text
stringlengths 1
134k
| label
int64 0
1
|
|---|---|
Home › HEALTH › SURGEONS ADMIT THAT MAMMOGRAPHY IS OUTDATED AND HARMFUL TO WOMEN SURGEONS ADMIT THAT MAMMOGRAPHY IS OUTDATED AND HARMFUL TO WOMEN 0 SHARES
[10/28/16] ETHAN A. HUFF – Every year, millions of women flock to their doctors to get their annual mammograms, a breast cancer screening procedure that involves pressing a woman’s breasts between two metal platforms to scope out tumors. But surgeons everywhere are starting to question the controversial practice , which studies show isn’t even an effective screening tool, and is actually harmful to the bodies of women who receive it.
The public is told that mammograms are the only way to catch breast cancer early, but a review of eight scientific trials evaluating the procedure, found that mammography is neither effective nor safe. After looking at data on more than 600,000 women between the ages of 39 and 74 who underwent the procedure on a routine basis, researchers found that many women are misdiagnosed. Many of these same women are consequently mistreated with chemotherapy , resulting in their rapid demise.
As published in the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews , the review concluded that mammography causes more harm than good , because many more women end up being misdiagnosed and mistreated than those actually avoiding the development of terminal breast cancer. Thus, the procedure known as mammography is an outdated scourge that belongs in the history books of failed medical treatments, and not at the forefront of women’s medicine.
“If we assume that screening reduces breast cancer mortality by 15% and that overdiagnosis and overtreatment is at 30%, it means that for every 2000 women invited for screening throughout 10 years, one will avoid dying of breast cancer and 10 healthy women , who would not have been diagnosed if there had not been screening, will be treated unnecessarily,” the authors concluded. Group of top medical experts admits mammography does more harm than good
One year after this review was published, a second one published in The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) came to a similar conclusion. A team of medical professionals that included a medical ethicist, a clinical epidemiologist, a pharmacologist, an oncologic surgeon, a nurse scientist, a lawyer and a health economist, decided that the medical industry’s claims about the benefits of mammography are essentially bunk.
They found that for every 1,000 women screened in the U.S. over a 10-year annual screening period beginning at age 50, one breast cancer death would be prevented, while a shocking 490 to 670 women would have a false positive, while 70 to 100 would undergo an unnecessary biopsy. Between three and 14 of these women, the study found, would also be over-diagnosed for a non-malignant form of cancer that never even would have become “clinically apparent.”
This study out of Switzerland corroborates another out of Canada – the 2014 Canadian National Breast Screening Study – which concluded in lockstep with the others that mammography screenings do not reduce mortality rates from breast cancer any better than a simple physical examination. In other words, the procedure is completely unnecessary, and in many cases exceptionally harmful .
And on and on the list goes, with data out of Norway and elsewhere confirming that mammography isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be. U.S. data spanning the course of nearly 40 years shows that more women are over- or misdiagnosed with breast cancer because of mammograms than are successfully early-diagnosed with breast cancer in such a way as to protect against metastasization. This represents an exceptionally poor track record that calls into question why mammography continues to be used when it clearly doesn’t work.
“I believe that if you did have a tumor, the last thing you would want to do is crush that tumor between two plates, because that would spread it,” says general practitioner Dr. Sarah Mybill, as quoted in the documentary film The Promise . Post navigation | 0 |
Le terrorisme régional vise à protéger les intérêts d'Israël Wed Oct 26, 2016 9:35AM Iran Le ministre iranien de la Défense, le général Hossein Dehqan. ©Tasnim #iran #terrorisme
Selon le ministre iranien de la Défense, le général de brigade Hossein Dehqan, l'objectif de la création et de la propagation du terrorisme et de l'extrémisme dans la région est de protéger le régime israélien.
Le général Hossein Dehqan, ministre iranien de la Défense, a indiqué, lors d'une réunion du comité stratégique de défense de ce ministère, que la création et l'extension du terrorisme et de l'extrémisme visaient à protéger les intérêts du régime israélien, à maintenir l'instabilité dans la région et à y prolonger la présence des forces d'occupation arrogantes.
"Les États-Unis et leurs alliés régionaux et internationaux scandent des slogans humanitaires d'un côté, mais de l'autre ils donnent le feu vert aux groupes terroristes tels que Fatah al-Cham (ex-Front al-Nosra), les autorisant ainsi à enfermer les civils dans les zones de combat et à les utiliser comme boucliers humains pour endiguer les opérations antiterroristes de l'armée syrienne, ce qui assure la survie des terroristes," a dit le ministre iranien de la Défense.
"Pourtant, l'une des priorités et des principales préoccupations des commandants du front de la Résistance, est de sauver le peuple et de préparer leur évacuation hors des régions non sécurisées. C'est avec ce même souci qu'ils ont sauvé, d'ores et déjà, la vie de milliers de gens sans défense", poursuit-il.
"Dans tout lieu où une opération antiterroriste se dirigeait vers la victoire, les États-Unis et leurs alliés ont recouru à des projets mensongers de cessez-le-feu et procédéà des démarches prétendument pacifistes, dans le but, en fait, de sauver les terroristes, alors qu'au moment où les terroristes commettaient crimes et massacres, ils n'avaient fait qu'observer le silence.", a regretté le général Dehqan.
"Dès le début de la formation des groupes terroristes takfiristes, la RII avait mis en garde contre les maux inimaginables que causeraient ces derniers en menaçant la sécurité de la région, voire du monde entier. L'ordre de l'Arrogance poursuit toutefois tous ses soutiens à ces groupes extrémistes", a-t-il rappelé.
Le ministre iranien de la Défense a exigé alors que l'on mette fin à la crise régionale, ce qui n'est possible, selon le responsable iranien, qu'avec la fin du soutien des États-Unis et de leurs alliés au terrorisme, le rejet du projet de démembrement des pays de la région, la reconnaissance des gouvernements légaux et l'aide à la lutte contre le terrorisme. Loading ... | 0 |
By wmw_admin on November 3, 2016 Nick Gutteridge — Daily Express Nov 2, 2016 .
The area around Stalingrad Metro station was turned into a refugee battleground as rival gangs of migrants set upon each other in shocking scenes of violence.
Asylum seekers wearing hooded tops wielded makeshift clubs fashioned from lengths of wood which they used to bludgeon each other as horrified pedestrians looked on.
The blood-curdling brawl erupted just yards from the Stalingrad Metro station, where a squalid migrant camp has popped up following the demolition of the Jungle.
It was not immediately clear what sparked the early morning fight, but rival gangs of people smugglers have previously been involved in violent brawls in Calais.
And despite the horrific brawl, a pro-migrant rally is apparently being organised to take place at the camp at 6pm tonight.
The once peaceful neighbourhood, in Paris’ 10th Arrondissement, used to be a popular area with tourists, boasting a lively nightlife scene bustling with restaurants and bars.
But worried residents have revealed how it has become a no go zone in recent weeks following the establishment of the refugee camp, which has brought squalor and violence.
Thousands of migrants – mostly from Sudan, Libya, Afghanistan, and Eritrea – have pitched tents under the Metro station after the demolition of the Jungle hampered their attempts to reach Britain. Gangs of migrants armed with clubs and staves prowl the streets of the 10th Arrondissement, Paris, at night. Click to enlarge
French police have tried and failed on many occasions to clear the squalid squat, but asylum seekers simply keep on returning and reestablishing it.
There are now nore than 2,500 migrants pitching up in the makeshift camp, with locals saying the eyesore is ruining their businesses and making life a “living hell”.
Residents in the once popular district say that the squatters are now becoming increasingly violent and dangerous, with increased reports of muggings.
Faisal, a shopkeeper, told the French daily Le Figaro that Stalingrad locals are living in fear, threatening the future of his business.
He said: “The stench of urine, faeces, and rubbish has made Stalingrad an insalubrious place to live. The place is dead – no-one wants to come here anymore. People are afraid to go out and lock themselves in.
“I’m making less than €60 (£53) a day. A few more weeks like this and I’ll go bust!
“French people have been kind to them. I know they’re desperate, but the least they can do is respect the law and try and integrate into French society.”
Jeanne, another Stalingrad resident, told Le Figaro the migrants had become increasingly violent towards locals.
She said: “Brazen migrants are snatching jewellery and handbags off passers-by – they’re even stealing bread. I’ve seen them beat people up too.”
Police have raided the camp some 30 times in the past year, and on Monday French president François Hollande vowed to close the camp for good.
But within 24 hours of a police operation to move migrants on tents had sprung up again, showing the uphill battle authorities in the French capital face to shut down such illegal encampments.
Furious locals have demanded that the camp be closed once and for all, describing how they have heard “blood-curdling noises” coming from it in the middle of the night.
Marie, who lives right next to the makeshift camp, told Le Figaro: “Life here has become unbearable. More than 2,500 squatters were evacuated in September, and now, less than two months later, they’re back. And now that the ‘Jungle’ camp has been closed, things are about to get even worse.”
Another local, Monique, said that she was at “a loss for words” and “utterly distraught” over the situation.
She said: “The streets are littered with rubbish and faeces. We can hear blood-curdling screams coming from the camp in the middle of the night. | 0 |
One “brutally honest” Oscar voter says nominee Meryl Streep played her role in this year’s Florence Foster Jenkins “like a clown” — and believes the actress was only awarded a nomination in return for delivering her infamous Trump speech at last month’s Golden Globes. [“I thought Meryl [Streep in Florence Foster Jenkins] played it like a clown — she’s cute and adorable, but this woman didn’t matter to me in the end — but people are gaga over Meryl, and I think she solidified her nomination when she gave that speech at the Golden Globes,” the anonymous Oscar voter told the Hollywood Reporter. The Academy member — a female member of the acting branch — added: “I don’t think she would have gotten nominated without it. ” In January, Streep used her Cecil B. DeMille Lifetime Achievement Award acceptance speech at the Golden Globes to rebuke President Trump for what she called his “disrespect” and his “violence” the actress also challenged a “principled press” to stand up to the president, and urged Hollywood to support the Committee to Protect Journalists. The ’s Globes speech was lauded by the film industry and the press and set the tone for other awards shows to feature screeds. Later that month, actors including Ashton Kutcher and Julia trashed Trump and his executive order on immigration from the podium at the Screen Actors Guild Awards. In February, a number of artists at the 59th annual Grammy Awards used their performances to make political statements, including Busta Rhymes, A Tribe Called Quest and Katy Perry. The Hollywood Reporter solicits opinions from anonymous Oscar voters every year in the week before the ceremony. While the responses of one Academy member are hardly an indication of how the entirety of the 6, 000+ members will ultimately vote, the “brutally honest” ballots usually offer a refreshing perspective on the process. In addition to her comments on Streep, this year’s anonymous voter said La La Land star Emma Stone’s performance wasn’t “as wonderful” as everyone is saying, the thriller Arrival “just sucked” and the Denzel Davis starring Fences underwhelmed because “they just filmed the play. ” See the rest of the anonymous voter’s “brutally honest” ballot here. The Academy Awards air Sunday night on ABC. Follow Jerome Hudson on Twitter @jeromeehudson | 1 |
Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed into law House Bill 45, more commonly known as “American Laws for American Courts,” or ALAC. It prohibits the use of any foreign law in the state’s courts, specifically in family cases that involve marriage or relationship matters. [One of the bill’s Representative Jeff Leach ( ) thanked the governor, who signed HB 45 on Wednesday. Leach called the law “vitally important bill to further safeguard and protect our Constitutional rights!” In the last legislative session, Leach authored the comparable yet unsuccessful ALAC measure, House Bill 562. HB 45 lead author Representative Dan Flynn ( ) also introduced similar past legislation that failed. In a recent press release, Flynn noted foreign law is often applied in Texas cases concerning divorce orders, child support, property settlements and sometime even, spouses enter into agreements to have foreign law applied to their disputes. “My colleagues and I here at the Texas Legislature want to make sure Texas judges never apply foreign law in Texas courts in violation of constitutional rights and the public policy of our state,” said Flynn. Under HB 45, Texas and U. S. law supersede all other laws. It prevents state judges from applying any foreign law because, in doing so, it infringes upon U. S. and Texas constitutional rights. The bill shields litigants in family law cases “against violations of constitutional rights and public policy in the application of foreign law” under the U. S. and Texas Constitutions, federal and judicial precedent, the Texas Family Code, and the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act, among other protections. HB 45 makes no mention of any particular foreign nation, religion, or cultural practice but clarifies that “foreign law” means a rule, law, or code from a jurisdiction outside of the United States and it shall not override U. S and Texas law or their respective constitutions. It specifies that a “foreign judgment” means a ruling from a court, tribunal, or administrative adjudicator outside U. S. states and territories. The bill underscores that, in the event of any legal conflicts, “federal or state law prevails. ” In January 2015, Breitbart Texas confirmed in a report that an Islamic tribunal using Sharia law operated in Dallas. Dr. Taher one of four attorneys who called themselves “judges” and not arbitrators, claimed the tribunal and its decisions were “voluntary. ” said the tribunal operated under Sharia as a form of “ dispute resolution” in civil disputes in family and business cases but also admitted that when in conflict between Sharia and Texas law, “we follow Sharia law. ” In December 2015, Flynn asked Attorney General Ken Paxton “the extent to which current law authorizes or requires a judge of a state court to apply foreign law in certain family law disputes. ” Last year, Paxton ruled in a nonbinding legal opinion: “Under Texas law, a court is not required in family law disputes to enforce a foreign law if enforcement would be contrary to Texas public policy or if it would violate a party’s basic right to due process. ” However, according to the Attorney General’s office, Paxton’s opinion only constituted a written interpretation of existing law and did not decide any law. The Texas chapter of the Council for Relations (CAIR) called HB 45 law and lobbied for the state’s Muslim community to oppose the bill. “We believe it prevents Muslims from practicing their faith in areas such as Islamic marriage, divorce, funeral procedures, and civil agreements, they said in a press release. HB 45 requires the Texas Supreme Court adopt its rules by January 1, 2018. The law goes into effect on September 1, making Texas the 12th state to enact ALAC. The other states are Alabama, Arizona, Florida, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Dakota, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Washington, according to ACT for America. Follow Merrill Hope, a member of the original Breitbart Texas team, on Twitter. | 1 |
Memes Breaking: Hillary cancels public appearance due to a large crowd of people chanting "Lock Her Up!" The New York Times featured a photo of Hillary Clinton being welcomed to an early voting site in Pompano Beach, Florida on Sunday. Apparently, she didn't stay too long at her rally location at the Pompano Beach Amphitheater. Clinton almost melted at the sight of Trump signs surrounding her and people yelling "Lock Her Up!". A police escort shared what happened: Share on Facebook Posted Tuesday, November 01, 2016 Suggested Videos | 0 |
Schools All Over America Are Closing On Election Day Due To Fears Of Violence
Will this be the most chaotic election day in modern American history? All across the nation, schools are being closed on election day due to safety fears. Traditionally, schools have been very popular as voting locations because they can accommodate a lot of people, they usually have lots of parking, and everyone in the community knows where they are and can usually get to them fairly easily. But now there is a big movement to remove voting from schools or to shut schools down on election day so that children are not present when voting takes place. According to Fox News , “voting has been removed or classes have been canceled on Election Day at schools in Illinois, Maine, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and elsewhere.” Just a couple days ago , I shared with you a survey that found that 51 percent of all Americans are concerned about violence happening on election day, and all of these schools closing is just another sign of how on edge much of the population is as we approach November 8th.
Many officials are being very honest about the fact that schools are being shut down on election day because they are afraid of election violence. The following comes from Fox News …
Several schools across the nation have decided to close on Election Day over fears of possible violence in the hallways stemming from the fallout from the heated rhetoric that consumed the campaign trail.
The fear is the ugliness of the election season could escalate into confrontations and even violence in the school hallways, endangering students.
“If anybody can sit there and say they don’t think this is a contentious election, then they aren’t paying much attention,” Ed Tolan, the Falmouth, Maine police chief, said Tuesday. His community has already called off classes on Nov. 8 and an increased police presence will be felt around town.
And without a doubt, voting locations are “soft targets” that often have little or no security. We have been blessed to have had such peaceful elections in the past, but we also need to realize that times have changed. I believe that there is wisdom in what Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp told reporters …
“There is a concern, just like at a concert, sporting event or other public gathering that we didn’t have 15 or 20 years ago,” said Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp, co-chairman of the National Association of Secretaries of State election committee. “ What if someone walks in a polling location with a backpack bomb or something? If that happens at a school, then that’s certainly concerning.”
All it is going to take is a single incident to change everything.
Let us hope that it is not this election day when we see something like that.
Another reason why polling locations are under increased scrutiny this election season is because of concerns about election fraud. This is something that Donald Trump has alluded to repeatedly on the campaign trail. For instance, just consider what he told a rally in Pennsylvania …
“We don’t want to lose an election because you know what I’m talking about,” Trump told an overwhelmingly white crowd in Manheim, Pa., earlier this month. “Because you know what? That’s a big, big problem, and nobody wants to talk about it. Nobody has the guts to talk about it. So go and watch these polling places .”
And of course reports are already pouring in from around the country of big problems with the voting machines. In Illinois this week, one candidate personally experienced a machine switching his votes from Republicans to Democrats…
Early voting in Illinois got off to a rocky start Monday, as votes being cast for Republican candidates were transformed into votes for Democrats.
Republican state representative candidate Jim Moynihan went to vote Monday at the Schaumburg Public Library.
“I tried to cast a vote for myself and instead it cast the vote for my opponent,” Moynihan said. “You could imagine my surprise as the same thing happened with a number of races when I tried to vote for a Republican and the machine registered a vote for a Democrat.”
In addition, if you keep up with my work on The Economic Collapse Blog , then you already know that a number of voters down in Texas have reported that their votes were switched from Donald Trump to Hillary Clinton .
Well, it turns out that those voting machines appear to have a link to the Clinton Foundation …
According to OpenSecrets, the company who provided the alleged glitching voting machines is a subsidiary of The McCarthy Group.
The McCarthy group is a major donor to the Clinton Foundation – apparently donating 200,000 dollars in 2007 – when it was the largest owner of United States voting machines. Or perhaps the 200,000 dollars went to paying Bill Clinton for speeches?
Either way, it doesn’t look good.
After everything that we saw in 2012 , I am convinced that there is good reason to be concerned about the integrity of our voting machines.
But Democrats don’t like poll observers, because they think that having too many poll observers will intimidate their voters…
“It’s un-American, but at the same time we have a long history of doing things like that ,” Ari Berman, author of the 2016 book “ Give Us the Ballot: The Modern Struggle for Voting Rights in America ,” previously told The Christian Science Monitor. “Voting was very, very dangerous. I don’t think anyone’s suggesting that we’re at the same place today. I just think the loss of the [official poll observers] is going to be really problematic.”
Without a doubt, this has been the craziest election season that we have seen in decades, and I have a feeling that it is about to get even crazier.
But will the end result be the election of the most corrupt politician in the history of our country ?
If that is the outcome after all that we have been through, it will be exceedingly depressing indeed. About the author: Michael Snyder is the founder and publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog and End Of The American Dream. Michael’s controversial new book about Bible prophecy entitled “The Rapture Verdict” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com.* Share This Article... | 0 |
By Amanda Froelich The rock legend’s latest song, Indian Givers, is about the pipeline and seeks to raise awareness about the Native water protectors in North Dakota. Since Donald Trump won the... | 0 |
Mississippi state Sen. Chris McDaniel, a hardline conservative who nearly toppled Sen. Thad Cochran ( ) in the 2014 midterm primaries, told Breitbart News exclusively on Wednesday evening he is considering launching another bid for the U. S. Senate in 2018. [This new bid would come against Sen. Roger Wicker ( ) a different but similar U. S. Senator from the Magnolia State, amid concerns over House Speaker Paul Ryan’s Obamacare 2. 0 plan, the “American Health Care Act. ” McDaniel told Breitbart News: I am definitely considering another run for U. S. Senate, for precisely the reason that now is the time when Mississippi’s conservatives should be leading the nation in the fight against Obamacare. Rather than championing conservative reform in D. C. Mississippi’s federal delegation — and Roger Wicker in particular — has been silent. Mississippians are among the most conservative people in the republic. We shouldn’t have to beg our Senators to fight for us. Wicker has until now remained publicly silent on the bill from Ryan and House GOP leaders, even though Ryan’s legislation does not repeal Obamacare, keeps in place the individual mandate but shifts the recipient of the penalty payment from a tax collected by the government to a fee collected by insurance companies, keeps the Obamacare Cadillac Tax in place indefinitely — among many other serious concerns. Republicans are rising up against it, from the House Freedom Caucus to Sens. Rand Paul ( ) and Mike Lee ( ). Sen. Ted Cruz ( ) who does not support the concept, says it does not have enough support to pass the Senate — and Sen. Susan Collins ( ) a moderate, says it will not pass the Senate either and that it is dead on arrival should it even reach that chamber. But it is unlikely to get there. The House Freedom Caucus, aides say, is united against the bill, and that is more than enough members to crush it. But many House Republicans outside the House Freedom Caucus are also against the legislation, their offices tell Breitbart News, with as many as “70 or more” Republicans against Ryan’s bill, according to one aide. Paul told Breitbart News in a recent interview that Ryan appears to be misleading the president when it comes to this bill’s realistic chances in the House — and that it really does appear this bill will fail. An aide in Wicker’s Senate office, Ryan Taylor, told Breitbart News that Wicker suports Ryan’s Obamacare 2. 0 legislation even though it does not repeal Obamacare. He claimed inaccurately in his statement to Breitbart News that the bill does repeal Obamacare. Taylor also attempted to blame President Trump for the proposal, stating inaccurately that it was “the President’s proposal,” not Ryan’s bill. “Sen. Wicker is working with President Trump, Vice President Pence, and most Republicans to pass the President’s proposal to repeal and replace Obamacare,” Taylor said, providing — when Breitbart News offered him an opportunity to amend that part of his statement and his claim the bill repeals Obamacare — a screenshot of President Trump’s Tweet announcing that Ryan rolled out the bill and that it is up “for review and negotiation. ” “Sen. Wicker is running for and has a campaign manager,” Taylor added, connecting Breitbart News with that campaign manager, Justin Brasell. “Senator Wicker is taking nothing for granted in his campaign,” Brasell said in a statement. “He has hired a campaign manager, is actively working to raise money and is organizing grassroots support in all 82 counties. He will be ready to once again earn the support of Mississippi voters in 2018, regardless of who runs. ” McDaniel has proven he can win a statewide U. S. Senate race in Mississippi. Back in 2014, McDaniel won more votes than Cochran in the primary, but since both finished under 50 percent plus one vote, it was kicked to a runoff election. In the runoff, McDaniel won more Republican votes than Cochran. And Cochran only won because of a effort to get Democrats to cross over to vote in an underhanded way in the GOP primary. McDaniel was endorsed, too, by Donald Trump. Of McDaniel, Trump said, he “is strong, he is smart he wants things to change in Washington. ” I hope voters in Mississippi cast their ballot for @senatormcdaniel. He is strong, he is smart he wants things to change in Washington. — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 24, 2014, In response to President Trump’s endorsement of McDaniel for U. S. Senate back in 2014, Brasell told Breitbart News that “this is a different race” and “Senator Wicker works well with President Trump. ” When Brasell was pressed on why, then, Wicker is not supporting efforts to repeal Obamacare, he told Breitbart News: “He is working with President Trump to repeal and replace Obamacare. ” But since the only bill that Wicker’s team is publicly supporting right now on this matter is a bill that does not repeal Obamacare, the American Health Care Act — or Obamacare 2. 0 from Paul Ryan — Breitbart News asked Brasell in a question what specific legislation other than that bill he is backing that repeals Obamacare. He has not answered. The more important implication than this McDaniel news out of Mississippi, however, is that Ryan’s failure here to deliver a healthcare bill that actually does repeal Obamacare may unleash a wave of primary challenges against incumbent Republicans nationwide in both the House and Senate in 2018. With Republicans in the majority in both the House and Senate, and with a Republican president, a primary challenge wave is the last thing anyone in the Republican Party wants. But Ryan may have just triggered it. | 1 |
Pinterest
Regan Pifer reports apparently the White House can only distribute criticism and cannot receive it. Must be a problem with their shipping department…
In a move that Putin or Kim Jong-un would admire, the White House issued a warning to Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump this week and told him First lady Michelle Obama is off limits.
Where oh where did the First Amendment go? Oh where, oh where can it be?
As reported by Newsmax.com :
The White House sent a warning to Donald Trump Thursday: Attacking Michelle Obama is off limits.
The first lady blasted Trump without actually naming him during a campaign speech for Democrat Hillary Clinton on Thursday. The White House followed up with its own message for the Republican presidential candidate.
“I can’t think of a bolder way for Donald Trump to lose even more standing than he already has than by engaging the first lady of the United States,” principal deputy White House press secretary Eric Schultz said on Air Force One…
…Mrs. Obama’s comments are some of the most forceful of a week in which scores of Republican leaders abandoned Trump…
So, while First lady Michelle Obama condemns Trump’s remarks, in an attempt to catapult Hillary Clinton to the White House, Trump is left with little alternative than to simply let her speak without defending himself.
Ahhh, the freedom of censorship…
As Michelle Obama told a packed audience of Trump’s remarks, “I can’t stop thinking about this. It has shaken me to my core in a way I could not have predicted. I know this is a campaign, but this isn’t about politics. It’s about basic human decency.”
Agreed. Basic human decency is letting someone respond to the comments you have made against them.
But let’s campaign for the Hillz–a compulsive, ill liar.
Make egregious attacks against her opponent, then hide behind the First lady shield.
That lacks human decency. That is politics. | 0 |
VIDEO: Idiot Destroys Trump’s Hollywood Star, Gets BAD NEWS Seconds Later Posted on October 26, 2016 by Robert Rich in Politics Share This
Social media is buzzing about Donald Trump’s Hollywood star being destroyed in California. However, it seems that the man responsible just came forward by making a video – but his stupid stunt turned around and slapped him big time when he got bad news just a short time later.
Since the beginning of his campaign, Trump’s Hollywood star in Los Angeles, California has sustained it’s fair share of vandalism. From people spray painting a Nazi swastika on it to literally taking a crap on it, the most recent stunt was far worse than all the rest.
Seemingly trying to destroy the star for good, a man, who has since been identified as James Otis, used a sledgehammer and pickaxe in order to help him vandalize the well-known emblem. All caught on video by shocked onlookers, Otis could be seen hitting the star with a pickaxe resulting two plates breaking free.
As it turns out, those plates depicted both the Hollywood star television emblem and the presidential hopeful’s name. Since that point in time, Otis has come forward in order to claim his fame – but it took mere seconds for him to realize that not everything is exactly going according to his poorly thought out plan when he promptly got some bad news. Donald Trump’s star before (left) and after (right) (Source: TMZ )
Although the man states that he’s willing to go to jail for his crimes, he may not have actually known what he was getting himself into. According to The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce, the plaque is (or was) worth a whopping $30,000, meaning that Otis admitted to a felony.
Felony vandalism (damaging over $10,000 worth of property) can result in imprisonment for up to three years in state prison and a fine of up to $50,000. Otis stated that he does intend to turn himself in and has already hired a lawyer, but we’ll see just how tough he is when he has to face a judge.
The tough guy wannabe later added that he “wanted to face Trump in court,” but the idiot must have forgotten that he didn’t destroy Trump’s property, but rather, the state of California’s. Making matters worse for himself, Otis states that he intends to sell the plaques taken from the star on election day, claiming he will donate all the money to Trump’s so-called sexual assault victims.
Unfortunately for him, the more he talked, the more trouble he got himself into. After all, most people know that selling or buying stolen property is a criminal offense as well. We all know that Hillary Clinton’s voters aren’t the smartest in society, but this guy may just take the cake. Then again, he’ll have plenty of time to think about how dumb he is while he’s pissing his life away behind bars. | 0 |
This article was written by Melissa Dykes and originally published at The Daily Sheeple .
Editor’s Comment: Though Trump’s election was a great victory/rebuke over the dictates and controls of the financial oligarchy that own and run this nation, the American people are not out of the woods yet. Quietly but constantly in the background of the entire Obama Administration, the Federal Reserve’s stimulus program that combined unlimited QE with zero percent interest rates has absolutely wrecked this country and its economic stability.
The system as we know it cannot be sustained. Yellen and co. have been simply waiting for the right time to let the other shoe drop – namely, after it could influence the election even further in the direction of Trump’s populist uprising. Unfortunately, he will now be largely blamed for the great destruction that is scheduled to fall upon this nation. In fact, that is the very reason that Brandon Smith of Alt-Market.com attributed to Trump’s victory when he predicted his election many months ago.
Something big is coming… prepare yourselves accordingly.
How Alt-Market Predicted Trump’s Win Months in Advance: “He won because the elites WANT HIM THERE, the global economy WILL collapse”
by Melissa Dykes
While many of us in the alternative media and especially those researchers of Clinton crimes are breathing a big fat sigh of relief that anybody but Hillary is headed to the White House in 2017, Brandon Smith of Alt Market is warning us all not to get too comfortable… and with history on his side here, we should listen to him.
Despite what looked like a rigged, fraudulent Hillary win orchestrated from the top down with the entire establishment machine behind her, Trump won the election. In an election year that would have otherwise seen record low voter turnout, the specter of Hillary that led to Trump’s victory has now given the people a reason to believe their vote actually matters again, an extra boon to further relegitimize the corrupt system running things in this country.
But Smith reminds us that if Trump is walking into the Oval Office in January, it is only because the elites decided to put him there in advance — and for a reason.
First it should be noted that Smith accurately predicted that Brexit would pass , even when the majority of the alt media was reporting that there was no way it possibly could. Was it another victory for the people?
No, it was predetermined well in advance:
“The mainstream media has been consistently comparing Trump supporters to Brexit supporters, and Trump himself has hitched his political wagon to the Brexit. This fits perfectly with the globalist narrative that populists and conservatives are killing the global economy and placing everyone at risk. “
Then he accurately predicted a Trump win … but not because voting actually matters:
“U.S. elections are indeed controlled, and have been for decades, primarily through the false left/right paradigm. However, as I have been pointing out since I correctly predicted the success of the Brexit referendum, I don’t think that Clinton is the choice of the elites.”
“To be clear, my position is that Trump is slated to take the White House and that this is by design. This has been my position since before Trump won the Republican Primaries, it was my position when the election cycle began, it has never changed, nor have my views on the reasons for this outcome ever changed…”
Smith says regardless of whether or not Trump is a legitimate anti-establishment candidate, his win means the global economic collapse the system has been holding off on will finally come to pass — as planned — under Trump’s watch:
“…Even if Trump is a legitimate anti-establishment conservative, his entry into the Oval Office will seal the deal on the economic collapse, and will serve the globalists well. The international banks need only pull the plug on any remaining life support to the existing market system and allow it to fully implode, all while blaming Trump and his conservative supporters…”
He will be the perfect scapegoat for something the alternative media have known is coming for a long, long time.
Now Smith is spelling it out :
The bottom line is, Trump is on the way to the White House because the elites WANT HIM THERE. Now, many liberty proponents, currently in a state of elation, will either ignore or dismiss the primary reason why I was able to predict the Brexit and a Trump win. These will probably be some of the same people that were arguing with me only weeks ago that the elites would NEVER allow Trump in office.
So, to clarify:
Trump may or may not be aware that he and his conservative followers have been positioned into a a trap. We will have to wait and see how he behaves in office (and he WILL be in office, despite the claims of some that the elites will try to “stop him” before January). My primary point is THAT IT DOES NOT MATTER, at least not at this stage. The elites will initiate a final collapse of the global economy under Trump’s watch (this will probably escalate over the course of the next six months), and they WILL blame him and conservatives in general. This IS going to happen. The elites play the long game, and so must we.
And there you have it.
It’s not much of a secret that the economy is being artificially propped up. The Fed’s QE stimulus programs are no longer working. We know it can’t remain this way forever.
And even though everyone just feels so much relief that we’ve all been spared the nightmare of Hillary Clinton climbing into yet another seat of even more power, we can’t just assume we’re all going to skip off into happy magical fairy sprinkle land unscathed.
Sure, the people have spoken, but it’s only the illusion of power that we’re seeing play out now. The Powers That Shouldn’t Be running this insanity circus always have a plan… how else have they gotten away with controlling the globe for at least the past century?
After saying “I told ya so,” Smith issued a final warning that we shouldn’t be so naive:
While millions of Americans are celebrating Trump’s win today, I will remain even more vigilant. The party is just getting started, folks. Don’t get too comfortable.
Sadly, we can’t ignore decades of New World Order history here just because we’re relieved a psychopath like Hillary lost the election. Smith is right. We’d all do well to listen to him and get prepared for what’s coming.
2017 is going to be a bumpy ride .
This article was written by Melissa Dykes and originally published at The Daily Sheeple . | 0 |
By Deanna Minich, PhD Your body has a natural, powerful, built-in system for detoxification that doesn’t require trendy juice cleanses or expensive protocols. All you have to do is sweat!... | 0 |
Perhaps you’ve heard the saying, “You can’t make this stuff up. ” So, so wrong. It turns out the subway cricket lady was a prank. The subway riders? Flimflam. Even, it seems, that New Yorker the Pizza Rat may have been schooled and rehearsed for the camera. Is no crazy thing sacred, or at least genuine? The subway cricket lady, for those not paying attention, was videotaped last week on the D train as she was supposedly trying to sell crickets and worms out of a bucket. As the story went, a group of teenagers bumped into her and she flew off the handle and dumped the crickets and worms into the train. “Straphangers Go Berserk After Woman Tosses Bugs in Subway Car,” The New York Post reported. The emergency brake was pulled — a truly useless maneuver, bringing the train to a dead stop on the Manhattan Bridge. The first reports of this were accompanied by a cellphone video of the chaos. Then another video surfaced and the reporters Rafi Schwartz and Soraya Auger of Vox noticed that it was quite a polished bit of filmmaking. Through advanced interrogation techniques, they extracted an admission of responsibility from the woman who posted it. She declared herself to be the and said she was engaged in performance art having something to do with homelessness. The bucket of bugs was knocked out of her hands by another member of her troupe. Who knows how many other passengers were part of the staging or just fated to be along for the ride. Eventually, the brakes were reset and the train moved off the bridge. On Tuesday, having been exposed, she was arrested on a charge of reckless endangerment by the police, who had previously been willing to let her slide. So actually, you can make this stuff up, and be believed. But why bother? The implausible is the daily bread of the subway, served without irony. Real events: Trysts. Preachers. Makeup artists. The “ ” acrobats. Buckets of dead crabs, as Gothamist reported, and a condom tied to a pole on the F train, apparently for weeks, and seemingly, we regret to say, . All manner of live creatures: chickens, frogs, goldfish, cats, a monkey. And of course, microbes, by the kajillion. (The Central Intelligence Agency took it upon itself in 1966 to see how quickly germs would be propelled through the tunnels via the piston effect of moving trains. At strategic spots, the C. I. A. people dropped light bulbs filled with what they termed innocuous bacteria, then measured how far they traveled.) Then there is the snake guy. “He wasn’t talking at all,” Conor C. Walsh remembered. “He had an intern, a young kid helper, and a duffel bag filled with five or six snakes. ” It was Halloween night two years ago, and Mr. Walsh and some friends were on a train that was moseying to Williamsburg. At first, the man draped the snakes on an overhead handrail. Then he walked through the car with them. “Unless you really protested, he was putting them on people,” Mr. Walsh, 28, said. “There was a woman shrieking and screaming. He wasn’t going to put it on her. ” Some of the passengers seemed thrilled about having a snake coiled around their bodies. “I don’t like them at all,” Mr. Walsh said. “It’s my one thing. I kept him away, at all times. I was just imagining his apartment, or his warehouse, wherever he kept them. ” Although the man did not speak, he appeared to be marketing the snakes. “He had business cards that he passed out,” Mr. Walsh said, “but no one was walking away with a snake. ” Mr. Walsh, who grew up in New York and teaches high school in Windsor Terrace, Brooklyn, is also a singer and guitarist with the indie band . He has put subway exotica to excellent use in his music. “There are days when you hate the subways and days when you meet some awesome people,” he said. “I sat down next to this guy one time, and we got talking, so I asked him what he did. He said: ‘I’m a shaman. I’m an actual shaman. I help my clients speak to the spirits.’ He was a nice kid, 26. Had gone to Hampshire, that college in Massachusetts. ” Mr. Walsh turned his encounter with the young shaman into a brisk, fun pop tune, “Shaman,” which begins: “I met a shaman who grew up in Queens On the D train his knees touching me. ” After all, there’s magical realism to spare. | 1 |
WASHINGTON — Known as a prosecutor, Rod J. Rosenstein was expected to sail through Senate confirmation to be the Justice Department’s . But that process has become enmeshed in the drama surrounding questions about President Trump’s campaign ties to Russia. Mr. Rosenstein faces the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday as the president’s nominee for deputy attorney general. In that post, he would oversee investigations into Mr. Trump’s campaign and Russia, because Attorney General Jeff Sessions removed himself from any such cases after the disclosure last week that he had misled Congress about meeting twice with the Russian ambassador. Democrats who have otherwise expressed confidence in Mr. Rosenstein’s prosecutorial skills said they were skeptical that he — or anyone besides an independent outside counsel — would not be subject to political pressure while overseeing such an investigation. “Rosenstein has a good reputation as a career prosecutor, but this is going to test him, and I worry about the integrity of the Justice Department,” Senator Patrick J. Leahy, a Vermont Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, said in a telephone interview Monday. Through his office, Mr. Rosenstein declined to comment. The F. B. I. which is overseen by the Justice Department, is known to have examined possible contacts between Russia and Trump advisers. The House Intelligence Committee has also opened an inquiry into whether Russia tried to influence the election. Mr. Rosenstein, who received his law degree from Harvard, is nothing if not a survivor after nearly 12 years as the United States attorney for Maryland under both Republican and Democratic presidents. He was one of only three United States attorneys appointed by the administration of President George W. Bush to be kept in the job by President Barack Obama in 2009 — and the only one to last all eight years of Mr. Obama’s administration. His supporters say he has been willing to take on politically charged cases throughout his career. Two decades ago, Mr. Rosenstein worked on Kenneth Starr’s independent counsel investigation into the Whitewater affair, earning three convictions related to President Bill Clinton’s business dealings in Arkansas. In a leak case last year, Mr. Rosenstein extracted a guilty plea from James E. “Hoss” Cartwright, a retired Marine general and a former vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Former Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. had asked Mr. Rosenstein and another prosecutor to handle the investigation after accusations the Obama administration was behind leaks related to a cyberattack and drone strikes. Just last week, Mr. Rosenstein announced the indictments of seven Baltimore police officers on conspiracy and racketeering charges. “He has a reputation for being a straight shooter who plays it right down the middle, and those are important qualities for a deputy attorney general,” said Matthew S. Axelrod, who was the top aide to former Deputy Attorney General Sally Q. Yates and is now in private practice in Washington at the Linklaters law firm. Mr. Trump fired Ms. Yates as the acting attorney general five weeks ago after she refused to defend the initial version of his travel ban in court because she said she was uncertain it was legal. Mr. Leahy, the Vermont senator, said that her firing made the debate over Mr. Rosenstein’s nomination even more important, with “that kind of precedent” hanging over him. Douglas F. Gansler, a former Maryland attorney general, said on Monday, “Rod is about as apolitical a person as you can imagine, which is why he could survive eight years in a Democratic administration after being named by a Republican. ” “Would he stand up to the political winds of President Trump?” he said. “I’d think yes. ” The Justice Department said Monday that if Mr. Rosenstein was confirmed, he would oversee any investigations related not only to the Trump campaign, but also to the president’s transition after the Nov. 8 election. In announcing on Thursday that he would remove himself from such a case, Mr. Sessions had left open the possibility that he might still oversee matters related to the transition period. But in a letter to leaders of the Senate Judiciary Committee late on Monday, he said that his recusal “would include any such matters,” as well. That question is important because Michael T. Flynn, who served as Mr. Trump’s national security adviser for less than a month, admitted that he had contacts with the Russian ambassador, Sergey I. Kislyak, during the transition. Some Democrats have said that those contacts — which helped force Mr. Flynn’s resignation — might have been illegal. Mr. Sessions also spoke at least twice with Mr. Kislyak: once at the Republican National Convention in July, and again at his Senate office in September, two months before the election. When asked at his confirmation hearing in January about a news article about contacts between the Trump campaign and Russian officials, Mr. Sessions responded, “I didn’t have, did not have communications with the Russians. ” Democrats accused him of lying to the committee by not disclosing his conversations with the ambassador, and they called for the Justice Department to open a perjury investigation. In his letter on Monday, Mr. Sessions said that “my answer was correct,” because he said his conversations with the ambassador were not political in nature. In answering the question, Mr. Sessions wrote, “I did not mention communications I had had with the Russian ambassador over the years, because the question did not ask about them. ” Senator Charles E. Grassley, the Iowa Republican who leads the Judiciary Committee, said he was satisfied with the attorney general’s explanation. “I appreciate Attorney General Sessions’s quick action to clear up confusion about his statement,” Mr. Grassley said Monday. | 1 |
LOS ANGELES — anthropomorphic food. Meryl Streep as a clueless opera singer. A furry, folksy Disney dragon. Bank robbers in West Texas. It was a weekend of unusually new offerings at North American theaters, and it worked out well for Hollywood — for the most part. As expected, “Suicide Squad” (Warner) led the box office pack for a second weekend, taking in an estimated $43. 8 million, for a new domestic total of $222. 9 million, according to comScore. But the film also dropping 67 percent weekend to weekend, as its Rotten Tomatoes grade from critics caught up to it and the fanboy audience turned toward the animated “Sausage Party. ” Backed by a crackerjack marketing campaign, “Sausage Party” (Sony) collected about $33. 6 million, beating the prerelease expectations of some box office analysts and proving once again that audiences respond to original concepts. “Sausage Party,” with character voices provided by Seth Rogen and Kristen Wiig, was also relatively cheap: Sony and Annapurna Pictures split the $19 million in production expenses. “Pete’s Dragon” (Disney) was third. Ticket sales totaled $21. 5 million, a bit less than anticipated. This remake charmed most critics, but its crowd appeal was limited. Disney said on Sunday that 33 percent of the audience was under the age of 12. “Pete’s Dragon” cost about $65 million to make. Playing in less than half as many theaters, the Meryl Streep vehicle “Florence Foster Jenkins” (Paramount) began its run with $6. 6 million in ticket sales, on par with expectations for a period film aimed at older women. (Paramount said on Sunday that 97 percent of the audience was over the age of 25.) While Ms. Streep has lost some of her box office sizzle in recent years, she continues to be adored by critics, receiving strong enough reviews in this modestly budgeted film to spark early awards buzz. Also of note: “Hell or High Water” (Lionsgate and CBS Films) a $12 million Texas heist thriller that has received euphoric reviews and stars Jeff Bridges, began a slow, rollout, arriving in 32 theaters and collecting $592, 000, for a hefty average of $18, 500. | 1 |
Leave a Reply Click here to get more info on formatting (1) Leave the name field empty if you want to post as Anonymous. It's preferable that you choose a name so it becomes clear who said what. E-mail address is not mandatory either. The website automatically checks for spam. Please refer to our moderation policies for more details. We check to make sure that no comment is mistakenly marked as spam. This takes time and effort, so please be patient until your comment appears. Thanks. (2) 10 replies to a comment are the maximum. (3) Here are formating examples which you can use in your writing:<b>bold text</b> results in bold text <i>italic text</i> results in italic text (You can also combine two formating tags with each other, for example to get bold-italic text.)<em>emphasized text</em> results in emphasized text <strong>strong text</strong> results in strong text <q>a quote text</q> results in a quote text (quotation marks are added automatically) <cite>a phrase or a block of text that needs to be cited</cite> results in: a phrase or a block of text that needs to be cited <blockquote>a heavier version of quoting a block of text...</blockquote> results in: a heavier version of quoting a block of text that can span several lines. Use these possibilities appropriately. They are meant to help you create and follow the discussions in a better way. They can assist in grasping the content value of a comment more quickly. and last but not least:<a href=''http://link-address.com''>Name of your link</a> results in Name of your link (4) No need to use this special character in between paragraphs: ; You do not need it anymore. Just write as you like and your paragraphs will be separated. The "Live Preview" appears automatically when you start typing below the text area and it will show you how your comment will look like before you send it. (5) If you now think that this is too confusing then just ignore the code above and write as you like. Name: | 0 |
— Liars Never Win (@liars_never_win) October 28, 2016
It’s hard not to think “frail old lady” when you think of Hillary Clinton, but today, she proved that she’s still got a little spring in her step: Reporters seeking comment on the email investigation got only a quick wave from @HillaryClinton pic.twitter.com/0m87gIOY8c
— Colleen Nelson (@ColleenMNelson) October 28, 2016 Wow! Thats the fastest #Hillary has EVER moved! Avoiding questions about James Comey and The FBI reopening the email investigation… pic.twitter.com/arLj9G7yav
— Tim Young (@TimRunsHisMouth) October 28, 2016
So, is that what it takes to get her movin’? @TimRunsHisMouth @anna12061 amazing how fast she can haul it when she's trying to avoid the press finally asking her relevant questions.
Just look at her go! @TimRunsHisMouth Suddenly got a rush of #STAMINA
— Sellrite Deals (@SellriteDeals) October 28, 2016 @TimRunsHisMouth AMAZING SHE WAS ALMOST RUNNING
— NOBODY HOME ON LI !! (@shadozmom) October 28, 2016 @TimRunsHisMouth The amazing part is that she was able to get in without help.
— Heeeere's Jonny (@jonsgardner) October 28, 2016
And look glamorous doing it. Thanks, apparently, to a photoshoot she’d wrapped up just moments earlier: It appears Clinton was doing an Annie Leibovitz photo shoot when the FBI news broke #2016 https://t.co/dofjBK6t9i
— Shane Goldmacher (@ShaneGoldmacher) October 28, 2016
Oh, how fun! Clinton delay on tarmac wasn't about the FBI, it turns out. Pool report notes that Annie Leibovitz came off after, likely had a photo shoot. pic.twitter.com/xE5pm3ITRC
— Ruby Cramer (@rubycramer) October 28, 2016 The American Empire in its twilight glow: https://t.co/jl0HSu38uG | 0 |
WASHINGTON — By a single vote, the Senate gave final approval on Thursday to a measure to block cities and counties from organizing retirement savings accounts for workers who have no access to plans. The vote reverses a Labor Department rule that allows local governments to automatically enroll workers in retirement plans unless they opt out. The vote was a startling reversal for many Republicans, who have argued for much of their careers that overzealous federal regulators were trampling the rights of state and local governments. In this case, congressional Republicans protested that President Barack Obama’s rules gave local regulators too much leeway. Representative Virginia Foxx, Republican of North Carolina, a sponsor of the legislation, called it “unconscionable” that the Obama administration’s rule was denying workers federal consumer protections. The White House has indicated that President Trump will sign the measure into law. New York City, Philadelphia and Seattle all have considered retirement plans taking advantage of the Labor Department rule — what they call a “safe harbor” — that Republicans seek to reverse. Five states have also passed legislation permitted by a similar Labor Department regulation, which gives the states the power to appoint private money managers who would oversee portable savings accounts for workers. The Senate is expected to soon take up a separate House resolution rolling back that state rule. The consequences of the Senate’s votes could be significant. The Labor Department rules were designed to give around 13 million people in the five states access to retirement accounts, out of 55 million nationwide who lack retirement programs. Among those affected most by the measure passed on Thursday will be small business owners and employees who have blanched at the cost of conventional 401( k) plans or pensions. In a joint statement, Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York, the City Council president, the city’s public advocate and a council member said that they were “deeply disappointed that Congress has voted to overturn the Department of Labor rule providing a safe harbor for us to create retirement savings plans for private sector employees. ” “This vote does little more than block them — the majority of whom are women and people of color — from securing their futures,” the statement said. Thursday’s vote was only the latest regulation that Republicans have rolled back this year using the 1996 Congressional Review Act, which had hardly been used in the two decades before Mr. Trump’s inauguration. Seven rollbacks have been signed into law by President Trump, with several others awaiting his signature. But in this case, Republicans were replacing local regulatory authority with federal control — taking up a cause of investment banks that fear competition from state and local governments. The Obama Labor Department’s rule actually gave states more autonomy in reaching contracts with financial managers to handle the savings accounts. State governments could be administrative conduits, keeping records while passing on funding to private consultants, who would manage the money in place of state treasurers. “Too many states have made questionable decisions when it comes to managing retirement funding,” said Representative Phil Roe, Republican of Tennessee. Republicans maintained that retirement savings accounts free of federal consumer protection rules had an unfair advantage over plans from providers. Under the law that governs pensions, employers must show that they are managing their retirement programs on behalf of their workers, not the investment funds — a provision some Republicans argued that state and city plans could skirt. In fact, many states that have passed legislation to take advantage of the Labor Department regulation have included a similar “fiduciary responsibility” requirement in their programs. And Congress has acted to reverse an Obama administration regulation that demanded that retirement investment advisers make their clients’ interests paramount. Senators in both parties lobbed comments on the issue on the Senate floor Wednesday. Critical of what he called the “competitive advantage” that the rules might give cities and states over retirement offerings, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, said the Labor Department statutes spelled “more government at the expense of the private sector. ” “These retirement savings regulations are a classic case of the whole being worse than the sum of its parts,” he said. Both of Oregon’s senators, who are Democrats, spoke on behalf of the Labor Department rules, which would protect their state’s “OregonSaves” retirement accounts, scheduled to open in July. “I hear all the time in here about states’ rights. I hear all the time about how states are the place for experimentation to see what works and what doesn’t work,” Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon said. “This Congressional Review Act proposal says the opposite. It says, ‘Let’s stomp out experiments by our municipalities. ’” Some liberals see the fight over the House bills as a proxy battle that Republicans were eager to wage on behalf of the financial services industry. “They’re ignoring the fact that the idea of the . R. A. came out of the Heritage Foundation and Brookings,” said Joshua Gotbaum, chairman of the board responsible for setting up Maryland’s version of the plan, referring to a conservative research institution and the more liberal Brookings Institution. “It’s supported by the Republican state treasurer of Utah and Indiana — real Republican states. ” “This is fundamentally a Republican idea,” Mr. Gotbaum added. David John, a policy adviser at AARP and the deputy director of the Brookings Institution’s Retirement Security Project, wrote papers defending the . R. A. concept while he was at the conservative Heritage Foundation. “This is a problem that could be just as easily dealt with at the federal level. But it’s not being dealt with. Rather than doing nothing, states are stepping in and recognizing that it’s in their financial interests to act and build these systems,” Mr. John said. “With the plans, we’re seeing for the first time hundreds of thousands of people who have access to these from the day they go to work to the day they retire,” he added. Mr. Gotbaum expressed confidence in states’ ability to defend their prerogatives. “There’s going to be a lawsuit, and the lawsuit is going to decide this,” he said of the next step for them. “They’re going to go ahead no matter what. ” | 1 |
San Francisco does not have enough places to live. Sonja Trauss, a local activist, thinks the city should tackle this problem by building more housing. This may not sound like a controversial idea. But this is San Francisco. Ms. Trauss is a anarchist and the head of the SF Bay Area Renters’ Federation, an upstart political group that is pushing for more development. Its platform is simple: Members want San Francisco and its suburbs to build more of every kind of housing. More subsidized affordable housing, more rentals, more condominiums. Ms. Trauss supports all of it so long as it is built tall, and soon. “You have to support building, even when it’s a type of building you hate,” she said. “Is it ugly? Get over yourself. Is it housing? Get over yourself. Is it luxury housing? Get over yourself. We really need everything right now. ” Her group consists of a mailing list and a few dozen members — most of them young professionals who work in the technology industry — who speak out at government meetings and protest against the protesters who fight new development. While only two years old, Ms. Trauss’s Renters’ Federation has blazed onto the political scene with youth and bombast and by employing guerrilla tactics that others are too polite to try. In January, for instance, she hired a lawyer to go around suing suburbs for not building enough. The organization also inflamed Sierra Club volunteers in San Francisco by trying to elect its own candidate to the environmental group’s executive committee. That effort failed, and last week her candidate, Donald Dewsnup, was arrested and charged with voter fraud — a move that Ms. Trauss claims is political retaliation. “There’s no other explanation for why the district attorney of a major city would investigate and charge one person for registering at an inaccurate address,” she said. In an interview, Mr. Dewsnup said he was homeless and simply used an address near the place where he was sleeping at the time. Across the country, a reversal in urban flight has ignited debates over gentrification, wealth, generational change and the definition of the modern city. It’s a familiar battle in suburbs, where homeowners are an American archetype. In San Francisco, though, things get weird. Here the tech boom is clashing with tough development laws and resentment from established residents who want to choke off growth to prevent further change. Ms. Trauss is the result: a new generation of activist whose bent is the opposite of the San Francisco stereotypes — the lefties, the aging hippies and tolerance all around. Ms. Trauss’s cause, more or less, is to make life easier for real estate developers by rolling back zoning regulations and environmental rules. Her opponents are a generally older group of progressives who worry that an influx of corporate techies is turning a city that nurtured the Beat Generation into a gilded resort for the rich. Those groups oppose almost every new development except those reserved for subsidized affordable housing. But for many young professionals who are too rich to qualify for affordable housing, but not rich enough to afford $ rents, this is the problem. Adding to the strangeness is that the typical San Francisco progressive and the typical member of Ms. Trauss’s group are likely to have identical positions on every liberal touchstone, like marriage and climate change, and yet they have become bitter enemies on one very big issue: housing. “We have liberal Democrats, and very liberal Democrats, and yet we are as polarized as the rest of the country,” said Tim Colen, executive director of the San Francisco Housing Action Coalition. Ms. Trauss is smart and energetic and unpolished. She called her group the Bay Area Renters’ Federation because “federation” reminds her of “Star Trek” and because her roommate thought it would be funny if her group’s acronym spelled “BARF. ” Jennifer Fieber, policy director at the San Francisco Tenants Union, likened the group to the Tea Party, because it lacks nuance (“Just build! ”) and can be rude. BARF’s public message board does in fact veer into strident libertarianism and juvenile ribbings, like pictures that equate its opponents to Adolf Hitler. This might make it tempting to dismiss Ms. Trauss as just another colorful activist in a place where activism is a local sport. But the anger she has tapped into is real, reflecting a generational break that pits cranky homeowners and the San Francisco political establishment against a cast of newcomers who are demanding the region make room for them, too. To befriend a certain kind of techie on social media is to be bombarded with angry Facebook posts and retweeted news articles about how San Francisco doesn’t build enough housing or how it is also the suburbs’ fault and isn’t Seattle great? Every few weeks, when a company like Zillow puts out a new price report, both sides hold up the numbers as an example of how San Francisco has failed the middle class. Zillow puts the city’s median home price at $1. 1 million, neck and neck with Manhattan. The region’s rent, at $3, 500 a month for an average apartment, is the highest in the nation. Today Ms. Trauss’s group is one of several organizations (GrowSF and East Bay Forward are others) that represent a kind of “Yimby” party, built on the frustrations of young professionals who feel priced out of the Bay Area. BARF has won the backing of technology millionaires — Jeremy Stoppelman, and chief executive of Yelp, is the group’s largest individual donor — and the encouragement of local politicians. “BARF is an important voice in this housing debate, and that is the voice of young people who are asking the question: ‘What is my future in this city? ’” said Scott Wiener, a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. “And you can agree or disagree with them, but they have activated a new generation of activists. ” The group’s platform may be politically contentious, but economically speaking, it is anything but controversial. The Bay Area was expensive even before the tech boom. And the supply of new projects, while increasing, remains decades behind population growth. This extends from Silicon Valley suburbs like Palo Alto, whose ratio of jobs to housing units is triple the median level in the Bay Area, to San Francisco, which despite an increase in new housing has lagged behind job growth, according to the Association of Bay Area Governments. Much of San Francisco’s progressive establishment feels the city is building too much housing. Some go so far as to argue that the appetite for real estate here is so high that rules don’t really apply. To get prices down, “You’d have to, like, build another city on top of the city,” said David Campos, a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. He thinks the city should focus the vast majority of future development on affordable housing limited to people making well below the city’s median income. This thinking is at odds with a February report on housing prices from the California Legislative Analyst’s Office, which said underdevelopment was the primary cause of the high prices that afflicted cities throughout the coastal part of the state, especially in the Bay Area. “Many housing programs — vouchers, rent control and inclusionary housing — attempt to make housing more affordable without increasing the overall supply,” the report said. “This approach does very little to address the underlying cause of California’s high housing costs: a housing shortage. ” Ms. Trauss, 34, is a born activist from Philadelphia whose father is a lawyer who defends homeowners against foreclosure. She moved to the Bay Area in 2011, shortly after getting her master’s degree in economics from Washington University in St. Louis, and taught math at local community colleges. She intended to live in San Francisco, but settled across the bay in Oakland. Like nearly everyone who moves to the Bay Area, Ms. Trauss spent an inordinate amount of time complaining about rent. In 2014, after reading a history of Bay Area housing politics written by Cutler, a reporter at the TechCrunch news site who has gone on to help found a called Roam, Ms. Trauss started writing letters to the San Francisco Planning Commission in support of any new project with more than 30 units. She graduated from writing letters to attending planning meetings, and, after registering the SFBARF website, started recruiting members by finding voices on sites like Reddit and the comments sections of local news articles. “People say testifying doesn’t do anything — but guess what definitely doesn’t do anything: giving a dumb speech to your friend at the bar,” she said. Today BARF is her job, allowing her the financial wherewithal to become one of those strangely persistent people who speak regularly at City Hall. To an outside observer, this can feel like watching an obscure and sport. This is a town with an app for everything and where people get fussy when an Uber driver takes more than five minutes to arrive. City Hall, with its architecture and wait times, can feel like an anachronism. Ms. Trauss may be a millennial, but she loves it. “Even in this modern era of, whatever, the Internet and people like interacting in a place that’s no place at all, City Hall is still a center,” she said. One recent afternoon, she spent an hour on the hard wooden benches in the chamber of the Board of Supervisors. She was there to make a public comment in favor of a proposal to streamline the permitting process for some projects. Three days later she was back, this time to support a “density bonus” — a proposal to let developers build taller buildings in exchange for including more affordable housing as well. When she arrived, Mr. Campos, from the Board of Supervisors, was blasting the proposal from the City Hall steps, surrounded by 70 or so supporters. Ms. Trauss and another member of her group stood opposite and held up signs that said “Stop Affordable Housing. ” This was meant to be ironic. Their point was that Mr. Campos was opposing legislation that would create more housing — but also more affordable housing. Nobody seemed to get it, so Ms. Trauss went inside City Hall to add her name to a list of people making public comments before the planning commission. Her chance to speak would be hours away, so she trekked around City Hall, past bronze busts and wedding parties, in search of a quiet place to take a lunch break. She was joined by a man whose legal name is Starchild. Starchild is the sort of Francisco character you end up making friends with if you spend enough time at City Hall. He works nights as an “erotic service provider. ” Asked if this meant he was a prostitute, he said, “‘Prostitute’ is O. K. as long as it’s said in a respectful way. ” Starchild spends his days campaigning for libertarian causes and running doomed campaigns for office. The two ate on a marble ledge and discussed police brutality, pretrial detention and whether it was possible for an anarchist to be in favor of soda taxes. A short while later, Ms. Trauss headed back to a waiting room, where she took a selfie for the @SFyimby Twitter account and began a wait for a few more minutes at the microphone. “This is my life,” she whispered. “It’s ridiculous. ” Many longtime San Franciscans view groups like BARF as yet another example of how the technology industry is robbing San Francisco of its San . Far from the hippies of the 1960s, many of today’s migrants lean libertarian — drawn by dreams or to work for the likes of Google or Apple, two of the world’s most valuable companies. They tend to share a belief, either idealistically or naïvely, depending on who is judging, that corporations can be a force for social good and change. But BARF members are so about housing that they can be hard to label politically. They view San Francisco progressives as, in fact, fundamentally conservative. That is because, to the group members at least, progressive positions on housing seem less about building the city and more about keeping people like them out. On a drizzly Sunday in December, Ms. Trauss hosted the SF YIMBYParty Congress, a gathering of groups held at a Market Street space full of touches like mismatched furniture, a foosball table and lots of white men. Toward the beginning, a debate broke out about whether they should call themselves moderates to distinguish themselves from progressives. Ms. Trauss joked that she liked moderate because you can shorten it to mod, and mod sounds cool. Mr. Wiener, the supervisor, disagreed, noting that in San Francisco, a moderate Democrat “might have a Bernie Sanders sticker on their car. ” One man, who seemed exasperated by the discussion and the idea of using his Sunday to talk about politics, said, with more colorful language, that he did not give a hoot about progressives versus moderates — he just wanted some darn housing. The tech boom takes much of the blame for soaring housing prices. But the movement has less to do with tech as an industry, and everything to do with newcomers as a class. Brian Hanlon, a federation member who regularly attends Board of Supervisors meetings with Ms. Trauss, has a day job doing administrative work for the United States Forest Service. Two years ago, when he started worrying that his claim to an $ room in a apartment might be in jeopardy, he reacted in classic San Francisco fashion. He started marching in protests next to people beating drums and signs that said things like “Tech = Death. ” But he quickly broke ranks. Many of his fellow protesters also opposed building new apartments — putting him at odds with them. “They want to be on the side of tenants, but they don’t have any real plan for how do we become a welcoming metropolitan area for new people who don’t have money,” Mr. Hanlon said. “Their plans are only to allow current incumbent renters to stay in their place, presumably until they die and some rich person comes along. ” The progressive movement has played a guiding role in creating the quirky and picturesque San Francisco that many people love today. Progressives battled plans to crisscross the city with freeways and opposed urban renewal programs that destroyed black neighborhoods. They have fought for, and won, protections and funding for affordable housing, along with various amenities that many newcomers take for granted. The question is how to handle a demographic reversal in which cities across the country have regained population following years of “white flight” to the suburbs. After losing population for two decades through the 1970s, San Francisco resumed growth in the ’80s and has only accelerated from there. “There’s that book, ‘What’s the Matter With Kansas? ’” said Gabriel Metcalf, executive director of SPUR, an urban policy research organization. “What’s the matter with San Francisco? Why is it that in a city that’s renters we have adopted a housing policy that is horrible for renters?” The challenge for groups like BARF is that, politically speaking, they have a lot of persuading to do. The talk might sound great to a recent Stanford graduate, but San Francisco is in a moment when corporate buses are regarded as instruments of a tech invasion bent on turning people who can’t code into a underclass. The idea that everything would be better if only the city threw up more tall buildings is a hard sell. Of the 11 propositions on San Francisco’s ballot in November, seven were either directly or indirectly related to high home prices and the influence of the technology industry. Michael Hankinson, a Harvard Ph. D. candidate who is studying and housing prices, surveyed voters for his dissertation and found renters skeptical that new development would do anything other than raise prices. For instance, a recent proposal to temporarily stop development in the city’s Mission District, a gentrifying neighborhood popular with technology workers, failed citywide. But Mr. Hankinson found that a majority of renters favored it because they did not think that new development would do anything for them — and feared that it might, somehow, get them evicted. “BARF has to convince renters that neighborhood change will benefit them in the long run,” he said. Today, when eviction is a hot party topic, most renters are unwilling to take that gamble. So Ms. Trauss is taking her campaign to the courts. In December she sued the city of Lafayette, Calif. an East Bay bedroom community, after it took a parcel that had been set aside for apartments and office buildings and rezoned it for homes instead. She wrote the petition herself, saying the move violated the California Housing Accountability Act, a 1980s law and “ ” statute that limits cities’ ability to downsize housing developments. Recently, she hired a lawyer to litigate the case. Asked about Ms. Trauss’s lawsuit, Steven Falk, Lafayette’s city manager, said the city actually faced another lawsuit over the same development. The second group is suing, he said, because they think it is too big. | 1 |
PHILADELPHIA — President Obama delivered a stirring valedictory address at the Democratic convention Wednesday night, hailing Hillary Clinton as his rightful political heir and the party’s best hope to protect democracy from “homegrown demagogues” like the Republican Donald J. Trump. Taking the stage to rapturous roars of “We love you” and “Yes we can,” Mr. Obama acknowledged that Democrats were still divided after a bruising nomination fight and that Mrs. Clinton had made “mistakes. ” But he vouched passionately for Mrs. Clinton as a trusted and reliable ally not just for him but for all Americans who need a fighter to improve their lives and keep them safe. “She’s been there for us — even if we haven’t always noticed — and if you’re serious about our democracy, you can’t afford to stay home just because she might not align with you on every issue,” Mr. Obama said, an explicit appeal to supporters of Senator Bernie Sanders who continue to resist Mrs. Clinton. Mr. Obama offered an optimistic portrait of America and a strong defense of his policies, but also unleashed by far his most ferocious attack yet on Mr. Trump, even portraying the Republican nominee as a threat to the country. “That’s why anyone who threatens our values, whether fascists or communists or jihadists or homegrown demagogues, will always fail in the end,” he said. In the most unmistakable declaration yet by Mrs. Clinton that she is effectively seeking Mr. Obama’s third term, she strolled on stage after his speech and embraced the president as the delegates roared. It was a tableau of continuity and a vivid illustration of how dependent the two former rivals are on each other now. Mr. Obama also used his own remarks to try to drive a wedge between Mr. Trump’s campaign and Republican voters. “It wasn’t particularly Republican and it sure wasn’t conservative,” he said of last week’s Republican convention. “There were no serious solutions to pressing problems. Just the fanning of resentments and blame and hate and anger. ” The president’s contempt for Mr. Trump took on a personal dimension as well when he recalled his grandparents from Kansas and said, “I don’t know if they had their birth certificates” — a reference to Mr. Trump’s leadership of the birther movement that raised questions about Mr. Obama’s citizenship. Wednesday signaled a transition for the party. Emotion suffused the convention hall: Some delegates, in tears, were not ready to say goodbye to Mr. Obama yet, and others — particularly some liberals and young Democrats — were not ready to accept Mrs. Clinton as their new leader. As she prepares to give her nomination acceptance speech on Thursday night, the left wing of the party still remains divided, while many Republicans appear ready to fall in line behind Mr. Trump. Mr. Obama’s speech, a passionate defense of Mrs. Clinton’s vision and character, did not itself herald the start of new political era. Mrs. Clinton has wrapped herself in the cloth of the Obama presidency rather than break with him and offer a new path, like Vice President George Bush’s promise of “a kinder, gentler nation” in 1988 after the Reagan years. Instead, the lineup on Wednesday reflected a party attempting to rally its own partisans and attract Republicans with blunt warnings that, whatever they may think about the new Democratic they must all do their duty to thwart Mr. Trump. And the convention speeches were full of appeals, as Senator Tim Kaine, the Democratic nominee, offered Republicans “a home” if they felt Mr. Trump did not represent “the party of Lincoln,” and former Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg of New York urged independents to vote for “a sane, competent person” — Mrs. Clinton. Mr. Kaine, a senator and a former governor of Virginia, introduced himself to his largest television audience yet as a product of a Jesuit high school who embraced its motto — “Men for others” — who held close to his faith while trying to help Americans as a civil rights lawyer and then as a political leader whose most searing experience was the mass shooting at Virginia Tech in 2007. He occasionally shifted to Spanish, which he speaks fluently, and led the audience in a chant of an Obama political slogan, “Sí se puede” (“Yes you can”). Mr. Kaine paid brief tribute to Republicans and also hailed Senator Bernie Sanders, whom Mrs. Clinton defeated for the nomination, at several points. Yet some Sanders supporters were not willing to fall behind the new nominee. As Mr. Kaine spoke, jeers broke out from the Utah delegation attacking the Partnership trade deal that the senator has supported and Mr. Sanders is against — and Mrs. Clinton has shifted to oppose. Placards denouncing the trade deal quickly spread through the hall, including a couple of dozen in the California delegation. Leon E. Panetta, the former defense secretary and C. I. A. chief, spoke early in the evening and was repeatedly interrupted with shouts of “No more war!” from several state delegations that favored the candidacy of Mr. Sanders during the presidential race. As the heckling persisted, Mrs. Clinton’s supporters took up a heard more often at the Republican convention to drown out the jeers: “U. S. A. U. S. A. !” Mr. Obama and Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. also turned to images and language more commonly used by the right to depict Mr. Trump as denigrating American greatness, invoking patriotism and saluting military service. Before Mr. Obama even entered the convention hall here, the audience was clearly as devoted to him as they were excited for Mrs. Clinton. The first lady, Michelle Obama, was received with adoration and her speech on Monday was the most moment of the first days of the convention. And even a quick flash of Mr. Obama’s face, amid a procession of past presidents on the convention screen Tuesday, brought a burst of applause. The president is also the strongest adhesive holding Democrats together after five months of bitterly fought primary and caucus contests between Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Sanders of Vermont. According to a New York poll earlier this month, 82 percent of Sanders supporters approved of Mr. Obama’s job performance. After two nights of convention speeches focused on Mrs. Clinton’s virtues and attempts to make peace with Sanders supporters, Clinton campaign officials sought to address the threat of radical Islamists — an omission early on that Republicans had criticized. And in a shift from only about a decade ago when they largely avoided the issue, Democrats used much of Wednesday to advocate gun control, sending relatives of those murdered in Newtown, Conn. and Charleston, S. C. as well as a former congresswoman, Gabrielle Giffords, to recount their stories. But virtually all of the anticipation on Wednesday surrounded Mr. Obama and the symbolic passing of the torch to Mrs. Clinton after she became the party’s nominee on Tuesday night. Mr. Obama’s resounding endorsement of his rival was the final consummation of a political alliance over a decade in the making, since Mrs. Clinton flew to Chicago in 2004 to raise money for a state senator and discovered a phenom. Back then he was the one who benefited from the imprimatur of a political star, and her support continued to prove critical over the years. After he won the presidential nomination that she expected to be hers in 2008, Mrs. Clinton put aside her resentment and helped him unify a divided Democratic Party. And later that year, she again came to his aid by agreeing to become his first secretary of state. Mr. Obama is the one riding high now, his approval rating over 50 percent. And his image is only enhanced as voters view him, in his final months as president, through the prism of a race to replace him that features two deeply unpopular candidates. While acknowledging that Mrs. Clinton has “her share of critics’’ on the right and the left, the president sought to transfer his prestige and political appeal to his long ago rival. “Tonight, I ask you to do for Hillary Clinton what you did for me,” he said. “I ask you to carry her the same way you carried me. ” “And if you’re serious about our democracy, you can’t afford to stay home just because she might not align with you on every issue. You’ve got to get in the arena with her, because democracy isn’t a spectator sport. America isn’t about ‘Yes he will.’ It’s about ‘Yes we can. ’” | 1 |
On Saturday, hundreds of thousands of women are expected to march in Washington after Donald J. Trump is sworn in as the 45th president of the United States. This past Tuesday, the Fiona Apple gave those preparing to protest a signature chant. The chant is on a new track called “Tiny Hands,” which repeats 10 words recorded by Ms. Apple on a phone: “We don’t want your tiny near our underpants. ” The track includes a sample of Mr. Trump’s comments from a 2005 leaked “Access Hollywood” recording with Billy Bush in which he brags of grabbing of women’s body parts whenever he wanted. The track was produced by the composer Michael Whalen, who released the song on SoundCloud, where some commenters did not think that the chant went far enough. ”A reference to male rhetoric?” said one SoundCloud critic, arguing that Ms. Apple should have included more substantive complaints. “If that’s the worst we can complain about him, then maybe we should have all voted for him. ” Mr. Whalen responded that Ms. Apple’s goal had simply been to create a chant for the march. A spokeswoman for Mr. Trump did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Wednesday. Online, the song met with a scattering of criticisms from Mr. Trump’s supporters, who pointed out that those who normally denounce bullying were embracing derogatory and demeaning language about the future president. Ms. Apple, who began her music career in the 1990s, has become something of a recluse. A New York Magazine article from 2012 labeled Ms. Apple a “musical hermit. ” But her albums continue to be critically acclaimed. Her last L. P. released that year, received a high aggregate score, 89, on the website Metacritic, and was her effort to date. Ms. Apple’s new song is not the first time that Mr. Trump’s comments from the incendiary recording have been repurposed by his opponents. A group of knitters united online to form “The Pussyhat Project,” dedicated to creating 1. 1 million hats for protesters to wear at the march on Saturday. “Tiny Hands” is also not the indie singer’s first protest song aimed at Mr. Trump. Last year, Ms. Apple released a Christmas tune on Tumblr that made such ferocious use of a double entendre that its title can’t be published in The New York Times. Ms. Apple has spoken publicly about being sexually assaulted at the age of 12 and has a history of airing her perspective on serious matters in her music. Accepting an MTV award for best new artist in 1997, she railed against the artificiality of the music industry, referred to Maya Angelou as an inspiration and implored her fans to think for themselves. Other artists, however, are celebrating Mr. Trump’s imminent assumption of the presidency. A relatively obscure American poet, Joseph Charles MacKenzie, wrote a poem praising the and his Scottish heritage. The poem refers to Mr. Trump as “the Domhnall,” the Scottish form of his first name. It reads in part: When crippling corruption polluted our nation And plunged our economy into stagnation, As rogues took the opulent office And plump politicians reneged on their promise, The forgotten continued to form a great crowd That defended the Domhnall, the best of MacLeod! | 1 |
October 28, 2016 Susan Rice: U.S. Must Integrate LGBT Rights into Gov’t and Foreign Policy
National Security Advisor Susan Rice told students at American University in a speech on LGBT rights Wednesday that the “United States must continue to integrate LGBT rights into our government and foreign policy,” including “creating a more diverse national security workforce.”
“This is an issue that I’m particularly passionate about, and one that President Obama has prioritized,” Rice said, “because without tapping America’s full range of races, religions, ethnicities, social and economic experiences—without embracing people of every sexual orientation and gender identity—we’re leading in a complex world with one hand tied behind our back.”
Rice, who once served as U.S. ambassador to the U.N., said that “whether we are talking about race, religion, sexual orientation or gender identity, this fight for equal rights is what our history and values demand.” | 0 |
In its latest effort to defuse a major public relations problem that might have loomed over Donald J. Trump’s presidency, the Trump Organization on Wednesday announced union accords at two major hotel holdings. The agreements resolve labor disputes that could have posed a conflict of interest for the and come on the heels of other similar moves in recent weeks. In November, Mr. Trump paid $25 million to settle a number of lawsuits surrounding fraud allegations at Trump University, his former education business, and this month the Trump Organization extricated itself from the management of a hotel project in Brazil, where the authorities were investigating allegations of corruption. Taken together, the moves suggest that Mr. Trump is sensitive to at least the perception that his business dealings could cast a shadow over his presidency, even if he has yet to detail how he might seek a more comprehensive solution to potential conflicts, such as outright divestment. “On the one hand, I think it’s important to acknowledge that this is meaningful, it does matter,” Danielle Brian, the executive director of the Project on Government Oversight, a nonpartisan ethics watchdog group, said of Wednesday’s agreements. “However, this piecemeal approach to dealing with conflicts is not going to deal with the bigger looming problem. ” The agreements also provide insight into Mr. Trump’s views on workers and labor unions. In contrast to the deal he helped broker at the Carrier plant in Indiana, which recently agreed to preserve about 850 jobs that it had planned to shift to Mexico, and which Mr. Trump was on hand to announce in person, the announcement of Wednesday’s deals came by way of a news release featuring statements from the Trump Organization and affiliates of the unions involved. The Trump transition team offered no comment and released no statement. One of the two labor agreements provides a union contract to workers at the Trump International Hotel Las Vegas, whose union the hotel had previously refused to bargain with. The second agreement eases a hurdle to unionization at a recently opened Trump hotel in Washington. The agreements reduce the probability that the National Labor Relations Board, which protects the labor rights of employees, will be called on to adjudicate disputes between workers and the Trump Organization. That possibility raised the prospect of a conflict of interest if Mr. Trump were to retain a stake in his business. As president, Mr. Trump will eventually nominate all five members of the labor board, as well as its general counsel, who typically has the final say on whether to issue formal complaints against employers. The speed of the negotiations at the hotel in Las Vegas suggested that Mr. Trump was eager to put the issue behind him before his inauguration in January, after the hotel resisted workers’ efforts to unionize there for most of the past year and a half. The hotel hired consultants who spoke with employees at mandatory meetings about the risks of unionizing, according to earlier statements from the union. In charges filed with the labor board, some workers alleged that they had been fired or suspended from their jobs because of their unionization efforts. After the successful union election last December, the hotel appealed within the labor board structure, arguing that workers had been intimidated into voting for the union. When the full board rejected its final appeal last month, the hotel appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Bethany Khan, a union representative, said the new labor agreement had come together over a few days of negotiation last week and been ratified by union members over the weekend. Under the accord, the workers will join locals for culinary workers and bartenders that are affiliated with Unite Here, a prominent national union that represents hotel workers. The two sides agreed to a contract beginning Jan. 1 and running through May 31, 2021, which follows a relatively standard template for hotels in Las Vegas by providing annual wage increases, pension and health benefits, and job protections. Under the second accord, the Trump International Hotel Washington D. C. agreed to remain neutral as workers seek to unionize under a agreement, enabling workers to simply sign authorization cards indicating that they want to unionize. The hotel will recognize the union if a majority of workers sign cards. The alternative, a election, typically occurs when the employer opposes the unionization effort, as was the case at the Las Vegas property. In a statement referring to the agreement in Washington, Eric Danziger, the chief executive of Trump Hotels, said, “We share mutual goals with the union, as we both desire to ensure outstanding jobs for the employees, while also enabling the hotel to operate successfully in a competitive environment. ” Wednesday’s agreements do not eliminate the potential for conflicts of interest involving Mr. Trump and the labor board. The board’s general counsel, whose replacement Mr. Trump will probably appoint next year, will be in a position to decide whether to issue complaints about allegations of labor rights violations, but could also leave the decision to career civil servants. Such allegations could include refusing to bargain with the union in the future, or firing or disciplining union stewards for sticking up for fellow members under procedures outlined in the contract. The decision on issuing a complaint is in some sense the critical step of the labor board process. There are typically 20, 000 to 25, 000 charges of unfair labor practices in a given year, of which only a fraction result in a complaint — about 1, 270 last year — although some are settled beforehand. Any complaint issued by a regional director or the general counsel could then come before the board, at least some of whose members are likely to have been appointed by Mr. Trump. But if the general counsel declines to issue a complaint, the charge is effectively dead and generally cannot be appealed. “It’s the gateway into litigation,” said Wilma Liebman, a former labor board chairman. There remains an open charge of unfair labor practices against the Trump Organization, which was filed on behalf of a worker advocacy group in September over the contract that employees of the Trump presidential campaign were required to sign. The group alleged the contract’s noncompete and confidentiality clauses illegally discouraged employees from exercising their labor rights. Mr. Trump and his organization faced a potentially punishing calculus in deciding to bargain with the union in Las Vegas, aside from the issues of conflict of interest. Even if the Trump hotel in Las Vegas had prevailed in its efforts to undo the union election in federal court, which was probably a long shot in itself, the culinary workers would probably have continued their unionization campaign, creating a lingering source of embarrassment for the . In September, workers at the Boulder Station casino in Las Vegas — owned by a company controlled by Frank and Lorenzo Fertitta, who until recently operated the Ultimate Fighting Championship, a mixed martial arts promoter — voted to unionize after a dogged campaign by the union that lasted more than six years. The campaign included the creation of a website highlighting the tirades of the president of the U. F. C. and an effort by union affiliates in New York State to fight the league’s attempts to overturn a law banning the sport there. “They fight really hard,” said C. Jeffrey Waddoups, an economist at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, who studies union bargaining in the hotel and gambling industry. “It would draw a lot of attention. ” | 1 |
Sweden on the Brink? Police Force Pushed to Breaking Point by Violence amid Migrant Influx Lizzie Stromme, Express, November 1, 2016
Sweden is on the brink of becoming a lawless state as the police force is losing the battle against unprecedented levels of crime and violence amid a growing migrant crisis.
The Scandinavian country is facing an existential crisis with on average three police officers handing in their resignations a day.
If the alarming trend continues, and police officers continue to resign more than 1,000 officers will have quit the service by New Years.
Since the migrant crisis began last summer, Sweden has been hit by a series of brutal crimes and violent incidents .
In 2015 alone Sweden, with a population of 9.5 million, received over 160,000 asylum applications and the country is expected to take as many as 190,000 refugees, or two per cent of the population, by the end of 2016.
Since the Second World War Sweden has prided itself on helping migrants who cross their borders despite some moves to the political right in recent years.
But police have now admitted the force has reached breaching point as more than 50 areas in the country have now been placed on a “no-go zone” list .
In February a report from Sweden’s National Criminal Investigation Service announced there were 52 areas where officers would not cope with the levels of crime being committed .
Sex assaults , drug dealing and children carrying weapons were just some of the incidents mentioned in the report.
In September, Swedish officials were forced to add another three areas to the list.
Now the Police Association have said they need at least 200 new officers to regain control in the south-east of the country.
Thomas Stjernfeldt, from the region’s police association, told SVT : “We are missing extremely many officers in the operational sector, right now we need 200 more officers to be added to the force to establish a reasonable working environment in the southeast of Götaland.”
Götaland is one of the regions in the country that has been hit hard by the car fire attacks, which have been occurring throughout Sweden.
On Monday, Express.co.uk reported a number of the arsonist attacks in the city of Växjö, in Götaland, had been committed by frustrated migrants .
Currently there are more than 6,000 suspected crimes that are unsolved in the area and 400 of these cases are suspected to be rapes, murder or attempted murder.
Mr Stjernfeldt said the figures are alarming and police officers are constantly forced to work overtime in an attempt to solve the reported crimes.
The Police Association admitted it fears the public will lose faith in the force and their ability to protect citizens if the situation is not resolved.
The union’s call for more resources echoes National Police Commissioner Dan Eliasson’s February warning, where he said he needed a further 4,100 officers and specialist staff to reestablish law and order in Sweden. | 0 |
A commercial fisherman faces life in prison for catching a 45 pound haul of cocaine and selling it instead of turning it over to the authorities. [Thomas Breeding, a boat captain who has had a history of drug and weapons convictions, was charged with conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance and unlawfully transporting a firearm, the Panama City News Herald reported. Breeding said he had never been involved in the drug trade before and was “just a young commercial fisherman. ” Breeding distributed the cocaine to four others who helped him sell the product and then received a cut from the sales. The cocaine haul was worth between $500, 000 and $620, 000, according to AL. com. Authorities investigated the scheme and charged all five people involved with conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance. Breeding pleaded guilty to the charges Wednesday along with his . Breeding faces a maximum sentence of life in prison and a $4. 25 million fine, and he’s warning others not to follow his example. “This changed my life and way of thinking and also made me aware of some of the dangers that can be found off shore in the Gulf,” Breeding wrote recently in a letter to the News Herald from the Washington County Jail. “I would like to let the public know the dangers and what not to do if this situation comes about. ” | 1 |
The moment Joanna Acevedo first set foot in a boxing gym, she had a vision of herself standing in the ring, wearing gloves and trading blows with an opponent. But her adoptive mother refused to let her box. She was too much of a fighter out of the ring. Ms. Acevedo, who as a child would not back down from a schoolyard brawl, said her irascible nature stemmed from years spent in the foster system. Her birth mother had a substance abuse problem, and her father was in prison for much of her life. “I grew up not being loved at all,” Ms. Acevedo, 22, said. “If you tell me how it feels for somebody to love me, I wouldn’t even know. ” She distracted herself with heavy partying and dropped out of high school. In 2011, Ms. Acevedo was arrested on robbery and assault charges. After her release from the Rikers Island jail complex, Ms. Acevedo vowed to correct her errant path. She returned to Fannie Lou Hamer Freedom High School in the South Bronx and received her diploma. She also connected with a social worker from the Children’s Aid Society, one of the eight organizations supported by The New York Times Neediest Cases Fund. Then Ms. Acevedo finally took up boxing. “Boxing has changed my life from zero to 100,” she said. “It helped me stop drinking, smoking, clubbing. That’s all I was doing at one point. ” The sport brought and a focus she had never known. Ms. Acevedo devoted herself to it, competing in numerous tournaments across New York City. In 2014, she learned she was pregnant. Her first instinct was not to go through with the pregnancy. But she decided to become a mother in part because she dreamed of training alongside her daughter at the boxing gym. Ms. Acevedo gave birth to Serenity in July 2015. Her daughter, she said, has helped her experience life in a new way. “The only love I have is for my daughter,” Ms. Acevedo said. “Once I had my daughter and I cried, I felt like this is how it feels to be loved. I love her like crazy. ” Serenity was born with a rare condition called optic nerve hypoplasia. In utero, her pituitary gland shifted in her brain, preventing her optic nerves from fully developing. The extent of her blindness is still unknown. “That’s a one in a million,” Ms. Acevedo said. “My daughter got it. That’s not fair. ” A month after Serenity was born, her father was arrested, and Ms. Acevedo and her baby moved into her mother’s home in the Bronx. Ms. Acevedo does not work. Much of her time is dedicated to caring for Serenity, administering medications and taking her to doctors. Each month, Ms. Acevedo receives about $250 in federal assistance. She is in the process of applying for disability benefits for Serenity. In June, Ms. Acevedo was given $250 from the Neediest Cases Fund by the Children’s Aid Society for gift cards, which were used to buy clothing and food. For a time Ms. Acevedo was able to continue boxing, taking her daughter with her to the gym. As Serenity grew older, more apt to squirm and cry, Ms. Acevedo had to stop going. “Sometimes people can’t accomplish their dream because of a certain situation they’ve got to put first,” she said. “That’s how I feel right now. I can’t really do what I’d love to do because I have to take care of her right now, put her first. ” Her dream of expanding her family has been postponed. Ms. Acevedo is hesitant to have more children, concerned that something could happen to them. And without an outlet for aggression, Ms. Acevedo has become more restless. She has picked back up what she admits is a bad habit: smoking. But she said she would go no further than cigarettes, for fear of losing her daughter. “That’s what keeps me focused,” she said. “I don’t want her reliving a life that I lived. ” Recent experiences have led Ms. Acevedo to consider a career in nursing, but she is not sure when or if she will be able to pursue it. There is no day care for blind children in the city, she said, and she does not trust others to care for Serenity as vigilantly as she does. Ms. Acevedo says she believes in God, and in miracles, and remains hopeful that modern medicine will find a remedy for her daughter’s condition. Ms. Acevedo laments what her daughter will miss: sunsets, the delight in the holiday spectacle of Rockefeller Center or the joy of animals at the zoo. “I’m going to wish she could do this with me, that with me,” Ms. Acevedo said. “I’m never going to let her know, of course. But deep down inside, closed in a room or when she’s sleeping, and I’m up at night, that’s going through my head. ” | 1 |
A judge in Maryland has granted a new trial to Adnan Syed, setting aside his conviction for the 1999 murder of his former girlfriend, in a case that was the subject of the first season of the hit podcast “Serial. ” Mr. Syed’s lawyer, C. Justin Brown, posted the news on Twitter on Thursday afternoon and confirmed by phone that the motion for a new trial had been granted by Judge Martin P. Welch of the Baltimore City Circuit Court. The decision to grant Mr. Syed, 35, a retrial was a major victory for an inmate who has long maintained his innocence and has exhausted all other avenues of appeal. He was convicted in 2000 in the murder of his former girlfriend, Hae Min Lee, and had served 16 years of a life sentence. “Serial” turned speculation about Mr. Syed’s guilt and whether he had received a fair trial into something of a national pastime in 2014. The show was downloaded more than 100 million times and won a Peabody Award for its role in illuminating flaws in the criminal justice system. At a news conference in Baltimore, Mr. Brown was asked if he thought there was any chance that the retrial could have come about without “Serial. ” “I don’t think so,” he said. On the possibility that Mr. Syed may eventually go free, Mr. Brown said: “I’m feeling pretty confident right now. This was the biggest hurdle. It’s really hard to get a new trial. ” On Thursday, Mr. Brown said that he had not been able to reach Mr. Syed to tell him the news, but by Friday, he said in a post on Twitter that his client had been “informed of the decision. ” The family of Ms. Lee has expressed pain and outrage at the attention surrounding Mr. Syed’s bid for a new trial. In a statement released through the Maryland Attorney General’s Office on Friday, the family said: “We continue to grieve. We continue to believe justice was done when Mr. Syed was convicted of killing Hae. ” For its part, the Attorney General’s Office said Thursday night that it had a responsibility to keep pursuing justice and “to defend what it believes is a valid conviction. ” Mr. Syed’s brother, Yusuf, 26, said in an interview on Thursday that the family had high hopes for a favorable decision, based on the strength of the legal arguments and the outpouring of support. “We really felt 100 percent that the judge would rule in our favor,” he said, adding, “We’ve been waiting 20 years for this. ” Rabia Chaudry, a family friend of Mr. Syed’s who introduced Sarah Koenig, the host of “Serial,” to the case, celebrated the decision online, thanking the judge and witnesses, among others. A production manager for “Serial,” Emily Condon, declined to comment on Thursday. The judge’s decision came after three days of postconviction hearings in February. Mr. Syed and his legal team had presented new evidence, including the testimony of a new alibi witness, and argued that his original defense counsel had been grossly negligent. The proceedings were held before Judge Welch, a retired judge, who had granted Mr. Syed’s request for a hearing in November. Mr. Syed first filed a request for a postconviction hearing in 2010, but was denied. Mr. Syed’s defense had argued in February that the decision by Mr. Syed’s lawyer in the original trial, Maria Cristina Gutierrez, not to question a state’s expert, Abraham Waranowitz, about the reliability of evidence relating to cellphone towers constituted ineffective assistance. The judge’s decision to grant Mr. Syed a new trial turned on that issue. In a memo, Judge Welch wrote that Ms. Gutierrez’s failure to question Mr. Waranowitz “created a substantial possibility that the result of the trial was fundamentally unreliable. ” Judge Welch also said in the memo that the substantial public interest in the case did not affect his decision. “Regardless of the public interest surrounding this case, the court used its best efforts to address the merits of petitioner’s petition for postconviction relief like it would in any other case that comes before the court unfettered by sympathy, prejudice, or public opinion,” he wrote. Ms. Gutierrez was a prominent Baltimore defense lawyer in the 1990s whose career crumbled in 2001 when she was disbarred by consent after a state commission uncovered financial improprieties involving her clients. She told The Baltimore Sun at the time that her legal practice suffered in part because of her severe medical problems related to multiple sclerosis. She died of a heart attack in 2004. On Thursday, hundreds of fans of “Serial” took to social media, some of them to celebrate and others to emphasize that they still believed Mr. Syed was guilty. The podcast recently ended its second season, which told the story of Bowe Bergdahl, an American soldier in Afghanistan who was captured by the Taliban in 2009 and released as part of a prisoner swap in 2014. | 1 |
EDITOR'S CHOICE | 08.11.2016 NYT Admits Key Al Qaeda Role in Aleppo Investigative reporter Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s As much as The New York Times and the mainstream U.S. media have become propaganda outlets on most foreign policy issues, like the one-sided coverage of the bloody Syrian war, sometimes the truth seeps through in on-the-ground reporting by correspondents, even ones who usually are pushing the “propo.” Such was the case with Anne Barnard’s new reporting from inside west Aleppo, the major portion of the city which is in government hands and copes with regular terror rocket and mortar attacks from rebel-held east Aleppo where Al Qaeda militants and U.S.-armed-and-funded “moderate” rebels fight side-by-side. Samantha Power, Permanent Representative of the United States to the UN, addresses the Security Council meeting on Syria, Sept. 25, 2016. Power has been an advocate for escalating U.S. military involvement in Syria. (UN Photo) Almost in passing, Barnard’s article on Sunday acknowledged the rarely admitted reality of the Al Qaeda/”moderate” rebel collaboration, which puts the United States into a de facto alliance with Al Qaeda terrorists and their jihadist allies, fighting under banners such as Nusra Front (recently renamed Syria Conquest Front) and Ahrar al-Sham. Barnard also finally puts the blame for preventing civilians in east Aleppo from escaping the fighting on a rebel policy of keeping them in harm’s way rather than letting them transit through “humanitarian corridors” to safety. Some of her earlier pro-rebel accounts suggested that it wasn’t clear who was stopping movement of civilians through those corridors. However, on Sunday, she reported: “We had arrived at a critical moment, as Russia said there was only one day left to pass through a corridor it had provided for people to escape eastern Aleppo before the rebel side was flattened, a corridor through which precious few had passed. The government says rebels are preventing civilians from leaving. Rebels refuse any evacuation without international supervision and a broader deal to deliver humanitarian aid.” Granted, you still have to read between the lines, but at least there is the acknowledgement that rebels are refusing civilian evacuations under the current conditions. How that is different from Islamic State terrorists in Mosul, Iraq, preventing departures from their areas – a practice which the Times and other U.S. outlets condemn as using women and children as “human shields”– isn’t addressed. But Barnard’s crimped admission is at least a start. Barnard then writes: “Instead [of allowing civilians to move through the humanitarian corridors], they [the rebels] are trying to break the siege, with Qaeda-linked groups and those backed by the United States working together — the opposite of what Russia has demanded.” Again, that isn’t the clearest description of the situation, which is stunning enough that one might have expected it in the lede rather than buried deep inside the story, but it is significant that the Times is recognizing that Al Qaeda and the U.S.-backed “moderates” are “working together” and that Russia opposes that collaboration. She also noted that “Three Qaeda-linked suicide bombers attacked a military position with explosive-packed personnel carriers on Thursday, military officials said, and mortar fire was raining on neighborhoods that until now had been relatively safe. It was among the most intense rounds in four years of rebel shelling that officials say has killed 11,000 civilians.” While she then throws in a caveat about the impossibility of verifying the numbers, the acknowledgement that the U.S.-backed “moderate” rebels and their Al Qaeda comrades have been shelling civilians in west Aleppo is significant, too. Before this, all the American people heard was the other side, from rebel-held east Aleppo, about the human suffering there, often conveyed by “activists” with video cameras who have depicted the conflict as simply the willful killing of children by the evil Syrian government and the even more evil Russians. More Balance With the admission of rebel terror attacks on civilians in west Aleppo, the picture finally is put into more balance. The Al Qaeda and U.S.-backed rebels have been killing thousands of civilians in government-controlled areas and the Syrian military and its Russian allies have struck back only to be condemned for committing “war crimes.” The second plane about to crash into the World Trade Center towers in New York City on Sept. 11, 2001 Though the human toll in both sides of Aleppo is tragic, we have seen comparable situations before – in which the U.S. government has supported, supplied and encouraged governments to mount fierce offensives to silence rockets or mortars fired by rebels toward civilian areas. For instance, senior U.S. government officials, including President Barack Obama and Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, have defended Israel’s right to defend itself from rockets fired from inside Gaza even though those missiles rarely kill anyone. Yet, Israel is allowed to bomb the near-defenseless people of Gaza at will, killing thousands including the four little boys blown apart in July 2014 while playing on a beach during the last round of what the Israelis call “mowing the grass.” In the context of those deaths, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power, who has built her career as a supposed humanitarian advocating a “responsibility to protect” civilians, laid the blame not on the Israeli military but on fighters in Gaza who had fired rockets that rarely hit anything besides sand. At the United Nations on July 18, 2014, Power said , “President Obama spoke with [Israeli] Prime Minister Netanyahu this morning to reaffirm the United States’ strong support for Israel’s right to defend itself…. Hamas’ attacks are unacceptable and would be unacceptable to any member state of the United Nations. Israel has the right to defend its citizens and prevent these attacks.” But that universal right apparently does not extend to Syria where U.S.-supplied rockets are fired into civilian neighborhoods of west Aleppo. In that case, Power and other U.S. officials apply an entirely different set of standards. Any Syrian or Russian destruction of east Aleppo with the goal of suppressing that rocket fire becomes a “war crime.” Perhaps it’s expected that the U.S. government, like other governments, will engage in hypocrisy regarding affairs of state: one set of rules for U.S. allies and another for countries marked for U.S. “regime change.” Statements by supposed “humanitarians”– such as Samantha Power, “Ms. R2P”– are no exception. But double standards are even more distasteful when they come from allegedly “objective” journalists such as those who work at The New York Times, The Washington Post and other prestige American news outlets. When they take the “U.S. side” in a dispute and become crude propagandists, they encourage the kind of misguided “group thinks” that led to the criminal Iraq War and other disastrous “regime change” projects over the past two decades. Yet, that is what we normally see. A thoughtful reader can’t peruse the international reporting of the U.S. mainstream media without realizing that it is corrupted by propaganda from both government officials and from U.S.-funded operations, often disguised as “human rights activists” or “citizen journalists” whose supposed independence makes their “propo” even more effective. So, it’s worth noting those rare occasions when The New York Times and the rest of the MSM let some of the reality peek through. When evaluating the latest plans from Hillary Clinton and other interventionists to expand the U.S. military intervention in Syria – via prettily named “safe zones” and “no-fly zones”– the American people should realize that they are being asked to come to the aid of Al Qaeda. | 0 |
RIO DE JANEIRO — Soon after the first news media reports surfaced Sunday morning of an armed assault on four American swimmers, the athletes were interviewed at the United States Olympic team’s hospitality house by State Department officials, national swim team officials and Olympic officials. They all agreed that the swimmers should avoid further attention and that the United States Olympic Committee would soon put out a statement. But Ryan Lochte, a medal winner, left the hospitality house and walked across the street to Ipanema Beach, where he gave a lurid interview to NBC, describing a holdup by men identifying themselves as police officers. Mr. Lochte’s account touched off a dispute that quickly transcended sports, emerging as a point of tension between the United States and Brazil as the authorities in Rio de Janeiro faced scrutiny over their security preparations for the Olympics in a city on edge over a crime wave and gun battles between drug gangs and the police. On Thursday, Mr. Lochte’s account came under siege by the Brazilian police in an internationally televised news conference. They said he had fabricated his description of the episode, damaging Rio’s image at its moment on the global stage. “We saw our city stained by a fantastical version,” said Fernando Veloso, the Civil Police chief for the state of Rio de Janeiro. Beyond the sensitive issues of sovereignty and nationalism around the Rio Olympics, the episode unleashed a discussion around Brazil about perceptions of privilege, accountability and danger in a society where many Brazilians themselves often lament their exposure to alarming levels of violent crime and police corruption. The episode “has tapped into one of Brazilians’ biggest pet peeves — gringos who treat their country like a spring break destination where you can lie to the cops and get away with it,” said Brian Winter, vice president for policy at Americas Society and Council of the Americas. The uproar has its origins in a lavish Olympics party hosted by the French authorities over the weekend at the Sociedade Hípica, a riding club that is a bastion for Rio’s elite. The four swimmers — Mr. Lochte, Jimmy Feigen, Jack Conger and Gunnar Bentz — stumbled out at dawn into a taxi for the ride across Rio to their lodgings in the Olympic Village. In his original account, Mr. Lochte said the car had been pulled over by armed men, one of whom put a gun against his head before taking the cash from his wallet. But police investigators said Thursday that Mr. Lochte and the others had acted more like vandals than the victims they claimed to be. Making a stop around 6 a. m. Sunday at a Shell gas station, the men were obviously drunk, the station’s owner said. They broke a soap dispenser in the bathroom, damaged a door, tore down a sign and urinated around the premises, the owner told reporters. “One of them was really worked up,” said Mr. Veloso, the police chief, who described Mr. Lochte, 32, as a kind of elder ringleader of the group. Mr. Lochte had left Brazil before a judge ordered the police to seize his passport. Mr. Bentz, 20, and Mr. Conger, 21, flew back to the United States on Thursday night, the United States Olympic Committee said in a statement. Mr. Feigen, 26, remained in Brazil on Thursday evening, but on Friday morning, after meeting with a judge and prosecutors, his lawyer, Breno Melaragno Costa, told reporters that Mr. Feigen had agreed to pay 35, 000 reals, or about $10, 800, to a Brazilian organization called the Reaction Institute, as part of a deal to avoid prosecution, The Associated Press and ABC News reported. The Brazilian police suggested on Thursday that Mr. Lochte and Mr. Feigen, the only swimmers who had given initial testimony to investigators about the episode, could face charges of providing false testimony about a crime. Mr. Bentz and Mr. Conger, who were pulled off their plane by the police on Wednesday in Rio, offered testimony on Thursday that contradicted Mr. Lochte’s accounts, police investigators said. The two men were still shouted down as “liars” by a crowd when they left a Rio police station. The sight of the athletes wading through the crowd, along with a torrent of venomous comments by Brazilians on social media, raised concerns after a period in which Brazil and the United States had experienced a thawing of ties, with law enforcement officials working closely to identify potential security threats during the Olympics. “This episode will not in any way interfere in the relations between the U. S. and Brazil,” said Eliseu Padilha, the chief of staff for Brazil’s interim president, Michel Temer. Mr. Padilha added, “This could have happened with individuals of any other nationality. ” Using video footage, accounts from witnesses and testimony from the swimmers, investigators said a security guard had brandished a gun after one or more of the athletes vandalized the gas station bathroom. In his original account, Mr. Lochte claimed that men claiming to be police officers had pulled over the taxi and that an assailant had put a cocked gun to his forehead before taking his money. He later altered that account, saying the taxi had stopped at a gas station so the athletes could use the bathroom. Still, the description of the security guard’s use of a gun dovetailed with Mr. Lochte’s explanations of the episode, raising the possibility that the men had felt during the confusion of the moment that they were being pressured to hand over their money. Mr. Veloso, the police chief, said he could not rule out that there was an extortion attempt by the guards, whom he described as “public agents,” a term that can be used for police officers or other members of the public security forces. Another police official clarified that the guards were prison guards working a second job at the gas station. “For the time being, nothing indicates” extortion, Mr. Veloso said, emphasizing that the guards were reacting to four large athletes “exhibiting, at a minimum, inadequate attitudes, breaking things and showing themselves ready to elevate the level of violence. ” In the midst of the confusion at the gas station, someone called the police, but by the time a police car arrived, the swimmers were gone. Witnesses, including a man who offered to translate for the swimmers, said they had offered to give money to the manager before leaving. Mr. Lochte’s lawyer, Jeff Ostrow, said the video footage had corroborated the “primary elements” of his client’s descriptions of the episode. “There was a uniformed person with a gun who forced them to hand over their money,” Mr. Ostrow said. Mr. Veloso said one of the first leads in the investigation had come from a taxi driver who gave a ride to two Brazilian women who had left the same party and discussed having romantic encounters with the swimmers. “At least one of the athletes may have had a motive for telling a story that wasn’t true,” Mr. Veloso said, raising the possibility that the accounts were fabricated to disguise that the swimmers had remained at the party until almost sunrise. Mr. Veloso did not specify which of the swimmers might have had that motive. Still, Judge Marcello Rubioli, the head of the special court handling the case involving the swimmers, said that making a false claim in Brazil was “not that serious” and “results in very little punishment. ” “If they are found guilty, they would just have to make a payment to an N. G. O. that does humanitarian work,” he continued, referring to a nongovernmental organization. The new turns in the case raised tensions around Brazil, with some commentators questioning the role of American Olympic officials in providing confusing initial accounts and then shielding the swimmers from scrutiny. But Olympic officials in Rio seemed to be trying to play down the episode. “No apologies from him or from the other athletes are needed,” said Mario Andrada, a spokesman for the Rio Olympics organizing committee, referring to Mr. Lochte. “We need to understand that these kids were trying to have fun. ” He added, “Sometimes you take actions that you later regret. ” Some in Rio lamented the episode, though, emphasizing that they wished the police were always so efficient in clearing up reports of violent crime. Before the Olympics, the authorities had sought to ease fears by deploying a security force comprising 85, 000 police officers and soldiers. “The real dilemma is that people in this city live in fear of crime,” said Eduardo Rangel, 64, the owner of store selling office supplies. “The swimmers took advantage of the mess that exists around here to further denigrate the city. That doesn’t mean Rio is some paradise without crime. ” Others in Rio, however, said they felt deeply insulted by the behavior of the American swimmers. “These guys from abroad think they’re superior to us, that they can come here, make a mess, lie about it and stain the image of Brazil,” said Airton Rocha, 28, a waiter at a cafe. “Well, the law is the law, and it should apply to everyone in the same way. ” Late Thursday night, American Olympics officials issued an apology. “The behavior of these athletes is not acceptable, nor does it represent the values of Team USA or the conduct of the vast majority of its members,” said the statement, which was attributed to the organization’s chief executive, Scott Blackmun. “On behalf of the United States Olympic Committee, we apologize to our hosts in Rio and the people of Brazil for this distracting ordeal in the midst of what should rightly be a celebration of excellence. ” | 1 |
In the past five weeks, you’ve seen America inaugurate a president, march for women’s rights, protest an immigration order and debate a Supreme Court nominee. Even if you’ve only occasionally peeked at the news, the shock of so many updates may have left you reeling. This is the moment for a vacation, especially one where the focus isn’t on screens. But it sounds easier than it is. “Being so technologically connected all the time, as many of us are, is overwhelming, and a break is a way to show yourself some love,” said Miriam Geiser, a travel consultant with KK Travels Worldwide in Chicago who has planned getaways for clients and has taken several herself. “A vacation is about slowing down and nurturing yourself so you feel truly mentally and physically rested at the end,” she said. Here is advice on how to take such a trip. D. I. Y. a Digital Detox You don’t have to camp on a remote island to shed your devices. Leave your laptop and iPad at home, and lock your cellphone in your hotel room safe, using it only for emergencies. Sometimes, just the idea of cutting the cord can lead to anxiety, and the first few hours of such a trip can feel stressful, but Ms. Geiser said that many of her clients who have taken digital detox trips report feeling liberated and peaceful by the second day of their vacation. Suggested destinations: Post Ranch Inn in Big Sur, Calif. and any national park within driving distance. Painting Away the Pressure You don’t have to be Picasso, but a vacation incorporating art can inspire creativity in your everyday life, according to Susan Sparks, a travel adviser at Points of Interest Travel in Aspen, Colo. “Art is a way to express yourself and go beyond your usual spectrum, and that can be very reviving,” she said. Many resorts and spas around the world offer art classes, ranging from a few hours to several days, in painting, sculpture and collage. Suggested destinations: Vik Retreats in Uruguay Ojai Valley Inn Spa in Ojai, Calif. and Sundance Mountain Resort in Sundance, Utah. Immerse Yourself in Nature There’s nothing more relaxing, according to Ms. Geiser, than being surrounded by nature. Hearing the sound of crashing waves or chirping birds and insects, taking in a beautiful vista on a pristine lake, smelling the flowers of a tropical garden or feeling the warmth of the sunshine on your skin stimulate the senses in a positive way and take you away from the hubbub of your daily life. Spend your days on a trip, going on hikes, bike rides and walks, or consider kayaking, fishing, horseback riding or snowshoeing. Suggested destinations: Lake Kora in the Adirondack Mountains in upstate New York the Resort at Paws Up in Greenough, Mont. Jade Mountain Resort in St. Lucia Minaret Station on South Island in New Zealand. Savoring Rather Than Food — cooking and eating it — can actually be a destressor, Ms. Sparks said. “Cooking, even if you only do it for a few hours, shuts off your brain, and at the end, you have a meal that you put your heart and soul into,” she said. Weeklong cooking holidays abound around the world. Suggested destinations: Mamma Agata, a cooking school on the Amalfi Coast of Italy and Ballymaloe Cookery School in County Cork, Ireland. Many hotels also offer and cooking classes. The Wellness Retreat Route The singular focus of these means that they do often work. Some retreats are meant to be a lifestyle overhaul with medical professionals who complete a comprehensive diagnostic analysis and provide a customized road map to improve your health. Other programs are more focused on detoxes or cleanses, and others still are spiritual in nature, offering daily yoga or meditation. No matter the approach, you’ll return refreshed. Suggested destinations: The Ranch at Live Oak in Malibu, Calif. Golden Door in Escondido, Calif. Como Shambala in Bali Chablé Resort Spa in the Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico. | 1 |
The election of a president of the United States isn’t just democracy in circuslike action. It also may be, at its core, the most elaborate and expensive recruitment and hiring process that mankind has ever created. You can think of a presidential election as being like a particularly large company’s search for a chief executive. In this case, the search costs a couple of billion dollars (the amount that will be expended on campaigns) has a hiring committee of 127 million people (the number of voters last cycle) and is covered at every turn by virtually every media organization on earth. What, then, can the latest evidence about best hiring practices tell us about the election, in which hiring the best employee has particularly high stakes? Good news: The answers might just make you feel a little better about American democracy. In the last several years, there has been a lot of evidence, both from academic work and from companies that approach recruitment analytically, that traditional job interviews aren’t particularly good tools for identifying the best employees. One conclusion: It’s a bad idea to hire someone primarily based on a job interview, or on a manager’s gut instinct. Some people perform better when being interviewed, but that seems to be a skill. It doesn’t tell you much about whether a person would be a good software engineer or accountant. “Interviewers are likely to feel they are getting useful information from unstructured interviews, even when they are useless,” concluded a 2013 article in the academic journal Judgment and Decision Making. “Our simple recommendation for those who make screening decisions is not to use them,” wrote Jason Dana, Robyn Dawes and Nathanial Peterson. Major companies have come to the same conclusion. Google long had a reputation for putting job candidates through multiple interviews and asking potential employees questions to see how they responded. Not anymore. “We looked at tens of thousands of interviews, and everyone who had done the interviews and what they scored the candidate, and how that person ultimately performed in their job,” Google’s chief human resources executive, Laszlo Bock, told The New York Times in 2013. “We found zero relationship. It’s a complete random mess. ” Maybe the search committee for the next president — that is, every American voter — shouldn’t put too much weight on what they see in unstructured press interviews with candidates. I argue that speeches and debate performances fit the same pattern, in that they are performances that don’t tell you a ton about how a person would perform in the vast portion of the presidency that takes place . So what does work? Google found that structured interviews, in which applicants are asked uniform, concrete questions, were helpful. And a large body of work suggests that tests and simulations can give particularly useful information about how a person will perform on the job. Economists looked at data from firms employing workers, in which some managers had the discretion to hire the employees they thought were the best fit, while others relied on a performance test. Those hired with tests alone stayed in the jobs 15 percent longer than those chosen by managers, a sign they were a better match. And in an experiment with British doctors, a daylong series of simulations, such as interaction with an actor playing a sick patient, more accurately predicted their future performance than a test. Plenty of companies in a wide range of fields have embraced the idea. Consulting firms like McKinsey have long hired bright young M. B. A.s in part by giving them a case study of a business challenge and asking them a series of questions about how they would approach the problem. If tests and simulations are the way to go in picking an employee, what does that mean for picking a president? Perhaps the ideal scenario would be to put Ted Cruz and Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders through a simulation in which they must jump between persuading a member of Congress to vote for a highway bill and conducting an arms control negotiation. That won’t happen anytime soon. But in a weird way, we might be seeing a version of exactly that simulation. What are the qualities it takes to be a successful president? He or she needs to be good at hiring and trusting the right people making constant big decisions with limited information and often while exhausted setting the right big picture strategy and knowing when to stick with it as circumstances change and when to make tactical adjustments. If you look at it that way, running a presidential campaign starts to look like exactly the kind of simulation of being president that our search committee needs to pick a president! The leading candidates in this campaign come from very different backgrounds: two senators, a former secretary of state and a businessman, which makes it hard to judge them against one another. But right now we’re seeing an comparison in how they run a campaign. Is the campaign disciplined and well run, displaying the aforementioned mix of smart strategy and clever tactical choices? Does the candidate hire skilled employees and put trust in people who are competent? Does the candidate have the kind of stamina to put in the long hours of campaigning, or does that person get tired and say the wrong thing or make bad decisions? It’s easy to criticize the length of American campaigns, and the complexity of the system by which delegates are selected to choose each party’s nominee. But in a weird way, the duration and complexity of the task make campaigns an even better hiring test. Just as a daylong simulation was a better way to judge the competence of British doctors than a test, a long campaign gives more time for a person to flunk the simulation by making bad strategic decisions, listening to bad advice or saying something stupid. In early 2008, a person would have had plenty of reason to be skeptical about whether Barack Obama, who had served in the Senate for about three years and had never run anything larger than his Senate office, had the leadership chops to run the entire federal government. The fact that he ran his primary campaign more effectively than Mrs. Clinton was one piece of evidence that he did. The American campaign system has evolved over the years without any master plan. But whenever you groan about yet another state primary or long debate, look at it this way: If you were on the search committee to hire a C. E. O. you would want the longest, hardest simulation you could get. And in your role on this very large search committee, that’s exactly what you’re getting. | 1 |
By Mike Wall
If intelligent aliens actually do live around Tabby’s star , astronomers are determined to find them.
The Breakthrough Listen initiative, which will spend $100 million over the next 10 years to hunt for signals possibly produced by alien civilizations, is set to begin studying Tabby’s star with the 330-foot-wide (100 meters) Green Bank Telescope in West Virginia, project team members announced Tuesday (Oct. 25).
“The Green Bank Telescope is the largest fully steerable radio telescope on the planet, and it’s the largest, most sensitive telescope that’s capable of looking at Tabby’s star given its position in the sky,” Breakthrough Listen co-director Andrew Siemion, who also directs the Berkeley SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Research Center at the University of California, Berkeley, said in a statement.
“We’ve deployed a fantastic new SETI instrument that connects to that telescope, that can look at many gigahertz of bandwidth simultaneously and many, many billions of different radio channels all at the same time so we can explore the radio spectrum very, very quickly,” Siemion added.
The observations will take place for 8 hours per night for three nights over the next two months, with the first observations set to take place Wednesday (Oct. 26), project team members said.
Tabby’s star, officially known as KIC 8462852, lies about 1,500 light-years from Earth. Observations by NASA’s Kepler space telescope showed that the star dimmed dramatically several times over the past half-decade or so, at one point by a whopping 22 percent. These occasional brightness dips — which were first reported last year by a team led by Yale University postdoc Tabetha Boyajian (hence the star’s nickname) — are far too substantial to be caused by an orbiting planet, astronomers have said.
So researchers have offered up a number of alternative explanations for the dimming to date. Perhaps a cloud of comet fragments periodically blocks the star’s light, for example, or maybe some unknown structure in the depths of space between Earth and Tabby’s star is responsible.
It’s even possible that the brightness dips are caused by an “alien megastructure” — an enormous collection of energy-gathering solar panels, for example.
Astronomers have stressed that the megastructure hypothesis is a long shot, but long shots shouldn’t be dismissed out of hand, Breakthough Listen team members said.
“I don’t think it’s very likely — a one-in-a-billion chance or something like that — but nevertheless, we’re going to check it out,” Dan Werthimer, chief scientist at Berkeley SETI, said in the same statement . “But I think that E.T., if it’s ever discovered, it might be something like that. It’ll be some bizarre thing that somebody finds by accident … that nobody expected, and then we look more carefully and we say, ‘Hey, that’s a civilization.'”
A number of other research teams have already searched for signals coming from Tabby’s star, and all of those searches have come up empty so far.
Siemion, Boyajian and astronomer Jason Wright, who’s based at Pennsylvania State University, will discuss the planned Tabby’s star observations during a video chat from the Green Bank Telescope site on Wednesday at 4 p.m. EDT (2000 GMT). You can watch it live here:
Source: Live Science
| 0 |
A no nation world, there's a novel idea. There would still have to be some order. Now, what should we call it?
Travel is one thing, immigration is another. If we were helping other nations instead of impoverishing or bombing them, perhaps they'd be happier staying home. It's corporate influence seeking cheap labor, conglomerate take over of resources, market instability and bankers that are the real issue, not to mention politicians owned by us. Perhaps we should keep our political influence on our side of borders for a change. | 0 |
YANGON, Myanmar — The rights lawyer had devised a plan to replace Myanmar’s Constitution with one that would strip the military of its extraordinary political powers. The lawyer, U Ko Ni, a top adviser to the governing National League for Democracy, had recently been working on a new draft, a colleague said, and he hoped to promote his project at a conference this month. But when he returned to the Yangon airport on Sunday from a trip to Indonesia, cradling his young grandson in his arms as he waited for a taxi, a man drew a pistol and shot him in the head. The killing appears to have been a rare political assassination in Myanmar, fueling rumors, distrust and worry about the country’s future. “This bullet was not only for Ko Ni,” the colleague, U Thein Than Oo, a human rights lawyer in Mandalay, Myanmar, said by telephone. “It was for the N. L. D. and the people who want to amend and replace the 2008 Constitution and support the peace process. ” The Myanmar police have said that the assailant, detained shortly after the shooting, was a professional hit man, and they have arrested three other suspects in the attack, including the man they say hired the killer. The police have not announced a motive for the killing. It is not clear whether Mr. Ko Ni could have succeeded in changing the Constitution, although colleagues said he had been pressing the case. While unverified rumors swirled on Myanmar’s social media this week that the military was behind the killing, the police said there was no evidence to support the claims. The assistant secretary of the Home Affairs Ministry, U Maung Maung Myint, issued a statement on Wednesday denying rumors that the home affairs minister, Lt. Gen. Kyaw Swe, had orchestrated the killing. But even as a few details began to leak out, there were still more questions than answers. Those guessing at motives noted that Mr. Ko Ni, 65, was one of the country’s most prominent Muslims in a majority Buddhist country torn by religious strife. But he was hardly a firebrand. While he did not hesitate to advocate the legal rights of Muslims and other minorities whenever he felt they were threatened, he did not promote Islamic law and he backed a decision by the National League for Democracy not to field Muslim candidates in the 2015 election, telling a reporter at the time that it was not worth it given the polarized political climate. Instead, he expressed an inclusive vision that was shaped in part by his background as the son of an ethnic Burmese and Buddhist mother and a Muslim father from India. “He was a man who could appreciate different traditions precisely because his own tradition in his country did not always receive the respect that it deserved,” said Melissa Crouch, an expert on Myanmar’s Constitution at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia. The main suspect, U Kyi Lin, had been jailed from 2003 to 2014 for smuggling ancient Buddha statues, according to police statements and leaked police documents. That would hardly be the profile of a radical Buddhist. Mr. Kyi Lin was pardoned in 2014 in a prisoner amnesty by the government of former President Thein Sein, who was an army general. Some lawyers wondered how the gunman had acquired a pistol, which is manufactured by the Myanmar Army, in a country where civilian firearm sales have been prohibited for decades. There was also speculation about how the attacker could have carried out the killing in daylight in a public place that is among the country’s most secure and that regularly hosts national and foreign dignitaries. All of which lead Mr. Ko Ni’s friends and colleagues back to his efforts to challenge the military and its powerful supporters. A canny constitutional lawyer, Mr. Ko Ni had outmaneuvered the military before. Before the military dictatorship that ruled Myanmar for nearly 50 years allowed democratic elections, it left in place a Constitution that barred anyone with a spouse or child with foreign citizenship from becoming president. That clause was aimed at one person: Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the popular Nobel laureate and leader of the National League for Democracy, whose husband, now dead, was British and whose sons are also British citizens. Mr. Ko Ni is widely credited with helping devise the strategy that allowed her to take power after her party won a landslide election in 2015. Parliament created a new position, state counselor, that would be above the president and appointed her to the job. Richard Horsey, a political analyst and former United Nations official in Yangon, called the move a legal “fudge” that may have survived because Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi’s party controlled the courts. But he said that Mr. Ko Ni was among the most knowledgeable legal minds in the National League for Democracy orbit. “There aren’t many people like that, so in that sense, he played a very important role,” Mr. Horsey said. But the party has long had another target: eliminating the special powers for the military enshrined in the Constitution, including a crucial veto. The veto is actually two parts: a quota that allocates a quarter of the seats in Parliament to the military, and the requirement of a 75 percent majority to pass a constitutional amendment. Mr. Ko Ni had proposed introducing a bill on a referendum about drafting a new constitution. The bill could be passed with a simple majority, which the National League for Democracy could easily muster. “If the military still focuses on protecting its interests, it will be impossible to change any part of the Constitution within Parliament,” he said last year, according to The Myanmar Times. “That’s why writing a new one is the best way to pursue a democratic Constitution. ” Party officials, however, have not publicly endorsed this solution, and U Win Htein, a party leader contacted this week, said the party still favored amending, rather than replacing, the Constitution. But Mr. Ko Ni was still promoting the idea, and one colleague, Mr. Thein Than Oo, said that “one of his last works” had been drafting a new Constitution. The consequences of the killing for the country will depend on what motive is ultimately established, as well as the transparency of the police investigation. But the killing has already demonstrated that the rule of law in Myanmar remains fragile, and it could further erode the National League for Democracy’s ability to govern, said Elliot Brennan, a Myanmar specialist and a research fellow at the Institute for Security and Development Policy in Stockholm. Initial expectations that the party could bring major changes to Myanmar were “far too high, and we’ve been waiting for the expectations, the red balloon, to pop,” he said. “The assassination might not be the final pinprick, but we’re getting very close. ” That the party leadership has said little about the killing has raised questions about its ability to handle the situation. Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, who has faced international criticism for recent military operations in Rakhine State against the Rohingya, a persecuted Muslim minority, has also been rebuked. The office of Myanmar’s president, U Htin Kyaw, said in a statement on Monday that the attack had been carried out to undermine the country’s stability. U Zaw Htay, a spokesman for Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, later said that the statement by the president’s office had been made on her behalf. But Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi did not attend Mr. Ko Ni’s funeral, and his daughter, Dr. Yin Nwe Khaine, said on Wednesday that, to the best of her knowledge, Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi had not sent condolences. She said she knew that her father’s work carried risks, but that he never talked about them at home. “He always said that lawyers are forever worrying, and he never wanted to pass those worries on to his family,” she said by telephone, fighting back tears. But he did train her to be strong in difficult times, she added, and this was one of them. “My father is my hero,” she said. | 1 |
I hate to see this happening to my European brothers and sisters, but the silver lining here is the rapidity of this whole vile transformation, which has awakened millions to what's going on. It's the whole "frog slowly boiling to death" thing. Here in America, our demographic annihilation has proceeded at just slow enough a pace for long enough that normies have allowed it to happen without even realizing it until now, when it's too late. The white European political resistance will be swift and formidable simply because of the cataclysmic nature of the invasion. White Americans waited too long-- our invaders are already out-voting us. | 0 |
Wed, 26 Oct 2016 23:00 UTC Authorities in North Dakota may be feeling the heat from the international attention the Dakota Access Pipeline is getting. They're now saying they lack the manpower to remove the encampment of protesters located on federal land near the controversial pipeline. The announcement may signal a softening of the treatment the protesters, up until now, have been receiving. For months now, The Free Thought Project 's spotlight has been shining on the, some might say, dark and dirty deeds of law enforcement and their treatment of largely Native American peaceful protesters. Attack dogs were unleashed on the protesters in September, injuring six, and an additional 30 protesters, including children, were sprayed with pepper spray. In all, more than 260 people have reportedly been arrested since the protests began in Morton County — over 100 this weekend alone. The sheriff's office's announcement comes just two days after The Free Thought Project encouraged readers to contact Sheriff Kyle Kirchmeier's office demanding him to allow for peaceful protest, even providing a link to a petition for his removal. Spokeswoman Donnell Preskey told The Associated Press the department doesn't "have the manpower" to remove the more than 100 protesters from the property. "We can't right now," she said. Preskey said the land belongs to a Texas-based firm, Energy Transfer Partners, and was purchased from a local rancher for an undisclosed price. According to the AP , the Native Americans claim the land is theirs by way of an, "1851 treaty and they won't leave until the pipeline is stopped." "We never ceded this land," said protester Joye Braun. "The $3.8 billion pipeline, most of which has been completed, crosses through North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa and Illinois. Opponents worry about potential effects on drinking water on the Standing Rock Sioux's reservation and farther downstream on the Missouri River, as well as destruction of cultural artifacts," writes the AP. The disputed ranch is more than 100 years old and was the first one to be inducted into the North Dakota Cowboy Hall of Fame. According to the AP: "It is within a half-mile of a larger encampment on U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' land where the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and hundreds of others have gathered in protest. Protesters do not have a federal permit to be on the corps' land, but the agency said it wouldn't evict them due to free speech reasons . Authorities have criticized that decision, saying the site has been a launching point for protests at construction sites in the area." While the announcement by the Morton County Sheriff's office may signal a change in tone and the potential for more relaxed police tactics, it remains to be seen. Late Monday, Standing Rock Sioux chairman Dave Archambault II issued the following statement, calling on the Obama Administration's U.S. Department of Justice to investigate the militant treatment of its peaceful protesters, and asked for an injunction to the pipeline's construction. Archambault wrote; The militarization of local law enforcement and enlistment of multiple law enforcements agencies from neighboring states is needlessly escalating violence and unlawful arrests against peaceful protestors at Standing Rock. We do not condone reports of illegal actions, but believe the majority of peaceful protestors are reacting to strong-arm tactics and abuses by law enforcement. Thousands of water protectors have joined the Tribe in solidarity against DAPL, without incident or serious injury. Yet, North Dakota law enforcement have proceeded with a disproportionate response to their nonviolent exercise of their First Amendment rights, even going as far as labeling them rioters and calling their every action illegal. We are disappointed to see that our state and congressional delegations and Gov. Jack Dalrymple have failed to ensure the safety and rights of the citizens engaged in peaceful protests who were arrested on Saturday. Their lack of leadership and commitment to creating a dialogue towards a peaceful solution reflects not only the unjust historical narrative against Native Americans, but a dangerous trend in law enforcement tactics across America. For these reasons, we believe the situation at Standing Rock deserves the immediate and full attention of the U.S. Department of Justice. Furthermore, the DOJ should impose an injunction to all developments at the pipeline site to keep ALL citizens - law enforcement and protestors - safe. The DOJ should be enlisted and expected to investigate the overwhelming reports and videos demonstrating clear strong-arm tactics, abuses and unlawful arrests by law enforcement. The chairman's request seems to validate many of the reports coming from the field, that peaceful protesters are being labeled as rioters and are not being treated with the dignity they feel they deserve. As The Free Thought Project reported two days ago, many of the protesters are being thrown to the ground, squashed underfoot, strip-searched, and forced to remove sacred hair braids — all considered "strong-arm tactics, abuses, and unlawful," by Archambault. | 0 |
Next Swipe left/right All of “Danny Dyer’s Football Foul Ups” DVD in 90 seconds All the highlights from “Danny Dyer’s Football Foul Ups” DVD edited together into one glorious chunk. I edited the "Danny Dyer's Football Foul Ups" DVD into one 90 second chunk. pic.twitter.com/X40YquHTt9
— #BROKEN Wil Jones (@AchinglyChic) October 27, 2016
In case you missed it, here’s all six episodes of Danny Dyer’s “The Real Football Factories” condensed into a minute. I edited the entire first season of Danny Dyer's The Real Football Factories into one 60 second chunk. pic.twitter.com/U8thmYU9CR
— #BROKEN Wil Jones (@AchinglyChic) September 29, 2016 | 0 |
A lawsuit about overtime pay for truck drivers hinged entirely on a debate that has bitterly divided friends, families and foes: The dreaded — or totally necessary — Oxford comma, perhaps the most polarizing of punctuation marks. What ensued in the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, and in a court decision handed down on Monday, was an exercise in grammar pedantry that could cost a dairy company in Portland, Me. an estimated $10 million. In 2014, three truck drivers sued Oakhurst Dairy, seeking more than four years’ worth of overtime pay that they had been denied. Maine law requires workers to be paid 1. 5 times their normal rate for each hour worked after 40 hours, but it carves out some exemptions. A quick punctuation lesson before we proceed: In a list of three or more items — like “beans, potatoes and rice” — some people would put a comma after potatoes, and some would leave it out. A lot of people feel very, very strongly about it. The debate over commas is often a pretty inconsequential one, but it was anything but for the truck drivers. Note the lack of Oxford comma — also known as the serial comma — in the following state law, which says overtime rules do not apply to: Does the law intend to exempt the distribution of the three categories that follow, or does it mean to exempt packing for the shipping or distribution of them? Delivery drivers distribute perishable foods, but they don’t pack the boxes themselves. Whether the drivers were subject to a law that had denied them thousands of dollars a year depended entirely on how the sentence was read. If there were a comma after “shipment,” it might have been clear that the law exempted the distribution of perishable foods. But the appeals court on Monday sided with the drivers, saying the absence of a comma produced enough uncertainty to rule in their favor. It reversed a lower court decision. In other words: Oxford comma defenders won this round. “That comma would have sunk our ship,” David G. Webbert, a lawyer who represented the drivers, said in an interview on Wednesday. The language in the law followed guidelines in the Maine Legislative Drafting Manual, which specifically instructs lawmakers to not use the Oxford comma. Don’t write “trailers, semitrailers, and pole trailers,” it says — instead, write “trailers, semitrailers and pole trailers. ” The manual does clarify that caution should be taken if an item in the series is modified. Commas, it notes, “are the most misused and misunderstood punctuation marks in legal drafting and, perhaps, the English language. ” “Use them thoughtfully and sparingly,” it cautions. Legal history is replete with cases in which a comma made all the difference, like a $1 million dispute between Canadian companies in 2006 or a very costly insertion of a comma in an 1872 tariff law. Varying interpretations of a comma in the Second Amendment have figured in court decisions on gun laws, including a Federal District Court overturning a Washington gun ordinance in 2007. (The Supreme Court later overturned the law in the case known as District of Columbia v. Heller.) Most American news organizations tend to leave the Oxford comma out while allowing for exceptions to avoid confusion, like in the sentence: “I’d like to thank my parents, Mother Teresa and the pope. ” Reporters, editors and producers at The New York Times usually omit the comma, but Phil Corbett, who oversees language issues for the newsroom, wrote in a 2015 blog post that exceptions are sometimes made: The Associated Press, considered the authority for most American newsrooms, also generally comes out against the Oxford comma. But the comma is common in book and academic publishing. The Chicago Manual of Style uses it, as does Oxford University Press style. “The last comma can serve to resolve ambiguity,” it says. A 2014 survey of 1, 129 Americans by FiveThirtyEight and SurveyMonkey Audience found 57 percent in favor of the comma and 43 percent opposed. Mr. Webbert, who said working on the case recalled his boyhood grammar and Latin lessons, scoffed at the idea that he was representing all those in favor of the Oxford comma. He was only representing the truck drivers, he said. The drivers, who earned between $46, 800 and $52, 000 per year without overtime, worked an average of 12 extra hours a week, Mr. Webbert said. Though three drivers filed the lawsuit in 2014, about 75 will share the money. Oakhurst, a longtime family business that was acquired by Dairy Farmers of America in 2014, employs about 200 people and has annual sales of $110 million, selling dairy products throughout New England, according to its website. Its president, John H. Bennett, said in an interview on Thursday that “our management team values our employees and we take employee compensation seriously. ” “We believe we’re in compliance with state and federal wage laws, and we’ll continue to defend ourselves in this matter,” he said. Mr. Webbert declined to take a personal position on the broader debate of using the Oxford comma. But he sounded like a lot of English teachers and writing coaches who offered an alternative suggestion: If there’s any doubt, tear up what you wrote and start over. “In this situation, it did create an ambiguity, which means you have to either add a comma or rewrite the sentence,” he said. | 1 |
The European Parliament Committee on Legal Affairs has voted favorably on a draft report which proposes giving legal personage to robots. [With seventeen votes against two, along with two abstentions, the committee agreed that “the most sophisticated autonomous robots could be established as having the status of electronic persons with specific rights and obligations, including that of making good any damage they may cause. ” The report asserts that humanity stands “on the threshold of an era” in which artificial intelligence could be responsible for a “new industrial revolution. ” It includes obligations that robots would be held to as well, which seem based on Asimov’s Three Laws of Robotics, introduced by the author in a 1942 short story. His visionary fiction is now on the road to becoming a legal reality. Luxembourg MEP Mady Delvaux has further proposed a “kill switch,” a mechanism by which humans could deactivate any artificially intelligent entity that operates outside of the laws established. Different levels of accountability would be assigned robots based on their level of sophistication, with increased levels of personal responsibility commensurate with the complexity of the synthetic being in question. Despite offering a semblance of humane treatment to robots, the draft report also proposes very stringent boundaries on their design. It clearly draws a line in the sand, where “a robot is not a human and will never be human. A robot can show empathy but it cannot feel empathy. ” Furthermore, it declares that no robot should ever appear to be “emotionally dependent. ” Robots should never be allowed to seem overtly human, or “that he loves you or he is sad. ” Delvaux addressed the need to solve the complicated problems arising from daily interaction with complex AI in a brief interview. Among those issues are things as obvious as safety and privacy, but as nuanced as “informed consent. ” The rise of artificial life will very likely be humanity’s first interaction with intelligent entities. Despite being of our own creation, there is a distinct possibility that they could outstrip us both mentally and physically. It’s heartening to see such concepts addressed with the gravity they’re owed, even if such rules are somehow never necessary. The draft report and its revolutionary proposals are now on their way to the house, which will vote on it in February. Follow Nate Church @Get2Church on Twitter for the latest news in gaming and technology, and snarky opinions on both. | 1 |
HOUSTON — Twenty years ago, as Rex W. Tillerson was rising through the ranks at Exxon, he was charged with negotiating with the government of Yemen to build a natural gas export plant. The talks got bogged down over Yemen’s insistence that it have veto power over important business decisions. Mr. Tillerson, at one point, flew into a rage, throwing a book across the room and storming out, perhaps for dramatic effect. Yemeni negotiators and other representatives of other oil companies partnering with Exxon in the international consortium looked on in bewilderment. In the end, Yemen got at least some of its demands. But that kind of determination to bend others’ wills could be exactly what Donald J. Trump is looking for in a secretary of state. It is also the kind of unconventionality that could open up Mr. Tillerson to closer scrutiny in Senate confirmation hearings, particularly when it comes to his close relations with Russia. “He’s much more than a business executive,” Mr. Trump said of Mr. Tillerson in an interview with Fox News on Sunday, without confirming that Mr. Tillerson would be the ultimate choice. “He’s a player. ” To make a fresh start with Russia, as Mr. Trump promised during the campaign, there may not be a better envoy than Mr. Tillerson, 64, who has made a career at Exxon — and Exxon Mobil since the 1999 merger — by drilling more fossil fuels out of Russian soil and has even been decorated for his friendship with the country. The United States and Russia are quarreling these days in ways rarely seen since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Ukraine and Syria are just two of several hot spots where the countries have clashing interests, and United States intelligence has concluded that Russia covertly tried to undercut the very essence of American democracy by hacking computers and selectively leaking information to hurt Hillary Clinton and promote Mr. Trump’s presidential campaign. Mr. Tillerson’s clever maneuvering in Russia at a time of growing tensions with the West was amply shown in 2014, shortly after the United States and its allies applied sanctions on Russia for meddling in Ukraine. President Obama asked American business leaders not to attend a major business forum in Russia that May, and Mr. Tillerson obeyed the president’s wishes. But Mr. Tillerson, Exxon Mobil’s chief executive, still found a way to get a seat at the table. He sent his company’s top exploration official in his place. The official, Neil W. Duffin, signed an agreement to promote more business with Rosneft to expand joint drilling in the Arctic Ocean, develop shale fields with new technologies and cooperate on a gas export plant in Siberia. Tougher sanctions eventually froze the growth of Exxon’s activities in Russia, but Mr. Tillerson had once again proved his commitment to doing business with the country’s president, Vladimir V. Putin. “Tillerson will be a credible and effective messenger for a U. S. reset because he is not a member of the foreign policy establishment but also because his history embodies the investment potential Russia could enjoy with a better relationship with the United States,” said David L. Goldwyn, who was the State Department’s top energy diplomat during the first Obama administration. Of Mr. Trump, Mr. Goldwyn said: “He has definitely decided to do a reverse Nixon and side with Russia against China. He thinks we probably can make common cause with Russia in Syria but also in Libya, and he doesn’t have a problem supporting strongmen. ” Russia may be Mr. Tillerson’s strength, but it could also ultimately be his Achilles’ heel. The Russian government gave him the country’s Order of Friendship decoration in 2012, an award that could now well be an embarrassment. Senator Marco Rubio, Republican of Florida, said on Twitter on Sunday, “Being a ‘friend of Vladimir’ is not an attribute I am hoping for from a Secretary of State. ” Mr. Tillerson has opposed sanctions on Russia, which are the single greatest obstacle to foreign investment in that country. Russia has two enormous areas for new oil development, in the Barents Sea and the Bazhenov shale field in western Siberia, that are essentially closed to development because of a lack of foreign capital and expertise. Exxon was poised to invest in both areas before the sanctions. Exxon operates in about 50 foreign countries, and Mr. Tillerson has relationships far and wide. Energy experts say he is particularly well versed in the affairs of Angola, Argentina, Canada, Mexico, Nigeria and Qatar. “My impression is he is a corporate diplomat,” said Chase Untermeyer, who was United States ambassador to Qatar in the George W. Bush administration. “In my day in Qatar, he would come and go for meetings with the most senior leadership of the country. ” But environmentalists and human rights groups have already reacted to the likely appointment with alarm, saying Mr. Tillerson would send the wrong message on the United States’ commitment to curbing climate change because he has spent his entire professional career at a company. Also likely to come up at confirmation hearings would be Mr. Tillerson’s potential interest in seeing Exxon succeed in Russia and elsewhere in the future. According to company filings this year, Mr. Tillerson owned $218 million in company stock, and his pension plan was worth nearly $70 million. Raymond C. Offenheiser, president of Oxfam America, an antipoverty organization, said his group questioned how Mr. Tillerson would “balance the pressure to transact deals against his larger responsibility to strengthen the rules and institutions that protect economic hope and fundamental human rights for so many on the planet. ” Mr. Offenheiser added, “Under Tillerson’s leadership, Exxon has continued to work to undermine climate science. ” Mr. Tillerson is not always easy to define. Deeply conservative and committed to the Boy Scouts of America, he quietly pushed the organization to be open to gay rights. But under his leadership, Exxon was slow to adopt explicit policies protecting gay employees from discrimination. Although reputed to be a decisive leader with a long view, he appeared slow to grasp the full potential of the United States’ shale gas revolution. Exxon executives, speaking confidentially because they were not authorized to discuss the potential nomination, argued that Mr. Tillerson had pushed for more research on advanced biofuels, carbon capture and sequestration, and carbon taxes to reduce greenhouse emissions. Mr. Tillerson has also moved the company toward acknowledging climate change as a serious problem, although he has strongly defended the company amid investigations by several state attorneys general into allegations that the company took public positions skeptical of climate change when its own scientists were warning of the risks of burning fossil fuels. Meanwhile, Mr. Tillerson’s opposition to sanctions for Russia made sense given Exxon’s interests there, supporters say. Exxon has been active in Russia for decades, and it has various joint ventures with Rosneft inside and outside Russia. Western sanctions against Russia have hurt the company, costing it as much as a billion dollars by some estimates. The company is unable to collect revenue from an investment in an oil and gas consortium that operates off Sakhalin Island or develop other unconventional projects, like Arctic offshore and shale drilling. Mr. Tillerson’s strong suit could be his knack for getting his way in negotiations. He can be expected to encourage the permitting of the Keystone XL pipeline, which would deliver more oil from the Canadian oil sands to American refineries. Having just successfully bid for a deepwater drilling block off the coast of Mexico, and understanding the importance of Mexico as a growing natural gas export market, he can also be expected to try to smooth relations with Mexico City. Some energy experts say Mr. Tillerson could encourage Mr. Trump to support the international climate accord negotiated in Paris last December, but with added emphasis on the benefits of natural gas and ways to bury carbon waste. Mr. Tillerson, said Paul Bledsoe, a former climate change adviser in the Clinton administration, “might bring Trump equal measures of new pressure and political cover to engage on international climate change issues. ” | 1 |
NTEB Ads Privacy Policy NOT OVER: FBI To Conduct New Investigation Of Emails From Clinton’s Private Illegal Server In a letter to congressional leaders, Comey said that the FBI had, in connection with an “unrelated case,” recently “learned of the existence of emails that appear to be pertinent to the Clinton investigation.” by Geoffrey Grider October 28, 2016 The FBI will investigate whether additional classified material is contained in emails sent using Hillary Clinton’s private email server while she was secretary of state, FBI Director James Comey informed congressional leaders Friday.
EDITOR’S NOTE: It’s a sad, sad, day in America when the first and only woman from one of our two political parties to run for president is being investigated by the FBI for leaking classified information through her private and illegal email server. Crooked Hillary has bragged about “making history” and she’s right, this is truly an historic event, albeit one that belongs in the Hall of Shame.
The announcement appears to restart the FBI’s probe of Clinton’s server, less than two weeks before the presidential election, an explosive development that could shape the campaign’s final days. MSNBC: FBI re-opening investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server Donald Trump announces FBI reopening Hillary Clinton case:
In a letter to congressional leaders , Comey said that the FBI had, in connection with an “unrelated case,” recently “learned of the existence of emails that appear to be pertinent to the Clinton investigation.” Breaking news: FBI reopening Hillary email case
Comey indicated that he had been briefed on the new material yesterday. “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 wrote. CNN: Clinton team ‘stunned’ by FBI re-opening email investigation, didn’t know until plane landed
T he FBI had previously closed its investigation in July with no charges, though Comey had concluded there had been classified content exchanged on the server and that Clinton had been “extremely careless.” 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 | 0 |
Published on Oct 29, 2016 Hearts and Mines: The US Empire’s Culture Industry From Katy Perry training alongside US Marines in a music video, to the global box-office mastery of the US military-supported Transformers franchise, it’s clear that the US national security state is a dominant force in global media culture. How and why is this so? This book covers the production, profit and power of US Empire’s culture industry — a nexus between the US state and globalizing media firms and the source of entertainments that promote US Empire as a way of life around the world. With: * Tanner Mirrlees, Assistant Professor of Communication and Digital Media Studies, University of Ontario Institute of Technology, and * Scott Forsyth, Associate Professor of Cinema and Media Arts, York University. The launch was co-sponsored by the Centre for Social Justice, the Global Labour Research Centre, the Socialist Project, and Union for Democratic Communication. Recorded in Toronto, 20 October 2016. NOTE: ALL IMAGE CAPTIONS, PULL QUOTES AND COMMENTARY BY THE EDITORS, NOT THE AUTHORS PLEASE COMMENT AND DEBATE DIRECTLY ON OUR FACEBOOK GROUP CLICK HERE 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]
We apologize for this inconvenience.
What will it take to bring America to live according to its own propaganda? =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. | 0 |
WikiLeaks Destroys Hillary Mouthpiece Donna Brazile… Iron-Clad Proof
“I am sick and tired of people like you using that language. That is inflammatory, that is not true,” Gingrich said during the interview. “When you use those words, you take a position, and it is very unfair of you to do that, Megyn.”
“I think your defensiveness on this may speak volumes, sir,” Kelly told Gingrich. “If Mr. Trump is a sexual predator, then it is a big story. And what we saw on that tape was Trump saying himself he likes to grab women by their genitals and kiss them against their will. That’s what we saw. And then we saw 10 women come forward after he denied actually doing it.”
“You are fascinated with sex and you don’t care about public policy,” Gingrich countered. Advertisement - story continues below
You can watch the interview here:
Now, it seems the chickens from that encounter might be coming home to roost.
“Mr. Murdoch said in an interview that she is important to the network and he hopes to get a contract signed ‘very soon,’ but noted, ‘it’s up to her,’” The Wall Street Journal reported. Advertisement - story continues below | 0 |
Russian scientists will track sea lions from space 28 October 2016 TASS The researchers succeeded in installing five GPS tags on two full-grown sea lionesses. Facebook science , research , russia
Researchers at the Kamchatka branch of the Pacific Institute of Geography of Russia’s Science Academy’s Far East Department now have the opportunity to monitor Steller sea lions that are on Russia’s Red List of Threatened Species, from space, the Komandorsky Nature Reserve’s Spokesman Alexei Veledinsky told TASS on Friday. The researchers succeeded in installing five GPS tags on two full-grown sea lionesses and three cubs on the national park’s territory.
"It was not an easy task as these animals are very timid. They had to be knocked out using tranquillizers so that they could be tagged," Veledinsky said.
However, right after the animals woke up, scientists started receiving the data on their movement. In one case, a few days after being tagged, a sea lionesses and her cub travelled several hundred kilometers from the Commander Islands through the Pacific Ocean to Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula. All of the sea lions’ movements are depicted on a map via a computer program.
"Researchers will be able to follow the sea lions for approximately one year. The tags placed on the animals’ heads will fall off when they begin to shed their fur. That said, the tags are glued to their fur with a specific paste," Veledinsky explained.
One of the main goals of this research is to garner scientific data on the winter habitats of the sea lions populating the Commander Islands as their number has been falling. In the 1960s and 1970s up to 12,000 sea lions used to spend the winter on the islands, while in summer there were 2,000 to 5,000 animals there. Now there are no more than 600 sea lions. The new data will enable the creation of more safe conditions in the sea lions’ rookeries. There are four rookeries where sea lionesses bear cubs on the Commander Islands, which is encompassed by the national park. Besides that, there are also three rookeries where cubs are not born.
The Komandorsky Nature Reserve, founded in 1993, is the largest marine sanctuary in Russia with a territory of more than 3 mln hectares.
First published by TASS . | 0 |
By Seizing the Definition of ‘Populism,’ Reuters Warns Us of Chaos to Come By Daily Bell Staff - November 10, 2016
After Trump & Brexit, populist tsunami threatens European mainstream … Back in May, when Donald’s Trump’s victory in the U.S. presidential election seemed the remotest of possibilities, a senior European official took to Twitter before a G7 summit in Tokyo to warn of a “horror scenario”. Imagine, mused the official, if instead of Barack Obama, Francois Hollande, David Cameron and Matteo Renzi, next year’s meeting of the club of rich nations included Trump, Marine Le Pen, Boris Johnson and Beppe Grillo. -Reuters
Back in June, we identified what has become an overarching elite meme: “populism versus globalism.”
We’ve never fully defined populism, and this Reuters article gives us an opportunity to examine the word and the context in which it is being used.
With Trump’s triumph over his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, the populist tsunami that seemed outlandish a few months ago is becoming reality, and the consequences for Europe’s own political landscape are potentially huge.
In 2017, voters in the Netherlands, France and Germany – and possibly in Italy and Britain too – will vote in elections that could be colored by the triumphs of Trump and Brexit, and the toxic politics that drove those campaigns.
The lessons will not be lost on continental Europe’s populist parties, who hailed Trump’s victory on Wednesday as a body blow for the political mainstream. “Politics will never be the same,” said Geert Wilders of the far-right Dutch Freedom Party. “What happened in America can happen in Europe and the Netherlands as well.”
We can see from these excerpts that “populism” is not seen by Reuters as positive description. In fact, the synonym in the above excerpt is “toxic.”
“Populism” is contrasted to the “political mainstream” as well. This informs us that populism is irregular, even aberrant. We are living through unusual times and populism is the result.
Watching the “populism versus globalism” meme advance is fascinating because it is such a significant positioning of propaganda.
We can see clearly that in many ways mainstream media around the world is not at all hesitant to reveal the basic organizational structure behind it.
There is no way that populism – and, contrastingly, globalism – would appear ubiquitously in so many arenas without considerable unity among supposedly disparate media.
In other words, the organization behind this is formidable. It’s not just this one example either that provokes our observations. The powers-that-be were not shy about illustrating the essential linkages between publications during Trump’s election.
The mainstream sounded as one when it came to Trump. And top-down control was obviously evident, and commented on as well.
The emergence of “populism versus globalism” doesn’t just provide us with evidence of editorial control. Even more importantly it shows us how those who secretly run our societies find this sort of meme-making to be a priority because it anticipates trends and reinterprets them.
By beginning to disseminate the meme in the summer, elite media shapers were able to position fall’s narrative – Trump’s win in particular – within the larger context they’d already defined.
We would suggest that the wave of “populism” sweeping over the US and Europe is at heart a resurgence of a yearning for freedom that is obviously slipping away – not that there was much of it to begin with.
But the Internet has raised people’s consciousness about what they are losing, and why. As a result, more than ever, people are coming to understand the globalist narrative and are registering their disgust.
But this is NOT going to be how the mainstream media interprets what is going on. We can already see that people’s determination to shake off political, monetary and military control is going to be interpreted as essentially greedy and selfish.
We could see this interpretation emerge within the context of Trump’s increasing appeal. Over and over we were told that his support was “rural” and “white” – and that these individuals were flocking to Trump because they were feeling “left out” of the current prosperity and thus resentful.
Of course, one can interpret this trend much differently. Our perspective is that globalism is at fault here. Initiated and expanded by a tiny group of banking interests, globalism seeks to consolidate worldwide power with a tiny group of massive corporations, governments and technocratic leaders.
No wonder why so many people in the West feel left out. This vision provides them no room to grow or prosper. In fact they are not – but their emotion at what’s occurring is perfectly reasonable and logical. We wouldn’t characterize it as resentment so much as rightful anger and frustration.
But Reuters and the other mainstream media have gotten here first and are busily redefining what’s taking place.
We’ve pointed out that the mainstream may be actively enhancing the meme now that they have gotten control of it.
The idea is to marry this emergent propaganda with “directed history” and create a series of economic and political disasters that can be directly (if illegitimately) linked to “populism.”
As populism is denigrated, globalism, in our view, will be uplifted. We’ll be subject to considerable contrasts between “toxic” populism and erudite – “mainstream” – globalism.
We’ve already indicated that we believe this meme is a cultivated one. We don’t believe that the sudden emergence of populism throughout the West is simply coincidental or even evolutionary.
We think this meme is being deliberately cultivated and that it is part of a larger Hegelian dialectic that is intended to reinforce globalism in the long-term. You can see some additional speculation here.
Here at DB we analyze elite memes, their significance and impact. It’s clear to us that the mainstream media is “out front” when it comes to defining “populism” and that there are forces urging it on.
The conclusion of the meme will probably involve a series of catastrophes that will further cultivate and expand globalism. It’s happened before, especially after the 20 th century’s world wars. There is no real reason to think the playbook has been significantly adjusted.
Conclusion: This meme is not only of the utmost importance, it is clearly warning us of considerable distress to come. | 0 |
ABOARD WAVERTREE IN KILL VAN KULL — In the 131 years since the cargo ship Wavertree was built, it has been tossed and tattered — its main mast ripped away in a hurricane, and its role demoted to sand barge. So when the vessel sailed from the South Street Seaport to Staten Island last year for a restoration, the crew feared that the extensive damage would draw out repairs and delay the ship’s return to its Manhattan berth. They should have known better. Wavertree, which has endured no shortage of natural and economic calamity, turned out to be more resilient than anyone anticipated. In September, after more than a year away, it is set to return to the South Street Seaport Museum, mended, gleaming and ready to remind visitors of the ships that define New York City’s history. The $13 million undertaking has progressed ahead of schedule, hastening the goal of once again sailing Wavertree through New York Harbor. “We were pleasantly surprised,” Jonathan Boulware, the executive director of the seaport museum, said. “It’s a real testament to the era’s wrought iron. ” When it was commissioned in Southampton, England, by R. W. Leyland Company of Liverpool, Wavertree was among the last sailing ships fashioned from wrought iron and it remains the largest afloat, according to the museum. Last May, workers brought it by tugboat to the Caddell Dry Dock and Repair Company in the Richmond Terrace section of Staten Island and expected to replace 10 large metal plates on the hull. Instead, the 4 slabs of iron, which sit below the water line, needed only minor repairs. Wavertree has nonetheless required an ambitious overhaul, carried out by a crew of up to three dozen. The ship spent five months in dry dock, where workers scrubbed away barnacles, seaweed and other gunk before adding layers of protective paint to its underside. The team has also been replacing three decks. The wood that once covered the main deck has been exchanged for steel to keep out water. The poop deck is being repaired traditionally, using wooden planks caulked with cotton and oakum then sealed with pitch. And Wavertree once again has its ’tween deck, a modest level between the main deck and the cargo hold that had been absent for decades. The most daunting task, workers said, has been the renovation of the ship’s three masts and their rigging. For that, Caddell built a pair of sheds outfitted with both and highly modern tools. Inside one, the crew is building 16 spars from laminated timber. The other has held more than three miles of wire, which was stripped of its old protective coating and wrapped in a new layer of pine and leather. Though the crew did not expect to fully rig the ship by September, time and money saved on the hull plates accelerated the schedule. “I marvel at how effectively and efficiently we’ve been able to conduct the restoration,” Mr. Boulware said. Although its immense iron frame and masts give Wavertree a distinguished profile today, it was a relatively common model when it was built by Oswald Mordaunt Company in 1885. A plaque identifies the Wavertree as the company’s hull No. 231. Mr. Boulware noted that stringers, which fortify the hull, on the ship’s port side dip below those on its starboard — one of several imperfections in the construction. The cramped quarters once held bunk beds stacked tightly to accommodate a crew of 35 men in the ship’s heyday. Over the years, Wavertree circumnavigated the globe nearly 30 times, ferrying sundry cargo — coal, kerosene, jute, cotton, tea, coffee, molasses, timber. On Jan. 14, 1895, it called on the Port of New York, bearing a load of nitrate from Chile. In 1910, a violent storm off Cape Horn splintered Wavertree’s masts, ending its days. Its owners sold the ship to Chilean businessmen, who used it as a warehouse for 30 years. It transferred hands again in 1947, beginning a career as a sand barge in Buenos Aires. Wavertree was acquired by the museum in 1968. The ship’s homecoming was made possible in part by the impending departure of Peking, another sailing ship, which has graced the seaport since 1974. Peking, too, has been battered — by war, by waves and by weather. It suffered through plummeting tourism in Lower Manhattan after the Sept. 11 attacks, and the devastation of Hurricane Sandy in 2012. Faced with mounting financial difficulties, the museum considered dispensing with the barque, which was built in Hamburg, Germany, in 1911. However, salvation came from the German government, which is spending 30 million euros (about $33 million) to bring Peking home, carried across the Atlantic Ocean on the back of a ship. “I’ll be sad to see her go, but it’s what’s best for everyone,” Mr. Boulware, said. “It’s about resource allocation. ” Funding for Wavertree’s restoration has come from the City Council, the office of the Manhattan borough president and the city’s Cultural Affairs Department. “Wavertree is an incredible object with a direct connection to the site that really gives the area an authentic sense of its past,” Tom Finkelpearl, the department’s commissioner, said. The Wavertree project was also helped by a $4. 8 million grant given to the museum in March by the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation. The money will go toward improving safety and accessibility at the museum, and adding an education center, Mr. Boulware said. “The port is what built the city and what continues to build it today,” Mr. Boulware said, showing off the museum’s first new exhibition since 2012, “Street of Ships: The Port and Its People. ” It plumbed the museum’s collections to tell the history of the Port of New York, once the fulcrum of world shipping. That exhibition will be complete, Mr. Boulware said, when Wavertree assumes its place again in the museum’s marina. | 1 |
WASHINGTON — Donald J. Trump filled two but influential White House staff jobs on Friday, while his candidate for secretary of housing and urban development, Ben Carson, continued to deliberate about whether to join the administration. Mr. Trump offered the housing job this week to Mr. Carson, a neurosurgeon who challenged him for the Republican presidential nomination. But despite expectations of a Friday announcement, Mr. Carson was “still pondering,” said a friend, Armstrong Williams. The ’s aides said Mr. Trump did not plan any more announcements until next week. For the politically sensitive post of White House counsel, Mr. Trump chose Donald F. McGahn II, a Washington election lawyer who pushed to deregulate campaign finance and election laws. The counsel’s job may be even more daunting than it was in previous administrations, given Mr. Trump’s business empire, with which he shows no inclination toward severing ties. For the equally critical job of deputy national security adviser, Mr. Trump chose K. T. McFarland, an aide in three Republican White Houses and a Fox News commentator. She has been highly critical of President Obama’s approach to combating terrorism — a view that aligns her with Mr. Trump’s choice for national security adviser, Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn. In rolling out the appointments, the Trump transition team lined up testimonials from big names in both parties. Former Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, regarded as a foreign policy hawk, praised Ms. McFarland, 65, as “one of our country’s most experienced, informed and wise foreign policy and national security experts. ” Mr. Lieberman, a Connecticut Democrat turned independent, was a Yale College and law school classmate of Ms. McFarland’s husband, Alan R. McFarland, a investment banker. Edwin Meese III, an attorney general under President Ronald Reagan, said Mr. McGahn, who was the general counsel for the Trump campaign, had “dealt ably with the intersection between politics, government ethics and the rule of law. ” C. Boyden Gray, a White House counsel to the elder President George Bush, said Mr. McGahn was well suited to the job because of his “serious prior relationship with the president” and his “working knowledge of government ethics and election law. ” A brash, conservative born in Atlantic City, Mr. McGahn learned the fine points of election law from a longtime Republican expert in the field, Benjamin L. Ginsberg. At the Federal Election Commission, where he served five years, including terms as chairman and vice chairman, Mr. McGahn was a powerful voice of opposition to what he often saw as intrusive government meddling in elections. He also spent nearly a decade as the general counsel to the National Republican Congressional Committee. Ms. McFarland’s national security experience dates to the Nixon administration, when she was an aide to Henry A. Kissinger. She was a staff member on the Senate Armed Services Committee, a speechwriter for Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger, and the principal deputy assistant secretary of defense for public affairs. She is a familiar presence on Fox News, where she has harshly criticized Mr. Obama over his handling of the Islamic State. “The president has stuck his head in the sand,” she said in September 2014 after the group had kidnapped and executed two American journalists. “To me, it’s a dereliction of duty,” she added. “What was this president doing? Well, he was playing a lot of golf this summer, but he clearly was not attending to the defense of the United States. ” In 2006, Ms. McFarland mounted a bid for the Republican nomination for the Senate in New York. The mayor of Yonkers, John Spencer, defeated her and went on to lose to the Democratic incumbent, Hillary Clinton. During the campaign, Ms. McFarland came under scrutiny for gilding her résumé — claiming, for example, that she had been the woman in the Pentagon when, in fact, two other women outranked her. The deputy national security adviser has one of the most demanding jobs in the West Wing, coordinating meetings of deputies and principals to formulate policies and organizing the vast flow of paperwork from the agencies to the White House. “That job is the ultimate policy and job,” said Peter D. Feaver, who served in the National Security Council under President George W. Bush. “It is all about reviewing policies, framing disagreements and teeing up decisions. It is supposed to be the place where bad ideas die, and so places a premium on analytical insight. ” “Her early work in the Reagan administration is more important than her recent work on TV,” he said of Ms. McFarland. As Mr. Trumps fills key staff positions, some of his cabinet decisions have become complicated. The search for a secretary of state has bogged down as rival factions argue for Rudolph W. Giuliani, the former New York mayor and a Trump loyalist, and Mitt Romney, the former Republican presidential nominee, who stridently opposed Mr. Trump during the campaign. Among those raising questions about Mr. Giuliani is Vice Mike Pence, according to people in the Trump transition who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive internal matters. Mr. Pence, they said, has favored Mr. Romney in internal discussions. Reince Priebus, whom Mr. Trump named as chief of staff, has said positive things about Mr. Romney but has been more circumspect, and has tried to offer perspective to Mr. Trump on both men. But other people, including Kellyanne Conway, who managed the campaign, have raised questions about Mr. Romney’s loyalty after he became one of the most vocal critics of Mr. Trump’s candidacy. Mr. Trump has remarked to people that he was surprised by the intense resistance to Mr. Romney. Mr. Romney and Mr. Trump spoke again in recent days, according to people briefed on the deliberations, and plan to speak again early next week. But some of Mr. Romney’s allies, who have no interest in seeing him apologize for criticizing Mr. Trump during the campaign, say privately that his chances of being chosen are dimming. With Mr. Carson, the delay appears to be less about fissures within the Trump camp than within Mr. Carson himself. “He’s still pondering, believe it or not,” Mr. Williams, his friend, said on Friday. “Dr. Carson is very methodical, just like he’s going through a surgery, planning every aspect. ” Mr. Carson endorsed Mr. Trump after ending his own campaign. But he has appeared conflicted about joining the administration. Last week, Mr. Williams was quoted as saying his friend was reluctant to take a job for which he had no experience and that “could cripple the presidency. ” Mr. Carson, however, then took to Facebook, where he has built much of his political following, to say his reasons for declining a cabinet job had been misreported. He was on Facebook again on Wednesday, explaining his change of heart. “After serious discussions with the Trump transition team,” Mr. Carson wrote, “I feel that I can make a significant contribution particularly to making our inner cities great for everyone. ” | 1 |
As the snow falls, Times reporters hit neighborhoods and airports from Washington to Boston. Here are some of the stories they found. Snow may have been in the forecast for the Jersey Shore on Tuesday morning but something else ended up coming down in buckets: sarcasm. “What storm?” said Billy Pisano, a painter, who said he “fought the lines for bread and milk” Monday night and canceled his Tuesday job only to wake up to no snow. “I guess I’m going to stay home in the rain,” he said. “I think it’s going to be a Netflix day. ” At a Wawa convenience store in Neptune, people stopped for coffee, cigarettes and griping. George Martin, 50, had strapped a snowplow to his sport utility vehicle and planned to spend the day using it to scrape up a few dollars. He expected seven inches. His spirits sank when he woke up extra early and looked outside. “Like, oh man, come on, they did it again,” he said. “It’s like having a firecracker and you throw it and it’s a dud. ” He added, “There’s nothing to plow. You can’t charge people for something that’s not there. ” Al Clark, 38, and Stephen Vierschilling, 26, at a shop that paints fire engines, shared jokes about weather forecasters. “The last few storms they said it was going to be Armageddon and it wasn’t,” Mr. Clark said. Soo Becchina, a special education teacher from Oceanside on Long Island, tutors students after school four days a week. Because of the storm, she had to cancel sessions with her students. The missed day means missed wages. “Tutoring is a side business for me,” Ms. Becchina said. “But, more important it always upsets me when I cannot give my kids what they need. One of the girls I see is having a math test tomorrow. I am hoping that the teacher doesn’t give the test but, I know this teacher and she normally doesn’t move test dates. ” Despite losing the day and the money, Ms. Becchina still plans on doing a phone session with her student later in the day, at no charge. — NATE SCHWEBER and RUTH BASHINSKY Cancellation notices covered the international flight board at Terminal 4 at Kennedy Airport in Queens on Tuesday morning. But one flight, from Guangzhou, China, had landed shortly before 5 a. m. David Dubois, an engineer and aviation enthusiast from Hudson, N. H. was among the passengers. He said he was impressed with the plane’s landing, despite the snowy conditions. “The pilot really had a difficult time and pulled it off really well,” Mr. Dubois said. “There was no tarmac it was all snow. When he landed, you could just feel it starting to go sideways. He pulled it straight — no bounce, no nothing. I couldn’t believe it. ” But Mr. Dubois still had to get to New England. Kamari Simon, 18, was in a similar bind in Terminal 5. Mr. Simon, a D. J. said he was scheduled to perform with a rapper named Smooky Margiela at the South by Southwest Festival in Austin, Texas. “I hope everything goes through and I’ll be down in Austin,” said Mr. Simon, who studies music at Five Towns College in Dix Hills, on Long Island. “It’s an opportunity for me to meet other artists and network. ” — SEAN PICCOLI Tuesday’s storm shuttered schools along the Eastern Seaboard, keeping students out of the classroom. But, even though school was closed, elementary students in Petersham, Mass. a town of 1, 200 in the central part of the state, did not exactly have a snow day. Instead, they had homework — books, activities, worksheets and even a science experiment — intended to allow them to make up the day of school without being there, and, thus, to prevent the school from having to add a day at the end of the year. The idea emerged after the winter of 2015, when the district had 10 snow days. Tari Thomas, the superintendent of schools for a consolidated school district that includes Petersham, said the district experimented with sending older students home with online coursework to complete on laptops (although that was not the case on Tuesday, because the students had already used up the five days of online learning they were allowed for the year). “There have been a small pocket of parents that have said, ‘Why can’t kids be kids and have a snow day? ’” said Ms. Thomas. But, Ms. Thomas added, “We’ve had parents say, ‘Oh my gosh, thank goodness you gave them something to do. ’” In Central Park in Manhattan, it was a different story. It was a true snow day with schools canceled. Aliana Lambert, 6, dragged her purple sled to a hill. There was no written rule banning girls from the hill at 100th Street and Central Park West, but at 2 p. m. Aliana was the only girl standing. Kat Vlasica, Aliana’s mother, said they came to their neighborhood hill for every snowstorm. “When you’re in New York with 800 square feet, you have to take advantage of a hill like this,” she said. “This is our hill, and we don’t even have to salt or scrape it. ” — JESS BIDGOOD and EMILY PALMER Navigating New York City streets was a challenge, what with snow and sleet and gusting wind and patches of ice. Drivers on Staten Island confronted another obstacle: a pair of runaway ponies. Terence Monahan, the chief of patrol, said the two ponies escaped from a stable. An police officer driving his truck saw them walking down Hylan Boulevard on the South Shore. The officer stopped and grabbed a tow strap from inside his truck. “He grabbed them, tied them to a lamp post. We got a radio car there and we were able to return them back to the stables,” he said. “They’re safe, they’re in great shape. ” The mayor, for his part, thanked the “cowboy officer. ” — ASHLEY SOUTHALL WASHINGTON — Washington is finally getting the snow day it thought this winter had forgotten — well, kind of. Never mind that only an inch or two of snow, sleet and freezing rain fell across the city and nearby swaths of Virginia and Maryland overnight. Or that public transportation and the federal government, the region’s largest employer, were open for business. As layers of snow and sleet buried crocuses and wilted Washington’s early cherry blossoms, the roads were unplowed and mostly empty at dawn on Tuesday. Business owners who decided to open anyway shoveled front walks only to see them recoated in slippery slush. Even lawmakers in the House of Representatives, who are racing to move major health care legislation forward this week, elected to give themselves something of a snow day on Tuesday. Citing the rash of canceled flights across the country, they postponed all votes until Wednesday. Inside the Oval Office, President Trump hosted Mohammed bin Salman, Saudi Arabia’s deputy crown prince, for lunch and a . Outside, the daily steady shuffle of tourists posed for pictures. David and Michelle Wilding of Dallas were among them, accompanied by their daughters, Hope and Grace. They had imagined something of a greener spring getaway. So snow? “It’s wonderful,” Mr. Wilding said, especially after a winter at home that did not send its usual dose. — NICHOLAS FANDOS The snowstorm threw a wrench into Town Meeting Day, a pillar of the local democratic process in New Hampshire. With the jury out on what, exactly, elections officials were allowed to do, some town moderators postponed the votes that make up the backbone of governance here. Others let them go ahead, and voters navigated wind and snow to make it to the polls. “We had to instruct our voter clerks to tell the voters, please don’t drip on the ballots,” said Wayne Colby, the town moderator in Henniker, N. H. west of Concord. “I grew up in New Hampshire,” Mr. Colby said, adding, “We don’t have snow days for elections. ” The town meeting, where voters hash out the budget or other issues related to fire and police departments, is older than the state itself. It is also a day of voting for local offices, ordinance changes or bonds. When it became clear that the day would collide with a major winter storm, some town moderators wondered if they could postpone their votes and meetings. The answer from the governor? It’s not clear, but please don’t. “Given that there are differing opinions, the best we can do is strongly recommend that all towns stay open for voting tomorrow,” said Gov. Chris Sununu, a Republican. The issue has become the latest disruption in a state that is reeling over accusations of widespread voter fraud by President Trump, and comes on the heels of a number of proposals by Republicans to tighten voting rules. — JESS BIDGOOD | 1 |
SEOUL, South Korea — Samsung on Saturday urged consumers worldwide to stop using Galaxy Note 7 smartphones immediately and exchange them as soon as possible, as more reports of the phones catching fire emerged even after a global recall by the company. The call from the South Korean company, the world’s largest maker of smartphones, came after the United States authorities urged users to switch the Galaxy Note 7 off and not to use or charge it during flights. Several airlines around the world asked travelers not to switch on the smartphone or put it in checked baggage, and some carriers banned the phone on flights. In a statement posted on Saturday on its website, Samsung asked users around the world to “immediately” return their existing Galaxy Note 7 and get a replacement. “We are asking users to power down their Galaxy Note 7s and exchange them as soon as possible,” said Koh the president of mobile communication for Samsung. “We are expediting replacement devices so that they can be provided through the exchange program as conveniently as possible. ” Consumers can visit Samsung’s service centers to receive rental phones for temporary use. Samsung plans to provide Galaxy Note 7 devices with new batteries in South Korea starting Sept. 19, but dates for other countries vary. This month, Samsung announced an unprecedented recall of 2. 5 million Galaxy Note 7s worldwide, just two weeks after the phone was released. That move came after Samsung’s investigation into reports of fires found that rechargeable lithium batteries manufactured by one of its suppliers were at fault. The United States was among the first countries to take action after the recall. Late on Friday, the Consumer Product Safety Commission urged people to turn the phones off and leave them off. It also said it was working with Samsung and hoped to announce an official recall “as soon as possible. ” The recall by the safety commission will allow the United States Federal Aviation Administration to bar passengers from carrying the phones on planes. The F. A. A. warned airline passengers on Thursday not to turn on or charge the Galaxy Note 7 during flights and not to put the smartphone in their checked bags. Scandinavian Airlines said Saturday that it had prohibited passengers from using the Galaxy Note 7 on its flights because of concerns about fires. Singapore Airlines has also banned the use or charging of the device during flights. Samsung said it had confirmed 35 cases of the Galaxy Note 7 catching fire as of Sept. 1, most of which occurred while the battery was charging. There are at least two more cases that Samsung said it was aware of — one at a hotel in Perth, Australia, and another in St. Petersburg, Fla. where a family reported that a Galaxy Note 7 left charging in a Jeep had caught fire, destroying the vehicle. Samsung released the Galaxy Note 7 on Aug. 19. The Galaxy Note series is one of the most expensive lines made by Samsung. | 1 |
The day has come. Within a few hours, we should know who is the next President of the United States. You can also follow results on the RVF election results thread or the high energy Donald Trump thread .
Don’t Miss: If Donald Trump Doesn’t Win, We’re Screwed
| 0 |
Posted by Daisy Luther
According to a report in the New Yorker, James Comey , Big Kahuna of the FBI, went full-on cowboy in releasing details of the new Clinton email inquiry. Apparently, the Department of Justice advised him not to release the information just days before the presidential election.
Gosh. I wonder if the same advice would have been given if it was Donald Trump who was being investigated by the FBI.
Comey explained his decision in a letter to FBI employees :
“We don’t ordinarily tell Congress about ongoing investigations, but here I feel an obligation to do so given that I testified repeatedly in recent months that our investigation was completed. I also think it would be misleading to the American people were we not to supplement the record.”
The DoJ – and by DoJ I mean Attorney General Loretta Lynch , who famously had a secret meeting on an airport tarmac with Bill Clinton to talk about her non-existent grandchildren – is implying that Comey is not playing fair and that the move is inconsistent with the rules which have been designed to make it seem like they are not interfering in an election.
Here’s Comey’s letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee:
Really?
The DoJ thinks that the public shouldn’t know that the person they may be voting for is being investigated by the FBI?
That’s the most absurd thing I have heard for quite some time, and considering this election, that’s really saying something.
This is from the New Yorker report, emphasis mine.
On Friday, James Comey, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, acting independently of Attorney General Loretta Lynch , sent a letter to Congress saying that the F.B.I. had discovered e-mails that were potentially relevant to the investigation of Hillary Clinton’s private server. Coming less than two weeks before the Presidential election, Comey’s decision to make public new evidence that may raise additional legal questions about Clinton was contrary to the views of the Attorney General, according to a well-informed Administration official. Lynch expressed her preference that Comey follow the department’s longstanding practice of not commenting on ongoing investigations, and not taking any action that could influence the outcome of an election, but he said that he felt compelled to do otherwise .
Comey’s decision is a striking break with the policies of the Department of Justice, according to current and former federal legal officials. Comey, who is a Republican appointee of President Obama, has a reputation for integrity and independence, but his latest action is stirring an extraordinary level of concern among legal authorities, who see it as potentially affecting the outcome of the Presidential and congressional elections. ( source ) Is this investigation the iceberg to HRC’s Titanic campaign?
Hillary Clinton has said she finds the development “unprecedented and deeply troubling.” (source )
Oh, I’ll bet she does.
I’ll bet if Trump had been the target of the investigation she would have been up on the stage, gripping the podium to stay upright , saying how wonderful it was that Comey decided to break the news so that voters could be aware that they might be voting for someone who was suspected of having broken federal laws. I’ll bet she’d be saying that the public has a right to know if a candidate was under investigation. I’ll bet she’d take the high road and say that those elected to the office of President of the United States have to be above and beyond reproach.
Of course, when it’s her, things are a little different, aren’t they?
We do have a right to know. We absolutely have a right to know that a person who could be elected to know all of the secrets was careless when she only knew some of the secrets. It seems like a no-brainer that the public should know that a candidate is being investigated for a second time for being criminally negligent with information entrusted to her.
And the fact that we know has severely damaged Clinton’s campaign. Although previous polls were incredibly skewed to the point of being outright fake , it looks like the mainstream is now trying to save face with a new batch of polls. A poll from ABC news and the Washington Post , both hotbeds of liberal voters, has shown that her lead has dropped to within a single point over Donald Trump due to the Clinton email scandal.
“About a third of likely voters say they’re less likely to support Clinton given FBI Director James Comey’s disclosure Friday that the bureau is investigating more emails related to its probe of Clinton’s use of a private email server while secretary of state. “
Finally, some people are actually paying attention to the character of Hillary Clinton.
But it may not be enough. There was one finding that was astonishing to me, even though it probably shouldn’t be:
“Given other considerations, 63 percent say it makes no difference.”
Meanwhile, on social media, the FBI emails are somehow not a trending topic. It certainly appears that Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, and Buzzfeed are blacking out the topic. My biggest question is this: Why now?
Why did James Comey, who has probably committed career suicide, along with a potential actual “suicide” via a shot to the back of his own head like others who have run afoul of the Clintons, feel the need to break the news, particularly after giving her a pass during the last investigation?
Opponents will jump on the fact that he’s a Republican and will say that he did it for political reasons.
They won’t admit that perhaps he felt guilty for being complicit in letting her off the hook in the first investigation into the Clinton email negligence.
They will never, ever admit that maybe his integrity and belief in the office he holds made it impossible for him to keep quiet until after the election and that, perhaps, when he was given a chance to right a previous wrong, he took it. Clinton isn’t taking it gracefully.
Clinton’s complaints, which have appeared in the press around the world, make her look even worse than she did before.
This is from The Telegraph , a UK publication:
Hillary Clinton was furiously fighting to keep her Presidential bid on track on Saturday night as her lead in the polls narrowed, after the FBI’s bombshell announcement that it had reopened its investigation into her emails.
James Comey announced on Friday afternoon that fresh evidence had emerged for his investigation into whether Mrs Clinton was criminally negligent in her handling of classified material.
On Saturday, the latest poll of polls by tracker site RealClearPolitics put Clinton 3.9 percentage points ahead of the Republican nationwide, down from 7.1 points just 10 days previously.
But wait – it gets better:
The Clinton campaign has responded with what amounts to a declaration of open warfare against Mr Comey, alleging that his actions are backed by a political motive. And Mrs Clinton herself called the decision “unprecedented” and “deeply troubling”.
“It’s pretty strange to put something like that out with such little information right before an election,” she complained, addressing cheering supporters at a rally in the must-win state of Florida.
Democrats questioned the timing of the agency’s decision, which comes as polls showed Mrs Clinton’s lead falling just 10 days before the presidential election.
“This is like an 18-wheeler smacking into us, and it just becomes a huge distraction at the worst possible time,” said Donna Brazile, the chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee.
“The campaign is trying to cut through the noise as best it can.
“We don’t want it to knock us off our game. But on the second-to-last weekend of the race, we find ourselves having to tell voters, ‘Keep your focus, keep your eyes on the prize.’”
Hillary’s campaign manager sounds pretty desperate to me. As for the complaints from HRC, they just make her sound like the out-of-touch, money-grabbing, power-hungry, deceitful | 0 |
VIDEO : Epic Loser Weiner Says He Downloaded ALL OF HUMA’S EMAILS By “ACCIDENT” VIDEO : Epic Loser Weiner Says He Downloaded ALL OF HUMA’S EMAILS By “ACCIDENT” Breaking News By TruthFeedNews November 1, 2016
HOLY SMOKES! So ALL of Huma’s emails from her smartphone are now in possession of the DOJ and FBI.
Anthony Weiner says it was “by accident.” Perhaps so, either way he is an epic disgraced loser.
You have to believe that with DOJ and the FBI having all of Huma’s emails, MANY will contain threads with Hillary and there will be enough damning information to convict her without any reasonable doubt.
The question is, are there people in the DOJ and FBI with enough pull to have the courage to tell the truth, or will their efforts be stonewalled by the likes of Hillary shill Loretta Lynch and Peter Kadzik.
Watch the video:
Support the Trump Movement and help us fight Liberal Media Bias. Please LIKE and SHARE this story on Facebook or Twitter. | 0 |
PARIS — The French authorities on Thursday identified a second man who stormed a church in Normandy and killed an priest as he celebrated Mass. The Paris prosecutor’s office identified the man as Nabil Petitjean, 19. It was not clear how he knew the other killer, Adel Kermiche, also 19, who lived near the church, the Église St. in St. a suburb of Rouen. Both were of Algerian ancestry. They were shot dead by the police after the assault on the church on Tuesday, which also left an parishioner severely wounded he is in stable condition. The Islamic State released videos on Wednesday in which the two young men pledged allegiance to the terrorist group before the assault, which killed the Rev. Jacques Hamel. Mr. Petitjean was born in St. in Lorraine in northeastern France, but grew up in in the southeast. He attended a high school there, the Lycée Marlioz, and his father lives in Montluçon, a town in central France, north of . Mr. Petitjean flew to Turkey on June 10 but was stopped at the airport, before he reached the desk, when he was seen talking with someone who was on the list, according to a Turkish official who spoke on condition of anonymity. He left Turkey the next day, and was placed on a blacklist, as a precaution, the following week, and the French authorities were immediately notified, the official said. The Paris prosecutor’s office said on Thursday that Mr. Petitjean came to the attention of the police on June 29. On July 22 — four days before the attack — a foreign intelligence agency sent his picture to French intelligence services, but without a name or description, the office said. Interviewed by French reporters, Mr. Petitjean’s mother, who was identified by news agencies as Yamina Boukessoula, expressed astonishment. She said he had last spoken to her early this week. She said: “He said, ‘Don’t worry, get some sleep, everything is O. K.’ He had a soft voice. He sounded well. It wasn’t worrisome. He has friends, like everyone else. ” The mother told reporters, “Daesh is not part of his language,” using an Arabic acronym for the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL. She said that her son had been visiting a cousin in northeastern France and that she had no idea how he had ended up in St. the town in Normandy where the attack occurred, although he appeared to have relatives in Normandy. “I was a good mother,” she said. “I was always there for my children, maybe even too much. Malik doesn’t have psychological problems. He’s like all with ambition, with plans. He’s smart. ” Mr. Kermiche had been detained for nearly 10 months after trying, twice, to enter Syria, but he was released in March over the objections of prosecutors. He was made to wear an electronic ankle bracelet, forbidden to leave his local department of required to report to a probation officer once a week and ordered to live in his parents’ house. He was allowed free movement from 8:30 a. m. to 12:30 p. m. on weekdays the attack on the church occurred at 9:25 a. m. The killing of the priest has elicited condemnation worldwide. On Thursday, the French Council of the Muslim Faith urged Muslims to attend Mass on Sunday morning, to “again express solidarity with and compassion for our Christian brothers. ” President François Hollande has again found himself confronting the specter of Islamic State terrorism — a rampage in Nice, on the evening of July 14, Bastille Day, which killed 84 people, followed by the attack on the church in Normandy just 12 days later — as the nation’s mood has increasingly turned somber. On Thursday morning, Mr. Hollande met with lawmakers to discuss the possibility of establishing a National Guard of volunteer reservists, including retired gendarmes, to help protect the nation. The plan, which he first floated in November, “is not meant to replace public forces, but to back them up and reinforce them,” Mr. Hollande said at a ceremony to open a highway in southwestern France. Mr. Hollande’s government declared a state of emergency in November. It was extended after the attack in Nice, giving the police and prosecutors expanded powers. But he has resisted calls by political rivals, including former President Nicolas Sarkozy and the leader of the National Front, Marine Le Pen, for even more drastic constitutional and legal changes. On Thursday, Mr. Hollande reacted angrily to a comment a day earlier by Donald J. Trump, the Republican nominee for president of the United States, who, in response to the killing of the priest, said that “France is no longer France. ” Mr. Hollande retorted: “France will always be France. It never gives up, because it still bears ideals, values, principles that are recognized worldwide, and it’s when you lower your standards that you are no longer what you are. That’s something that may happen to others, on the other side of the Atlantic. ” | 1 |
Federal immigration officials arrested nearly 1, 400 gang members in a nationwide operation, including illegal immigrants gang members who had protected status under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. [Altogether, 1, 378 gang members were arrested by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency, 1, 098 of which already have federal or state criminal charges against them, according to a news release. of the members had pending murder charges against them, while another seven were facing rape allegations. The other 280 were arrested for being in the U. S. illegally. Three of the gang members arrested in the ICE operation had protected status as illegal immigrants under the DACA program. Since DACA’s inception, more than 1, 500 illegal immigrants have had their protected status revoked after they were found to be involved with a gang or committed a crime. DACA recipients are given protection by the federal government and since the Trump Administration has not ended the program, experts like Mark Krikorian have previously said that 800 new permits for protected DACA status can be granted by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) every day. “They’re still processing these work permits,” Krikorian told Breitbart Texas at the time. “That’s got to end at the absolute minimum. ” Additionally, of the 1, 478 gang members arrested, 10 of them had crossed the U. S. Brder as unaccompanied minors. Of those 10, nine were confirmed gang members and eight of those 10 were specifically. Most recently, Breitbart Texas reported on the continued resettlement of foreign unaccompanied minors into regions of the U. S. despite experts pointing to evidence that this process allows foreign crime syndicates to flourish. Since the beginning of the Fiscal Year, October 1, 2016, 651 unaccompanied minors were placed in Nassau County, which is home to one of the largest growing gang population’s in the U. S. In neighboring Suffolk County, which has a widespread gang problem in Brentwood and Central Islip, approximately 915 have been resettled in the region. John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart Texas. Follow him on Twitter at @JxhnBinder. | 1 |
Sunday on MSNBC’s “AM Joy,” Rep. Maxine Waters ( ) said the public was “getting weary” that Democrats have not done enough to begin the process of impeaching President Donald Trump. Partial transcript as follows: REID: Congresswoman, on the subject of being more aggressive, you have openly talked about the fact that this president has put himself in a position where impeachment is on the table but your party, the Democratic party is very reluctant, The New York Times has an article out last week about how hesitant Democratic leadership, in particular, are to call for Donald Trump’s impeachment. In closing, why do you suppose that is? WATERS: I don’t know what the reticent is but I know this, that the American public is getting weary of all of these actions without enough being done by the elected officials who they elected to represent them. I believe that this man has done enough for us to determine that we can connect the dots, that we can get the facts that will lead to impeachment. I believe there was collusion. I think we have enough information about the meetings, the about the lying about those meetings to help us to understand that something was going on. There was an interaction there. And certainly I believe it was collusion, but if they just do their work and do their job, they will find out it was collusion. And I believe this president should be impeached. I don’t care what others say about ‘it’s too soon, we don’t know, we think.’ I think that they’re letting the American public down by not delving deeper into what is going on with Jared Kushner and this back channeling, about the lies and his failure to disclose he had had these meetings, the same thing with sessions, failure to disclose about the meetings. What more do we need? Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN | 1 |
Email
A bombshell of new audio is exposing Hillary Clinton for the immoral, politically motivated opportunist that she is. Now the question is, will this impact her race for the White House?
Some ten years ago (more recent than Donald Trump’s now infamous “locker room talk” recording) in September of 2006, Hillary Clinton was running for reelection to the Senate when she sat down to speak with the editorial board of the Jewish Press. The sit-down was recorded, but the full conversation had never been released, until now. One of the editors present during the interview spoke with the Observer this week and played them the 45-minute long tape of the conversation with Clinton.
Below is what is likely the most important disclosure of the conversation, and it provides reason for American voters to worry. It also proves that Donald Trump is not some crazy conspiracy theorist for expressing concern about the Democrat Party trying to “rig” the 2016 election.
While talking to the Jewish Press, Clinton commented on the 2006 election for the second Palestinian Legislative Council (where terrorist organization Hamas won control of the Palestinian government) and expressed her belief that allowing the election was a huge mistake, but if they were going to allow it… then the US government should have rigged the election to suit their needs.
“I do not think we should have pushed for an election in the Palestinian territories. I think that was a big mistake. And if we were going to push for an election, then we should have made sure that we did something to determine who was going to win.”
Yes, you just heard correctly. A sitting US Senator, and the future Secretary of State and then presidential candidate just argued that we should have rigged the election, thereby disallowing the right of the Palestinian people to choose their own leaders.
While Hamas is a terrorist organization and they are horrible, murderous thugs whose ideology we must stamp out… the comments should raise this question in our minds – if Hillary Clinton is willing to rig an election in Palestine, why wouldn’t she do the same here if she could? This realization that Clinton is not beyond “fixing” the results of an election, should make all of the other recent evidences of massive voter fraud all the more concerning.
Well known election fraud expert John Fund has written article , after article , after article and even books chronicling voter fraud in the U.S.
Fund wrote extensively, for instance, of the 2008 election that put Al Franken in the U.S. Senate for the State of Minnesota. The 312-vote victory Franken eked out, Fund wrote , was not a happy result of just enough votes but a result born of massive vote fraud.
Other reporters have written of vote fraud, of course. Take the report in the Washington Free Beacon that revealed that 141 U.S. counties have more people registered to vote than they even have residents eligible to do so!
These charges have been building for at least 20 years and over the last few months they have shifted into high gear. But we don’t have to stick to recent history to find people complaining about voter fraud. Only eight years ago when he was first running for the White House, even Barack Obama was heard complaining about rampant vote fraud in the U.S…
And then there is the new series of undercover videos by Jame O’Keefe’s Project Veritas which has revealed Democrat operatives admitting that they routinely engage in voter fraud in order to win elections by hook or crook.
Please make sure to read the full Observer story about the 2006 interview with Hillary Clinton. There are a few other remarkable observations made about some of Clinton’s comments – like her willingness to speak with world leaders no matter the current political climate between our countries and Clinton’s seeming approval of “an eye for an eye” interactions between Israel and Hamas.
Article reposted with permission from Constitution.com | 0 |
Behind much of the Middle East’s chaos — the wars in Syria and Yemen, the political upheaval in Iraq and Lebanon and Bahrain — there is another conflict. Saudi Arabia and Iran are waging a struggle for dominance that has turned much of the Middle East into their battlefield. Rather than fighting directly, they wield and in that way worsen the region’s direst problems: dictatorship, militia violence and religious extremism. The history of their rivalry tracks — and helps to explain — the Middle East’s disintegration, particularly the sectarianism both powers have found useful to cultivate. It is a story in which the United States has been a supporting but constant player, most recently by backing the Saudi war in Yemen, which kills hundreds of civilians. These dynamics, scholars warn, point toward a future of civil wars, divided societies and unstable governments. F. Gregory Gause III, an international relations scholar at Texas A M University, struggled to name another region that had been torn apart in this way. Central Africa could be similar, he suggested, referring to the two decades of interrelated wars and genocides that, driven by meddling regional powers, killed five million. But in the Middle East, it is just getting started. Saudi Arabia, a young country pieced together only in the 1930s, has built its legitimacy on religion. By promoting its stewardship of the holy sites at Mecca and Medina, it could justify its royal family’s grip on power. Iran’s revolution, in 1979, threatened that legitimacy. Iranians toppled their authoritarian government, installing Islamists who claimed to represent “a revolution for the entire Islamic world,” said Kenneth M. Pollack, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. The revolutionaries encouraged all Muslims, especially Saudis, to overthrow their rulers as well. But because Iran is mostly Shiite, they “had the greatest influence with, and tended to reach out to, Shia groups,” Dr. Pollack said. Some Saudi Shiites, who make up about 10 percent of the population, protested in solidarity or even set up offices in Tehran — stoking Saudi fears of internal unrest and separatism. This was the opening shot in the sectarianization of their rivalry, which would encompass the whole region. “The Saudis have looked at Iran as a domestic threat from the from 1979,” Dr. Gause said. Seeing the threat as intolerable, they began looking for a way to strike back. They found that way the next year, when Saddam Hussein’s Iraq invaded Iran, hoping to seize territory. Saudi Arabia, Dr. Pollack said, “backed the Iraqis to the hilt because they want the Iranian revolution stopped. ” The war, over eight years of trench warfare and chemical weapons attacks, killed perhaps a million people. It set a pattern of struggle through proxies, and of sucking in the United States, whose policy is to maintain access to the vast oil and gas reserves that lie between the rivals. The conflict’s toll exhausted Iran’s zeal for sowing revolution abroad, but gave it a new mission: to overturn the regional order that Tehran saw as an existential threat. That sense of insecurity would later drive Iran’s meddling abroad, said Marc Lynch, a political scientist at George Washington University, and perhaps its missile and nuclear programs. The 1990s provided a pause in the regional rivalry, but also set up the conditions that would allow it to later explode in such force. Saudi Arabia, wishing to contain Iran’s reach to the region’s minority Shiite populations, sought to harden rifts. Government programs promoted “ incitement in schools, Islamic universities, and the media,” Toby Matthiesen, an Oxford University scholar, wrote in a brief for the Carnegie Endowment. These policies, Dr. Matthiesen warned, cultivated sectarian fears and sometimes violence that would later feed into the ideology of the Islamic State. In 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait, a Saudi ally. The United States, after expelling the Iraqis, established military bases in the region to defend its allies from Iraq. This further tilted the regional power balance against Iran, which saw the American forces as a threat. Iraq’s humiliating defeat also spurred many of its citizens to rise up, particularly in poorer communities that happened to be Shiite Arab. In response, Dr. Gause said, “Saddam’s regime became explicitly sectarian,” widening divides to deter future uprisings. That allowed Iran, still worried about Iraq, to cultivate allies among Iraq’s increasingly disenfranchised Shiites, including militias that had risen up. Though it was not obvious at the time, Iraq had become a powder keg, one that would ignite when its government was toppled a decade later. The 2003 invasion, by toppling an Iraqi government that had been hostile to both Saudi Arabia and Iran, upended the region’s power balance. Iran, convinced that the United States and Saudi Arabia would install a pliant Iraqi government — and remembering the horrors they had inflicted on Iran in the 1980s — raced to fill the postwar vacuum. Its leverage with Shiite groups, which are Iraq’s largest demographic group, allowed it to influence Baghdad politics. Iran also wielded Shiite militias to control Iraqi streets and undermine the occupation. But sectarian violence took on its own inevitable momentum, hastening the country’s slide into civil war. Saudi Arabia sought to match Iran’s reach but, after years of oppressing its own Shiite population, struggled to make inroads with those in Iraq. “The problem for the Saudis is that their natural allies in Iraq,” Dr. Gause said, referring to Sunni groups that were increasingly turning to jihadism, “wanted to kill them. ” This was the first sign that Saudi Arabia’s strategy for containing Iran, by fostering sectarianism and aligning itself with the region’s Sunni majority, had backfired. As Sunni governments collapsed and Sunni militias turned to jihadism, Riyadh would be left with few reliable proxies. As their competition in Iraq heated up, Saudi Arabia and Iran sought to counterbalance each other through another weak state: Lebanon. Lebanon provided the perfect opening: a frail democracy recovering from civil war, with parties and lingering militias primarily organized by religion. Iran and Saudi Arabia exploited those dynamics, waging a new kind of proxy struggle “not on conventional military battlefields,” Dr. Gause said, but “within the domestic politics of weakened institutional structures. ” Iran, for instance, supported Hezbollah, the Shiite militia and political movement, which it had earlier cultivated to use against Israel. Riyadh, in turn, funneled money to political allies such as the Sunni prime minister, Rafik Hariri. By competing along Lebanon’s religious lines, they helped drive the Lebanese government’s frequent breakdowns, as parties relied on foreign backers who wanted to oppose one another more than build a functioning state. With Iran promoting Hezbollah as the nation’s defender and Saudi Arabia backing the Lebanese military, neither had a full mandate, and Lebanon struggled to maintain order. As the foreign powers escalated their antagonism, Lebanon’s dysfunction spiraled into violence. In 2005, after Mr. Hariri called for the withdrawal of Syrian troops, he was assassinated. (Hezbollah has long been suspected.) Another political crisis, in 2008, culminated with Hezbollah overpowering Sunni militias to seize much of Beirut. Saudi Arabia requested United States air cover, according to a WikiLeaks cable, for a force to retake the city. Though the intervention never materialized, the episode was a dress rehearsal for the turmoil that would soon come to the wider region. When the Arab Spring toppled governments across the Middle East, many of them Saudi allies, Riyadh feared that Iran would again fill the vacuums. So it rushed to close them, at times with force. It promised billions in aid to Jordan, Yemen, Egypt and others, often urging those governments to crack down. After protesters rose up in Bahrain, a Saudi ally whose Sunni king rules over a majority Shiite population, Saudi Arabia sent 1, 200 troops. In Egypt, Saudi Arabia tacitly supported a 2013 military takeover, seeing the military as a more reliable ally than the elected Islamist government it replaced. As Libya fell into civil war, it backed a general who was driving to consolidate control. Though Iran has little influence in either country, Saudi Arabia’s fear of losing ground to Iran made it fight harder to retain influence wherever it could, analysts believe. Syria, an Iranian ally, reversed the usual dynamic. Saudi Arabia and other Sunni states steered money and arms to rebels, including Sunni Islamists. Iran intervened in turn, sending officers and later Hezbollah to fight on behalf of Syria’s government, whose leaders mostly follow a sect of Shiism. Their interventions, civil war scholars say, helped lock Syria in the stalemate that has killed over 400, 000. The United States has struggled to restore the region’s balance. President Obama has urged Iran and Saudi Arabia “to find an effective way to share the neighborhood and institute some sort of cold peace,” he told The Atlantic. But Dr. Lynch called this plan for “a equilibrium” between the Mideast powers “ . ” The nuclear agreement with Iran, instead of calming Saudi nerves, hit on fears that “the United States wants to abandon them in order to ally with Iran,” Dr. Lynch said, calling the belief “crazy” but widespread. Mr. Pollack said he often heard Sunni Arab leaders express this as a metaphor. “They would say, ‘What is wrong with you people? You have this good, loving, loyal wife in us, and this crazy mistress in Iran. You don’t understand how bad she is for you, and yet you endlessly run off to her the moment that she winks at you,’” he recounted. The White House looked for other ways to reassure Saudi leaders, facilitating arms sales and overlooking Saudi actions in Egypt and Bahrain. Then came Yemen. A rebel group with loose ties to Iran ousted the president, deepening Riyadh’s fears. Saudi Arabia launched a bombing campaign that inflicted horror on civilians but accomplished little else. The assault receives heavy American support, though the United States has few interests in Yemen other than counterterrorism and sometimes criticizes the campaign. In exchange, Riyadh acquiesced to the Iran deal and began to follow Washington’s lead on Syria. But the underlying proxy war remained. Asked when the struggle might cool, Mr. Pollack said he doubted that it would: “Where we’re headed with the Middle East is the current trend extrapolated, with more failed and failing governments. ” In Yemen, this is already “reorganizing Yemeni society along sectarian lines and rearranging people’s relationships to one another on a basis,” Farea an analyst, wrote in a Carnegie Endowment paper, which cited similar trends across the region. Continued crises will risk sucking in the United States again, Mr. Lynch said, adding that no American president was likely to persuade Saudi Arabia or Iran to stay out of regional conflicts that it saw as potentially existential threats. Donald J. Trump will enter office having echoed Saudi Arabia’s view of the region. Iran “took over Iraq,” he said at a rally in January. “They’re going to have Yemen. They’re going to have Syria. They’re going to have everything. ” Mentioning both the and Hillary Clinton, Dr. Gause said he doubted that any administration could reset the Middle East’s power struggles. “I do not think that the fundamental problem of the region,” he said, “is something that either Mr. Trump or Mrs. Clinton could do that much about. ” | 1 |
Lavrov and Kerry discuss Syrian settlement October 28, 2016 TASS
Russian Foreign Ministry Sergey Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry discussed the Syrian settlement as well as the situation in Yemen and Libya by telephone on Oct. 28.
The Russian Foreign Ministry said that the conversation had taken place at the U.S. side’s request.
"The foreign policy chiefs continued discussing ways of settling the Syrian conflict, including the normalization of the situation around Aleppo, with account taken of fundamental approaches contained in the previously reached Russian-U.S. agreements. For that, the United States should ultimately separate moderate opposition (in Syria) from terror groups," the Russian Foreign Ministry said.
"Lavrov and Kerry also discussed assistance to the solution of crises in Yemen and Libya as well as separate issues of bilateral agenda," the Russian Foreign Ministry stressed. | 0 |
L’influence des USA et de l’Otan dans les rapports de l’UE avec la Chine par Manlio Dinucci Intervenant dans un forum international, le géographe italien Manlio Dinucci synthétise son analyse des armes dont les États-Unis se sont dotés pour dominer l’ensemble du monde. Cet article est d’autant plus important que c’est cette domination clairement assumée, cette organisation unipolaire du monde, que la Syrie, la Russie et la Chine mettent aujourd’hui en cause les armes à la main.
Réseau Voltaire | Rome (Italie) | 27 octobre 2016 Je vais tout de suite au nœud de la question. Je pense qu’on ne peut pas parler de relations entre Union européenne et Chine indépendamment de l’influence que les États-Unis exercent sur l’Union européenne, directement et par l’intermédiaire de l’Otan.
Aujourd’hui 22 des 28 pays de l’UE (21 sur 27 après la sortie du Royaume-Uni de l’UE), avec plus de 90 % de la population de l’Union, font partie de l’Otan, reconnue par l’UE comme « fondement de la défense collective ». Et l’Otan est sous commandement US : le Commandant suprême allié en Europe est toujours nommé par le président des États-Unis d’Amérique et tous les autres commandements clé sont aux mains des USA. La politique étrangère et militaire de l’Union européenne est ainsi fondamentalement subordonnée à la stratégie états-unienne, sur laquelle convergent les plus grandes puissances européennes.
Cette stratégie, clairement énoncée dans les documents officiels, est tracée au moment historique où la situation mondiale change à la suite de la désagrégation de l’URSS. En 1991 la Maison-Blanche déclare dans la National Security Strategy of the United States : « Les États-Unis demeurent le seul État avec une force, une portée et une influence en toute dimension —politique, économique et militaire— réellement globales. Il n’existe aucun substitut au leadership américain ». En 1992, dans la Defense Planning Guidance , le Pentagone souligne : « Notre premier objectif est d’empêcher qu’une quelconque puissance domine une région dont les ressources seraient suffisantes pour engendrer une puissance mondiale. Ces régions comprennent l’Europe occidentale, l’Asie orientale, le territoire de l’ex-Union Soviétique et l’Asie sud-occidentale ». En 2001, dans le rapport Quadrennial Defense Review —publié une semaine avant la guerre USA/Otan en Afghanistan, aire de première importance géostratégique à l’égard de Russie et Chine—, le Pentagone annonce : « La possibilité existe qu’émerge dans la région un rival militaire avec une formidable base de ressources. Nos forces armées doivent conserver la capacité d’imposer la volonté des États-Unis à n’importe quel adversaire, y compris États et entités non-étatiques, de façon à changer le régime d’un État adverse ou occuper un territoire étranger jusqu’à ce que les objectifs stratégiques états-uniens soient réalisés ».
Sur la base de cette stratégie, l’Otan sous commandement US a lancé son offensive sur le front oriental : après avoir démoli par la guerre la Fédération Yougoslave, de 1999 à aujourd’hui elle a englobé tous les États de l’ex-Pacte de Varsovie, trois de l’ex-Yougoslavie, trois de l’ex-URSS, et sous peu elle en englobera d’autres (à commencer par la Géorgie et l’Ukraine, cette dernière étant de fait déjà dans l’Otan), en déplaçant bases et forces, y compris nucléaires, toujours plus près de la Russie. En même temps, sur le front méridional étroitement relié à celui oriental, l’Otan sous commandement US a démoli par la guerre l’État libyen et a essayé d’en faire autant avec celui de la Syrie.
Les USA et l’Otan ont fait exploser la crise ukrainienne et, accusant la Russie de « déstabiliser la sécurité européenne », ils ont entraîné l’Europe dans une nouvelle Guerre froide, voulue surtout par Washington (aux dépens des économies européennes à qui les sanctions et contre-sanctions ont porté préjudice) pour casser les rapports économiques et politiques Russie-UE néfastes aux intérêts états-uniens. C’est dans la même stratégie qu’entre le déplacement croissant de forces militaires états-uniennes dans la région Asie/Pacifique dans une fonction anti-chinoise. L’U.S. Navy a annoncé qu’en 2020 elle concentrera dans cette région 60 % de ses forces navales et aériennes.
La stratégie états-unienne est focalisée sur la mer de Chine Méridionale, dont l’amiral Harris, chef du Commandement US pour le Pacifique, souligne l’importance : c’est là que passe un commerce maritime d’une valeur annuelle de plus de 5 000 milliards de dollars, dont 25 % de l’export mondial de pétrole et 50 % de celui du gaz naturel. Les USA veulent contrôler cette voie maritime au nom de celle que l’amiral Harris définit comme une « liberté de naviguer fondamentale pour notre système de vie ici aux États-Unis », en accusant la Chine d’« actions agressives en mer Chinoise Méridionale, analogues à celles de la Russie en Crimée ». Pour cela l’U.S Navy « patrouille » la mer de Chine Méridionale. Dans le sillage des États-Unis arrivent les plus grandes puissances européennes : en juillet dernier la France a sollicité l’Union européenne pour « coordonner la patrouille navale de la mer Chinoise Méridionale afin d’assurer une présence régulière et visible dans ces eaux illégalement réclamées par la Chine ». Et tandis que les États-Unis installent en Corée du Sud des systèmes « anti-missiles » mais en mesure de lancer aussi des missiles nucléaires, analogues à ceux installés contre la Russie en Roumanie et bientôt en Pologne, en plus de ceux qui sont embarqués sur des navires de guerre en Méditerranée, le secrétaire général de l’Otan Jens Stoltenberg reçoit le 6 octobre à Bruxelles le ministre des Affaires étrangères sud-coréen, Yun Byung-se, pour « renforcer le partenariat de l’Otan avec Séoul ».
Ces faits et d’autres encore démontrent qu’en Europe et en Asie la même stratégie est à l’œuvre. C’est la tentative extrême des États-Unis et des autres puissances occidentales de maintenir la suprématie économique, politique et militaire, dans un monde en forte transformation, dans lequel émergent de nouveaux sujets étatiques et sociaux. L’Organisation de coopération de Shanghai, née de l’accord stratégique sino-russe, dispose de ressources et de capacités de travail capables d’en faire la plus grande aire économique intégrée du monde. L’Organisation de Shanghai et les Brics sont en mesure, avec leurs organismes financiers, de supplanter en grande partie la Banque mondiale et le Fonds monétaire international qui, pendant plus de 70 ans, ont permis aux USA et aux plus grandes puissances occidentales de dominer l’économie mondiale à travers les prêts usuraires aux pays endettés et d’autres instruments financiers. Les nouveaux organismes peuvent en même temps réaliser la dédollarisation des échanges commerciaux, en ôtant aux États-Unis la capacité de décharger leur dette sur d’autres pays par l’impression de papier monnaie utilisé comme devise internationale dominante.
Pour maintenir leur suprématie, toujours plus vacillante, les États-Unis utilisent non seulement la force des armes, mais d’autres armes souvent plus efficaces que celles proprement dites.
Première arme : les dits « accords de libre-échange », comme le « Partenariat transatlantique sur le commerce et les investissements » (TTIP) avec l’UE et le « Partenariat Trans-Pacifique » (TPP) dont le but n’est pas seulement économique mais géopolitique et géostratégique. C’est pour cela qu’Hillary Clinton qualifie le partenariat USA-UE de « plus grand objectif stratégique de notre alliance transatlantique », en projetant une « Otan économique » qui intègre celle politique et militaire. Le projet est clair : former un bloc politique, économique et militaire USA-UE, toujours sous commandement états-unien, qui s’oppose à l’aire eurasiatique en ascension, basée sur la coopération entre la Chine et la Russie ; qui s’oppose aux Brics, à l’Iran et à tout autre pays qui se soustraie à la domination de l’Occident. Comme les négociations sur le TTIP ont du mal à avancer à cause de divergences d’intérêt et d’une vaste opposition en Europe, l’obstacle est pour le moment contourné avec l’ « Accord économique et commercial global » (CETA) entre le Canada et l’UE : un TTIP camouflé étant donné que le Canada fait partie du NAFTA avec les USA. Le CETA sera probablement signé par l’UE le 27 octobre prochain, pendant la visite du Premier ministre canadien Trudeau à Bruxelles.
Seconde arme : la pénétration dans les pays cible pour les désagréger de l’intérieur. En s’appuyant sur les points faibles qu’a tout pays en mesure diverse : la corruption, l’avidité d’argent, l’arrivisme politique, le sécessionnisme fomenté par des groupes de pouvoir locaux, le fanatisme religieux, la vulnérabilité de vastes masses à la démagogie politique. En s’appuyant aussi, dans certains cas, sur un mécontentement populaire justifié quant à la conduite de leur gouvernement. Instruments de la pénétration : les soi-disant « organisations non gouvernementales » qui sont en réalité la main longue du département d’État et de la CIA. Celles qui, dotées d’énormes moyens financiers, ont organisé les « révolutions colorées » dans l’Est européen, et ont tenté la même opération avec la soi-disant « Umbrella Revolution » à Hong Kong : qui visait à fomenter des mouvements analogues dans d’autres zones de la Chine habitées par des minorités nationales. Les mêmes organisations qui opèrent en Amérique Latine, avec l’objectif premier de subvertir les institutions démocratiques du Brésil, en minant ainsi les Brics de l’intérieur. Instruments de la même stratégie : les groupes terroristes, type ceux armés et infiltrés en Libye et en Syrie pour semer le chaos, en contribuant à la démolition d’États entiers attaqués en même temps de l’extérieur.
Troisième arme : les « Psyops » (Opérations psychologiques), lancées à travers les chaînes médiatiques mondiales, qui sont définies ainsi par le Pentagone : « Opérations planifiées pour influencer à travers des informations déterminées les émotions et motivations et donc le comportement de l’opinion publique, d’organisations et de gouvernements étrangers, afin d’induire ou renforcer des attitudes favorables aux objectifs préfixés ». Avec ces opérations, qui préparent l’opinion publique à l’escalade guerrière, on fait apparaître la Russie comme responsable des tensions en Europe et la Chine comme responsable des tensions en Asie, en les accusant en même temps de « violation des droits humains ».
Manlio Dinucci, et son épouse, Carla, devant la maison natale de Mao Tsé Toung, en 1965. Une dernière considération : ayant travaillé à Pékin avec ma femme dans les années Soixante, contribuant l’un et l’autre à la publication de la première revue chinoise en langue italienne, j’ai vécu une expérience formatrice fondamentale au moment où la Chine —libérée depuis à peine quinze ans de la condition coloniale, semi-coloniale et semi-féodale— était complètement isolée et non reconnue par l’Occident ni par les Nations Unies comme État souverain. De cette période restent imprimées en moi la capacité de résistance et la conscience de ce peuple, à l’époque 600 millions de personnes, engagé sous la conduite du Parti communiste à construire une société sur des bases économiques et culturelles complètement nouvelles. Je pense que cette capacité est également nécessaire aujourd’hui pour que la Chine contemporaine, qui est en train de développer ses énormes potentialités, puisse résister aux nouveaux plans de domination impériale, en contribuant à la lutte décisive pour l’avenir de l’humanité : la lutte pour un monde sans plus de guerres dans lequel triomphe la paix indissolublement liée à la justice sociale.
Manlio Dinucci Traduction
Marie-Ange Patrizio | 0 |
Monica`s Stained Blue Dress Back in the news # rr bb 1
Bill Clintons son Danny Williams just had a press conference stating that he has sent a letter to Monica Lewinski . The letter asks Monica if Danny Williams can barrow the Blue Dress that Bill Clinton left his DNA on many years ago. Can DNA still be abstracted from that dress after all these Years. Well if Monica says yes we will soon find Out! Tags | 0 |
Wed, 26 Oct 2016 21:12 UTC © Alice Martins/The Washington Posy View of a heavily damaged neighborhood in Kobane, Syria, which had been targetted by a series of US-led coalition airstrikes. The hypocritical Western heart beats for all except those the US Empire drowns in blood . [1] "In Syria almost everybody is under siege to a greater or lesser degree," observes the Independent's Patrick Cockburn. [2] Most people, however, think the only siege in Syria is the one imposed on (East) Aleppo by Syrian and Russian forces. But siege as a form of warfare is hardly uniquely embraced by the Syrian Arab Army and Russian military. On the contrary, the United States and its allies have been practicing siege warfare in the Levant and beyond for years, and continue to do so. It's just that US-led siege warfare has been concealed behind anodyne, even heroic, labels , while the siege warfare of countries Washington is hostile to, is abominated by Western state officials crying crocodile tears. Here's how the deception works: Sieges of cities controlled by Islamic State, carried out by US forces and their allies, are called rescue operations, or campaigns to liberate or retake cities—never sieges. Other sieges— the ones carried out by Al Qaeda's affiliate in Syria , Jabhat Fatah al-Sham, formerly Al Nusra, which, herein, I'll call Al Qaeda for convenience— are ignored altogether (which might suggest something about the relationship of Al Qaeda's Syria affiliate to the United States.) And a particularly injurious form of siege— economic sanctions — is presented as a separate category altogether and not siege warfare at all. But sanctions, imposed by rich countries , such as the United States and those of the European Union, on poor countries, such as Syria, are a modern form of siege, and have been called sanctions of mass destruction, in recognition of their devastating character. In the Levant, the sieges which are identified as such by Western state officials , and in train, by the Western mass media, are sieges of cities controlled by Al Qaeda, carried out by Syrian forces and their allies. These sieges —which cause hunger, kill civilians, and destroy buildings— are denounced in the West as ferocious attacks on innocents which amount to war crimes. "Russia's bombardment backing the siege of Aleppo by Syrian government forces," notes the Wall Street Journal , "has created a humanitarian crisis." [3] A UN Security Council resolution—vetoed by Russia—has called for an end to Russian bombing of Aleppo. British foreign minister Boris Johnson has mused openly about war crimes indictments against Syria and Russia. Yet US campaigns to drive Islamic State out of Manbij, Kobani, Ramadi, Fallujah, Baiji and Tikrit, and now Mosul, have also caused hunger, killed civilians, and destroyed buildings. Unlike the Syrian military's siege of East Aleppo, these campaigns have been celebrated as great and necessary military victories, but have, themselves, created vast humanitarian crises. Cockburn observes that the "recapture" of "cities like Ramadi, Fallujah, Baiji and Tikrit...would scarcely have happened without the coalition air umbrella overhead." [4] That is, the cities liberated by Iraqi forces and their US patron were bombed into submission, even though civilians were trapped inside. Iraqi ground forces only moved in after these cities were left in ruins by coalition airstrikes and Iraqi artillery bombardment, as mopping up forces. © Ali al-Mashhadani, Reuters Market in Ramadi destroyed by US coalition airstrikes Rania Khalek, writing in the Intercept , points out that "U.S.-backed ground forces laid siege to Manbij, a city in northern Syria not far from Aleppo that is home to tens of thousands of civilians. U.S. airstrikes pounded the city over the summer, killing up to 125 civilians in a single attack. The U.S. replicated this strategy to drive ISIS out of Kobane, Ramadi, and Fallujah, leaving behind flattened neighborhoods." [5] To recover Ramadi from Islamic State, Iraqi forces surrounded and cordoned off the city. [6] In addition, the US led coalition bombarded Ramadi with airstrikes and artillery fire. [7] The bombardment left 70 percent of Ramadi's buildings in ruins. The city was recovered, but "the great majority of its 400,000 people" were left homeless. [8] Iraqi forces also besieged the city of Fallujah, preventing most food, medicine and fuel from entering it. [9] Militias "prevented civilians from leaving Islamic State territory while resisting calls to allow humanitarian aid to reach the city." [10] This was done "to strangle Islamic State" [11] with the result that civilians were also "strangled." Inside the city, tens of thousands endured famine and sickness due to lack of medicine. [12] Civilians reportedly survived on grass and plants. [13] Many civilians "died under buildings that collapsed under" artillery bombardment and coalition air strikes. [14] © US Defense Department The US-led coalition has been bombarding Mosul for months. The current campaign to recover Mosul is based on the same siege strategy US forces and their Iraqi client used to liberate Ramadi and Fallujah. US and allied warplanes have been bombarding the city for months. [15] Iraqi forces, aided by US Special Forces, are moving to cordon it off. "Some aid groups estimate that as many as a million people could be displaced by fighting to recapture the city, creating a daunting humanitarian task that the United Nations and other organizations say they are not yet ready to deal with." [16] Writer and journalist Jonathan Cook commented on the utter hypocrisy of Westerners who condemn the Syrian/Russian campaign to liberate East Aleppo from Islamist fighters while celebrating the Iraqi/US campaign to do the same in Mosul. Targeting the British newspaper, the Guardian , beloved by progressives, Cook contrasted two reports which appeared in the newspaper to illustrate the Western heart beating for all except those the US Empire drowns in blood. Report one: The Guardian provides supportive coverage of the beginning of a full-throttle assault by Iraqi forces, backed by the US and UK, on Mosul to win it back from the jihadists of ISIS - an assault that will inevitably lead to massive casualties and humanitarian suffering among the civilian population. Report two: The Guardian provides supportive coverage of the US and UK for considering increased sanctions against Syria and Russia. On what grounds? Because Syrian forces, backed by Russia, have been waging a full-throttle assault on Aleppo to win it back from the jihadists of ISIS and Al-Qaeda - an assault that has led to massive casualties and humanitarian suffering among the civilian population. [17] Aleppo’s rebels, members of the Al Qaeda derived Jabhat Fatah al-Sham. Central to Western propaganda is the elision of the Islamist character of the Al Qaeda militants who tyrannize East Aleppo. This is accomplished by labeling them "rebels," while the "rebels" who tyrannize the cities the United States and its allies besiege are called "Islamic State," ISIL" or "ISIS" fighters. The aim is to conjure the impression that US-led sieges are directed at Islamic terrorists, and therefore are justifiable , despite the humanitarian crises they precipitate, while the Syrian-led campaign in East Aleppo is directed at rebels, presumably moderates, or secular democrats, and therefore is illegitimate. This is part of a broader US propaganda campaign to create two classes of Islamist militants—good Islamists, and bad ones. The first class, the good Islamists , comprises Al Qaeda and fighters cooperating with it, including US-backed groups, whose operations are limited to fighting secularists in Damascus, and therefore are useful to the US foreign policy goal of overthrowing Syria's Arab nationalist government. These Islamist fighters are sanitized as "rebels." The second class, the bad Islamists , comprises Islamic State. Islamic State has a mbitions which make it far less acceptable to Washington as an instrument to be used in pursuit of US foreign policy goals. The organization's leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, aspires to lead a caliphate which effaces the Sykes-Picot borders, and is therefore a threat, not only to the Arab nationalists in Damascus—an enemy the organization shares in common with Washington— but also to the US client states of Iraq and Saudi Arabia, which Islamic State attacks. The US objective in connection with Islamic State is to push the organization out of Iraq (and out of areas in Syria that can be brought under the control of US-backed fighters) and into the remainder of Syria, where they can wear down Arab nationalist forces. Syria's "moderates"—the "rebels"—if there are any in the sense of secular pro-democrats, are few in number. Certainly, their ranks are so limited that arming them, in the view of US president Barack Obama, would make little difference. The US president told New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman that his administration had "difficulty finding, training and arming a sufficient cadre of secular Syrian rebels: 'There's not as much capacity as you would hope,'" Obama confessed. [18] Obama's assessment was underscored when "a US general admitted that it had just four such 'moderate' fighters in Syria after spending $500 million on training them." [19] Veteran Middle East correspondent Robert Fisk dismissed the idea of the "moderates" as little more than a fantasy. "I doubt if there are 700 active 'moderate' foot soldiers in Syria," he wrote. And "I am being very generous, for the figure may be nearer 70." [20] Elizabeth O'Bagy, who has made numerous trips to Syria to interview insurgent commanders for the Institute for the Study of War, told the New York Times' Ben Hubbard that my "sense is that there are no seculars." [21] Anti-government fighters interviewed by the Wall Street Journal found the Western concept of the secular Syrian rebel to be incomprehensible. [22] To be clear: Syrian and Russian forces are waging a campaign to liberate East Aleppo from Islamists, whose only difference from Islamic State is that they're not a threat to the US client states, Iraq and Saudi Arabia. It's "primarily al-Nusra who holds Aleppo," US Department of Defense spokesperson Colonel Steve Warren said on April 25, referring to Al Qaeda. [23] Other militant Islamist organizations, including US-backed groups, are also in Aleppo, intertwined with, embedded with, sharing weapons with, cooperating with, and acting as auxiliaries of Al-Qaeda. Author and journalist Stephen Kinzer, writing in the Boston Globe , reminds us that: For three years, violent militants have run Aleppo. Their rule began with a wave of repression. They posted notices warning residents: "Don't send your children to school. If you do, we will get the backpack and you will get the coffin." Then they destroyed factories, hoping that unemployed workers would have no recourse other than to become fighters. They trucked looted machinery to Turkey and sold it. [24] The Invisible Sieges While sieges imposed by US-led forces are hidden by not calling them sieges, sieges imposed by Washington's Al-Qaeda ally are simply ignored. "Only three years ago," notes Fisk, the same Islamist fighters who are under siege today in East Aleppo, "were besieging the surrounded Syrian army western enclave of Aleppo and firing shells and mortars into the sector where hundreds of thousands of civilians lived under regime control." [25] Fisk observes acidly that the "first siege didn't elicit many tears from the satellite channel lads and lassies" while the "second siege comes with oceans of tears." [26] © Delil Souleiman/Agence France Presse Wreckage of Manbij in the wake of US coalition airstrikes, June 23, 2016 To the ignored Al Qaeda-orchestrated siege of West Aleppo can be added "the untold story of the three-and-a-half-year siege of two small Shia Muslim villages in northern Syria," Nubl and Zahra. Those sieges, carried out by Al-Qaeda against villages which remained loyal to Syria's Arab nationalist government, left at least 500 civilians dead, 100 of them children, through famine and artillery bombardment. [27] The "world paid no heed to the suffering of these people," preferring to remain "largely fixed on those civilians suffering under siege by (Syrian) government forces elsewhere." [28] And then there's the largely untold story of the 13 year-long siege imposed on a whole country, Syria, by the United States and European Union . That siege, initiated by Washington in 2003, with the Syria Accountability Act, and then followed by EU sanctions, blocks Western exports of almost all products to Syria and isolates the country financially. This massive, wide-scale siege plunged Syria's economy into crisis even before the 2011 eruption of upheavals in the Arab world [29]—demonstrating that Washington's efforts to force Syrian president Bashar al-Assad to step down began long before the Arab Spring. The roots of US hostility to Assad's government are found in the danger of its becoming "a focus of Arab nationalistic struggle against an American regional presence and interests" [30] - another way of saying that the Arab nationalist goals of unity, independence and socialism, which guide the Syrian state, are an anathema to the US demand—expressed in the 2015 US National Security Strategy—that all countries fall in behind US global "leadership." Under US siege warfare, unemployment shot up, factories closed, food prices skyrocketed and fuel prices doubled. [31] "Syrian officials" were forced "to stop providing education, health care and other essential services in some parts of the country." [32] Indeed, so comprehensive was the siege, that by 2011 US "officials acknowledged that the country was already under so many sanctions that the United States held little leverage." [33] Western siege warfare on Syria has blocked "access to blood safety equipment, medicines, medical devices, food, fuel, water pumps, spare parts for power plants, and more," [34] leading Patrick Cockburn to compare the regime change campaign to "UN sanctions on Iraq between 1990 and 2003." [35] The siege of Iraq—at a time when the country was led by secular Arab nationalists who troubled Washington as much, if not more, than the secular Arab nationalists in Syria vex Washington today—led to the deaths, though disease and hunger, of 500,000 children, according to the United Nations. Political scientists John Meuller and Karl Meuller called the siege a campaign of economic warfare amounting to "sanctions of mass destruction," more devastating than all the weapons of mass destruction used in history. [36] When the West's siege warfare on Arab nationalist Iraq ended in 2003 it was immediately resumed on Arab nationalist Syria, with the same devastating consequences. According to a leaked UN internal report, the "US and EU economic sanctions on Syria are causing huge suffering among ordinary Syrians and preventing the delivery of humanitarian aid." [37] Cockburn notes that "Aid agencies cited in the report say they cannot procure basic medicines or medical equipment for hospitals because sanctions are preventing foreign commercial companies and banks having anything to do with Syria." [38] "In effect" concludes the veteran British journalists, " the US and EU sanctions are imposing an economic siege on Syria as a whole which may be killing more Syrians than die of illness and malnutrition in the sieges which EU and US leaders have described as war crimes." [39] | 0 |
The open borders lobby is bracing for a fight with President Donald Trump’s administration over the foreign guest worker program, which opponents say is discriminatory against American workers. [In a piece by the Hindustan Times, a newspaper based out of India, open border proponents with the Indian group “Immigration Voice” are decrying the Trump Administration’s expected effort to not defend an rule that allows foreign guest workers’ spouses to also work in the U. S. Sudarshana Sengupta, who is specifically cited by Immigration Voice, is currently in the U. S. on an visa, which is given to spouses of workers as they await green cards. When Attorney General Jeff Sessions, a longtime opponent of massive foreign guest worker programs, did not immediately defend the open borders lobby in a Washington court case, Immigration Voice denounced the move. The Washington court case was filed by Save Jobs USA, an organization comprised of IT workers who have been fired from their jobs after being replaced by cheaper, foreign workers under the program. “The recent statements from the government present an unacceptable risk for Immigration Voice members that the department of justice might decide after 60 days to adopt the position of Save Jobs USA,” of Immigration Voice Aman Kapoor wrote in a statement. Immigration hawks at NumbersUSA say the open borders lobby appears to be opposing every position the Trump Administration holds on immigration. “I think that the advocacy groups are going to scream and yell about any single thing that anyone proposes that is not open borders,” NumbersUSA Government Affairs Director Rosemary Jenks told Breitbart Texas. “They’ve decided that it’s in their interest to fight everything Trump wants to do. ” Jenks said the “coalition” between the business community, who wants continued cheap, foreign labor, and the Hispanic advocacy groups, who want to see higher levels of illegal and legal immigration, will continue as a united front in order to give the illusion that they care about workers and business. “The business community doesn’t really have much stake in chain migration issues,” Jenks told Breitbart Texas. “And the advocacy groups like La Raza don’t have a lot of stake in the foreign guest worker issues. They’re going to look like they’re defending the interest of business in order to keep that coalition going. ” Trump and Sessions’ positions on foreign guest worker programs remains highly popular with the American public, as only 30 percent of Americans said in a recent poll that the visa was necessary, Breitbart Texas reported. The vast majority of Americans also said the number of visas allotted every year to companies should either be kept on level or decreased. Only 23 percent of Americans said the number of visas given out should be raised. John Binder is a contributor for Breitbart Texas. Follow him on Twitter at @JxhnBinder. | 1 |
Report: Things Finally As Bad As Trump Claims Close Vol 52 Issue 44 · Politics · Politicians · Election 2016 · Donald Trump
WASHINGTON—Following Donald Trump’s stunning victory in the general election early Wednesday morning, political experts confirmed that conditions in the United States are now finally as bad as the Republican nominee has long claimed. “Though we had previously been able to dismiss Trump’s proclamations as mere hyperbole and scare tactics, the United States now definitively meets the criteria of being the declining superpower that Trump has described for the past 17 months,” said Georgetown University political science professor Ronald Leidecker, adding that, as of tonight, the nation no longer commands the same respect among world powers it once did, and our country’s greatest days most definitely lie in its past, just as the Republican has asserted. “Our economy is, since about 10 p.m yesterday, on the verge of collapse, and when it comes to foreign relations, we have foolishly made ourselves vulnerable on multiple fronts, putting the very existence of everything our nation holds dear at risk. In the words of Donald Trump, our country is a disaster.” Once again echoing the pronouncements of president-elect Trump, Leidecker noted that we sadly won’t be able to rely on Washington to change anything, as our political system is largely run by self-serving, power-hungry factionalists who don’t have the best interests of common Americans at heart. 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 |
‘Trump Unveiled’ Reveals the Big Con of Donald Trump’s Presidential Run Posted on Nov 1, 2016
By John K. Wilson ( OR Books )
Editor’s note: The following is an excerpt from “Trump Unveiled: Exposing the Bigoted Billionaire,” by John K. Wilson. “Trump Unveiled” is published by OR Books. Click here for details.
With his casino background, Trump is an expert at attracting gamblers, people who are willing to throw the dice with the irrational hope it will make their lives better. Trump understands how to recruit gamblers—by evoking hope and concealing facts. A casino doesn’t tell you that you’re likely to lose; a casino tells you that anything can happen, and you might just win, and what the hell, you’ll have some fun along the way. That’s the appeal of Trump’s campaign: take a chance on me, and I’ll give you everything.
In fact, Trump literally promised “everything” to his followers. Trump promised workers in Michigan, “I’ll get you a new job; don’t worry about it.” If the cost of supporting Trump is so small (a mere vote) and the potential economic benefits are so great (a new job, economic prosperity, and global dominance), why not go for Trump? Trump is the cheapest lottery ticket you’ll ever buy. And even if the odds that he’ll keep his word are very small, why not take a gamble on Trump?
This explains why Trump is so committed to denouncing America. He claims (despite all the evidence to the contrary) that the economy is a disaster, that the unemployment rate is really 42 percent, that everything is terrible, and that only he can make America great again. If you’re trying to recruit a gambler, you need to make them feel like normal life is boring and miserable. Trump tells America that their lives are horrible, and even though it’s factually not true for the overwhelming majority, they begin to wonder if he might be right. Everyone can imagine being richer and happier, and that’s precisely the core appeal of gambling.
As Trump the real estate developer put it: “I play to people’s fantasies. ... The more unattainable the apartments seemed, the more people wanted them.” Trump is applying the same principles to politics: Trump is presenting a fantasy of what people want from a president, and the more unattainable and unrealistic his promises are, the more people will want him even if they know they are being irrational.
Trump’s own lavish lifestyle serves his message. Trump loves to have rallies at airport hangers; it’s not just the convenience of flying in and out quickly. The true appeal of it to Trump is that it reminds his audience how incredibly wealthy he is: he has a giant plane with his name on it. Trump is telling supporters, I’ve got a plane. Do you? Vote for me, and who knows, maybe you will. Might Trump’s ostentatious display of extreme wealth turn off potential voters who are angry at financial inequality and the rigged system that favors the rich? The opposite is true: Trump is telling them the system is rigged and they’re right to be angry at the rich, but Trump is the only one who can offer the salvation of getting rich yourself. Trump University was another form of shafting suckers gambling on Trump. Give Trump thousands of dollars to learn his secrets, and maybe, just maybe, you’ll get really rich, too.
Trump also understands that the best way to bring people to a casino is with a distraction, and the best kind of distraction is a fight. A big boxing match attracts crowds who stick around to toss some coin at the casino. And so Trump is always provoking fights: with his opponents, with protesters, with the media, with Twitter critics, with anyone and everyone who irritates him. Distraction is essential to any casino. You want bright lights and noisy machines, free drinks and sexy waitresses. You want fancy palaces with shimmering chandeliers. You want the customer paying attention to everything except the fact that it’s all a giant, flashy scam. As the slogan of the Trump Taj Mahal says, “Excitement Returns.” Distractions make people more willing to gamble. In an environment of calm analysis, rational thinking tends to prevail.
Trump explained his approach to The Apprentice: “I rant and rave like a lunatic and the crazier I am, the higher the ratings.” This is also Trump’s approach to his presidential campaign, because it is his way of life.
Casinos are a legal con. The gamblers always lose, collectively, and everyone knows that. But individuals can sometimes win. The key for any casino is to convince gamblers to imagine that they will be the exception to the odds. They don’t even have to believe something so irrational is likely, they just have to hope.
Trump is gambling on the idea that he can convince the voters that the world they live in is a rigged game. They keep trying to play fair, and they get screwed. Trump is promising to play this rigged game, but says he will rig it on behalf of America. Nobody thinks Trump is an honest person; but the more he lies, the more his supporters can imagine that he’s going to lie for us. He’s going to be a lying son of a bitch, but he will be our lying son of a bitch. He’s a con man working for us to take the rest of the world’s money after they stole it from us.
The trick of Trump’s con is that he implicitly admits to being a con man. Trump’s book, The Art of the Deal, could easily have been titled The Art of the Con. The book is full of examples of how Trump misleads (“truthful hyperbole”) and manipulates people to take advantage of them. Trump has bragged, “I’ve taken advantage of the banks probably more than any other human being on earth.” To Trump, conning people is a credential.
As a con artist, Trump believes in nothing but himself. Only a con artist could propose the largest tax increase on the wealthy in human history just a few years ago and now propose the largest tax cut on the wealthy in human history while simultaneously claiming that he’s going to make the rich pay more. Trump will say anything to get elected.
Trump has only a few consistent positions he has held for decades. Because Trump is a con artist, he will never believe in free trade. The concept of mutually beneficial agreements is alien to him; someone is always taking advantage of someone else in Trump’s world. You’re either the con artist or the victim.
The fact that Trump is a con artist does not mean he is plotting as president to steal a trillion dollars and run off to a remote island. Trump, after all, is a narcissist who dreams of being president and imagines himself the greatest leader in history. But Trump can never escape his con artist instincts. He is unable to change, and incapable of self-criticism. He will govern as a con artist, as someone who deceives and manipulates and seeks to control everything around him. As a con artist, Trump imagines that everyone is organizing a con as well, which leads to his conspiratorial thinking. Only the naïve fail to understand they’re the victim of a con.
Casting a vote is as easy as buying a lottery ticket, and it’s free, too. Why not take a chance that Trump can deliver what he says, even if you know he can’t? The odds are against you, but hope matters more than probabilities. As the Powerball ad slogan says, “anything’s possible.”
Trump once said, “My life is like a game of poker.” As a gambler, Trump knows how to take risks with other people’s money. But he shows a dangerous tendency to follow instinct rather than reason. The only hope for Trump to emerge victorious is if he can convince the American people to be the same kind of gambler he has been.
Donald Trump is a pathological liar, a sexist pig, a hateful racist, a corrupt businessman, a pandering populist, a conspiracy nut, and a vicious bully. Trump’s cynical narcissism explains why he wants to be president, but his political success reflects much deeper problems in America: the inequality of wealth that makes a man like Trump so powerful, the celebrity-obsessed media that gave Trump an uncritical platform for his ideas, and the failure of our political system to address America’s flaws, which has allowed a bigoted demagogue to seize control of the Republican Party. | 0 |
Another day, another scandal…but this one might turn out to be the most damaging so far.
On October 28, FBI director James Comey informed the Senate Judiciary Committee via letter that the agency would be re-opening its investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server.
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 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.
Later that day, The New York Times provided an intriguing update:
Emails from Hillary Clinton’s private server were found after the F.B.I. seized electronic devices once shared by Anthony D. Weiner and his estranged wife, Huma Abedin, a top aide to Mrs. Clinton, federal law enforcement officials said Friday.
The F.B.I. is investigating illicit text messages that Mr. Weiner, a former Democratic congressman from New York, sent to a 15-year-old girl in North Carolina. The bureau told Congress on Friday that it had uncovered new emails related to the Clinton case — one federal official said they numbered in the thousands — potentially reigniting an issue that has weighed on the presidential campaign and offering a lifeline to Donald J. Trump less than two weeks before the election.
Now, Weiner is reportedly cooperating with the FBI…and gave them a laptop that he shared with his estranged wife…which means no warrant is necessary to search that particular device.
Is it possible that he will get some sort of deal based on an agreement to testify?
One can’t help but wonder what the FBI is going to find on that laptop. There are a reported 650,000 emails to scour through. It will take weeks – possibly longer – to sort through them, and the election is just days away.
There’s a particularly disturbing rumor circulating about the emails…
Rumors stirring in the NYPD that Huma's emails point to a pedophila ring and @HillaryClinton is at the center. #GoHillary #PodestaEmails23 pic.twitter.com/gkEH5oL269
— David Goldberg (@DavidGoldbergNY) October 30, 2016
I would not report this unless I was 100% sure – known this source 15+ years
— Greg Hilliard (@UnityActivist) October 31, 2016
Now, to clarify again – this IS just a rumor – unsubstantiated as of now.
And it sounds preposterous…until you consider that child sex rings among the powerful elite have been reported for years. Bill Clinton has been linked with a convicted billionaire pedophile named Jeffrey Epstein , who pimped out underage girls to powerful men. Flight logs show that Clinton was a frequent flyer on the registered sex offender’s infamous jet.
In May, Fox News reported :
…flight logs showing the former president taking at least 26 trips aboard the “Lolita Express” — even apparently ditching his Secret Service detail for at least five of the flights, according to records obtained by FoxNews.com.
…trips between 2001 and 2003 included extended junkets around the world with Epstein and fellow passengers identified on manifests by their initials or first names, including “Tatiana.” The tricked-out jet earned its Nabakov-inspired nickname because it was reportedly outfitted with a bed where passengers had group sex with young girls.
Conchita Sarnoff of the Washington, D.C. based non-profit Alliance to Rescue Victims of Trafficking and author of a book on the Epstein case told Fox:
Bill Clinton … associated with a man like Jeffrey Epstein, who everyone in New York, certainly within his inner circles, knew was a pedophile. Why would a former president associate with a man like that?
Also from Fox:
Epstein, who counts among his pals royal figures, heads of state, celebrities and fellow billionaires, spent 13 months in prison and home detention for solicitation and procurement of minors for prostitution. He allegedly had a team of traffickers who procured girls as young as 12 to service his friends on “Orgy Island,” an estate on Epstein’s 72-acre island, called Little St. James, in the U.S. Virgin Islands.
Why didn’t Epstein face harsher punishment?
Remember, he’s a billionaire with friends in high places.
More shocking details from Fox:
The U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida prepared charging documents that accused Epstein of child sex abuse, witness tampering and money laundering, but Epstein took a plea deal before an indictment could be handed up.
On Sept. 24, 2007, in a deal shrouded in secrecy that left alleged victims shocked at its leniency, Epstein agreed to a 30-month sentence, including 18 months of jail time and 12 months of house arrest and the agreement to pay dozens of young girls under a federal statute providing for compensation to victims of child sexual abuse.
In exchange, the U.S. Attorney’s Office promised not to pursue any federal charges against Epstein or his co-conspirators.
Florida attorney Brad Edwards, who represented some of Epstein’s alleged victims, is suing the federal government over the secret non-prosecution agreement in hopes of having it overturned. Edwards claimed in court records that the government and Epstein concealed the deal from the victims “to prevent them from voicing any objection, and to avoid the firestorm of controversy that would have arisen if it had become known that the Government was immunizing a politically-connected billionaire and all of his co-conspirators from prosecution of hundreds of federal sex crimes against minor girls.”
Oh, but there’s more . According to the pilots’ logbooks, which surfaced in civil litigation surrounding Epstein’s crimes, this happened in 2002…
…Clinton, his aide Doug Band, and Clinton’s Secret Service detail are listed on a flight from Japan to Hong Kong with Epstein, Maxwell, Kellen, and two women described only as “Janice” and “Jessica.” One month later, records show, Clinton hopped a ride from Miami to Westchester on a flight that also included Epstein, Maxwell, Kellen, and a woman described only as “one female.”
Why hasn’t Donald Trump added Bill’s Epstein ties to his arsenal against Hillary? He’s brought up the women who have accused Bill of sexual assault and rape.
Why would he leave out Epstein?
Probably because Trump also knows Epstein – very well, actually – as reported in a 2002 New York magazine profile titled Jeffrey Epstein: International Moneyman of Mystery :
Epstein likes to tell people that he’s a loner, a man who’s never touched alcohol or drugs, and one whose nightlife is far from energetic. And yet if you talk to Donald Trump, a different Epstein emerges. “I’ve known Jeff for fifteen years. Terrific guy,” Trump booms from a speakerphone. “He’s a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side. No doubt about it — Jeffrey enjoys his social life.”
Trump’s name and contact information is in Epstein’s black book – but so are the names and contact information for MANY other prominent and influential people, including Prince Bandar of Saudi Arabia, Tony Blair, former Utah governor and Republican presidential candidate Jon Huntsman, Senator Edward Kennedy, Henry Kissinger, David Koch and Pepe Fanjul, according to a report by Vice .
In 2010 , Epstein pled the Fifth when asked by a lawyer representing one of Epstein’s victims about his relationship with Trump:
Q: Have you ever had a personal relationship with Donald Trump?
A. What do you mean by “personal relationship,” sir?
Q. Have you socialized with him?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. Yes?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. Have you ever socialized with Donald Trump in the presence of females under the age of 18?
A: Though I’d like to answer that question, at least today I’m going to have to assert my Fifth, Sixth, and 14th Amendment rights, sir.
Both Trump and Epstein are named in a lawsuit for the rape of a 13-year old girl who is using the name Katie Johnson that allegedly occurred at a “sex party” way back in 1994, but the veracity of the case has yet to be determined. Judge Ronnie Abrams has scheduled an initial status conference in the civil lawsuit for December 16 in a New York district court.
Trump has vociferously denied the accusations. Epstein, an associate of the UK’s Prince Andrew who was convicted of underage sex crimes in Florida in 2008, has also denied the allegations. A lawyer for the Trump Organization told the Guardian in July: “This is basically a sham lawsuit brought by someone who desires to impact the presidential election.”
Edwards, who has represented Epstein victims, spoke with Johnson and declined to take her case, as The Daily Beast reported:
Concerning Trump’s involvement in Epstein’s illicit affairs, Edwards said he hadn’t seen any evidence that would implicate the GOP nominee and described Trump as “extremely helpful and honest,” during questioning.
In 2014 , another young woman filed a lawsuit claiming that Epstein used her as a sex slave for his powerful friends—and that she’d been at parties on his private island with Bill Clinton.
Epstein also reportedly donated money to the Clinton Foundation – even after he was convicted.
****
Back in July, a 4chan user by the name of FBI Anon shared some inside information, which was then posted on Reddit .
When asked if Hillary sold weapons and favors from the State Department for cash to our enemies, FBI Anon replied : “Weapons, favors, intelligence, and people.”
When asked what the Clinton Foundation does, FBI Anon replied: “Sold intel, favors, and people to anyone willing to pay.”
Regarding a possible Hillary indictment, FBI Anon said , “There is enough for her and the entire government to be brought down. People do not realize how enormous this whole situation actually is. Whether she will be or not depends on how much info about others involved gets out, and there are a lot of people involved.”
More quotes from FBI Anon:
“The real point of interest is the Clinton Foundation, not the email server. We received the server from Benghazi, then from the server we found data on the CF. Then we realized the situation is much worse than previously thought.”
“The DOJ is most likely looking to save itself. Find everyone involved in the Clinton Foundation, from its donors to its Board of Directors, and imagine they are all implicated.”
(Could this be why the DOJ tried to stop the investigation into the Clinton Foundation?)
“My message to you and everyone on this board is do not get distracted by Clinton’s emails. Focus on the Foundation. All the nightmarish truth is there. The emails will pale in comparison.”
More, from page 2 :
When asked if the people leading the investigation are blackmailed pedophiles: “No. The people under the magnifying glass do have an affinity for children.”
When asked what would happen if all of the information regarding the Clinton Foundation was released to the public: “Total chaos. The government would be exposed at every layer, who pays who, who buys what, and no one has yet asked about the human trafficking bits I have been laying out.”
When asked if members of Congress own strip clubs and have their own sex slaves?: “Epstein.”
“Pedophiles and sex traffickers everywhere. Many politicians trade girls like cattle.”
“BC (Bill Clinton) is a confirmed pedo.”
“Sex rings are popular in all governments, but pedophilia is primarily in British parliament & Saudi Arabia, and that’s why HRC and BC love foreign donors so much. They get paid in children as well as money. Dig deep and you can find it. It will sicken you.”
Of course, all of this could be fabricated by a person pretending to have inside information. We may never know the truth. But if these claims are true, they are deeply disturbing.
****
In August 2015, Trump made an interesting prediction…
It came out that Huma Abedin knows all about Hillary’s private illegal emails. Huma’s PR husband, Anthony Weiner, will tell the world.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 3, 2015
What will the emails (and perhaps other information) on Weiner’s devices reveal?
Will it be more revelations regarding play-for pay schemes, election rigging, or email-scrubbing?
Or will something more sinister be uncovered?
Hillary has called for the FBI to release details about the latest probe to the public “Immediately.”
Could that be because she knows they WON’T publicize the information if it would bring down MANY of her government colleagues and cause mass chaos and disruption?
Time will tell.
It would be something, though – wouldn’t it – if both Clintons were brought down by misbehaving weiners?
Oh, and speaking of perverted folks…
Two days ago, during an interview with Michael Smerconish of CNN, Creepy Uncle Joe Biden learned, on live TV, that the new emails being reviewed by the FBI are related to the investigation of Anthony Weiner. Watch his response.
Delivered by The Daily Sheeple
We encourage you to share and republish our reports, analyses, breaking news and videos ( Click for details ).
Contributed by Lily Dane of The Daily Sheeple .
Lily Dane is a staff writer for The Daily Sheeple. Her goal is to help people to “Wake the Flock Up!” | 0 |
Thu, 27 Oct 2016 16:45 UTC © Yves Herman / Reuters The Belgian government has reached a deal with the Wallonia region on the free trade agreement between the European Union and Canada, according to Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel. Michel said "an agreement" was found after a last minute round of negotiations with Belgium's French-speaking community who have been holding up the deal. Brussels has not released the details of the compromise. The signing of the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) was cancelled on Thursday after the deal was blocked by Wallonia's regional parliament. Comment: Belgium's Wallonia region defying EU Junker's CETA trade deal Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was forced to cancel Thursday's trip to Brussels as the negotiations had stalled. Wallonia premier Paul Magnette said the region was not opposed to an EU trade deal with Canada. However, he insisted the secret arbitration scheme allowing corporations to sue governments had to be dropped from the agreement. Regional leaders in Wallonia voted 46 to 16 against CETA over fears of job losses due to cheaper farming and industrial imports. CETA promises to eliminate tariffs on 98 percent of goods immediately after ratification and also encompasses regulatory cooperation, shipping, sustainable development and access to government tenders. CETA's supporters say the deal would yield billions in added trade through customs and tariff cuts and other measures facilitating business ties. Opponents claim the trade deal will only benefit the wealthy and large corporations. For CETA to be ratified, all 28 European Union countries have to agree the treaty. Until now, Belgium has been the main obstacle to the free trade deal. "All parliaments are now able to approve by tomorrow at midnight. Important step for EU and Canada," Michel tweeted. | 0 |
Trump’s election breaks chains of political correctness By Ben Tanosborn Ben Tanosborn
One likely winner to come out of the 2016 US presidential election: accuracy in polling. Obviously not past but future polling!
Donald Trump, from the start of his campaign to capture the presidency, harangued his followers during the rallies with such unrestricted language that they felt liberated, able to speak out their minds without any fear of repression or recrimination. Well, at least not in the safety and camaraderie of their rallies; although also aware that politically correct America frowned on such openness, leaving them with a bi-forked tongue when applied to people who would likely judge, or categorize them . . . and that definitely applied to pollsters.
One suspects that as much as 10 percent of the actual Trump vote came out of what we could call correctness-hiding, making total mockery of most pollsters. As a pertinent note I might add that while a student in operations research, I had a professor (Anant Negandhi, UCLA) who then claimed that polling involving issues with sociopolitical subjectivity was for the most part worthless because of the difficulty in modeling a survey which would correctively identify and quantify both the causal and intervening variables. Over a generation later, that difficulty has not really changed; nor has the need of pollsters to make a living, which may push them to sell smoke and mirrors to a well-funded political establishment.
My own observation in weighing the impact of Trump’s campaign on his followers, most particularly those in the construction trades, has been one where from the start of the campaign, and solidly after Trump’s winning the Republican candidacy, these people who had expressed racial and ethnic bias with some trepidation were now doing so with little angst, as if their speech now had society’s imprimatur and they had been godfathered by Donald Trump.
After the cataclysmic misreading by a polling industry that has reverted from a science to an art . . . lagging miles behind the weather predicting science, one would expect the rigidity of science to take a critical role. So, of necessity if wishing to survive, the entire industry must undergo a true and complete overhaul. And that would be one positive result from this election: accuracy in polling.
Now that Trump has become president-elect, to be escorted to the White House by a Republican Congress . . . and a conservative-in-waiting Supreme Court, will the specter of political correctness exit from American life? Not likely; but rest assured that there will be a great degree of accommodation for the 26 percent of American bigoted patriots (bigopats). [Read my article of June 16, 2016: Bigopats: ‘ Undocumented’ Largest Group in American Politics . ]
To say that America is divided is a mini-characterization of incredible proportions that we, as a nation, will have incredible difficulty in overcoming . . . and perhaps never will. First, we must cope with the surreal realization that this United States of America isn’t at all represented by Kansas being a dream away from Oz. The results from this last election have told us the naked truth about our nation; a truth that most Americans would like to keep under wraps: that more than a divided country split in two or more political camps, America is really a fallen Humpty Dumpty fragmented economically, socially, and politically in a way that it will take a Herculean effort to be able to put it back together again. An effort that requires drastic change: both political and institutional.
Once upon a united America, we insist in telling ourselves, we were the land of promise and hope; the great experiment in humankind: economic opportunity, the American dream, the mythical melting pot, freedom, dignity and self-realization. But we seem to forget, that it was the economic wellbeing in the America of generations past that did provide the glue that kept our multi-part Humpty Dumpty (diverse America) sitting smilingly on the wall, looking condescendingly over the rest of the world.
Globalization has melted that glue; and economic change for that symbolic American middle class, whether coming from the Right (Trump) or the Left (Sanders), is unlikely to improve their lot. But at the end of the day, neither would have that middle path that Hillary Clinton would have walked.
The establishment Detestables have lost the Toilet Bowl to Trump’s Deplorables . . . we either grin and bear it; or, for the lack of a better plan, get ourselves dirty fighting Trump’s Movement . . . certifiably a bowel movement in this last Toilet Bowl. Copyright © 2016 Tanosborn
Ben Tanosborn, columnist, poet and writer, resides in Vancouver, Washington (USA), where he is principal of a business consulting firm. Contact him at . | 0 |
Observers on Twitter noted Friday afternoon that the White House’s page on climate change, a creation of the Obama administration, appears to have been taken down shortly after Donald Trump assumed the nation’s presidency. [In its stead, the new White House published an explanation of what the Trump team is calling the “America First Energy Plan. ” At press time, the link to the White House page publicizing a plan to combat climate change leads to a blank page. RIP @WhiteHouse climate webpage. pic. twitter. — Amy Harder (@AmyAHarder) January 20, 2017, A cached version of the page shows that President Obama’s administration had used it to advertise a plan to reduce America’s carbon footprint and have America participate in “global effort to combat climate change. ” “For the sake of our children and future generations, we must act now,” the page read, “And we are. ” The Trump administration has instead published a page that lays out its energy plan. “The Trump Administration is committed to energy policies that lower costs for hardworking Americans and maximize the use of American resources, freeing us from dependence on foreign oil,” the page reads. The page addresses finding economically viable energy solutions that are mindful of the environment: [O]ur need for energy must go with responsible stewardship of the environment. Protecting clean air and clean water, conserving our natural habitats, and preserving our natural reserves and resources will remain a high priority. President Trump will refocus the EPA on its essential mission of protecting our air and water. | 1 |
Iran Warns President-Elect Trump Not To Mess With Their Sweetheart Nuclear Deal From Obama President-elect Trump once said during his campaign that he would “rip up” the agreement, drawing a harsh reaction from Khamenei, who said if that happens, Iran would “set fire” to the deal. 23, 2016 Extending U.S. sanctions on Iran for 10 years would breach the Iranian nuclear agreement, Iran Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei said on Wednesday, warning that Tehran would retaliate if the sanctions are approved. The U.S. House of Representatives re-authorized last week the Iran Sanctions Act , or ISA, for 10 years. The law was first adopted in 1996 to punish investments in Iran’s energy industry and deter Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons. The Iran measure will expire at the end of 2016 if it is not renewed. The House bill must still be passed by the Senate and signed by President Barack Obama to become law. Iran and world powers concluded the nuclear agreement, also known as JCPOA , last year. It imposed curbs on Iran’s nuclear program in return for easing sanctions that have badly hurt its economy. Obama Announces a Historic Nuclear Deal with Iran:
So the same guy who said you could “keep your doctor” and “keep your plan” now says this deal will solve the problem. Do YOU believe him? We sure don’t. “The current U.S. government has breached the nuclear deal in many occasions,” Khamenei said, addressing a gathering of members of the Revolutionary Guards, according to his website. “The latest is extension of sanctions for 10 years, that if it happens, would surely be against JCPOA, and the Islamic Republic would definitely react to it.” The U.S. lawmakers passed the bill one week after Republican Donald Trump was elected U.S. president. Republicans in Congress unanimously opposed the agreement, along with about two dozen Democrats, and Trump has also criticized it. Obama’s deal with Iran “worst treaty since Chamberlain”: Lawmakers from both parties said they hoped bipartisan support for a tough line against Iran would continue under the new president. President-elect Trump once said during his campaign that he would “rip up” the agreement, drawing a harsh reaction from Khamenei, who said if that happens, Iran would “set fire” to the deal. The House of Representatives also passed a bill last week that would block the sale of commercial aircraft by Boeing and Airbus to Iran. Trump and Clinton on U.S. nuclear policy, Iran deal: The White House believes that the legislation would be a violation of the nuclear pact and has said Obama would veto the measure even if it did pass the Senate. source SHARE THIS ARTICLE | 0 |
Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council spoke with Breitbart News Daily SiriusXM host Raheem Kassam on Friday regarding President Trump’s signing of an executive order allowing churches to engage in more political activity and its implications for the Jeffersonian notion of the separation of church and state. [Asked if the executive order is “a contravention of the Jeffersonian notion of separation of church and state,” said Perkins, “actually, I think it’s in compliance with Thomas Jefferson’s view that the government shouldn’t be meddling in the business of the church. ” “That’s what’s happening, increasingly,” added Perkins. “The wall, so to speak, that’s been breached hasn’t been breached by the church, its been breached by the government getting involved … I mean, when you have the government telling churches that they have to provide for elective abortion coverage in their health care plans, regardless of what their faith view is of human life … that’s the government meddling in the business of the church. ” Breitbart News Daily airs on SiriusXM Patriot 125 weekdays from 6:00 a. m. to 9:00 a. m. Eastern. | 1 |
The Moon that Fell from Heaven page: 1 link There is an intriguing text from Anatolian myth with regards to the Moon falling from Heaven; The Moon God fell from the sky and fell upon the gate complex, but no one saw him. The Storm God sent rain after him; he sent rains after him. Fear seized him; anxiety seized him. The god Hapantali went there. He stood beside him and uttered over him the words of a spell. The goddess Kamrusepa looked down from the sky and said: "What in the world has happened here? A good question from Kamrusepa there then, but the text is fragmentary and partial and the matter isn't really explained, so anyway the first question then is were was this gate complex and why couldn't he, the Moon, be seen having landed. My consideration is that the gate complex is that of the Cilician Gates , and that the Moon can no longer be seen as he has infused the Taurus Mountains with Silver. That region did relate to the Silver Mountains as several sources mention and was a major centre for the trade in Silver at Kultepe/Kanes; The essence of the trade was to ship tin, woolen textiles and lapis lazuli to Anatolia to sell it there in order to acquire, directly or indirectly, silver and gold, which was shipped back to Assur. Tin, essential for the Anatoian production of bronze was imported in Assur from Susa, perhaps by Elamite caravans, and ultimately originated from Central Asia. Assyrian trade colony at Kanes There are a great many tablets related to this trade recovered from Kultepe, on these sometimes can be seen the Taurus bull that bears upon it's back the Silver Mountain. Also seen beneath on that example is the Scorpion which was likely also an ideogram based upon the Cilician gates and greater region, also the symbol of Ishara the Goddess of the Silver Mountain and related to concept idea of the Moon within the Underworld, her symbolic metal silver and purity through refinement, the Temple of Ishara being at Kanes or Nesi to the Hurrians. There were a great many ideas bound up within this symbolism then, including in Cosmological terms the entrance into the underworld being above Taurus in Gemini, and it's opposite point of emergence in Scorpio, according to the inter-section point of the Galactic and Ecliptic planes. Were this gets interesting is that there is a Hurrian myth that relates to a conflict in the primeval period named The Song of Silver involving their tutelary God Tessub and his ongoing issues with Kumarbi, God of Destiny; Among Tessub, the Sun God of the Sky, Sauska Nineveh's Queen, and all the gods, no one worships him, although his power is greater than their power. His word is greater than their words, his wisdom is greater than their wisdom, his battle and his g1ory are greater than theirs. It is Silver the Fine of whom I sing. Wise men to1d me the story of the fatherless boy. It did not exist. Long ago Silver's Father had disappeared. And they do not know his sp1endor. Heroic men ran to battle. Abundance did not exist. And grain did not grow only hunger The Songs of the Kumarbi cycle can contain veiled allegory regarding ethnic disputes such as i outlined here with regards to Byblos and Ebla, it is likely the same in this case, conflict with the region of Nesa and the Silver Mountains, this however relating to a much earlier period, potentially also this relates to conflict from the Heavens as Silver could be named Kubbabar-Anzu as noted here the association with Anzu in conflict with Tessub relating to the same with Ninurta in the Sumerian mythos, and that seemingly from Anatolia. The identification of Silver as DUMU also correlates with the Sumerian notion of the Divine child as Damu, often seen as the basis for the cult of Dumuzid, were it was also the case that the City of Dumuzid, Bad-Tivira, was the centre of the Sumerian metallurgy industry. Silver is described in this text as a wannumiyas DUMU, which means a child whose father is dead or missing. Hittitologists generally translate this as "orphan," Silver's consternation at being told by the orphan boy that he too was an orphan need not mean that he was discovering this for the first time. The Song of Silver again is fragmentary but does seem to involve Silver at some point establishing his power; Silver seized power with his hands. Silver seized the spear. He dragged the Sun and Moon down from heaven. The Sun and the Moon did reverence. They bowed to Silver. The Sun and the Moon began to speak to Silver: O Silver, our lord, do not strike/kill us! We are the luminaries of heaven and earth. We are the torches of what lands you govern. If you strike/kill us, you will proceed to govern the dark lands person-ally." His soul within him was filled with love.He had pity on them In dragging the Sun and the Moon down from Heaven again it could be considered that is what had infused the Mountains with Gold and Silver, but also it could relate to the establishment of the cults of Allani and Ishara at the time of silver, the spiritual qualities brought down to Earth. Hopefully in the future more complete accounts of these texts will emerge as they are most intriguing and almost completely overlooked apart from specialists in the field, which is a pity as they are more interesting than most. edit on Kam1031300vAmerica/ChicagoThursday2731 by Kantzveldt because: (no reason given) | 0 |
The stars of CBS’s Mom are launching a donation campaign to support Planned Parenthood. [Twitter: Now is more important than ever to #StandWithPP. Thank you @JOSS Whedon for joining the fight → https: . — Allison Janney (@AllisonBJanney) May 18, 2017, Actresses Allison Janney (pictured) and Anna Faris, along with series producer Chuck Lorre, are kicking off their campaign to support the abortion industry giant in place of spending funds on an Emmy FYC campaign, reports Deadline: Hollywood. I am so proud of everyone at @MomCBS for making this decision at such a critical time in @PPact future 💖 https: . — Allison Janney (@AllisonBJanney) May 18, 2017, Thank you @Abartlette ’m really proud to be a part of @MomCBS and I thank you guys so much for being the fucking awesome people you are https: . — Anna Faris (@AnnaKFaris) May 19, 2017, Many Hollywood celebrities are supporting Planned Parenthood after videos emerged two years ago that led to allegations the organization sells the harvested body parts of aborted babies for a profit. Several congressional committees have referred the abortion provider for possible criminal prosecution as a result of investigations into the allegations. Just in case anyone needed yet another reason why @AllisonBJanney is amazing — thank you Allison and @MomCBS! https: . — Cecile Richards (@CecileRichards) May 18, 2017, Republicans in Congress are attempting to eliminate Planned Parenthood’s taxpayer funding and redirect it to other federally qualified healthcare centers (FQHCs) that provide more comprehensive care without performing abortions. President Donald Trump has promised to work to defund the group if it continues to provide abortions. A video produced by organization Live Action highlights how politicians promote Planned Parenthood’s “healthcare services” when such services are either unavailable or greatly declining: [VIDEO] A recent Marist poll found that 61 percent of Americans oppose taxpayer funding of abortion, including 40 percent of those who say they are “” and 41 percent of Democrats. Planned Parenthood performs more than 300, 000 abortions per year and receives over a half billion dollars in federal taxpayer funding annually. Live Action also reports that, over the last six years, Planned Parenthood’s annual clientele has dropped half a million clients, and the organization has closed more than 200 clinics. Utilizing Planned Parenthood’s own annual reports, the group found that over the last ten years, Planned Parenthood’s annual breast exams have declined 60 percent, Pap tests have decreased 77 percent, and annual cancer screenings have dropped 68 percent. “However, Planned Parenthood’s annual abortions have increased 27 percent,” observes Live Action, noting the group performs 34. 9 percent of abortions in the nation. | 1 |
TONIGHT @marthamaccallum interviews @VP Pence on #First100 Tune in at 7p ET on Fox News Channel! pic. twitter. During a preview of an interview set to air on Wednesday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “The First 100 Days,” Vice President Mike Pence pushed back against assertions that the on the National Security Council constituted a demotion of homeland security adviser Tom Bossert and chief strategist and former Breitbart News chairman Steve Bannon. Pence said that neither Bannon and Bossert were demoted, and both are “highly valued members of this administration. They’re going to continue to play important policy roles. But I think with H. R. McMaster’s addition as our National Security Adviser, a man of extraordinary background in the military, this is just a natural evolution, to ensure the National Security Council is organized in a way that best serves the president in resolving and making those difficult decisions. ” Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett, | 1 |
Don’t ask Thom Yorke to write a cover quote for your book If you’ve got a book coming out and need a quote for the cover, it’s probably for the best if you don’t ask Radiohead’s Thom Yorke. Subtext: Don’t ask Thom Yorke to blurb your book pic.twitter.com/yILKS1vXry
— Mark O'Connell (@mrkocnnll) October 27, 2016 | 0 |
0 |
|
In the complaint that Gretchen Carlson, the former Fox News anchor, filed this week against Roger Ailes, the network’s chairman, one thing stands out above all: the overtness of the sexual harassment that Ms. Carlson says she endured. “I think you and I should have had a sexual relationship a long time ago and then you’d be good and better and I’d be good and better,” Mr. Ailes told her last year, according to the complaint. And yet the legal case Ms. Carlson has built is based largely on her claims of Mr. Ailes’s retaliation against her for standing up to him, not the underlying discrimination. “Definitely the primary complaint is that she has been retaliated against by rebuffing his demands, complaining about discrimination,” Nancy Erika Smith, Ms. Carlson’s lead lawyer, said in an interview. In fashioning their arguments this way, Ms. Carlson and Ms. Smith epitomize a stark trend in discrimination cases over the last decade or two: More and more workers are bringing retaliation claims, and those claims, in turn, often determine the outcome of their cases. So pronounced is this practice that proving retaliation has sometimes displaced attempts to remedy the discriminatory treatment itself, a development that concerns some legal experts. “A lot of companies would find it easier to deal with the problem of retaliation, as opposed to addressing these underlying problems of harassment — denying promotions, paying lower wages because of sex,” said Peter of the Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs. According to data compiled by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, charges of retaliation linked to discrimination claims more than doubled from 1997 to 2015, to just under 40, 000, overtaking charges of racial discrimination, which had previously been the most common E. E. O. C. charge. One reason for the trend may be a pair of Supreme Court rulings in the late 1990s that prompted employers to enact policies that encourage workers to come forward when they believe they have suffered discrimination. But, of course, any uptick in workers speaking up also creates more risk that their bosses will retaliate against them for doing so, said Carolyn Wheeler, a longtime E. E. O. C. lawyer now at the firm Katz, Marshall Banks in Washington. In recent years, the commission has also made a priority of combating retaliation, Ms. Wheeler said, for the simple reason that it can fulfill its mission only if “people aren’t afraid to bring discrimination to the attention of the agency. ” Perhaps most important, however, is the fact that it is often easier to win a retaliation claim than a case about the original discrimination, and it has become more so in recent years. The Supreme Court in 2006 made it easier to prove that an employer’s response was serious enough to constitute retaliation, instead of being able to win only when an employee suffered an unambiguously harsh consequence for speaking up, like being fired. Anything that might well have discouraged a reasonable person from coming forward, like a schedule that makes it tough to care for one’s children, could suffice. Ms. Smith, the lawyer in the Carlson case, adds that retaliation claims can be more intuitive, because the desire to punish an accuser is almost universal. By contrast, discrimination claims may involve comments or actions that not everyone will view as hostile or demeaning. “I do think it’s absolutely true that it’s easier for juries to get retaliation,” she said. “It’s easier for even men to understand retaliation in a case. Maybe women might understand more how damaging this environment is. ” There is evidence to support this. Cynthia Calvert, a discrimination lawyer and senior adviser at the Center for WorkLife Law in San Francisco, recently reviewed 4, 400 cases involving workers who believed their employers had discriminated against them because of their role as caregivers, such as mothers of newborns. Ms. Calvert said that although many employees would file both discrimination and retaliation claims, “not infrequently, the discrimination claim would be dismissed in summary judgment, but the retaliation claim would remain. ” “The end result,” she said, “is that we probably have more verdicts and settlement on retaliation than on the underlying claim. ” In one prominent case in May, a sheriff’s sergeant in Sacramento won an award of more than $3 million when the jury found that her superiors had retaliated against her for complaining of discrimination. The discrimination claims had been dismissed. (Other lawyers note that retaliation claims can fail when the alleged retaliation comes a considerable time after the plaintiff first complained of discrimination, so this approach is hardly bulletproof.) The trend has its downsides, however, if the goal is to root out and address actual discrimination. “The whole point of this is, if there’s wrongdoing in a workplace, you want to make sure an employer understands what it is and corrects it so that it doesn’t go on in the future,” Ms. Calvert said. If the focus is primarily on retaliation, “you’re not getting that effect. ” In the extreme situation, aggressively policing retaliation but setting a dauntingly high bar for many types of discrimination claims could have the odd effect of making it relatively easy for workers to confront their employers while giving those employers little incentive to change certain corrosive practices. It would be akin to protecting corporate and government while leaving intact barriers to prosecuting corruption. To truly root out discriminatory behavior, many experts say, it must become easier for victims to gain redress legally. For example, courts frequently require plaintiffs to show that a similar employee was treated differently — say, a woman claiming that she was denied promotion because of gender discrimination would need to show that a similarly productive man with the same duties and qualifications received the promotion. But such airtight comparisons frequently do not exist, particularly at smaller companies. More broadly, courts grappling with discrimination cases are often laboring under a standard that favors direct evidence — like explicitly sexist or racist comments — that emerged almost two generations ago. In those days, bias was frequently overt. Today, biases tend to be more subtle and unconscious, like employers believing they are treating different workers equally even when they are not. “‘We don’t hire people like you’ was the world of the 1960s and 1970s, and the courts came up with ways of proving discrimination of that sort,” said Ms. Wheeler, the former E. E. O. C. lawyer. “That doesn’t help very much for plaintiffs today. ” | 1 |
Google has launched a new AI program called Perspective to detect “abusive” comments online in an effort to crack down on hate speech. [Publications such as The New York Times, The Guardian, and The Economist are testing the new software as a way of policing comments sections, according to the Financial Times. “News organizations want to encourage engagement and discussion around their content, but find that sorting through millions of comments to find those that are trolling or abusive takes a lot of money, labour and time,” said Jared Cohen, president of Jigsaw, the Google social incubator that built the tool. “As a result, many sites have shut down comments altogether. But they tell us that isn’t the solution they want. ” Perspective is available to all publications that are currently part of Google’s Digital News Initiative, which includes The Guardian, the BBC and The Financial Times. In theory, the software could also be utilized by social media companies such as Facebook and Twitter. Twitter has recently attempted to impose stricter rules on users in an attempt to reduce supposed harassment on the platform. CJ Adams, a product manager at Jigsaw, discussed the adaptability of their program, saying, “We are open to working with anyone from small developers to the biggest platforms on the internet. We all have a shared interest and benefit from healthy online discussions. ” Perspective is used to filter and compile comments on websites for human review. In order to learn what exactly counts as a “toxic” comment, the program studied hundreds of thousands of user comments that had been deemed unacceptable by reviewers on websites like The New York Times and Wikipedia. “All of us are familiar with increased toxicity around comments in online conversations,” said Cohen. “People are leaving conversations because of this, and we want to empower publications to get those people back. ” Apparently Perspective cut the review time of comments on The New York Times in half, allowing reviewers to check twice as many comments thanks to Perspective’s comment filtering abilities. Speed is paramount to Paragon, Jigsaw’s Chief Research Scientist Lucas Dixon said: “Their goal is to be able to [improve] review speed by 10x, so the project is ongoing. ” Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan_ or email him at lnolan@breitbart. com | 1 |
You are here: Home / political cartoon / Why Polls Showing Hillary in The Lead Are Useless And Misleading [CARTOON] Why Polls Showing Hillary in The Lead Are Useless And Misleading [CARTOON] October 29, 2016 Pinterest
Robert Gehl reports that with less than ten days to go, Donald Trump appears to be surging with likely voters across the country.
Despite an onslaught of negative coverage from all corners of the media, the Republican Presidential candidate has gained on Hillary Clinton in the latest poll from The Washington Post and ABC News.
Hillary still holds a 48-44 percent edge over Trump, but that is up from 38 percent support for Trump in the last week alone, fueled by support is shoring up among political independents and hard-core Republicans. He has made up ground among white people – with a 30-point advantage among whites without a college degree, up from a 20 point advantage.
Trump saw his biggest gains among political independents, favoring Trump by a 12-point margin in the latest tracking poll, 49 to 37 percent, after giving Clinton a narrow edge in late last week. Neither candidate has maintained a consistent lead among independent likely voters in Post-ABC polling this fall.
Despite the surge in Trump’s popularity, still six in ten voters expect Hillary Clinton to win anyway. The same poll found that only 30 percent thought Donald Trump would prevail. This plays into the Trump narrative that the vote is somehow “rigged” in favor of Clinton and no matter how much support he has, Trump would never ascend to the presidency.
Sizable minorities of likely voters express concerns about fraud and inaccuracy at the ballot box, though worries about both have declined in the past month. Fewer than four in 10 voters now say voter fraud occurs very or somewhat often (37 percent), down from 47 percent in early September. Studies of voter fraud have found that it is very rare.
In a separate question, the share of voters saying they do not have confidence votes will be counted accurately dipped from 33 to 28 percent, while the percentage saying they are “very confident” rose from 31 to 43 percent.
Seven in 10 Trump supporters say voter fraud occurs at least somewhat often, including 34 percent who think it happens “very often.” And Trump voters are split on whether votes will be counted accurately across the country, with 50 percent at least somewhat confident and 49 percent “not too” or “not at all” confident.
While Trump voters’ concerns about fraud and vote counting have not changed significantly since last month, Clinton supporters expressed growing confidence in the election process. The share of Democrats who are “very confident” the vote will be accurately counted has grown from 45 percent last month to 70 percent in the new Post-ABC poll. And while more than 1 in 5 Democrats last month thought voter fraud occurs at least somewhat often, that has fallen to slightly more than 1 in 10 in this week’s poll.
The poll was conducted with a sampling of 1,775 adults and has a margin of error of plus-or-minus 2.5 percentage points. | 0 |
The orange highway sign with black letters holds a familiar warning: “Lane closed ahead. ” What do you do? If your instinct is to immediately get out of the lane that will be closing, you may think you are being courteous to fellow drivers by reacting early — but in reality you could be slowing traffic, experts say. It may sound like a breach of etiquette to wait until the last minute to merge, but traffic engineers and transportation departments in several states are promoting that exact move, sometimes with mixed results as they try to overcome drivers’ ingrained habits. The maneuver is known as the late merge — or zipper merge, for the way that cars taking turns getting into a lane resembles the teeth of a zipper coming together. The move, in which drivers in dense, traffic remain in the lane that will be closed and then pull into the other lane at the merge point, helps ease congestion and drivers’ frustrations, experts said. As Tom Vanderbilt, the author of “Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do (and What It Says About Us),” noted, “Merging late, that purported symbol of individual greed, actually makes things better for everyone. ” Colorado started to promote the late merge during a highway project more than 10 years ago. Signs were posted, starting two miles from the point of the lane closing. The first signs read, “Use both lanes during congestion. ” The next signs said, “Use both lanes to the merge point. ” When the lane was ending, the last signs read: “Take turns. Merge here. ” The result? A 15 percent increase in the volume of cars moving through the work zone and a 50 percent decrease in the length of the line, K. C. Matthews, a traffic specifications and standards engineer at the Colorado Department of Transportation, said in an interview last week. The approach is effective in traffic and it allows drivers to take advantage of the lane that is about to close. In traffic, there is less need to rely on the late merge, officials said. A work zone engineer for the Kansas Department of Transportation, Kristi Ericksen, said in an email that officials would customarily expect in work zones to see “large differences in the speed of traffic (nearly at a standstill in one lane and highway speeds in the adjacent lane) and road rage (rude gestures, eliminating gaps, lane blocking). ” Since the late merge was introduced, the queues for those two types of lanes are about half the length officials expected, and drivers take turns at the merge point, she said. “As for traffic flows, the data suggests that while the speeds are lower and the travel time may not be shorter, traffic continues to move and is predictable,” she wrote. “In other words, the travel conditions are more reliable, which has its own set of benefits. ” But when people apply their “ sensibilities” to their driving, the late merge can be harder to manage, Mr. Vanderbilt, the author, said in an interview last week. For instance, a person would be considered rude if he or she walked to the head of a line of customers waiting for a bank teller. A driver in a free lane who zipped to the merge point and then tried to cut in could be judged similarly. Some drivers then take it upon themselves to become traffic monitors, enforcing societal norms and straddling the lanes to block those who might try to get ahead, he said. “In a car moving at a certain speed, when the moment comes to make a quick decision, we may become more interested in getting into a battle for progress,” he said. When the Minnesota Department of Transportation tried to promote the zipper merge, officials found that some drivers in the lane that was going to end kept pace with the car next to them “whether acting out of perceived courtesy or a sense of vigilante justice,” Mr. Vanderbilt wrote in his book. The result was confusion and congestion. Quoting the puzzled Minnesota transportation officials, Mr. Vanderbilt wrote, “For some unknown reason, a small number of drivers were unwilling to change their old driving behaviors. ” Officials report mostly positive feedback from drivers about the late merge, though some occasionally take a dim view of it. Mr. Matthews recalled a Federal Highway Administration official who was in her own vehicle and driving through a construction zone in Colorado. She was excited to see a zipper merge in action and zoomed to the merge point in the lane that was to end. Another driver, who was apparently not as impressed as she was, threw a burrito at her car, he said. | 1 |
MONTREAL — The idea was to celebrate Montreal’s coming 375th anniversary with a Christmas tree bigger and grander than the famous one at Rockefeller Center in New York. Instead, downtown Montreal wound up with something only Charlie Brown could love. “It’s a bit of an eyesore,” said Noor Malick, who has a view of the tree from her office window. “It’s horrible, it’s completely awful,” said Georges Malouin, who was passing through the Christmas market where the tree is displayed. “I’m so surprised. I saw it on the internet but now, live, it looks very — cheap. ” “It’s quite sad, really,” said Michaela van den Berg, a visitor from England whose husband, Jos, compared the tree to a matchstick. “Maybe it’s a joke. ” People certainly are laughing, both in the streets and online. The tree has two mock Twitter accounts, one mainly in French and one in English. Mélanie Joly, the federal minister of Canadian heritage who, among other things, oversees the national holiday decorations in Ottawa, tweeted that she loved the Montreal tree, but she added a winking emoji. A classic specimen, the tree is not. Its trunk is crooked, for one thing. And its other shortcomings are painfully obvious to . “It doesn’t have a top. It looks like it’s missing branches it’s kind of ” Pierre Bourcier said after snapping a photo with his phone. And then there are the ornaments: The tree is covered with red plastic inverted triangles topped by green maple leaves, the logo of the Canadian Tire retail chain, which supplied its white lights. A small child standing at the base of the tree this week stumped her father by asking why it “looked like a store. ” How did a holiday celebration became a municipal punch line? Chalk it up to (perhaps too much) ambition, inadequate financing and Murphy’s law. “We have good intentions,” said Pelletier, one of the principals of Sapin MTL, the company that came up with the idea of rivaling New York’s tree. “But the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and we had problems. ” Sapin MTL is in the business of Christmas trees, and it proposed the big one as a promotional gimmick. Mr. Pelletier said the company had a more majestic, shapely tree in mind. It researched the typical height for recent Rockefeller Center trees — 74 to 76 feet — and found a in Ontario that Mr. Pelletier described as “amazing. ” But its narrow height advantage vanished in early November when Rockefeller Center announced that its 2016 tree would be a Norway spruce. Mr. Pelletier and his partners then had less than a month to come up with a new, taller rival, and they appealed to the public, which suggested about 100 candidates. The balsam fir they chose came from the Eastern Townships of Quebec, near the border with the United States. “It’s not perfect, but it’s authentic and it’s a real tree that you find in the forests of Quebec,” Mr. Pelletier said. “We’re not pretending this is the most amazing, beautiful tree in the world. ” Facing a Nov. 30 deadline for unveiling the tree, the Sapin crew had to hurry. The tree was harvested, placed on a special flatbed truck and brought to Montreal under police escort within 72 hours. But a tight schedule and a tight budget meant that some corners were cut — and so was the tree. Somehow, the tree that reached the section of St. Catherine Street where the market is held measured just 88 feet tall, six feet short of the one in Rockefeller Center. Mr. Pelletier’s brother Philippe, another principal in the company, said a bit sheepishly on Friday that they had simply settled for the tallest tree they could find in time. And there was no time or money to give it the extensive arboreal spa treatment that the New York tree gets all the workers could do was reattach, sometimes rather obviously, a few of the larger branches that had broken off in shipping. As for the decorations, Pelletier said his company’s responsibility ended once the tree was in its bare steel stand on St. Catherine Street. Jane Shaw, a spokeswoman for Canadian Tire, said the company had not required the logo ornaments in exchange for donating the lights. She called them “a gesture from the organizers” of the Christmas market. The skinny, misshapen and widely unloved tree does attract some expressions of appreciation. Many seem to be of the ironic variety often reserved for horror movies. But some seem sincere. As a reporter was interviewing Mr. Pelletier in the market, a woman interrupted to say the tree was “beautiful,” before swiftly walking away. This year’s debacle hasn’t deterred Mr. Pelletier. He said his company was determined to make sure that Montreal truly outdoes New York next year, now that his fellow citizens have had their fun at this year’s tree’s expense. “I think we can celebrate the Christmas magic and stop saying it’s ugly, ugly, ugly,” he said, as a family posed for a photo in front of the tree. “Now in Quebec, there’s Cirque du Soleil, Celine Dion and the naughty fir — we prefer that to ‘ugly.’ ‘Naughty’ is better. ” Gesturing up at the tree, he said: “Look at him. You’ll find something sympatique in him. ” So would Charlie Brown. | 1 |
NASA is getting new looks at Jupiter, from close up and far away. Its Juno spacecraft made its fifth dive of Jupiter on March 27, its eight instruments gathering data on the planet’s interior as it accelerated to 129, 000 miles per hour. On each flyby, the public nominates and then votes on the atmospheric features Juno’s camera should record. This time, one of the winning targets was a boundary between two atmospheric regions. The bluish streak on the right is part of a persistent storm. Juno snapped this image 7, 900 miles from the planet. This week, NASA released an image of Jupiter taken by the Hubble Space Telescope, which is in orbit around Earth. The distance, 415 million miles, is the closest that Earth gets to Jupiter, which makes it a good time for Hubble to perform a survey of the solar system’s largest planet. The space telescope is able to discern features on Jupiter as small as 80 miles across. “We can map out the full planet,” said Amy A. Simon, an astronomer at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. who led the observations. “On a first glance, the Great Red Spot is still strikingly colored. It stands out quite well. ” Dr. Simon said that Jupiter’s atmosphere appears to be more turbulent than in the past couple of years. “That’s telling us something about the deeper atmosphere,” she said. “We’re going to be analyzing this over the next few months. ” Because the Hubble observations roughly coincided with Juno’s flyby, scientists will be able to match the with a wider view of the planet. “We could do a there and help out Juno at the same time,” Dr. Simon said. | 1 |
ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates — Lewis Hamilton may have won the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix on Sunday, and he may have won 10 races this season compared to nine victories for his Mercedes teammate, Nico Rosberg. But Rosberg, who finished the race in second place, not only won the 2016 world drivers’ championship, having earned 5 points more than Hamilton this year, but he also proved that he deserved that title, and above all, that it is still possible in the cutthroat world of modern Formula One to win with the style and grace of a gentleman. After conceding the drivers’ title to Hamilton during the past two seasons, and even losing when they were teammates in as children, Rosberg finally beat his nemesis. “It feels like I’ve been racing him forever,” Rosberg said of Hamilton. “He has always managed to just edge me out and get the title, even when we were small in . He’s an amazing driver and one of the best in history, so it’s unbelievably special to beat him because the level is so high. ” It was not just the manner in which Rosberg succeeded, and his generosity in praising his teammate, but also the contrasting style with which Hamilton lost the title, that defined this final duel of the 2016 season. With just 12 points between them before the race, and Rosberg leading the series, Hamilton, who started from the pole position — with Rosberg starting second — had to win the race and hope that Rosberg failed to finish second or third. There was widespread speculation before the race that Hamilton would use dirty tactics by trying to hold his lead to the first corner, and then drive slowly in order to force Rosberg into a battle with the drivers who were behind him — notably those from Red Bull and Ferrari, who started from third to sixth. “That’s not really ever been my thought process,” Hamilton said before the race, adding that it “wouldn’t be very easy or wise to do so. ” But it was exactly what Hamilton did, driving at one point as much as nine seconds slower per lap than he had in qualifying for the pole, and despite his Mercedes engineer regularly telling him to speed up as the team feared it could lose the victory. But even before that point, Rosberg had also fallen victim early in the race to another similar tactic from a competing team, after Max Verstappen in one of the Red Bull cars moved ahead of him after his pit stop, and Verstappen slowed to block Rosberg and help the other Red Bull driver, Daniel Ricciardo, to catch up from behind Rosberg. At that point, Rosberg had to contemplate that he might end up behind both of the Red Bull drivers, with Hamilton winning the race and the title. “The feelings out there in the battle with Max, unreal,” said Rosberg, looking both emotionally and physically exhausted. “I hope I don’t experience that many times again. ” He then proved what a gutsy and precise driver he is when his engineer told him that he absolutely had to pass Verstappen as soon as possible. He did so with a brilliant and brave move on Lap 20 of the race, despite the knowledge that Verstappen has been criticized all season as a dangerous and unpredictable driver to pass. Rosberg then set several fastest laps of the race and caught up to Hamilton again, showing that he was in full control of his car and himself. But a bigger trial lay ahead in the final laps of the race: As predicted, with Rosberg less than a second behind him, Hamilton drove as slowly as he could in order to push Rosberg into Sebastian Vettel of Ferrari, who was catching him, and Verstappen. Hamilton’s engineer continuously requested he speed up. But Hamilton kept his car as slow as possible, even answering, for an employee of a racing team, insubordinately. “Right now, I’m losing the world championship,” Hamilton said with two laps remaining. “So I’m not bothered if I’m going to lose the race. ” Rosberg had a card of his own to play, of course, had he decided to act like drivers such as Ayrton Senna, Alain Prost and Michael Schumacher in similar situations in the 1980s and 1990s, who all settled titles with knockout crashes into their own teammates. But before the race, Rosberg had said he would only do everything within the rules to win. And after the race, he said he never considered trying to pass in unrealistic circumstances. There was a certain justice that dawned after the race about Hamilton’s tactic, as Vettel repeated twice that he could not have made an attempt to pass Rosberg because Hamilton was actually too close in front of Rosberg, and any leap past Rosberg might send Vettel into a collision with Hamilton’s car. Under immense pressure throughout the season, Rosberg did everything he had to do to hold his advantage — Hamilton led the series for a period of only four midseason races — and Rosberg did so despite Hamilton’s efforts, both in words and on the track, to impose his will. Paddy Lowe, the technical director of the Mercedes team, explained why he felt there was no question that Rosberg deserved to win the title. “For me, it’s about not just winning races, it’s about sustaining that energy, sustaining that commitment, sustaining that nerve throughout a championship,” Lowe said. “And it all came down to this race today, and he did it, and that is the mark of a real world champion. ” But it was Rosberg’s own contrasting, and worthy, behavior that impressed the most. Despite Hamilton’s tactics on Sunday, and the media grilling them both over its ethical merits, Rosberg refused to say a bad word against Hamilton. “You can understand the team’s perspective, and you can understand Lewis’s perspective — so that’s it,” said Rosberg, closing the debate. Hamilton, however, was unrepentant. “I don’t think what I did was dangerous, so I don’t think I did anything unfair,” Hamilton said. “We are fighting for a championship, so I controlled the pace. That’s the rules. ” It was all a stark contrast to the early years of the series, when it was possible for one driver to hand his car to another driver of the same team, as Peter Collins did for Juan Manuel Fangio in 1956 in the final race, handing his own chance at winning his first title to Fangio, who ended up claiming his fourth. But Rosberg has perhaps learned his lessons from a driver from another age as well, as he became only the second son of a Formula One world champion — after Graham and Damon Hill — to win the title himself. His father, Kéké, won the title while driving for the Williams team in 1982, and after only a single victory that season. “I hope my dad survived that race,” Rosberg said of his victory. “I haven’t seen him yet. I’m sure it was pretty intense for him, so I hope he’s O. K. ” | 1 |
“Take off your clothes, step into the pod and shut the top. And be really careful not to get any of the salt in your eyes. ” Those were the instructions I was given recently just before I entered a sensory isolation tank in Seattle. Finally, I would have my chance to see what it would be like to be a brain in a jar. Lying in a supersaturated solution of magnesium sulfate — better known as Epsom salts — cranked up to body temperature, I pulled the top down over me and pushed the button to extinguish the violet light illuminating the pod. Cut off from the world of sensory stimuli, my brain had free rein to invent any experience it had up its sleeve. So I floated in pitch blackness and waited for a profound experience to wash over me. This is what adherents paid $89 a pop to feel. I’d heard it was better than meditation, yoga and drugs — perhaps because it promised nirvana without any effort or side effects. But I felt nothing. After some time, I became acutely aware that I could not feel my body, which I suppose was the whole point of depriving the brain of any connection to the physical world. I started to slowly move my hands and legs to reassure myself they were still there. Check. I had a vivid image of my phantom body I knew intellectually that it was present, but couldn’t detect it in the normal sense. Just then, I made the error of letting my head drop too low in the salt broth and got some into my eyes. The sting was immediate and distinctly unpleasant. The brief period of nothingness had ended, and over the next few minutes, my mental state moved from curiosity to boredom to annoyance. I blinked and rubbed my eyes. My stomach rumbled. My brain was bombarded with all kinds of physical sensations. I was beginning to feel sympathy for pickled fish. Instead of a transcendent excursion into an altered consciousness, sensory deprivation had hilariously underscored the primacy of my body it was almost a purely physical experience from start to finish. It was like being at a meditation retreat with a runny nose. My brain was simply incapable of escaping the signals my body was sending it. When the hour was up, I showered and came down to the receptionist to pay. There were three women there who were like me, and they all looked blissful. “How was it?” one of them dreamily asked me. Not wanting to be a downer, I replied that it was lovely and interesting. At least it was half true. The experience made me wonder about a question that has never let go of me: Are you more than your brain? Hardly a week goes by, it seems, without an enthusiastic report in the popular media about intriguing neuroscience research linking some human behavior to the function of a particular brain circuit. So you might hear that the insula lights up when you’re sad, another region when you’re happy and still another when you’re enjoying a drink or an orgasm. For some reason we love to hear our mental experiences described in the language of neuroscience, yet what does it actually add to our understanding of ourselves to learn that our brain shows activity when we think and feel one thing or another? By itself, not a lot, except to encourage the erroneous and simplistic idea that the brain is an independent sovereign, calling all the shots. Of course, the brain gives rise to our mind, which then tries to understand and manipulate the very neural apparatus that brought it about. It gives me a headache just thinking about it. Some very smart neuroscientists and philosophers like to say that the very notion of mind is an illusion, a trick of the brain — something they have been carrying on about for rather a long time. Don’t get me wrong. I’m a neuroscience junkie. But we are not just a brain in a jar we are also bodies, and what we do with those bodies can influence the brain. You can easily alter your thinking and mood by manipulating your body: by, for example, injecting your forehead with Botox, shining light into your eye, exercising — or floating in an isolation tank. In the end, whether or not we are more than our brain is less important and less interesting than the fact that our brain does not just give orders it takes them, too. An isolation tank can turn the body weightless and invisible, but your brain knows better. | 1 |
Talk show host Chelsea Handler tweeted a joke mocking President Donald Trump’s unborn grandchild Monday afternoon, but appeared to misspell the word “genes,” leading Trump’s sons to reply with the correct spelling. [“I guess one of @realDonaldTrump’s sons is expecting a new baby,” Handler tweeted. “Just what we need. Another person with those jeans. Let’s hope for a girl. ” I guess one of @realDonaldTrump’s sons is expecting a new baby. Just what we need. Another person with those jeans. Let’s hope for a girl. — Chelsea Handler (@chelseahandler) March 20, 2017, Handler had apparently attempted to use the word “genes. ” Donald Trump Jr. replied to Handler’s post to correct the mistake, writing: “Jeans? ?? I guess I’m not at all surprised … but really? !?! #genes” Jeans? ?? I guess I’m not at all surprised … but really? !?! #genes https: . — Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) March 20, 2017, A short time later, Eric Trump — who announced earlier Monday that he and wife Lara are expecting a boy in September — also replied to correct the tweet and remind Handler he is expecting a son. Somewhat ironically, Handler mocked Melania Trump’s English skills in a recent interview at Sundance, during which she said she would never interview the First Lady on her Netflix talk show. “No. Melania? To talk about what? She can barely speak English,” she told Variety in January. The First Lady, who was born in Slovenia, reportedly speaks five languages. Handler apologized for the spelling error in a tweet Monday evening, saying she was a “little stoned. ” Sorry about spelling mistake. I meant ”genes,” not ”jeans.” I’m a little stoned. What’s your excuse? — Chelsea Handler (@chelseahandler) March 20, 2017, The Chelsea star — who supported Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential race — has been a vocal critic of Trump since well before the November election. In April, the comedian posed with the phrase, “Trump is a butt hole” scrawled across her back. “It’s always a good thing to be able to look at somebody and be like, ‘That’s the worst thing that could happen,’” she told Variety in September. “And I think we should keep him in the spotlight. Not as president, obviously, but, you know, as The Apprentice or whatever that show is called. ” In January, Handler led the Women’s March on Main in Park City, Utah, a sister march of the larger Women’s March on Washington that occurred simultaneously in the nation’s capital. “Women are under a political assault, and I intend to fight back with all my might against a Republican president, a Republican Congress, and the radical, religious right who are drooling to defund Planned Parenthood health services nationwide,” she wrote in a guest column for the Hollywood Reporter at the time. Follow Daniel Nussbaum on Twitter: @dznussbaum | 1 |
Politico reported Thursday that President Donald Trump, chastened by his experience pushing for the failed Ryancare bill, is moving forward on tax reform with is own economic team in the lead — not Speaker Paul Ryan ( ):[Just on Thursday, President Donald Trump huddled with Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn, senior strategist Steve Bannon, and consigliere Jared Kushner and staffers from the National Economic Council and Treasury to delve into the various policy and ways to structure a plan. The key takeaway: The White House is not outsourcing these details to anyone, including the speaker of the House. The report said White House press secretary Sean Spicer confirmed this new dynamic at Friday’s news briefing: “The president will put out principles, I’m sure, in terms of what his goals are and drive this as the process moves forward. ” A paper, obtained by Politico and developed during the presidential transition, is the central blueprint for the president’s tax reform program — and it would push Ryan’s own Border Adjustment Tax off the table. The president is expected to propose cutting the corporate tax rate to 15 percent combined with a wiping out of the tax code’s catalog of tax loopholes and deductions Congress created to ameliorate the 35 percent rate for business profits. Another part of the plan is to simply the individual tax rates, again by lowering the rates and removing specialized deductions. Trump’s corporate and individual tax reforms are significant, but no way near the revolutionary changes contained in Ryan’s Border Adjustment Tax, which shifts $1 trillion in annual tax burden onto exported goods and exporters. That fight has already been going on behind the scenes, as domestic manufacturers and retailers line up allies and resources as they contest for who will be on the hook for of the federal government’s annual revenues. Ryan read Capitol Hill Republicans into his schedule that would carry on through Labor Day at the GOP lawmakers’ policy retreat held in Philadelphia in the last week of January. The schedule called for the House to focus on overturning President Barack Obama’s regulations through the Congressional Review Act, while the Senate focused on confirming the first wave of Trump administration appointees. March was dedicated to the of the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare. In April, the Senate would confirm the president’s choice to fill the Supreme Court seat made vacant by the death of Justice Antonin Scalia, and the House would tackle reforming the tax code — a process coupled with the approval of the fiscal year 2018 budget that would consume both chambers. In Philadelphia, Ryan had not yet revealed that he would hijack the of Obamacare with his own bill that fell short of what Republicans had expected and had promised voters in every political cycle since Obamacare became law in 2010. The Ryancare bill alienated conservatives and frightened moderate Republicans hesitant to cast a politically risky vote for a bill that might not pass the Senate. In the end, the speaker pulled the Ryancare bill from the House floor March 24, nearly 15 minutes from the roll call that would have meant its certain defeat. If Ryan had a working majority in the House, he would be the man driving the agenda, he but does not have that majority, so the White House is moving forward with its own agenda and its own ideas. The aborted American Health Care Act has been portrayed as a defeat for the president, who rallied for the bill in events outside of Washington and behind closed doors at the White House and on Capitol Hill. Now that things have settled, it appears that instead of a setback for the president, the failure of the speaker’s health care legislation was really Trump’s liberation. During the 2016 presidential cycle, Ryan created “The Better Way” agenda as a parallel campaign platform, so that he and his allies could campaign for themselves without mentioning the president’s name nor offer him support. Now, Trump has found his own better way. | 1 |
You mean a war against Russia -- starting in Syria, and spreading to god only knows where. | 0 |
Former United States Attorney for the District of Columbia Joe diGenova suggested Friday James Comey’s reopening of the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails was the product of a “revolt” inside the FBI.
While speaking with WMAL’s Larry O’Connor , diGenova was asked what Comey meant by saying newly discovered Clinton emails from Anthony Weiner and Huma Abedin’s devices “appear to be pertinent” to the FBI’s prior investigation.
“It tells me that the original investigation was not thorough, and that it was an incompetent investigation,” diGenova said, “otherwise they would have discovered this — and I’ll tell you why.”
“These were found on the phone that was used by Anthony Weiner and Huma Abedin,” he said. “Why was that phone not looked at originally?”
“There could be one explanation: Huma Abedin may have denied that any other phone existed, and if she did, she committed a felony. She lied to the FBI just like General Cartwright, and if she did, she’s dead meat, and Comey knows it, and there’s nothing he can do about it.”
diGenova continued: “And why this letter was sent today was very simple: the agents came to Comey yesterday, they told him about the evidence, and he said oh ‘S’, and realized that his goose was cooked, that this would prove conclusively that his original investigation was incompetent, and he knew that the agents running the Weiner case would leak it if he did not send this letter to congress.”
“And I’ve also been told something very significant, it’s been reported that those laptops [belonging to Clinton aides Cheryl Mills and Heather Samuelson] were destroyed, they were not, and the reason is the FBI agents refused to do it.”
diGenova went on to say he believes “there is a quiet but serious revolt against the director right now.”
“He sent those letters today because he is in deep trouble inside the bureau,” he said. “Comey sent this letter today because he had to. He has no moral authority inside the agency right now, he’s a joke, he’s a laughingstock of the agency, and among former FBI agents, he has become an anathema.”
Listen to the full interview courtesy of WMAL:
Courtesy of Information Liberation Don't forget to follow the D.C. Clothesline on Facebook and Twitter. PLEASE help spread the word by sharing our articles on your favorite social networks. Share this: | 0 |
Sesame Seeds for Knee Osteoarthritis VN:F [1.9.22_1171] Close Transcript Transcript: Sesame Seeds for Knee Osteoarthritis
Below is an approximation of this video’s audio content. To see any graphs, charts, graphics, images, and quotes to which Dr. Greger may be referring, watch the above video.
Ever since the 1920s, doctors have been injecting arthritis patients with gold. Evidently, “gold-based medicines have been in use for thousands of years,” and remarkably, are still in clinical use as so called disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs—meaning they can slow the progression of rheumatoid arthritis.
Unfortunately, such drugs can be toxic, even fatal, causing conditions such as gold lung, a gold-induced lung disease. “Although its use can be limited by the incidence of serious toxicity,” injectable gold has been shown to be beneficial. But maybe, some researchers suspected, some of that benefit is the sesame oil that’s injected, which is used as the liquid carrier for the gold.
Sesame seeds contain anti-inflammatory compounds, with names like sesamin and sesamol, which researchers suspect “may serve as a potential treatment for various inflammatory diseases.” But, these were in vitro studies. First, we have to see if it has an anti-inflammatory effect in people, not just cells in a petri dish. But, there haven’t been any studies on the effects of sesame seeds on inflammatory markers in people with arthritis, for example—until now.
“Considering the high prevalence of osteoarthritis…and since until now there has not been any human studies to evaluate the effect of sesame in [osteoarthritis] patients, this study was designed to assess the effect of administration of sesame [seeds] on inflammation…” And, they found a significant drop in inflammatory markers. But, what effect did it have on their actual disease?
Fifty patients with osteoarthritis of the knee were split into two groups; standard treatment, or standard treatment plus about a quarter-cup of sesame seeds a day, for two months. Before they started, they described their pain as about 9 out of 10—where zero is no pain, and 10 is the maximum pain tolerable. After two months, the control group felt a little better—pain down to 7. But, the sesame group dropped down to 3.5—significantly lower than the control group.
The researchers conclude that sesame appeared to have a “positive effect,”“improving clinical signs and symptoms in patients with knee [osteoarthritis].” But, the main problem with this study is that the control group wasn’t given a placebo. It’s hard to come up with a kind of fake sesame seed. But, without a placebo, they basically compared doing nothing to doing something. And, any time you have patients do something special, you can’t discount the placebo effect.
But, what are the downsides? I mean that’s the nice thing about using food as medicine—only good side effects. Though the results are mixed, there have been studies using placebo controls that found that adding sesame seeds to one’s diet may improve our cholesterol and antioxidant status. And, the amount of sesamin found in as little as about one tablespoon of sesame seeds can modestly lower blood pressure a few points within a month—enough, perhaps, to lower fatal stroke and heart attack risk by about 5%; potentially saving thousands of lives. Please consider volunteering to help out on the site. Close Sources Video Sources | 0 |
Andrew Anglin
26, 2016
What Blacks think Black interactions with White cops look like:
What SJW feminists think Black interactions with White cops look like:
What I wish Black interactions with White cops looked like:
What Black interactions with White cops actually look like:
Black People Cops The Blacks 2016-10-26 Andrew Anglin | 0 |
Pennsylvania State Rep. Jamie Santora ( ) is pushing a ban on private gun sales nearly identical to the ones Michael Moms Demand Action pushed in Washington state, Maine, and Nevada. [Santora’s bill would bar the private sales that Americans have enjoyed since the Second Amendment was ratified in 1791 and would require that every sale be processed in front of an agent of the government via a background check. This means that Pennsylvanians selling a gun to a fellow hunter, lifelong or childhood friend would have to seek out a Federal Firearms License (FFL) holder and the buyer would have to pass a background check just as the Orlando Pulse attacker (June 12, 2016) the Aurora movie theater attacker (July 20, 2012) Gabby Giffords’ attacker (January 8, 2011) the Fort Hood attacker (November 5, 2009) and the Virginia Tech attacker (April 16, 2007) did. According to the Delaware County News Network, Santora says his attempt to expand the frequency of background checks is “common sense. ” He said, “We’re not trying to take away Second Amendment rights. Anyone who has a gun should have a background check. ” It should be noted that the following individuals all submitted to background checks in order to acquire their guns: The two of Santora’s gun control bill are Democrats. AWR Hawkins is the Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and host of Bullets with AWR Hawkins, a Breitbart News podcast. He is also the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart. com. | 1 |
By Claire Bernish Disinformation. Misinformation. Propaganda. Outright lies. Purposeful distractions. Misleading bias. All tools of the government and close ally, corporate media, to keep the... | 0 |
USA News Flash 1 Comment
As you know, the NYPD confiscated Huma and Antony Weiner’s home devices as part of the investigation into Weiner’s “sexting” with underage girls.
Well guess what… the cops didn’t stop only with them. They also raider Hillary’s property and guess what they found?!
An NYPD source just claimed that within the emails on that device, Hillary and Bill are directly implicated ins a MASSIVE child sex/trafficking ring along with their friend, and convicted pedophile, Jeffrey Epstein. (See Below)
According to the source,
“…It’s much more vile and serious than classified material on Weiner’s device. The emails DETAIL the trips made by Weiner, Bill and Hillary on their pedophile billionaire friend’s plane, the Lolita Express.”
“We’re talking an international child enslavement and sex ring“
These claims were backed up by other NYPD sources as well:
Jeff Epstein is a level-3 registered sex offender and the media ignores the fact hat Bill Clinton flew 26 times on Epstein’s private Jet and allegedly visited Epstein’s sex slave island. Now that Hillary has also been directly implicated, the media cannot ignore this any longer!
The NYPD source makes specific claims about her involvement. He says, “Hillary has a well documented predilection for underage girls, and Mr. Weiner could not bear to see those details deleted.”
This can very well be the biggest scandal of Hillary Clinton. She is definitely losing the election after this.
Let’s all share this article everywhere and expose her! The media refuses to cover this, but we will.
Thank you for reading. | 0 |
During the Senate Judiciary Committee’s hearing on Supreme Court nominee Judge Neil Gorsuch on Monday, Ranking Member Senator Dianne Feinstein ( ) said she was troubled by Gorsuch’s “originalist” judicial philosophy, and that “if we were to dogmatically adhere to originalist interpretations, then we would still have segregated schools and bans on interracial marriage, women wouldn’t be entitled to equal protection under the law, and government discrimination against LGBT Americans would be permitted. ” Feinstein said, “Judge Gorsuch has also stated that he believes judges should look to the original public meaning of the Constitution when they decide what a provision of the Constitution means. This is personal, but I find this originalist judicial philosophy to be really troubling. In essence, it means the judges and courts should evaluate our constitutional rights and privileges as they were understood in 1789. However, to do so, would not only ignored the intent of the framers, that the Constitution would be a framework on which to build, but it severely limit the genius of what our Constitution upholds. I firmly believe the American Constitution is a living document, intended to evolve as our country evolves. In 1789, a population of the United States was under 4 million. Today, we’re 325 million and growing. At the time of our founding, were enslaved. it was not so long after women had been burned at the stake for witchcraft, and the idea of an automobile, let alone the Internet, was unfathomable. In fact, if we were to dogmatically adhere to originalist interpretations, then we would still have segregated schools and bans on interracial marriage, women wouldn’t be entitled to equal protection under the law, and government discrimination against LGBT Americans would be permitted. So I am concerned when I hear that Judge Gorsuch is an originalist and a strict constructionist. ” Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett | 1 |
HANGZHOU, China — Air Force One had a bumpy landing in Hangzhou on Saturday, but it was nothing compared with what happened after the plane rolled to a stop. As the reporters who traveled to the Group of 20 summit meeting with President Obama from Hawaii piled out and walked under the wing to record his arrival, we were abruptly met by a line of bright blue tape, held taut by security guards. In six years of covering the White House, I had never seen a foreign host prevent the news media from watching Mr. Obama disembark. When a White House staff member protested to a Chinese security official that this was not normal protocol, the official shouted, “This is our country. ” In another departure from protocol, there was no rolling staircase for Mr. Obama to descend in view of the television cameras. Instead, he emerged from a door in the belly of the plane that he usually uses only on trips, like those to Afghanistan. Witnessing the scene, Susan E. Rice, the national security adviser, looked baffled and annoyed. Joined by her deputy, Benjamin J. Rhodes, she ducked under the rope to make her way closer to the president. The two were immediately stopped by the same Chinese official, who angrily challenged them. Asked later what happened, a diplomatic Ms. Rice replied, “They did things that weren’t anticipated. ” There were further surprises. At the West Lake State House, where Mr. Obama met President Xi Jinping, White House aides, protocol officers and Secret Service agents got into a series of shouting matches over how many Americans should be allowed into the building before Mr. Obama’s arrival. There were fears the confrontation would become physical. “Calm down, please,” an American official said, according to a pool report. A Chinese foreign ministry official said, “Stop, please,” adding, “There are reporters there. ” To some in Mr. Obama’s delegation, it was reminiscent of the rough treatment he received on his first trip to China, in 2009. Then the Chinese refused to broadcast on state television a meeting packed the hall with Communist Party loyalists and censored an interview he gave to a Chinese publication. At the time, many viewed the treatment as a metaphor for a rising power flexing its muscles with a young president from a superpower in decline. In later visits, the White House has pushed the Chinese for better news media access — with some success. In November 2014, the Chinese agreed to have Mr. Xi take questions at a news conference with Mr. Obama in the Great Hall of the People. When I asked Mr. Xi about the Chinese government’s refusal to renew visas for foreign correspondents, including some from The New York Times, he offered a curt lecture. When one’s car breaks down, he said, “perhaps we need to get off the car and see where the problem lies. ” On this trip, there was little threat of reporters making trouble. China has placed tight restrictions on foreign news media coverage of the entire summit meeting. When Mr. Xi took Mr. Obama on a leisurely stroll after dinner on Saturday, Chinese security cut the number of American journalists allowed to witness it to three from the original six, then ultimately to a single reporter. “This is our arrangement,” a Chinese official explained to his American counterpart, according to a pool report. “Your arrangement keeps changing,” the American replied. Asked on Sunday about the conflict, Mr. Obama noted that it was not the first time there had been tension with the Chinese over security and news media access during his travels here. This time, he said, “the seams are showing a little more than usual. ” But Mr. Obama said it had no bearing on the broader relationship. “I wouldn’t the significance of it,” he said. | 1 |
With the election over and done with, America is turning its attention to the transition from President Obama to President Trump. In barely two months, the Donald will take office, ejecting the Democrats’ coterie of corrupt courtiers and beginning his mission to right America’s wrongs . But President Trump can’t do it alone: he needs good, talented people to work under him and carry out the hard work of making America great again.
That’s where you come in.
The Trump administration is now soliciting people to apply for jobs for when the man himself takes office in January. We are officially calling on all ready and able Return Of Kings readers to submit their applications and take up any job offers. Here’s why you should consider a job in President Trump’s administration (beyond obvious reasons such as money and prestige)…
1. It’ll help keep President Trump accountable
While the media is lying about Trump reneging on his campaign promises, it’s still a good idea to give the man more reasons to keep his word. By staffing his administration with committed nationalists, we’ll make it easier for President Trump to fulfill his political program, as well as make it more difficult for him to go back on his promises. Remember, it was rank-and-file FBI agents who forced James Comey to reopen the investigation into Hillary Clinton ; a leader needs loyal men in order to carry out his agenda.
2. You’ll be able to make history
Given the momentous task of rebuilding America after eight years of Obama’s perfidy and failure, you almost have a civic duty to help President Trump in his mission. Expecting America to become great again all on its own is delusional; we need to do our part to restore this nation’s glory. By working with the Trump administration, you’ll have a direct role in reshaping America for years—possibly decades—to come.
3. You’ll help trigger the left
Despite their massive losses in the election—beyond Hillary Clinton’s defeat, the Democrats now control only a handful of state governments and failed to dent the GOP’s Congressional majority—the leftist mainstream media is trying to order Trump around and persuade him to staff his administration with the same flacks who filled Bush’s and Obama’s. Right now, they’re freaking out over Breitbart executive chairman Stephen Bannon being appointed as Trump’s chief strategist .
By joining the Trump administration, you’ll have a hand in helping trigger the left into conniption fits and spasms of impotence. Nothing horrifies them more than losing access to the levers of power, which they’ve controlled for decades. Watching leftists squirm and cry is one of the biggest fringe benefits of Trump’s victory, and we need to keep the triggering up for years to come.
If you think you have the job skills, Return Of Kings highly recommends you apply for a job in Trump’s administration . President Trump may have started the fire, but it’s our job to help the fire rise.
Read More: Did The Anti-Donald Trump Riot In Chicago Help Trump Cruise To Victory On Tuesday?
| 0 |
Police truncheon anyone calling for Orgreave inquiry 01-11-16
PEOPLE contemplating an inquiry into the ‘Battle Of Orgeave’ have been broken up by mounted police.
South Yorkshire Police commander Roy Hobbs said: “Some of those involved were wielding extremely dangerous opinions that we managed to beat out of them with big wooden sticks.
“I can reassure the public that none of our officers were physically hurt as the protestors were mostly old people due to the length of time they’ve been waiting for justice.
“Over 100 officer statements were generated during the operation and will be made public just as soon as I’ve got round to writing them.”
A formal confirmation of the decision will be published next week with a lengthy foreword to explain obscure historical terms such as ‘mining industry’ and ‘unions’.
Share: | 0 |
And You Thought the Silver Market was Rigged! Posted on Home » Headlines » Finance News » And You Thought the Silver Market was Rigged!
The great irony will not be lost on precious metals investors…
From Dr. Jeffrey Lewis :
We live in a world where the yield-starved and tech-savvy conspire in the basement of the underground and unaccounted. While the rise of Bitcoin and the explosion of alternative currencies may become the new scapegoat of behavioral finance, there is nothing quite like the reality of trickle down finance gone wrong.
Recently, EU officials called for putting safeguards on Internet currency.
The European Banking Authority called on the EU to develop safeguards for trading platforms. They were also called to start groups to oversee each Internet currency to ensure that no individual can manipulate the integrity of a particular virtual currency scheme and its key components. In the meantime, banks shouldn’t buy, hold or sell virtual currencies.
They stated:
“European Union banks should shun virtual currencies such as Bitcoin until rules to prevent abuses are put in place, according to the Bloc.”
This would be sad if it wasn’t so ironic.
It is also ironic that one of the other excuses for regulation is that electronic currencies make it harder for regulators to “manage monetary policy”, which is one of the reasons for using alt currencies to begin with to avoid the unintended consequences of intervention.
The key point is that media and the financial elite see the central banks as regulators and policy makers.
The 100 year old central banking meme is still very much alive and well.
On the surface, Bitcoin represents many things. To the precious metals inclined, it is often framed as an alternative or substitute.
But it is better to view the phenomenon and an anonymous currency with market backing.
The Bitcoin trading is well advanced. Not only do dozens of exchanges exist, but they are also functioning like their mainstream financial counterparts.
Yes, similar equities and other paper trading vehicles borrowing Bitcoins is a robust and well entrenched phenomenon. Margin swaps run in excess of $25 million on a daily basis.
Spin-off currencies are an even more dramatic spectacle. Well in excess of 200 individual currencies, these “software code-backed” instruments are born on an almost weekly basis. Coders, the exchanges, and a handful of insiders collude on the rise and inevitable fall of these new alternative currencies. New crypto currency launches come equipped with the most advanced automated social media marketing tactics.
The tactics used to launch a new currency are an extension of those pioneered by the penny stock ‘pump and dump’ phenomenon. At least the penny stocks have some form of backing — and not just code.
Regulation of these markets is a show.
First of all, regulators do not understand alt currencies anymore than they understand high frequency trading or algorithm. And secondly, while there is certainly a taboo associated with this, there really isn’t much money to go after.
In addition, the rate in which these new currencies crash and burn (and the relatively small size of the pool) results in an odd form of self or market regulation. Alternative currencies beckon for their own form of backing.
But speaking of justice and regulation…
Isn’t it ironic that any fuss should be made over these small markets, when a journey up the chain of modern finance reveals the same corruption and collusion – only worse?
When you consider that mainstream financial regulators are always one step from rotating into the banks they are charged with regulating, it becomes much easier to fathom the astounding degree of corruption.
And then there are the precious metals markets.
Regulators, exchanges, and a small handful of advantaged and well positioned players have access to the greatest ongoing pump and dump scheme imaginable.
It makes what happens in the alt currencies seem like child’s play – which is some ways it is when you consider the average age of the typical coder copying and pasting the next program into the next new currency.
The great irony will not be lost on precious metals investors. As the alt currency markets burn themselves out one by one before regulators have a chance to get close, the fuse has been lit on another (largely) limitless electronic experiment gone wrong. As the gold and silver pump and dump becomes recognized for the scam that it is, the desperate search for wealth will become apparent and too late for most. | 0 |
There could not, on first glance or listen, be two artists more different than John Zorn and Agnes Martin. Mr. Zorn, 63, a longtime fixture of downtown Manhattan, is known for composing frenzied, explosive music, riots of psychotically bright colors. Martin — who lived alone in the New Mexico desert for decades, died in 2004 at 92 and is currently the subject of a quietly majestic retrospective at the Guggenheim Museum — made paintings of serene subtlety. Mr. Zorn stated the obvious question as he walked on Monday morning around the Guggenheim’s rotunda, where a series of his works will be played on Thursday and Friday evenings. “Crazy John Zorn and Agnes Martin, the spiritual, the saint,” he said. “Where does it connect?” In fact, the connections go back to Mr. Zorn’s teenage years in New York, when he first encountered Martin’s painting “Red Bird,” with faint lines in colored pencil on a background, at the Museum of Modern Art. “I was completely hypnotized by it,” he said. Martin had by then grown famous for her softly colored grids, but Mr. Zorn found in her art as much passion as precision. “When I look at her work, I don’t see horizontal lines,” he said. “I don’t see a grid. I see a glow. It’s a feeling that’s going on here. ” Walking up to one of the paintings at the Guggenheim, he added: “You see all these minute — you could call them mistakes. It’s supposed to be a straight line, but it’s not a straight line. But she accepts those irregularities, the imperfections that make it perfect. That’s improvisation. Playing, and making a mistake, but you keep working with that mistake and it makes it right. ” It’s in that spirit of improvisation that Mr. Zorn, with his grounding in jazz, perceives a connection between his work and Martin’s that transcends their obvious differences. (“I can’t just go to the desert and start writing,” he said. “That’s not who I am. ”) But they share, in his telling, a fundamental focus on their work and a perpetual need for the sensory rejuvenation aloneness brings, whether in the expanses of New Mexico or the chaos of the East Village. “She lived in a desert environment,” he said. “I live in a city environment. My home is a device to enable creativity. It’s my desert, it’s where I’m going to get those receptors open. ” “As crazy as my work may sound,” he added, “even at its craziest, there is a spiritual practice going on in the process. ” Mr. Zorn long ago gave up on the idea of seriously collecting Martin’s work. (One of her paintings sold at auction this year for more than $10 million.) Instead, he has accumulated old posters for her gallery shows. His musical tributes to her began in the 1990s, when he returned to a few hypnotic, sensuous chords he had created as part of a soundtrack for a lesbian erotic film. Playing with the chords, Mr. Zorn stretched them into a piece that amplified that mesmerizing quality. He hadn’t been thinking explicitly of Martin while composing, but when he finished, he said, he realized, “Oh, this is an Agnes Martin thing. ” “Her work has a hypnotic vibe to it, you know,” he added. “It has introspection. And it flows in a sensual way, and that’s what those chords did. ” “Redbird,” as he called the piece, moves forward in a long series of calm yet ominous downbeats and their comet trails of resonance, sprinkled with slight rustles of percussion and the smoky undercurrent of a jazz club. The general stillness quivers with the expectancy of a long Morton Feldman work when “Redbird” came out, some summed it up as “Zorn does Feldman. ” Translating the order of the chords in “Redbird” into the duration of hits on four bass drums, he created the booming “Dark River,” and released the two works together. When the Guggenheim was planning its Martin retrospective (a traveling exhibition that, since the summer of 2015, has visited museums in London Düsseldorf, Germany and Los Angeles) officials there, having heard “Redbird,” asked Mr. Zorn if he would perform it live. He demurred, believing that the piece, intended to be heard solely in recorded form, wasn’t meant to be revived in person. But he surprised the museum by offering to write something new instead — and for free. (Mr. Zorn said that he does not accept commissions, preferring to follow the timetable and subject matter his inspiration dictates.) At the time, he was mulling a piece for the American Brass Quintet. While he usually composes scores in full, all at once, this time he started with a simpler harmonic progression, which he wrote down on a staff. (Think of piano music.) When it was done, though, it somehow didn’t seem like a brass piece: It felt, instead, like a work for harp. That became “Praise,” which surrounds a harpist with electronics and percussion. Just as Mr. Zorn considers “Dark River” a précis of “Redbird,” so is “Praise” a précis of “Blue Stratagem,” the piece he eventually made for the brass quintet, featuring the same harmonic motion. Both new works will have their premiere at the Guggenheim this week, alongside “Dark River” and “Curling” (1977) one of the “game pieces” that Mr. Zorn created early in his career. “Redbird” will play over speakers as the audience tours the exhibition after the concert. It is not the first time Mr. Zorn has occupied a major museum in recent years. This downtown doyen, once an enfant terrible and now an established master, was celebrated at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on his 60th birthday in 2013, as performances of his work sprawled through the building, an experience that, for this art lover, was, “ ” he said. “I’m still naïve enough,” he said as he looked closely at a Martin, “to believe that a few marks on a piece of paper can change the world. ” | 1 |
BAGHDAD — Iraqi forces trying to reclaim Mosul penetrated the western part of the city on Tuesday, retaking a bridge and several public buildings during heavy clashes with the Islamic State militants, officials said. Civilians reported that the bombardment and gunfire were the heaviest since Feb. 19, the beginning of the operation to retake the western part of the city — the country’s where roughly a million people are trapped and living in desperate conditions. Soldiers recaptured a branch of the central bank, an archaeological museum that jihadists ransacked after taking the city in 2014, and the Hurriya Bridge, which crosses the Tigris River in the center of the city, Brig. Gen. Yahya Rasool, a military spokesman, said by phone. “We will never stop until we liberate Mosul entirely,” he said. Lt. Gen. Raed Shakir Jawdat, the chief of the federal police, said that security forces had also retaken a government compound. A statement from the coalition forces assisting the Iraqis gave a similar account of their progress. The museum was a focus of worldwide attention after it was seized by Islamic State militants, who used sledgehammers and drills to smash artifacts in its collection. The destruction horrified scholars around the world. Lt. Gen. Abdul Amir a spokesman for an elite unit of Interior Ministry troops, said that the buildings retaken from the Islamic State included a courthouse where militants had carried out whippings, stonings and beheadings, as well as a building where militants had thrown people to their deaths. “The liberation of the government compound is a step forward for our forces, a vital motivating position for us,” General Muhammadawi said in an interview. “The international coalition’s airstrikes and drones have played a major role in accelerating the liberation of the city. ” It was not yet clear how lasting the gains would be. Although soldiers raised the Iraqi flag over the government compound, in the Dawasa neighborhood, they were later forced to retreat under heavy fire from Islamic State militants, The Associated Press reported. The museum remained within the range of Islamic State snipers, making it vulnerable to a counterattack. Social media accounts associated with the Islamic State reported that militants had set off three suicide bombs during the offensive. Though the military advances were tenuous, government forces said that Tuesday represented a critical moment in their weekslong offensive to retake western Mosul. The fighting, which included recapturing most of the city’s airport, has not been easy. It took Iraqi forces more than three months to gain control over eastern Mosul, and casualties there were heavy. Prime Minister Haider and the chief of staff of the country’s armed forces toured the headquarters of the operations command responsible for the offensive, just outside Mosul, on Tuesday to “review the progress of security forces,” according to a statement. The Hurriya, or Freedom, Bridge is the second of five bridges to be retaken by government forces. airstrikes damaged all five bridges last year in a bid to isolate the militants in Mosul. Mosul fell to the Islamic State in June 2014, along with large parts of the country’s north and west. It is the largest Iraqi population center still wholly or partly in the militant group’s control. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs reported on Tuesday that about 46, 000 people had been displaced from their homes in Mosul since Feb. 19 — including 13, 350 on Friday alone — in the highest continuous displacement of civilians since October. “All people displaced from western Mosul have been accommodated either with family members or in camps or emergency sites, where they receive a tented plot, basic household supplies, hygiene kits and food rations,” the United Nations office said. Camp construction and the installation of water and sanitation services are underway south of Mosul, the office added. Since Feb. 19, the office said, more than 500 people have been treated for wounds, including 15 people who were hospitalized in Erbil, a city east of Mosul, for treatment after an apparent attack. Many in eastern Mosul lack drinking water, officials have warned, and many in the southern and western parts of the city are drinking untreated water, which could lead to the spread of diseases. | 1 |
Subsets and Splits