cascade of federal investigations to earn an estimated $230 million in the next 15 years.
As the Clintons fashioned a new life in New York, Trump was transforming himself as well — from a risk-taking developer facing bankruptcy to a low-risk licenser of his name for other people’s projects, from a brazen builder to a gilded reality-TV star on “The Apprentice.” He had come out of Queens, a pushy New York kid with family money but no social tools to climb the society ladder. “Even stuck out on Avenue Z, his head was always in Manhattan,” says Wayne Barrett, author of the biography “Trump: The Greatest Show on Earth.” Gwenda Blair, author of “The Trumps,” says Trump, resplendent in the ’70s in his three-piece burgundy suit with matching shoes and matching limo, recalled “this strapping lad from the provinces who comes to the city, like a figure out of Balzac’s ‘Lost Illusions.’?”
The New York society scene was set by the Rockefellers and the Astors with a tradition of civility, philanthropy and the arts at its heart. Even those who make money the rough way — especially them — adopt this genteel facade. Michael Bloomberg is the quintessential emblem of this model and Donald Trump is the quintessential raspberry to it. One top New York foundation official who requested anonymity — many people will only speak anonymously about the Trumps and the Clintons, because both clans are known to be vindictive — notes that “in the community of plutocrats and superachievers who come to New York, Donald Trump is seen as persona non grata. He’s not a civic leader.” New York, this person says, is a place where private-equity C.E.O.s like Henry Kravis and Stephen Schwarzman see themselves making commitments to the public good. Their status doesn’t come only from being in charge of powerful corporations. “It also comes from some attachment to a hospital or university or cultural center. Trump was never part of that ecosystem.” When the tightfisted Trump hosts a charity event for veterans or a charity golf tournament, it is dismissed as something to polish the Trump brand. Trump has turned off many people in the worlds of real estate, banking and law with his strong-arming, fee-shaving or stiffing, bankruptcies and litigiousness. “Most real estate guys won’t go near him,” a leading New York financial executive says. “You lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas.”
Trump thumps his chest about money, acting as if he’s Bloomberg-wealthy, while the Clintons pretend they have less than they do. Trump wants to belong, to get more legitimacy by elbowing his way into the power crowd, while the Clintons passed that threshold of belonging after two terms in the White House. A top media mogul dismisses all three as outsiders: “No one here thinks of the Clintons as New Yorkers, and Donald is a bridge-and-tunnel person. He’s always been a poseur in New York.” | 1 |
*Articles of the Bound* / Russian Operations Inside the United States Russian Operations Inside the United States November 1, 2016, 10:02 am by Denise Simon Leave a Comment 0
By: Denise Simon | Founders Code
This site has posted countless articles on Russia clandestine operations around the world and the blueprint for what Putin’s ultimate objective may be. Putin not only affects the United States but the UK spy chief is declaring the same thing.
MI5 head: ‘increasingly aggressive’ Russia a growing threat to UK
Exclusive: In first newspaper interview given by a serving spy chief, Andrew Parker talks of terror, espionage and balance between secrecy and privacy Andrew Parker said Russia was ‘using its whole range of state organs and powers to push its foreign policy abroad in increasingly aggressive ways’. Photograph: Jeff Overs/BBC/PA
Denial is a dangerous conditions and facts matter.
During the last months of the United States presidential campaigns, much has been investigated and written about how Moscow has injected itself into the process least of which is hacking….and the Kremlin does have global hacking operations without dispute.
Hillary and her team are targeting Donald Trump for his Russian connections and that is followed by Harry Reid saying the same. Intelligence briefings are given weekly to key members of Congress that have chairman positions on certain committees and Trump has been included in those . Two media outlets, Slate and the New York Times have provided some deep summaries of investigations between Trump and a Russian bank surrounding a server. White Hats performed these studies.
Then there is Hillary herself and at least two events for which she colluded with Russia. Secretary Clinton approved the Open Skies Treaty with Moscow but worse she was the marshal of the agreement with the Kremlin and an IT company called Skolkovo . This company is a high tech espionage operation. Due to WikiLeaks we cannot leave out Hillary chief campaign architect, John Podesta for his investments with Russian oligarchs.
Do we have such a short memory that we have deported countless Russian spies back to the motherland? Brooklyn Resident And Two Russian Nationals Arrested In Connection With Scheme To Illegally Export Controlled Technology To Russia Defendants Used Brooklyn-Based Front Companies to Procure Sophisticated Military and Satellite Technology on Behalf of Russian End-Users
It must be noted with distinction that the FBI is the only agency that assigns agents to run covert operations to track foreign operatives. It is also noted that James Comey has stopped short of his own declaration as to whether Russia is involved in missions inside the United States when several other agencies have published statements that Russia has operations inside the United States. What Comey may be covering is a real time and ongoing mission to track and trace more than one case dealing with Russian intrusion and he does not want that cover blown. That is how it works.
Now, lets go back to Putin himself and the recent changes he has made to his own intelligence agencies, obviously we need reminders.
**** Vladimir Putin resurrects the KGB The new agency revives the name of Stalin’s secret police and will be larger and more powerful than today’s FSB. By Owen Matthews
Politico/MOSCOW — Soon after he was first appointed prime minister back in 1999, Vladimir Putin joked to an audience of top intelligence officers that a group of undercover spies, dispatched to infiltrate the government, was “successfully fulfilling its task.”
It turns out Putin doesn’t do jokes. Over Putin’s years in power, not just the Kremlin but almost every branch of the Russian state has been taken over by old KGB men like himself.
Last week news broke that their resurgence is soon to be topped off with a final triumph — the resurrection of the old KGB itself. According to the Russian daily Kommersant, a major new reshuffle of Russia’s security agencies is under way that will unite the FSB (the main successor agency to the KGB) with Russia’s foreign intelligence service into a new super-agency called the Ministry of State Security — a report that, significantly, wasn’t denied by the Kremlin or the FSB itself.
The new agency, which revives the name of Stalin’s secret police between 1943 and 1953, will be as large and powerful as the old Soviet KGB, employing as many as 250,000 people.
The creation of the new Ministry of State Security represents a “victory for the party of the Chekists,” said Moscow security analyst Tatyana Stanovaya, referring to the first Bolshevik secret police. The important difference is that, at its core, the reshuffle marks Putin’s asserting his own personal authority over Russia’s security apparatus.
Putin, who in 2004 said that “there is no such thing as a former KGB man,” has always had a complicated relationship with the FSB.
On the one hand, Putin has allowed the FSB to absorb pieces of the old KGB, chopped off when Boris Yeltsin tried to dismantle the once all-powerful Soviet security apparatus in the early 1990s. Under Putin, the FSB regained control over Russia’s borders, border troops, and electronic intelligence gathering. At the same time, former KGB men began their takeover of every institution of state, as well as Russian businesses.
But at the same time, Putin has made several attempts to reform and control the FSB. In 2007 he put his close ally Viktor Cherkesov in charge of the Federal Anti-Drug Agency and tasked it with investigating the murky business dealings of top FSB officers. When Cherkesov’s clean-up failed, Putin built up another rival security agency, the Investigative Committee, and tasked it, rather than the FSB, with investigating high-profile political murders like those of journalist Anna Politkovskaya and opposition politician Boris Nemtsov.
“The aim in all cases seems to be to replace old-guard Putin allies with younger, more loyal and less independent figures.”
Now, however, Putin seems to have put that divide-and-rule policy into reverse and is instead consolidating power into a pair of super-agencies: the National Guard — created in July, that united internal security troops under the Kremlin’s control — and now the new Ministry of State Security. Putin will personally control these super-agencies.
“On the night of September 18 to 19 … the country went from authoritarian to totalitarian,” wrote former liberal Duma deputy Gennady Gudkov on his Facebook page .
Further evidence of Putin’s gathering of power into his own hands is an ongoing purge launched over the summer that has already claimed the heads of the Federal Narcotics Service, Federal Protection Service (Putin’s bodyguard), the Federal Migration Service and Russian Railways, as well as the president’s Chief of Staff and personal confidant Sergei Ivanov.
The aim in all cases seems to be to replace old-guard Putin allies with younger, more loyal and less independent figures. The same pattern has been repeated among regional governors — four of whom have recently been sacked, and two replaced by Putin’s personal bodyguards. Protect the regime
The creation of the Ministry of State Security is part of a “project aimed at replacing old allies with new ones,” said independent Moscow-based analyst Stanislav Belkovsky. Putin “dislikes being surrounded by people who feel untouchable because of their personal closeness to him. He doesn’t want to have anything to do with his old friends, he wants people who can execute his will.”
He’s even selected a hatchet man — Sergei Korolev, head of the FSB’s economic security department — to prosecute and eliminate any independent voices in the new Security Ministry, said Belkovsky.
The deeper significance of all these purges and reshuffles goes beyond just Kremlinology. They are clear signs of a regime bracing for trouble. Ever since oil prices began to tumble in 2013, the Kremlin has been preparing for unrest and discontent — primarily with the help of distractions such as annexing Crimea and the campaign in Syria. But Putin is preparing an iron fist too.
“I can’t remember a time when so many security service guys ascended to power at once” — Dmitry Gudkov, State Duma
“The KGB, it should be remembered, was not a traditional security service in the Western sense — that is, an agency charged with protecting the interests of a country and its citizens,” wrote security analyst Andrei Soldatov , founder of the Agentura.Ru website. “Its primary task was protecting the regime. Its activities included hunting down spies and dissidents and supervising media, sports, and even the church. It ran operations both inside and outside the country but, in both spheres, the main task was always to protect the interests of whoever currently resided in the Kremlin.”
That’s precisely what the Kremlin needs today as inflation remains in double digits and Russian business remains cut off from international financial markets and investment by Western sanctions over Ukraine.
“I can’t remember a time when so many security service guys ascended to power at once,” Dmitry Gudkov , an independent State Duma deputy, wrote of the summer’s purges on his Facebook page. “We don’t know anything about these people’s management expertise. Preparing the guns for battle, closing ranks — this is what these appointments are all about. [The Kremlin] can’t trust anyone but those in uniform.” ‘Terminator 2’
And there’s a final, more personal reason for Putin’s purge and revival of the Ministry of State Security.
“In some ways, this is a sign of Putin’s strength, because he feels confident enough to full, personal, authoritarian rule,” said Belkovsky, who advised the Kremlin in the mid-2000s. “It’s also a sign of weakness because the reason behind it is to defuse the possibility of a palace coup.” Putin is a “man of systems and institutions” according to Belkovsky and, as such, knows his allies are also the greatest threats to his rule.
In creating the super ministry, Putin is completing a full 25-year circle. When Boris Yeltsin came to power in 1991 in the wake of a hardline coup against Mikhail Gorbachev largely sponsored by the KGB and its boss, Vladimir Kryuchkov, Russia’s new leader attempted to create a security agency that would not meddle in politics or society and confine itself strictly to law enforcement.
Yeltsin failed. According to Soldatov, by the mid-1990s “various component parts and functions of the old KGB had begun to make their way back to the FSK, like the liquid metal of the killer T-1000 android in “Terminator 2” … slowly reconstituting itself after having been blown to bits.”
Now those bits have finally coalesced into a full-fledged replica of the original — but with one important difference. The new Ministry of State Security has been designed specifically as a guarantor of Putin’s rule.
Whoever heads the new ministry will certainly be an important political player — but it’s clear that the true head of both the Russian state and its new, consolidated security organs will be Putin himself.
That hasn’t happened since the rule of Yuri Andropov, KGB head-turned general secretary between 1982-84. He presided over a collapse in oil prices, a war in Afghanistan designed to boost the regime’s popularity that quickly turned disastrous, and finally an accelerating economic crisis that no amount of repression or propaganda could prevent from snowballing into collapse and revolution.
Putin is hoping that this time round, harsher repression and smarter propaganda will save him from the same fate.
*** As Russian spies play rough, ignoring Putin’s war against the West will only make it nastier 0 | 1 |
Source: Common Dreams
Arctic is losing ice and heating up despite seasonal onset of 24-hour darkness—phenomena that break all previous records
As 2016 continues on its march toward becoming the hottest year on record , the Arctic is seeing extreme warmth beyond anything previously recorded at this time of year—prompting alarm from climate scientists around the world.
"Folks, we're in a climate emergency," tweeted meteorologist Eric Holthaus. Yeah, this isn't normal. Follow @ZLabe @Weather_West @Climatologist49 for more. Folks, we're in a climate emergency. Tell everyone you know. pic.twitter.com/BKuD7H4qfD
— Eric Holthaus (@EricHolthaus) November 17, 2016
The temperature at the North Pole as of Thursday was a stunning 36ºF (20°C) above normal.
The bizarre heat is fueling the rapid melt of the pole's ice caps, and it is particularly unusual because it's all happening during the polar night—the time of year when the North Pole never sees the sun, observed UCLA climate scientist Daniel Swain: Despite onset of #PolarNight , temperatures near #NorthPole increasing. Extraordinary situation right now in #Arctic , w/record low #seaice . pic.twitter.com/zpS8hDK2nG
— Daniel Swain (@Weather_West) November 16, 2016
Other meteorologists on Twitter highlighted the abnormality of the situation: Today's latest #Arctic mean temperature continues to move the wrong direction… up. Quite an anomalous spike! pic.twitter.com/C93cQWUKV9
— Zack Labe (@ZLabe) November 15, 2016
The cause? According to the Washington Post , it's the result of an elongated jet stream propelling hot air farther north than normal—which is caused by climate change.
"The Arctic warmth is the result of a combination of record-low sea-ice extent for this time of year, probably very thin ice, and plenty of warm/moist air from lower latitudes being driven northward by a very wavy jet stream," Jennifer Francis, an Arctic specialist at Rutgers University, told the Post .
The Washington Post continued:
Francis has published research suggesting that the jet stream, which travels from west to east across the Northern Hemisphere in the mid-latitudes, is becoming more wavy and elongated as the Arctic warms faster than the equator does.
"It will be fascinating to see if the stratospheric polar vortex continues to be as weak as it is now, which favors a negative Arctic Oscillation and probably a cold mid/late winter to continue over central and eastern Asia and eastern North America. The extreme behavior of the Arctic in 2016 seems to be in no hurry to quit," Francis continued.
Another culprit is that areas of open ocean water are showing unusually hot surface temperatures, according to Mark Serreze, director of the National Snow and Ice Center, who was quoted by environmental writer Hannah Waters on Twitter.
Serreze commented to the Washington Post : "There are some areas in the Arctic Ocean that are as much as 25 degrees Fahrenheit above average now. It's pretty crazy."
The alarming Arctic weather happens during the United Nations climate conference in Morocco , and as environmentalists and climate scientists in the U.S. grapple with the prospect of a president-elect who denies the existence of climate change. Things are indeed not looking good for the planet, experts warn . | 0 |
Sprint has purchased 33% of Jay Z’s digital music streaming platform Tidal for $200 million, according to a report by Billboard. [Tidal will become available to 45 million Sprint customers as part of the deal, according to Billboard, while the new partnership also “includes the creation of a ‘dedicated marketing fund,’ which a source says will have an annual budget of $75 million solely for the artist initiatives and exclusives. ” “Jay saw not only a business need, but a cultural one, and put his heart and grit into building TIDAL into a music streaming platform that is unrivaled in quality and content,” said Sprint CEO Marcelo Claure, who has now joined Tidal’s board of directors. “The passion and dedication that these bring to fans will enable Sprint to offer new and existing customers access to exclusive content and entertainment experiences in a way no other service can. ” “Sprint shares our view of revolutionizing the creative industry to allow artists to connect directly with their fans and reach their fullest, shared potential,” added Jay Z in a statement. “Marcelo understood our goal right away and together we are excited to bring Sprint’s 45 million customers an unmatched entertainment experience. ” Despite boasting exclusive albums from a variety of artists including Beyonce, Kanye West, and Rihanna, Tidal lost $28 million in 2015. Disregarding the financial loss, however, Tidal donated $1. 5 million to #BlackLivesMatter and other social justice organizations last year — with the company’s owner Jay Z acting as a prominent Democrat and Hillary Clinton supporter. Charlie Nash is a reporter for Breitbart Tech. You can follow him on Twitter @MrNashington or like his page at Facebook. | 0 |
Date: October 29, 2016 By: Wayne Thomas, Nation One News | In a White House invitation only event, “Science” conference. Barack Obama went off topic to discuss the Media. Specifically, what he called the “magazines you get at the grocery store”. He characterized this kind of media as a problem. His comments came following a lengthy conference with a room full of Obama’s scientific elite. So of course, his comments were well received by the audience. It is not hard to interpret what Obama is talking about. He is talking about papers like ours. We are not controlled by anyone except our own conscience. We use titles that encourage people to read our content. But, you won’t find us in the Grocery store. No, you will find us everywhere else. We check our facts and all too often they don’t agree with what the mainstream media wants you to believe! He begins by saying: “We are going to have to rebuild, within this wild, wild west of information flow; some sort of curating function” You will notice he explains how the media was once easy to control when he says: “It used to be there were three television stations, and Walter Cronkite was there” He goes on in an attempt to bundle everyone who disagrees with them into the same group as conspiracy theorists by saying: there were always those WHO didn’t agree, and [chuckle THEY] didn’t believe we landed on the moon or that Elvis is dead. He makes a striking admission when he says: It wasn’t always as democratic as it should have been. He closes his idea by saying: There has to be some for of way we can sort through information that passes some sort of truthyness test. I don’t need to remind you that Barrack Obama is speaking to a room full of hundreds of very influential people. These include teachers, scientists, and even politicians. Barack Obama just instructed that community to find a way to Censor Free Press without calling it “Censoring the FREE PRESS.” Within days of his statements, we see the Establishment Media targeting small sites and up and coming news sources such as Breitbart. We wrote a story about this earlier today. There have also been hundreds of reports of censorship by Facebook, which we will report on in the coming days. Barack Obama never mentioned Donald Trump, but one has to wonder why now? Why now, after forty years of the unmolested free press does the Establishment want to Censor it? The answer is right in front of you , after all, look at what you are reading, and who published it. We are not ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, or FOX. We are nationwide Media organization not motived by money, and we run on a shoestring budget.We are the FREE PRESS! I mean I wrote this article, cut the video, fact checked it, published it and never left the folding table in my garage. Man! …the weather is nice this weekend! Who needs an AR-15 when you have a KEYBOARD! Here is the Video is you feel the need to check my facts. Submit your review | 0 |
As he seeks to revive his embattled candidacy, Donald J. Trump has seized on a new argument to rally his supporters and to explain away a possible defeat in November: that Democrats are preparing to exploit weak voter identification laws to win a “stolen election” through fraudulent voting. The claim has spurred outrage among Democrats and has alarmed some Republicans who worry his tactics will backfire, angering minority voters and threatening the party’s chances in close races down the ballot. Since 2010, Republican governors and state legislatures have fought for stricter voter identification laws, which Democrats argue are intended to hinder turnout by the poorest voters, many of them black and Hispanic, who tend to vote Democratic. But Mr. Trump’s language has moved beyond his party’s call for rigid identification requirements and the unfounded claims that polls are “skewed” to predictions of outright theft of the November election. And his warnings have been cast in increasingly urgent and racially suggestive language, hinting that the only legitimate outcome in certain states would be his victory. In Pennsylvania, where he recently made such an argument on the campaign trail, Mr. Trump is well behind the Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton, in polls. No Republican has won the state in a presidential election since 1988. Nonetheless, Mr. Trump has said the race could be snatched from him there. His campaign is urging people to sign up as election workers to watch voters as they cast their ballots on Nov. 8, fueling concerns about voter intimidation on Election Day. “The only way we can lose, in my opinion — I really mean this, Pennsylvania — is if cheating goes on,” Mr. Trump said at a rally on Aug. 12 in Altoona. A local Republican official introducing Mr. Trump was more specific, pointing to Philadelphia, a city with a large population. That came days after Mr. Trump told a rally in Wilmington, N. C. that without strict voter identification laws, people would be “voting 15 times for Hillary. ” Last week, Mr. Trump hired as his campaign chief Stephen K. Bannon, the executive chairman of Breitbart, a conservative news website that has frequently given voice to Mr. Trump’s claims of a manipulated process, holding forth on perceived voter fraud and “propaganda polls” showing Mrs. Clinton ahead. And on Friday, Mr. Trump released his first campaign ad, focused on immigration, featuring an image of a polling site with the word “rigged” flashing onscreen less than two seconds after the spot begins. Election law officials have expressed concern that Mr. Trump’s incendiary words will create a prophecy, all but ensuring claims of fraud from his poll watchers and a delegitimization of the election results should Mrs. Clinton win. “It went from being laughable to be what I consider to be dangerous,” said Richard L. Hasen, a professor and election law expert at the University of California, Irvine, School of Law. Mr. Hasen said that while it initially seemed Mr. Trump was merely seeking an early scapegoat for a possible loss, his language had taken a darker turn. A Pew Research Center survey released last week showed that 51 percent of Mr. Trump’s supporters have little or no confidence in the accuracy of the vote count nationally, a drastic change from supporters of the Republican nominees in 2004 and 2008. Concerns about a rigged election have periodically gnawed at American politics but were most pronounced after the 2000 presidential race. In that race, the popular vote winner, Al Gore, a Democrat and former vice president, was separated from George W. Bush, a Republican, by a few hundred votes in Florida. The United States Supreme Court ultimately settled the election in Mr. Bush’s favor. After the 2012 presidential election, some conservatives made claims of voter fraud in Pennsylvania that were never substantiated. Mark Braden, a Republican election lawyer, said that while there had been cases of voter fraud over decades, “the election system in the United States generally works extremely well, and fraud, although real, is modest. ” Demonstrable episodes of widespread individual fraud have been hard to come by. According to a study by the nonpartisan Brennan Center in 2007, “by any measure, voter fraud is extraordinarily rare. ” Mr. Trump’s assertions echo a theme he has increasingly pursued in recent weeks: that the political system is “rigged” — he points to the lack of charges against Mrs. Clinton over the use of a private email server while serving as secretary of state — and that the news media is tilting its coverage to benefit Democrats. But his suggestions that voting itself will be tainted could have a resonance. Since 2000, some Republicans have pointed to an increased use of electronic voting machines to suggest that results could be subject to tampering. Roger J. Stone Jr. an informal adviser to Mr. Trump, wrote in The Hill that electronic voting machines could be “manipulated. ” “We are now living in a fake reality of constructed data and phony polls,” he added. Marc Elias, the main counsel to Mrs. Clinton’s campaign and a lawyer involved in cases against a string of strict voter identification laws in states such as North Carolina and Virginia in recent years, called such talk aimed at depressing minority turnout. “It’s a sad day when Donald Trump and the Republicans have to rely on scaring people out of voting to try to achieve their electoral aims,” Mr. Elias said. Feeding into Mr. Trump’s expressions of concern is a federal appeals court’s July ruling striking down North Carolina’s voter identification law because it targeted . North Carolina is a swing state that was, until recently, dependably Republican, but polls have shown Mrs. Clinton with an edge there. After years of conspiracy theories about President Obama’s birthplace — propagated by Mr. Trump, among others who have sought to delegitimize the president’s rise to power — Democrats fear that the voting claims could resonate among opponents of Mrs. Clinton long after Election Day, should she win. Last week, Mrs. Clinton took her campaign to the heart of a neighborhood that election conspiracy theorists have viewed suspiciously: West Philadelphia, a predominantly black area where, in 2012, Mr. Obama captured 100 percent of the vote in some precincts. Speaking last Tuesday at a high school gymnasium, across from a strip of moldering rowhouses with windows that occasionally featured Clinton signs, Mrs. Clinton steered clear of Mr. Trump’s claims, at least directly, making the case that relentless voter registration efforts were the best defense against his tactics. “We know what we need to do,” she told the crowd. “The question is whether we will do it. ” Mr. Trump’s charge of prospective fraud has rankled black voters and Democratic leaders, by turns calling to mind a painful history of racially charged voter intimidation and inspiring bemusement at the notion that Mr. Trump thinks he might be able to win the support of minorities on the merits — if only he could root out the chicanery. “If he thinks that Obama winning North Philly and West Philly was rigged, he should come out himself and speak to every voter and see exactly who they voted for,” said James Walton, 30, from North Philadelphia, another largely black area of the city. Darrell L. Clarke, Philadelphia’s City Council president, said the racial overtones of Mr. Trump’s remarks were clear. “When you talk about ‘certain areas’ in Pennsylvania, we all know what that means,” he said. “He’s talking about Philadelphia and some of the urban areas. ” The Trump campaign recently started a website urging people to sign up as election watchers. All campaigns bring on poll watchers, but they are required to go through extensive training about what crosses the line into intimidation. The Republican National Committee has been operating under a consent decree for more than three decades, after claims that members of the committee intimidated minority voters at the polls in the 1970s and 1980s. Mr. Trump’s campaign, according to committee officials, is not bound by that document, despite the intermingling of its resources with the committee’s. The consent decree is set to expire soon, but not before the election. Republicans have fretted that Mr. Trump’s bombast could invite Democrats to fight to keep it in place. Mr. Braden, the Republican election lawyer, said that sweeping talk about fraud could backfire in tight Senate races in which Republicans end up ahead by a slim margin. “From my perspective, no, it is not helping,” he said. “A more measured, thoughtful discussion of the issue, which is worth discussing, would be helpful. ” “But that,” he added, “does not seem to be his style. ” | 1 |
November 1, 2016 NATO, RUSSIA TO HOLD PARALLEL DRILLS IN THE BALKANS NATO is holding an emergency exercise drill in Montenegro while Russian troops will participate in a war game in Serbia as the two Balkan neighbors seem to be heading in different directions strategically. The five-day drill in Montenegro that started Monday includes fighting floods and chemical attacks. It will involve 680 unarmed personnel from seven NATO countries and 10 partner states. The 13-day armed exercise in Serbia, dubbed “The Slavic Brotherhood 2016,” begins Wednesday. It will include 150 Russian paratroopers, 50 air force staffers, 3 transport planes and an unspecified number of troops from Serbia and Belarus, Russia’s Defense Ministry said.
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LONDON — Queen Elizabeth II, who has been battling a cold for more than a week, missed a New Year’s Day church service at her country estate in Sandringham, Buckingham Palace said on Sunday. A week earlier, the queen, who is 90, missed a Christmas Day church service, for the first time since 1988, because of the illness. “The Queen does not yet feel ready to attend church as she is still recuperating from a heavy cold,” the palace said in a statement. The queen’s husband, Prince Philip, who had also been ill, was well enough to attend both services, in the church at Sandringham, which is in Norfolk, on the east coast of England. The queen, who ascended to the throne in 1952, became the world’s monarch following the death of King Bhumibol Adulyadej of Thailand in October. She is also Britain’s monarch, having last year surpassed Queen Victoria’s reign. Her mother lived until the age of 101. | 0 |
October 26, 2016
Channel 4 has announced that it has finally come up with a format to rival the success of Gogglebox, the documentary-style reality show it created in 2013 that allows viewers to watch various families as they watch TV.
“We toyed with various ideas,” said a Channel 4 executive, “including Celebrity Gogglebox. Though obviously, we don’t mean actual celebrities – just people who’ve been in an earlier series of Gogglebox. That counts, right?
“Then someone suggested I’m a Sentient Life-Form, Get Me Out Of Here, in which we’d watch people realising there’s more to life than watching TV. And someone else suggested we just film ourselves struggling to squeeze ever more mileage out of what was a lame idea to begin with.
“But we finally settled on Gogglebox’s Little Brother. To be shown immediately after Gogglebox, it will allow viewers to watch the participants of Gogglebox as they watch themselves on Gogglebox.
“What’s more, we’ll encourage viewers to video themselves as they watch it and email it to us to win a prize. The winner will be whoever’s bonded with their sofa at subatomic level.” Share this story...
Posted: Oct 26th, 2016 by Guest Click for more article by Guest .. More Stories about: From The Archives 0 | 0 |
RIO DE JANEIRO — Some of the inmates were beheaded. Others had their hearts torn from their bodies. Gang leaders used the blood of their victims to write a nightmarish message of retribution: “Blood is paid for with blood. ” The harrowing scenes on Friday from the latest prison riot in Brazil, in which 31 inmates were killed in the northern state of Roraima in the Amazon River Basin, pushed the death toll to 93 in six days of mayhem in penitentiaries around the country. The bloodshed has shocked the country and is emerging as the most pressing crisis facing President Michel Temer, whose beleaguered government was already grappling with graft scandals, a weak economy and simmering anger over austerity measures. “The bloodshed is revealing a war between drug gangs, a failed prison system and a weak government,” said Rafael Alcadipani, a scholar who specializes in public security policies at Fundação Getúlio Vargas, a leading Brazilian university. “And now the horror is spreading. ” Prison violence that has spilled out into neighboring communities has been a perennial problem in Brazil. In 2006, street fighting between the police and First Capital Command, a gang, left almost 200 people dead in São Paulo, causing chaos in the city of 20 million people. The killings in Roraima came just days after 56 men were killed in a massacre at a prison in the city of Manaus. In two different riots at prisons this week in the states of Amazonas and Paraíba, six men were also killed. The violence at the Monte Cristo Agricultural Penitentiary in Boa Vista, the capital of Roraima, adds to fears about an intensifying war between drug gangs for control of the cocaine trade in the Amazon region in Brazil. The latest episode is thought to involve fighting between First Capital Command, commonly known by its Portuguese initials, P. C. C. which has roots in the prisons of São Paulo in southeastern Brazil, and supporters of Red Command, a drug trafficking organization that has long held sway in Rio de Janeiro. The authorities, however, tried to play down the possibility that warring gangs were to blame. The gangs, which operate inside prisons as well as on the streets of many Brazilian cities, are battling for supremacy over the trade in cocaine smuggled into Brazil across the porous Amazonian frontier from countries like Bolivia, Colombia and Peru. Family of the North, an increasingly influential gang in the Amazon that has allied itself with Red Command, was responsible for the attack at the prison in Manaus, massacring dozens of rivals from the P. C. C. gang. The attack had been planned for months, according to text messages intercepted by intelligence agents. Mr. Temer, the president, has been chided for what some have called a response to the crisis. He said nothing for two days about the killings in Manaus, before calling them a “dreadful accident” and seeking to deflect blame from public agencies because a private contractor runs the prison there. Just months after emerging victorious in the battle to impeach his predecessor, Dilma Rousseff, Mr. Temer is grappling with calls from some of his own allies to resign. In an effort to defend himself, he sent a message Thursday on Twitter listing synonyms for the word “accident” — tragedy, loss, disaster, disgrace and misfortune. Although the Manaus riot has fueled a debate over whether management of some prisons should be handed to private companies, the violence in Roraima casts scrutiny directly on state officials. The Boa Vista prison, which is run by the state, has a long history of deadly riots and inmate escapes. The prison was built for 700 inmates but currently holds about 1, 400. Carlos Paixão de Oliveira, a prosecutor in Roraima, publicly criticized the management of the facility in October, when inmates from the P. C. C. gang killed at least 10 rivals from Red Command. Mr. Oliveira suggested at the time that the prison should be demolished and replaced. “If they want, the inmates will carry out a new slaughter in there, because no one has control of that prison,” he said. Despite the writing in blood on Friday proclaiming the supremacy of the P. C. C. the authorities contended that the latest killings did not involve between gangs but a power struggle within the P. C. C. itself, or an effort to project power by the gang. “We’ve been on guard about something like this for some time, transferring prisoners from Red Command to other units,” said Uziel Castro, the top security official in Roraima. “We think this had to do with an internal battle. ” Either way, the scenes from the Roraima penitentiary offered an unsettling reminder of how the bloodshed in the country’s prisons is a problem that has been building for decades, revealing a system hobbled by corruption, overcrowding and mismanagement. Human rights groups compare the current string of uprisings to the Carandiru prison massacre in 1992 in São Paulo, when the police stormed the facility and killed 111 inmates. An appeals court recently voided the convictions of 73 police officers for their participation in the killings. The problems in Brazil’s prisons that led to earlier episodes of carnage have intensified with the growing drug trade, security experts say. Brazil’s prison population has swelled this century as the authorities lock up more people on minor drug offenses. Brazil now has a prison population exceeding half a million, with about 40 percent of detainees awaiting trial. Drug gangs that originated in prisons are expanding their sway and battling one another for territorial control of the trade. “This war between the criminal factions is worsening,” said Antonio Cláudio Mariz de Oliveira, a former security official in São Paulo. “The problem is largely a result of the lack of attention towards the prison system, both by the government and the public. ” “People only react when there’s an episode like this,” said Mr. Mariz de Oliveira. “Then they forget about it until the next one. ” Indeed, some elected officials have expressed the hardened views held by voters. José Melo, the governor of Amazonas State, said “there were no saints” among the dozens of inmates killed in the state’s prisons this week, calling the victims murderers, rapists or gang members. At the same time, officials in Mr. Temer’s administration have tried to play down the prison crisis. “The situation is not out of control,” said Justice Minister Alexandre de Moraes. | 1 |
MOSCOW — A Russian court on Wednesday effectively derailed a presidential run by Aleksei A. Navalny — the only opposition candidate with a broad, enthusiastic popular following — by reviving a criminal conviction. The decision by the district court was widely viewed as a move by President Vladimir V. Putin to eliminate his only viable rival in an election scheduled for March 2018. Although Mr. Putin has been coy about his decision to run for a fourth term, there is little question that he will. Some observers had speculated that the president would want a weighty opponent to lend legitimacy to his next victory. The best chance for a competitive race came to a screeching halt on Wednesday, however, when a district court in the small city of Kirov, nearly 500 miles northeast of Moscow, pronounced Mr. Navalny guilty of defrauding a state company. Russian law bars anyone with a criminal conviction from seeking elected office. Since he first came to power in January 2000, Mr. Putin and his allies have gone to great lengths to silence or undermine all critical voices in Russia. It has been almost two years since the assassination of Boris Nemtsov, another charismatic opposition figure, on the doorstep of the Kremlin. His is the most recent in a string of killings of prominent critics — politicians, journalists and human rights activists — that remain unsolved. Russian television is largely back under government control, as it was during Soviet times, along with most formerly independent news agencies. More than 100 nongovernmental organizations working on issues including the environment, civic education and fighting the spread of AIDS have been declared “foreign agents,” forcing many to close. Mr. Navalny was the driving force behind large street protests in 2011, 2012 and 2013 that unnerved Mr. Putin. He has also repeatedly embarrassed senior officials by accusing them of corruption, exposing their lavish mansions and other perquisites that seem beyond the reach of a public servant earning a modest government salary. In recent years, Mr. Navalny became the prime example of how the government would use the courts to entangle critics. In addition to the conviction revived on Wednesday, he has been accused of defrauding a French perfume company and stealing a nearly worthless piece of street art, and he was caught up in yet another case involving the death of an elk. While he spent much of 2014 under house arrest, his younger brother Oleg was sent to jail for three and a half years. Mr. Navalny, who called the Kirov fraud charges baseless and politically motivated, responded to the latest judgment against him with defiance. “Putin and his gang of thieves are afraid to face us in elections,” he wrote on Twitter. “Rightly so: We will win. ” In a longer statement, he vowed to continue his presidential run. “We do not recognize this verdict. It will be overturned,” he said. “According to the Constitution, I have a full right to take part in elections, and I will do this. I will continue to represent the interests of people who want to see Russia as a normal, honest, uncorrupt country. ” The Kirov court’s ruling followed almost verbatim the judgment issued against Mr. Navalny in the same case in 2013, which resulted in a suspended sentence. That verdict was overturned by the European Court of Human Rights, and Russia’s Supreme Court ordered a new trial in December. Although the retrial was organized unusually quickly for Russia, Mr. Navalny announced that he was running for president before his latest conviction. Russian political analysts suggested that the prospect of Mr. Navalny’s gaining a national platform to further criticize Mr. Putin had proved too much for the Kremlin hierarchy to tolerate. “The danger associated with Mr. Navalny is easy to explain,” Vladislav L. Inozemtsev, director of the Center for Postindustrial Studies in Moscow, wrote in an email. “If allowed to run, he will disseminate his corruption findings more widely than ever — and this disturbs very much Mr. Putin and his gang. ” Officials figured a predictable campaign against impotent opposition was a safer bet, analysts said. Some Kremlin insiders were concerned that letting Mr. Navalny run now would improve his standing for the presidential race in 2024, when Mr. Putin cannot run under current laws, analysts said. Mr. Navalny, 40, is a handsome, telegenic figure with a model family, much more approachable than the usually dour apparatchiks churned out by the Kremlin bureaucratic mill. Despite his earlier conviction, Mr. Navalny was allowed to run for mayor of Moscow in 2013. He garnered 27. 2 percent of the vote, just short of the threshold needed to force the candidate into a runoff — and enough to feed the Kremlin’s fears. Mr. Navalny’s spokeswoman, Kira Yarmysh, announced that he would appeal the verdict and file complaints with Russia’s Constitutional Court and the European Court of Human Rights. The European Union issued a statement criticizing the latest verdict, noting that its human rights court had already found that Mr. Navalny did not get a fair trial in 2013. “This latest decision, which effectively excludes Mr. Navalny from the political arena, further constrains political pluralism in Russia and raises serious questions as to the fairness of democratic processes in Russia,” the statement said. Mr. Navalny and his team pointed out that there was a conflict between the electoral law and the Constitution, which does not list a criminal conviction among the specific reasons to bar a candidate. Legal analysts said that, just as in the fraud case, any rulings in the other cases against Mr. Navalny would undoubtedly favor the Kremlin. “You can complain about this, but the result will be clear,” said Andrei Y. Buzin, an expert at Golos, an independent election monitor. “The Constitutional Court will say that lawmakers have the right to impose the restrictions it deems necessary to protect the freedoms of other citizens. ” In the Kirov case, the court convicted Mr. Navalny of embezzling 16 million rubles, worth about $500, 000 at the time, by purchasing timber from a company at rates and then reselling it at market value. The investigators said Mr. Navalny had used his position at the time as an aide to the Kirov regional governor to persuade the company to sign the contract. Mr. Navalny said the timber was bought at market rates. As the judge, Aleksei Vtyurin, droned through the familiar decision in a barely audible monotone, reading from nearly the same verdict as four years ago, Mr. Navalny took to Twitter to mock the proceedings. “This is page 40 now, and there are 77 of them. It’s comfortable to have the verdict in hand,” Mr. Navalny said from the courtroom. Even before the verdict was announced, the government moved to shut down the logistics for his presidential run. On Tuesday, Russia’s leading information technology company, Yandex, unplugged the online account that Mr. Navalny had used to collect money from supporters. | 1 |
TORONTO — Step on board, and the subway car immediately feels different. With a clear view down the length of the train, commuters walk from car to car searching for a less crowded spot to stand. Others gather in the passageway between cars, an area once separated by doors. Nearly five years after Canada’s largest city introduced the spacious new cars, subway riders here — usually quick to find fault with the transit system — have given the trains a ringing endorsement. “You can fit more people, especially during rush hour,” said Louis Molnar, 43, an accountant who stood in the shifting connector between two cars on a recent evening. “In the past, sometimes you’d have to wait for the next car, and this makes it so much better. ” Now, officials in New York City are embracing the car design to create more breathing room for subway riders as the system struggles with booming ridership and increasingly overstuffed trains. The new subway trains, which could start to appear in New York by 2020 or earlier, do not have doors between cars, creating up to 10 percent more space. These open gangway trains are common in cities like London and Shanghai, but subway systems in the United States have not adopted them. Not far from New York on the other side of Lake Ontario, the trains have become popular in Toronto, a city that is also grappling with a growing population and an overtaxed transit system. Some riders even enjoy standing in the bouncing connector, comparing it to surfing or skateboarding. “It’s just kind of fun,” Chantal Wall, 33, a stylist, said as she balanced on a connector in heels. “It makes it a little bit more interesting. I feel like I get a little bit of a workout. ” In New York, officials plan to order up to 750 of the cars to run on the subway’s lettered lines. The higher capacity trains are part of a broader push to ease crowding. The authority is also updating the signal system so that trains can run closer together and expanding the system with projects like the Second Avenue subway line, which is scheduled to open on the Upper East Side in December. The transportation authority had planned to buy only 10 open gangway cars, but moved to expand the order after Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, a Democrat, asked it to look at ideas from around the world, said Veronique Hakim, president of New York City Transit, the authority division that runs city subways and buses. The agency plans to work with the builder to make sure the cars arrive “as soon as possible,” she said. “When you look at other large systems — Paris, London, Toronto — you can really see and appreciate that these car designs provide additional space,” Ms. Hakim said in an interview. To make it easier for riders to enter the cars, the new trains will have doorways, up from 50 inches, though Toronto’s doorways are 64 inches. (To be fair, Toronto’s system is far from perfect it still accepts tiny tokens while New York retired the coins more than a decade ago.) Toronto’s reputation as a livable city with good transit has helped it grow to more than 2. 8 million people, on par with the population of Chicago. Toronto’s transit system — the third largest in North America — has about 1. 7 million riders each weekday on its network of subways, streetcars and buses, but those figures are dwarfed by New York City’s nearly 6 million daily subway riders. Toronto’s transit system is facing major crowding challenges and uncertainty over funding. The city has three main subway lines, and its busiest, the line, is regularly packed at rush hour, mirroring conditions on New York’s busiest lines. Steve Munro, a longtime transit advocate in Toronto, said that the new cars had helped with crowding, but that the city should have built new subway lines to handle the rising demand decades ago. “By the time you realize you need the new trains, you already have a crowding problem, and there is a backlog of demand that will immediately fill the new capacity,” Mr. Munro, 67, said at a cafe near the busy station. Mr. Munro, Toronto’s version of Gene Russianoff, New York City’s prominent voice for subway riders, cautioned that even with the new cars, trains would still be very crowded. Some riders in New York have raised concerns that regular subway annoyances — from “showtime” dancers to misbehaving riders — might now become the whole train’s problem, instead of being contained to one car. Andy Byford, the chief executive of the Toronto Transit Commission and an enthusiastic evangelist for improving the system, dismissed those fears, saying riders could easily escape unpleasant situations in the new cars. “You’re not then trapped in a single carriage,” Mr. Byford said from his office atop the Davisville station north of downtown Toronto. “You can get up and move. ” If a rider urinates or vomits, someone could simply walk away, rather than waiting for a station and darting from one car to another. Shameen Miller, 33, said that was how she responded when she came across a man emitting a foul odor. “Think about it — their smell is not going to drift all the way down,” Ms. Miller said. One downside is that if a train has a technical problem, workers must remove the entire train from service, Mr. Byford said, instead of separating a pair of cars and replacing them. But over all, he said, the benefits have outweighed the drawbacks. As major cities around the world have switched to open gangway subway cars, American cities have been reluctant to try them. Yonah Freemark, a transit blogger in Boston who created a map of all the cities where the trains are used, called the delay a case of “American exceptionalism in a really bad way. ” New York’s decision to buy the cars was a major step, especially because the authority has been slow to adapt to technology, like countdown clocks or a new fare payment system. “It exhibits that the agency is moving into the 21st century when it comes to trains,” Mr. Freemark said. American transit officials have had reservations about whether the design could work on the nation’s aging subways and whether ridership levels warrant the expense of switching to the new cars, said Randy Clarke, a safety and operations expert at the American Public Transportation Association. In Boston, subway officials considered the idea for new cars on two lines but decided against it. Officials in New York have worked with engineering consultants on the plans and are confident the design is feasible, even though the subway is an older system, Ms. Hakim said. In Toronto, the best sign of the cars’ popularity is that riders whose lines do not have the trains are pleading for them. Sygmund Gaskin, 45, said he wished the older trains on his Line could be replaced with the new cars. “I don’t know why it takes so long to get them for this line,” he said. “How come we don’t have them here as well?” | 1 |
In a ruling issued on Wednesday afternoon, a federal judge, and Obama appointee, prevented the President of the United States from enforcing his own executive order to protect the nation from migrants from countries. [The judge then prevented every other judge and every other state from following the President’s order, the judge making himself a Supreme Court and substitute President. The judge then held that American universities and immigrants living here can prohibit America from ever limiting immigration from countries, claiming the First Amendment gives nations a right of immigration to America. Such arrogance and abuse of authority sound familiar? Such First Amendment favoritism toward Islam sound familiar? Well, Obama did appoint this judge, and a rule of thumb with federal judges is they tend to mirror the psychologies of the man who appointed them. The judge’s ruling is completely lawless, mirroring Obama’s deep state allies in his shadow government’s attempt to sabotage the Trump presidency. There is no precedent for the court’s order. In fact, every precedent is against the court’s order just read the detailed logic and scholastic citation of proper governing legal authorities from the decision of a moderately liberal Boston judge who upheld every part of Trump’s prior order. To give you an idea of how lawless the decision is, just try to find the analogous case the Hawaii judge cites for his ruling there is none, not one single prior example of another judge ever doing what this Judge did to the extent he did it. To give you another example of how baseless the court’s ruling is, even liberal law professors and scribes criticized the more limited Ninth Circuit decision that this Hawaii judge goes far beyond. Liberal law professor Turley noted Trump should win a challenge against that ruling. Liberal democrat professor Alan Dershowitz noted the same. Liberal law scribe Jeffrey Toobin conceded the same. Here are a few reasons why: First, nationwide injunctions for plaintiffs are not supposed to happen. A district judge presides over his district, not the nation. He should not overrule other judges, nor dictate his opinions on the whole nation. The law does not make him a single judge Supreme Court. The Supreme Court itself warned against issuing any relief not individually and specifically necessary to the plaintiffs before the court. Noting that “neither declaratory nor injunctive relief can directly interfere with enforcement of contested statutes or ordinances except with respect to the particular federal plaintiffs,” the Supreme Court warned against extending its reach beyond “the particular federal plaintiffs” in the case. The Ninth Circuit itself even admits this. The “principles of comity” compel that a court should not grant national relief when doing so would “create tensions” with courts in other circuits and “would encourage forum shopping. ” The Ninth Circuit further reinforced that: “A federal court … may not attempt to determine the rights of parties not before the court. ” What kind of case was that the Ninth Circuit saying not to extend your ruling beyond the plaintiffs in front of you? An immigration case (Nat’l Cir. for Immigration Rights v. INS, 743 F. 2d 1365 (9th Cir. 1984). The Ninth Circuit repeated this principle again and again. That is why the Supreme Court reversed a California judge’s order just like this Hawaii judge’s order — imposing a national ban beyond his limited district jurisdiction of the parties before him. Second, there is no constitutional right to a visa or a right of immigration or emigration. A quick recap of key Supreme Court decisions explains why. Aliens “outside the country receive no constitutional protection. ” The Supreme Court repeatedly held an alien seeking initial admission to the United States “requests a privilege, and has no constitutional rights regarding his application, for the power to admit or exclude aliens is a sovereign prerogative. ” Thus, the President “may shut out aliens” whenever the President determine such “entry would be prejudicial to the interests of the United States. ” Congress expressly authorized this Presidential action in the one statute the Ninth Circuit tried to hid in its prior decision, cited above at 8 U. S. C. 1182. The actions of the President in respect of enforcing this law “are largely immune from judicial inquiry or interference. ” This is because the Constitution entrusts “the power regulate immigration” exclusively “to the political branches of the Federal Government. ” As the Supreme Court recently reiterated during Clinton’s presidency: judicial “deference to the Executive Branch is especially appropriate in the immigration context” given the “sensitive political functions that implicate questions of foreign relations. ” Admission into America is a privilege, not a right. Congress gave the President broad statutory authority to exclude any aliens he saw fit to. A full recitation of that law is useful, because it is the one law the Hawaii judge, like the Ninth Circuit, hid from: (f) Suspension of entry or imposition of restrictions by President, Whenever the President finds that the entry of any aliens or of any class of aliens into the United States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, he may by proclamation, and for such period as he shall deem necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants, or impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate. Whenever the Attorney General finds that a commercial airline has failed to comply with regulations of the Attorney General relating to requirements of airlines for the detection of fraudulent documents used by passengers traveling to the United States (including the training of personnel in such detection) the Attorney General may suspend the entry of some or all aliens transported to the United States by such airline. The law is clear in the power it gives the President, in the statute cited above — 8 U. S. C. 1182( f). Like the Ninth Circuit decision before, the Hawaii judge goes out of his way to pretend this statute does not exist. Indeed, it is never addressed in any real way in the court’s entire opinion (much of which appeared prior to the oral argument). Just as we have a right to decide which strangers enter our home and who sleeps next to our daughters’ bedroom or eats our family’s food, we as a country enjoy the democratic right to decide who enters our country, who lives next to us as a neighbor, and who enjoys the fruits of our ancestral inheritance. The Hawaii Obama judge went much further in the opposite direction: he claimed an immigrant here has a right to bring in whatever other immigrants he wants, even citizens from failed, corrupted states that cannot vet or screen aliens entering America. Ask San Bernardino how that worked out. Third, the First Amendment does not apply to foreign aliens. That is how we kept anarchists out of the nation and communists out of the nation. That is how every President for more than a century limited migrants based on ideology or statehood. That is why we were much more successful than Europe in limiting the violence (that led Europe into World War I) and in limiting communist internal sabotage (that led much of eastern Europe into communist totalitarianism). Every federal court followed that process in limiting immigration from nations after . This Hawaii court’s decision directly conflicts with those Circuits but, per usual, it never even mentions any of those authorities. As the Second Circuit noted: “one major threat of terrorist attacks comes from radical Islamic groups. The September 11 attacks were facilitated by violations of immigration laws by aliens from predominantly Muslim nations. The Program was clearly tailored to those facts. ” This court’s ruling would overturn all of that, and basically claims every president since Teddy Roosevelt violated the First Amendment in our immigration policies. Put simply, the Hawaii federal judge ruled that because the imam was Muslim and his migrant visas came from nations, the First Amendment gave him a special right to bring whomever he wanted into the country, even from countries in security compromised states the President recognized as a direct threat to the peace of the people. The First Amendment has never applied to a right of immigration of foreign aliens, nor does it compel religious favoritism toward Muslims. This is the new left’s interpretation of the Constitution, and it is as perilous to our politics as the deep state within and radical Islam abroad. The Hawaii Obama judge didn’t interpret the Constitution he rewrote it, usurping to himself the sole power to control borders, then delegated the exercise of that power to a Muslim imam and his free visa wish list. The judge dishonored the rule of law in his order and disrespected our legal traditions and governing legal authorities in his reasoning for it. He effectively declared himself king and executioner. Meet the new left’s America: foreigners first, Muslims preferred, law last, elections irrelevant. Robert Barnes is a trial lawyer with high profile wins in constitutional, criminal, and civil law. You can follow him @Barnes_Law. | 1 |
LONDON — China and Norway announced on Monday that they would normalize relations, six years after the decision to award the Nobel Peace Prize to the imprisoned democracy advocate Liu Xiaobo opened a rift between the countries. Neither nation explained the timing of the announcement, but analysts said Norway hoped to revive talks on a trade deal that stalled after the Nobel committee awarded the 2010 prize to Mr. Liu, a literary critic and political essayist. The news accompanied an unannounced visit to Beijing by the Norwegian foreign minister, Borge Brende, who met with Premier Li Keqiang. “Through meticulous and numerous conversations, the two sides have, over the last years, reached a level of trust that allows for resumption of a normal relationship,” they said in a joint declaration, which stated that Norway was “fully conscious of the position and concerns of the Chinese side” over the prize. The Chinese foreign minister, Wang Yi, said in a statement that “Norway deeply reflected upon the reasons bilateral mutual trust was harmed, and had conscientious, solemn consultations with China about how to improve bilateral relations. ” In the statement, Norway said it “fully respects China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, attaches high importance to China’s core interests and major concerns, will not support actions that undermine them, and will do its best to avoid any future damage to the bilateral relations. ” Rights advocates expressed concern that Norway might be caving on its longtime commitment to democracy and human rights. “We are worried about some of the wording in the declaration,” John Peder Egenaes, secretary general of Amnesty International in Norway, said in an interview. “If this sentence means the Norwegian government becomes subservient, we will criticize them for it. Time will tell. Human rights have been a foreign policy priority for Norway, and in particular support for champions of human rights. This policy has to apply to China, as much as to any other place. ” Stein Tonnesson, a historian and former director of the Peace Research Institute Oslo, said the agreement was “of huge importance to Norway” because of the commercial potential. Norway’s salmon industry stands to benefit significantly. Mr. Tonnesson said he doubted that the agreement would impair Norway’s reputation as an advocate for human rights, but he added that the timing — weeks after the election of Donald J. Trump as president of the United States — was significant. “The deal with Norway might be one pawn in a greater game to secure and renew trade policy with other countries in Europe and elsewhere traditionally close to the U. S.,” he said. Mr. Liu, 60, was arrested in China in December 2008 and is serving an sentence for “inciting subversion of state power” by organizing a petition urging an end to rule. The decision by the Norwegian Nobel Committee, which is composed of five members appointed by Parliament but is independent of the government, drew outrage from the government in Beijing. China had warned the secretary of the Nobel committee against giving Mr. Liu the prize, and after the decision, Beijing canceled meetings with Norwegian officials and it later halted the trade talks. Even so, “the overall impact on trade, even in the seafood sectors, was not very profound, and bilateral trade hit record levels in 2015,” according to Marc Lanteigne, a senior research fellow at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs. At the prize ceremony in December 2010, Mr. Liu was represented by an empty chair. It was the first time since 1935 — when the laureate was Carl von Ossietzky, a German pacifist detained by the Nazis — that no relative or representative of the prize’s recipient was present to accept the award or the $1. 5 million check that came with it. In 2013, after voters ousted Norway’s government, the new conservative government vowed to improve relations with China. Symbolic steps were taken in that direction. The next year, a Norwegian museum announced that it would return seven columns taken from the Old Summer Palace in Beijing, more than a century after they were acquired by a Norwegian cavalry officer, while the National Library of Norway said it would return to China a 1927 silent film, discovered in the library’s archives in 2011. The chilly relations were also seen as a factor in the decision to demote the chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, the diplomat Thorbjorn Jagland, in March 2015, though he had also drawn criticism when the 2009 Peace Prize was awarded to President Obama. “No specific concessions have publicly been given on the Norwegian side, but the devil is always in the details,” said Bjornar a research fellow at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs. “The degree to which there is mutual understanding of the definition of this will be a thing to watch in the years ahead, in particular the next time the Dalai Lama plans a visit to Norway. ” Prime Minister Erna Solberg was widely criticized for not meeting with the Dalai Lama in May 2014, when the Tibetan spiritual leader visited Norway. The Chinese government views the Dalai Lama, who lives in exile in India, as a separatist. | 1 |
Former President Barack Obama issued a statement reacting to President Donald Trump’s executive order to restrict immigration from countries in the Middle East, urging Americans to organize against the president. [“President Barack Obama is heartened by the level of engagement taking place in communities around the country,” Obama’s spokesman Kevin Lewis said in a statement to reporters. Through his spokesman, Obama also opposed discrimination against people because of their faith or religion, although he did not say that Trump’s actions did so. “With regard to comparisons to President Obama’s foreign policy decisions, as we’ve heard before,” Lewis said. “The president fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion. ” Lewis recalled the former president’s final speech as president, urging Americans to “be the guardians of our democracy. ” “Citizens exercising their Constitutional right to assemble, organize, and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake,” the statement read. In November 2016, Obama was asked whether he would criticize his successor if he disagreed with him, imitating former President George W. Bush for remaining silent. “I want to be respectful of the office and give the an opportunity to put forward his platform and his arguments without somebody popping off in every instance,” Obama said during a press conference in Peru. But Obama specified that he would reserve the right to speak out, if he felt that Trump was affecting core American ideals. “[I]f I think that it’s necessary or helpful for me to defend those ideals, then I’ll examine it when it comes,” he said. | 0 |
Insists SDF the 'Only Force' That Will Invade the ISIS Capital by Jason Ditz, November 03, 2016 Share This
A new statement from the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a faction which is dominated by the Kurdish YPG, has affirmed that not only will they be participating in the invasion of the ISIS capital city of Raqqa, as previously announced by the US, but that they intend to be the “ only force that will take part in the operation .”
Even more noteworthy, since the Turkish government has over the past two months repeatedly publicly warned the US that the Kurds mustn’t be allowed to participate in the Raqqa operation at all, the SDF’s statement offered its own warning to the US that Turkey can’t have any role.
Turkey’s military and its allied rebel factions have been invading northern Syria for some time now, mostly fighting ISIS as well, but Turkish warplanes have repeatedly attacked Kurdish YPG forces as well, mostly notably a few weeks ago when they launched strikes against YPG forces who were engaged in an offensive against ISIS at the time.
It is unsurprising, then, that neither side is comfortable working with the other in offensives, but still raises the possibility of the two getting into direct combat over who gets to attack Raqqa. This is particularly true since Turkey is still resenting their exclusion from Iraq’s invasion of Mosul. Last 5 posts by Jason Ditz | 0 |
A leading US senator: US Supporting War in Syria
A leading US senator said the war in Syria would have been over by now if the US had put an end to its intervention when Russia entered the war-ravaged country.
“If the United States had just stayed out of it at that point, the war would be over by now; people would be rebuilding, refugees would be returning back to Syria, but the United States rushed anti-Tank missiles, and we used these so-called moderate rebels as a conduit to supply al-Nusra Front (also known as Fatah al-Sham Front), which is al-Qaeda in Syria,” republican member of the Virginia State in US Senate, Richard Hayden Black said in an exclusive interview with Press TV.
“If we were not supporting the war in Syria, I believe that the Syrians, combined with their allied forces from Iran, Lebanon and Russia… would move very steadily and restore the borders of Syria.”
The senate member, who visited Syria in April, refused to distinguish between militants and terrorists fighting the government of President Bashar al-Assad, saying, the two are “thoroughly integrated.”
“They really are one and the same, they’re part of the same army,” he said, citing a US defense intelligence agency’s investigation in 2013, which showed Washington’s ties with the terror group.
The outspoken state senator referred to plans by the CIA to transfer arms from Libya to Turkey and from there to Syria to supply the militants, noting that the move “evolved into an indiscriminate program of supplying all militant groups, including specifically ISIL and al-Qaeda.”
“We do it indirectly because it’s unlawful to do it directly,” he said, adding that the US keeps “extremely violent organizations… off the terrorist watch list because these are the agents that take our weapons and then distribute them to ISIL and al-Qaeda.”
In response to a question on why Iran and Russia are portrayed as the “bad guys,” while they are the ones really fighting terrorism there, as put recently by GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump, Black said the Republican candidate has a “clear understanding of what’s happening over there.”
“Sometimes, his rhetoric has to match the political mood of the moment… but I know a number of his advisers and they believe that our determination to topple the government in Syria is suicidal, that it threatens not only the entire Middle East but literally the entire world.”
He further warned that the US itself could be “threatened,” arguing that, “if Syria falls, it will be dominated by some al-Qaeda-related organization; Lebanon will fall; Jordan will fall and the entire area will be destabilized.”
The Vietnam war veteran also elaborated on his personal definition of the Middle East “axis of evil,” naming Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and “particularly” Turkey over their support for terrorism.
“Probably, three quarters of the rebels are not Syrian at all, they are mercenaries recruited by Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia,” he asserted, describing the three countries as “the primary force behind the terrorist movement.”
“Turkey has invaded Iraq and Syria with heavy military forces. Turkey has really become a rogue nation,” he added, referring to a 1923 treaty that set the border between Turkey and Greece, saying that was even being questioned by President Rececp Tayyip Erdogan.
“And now you see this emerging threat against Western Europe by Turkey,” he noted, further adding that Erdogan “has made it clear that he looks to resurrection of the Ottoman Empire.”
“He has become more and more aggressive; he’s crushed the military, the free press; every powerful institution of the Turkish government has come under his iron fist and he’s now a total dictator. He’s a man who has said that he wants the constitution amended so that he will have power similar to those of Adolf Hilter… This is our great ally; we’re allied with a man who would be Hitler.”
He also blasted Washington’s alliance with Saudi Arabia, “where women are not allowed to walk out in the front yard to pick up the newspaper without a man’s permission; they can’t drive a car!”
“Somehow, this is part of the liberalization that we seek to impose on the Middle East,” he said ironically, calling it “bizarre.”
He also praised the resistance against the Saudi aggression by the people of Yemen, saying, “God bless them! The Yemenis are giving the Saudis a bloody nose,” despite being a “tiny little, poor nation.”
“I think the world recognizes that Saudi Arabia has just embarked in massive war crimes in Yemen,” he said, voicing regret over the US support for the monarchy.
“We don’t pay too much attention to them while engaged in war crimes because they’re our good allies,” he said, concluding that Washington is on a “suicidal course of action.”
“Saudi money pays the very top politicians in many Western nations. And they really have co-opted the American military into acting as mercenaries for Wahhabism.”Black referred to the Western media’s portrayal of Iran as a supporter of terrorism, saying, “The fact of the matter is that if you really look at global terrorism, it all emanates from Saudi Arabia.”
He exemplified various terrorists attack, including the 9/11, the Boston bombing, and the Brussels attacks, noting that they are all a “reflection of the Wahhabi philosophy.” | 1 |
When C. I. A. interrogators in a Thailand prison sent a cable to agency headquarters recounting that they had been slamming Abu Zubaydah, a captured terrorism suspect, against a wall, they emphasized that they were obeying instructions to take steps to prevent his injury, like putting a towel behind his neck, and described the practice in detached terms. “Subject was walled with the question, ‘What is it that you do not want us to know? ’” reported a cable from Aug. 5, 2002, part of a trove of newly disclosed documents about the agency’s “enhanced interrogation” program. “Subject continued to deny that he had any information. ” From the perspective of Mr. Zubaydah — whom interrogators eventually conceded had no additional information, contrary to their suspicions at the time — the experience felt far different. “He kept banging me against the wall,” Mr. Zubaydah told his lawyer in 2008, in a narrative that has now been declassified. “Given the intensity of the banging that was strongly hitting my head I fell down on the floor with each banging. I felt for few instants that I was unable to see anything, let alone the short chains that prevented me from standing tall. And every time I fell he would drag me with the towel which caused bleeding in my neck. ” Batches of newly disclosed documents about the Central Intelligence Agency’s defunct torture program are providing new details about its practices of slamming terrorism suspects into walls, confining them in coffinlike boxes and subjecting them to waterboarding — as well as internal disputes over whether two psychologists who designed the program were competent. The release of the newly available primary documents, which include information not discussed in a executive summary of the Senate Intelligence Committee’s investigation into the C. I. A. torture program that was released in 2014, comes at the same time as an urgent legal battle is unfolding over the potential fate of the full version of that report. Lawyers for two detainees who were subjected to the C. I. A. ’s most extreme “enhanced” interrogation techniques, Mr. Zubaydah and Abd the suspected mastermind of the deadly October 2000 attack on the American destroyer Cole, are asking federal judges to order the executive branch to deposit a copy of the full report with the judiciary to ensure that the Trump administration and congressional Republicans do not destroy it. But the Obama administration, in its waning hours, is fighting that idea. On Thursday, the judge overseeing Mr. Zubaydah’s habeas corpus case, Emmet G. Sullivan, ordered the United States government to “immediately” preserve a complete, unredacted copy of the Senate report and deposit it with the court for secure storage by Feb. 10. Against that backdrop, the two sets of newly available documents present a vivid contrast in perspectives, as the C. I. A. cables recount in bloodless bureaucratese the infliction of techniques that Mr. Zubaydah recalled experiencing in harrowing terms. For example, when interrogators at a C. I. A. black site prison in Thailand confined Mr. Zubaydah in a cramped box on Aug. 5, 2002, they observed to headquarters that he showed “signs of distress,” according to one of the cables from a group the government declassified as part of a lawsuit against the psychologists who designed the program. The lawsuit is being brought by detainees represented by lawyers including from the American Civil Liberties Union. The A. C. L. U. provided the documents to The New York Times. Mr. Zubaydah remembered the box experience in more vivid terms. “I felt I was going to explode from bending my legs and my back and from being unable to spread them not even for short instants,” he wrote to his lawyers in 2008, noting that the box was so short and tight he could not sit up or change positions. “The very strong pain made me scream unconsciously. ” Other C. I. A. cables also clinically recount applying torture methods like the suffocation technique known as waterboarding. (Previously disclosed documents and the Senate report executive summary had already discussed Mr. Zubaydah’s waterboarding in extensive detail, including that he was subjected to the treatment 83 times in one month.) The contemporaneous cables describe him crying, but generally use bland descriptions, like: “Water treatment was applied. ” For Mr. Zubaydah, it felt as if he was “dying. ” “They kept pouring water and concentrating on my nose and my mouth until I really felt I was drowning and my chest was just about to explode from the lack of oxygen. ” Mr. Zubaydah also described experiencing what he thought were persistent health consequences of his torture, including severe headaches and seizures. Many other detainees experienced lasting harm after harsh treatment in American custody, including stress disorder, a recent New York Times investigation found. Another group of documents produced in discovery from that lawsuit, first provided by the A. C. L. U. to The Washington Post, showed that in about a year after the agency hired the two contract psychologists, James Mitchell and J. Bruce Jessen, to design a torture regimen for Mr. Zubaydah, unidentified C. I. A. employees raised sharp questions about their ethics and competence to judge whether the techniques they had orchestrated were harmful or effective. While other documents, including the Senate report summary, have shown that there were internal concerns about relying so heavily on the two psychologists, the newly available documents add texture to that history. For example, a June 2003 message that appears to have been sent by an official representing a “Renditions and Detainees Group” at the C. I. A. which had assumed control of Mr. Mitchell’s and Mr. Jessen’s activities, criticized the psychologists’ “arrogance and narcissism” and “blatant disregard for the ethics shared by almost all of their colleagues. ” But the same message also recommended that the two psychologists be assigned to develop a code of ethics and standards for interrogators. “We have identified this as a major gap in our program,” the official wrote. A lawyer for the psychologists, Henry F. Schuelke III, declined to comment. The newly available files supplement the publicly available historical record about the torture program, intensifying questions about whether the public will ever see the full fruits of the Senate Intelligence Committee’s investigation — the result of years of combing and contextualizing millions of pages of government documents by committee staff members. Democrats raised fears last month that the incoming administration of Donald J. Trump, who has voiced support for the outlawed interrogation methods detailed in the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence report, could cause all copies of the document to be “hidden indefinitely, or destroyed. ” In 2015, after Republicans took control of the Senate and the Intelligence Committee, they asked President Obama to return all copies of the full report, which former Democratic senators have said contains “volumes of new information” that were not made public when a executive summary was disclosed in 2014. Mr. Obama did not comply with that request, and in December of last year, he notified the Senate that he was including a copy of the full, report in his presidential records that would be deposited at the National Archives. But Michel Paradis, a lawyer for Mr. Nashiri, argued that Mr. Obama’s decision about his presidential records was insufficient, because Mr. Trump might seek to withdraw the report from the archives and destroy it. Last week, in response to a request by Mr. Nashiri’s lawyers to secure a copy of the full report in the hands of the judiciary, Judge Royce C. Lamberth of the Federal District Court for the District of Columbia ordered the Obama administration to provide a copy to the court’s security officer. (Lawyers for Mr. Zubaydah are separately making the same request.) But in court filings, the Obama administration asked Judge Lamberth to reconsider, making two arguments: Preserving it would interfere with branch relations, and giving a copy to the court was unnecessary in part because of Mr. Obama’s archived copy. It also suggested that the executive branch would appeal if the judge did not change his mind. On Thursday afternoon, Judge Lamberth refused, saying in a terse, order that the court was “obliged” to protect Mr. Nashiri’s possible right to access the report and saying that nothing had changed since he issued the original, “crystal clear” order. He threatened to hold the executive branch in contempt if it did not comply, although he did not set a specific deadline. The C. I. A. cables revealed other potentially important new details. For example, detainees at C. I. A. prisons have long claimed that they were injected with unknown drugs against their consent, which had powerful effects on them — something that medical experts have denounced as unethical. While previously released documents from 2004 said that C. I. A. prisoners could be sedated as a last resort, a newly released cable describes a different practice. In April 2002, C. I. A. personnel at an interrogation site wrote that they planned to transport a detainee — apparently Mr. Zubaydah — “in a state of pharmaceutical unconsciousness to decrease potential security concerns as well as to maximize the intended effect of disorienting” him. It is unclear from the documents whether the C. I. A. followed through. The new information is consistent with the conclusion of the Senate committee’s torture report that the C. I. A. ’s use of enhanced interrogation techniques was not effective in acquiring intelligence or gaining cooperation from detainees. On Aug. 18, 2002, after 15 days during which Mr. Zubaydah was repeatedly waterboarded, kept for hours in small boxes, pushed into walls and threatened, the interrogators sent a cable to headquarters stating their conclusions. The prisoner “has not provided significant actionable info beyond previously provided details,” they wrote. | 1 |
Home › POLITICS | WORLD NEWS › REASONS TO BELIEVE JULIAN ASSANGE IS IN CIA CUSTODY…. REASONS TO BELIEVE JULIAN ASSANGE IS IN CIA CUSTODY…. 0 SHARES
[11/1/16] NEONNEXUS – On the 26th of September 2016 Secretary of State John Kerry (self admitted Skull and Bones member) visited Colombia. WikiLeaks reported that inside sources had confirmed that John Kerry also met with Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa in Ecuador to personally ask Ecuador to stop Assange from publishing documents about Clinton. This was initially fervently denied in the press only later to be confirmed by the Ecuadorian embassy who admitted cutting off Julian’s internet due to pressure from the US. Ecuador wanted to appear impartial.
For over four years, the Ecuadorian embassy has been under surveillance and Julian’s human rights violated as he has been unlawfully detained termed “illegal arbitrary detention” by a recent UN ruling. During that time, it has been possible for intelligence agencies to gather critical information and build a detailed profile and plan to circumvent Julian’s dead man’s switch.
Both John Kerry and US intelligence agencies know perfectly well that cutting off Julian’s internet would have no impact on the release of the leaked emails that are damaging to Hillary’s campaign. It has been very clear for a long time that many US officials wanted Julian Assange dead, Hillary Clinton even has remarked, “can’t we just drone the guy”.
The cutting off of Julian’s internet access was not for the purpose of preventing the leaks of the Podesta and Hillary emails. Unless intelligence agencies are truly inept, they know that media organisations already have the entire leaked email database and a schedule for release, they also know WikiLeaks staff would continue to leak regardless of Julian’s ability to communicate.
Removing Assange would not be enough, they would need to circumvent his dead man’s switch and then tarnish WikiLeaks reputation. Removing Assange’s internet could have the effect of causing Assange to take steps that can be followed to prevent the automatic triggering of his DMS.
From the day Julian’s internet was cut off, a series of peculiar and uncharacteristic events started to take place. The same day that Julian’s internet was cut off, CBS reported that Pamela Anderson visited Assange and had “Tortured” him with a vegan sandwich. A few days before on the 14th, John Podesta tweeted “I bet the lobster risotto is better than the food at the Ecuadorian Embassy”. Then on October the 16th the SHA-256 prerelease keys were issued on WikiLeaks twitter feed, although these events are odd and seemingly inconsequential, combined with John Kerry being in the UK from the 16th to the 17th sparked concern among the community for Julian’s safety.
Assange supporters started to gather at the embassy to keep Assange safe and witness any foul play, some of these witnesses have claimed that a very swift police armed raid took place that lasted only 5 minutes while the crowd was kept under control and prevented from approaching, there have also been reports that they were prevented from taking photographs and that their phones were confiscated. A live periscope feed was also cut off. There have also been some reports of the presence of a mobile jamming van.
If Assange has been seized, any recognition by mainstream media would be detrimental to Hillary’s campaign. A covert operation with media blackout would be the only effective way of seizing him at this time. On October the 18th Fox News said that Julian Assange would be “arrested soon, maybe in a matter of hours.”. The was video was then promptly removed and articles relating to it have disappeared. However, one reddit user was able to find an alternative source and now the video can be found again on YouTube.
Although Julian’s primary DMS (the release of insurance file encryption keys) did not activate, on October the 18th one of Julian’s contingencies did activate, a script was activated that made https://file.wikileaks.org/file publicly visible and set all the file date and time stamps to 01/01/1984 (Orwell reference). This file repository contains many documents that had not been released prior.
Staffers Kristinn Hrafnsson and Sarah Harrison, have gone silent while the Ecuadorian embassy is refusing to provide any updates on Assange’s fate. There is a recorded call made to the embassy by a journalist where the receptionist refused to confirm that Julian was at the embassy, she also refused to confirm that Julian was even alive. Julian has not made an appearance at the window of the embassy since being cut off.
WikiLeaks suggested in a tweet that its supporters were responsible for the DDOS attacks on the 21st. Neither Assange or WikiLeaks would ever insinuate such a thing. WikiLeaks deceptively tweeted a video of Michael Moore that was actually recorded in June. The video was posted on the 24th of October giving the impression that Michael Moore had been speaking with Assange in the embassy. Why would WikiLeaks do this when they know they are already under suspicion?
WikiLeaks have been using their Twitter account to give the appearance of his safety while providing no concrete evidence of his safety. They issued a poll asking what proof would satisfy the public that Julian was safe. WikiLeaks have yet to follow-up on the conclusive result of a video or window appearance.
Julian Assange is known for his attention to detail and his consistently good spelling and grammar. Currently the twitter feed has very poor spelling, there are numerous uncharacteristic spelling errors, for example, an accomplished cryptographer knows how to correctly spell algorithm and so do WikiLeaks staff.
On the 21st of October, there was a massive widespread DDOS attack that disrupted US and EU internet. Also on the 21st of October London City Airport was evacuated. The next day (the 22nd), Gavin MacFayden is reported dead. WikiLeaks made a further blunder by stating his death as the 23rd.
There has been a number of high level WikiLeaks deaths recently too. John Jones QC – WikiLeaks U.N. lawyer died on April 16th 2016. Michael Ratner – WikiLeaks chief counsel died on May 11th 2016. Seth Rich – Employee of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) was fatally shot on July 10th 2016 and Gavin MacFadyen – WikiLeaks director died October 22nd 2016.
If WikiLeaks has been compromised, it is already preparing the scene for future discrepancy to seriously tarnish WikiLeaks reputation. Nothing WikiLeaks has shared since the 15th of October 2016 should be trusted until Julian has been fully verified as alive.
My speculative fears are that Julian has been seized and removed from the Embassy. His internet being cut not being related to the release of the emails, but rather as a component of a plan of 4 years in the making to as secretly as possible remove Assange from the embassy, circumvent his DMS and hijack WikiLeaks with the key team members silenced or under duress.
My fears would be confirmed by no future public (mass witnessing and recorded/televised) appearance of Julian Assange discussing recent topics. His death by whatever means after the US presidential election would be extremely suspect. Until proof of life, assume the following compromised:
SHA-256 verification Keys posted after the 15th. WikiLeaks submission process and/or platform. WikiLeaks twitter feed. Any WikiLeaks leaks after the 15th October 2016. Post navigation | 1 |
SAN FRANCISCO — The Justice Department charged two Russian intelligence officers on Wednesday with directing a sweeping criminal conspiracy that stole data on 500 million Yahoo accounts in 2014, deepening the rift between American and Russian authorities on cybersecurity. The Russian government used the information obtained by the intelligence officers and two other men to spy on a range of targets, from White House and military officials to executives at banks, two American cloud computing companies, an airline and even a gambling regulator in Nevada, according to an indictment. The stolen data was also used to spy on Russian government officials and business executives, federal prosecutors said. Russians have been accused of other cyberattacks on the United States — most notably the theft of emails last year from the Democratic National Committee. But the Yahoo case is the first time that federal prosecutors have brought cybercrime charges against Russian intelligence officials, according to the Justice Department. Particularly galling to American investigators was that the two Russian intelligence agents they say directed the scheme, Dmitry Aleksandrovich Dokuchaev and Igor Anatolyevich Sushchin, worked for an arm of Russia’s Federal Security Service, or F. S. B. that is supposed to help foreign intelligence agencies catch cybercriminals. Instead, the officials helped the hackers avoid detection. “The involvement and direction of F. S. B. officers with law enforcement responsibilities makes this conduct that much more egregious,” said Mary B. McCord, the acting assistant attorney general, at a news conference in Washington to announce the charges. The two other men named in the indictment include a Russian hacker already indicted in connection with three other computer network intrusions and a Kazakh national living in Canada. One of the hackers also conducted an extensive spamming operation, stole credit and gift card information, and diverted Yahoo users looking for erectile dysfunction drugs to a particular pharmacy. Nikolay Lakhonin, a spokesman for the Russian embassy in Washington, said that Moscow had no “official reaction” to the indictments. But Mr. Lakhonin did point a reporter to two articles posted Wednesday in the Sputnik News that were openly skeptical of the charges. One was headlined “Yahoo Hack: What US Mainstream Media Don’t Tell You About Russian ‘Spy. ’” Indeed, one of the two Russian intelligence agents indicted in the Yahoo case, Mr. Dokuchaev, was arrested in early December in what amounted to a purge of the Center for Information Security, the cyberwing of the F. S. B. Mr. Dokuchaev, who was reportedly a former hacker recruited to work in the F. S. B. at least seven years ago, and a fellow officer were accused of treason for passing secret information to the United States. United States officials said Wednesday that they were not certain if the Dmitry Dokuchaev arrested in December was the same man as the one named in the indictment. The Justice Department’s indictment, which was filed under seal in Federal District Court in San Francisco on Feb. 28, immediately threatened to escalate diplomatic tensions over Russia’s meddling in the November election. “The indictments are intended to be a clear, public signal of what we will not accept,” said James A. Lewis, a cybersecurity expert at the Center for Strategic Studies, a research organization in Washington. “If you’re one of these people, you can’t leave Russia. You know you’ve been caught. There is an Interpol warrant out for your arrest. ” Karim Baratov is the only one of the accused hackers who has been arrested in connection with the case. He was captured by the authorities in Canada on Tuesday. The chances of the United States taking the other three into custody any time soon appear slim, especially because the United States has no extradition treaty with Russia. The fourth person involved in the scheme, a Russian named Alexsey Belan, had been indicted twice before for three intrusions into American companies. At one point, he was arrested in Europe, but he escaped to Russia before he could be extradited. Prosecutors said they had repeatedly asked the Russian government to hand over Mr. Belan but had gotten no response. Nonetheless, officials said that they believe criminal charges serve as a powerful tool to deter cyberattacks. For example, they said, China’s hacking against United States targets decreased after charges were brought against five military officials there in 2014 over damaging attacks against government and systems. The action on Wednesday was the latest in a series of criminal prosecutions that American officials have brought since 2014 against cyberattackers who they charge were acting on behalf of foreign governments, including China, North Korea, and Iran. Yahoo disclosed the theft of its data in September and said it was working with the law enforcement authorities to trace the perpetrators. The hackers were able to use the stolen information, which included personal data as well as encrypted passwords, to create a tool that gave them access to 32 million accounts over a period of two years. In a statement on Wednesday, Yahoo thanked the F. B. I. and the Justice Department for their work. Jack Bennett, the special agent in charge of the F. B. I. ’s San Francisco office, said that his investigators had worked on the case for two years, although the inquiry intensified last year. It remains unclear why Yahoo users were not informed about the hack during that time. An internal investigation by the company’s board found that some senior executives and information security personnel were aware of the breach shortly after it occurred but “failed to properly comprehend or investigate” the situation. Two weeks ago, the company’s top lawyer, Ronald S. Bell, resigned over the episode, and its chief executive, Marissa Mayer, lost her 2016 bonus and 2017 stock compensation. Mr. Bennett said the F. B. I. was still investigating a separate, larger breach of one billion Yahoo accounts that occurred in 2013 but was disclosed by the company only three months ago. Yahoo has said it has not been able to glean much information about that attack, which was uncovered by InfoArmor, an Arizona security firm. The two thefts, the largest known breaches of a private company’s computer systems, had threatened to scuttle a deal that Yahoo struck last summer to sell its internet businesses to Verizon Communications. Verizon sought to shave $925 million from the original $4. 8 billion deal following news of the attacks, but last month, the two companies finally agreed to a $350 million price reduction. Ms. McCord and other officials would not discuss any connection between the charges in the Yahoo case and an ongoing investigation into Russia’s meddling in the November election and a hack at the Democratic National Committee. Some investigators believe that the F. S. B. orchestrated the D. N. C. hack to help President Trump win the election. Democrats were quick to link the attacks. Senator Dianne Feinstein of California, the top Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, said that with Russia blamed in the cyberattacks involving both Yahoo and the presidential election, “the United States must take steps not only to bring those responsible to justice but also ensure future attacks are not allowed to occur in the first place. ” The main purpose of the Yahoo hack was to gather political and economic intelligence, officials said. The hackers stole a database of 500 million Yahoo users and other Yahoo software code which they used to falsify cookies, a technique that gave them full access to millions of Yahoo accounts without needing the passwords. They found accounts of interest by searching recovery email addresses that users provided, allowing them to target employees of specific companies or organizations for other attacks. At least 50 Gmail accounts were targeted, as were accounts at financial firms and other technology providers. Mr. Belan, one of the F. B. I. ’s cybercriminals, was also making money on the side as part of the scheme, officials said. He used information from the Yahoo accounts to steal credit and gift card numbers, send spam and redirect searches for erectile dysfunction treatments to an online pharmacy that paid for the traffic, according to the indictment. | 1 |
(AFP) Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said on Saturday that “terrorists” were applauding his US counterpart Donald Trump for launching a missile strike on an airbase of his Syrian government ally. [But he backed calls for an independent inquiry into a suspected chemical weapons attack on a town in northwestern Syria on Tuesday that Trump blamed on the Damascus regime. “This man who is now in office in America claimed that he wanted to fight terrorism but today all terrorists in Syria are celebrating the US attack,” Rouhani said in a speech aired by state television. “Why have you attacked the Syrian army which is at war with terrorists? Under what law or authority did you launch your missiles at this independent country?” Iran and Russia are the closest allies of Syrian President Bashar Assad. They have provided him with military support not only against jihadists like the Islamic State group and former affiliate Fateh Front that are targeted by a coalition but also against other rebels they deem “terrorists” too. Both governments have defended their Damascus ally against Western allegations that it carried out a chemical weapons attack on the town of Khan Sheikhoun on Tuesday, killing dozens of civilians. Rouhani called for “an independent commission” by “impartial countries” into the claims. “According to the United Nations, the Syrian government does not possess chemical weapons,” he said. Rouhani was referring to the destruction of the Damascus regime’s chemical arsenal under a 2013 agreement between Washington and Moscow. On Friday, hours after the US missile strike, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said the Western allegations were “bogus. ” He likened them to the claims that Saddam Hussein’s regime had weapons of mass destruction which premised the invasion of Iraq in 2003 but which later turned out to be baseless. | 0 |
Fox News
The FBI has reopened its investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private server while secretary of state after discovering new emails, in a stunning turn of events just days before the presidential election.
FBI Director James Comey wrote in a letter to top members of Congress Friday that the bureau has “learned of the existence of emails that appear to be pertinent to the investigation.”
CLICK HERE TO READ THE LETTER
Comey did not detail those emails, saying only that they surfaced “in connection with an unrelated case.”
He told lawmakers the investigative team briefed him on the information a day earlier, “and I agreed that the FBI should take appropriate investigative steps designed to allow investigators to review these emails to determine whether they contain classified information, as well as to assess their importance to our investigation.”
He said the FBI could not yet assess whether the new material is significant and he could not predict how long it will take to complete “this additional work.”
A senior law enforcement official separately told Fox News the FBI decision is not linked to WikiLeaks messages or any hack, and the newly discovered emails did not come from the Clinton server – but from another device from another government official.
The move comes after Comey and the Justice Department decided in July not to pursue charges over Clinton’s email practices, saying at the time that the investigation was finished.
Comey has since come under criticism from Donald Trump, lawmakers and others who claim the investigation downplayed the mishandling of classified information during Clinton’s tenure.
Trump, speaking to cheering supporters Friday afternoon in Manchester, N.H., praised the FBI for having the “courage” to “right the horrible mistake that they made” – saying he hopes that is “corrected.”
“Hillary Clinton’s corruption is on a scale we have never seen before,” Trump said. “We must not let her take her criminal scheme into the Oval Office.”
In a nod to the significance of the FBI’s announcement, Trump quipped: “The rest of my speech is going to be so boring.”
Other GOP lawmakers also weighed in, urging the bureau to pursue a thorough new probe.
“The FBI’s decision to reopen its investigation into Secretary Clinton reinforces what the House Judiciary Committee has been saying for months: the more we learn about Secretary Clinton’s use of a private email server, the clearer it becomes that she and her associates committed wrongdoing and jeopardized national security,” House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., said in a statement.
Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus said the discovery must be “serious” for the bureau to investigate this close to the election.
Clinton did not respond to questions from reporters about the development as she landed in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and did not address the matter while speaking to supporters in the same city.
The development comes 11 days before the general election, and is the latest shockwave to hit the race. Clinton had been gaining in the polls over Trump in the wake of the release of footage showing Trump talking about groping women and subsequent allegations of sexual assault and harassment against him.
However, daily revelations from hacked Clinton campaign emails obtained by WikiLeaks have become a headache for the Democrat’s campaign. The resumption of the FBI probe poses a potentially bigger problem.
Ron Hosko, former assistant director of the FBI, told Fox News in a telephone interview that retired FBI officials were “livid” at Comey over the fact that charges were not brought against Clinton in round one of the investigation.
“He lit her on fire and then walked away,” Hosko said of Comey holding a news conference laying out Clinton’s mishandling of classified information but then not pressing criminal charges.
Hosko said he still defends Comey for not pressing charges because the FBI always has to make a decision “based on what they have” at the time. Hosko said he thinks agents were probing a separate matter and found emails that made them say, “Oh my God look at what we have.”
House Speaker Paul Ryan called the FBI decision “long overdue.” BREAKING NEWS → The FBI is reopening its investigation into Secretary Hillary Clinton.
My full statement ⇩ pic.twitter.com/LHfyg46dWk
— Paul Ryan (@SpeakerRyan) October 28, 2016
But former Obama administration spokesman Tommy Vietor chided the bureau on Twitter. How many emails did the FBI find? Get your butt in gear, read them, assess them, form a conclusion. Letting this hang is so irresponsible. | 1 |
Last Sunday the public editor’s column addressed the fraught discussions around the use of the term “ . ” Using the column as a springboard, one reader took issue with another term used frequently in The Times’s pages. We asked the editor overseeing standards, Phil Corbett, whether The Times has had discussions around the term’s use. He said, “I’m aware that there’s debate over these terms, but we haven’t come up with any style rules as of yet. ” The public editor’s column also recently addressed how much an story should disclose about its author. A piece in Sunday’s Times Magazine on a Palestinian refugee camp in East Jerusalem similarly raised readers’ eyebrows regarding a piece of information it did not include: the name of the organization partly financing the project. In the piece, Kushner notes, “I was invited on an extensive tour of the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and was asked to choose a subject to write about, for a book to be published next year. ” We asked the magazine’s editor, Jake Silverstein, to talk about the story’s provenance: The public editor’s take: I found Kushner’s magazine story to be an exceptional piece of reporting and writing, one that didn’t seem to be carrying anyone’s political agenda. That said, the wiser choice would have been to make clear the role of Breaking the Silence in the project. Disclosure ahead of time is better than questions afterward. Another reader also finds The Times’s performance coming up short — though her complaint is not about the news coverage. When the reader tried to pay for her Times subscription, the online payment system refused to accept her last name. The reader notified The Times’s customer service department, explaining, “My card is working and I think it goes without saying that my surname is too. ” But she got this reply: “Our Credit Card system has a minimum of three characters for the first and last name. ” The reader then came to us. Ng also noted that the problem has yet to be fixed, so we reached out to Eileen Murphy, the head of communications at The Times, for comment. “First, this customer should have been responded to in a timely fashion, and we apologize that didn’t happen,” Murphy said. “Clearly, this is a flaw in our system, one that we have prioritized fixing. ” Finally, there was the public editor appearance on Fox News’s Tucker Carlson show last Friday. The downpour of mail on this subject this past week fell into two camps. One group appreciated that someone from The New York Times went on Fox to address the subject of media bias. But another group was incensed that the public editor was even on the show, much less criticizing The Times. A firestorm erupted on Twitter, and some of the flames singed the public editor’s inbox, too. The public editor’s take: Let me start with the biggest question: Why did I go on? Simple. I wanted to get before an audience that doesn’t normally read The New York Times. A voyage outside the echo chamber. I gave my honest view of The Times’s sometimes leftward political tilt, expressed in various forms. And sometimes I pushed back, pressing my belief, for example, that the vast majority of journalists who walk into the Times building everyday have the highest journalistic standards. Twitter? It’s not a place for reporters to express their political opinions — though I wish I would have made clear that Carlson’s list of offenders was his, not mine. In response to the reader above, Twitter isn’t a venue where journalists should banter about their ideological beliefs — or clearly suggest them in judgmental terms. That’s not just my view — it’s the official newsroom policy, regularly sent around to reporters and editors to remind them. In the alternative universe of email fans — those surprised and pleased that I spoke honestly to conservatives — I’m glad you listened and I’m glad some expressed an interest in giving The Times another look. I’m paid to be the house critic, but I will say to the reader who raised it, the work that’s produced here is most definitely a public service. Till next week. | 1 |
Of course Americans are stupid enough to do this, say experts 08-11-16
EXPERTS have stressed that of course America is genuinely stupid enough to elect a deranged murder clown as its president.
Professor Henry Brubaker, from the Institute for Studies, said: “The question ‘are Americans really stupid enough to do this?’ is, in itself, fairly idiotic.
“In recent years, thanks to some very well made television programmes like Breaking Bad and House of Cards , we may have led ourselves to believe that America is more intelligent than it actually is.
“More than half the population believes in some form of creationism. More. Than. Half.
“Meanwhile, many of them are unable to locate their own state on a map, never mind large, well known foreign countries.
“And then there’s the guns. So many fucking guns. It’s how a great many of them define themselves. That is not a good thing to do with your brain.”
He added: “Anyway, have a lovely evening.”
Share: | 0 |
Freedom Rider: Dump the Democrats for good By Margaret Kimberley Posted on November 10, 2016 by Margaret Kimberley
This columnist did not see a Donald Trump victory coming. The degree of disgust directed at an awful candidate was more than I had predicted. Neither the corporate media, nor Wall Street, nor the pundits, nor the pollsters saw this coming, either. Their defeat and proof of their uselessness is total. Those of us who rejected the elite consensus and didn’t support Hillary Clinton should be proud.
Black people are now in fear and in shock when we ought to be spoiling for a fight. All is not lost. Even the victory of the openly bigoted Trump poses an opportunity to right our political ship. Not the electoral ship, the political one. For decades black Americans have been voting for people who have done them wrong. Bill Clinton got rid of public assistance as a right, and undid regulations that kept Wall Street in check. He put black people in jail and yet black people didn’t turn on him until he and his wife tried to defeat Obama. But Obama gave us more of the same. Bailouts of Wall Street, interventions and death for people all over the world, and a beat down of black people who still loved him. Despite the fear of Republican victory, we end up losing whenever a Democratic presidential candidate wins.
Victory is ours if we dump the Democrat Party and their black misleaders. The Democrats were so entrenched in their corruption and self-dealing that they didn’t see the Bernie Sanders campaign for modest reform as the savior it might have been. Instead, they marched in lock step with a woman who was heartily disliked. Sanders went along as the sheep dog who led his flock straight over the cliff. The Democrats inadvertently galvanized people who had stopped participating in the system and who want change from top to bottom.
One of our biggest problems lies not in facts but in perceptions. What did Democrats do for black people? The Democrats ship living wage jobs off shore in corrupt trade deals like NAFTA and TTP. They don’t prosecute killer cops or raise the minimum wage. Trump will be hard pressed to deport more people than Obama did. The list of treachery is very long.
When Donald Trump asked black people, “What have you got to lose?” his words were met with derision. But in reality he posed a good question. What do we have to show for years of Democratic votes? Obama bailed out banks, insurance companies, Big Pharma and even Ukraine. But he didn’t rebuild Detroit or New Orleans. The water in Flint, Michigan, is still poisoned and the prisons are still full.
The outpouring of love for Barack Obama was purely symbolic. In state after state, black people who gave him victory in 2008 and 2012 stayed home. They loved seeing him and his wife dressed up at state dinners but they were never fully engaged in politics because that is not what Democrats want. The love was phony and void of any political intent. Donald Trump will be president because of that veneer of political activism.
As for white people who voted for Trump, of course many of them are racists. However they are not without valid complaints. They don’t want neoliberalism but black people don’t, either. They don’t want wars around the world and neither do black people. We corrupt our own heritage of radicalism in favor of shallow symbolism. While we slept walk in foolish nostalgia for Obama and cried at the thought of him leaving office, white people kept their hatred of Hillary to themselves or lied to pollsters. They want America to be great again, great for them. White nostalgic yearnings are dangerous for black people, and we must be vigilant. But there may be opportunity in this crisis if we dare to seize it.
Republicans have been the white people’s party for nearly 50 years. Trump just made it more obvious. He didn’t tell us anything we didn’t already know. We don’t have to be the losers in this election. Let us remember what we have achieved in our history. Half of black Americans didn’t even have the right to vote in the 1960s yet made earth shattering progress in a short time. But we must understand the source of that progress. It came from struggle and daring to create the crises that always bring about change.
Yes white people will strut for President Trump but that doesn’t mean we must submit as if we are in the Jim Crow days of old. We have ourselves to rely on and we can reclaim our history of fighting for self-determination. The dread of redneck celebration should not be our primary motivation right now. Before we quake in fear at white America, we must send the scoundrels packing.
The black politicians and the Democratic National Committee and the civil rights organizations that don’t help the masses must all be kicked to the proverbial curb. The rejection must be complete and blame must be laid squarely at their feet.
Those of us who voted for the Green Party ticket of Jill Stein and Ajamu Baraka must stand firmly and proudly for our choice. We must strategize on building a progressive party to replace the Democrats who never help us. We must applaud Julian Assange and WikiLeaks for exposing their corruption. There should be no back tracking on the fight to build left-wing political power.
The black people who didn’t return to the polls shouldn’t be blamed, either. Those individuals must have personal introspection that is meaningful and political. Their lack of enthusiasm speaks to Democratic Party and black misleadership incompetence. We should refrain from personal blame and help one another in this process as we fight for justice and peace.
The end of the duopoly is the first step in liberation. Staying with a party that literally did nothing was a slow and agonizing death. Sometimes shock therapy is needed to improve one’s condition. If we don’t take the necessary steps to free ourselves, this election outcome will be a disaster. Instead, why not bring the disaster to the people who made it happen? The destruction of the Democratic Party and creation of a truly progressive political movement is the only hope for black America.
Margaret Kimberley’s Freedom Rider column appears weekly in BAR, and is widely reprinted elsewhere. She maintains a frequently updated blog as well as at freedomrider.blogspot.com . Ms. Kimberley lives in New York City, and can be reached via e-Mail at Margaret.Kimberley(at)BlackAgendaReport.com . | 1 |
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“Real housewives of Kandahar”? We all know Hollywood, and especially the TV version of Hollywood, is in the bag for Hillary. The “reality TV” people … are at the top of her promoters and with just 10 days left before the election is a new reality series promoting Hillary and raising money for her cause.
That’s it, just donate to the Clinton Foundation and all will be well. Hillary will certainly be on top of continued Smart Diplomacy in the region and life will be good. Well, except maybe for the cute little goat and the Israelis. And anybody else who isn’t a Muslim.
I understand Hillary is selling “Stronger Together” hijabs in her campaign store. | 0 |
Il dipartimento di Stato equipara Resistenza all’imperialismo a terrorismo Rete Voltaire | 26 ottobre 2016 français Español Türkçe Deutsch عربي Il dipartimento di Stato ha annunciato di aver iscritto il libanese Haytham ‘Ali Tabataba’i, detto Abu ‘Ali Al-Tabataba’i, nella lista dei «terroristi globali».
È un fatto particolarmente rivelatorio: il dipartimento di Stato rimprovera a quest’ufficiale superiore dello Hezbollah di sostenere la Repubblica Araba Siriana, uno Stato membro delle Nazioni Unite.
Per avvalorare maggiormente la decisione, il dipartimento di Stato fa menzione anche del fatto che Haytham ‘Ali Tabataba’i è stato visto in Yemen. Sulla base di quest’unica informazione, l’ufficiale viene accusato di combattere a fianco della Coalizione degli Huti e dei sostenitori dell’ex presidente Saleh, che controllano la maggior parte del Paese.
Il dipartimento di Stato non accusa in alcun modo Haytham ‘Ali Tabataba’i di azioni terroristiche; semplicemente assimila la Resistenza all’imperialismo statunitense al terrorismo.
Traduzione
Rachele Marmetti
Il Cronista | 0 |
Coal, copper, iron ore, natural gas, oil, zinc Kazakhstan Bauxite, copper, gold, iron ore, lead, silver, uranium Kyrgyzstan Coal, gold, iron ore, natural gas Mongolia Coal, copper, gold, iron ore, nickel, silver, zinc Russia Bauxite, coal, copper, iron ore, natural gas, nickel, rare earths, silver, zinc Tajikistan Coal, copper, gold, iron ore, lead, natural gas, oil, zinc Turkmenistan Uzbekistan Coal, copper, gold, lead, natural gas, silver, uranium This table does not take into account China’s relationship with non-contiguous trading partners, including Brazil and South Africa, both major mineral exporters and along with Russia and India, members of the BRICS grouping. There are also other African countries that have been the object of massive Chinese investment in recent years. They also produce commodities in competition with Australia that are in demand by Chinese industry. The strong and expanding Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) reinforces the infrastructure links of the One Belt One Road development. Its six current members include the nations in the above table excluding Afghanistan, Iran and Mongolia (all observer members) and Burma. Pakistan and India are both observer members expected to join in 2017, as will Iran. There are a further six dialogue partners of whom the most strategically and economically important member is Turkey. BRICS and the SCO have a growing relationship with the Eurasian Economic Union, which comprises five member states of which three, Russia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, are also linked via the SCO and the One Belt One Road development. Russia’s membership is common to all of the major economic blocs. Western economic sanctions against Russia and belligerent military activity by NATO on Russia’s borders have been a major driver of closer Sino-Russian relations. China also has been the object of western military pressure, quite apart from the South China Sea issues referred to above. There are currently 400 US military bases encircling China. There is no military justification for this. It is clearly part of an attempt by the US and its allies to “contain” China, a policy that will either fail, as recent developments suggest, or end in war. Either way, the risks to the security of Asian nations are jeopardized. That subplot is again a major reason why so many nations are signing up for the peaceful alternative offered by the One Belt One Road initiatives. It is also a factor in 57 nations, including Australia in a rare show of defiance to the Americans, in joining the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). Again, that bank is a Chinese initiative and a key part of the economic reordering of the world’s financial structures dominated for most of the post world War 2 period by the IMF and World Bank. The Chinese Yuan recently becoming part of the IMF’s Special Drawing Rights is a further weakening of western financial dominance. Even more importantly, China is now conducting its trade with more than 60 countries in each country’s respective currencies, thereby bypassing the US dollar as the sole medium of international trade. The demise of the dollar’s role in world trade will spell the end of US hegemony that has prevailed for the past 70 years. The US will not relinquish that role lightly as Libya and Iraq among others have found to their considerable cost. More turmoil and disruption can be safely predicted irrespective of the outcome of the US Presidential election. The TPP and its European equivalent (the TTIP) are part of the rearguard actions being mounted to prevent the dollar’s collapse from its preeminent position. The relentless proxy wars, regime changes and general destabilization through ‘colour revolutions’ are manifestations of the same desire to maintain what the US Department of Defence called “full spectrum dominance” in its 2002 paper, Vision 2020. That such an arguably insane objective will fail is inevitable. Not the least of the reasons is that countries, especially in Eurasia, have a viable alternative of peaceful development in what President Xi refers to as a “win win” situation for all parties. The issue for Australia is a stark one. Its geography, its trading relationships, its wealth and its economic future all lie squarely with Asia. The conundrum lies in the central message of the 2016 Defence White Paper: the US is and will remain the essential guarantor of Australia’s security, and the military alliance is an unshakeable component of that. It is the paying of insurance premiums on that perception of the alliance that explains Australia’s continued willingness to involve itself in America’s illegal wars. Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria are only some of the more blatant examples. Now however, for the first time in its trading history, Australia’s major trading partner is not also its ally. That its current political policies persist in portraying that major trading partner as a threat, either actual or potential, is evidence of its policy schizophrenia. The perils of such a policy lie in the figures quoted above as to the resources available to China from neighbours and trading bloc partners that can be used to substitute Australian products upon which the past 40 years of Australian prosperity has been based. From a Chinese perspective, if one has a choice between sourcing raw materials from neighbours linked by high-speed rail, or from a belligerent and unreliable alternative that Australia is in danger of becoming, the choice in the vernacular is a no-brainer. China may opt to switch its raw material trade anyway. But a prudent government conscious of Australia’s long term national interest should surely be exploring policy alternatives outside the straitjacket imposed by the US alliance. James O’Neill, an Australian-based Barrister at Law, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook” . Popular Articles | 1 |
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Our nation is out of control, and perhaps the biggest threat is our lax border policy, courtesy of Barack Obama. Proving just that is an illegal alien who managed to sneak his way back into this country after being deported twice. However, it’s the sick surprise he had for his girlfriend that landed him behind bars – and hopefully, it’s for good.
It all started when the daughter of illegal alien Raul Perez, 43, got an odd phone call from her father that just couldn’t be ignored. After hanging up with her father, Perez’s daughter immediately called 911, prompting dispatch to send a few officers to the home of the girl’s mother, 31-year-old Karla Guadalupe-Magana, a mother of 5 and Perez’s girlfriend. Raul Perez (left), Karla Guadalupe-Magana (right) (Source: Mail Online )
Unfortunately, the situation would take a horrid turn as officers made their way into the home to find the woman dead on the bathroom floor with Perez asleep in the bed just feet away. Come to find out, the illegal alien decided to strangle her to death for reasons unknown – but it only gets worse from there .
According to reports, Perez is actually a Mexico national in the United States illegally and had already been deported twice, but making matters worse, he was actually in police custody just 4 days prior to the murder. Unfortunately, he was released on bond due to a technicality.
Perez had been arrested for operating a vehicle while intoxicated, but he reportedly used a fake name to fly under the radar. Although his fingerprints were taken and sent to the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), seeing how the agency “ doesn’t monitor this type of thing 24/7 ,” Perez was released on bond before the local jail heard anything back.
Right now, Perez is facing life in prison and deportation once he has answered for his crimes – not that it really does any good. As it stands, this illegal alien could live the rest of his life, leeching off the American taxpayer while in our prison system, because our border is so porous that he just walked across three separate times. If he’s deported, that would solve the drain on our taxpayers, but as he’s already proven, it also means he could do it all again if our border issue isn’t solved.
This is the type of problem that America is dealing with, and it all stems from Barack Obama’s presidency and the man’s dangerous policies. Beyond tying Border Patrol’s hands behind their backs, our so-called leader has left our nation’s border literally open for anyone to simply walk across.
Unfortunately, because of that lunacy, a mother of 5 is now dead. However, there may be a light at the end of the tunnel if Donald Trump gets elected. Not only will he allow Border Patrol to do its job, he’ll build a wall, making it just about impossible for scum like Perez to come into this country – and that, my friends, is exactly what we need. | 0 |
A little over a year ago, Billy Bean, Major League Baseball’s ambassador for inclusion, began hearing from people outside the sport who were concerned about a growing phenomenon inside the game. The annual hazing routine that forces rookies to dress in outlandish costumes for a day, including having some dress as women, had taken on more prominence in recent years because photographs of the ritual were showing up on social media outlets. The people who came to Bean said they felt that the costumes that depicted women were often demeaning and offensive and now were being seen everywhere. He relayed the concerns to other people in the commissioner’s office and in the players’ union, the Major League Baseball Players Association, and so began a conversation that has now led to a rule change stitched into the new collective bargaining agreement. The general practice of making rookies wear costumes is still permitted. Players can dress in pajamas or as superheroes or overgrown babies. But no one may wear costumes depicting women, whether willingly or forced into it. “We are the sport of Jackie Robinson, and we need to lead by example,” Bean said. “We are not trying to take the fun away from the players. This is no different than making sexist comments about women in the workplace or about people’s religious beliefs or ethnic background or the language they speak or their sexual orientation. ” The new rule prohibits anyone from dressing up as women or wearing costumes that may be offensive to individuals based on their race, sex, nationality, age, sexual orientation, gender identity or other characteristics. While other sports have their own hazing rituals, such as forcing rookies to sing their college fight songs in public, it is baseball that is identified with the wearing of costumes. Bean, a former major league player who came out publicly as gay in 1999, was hired in 2014 to lead baseball’s efforts at inclusion. He said that when he played in the 1980s and ‘90s, the hazing rituals usually included activities like carrying luggage for veterans. The practice of having the rookies dress in costumes has also existed for decades, Bean said, but back then, it was not publicized the way it is today. One concern is that players in high schools and colleges might increasingly emulate the costume hazing now that it has become more visible on social media, and would do so in an unsupervised manner. Although some major league rookies have objected to the custom of dressing up in costumes, which usually takes place late in the season, others have thought of it as funny and happily posed for photos. Earlier this year, the Mets veterans made their rookies, including the reserve outfielder Brandon Nimmo, don dresses and wigs as characters from the film “A League Of Their Own. ” “I guess I’m sad to see that go,” Nimmo said Tuesday when asked about the new ban on such costumes. “Not my decision, but I’m glad I got to partake in it last year. I wouldn’t trade that. ” Nimmo spoke as he was participating in the annual Mets holiday party at Citi Field. He was dressed as an elf, which, under the new rule, would not be of bounds, Christmas party or no Christmas party. Also at Citi Field on Tuesday was the Mets’ pitcher Noah Syndergaard, who was playing the role of Santa Claus — a fuzzy blue one in this instance. He recalled being part of a rookie ritual in 2015 in Cincinnati in which he and his fellow players had to put on tight underwear and pajamas and walk the streets of the city. “I wouldn’t say I understand it,” Syndergaard said when asked about the new rule banning women’s costumes. “But I have no say in it. ” Mets General Manager Sandy Alderson said he frowned on the whole practice of having major league rookies dress up in costumes, regardless of what outfits they wore. A former Marine, Alderson noted that there had been similar practices in the military. “It’s divisive and undercuts morale,” he said. “Is it constructive? Is it useful? Is it juvenile? It’s probably juvenile. It’s probably not useful or constructive in too many ways. ” In 1999, a Mets hazing ritual actually turned violent when the rookie Jorge Toca, a reserve first baseman and outfielder, refused to participate. Shortstop Rey Ordonez, who was also from Cuba, obstinately defended Toca, and when the tension escalated, Ordonez wound up being punched in the face by another Mets teammate, the utility player Luis Lopez. “Do you want an activity that is supposed to be a uniter turn into a divider?” asked Al Leiter, a pitcher on that team and now a television baseball analyst. “Especially at that time of the year, when you are headed into the postseason? “And as an industry, do you really want your star players being photographed in a thong? Does it make sense to have photographs of Bryce Harper or Mike Trout dressed in a or a ballerina tutu? If it were me, I wouldn’t want that. ” In 1996, Los Angeles Dodgers veterans cut up a dress suit belonging to pitcher Chan Ho Park, then in his first full season in the major leagues. Park exploded, screaming invectives and throwing furniture and food around the clubhouse. Most cases are less volatile. Years ago, the prospect Drew Henson of the Yankees was made to wear a wedding dress, and pitcher Wang and second baseman Robinson Cano were made to dress as female Yankee cheerleaders. When the Expos existed, National League teams liked to time their hazing events with their exit from Montreal, forcing the rookies to wear their costumes in public through customs. Bean said those who might criticize the new rule as being just another example of political correctness would be missing the point. “The people who are making a majority of those comments are not the people that those jokes are directed at,” Bean said, “and that is an easy seat to sit in and point fingers and say you are ruining something. ” In any case, not all the costumes are sexually oriented. Sometimes, players dress as superheroes, or as Elvis Presley, or, as the Yankees recently did, as 1980s rappers. “We’re going to give the players the opportunity to show how creative they can be in a way that is not shaming or disparaging anyone that is part of that club, or a fan that might sit in one of their seats during their 81 home games,” Bean said. “I think it’s a responsibility they can meet, and I hope we are remembered for putting this conversation out there. ” | 1 |
by Jerri-Lynn Scofield
Jerri-Lynn here. Normally, I would not post another Real News Network interview with Colin Powell’s former chief of staff when he was Secretary of State, Tom Wilkerson so close to Yves posting Is the US Headed Towards War in Syria? , another interview with the same subject just last week. Yet given the urgency of the topic, reader interest in last week’s post, and the perhaps Panglossian hope that high-level focus on this issue now might limit the range of future options that hawkish Hillary Clinton can take in future– in what I must admit still looks to be the likeliest scenario, that she is inaugurated come January– I upload this post. Perhaps if the Obamamometer took time off from his rounds of legacy-burnishing interviews and concentrated on this problem, he might have a chance of correcting one specific aspect of his horrendous existing foreign policy legacy before the clock runs out on his administration.
This Real News Network interview with Lawrence Wilkerson , offers some suggestions on what would be necessary to stop the immediate ongoing slaughter and reach a peaceful solution in the longer term. It’s by no means the most comprehensive nor the last word on the subject. I cleaned up the rush transcript as best I could. Please excuse any remaining errors.
SHARMINI PERIES, TRNN: Welcome to the Real News Network. I’m Sharmini Peries coming to you from Baltimore. As the civil war in Syria rages on, a school was struck in an airstrike in a rebel held area of northern Syria last week. Reports indicate that 22 children died in the attack along with several civilians. The Russians who are supporting Syria’s president al-Assad denied any involvement in the strike. There’s also much speculation that Russians were not reelected to the UN Human Rights Council last Friday because of its involvement in Syria. But this is not known for certain since nations do not need to disclose why they choose to reject candidates for the council. Also last week, Amnesty International released a report in which it estimates that US-led coalition airstrikes in Syria have killed at least 300 civilians. It suggests the US military must come clean on the casualties that they have caused. So far, the war in Syria has cost somewhere between 250 thousand and 400 thousand deaths and has created over 4 million refugees. The highly complicated conflict has increased tensions between the US and Russia and a ceasefire seems more remote than ever.
Joining us now to take a closer look at the conflict and what is required to end this is Larry Wilkerson. Larry is a retired United States army soldier and former chief of staff to the United States Secretary of State, Colin Powell. Larry, it’s so good to have you with us today.
LARRY WILKERSON: Thanks for having me Sharmini.
PERIES: So Larry, last week when we talked, you mentioned that Hillary Clinton’s proposal to implement a no fly zone over Syria and what that would probably mean is that it would worsen the conflict. So then, what steps need to be taken by the US to bring this conflict to a peaceful resolution?
WILKERSON: Sharmini, this is going to sound like the impossible but there are two steps that need to be taken right away, immediately. The first is a high-level policy step which says President Obama and his council of elders, his National Security Council, whatever, should decide that Bashar al-Assad does not have to go. I think from what we have seen, the United States continuing to insist that Bashar al-Assad being untenable– that is unacceptable as President Obama said it earlier– is simply a position that now is part and parcel to all this blood and carnage and treasure and lives and diaspora being caused. If you can’t back up from a strategic error like this and count your loses and say okay I made a mistake. You don’t have to publicly say that but you have to say that in the councils of government and you have to be able to say I’m going to rectify that mistake. I miscalculated.
Bashar al-Assad has enormous support. He has support not just outside Syria from Iran and Russia and elsewhere. He has support from inside Syria. Significant support. Then you have to face the reality too that on the other side you are largely supporting your own enemy, Al Qaeda. No matter what you say about the CIA’s ability to differentiate between so called moderate rebels and those of the Al Nusra Front and those of Al Qaeda affiliates, that is pure nonsense. The CIA does not have that kind of capability. It does not have that kind of discrimination. So, most of the people we are now arming to fight Assad look a lot like Al Qaeda to me. So, you’ve got to admit you’ve made two huge errors and you have to rectify those errors. Those are the steps you need to make immediately.
PERIES: Now what’s preventing them from doing that and is what you’re proposing unrealistic in the US diplomatic and military milieu?
WILKERSON: Unrealistic if you don’t have the political will nor the political courage to pursue a rectification of your errors. But what is the consequence? The consequence is more death, more conflict, more destruction, more damage, more tragedy, more refugees, more making Jordan unstable, and so forth. You’ve got to be able to back up from these strategic errors and instead of doing what throughout history, bad leaders have done, that is reinforce the strategic error until it becomes catastrophic, you’ve got to reverse it. And you’ve got to replace it with a better policy. You’ve got to force Saudi Arabia, you’ve got to force the Qataris, you’ve got to force the Turks however way you may do it. Economic, political, financial, whatever, you’ve got to force them to follow you. They don’t have to follow you like lapdogs but at least they do have to recognize your change in policy and begin to at least for appearance’s sake, support it.
If the United States were to leave I think the rest of them would, reluctantly somewhat, follow in domain. What does that mean? That means you quit supplying these opposition forces with the massive arms that we are supplying them with. That includes anti-tank missiles and other elements. They’re just going to make them go on and on and on. After all, Iran and Russia and Syria had an inexhaustible [coffers] of the kind of equipment that they need to oppose us as we do to oppose them. So, what are we doing here? We’re having a great power confrontation over the graves and the blood of the Syrian people. This just simply has to stop.
PERIES: Now in the past, Larry you said that Israel seems to be playing a contradictory role in Syria’s conflict. If one is to believe that Israel actually prefers Assad to be in power than an Islamic regime there, would it not make sense for US to do what you’re saying? To reassess and take a step back and keep Assad in power?
WILKERSON: I think I’d have to say the contrary is operating right now Sharmini. Michael Horne has said point blank, he has that Israel would rather when I say Israel, let me be more precise, Bibi Netanyahu and Bibi Netanyahu’s government would rather see ISIS in command, Al Qaeda in command in Damascus, than they would Bashar al-Assad. So, that’s what we’re up against here. But I don’t think we’re up against the Israeli people. If the Israeli people were confronted with the reality of this chaos and this collapse of nations all around them, it’s more detrimental to their long-term security than coming to some accommodation with these countries and helping them come back to some reasonable degree of stability and political feasibility, I think it’d get a change of attitude in Israel.
But no one’s telling them the truth. Everyone is scaring them and everyone is saying well you’ve got to keep these people in chaos. You’ve got to keep them on the verge of collapse if not collapsing. You’ve got to change these regimes and it would be better to have ISIS in charge in Damascus rather than have Assad. Just think how preposterous that is and yet that’s what’s being said.
PERIES: Now in the last few weeks Larry, we’ve seen the battle of Aleppo covered extensively in the media. However there’s another battle going on in Mosul similar in that sense in terms of the number of people that its attacking and very devastating there as well but very little attention in the media about what’s happening in Mosul. What is going on there and what’s the comparison here?
WILKERSON: Well the media in this country don’t care about this place Sharmini. They don’t care about anything but Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton and how big Kim Kardashian is today. What’s happening in Mosul is in one sense a tactical defeat and maybe even an operational and maybe even strategic defeat for the group known as ISIS, ISIL and their ideal of upholding territory. It’s going to happen in Mare’. They’re going to be roundly defeated with regard to that aspect of their strategy. But what’s going to happen in Mosul afterwards is going to refer back to their previous comments just now Sharmini which are going to have happen in Mosul afterwards is going to be the Turks and the Iraqis confronting one another.
Everyone has made it pretty clear that he’s not going to respond to the Baghdad government’s request for him to stay out of Mosul in any real way. You’re going to have Kurds. You’re going to have all manner of different groups that have sufficient power to contest power in Mosul after ISIS is kicked out. Then you’re going to see the proof of the pudding with regard to whether Iraq stays a state as it is currently constituted, however fragile, or it goes into something else. Splinters into two or three or possibly even more states. And you’re going to see whether or not the Kurds can be talked into an autonomous relationship with these countries rather than an independent country of their own or whether everyone in Turkey will bless any of that.
So, you’re going to have the aftermath of Mosul and the defeat of ISIL which I think is going to happen. You’re going to have that aftermath determine the future of several countries in that region if not the future of the region for many years to come and it’s going to be indicative of whether or not we’re going to be able to politically, diplomatically, economically and otherwise forge some kind of stability, some kind of peace, some kind of prosperity for the many young people in the region and bring people home from places like Jordan and Lebanon. And put them back in their own homes in places like Libya and Syria and so forth. The proof of the pudding as I said is going to be in the aftermath of Mosul, not necessarily in the tactical battle occurring there right now.
PERIES: Alright Larry, Ill let you go for now but looking forward to having you back next week.
WILKERSON: Thanks. Take care.
PERIES: And thank you for joining us on the Real News Network. 0 0 0 0 0 0 This entry was posted in Guest Post on | 1 |
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Print Fairfax County, Virginia, voter Jena Jones told WND and Radio America she found this Democrat insert included with her absentee ballot, among others
Democratic Party officials in Fairfax County, Virginia, are categorically denying that pro-Democrat campaign materials were included in the same envelope as a voter’s absentee ballot, arguing that pamphlets were sent in a separate mailing to absentee voters from the Fairfax County Democratic Committee, or FCDC.
Earlier this week, Jena and David Jones shared their story of finding more than they expected in the envelope that contained her ballot. (See images of the materials Jena and David say they found at the end of this article. Also included are two images from Democrats showing what they say is confusion on the part of the voters.)
“I found a letter from the governor of Virginia asking me to please vote Democrat and ‘help keep Virginia blue’ this year,” Jena explained. “Then I got a letter from the Fairfax County Democratic Committee, giving me a step-by-step, yes-and-no what I should vote for as far as the meal tax and all those other things on the ballot.”
In recent days, at least two more people contend they received the same materials in the envelope with their absentee ballots.
After the report was first published, and shared on Facebook by David Jones, Fairfax County Democratic Committee Executive Director Frank Anderson replied to David’s post to dispute their account of what the ballot envelope contained.
“These materials were NOT sent in the same envelope as the ballot. The ballot is mailed separately by the Office of Elections. Political parties are free to mail items to voters who request absentee ballots. The two envelopes arrived at the same time,” commented Anderson.
That triggered a quick back-and-forth between David Jones and Anderson.
“I hate to tell you but you’re wrong. All items came in one envelope,” Jones said.
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“Impossible. That letter came out of my office. We never have access to other people’s ballots,” replied Anderson.
“Then it seems those that sent the ballots have access to YOUR letters,” said Jones. “Who should I believe? You or my lying eyes?”
Anderson then stated that political parties are informed when anyone requests an absentee ballot, and mailings are sent to those voters to promote Democratic Party candidates and positions on ballot initiatives.
“I am literally sitting down the hall from the place where those envelopes are stuffed. We are a political office and have no business handling anyone’s ballots. You can believe what you want to believe,” concluded Anderson.
The Virginia Department of Elections did not respond to repeated attempts for a response. But after seeing reports from WND and Radio America, Anderson protested the premise of the story.
“Please stop spreading these absurd allegations that are just hearsay from a misinformed voter who cannot verify his claim,” stated Anderson in an email in which he also explained why he believed the Jones account could not be accurate.
He shared a photo sent by State Sen. Scott Surovell, showing his absentee ballot envelope next to a separate envelope containing Democratic Party advocacy.
In a formal interview, FCDC Communications Adviser Bruce Neilson told WND and Radio America the Jones version of what the ballot envelope contained cannot be true.
“It’s not possible,” said Neilson, who then explained how absentee voters are approached by the local Democrats.
“Voting is a sacred privilege and a right of every citizen,” he said. “The activity of voting is also a public record. The Fairfax County Democratic Committee receives a notice of everyone who has requested an absentee ballot. We get that information as public information on the day the ballot is mailed.
“The same day the ballot is mailed, our volunteers prepare materials to advise voters what the Fairfax (County) Democratic Committee knows to be Democratic positions on the ballot,” said Neilson, noting the materials include fliers on candidates and ballot proposals like the meals tax.
Listen to the WND/Radio America interview with Bruce Neilson:
However, he insists those materials are never sent with the ballot itself.
“That material is mailed in a separate envelope, labeled with our initials – FCDC – and our return address in Fairfax, Virginia, and would be received either the same day, perhaps the day before or the day after she received her official absentee ballot from the government,” Neilson said.
“It’s a separate mailing. It’s a separate stamp. It’s a separate envelope. It’s very easy to confuse where they came from if you have all those materials on the table at the same time while you’re filling in your votes,” he said.
Jones is standing by her story 100 percent, as is her husband. David says it’s a very clear memory.
“Jena opened the envelope that contained her ballot, the green sample ballot, the two-sided letter from the governor and card with kids on it saying ‘go vote’ or something of that nature. There was also the return envelope, which I signed,” David said.
The coverage of Jena’s story has also elicited similar stories from two other Fairfax County voters. Both of them commented on Reddit.
“I can confirm this. I live in Herndon, VA (Fairfax County) and also received these materials in my absentee ballot. I thought it was fishy at the time but didn’t look into it,” stated a comment by a reader using the handle thisisaterriblename.
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Another, under the Reddit handle Nightingale-Nights, said the same thing happened to them and posted similar photos to the ones David and Jena shared last week.
Neilson said there is no way the county government, which sends out the ballots, could be including partisan materials in the envelope containing the ballot.
“They don’t have our materials,” he said. “Our materials are printed for us, by our printer, and we have complete control over our materials in our office, and they come from our office in our mailing. They don’t go anywhere else.
“It’s not possible that the county government is distributing partisan Democratic materials. It’s never happened before. I’m not aware of it happening now. And I don’t think that it would happen anywhere in the future,” Neilson said.
There are only a few known complaints of stuffed ballot envelopes in Fairfax County, leading David Jones to believe an individual in the government is responsible. He accepts the explanation that the Fairfax County Democratic Committee is not responsible for what he and Jena discovered with her ballot.
“I understand Frank’s comments about his office has nothing to do with the ballots. I believe that,” Jones said. “I think what we are seeing here is a person that actually stuffs and mails the ballots is taking it upon themselves to add in extra material. I don’t see how Frank’s office could be held accountable for what’s in the ballot envelope. But it does seem odd that others are now reporting similar issues.”
Neilson said there is zero chance of that scenario being true.
“I just can’t imagine that happening because of the internal controls that we have on the literature that we mail,” Neilson said.
He also said the internal controls at the county government are air tight.
“I am an election official. On Election Day, I serve in a non-partisan capacity for our county election office,” Nielson said. “I can assure you, you have Democrats and Republicans working in the office. You have plenty of oversight of the voting process, and there’s no way that a partisan political piece was mailed with her ballot. There is no way that happened.”
The following are three images of the Democratic Party materials Jena and David Jones say they found stuffed inside the absentee ballot:
The following are two images from Democrats who say the voters must be confused: | 1 |
USA Today issued a correction to their recent article about Breitbart Senior Editor MILO after falsely labeling him a “white nationalist,” “racist,” and “ . ”[“After white nationalist and poster boy Milo Yiannopoulos landed a massive book deal with a reported $250, 000 advance, publisher Simon Schuster has come under harsh criticism from those concerned that a book will elevate the voice of the notorious Breitbart editor,” wrote USA Today’s Kelly Lawler in her original article. “Yiannopoulos made headlines earlier this year when he was permanently banned from Twitter for organizing a targeted racist and sexist harassment campaign against Ghostbusters [2016] and Saturday Night Live star Leslie Jones. ” The allegations that MILO is a white nationalist and a member of the have since been removed, instead describing MILO as a “controversial internet personality,” while the false claim that he led a racist harassment campaign against actress Leslie Jones has also been changed. The article still claims that MILO had a “part in a targeted racist and sexist harassment campaign” against Jones, however. USA Today added an editor’s note to the updated article, reading: “Corrections clarifications: An earlier version of this story misstated controversial affiliations for Milo Yiannopoulos. ” Several other mainstream media outlets have falsely branded MILO a white nationalist and a member of the since the announcement of his upcoming book Dangerous, including NBC News, who claimed that MILO is a “white nationalist troll,” and the New Yorker, who claimed MILO led a “racist online harassment campaign against the comedian Leslie Jones. ” The has repeatedly disassociated itself with MILO, declaring on numerous occasions that he is not a member of the movement. The Chicago Review of Books also claimed MILO’s book could inspire terrorism of the likes of Omar Mateen and Dylann Roof, while ELLE writer Sady Doyle claimed his work “will endanger human lives. ” Charlie Nash is a reporter for Breitbart Tech. You can follow him on Twitter @MrNashington or like his page at Facebook. | 0 |
WASHINGTON — Senators received a rare briefing at the White House on Wednesday from the President Trump’s national security team on North Korea’s nuclear weapons program, which has become one of the most pressing foreign policy challenges early on in the administration. [“Sobering briefing,” tweeted Sen. Steve Daines ( ) after the briefing, hosted by Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats. The President also briefly attended the event. Sen. Marco Rubio ( ) called it an “important” meeting. “We will never accept North Korea as a legitimate nuclear weapons power,” he tweeted. Just returned to Capitol. Sobering briefing. https: . — Steve Daines (@SteveDaines) April 26, 2017, Just attended important @WhiteHouse meeting on #NorthKorea. We will never accept North Korea as a legitimate nuclear weapons power. — Senator Rubio Press (@SenRubioPress) April 26, 2017, Sen. John Barrasso ( ) told NBC News that North Korea’s “capacity is increasing and has increased significantly. ” After the meeting, Tillerson, Mattis, and Coats released a statement, calling North Korea’s pursuit of nuclear weapons an “urgent national security threat and top foreign policy priority”: Just weeks after Trump took office, North Korea a ballistic missile, on February 11. The regime then launched four ballistic missiles on March 6. On April 5, it launched another missile. The tests, in defiance of international law, show progress in North Korea’s illicit nuclear weapons program. Earlier this year, North Korea fired a missile using solid fuel, which makes it harder to detect before launch. North Korea’s leader Kim has vowed to obtain a nuclear weapon that can hit the U. S. homeland, and Trump has warned that it will not happen during his watch. The White House meeting was highly atypical. In the previous administration, the White House would often send senior officials to Capitol Hill to brief lawmakers, as opposed to inviting them to the White House. While some critics argued the briefings were little more than a photo opportunity, others — including Sen. David Perdue ( ) — praised the White House for inviting both Democrats and Republicans to the briefing, and for trying to engage with senators. Senate Armed Services Committee member @sendavidperdue’s statement on White House #NorthKorea meeting: pic. twitter. — Kristina Wong (@kristina_wong) April 26, 2017, Sen. Roger Wicker ( ) after the meeting, also praised the president, saying he “deserves credit for updating the entire Senate. ” “The Administration’s decision to hold this briefing at the White House indicates the seriousness of the threat,” he said in a statement. Sen. Todd Young ( .) called North Korea a “grave” and “urgent threat. ” Democrats were more critical. Sen. Ed Markey ( ) said on NBC News it was “heartening” that there was more talk about diplomacy, but said it was in the context of more U. S. military exercises in the region and expressed concern about an “accidental war. ” After the Senate meeting was announced, the White House decided to hold a briefing for members of the House, but at the Capitol. Senators were bussed over to the briefing, which took place in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building on the White House grounds. The meeting occurred as the U. S. continued to deploy parts of a missile defense system to South Korea, known as the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD). U. S. Pacific Command Commander Adm. Harry Harris said earlier in the day that the system would be operational “in the coming days. ” Sen. Ted Cruz ( ) after the meeting tweeted that it was “time to ” North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism, following a Reuters report saying that the administration was considering doing so. N Korea utilizes terrorism funds terrorists. Time to as state sponsor of terrorism as called for in S. 672 https: . — Senator Ted Cruz (@SenTedCruz) April 26, 2017, | 0 |
CAIRO — Fighters aligned with Libya’s United unity government are advancing along the Mediterranean coast toward the Islamic State stronghold of Surt, signaling the first major assault on territory that, since last year, has become the terrorist group’s largest base outside Iraq and Syria. Two separate militia forces have fought their way toward the city in recent days, attacking from both the east and the west, in apparently uncoordinated attacks that have reduced the length of Libyan coastline controlled by the Islamic State to 100 miles from about 150 miles. On Wednesday, one of the militias claimed to have seized control of Surt’s power plant, 20 miles west of the city. Those victories occurred in sparsely populated areas, and it was unclear whether the militias had either the strength or the will to push into Surt, which is thought to be heavily fortified and also harbor several thousand foreign fighters. But the advance did signal a new setback for the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, at a time when it is already under concerted attack in Falluja, Iraq, and in parts of Syria. Analysts and diplomats warn that while the offensive addresses the West’s biggest concern in Libya, it also risks destabilizing the fragile peace effort there by fostering violent competition between rival groups. “Only a year ago, these two groups were battling for control of the oil crescent, and lobbing rockets and shells at one another,” said Frederic Wehrey, a Libya specialist at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, who visited that country recently. “Now they are converging on a common enemy, but the great fear is what comes next. ” Over the past year, Surt, the hometown of the ousted Libyan dictator Col. Muammar has become a preoccupation for Western countries worried that it could become a refuge for militants fleeing Iraq and Syria. Islamic State fighters have presided over a brutal rule in the city, with public executions and floggings, as well as shortages of food and medicines. Since late 2015, small groups of American, British and French special operations forces have quietly deployed across Libya, making contact with friendly Libyan militias in an effort to gather intelligence on the Islamic State. In February, the Pentagon presented the White House with a potential plan for extensive airstrikes against the militant group’s camps, command centers and munitions depots in Libya. But President Obama has stayed his hand, limiting overt American action to sporadic strikes against a handful of Islamic State targets in an effort to allow a United peace process to take root in Libya. That endeavor, however, has faltered badly as the unity government, which arrived in the capital, Tripoli, in March, has failed to gain broad political acceptance. Now, with the sudden move against the Islamic State, military action on the ground is moving faster than the country’s tangled politics. The power plant where fighting raged on Wednesday is a significant prize because its loss to the Islamic State last June was seen as a significant step in the group’s domination of the Surt region. The assault was instigated by militias from Misurata, a powerful trading city further west along the coast, in response to Islamic State attacks. Dozens of Misuratan fighters have died in recent weeks, according to Libyan media reports. Hamza Ahmed Abusnaina, a senior Misuratan commander, said in a telephone interview on Wednesday that the attackers had captured both the Surt power plant and an area south of the city called Wadi Jaref. Mr. Abusnaina’s claim could not be independently confirmed, but it was echoed by Twitter accounts associated with the Misuratan militias. On the eastern side of the city, the attack is led by Ibrahim Jathran, a young militia commander who controls a stretch of coast known as the oil crescent, where most of Libya’s oil terminals are. In recent days, his group seized the coastal town of Bin Jawad and claimed on Tuesday to have moved on nearby Nawfaliyah. That would bring his group, known as the Petroleum Facilities Guard, within 80 miles of Surt. It is unclear whether foreign forces are playing a direct role in the offensive. In The Times of London last week, a report from Misurata cited a local commander who said that British special forces soldiers had fired a missile to destroy an Islamic State truck packed with explosives during a battle in early May. British defense officials did not comment on the report. In April, a Pentagon spokesman said that the small group of United States Special Operations forces deployed to Libya — about two dozen troops operating near Misurata and Benghazi — were principally involved in intelligence gathering and reconnaissance. As the assault on Islamic State territory unfolded, several analysts pointed to the role of the unity’s government’s new defense minister, Almahdi who has been trying to bring rival militant factions under a central command that could become a national army. But such efforts are being frustrated by the tribal and personal rivalries that have fueled chaos in Libya since the fall of Colonel Qaddafi in 2011. “These forces lack crucial capabilities,” said Mr. Wehrey, of the two groups. “It’s one thing to push back I. S. in the surrounding villages and towns but quite another to liberate Surt. ” The coastal city is thought to be home to a majority of the Islamic State fighters in Libya, estimated to number between 3, 000 and 6, 500. Western officials say that any group attacking Surt would likely face suicide bombers, roadside bombs and the resistance of fighters with few avenues of escape. It is estimated that of the city’s population has already fled. More broadly, there is a danger of deepening divisions between east and west in Libya. One Western official who recently visited the country said the political mood in Libya had become increasingly confrontational during recent months as the United Nations, acting under pressure from the United States and its allies, has struggled to win acceptance for the unity government. The assault on Surt could further isolate Gen. Khalifa Hifter, a powerful militia commander in the eastern city of Benghazi, who has determinedly resisted all entreaties to join the unity government. Only weeks ago, he boasted that he would be the one to rout the Islamic State from Surt. In a sign of those divisions, the eastern branch of the country’s central bank this week announced that it had printed 4 billion Libyan dinars through a company in Russia, drawing a furious reaction from the main central bank in Tripoli. On Wednesday, the Tripoli bank took delivery of its own consignment of new bank notes which, officials said, had been produced by Libya’s traditional currency printer — in Britain. | 1 |
After This October Surprise, Donald Trump Only Has One Option Left: Expose The Clinton Crimes Michael On Television Democrats Are Now Calling For A ‘Revolution In The Streets’, And I Believe That They Are Quite Serious By Michael Snyder, on November 13th, 2016
The surprise victory by Donald Trump on November 8th has spawned a series of violent protests and riots all over the nation as stunned leftists continue to throw the largest post-election temper tantrum in U.S. history. Protesters in large cities all across America have been disrupting public transportation, looting stores, hurling objects at the police and burning Trump in effigy. There have even been shootings at anti-Trump rallies in Seattle and in Portland . Hundreds of protesters have been arrested so far, and organizers are promising that this is only just the beginning. Meanwhile, large numbers of enraged leftists are physically threatening Trump on Twitter , and some are even calling for a violent revolution. Sadly, I believe that they are quite serious about this.
Even some big celebrity names are starting to use the word “revolution” in messages to their followers. On Twitter, Katy Perry has ominously warned that “ the revolution is coming “, and comedian Sarah Silverman has boldly declared that “ Trump gets a chance to hear us (or else we R them) If he fails REVOLUTION IN THE STREETS “.
Of course other leftists are seeking less violent ways to oppose Trump. There is a major push to use the electoral college to block a Trump presidency, if that fails there are many hoping to immediately impeach Trump once he takes office, and other activists such as former Labor Secretary Robert Reich are calling for a new third party if their planned post-election takeover of the Democratic Party is not successful.
But for many on the radical left the time for patience is over. The “Not My President” movement is taking off like a rocket, and one survey found that only 58 percent of all Clinton supporters consider Trump’s victory to be legitimate. A protest near Trump Tower in New York City on Saturday drew approximately 25,000 people, and USA Today reported that the anti-Trump protest in Portland, Oregon on Saturday night rapidly “ devolved into a riot “.
It is becoming clear that these protests are not going away any time soon, and some are even beginning to refer to this movement as “the Purple Revolution” …
No sooner had Trump been declared the 45 th president of the United States, Soros-funded political operations launched their activities to disrupt Trump during Obama’s lame-duck period and thereafter. The swiftness of the Purple Revolution is reminiscent of the speed at which protesters hit the streets of Kiev, the Ukrainian capital, in two Orange Revolutions sponsored by Soros, one in 2004 and the other, ten years later, in 2014.
As the Clintons were embracing purple in New York, street demonstrations, some violent, all coordinated by the Soros-funded Moveon.org and Black Lives Matter, broke out in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Oakland, Nashville, Cleveland, Washington, Austin, Seattle, Philadelphia, Richmond, St. Paul, Kansas City, Omaha, San Francisco, and some 200 other cities across the United States.
So could we actually see a violent revolution on the streets of America?
Is the radical left really so horrified by the prospect of a Trump presidency that they would actually be willing to engage in a prolonged campaign of chaos, violence and physical intimidation?
Well, the Oath Keepers are so concerned about what this movement could become that they have initiated an intelligence gathering operation that they are calling “Operation HYPO” …
Clearly as Oath Keepers, we cannot simply sit around and watch while the enemies of liberty work to use violence to initiate a communist revolution in our country. As a result of the intelligence being provided by our Operation Sabot operatives, we have initiated Operation HYPO. We have allowed our personnel to burrow deep inside these protest organizations to collect information regarding tactics, motivations, schedules and logistics.
We had operatives at the planning meetings for the protests that occurred last evening in Baltimore, MD and Philadelphia, PA . Our operatives have also penetrated numerous other planning organizations in cities across the country. For OPSEC reasons, the precise list of cities we are operating in will not be publicly disclosed.
And one thing that we already know is that the radical left is hoping to organize the largest political protest in United States history in Washington D.C. on Inauguration Day. I will be writing about this later today on The Most Important News .
The election of Donald Trump has been the single most galvanizing event for the radical left that we have seen in decades. One of the early leaders of the “Not My President” movement is filmmaker Michael Moore, and the following are three of his key action points which he feels must be implemented immediately …
1. Must quickly and decisively form an opposition movement, the likes of which hasn’t been seen since the 1960s. I will do my part to help lead this as I’m sure many others (Bernie, Elizabeth Warren, MoveOn, the hip-hop community, DFA, etc.) will, too. The core of this opposition force will be fueled by young people who, as with Occupy Wall Street and Black Lives Matter, don’t tolerate b.s. and are relentless in their resistance to authority. They have no interest in compromising with racists and misogynists. 2. Prepare to impeach Trump. Just as the Republicans were already planning to do with President Hillary from Day One, we must organize the apparatus that will bring charges against him when he violates his oath and breaks the law — and then we must remove him from office. 3. Must commit right now to a vigorous fight (including civil disobedience, if necessary)which will block any and all Donald Trump Supreme Court nominees who do not meet our approval. We demand the Democrats in the Senate aggressively filibuster any nominees who support Citizens United or who oppose the rights of women, immigrants and the poor. This is non-negotiable.
But of course other liberals are still in the “shock and disbelief” stage. As I have stated before, Americans were more emotionally invested in this election than they had been in any election in decades, and the aftermath has not been pretty.
This has been particularly true on college campuses all over the nation. According to the New York Post , college administrators have been going to extraordinary lengths to soothe the deep emotional pain that many of their students are experiencing… The University of Michigan offered its traumatized students coloring books and Play-Doh to calm them. (Are its students in college or kindergarten?) The University of Kansas reminded its stressed-out kids that therapy dogs, a regular campus feature, were available. Cornell University, an Ivy League school, held a campus-wide “cry-in,” with officials handing out tissues and hot chocolate. Tufts University offered its devastated students arts and crafts sessions. (OK, not kindergarten — more like summer camp.) At campuses from elite Yale to Connecticut to Iowa and beyond, professors canceled classes and/or exams — either because students asked or because instructors were too distraught to teach.
And it is also being reported that suicide hotlines are ringing off the hook all over the nation.
We have never seen anything like this ever before, and I have a feeling that this “Not My President” movement is going to absolutely dwarf the “Occupy Wall Street” and “Black Lives Matter” movements. And considering the very high levels of anger, frustration and pain that these radical leftists are feeling, it is easy to see how this movement could become very violent.
Many patriots, conservatives and Christians were hoping that Donald Trump could bring America together and lead us into a new era of peace and prosperity, but the radical left already hates Trump more than any president that has ever come before him.
It isn’t going to take much to push the radical left over the edge, and if that happens we could see endless chaos, violence and civil unrest for the next four years. | 1 |
“Saturday Night Live” is adding three cast members as it enters its 42nd season, NBC announced on Monday. The season begins Oct. 1. One, Mikey Day, has been a writer for the show since 2013, while the others, Melissa Villaseñor and Alex Moffat, are new to “Saturday Night Live. ” All three have been brought on as featured players. In August, NBC announced that three cast members — the principals Taran Killam and Jay Pharoah, and a featured player, Jon Rudnitsky — would not return for the season. Mr. Day, who this year was a head writer and cast member on the NBC variety show “Maya Marty,” has also been a member of the Los Angeles troupe the Groundlings, which counts other “Saturday Night Live” stars, including Kristen Wiig and Will Forte, among its alumni. (“Maya Marty,” which, like “Saturday Night Live,” is produced by Lorne Michaels, has not yet been renewed for a second season.) Ms. Villaseñor performs comedy and impressions, which are central to the show’s brand of political satire during election seasons. Mr. Moffat has been onstage in Chicago with the iO and Annoyance Theaters. | 0 |
At the edge of dark, dark woods in South Carolina, children have been telling adults that a group of clowns have been trying to lure them into the cluster of trees. They say the clowns live deep in the woods, near a house by a pond. This tale sounds like a mishmash of newspaper clippings and pages ripped from Stephen King novels, but these are actually details taken from a report filed by the sheriff’s office in Greenville County, S. C. last week, after several residents at an apartment complex there said that people in clown makeup had been terrorizing both children and adults. Several children said that clowns were offering them money to follow them into the woods, close to the house by the pond. (The police say they have found no evidence of clown paraphernalia at the house.) A woman walking home late one night said she had seen a “ ” clown waving at her from under a streetlight, the police said. (She waved back.) And another woman said her son had heard clanging chains and a banging noise at his front door. In these cases, people who reported clown sightings refused to give their names to the police. The police don’t know whether the stories are coming from the imaginations of children or something sinister is afoot, but panicked residents seemed to be taking the law into their own hands: The Greenville sheriff’s office investigated reports that residents of the apartment complex may have fired shots in the direction of the wooded area. Master Deputy Sheriff Ryan Flood said Tuesday that the authorities had not confirmed any of these sightings but said that extra deputies were patrolling the apartment complex. Property managers were also distributing fliers that warn children against walking in the woods alone at night. And the calls to the police continue: On Monday, a child at a different complex phoned the police to report another clown sighting. How do clowns — supposedly agents of humor and good fun — cause such chaos? Across the United States, clown sightings spring up like and our collective fear of evil clowns has a way of elevating a local nuisance to a national news story. In 2014, there were a number of reported sightings, from Albuquerque to Fishers, Ind. Last year, a clown was spotted skulking around a Chicago cemetery. And just a few weeks ago, residents of Green Bay, Wis. reported that a clown was seen toddling around town clutching a bunch of black balloons. (Somewhere, there are probably plenty of stories about good clowns, too, but an email requesting comment from Clowns of America International, a trade group, was not immediately returned on Tuesday.) Some locals made a sport out of spotting the Green Bay clown, whom they nicknamed Gags. But others pulled out their firearms, according to C. J. Guzan, a local actor who said that the Gags project was just a viral marketing stunt for a movie. “It’s getting a little bit scary because people are starting to believe it a little bit more, and we’re starting to see some of those unsettling pictures on Facebook,” Mr. Guzan told a local ABC affiliate. “Not of the clown, but of people armed and preparing to defend themselves, saying, ‘I can’t go outside because I’m afraid of clowns,’ or whatever. That’s just a little too far. ” The pranksters, viral marketers and criminals may be taking advantage of a cultural fear of clowns, with examples including Mr. King’s “It,” and John Wayne Gacy, a serial killer who dressed as a clown. But Steven Schlozman, a child psychiatrist who teaches a course on the psychology of horror films at Harvard University, suggests that something more primal could be at work. Humans are built to recognize patterns from an early age, and a clown’s exaggerated human features set off a primal warning bell from within our “crocodile brains,” Dr. Schlozman said in an interview on Tuesday. “It has this kind of capacity to grab you emotionally before it grabs you cognitively,” Dr. Schlozman said. “That’s the key to making something viral online actually: to make people emotionally engaged before they’re intellectually engaged. ” In his years researching the things that scare us, Dr. Schlozman has also uncovered another truism: Horror is almost never about the thing that’s scary. The horror unravels once terrified people respond. When the locals take their guns out and fire into the woods, it’s not that different from people going with their pitchforks into the woods after Frankenstein’s monster, he said, adding: “It never ends well. ” | 1 |
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According to WikiLeaks emails published Monday, Hillary Clinton’s staff knew that Anthony Weiner was messaging an underage girl as far back as 2011, yet did nothing about it. The protection of young women isn’t high on the list of priorities when you work for the Democratic nominee.
RedStateWatcher reported that the email detailed lurid claims of private messages to an underage girl being investigated by police – and was met with the response ‘oof’ by Clinton campaign manager John Podesta.
“Police on Friday afternoon came to the home of a 17-year-old high school junior to ask her about direct online communications she has had with Rep. Anthony Weiner,” the email read.
“Two officers from the New Castle County Police Department arrived at the girl’s home around 4:30 p.m. and asked to speak with the girl’s mother about the daughter’s contact with Weiner. Another officer appeared at the home a short time later.”
Weiner is married to Huma Abedin, Hillary’s top aide.
In June of 2011, an investigation was launched into his online contact with a 17-year-old Delaware high school student. Since then, the disgraced former Congressman hasn’t been able to kick the habit. (Most recently, he was caught sending suggestive photos of himself to a mistress. His son was asleep in the background of one infamous shot.)
Abedin herself is now at the center of a fresh FBI investigation into the handling of classified material while Clinton was in office. | 0 |
An overwhelming majority of Republican voters say their party’s leaders should get behind Donald J. Trump, even as he enters the general election saddled with toxic favorability ratings among the broader electorate, according to the latest New York News poll. And as Mr. Trump faces deep skepticism with general election voters and some Republican holdouts, the Democratic Hillary Clinton, is grappling with Senator Bernie Sanders and how to win over his impassioned supporters. Both parties thus approach their July nominating conventions with significant unease and hurdles to overcome. Mr. Trump and Mrs. Clinton are widely disliked by voters, and both parties will need to repair schisms that might spell doom in an ordinary election year. But this, of course, is no ordinary year. Mr. Trump’s and Mrs. Clinton’s soaring levels of unpopularity are extraordinary for the likely nominees of the two major parties. Nearly of voters, for example, say that Mr. Trump is not honest and trustworthy. Just as many say the same of Mrs. Clinton. Strong majorities of voters say the candidates do not share their values. Mr. Trump’s difficulties appear to be more troublesome at the moment. If the election were held now, 47 percent of registered voters would support Mrs. Clinton, versus 41 percent for Mr. Trump. Mrs. Clinton’s advantage has narrowed somewhat since Mr. Trump became the presumptive Republican nominee: Last month, she led him by 10 points in a CBS News poll. In a more hypothetical matchup, Mr. Sanders leads Mr. Trump, 51 percent to 38 percent. The survey reveals that Republican voters are starting to fall in line with Mr. Trump now that he is their presumptive nominee — and that they expect party officials to do the same. Eight in 10 Republican voters say their leaders should support Mr. Trump even if they disagree with him on important issues. And unfavorable views toward Mr. Trump among Republican voters have plummeted 15 percentage points since last month 21 percent now express an unfavorable view of him, down from 36 percent in April. Republican voters are drifting toward unity even though some party elites are still withholding their support. The House speaker, Paul D. Ryan, continues to deliberate over whether to endorse Mr. Trump, while other prominent Republicans are actively searching for a nominee as an alternative. Yet many of the party’s voters think that while Mr. Trump may be imperfect, the time has come to rally to their unlikely — if only to keep Mrs. Clinton out of the White House. “The reason I would support him is because the alternative is less favorable, in my opinion,” Delores Stockett, 76, a retired teacher from Osceola, Ark. said in a interview. “And I think Republican leaders should support him for the same reason I am supporting him. The alternative is not palatable to those of us who hold conservative views. ” Republican voters remain remarkably pessimistic about the state of their party. More than eight in 10 call the party divided, and 43 percent say they are discouraged about its future. About think Mr. Trump can unite the party this year. By contrast, fewer than half of Democratic voters say their party is divided, and eight in 10 are hopeful about its future. More than eight in 10 think Mrs. Clinton can unite the party after the primaries end next month. However, Mrs. Clinton is still contending with resistance to her candidacy from supporters of Mr. Sanders as their contest carries on and grows more contentious. percent of Mr. Sanders’s primary voters say they will not support her if she is the nominee, a figure that reflects the continuing anger many Sanders supporters feel toward both Mrs. Clinton and a process they believe is unfair. “I don’t support her mostly because I don’t trust her,” said Will Lambert, 32, an engineer in Denver who supports Mr. Sanders. “If she became the nominee, I might vote for a candidate, like the Green Party, or I might do a for Bernie. I’m still not 100 percent decided, because I don’t necessarily want to see Trump elected, either. It’s a slim possibility that I might vote for Hillary, but then, I’m at a point in my life where I just don’t want to vote for the lesser of two evils. ” Still, the Democratic resistance is less widespread than it was in the 2008 primary. While 72 percent of Mr. Sanders’s supporters say they would vote for Mrs. Clinton this fall, a News survey taken in early May 2008 found that only 60 percent of Mrs. Clinton’s supporters said they would vote for Barack Obama in the general election. Mr. Trump, his primary race decided, is still confronting opposition from some of the voters in his party who backed other candidates. Three in 10 voters who supported other Republican candidates said they would not vote for Mr. Trump in November. The nationwide telephone poll was conducted May 13 to 17 on cellphones and landlines with 1, 300 adults, including 1, 109 registered voters. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points for all adults and for all voters. Mr. Trump is hampered by a high level of contempt among important voting blocs. Only 21 percent of female voters view him favorably, while 60 percent view him unfavorably. A mere 14 percent of voters 18 to 29 view him positively, while 65 percent of such young voters have a negative opinion about him. And just 12 percent of nonwhite voters view Mr. Trump favorably, while 68 percent view him unfavorably. Mrs. Clinton fares little better. Just 23 percent of white voters view her favorably, while 63 percent of whites have an unfavorable view. Men dislike her almost as much as women dislike Mr. Trump: Only 26 percent of men view her favorably, and 58 percent hold an unfavorable perception of her. One factor working in Mrs. Clinton’s favor, though, is that the current Democrat in the White House is enjoying a modest rejuvenation. Fifty percent of Americans now approve of President Obama’s job performance, his highest rating in more than three years. Majorities say that Mr. Trump and Mrs. Clinton have strong leadership qualities. Mr. Trump, though, faces considerable questions over his demeanor and the effect it would have on the country. Seven in 10 voters say he does not have the right temperament to be president. And 61 percent say that electing him would worsen the United States’ image in the world. Asked whether candidates for the presidency should release their tax returns, six in 10 said they should. Mr. Trump has refused to release any tax forms, saying last week that voters had no right to see them and telling an interviewer that his tax rate was “none of your business. ” | 1 |
As anyone who lives in a big city knows, space is a valuable commodity. Whether you’re in a minuscule studio or a Classic 6 with too few closets, there is rarely enough of it. Most of us try to make the best of what we’ve got, embracing our tiny kitchens and eking out storage where we can. But what do designers who specialize in small spaces — and those who have made an art form of living in them — know that the rest of us don’t? Below, some tips and tricks. GET ORGANIZED “Having a place for everything is key,” said Lauren DeCaro, who moved from the large she shared with three roommates into a studio in Brooklyn Heights that she bought for about $500, 000 last winter. Working with a contractor she found through Sweeten, a free service that matches homeowners with vetted professionals, Ms. DeCaro, 28, who works in development for the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Manhattan, overhauled the apartment with special attention to where all her things would go. “I knew I didn’t want a dresser taking up valuable floor space in my apartment, so I made sure to install drawers and shelving in the closet,” she said, noting that the $1, 500 system from California Closets was custom made, taking into consideration everything from her height to the number of shoes she owns. In the kitchen, $40 rolling cabinet inserts from the Container Store help corral her Tupperware and pots and pans. She installed her microwave in an cabinet (along with its own electrical outlet) to avoid taking up valuable counter space and added a linen closet in an awkwardly shaped wall niche in the bathroom. “Having a designated place for everything has allowed me to have a streamlined, uncluttered studio apartment,” she said. IF YOU DON’T USE IT, LOSE IT “It’s all about the edit,” said David Bazner, 26, who lives in a in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn, and works as an interior designer at the Studio at One Kings Lane. “I spent a lot of time getting rid of things that held no emotional value. If something means nothing to you, then it can be categorized as clutter — and clutter is a small space’s worst enemy. ” Getting rid of things he didn’t love, he said, “allowed the pieces I really care about to take center stage” — an Afghan rug from his parents, an LC4 cowhide chaise, his favorite books. Mr. Bazner even did away with the headboard on his bed, stretching a tapestry he picked up for $20 from the ceiling to the floor along the full width of the bed, then pairing it with some throw pillows to make the whole thing seem more expensive. GO VERTICAL “Opt for the tallest bookcase possible,” Mr. Bazner said. “The height will cue the eye to the top of the room, making your ceiling appear taller than it really is. ” James Tabb, 32, an interior designer for the online design service Laurel Wolf, likes to add a floating shelf near the ceiling, along the perimeter of a room. The wraparound shelf not only frees up space below, but when filled with books or collectibles, he said, “creates an effect similar to crown molding,” drawing the eye upward and adding definition to a room. The kitchen in his in Los Angeles has about 80 square feet and only one drawer, so he installed a magnetic wall strip to hold knives and utensils. He suggests using sconces instead of floor or table lamps whenever possible, because it “not only adds an interesting design feature to your space, but also serves a necessary, functional purpose. ” To hide unsightly cords, he said, pick up some cord covers (about $14 for a length at Home Depot) and paint them the same color as the wall: “You won’t even know they’re there. ” LEAVE ROOM TO BREATHE “When you have a small apartment, it can be tempting to place furniture in corners to save space,” Mr. Tabb said. “However, this actually ends up making your space look and feel much smaller. ” Leave “a little breathing room between your furniture pieces and walls, as this visually opens up your space. ” MAINTAIN VISUAL FLOW “Opt for sofas and credenzas with visible legs,” said Kimberly Winthrop, 35, a senior designer at Laurel Wolf. “The little bit of negative space will help to keep your small apartment from feeling like it’s filled from wall to wall with furniture. ” Mr. Bazner of One Kings Lane recommends club chairs with a seat height of about 20 inches to complement a sofa or settee. “Their skeletal nature maintains the visual flow of the room, while their height makes them appropriate to be used at a dining table in a pinch,” he said. And if you’re struggling to find a coffee table that’s the right size, he added, try an arrangement of three smaller side tables: “It’s an idea perfect for today’s nomad, as the lack of bulk makes moving a breeze when the lease is up. ” BE FLEXIBLE Consider collapsible furniture, like a gateleg or table, as well as pieces that can do double duty, like an ottoman with hidden storage, Ms. Winthrop suggested. That also goes for things like kitchen gadgets that can quickly crowd drawers or countertops. “If a tool or utensil doesn’t have at least two to three functions, I simply don’t buy it,” said Mr. Tabb, who does without a microwave to save space in his kitchen. “It may sound weird, but you really don’t need one,” he said. “Popcorn is a bit more challenging to make on the stovetop, but the results are well worth the effort, and food reheated by stove or oven always tastes better. ” | 1 |
MIAMI — By the time Donald Robertson, a retired architect, arrived at Fort International Airport’s Terminal 1 on Friday afternoon, the mass shooting in Terminal 2, which left five people dead, had been over for at least an hour. The accused gunman, Esteban Santiago, was in police custody and the airport had largely returned to its normal rhythm — passengers were noshing, charging their phones, watching television. Things were so sedate that Mr. Robertson did not even realize there had been a shooting. But as he made his way past the gate, Mr. Robertson looked up and saw a “stampede” of people, including what looked like law enforcement agents, racing toward him. “It was tremendous,” he said. “It was like a herd reacting. Everyone around me was diving under chairs. ” A rumor about a possible second gunman had spread across the airport, via social media, news sites and word of mouth. People panicked and the airport was shut down, a turn of events that upended what had seemed like an orderly finale to a tragic afternoon. What followed that single rumor was a rush of terror for travelers and airport workers as they fled to the tarmac, were separated from loved ones, injured themselves in the tumult, hid in kitchens and storage rooms and hunkered down behind luggage trucks. Chaos and uncertainty unfolded over the next 12 hours. Through it all, travelers said, they were frustrated every step of the way by the dearth of information about whether they were safe, where to go once the airport was shut down and how they could retrieve the thousands of items — 23, 000 according to a tally by airport officials — that were scattered across terminals. For the thousands who fled the terminals, seeking refuge on the tarmac or hiding wherever they could, food and water quickly became scarce. Bathrooms were nonexistent. Passengers on some planes that were either preparing to take off or trying to reach a gate were stuck on board for up to seven hours. Travelers said that some level of pandemonium is to be expected after a shooting, and they praised law enforcement for the swift response. But it was the aftermath of the rumor, which was debunked relatively quickly, that left them bewildered and angry. “Nobody gave us information, and as time went on, we were treated more and more like suspects,” Mr. Robertson said, referring to the by law enforcement and orders for people to raise their hands as they walked from the airport down side roads. “When they decided to clear the terminal — that created terror. And it was real terror. People were really, really, really terrified and crying. ” Sheriff Scott Israel of Broward County, Fla. said he issued the order to close the entire airport as a safety precaution after he received information that “perhaps gunfire had happened and an active shooter was in another terminal. ” At that point, he said, the safety of the people at the airport was paramount. “I made a decision to clear the airport,” Sheriff Israel said in an interview. “I worked with our SWAT team and other SWAT teams to clear the entire airport and the parking garage to make sure we didn’t have any other active shooter. It was a voluminous undertaking and we did it, as horrific and horrible as this scene was. ” Until that point, he said, the plan was by the book. “Had the misinformation of the active shooter not surfaced,” he said, “we would have had buses to the airport within 30 minutes. ” Sheriff Israel said he could not remember how long it took to confirm there was no second gunman. The authorities debunked the rumor about 30 to 45 minutes after it had started to spread, raising questions about whether the airport could have been reopened right away. By then, law enforcement was already sweeping the airport and garages. It is still unclear how the rumor began. Several travelers said in interviews that they heard what they believed to be gunshots in Terminal 3, something that sounded like loud pops. Sheriff Israel said that he was told somebody saw a bloody person and assumed a second gunman was loose. Providing accurate information to passengers and airport and airline staff members also proved challenging. Law enforcement typically can access wireless emergency alerts — the system that sends Amber Alerts — but alerts were not used to inform people that the danger had passed or instruct them on what to do next. Some airports have internal communication systems for employees to send important messages. It is unknown whether this was in place at the Fort Lauderdale airport. Instead, news, accurate and otherwise, traveled through word of mouth or was gleaned from cellphones. “Airports can put out messages to employees, and that is important because passengers will tend to follow directions from uniformed employees in the know,” said Douglas Mansel, the aviation security manager at Oakland International Airport in Oakland, Calif. All airports have emergency plans approved by the Federal Aviation Administration, including for scenarios. The Fort Lauderdale airport’s director, Mark E. Gale, was not available to comment on airport protocols or on how events unfolded on Friday. Sheriff Israel said that communication proved tricky. With so many people spread out across different areas, including on the tarmac and in garages, it was hard to get information out. “I tried to tell as many people verbally,” he said. “Communication is critical, but there is no way to communicate to thousands. ” Anne Buongiorno, 56, who was visiting from Canada, had to evacuate Terminal 2 twice. The first time, after the shooting, she and her daughter jumped under a seat, their hands over their heads. Her husband was in the bathroom. Terrified, they followed a surge of people down a staircase, but people were shoving one another. She fell down and broke her rib. She and her daughter ended up on the tarmac and were told to lie on the ground near a luggage truck. A while later, they were told to go back inside. A similar scenario played out as the report spread of the possible second gunman. Ms. Buongiorno said she again wound up among thousands of people on the tarmac. Clusters of people ran back and forth, fleeing what they feared was a threat as the rumor took hold. Ms. Buongiorno hid behind a truck and waited nearly for five hours before being led to a hangar and later put on a bus for the cruise port. Nobody gave her information about where to go, so she used to iPad to find a hotel, got in a long line for a cab and went there. The next day, she was back at the airport waiting for word about how to get her belongings and fly back to Canada. “It was the first time in my life I was so afraid,” she said, her voice quavering at the memory. “I’m afraid still. When I heard somebody talk over there, I’m afraid. ” Others joined the long line of people who were told to walk out of the airport along a set of railroad tracks, which skirted a marshy area. A few who had tried to avoid the mayhem by jumping a fence were confronted by law enforcement officers with pointed guns. Those who had luggage dragged it along. Officers sometimes issued contradictory orders — people directed to one location were told by officers there to go back where they came from. Along the way, law enforcement personnel ordered people to raise their arms and sometimes frisked them as they filed by — a common precaution, security experts said, but one that alarmed some. “They were patting us down like there was another shooter,” said Melody Dorward, 22, of Ohio, who walked the railroad tracks. “I felt traumatized. Not safe. ” | 1 |
Jet lag may be the worst part of traveling. And it hits many people harder traveling east than west. Why they feel this way is unclear. But scientists recently developed a model that mimics special cells in the body and offers a mathematical explanation for why traveling from west to east feels so much worse. It also offers insights on recovering from jet lag. Deep inside the brain, in a region called the hypothalamus (right above where our optic nerves cross) the internal clock is ticking. And approximately every 24 hours, 20, 000 special pacemaker cells that inhabit this area, known as the suprachiasmatic nucleus, synchronize, signaling to the rest of the body whether it’s night or day. These cells know which signal to send because they receive light input from our environments — bright says wake, dark says sleep. But when you travel across multiple time zones, like flying from New York to Moscow, those little pacemaker cells that thought they knew the routine scramble around confused before they can put on their show. The whole body feels groggy because it’s looking for the time and can’t find it. The result: jet lag. Most of our internal clocks are a little bit slow, and in the absence of consistent light cues — like when you travel across time zones — the pacemaker cells in your body want to have a longer day, said Michelle Girvan, a physicist at the University of Maryland who worked on the model published in the journal Chaos on Tuesday. “This is all because the body’s internal clock has a natural period of slightly longer than 24 hours, which means that it has an easier time traveling west and lengthening the day than traveling east and shortening the day,” Dr. Girvan said. Jet lag can be resolved by matching your internal clock to your destination’s clock as soon as possible. (There’s an app for that). So the researchers built a model that considers all of your pacemaker cells, how sensitive you are to light, the brightness of light, multiple time zones and people’s slightly off kilter internal clocks. They hope the model offers a simple way of explaining how a typical body might recover from jet lag with no intervention. That is, how its pacemaker cells try to synchronize in the presence of different light cues (like sunshine, artificial light or dim light from clouds) when arriving at various time zones three hours, six hours, nine hours and 12 hours away either to the east or west. The model confirms what was already known: Generally, westward recovery is easier than eastward. But it also helps us understand that flying across more time zones can sometimes be easier than traveling across fewer. For example, it would take you about eight days to recover from a westward trip across nine time zones, if you did nothing to fight it. But if you cross the same number of time zones going east, recovery would take more than 13 days, according to the model. This recovery time is worse than if you flew smack across the globe, crossing 12 time zones, which is about the distance from New York to Japan. Confusing? The model shows that your body is confused, too, as your cells try to adjust to new light cues in different places. It also shows that a trip less than 12 hours going east is going to feel worse than the same time going west. It all comes back to whether you’re a lark — an early riser — or an owl, and “most people are a little owlish,” said David Welsh, a neuroscientist at the University of California, San Diego, who studies the body’s pacemaker cells and was not involved in the study. If you’re traveling across several time zones, like from New York to Moscow, and you want to start feeling normal sooner, “you really want to experience that external stimuli appropriate to your new time zone as quickly as possible,” said Dr. Girvan. And that sometimes means owls succumbing to early nights. | 1 |
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