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RIO DE JANEIRO — Simone Manuel managed to make history and break a record, all in less than a minute. Manuel became the first woman to win an individual event in Olympic swimming on Thursday night. She and Penny Oleksiak of Canada tied for the fastest time, an Olympic record in the women’s freestyle: 52. 70 seconds. “I definitely think it raises some awareness and will get them inspired,” Manuel, 20, said about the significance of her accomplishment. “I mean, the gold medal wasn’t just for me. It was for people that came before me and inspired me to stay in the sport. For people who believe that they can’t do it, I hope I’m an inspiration to others to get out there and try swimming. You might be pretty good at it. ” Manuel is sharing a room with another American swimmer, Katie Ledecky, in the athletes’ village here. She and Oleksiak shaved 0. 01 seconds off the Olympic standard of 52. 71, set earlier in the Rio Games meet by Australia’s Cate Campbell. Sweden’s Sarah Sjostrom won the bronze in 52. 99. The last time an American won gold in the event was 1984, when Nancy Hogshead and Carrie Steinseifer also tied and shared the gold medal with a time of 55. 92 seconds. Several black swimmers have won Olympic medals for the United States. The first black woman to make an American Olympic team was Maritza Correia, a member of the freestyle relay team that won silver at the 2004 Athens Games. (Her parents were from Guyana she was born and raised in Puerto Rico.) Lia Neal, a Brooklyn native, won a bronze in a relay at the 2012 London Games and a silver in a relay here at the Rio Games. Anthony Ervin and Cullen Jones, who are black, have won Olympic gold medals. Both Manuel and Oleksiak had to come from behind to take the victory on Thursday night. Manuel was third at the halfway mark, while Oleksiak was seventh at the turn. At the finish, Manuel looked at the scoreboard and seemed surprised and thrilled, covering her mouth with her hand. “I was pretty shocked,” said Manuel, who is from Sugar Land, Tex. and attends Stanford. “My goal coming in was to get on the medal stand after seeing how I swam in prelims and semifinals. But getting a gold medal in my first Olympics, I still can’t describe it but I’m really excited about it. ” In case anybody had doubts, Simone Biles made it official: she’s the best gymnast in the world. The American dominated the women’s competition on her way to a gold medal Thursday. In doing so, she joined Mary Lou Retton, Carly Patterson, Nastia Liukin and Gabby Douglas as American winners. Aly Raisman (U. S.) won the silver, and Aliya Mustafina (Russia) won bronze. Read about Biles’s gold medal performance here. See the moves she pulled off here. Here’s why Simone Biles is the unbeatable gymnast. Michael Phelps won the 200 individual medley easily, beating not only teammate Ryan Lochte, but an ancient Greek. Leonidas of Rhodes won 12 individual events over four Olympics. At 36, five years older than Phelps, he won his last three golds in 152 B. C. in races of about 200 and 400 meters and in a race. It wasn’t easy, but Phelps surpassed Leonidas, winning his 13th individual gold (and 22nd gold overall and 26th medal). With the victory, Phelps also joined the track and field Olympians Al Oerter and Carl Lewis as the only Americans to win an individual event four times. Phelps was timed in 1 minute 54. 66. He won by over a bodylength, and the time was his ever behind a 1:54. 23 from Beijing. He held up four fingers afterward to indicate his four consecutive victories in the event. Japan’s Kosuke Hagino took the silver. Lochte finished fifth. Read about Phelps’s big victory here. Watch Michael Phelps versus Michael Phelps through the years. In the final judo match of her career, Kayla Harrison won her second straight gold medal, then pondered her future at age 26. With just seconds to go in the gold medal match, Harrison caught Audrey Tcheumeo of France in an armlock to gain the submission. “She dropped to the mat, I saw the arm, I saw the opening and I took it,” Harrison said. Harrison had ripped through her earlier opponents: Zhang Zhehui of China in 42 seconds, Abigel Joo of Hungary in 1:45, and Anamari Velensek in 1:43 on the way to the final. Every match was won by ippon, the highest score a fighter can achieve. Harrison’s gold medal in 2012 was the first ever for the United States in judo. Her gold on Thursday is the second. Harrison said she would retire from judo. “My job is to grow the sport and show my passion for it. ” Asked if she would follow in the footsteps of the most famous former judo player, the Olympic bronze medalist Ronda Rousey, now a mixed martial arts fighter, Harrison demurred: “It’s such a different atmosphere from the Olympic stage. I don’t know if I’m cut out for a world where you get fights by how pretty you are and how you talk. ” But, she acknowledged, “Who doesn’t want to be rich and famous? It is tempting. ” — VICTOR MATHER Fiji wins its first gold: It started in 1956, when five athletes, two sailors, two boxers and a discus thrower traveled to Melbourne for the Olympics. They represented Fiji, the South Pacific nation. None of them won a medal. The result was the same at every subsequent Olympics, including a few forays into the Winter Games. At this year’s soccer competition, Fiji lost its three games, and . But there was hope. Rugby, Fiji’s national sport, was being added to the Games for 2016. Fiji has advanced as far as the quarterfinals of the Rugby World Cup against much bigger and wealthier countries. And the version being added, rugby sevens, with its faster play and smaller teams, suited a country like Fiji, with a population of only 900, 000. Fiji had been sevens world champions in 1995 and 2005. On Thursday, the Fiji men’s sevens team finally landed the country its first medal. A gold one. Fiji beat its former colonial ruler, Britain, by to win the inaugural men’s rugby sevens competition. Back with an ace: Golf returned to the Games on Thursday for the first time since 1904, and it did not take long for the first Olympic in more than a century. Justin Rose of Britain aced the fourth hole at the Olympic Golf Course. Marcus Fraser of Australia shot an 63 to win the round. Different sports require different body types, right? Volleyball players are usually long and lean. Weight lifters, not so much. So we asked a bunch of Olympians and Paralympians to strip down to their underwear (or whatever they felt comfortable with) so you could try to guess which sport they compete in. How many can you guess correctly? The playing of the United States’ national anthem at Olympic medal ceremonies is bringing tears to the eyes of American athletes here. Elsewhere, the song is having a very different effect. “It is driving me crazy,” said Jason DeBord, a living in Ann Arbor, Mich. “I hit the mute button, or I make dinner, or I just sit there and brace myself. ” DeBord has nothing against displays of patriotism, nor is he simply eager to return to the action. What irritates him is the version of “The Banner” being used at the Olympics. Put bluntly, it has been butchered. Listen to the “other” version of our national anthem. | 1 |
Valve President Gabe Newell took to Reddit for an AMA this week, giving us another brief peek into the world of the hugely successful . [Newell admitted that customer support is where Valve most needs to improve, but made sure to highlight the changes the company has already made to its gaming distribution platform Steam: Since the last AMA, we’ve introduced refunds on Steam, we’ve grown our Support staff by roughly 5x, and we’ve shipped a new help site and ticketing system that makes it easier to get help. We’ve also greatly reduced response times on most types of support tickets and we think we’ve improved the quality of responses. We definitely don’t think we’re done though. We still need to further improve response times and we are continually working to improve the quality of our responses. We’re also working on adding more support staff in regions around the world to offer better native language support and improve response times in various regions. He’s also not entirely happy with the current state of Steam trading and wants to see it improved. When asked about the disappearance of the “flash sales” from the marketplace during Steam’s storewide sales throughout the year, he explained that the limited time they were available “made it difficult for many people to participate. ” Steam is apparently erring on the side of caution, so that “users can count on finding the best deals whenever they are able to visit the store during the sale. ” Steam’s library increased by 40% in 2016 alone, but a huge portion of that increase was due to terribly rated shovelware titles like GASP. When asked about the increased pollution of the store by low quality titles, Newell waffled a bit. He considers handling the influx of content more a question of organizing games so that the “right” titles are recommended to consumers: There’s really not a singular definition of quality, and what we’ve seen is that many different games appeal to different people. So we’re trying to support the variety of games that people are interested in playing. We know we still have more work to do in filtering those games so the right games show up to the right customers. Will the “right” games include uncensored adult content? According to Newell, addressing uncensored content on the platform first requires solving two problems. First are the challenges of “a completely uncurated distribution tool for developers,” but perhaps even more important is a “toolset” by which customers can both “find and filter content,” so that your kid’s front page isn’t flooded with pornographic visual novels. This answer is just vague enough to offer a potential opportunity for the adult game industry. The strength of a trusted platform like Steam could open doors for content that would otherwise never become profitable enough to develop. Whether that would be good or bad for the industry at large remains to be seen, but Valve is apparently already loosening their grip a little, with titles like Ladykiller In A Bind launching on the platform uncut. On the future of Valve in the gaming industry, Newell had a lot to say. The company is focused on the promise of new technologies, rather than staying safely within the confines of their previous work: The big thing right now is broadening the range of options we have in creating experiences. We think investing in hardware will give us those options. The knuckles controller is being designed at the same time as we’re designing our own VR games. Much more narrowly, some of us are thinking about some of the AI work that is being hyped right now. Simplistically we have lots of data and compute capability that looks like the kinds of areas where machine learning should work well. Personally I’m looking at research in interfaces. But while Newell ponders jacking a Steam account directly into your brain, that doesn’t mean we’ll know about it before it’s ready. Many of the questions tried — and summarily failed — to extract information about the future of franchises like Left 4 Dead and . When a user specifically questioned the company’s approach to development, Newell gave as clear an answer as he ever has about the way Valve as a whole likes to function. He claims that the way Valve makes decisions is “way more conditional than most other companies,” and that they are determined not to waste customers’ time and money in the process. Because of that, they’re much more likely to “cancel or change stuff much later in development. ” He thinks that “tracking [Valve’s] choices would be annoying and frustrating. ” Interestingly, Newell stated that he had many regrets about the franchise when asked about the games: “The issue with for me is that I was involved in a much higher percentage of the decisions about the games, so it’s hard for me to look at them as anything other than a series of things I regret. ” If you are involved in a game, everything ends up being a set of . Anything in a game is a sacrifice of things not in the game. I just feel those more personally about for a bunch of reasons. There were a variety of other questions answered. Among them: Steam will consider an option to toggle off the tray notifications. Newell confirmed the J. J. Abrams movies based in the universe are still coming. He’d like to see harsher punishments for Steam scammers. He enjoyed a visit to Amsterdam. The Valve snack bar has gotten healthier. And he’s going to sign a copy of the Lord GabeN art, for the original artist. For the full text, check out the Reddit AMA. Follow Nate Church @Get2Church on Twitter for the latest news in gaming and technology, and snarky opinions on both. | 1 |
In the World’s Ugliest Dog Contest, where there were more beasts than beauties, it was hard to beat a wrinkled, bony Chinese crested Chihuahua named Sweepee Rambo. The dog — 17 years old, blind in both eyes and, at four pounds, not much bigger than two hands put together — was a crowd favorite at the contest, which was held on Friday night at the Fair in Petaluma, Calif. The audience went wild for the dog, with some people carrying signs that read, “Sweepee for President,” said the fair’s marketing director, Karen Spencer. Ms. Spencer identified the owner as Jason Wurtz of Encino, Calif. He was swarmed by reporters — some from as far away as France and Germany — on Friday night and was not immediately available to comment, she said. In his contest entry, he expressed appreciation for Sweepee’s “ freckled skin and legendary blond Mohawk. ” Sweepee, described as a “ride or die chick,” enjoys riding with her owner on his Honda motorcycle, the entry said. The winner last year was Quasi Modo, who had short spine syndrome, a birth defect. To look at anything, Quasi had to move her entire body because she could not move her head, the dog’s owner, Virginia Sayre, told The Guardian. Of the 16 dogs in this year’s contest — some with names like Icky, Rue, Roast Beef and Rascal Deux — more than half featured bad hair. One in particular, Himisaboo, was drawing attention for a head of hair that had a striking resemblance to Donald J. Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee. The contest, which has been hosted by the fair for 28 years, is run similar to a beauty pageant, Ms. Spencer said. Contestants walk a red carpet, they are introduced to the audience and they are paraded onstage. Three judges awarded points based on the dogs’ personalities, appearances and how the audience reacted. Like all good contests, this one has strict rules. Among them: “animal must not have been intentionally altered to enhance appearance for the purpose of this contest. ” Sweepee’s owner won $1, 500 and a trophy that is as unattractive as the dog it honored. | 1 |
When the creator of ‘Dilbert’, Scott Adams, sat down to decide who he would endorse for President, it didn’t take him very long. His method of deciphering right from wrong was pretty simple… he looked for the truth.
The question he asked himself was: “What common traits bind Clinton supporters together?”
You’re going to fully support the answer he came up with…
Check this out!
“I’ve been trying to figure out what common trait binds Clinton supporters together. As far as I can tell, the most unifying characteristic is a willingness to bully in all its forms. Have a Trump sign in your lawn? They will steal it. If you have a Trump bumper sticker, they will deface your car.
If you speak of Trump at work you could get fired. On social media, almost every message I get from a Clinton supporter is a bullying type of message…We know from Project Veritas that Clinton supporters tried to incite violence at Trump rallies. The media downplays it. We also know Clinton’s side hired paid trolls to bully online. You don’t hear much about that…”
See what happens for people that actually “think” things through? They come up with logical answers and start off on whatever endeavor they are facing on the right foot!
He’s absolutely right! Clinton followers tend to yell and judge everyone else for “sins” that they themselves are living in as they are pointing the finger at others! All things racist, sexist, bigoted, and telling us all we are these things because we lack tolerance, when in fact, that isn’t the case at all…is BULLYING!
Which is rather IRONIC don’t you think? Because they also go on and on about how they are against bullying and we all need to be tolerant. Yet are constantly inciting violence, and condoning intimidation towards ALL who do not agree with them.
Here’s the endorsement, and it’s glorious.
“I endorse Donald Trump for President of the United States because I oppose bullying in all its forms. I don’t defend Trump’s personal life. Neither Trump nor Clinton are role models for our children. Let’s call that a tie, at worst. Today I put Trump’s odds of winning in a landslide back to 98%. Remember, I told you a few weeks ago that Trump couldn’t win unless ‘something changed.’ Something just changed.”
That’s right. Trump is no angel, but Hillary is Satan. Trump loves America and for now, in the state we are in, that’s going to do a WHOLE lot of good. Some feel this election is about picking your poison, which is the least potent. I believe, it’s about picking what’s best for America. First step…would be choosing someone who loves this country. After 8 years of being under the reign of someone who hates this country, this should be clear.
Because this is the alternative… Related Items | 0 |
Gold & The Dollar Moving In Tandem? Fund Manager Explains Important Shift Posted on Home » Silver » Silver News » Gold & The Dollar Moving In Tandem? Fund Manager Explains Important Shift
The manipulated gold and silver correction is OVER…
From PM Fund Manager Dave Kranzler :
One interesting occurrence that has not been written about in the precious metals alternative media or blog space yet is that gold has been quietly moving in tandem with the dollar over the past several trading sessions. It has been quite pronounced during the past four trading days, today inclusive. In the previous 15 years, gold’s best periods of return have occurred when gold and the dollar move in tandem higher for a brief period of time, followed by a period of time when the dollar heads south and gold continues higher.
If you look at graphs of both gold and the dollar side by side, you’ll see that this occurred in late 2005 into early 2006, when gold moved higher until May while the dollar fell and again in late 2008. It’s too early tell if that will happen now, but suffice it to say that both are moving in tandem right now and it’s worth watching to see if it continues. My theory is that there’s flight to safety into gold and the dollar ahead of an adverse economic event. As the event unfolds, the dollar begins to sell off but capital continues to flow into gold as the ultimate wealth preservation asset.
The above analysis is an excerpt from the latest issue of IRD’s Mining Stock Journal which was released last night. Earlier today, Bill “Midas” Murphy poked his head out of the New Orleans Investment Conference and asked me why the metals were acting “so goofy” this morning, to which I replied:
Interestingly, gold and the dollar have been moving in tandem the past several days. Not perfect correlation but I bet its 80-85%. I discussed this in the latest issue of my Mining Stock Journal . Over the last 15 years, gold has had some of its best performance periods when it moved in tandem with the dollar for a bit then took off higher while the dollar sold off. It’s been moving in tandem with the dollar today as well.
The manipulated correction is over. India and China are buying a LOT of gold right now. Two days ago nearly 100 tonnes were delivered onto the SGE. I don’t think the cartel can take gold lower and I think right now they are merely trying to keep the “beachball” from popping above the surface of the water. Every time gold pops up, they hit it, but gold bounces back like one of those punching clowns.
At some point they are going to have to go back into “managed retreat.” Maybe once the election is over.
You’ll note that there’s now been a complete reversal in the precious metals sector, with gold, silver and the HUI running higher and the SPX/Dow headed south. This entry was posted in Gold News , Silver News and tagged Dave Kranzler , gold manipulations , gold update , silver manipulation , silver update . Bookmark the permalink . Post navigation | 0 |
Leave a reply Charles Hugh Smith – Let’s set aside Hillary Clinton as an individual and consider her as the perfection of a corrupt political system. As I noted yesterday, Politics As Usual Is Dead , and Hillary Clinton is the ultimate product of the political system that is disintegrating before our eyes. The corruption of pay-to-play and the commingling of public and private influence is not the failing of an individual–it is the logical conclusion of a thoroughly corrupt political system. Given the incentives built into politics as usual, public/private pay-to-play doesn’t just make sense–it is the only possible maximization of the political system. Cobble together a multi-million dollar private foundation, millions of dollars in speaking fees from big-money contributors, conflicts of interest, the secrecy of private email servers, pay-to-play schemes and corrupted loyalists planted in the Department of Justice, and the inevitable result is a politics as usual money-harvesting machine that lays waste to the nation, supporters and critics alike. All the Clintons did is assemble the parts more effectively than anyone else.Now that the machine has scooped up hundreds of millions of dollars in “contributions” and other loot, vested interests and corrupted loyalists within the federal government will do anything to protect the machine and its vast flow of funds. The nation’s political system needs a thorough cleaning from top to bottom. Exposing the Clintons’ perfection of politics as usual won’t change the conditions and incentives that created the Clintons’ harvester of corruption. That will require rooting out the incentives that made the Clintons’ perfection of corruption both logical and inevitable. SF Source Of Two Minds Nov. 2016 Share this: | 0 |
WASHINGTON — Former President George W. Bush implicitly criticized President Trump on Monday, taking issue with his approach to immigration and the news media, and suggested that any ties between the new president’s team and Russia should be investigated. In a television interview to promote a new book of his paintings, Mr. Bush indicated that important questions were raised by reported contacts between Russian officials and Mr. Trump’s associates during last year’s election campaign. Mr. Trump forced out his national security adviser for withholding information about a call with Russia’s ambassador. “I think we all need answers,” Mr. Bush said on the “Today” show on NBC. He said he would defer to Senator Richard M. Burr, Republican of North Carolina and chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, about how such an investigation should be conducted. He is a “really good guy, and an independent thinker,” Mr. Bush said of Mr. Burr, “and if he were to recommend a special prosecutor, then it would have a lot more credibility with me. ” Like other members of his family, Mr. Bush did not support Mr. Trump during last year’s campaign against Hillary Clinton, although in public he largely kept his views to himself. Mr. Bush congratulated Mr. Trump after his victory and attended the inauguration last month, but the interview on Monday made clear that the most recent Republican president still had serious disagreements with his party’s incumbent commander in chief. Although he did not mention Mr. Trump by name, Mr. Bush expressed disapproval of the president’s assertion that “fake news media” organizations are the “enemy of the American people. ” “I consider the media to be indispensable to democracy,” Mr. Bush told Matt Lauer, the “Today” host. “We need the media to hold people like me to account. I mean, power can be very addictive and it can be corrosive and it’s important for the media to call to account people who abuse their power, whether it be here or elsewhere. ” He seemed to suggest that language like Mr. Trump’s made it more difficult to press authoritarian leaders like President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia to tolerate a free press. “It’s kind of hard to, you know, tell others to have an independent free press when we’re not willing to have one ourselves,” he said. Mr. Bush also urged tolerance when asked about Mr. Trump’s efforts to temporarily ban travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries. As president, Mr. Bush made a point of visiting a mosque after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and regularly insisted that the United States was not at war with Islam. “It’s very important for all of us to recognize one of our great strengths is for people to worship the way they want to or not worship at all,” Mr. Bush said. “I mean the bedrock of our freedom — a bedrock of our freedom is the right to worship freely. ” Asked if he supported a ban on Muslim visitors to the United States, the former president said, “I am for an immigration policy that’s welcoming and upholds the law. ” But Mr. Bush, who has emphasized the importance of not criticizing a successor, tried to avoid seeming too critical of Mr. Trump. “Well, first of all, there’s only been one month in office,” he said. “Secondly, I think you have to take the man for his word that he wants to unify the country, and we’ll see whether he’s able to do so. ” Mr. Bush agreed to give interviews to publicize his book, “Portraits of Courage: A Commander in Chief’s Tribute to America’s Warriors,” published by Crown Publishing. The book, his third since leaving office, is a collection of 66 portraits of military veterans he has gotten to know personally. It also includes a mural he painted of several active and former members of the military. The paintings will be displayed at his presidential center in Dallas from March to October. Mr. Bush picked up painting after leaving office when the historian John Lewis Gaddis mentioned that it was a hobby of Winston Churchill’s. The former president’s initial efforts focused on his pets as subjects. Then he painted a series of portraits of world leaders he met while in office, including Mr. Putin, and displayed them at his center. Mr. Bush, who as commander in chief ordered American forces into Afghanistan and Iraq, hosts regular bicycle rides and golf tournaments with wounded veterans and decided to make them his next focus. He started painting them in September 2015. Some of the portraits in the book show veterans with prosthetic limbs. A few depict amputees playing golf. “I painted these men and women as a way to honor their service to the country and to show my respect for their sacrifice and courage,” he wrote in the book. “I hope to draw attention to the challenges some face when they come home and transition to civilian life — and the need for our country to better address them. ” | 1 |
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[Ed. – Suddenly, Newsweek cares that the Hillary case might be politicized? When Comey and the media have been politicizing it all along, by giving Hillary special treatment that no one else on earth would have gotten in the same circumstances?]
Why did FBI Director James Comey shock Washington on Friday with an announcement that the FBI “has learned of the existence of emails” related to Hillary Clinton’s private email server, and what does it mean?
The truth is Comey didn’t have a choice. Because the new information followed his sworn testimony about the case, Comey was obligated by Department of Justice rules to keep the relevant committees apprised.
Under oath Comey had stated that the bureau had completed its review. Once he learned that there were new emails that required examination, Comey had to notify Congress that he had to amend his testimony because it was no longer true. …
Had Comey not told Congress and it emerged after the election that new materials had come into its possession, the director and his entire agency’s credibility might have been questioned.
In his letter, Comey did not use the phrase being touted by Republicans that the case had been reopened. Technically it was never closed. | 0 |
Another Saudi War Crime in Yemen as 43 Prisoners Dead in Airstrike Posted on Oct 31, 2016
By Juan Cole / Informed Comment
Saudi airstrikes targeting a judiciary building in al-Hudayda, a port on the western coast of Yemen under Houthi control, have killed some 43 people and wounded dozens of others, most of them prisoners.
The strike on the judiciary building, which had a prison attached, could have been predicted to kill civilians. It is therefore a war crime in international law. It isn’t that hard, Riyadh. If you think taking the shot will possibly kill non-combatants, especially a lot of non-combatants, you can’t take it.
Prisoners are especially vulnerable since they are restrained.
Whoever ordered that airstrike should be hauled before the International Criminal Court in the Hague.
h/t wikipedia
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In the past, the US military has warned the Saudis against hitting civilian infrastructure (including the port of al-Hudayda and a key bridge at that city) and Riyadh has blown Washington off and hit them anyway. Which makes me want to ask why the US hasn’t completely dissociated itself from this bloodbath.
In mid-September, jets of the Saudis and their allies killed 25 people in their private residences when they struck the residential al-Hunoud district (they were trying to hit a governmental building in the hands of the Houthis).
On October 8, the Saudis struck a civilian funeral from the air . The US said it was reviewing its involvement then, but nothing changed.
The Houthis have also committed war crimes, sending rockets on civilian neighborhoods in Najran, e.g., but in the nature of the case a small guerrilla group can’t wreak the kind of havoc that an America-equipped state of the art air force can.
The Saudi war on the Houthis of north Yemen has been going on for 18 months and for the past 14 months the Saudis and their allies have had exactly zero success. This is because you can’t win a guerrilla war from the air, and there aren’t enough Yemeni troops willing to fight for deposed president Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi to take even major Sunni cities from the Zaydi Houthis.
The Houthis bear a lot of the blame for the conflict, since they interrupted Yemen’s constitutional process and made a coup, hand in glove with deposed president Ali Abdallah Saleh, in January of 2015. They then tried to take over the whole country, which wasn’t plausible.
The Houthis are a religious extremist movement hailing from the Shiite Zaydi branch of Islam. Part of what started their rebellion was Saudi proselytizing in Yemen for the anti-Shiite Wahhabi branch of Islam.
About a third of the 22 million Yemenis are Zaydis, mainly in the northwest of the country. It was never very likely these 7 million could rule the 15 million Sunnis, or Sunni cities like Aden, and they were fairly swiftly kicked back out of it by the Arab coalition, in summer of 2015. (In fact, most of the 7 million Zaydis aren’t pro-Houthi, so their ambition is even more overweening than this demographic suggests).
The Houthis are braggarts who say they will overthrow the Saudi government. They have imprisoned many human rights workers. The Saudis accuse them of being Iranian puppets but that frankly is silly. They are an indigenous Yemeni movement and they got most of their weapons by raiding Yemeni army depots for American arms. Iran has probably given them a little help, but configuring what is going on as Saudi v. Iran in Yemen is ridiculous.
Apparently the population in Sanaa, the capital, has swung behind the Houthis on nationalist grounds, and they’ve held big demonstrations against Saudi Arabia (Saudi bombed the demonstration).
The Saudi-led war on Yemen has produced enormous hunger and displacement, which is likely only to get worse.
The reason the Saudis keep committing these war crimes is that their tactics are unsuited to the struggle the want to wage. And if they go on like this, they will come to regret it. TAGS: | 0 |
Former Late Show host David Letterman says he has been enjoying “doing nothing” since leaving the CBS show, and laughs off people who say his enormous beard makes him look like a “vagrant. ”[“People make fun of this beard — they think I look like a vagrant. I’ll tell you something, I have cut my shaving time to zero,” the former Late Night show host told TMZ in an impromptu interview in New York City. Of his Late Show successor Stephen Colbert — whose ratings have soared in recent months as his show has taken an increasingly hostile tone toward President Donald Trump — Letterman said “he’s a gifted young entertainer. ” Letterman added that “it would kill” him to have to host his old show. “Everyday, day after day after day, no. I couldn’t keep up,” he said. While Letterman may be enjoying retirement, he hasn’t let his absence from late night stop him from bashing President Donald Trump. The former CBS star’s last show aired two months before Trump announced his presidential bid. Letterman told New York magazine last month that the president is “insulting to America. ” “How do you know if Donald Trump is lying? His lips are moving. Thank you!” Letterman said. “But in addition to every other thing that’s wrong with the Trump, he’s ignorant in a way that’s insulting to the office, insulting to America, insulting to human rights, insulting to civil rights, insulting to John Lewis. Trump saying that broke my heart. ” This article was updated to reflect that Late Show airs on CBS. Follow Jerome Hudson on Twitter: @JeromeEHudson | 1 |
Jennifer Rosen was scheduled to depart Kennedy International Airport on an 8:55 p. m. flight to San Francisco but instead found herself stuck at Gate C62 in Terminal 2. It was the typical misery of summer airline travel — or so it seemed. A short distance way away, in another terminal, something more unpredictable than the weather had begun to sweep across the New York airport: Panic. It spread quickly and without warning. By the time Sunday night was over, Ms. Rosen, 32, had sprawled out under a table seeking cover, followed a crowd of people who bolted through a secure door onto the tarmac, frantically called her sister to find out what was happening and tell her that she was alive, and, finally, made a mad dash from the terminal to join mobs of travelers who thought they might be living through an episode of terror. In the end, it proved to be a false alarm. While the authorities were still trying to piece together exactly how a report of gunfire at 9:34 p. m. outside the security checkpoint at Terminal 8 led to complete turmoil across one of the nation’s busiest airports, the accounts of passengers in interviews and on social media offered a lesson in the anatomy of fear. It was a night of confusion and dread, informed by the latest headlines — including reports of recent attacks on airports in Brussels and Istanbul — as much as fact. In the absence of official information or instructions, unconfirmed reports from social media fueled the hysteria. Officials said there was no evidence that what took place at Kennedy Airport was the result of a hoax. It was, rather, a sign of the times. “Right now, what is being concentrated on is the investigation into what the catalyst of the incident is,” said Joe Pentangelo, a spokesman for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which runs the airport. Joe Haviland was at Terminal 8 seeing off his family when the first wave of panic hit. People nearby had been gathered watching the Olympics, as Usain Bolt of Jamaica made his bid for a third gold medal in the dash. “We heard a big celebration,” Mr. Haviland told Fox News shortly after being evacuated. He described hearing something like a loud pop, followed by the sight of a herd of people running his direction. “When you see 80 people come running around the corner,” he said, “and they break a door to get out, you think ‘Oh my God, what is happening? ’” He said he saw “people working for the airline taking off their shirts,” and saying, “This is not worth it, I am leaving. ” Within minutes, he said, police officers with their guns drawn were shouting, “Show me your hands!” The bomb squad soon arrived, and the area was evacuated. But inside Terminal 8, by the departure gates, many passengers had no idea anything was wrong. Judy Rothman Rofé, who had been visiting her son in Brooklyn and was waiting for an American Airlines flight back to Los Angeles, was waiting by Gate 33. Around 10 p. m. a passenger nearby was checking the internet and told her it seemed their flight was not delayed because of the weather. “There is a shooter at large,” she was told. Still, she said, as the news filtered out, people around her were relatively calm. “It was business as usual in our section of the terminal,” she said. Until it wasn’t. Shortly after 11, she said, “we heard screaming. ” It was unclear what set off the wave of panic, but suddenly the eerie calm turned to chaos. “Lots of screaming, crying, mass hysteria,” she said. The gate agents, she said, were nowhere to be found passengers threw themselves under counters and huddled under chairs. After several minutes, an announcement came over the public address system, ordering passengers to leave their bags, put their hands above their heads and evacuate. As she left, she said, scores of law enforcement officers, weapons drawn, were heading into the terminal. Around the same time, Terminal 1 was also officially evacuated, sending hundreds of people into the street outside the airport, unsure what was happening. The Port Authority said that those were the only two terminals evacuated, but that the panic spread quickly to the rest of the airport. In Terminal 2, where Ms. Rosen was waiting for her San Delta Air Lines flight, everything seemed normal nearly an hour after the first calls to 911 about a possible gunman. It was around 10:30 p. m. when someone screamed, “Shots!” “Everyone started screaming and yelling,” Ms. Rosen said. “I dove under this desk space like everyone else. “Then this guy came running over,” she added. He was not an airport employee or an official, but he had an urgent warning. She recalled that he shouted: “They’re coming! Let’s go this way!” Not knowing who “they” might be and not wanting to find out, Ms. Rosen and about a dozen others followed the man through a secure door and onto the tarmac, leaving their belongings behind. “There were no announcements, nothing,” she said. All she could hear was an alarm. She waited with about 20 others on the hot, humid tarmac. “I called my sister, freaking out,” she said. “I told her I am on the tarmac, people are saying there are gunshots. I think I am safe. If you see news about this, I am O. K. ” The crowd was searching Google and social media when a man — she thought he was a pilot — finally said they should return. “People were like, ‘I don’t want to go back inside,’” she said. Still, when the man opened the door, they found things just as chaotic as when they left. A flood of people were running in a single direction, she said. Out of the terminal. Once again she followed the crowd. There were “just mobs of people,” she said. She spotted a man in a Transportation Security Administration shirt and asked him what was happening. “You probably have a better idea than I do” was his response, she said. Finally, a little after midnight early on Monday, employees were allowed back inside the airport. Passengers were permitted to collect their belongings. It would take time for operations to fully resume. And thousands of passengers still needed to figure out what to do next. There were no trains running. The Van Wyck Expressway leading to the airport was closed. Cabs were just starting to trickle back. Eventually, Ms. Rosen climbed in a cab with several others and made her way to her twin sister’s apartment in the city. As she prepared to set off for the airport again on Monday morning, she was a bit more leery about the procedures that might be in place in the event of an actual emergency. “I understand situations like this are inherently chaotic, but the lack of communication and guidance just compounded an already tumultuous and traumatic experience,” she said. “At least in our terminal, they should have had enough time to get a coordinated plan together. But they didn’t, and that caused a lot of unnecessary panic and heartache. ” | 1 |
Government Corruption / How A Disgraced Congressman Sexting a Child Led to the FBI Reopening Investigation into Clinton How A Disgraced Congressman Sexting a Child Led to the FBI Reopening Investigation into Clinton Jack Burns October 29, 2016 2 Comments
In case you’ve been locked in a port-a-potty for the last 24 hours, the once closed criminal investigation against Hillary Clinton’s handling of classified information, on an unauthorized non-government private server, has been reopened. And now that the nation is within 10 days of electing or rejecting her as the next president of the United States, the announcement has proven to be a true October surprise.
Perhaps millions of Americans were holding their breath as FBI Director James Comey, on July 5th, 2016 , made the following statement to the American people. “From the group of 30,000 e-mails returned to the State Department, 110 e-mails in 52 e-mail chains have been determined … to contain classified information at the time they were sent or received. Eight of those chains contained information that was Top Secret at the time they were sent; 36 chains contained Secret information at the time; and eight contained Confidential information, which is the lowest level of classification. Separate from those, about 2,000 additional e-mails were “up-classified” to make them Confidential; the information in those had not been classified at the time the e-mails were sent.”
The admission that former Secretary of State Clinton had, indeed, sent and received classified information on her now infamous server was contrary to her repeated claims she’d done no such thing. Nonetheless, Comey chose not to recommend an indictment be issued for her arrest, leaving many scratching their heads in disbelief.
Even Comey’s former boss, former mayor of NYC Riudi Giuliani said Comey got it wrong. And Trey Gowdy (R-SC), chair of the Select Committee on Benghazi, hauled Comey’s behind back in front of Congress to explain why Comey insisted because Clinton didn’t intend to commit a crime, she shouldn’t be prosecuted. Over and over again, Comey has had to explain his decision not to indict the then Democratic nominee for president. And Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) stated in September Comey had created a double standard by doling out immunity deals to several of Clinton’s staffers, amid ongoing investigations in the Clinton email scandal.
Now enter the disgraced former House member Anthony Weiner, and Comey’s letter to several members of Congress. The director of the FBI informed various committee members, in no uncertain terms, that he is reopening the Clinton email case as he was made aware of the “existence of emails that appear to be pertinent to the investigation.”
According to Comey’s letter, the new emails were discovered while the FBI was investigating an, “unrelated case.” So what does Weiner have to do with anything?
As Fox News reported, “An FBI source … confirmed to Fox News that the new emails were discovered after the bureau seized devices belonging to disgraced ex-Rep. Weiner and his wife Huma Abedin, a top Clinton aide who recently announced she was separating from the former congressman.” That “unrelated case,” as Comey described it to congressional members, supposedly involves Weiner sexting photos of his wanker to a 15-year-old female from North Carolina, as reported by The Atlantic.
But that’s all we know at this point, which leads to speculation. It’s no secret that Abedin and Weiner are in Splitsville , with Abedin filing for divorce over Weiner’s insatiable sexting habits. But what’s more important to consider is that Weiner now has motivation to tell all that he knows. Let’s face it, his derriere is facing some serious punishment in jail, and he may be willing to cut a deal with federal prosecutors to minimize any potential sentencing.
There’s no question Weiner had access, over the years, to the kind of pillow talk which could implicate Clinton. Let’s face it! He was sleeping with Clinton’s closest confidante . And what this email scandal case has needed and hasn’t gotten until this point, is someone willing to talk, AKA a “rat”. If Weiner turns out to be the rat investigators are looking for, he may be willing to tell all he knows. And who knows where that will lead? Since Abedin has been working for Clinton since 1996, if anyone has any new incriminating evidence on Clinton, it’s almost certain to be Abedin. And now Abedin’s estranged husband (Weiner) may be spilling the beans, and getting a bit of sweet revenge in the process. Share Google + Phil Freeman
An investigation is NOT an indictment, which is a grand jury function not an information function of the executive branch. A true bill is required here folks!!! It’s Bravo Sierra politics. GaryL
“Comey has had to explain his decision not to indict the then Democratic nominee for president.”– Neither Comey nor FBI “indicts.” That decision is made by DOJ Criminal Division.
“Comey had created a double standard by doling out immunity deals to several of Clinton’s staffers.” Comey nor FBI grants “immunity deals.” Those are “doled out” by DOJ Criminal Division.
“[H]e may be willing to cut a deal with federal prosecutors to minimize any potential sentencing.” Or, he may receive an “immunity deal,” or he may have an “accident.”
Obviously, we’ll see what the DOJ Criminal Division decides to do, but if the above is any indication, the answer is probably already clear. Social | 0 |
CORAL GABLES, Fla. — Juanita Castro considered her brother Fidel a traitor and had not spoken to him in 52 years, but, even so, she feels that a piece of her is missing now that he is dead. Mr. Castro was reviled by many as a despot who had killed innocents and caused countless Cubans to flee the island, and when he died Friday night, spontaneous parties broke out in the streets of Miami. Ms. Castro expressed disdain for the thousands who danced and rejoiced over her brother’s death. “Logically, that reaction hurts,” Ms. Castro, 83, said Sunday in an interview at her home in a quiet, neighborhood here in South Florida, where she has lived since 1964. “It’s not necessary to do what the Cuban people have done here in the streets of Miami,” she said. “I respect the sentiment of everybody I cannot accept this. It’s not a good thing. ” “It’s not the first time that they did it, nor is it the first time I have suffered,” she said. “When he fell ill 10 years or so ago, I had my business, and they practically lynched me there, because I said I didn’t rejoice in anyone’s sickness, in anyone’s misfortunes, nor in anyone’s death. That’s not Christian. It’s not humane. ” Ms. Castro said she learned of her brother’s death in a phone call from a friend. She was awake at the time and could not sleep afterward because the phone kept ringing. “I didn’t know where to hide the phone,” she said. She called her sister Enma in Mexico, hoping to get more information, but her sister had few additional details. She heard, but has not been able to confirm, that her brother had a heart attack. Although she has not set foot in Cuba in more than five decades, she was clearly up on the latest intrigue and details. She described the photos of a weakened Fidel she saw from his 90th birthday party in August, which her sister attended. Ms. Castro noted with a tinge of concern how someone had to help him get up. Like many Cubans, Ms. Castro initially supported her brother’s vision of social justice for the island nation. And like hundreds of thousands of Cubans who eventually fled, she grew disillusioned when Mr. Castro declared himself a Communist. Her last few years in Cuba were spent helping other people sneak out of the country and clashing with her brother and members of his inner circle. The two exchanged harsh words as she grew increasingly vocal, particularly when people she cared about found themselves arbitrarily detained. They barely exchanged glances at their mother’s funeral in 1963, and she decided to leave soon after when she was detained by a military official, who berated her at a bowling alley for smoking Chesterfields, an American brand of cigarettes. Her brother’s rhetoric, she had concluded, amounted to cheap slogans. “ ‘Bread with freedom’ — that expression remained recorded in my mind, because I thought it was going to be that way. I felt as betrayed as the most humble of Cubans,” she said. “He had it all in his hands, without having to turn it all over to any power, and then he goes and turns himself over to the worst of powers, the Russians. ” Ms. Castro initially moved to Mexico and began speaking out at places like the United Nations and other international gatherings, accusing her brother of betraying his country with false promises. She moved to Miami after a few months because she thought it was the best place to position her exile activism. But she never quite fit in among here who viewed her suspiciously. “They rejected me, because I had the last names Castro Ruz,” she said. “Imagine, as if I had chosen my surnames. ” Her phone continued to ring nonstop on Sunday as she sat in her den and talked, speaking deliberately and stopping occasionally to recall details. She was recovering from foot surgery and wore a medical boot. Fresh white flowers sat on the dining table in the next room. She retired recently after having owned a small pharmacy for more than 30 years, and she has written a memoir about her brothers, “Fidel and Raúl, My Brothers,” which is to be translated into English soon. Ms. Castro grew most animated discussing the recent presidential election, when after speaking calmly for over an hour, she practically spit out insults at Donald J. Trump. “Repugnant” and “detestable,” she called him, as she ran through a litany of reasons she believes no Cuban should have voted for him. She seemed genuinely angry, particularly when she remembered his comments about grabbing women “by their parts. ” A supporter of President Obama and his policies toward Cuba, she sees parallels in her brother and Mr. Trump. “The only difference is that he may have millions, but the other had a brain,” Ms. Castro said of Mr. Trump and Mr. Castro. Unfortunately, she said her brother had not used his intelligence for the good of Cuba. Still, she said, her brother had no regrets and probably thought until the day he died that he was a great leader, never acknowledging his failures. Ms. Castro struggled to explain her sorrow at the loss of her brother. “This is one of those that I can say that something is missing,” she said. “And the Cuban people will also say that something is missing. ” Ms. Castro said she enjoyed a warm relationship with many of her siblings’ grandchildren, who also live abroad. In 2005, she won a libel suit, filed in Spain, against Fidel Castro’s estranged daughter for calling Ms. Castro’s father a murderer. Each year the family is getting smaller, and she does not attend the funerals. She will skip this one, too, but she laments not having the family she wished she had been able to hold on to — the kind whose members are there to console one another when one of them passes. “I live with pain in my heart, but I accept my destiny,” she said. “I forgive everybody, including my brother. ” | 1 |
This article is part of a series aimed at helping you navigate life’s opportunities and challenges. What else should we write about? Contact us: smarterliving@nytimes. com. Young people frequently say that they want to exercise, but they just can’t find the time. The solution just might be interval training. That means taking part in short bursts of intense exercise — while in the office. Recent studies show that very short but intense exercise rapidly builds and maintains fitness and health, even when the workout is only a few minutes long. You can complete an excellent, effective — and very brief — workout in an office stairwell, says Martin Gibala, a professor of kinesiology at McMaster University in Canada and an expert on interval training. Stairwell interval training requires only one minute of strenuous exertion, he says. For a study that he and his colleagues presented earlier this year, they asked 12 women in their 20s to warm up for two minutes by slowly walking up and down stairs in a campus office building. Then the women ran up the steps “as fast as safely possible,” Dr. Gibala says, for 20 seconds. They walked down and along a flat corridor for two minutes, ran back up the stairs for another 20 seconds, walked for two minutes, and ran up for a final 20 seconds. They then cooled down with three minutes of stair and corridor walking. The entire session lasted 10 minutes, which would easily fit into a lunch break. (If you do this, you may want to bring and change into workout clothing to avoid sweating in your work clothes and freshen up afterward with a bird bath in an office restroom.) They completed three of these abbreviated stair workouts per week for six weeks. By the end, their aerobic fitness had improved substantially, the researchers reported, by about as much as if they had been running or cycling each week for hours. (Related: What to know about really, really short workouts) To change body shape, you almost certainly need to also perform some type of weight training, exercise scientists agree. As with the stair training, weight work can be done during your workday. Keep a dumbbell near your desk and perform arm curls while you are on the phone. Stand on the edge of a stair during a midmorning break and let your heels drop, then slowly rise up until you are standing on your tiptoes on the stairs. Repeat that exercise 10 times and you can strengthen and tighten muscles throughout your legs. Parents and teachers may once have urged you to sit still, but wiggling, tapping your toes, standing briefly, and otherwise fidgeting as much as possible at your desk is in fact good for your body. In one recent study, college students showed healthier blood flow in their lower legs if they fidgeted than if they did not. Even better, a 2008 study found that among office workers, those who frequently fidgeted burned as many as 300 calories more each day than those who resolutely stayed still. For a fast, and interval program, close your office door and cue up the Scientific Workout. The program targets muscles in the upper body, lower body and core, improves aerobic endurance, and can be completed in less time than most of us spend dithering about how to get to the gym. Want more? You might also like: • The 8 health habits experts say you need in your 20s • How to start running • 15 ways to be a better person | 1 |
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This fall, the U.S. agreed to provide $38 billion in military aid to Israel over the next ten years, ensuring America’s continued role in funding the occupation of Palestine. Meanwhile, my friends and colleagues here in Gaza live in fear of another significant Israeli attack in the near future.
They have every reason to fear another major escalation – violence is a daily reality in Gaza. In two recent incidents, a rocket was fired from Gaza into Israel without causing damage or injuries, and in both instances Israel responded by bombing targets throughout Gaza.
In August alone, Israel bombed more than 50 locations in the small territory .
The simple story told about these events focuses on action and reaction: Palestinians attacked Israel with a rocket and Israel responded. We hear this logic after nearly every event of this sort, but it’s woefully incomplete.
In both instances, the rockets fired weren’t fired by Hamas, but rather by small radical armed groups at odds with Hamas, which governs Gaza. These groups seek to incite Israeli attacks on Hamas with the goal of destabilizing its control over Gaza, because they see Hamas as too comfortable with the status quo.
Since seizing power in 2007, Hamas has worked to control and limit violence from the territory. Outside of periods of defined military escalation – which tend to be precipitated by Israeli attacks – they have effectively stopped attacks against Israel from Gaza.
This explains why, as noted by the Israeli press, there were only 14 rockets fired from Gaza towards Israel between January and August this year. None were fired by Hamas, so Israel’s decision to target Hamas as a response makes no sense.
Of course, 14 rockets fired from Gaza is 14 too many for those of us committed to ending all violence, and none of this should be taken as an apology for other violence perpetrated by Hamas.
But, as the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the occupied Palestinian territories reports , there were also 45 Israeli military incursions into Gaza this year, resulting in 7 Palestinian deaths and, on average, injuring five Palestinians in Gaza every week.
This is the part of the story that isn’t told.
Gaza also remains under an Israeli-imposed blockade that severely limits travel, trade, and life for Gazans. Despite assurances that restrictions would be lifted in the 2014 Hamas-Israel ceasefire agreement, the blockade remains in effect.
Israel, with support from the US government, claims this decades-long blockade is in place to pressure the people of Gaza to rise up against Hamas and provide security for Israelis.
If those are Israel’s raisons d’etre, then it’s a complete failure. It hasn’t stopped violence, it hasn’t weakened Hamas, and it hasn’t brought Israelis or Palestinians security.
While the blockade hasn’t succeeded in achieving the changes Israel claims to be seeking, its impact on the civilian population of Gaza has been immense.
Over two years after the end of the last large military operation there, much of Gaza remains in ruins.
Of the 100,000 Palestinians in Gaza who were displaced during the 2014 Israeli bombardment, over 65,000 remain homeless, as 70 percent of the homes seriously damaged or destroyed haven’t been rebuilt. This is largely because reconstruction materials remain blocked from entering Gaza.
This important context is too often missing as US pundits and politicians consider the situation in Gaza.
Given the blockade and regular military incursions imposed by Israel, the firing of less than 2 rockets per month by Palestinians cannot be seen as the core reason for violence.
If the US is serious about promoting peace between Israelis and Palestinians, preventing future violence in Gaza, and guaranteeing security, then it must recognize the violence inherent in the Israeli occupation and end the blockade.
The next attack on Gaza, feared by my friends who live there, is an inevitable reality if nothing changes.
Mike Merryman-Lotze has worked with the American Friends Service Committee as the Palestine-Israel Program Director since 2010. Distributed by OtherWords.org . | 0 |
BUSTED: Eric Trump Admits Daddy ‘Started The Conversation’ About Obama’s Birth Certificate (AUDIO) By Andrew Bradford on October 28, 2016 Subscribe
Donald Trump has tried to deny that he is the person most responsible for keeping alive claims that President Obama wasn’t born in the United States and is therefore not eligible to serve as President. The GOP nominee has been the chief proponent of what is now known as “birtherism.” And yet when asked about the matter, Trump tries to shift the blame to Hillary Clinton and her campaign staff in the 2008 Democratic race.
Now, however, we have proof that Trump was indeed the driving force of birtherism, and that proof comes from the mouth of his son, Eric.
NBC news found audio of Eric Trump talking to biographer Michael D’Antonio, author of The Truth About Trump . In that audio, the Trump son admits: “I think with the birthers it’s, ‘Okay, well, then, just prove it. Meaning these people are going out saying that which a lot of people were at the time. ‘Then just show us. Just be transparent. You’re the leader of the free world, be transparent.’ There are underlying themes to this, and in fact, he has done his best to start the conversation that was unwilling to be had before. Now that conversation might flush itself out in one of several different ways. But at least the conversation is being had.”
Yes, at least we are trying to question the nationality of the first African-American President in the history of the United States. Nothing nefarious or the least bit racist about that, is there? Bullshit! Donald Trump knew exactly what he was doing when he repeatedly called for President Obama to release his birth certificate, and he did so to garner media attention as he considered running for the GOP nomination years before he finally did.
Donald Trump is a lying weasel and racist asshat who needs to be defeated soundly on November 8. He and his hateful ideas must be resoundingly rejected by the American people, who deserve better than the division he offers.
Featured Image Via YouTube Screengrab About Andrew Bradford
Andrew Bradford is a single father who lives in Atlanta. A member of the Christian Left, he has worked in the fields of academia, journalism, and political consulting. His passions are art, music, food, and literature. He believes in equal rights and justice for all. To see what else he likes to write about, check out his blog at Deepleftfield.info. Connect | 0 |
CHARLESTON, S. C. — A jury signaled here on Friday that it was within a single vote of convicting a white former police officer in the fatal shooting of an unarmed black man. But confusion reigned in the courtroom as the jury wavered about whether it was hopelessly deadlocked about the killing, which was recorded on video and became a symbol of the nation’s heated debate about race and policing. Over the misgivings of a defense lawyer, Judge Clifton B. Newman, who presided over a trial, did not declare a mistrial in the case of the former officer, Michael T. Slager, who shot and killed Walter L. Scott in North Charleston, S. C. on April 4, 2015. Jurors had been deliberating for about 48 hours and, by day’s end, had decided to resume their discussions on Monday. Yet Friday’s proceedings, before a crowded courtroom that alternated between focused and flummoxed, were a remarkable display of the divisions in one of the country’s most closely watched cases. It has been seen as a bellwether for whether video evidence could lead to a rare conviction of a law enforcement officer in an killing. “I cannot in good conscience consider a guilty verdict,” an unidentified juror wrote in a letter to Judge Newman, who read it aloud in court. The juror added that the panel “may never reach a unanimous decision. ” In a separate note, the jury’s foreman, the sole black member of the panel, appeared curt, writing, “It’s just one juror that has the issues. ” It was not clear whether the panel favored a conviction for murder, which could lead to a sentence of life in prison, or voluntary manslaughter, which carries a sentence of two to 30 years. Mr. Slager was indicted on a murder charge, and Judge Newman allowed jurors this week to consider the lesser offense of manslaughter. But the dueling messages — and the shifting positions from jurors about whether additional talks or instructions might yield a verdict — were a stunning turn in a case that began nearly 20 months ago, when Mr. Scott was shot and killed after fleeing from a traffic stop for a broken taillight. Mr. Slager, whom North Charleston fired after the shooting, testified that he had become involved in a physical struggle with Mr. Scott over his Taser device, leaving him in “total fear” and causing him to open fire in a lot behind a pawnshop in the city of about 108, 000. “He didn’t shoot him because of the brake light,” Andrew J. Savage III, Mr. Slager’s lead defense lawyer, said of the former officer during his closing argument. “He shot him in fear of his life. ” It was an account that, at first, local officials believed. But within days, a pedestrian’s cellphone video became public and showed a gruesome shooting that shook this region and reverberated around the world: Mr. Slager firing eight rounds toward Mr. Scott, who was running away and was at least 17 feet from Mr. Slager. Prosecutors argued that Mr. Slager had “malice aforethought” when he shot Mr. Scott, and that he had staged evidence in a frantic effort to justify the shooting, the first time he had fired his service weapon while on patrol. “The badge is supposed to be a shield, not a sword,” Scarlett A. Wilson, the chief prosecutor for Charleston County, said during her final presentation to the jury, when she argued that jurors could not acquit Mr. Slager “knowing these facts and South Carolina law. ” For a time on Friday, the proceedings appeared poised to end in a mistrial, an outcome that would have been similar to the results of other cases involving accusations of police misconduct. A judge in Baltimore declared a mistrial in December when a jury could not reach a decision in the case of an officer charged in connection with the death of Freddie Gray, and a Cincinnati jury deadlocked last month during its deliberations about a police officer who had shot and killed an unarmed black motorist. Shortly after lunch on Friday, the jury sent a note indicating it was at an impasse, prompting Judge Newman to deliver what is known as an Allen charge, a set of legal instructions intended to break deadlocks during deliberations. “You have a duty to make every reasonable effort to reach a unanimous verdict,” the judge told the jury of seven men and five women as he read the Allen charge, named for the 1896 Supreme Court case that enshrined such guidance. “The majority should consider the minority’s position, and the minority should consider the majority’s position,” Judge Newman told the jurors before ordering them to resume their deliberations in hopes that they would come to one of three conclusions: a conviction for murder, a conviction for manslaughter or an acquittal. The outward orderliness of the trial collapsed within hours, when the jury sent more notes that revealed details about the deliberations. The jurors veered from hopelessly deadlocked to willing to talk more, rattling the courtroom, which was filled with members of the Scott and Slager families, as well as onlookers who had gathered, they thought, to see an end to the trial. But Judge Newman was reluctant to end the proceedings, even as Mr. Savage protested that continued deliberations could be “extremely coercive. ” The jury, after sending another note announcing that it was exhausted, left the courthouse after nightfall. And Mr. Savage, a longtime defense lawyer in Charleston, seemed bewildered as he walked through a crowd of cameras after the court adjourned. “Let’s just wait till Monday, see what happens Monday and then we’ll come in after that,” he said. A lawyer for Mr. Scott’s family, L. Chris Stewart, offered a similar reflection as he left the courthouse. “It’s not over,” Mr. Stewart said. “We kept hearing: ‘It’s over. It’s over.’ It’s not over. Justice is still coming. ” | 1 |
Divergent 3D showcased its Blade Supercar, the world’s first highway-safe, 3D-printed supercar, during a press and dealers’ preview ahead of the Los Angeles Auto Show on Wednesday.
The vehicle boasts 700-hp motor, weights 1,400 lbs (635 kg), and is able to reach 0-60 mph in 2.5 seconds, according to manufacturer. Apart from that, Blade has 1/3 the emissions of an electric car and 1/50 the factory capital costs of other manufactured cars.
Kevin Czinger, CEO of Divergent 3D, says ‘this is the first car that’s actually a real car that can be taken on a highway that can be safety certified as a fully safe highway car… It’s going to be a 21st century revolution in manufacturing.’
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celebrities ripped President Donald Trump Thursday after he officially announced that the United States will withdraw from the Paris Climate Agreement. [Filmmaker Michael Moore took to Twitter and said “Trump just committed a crime against humanity. ” Trump just committed a crime against humanity. This admitted predator has now expanded his predatory acts to the entire planet. #ParisAccord, — Michael Moore (@MMFlint) June 1, 2017, USA to Earth: FUCK YOU, — Michael Moore (@MMFlint) June 1, 2017, Actor Alec Baldwin said Trump is a “deranged, infantile maniac” getting in the way of the country from addressing climate change. All the world wants 2 address climate chg. Except the US. This country is being piloted in2 an iceberg by this deranged, infantile maniac, — ABFoundation (@ABFalecbaldwin) June 1, 2017, “The United States will withdraw from the Paris Climate Accord,” President Trump said Thursday in a speech delivered in the White House Rose Garden. Withdrawing from the Paris Climate agreement was a major campaign promise made by Trump during his presidential run. Below is a sampling of the reaction from celebrities to Trump’s decision to remove the U. S. from the Paris Climate Accord. . @realDonaldTrump I ask humbly to remember your children, their children all children will be left to live results of your decision pic. twitter. — KATY PERRY (@katyperry) June 1, 2017, FIRE SCOTT PRUITT — EPA HEAD — DEAR GOD THIS IS FUCKING INSANE, — ROSIE (@Rosie) June 1, 2017, I’ve never been this embarrassed to be an American (besides Nov. 8th). #ActOnClimate #ParisAccord, — Kevin McHale (@druidDUDE) June 1, 2017, Today, our planet suffered. It’s more important than ever to take action. #ParisAgreement https: . — Leonardo DiCaprio (@LeoDiCaprio) June 1, 2017, #DonaldTrump quits Climate Accords. Think of all the time effort money poured into this he bails giving BigOil a windfall. — Bette Midler (@BetteMidler) June 1, 2017, Oh my God, you really are a monster, @realDonaldTrump. — Alyssa Milano (@Alyssa_Milano) June 1, 2017, Mother ducker. https: . — Alyssa Milano (@Alyssa_Milano) June 1, 2017, Don’t boo. VOTE. #2018 #ParisAgreement, — Alyssa Milano (@Alyssa_Milano) June 1, 2017, We need to organize our unions, retirement plans, stock accounts to pull out of all fossil fuels. We will have to lead our Gov. with our $. — Patricia Arquette (@PattyArquette) June 1, 2017, We have to stop this asshole. This is urgent. You have to vote in 2018. — John Legend (@johnlegend) June 1, 2017, You are a monster and you’re fucking up the world. https: . — (((Joshua Malina))) (@JoshMalina) June 1, 2017, I second that emotion! https: . — John Leguizamo (@JohnLeguizamo) June 1, 2017, The president believes in science LESS THAN THE POPE. #ActOnClimate pic. twitter. — Mike Birbiglia (@birbigs) June 1, 2017, The family of the future after #trump and the @GOP get through with the environment. pic. twitter. — moby XⓋX (@thelittleidiot) June 1, 2017, 2017 … the year science, reason and accountability died. https: . — Josh Gad (@joshgad) June 1, 2017, So Kathy Griffin is more harmful to Barron Trump than global warming. Got it. — billy eichner (@billyeichner) June 1, 2017, If you listen carefully, every word he says in this clip is total bullshit. https: . — Colin Hanks (@ColinHanks) June 1, 2017, A 70 year old moron who thinks climate change is a hoax hired a band to celebrate the earth dying faster. This is beyond embarrassing, — Ike Barinholtz (@ikebarinholtz) June 1, 2017, I’m guessing that Donald Trump doesn’t see the irony in making his announcement to leave the Paris Agreement while standing in a garden. — Chelsea Handler (@chelseahandler) June 1, 2017, Donald asks ”At what point does America get demeaned? At what point do they start laughing at us?” Literally, the moment you were elected. — George Takei (@GeorgeTakei) June 1, 2017, We have the list of senators who supported Paris pull out. Now pressure those who didn’t want to divest in fossil https: . — Patricia Arquette (@PattyArquette) June 1, 2017, He loves the ocean so much he’s gonna give us a lot more of it to appreciate. https: . — Full Frontal (@FullFrontalSamB) June 1, 2017, A neurotic megalomaniac just stepped on his own dick in the parking lot. Each governor, mayor, state assembly can ignore this accept Paris, — Peter Henry Fonda (@iamfonda) June 1, 2017, He needs to stop saying ”believe me” … it just reminds us that we never can. — Ellen Barkin (@EllenBarkin) June 1, 2017, Not only is Trump killing the Republican Party, he wants to make their mascot extinct. — Jason Reitman (@JasonReitman) June 1, 2017, How is stepping away from the Paris Climate change agreement ’Making America Great Again’ America is one of the biggest polluters on the 🌎💸 — Michelle Rodriguez (@MRodOfficial) June 1, 2017, Follow Jerome Hudson on Twitter: @jeromeehudson | 1 |
Pat Buchanan, an adviser to Richard Nixon, presidential candidate, and original rallying point of the American movement spoke with Breitbart News Wednesday to discuss the myriad Watergate comparisons making the rounds in Washington. [Since FBI Director James Comey’s ouster last week, the common Washington trope of Watergate comparisons has reached a fever pitch. Within hours of the announcement, a George W. Bush administration ethics attorney was telling Rolling Stone the Trump White House was now “worse than Watergate. ” The trend continued, even among Republicans, into the next week as the “Comey Memo” posited that Trump had told the Director to “let it go” in regard to already fired National Security Advisor Michael Flynn. Sen. John McCain ( ) said Tuesday night that “I think it’s reaching the point where it’s of Watergate size and scale. ” Buchanan was known as a voice of the conservative base inside the Nixon White House, where he served as a senior adviser to the president throughout the more than scandal that ended in the only presidential resignation in American history. As fate would have it, Buchanan released his second volume of political memoirs of the Nixon era, Nixon’s White House Wars: The Battles That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever, covering those very years, on the day of Comey’s dismissal. In conversation with Breitbart News, Buchanan rejected the idea we were at anything like the “smoking gun” moment of August 5, 1974: I think the comparison is grossly invalid for this reason, I don’t think there’s any crime in what I have read that Comey wrote. If Comey believed that the President of the United States had engaged in an obstruction of justice, he had a moral and a legal obligation to go to the Deputy Attorney General and tell him exactly what had transpired … He did nothing like that. He just put it in his files. Commentators, especially those on the left, rushed to invoke the “smoking gun tape” in explaining the Comey Memo Tuesday and Wednesday, a reference to the commonly used name for the recording of a 1972 conversation between President Nixon and his chief of staff, H. R. Haldeman. President Nixon’s own voice ordering Haldeman to have the CIA prevent the FBI from following up on areas of their Watergate investigation was the “smoking gun” of presidential obstruction of justice. Its release in the summer of 1974, more than two years after the sensational at the Democratic National Committee Headquarters in Washington, DC’s Watergate development, finally made defense of President Nixon untenable and led swiftly to his resignation. Convicted Nixon Attorney John Dean told CNN Tuesday that Comey’s Memo was a “direct parallel” to the smoking gun tape. Former Bill Clinton Speechwriter Bill Waldman argued roughly the same on the Daily Beast Wednesday. Buchanan found the comparisons “absurd,” explaining the context in which the smoking gun tapes became public: If you’re talking about the smoking gun tapes, that was revealed when I was at Camp David before Nixon’s resignation … That was 18 months into a Watergate crisis that had all manner of allegations of felonies and misdemeanors, and convictions, and trials. Since March of 1973 all the way through August of ’74. By the period described, over a dozen people had been indicted on serious charges relating to the initial and subsequent including several administration officials like Haldeman. Some, like G. Gordon Liddy, were already serving lengthy federal prison terms. Buchanan stressed that nothing of the sort occured to lend significance to Trump’s alleged comments to Comey. “So where is the crime?” Buchanan pondered. “There is no crime thus far. In this supposed hacking, there is no crime attributed to Donald Trump or his staff and no indictment in his alleged collusion with the Russians, because no collusion has been established. ” “To suggest that because Donald Trump said, ‘look, take it easy on General Flynn, he’s had a rough time’ that this is some crime, I think it’s absurd,” Buchanan argued. Even assuming the Comey Memo’s allegations are completely true, Buchanan was wary of comparing them to the deliberate interference in a fruitful criminal investigation by President Nixon: You’ve got a handful of words here. What exactly has [Trump] obstructed? What action did he take? He asks the FBI basically, “can you cut some slack for a guy who’s a good guy, and is in trouble, and has resigned from the White House. ” I don’t see any comparison at all. The comparison to the smoking gun tape was not the first attempt by some commentators to compare Comey’s dismissal to supposed Watergate equivalents. Comey’s ouster itself has been continually compared to the “Saturday Night Massacre” of 1973, where both Attorney General Elliot Richardson and Deputy Attorney General Bill Ruckelshaus resigned rather than obey Nixon’s direction to fire the special prosecutor appointed to investigate Watergate Archibald Cox, who eventually was fired by Solicitor General Robert Bork. Senator Ed Markey ( ) John Podesta, and newfound liberal hero former acting Attorney General Sally Yates have all publicly drawn the comparison to Trump’s decision to dismiss Comey — an act, unlike firing a special prosecutor like Cox, well within a president’s authority to take unilaterally. Buchanan himself wrote on the inevitable comparison on Monday. While he concluded that the media’s “hysteria” over a “constitutional crisis” from Comey’s firing did remind him of the Saturday Night Massacre, he explained Breitbart News Wednesday that the facts do not: I was in the Oval Office when Archibald Cox was fired. Here’s the comparison, when Archibald Cox was fired on the Saturday massacre, the Attorney General Resigned, the Deputy Attorney General resigned, the special prosecutor, Cox, was fired, the special prosecutor’s office was shut down, and we were already six months into the whole Watergate crisis. And there were resolutions of impeachment the next week, 20 of them on the floor of the House. We have here what? An FBI director has been fired, who says the president had a perfect right to fire him. And the investigation by the FBI into the connection, which has produced zero fruit to date, continues on unimpeded. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein’s Wednesday decision to appoint a special counsel in the person of Director Robert Mueller further isolates the Russia investigation from Trump’s dismissal of Comey. The probe will now be out of the normal FBI which Trump’s nominee to replace Comey will head. Asked to compare the political climate in Washington to that of the Watergate years, Buchanan explained: Because of the nature of media today, and the extraordinary contentiousness, virialence, and viciousness of the politics in the last four months, the mood in town and in the media … you’re getting to similar levels of heat and intensity and hostility that you had back then, but the substance is not there. “Most Americans weren’t even alive back in 1972, 73, 74. I can understand why some people rush and compare one thing to another,” Buchanan said, seeking to explain the prevalence of such comparisons. “There’s a gross exaggeration and something approaching a sense of insecurity and panic here in town when, again, it’s not justified by the reality. ” As for the likelihood of impeachment in the near future, as Rep. Al Green ( ) called for on the House floor Wednesday, Buchanan was skeptical. “The Republican Party that controls the House is not going to start House hearings on impeachment,” he said. Asked if he had any advice for the current generation of populist conservatives in the White House, Buchanan suggested unity and better information sharing among the president and his staff: The whole White House, they’ve got to get it together and organized … some of the staff has been pounded mercilessly and in most cases they’ve simply been left uninformed or been sent out uninformed of what the reality is and they awaken to new tweets. “It just is not working like a traditional White House and I think it really needs to be buttoned up,” Buchanan concluded. | 1 |
Big pharmaceutical companies don’t want you to know that some of the artificial medication for constipation significantly reduce the effectiveness of the intestines. As a result, some people report that without taking certain medication, they can’t visit the toilet. The good news is, you can solve constipation quite easily. But let’s delve deeply into what constipation can do to the body first. Bad Breath Firstly, constipation can cause bad breath (halitosis). Unfortunately, people who suffer from bad breath don’t always realize that they have a problem. People are unlikely to point out to a person that their breath stinks; therefore, they might miss out on social events and job opportunities due to bad breath. Constipation can cause bad breath because there is a build up of toxic waste and the gasses rise up through the body. Rectal Issues & Infection As stools spend more time in the bowels, water is reabsorbed. As a result, stools get hard and dry. Some constipation suffers report that passing bowels becomes very painful and can take many hours. As a result, the rectum is stretched beyond its limits. This can lead to rectal prolapse, which is a rectum which fails to close. Rectal prolapse sufferers usually wear diapers because stool leaks out of them. Moreover, they are more prone to infection. Increase Toxins The skin is the largest organ in the body and is a reflection of a person’s general health. Constipation typically increases the buildup of toxins in the body. As a result, the skin has to work harder to eliminate toxins. This can cause acne, skin discoloration etc. Therefore, if your skin is bad, don’t buy an expensive beauty product. Take a look at your diet, and whether you suffer from constipation. The skin is a reflection of inner health. Colon Cancer Constipation can also cause colon cancer. The colon is designed to hold a few pounds of stools. Think of it like a plastic bag. Overload with heavy items and it rips. It’s primary function is to transport stool. However, when an individual is constipated, it has to store stool. This puts a strain on the inner membrane and can cause ruptures and internal infections. Invasive surgery may be required in such instances. Loss Of Healthy Bacteria The intestines contain flora (healthy bacteria) which help with immunity and vitamin production. Constipation reduces the concentration of flora, thereby leaving sufferers more susceptible to infection and illness. Moreover, they help to keep stools soft. Therefore, constipation sufferers can go through a downward spiral whereby their condition worsens over time. As people age, they are more likely to get constipated. Moreover, it is more likely to have a serious effect on their health. This is because the body isn’t as resilient. Notably, constipation can have a big effect on quality of life; especially if it comes with one of the serious conditions above. Fortunately, there is a natural cure. Sufferers no longer have to be on a path to deteriorating health. What You Can Do A majority of constipation medication are filled with chemicals which can harm the body, and make constipation worse. Even a product like Metamucil contains ingredients no person should consume, like aspartame. Change your diet! This is one of the best ways to end constipation. Eat plenty of healthy fruits and vegetables and cut out processed foods as much as you can. Eating rancid fats (cooked meat) also doesn’t help with constipation and your digestive system so limiting that as much as possible is important. There are also some great products on the market that can assist you in ending constipation while you spend time changing your diet over time. Wholey Shit is a great example as it contains only a few natural, high quality ingredients -and it works great! You can get a free sample of Wholey Shit here. These types of remedies are a great way to get started and relief naturally and quickly while you further discover how to adjust your diet and lifestyle to reflect better digestion, eating habits and so forth.
The Sacred Science follows eight people from around the world, with varying physical and psychological illnesses, as they embark on a one-month healing journey into the heart of the Amazon jungle.
You can watch this documentary film FREE for 10 days by clicking here.
"If “Survivor” was actually real and had stakes worth caring about, it would be what happens here, and “The Sacred Science” hopefully is merely one in a long line of exciting endeavors from this group." - Billy Okeefe, McClatchy Tribune | 0 |
Friday during his “ ” segment on Fox News Channel’s “Hannity,” host Sean Hannity declared former FBI Director James Comey “humiliated” the media. Hannity, referring to Comey as “J. Edgar Comey,” pointed to parts of Comey’s testimony debunking reports of Trump collusion. Watch: Transcript as follows: So in a shocking turn of events, one of the biggest losers from yesterday’s Comey testimony was the propaganda media. We’re going to break down just how James Comey humiliated the mainstream press and why they are now facing a massive credibility crisis in tonight’s . So yesterday, the former FBI director James Comey, J. Edgar Comey, told the Senate Intel Committee that many of the media’s Russian collusion stories are just dead wrong. Watch this. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) JAMES COMEY, FORMER FBI DIRECTOR: There have been many, many stories partly based on classified information about lots of stuff but especially about Russia that are just dead wrong. The challenge, and I am not picking on reporters, about writing stories about classified information is the people talking about it often don’t really know what’s going on. (END VIDEO CLIP) HANNITY: Now after that testimony, even Mr. Thrill up his left Chris Matthews, he himself came to this stunning conclusion. I was even shocked. Take a look. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) CHRIS MATTHEWS, MSNBC HOST: The assumption of the critics of the president, of his pursuers you might say, is that somewhere along the line in the last years the president had something to do with colluding with the Russians, something to do, a helping hand, encouraging them, feeding their desire to affect the election in some way, some role they played, some conversation he had with Michael Flynn or Paul Manafort or somewhere. And yet what came apart this morning was that theory. (END VIDEO CLIP) HANNITY: “Pursuers. ” Now, the black helicopter crowd, the tinfoil hat Russia conspiracy theories being pushed by the media, the media, have now come apart at the seams. Now, it’s all been wrong. They have been lying to you, the American people. Of course, MSNBC was not the only outlet having to backtrack. “The Hill” is reporting that, quote, “CNN issues correction after Comey’s statement contradicts their reporting. ” And even ABC was also forced to update a story following Comey’s remarks. And then, of course, there is the paper of record, paper record, The New York Times. They were singled out yesterday for being flat out wrong, I would argue again. Take a look. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That report by The New York Times was not true. Is that a fair statement? COMEY: In the main, it was not true. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: On February 14, The New York Times published a story the headline of which was “Trump campaign aides had repeated contacts with Russian intelligence. ” You were asked earlier if that was an inaccurate story and you said: “in the main. ” Would it be fair to characterize that story is almost entirely wrong? COMEY: Yes. (END VIDEO CLIP) HANNITY: “The New York Times” are desperately trying to save face, fist issuing a tweet that reads, quote “We are looking into James Comey’s statements, and we will report back with more information as soon as we can. ” And then later, publishing a full article entitled “Comey disputes “New York Times” article about Russia investigation,” where they tepidly stood by their reporting and openly wondered why Comey rebuked their coverage. I guess we won’t be holding our breath for a full retraction or apology. So despite some widespread embarrassment for all these people in the media following the Comey testimony, do think we can ever expect them to stop spreading their fake news? In other words, land the black helicopters and get back to reality? Or will the crisis and credibility continue to grow? Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor | 1 |
So he didn't question where he was sending emails... that her name was on adress, ..The President had no knowledge of his Sec of State actions... i find this very difficult to believe and insulting... | 0 |
USA Continues Drive to Plutocracy, Dismantling of State 07.11.2016 Source: Pravda.Ru archive By John Stanton Interest groups and lobbyists have been busy peddling their client's interests since 1816 when Delaware manufacturer Isaac Briggs teamed up with his colleagues in an attempt to convince federal lawmakers to impose tariffs on the import of foreign made manufactures. Alexis de Tocqueville writing in his two volume set Democracy in America (1835, 1840) observed the unique American characteristic of banding together in civic and issue specific interest groups for the purpose of influencing lawmakers, regulators and public opinion at the local, state and national levels. Print version Font Size Congressional legislation to limit the influence of lobbyists in the US Congress and the federal government at large arguably did not being in earnest until the 20th Century. The landmark Foreign Agents Registration Act 1938, passed on the eve of World War II, "requires persons acting as agents of foreign principals in a political or quasi-political capacity to make periodic public disclosure of their relationship with the foreign principal, as well as activities, receipts and disbursements in support of those activities requiring foreign company or government." That act remains in force today. Nice Try The Federal Regulation of Lobbying Act of 1946, the Lobbying Disclosure Act of 1995 and the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act of 2007 are notable for their attempts to inform the public who was lobbying for what interest and for how much money. The Open Government Act of 2007 mandated a one year waiting period for federal public servants before they could make the move through the revolving door to lucrative for-profit opportunities. President Barak Obama issued an Executive Order in 2009 known as the Ethics Commitments by Executive Branch Personnel. That decree sought to impose a two year waiting period for executive branch appointees. US executive branch agencies can also write their own lobbying rules or modify those contained in legislative acts. Members of the US Congress can also play an active role above and beyond legislative actions. On December 18, 2008, then Senators John Kerry from Massachusetts and Richard Lugar of Indiana sent a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to the Clinton Foundation, and the soon to be confirmed US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, limiting the Clinton Foundation's interactions with foreign governments. In the MOU, the Clinton Foundation was instructed to spin off the Clinton Global Initiative placing strictures on Bill Clinton's ability to accept contributions from foreign governments. It appears that the Clinton's ignored the MOU with the recent revelations of Qatar's $1 million gift which went unreported. Thanks to Wikileaks, the DNC hack, Edward Snowden, Chelsea Manning and others, the internal workings of the US-Corporate State have been pried open to reveal a can of filthy worms entangled with each other in every which way. And not a damn thing will change no matter who runs the country. The American people, their constitution, Bill of Rights and ideals set forth in the Declaration of Independence are being tortured by opportunists. Besides that, they were written by "white people" back in the 1700's and so they hold no weight with large segments of the American citizenry. That, of course, plays right into the hands of the 'color of money' tech and financial interests who seek to eliminate the US nation-state leaving only the military, intelligence and the dollar's printing presses as backstops. No Win Situation In practice, all the well-intentioned federal legislation, tireless efforts of lobbyist watchdogs and anti-revolving door advocates had done little to inhibit much of the influence peddling undertaken by foreign agents and governments, US law firms, interest groups, trade associations, corporations and lobbying houses. Nor have their efforts slowed the speed of the revolving door though which officials who on one day are protecting and defending the Constitution of the United States emerge on the other side claiming fealty to a corporation's shareholders. The rules, regulations and procedures governing the process are not worth the paper they are printed on. The United States Supreme Court ruled that influence peddling by individuals or non-profit organizations are protected by the free-speech First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States. In 2010 the court's Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission extended that concept to for-profit associations, corporations and labor unions. Predictably, organizations and wealthy individuals have flooded the federal government and the 2016 election cycle with money. According to the public interest website Opensecrets.org--which tracks lobbying and revolving door activity--from 2008 to 2016 over $15 billion was spent by assorted organizations for US federal level influence peddling for all manner of issues ranging from defense and finance to sports and healthcare. The National Football League works hard at the local, state and federal levels for public funds to get their stadiums subsidized at the expense of taxpayers. In 2016 alone $1.6Bln was billed by lobbyists to their clients. In that same year 10,498 individuals and organizations registered as lobbyists. But even knowing how the system works, Americans see no alternative because they do not want to do the very difficult work of rebooting the system or holding their so called leaders accountable. A Look at AT&T, Time Warner Merger & Influence In October, the world's third largest telecommunications giant AT&T, a creature of the former Ma Bell System monopoly, offered cable and content provider Time Warner shareholders an $85 billion merger package. Both Boards of Directors gleefully approved the deal. Now that merger must receive the approval of the US Department of Justice and assorted state and federal regulatory bodies. If approved by regulators, the merger would create one the world's largest media conglomerates with one side of the monster, AT&T, very tight with the US National Security Agency. To increase the likelihood of success, AT&T, for its part, has mobilized some 100 lobbyists in Washington, DC, and scores more across the nation to cajole public utility, state legislatures and governors into supporting the merger. The company is already on the march in the US congress and at federal agencies like the Federal Communications Commission. Even the self-proclaimed titans in the US Congress who decry the influence of money in politics or swarms of lobbyists are on the dole. In 1999 Senator John McCain from the US state of Arizona and then Chairman of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, that oversees the telecommunications industry, introduced a bill that cleared the hurdles for the AT&T's acquisition of MediaOne Group making AT&T, at the time, the largest cable company in the United States, the Center for Public Integrity said in a report. "His efforts did not go unrewarded: Two weeks after he introduced his bill, AT&T employees and their spouses contributed $10,000 to his presidential campaign in addition to $3,000 they gave him three days after AT&T announced its merger plans." AT&T's federal influencers include revolving door types like former Senators John Breaux of Louisiana and Trent Lott of Mississippi who now work for heavyweight Washington, DC law-firm and influence house Squire, Patton and Boggs. AT&T will also apply pressure from its own Board of Directors, one of whom is former President Bill Clinton's chief economic advisor Laura D'Andrea Tyson. Coincidently she once served as a board member for Ameritech Corporation, formerly part of the AT&T-Bell System and now owned by AT&T. And how about this? The Board also includes the former Chairman of the US Federal Communications Commission from 1997 to 200, William Kennard. Inches or Sins? America is bankrupt and on the highway to hell. The outcome of the 2016 election will not halt that process unless the American people find a way out of the political, financial, cultural and military morass they and their leaders have created. There are two paths forward for Americans, it seems. The first is offered in dialogue from the movie SEVEN in which the serial killer John Doe (played by Kevin Spacey) innovatively murders seven people based on the Seven Deadly Sins. Sure, John's methods are unsound but the 'point' he makes about the sickness and tolerance levels of society are spot on. John Doe: "A woman... so ugly on the inside she couldn't bear to go on living if she couldn't be beautiful on the outside. A drug dealer, a drug dealing pederast, actually! And let's not forget the disease-spreading whore! Only in a world this shitty could you even try to say these were innocent people and keep a straight face. But that's the point. We see a deadly sin on every street corner, in every home, and we tolerate it. We tolerate it because it's common, it's trivial. We tolerate it morning, noon, and night. Well, not anymore. I'm setting the example. What I've done is going to be puzzled over and studied and followed... forever."The second path and a better alternative to John Doe's shock doctrine is from movie dialogue from Any Given Sunday in the famed inches speech by Coach D'Amato (played by Al Pacino). The football team has descended into the hell of cliques, internal clashes, off-field antics, and disagreements over play calling. No football team can be successful in such a situation. The team has to come together for some purpose. Americans face that challenge now. Coach D'Amato: "Either we heal as a team or we're 'gonna' crumble inch by inch, play by play until we're finished. We're in hell right now, gentlemen...we can stay here, get the shit kicked out of us, or we can fight our way back into the light. We can climb 'outta' hell... one inch at a time. You see life's this game of inches, so is football. Because in either game - life or football - the margin for error is so small. I mean, one half a step too late or too early and you don't quite make it. One half second too slow, too fast and you don't quite catch it. I know if I'm 'gonna' have any life anymore it's because I'm still willing to fight and die for that inch, because that's what living is, the six inches in front of your face. The inches we need are everywhere around us. That's a team, gentlemen, and either we heal, now, as a team, or we will die as individuals. That's football guys, that's all it is." John Stanton John Stanton played US contact football from youth level through small college on the offensive line. He captained his youth and high school teams and contributed significantly to three conference championships in college. He coached the sport for 25 years. His most recent book is US Military's Progressiveness Leaves Civil Society Behind. He's at [email protected] | 0 |
Nigel Farage Fears Brexit ‘Betrayal’ and Warns of ‘Public Anger’ Following Historic Article 50 Ruling Chris Kitching, Mirror, November 3, 2016
Nigel Farage has warned fellow politicians that any attempt to block or delay Britain’s exit from the European Union will be met with untold anger from the public.
In a statement released after the historic High Court ruling on Article 50 the interim Ukip leader said he fears a Brexit “betrayal” is on the horizon.
The judges ruled that the government doesn’t have the power to trigger two-year exit process Article 50 without a vote by MPs.
Farage campaigned vigorously for Brexit and declared the June 23 referendum Britain’s “independence day” after the shock result was confirmed.
After the High Court ruling was announced on Thursday morning Farage said: “I worry that a betrayal may be near at hand.
“Last night at the Spectator Parliamentary Awards I had a distinct feeling that our political class, who were out in force, do not accept the 23rd of June Referendum result.
“I now fear that every attempt will be made to block or delay the triggering of Article 50 .
“If this is so, they have no idea of the level of public anger they will provoke.”
Three of England’s top judges gave the ruling after a costly three-day hearing.
The Government immediately announced it would appeal to the Supreme Court.
Ukip millionaire donor Arron Banks accused the “legal establishment” of “declaring war on British democracy”.
He added: “Parliament voted six-to-one in favour of letting the people decide.
“They didn’t get the answer they wanted, and now they’re going to use every dirty trick in the book to try to sabotage, delay or water down Brexit.”
Ukip leadership hopeful Suzanne Evans blasted the judges and said the court ruling “undermines democracy”.
The former party chair urged the government to appeal.
She wrote on Twitter : “How dare these activist judges attempt to overturn our will? It’s a power grab & undermines democracy. Time we had the right to sack them.
” Article 50 is an EU trap we must not fall in to. It will tie us into the EU for years. The government must appeal. People power must win.”
Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn said: “This ruling underlines the need for the Government to bring its negotiating terms to parliament without delay.
“Labour respects the decision of the British people to leave the European Union.
“But there must be transparency and accountability to parliament on the terms of Brexit .
“Labour will be pressing the case for a Brexit that works for Britain, putting jobs, living standards and the economy first.”
Liberal Democrats Leader Tim Farron welcomed the ruling.
He said: “Given the strict two year timetable of exiting the EU once Article 50 is triggered, it is critical that the government now lay out their negotiating to Parliament, before such a vote is held.” | 0 |
TEL AVIV — In a 2010 email released yesterday by Judicial Watch, Jake Sullivan, Chief of Staff to Hillary Clinton at the State Department, discusses how to “help” news media figures “’figure out’ how things work. ”[Sullivan later served as chief foreign policy adviser to Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign. The February 9, 2010 email in question was sent to longtime Clinton confidantes Huma Abedin and Cheryl D. Mills, and to Philippe I. Reines, who served as Clinton’s Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Strategic Communications. It was an exchange started by Sullivan, who asked why New York Times columnist David Brooks “took a shot at me in his column today. ” “Any ideas what prompted it?” asked Sullivan. Brooks column that day, titled, “The House of Tranquillity” did not specifically mention Sullivan. It stated of Clinton and Iraq that, “Hillary Clinton’s influence on this and all issues is exceptionally hard to figure out. ” Brooks may have been referring to Sullivan and other top Clinton aides when he wrote: Finally, Biden was asked to come up with a agenda. This is a surprisingly difficult job because many of these programs — credits for college affordability and child care — fairly reek of Clintonism. This is an administration that is staffed by Clintonites but does not want to appear Clintonian in any way. In response to Sullivan’s email asking what may have prompted Brooks’ alleged criticism, Reines replied, “Not sure — but this is a good excuse to bring him in for an OTR with you. Lona mentioned you wanted to see Tom Friedman — with your ok, we could schedule both (separately) over the next month or so. ” OTR is an acronym for an conversation, something fairly common in government circles. Reines was referring to Times’ columnist Thomas Friedman. Sullivan responded with his comment about helping media personalities “’figure out’ how things work”: Philippe and I had an offline conversation about this and I agree entirely. I think it makes sense for you to meet with influencers on a regular — though not intrusive — basis. An OTR conversation with you is the best way to help guys like Brooks “figure out” how things work. The email was part of a batch of 1, 184 pages released yesterday by Judicial Watch following a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. The correspondence included 29 previously undisclosed emails. The Sullivan email about Brooks was also previously released by WiliLeaks, but it received no news media attention. Previous emails discussed methods of utilizing the news media for messaging. Breitbart News previously reported a memo requested by Clinton recommended that the State Department utilize “Specialty Media” to get its foreign policy message across, a newly released State Department email reveals. The 2009 memo urged Clinton to use her star power and singled out shows including Oprah, Ellen, The View, and others to be used to “amplify and deliver messages that advance policymaking. ” The section on The View stated that while the program lacks “international distribution, it makes up for it by creating a media echo chamber based on the intense discussions that take place every weekday during the Hot Topics segments. ” The reference to The View as “creating a media echo chamber” may be telling. Last May, a New York Times article quoted a senior Obama administration official who used similar phraseology in describing the alleged use of the news media to sell the Iran nuclear deal to the American public. That plot was referenced in a New York Times Magazine profile of President Obama’s deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes entitled, “The Aspiring Novelist Who Became Obama’s Guru. ” Robert Malley, senior director at the National Security Council, was quoted saying “experts” were utilized to create an “echo chamber” that disseminated administration claims about Iran to “hundreds of reporters” in the news media. Aaron Klein is Breitbart’s Jerusalem bureau chief and senior investigative reporter. He is a New York Times bestselling author and hosts the popular weekend talk radio program, “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio. ” Follow him on Twitter @AaronKleinShow. Follow him on Facebook. With research by Joshua Klein. | 1 |
The Rothschild Family has corrupted global banks, news media, oil and government share in: Central banks , Currency & debt , Deception , Energy , Freedom
The New World Order might seem a bit far-fetched for many. A handful of powerful people acting as puppet masters for the human race is a thought that might not even cross the minds of many that have seamlessly adapted to the beliefs that were instilled in them from a young age. The thought that we are all being controlled and enslaved by the banks with the aid of the government is for conspiracy theorists. There is no doubt that there are negative connotations associated with being a conspiracy theorist. That belief has been re-iterated many times, mostly from the mainstream media. There are people who see the world for what they are told it is, others see what’s really going on behind the curtain. The stranglehold the global elite have on money and knowledge makes them very powerful. They either directly or indirectly control every aspect of our lives.
Global mega-corporations make up to billions of dollars on an annual basis. A select few at the top of the company make absurd amounts of money, while the employees making the difference and driving the company forward are barely paid enough money to stay afloat. If humans stay busy working 40 weekly hours for very little income, they won’t have the time or the resources to realize they have been dealt a bad hand. The top 1 percent doesn’t want Americans to be any more educated then to have the ability to help operate and patronize their business’.
The global elite have a system in place which allows them to grow their global banking empire. All of humanity are literally slaves to the economic system. Money is necessary for our survival in the real world today. Most people will spend the majority of their time working just to survive in the system. If money is the god of our time, that makes Rothschild his prophet. Public School programs worldwide are where the global elite first begin to shape our minds. They continue the shaping through the media. We are taught what they want us to know and nothing more.
The rich continue to get richer by purchasing up many successful smaller businesses. When the top 1 percent owns the majority of banks, resources and even our governments, it means big problems for the people. The Rothschilds’ are worth over $500 trillion and they are just 1 of 13 families that pretty much collectively own the world. The Rothschilds’ alone could pay off the US national debt 26 times over. Unfortunately they would never do such a thing because they own the majority of the world’s central banks. The New World Order’s agenda is slowly taking small steps toward complete and definitive enslavement through use of the monetary system and ownership of resources.
Sources: | 0 |
Email
There was a time that the parent of a child was the final authority. There would be no way the state could step in and force decisions. Especially decisions that would be life altering and permanently damaging.
None of us would think that a social work would threaten to take our children if we did not let them have sex with their love interests. They would not make us allow our children to disfigure themselves. “If little Johnny wants to cut off his nose, you must consent.” This notion would be absurd.
Not in Britain.
The Christian Post reports :
Christian parents in the U.K. are taking legal action against their local council authority after it undermined their parental rights and sided with their 14-year-old daughter who says she wants to transition to become a boy.
The Daily Mail reports that the girl, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told local council officials that she wants to start transitioning to look like a boy. The parents have said that she is too young to be making such decisions, however, and will be meeting with teachers and social workers next month to discuss how the girl should be addressed and treated at school.
The Christian Legal Centre, which will be funding the legal costs for the parents, blamed the “transgender cultural movement” for creating what it called a new “conflict of rights” within the family.
Society is growing more and more antagonistic to parents. This antagonism is especially true if that parent is Christian. As I reported , in North Carolina, the Gender Unicorn teaches teens that their parents have no place in such decisions.
This proves that this is not something that is soon to be coming to America; it is already here.
Article posted with permission from Constitution.com shares | 0 |
Home › HEALTH | MEDIA › FDA FOUND MANIPULATING THE MEDIA IN FAVOR OF BIG PHARMA FDA FOUND MANIPULATING THE MEDIA IN FAVOR OF BIG PHARMA 0 SHARES
[10/27/16] Although the Federal Drug Administration is thought to serve American consumers by keeping them safe and well-informed, they are doing just the opposite by controlling the media and science press in order to create misleading and one-sided articles.
An investigation into documents released through the Freedom of Information Act by Scientific American revealed that the FDA uses a variety of tactics to prevent the full truth from being revealed about a certain product. The biggest tactic is the “close-hold embargo,” where they invite a select few news sites to a briefing about the to-be released information with conditions. They stipulate that the journalists have to surrender their reportorial independence by agreeing to only speak with sources approved by their agency.
When NPR reporter Rob Stein was extended one of these loaded invitations, he responded by saying, “My editors are uncomfortable with the condition that we cannot seek reaction,” and asked that they be given a bit more wiggle room to speak with others. When Stein was met with a resounding no, he decided to agree to the terms and attend the briefing.
Stein wasn’t the only reporter to attend this particular briefing, as other sites such as The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and The New York Times were all present. Despite agreeing to the terms, not everyone is actually comfortable with these conditions. The New York Times former Public Editor, Margaret Sullivan, said:
“I think embargoes that attempt to control sourcing are dangerous because they limit the role of the reporter whose job is to do a full look at a subject. It’s really inappropriate for a source to be telling a journalist whom he or she can and can’t talk to.”
Other tactics used by the FDA include denying major media outlets any access to the briefing prior to the public release of information, and the deliverance of half-truths when asked questions directly to hinder an investigation. Those who intend to speak with unapproved sources or announce these embargoes are met with threats. Post navigation | 0 |
Zog Benegeserit
Newt Gingrich rekt her too.
Megyn-Kelly-Newt-Gingrich-screenshot-640x480.jpg 640x480 75.7 KB | 0 |
Last Tuesday, a subscription service called Local Roots NYC dropped off boxes at pickup spots in New York City including a cafe, a brew pub and the offices of BuzzFeed. Alongside locally grown rainbow chard, romaine lettuce and beets, some members got bottles of olive oil from Italy or bars of chocolate and bags of dried pasta, both . From Rustic Roots, an delivery service in the tristate area, members could receive fruit boxes stacked with oranges, pineapples and avocados. Although both companies use the term “C. S. A. ,” agriculture, to describe their service, the presence of a middleman between the farmer and the customer is precisely what traditional C. S. A.s are designed to avoid. And since olives and oranges do not grow in this region, those products provide no direct income to local farmers, precisely the people the C. S. A. was invented to benefit. agriculture was originally defined by a very particular relationship between a farm and its customers. Starting in the 1980s (earlier in Europe and Japan) members banded together to support a nearby farm with an upfront financial commitment to buy its produce. It was a private transaction in which all the money went directly to the farmer. It did not rely on distributors or stores, and it gave farmers a crucial infusion of cash for the winter, used to buy seeds, repair equipment and expand into new growing methods. The goal was for C. S. A. farmers and members to build a mutually supportive relationship. Members would get produce from a farmer they knew and trusted, and farmers would get financial stability. “There’s no other customer that pays you 100 percent, in advance, year after year,” said Maggie Wood, an owner of Golden Earthworm Farm on the North Fork of Long Island. Ms. Wood’s farm is entirely supported by its 2, 150 C. S. A. members. As demand for local and organic produce has ballooned in the last five years, so have other ideas for connecting farmers to customers. Now, online hubs are using sophisticated distribution technology to snap into the food chain, often using “C. S. A. ” to describe what they deliver. The term is not regulated in most states, so companies can define it as they wish. Peapod, the online shopping service owned by the international grocery giant Ahold, delivers boxes throughout the Northeast FreshDirect offers a variety of C. S. A. options in and around New York City. As the “farm share” concept has spread, the C. S. A. has become just another part of the sprawling, messy modern system of knowing where your food comes from and choosing what you want to eat. The opportunity for confusion is of enormous concern to many farmers in the New York region. Depending on how and where these new businesses buy their produce, consumers can receive all the benefits of C. S. A. membership, while the farmers get only a fraction. Some farmers say that after years of steady growth, their C. S. A. memberships have dropped since the arrival of services like Local Roots or Farmigo. “At first it seemed like these services were going to be great for us,” said Eve an owner of Garden of Eve farm on the North Fork of Long Island. Some of them supplied software management programs and marketing tools others offered premium prices close to farmers’ market rates others picked up the produce instead of requiring farmers to deliver to a central warehouse. But the drawbacks can outweigh the benefits. Some say that these hubs have siphoned off their members, partly by offering a more convenient product, but also by blurring the definition of terms like “C. S. A. ” and “farm share,” so that customers believe they are directly supporting local farms with their purchases when they might not. “They are absolutely in competition with us,” said Ben Shute, an owner of Hearty Roots farm in the Hudson Valley. “There are only a certain number of people who will buy food this way. ” Ms. said that her membership had dropped from a high of 900 around 2012 to 600 today. Golden Earthworm, Katchkie Farm in Kinderhook, N. Y. and many other local farmers agree that after years of steady growth, they have been struggling to retain old members and attract new ones. And that to compete with the delivery services, they are scrambling to find sources for bread, cheese, fruit, meat, eggs and other that customers want. “Do consumers even know that when they sign up for one of these fake C. S. A. s, sometimes it doesn’t benefit local farmers any more than if they shop at the supermarket?” Ms. asked. Probably not. The organic farm boxes you buy online may or may not be local. Local farm boxes may or may not be organic. The farmers may or may not be paid more than wholesale prices. And customers may or may not care. “I just assume that if it’s organic, it’s good,” said Raquel Hoffman, a C. S. A. member in Fort Greene, Brooklyn. “I can’t also worry about whether it’s local, or whether the chickens were happy, and all that. ” Taking the time to tease out whether buying granola made in Brooklyn qualifies as supporting local agriculture can test the patience of consumers. Services like Local Roots offer an alluring simplicity. “If the goal is to make local food accessible, we need to make shopping for it as much like a shop as possible,” said Ying, who founded Local Roots NYC. “People who care about local produce are also going to care about great olive oil, so I’m going to connect them to great olive oil. And that money comes back to support the local food movement, including farmers. ” Ms. Ying said that the more food options her customers have, the more likely they are to remain in the C. S. A. which in turn sustains the 15 local farms from which Local Roots buys. Traditional C. S. A.s have a high turnover rate many people simply find the system too inflexible for their needs. “If we want the local food system to grow, we all have to grow and evolve with it,” she said. “If you’re stubborn against the change, it’s only going to hurt the local food movement. ” Eric Stone, who oversees C. S. A.s at FreshDirect, said he believed that widening distribution and raising visibility for local produce — as the company’s boxes do — benefit local agriculture in the long term. Hepworth Farms, in the Hudson Valley, packs C. S. A. boxes for FreshDirect customers that are stamped with the farm’s own name and logo. “I really think it gives them a chance to get their stuff out there,” he said. “It expands the whole market. ” Hepworth is an example of an organic farm that benefits from increased options for farmers, participating in a new distribution system alongside its farmers’ market, restaurant and wholesale businesses. Now that local food has become big business, Target and Walmart are trying to get a piece of it, and even Amazon is delivering locally grown kale. This new demand has been a boon for many farmers across the country, especially farmers equipped to sell in bulk new sales channels have been opened that they could never have accessed independently. Small farmers say they have no problem with new markets for local food they just don’t want them to be called C. S. A. s. Paula Lukats is the program director of Just Food, an advocacy and education group for local agriculture in New York State. She confirmed that after a peak in 2010, memberships in agriculture groups have been going down “across the board. ” For the sake of clarity, she said, she wishes that middlemen would stop using the term “C. S. A. ” altogether. “The C. S. A. system was developed for consumers and for small farmers,” Ms. Lukats said. “The was low prices and guaranteed income. Anything you put in the middle of that raises the prices for the consumer or takes away money from the farmer. ” But in interviews with farmers, policy makers and entrepreneurs, all parties agreed that for fragile local food systems to strengthen, consumers will have to be offered more choice and control over what they eat than is possible with a traditional C. S. A. “C. S. A.s are not for everyone, we know that,” said Maryellen Driscoll of Free Bird farm in the Hudson Valley. She estimated that her farm’s income will be down $32, 000 compared to last year from the loss of C. S. A. members. “What’s frustrating is that the copycats have such a lack of transparency, and it’s very easy for the real issues to be glossed over. ” The real issues facing C. S. A. farms and the food system are not confined to the New York metropolitan area. Judith Redmond, an owner of Full Belly Farm in Yolo, Calif. said that membership in its C. S. A. one of the oldest and biggest in California, has dropped this season after holding steady at 1, 200 (with a perpetual waiting list) since 1992. Ms. Redmond belongs to the Community Alliance With Family Farmers, a group that was instrumental in having the phrase “ Agriculture” codified by the California legislature, effective in 2014. It is the only state that has done so. Ben Shute of Hearty Roots said that there are financial risks for farmers in working through middlemen, and they are precisely the risks that C. S. A.s were designed to eliminate. “Some of them want to have real relationships with farmers, but some are shopping around for the best price,” he said. “When a farmer is growing a certain crop for them, and then they go elsewhere, what is that farmer supposed to do? The product is perishable. Its value has a short life span. ” Some of them have proved to have a short life span. In 2015, Good Eggs suddenly ended deliveries in Brooklyn, Los Angeles and New Orleans after just one year Farmstr, started with much fanfare in Seattle in 2013, also closed up shop in 2015. And in just the last two weeks, 15, 000 households in New York, New Jersey, Seattle and Northern California that subscribed to C. S. A.s through a company called Farmigo received boxes that would be their last, as the company abruptly shut down its food distribution operation — in the middle of the harvest season — to return to its core business: software. Farmigo, which started deliveries in 2013, fueled its rapid expansion with more than $25 million of venture capital, raised on the strength of a food distribution software platform that the founder, Benzi Ronen, claimed would eventually replace supermarkets altogether. Mr. Ronen said that was still inevitable. “I never saw a conflict with the C. S. A. s,” he said. “We saw a lot of customers leaving C. S. A.s because they wanted a more traditional market. So we built an online farmers’ market with 700 items. ” But the logistics of washing, packing, refrigerating, distributing and delivering those items to 400 locations proved overwhelming. So Farmigo members lost out on this growing season, and scores of Farmigo farmers were left with fields and trailers full of unsold produce. Still, Mr. Ronen said he did not believe that traditional C. S. A.s are the answer. “I started as a fanatic, all the way at the end of the spectrum,” he said. “But I’ve learned that if we want to grow the number of people who have access to this food, there have to be many approaches. ” | 1 |
You are here: Home / US / What Just Happened at a Tim Kaine Rally is BAD NEWS For Hillary What Just Happened at a Tim Kaine Rally is BAD NEWS For Hillary October 27, 2016 Pinterest
Forget Hillary Clinton … she can’t even get more than a handful of people to attend her rallies.
So why on earth would you hold an event with Tim Kaine? Can they possibly expect more than three, maybe four people to show up?
But that’s what they did at Lorain’s Admiral King High School in Ohio. They held the rally in the school’s gym, hoping to fill it up with students. Waiting for Vice Presidential candidate, Tim Kaine to speak at #Lorain Admiral King school. pic.twitter.com/A74ve1eKkF
— Mary Springowski (@maryspring) October 27, 2016
Students and other attendees (supporters, supposedly) wondered what the point of Kaine’s appearance was in the first place.
https://twitter.com/MorixRogue/status/791666557881552897/photo/1
Maybe it was (yawn!) Sen. Al Franken that got everyone all excited. Gearing up for Democratic Party nominee for Vice President Tim Kaine & Sen. Al Franken in #Lorain @LorainSchools @MorningJournal pic.twitter.com/47IucfCrsG
— Carol Harper (@mj_charper) October 27, 2016
So they get everyone together … they’re ready for the rally … and take a look at how absolutely massive the crowd is:
— ✨Mori✨ (@MorixRogue) October 27, 2016
I think – at most – there are 150 people there.
Remember folks, Mike Pence, Donald Trump’s VP Pic spoke to an overflow crowd of more than 2,300 people in Utah on Wednesday. | 0 |
BREAKING: FBI Dir. Announces Shock “Database” to Monitor Cops
However, after a county Democrat official who was also a gay activist received one complaint about Walsh, Walsh was summarily fired by the agency.
Walsh responded by filing a lawsuit against the state, alleging discrimination, which in turn met with an official demand that he turn over all of his sermons , related notes and a host of other documents, a demand he is resisting and that his legal team called “an excessive display of the government overreaching its authority and violating the sanctity of the church.”
A statement from Walsh read: “No government has the right to require a pastor to turn over his sermons. I cannot and will not give up my sermons unless I am forced to do so.” Advertisement - story continues below
Walsh has been supported in his resistance by Dave Welch , one of the Houston pastors who was similarly targeted, who stated, “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but Georgia’s demand is even worse than when the mayor of Houston demanded 17 different categories of materials, including sermons, from … us.”
“First, this is state government coming after a pastor, not just a rogue mayor in one city,” Welch explained. “Also, the state is demanding much more material: sermons, sermon notes, all documents without even topical or time limits. It could even include margin notes in this pastor’s preaching Bible. It’s almost as if they are ransacking the pastor’s study.”
“This sweeping demand is ominous and a threat to every pastor, every church, every denomination and every citizen of faith in America,” he added.
Walsh has also received support from the Concerned Women for America organization, with CEO Penny Nance saying, “The words of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. that ‘(i)njustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere’ still reverberate today – especially as we witness the Gestapo-like tactics of his native state.” Advertisement - story continues below | 0 |
Scientists have heard unusual messages from deep space probably coming from aliens Please scroll down for video
Recently scientists have heard unusual messages from the most distant stars in the observable universe that they think are extra-terrestrial. Upon new analysis of strange modulations in a tiny set of stars, 234 out of 2.5 million stars that have been observed during past surveyance of the sky, new evidence has been found that this tiny fraction of stars is behaving oddly. Aliens Are Trying To Make Contact With Us From Distant Stars. Scientists Say
The new study reports the finding of specific modulations in just 234 out of the 2.5 million stars that have been observed during a survey of the sky. The work found that a tiny fraction of them seemed to be behaving strangely. No obvious explanation has been concluded for what is going on, leaving the scientists observing these phenomena theorizing that aliens are in fact trying to alert us to their existence.
“We find that the detected signals have exactly the shape of an [extraterrestrial intelligence] signal predicted in the previous publication and are therefore in agreement with this hypothesis, ” write EF Borra and E Trottier in a new paper on this study.
The Astronomical Society of the Pacific has published the journal under the title 'Discovery of peculiar periodic spectral modulations in a small fraction of solar-type stars'. Originally it was suggested that it be named 'Signals probably from Extraterrestrial Intelligence,' according to a pre-print version of the paper hosted online .
Like with all scientific theories, further research will need to be undertaken to confirm or deny that hypothesis. This will be achieved by watching for the same signals using different technology so that many other possibilities of what it could be can be eliminated.
Earlier this year an initiative called 'breakthrough listen' was set up to search for alien life which has even been supported by both Stephen Hawking and Mark Zuckerberg. Although they agree this news is promising, they also state that further evidence must be found before these signals can be “unequivocally attributed” to aliens.
“The one in 10,000 objects with unusual spectra seen by Borra and Trottier are certainly worthy of additional study, ” the team said in a statement. “However, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." In fact, Internationally agreed-upon protocols for searches for evidence of advanced life beyond Earth (SETI) require anomalies to be confirmed by independent groups using their telescopes, and extraterrestrial agents can only be considered as an explanation when all natural phenomena are ruled out.
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Home › POLITICS › BECK: COMEY LETTER ‘ONE OF THE MOST IRRESPONSIBLE THINGS TO EVER HAPPEN’ BECK: COMEY LETTER ‘ONE OF THE MOST IRRESPONSIBLE THINGS TO EVER HAPPEN’ 0 SHARES
[10/31/16] Monday on his radio show, while discussing the FBI reopening the investigation into Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, conservative host Glenn Beck said FBI director James Comey contacting Congress is “one of the most irresponsible things to ever happen.”
Beck said, “For him to go for the subpoena and announce it and open this thing up when he says he doesn’t know if there’s even anything in those emails, that’s not too big of a risk for him, that is too big of a risk of anyone’s career, and not his, hers.” Post navigation | 0 |
Dem. candidate for Georgia congressional seat @ossoff: Not an issue I don’t live in district, can’t vote for myself https: . Tuesday on CNN’s “New Day,” Democratic congressional hopeful Jon Ossoff, who is reportedly one of the in the special election to fill the vacancy in Georgia’s Sixth Congressional district left by Secretary Tom Price, dismissed the relevance of not living inside of the district for which he is running. Ossoff told Alisyn Camerota he was living outside the district while his girlfriend finished medical school and planned on moving back once she finishes. “I grew up in this district,” he replied. “I grew up in this community. It’s my home. My family is still there. I’m a down the street to support Alicia while she finishes medical school. It’s something I’ve been very transparent about. In fact, I’m proud to be supporting her career. As soon as she finishes her medical training, I’ll be 10 minutes back up the road into the district where I grew up. ” Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor | 1 |
BNI Store Oct 31 2016 WELCOME TO PARIS where tour buses have to navigate around all the new Muslim tent cities filling the streets Now that France has shut down the filthy Calais ‘jungle’ camp where thousands of illegal alien Muslim invaders had been squatting, Muslim tent cities are sprouting up all over the streets of Paris. Gee, I guess French tourism hasn’t taken a big enough hit yet, following several Islamic terrorist attacks. | 0 |
We Are Change
In a new video investigating voter fraud released by Project Veritas Action Fund (PVA), a plot to bus impoverished voters – – told who to vote for – to the polls is caught on hidden camera.
In the video, PVA journalists posing as political consultants met Reverend Marlon Mack of Sweet Home Baptist Church in Gary, Indiana to discuss how to influence the election. Mack spoke of his political influence, prompting the PVA journalists to schedule a meeting with Reverend Mack and a friend of his, Reverend Marion Johnson, to see what their plans were for Election Day.
“We’ve got people to get on school buses and go to Indianapolis and the state houses and we just need you to show up,” said Mack.
“They didn’t even know what they were going down there for, all they know is the Pastor asked them,” said Johnson.
Mack and Johnson explained how they bus minority members of their community congregation to the polls and tell them how to vote.
“The thing is, I keep repeating this, our people getting to the polls. If we get our people to the polls they know who to vote for. It’s not going to be, ‘Oh who do I vote for?’ Because we’re going to tell them who to vote for,” said Johnson.
IRS code provides that 501 (c) 3 organizations cannot “Participate in, or intervene in, any political campaign on behalf of/in opposition to any candidate for public office.” Pastors and church staff should not be using church resources to engage in political campaigns.
“My thing is this. What I do is tell people who I am going to vote for. I say I’m voting for Hillary Clinton. And that’s automatically telling our congregation to vote for Hillary Clinton,” said Johnson…And you see all these vans rolling to the polls. With the name of the church and the pastor’s name on the side. And they know that the Pastor’s providing that. They know who they’re voting for. They know who they’re supporting,” said Johnson.
“We have church vans… I mean literally, we can have twenty vans roll up,” said Mack.
Reverend Mack and Reverend Johnson told PVA journalists times that they were sure their community would follow their lead at the polls, as long as they had the funds. They also were hoping that the PVA journalists would connect them with a donor to fund their “get out the vote” efforts and they had a very specific way they wanted the donation to be made so that a paper trail wasn’t left.
“He could possibly make the check to you. You cash the check and give cash. Or he could make the check to a particular church and then it works out as a charitable donation, because it looks like he just gave a donation to the church,” said Mack.
In an effort to avoid making their 501(c) 3 violation apparent, the Reverends suggested that the check be made as an anonymous charitable donation.
On Election Day, PV journalists traveled to Gary, IN to see if they would be told for whom to vote.
PV Journalist: “So should I just vote straight ticket Democrat?”
Mack: “That would be nice…you’re heading to the polls and don’t really have a lot of information to deal with issues…that would be probably the best bet…So prayerfully you’ll go in and just hit straight Democratic ticket and give us the help that we need.”
The post Holy Voter Fraud: Reverends Caught on Cam, “We Tell Them Who To Vote For” appeared first on We Are Change .
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November 25, 2016 - Fort Russ News - RusVesna - translated by J. Arnoldski -
Three servicemen of the Turkish army were killed yesterday as a result of a Syrian airstrike in the Aleppo province, the Turkish newspaper Hürriyet has reported citing the Turkish General Staff. The bombardment also injured 10 of Ankara’s soldiers.
On Thursday, November 24th, an airstrike by Syrian military aviation with Turkish troops as its target was recorded for the first time since the beginning of Turkey’s illegal Euphrates Shield operation on the territory of the Syrian Arab Republic.
Since August 24th, Erdogan’s forces have been engaged in operation Euphrates Shield in the Aleppo province without agreement from the government of Syria. The declared goal of the military operation is the clearing out of ISIS terrorists from the northern regions of Syria adjacent to Turkey. Many experts have called the real objective of the operation to be fighting against armed Kurdish groups.
A military source has reported to Russian Spring that the strike hit Turkish occupation units in the vicinity of Al-Bab, where they, together with members of the bandit formation known as the Free Syrian Army, are attacking Kurds and ISIS.
“Before the strike, the troops received several warnings that Syrian Air Force planes would bomb rebel positions north of Al-Bab. They were supposed to leave this territory of Syria,” the source said.
Yesterday was the anniversary of the death of Russian air force pilot Oleg Peshkov and marine Alexander Pozynich, who were killed by Turkish military operations and pro-Turkish militants in Syrian Latakia.
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By Beth Wallace
This past July, National Wildlife Federation (NWF) conducted a diving expedition to obtain footage of aging oil pipelines strung across one of the most sensitive locations in the Great Lakes, and possibly the world: the Straits of Mackinac . Footage of these pipelines has never been released to the public until now.
This NWF map simulates a 3, 6 and 12 hour spill from the tar sands oil pipeline based on Enbridge spill response plans, average current speeds and “worse case” discharge estimates.
The Straits of Mackinac pipelines, owned by Enbridge Energy, are 60-years-old and considered one of the greatest threats to the Great Lakes because of their age, location and the hazardous products they transport—including tar sands derived oil .
For nearly two years, NWF has been pressing pipeline regulators and Enbridge to release information about the integrity of these pipelines, including inspection videos showing how the pipelines cross the Straits of Mackinac. These requests have gone largely unanswered from both Enbridge and the Pipeline Hazards Safety Administration (PHMSA), who regulates pipeline operations. Because Enbridge hastily moved forward with plans to increase pressure on the aging pipelines, and has bypassed critical environmental permitting for changes in operation, NWF decided we needed to obtain our own:
The footage shows pipelines suspended over the lakebed, some original supports broken away—indicating the presence of corrosion—and some sections of the suspended pipelines covered in large piles of unknown debris. This visual is evidence that our decision makers need to step in and demand a release of information from Enbridge and PHMSA.
Heightening our concern around this pipeline and the company that owns it: despite having cleared our dive work with the U.S. Coast Guard, several Congressional members and Homeland Security, our staff and the dive crew had uncomfortable interactions with Enbridge representatives. As soon as our team set out on the water, we were quickly accompanied by an Enbridge crew that monitored our every move. This monitoring did not stop at the surface: Enbridge also placed a Remote Operated Vehicle (ROV) into the water to watch our team.
These actions and our video have raised our level of concern for the general operational behavior of this company and their overall safety culture—including the way they treat the concerned public living near their pipelines . If these aging pipelines rupture, the resulting oil slick would cause irreversible damage to fish and wildlife, drinking water, Lake Michigan beaches, Mackinac Island and our economy.
To make matters worse, the recent shutdown of our federal government has left communities and wildlife with an increased risk of oil spills and failed response because pipeline safety and responding agencies have been scaled back or closed all together. The recent oil spill in North Dakota , of approximately 800,000 gallons, is living proof.
This article was originally published on National Wildlife Federation’s Wildlife Promise . | 0 |
Thursday on Fox News Channel’s “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer criticized 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton for her remarks a day earlier at a tech conference in California. Clinton avoided blaming herself for the loss, for which Krauthammer called “childish” and “pathetic. ” “Look, I know I’m in a minority with conservatives, but I actually feel sorry for her,” Krauthammer said. “I have a soft spot. It could be because I was in my youth a liberal. I retain the marshmallow deep inside of my heart that I try not to betray these days. But it’s a pathetic performance. It’s sort of childish. She can’t accept responsibility. She has practiced at this where she says — I love in one of her riffs she says was a perfect candidate? No. Did I make mistakes? Yes. These are rhetorical devices, whoever said she was a perfect candidate? She was a terrible candidate. She was the worst of imaginable. I mean just look at the fact she couldn’t shake the challenge of a socialist, who, this is the best part about Bernie Sanders, honeymooned in the Soviet Union. She couldn’t shake his challenge for six months. ” “By the way, Lindsey Graham once said about Bernie and the Soviet Union, yes, and he never left,” he continued. “That was her challenge, and she had the DNC behind her. She complained about the DNC being against her. It’s not delusional. Losing an election, losing something you’ve been after for eight years probably 16 years is pretty hard. And I think her handlers are somebody who cares for her should have said don’t go out there. You wait a few more years, people will mellow to you. They want to remember details. Maybe they will have some affection for you. Michael Dukakis, Walter Mondale — these are people who didn’t elicit the same kind of antipathy she does because they didn’t wallow in . ” Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor | 1 |
Ivanka Trump has been tapped by her father, President Donald Trump, to review the United States’ commitment to the Paris Climate Change agreement, signed by former President Barack Obama as an executive agreement in 2015 without congressional approval, the Associated Press is reporting. [The agreement requires countries to cut greenhouse emissions on a basis, with Obama committing the U. S. to reduce carbon emissions by at least 26 percent below 2005 levels by 2025. The U. S. is expected to have a representative at the United Nations’ climate change meeting in Bonn, Germany, next week but Trump’s advisers — including daughter Ivanka and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt — are meeting on Tuesday in Washington to decide whether to stick with or withdraw from the deal. Last month, in an interview with FOX and Friends, Pruitt said that the “Paris [agreement] is something that we need to really look at closely. It’s something we need to exit, in my opinion. It’s a bad deal for America. It was an America second, third, or fourth kind of approach. “China and India had no obligations under the agreement until 2030,” Pruitt added. “We all of our costs. ” Trump, on the other hand, has expressed support for the agreement and has backing from some in the U. S. oil and gas industry, including Exxon Mobil, which was led by Rex Tillerson before he was nominated for Secretary of State, a post he now holds. “The industry campaign to stick with the Paris accord comes amid deep divisions in the Trump administration over the agreement,” Bloomberg reported last month. “Both the president’s daughter, Ivanka Trump, and her husband, Jared Kushner, a White House special adviser, have urged the president to stay in the deal, along with Tillerson. ” “The decision to participate in next week’s U. N. climate talks shouldn’t be construed as a sign that Trump has decided to stay in the Paris pact,” a State Department official told the AP. “To the contrary, the U. S. will be sending a ‘much smaller’ delegation than it has in years past, the official said, adding that they weren’t authorized to discuss specifics and requested anonymity from the AP. According to the United Nations, 144 of the 197 countries that signed the Paris agreement have ratified it. It is unclear which 53 countries have not ratified it. | 1 |
US Backed Saudi Airstrikes Kill 100 Yemenis In Two Days Source: Jason Ditz, Antiwar.com
People gather at the al-Zaydiya security headquarters that was destroyed by Saudi-led airstrikes Saturday, in the Red Sea port city of Hodeida, Yemen, Sunday, Oct. 30, 2016. Security and medical officials say dozens of prisoners and security personnel are feared dead after airstrikes battered two prisons inside the security headquarters. (AP Photo/Abdoo Alkarim Alayashy)
While the biggest single Saudi airstrike over the weekend in Yemen targeted a prison in Hodeidah, dozens of other strikes were reported over the weekend by villagers around Taiz and in the Maarib Province, with attacks killing at least 27 civilians , and wounding a number of others.
Most of the casualties were in Taiz, where attacks destroyed several homes and caused a large number of injuries. With hospitals in the area having very limited access to medicine because of the naval blockade, many of those injuries proved fatal.
The attacks in Maarib and Saada, however, may prove more devastating to the country in the long run, targeting some of the very limited farmland Yemen has, destroying a number of villagers’ homes and burning a lot of that farmland. Yemen has to import some 90 percent of its food under normal circumstances, with such imports severely limited by the blockade, and the loss of farmland just adds to food insecurity in the nation.
Saudi Arabia has been coming under growing international criticism for its air war against Yemen, with massive numbers of civilians killed and little sign that the promised improvements to targeting will ever amount to anything.
Previous article from Anti-war.com From October 30th:
Mostly destroyed and no longer usable, the prison in the Yemeni city of Hodeidah held 84 inmates until Saturday, when Saudi Arabian warplanes repeatedly bombed it, killing at least 60 of the people within and wounding dozens of others.
The exact number of prisoners killed compared to guards is unknown, though prisoners are said to be the vast majority. The prison was leveled in the attack, according to witnesses, and rescue workers are still looking through the rubble, with others believed trapped within.
Three airstrikes were targeted against the prison, with the first hitting it directly, bringing down the roof, and the follow-up attacks targeting the gates and the administration buildings. The Saudi coalition insisted the attacks were in keeping with targeting procedures, noting the prison was known to have Houthi security forces within.
It is unclear who the prisoners generally were at the prison, but deliberately attacking a prison will doubtless add to concerns about Saudi Arabia’s standards for airstrikes against Yemen, which have killed massive numbers of civilians over the past 19 months.
This article originally appeared in Anti-War.com Share This Article... | 0 |
Still Not Thanking Native Americans November 24, 2016
Returned to its historical roots, Thanksgiving would be a day to express thanks to Native Americans whose generosity saved the Pilgrims, but that never seems to be a lesson learned, as Dennis J Bernstein reports on the Dakota pipeline standoff.
By Dennis J Bernstein
Late Sunday night — at the start of Thanksgiving week — Native American protesters were attacked by law enforcement agents near the site of the Dakota Access pipeline, a project that Native Americans and environmentalists have been trying to block.
Police and other security forces deployed tear gas, rubber bullets, percussion grenades and water hoses to stop about 400 protesters from crossing the Blackwater Bridge on state Highway 1806, about a mile from an uncompleted section under Lake Oahe, a Missouri River reservoir, where work has been on hold by order of federal agencies.
“As medical professionals, we are concerned for the real risk of loss of life due to severe hypothermia under these conditions,” the Standing Rock Medic & Healer Council said in a statement posted on Facebook. One hundred sixty-seven people were injured and seven were taken to the hospital, according to Jade Begay, a spokeswoman for the Indigenous Environmental Network. Protest against the Dakota Access Pipeline in St. Paul, Minnesota on September 13, 2016 (Fibonacci Blue Flickr)
Sunday’s standoff began around 6 p.m. local time, when a group of about 100 “water protectors” attempted to clear burned out trucks that were blocking the bridge, which is on the most direct route from the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation to Bismarck, North Dakota. The trucks have been in place for several weeks, and law enforcement has constructed a barricade behind them, forcing all traffic to take an approximately 20-mile detour.
“The purpose of this action was to do something to remove that barricade because it’s dangerous,” said Begay, a member of the Tesuque Pueblo and Diné, who has been at the Standing Rock encampments since September. “That barricade poses a danger not just to everyone at the camp, but also to Cannon Ball and other communities that are south.”
“They’re using that barricade as an excuse for us not to be able to lawfully protest,” said Frank Archambault, a member of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe from Little Eagle, South Dakota. “We got word that the drill is now on the pad so tensions are high right now.”
The 1,200-mile, four-state pipeline is intended to carry oil from western North Dakota to a shipping point in Illinois. But construction of the $3.8 billion pipeline has been protested for months by the Standing Rock Sioux, whose reservation lies near the pipeline route and there are fears a leak could contaminate the drinking water. They also worry that construction could threaten sacred sites.
Cheryl Angel, an Elder member of the Rosebud Nation, was an eyewitness to what happened Sunday night [Nov. 20] in sub-freezing weather with water hoses. “Security” forces stationed at the Dakota Access pipeline construction spray protesters with pepper spray. (Photo by Tim Yakaitis)
Cheryl Angel: I’m a member of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe. I am Sasusaku, Lakota. I currently live at Cannonball, to support Standing Rock, in their efforts to save the water that millions of Americans [depend upon]. [On the evening of November 20 th ], after a day of prayer and ceremony at all three camps, our security attempted to open the bridge by removing the burnt out trucks that the North Dakota authorities had put there themselves, and had started on fire themselves and left on the bridge.
So our security forces tried to remove them from the bridge and the North Dakota authorities then decided to escalate their presence by calling in a militarized vehicle, and I’m going to say … maybe 100 more law enforcement vehicles. There were so many you couldn’t even count them. You need to understand that … what separates the tribe from the pipeline area that’s being excavated is the Cannonball River. At some points it’s about 40 feet wide, at other points it’s only 20 feet wide. But there is a bridge that connects between those two lands, those two boundaries. And that’s where the armored vehicles were parked that were already burnt out.
Dennis Bernstein: And, in terms of what happened… we understand that a number of people were wounded with these tear gas canisters. We understand that they were using water hoses in, I guess, 20 – 25 degree [Fahrenheit] weather. Tell us more about that kind of violence. So people can really, you know, get a human face on what’s going on there.
CA: I felt like I was in a war zone. I had … been called to a meeting so I was heading for the meeting. I could hear young warriors running through the camps, saying “Everybody to the north bridge.” So everybody answered the call. They got in their vehicles and they drove to the north bridge. So both sides of the road had cars facing north. People were walking on the sides of the road. The DAPL (Dakota Access Pipeline) being installed between farms, as seen from 50th Avenue in New Salem, North Dakota. August 25, 2016. (Tony Webster Flickr)
I had taken a back path that the deer, the wildlife, use and I entered from between two hills on a deer path. And I walked through the trees up along the fence and then from that point on … there was flood lights, there was at least 40 floodlights on the north side of the river, about a quarter mile apart, along the entire path of that pipeline. So it’s like moonlight… it’s like daylight on the north side of the river. On the south side, not so much. And people had gathered there, they had… they were singing at the front line. They were playing music at the front line. They were chanting “Water is life.”
By the time I had gotten there, people were coming back, soaked in water, and it was really cold out, and the wind had picked up. And truckloads of people with assistance had brought blankets and jackets, and water, and goggles and face masks. So when you entered the bridge you could look to your right and pick up a blanket, and pick up a goggle, and pick up a face mask, and you could walk further to where the encounter was taking place.
So, I kept to the right of the bridge, and I went down to where the razor wire is, because it’s like a war zone there. I’m not kidding. They have floodlights, they have the tank right centered on the bridge, and there was no instructions. They … had a water cannon there. I heard throughout the night that they had used seven fire engine trucks. They emptied seven of them. It was unbelievable. I didn’t think that they would continue to water cannon people. And I asked them… I went to the front lines and said “Stop this… please go home. We’re here praying for you. We’ll find you new jobs. Pray with us, stand with us. We’re protecting the water for millions.”
And they didn’t listen, they stood behind the barbed wire and they continued … they would lift their rifles and they would pick out, literally pick out, individuals in the crowd and they would shoot them. And so water protectors had plastic container tops, and they were using those as shields. And they were protecting people whenever they could. I was on the front line. I was very, very lucky, because I didn’t get shot. I got maced, I got peppered sprayed, I got water cannoned. A woman holds a sign protesting the Dakota Access Pipeline. Opposite side reads: Water is Life. Washington, D.C. November 17, 2016. (Photo by Chelsea Gilmour)
The force of a water cannon if you haven’t had one… it knocks you off your feet. And we had built fires to warm up the people who were soaking wet, in the frigid weather, people are shaking, they were drenched in water and tear gas. Our medics were out there in full force, doing what was necessary to keep people breathing. People were sharing their inhalers. Those who couldn’t breathe… it was unbelievable. I didn’t think that things would come to this end. But unless Obama stands up, unless people start calling their senators, our lives are in danger, not only the water, but our lives, are physically in danger. So, it hurts me to talk like this.But a call needs to be made. Hundreds of calls need to be made.
Our water needs to be protected. We need support up here. We need wool blankets. We need wool clothes. We need to replenish our first aid kits. We need more thermal blankets. We need batteries. We need jerky. We need those snack bars that you eat, when you’re not able to eat a hot meal. Thermoses. We need… I think we need hundreds of thermoses, because we can’t even carry hot water with us anywhere we go. It was just unbelievable. It was… between being shot with water and then dodging bullets, I’m trying to deliver a peaceful message, and saying prayer. It was hard.
I mean, I slid down the hill, I was knocked off the hill by a water cannon, people picked me up. There was a man standing right next to … a military vehicle, without any face protection, without any blanket and he was singing. And he kept singing, and they just kept spraying him over and over. I picked up an army blanket, I covered him up with it. I stood beside him. We sang together, we prayed together. And they still shot at us, they still maced us, and they still used the water cannon on whoever they wanted to… on everybody that was within their reach, everybody.
And the fires that were started to protect everybody, to warm people up… those fires that were set to warm people up because there was no warming station at that site, were targeted by the police… were targeted by the water cannons. […] The fires that were keeping us warm, they intended on [extinguishing the fires that were there for warmth] and that was there intent.
We didn’t start the fires, only the warming stations. The fires that were started randomly out in the field those were by the tear gas canisters that they were shooting off there. They were shooting canisters at us, into the crowd, everybody at one point thought they were trapped on the bridge because lights were coming over from the south of us. And those turned out to be our own warriors, our own water protectors, our own horse riders to support us. They stood up on the hill, on both sides of the bridge, on the south end, and we were down at the bottom on the bridge, up against the razor wire. I asked them to stop, repeatedly, repeatedly. They wouldn’t stop. They just kept going. Activists gather in Seattle to protest the Dakota Access Pipeline, September 2016. (John Duffy Flickr)
But the thing that really hurt me the most, is when they were trying to put out the fires that were literally saving peoples’ lives. I had got knocked down and was totally drenched in water, I walked over to the fire to warm up and I was only there long enough to empty the water out of my shoes and then they started targeting the fires. So the protectors put up a shield. And for thirty seconds they stood there with a continuous blast of water, and they were totally drenched. And then they all split. First the water hit the fire and there was so much steam and smoke that came out of there. We were blinded.
But there were two of us and we grabbed one of those Teflon, Mylar body armors, and we stretched it between us, and we knelt down on it, and held it between us, we crouched together, we covered one end of the fire. And we just sat there and we prayed. And they kept putting the water over us, until we were completely drenched, again, over and over.
And I could hear a young girl, when the smoke cleared, she was saying “grab the logs, grab the logs” and so people ran over, they grabbed the logs out of the fire and they ran a few yards south, put them together and started another fire, so people could warm up before they were taken to the medic tents. Because there were hundreds of people soaking wet. They weren’t dressed in wool.
When I make a call out for clothing it’s not for any cotton, it’s not for polyester, it’s for waterproof jackets and there’s hardly any waterproof tents at all, snow pants, snow bibs, anything that’s waterproof, and wool. We need wool sweaters, wool socks, wool gloves, wool jackets. Those are the things that we need right now.
I wish the Red Cross would show up. I really do wish that whoever has power to send the Red Cross over there [would]. We could do that because we are in a state of emergency. That’s how it was on the front line. The #NoDAPL water Protectors took non-violent direct action by locking themselves to construction equipment. This is “Happy” American Horse from the Sicangu Nation, hailing from Rosebud. August 31, 2016 (Desiree Kane, Wikipedia)
DB: It’s really important … you sort of hit this really hard but just to underline it… because places like NPR and the local police are saying that they had the water there because you all were starting fires, and that you were throwing Molotov cocktails. That was the story that was coming out of the police, and the local press. You want to talk a little bit more about that?
CA: I’m not afraid to call a liar to their face. If they’re going to post things like that they should be standing on the front lines, getting eyewitness testimony, instead of just passing on the lies [that] the sheriff, … and the governor of North Dakota, and the DAPL are putting out. Because they are taking their own words and using them against the people, to not know the truth. And that should be a crime. It should be.
If I was lying to get people to hurt other people, would I be called a good person? Would I be fit to wear a uniform? Would I be fit to lead a state? I don’t think so. Not according to the values that America claims that it follows. And so, NPR, get on the front line, take your own video, because you weren’t there. So I would like all these major media outlets to quit reprinting lies that are undocumented, undocumented statements from the police.
All that happened is our security wanted to open that road, because it is a public road. And that’s what they said to us when we had our vehicles parked on it. On October 24th they said “go on” they said “we need to open the road. It’s a public road. Move your cars.” So why can’t we move those 3 trucks off the bridge? It’s a public road. That’s how it all started.
DB: But those are two burnt trucks?
CA: That the military forces had placed there themselves. The North Dakota officials put those there and they started them on fire. And before they left they said, “Please stay away from the vehicles. They have propane inside of them, they’re explosive devices.” Which, of course, made everybody to move back from the bridge. And they left them there. And then they put razor wire, which is also unconstitutional. You cannot use that type of razor wire. I mean you only see those in war zones. You don’t see them in the United States. But I’m starting to feel we’re in a war zone. So it’s a battle, people. We need bodies, up front.
We need the world to know that water is a precious commodity and it is sacred to natives. When you understand its relationship to life you will understand the sacredness of it. And we need your support. We need this economy to stop being the oil and gas industries, it’s not good for our country. We need to divest from fossil fuels, and start being a leader in the world by adopting a green policy and getting new jobs for these people who are in the oil industry. Thank you for listening to me. My flight is about to leave. And I’m leaving for ceremony. I’ll be in ceremony for four days. And I’ll be available after four days. And things will probably change by then too.
Dennis J Bernstein is a host of “Flashpoints” on the Pacifica radio network and the author of Special Ed: Voices from a Hidden Classroom . You can access the audio archives at www.flashpoints.net . [To support the DAPL protesters, click here .] | 0 |
0 комментариев 3 поделились Фото: архив Pravda. Ru
За январь-август 2016 года умерли около 1,27 миллиона человек. "Это на 21,8 тысячи человек или на 1,7% меньше, чем за соответствующий период 2015 года", — отметил глава Минтруда. Снижение числа умерших зарегистрировано в 73 регионах. В ряде регионов, включая Республику Алтай, Забайкальский край, Костромскую область, Севастополь, темпы снижения числа умерших составили более 5%.
С чем связаны такие положительные цифры, Pravda. Ru рассказал ведущий научный сотрудник международной лаборатории политической демографии и макросоциологической динамики ВШЭ, демограф Андрей Коротаев.
"Главный фактор естественного прироста в эти годы, в эти месяцы этого года, не столько рост рождаемости (он не очень большой), сколько заметное снижение смертности в первые семь месяцев", — отметил эксперт. Связано это с внедрением — Единой государственной автоматизированной информационной системы (ЕГАИС), которая обеспечила эффективный контроль над продажами алкоголя и резко снизила количество продаваемого нелегального.
Андрей Коротаев добавил, что в нашей стране официальные продажи выросли, но реальное употребление алкоголя сократилось, потому что алкоголь стал менее доступен. Легальный алкоголь дороже нелегального. Поэтому главный фактор снижения смертности в стране и вообще любого колебания этого показателя принято связывать с алкогольным фактором. "Благодарим Росалкогольрегулирование", — объяснил собеседник Pravda. Ru.
Что касается рождаемости, по мнению демографа, с ней в ближайшее время появятся серьезные проблемы. Всему причина — замораживание материнского капитала — мера абсолютна несвоевременная. Но на данном этапе рождаемость все же растет, на нее влияет региональная политика. В Хабаровске, например, при рождении третьего ребенка полностью погашается размер ипотеки.
Эксперт Pravda. Ru рассказал, что весь этот позитивный эффект краткосрочен. Стоит готовиться к падению рождаемости и росту смертности. "ЕГАИС добились заметного снижения смертности, но сейчас, на фоне замораживания акцизов, разговоров про то, чтобы понижать минимальную цену на водку, боюсь, что у нас и смертность начнет расти уже в ближайшее время", — спрогнозировал демограф Андрей Коротаев.
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IT’S OVER: Hillary Clinton Wakes To Devastating News Posted on October 30, 2016 by Prissy Holly in Politics Share This
On Friday, the FBI dropped an unbelievable bomb on Hillary Clinton, announcing they were reopening the investigation into her private server. While Hillary’s previous scandals have had little effect to deter her presidential bid, that doesn’t appear to be the case this time. In a stunning turn of events, new evidence is revealing that Democrats are now turning on Hillary by the droves.
Immediately after the news hit of the FBI’s new investigation, Hillary held a press conference where she urged Americans to “get out and vote early,” apparently realizing her supporters would change their minds once whatever’s in those emails leaks to the public. But unfortunately for Hillary, her evil scheming is not going to get her off so easy this time around. These same “early voters” she was targeting in her speech have now begun to jump ship, as a devastating new poll reveals.
Voting is indeed underway. But in several states, not only has the FBI announcement changed their mind or persuaded them not to vote for Clinton, there are many going to the polls to change their votes, The Independent Journal revealed.Â
States allowing voters to change their early votes include many key battleground states such as Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania. Reports are revealing that many early voters are flocking to the polling offices to switch their votes, proving that the fallout from the reopened investigation is devastating Hillary’s presidential bid. Here's a list of States that will allow early voters to change their early vote following the reopening of the FBI probe. #HillarysEmails pic.twitter.com/ggPZDmgBNw
— Jared Wyand đşđ¸ (@JaredWyand) October 29, 2016
Even liberal-biased polls are revealing a shattering impact on Hillary’s previous lead. The same ABC/WaPo poll that had Hillary Clinton up four points  over Trump early last week now shows them in almost a dead heat. As of Saturday, only two points separate the candidates now.
So just how many voters are switching their ballots to Trump? According to one poll conducted by NJ.com, 24% of the 18,029 people polled said they would be ditching Hillary in the light of recent events. While some might argue that the online poll is unscientific, even if half that percentage switches sides, it would guarantee a landslide win for Trump.
For months, we’ve been patiently waiting for WikiLeaks to drop a bombshell that would end Hillary. How ironic would it be that in the end, a slime-ball from Hilary’s own party in the form of Anthony Weiner would be the one to destroy her chance of becoming president? It’s poetic justice if you ask me. | 0 |
A new website that accuses nearly 200 college professors of advancing “leftist propaganda in the classroom” and discriminating against conservative students has been criticized as a threat to academic freedom. The site, Professor Watchlist, which first appeared Nov. 21, says it names those instructors who “advance a radical agenda in lecture halls. ” “We aim to post professors who have records of targeting students for their viewpoints, forcing students to adopt a certain perspective, abuse or harm students in any way for standing up for their beliefs,” wrote Matt Lamb, an organizer of the site. The Professor Watchlist is a project of Turning Point USA, a nonprofit organization that says its mission is to educate students about “true free market values. ” Charlie Kirk, its founder and executive director, wrote in a blog post that “it’s no secret that some of America’s college professors are totally out of line” and that it was time to expose them. But Julio C. Pino, an associate professor of history at Kent State University in Ohio who is among those named on the site, said in an interview, “What we are seeing with this site is a kind of normalizing of prosecuting professors, shaming professors, defaming professors. ” “The broader issue it raises is: What kind of country is America going to become in the next four years?” he added. Professor Pino said professors should not fight the creators of the list directly but instead seek allies on and off campus to address what gave rise to the atmosphere that allowed the website to flourish in the first place. The professor is listed on the site because, it says, he faced investigation by the F. B. I. “for connections to ISIS. ” He declined to address the allegations, but has denied any ties to the terrorist organization and has spoken out against violence, according to The Plain Dealer in Cleveland. Mr. Lamb, a director of constitutional enforcement and transparency at Turning Point USA, said in an email that the website was “simply aggregating” professors whose actions have been the subject of news reports. “This site is a beautiful example of freedom of speech,” Mr. Lamb said. “Professors can say whatever they want, other people can report it and we can compile the reports on whatever they say. ” The website has thin information in its entries and a search function. That could be a reflection of how rapidly it was created to capitalize on the political climate, particularly after the election of Donald J. Trump as president, Professor Pino said. Among those featured is Melissa Click, a former University of Missouri professor who was caught on video calling for “some muscle” to remove a journalist from a student demonstration in 2015. The university later fired Ms. Click. One of the instructors listed, Joan Neuberger, a professor at the University of Texas at Austin who teaches Russian history, was described on the site as leading a petition to bar students who carry concealed weapons from entering classrooms “in violation of Texas law. ” But Professor Neuberger said in an email that the characterization was inaccurate. “The law had not been finalized yet when we were petitioning,” she said, adding that the website showed no commitment to posting factual information. Professor Pino said Professor Watchlist was a “reboot” of similar past efforts, such as Discover the Networks by the conservative activist David Horowitz. Tiede, the associate secretary for the department of academic freedom, tenure and governance at the American Association of University Professors, said in an interview: “There is a continuing cycle of these sorts of things. They serve the same purpose: to intimidate individuals from speaking plainly in their classrooms or in their publications. ” He noted in a blog post that the monitoring of organizations and people deemed “radical” dated to 1934, when the conservative political activist Elizabeth Dilling published “The Red Network: A ‘Who’s Who’ and Handbook of Radicalism for Patriots. ” Among the organizations listed in her work were the American Federation of Teachers and the American Civil Liberties Union. Ms. Dilling wrote that the federation supported “full ‘academic freedom’ to teach anything, including socialism, communism or atheism,” according to the blog post. Mr. Tiede said the site could be used to harass professors or sabotage them from gaining jobs or promotions. And some professors were submitting their own names to the website as a way to emphasize the absurdity of the list, he added. Others took to Twitter to highlight parody submissions, such as Albus Dumbledore from “Harry Potter” and the Professor from the television series “Gilligan’s Island. ” The submission for the latter character read in part: “Spent almost 30 minutes building a working radio out of coconuts but failed to maintain a working signal in the end. ” Some in academic circles said professors should not overreact to the site, but should not ignore it either. “In the past, I have taken the position that we ignore such challenges to free speech and the hate mail that usually accompanies it, but no longer,” Professor Neuberger said. “Now I say we fight as hard as we can against people who don’t care about accuracy, who can’t recognize fake news and who seek to monitor what we do as educators. ” | 1 |
Actress Anne Hathaway called out what she described as Hollywood’s double standards for women in an interview for this month’s cover story of Elle magazine. [“Hollywood is not a place of equality. I don’t say that with anger or judgment it’s a statistical fact,” Hathaway said when asked what it’s like to star in Ocean’s Eight, the spinoff of the 2001 casino heist caper Ocean’s Eleven. “And even though I’ve been in some films, I’ve never been in a film like this. ” The Academy says filming a movie starring seven other actresses forced her to come to grips with their shared struggled in the film industry in a way that male actors probably don’t think much about. “It just kind of makes you aware of the ways you sort of unconsciously change yourself to fit certain scenarios. It’s not better or worse or right or wrong, but there are certain things you understand about one another because of experiences you have in common … it’s probably easy for men to take that for granted,” Hathaway said. “Just being on a set where I’m the one who possesses that ease is really something,” she said of filming alongside Sandra Bullock, Cate Blanchett, Rihanna, Sarah Paulson, Mindy Kaling, Awkwafina, and Helena Bonham Carter. “It’s a nice alternative narrative. ” As U. N. Goodwill Ambassador for Women, Hathaway advocates for paid parental leave in the United States. In a speech last week before the United Nations, the actress and mother championed the United States’ Family and Medical Leave Act, which would grant new parents 12 weeks of unpaid maternity leave. “I can’t believe we don’t already have it,” she told Elle. Hathaway is hardly the only actress to call out Hollywood and the film industry’s treatment of its female stars. Other actresses who have commented on the issue recently include Jennifer Garner, Kristen Stewart, Melissa McCarthy, Helen Mirren and Sienna Miller. Follow Jerome Hudson on Twitter: @JeromeEHudson | 1 |
On Thursday, socialist septuagenarian Bernie Sanders, 75, said he wouldn’t necessarily rule out running for president in 2020, when he will be nearly 80. | 0 |
A new survey shows that fewer than Americans agree that people should be allowed to freely change their legal sex by switching their preferred “gender identity. ”[Only 22. 7 percent of people in the poll said people should be allowed to change their recorded sex or “gender identity” on government documents whenever they wish, said the poll. That political support from progressives for “gender fluid” laws is far greater than the estimated 0. 04 percent of the population which wishes to live as members of the opposite sex. In contrast, 44. 6 percent of respondents said people should be allowed to switch their legal sex, but only after first complying with medical or government criteria. percent opposed any change to identity documents, and 17. 1 percent declined to answer. The lopsided results were revealed in a survey conducted by Ipsos for the Williams Institute, a advocacy group at the University of California at Los Angeles. The institute downplayed Americans’ views by touting the views of foreigners in Peru, Sweden, Turkey, Belgium, and other countries, all of whom are entitled to set their own national rules on sex. The Williams organization also did not reveal the precise language of the questions, which can skew the respondents’ answers. For example, the press release from the Williams Institute steals a political base or two by declaring the existence of “Transgender Rights,” even though the legal rights have not been approved by voters in the United States. The lopsidedly normal results in the poll are a problem for gay groups and other progressives, who insist that people be allowed to freely change their legal sex, even without surgery or medical checks. That radical position is intended by gay groups and feminists to blur the normal sex distinctions that are the basis of male and female civic institutions. If won via a court case, their goal would fundamentally transform sports leagues and women’s shelters free speech, law enforcement, and social cooperation science education, parental guidance of children’s sexual development and health, such as the Boy Scouts. That goal is opposed by most conservatives, most moderates and by some gays, former transgender people, and feminists. However, President Barack Obama’s deputies accepted that claim in 2016 by formally insisting that the federal definition of a person’s sex — their biology — be replaced by a person’s chosen “gender identity. ” This means that a man, according to the White House, could be a legal male in the morning and a legal female in the afternoon — and other Americans must treat him as a male or female according to his current preferences, regardless of science or the impact on civic institutions. This revolutionary political push has a revolutionary goal — to equalize the social status of minority sexual cultures with the status of heterosexual families who birth and rear each new generation of Americans. That goal requires that Americans show as much respect to a childless gay man as they do to heterosexual parents who risk decades of their lives, and spend a huge amount of their money, trying to birth and raise several accomplished children. That goal is deeply unpopular among Americas. An April poll by Civitas showed that only 7 percent of 600 North Carolinians supported a judge’s demand “ordering girls and boys in public middle schools to share locker room, bathroom and shower facilities. ” The demand was strongly opposed by 72 percent of respondents. The vast majority of Americans have long recognized the existence of people who wish to live as members of the other sex. Americans’ polite culture allows them to ignore most occasions when the reality becomes apparent, and even to support some legal conveniences for men and women trying to accomplish the very difficult goal of living as members of other sex. For example, North Carolina’s compromise law allows people to change their legal sex after undergoing medical procedures. That law was passed in April to block the city of Charlotte’s radical ordinance that allowed people to switch “gender identity” as they prefer. The compromise, however, is fiercely opposed by gay groups who insist that the reality of biological sex should be ignored in favor of individuals’ choices. The gay groups generally oppose any medical or scientific definitions of a person’s legal sex. In November, the gay advocacy groups and their allies narrowly defeated the incumbent governor, Pat McCrory, after getting their business allies in universities and Silicon Valley to stage an apparent business boycott of the state. However, the GOP legislature is refusing the repeal the compromise law, which ensures that legislators — not judges, cities or individuals — can preserve the distinction between male and female by clearly setting the legal definition of male and female. Update: Full details about the poll can be downloaded here. The critical table is on page 90 of the longer file, and it shows how the respondents’ attitudes vary by sex, age, region, income and class. | 1 |
Home › POLITICS › HUMA IS JUST ‘ONE OF MY STAFFERS’ AFTER CLOSE AIDE GETS LEFT BEHIND ON OHIO CAMPAIGN TRIP HUMA IS JUST ‘ONE OF MY STAFFERS’ AFTER CLOSE AIDE GETS LEFT BEHIND ON OHIO CAMPAIGN TRIP 1 SHARES
[10/31/16] Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton blasted the FBI again Monday – and this time brought up the bureau’s probe into emails maintained by longtime aide Huma Abedin – dismissing the idea she did anything wrong while minimizing the close role of her staffer. ‘Now they apparently want to look at emails of one of my staffers – and by all means they should look at them,’ Clinton said, bring up the FBI attack at the start of a rally before a room packed with students at Kent State University. ‘And I am sure they will reach the same conclusion they did when they looked at my emails for the last year. There is no case here. And they said it wasn’t even a close call,’ Clinton said. The staffer Clinton failed to name was Abedin, who has been at her side since Clinton was first lady. Clinton considers her like a surrogate daughter as well as longtime confidant. Abedin has been known for years to be Clinton’s gatekeeper, and has been revealed in State Department emails as someone constantly consulted on matters relating to Bill Clinton, top donors, close friends, celebrities, who gets face time with the first lady, and paid speeches that pose potential conflicts. ‘I’m sure a lot of you may be asking what this new email story is about and why it he world the FBI would decide to jump into an election with no evidence of any wrongdoing with just days to go,’ Clinton asked early in her remarks, before adding, ‘That’s a good question.’ Clinton hammered the FBI over the weekend, after news broke Friday about the investigation. Since then, senior Democrats have taken up the cause. Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid released a blistering letter where he wrote that FBI Director James Comey violating Hatch Act provisions on government employees interfering in an election. As she unloaded on the agency this time, Clinton also offered up words of contrition. ‘For those of you who are concerned about using personal email, I understand,’ she said. ‘And as I’ve said, I’m not making excuses. And I’ve said it was a mistake and I regret’ it, Clinton said. Then she turned to attack Donald Trump for having a ‘hair-trigger temper’ that could imperil the entire world. Post navigation | 0 |
HAMBURG, Germany — Workplaces often display a particular type of signage: “This Department Has Worked __ Days Without An Accident. ” These notices, with their hopefully ascending numbers, are meant to remind employees of institutional standards, of individual responsibilities, of the importance of mindfulness and consistency. The Hamburger S. V. clock is sort of like that. Displayed prominently in the northwest corner of Hamburg’s cavernous home, the Volksparkstadion, the clock marks the total time, down to the second, that the team has spent in the Bundesliga, the top tier of German soccer. Last Friday, the digital numbers, glowing in white, ticked relentlessly upward when the club hosted Bayer Leverkusen: 53 years, 163 days, 3 hours, 31 minutes, 28 seconds at kickoff, all without an accident. As you read this sentence, they continue to mark the days, the hours, the seconds. In Hamburg, the simple act of keeping time commemorates an essential fact of the club’s identity. A founding member, it has played continuously in the Bundesliga since the league’s first competitive moments, on Aug. 24, 1963, at 5 p. m. It is a distinction no other German club can boast. Not the former European champion Borussia Dortmund. Not Hamburg’s Nordderby rival, and fellow founding member, Werder Bremen. Not even mighty Bayern Munich. All this helps explain the complicated angst once again shadowing this city’s biggest team. Pride outstripped performance here long ago. After decades of producing quality soccer — Hamburg has three Bundesliga titles on its résumé, and it reigned as the champion of Europe at the end of the season — the club is currently mired in a yearslong rut. Hamburg narrowly avoided its first relegation in 2012, and has survived two even closer calls since then. Now, a stream of losses this season has once again plunged the club toward the bottom of the standings. And the clock, a reminder of the club’s venerated past, has in effect become a scale measuring in real time the incessantly mounting weight of history. “I don’t know if it’s a blessing or a curse right now,” said Toben Baumgarten, 24, a fan of the team since childhood. “This can be a point of pressure on the team. They have to keep the clock running. ” Hamburg moved up one place last weekend to 16th in the league, with 15 games remaining. In the Bundesliga, the bottom two teams at the end of the season are automatically relegated. The team must play a playoff series against the team from the second division, with the winner awarded the final spot in the upper tier. Hamburg grabbed that lifeline in 2014 and 2015, pulling itself to safety and keeping its clock ticking. The club’s poor play, for now, has not much dampened its support. There were 45, 653 fans at the game on Friday, many of them eager to diagnose the team’s ills, to offer variations on similar themes: The players are afraid to lose history has handcuffed the club moves geared toward have suppressed big, fresh ideas. According to Bobby Wood, an American striker who joined the club last May on a contract, it does not take long for new players to grasp the depth of the club’s history, to absorb its pride — or to inherit its emotional baggage. It’s hard to avoid: In 2014, a small, digital version of the clock was mounted in the front window of the team bus. “You don’t want to be a guy on the team that gets relegated after all these years,” Wood said. “Just because we never got relegated doesn’t mean it’s not going to happen, so you can’t think it’s not going to happen. If we continue this way, we will get relegated. We have to get out of that mentality, start realizing we’re in a bad situation, and do something different to get out of it. ” Things have not always been this dire. Hamburg, which has played in Germany’s top tier since the modern incarnation of the club was formed in 1919, has captured six domestic league titles over all, and three German Cups. It won the European Cup in 1983, in the midst of a golden era that ran from the to the . When the first clock was installed in 2001, the team was mired in a spell of mediocrity that has extended to the present day. Back then it was a marker of pride as well as time. “We weren’t winning trophies at that point, so you look for the one thing everyone was proud about,” said Alexander Iwan, who was 7 years old when he watched Hamburg win the 1987 German Cup, the club’s last significant trophy. He still stands on the terraces every weekend, just below the clock, to sing alongside the team’s other fans. Twelve years ago, his university studies and sports loyalties fortuitously merged when he began working as a historian for the team. Sometimes, while giving tours of the stadium, Iwan will direct his guests’ attention to the clock and mention Bayern Munich, the biggest club in Germany. Bayern has never been relegated either, but, crucially, it was not a founding member of the Bundesliga, and only played its way in in 1965. “They win two trophies a year,” Iwan tells them about Munich. “But we have this. ” Iwan said the clock serves as a reminder of the club’s pedigree, regardless of its current state. No matter what, he added, it is loaded with meaning. “It shows everything — all the history, all the problems — at once,” he said. Hamburg won its game on Friday at the Volksparkstadion, with a workmanlike performance against visiting Leverkusen. The players launched themselves into tackles, skidding around the damp field, earning appreciative applause from the crowd. Around the 28th minute, and for the next several minutes, fans belted out a popular club song, which borrows the melody of “We’re Not Gonna Take It” by Twisted Sister: Sechs mal Deutscher meister, German champion, Drei mal pokalsieger, cup winner, Immer erste liga, H. S. V.! Always first division, H. S. V.! What would happen if the team got sent down? The song, for one thing, would disappear with the last tick of the clock. Patrik Voss, 31, predicted frustrations would boil over in vivid ways. “I think many people would be aggressive, angry,” he said. “Some riots, protests, might go on. ” The clock, Voss presumed, would be removed, never to be seen again. But others on Friday suggested it should be saved, perhaps used to count down to some predetermined deadline for promotion. And some said relegation might even serve as an overdue notice for the organization. Such thought exercises have been more common over the last five years, mental gymnastics amid the and the relegation playoff escapes. The clock, in the process, has sometimes become an object of jokes and scorn. Iwan said local newspapers often use headline puns playing on timepiece imagery. Sometimes, they have replaced text headlines altogether with images of the clock. Many fans have grown more cynical. “I think if we were not successful right now, we wouldn’t be so proud about always being in the league,” said Baumgarten, the young fan. “It’s more like there’s nothing else to be proud about, so you talk about the history a lot. ” Sipping a beer before Friday’s game, Baumgarten recalled going to a Hamburg game as a child and listening to his father explain the clock’s meaning. He was impressed, and the feeling stuck with him through the years as his devotion to the club grew. “I hope if I come here with my own son one day, I can show him the clock,” he said, smiling at his sudden sentimentality. “We’ll see. ” | 1 |
With funding for the wall stalled, with healthcare through the House, with the fundamentals of a massive Trump tax cut and tax reform effort laid out, many in the White House are now turning their attention to another critical Trump campaign promise: infrastructure investment. [On the campaign trail, Trump promised to rebuild American roads, bridges, airports and railways — and in the process — put millions of Americans back to work and grow the American economy. In an interview given in November, just after Trump’s victory over Hillary Clinton that shocked the political establishment, Steve Bannon, the President’s Chief Strategist — and one of the ideological flame keepers of Trumpism — talked about a one trillion dollar infrastructure plan. This trillion dollar infrastructure plan would be the core of Trump’s economic nationalism, and it is a plan that will not bury us further in debt with hundreds of millions in new spending but instead take advantage of partnerships to leverage the billion dollars. As Bannon told the Hollywood Reporter, “I’m the guy pushing a infrastructure plan. With negative interest rates throughout the world, it’s the greatest opportunity to rebuild everything. ” Bannon knows that by creating jobs and rebuilding the American working class, Republicans can create something of a permanent majority in this country. “The globalists gutted the American working class and created a middle class in Asia … If we deliver … we’ll get 60 percent of the white vote, and 40 percent of the black and Hispanic vote and we’ll govern for 50 years. That’s what the Democrats missed. They were talking to these people with companies with a $9 billion market cap employing nine people. It’s not reality. They lost sight of what the world is about. ” Bannon is absolutely right. We can rebuild the American working class. If successful in that endeavor, we can build a political majority for decades and we can do so without bankrupting future generations with new taxpayer spending. One of President Trump’s favorite example is airport infrastructure needs. On the campaign trail, candidate Trump frequently bemoaned the state of U. S. airports — particularly as opposed to some of our international neighbors. President Trump has promised to build great 21st century airports. The problem, of course, is that a recent study shows that American airports currently have $100 billion in unmet infrastructure needs. The good news is that those needs can be met exactly as Bannon and the Trump campaign envisioned. Conservative Congressman Thomas Massie ( ) has legislation with Rep. Pete DeFazio ( ) that would remove the arbitrary federal cap on the passenger facility charge (PFC) — allowing individual airports to set their own PFC without federal involvement. By allowing airports to raise the funds locally from the passengers who actually use the airports — rather than federal taxpayers — the bill would allow airports to make critical investments in infrastructure. This move would not only allow us to rebuild our airports — without spending a dime of federal taxpayer dollars — it would also return control to the individual local airports and away from Washington, DC. This is why so many conservative and libertarian organizations like the Competitive Enterprise Institute, FreedomWorks and Citizens Against Government Waste have explicitly endorsed the effort. Bannon can mark another promise made as a promise kept from his infamous White House white board if the Trump administration joins with other conservatives in supporting the effort to get the federal government out of the airport business. | 1 |
Vinnie Paz of the hip hop group, Jedi Mind Tricks, wrote this song inspired by the work of people’s historian, Howard Zinn. It picks up where his song, “You Can’t Be Neutral on a Moving Train,” left off, and similarly, it is a kind of hip hop cliff notes of Zinn’s book, “A People’s History Of the United States.”
“Writings On Disobedience and Democracy” was put out as part of the “30 Days, 50 Songs” project, which posted songs over a period of 30 days in order to motivate voters to defeat Donald Trump. The project was not just anti-Trump. Artists For a Trump-Free America were very pro-Hillary Clinton. However, what stands out and makes Paz’s song enduring is that it does not make any reference to Trump or the 2016 election.
As Paz said when the song was shared, “It felt like the right time to rekindle some of these forgotten stories in American history.” He added these are “stories that aren’t necessarily taught in our classrooms.”
The song opens with the following Zinn quote:
We have to stop thinking that we must have military solutions to the problems we face in the world. The solutions that we need are the solutions dealing with sickness and disease and hunger. That’s fundamental. If you want to end terrorism, you have to stop being terrorists, which is what war is.
Paz begins with the imperialist intentions behind the United States’s involvement in World War II. Acknowledging the unspeakable evil of Adolf Hitler’s regime, he then summarizes, “We opposed the Haitian revolution. We turned Guam, Puerto Rico, and Hawaii into institutions, pretended to help Cuba win freedom from Spain. This country’s built on the blood of other people’s pain.”
Blacks looked at anti-Semitism in Germany. What they saw mirrored their experience in the U.S. And America appeased Hitler in the 1930s until President Franklin Delano Roosevelt was ready to advance imperialist interests. But, as Paz puts it, “Roosevelt ain’t care about oppression of the Jews.”
As Paz tells it, in 1945, “Troops were jammed onto the Queen Mary. The blacks were stowed down in the depths of the same ferry. See there’s a parallel you have to understand, that they wanted them to fight but wouldn’t treat them like a man.”
Paz notes the workers’ resistance that occurred post-WWWII then the black revolt in the 1950s.
“Angelo Herndon felt everything was equal,” Paz raps. “He was arrested, they convicted for insurrection
How the fuck it’s insurrection? I call it dissension. Gave him five years when all he wanted was protection.”
“There was other black men that made the same connection. Benjamin Davis defended Herndon as a savior
Then Paul Robeson; he only magnified the danger. Harry Truman had to deal with the militant mood. But how the fuck that gonna work when he a racist too?”
The song covers the Freedom Rides, the Black Panthers, the Vietnam War and Watergate. Following these events, “There was a deep economic insecurity in this world of ours. Environmental deterioration took its toll. A cultural violence upon the families took its toll. Problems couldn’t be solved without bold changes. But no major party candidates proposed changes.”
Ronald Reagan was elected president. He cut welfare for the poor and unemployment grew. That is where Paz ends, but he plans to continue the conversation in a future song.
In the outro, Paz asks people to reflect on what they were taught in school and whether they were taught lies about American history. “Dig into the real history of this country, and the fact that it was built on blood,” he urges Americans.
Not only does it stand as a tribute to Zinn, but it also serves as a means to use the form of hip hop to reach people who may not be aware of the history brought to the fore by Zinn. It celebrates dissent and resistance at a time when it is critical for people to take the fear and panic from a Trump election and channel it into targeted action.
Listen to Paz’s “Writings on Disobedience and Democracy”:
The post Protest Song Of The Week: ‘Writings On Disobedience And Democracy’ appeared first on Shadowproof .
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Donald J. Trump said in an interview published on Sunday that he would be in favor of Britain leaving the European Union. Mr. Trump made the remarks in an interview with The Sunday Times of London ahead of a referendum on the issue on Thursday and before his planned visit to Britain. “I would personally be more inclined to leave, for a lot of reasons like having a lot less bureaucracy,” Mr. Trump said. “But I am not a British citizen. This is just my opinion. ” Mr. Trump has previously suggested that Britain “should leave,” although he has offered only circumscribed thoughts about the issue, which is expected to affect global markets. Mr. Trump is expected to arrive in Scotland on Friday, a day after the vote, for a at one of his newest golf clubs. It will be his first international trip since he became the presumptive Republican nominee. Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain, who is urging Britons to vote to stay in the European Union, has been deeply critical of Mr. Trump, describing him as “divisive. ” The newly elected mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, the city’s first Muslim mayor, has also criticized Mr. Trump for his proposed ban on Muslim immigrants entering the United States. In the Times of London interview, Mr. Trump declined to say anything about Mr. Khan other than wishing him luck. And he struck a magnanimous note about Mr. Cameron. “I respect David Cameron,” Mr. Trump said. “He doesn’t know me, but I respect him. I respect what he has done and what he is doing, and I would imagine we will have a very good relationship if I am successful. ” Mr. Trump said he favored maintaining the “special relationship” between Britain and the United States that has existed for decades. But in a tweak at Tony Blair, the former British prime minister, Mr. Trump added, “Sometimes the special relationship hasn’t worked out too well where they made a common mistake like Iraq. Frankly, they would have been a lot better off had they not become involved with Iraq. ” A spokeswoman for Mr. Trump did not respond on Sunday evening to an email seeking comment. | 1 |
Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte shocked international observers last week with a call to occupy the uninhabited islands of the South China Sea before China colonized them, an apparent from his campaign to improve bilateral relations with China. [Duterte assured China that he merely wanted to “maintain the geopolitical balance” in the Spratly Islands on Monday, an archipelago that both China and the Philippines, as well as Vietnam, claim in part. “For the information of China, we will not place there any offensive weapons, not even one gun,” he promised. “We are just there to claim the island for us because that is really ours. And I have ordered the Armed Forces to build structures there to signify to all that the islands are ours, and the Philippine flag should be placed on the structures. ” “China can relax, we are friends,” he added. “We will not go to war with you. ” Duterte has repeatedly asserted his fears that the Philippine military does not have the assets necessary to defeat China in a war. The Chinese government claims almost all territory in the South China Sea, including the sovereign territory of the Philippines, Vietnam, Taiwan, Brunei, Malaysia, and the waters off Natuna Island in Indonesia. In a landmark ruling last year, the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague ruled that China’s claims were invalid before international law and the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Seas, granting the Philippines full sovereignty over the contested territory. Last week, Duterte abruptly announced a military operation to reassert Manila’s presence in the Spratly Islands. “We tried to be friends with everybody but we have to maintain our jurisdiction now, at least the areas under our control. And I have ordered the armed forces to occupy all these,” he said. “Even those, those vacant (islands) that are considered ours, let’s live there,” Duterte added. “It’s like we’re all competing to take these islands. And what’s ours now at least, let’s take it and make a strong point there that this is ours. ” “This coming Independence Day [June 12] I may go to Pagasa [Thitu Island, Spratlys] to raise the flag. We want to make a strong point that that is ours,” Duterte promised. The announcement of a potential personal visit to the islands received a positive reception in Philippine media. “A visit to Pagasa will convey with impact the message of President Duterte about his looking after the needs of the most disadvantaged communities and the military contingent keeping watch over the threatened frontiers of the archipelago,” columnist Federico Pascual Jr. wrote in the Philippine Star. “With this one act, the President may nip the growing impression that he seems to be succumbing to China’s blandishments. ” The positive reception comes as little surprise given the public sentiment towards China in the Philippines. A poll released in late January found that 84 percent of Filipinos supported a confrontation with China over the South China Sea territories, particularly the Spratly and Paracel Islands. Another poll released this week, both by the firm Pulse Asia, found that Duterte’s approval ratings have fallen since December, though he still boasts an impressive 78 percent approval rating. Duterte has hinted for some time that he has changed his opinion on the presence of China in Philippine territory in the region. In March, the president made a vague promise to “tell them [China] straight that this is ours” by ordering the military to build “structures” on uninhabited islands in the region. “The President wants facilities built such as: barracks for the men, water (desalination) and sewage disposal systems, power generators (conventional and renewable) lighthouses, and shelters for fishermen,” Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana clarified. | 1 |
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) October 26, 2016
As you might guess, it didn’t take long for people to point out just how sad and strange the tweet was. There's regular narcissism, then there's wish-yourself-happy-birthday & call-yourself-the-future-president-before-the-election narcissism. pic.twitter.com/cQnAl0Pr0O
— Caleb Ecarma (@calebecarma) October 26, 2016 So Hillary Clinton has to tweet herself a happy birthday on Twitter! How pathetic is THAT?đŁ
— william barrett (@willdani61) October 27, 2016
It was just plain weird, as some users pointed out. @HillaryClinton Did you just wish a happy birthday to yourself? Weirdo lol
Other users had a little fun with Clinton’s picture. @HillaryClinton I've seen that look before. pic.twitter.com/TQ7FaW7Mnr
— Ian McKelvey (@mckelvey_ian) October 26, 2016 Odd RT @HillaryClinton Happy birthday to this future president. pic.twitter.com/FpluGgnovD
— Marcus Hawkins (@HawkinsUSA) October 26, 2016
Other users didn’t waste a moment getting down to the truth. @HillaryClinton happy bday to the single most corrupt politician in the history of the USA! #NeverHillary
— Chuck Norris (@Chuck7817) October 26, 2016 The saddest birthday tweet comes from yourself. https://t.co/ge67vMQhGu
— Michelle Ray (@GaltsGirl) October 26, 2016
Apparently the tweet was also promoted, which got under the skin of even more users. *Sigh* Why in the blue hell did I get a "Sign Hillary's Birthday Card" promoted tweet…I could NOT care less about her.
— Dan Trigona (@splinter48708) September 25, 2016
Clinton has always had a “people problem,” so it’s no surprise that the only way to get Twitter users to wish her a birthday was to promote a tweet. Advertisement - story continues below
Clinton might have thought it was cute to wish herself, the supposed future leader of this country, a happy birthday, but what she has done is show us who she thinks is the most important person in the world — herself. And apparently she wants everyone around her to know it.
Clinton’s problem with people is a serious one. Even those who have worked with the former secretary of state have said she isn’t exactly likable — and that’s putting it nicely.
Clinton already behaves as though she is above the law. It’s almost unimaginable how dangerous such an unlikable, narcissistic person could be in the White House.
Although I guess the last eight years have prepared us for it, at least a little. Advertisement - story continues below | 0 |
LONDON — The man charged with murdering the British lawmaker Jo Cox made his first court appearance on Saturday, telling the court when asked his name, “My name is death to traitors, freedom for Britain. ” Thomas Mair, 52, had been charged earlier Saturday with murder and several other offenses, including inflicting grievous bodily harm and possession of a firearm. Mr. Mair, of the town of Birstall, appeared briefly at Westminster Magistrates’ Court in London. Once charges have been brought, British media law prohibits any reporting about the case that might prejudice a trial. Ms. Cox, 41, a member of Parliament who advocated for immigrants’ causes, was gunned down on Thursday outside a library in Birstall, a town near the city of Leeds in northern England, as she was wrapping up a meeting with constituents. A man was also slightly injured in the attack. Her death came just days before a referendum on whether Britain should leave the European Union, and it led to an immediate suspension of campaigning on both sides out of respect for her memory. But Vote Leave, which supports Britain’s departure from the bloc, said Friday that it would resume campaigning over the weekend. Issues of immigration and national identity have been central to the occasionally bitter clashes over the referendum, and critics say the tone of the debate has verged on racism and xenophobia. The killing of Ms. Cox — the first of a sitting member of Parliament since the Irish Republican Army assassinated Ian Gow, a Conservative lawmaker, in 1990 — elicited an outpouring of sympathy in Britain, where gun ownership is strictly regulated. Ms. Cox, a member of the opposition Labour Party, was elected to Parliament to represent the area of Batley and Spen only in May 2015. But she had already established a strong reputation. Prime Minister David Cameron and his rival Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of the Labour Party, both praised her as a rising star in British politics. President Obama was reported to have called Ms. Cox’s husband to offer condolences. “The president noted that the world is a better place because of her selfless service to others, and that there can be no justification for this heinous crime, which robbed a family, a community, and a nation of a dedicated wife, mother, and public servant,” Sky News reported, citing the White House. | 1 |
“Baracketology,” became an annual thing at ESPN over the last eight years. Featuring then Commander in Chief Barack Obama, a white board, a sharpie, and Andy Katz as Obama made his NCAA Championship picks during March Madness. [According to reports, if ESPN has their way, this March the sports network may feature “Trumpetology. ” Okay, they may not call it that. But the point is that ESPN wants to invite President Trump on their network to fill out an NCAA bracket. According to ESPN Spokesman Josh Krulewitz, “At the appropriate time we will explore the bracket opportunity if he’s interested. ” This all sounds great. The sports giant has much atoning to do for their egregiously high level of leftist activism over the past eight years. And, just over this past weekend. But, why confine Trump to the bracket opportunity? President Trump was an executive for, and had a major speaking role on, one of the most successful and longest running reality TV shows in history. Why not let him do an episode of SportsCenter? Obama had once pitched doing an episode of SportsCenter. Trump is massively more qualified for that than Obama. Not to mention that Trump’s primary sports interests appear to include the NFL, boxing, and golf. Given that, why not bring him on for a special Super Bowl preview? Or, for a breakdown of the Masters Tournament in April? Why make him do Obama’s thing? After all, didn’t America elect President Trump to do the opposite of Barack Obama? Follow Dylan Gwinn on Twitter: @themightygwinn | 1 |
It happened sometime recently — maybe in the last six months, or a year — that everyone I know started meditating. Or at least they talked about the desire to meditate. Some used apps like Headspace others just put on trippy music and zoned out. A few went to events put on by Medi Club, a kind of group. “Mindfulness,” we’re calling it, this desire to take a chunk of each day and simply live in the present. I need some of that calm and focus in my life. I have a tendency to either live in paranoia about the future or dwell on the foibles of the past. Besides, I have never met a fitness or health or beauty or wellness trend I didn’t want to participate in. My old set of Tae Bo VHS tapes are slowly decomposing in a garage in California. Left on my own, meditation time turns into nap time, so I knew I needed some organization and supervision. I had heard that meditation studios are the new yoga studios, and I was intrigued. I chose Mndfl, which has locations in Greenwich Village, on the Upper East Side and in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Most of the classes are 45 minutes, which is about 44 minutes longer than I have ever successfully meditated. I know 45 minutes can be an eternity because I participate in both SoulCycle and therapy. I went to the studio on East Eighth Street on a freezing weeknight. Inside it is sleek, with blond woods and white walls, but with a certain coziness — think free tea and a area to read — sort of like a particularly Airbnb. My first official foray was an hourlong sound bath led by Sara Auster, a yoga and, according to her website, certified sound therapy practitioner. Sound baths are like listening to a concert while in savasana, the resting pose at the end of yoga. The idea is that the sound therapist plays resonant instruments like crystal and Himalayan singing bowls, tuning forks, gongs and bells that help you relax and clear your mind. WATCH: The author sits for a sound bath at Mndfl. Immediately I struggled with my urges. I went to go find the bathroom, leaving a pair of socks on one of the blankets that had been arranged around the room like a slumber party. When I got back, a woman had taken my spot and moved my socks across the room. The fact that this annoyed me made me think I really needed meditation. The sounds Ms. Auster played alternated between droning and tinkling though not melodic like music, they were pleasant to listen to. My mind slipped from the present to the usual reel of issues: deadlines, arguments, grocery lists, but I always came back to the sounds. Someone elsewhere in the room faintly snored for a spell. Afterward, I felt so sleepy I couldn’t even bring myself to take the subway home and hailed the first cab I found. I slept well that night. A few weeks later, after receiving the kind of angry email that usually makes me take to my bed for the rest of the day, I headed back to Mndfl for an afternoon class, this time with a teacher named Anne Kenan. She instructed us to bring ourselves back to the room whenever our minds wandered. And we were off. I closed my eyes and found myself picturing one of Gerhard Richter’s candle paintings. When I started thinking of the emails looming in my inbox, I would redirect myself to the room, breathe and whisper to myself, “I’m back. ” After 20 minutes, Ms. Kenan said that when our minds wandered we should just lightly touch the thought and see “how our hearts felt. ” A friend who popped into my mind felt slippery, like what I imagine a dolphin’s fin feels like. I wasn’t sure if this was what she had in mind. At the mark, we all shared our experiences. “I felt a kind of synesthesia,” I said. A girl who introduced herself as Beetle (or maybe Beatle?) nodded. What I didn’t say: Sometimes I felt scared, sometimes I felt as if I was going to start crying, and the entire time I felt about how often I was shifting my position on the pillow. The next day I was ready for something shorter, so I tried Mndfl’s video series. There are meditations sorted by specific teacher, style (breath, energy) or length of time (starting at one minute). I sat on my carpet in front of my laptop. My dog, who needs no coaching on how to live in the moment, sat next to me. I chose a class on emotions from Megan Mook, another Mndfl instructor, who was shown seated in front of a lush planted wall and has equally lush, enviable hair. She instructed me to get comfortable, and to breathe. For five minutes, I finally managed to do nothing more than that. | 1 |
Europe’s Battle: Nationalists vs. Elites October 26, 2016
On both sides of the Atlantic, a battle is underway between largely discredited “elites” and sometimes disreputable “nationalists,” a conflict over un-kept promises about the future and unsettling memories of the past, writes Andrew Spannaus.
By Andrew Spannaus
In recent years “nationalism” has become a bad word in Europe, a synonym of closure, racism and wars. Over the past 20-25 years European elites have instead embraced a concept of globalization based on a world without economic, physical and social borders.
This view assumes the gradual affirmation of a set of shared values internationally, consisting of human rights and economic freedom, that however much the remaining closed, autocratic regimes may try, will inevitably become the standard for the entire world. Flag of the European Union.
It is essentially the argument put forward by Francis Fukuyama in “The End of History:” liberal democracy and free markets have won the ideological war, and represent the culmination of human evolution.
The political events of 2016 are upending this view of the globalization of human rights and economic liberalism. The American electorate has supported a series of outsiders – most notably Donald Trump, who has run his campaign in direct opposition to the U.S. political and financial class, invoking economic protectionism and a stronger national identity.
Against expectations, the population of the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union, marking an irreparable break in the supposedly inevitable process of European unification. And across Europe support is growing for more extreme, anti-system political forces, that threaten not only to withdraw from the common currency – the Euro – but also to seal the borders in response to economic and security threats associated with immigration.
Establishment’s Failure
It is no exaggeration to speak of the failure of the entire transatlantic political establishment. Since the 1970s, Western economies have undergone a post-industrial transformation that has favored short-term gain over long-term investment. The notion of economic freedom has translated principally into support for deregulation and speculative finance. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is welcomed by German Chancellor Angela Merkel at the Federal Chancellery in Berlin, Germany, on April 14, 2011. [State Department photo/ Public Domain Central Banks have made unlimited resources available to the financial sector while large areas of the real economy struggle to survive, feeding discontent among the population. It is true that new economic sectors have arisen, along with widespread changes made possible by technologies that were inconceivable until a few years ago, but the overall effect has been to hollow out the middle class and create large-scale income equality.
In Europe, the principal vehicle of this process has been the economic policy of the European Union. From the implementation of the Maastricht Treaty in 1993, European nations have been stuck in a monetary straitjacket, that prevents governments from taking effective economic action. In the name of market principles, liberalization has been implemented that favors large financial interests while lowering standards of living for the middle class.
Countries are constitutionally required to move towards a balanced budget, with the European Commission and the European Central Bank essentially having veto power over national policies. This has translated into harsh austerity, including the massive budget cuts and tax increases inflicted on countries such as Greece, Spain and Italy in recent years.
Despite paying lip service to the need for change, the economic and political elites have refused to abandon this approach, that not only ignores the suffering of the population, but actually makes the problem worse. In fact the austerity causes a drop in economy activity and thus exacerbates budget problems, leading to a vicious cycle that Europe seems unable to stop.
A Big Backlash
The resulting backlash is calling into question the process of European integration as a whole, provoking a strenuous defense by the elite of institutions that are said to have guaranteed “50 years of peace” after the Second World War. The run-down PIX Theatre sign reads “Vote Trump” on Main Street in Sleepy Eye, Minnesota. July 15, 2016. (Photo by Tony Webster Flickr)
It is true, of course, that there are some benefits to E.U. integration, and that nobody wants to return to a situation of conflict among the member states. But the current policies are quite different than the fruitful cooperation that existed until the 1990s, when the financial elite began its move to exert supranational control.
Now, the failed economic policies of the past 20 years are no longer sustainable. Governments are forced to negotiate over .1 percent of the budget deficit with the bureaucracy in Brussels, while the need for public and private investment runs in the trillions.
The pro-finance, anti-production policies must change not for ideological reasons or to serve some specific interest group; they must change because there is no other choice. People are revolting against a political class that does not respond adequately to widespread economic and social discontent. In times of economic distress the population becomes more vulnerable to demagogues, raising the risk of dangerous outcomes, as seen with Fascism and Nazism in the 1920s and 1930s.
Currently, there are unprepared and unpredictable political forces with growing support across Europe, that in some cases represent a threat to the democratic rights and values that the European Union aims to promote. Defending the orthodoxy of E.U. policy against popular movements that target failed economic policies, will only further damage precisely those values on which Europe is said to stand.
What to Do
At this point Europe needs a return to measures that promote productive investment and innovation, rather than cut social welfare programs and encourage further deregulation. Refugees from Mideast wars camped along rail lines in Greece.
There are two potential directions: a wholesale change in the policies of the E.U. institutions, without modifying their essential structure, or a step back from the process of cancellation of national sovereignty.
The first option seems unrealistic, for various reasons. These include the constitutional nature of many economic and budget constraints, and the stubbornness demonstrated by the European ruling class in recent years; a class that, despite numerous alarm bells, does not at all seem ready to abandon an elitist view of globalization.
The response to the Brexit vote is a glaring example. Representatives of the E.U. institutions lashed out with arrogance and bitterness, essentially accusing half of the British population of being ignorant, racist and isolationist. It’s a comforting excuse based on partial truths, that avoids reflection on Europe’s own mistakes.
At this point a return of decision-making power to national governments is becoming inevitable: not in order to stop international cooperation, or to reject shared values, but because the model pursued by the supranational institutions and their allies in the financial world has failed, and risks producing both serious internal conflicts, and unacceptable strategic failures in an increasingly complex world.
Andrew Spannaus is a freelance journalist and strategic analyst based in Milan, Italy. He is the founder of Transatlantico.info, that provides news, analysis and consulting to Italian institutions and businesses. His book on the U.S. elections Perchè vince Trump (Why Trump is Winning) was published in June 2016. | 0 |
If there was a single moment that captured what would carry Hillary Clinton to the 2016 Democratic nomination, it came not during her campaign kickoff in New York last June, or in any of her speeches celebrating primary victories over Senator Bernie Sanders. No, it was the unscripted instant in which a blasé Mrs. Clinton coolly brushed from her shoulder a speck of lint, dirt — or perhaps nothing at all — as a House panel subjected her to more than eight hours of questioning in October over her handling of the 2012 terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya. She may not be the orator President Obama is, or the retail politician her husband was. But Mrs. Clinton’s steely fortitude in this campaign has plainly inspired older women, black voters and many others who see in her perseverance a kind of mirror to their own struggles. And Mrs. Clinton’s very durability — her tenacity, grit and capacity for enduring and overcoming adversity — could be exactly what is required to defeat Donald J. Trump. As a politician’s wife, first lady, senator and secretary of state — and as a candidate for president — Mrs. Clinton, 68, has redefined the role of women in American politics each time she has reinvented herself. She has transfixed the nation again and again, as often in searing episodes of scandal or setback as in triumph. “She came on the public stage as someone who was a little different,” said Ann Lewis, a longtime adviser. “She attracted fascination, devotion and attacks — and the partisan attacks haven’t stopped. ” “Even as first lady, it was ‘Who does she think she is? ’” said Melanne Verveer, a close friend of Mrs. Clinton’s who was her White House chief of staff. Mrs. Clinton’s confidants say it is only fitting that, having overcome so many obstacles before, including some of her own making, she now faces an opponent so eager to go negative with her — and to refight the brawls that have defined her career. In her victory speech Tuesday night, Mrs. Clinton said the biggest influence on her life had been her mother, “and she taught me never to back down from a bully — which turned out to be pretty good advice. ” It was with that same grit that Mrs. Clinton picked herself up after a bruising defeat by Mr. Obama in 2008, when she assured a crowd of tearful female supporters, eight years ago to the day, that they had made 18 million cracks in “the highest, hardest glass ceiling. ” For 14 straight years, and 20 in all, Mrs. Clinton has been named the woman Americans admire most, according to a yearly Gallup poll. But her campaign, and the controversy over her use of a private email server as secretary of state, have taken a toll: Her favorability and trustworthiness ratings have plummeted. And she is being caricatured, once more, as a calculating and inauthentic career politician: Lady Macbeth, now in her own play. In the same way, her longevity and fame are not undiluted assets: The baggage she brings as a consummate Democratic insider, pointed up most damagingly in the enormous sums she commanded as a paid speaker to Wall Street banks, has weighed Mrs. Clinton down in an election cycle in which outsiders have had the wind at their backs. Mrs. Clinton’s career has not taken a predictable route by any stretch. She came of age in the feminist movement in the 1960s at Wellesley College — where she urged her peers to spurn incremental change and instead work at “making the impossible possible” — then was drawn to the South in furtherance of her husband’s ambitions. She was one of her husband’s chief campaign strategists and overseer of a failed health care effort, while holding her marriage together through his sex scandals and impeachment. But if she seemed to embody contradictions, they also reflected a society in which expectations of women, and women’s expectations for themselves, were rapidly changing. And it has always been hard to parse opinions about Mrs. Clinton and about powerful women in general. Roy M. Neel, who was a campaign manager for Al Gore in his 1992 run, said in an oral history of the Bill Clinton years that women in the South particularly disliked Mrs. Clinton, the first working mother to serve as first lady and the first — and, so far, the only — to have an office in the West Wing, because she “appeared to be something of an affront to their sense of who they were. ” If antipathies to Mrs. Clinton can be chalked up in part to Americans’ struggles to adjust to changing gender roles at home, at work and in politics, her history of political combat has also left scar tissue that, in part, defines the candidate she is: about the realities of Washington, but cautious and wary to a fault. Her prolonged contest with Mr. Sanders, whose campaign was not widely expected to survive the first few nominating contests, laid bare the cost of that restraint, both in style and substance. As voters have gravitated to Mr. Trump’s unchecked impulsiveness and Mr. Sanders’s unabashed idealism, Mrs. Clinton has displayed little of either. “This is not an incremental, cautious election, and being cautious is not her friend,” said Anna Greenberg, a Democratic pollster. “Both primaries exposed the depth of anger and frustration and disgust,” she added. “She has had to, and will have to, adjust to it. ” For 14 months, Mrs. Clinton’s campaign has been out of step with younger voters and with swaths of an angry electorate that has demanded more than the competence and hard work she has promised. Her difficulties with those voters could be a warning sign. While her husband could draw on the crisp centrist philosophy of the “third way” Democrats in 1992, when he devoted his candidacy to the “forgotten middle class,” Mrs. Clinton has struggled to hit upon as simple and clear a rationale for her campaign. And, though she has issued the most detailed policy proposals and positions of anyone in the race, what she truly believes remains a mystery for many voters. Mrs. Clinton has praised Mr. Obama’s accomplishments over the past eight years, and won roughly 77 percent of the vote among blacks through the May 10 contests, according to exit polls. But she has also promised to push harder than Mr. Obama in extending citizenship to undocumented immigrants, opposed his signature trade deal, and outstripped his plans to defeat the Islamic State by calling for a zone in Syria. She has praised her husband’s economic record as president and offered to put him in charge of reviving some of the regions. But Mrs. Clinton has also had to repudiate crucial parts of her husband’s legacy. It has not helped that her campaign has cycled through a slogans, from championing “everyday Americans” to “fighting for us,” “breaking down barriers,” and, most recently, “stronger together” — playing on Mr. Trump’s more divisive remarks about Mexicans, Muslims and other groups. As Mr. Sanders has demonized Wall Street and Mr. Trump has disparaged immigrants, and as they have vowed to reverse economic malaise, Mrs. Clinton has run on a flinty practicality. The most telling promise she has made is that she will not overpromise. “We don’t need any more of that,” she has told voters. But what she has lacked in rhetorical brio, she has made up for by listening to people’s problems and prescribing solutions. She has shed tears in conversations with a man whose mother had Alzheimer’s and a woman who lost a child to a gun accident. And she has shown a vulnerability she did not reveal in 2008, when she campaigned as a strong commander in chief, seeking to neutralize any doubts about whether she was tough enough for the Oval Office. “I am not a natural politician, in case you haven’t noticed, like my husband or President Obama,” Mrs. Clinton said in one of her debates with Mr. Sanders, a bracingly honest statement. To her supporters, there may be a kind of strange logic at work. Mrs. Clinton is somehow expected to project the mettle of a commander in chief, the charisma of a drinking buddy, the warmth of a favorite aunt, they say. “You’re required to be and smiley and also required to grow a hide like an elephant,” said Tina Brown, the journalist. “Which is it?” An impossible combination, they complain — and if she managed all that, there would no doubt emerge some other vital quality that she was failing to display, because there is no template yet for a female United States president. “People are so undecided about how they feel about female leadership, and it’s something people really struggle with,” said Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, Democrat of New York. “The ambiguity about Hillary is outside of her. It comes from people’s own perspectives. ” Attitudes about female leadership eventually may change, of course. And in talking to reporters on Monday, hours before reports that she had clinched the nomination, Mrs. Clinton looked past November to a time when female presidential candidates may not require quite so much durability to have a shot at the White House. “It’s predominantly women and girls, but not exclusively — men bring their daughters to meet me and tell me that they are supporting me because of their daughters,” she said. “And I do think it will make a very big difference for a father or a mother to be able to look at their daughter just like they can look at their son and say, ‘You can be anything you want to be in this country, including president of the United States. ’” | 1 |
HOUSTON — The Justice Department on Monday dropped a crucial objection to Texas’ strict law, signaling a significant change from the Obama administration on issues. The Texas Legislature passed one of the toughest voter ID laws in the country in 2011, requiring voters to show a driver’s license, passport or other photo ID before casting a ballot. The Obama administration’s Justice Department sued Texas to block the law in 2013 and scored a major victory last year after a federal appeals court ruled that the law needed to be softened because it discriminated against minority voters who lacked the required IDs. Opponents of the law said Republican lawmakers selected IDs that were most advantageous for white voters and discarded IDs that were beneficial to minority voters. For example, legislators included licenses to carry concealed handguns, which are predominantly carried by whites, and excluded government employee IDs and public university IDs, which are more likely to be used by blacks, Hispanics and younger voters. But the Justice Department under President Trump and Attorney General Jeff Sessions told a judge on Monday that it was withdrawing its claim that Texas enacted the law with a discriminatory intent. The Justice Department remains a party in the case. But it is pulling back at a crucial phase. If a judge finds the state acted with discriminatory intent, as the Justice Department and other plaintiffs have alleged, Texas could be forced to seek federal approval before it makes any changes to its voting laws or procedures. That would have major impacts on voting rules in Texas and be a potent symbol of the ability of the federal government to be a major brake on voting discrimination nationally. “This is a complete turn,” said Danielle Lang, a lawyer for the Campaign Legal Center, one of the groups that sued Texas and represents some of the Justice Department’s fellow plaintiffs in the voter ID case. Under the Obama administration, she added, the Justice Department was “fully committed to the case. ” “They were full partners,” Ms. Lang said. “This was their case as much as ours. ” The Texas Legislature is considering a new voter ID bill that will allow those who have difficulty obtaining the appropriate IDs to vote as long as they sign an affidavit and show more widely available types of identification, including a utility bill or a bank statement. In documents filed on Monday, the Justice Department said that in light of the recently filed bill, it was withdrawing its claim to allow “the Texas Legislature the opportunity to rectify any alleged infirmities with its voter identification law. ” The agency added that the Supreme Court has emphasized that “federal courts should allow state legislatures the first opportunity to remedy voting rights violations. ” The decision was the second time in a week that the Trump administration retreated from the Justice Department’s stance in a major civil rights case. One week ago, the department — with the backing of Mr. Trump — withdrew a policy imposed by the Obama administration to give federal protections to transgender students in schools. Mr. Sessions, who was battered by Democrats at his confirmation hearing over his opposition in the Senate to some voting and civil rights measures, pushed for the reversal on the transgender issue over the objections of Betsy DeVos, the education secretary, officials said. The reversal in the Texas case was all the more striking because it came just three months after the Justice Department, under the Obama administration, filed a brief arguing on behalf of the very issue it backed away from Monday — that the Legislature intentionally sought to discriminate when it approved the law. Under the Trump administration, the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department is expected to undergo the most severe shift in philosophy of any section under the Trump administration, and Mr. Sessions appears to be quickly meeting those expectations. On a number of civil rights and voting measures during his days in the United States Senate, Mr. Sessions saw the federal government as improperly meddling in issues he said should best be left to the states. Mr. Sessions took that same states’ rights approach last week on the transgender issue, saying the Obama administration had overreached. Other important voting rights decisions loom for the Justice Department. Perhaps the most closely watched is in North Carolina, where the courts have ruled that a voting measure was devised specifically to disenfranchise minorities. The Justice Department under the Obama administration helped fight to overturn the law, but Mr. Sessions has not said what he will do. The move on Monday in Texas came before a federal judge in Corpus Christi was scheduled to hear arguments on the issue on Tuesday. The case will proceed because the parties that sued Texas — including voters, elected officials, civil rights organizations and black and Hispanic advocacy groups — will continue the lawsuit. “We stay the course,” said Kristen Clarke, the president and executive director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, which is part of the legal team representing the Texas branch of the N. A. A. C. P. and the Mexican American Legislative Caucus. But the reversal by the Justice Department — after a team of lawyers in the Civil Rights Division spent more than three years and more than $1 million on the case — angered Texas Democrats and advocates for voting rights. The Justice Department’s involvement in Texas’ voter ID law predates the lawsuit it filed against the state in 2013. The agency has been formally reviewing the law for nearly six years, starting in 2011, and made its first official objection to aspects of it in March 2012. “I am appalled and disgusted that D. O. J. would abandon their claims, that they have advocated for years, that Texas’ photo ID law was enacted with a racially discriminatory purpose,” said J. Gerald Hebert, a lawyer who represents several of those who sued Texas, including the League of United Latin American Citizens and Marc Veasey, a Democratic Texas congressman who is . Officials from the Justice Department and the Texas attorney general’s office declined to comment on the case. In July, the most conservative federal appeals court in the country — the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, in New Orleans — found that the law had a discriminatory effect on minority voters and set in motion a loosening of the ID rules for the November elections. The judge in Corpus Christi — Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos, of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas, who oversaw a trial on the voter ID case in 2014 — is weighing the evidence on whether Texas enacted the law with a racially discriminatory intent. If the judge finds discriminatory intent, Texas could be forced to seek federal approval before it makes any changes to its voting laws or procedures. For decades, Texas and several other mostly Southern states with a history of discrimination had been required to seek advance federal approval before making changes to their voting laws. But Texas and the other states were freed from that requirement in 2013, after a Supreme Court decision that invalidated key provisions of the Voting Rights Act. A finding of intentional discrimination, however, could once again put Texas under federal supervision, making it the first state brought back into preclearance since the Supreme Court’s 2013 ruling. The Texas attorney general, Ken Paxton, as well as his predecessor, Greg Abbott, who is now governor, have denied that the Legislature intentionally discriminated against minority voters, arguing that the law was aimed at preventing voter fraud. But critics say the law has more to do with suppressing the turnout of those likely to vote Democratic than preventing fraud. Whatever the case, Richard L. Hasen, a law professor at the University of California, Irvine, and an expert, said he saw the Justice Department’s action on Monday as “a sign of things to come. ” “This is the first step in what I expect to be a series of steps, with D. O. J. siding with the state of Texas,” he said. He added that by remaining in the case, the Justice Department “could actually do Texas more good than by getting out. ” | 1 |
Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s administration in Chicago launched a refugee campaign designed to help get newcomers to the U. S. on public services. [The ‘One Chicago’ campaign is designed to “facilitate access” of public services to foreign refugees, legal and illegal immigrants. “One Chicago is more than a campaign it is a statement of faith,” Emanuel said of the campaign in a statement. “Chicago, like America, is not just a place on a map, but a set of ideals and values carried on through generations of immigrants, migrants, and refugees who came to Chicago in search of a better life for themselves and their families. ” The campaign highlights the city’s legal defense fund, in which illegal immigrants can receive attorneys in order to fight deportation orders in immigration courts. The organization the city has teamed up with to help illegal immigrants and foreign refugees is the Resurrection Project, which is vehemently opposed to any reforms or halts on immigration. The efforts by Emanuel to further obstruct cooperation with the Trump Administration and Attorney General Jeff Sessions on immigration issues come just as the City has refused to reverse its sanctuary status for illegal immigrants. The Resurrection Project has praised Emanuel’s sanctuary policies, writing months ago “We applaud Mayor Emanuel on his firm decision to stand by our community, taking the appropriate measures to guarantee that Chicago remains a welcoming city, where freedom and respect for immigrants — no matter their origin — are still upheld. ” John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart Texas. Follow him on Twitter at @JxhnBinder. | 1 |
Britain to send hundreds more troops to Russia border as Cold War tension escalates page: 1 link Britain will send hundreds more troops close to Russia’s border, the Government has said, as the Prime Minister also called for “pressure” on Moscow over the Syria crisis. Around 800 soldiers along with tanks, armoured vehicles and drones will now head to Estonia in the spring in a Nato effort to reassure the Baltic states over Russian aggression. Is it starting to look like WW3 yet? Let's see if the main critiques of these kinds of threads are answered. 1. Is this "saber rattling"? No. 2. Is this move unequivocally directly related to countering Russia? Yes. 3. Is this "fearmongering"? No. There was something in the news yesterday that seemed to slip by everyone: Guy Verhofstadt, former prime minister of Belgium and now the EU’s representative on Brexit talks with the UK, called Spain’s decision to allow the refuelling “scandalous”. "It is scandalous that Spain, a member of NATO and the EU, is today allowing the Russian #Kuznetsov fleet to refuel and receive technical assistance on Spanish territory. Only last week – this Spanish Government signed up to a statement from the European Council accusing Russia of war crimes against civilians in #Aleppo, yet today it provides assistance to a fleet which has one purpose; the annihilation of Aleppo and the harassment of EU & NATO forces ." SOURCE Did Guy Verhofstadt just state that Russia is using a fleet of warships to terrorize EU & NATO forces? I realize that the word "harassment" is used in the quote above, but how does that word fit in this context? It seems like it could be a coded message. Either way, "the harassment of EU & NATO forces" sounds like it could be an act of war to me. That's the essence of my argument for why WW3 has already started. It's well past the point of "saber rattling" and "posturing", actual harassment/terrorism/warfare (take your pick of words) is involved. edit on 27-10-2016 by Profusion because: (no reason given) link a reply to: Profusion Hm. On its side, Russia has just unveiled her new, Satan 2 nuclear warhead, capable of "destroying UK two times over". I agree with you, this isn't just saber rattling anymore. Good thread. We should really kick those baltic states out of NATO. They've been nothing but trouble since we let them in. Turkey can go too. Ever wondered if it is a spiritual war where the peasants in the soldiers native country are soon to be tested by Jesus. 1) remove all military personal overseas. 2) create war between imported terrorists (ISIS) and local Brits. 3) the Brits that cower, die fast. The ones that stand their ground get angelic powers and become the New World leaders after all of Lucifers goons are Judged and Hung. link originally posted by: Profusion Britain will send hundreds more troops close to Russia’s border, the Government has said, as the Prime Minister also called for “pressure” on Moscow over the Syria crisis. Around 800 soldiers along with tanks, armoured vehicles and drones will now head to Estonia in the spring in a Nato effort to reassure the Baltic states over Russian aggression. Is it starting to look like WW3 yet? Let's see if the main critiques of these kinds of threads are answered. 1. Is this "saber rattling"? No. 2. Is this move unequivocally directly related to countering Russia? Yes. 3. Is this "fearmongering"? No. There was something in the news yesterday that seemed to slip by everyone: Guy Verhofstadt, former prime minister of Belgium and now the EU’s representative on Brexit talks with the UK, called Spain’s decision to allow the refuelling “scandalous”. "It is scandalous that Spain, a member of NATO and the EU, is today allowing the Russian #Kuznetsov fleet to refuel and receive technical assistance on Spanish territory. Only last week – this Spanish Government signed up to a statement from the European Council accusing Russia of war crimes against civilians in #Aleppo, yet today it provides assistance to a fleet which has one purpose; the annihilation of Aleppo and the harassment of EU & NATO forces ." SOURCE Did Guy Verhofstadt just state that Russia is using a fleet of warships to terrorize EU & NATO forces? I realize that the word "harassment" is used in the quote above, but how does that word fit in this context? It seems like it could be a coded message. Either way, "the harassment of EU & NATO forces" sounds like it could be an act of war to me. That's the essence of my argument for why WW3 has already started. It's well past the point of "saber rattling" and "posturing", actual harassment/terrorism/warfare (take your pick of words) is involved. It's American election time. Just look at the Philippine situation also. Distraction at its finest. link a reply to: Rapha the Brits that cower, die fast. The ones that stand their ground get angelic powers and become the New World leaders after all of Lucifers goons are Judged and Hung. Oh? I've stood my ground alot of times, yet this didn't make me gain any Level Up Angelic Powers, nor did I become leader of the New World and made Lucy's goon magically hang in the process? Maybe I did it wrong? Perhaps I didn't do my stance right when I stood my ground? edit on 27-10-2016 by swanne because: (no reason given) link a reply to: Profusion It is scandalous that Spain, a member of NATO and the EU, is today allowing the Russian #Kuznetsov fleet to refuel and receive technical assistance on Spanish territory. spain cancelled this, yesterday . a reply to: Profusion i wish brtian will just let USA destroy it self and stop licking their a$$es. Russia should be left alone or at least have dialoge on similar interesets. All becasue of USA big EGO they stepped into syria edit on ThursdaythkThu, 27 Oct 2016 05:36:46 -0500America/Chicago4Thursday2016201646 by lSkrewloosel because: (no reason given) originally posted by: Ohanka We should really kick those baltic states out of NATO. Why? So that we could leave Russia free to invade and occupy them again? Did I say occupy? Sorry, I meant annex. Moving troops around NATO members for training and inter-service collaboration id not new. It's just reported a bit more because to the current tensions. Note that a couple of weeks ago Russia was putting massive forces into their enclave of Kaliningrad which makes the movement of a few hundred British squaddies seem a little bit of a token gesture. Kaliningrad was a part of Germany annexed by Russia after WW2 and the place was ethnically cleansed of the natives. link a reply to: Rapha Don't really see how anyone or anything for that matter could stand there ground against a nuclear attack. This has nothing to do with spiritual war, this is about humanity's inability to communicate without resorting to waving there nuclear penis at one another. If there is a third world war of the nuclear variety nobody wins and all it will serve to achieve is to set back humanity for the next 10,000 years or so. edit on 27-10-2016 by andy06shake because: (no reason given) link originally posted by: Rapha Ever wondered if it is a spiritual war where the peasants in the soldiers native country are soon to be tested by Jesus. 1) remove all military personal overseas. 2) create war between imported terrorists (ISIS) and local Brits. 3) the Brits that cower, die fast. The ones that stand their ground get angelic powers and become the New World leaders after all of Lucifers goons are Judged and Hung. I guess a link is out of the question ? a reply to: Profusion i wish brtian will just let USA destroy it self and stop licking their a$$es. Russia should be left alone or at least have dialoge on similar interesets. All becasue of USA big EGO they stepped into syria Exactly. The dumbarses destroy each other. Britain can survive and pick up the pieces. In WW3 NO ONE WINS. So no point getting involved! As a UK citizen i refuse to support any actions of aggression and will remain neutral. I do not care if that makes me a traitor. edit on 27-10-2016 by crazyewok because: (no reason given) link a reply to: crazyewok If the USA and Russia do decide to start lobbing atomics at one another whether or not Britain chooses to play the part of Americas lap dog is nether here nor there considering it will ultimately lead to full blown world war. Even if we were not targeted and they kept there exchange to there own nations we would still be blanketed by the fallout contaminating our water supply's, food stuffs, land and atmosphere beyond repair for the next few thousand years. So your no traitor for not supporting there crazy nonsensical saber rattling, point of fact i imagine most people can see Nuclear war for the no brainer it actually is. link originally posted by: swanne I've stood my ground alot of times, yet this didn't make me gain any Level Up Angelic Powers, nor did I become leader of the New World and made Lucy's goon magically hang in the process? Maybe I did it wrong? Perhaps I didn't do my stance right when I stood my ground? By not committing suicide is already a stance. A lot of people are losing it now with suicides on the rise. It will be at least a week or two before something big happens. Just hang-in-there. We should really kick those baltic states out of NATO. They've been nothing but trouble since we let them in. Turkey can go too. This is right, and not only for warmongerers reasons! But we also should not forget that these miniature states are only used too, like the rest of dumb europe. By the anglo-american axis, some call it meanwhile the new axis of evil. Bceause, for the simple reason that russia didn´t break made promises, after the Globalists "reunited" Germany, let´s better say brought down the wall(To be honest, there is no unity between german people, often not even in the own families, less than ever between the east and west of germany). The broken promises were about the eastward enlargement of the NATO. NATO's Eastward Expansion Did the West Break Its Promise to Moscow? "Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has accused the West of breaking promises made after the fall of the Iron Curtain, saying that NATO's expansion into Eastern Europe violated commitments made during the negotiations over German reunification. Newly discovered documents from Western archives support the Russian position." Russia didn´t expand his military troops to the borders of the USA or UK, didn´t build a rocket shield in Mexico, Canada or elsewhere at the borders of the USA. I read right now that Orban acts the same like Erdolf aka Erdogan. The last hungarian newspaper that reported about the criminal acts of the Orban family, the "Népszabadság" was closed down, freedom of the press is almost terminated now. And those EU puppets send taxmoney to such states and get nothing but problems back, but don´t even try to stop such Hobby Hitlers. Good that Erdolfistan is not in the EU like hungaria and the other "want revenge from russia" liliputh states. And the people that elected Orban, just for anti-refugee and othe Nazi reasons, for nothing else? Another year under Orban and they will end as refugees in western europe! That will become embarrassing for the anti-refugee masses... To come to an end. It´s obvisiously the "west" who is playing foul, playing foul and nothing else than that, at least since 9/11. The anglo-american axis(the modern mass surveillance pioneers) is surrounding russia, not russia the "west"(and is using it´s idiot european "partners" for this). It´s not russia that covers every part of the world with his military and his eavesdrop stations. It´s not russia that "owns" almost unsinkable aircraft carries like Germany(38.500 US troops in germany), for example. It´s not russia that stores nuke in germany, that we germans aren´t even allowed to own or store on our territory. The NSA isn´t russian. TTIP, CETA, NAFTA, TISA and all that, isn´t russian. The bankster crash 2008 was not based in russia. The robber baron capitalism that "feeds" a few but exploits 99,9% is not coming from communism(though they learned fast how it works). Monsanto, Dupont etc, not russian. I could go on and on, but i have to come to an end. | 0 |
Posted on November 6, 2016 by Dr. Eowyn | 9 Comments
Barack Obama, a sitting President of the U.S. of A., not only tells a bald-faced lie — that “undocumented immigrants,” i.e., illegal aliens, are U.S. citizens — he actively encourages illegals to vote, with impunity.
What a slap in the face of countless people across the world who actually respect this country’s laws by applying to immigrate to the United States.
Here’s the video, followed by my transcript:
Woman who identifies herself as a Millenial “ Dreamer ,” i.e., she illegally came into the U.S. when she was a minor (defined as younger than 16 years old): “The Millenial Dreamers, undocumented citizens — and I call them citizens because they contribute to this country — are fearful of voting. So if I vote, will Immigration know where I live, will they come for my family and deport us?”
Obama: “Not true, and the reason is, first of all, when you vote, you are a citizen yourself, and there is not a situation when the voting rolls somehow are transferred over and people start investigating. The sanctity of the vote is strictly confidential.”
Words no longer have meaning: “Undocumented citizens” is a new Orwellian oxymoron.
Recall that Obama had studied Constitutional law at Harvard Law School. His course of study must have been How to Subvert the U.S. Constitution.
Why isn’t Congress impeaching this outlaw and disgrace to the presidency?
H/t “Barry Soetoro” | 0 |
Region: Europe It is now an undisputed fact that the Western democratic values and the so-called “freedom of speech” that have been heralded for a long time as the principal achievements of the Western world are nothing but empty slogans. This is evidenced by the latest resolution of the European Parliament on countering Russia’s media influence dubbed the “EU strategic communications with a view to counteracting propaganda.” This document was initiated by a Polish member of the European Parliament, Anna Fotyga who claims that Russia has been providing financial support to opposition political parties and organizations in the EU, thereby undermining the unity of its states. It is noteworthy that the authors behind this document are speaking about the necessity of media pluralism and freedom of information, while introducing a form of censorship against all Russian media sources. At the same time those behind this curious paper advocate the revocation of Article 55 of Chapter IX of the UN Charter, which demands a universal respect and observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms for everyone, regardless of their race, sex, language or religion, including the rights to freedom of expression. It’s curious that delusional which hunts and the suppression of alternative media sources has recently become one of the principal attributes of the European politics. This is clearly shown by the report that has been presented by Dr Andrew Foxall, the Director of the Russia Studies Centre at The Henry Jackson Society, that advocates the notion that activists, journalists, and politicians should point out the pro-Russian connections of individuals and parties across the political spectrum and challenge the credibility of these entities via political debates, while personal and organizational connections of left- and right-wing politicians and parties and their Russian counterparts should be mapped across Europe. It’s curious that Dr Marcus Papadopoulos, the editor in chief of Politics First has been outraged by the above mentioned report, calling it manifestation of a modern form of McCarthyism. Papadopoulos is convinced that this is nothing but a slap in the face of freedom of speech and a rather stupid attempt to try to silence those who disagree with with the UK government. It’s curious that UK politicians are convinced they can call “idiots” anybody who disagrees with their position. Moreover, the “Foxall’s proclamation” was released on the eve of the discussion of the EU strategic communications with a view to counteracting propaganda in the EU parliament and has become a sort of foundation for this document. This means that the Operation Mockingbird that was launched by the CIA in the 1950s hasn’t been discontinued and is now being implemented in the EU. If you take a look at the rapidly growing funding of the European corporate media sources, it becomes obvious that America’s loyal puppets have been busy producing disinformation on the massive scale. Every day we witness new articles being published that have nothing in common with reality, yet no amount of evidence can force those corporate media sources to confess that they’ve been deliberately lying. Just take a look at the role Western media played in the Ukrainian crisis, where Russia’s position is just being ignored by every single Western journal and newspaper. Yet, the fact that Russia hasn’t been preparing any sort of occupation of Ukraine has been proven by France’s military intelligence, General Christophe Gomart in the speech he delivered in front of the French National Assembly. Yet, his report was just ignored. It must be clearly understood that a web of deception is always being created by the CIA in those regions and in those periods when specific Washington’s actions may become the cause of serious criticism and may lead to the manifestation of one’s independence from the United States. For this purpose, the White House annually allocates billions of dollars to the National Endowment for Democracy, USAID, the CIA and countless NGOs to spread disinformation. However, such steps are not causing alarm among European politicians, that are subjecting their people to vassal dependency on Washington and its position. Back in 2011 the Guardian would report : The US military is developing software that will let it secretly manipulate social media sites by using fake online personas to influence internet conversations and spread pro-American propaganda. A Californian corporation has been awarded a contract with United States Central Command (Centcom), which oversees US armed operations in the Middle East and Central Asia, to develop what is described as an “online persona management service” that will allow one US serviceman or woman to control up to 10 separate identities based all over the world. The multiple persona contract is thought to have been awarded as part of a programme called Operation Earnest Voice (OEV), which was first developed in Iraq as a psychological warfare weapon against the online presence of al-Qaida supporters and others ranged against coalition forces. Since then, OEV is reported to have expanded into a $200m programme and is thought to have been used against jihadists across Pakistan, Afghanistan and the Middle East. Today we can witness the direct result of this program on most European forums, where those dissatisfied with their elected officials are being subjected to harassment and trolling. Yes, the delusional notion about the so-called “Russian propaganda” is the talk of the day in the EU, while the aggressive Washington’s disinformation campaign is being silently ignored, as if nothing of interest was happening in this domain. Grete Mautner is an indepenent researcher and journalist from Germany, exclusively for the online magazine “ New Eastern Outlook. ” Popular Articles | 0 |
Feds get a warrant to start search for classified info in 650,000 emails - thousands of them from her private server - on sexting Weiner's laptop. Clinton faces ongoing FBI probe even if she's elected President By Wills Robinson Daily Mail November 1, 2016 The FBI now has a warrant to read the emails from Huma Abedin, Hillary Clinton ‘s most trusted aide, which were among hundreds of thousands discovered on Anthony Weiner’s laptop. Law enforcement officials confirmed that investigators gained permission to start trawling through the 650,000 emails discovered on the laptop on Sunday evening, NBC reported. Thousands of them could be from Clinton’s private server. Feds seized the laptop belonging to Weiner, Abedin’s disgraced husband, in September after DailyMail.com exposed his sexting of a 15-year-old girl. In early October, agents told FBI heads they’d found emails on the laptop from Abedin that may have been deleted from Clinton’s private server but their warrant did not allow them to read emails that were not linked to the Weiner investigation. The newly reopened investigation will take time due to the sheer volume of emails to be read, the Wall Street Journal reported. It will likely take agents until well past the election to assess how many, if any, contain classified information – leaving Clinton with the prospect of facing an ongoing investigation even if she is elected president. The Democratic candidate already shows signs of slipping in the polls after an ABC News/Washington Post tracker poll revealed Trump was just one point behind – an 11 point change since last week. And since FBI director James Comey’s shock announcement on Friday that the Clinton private server probe was to be reopened, questions have continued to mount over Abedin’s future on the Clinton campaign. She has stayed behind in New York while her boss hits the campaign trail. Abedin has pleaded ignorance about how the emails ended up on husband Weiner’s laptop. She swore under oath while testifying in a lawsuit brought against the State Department by Judicial Watch that she had handed over all of her devices that could hold emails relevant to the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private email server. If she’s found to have lied she could face up to five years in jail. On Sunday, Clinton – no longer accompanied by Abedin – said at a Florida rally that she would not be ‘knocked off course’ by Friday’s shocking development. ‘I’m not stopping now, we’re just getting warmed up,’ she declared to a packed crowd with many gay and lesbian supporters in the city of Wilton Manors. ‘We’re not going to be distracted, no matter what our opponents throw at us.’ Donald Trump delivered a swift kick to disgraced former Democratic congressman Weiner on Sunday, thanking him for preserving the emails that could bring Clinton down. | 0 |
ISTANBUL — The day after Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, declared a national state of emergency in the wake of a failed coup, an anxious nation awoke on Thursday to a text message from its leader, personally exhorting continued loyalty as the government moved against its enemies. Urging his supporters to maintain their presence in public squares, where they have flocked each evening since the coup attempt failed, he wrote, “Do not abandon the heroic resistance you have put up for your country, homeland and flag. ” Even as Turkish officials were more broadly trying to assure the public on Thursday that individual freedoms would not be threatened by the state of emergency, Mr. Erdogan’s message to nationwide cellphone customers struck a more martial tone. In particular, it carried a thinly veiled threat to a wide section of society that Mr. Erdogan views as his mortal enemy: the followers of Fethullah Gulen, a former ally and Muslim cleric who lives in Pennsylvania and whom the Turkish government has identified as the mastermind of the coup conspiracy. Turkish officials have demanded that the United States extradite him to face justice in Turkey. In his nationwide text message, Mr. Erdogan cast the nightly gatherings of his supporters in places like Taksim Square, in central Istanbul, as necessary to protect the country from Mr. Gulen. He wrote: “To teach the traitor, the terrorist” — a reference to Mr. Gulen’s following, which the Turkish government calls the Fethullah Terrorist Organization — “a lesson, continue your resistance and duty to guard democracy. The owners of our squares are not tanks, but the people. ” In the wake of the failed coup, which plunged the country into chaos after a night of violence that began late Friday, the government has moved quickly to purge from society tens of thousands of people now considered active or potential enemies. Some generals and officers have been arrested on charges of plotting the coup, but thousands of soldiers, judges, teachers, police officers, governors and others either have been detained or have lost their jobs. All of them, according to the government, have links to Mr. Gulen. Mr. Gulen has denied any involvement in the coup plot, and insists that his movement within Turkey is peaceful. Now that Mr. Erdogan has declared a state of emergency, giving the state the power to bypass Parliament and pass laws that could possibly limit individual freedoms and suspend the rule of law for issues like pretrial detentions, many Turks are worried that the purge of suspected enemies will broaden. The concern is that Mr. Erdogan will target any and all opponents, not just those who are suspected of being followers of Mr. Gulen or of being linked to the coup. On Thursday, many saw a strong signal that that was already happening, as a prominent and widely regarded human rights lawyer, Orhan Kemal Cengiz, was detained in Istanbul, outraging human rights activists. The exact reason for his detention was unclear, but Mr. Cengiz has been a longtime critic of Mr. Erdogan’s government. “Orhan Kemal Cengiz is a respected human rights lawyer,” said Andrew Gardner, the Turkey researcher for Amnesty International. “He’s a columnist, and a lot of his work is about human rights issues. ” Some speculated that it was Mr. Cengiz’s work in the past for newspapers affiliated with Mr. Gulen, like Today’s Zaman, seized this year by the government, that led to his detention. If that was the case, it suggested that the government was using a very wide definition of who may be affiliated with Mr. Gulen. “He had worked for Today’s Zaman and other newspapers,” Mr. Gardner said. “But he is in no way pushing editorial lines in his columns that are supportive of Fethullah Gulen. ” Mr. Cengiz, who was challenging in court the seizure by the government of Today’s Zaman and its sister publication, Zaman, was detained at the airport on his way to London for a conference. Earlier in the week, Turkey effectively barred academics from traveling abroad. Still, Turkish officials on Thursday moved to assure the public that the state of emergency would not lead to the widespread curtailment of individual freedoms, and that the government would focus only on targeting suspected coup plotters. “I want to guarantee that fundamental rights and freedoms and normal daily life will not be affected by this,” Numan Kurtulmus, a deputy prime minister, told reporters in Ankara, the capital. As required of a member of the Council of Europe, Turkey said it was suspending its participation in the European Convention on Human Rights, as France did after the terrorist attacks in Paris last year. Officials also sought to contain the economic fallout from Turkey’s crisis, even though the value of the Turkish lira has already plunged against the dollar. “Life of ordinary people and businesses will go unimpacted, uninterrupted, business will be as usual,” Mehmet Simsek, a deputy prime minister and former finance minister, said in an interview with NTV, a private broadcaster. Also on Thursday, a court in Alexandroupolis in northern Greece sentenced eight Turkish military officers who fled to Greece on a helicopter after the failed coup to two months in prison, finding them guilty of illegal entry into the country. The Turkish officers’ sentence was suspended for three years, but the eight were detained pending the outcome of their requests for political asylum in Greece. Turkey has called on Greece to swiftly extradite the officers, who have claimed that they were not involved in the coup but that they fled the country in fear of their lives. Mr. Erdogan has used the failed coup to whip up the emotions of his religiously conservative base of supporters, representing roughly half the country. That has intensified concerns that the president’s provocative language could lead to lasting divisions, and possibly incite more violence. Earlier in the week, a banner seen flying over Taksim Square, seemingly a message from Erdogan supporters to Mr. Gulen and his followers, promised as much: “We will hang you and your dogs by your own leashes. ” | 1 |
SAYON TOWN, Liberia — For the first time in 26 years, the electricity came on in Hayes Lewis’s modest house in this cluttered Monrovia suburb. The very next day, Mr. Lewis went out and purchased a television set, a fan and a single light bulb. The purchases cost him $250 — about a quarter of a year’s income for the . But it was money Mr. Lewis had been longing to spend. He remembers the time back in 1990 when the warlord Prince Johnson’s forces took over the area and fighting destroyed the nearby Mount Coffee hydroelectric plant, cutting off electricity — or, as Liberians call it, “current. ” “To have current, tha’ not small thing,” he said in Liberian English, motioning proudly at the light bulb in his bedroom. Except the light bulb was dark, the fan was still and the television screen was blank because the electricity, after making its much heralded return, had gone out again. On New Year’s Day, a bandit trying to steal the copper wire from one of the light poles at the newly reopened Mount Coffee Hydropower Plant had electrocuted himself, prompting the shutdown of huge swaths of the system. Five days later, Mr. Lewis once again had no current. I asked him what he was going to do. Shrugging, Mr. Lewis trudged outside and put a large rectangle object on the table. “I wi’ use Chinese lantern,” he said, resignedly. After 26 years, the irony of the situation was beyond him. He supposedly had current, but he was still using the same makeshift battery light that had gotten him through the last two decades. But that is all par for the course here in this country that, 13 years after the civil war ended, is still trying to put back together the pieces that the war ripped apart. Fourteen years of war snuffed out 200, 000 lives and laid waste to Liberia, producing generals who led ritual sacrifices of children before going into battle, naked except for shoes and a gun. By the time the war was finally over in 2003 and Charles Taylor was escorted out of the country, to eventually face a war crimes conviction, the country was left a shell. Schools were shuttered. What passed for a middle class had fled. Infrastructure was destroyed. And current was gone, taking with it running water, streetlights, and the simple assumptions of everyday life, including walking into your house and turning on the lights, or opening your refrigerator and getting a cold glass of water. Downtown Monrovia at night looked medieval candles in shopfronts cast their dim light on the ribbons of dirty water running down the gutters. Liberians, as they have for decades, simply adapted. They acquired Tiger batteries, the alternative to expensive generators, and used those to plug in their cellphones. Those cellphones they then used to light their way at night, as they traveled in the dark along rural roads and city streets. They bought Chinese lanterns every other day. In Liberia, the phrase “Chinese lantern” does not apply to the red and gold lights that people string up at Chinese New Year. Instead, it is an ugly square or rectangular light, the kind you might use at a campground at night. Even the wealthiest Liberians — those with access to generators — still hoard electricity as if it’s about to be taken from them. If you walk into the average Liberian’s house during the day, you will not find any lights glowing, let alone fans, televisions, radios or refrigerators running. In fact, most Liberians with generators don’t have refrigerators they have a deep freezer that they plug in for a few hours at night, long enough to get cold. Then they unplug it and keep the door closed, sometimes for up to two days, until they decide it needs another juicing. When President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf arrived at the Mount Coffee plant on a Friday in December to flick the switch that would officially signal the reopening of the plant, it was a big deal here. Flanked by Linda the Obama administration’s assistant secretary of state for African affairs, Ms. Sirleaf was visibly buoyant, in no small part because, as she nears the end of her term in office, she was finally making good on an early promise from 2006 that she would get Mount Coffee up and running again. The United States, Germany, Norway and the European Investment Bank contributed to the $357 million project, which was delayed after the Ebola outbreak in 2014. Finally, last summer, neighborhoods like Mr. Lewis’s began getting hooked up to the electrical grid, in anticipation of the hydropower plant’s reopening in December. But the process is slow. In Sayon Town, Mark Laffor, 30, was selling DVDs in his tiny stall, using the power of the same small generator that he has been using for years. He was supposed to be one of the people to benefit when Mount electricity, with its far lower price tag, returned. But he said his current lasted only a couple of days before going back out. “We were having current but they said the pole was destroyed,” he said, shaking his head in frustration. A few houses down from Mr. Laffor, old Nora Tabah, a market woman, proudly invited me into her home to show off the single light bulb she had recently installed in the hallway. “For years I was living in darkness,” she said. She was still living in darkness. Like Mr. Lewis, her current had gone out after a few days. But Ms. Tabah, who sells farina and kola nuts in front of her house, expressed optimism that things were about to change. “I ‘coming buy freezer,” she said. Hedrick Walker, 24, owns a shop in Sayon Town that sells “yama yama” — water, biscuits, Spam, and the like. He said both his life and the town had changed now that Mount Coffee had come back on. “It’s more lively now,” he said. “I used to close at 6 p. m. ” when the sun goes down. “Now,” he said proudly, “I am open until 11 p. m. ” — at least on nights when the electricity is on. A few miles away, at Raymond Camp, just outside the Mount Coffee plant, Fatu Quay, 32, sitting at a table in her house that also serves as a shop, said that she was hedging her bets on electricity in Liberia. She spent $15 in December to purchase electricity when the power plant came online, and was pleased to see that two weeks later she still had money in her account. “But then the current went out,” she said, grinning. Quickly she switched back to the expensive generator that, for about $300 a month, has provided her with electricity at night, adding that she has no plans to get rid of it anytime soon. Like most Liberians, she said she didn’t use electricity during the day. But she is hoping that the cheaper Mount electricity will return before her aunt comes to visit this month. “She’s coming from America,” Ms. Quay said, “so I will have to turn the current on in the day to run fan for her. ” | 1 |
Wednesday on CNBC’s “Power Lunch,” Washington Post columnist George Will reacted to the news of Bill O’Reilly, host of Fox News Channel’s flagship program “The O’Reilly Factor,” would be parting ways with Fox News amid allegations of sexual harassment. Will, who had a with O’Reilly in November 2015 over some of the details in O’Reilly’s “Killing Reagan” book, said for Fox News to brand itself as something other than “a somewhat stale product” was contingent on moving beyond O’Reilly. “It’s like being called you ugly by a frog,” Will said. “Mr. O’Reilly is, on air is reckless, coarse and bullying. Turns out off the air, he’s reckless, coarse and bullying. So there’s a kind of seamlessness here. I think Fox News has to decide what it wants to be and for whom it wants to be a news source. It seems as long as Bill O’Reilly is the face of Fox News, and let’s face it, he is, their ability to expand their brand and to diversify their audience and become something other than a somewhat stale product depends on moving beyond Bill O’Reilly. ” “Power Lunch” Michelle asked how that squared with the fact the O’Reilly puts up the biggest numbers in cable news, to which Will said it was based more on brand loyalty than personalities. “Well, the question is, are they loyal to Bill O’Reilly or are they loyal to the Fox brand itself?” Will replied. “When Megyn Kelly left, and they put Tucker Carlson in her slot, nothing happened. The ratings stayed strong, and the viewers were happy. I have a feeling that Mr. O’Reilly is replaceable. As Charles de Gaulle once said, the graveyards are full of indispensable men. ” Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor | 1 |
It’s that time of year when financial advice sites issue their lists of the “Stocks to Buy for 2017. ” Before you take them up on their suggestions, let’s look at how well such portfolios did in 2016. The portfolios of stocks they were telling you to buy generally did much worse than the stock market over all. The results underline what many personal finance experts recommend: Invest in a broad, mutual index fund. (The Times’s “Your Money” columnist wrote more on this here.) In 2016, the broad S. P. stock index increased 9. 5 percent. But if you invested in Forbes’s 2016 list, your money grew about 7 percent. Kiplinger’s was about half that. A list that appeared on the Money magazine site garnered 4. 9 percent, and Barron’s returned 5. 3 percent. One such list at CNBC did a little better than most at 10. 6 percent. But Vanguard’s Total Stock index fund returned 12. 5 percent in the same period. We even calculated these returns by assuming that any of the dividends were reinvested, but still none beat the widely owned index fund. There is nothing wrong with these lists if you are using them as mere suggestions of what companies might be worth investigating. There were some bona fide winners on almost every list: Goldman Sachs, Kennametal, Ellie Mae, Douglas Dynamics, Burlington Stores. You might not have heard of some of those companies, so it’s not a bad place to look for ideas. But the problem with such lists is that they encourage people to approach investing the wrong way. Unsophisticated investors are being persuaded that they should own a sheaf of stocks. But as you can see, even when the stocks are recommended by professional money managers and filtered through some of the best financial journalists, they don’t do as well as the averages. The best advice remains the same: If you have money you want to play with, go have some fun with a few stocks that you can monitor closely. If you keep it simple, it’s easier to track and respond. But for the rest of us, the smart investment is those index funds. They cost less than stocks or other funds. They remove most of the emotion from your decision making, which is the cause of a lot of bad decisions. That’s your best bet in 2017. | 1 |
Chuck Norris Says Hillary Presidency Will Happen if GOP Doesn’t Support Trump
In response to a Bloomberg claim that the FBI had recovered some of Clinton’s deleted emails, Clinton’s team was supposed to cite that claim as “proof” that Clinton never “wiped” her server clean — you know, like with a cloth or something .
In truth, we know that Clinton’s team “wiped” the server clean with a program called “Bleachbit” shortly after the contents of the server were subpoenaed by Congress.
The talking points also perpetuated the lie that Clinton had turned over all of her “work-related” emails to the State Department.
Of course we learned later from the FBI investigation and Director James Comey that “several thousand” work-related emails had been recovered from the private server, emails that had never been turned over to the State Department.
In reference to the story in The Post, the talking points falsely claimed that Clinton had “complied in full” with State Department requests to turn over all work-related emails.
Again, the FBI investigation confirmed otherwise. | 0 |
By now everyone has been reminded that the media is not infallible. It is composed of very fallible human beings who make mistakes with the same regularity as all the rest of us. I was recently reading a bit about something in statistics called “Galton’s Problem,” an observational dynamic named after its discoverer, Sir Francis Galton.
To state it very crudely, Galton’s Problem is a situation resulting when observers assume that certain things are separate and discrete, when in fact they are not. For example, those who failed to predict Donald Trump’s electoral victory assumed that social conditions in the United States were isolated from those of the rest of the world. Such people failed to notice the evidence of widespread public anger in many other countries, most notably England, Italy, France, and Hungary.
Sir Francis Galton
Failure to take into consideration the “big picture” is still forgivable, of course; no one can be right all the time, or even most of the time. Systems in the modern world suffer from too much input and data, rather than too little. But deliberate lying is quite another matter. And it is undeniable that some mainstream media outlets have deliberately sought to conceal the truth on a variety of domestic and foreign issues. Rather than act as a check on governmental power, the media has actually become an arm of government power, enforcing doctrinal orthodoxy with a variety of carrots and sticks that have proven to be reasonably effective.
Individual journalists can play significant roles in this process. Consider a favorite example of mine, the case of famed baseball player Ty Cobb. I’ve been an admirer of Cobb for a very long time, ever since reading his autobiography as a boy. Something never quite felt true about all those stories that other biographers would tell about him. The worst of these was sports writer Al Stump, whose biography of Cobb has now been discredited as mostly fabrication.
Stump was granted exclusive access to Ty Cobb in 1960 and 1961 for his biographical purposes. Cobb shared with him many intimate details of his life and career; but instead of faithfully reproducing those recollections, Stump embellished, slanted, and outright fabricated numerous anecdotes designed to cast Cobb in the worst possible light. Stump portrayed Cobb as a southern racist (Cobb was from Georgia), a misogynist, and even a murderer. Cobb was not alive at the time all these stories began to circulate and was unable to defend himself.
To add insult to injury, Stump’s writings were used as the basis for a terrible 1994 film called Cobb, which starred Tommy Lee Jones. The film is a tissue of lies and distortions that deserved to—and did—flop at the box office. The real Ty Cobb was a complex, driven, and highly intelligent figure, who knew how to court controversy when he had to, but was actually a gentleman by the standards of the era. Readers interested in further reading should consult the wonderful biography by Charles Leerhsen entitled Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty .
A famous photo of Cobb stealing third base
To begin with, Cobb used brains rather than brawn to beat his opponents. He made careful studies of all the top players of his day and crafted strategies designed to exploit their weaknesses. For example, when he learned that pitcher Walter Johnson hated hitting batters with pitches, Cobb would crowd the plate to force Johnson to walk him. He learned how to get inside the heads of his adversaries, forcing them to lose their tempers; when they did, Cobb would steal bases right under their noses. He remains one of the few players in history who knew how to steal home base.
One legend about Cobb that has persisted is that he was a violent brawler. This is simply not true. It is true that men of his era got into fistfights often—it was part of a healthy masculine culture back then—but he never gratuitously assaulted or struck anyone. The few incidents that have been held out as examples of his misbehavior (e.g., a fight with a black groundskeeper and assorted hotel brawls) prove to be on closer inspection nothing more than the standard types of fights that physically-minded men like him became entangled with. Nearly all ballplayers of his era engaged in them, including Babe Ruth.
Al Stump’s character assassination of Cobb went even further, painting him as an unreconstructed southern “racist” who had a grudge against blacks. This is completely false. Cobb was actually one of the few early supporters of integration in the big leagues. When asked his opinion about subject by the Sporting News in 1952, he said, “The negro has the right to compete in sports, and who is to say he has not?”
He had nothing but compliments for black athletes like Willie Mays and Jackie Robinson, and players in the Negro League whom Cobb interacted with in the 1920s confirm that there was no trace of prejudice in Cobb’s makeup. Cobb mentored younger players, corresponded with fans with personalized letters, and helped found a hospital and a college education fund.
Cobb was certainly no angel, but in hindsight he was nothing more than an aggressive, daring man who played professional sports at a time when things were much less regulated than they are now. Cobb himself may even have allowed spurious tales about himself to circulate in order to court publicity. But he had a limit, and complete fairy tales he would not tolerate.
Stump’s lies have been so pervasive and persistent that the mythology surrounding Cobb will take decades to undo. If anything, Cobb was too trusting in letting a man like Stump into his confidence. Cobb was so angry with Stump’s hatchet job that he was preparing to sue to prevent publication of Stump’s writings in 1961, just before his death. The terrible 1994 film Cobb only added more oil to the fire.
Malicious journalism can do serious damage. Sometimes the damage comes from ignorance, other times from deliberate peddling of falsehood. The motives for lying—whether coming from money, fame, or the desire to “virtue signal”—can always be found if one digs below the surface. In the modern era, the default rule must be to seek independent confirmation of news stories, and to remember that journalists are subject to the same human emotions and weaknesses as all the rest of us.
Read More : An Examination Of Cult Leader Game
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BERLIN (AFP) — A Syrian refugee was convicted in Germany Monday of planning a bomb attack on behalf of the Islamic State jihadist group and sentenced to two years’ juvenile detention. [The regional court in the western city of Cologne said in a statement that the defendant was found guilty of plotting “a serious act of violence threatening state security”. The teenager, who was not identified by the court, was arrested at an asylum shelter in Cologne in September and went on trial in February. Police had said the suspect’s mobile phone showed he had been in touch with an IS contact abroad and expressed willingness to carry out a bombing. Investigators found online chat messages on the phone that included “concrete instructions” for building an explosive device. However the court found that the plot was thwarted at a “very early stage”. “At no time was the public specifically in danger,” it said. The teenager and his family were among the nearly 900, 000 migrants and refugees who arrived in Germany in 2015, a record influx that has fuelled security concerns. The suspect was brought to police attention after residents and employees at the refugee shelter where he was staying voiced concerns that he had been radicalised, as did a local mosque. The court found that the “particular loneliness” of his housing situation at the shelter meant that he spent most of his time on his mobile phone, making him easy prey for jihadist propaganda online. Germany has been on high alert since a series of attacks last year claimed by IS, the deadliest of which was a truck rampage through a Berlin Christmas market which killed 12 people in December. | 1 |
This is the buzz saw that Janet Yellen, the Federal Reserve chairwoman, walked into as she addressed the news media — and by extension, every trading floor on earth — Wednesday afternoon. The Fed’s official mission is to take care of the American economy, and the economy is doing pretty well. The unemployment rate is 4. 7 percent, its lowest in nine years and around the level Federal Reserve officials think is sustainable in the long run. Wages are rising steadily. After a soft first quarter, economic growth is accelerating. For Ms. Yellen, a labor economist with decades of experience, it all points to a recipe for higher inflation, a single month of weak jobs data notwithstanding. Some of her colleagues would also emphasize that keeping rates too low could create imbalances in the economy and spur new financial crises. But global financial markets aren’t having it. If you take bond and currency markets at face value, the underlying path of growth in the United States is too weak and global deflationary forces too powerful the Fed will need to raise interest rates much slower than its officials say they expect. If markets could talk, they would be saying: “We don’t think you’ll raise interest rates as much as you say, and if you do it anyway you’ll probably regret it. ” All 17 top officials of the Fed expect an interest rate increase to happen this year, according to projections they released Wednesday. Yet financial futures markets price in only about a 40 percent chance that it will happen. Fed officials envision a 2. 4 percent interest rate target at the end of 2018, versus 0. 6 percent that is priced into the markets. Fed officials see inflation rising to its target of 2 percent by 2018 and staying there the price of bonds implies it will be much lower. There are technical factors that distort those market signals, as Ms. Yellen noted in her news conference. For example, aggressive by the European Central Bank and the Bank of Japan may be sending money flooding across borders into American bonds, making American rates lower than the economic fundamentals would justify. But even with those distortions, Ms. Yellen and the Fed face danger if they ignore these market signals entirely. A pattern has repeated for years: Markets expect slower growth, lower inflation and a slower path of rate increases than Fed officials themselves markets turn out to be right. Two years ago, for example, the median projection among Fed officials was that its interest rate target would be 2. 5 percent at the end of 2016. A year ago it was 1. 68 percent at the end of 2016. Now both look like pipe dreams. Fed leaders expect a 0. 9 percent rate at the end of the year, and markets expect 0. 4 percent. Ms. Yellen and the Fed have been grappling with which set of signals to listen to, and the tone that pervaded her news conference Wednesday was one of uncertainty. “We’re quite uncertain about where rates are heading in the longer term,” she said. “Many of us believe as a base case it’s reasonable to assume those rates will move up over time, but we aren’t certain about that. There could be revisions in either direction. ” Ultimately, by holding off on a June rate increase and marking down rate forecasts for the months ahead, the Fed nudged its views toward market views. As Fed officials make their decisions at their remaining four meetings of 2016, the issue that hangs over them is as complex as ever. It is not merely about evaluating how the United States economy is doing and whether it remains solidly on track — and given the flaws in economic data, that job is hard enough. Fed officials must also weigh whether the global force of low inflation is so powerful as to continue dragging down prices in the United States even after the domestic economy has healed. They have to figure out whether the feedback loops between economic weakness and easy money in other countries create unconventional risks to the United States by raising rates too quickly. The 2008 financial crisis was a profound test of the Fed’s ability to prevent economic collapse from 2009 to 2012, the central bank made crucial decisions to keep pushing the United States economy toward recovery. This year is showing just how intricate the exit from this era of easy money will truly be. | 1 |
The threat of World War 3 is over! We can now breathe relaxed people! World War 3 will have to wait for another era! It is time for peace and prosperity.
RUSSIA
Russia is ready and looks forward to restoring bilateral relations with the United States, Russian President Vladimir Putin said, commenting on the news of Donald Trump’s victory in the US presidential election.
“We heard [Trump’s] campaign rhetoric while still a candidate for the US presidency, which was focused on restoring the relations between Russia and the United States,” President Putin said, speaking at the presentation ceremony of foreign ambassadors’ letters of credentials in Moscow.
“We understand and are aware that it will be a difficult path in the light of the degradation in which, unfortunately, the relationship between Russia and the US are at the moment,” he added.
Speaking about the degraded state of relations between the countries, the president once again stressed that “it is not our fault that Russia-US relations are as you see them.”
Earlier today, in a message to Donald Trump the Russian President expressed confidence that the dialogue between Moscow and Washington, in keeping with each other’s views, meets the interests of both Russia and the US.
The Russian leader noted in the message that he hopes to address some “burning issues that are currently on the international agenda, and search for effective responses to the challenges of the global security,” RIA Novosti reported.
On top of it, Putin has expressed confidence that “building a constructive dialogue between Moscow and Washington, based on principles of equality, mutual respect and each other’s positions, meets the interests of the peoples of our countries and of the entire international community.”
Russian State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin has also expressed hope that Trump’s victory in the presidential election will help pave the way for a more constructive dialogue between Moscow and Washington.
“The current US-Russian relations cannot be called friendly. Hopefully, with the new US president a more constructive dialogue will be possible between our countries,” he said.
“The Russian Parliament will welcome and support any steps in this direction,” Volodin added on Wednesday.
A member of the Federation Council Committee on Defense and Security, Senator Aleksey Pushkov, has meanwhile noted that Hillary Clinton’s stake on the conflict with Russia has eventually done her a terrible disservice.
“[Playing the] ‘Russian card’ and portraying Putin as a bad guy did not help Clinton. On the contrary, staking on the conflict with Moscow has only caused fear, doing her a disservice,” he tweeted.
According to many observers, US-Russia relations are now at their lowest point since the Cold War. Putin has repeatedly noted that the worsening of Russia’s relations with the US “was not our choice,” however.
For things to improve between Moscow and Washington, the US should first and foremost start acting like an equal partner and respect Russia’s interests rather than try to dictate terms, Putin said last month.
The US will have to negotiate with Russia on finding solutions to international issues as no state is now able to act alone, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said last week, adding that problems in bilateral relations began to mount long before the Ukrainian crisis broke out in 2014.
FRANCE
In France, Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault has said that the election results mustn’t weaken relations between Europe and the US, and assured that France remains an ally of the US, and will have to see what the new president’s policies will be.
The leader of the French “National front” party, Marine le Pen, has congratulated Trump on his win over Twitter, posting, “Congratulations to the new US president Donald Trump and the free American people!”
ITALY
Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, who had previously openly supported Hillary Clinton, congratulated Donald Trump and gave assurances that Italy’s ties with the United States remain strong.
“I wish him well. The Italo-American friendship is solid,” Renzi said at the start of a speech in Rome.
UNITED KINGDOM
UK Prime Minister Theresa May expressed readiness to work with Donald Trump “building ties to ensure the security and prosperity of our nations.”
Nigel Farage, UK Independence Party leader, who was a figurehead in Britain’s exit from the European Union, said Trump has fought a brave campaign.
“I hand over the mantle to @RealDonaldTrump! Many congratulations. You have fought a brave campaign,” Farage wrote on this Twitter. Earlier he said he would accept a job from Donald Trump if the latter became president.
HUNGARY
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban responded to Trump’s victory with the words “what a great news. Democracy is still alive,” posted on his Facebook page.
AUSTRIA
Austria will remain a “bridge builder” between the East and West and is ready to cooperate with any head of state chosen by the American people, Austrian Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz said.
“We are a ‘bridge builder’ and the country in which both the East and the West are well represented. We will continue with this course. We will accept any result of the election and will continue to strive for joint work with the United States,” Kurtz said on radio OE1, as cited by RIA Novosti news agency. He also compared the results of the US election with the Brexit vote.
Austria’s far-right Freedom Party (FPO) leader Heinz-Christian Strache said Trump’s victory in the election is the righteous punishment for the corrupt establishment.
“The political left as well as the aloof and sleazy establishment are being punished by voters and voted out of various decision-making positions,” Strache said on Facebook. His party is hopeful its own anti-immigrant and EU-critical candidate Norbert Hofer will become the European Union’s first far-right head of state on December 4.
PALESTINE
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said in a statement that he “congratulates the elected American president, Donald Trump, and hopes that peace will be achieved during his term,” as cited by AP.
INDIA
Indian Prime Minister Narenda Modi also congratulated Trump, tweeting he is “looking forward to working with [Trump] closely to take India-US bilateral ties to a new height.”
AUSTRALIA
Australia’s foreign minister, Julie Bishop, said her government is ready to work with “whomever the American people in their wisdom choose to be their president.” She noted that the US administration “will have a number of challenges, particularly in our region, and we want to work constructively with the new administration to ensure the continued presence and leadership of the United States in our region.”
SOUTH KOREA
One of America’s top allies in the Pacific, South Korea, said that they would expect the US to go on with the policy of pressuring North Korea.
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Good morning. Welcome to California Today, a morning update on the stories that matter to Californians (and anyone else interested in the state). Tell us about the issues that matter to you — and what you’d like to see: CAtoday@nytimes. com. Want to receive California Today by email? Sign up. With the new school year underway, California is cracking down on parents who refuse to vaccinate their children. Since a new law took effect in July, no longer will a child be able to attend class unimmunized on the basis of a parent’s objections. In the past, parents could sidestep vaccine mandates by declaring that the injections were contrary to their religious or personal beliefs. This occurred despite overwhelming evidence from doctors and public health officials that they are safe and effective in preventing infectious diseases. Tens of thousands of parents across California now face three options: yield, tutor your children at home or pack up and leave the state. But if there is to be any exodus from California schools, expect it to unfold slowly. The law, known as SB 277, only requires proof of immunizations as children enter school for the first time or the seventh grade. That means many won’t have to vaccinate for years or, if they’re in eighth grade and above, at all. In 2015, parents of incoming kindergartners in California filed more than 13, 000 personal belief exemptions. It’s unclear how the latest crop of kindergarten parents are responding to the law. Schools took steps to ensure that parents understood the rules and even helped coordinate vaccine clinics, said Robert Oakes, a spokesman for the California Department of Education. “It’s the right thing to do for public health, and it’s the law in California,” he said. Still, opponents say a trickle of defectors has been leaving California since the middle of last year, when the bill was signed into law in the wake of a measles outbreak, which began at Disneyland and was attributed, in part, to diseases being spread by children who had not been vaccinated. Stefanie Duncan Fetzer, an opponent in San Clemente, said she personally knew of roughly 200 families who have fled. Many went to Oregon, Colorado or Texas, she said, states seen as unlikely to impose strict vaccine rules. Other parents are in a sort of limbo, unable to make other arrangements for their children. Ms. Fetzer described one family that sold their house, bought a camper and “just took off. ” “They don’t know where they are going to land,” she said. “They are just going to drive around the country and their kids and hope to find a place to go. ” • Brock Turner, the former Stanford University student who spent three months in jail after sexually assaulting an unconscious woman, registered as a sex offender in his home state of Ohio. The designation will stick for life. [USA Today] • The disappearance 20 years ago of Kristin Smart, a freshman at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, is one of the Central Coast’s cold cases. Now, officials are saying they have developed a lead, and are planning to excavate a site near the campus. [The Associated Press] • One of the nation’s largest college chains, ITT Technical Institute, closed nearly all of its campuses Tuesday, leaving thousands of students adrift. The company ran 15 locations in California. [The New York Times] • On Wednesday, the California Coastal Commission is expected to vote on a giant development proposed for the last big coastal lot in Orange County. The project has stirred fierce opposition. [Los Angeles Times] • A federal judge blocked a plan by the Bureau of Land Management to open more than a million acres in Central California to oil drilling. [San Francisco Chronicle] • In Sacramento, gathered 2, 000 signatures on a letter to the mayor demanding something be done about a rash of robberies targeting their community. [Sacramento Bee] • Six ways that legal marijuana would change California, and seven ways that it wouldn’t. [KQED News] • Seventeen voter initiatives? That’s nothing. On top of those statewide proposals, San Diegans will face 12 city and two county measures in November — 31 in all. Here’s help. [Voice of San Diego] • No one else grows strawberries like Driscoll’s, the berry juggernaut in Watsonville. Now the company is hoping to make berry lovers care about that distinction. [The New York Times] • A study of the Berkeley soda tax found that residents cut sugary drink consumption by a fifth. [The New York Times] • Finally, watch this painfully accurate depiction of what it’s like to talk to someone just back from Burning Man. “It was everything. It was literally everything. ” (Warning: Salty language) [YouTube] A bunch of readers sent emails Tuesday urging California Today to reflect the entire mosaic of the state. A few highlights: I want to remind you to venture away from the coast to look at the Central Valley and California, too. That’s where some of the most pressing social, economic and environmental issues are playing out. — Diane Cary, 64, Winters My view of California is one of many “Californias,” each of them having their own beauty, their own struggles, their own politics. — Mauro Sifuentes, 31, San Francisco Please do not treat San Diego as a suburb of L. A. We are so much more than a border town. I would love to see California being more than San Francisco and L. A. — Susan Elliott, 66, Encinitas Our tech reporters will be calling the during Apple’s annual showcase this morning in San Francisco, where the company is expected to unveil its next iPhone. Rumormongers say it will be thinner, faster and — gasp! — lacking a headphone jack. The event starts at 10 a. m. Pacific. Find live coverage and analysis on The Times’s home page and mobile feed then. It was like a moment from a Disney movie. Mike Karas, a tourist from Honolulu, had his camera pointed toward an exquisite view of Yosemite when a bride and her groom stepped onto a rocky ledge high above a valley. She turned to him as the sun burst into an apricot hue on the horizon. “It was like wow, that’s amazing,” Mr. Karas, 31, said. He snapped a photo. But the mystery couple vanished down a trail before he could flag them down. Later, he posted the image to Instagram, where it spread like crazy and inspired reports as far away as New Zealand. It also fueled an effort to identify the couple that stretched for days. Then, late Tuesday, the mystery was solved. The bride was Catherine Mack, an Australian actress, and her groom Rick Donald, also an actor. Mr. Karas said he spoke to Ms. Mack by phone after she spotted the photo on social media and connected with him. “She was laughing and happy about the photo and the whole story and loved it,” he said. “She didn’t know how big exactly the story had become. ” Ms. Mack said in an email that the couple were married in the national park right before the photo was taken. California Today goes live at 6 a. m. Pacific time weekdays. Tell us what you want to see: CAtoday@nytimes. com. The California Today columnist, Mike McPhate, is a Californian — born outside Sacramento and raised in San Juan Capistrano. He lives in Davis. Follow him on Twitter. California Today is edited by Julie Bloom, who grew up in Los Angeles and attended U. C. Berkeley. | 1 |
Federal health officials on Monday urged pregnant women to stay away from a Miami neighborhood where they have discovered additional cases of Zika infection — apparently the first time the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has advised people not to travel to a place in the continental United States. Florida officials said the number of Zika cases caused by local mosquitoes had risen to 14 from the four announced on Friday: 12 men and two women. They declined to say whether either woman was pregnant. All of the cases have been in one neighborhood. Health officials said they still did not expect the number of local cases to grow into anything comparable to the epidemic that has raged across Latin America in recent months. The 10 newly identified patients were most likely infected weeks ago, as early as the officials said. But the new information casts doubt over the effectiveness of weeks of intensive efforts in South Florida and raises questions about tourism in the state, which drew more than 100 million visitors last year. Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, the director of the C. D. C. said that the Aedes aegypti mosquito, which transmits the Zika virus, has proved to be a wily adversary in Wynwood, a crowded, urban neighborhood in north Miami where all the cases were found. The mosquito may be resistant to the insecticides being used or may be able to hide in standing water. “Aggressive mosquito control measures don’t seem to be working as well as we would like,” he said in a press briefing on Monday. The authorities had expected additional cases of Zika infection linked to the neighborhood, he said. But officials were particularly concerned by indications over the weekend that “moderately high” numbers of Aedes aegypti mosquitoes and their larvae were still being found in a section in Wynwood, an area of warehouses, art galleries, restaurants, bars, apartments and condominiums. “We advise pregnant women to avoid travel to this area,” Dr. Frieden said, “and pregnant women who live and work in this area and their partners to make every effort to avoid mosquito bites and practice safe sex. ” Pregnant women who traveled to the neighborhood on or after June 15 should talk with their doctors about getting tested for possible infection, he said. In addition, said Dr. Denise J. Jamieson, a leader of the C. D. C. ’s pregnancy and birth defects team, “we are recommending women who are considering pregnancy not get pregnant for up to eight weeks after returning from that area. ” No mosquito found in the neighborhood has tested positive for the virus, but this species has a short life span. Health officials said the Florida mosquitoes carrying the virus had probably acquired it by biting an infected traveler from Latin America or the Caribbean. At the request of the state, the C. D. C. has dispatched an emergency response team of eight experts in fields including birth defects and mosquito control. Dr. Frieden said mosquitoes in the neighborhood would be tested for resistance to the insecticides being used, which he said were two different types of pyrethroids. In a sign that the Zika cases might affect tourism in Florida, Britain’s health agency, saying the risk was moderate, advised pregnant women on Saturday to “consider postponing nonessential travel to affected areas until after the pregnancy. ” Jack Ezon, the president of Ovation Vacations in New York, said that his agency received 22 reservation cancellations on Monday for trips to Florida over the next six months, and that about four times as many people called for information about the travel advisory. “Yesterday, the news was terrorism. Today, the news is Zika,” he said. The airline JetBlue said in a statement that it would allow refunds for people with “concerns of traveling to areas confirmed by the C. D. C. ” But Ross Feinstein, a spokesman for American Airlines, which has a hub in Miami, said no refunds would be issued, even for pregnant women. “The C. D. C. advisory doesn’t tell people they shouldn’t travel to Miami,” he said. Abraham Pizam, the dean of the Rosen College of Hospitality Management, said that if the travel advisory had any effect on tourism, it would be only “for a very short period of time” and would not put a big dent in the diverse range of tourists who visit Florida. Gov. Rick Scott said in a statement that the Florida health authorities had tested people in three locations in and Broward Counties and ruled out transmission by local mosquitoes in two of those locations. Six of the 10 newly identified cases were asymptomatic and discovered through the testing. Dr. Frieden said 12 of the 14 cases were linked to a area around two workplaces where the initial two cases were identified in July. Since July 7, when Florida began investigating what turned out to be the first diagnosed local transmission, more than 200 people in and Broward Counties who live or work near the Wynwood neighborhood have been tested, Mr. Scott said. Mosquito experts said Aedes aegypti thrives in tiny pockets of water — a bottle cap, a storm drain — making for a notoriously elusive foe. “Very little historically has worked on Aedes aegypti, owing to its stealthy and domestic behavior,” said Phil Lounibos, a professor of entomology at the University of Florida. Aerial spraying is largely ineffective in an urban setting like Wynwood. Instead, mosquito control employees have conducted 621 property inspections there, treated 21 properties for mosquito breeding and used portable sprayers against adult mosquitoes on 100 properties, said Gayle Love, the spokeswoman for the County Department of Solid Waste. Spray trucks were also sent to the neighborhood, but were legally allowed to spray only at night, while Aedes aegypti mosquitoes tend to bite during the day, said Michael S. Doyle, the executive director of the Florida Keys Mosquito Control District. “Most of the chemicals that are available for mosquito control are not effective against Aedes aegypti — they are resistant,” he said. On Monday, in Wynwood, there was little obvious concern. “I haven’t seen any panic,” said Virgil Cantú, 22, a bartender at the Bar Next Door. Melanie Hernandez, 20, who was working Monday at the Marine Layer clothing store in Wynwood, said she was worried, even though she did not plan to get pregnant anytime soon. “I looked up the symptoms online after I heard that Wynwood is ground zero for Zika,” she said. “Obviously you’re scared, because you never know. ” | 1 |
HAVE YOU THOUGHT OF WHERE YOUR SOUL IS GOING WHEN YOU DIE? Heaven and hell is real but Jesus Christ is the way the truth and the LIFEThe true life is in Jesus Christ John 5:26 Jesus said For as the Father hath life in himself; so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself;John 5:24 Jesus said Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.John 3:18 KJVJesus said He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. jesus christ is lord of lords and king of kings. Anonymous Coward | 0 |
Dems sue GOP over Trump's 'rigged' complaints Claim argument designed to suppress vote in minority communities Published: 2 hours ago
(CNN) The Democratic National Committee is suing the Republican National Committee for aiding GOP nominee Donald Trump as he argues that the presidential election is “rigged,” claiming that Trump’s argument is designed to suppress the vote in minority communities.
The suit, filed Wednesday in US District Court in New Jersey, argues that the RNC has not sufficiently rebuked Trump for the line of attack, which he has used as a rallying cry and is assumed to be a way to explain away a potential loss on Election Day.
What (more) we’ve learned about Clinton’s circle, Neera Tanden from email hack | 0 |
On Friday’s “Real Time with Bill Maher” on HBO, host and comedian Bill Maher interviewed Breitbart News Alex Marlow. The two discussed Breitbart’s coverage, the media, Russia, free speech, the shooting at a congressional baseball practice, and political rhetoric. Marlow said that Breitbart is “not going to cover the exact same stories the exact same way as all the other outlets. We’ll leave that to the rest of the establishment press. We’re very much trying to highlight stories that we don’t think get their fair day. ” After the discussion turned to Russia, Marlow stated that there was no evidence of collusion or obstruction of justice, adding, “You guys continue to talk about this story in the establishment press instead of talking about the president’s agenda, which is by design. Because you guys won’t apologize if it turns out there’s nothing, no one will come out on MSNBC, they’ll just move on to the next hysteria, and that’s a huge advantage for people like me who are covering the rest of the news. ” Marlow later said, “I love highlighting Muslim voices who are progressive and reformist and want to take out some of the misogyny and some of the hatred associated with radical elements of it. And I think that’s an important place to start, but to bring back what Breitbart does different than anyone else, is we cover stories the establishment press doesn’t want to cover. ” On free speech, Maher and Marlow agreed that if the depictions of the assassination of President Trump were of President Obama, the reaction on the left would be different. Maher then raised corporations pulling ads from people who engage in speech they do not like. Marlow said, “This really started — in my view — in the modern era, with Breitbart — where a lot of people are boycotting Breitbart. And what they’re doing is, there’s a lot of anonymous people online, cowardly people. We don’t know who’s funding them. We don’t know who they are, who are putting out all of this misinformation about who we are and what we stand for, and they’re trying to round up corporations to boycott us. And so, what’s happened is that corporations are now deciding what’s free and fair speech, who can make a living, what opinions you can make a living saying now, and, of course, now, you’re seeing the right fight fire with fire and want boycotts of when the left takes it too far in their Trump hatred. So it’s a very dangerous path we’re on, and I really do think, Bill, and I appreciate you giving me this opportunity, people on the left and the right who are free speech advocates need to come together right now and say that corporations are not going to define the First Amendment and free speech in this country. ” Marlow said that he does not believe Bernie Sanders is at fault for the congressional baseball practice shooting and continued, “When you have a climate where you have, CNN, for example, calling Breitbart to the number one platform for the Nazi salute over a video we never played and CNN played, when you have the New York Times accusing Breitbart of putting racist dog whistles out, when the media lies so much about people, calling Trump supporters racists, despicable, deplorable, all of these things over and over … ” Maher cut in, “They have been racist, despicable, and deplorable. ” Marlow concluded, “I encourage everyone to go to breitbart. . You can meet some of the Breitbart reporters, the Breitbart editors. They’re the most wonderful, diverse, influential journalists on the planet, and no one is interested in their real story because they’re so quick to call people racist. And it’s not working. That is why so many Democrats are losing across the country. … And so, if you want to play that game, Bill, if you want to keep calling us racists, I don’t think it’s going to work for you, so please, have at it. ” Follow Breitbart. tv on Twitter @BreitbartVideo. | 1 |
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LAS VEGAS, NV – Patient Brian McDowell put on a show for the ages, as he became the first patient on a hospital bed to successfully leap through a ring of fire unscathed. Performed during a matinee show at the MGM Grand Hospital yesterday, health care personnel applaud the act, calling it the best combination of entertainment and treatment in recent memory.
“There hasn’t been much to write about since Philip Rogers rode in a wheelchair through a halfpipe back in 2001,” wrote local entertainment reporter Eva Roberts. “All we’ve had is magic mouthwash and pet therapy , but that’s about it. McDowell’s death-defying leap against patient safety precautions was a much needed breath of fresh air.” Thankfully, the Joint Commission wasn’t there to witness it.
The 55-year-old McDowell has always been a lifelong adventurer. His youth saw participation in skateboarding, snowboarding, and motocross biking until “a few too many broken bones ” sidelined him for good over two decades ago. However, it was during this most recent hospitalization that McDowell felt the old itch come back and thought the hospital was just the place to get things started.
“The way I saw it, the worst thing that happens, I get set on fire and there’s a burn unit right here; or if I broke a bone, I knew ortho , PT, and OT would be ready and waiting,” explained McDowell. “Best case scenario I’ve provided a hospital, a setting not typically known for world-class entertainment, something to talk about for weeks, months, maybe even years to come.” McDowell idolized Rogers and his wheelchair X Games jumps, and wanted to make a name for himself in a hospital one day.
After convincing his transport tech to arrange the ramps accordingly and give him a good running push, McDowell used his arms and body to steer the hospital bed before he took off “like a Haldol blowdart ,” guiding himself through the heart of the ring of fire. His landing was perfect, no bedsheets were singed, and everyone there to witness the feat got on their feet to give McDowell a rousing standing ovation .
Though McDowell is being treated for asthma exacerbation, he reassures his family, friends, and Gomerblog that the smoke inhalation while passing through the smoky ring of fire was “minimal,”“worth it,” and “better than a ring of my aunt’s perfume.”
McDowell finishes an albuterol nebulizer treatment, takes the mask off, and hacks up some charred mucous. “If it brought a smile to even one person who looked up from their charting , it was worth it, it was totally worth it.” 87 Shares | 0 |
BEIJING — The anesthesia was administered, and Lu Yi gradually lost consciousness. Over the next 30 minutes, a doctor retrieved eight eggs from her body. They were transferred to a liquid nitrogen storage chamber, where the fragile bubbles of human potential entered a frozen future full of hope and uncertainty. Ms. Lu has a business degree from Stanford University and founded a company in Shanghai that connects Chinese cancer patients with American medical specialists. But like many other women, she has found it difficult to pursue both career and family. “I knew at some point I might want to have children, but definitely not now,” said Ms. Lu, who is single. So last year, at the age of 34, she decided to have her eggs frozen. China prohibits fertility treatments for unmarried women, so she underwent the procedure in California, joining the growing number of single Chinese women going abroad to have their eggs frozen as a way to preserve an option and control the pace of their lives. That there even was such an option was unknown to much of the Chinese public until last year, when the actress Xu Jinglei posted on Weibo that she had gone to the United States to have her eggs frozen in 2013. “It was the first time that many of us learned that this technology exists,” Ms. Lu said. “We thought, if she can do it, why can’t I?” According to the National Health and Family Planning Commission of China, assisted reproductive technologies are denied to “single women and couples who are not in line with the nation’s population and family planning regulations. ” Even married women must provide proof of marriage, a license to give birth and evidence either of infertility or of medical treatments that could impair fertility, such as chemotherapy. The restrictions have been driven in part by population controls that have been in place since 1979. The recent easing of those controls, allowing all families two children, do not apply to unmarried women. “There is still a lack of enthusiasm for reproductive technologies, because the government is worried about the negative impact on its population policies, and possible problems like a black market for human eggs,” said Wang Hongxia, a researcher at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences specializing in urban and demographic development. “So the solution was to ban them at the cost of reproductive rights for certain groups, like unmarried women. ” In addition, Ms. Wang said, “The idea of women having babies out of wedlock is in conflict with the sense of moral order within the society. ” Ms. Xu’s account of her own experience set off a public debate in China over access to fertility treatments. CCTV, the state broadcaster, responded to her statement with a segment on that reiterated the restrictions. But a Weibo poll conducted after the show attracted more than 83, 000 respondents, with nearly 80 percent voting against the ban on egg freezing for unmarried women. Determined single women circumvent the law the way Ms. Xu did: by leaving China. “Regulations simply cannot stop people from going elsewhere,” Ms. Lu said. Among them is Ye Qinmin, 39, an interior designer in Shanghai who had her eggs frozen at a reproductive clinic in Canada. “The government shouldn’t have a say about my ovaries just because I’m not married,” she said. Medical consultancies have begun to capitalize on this trend, bridging the gap between Chinese citizens and foreign fertility clinics. “We’ve seen a 10 to 15 percent annual increase in demand for services in the U. S. in the last three years,” said Yang Jie, the marketing director of Travel Healthcare, an agency in Shanghai that cooperates with Oregon Reproductive Medicine. The agency assists clients with visa applications, airport pickups, housing, translators, even drivers. “Whatever our clients need, we will arrange for them,” Ms. Yang said. She added that Travel Healthcare also held seminars and promoted its services to employees of major companies in Shanghai. Some American clinics have also set up offices in China. Six doctors at HRC Fertility, a chain of clinics, established Mengmei, which now has offices in 10 Chinese cities. Its website reads: “We offer reproductive services to L. G. B. T. s, H. I. V. patients and single women to help them achieve their dreams. ” “Most of our clients are affluent and Chinese women in their 30s,’’ said Deng Xuyang, Mengmei’s chief executive. “They are open enough to seek the service and can afford it. ” In the United States, egg freezing typically costs between $11, 000 and $16, 000, and annual storage fees range from $450 to $600. “We partner with different companies to reach out to potential clients,” Mr. Deng said. “We also work with real estate groups to combine open houses abroad with visits to our clinics. ’’ According to data from the Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology, 33 out of 51 clinics in California provide services tailored to Chinese clients, such as documents and websites in Chinese, and staff. However, the rising popularity of the procedure among women like Ms. Lu has not yet matched its outcomes. According to Dr. Kevin Doody, the society’s from 2009 to 2014, the number of cycles in the United States rose from 568 to 6, 165. For this same period, however, the live birthrate from thawed eggs was just below 24 percent, he said in an interview. Both the quality and quantity of a woman’s eggs decline over time, especially after the age of 34. And the procedure can have side effects. Ms. Lu was in the 1 percent of patients who experienced ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome from the medication that promotes egg growth. “I looked like I was eight months pregnant by the end of day five,” she said. “I wasn’t sure if I would be able to continue. But I kept telling myself, I must go on, I will go on. ” Ms. Lu chronicled her experiences on WeChat, the microblog service, and received more than 100, 000 views. She also set up a group chat with more than 100 Chinese women who were either considering or were in the process of having their eggs frozen. “We share information, support each other,’’ Ms. Lu said. “Some even go to the U. S. together for the procedure. ” For now, Ms. Lu continues to focus on her company, while holding onto the thought that she has bought herself more time to attend to her personal life. Looking back on her decision to freeze her eggs, she said, “It changed nothing and everything. ” | 1 |
The state of Virginia refuses to track the number of refugees it resettles who are diagnosed with active tuberculosis (TB). [This refusal continues even as the number of cases diagnosed in the state has increased for two consecutive years, from 180 in 2013 — the year former Democratic National Committee chairman Terry McAuliffe, a staunch Clinton ally, was elected governor — to 198 in 2014, the year he took office, to 212 in 2015, the last year for which data is available. The percentage of cases of TB in Virginia has increased from 74 percent in 2013 (147 out of 180) to 79 percent in 2015 (168 out of 212) well above the national average of 66 percent in 2015 (6, 350 out of 9, 536). In the Centers for Disease Control’s (CDC) Reported Tuberculosis in the United States, 2015, those 6, 350 cases of TB were broken down into the following categories of immigration status upon arrival: But the Virginia Department of Health (VDH) does not think it should be a priority to track TB cases by category, as do 44 states who have provided the CDC with that data since 2012 (Tennessee became the 45th state to do so in 2014) in its annual Report on Tuberculosis in the United States. “The Virginia Department of Health does not collect the data you have requested,” a spokesperson for VDH responded when Breitbart asked to know the immigration status upon first entry of the 168 residents of Virginia diagnosed with active TB in 2015. “When the revised Report of Verified Case of Tuberculosis was adopted in 2009, the additional variables regarding immigration status were not required by CDC to be collected. The Virginia Department of Health TB program did not consider this information a priority for surveillance, since it already collected country of origin and arrival date for foreign born people,” the spokesperson responded when Breitbart asked why Virginia fails to provide the data 45 other states do to the CDC. “We collect surveillance data to track tuberculosis in Virginia and to prioritize our prevention efforts. All refugees and B1 immigrants are evaluated for TB when they enter the country and if they have disease they will be treated. Prompt treatment for active disease is the primary intervention public health has to control tuberculosis,” the spokesperson answered when asked why Virginia does not consider the information a priority for surveillance, though 45 other states and the CDC do, adding: As you can see from the national data available not very many refugees are diagnosed with tuberculosis once they get here. In Virginia, the number would be insignificant and it would not contribute to planning or thinking about prevention efforts, therefore collecting that information was not a priority for surveillance. Every state has different populations and different approaches to data collection within a general framework provided by the CDC. As a result each state and indeed even at the county and city level the focus will be based on what the risks are among the population in that location. (emphasis added) The spokesperson did not respond when Breitbart asked for evidence to support the assertion that “ not very many refugees are diagnosed with tuberculosis once they get here. ” The overwhelming evidence presented in numerous medical reports shows exactly the opposite — the per capita rate of active TB among refugees is much higher than the per capita rate in the general population, and by an order of magnitude. The rate of TB among the general population was 3. 0 per 100, 000 in 2015. In contrast, the estimated rate of TB among refugees nationally exceeded 20 cases per 100, 000 refugees that same year (409 cases diagnosed in 45 reporting states where an estimated two million refugees reside). In states where cases of TB are significantly above the national average, like Virginia, the estimated rate of TB among refugees is even higher. McAuliffe has been a advocate of open borders and refugees. In November 2015 he very publicly refused to ask the Obama administration to halt the resettlement of Syrian refugees in the state. “Gov. Terry McAuliffe said Tuesday that he would veto any attempt by the General Assembly to block Syrian refugees from coming to the state, dismissing the idea as ‘political posturing’ ” Richmond. com reported at the time. The number of Syrian refugees resettled in the state by the Obama administration increased significantly after that statement, from 21 in the three years between FY 2013 and FY 2015, to 196 in FY 2016, according to the Department of State’s interactive website. Syrian refugees have been resettled in Virginia in the first three months of FY 2017. Virginia’s problem with TB began before McAuliffe was elected governor in 2013. In 2002, for instance, TB cases were only 60 percent of all TB cases in the state. Since then, a total of 19, 213 refugees have been resettled in the state, according to the Department of State’s interactive website. In 2007, an influx of refugees from high TB burden countries like Bhutan and Burma began. In the four years between FY 2003 and FY 2006, 117 refugees were resettled in Virginia from Burma. In the four subsequent years, FY 2007 to FY 2010, 969 refugees were resettled from Burma. In the five years between FY 2003 and FY 2007, no refugees were resettled in Virginia from Bhutan. In the five subsequent years, FY 2008 to FY 2012, 2, 233 refugees were resettled from Bhutan. Virginia does, however, track country of origin for TB cases. In 2015, 23 of Virginia’s 168 cases of TB were from the Philippines, 17 were from Viet Nam, 17 were from India, seven were from Haiti, five were from Mexico, one was from China, and 98 were from “all other” 136 countries. Very few of the 69, 933 refugees resettled in the United States in FY 2015 arrived from the Philippines, Viet Nam, India, Haiti, Mexico, or China. The vast majority — 99 percent, or 69, 843 out of 69, 933 — arrived from the 136 countries in the “all other” category. (69, 843 out of 69, 933). In FY 2016, 99 percent of the refugees resettled in the United States (84, 878 out of 84, 995) arrived from the 136 countries in the “all other” category, according to the Department of State. | 1 |
President Trump hinted that it is “possible” that the FBI’s top post will be filled by Friday, according to a White House press pool report released Saturday. [Trump mentioned that he might even make the final decision on who gets the top FBI post before he leaves for Saudi Arabia Friday, saying “even that is possible. ” “We can make a fast decision,” Trump said, explaining the FBI’s vetting process. Trump spoke highly of the candidates for the position, describing them as “very ” and “ ” people with a lot of talent, according to the pool report. The president did not say whether these candidates are being vetted for the interim director or permanent director position. “Almost all of them are very well known,” he said. “They’ve been vetted over their lifetime, essentially. But very well known, highly respected, really talented people. And that’s what we want for the FBI. ” Four candidates for the permanent position to replace former FBI director James Comey are being interviewed Saturday by Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, Fox News reported. The four candidates include Assistant Attorney General Alice Fisher, acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe, Sen. John Cornyn ( ) and New York Court of Appeals Judge Michael J. Garcia. Trump said he would have fired Comey “regardless” of the recommendations he received from Sessions and Rosenstein in an interview with NBC Nightly News Thursday. The White House told Breitbart News Wednesday that Comey’s inability to handle the FBI’s tendency to leak to the media “was one of many” reasons why Trump was dissatisfied with his performance. | 1 |
Criminal are generating around 35 billion USD in revenue from the migrant trade, according to the International Organisation for Migration (IOM). [Lacy Swing, who heads the United Nations agency, estimated that around 1, 700 migrants have died while in the care of this year. Around 5, 000 died in 2016, and 3, 700 in 2015, suggesting a worrying upward trend. Swing cautioned that we should be “careful” when considering these figures, however, “because those are the people we know who died, how many other bodies are submerged in the Mediterranean or buried in the sands of the Sahara?” He added: “That’s the tragedy and this is why we are so concerned to try to caution migrants about smugglers. The smugglers are really the big problem. It’s about $35 billion a year [that people smugglers make] and we know they’re making lots of money across the Mediterranean. ” People smugglers make about USD 35 billion a year @IOMchief https: . pic. twitter. — IOM (@UNmigration) June 1, 2017, Swing claimed the migrant crisis was being exacerbated by “unprecedented sentiment,” although he did not appear to offer any explanation as to the mechanism through which this alleged sentiment could contribute to the issue. He added that feelings were “fueled now by suspicions that some of those fleeing terrorism might be terrorists themselves” — a possible reference to migrants like the Islamist refugee Ramadan Abedi, whose son Salman killed 22 children, young people and parents at Britain’s Manchester Arena in May or bogus asylum seeker Anis Amri, who drove a hijacked lorry into a Christmas market in Berlin last year. The IOM has actively supported open borders and mass immigration throughout the migrant crisis, claiming that, “with 244 million people on the move, migration is inevitable, necessary, and desirable” as part of its #ForMigration campaign. With 244 million people on the move, migration is inevitable, necessary, and desirable: https: . #ForMigration pic. twitter. — IOM (@UNmigration) May 19, 2017, Significantly, a comprehensive Risk Analysis by the European Union Border Agency (Frontex) indicates that global bodies’ relaxed and even welcoming attitude towards mass immigration is a large part of the problem when it comes to with the “taxi service” to Europe offered by the authorities and NGOs strengthening their business model, encouraging more journeys and, inevitably, resulting in more drownings. “Apparently, all parties involved in [ ] operations in the Central Mediterranean unintentionally help criminals achieve their objectives at minimum cost [and] strengthen their business model by increasing the chances of success,” the report noted. “Migrants and refugees — encouraged by the stories of those who had successfully made it in the past — attempt the dangerous crossing since they are aware of and rely on humanitarian assistance to reach the EU. ” Stopping the boats has stopped the drownings. Australia’s “tough love” policy less deadly than EU’s. https: . — Jack Montgomery ن (@JackBMontgomery) February 8, 2017, Worryingly, is known to be a significant source of income for terror groups such as the Islamic State, which was reported to have made over $320 million from the trade in 2015. This suggests that, so long as continues relatively unchecked, efforts to cut off the revenue streams to Islamic radicals will be unsuccessful. | 1 |
Apple built an empire on hermetically sealed systems with sleek, minimalist designs. Nowhere was its strategy more evident than in iMessage, the company’s instant messaging system that offered a free, elegant chatting solution exclusive to Apple devices. Until last week, that is, when Apple updated its software, cracked open iMessage and allowed the ephemera of the outside internet to seep in. Now, click on an unassuming arrow in the chat window, and you’ll throw open a junk drawer of digital tchotchkes scavenged from web properties new and old. GIFs, stickers and supersized emoji dominate this digital playground, while text — actual words — becomes almost an afterthought. But unlike the freewheeling world of the outside web, where we grab and go as we please, Apple is steering users toward a tightly curated selection of toys. None would look out of place at a ’s birthday party. Many come at a price. Welcome to Apple’s sanitized, monetized version of internet culture. Apple’s extreme messaging makeover gives us a suite of new visual effects — throw confetti, release balloons and shoot lasers across the text screen — that recall the crude, décor of GeoCities sites. Another set of tricks turns the text box into a kind of slick, improvised web video: The “loud” effect makes the chat bubble stretch and tremble as it’s delivered, while the “gentle” effect shrinks it down to visualize a whimper. The most superfluous piece of flair is the “digital touch” feature, which conjures a beating heart or a sizzling fireball when you press on the screen just so. These features mimic the aesthetics of the open internet, which is obsessed with nostalgia and is not exactly subtle. But they can’t replicate the feeling of collecting digital miscellany in our travels across the internet, remixing the material and sending it along to friends who might appreciate the find. The programmatic iMessage sucks the spontaneity from the experience. It standardizes the strange. Several new features, meanwhile, blow up iMessage’s intimate chat experience to help it compete with the social networks. A handy GIF keyboard jumps off the empire that Tumblr built, calling up video loops of broadly accessible cultural references (Honey Boo Boo dancing, two Minions giggling) to convey a range of emotional states. Another feature lets you directly onto your photos, just like you can on Snapchat. But mostly, this thing feels like Facebook. A new class of iMessage apps — yes, apps within an app — lets chatters play Words With Friends, send money through Square or make dinner reservations on OpenTable, all right within the chat window. It feels like iMessage is trying to swallow the rest of your phone. The camera is in here, and so too can be Fandango, ESPN, and, if you want, Carrot, a snarky robot that reads you the weather report for $3. 99. In many of these cases, the service is so slight that exchanging actual words would work just fine: Want to see “Snowden” at 10:15? Did you catch the Nats game? It’s 77 and sunny — greeaaaaat. It’s not clear why every shade of human interaction needs to be mediated by its own app. Here’s one theory: Each tap into the iMessage world sends you further away from your chat bubbles and deeper into Apple’s labyrinth of special features. Follow the path to its inevitable conclusion, and all of a sudden, you’re no longer talking with your friends. You’re shopping. Five clicks into iMessage, you’ll arrive at Apple’s sticker shop. Offering colorful sets of illustrations to drag and drop into your chats, it’s one of iMessage’s most tantalizing new destinations. If our chat windows function as modern living rooms, stickers offer the opportunity to appoint our walls with art from digital creators. Too bad Apple is most excited to highlight stuff created by brands. This past weekend, the app store showcased sticker packs sponsored by Pokémon, Star Wars and Disney. Other top offerings came from the Powerpuff Girls, Marvel, Sesame Street, Sephora, the Backstreet Boys and Ellen DeGeneres, who’s charging $1. 99 for a set of illustrations including an avocado in a top hat and a cucumber in a snapback cap. The products are ads for other products. iMessage is the iPhone’s most trafficked feature. Its chats facilitate an endless combination of social interactions and emotional expressions. But Apple’s shop suggests that all conversations would improve from a Party redecoration, with generic celebratory sentiments and flair. “Stickers” sound inherently childish, but they don’t have to be. The stickerification of chats was pioneered by Line, a Japanese chat giant that swept Asia and is lately making a bid for western audiences. Line loves corporate synergy, too, heralding sticker sets starring Snoopy, Super Mario and Hello Kitty. But even as it attempts world chat domination, Line services online subcultures. Dozens of sticker sets feature gay characters, and more than one — “Fangirl’s Activities” and “I Love KPOP” — depicts anime girls in various states of obsession. Then there’s the sex stuff. The “UMAOTOKO” sticker shows two men in horse costumes, uh, stretching together. The most risqué sticker I could find in Apple’s version was in a set called “Failmoji. ” It’s a butt with the caption “FART! !” Apple’s chat overhaul ushers elements of internet creativity into the company’s tightly controlled . But the most truly creative expression to unfurl inside iMessages so far has been made in opposition to Apple’s imposed boundaries. Madison Malone Kircher, a writer at the New York magazine tech blog Select All, wrote a handy guide to using iMessage to “annoy the hell out of your friends. ” When the tech writer Casey Johnston updated her phone and the new iMessage, she posted screenshots of herself and a friend virtually vandalizing their chat window with smarmy pregnancy stickers, effects and graphics layered so high the images became unintelligible. As Ms. Johnston put it: “The race to find the worst thing iOS can possibly do is on. ” May I suggest this celebrity sticker pack created in the image of the white rapper ? | 1 |
11. July 10, 2012: Remarks With Foreign Minister Pham Binh Minh After Their Meeting “So we’re working on expanding it through a far-reaching, new regional trade agreement called the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which would lower trade barriers while raising standards on everything from labor conditions to environmental protection to intellectual property. Both of our countries will benefit. And in fact, economists expect that Vietnam would be among the countries under the Trans-Pacific Partnership to benefit the most. And we hope to finalize this agreement by the end of the year.” 12. July 10, 2012: Remarks at American Chamber of Commerce Reception and Commercial Signings “Domestic and international businesses alike continue to face rules that restrict their activities, and that, in turn, deters investment and slows growth. So we are encouraging the Government of Vietnam to keep on the path of economic and administrative reform to open its markets to greater private investment. And through the Trans-Pacific Partnership, we’re working with Vietnam and seven other nations to lower trade barriers throughout the region, as we ensure the highest standards for labor, environmental, and intellectual property protections. Vietnam was an early entrant to the TPP, and we’re hoping we can finalize the agreement this year. And the economic analysis is that of all the countries that will be participating — Australia, Canada, Mexico, others — of all the countries participating in the TPP, Vietnam stands to benefit the most. So we’re hoping to really see this agreement finalized and then watch it take off.” 13. July 8, 2012: Remarks With Foreign Minister Koichiro Gemba “We also discussed the opportunity to strengthen our economic relationship, and the United States welcomes Japan’s interest in the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which we think will connect economies throughout the region, making trade and investment easier, spurring exports, creating jobs. The TPP is just one element of our increased focus on the Asia Pacific, but it is important that we recognize that the Japanese-American relationship is really at the cornerstone of everything we are doing in the Asia Pacific. We are not only treaty allies; we are friends and partners with common interests and shared values.” 14. April 30, 2012: Remarks With Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, Philippines Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario, and Philippines Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin After Their Meeting “Finally, we discussed the maturing economic relationship between our countries as well as our shared commitment to enhanced development, trade, and investment. We would like to see the Philippines join the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade community. The foreign secretary raised the Philippines’ interest in seeking passage of the Save our Industries Act, and we have conveyed that message to the United States Congress.” 15. April 12, 2012: Remarks at the White House Conference on Connecting the Americas “Now President Obama and I have said many times that this will be America’s Pacific century, and we are focused on the broader Pacific. But remember, the Pacific runs from the Indian Ocean to the western shores of Latin America. We see this as one large area for our strategic focus. That’s why we’re working with APEC; that’s why we’re creating the Trans-Pacific Partnership. We recognize the mutual benefits of engagement between the Americas and the rest of the Pacific.” 16. April 10, 2012: Forrestal Lecture at the Naval Academy “As part of that same trip last November, the President built momentum for a new far-reaching trade agreement called the Trans-Pacific Partnership that we are negotiating with eight other countries in the Asia-Pacific region. This agreement is not just about eliminating barriers to trade, although that is crucial for boosting U.S. exports and creating jobs here at home. It’s also about agreeing on the rules of the road for an integrated Pacific economy that is open, free, transparent, and fair. It will put in place strong protections for workers, the environment, intellectual property, and innovation — all key American values. And it will cover emerging issues such as the connectivity of regional supply chains, the competitive impact of state-owned enterprises, and create trade opportunities for more small-and-medium-sized businesses.” 17. April 21, 2012: Keynote Address At Global Business Conference “Big or small, we’re standing up for an economic system that benefits everyone, like when our Embassy in Manila worked with Filipino authorities on new intellectual property protections or when our negotiators ensure that the new Trans-Pacific Partnership requires that state-owned enterprises compete under the same rules as private companies.” 18. February 1, 2012: Remarks With Singaporean Foreign Minister and Minister for Law K. Shanmugam “This is a very consequential relationship. The multidimensional growth of our relationship with Singapore is an example of the importance that the United States sets on strengthening our engagement in the Asia Pacific. We are working together on a full range of issues, including moving forward on a high-quality trade agreement through the Trans-Pacific Partnership process.” 19. December 19, 2011: Remarks With Japanese Foreign Minister Koichiro Gemba After Their Meeting “The minister and I also discussed a number of bilateral and regional issues and reviewed the close and ongoing collaboration between Japan and the United States in the aftermath of last March’s earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear crisis. We discussed Japan’s recent move to pursue consultations on joining the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations to resolve longstanding trade concerns in order to deepen the economic ties to the benefit of both our countries. I also urged that Japan take decisive steps so that it accedes to The Hague Convention on International Parental Child Abduction and address outstanding cases.” 20. November 18, 2011: Remarks at ASEAN Business and Investment Summit “Now let me describe briefly four ways that we want to work with you: first, by lowering trade barriers; second, by strengthening the investment climate; third, by pursuing commercial diplomacy; and fourth, by supporting entrepreneurs. We’re excited about the innovative trade agreement called the Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP. That would bring economies from across the Pacific, developed and developing alike, into a single trading community, not only to create more growth, but better growth.” 21. November 16, 2011: Presentation of the Order of Lakandula, Signing of the Partnership for Growth And Joint Press Availability With Philippines Foreign Secretary Albert Del Rosario “Together we hope to deliver an array of benefits to the people, including more foreign investment to create new jobs, a more streamlined court system that can deliver justice and protect local businesses, better services, and more resources to fight poverty. Over time, these steps will better position the Philippines to join the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which we hope will dramatically increase trade and investment among the peoples of the Pacific.” 22. November 10, 2011: America’s Pacific Century “There is new momentum in our trade agenda with the recent passage of the U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement and our ongoing work on a binding, high-quality Trans-Pacific Partnership, the so-called TPP. The TPP will bring together economies from across the Pacific, developed and developing alike, into a single 21st century trading community. A rules-based order will also be critical to meeting APEC’s goal of eventually creating a free trade area of the Asia Pacific.” 23. October 14, 2011: Economic Statecraft One of America’s great successes of the past century was to build a strong network of relationships and institutions across the Atlantic — an investment that continues to pay off today. One of our great projects in this century will be to do the same across the Pacific. Our Free Trade Agreement with South Korea, our commitment to the Trans-Pacific Partnership, are clear demonstrations that we are not only a resident military and diplomatic power in Asia, we are a resident economic power and we are there to stay.” 24. September 15, 2011: Celebrating 60 years of the U.S.-Australia Alliance “We are working to encourage trade through the Trans-Pacific Partnership and through APEC, whose leaders the President will be hosting this fall in Hawaii. Together, we are strengthening regional institutions like the East Asia Summit and ASEAN. And as Secretary Panetta will explain, our military relationship is deepening and becoming even more consequential.” 25. July 25, 2011: Remarks on Principles for Prosperity in the Asia-Pacific “That is the spirit behind the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the so-called TPP, which we hope to outline by the time of APEC in November, because this agreement will bring together economies from across the Pacific—developed and developing alike—into a single trading community.” 26. July 20, 2011: Remarks on India and the United States: A Vision for the 21st Century “The United States is pushing forward on comprehensive trade deals like the Trans-Pacific Partnership and our free trade agreement with South Korea. We are also stepping up our commercial diplomacy and pursuing a robust economic agenda at APEC. India, for its part, has concluded or will soon conclude new bilateral economic partnerships with Singapore, Malaysia, Japan, South Korea, and others. The more our countries trade and invest with each other and with other partners, the more central the Asia Pacific region becomes to global commerce and prosperity, and the more interest we both have in maintaining stability and security. As the stakes grow higher, we should use our shared commitment to make sure that we have maritime security and freedom of navigation. We need to combat piracy together. We have immediate tasks that we must get about determining.” 27. May 17, 2011: Secretary Clinton’s Remarks With New Zealand Foreign Minister Murray McCully “We looked ahead to the East Asia summit where President Obama will participate for the first time, and the United States will send our largest, most senior delegation ever to the Pacific Island Forum in New Zealand later this year. We talked about developments in Fiji, and both New Zealand and the United States agree that the military junta must take steps to return Fiji to democracy. And we agree on the importance of pursuing negotiations on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which will provide a free trade agreement for nine countries across the region, including both of ours. We’re making steady progress on this. We hope to be able to have the negotiations complete by the time we all meet in Hawaii for APEC toward the end of this year.” 28. May 2, 2011: Remarks With Australian Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd After Their Meeting “And both of us understand the benefits of deeper economic integration and fair trade. Minister Rudd was very influential in helping us to work toward a greater, more relevant involvement in the Pacific-Asian institutions, such as joining the East Asian Summit. The Trans-Pacific Partnership, which is exploring ways to expand opportunity, is critical, and APEC and ASEAN are two other organizations where we work together.” 29. April 17, 2011: Remarks at the American Chamber of Commerce Breakfast “We will be hosting the 2011 APEC summit in Hawaii later this year. We are pushing to advance economic integration, remove trade barriers, and make sure that our national regulations line up in a way that encourages trade. We are also working hard on the trans-Pacific partnership, a cutting edge regional free trade agreement that would eventually cover an area responsible for over 40 percent of global trade.” 30. March 18, 2011: Remarks at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) on Latin America “As countries step up on the global stage, they will make essential contributions to helping all of us meet some of those most important challenges. Mexico, for example, made a crucial contribution to the fight against climate change through its remarkable leadership in Cancun last year. Brazil, Mexico, and Argentina in the G-20; Chile and Mexico in the OECD; Chile and Peru in the Trans-Pacific Partnership; and along with Mexico in APEC, these are all helping to build a foundation for balanced global growth, a transparent global economy, and broad-based opportunity. “ 31. March 9, 2011: Remarks at the First Senior Officials Meeting (SOM) for the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Forum “The United States is also making important progress on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which will bring together nine APEC economies in a cutting-edge, next generation trade deal, one that aims to eliminate all trade tariffs by 2015 while improving supply change, saving energy, enhancing business practices both through information technology and green technologies. To date, the TPP includes Brunei, Chile, New Zealand, Singapore, Australia, Malaysia, Peru, Vietnam and the United States.” 32. January 14, 2011: Inaugural Richard C. Holbrooke Lecture on a Broad Vision of U.S.-China Relations in the 21st Century “We are taking steps to ensure that our defense posture reflects the complex and evolving strategic environment in the region and we are working to ratify a free trade agreement with South Korea and pursuing a regional agreement through the Trans-Pacific Partnership to help create new opportunities for American companies and support new jobs here at home. Those goals will be front and center when we host the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Forum in Hawaii later this year.” 33: November 7, 2010: Remarks at U.S. Trade Promotion Event “Now, we’ve seen how bilateral trade benefits both sides. Our challenge now is to broaden those benefits. That means we have to look for even more opportunities to increase trade and investment between us. And it means that we work harder to broaden the benefits of trade even beyond our two countries. Australia is an important partner in negotiating the ambitious new multilateral trade deal called the Trans Pacific Partnership. Over time, we hope to deliver a groundbreaking agreement that connects countries as diverse as Peru and Vietnam with America and Australia to create a new free trade zone that can galvanize commerce, competition, and growth across the entire Pacific region.” 34. November 7, 2010: Speech and Townterview with Australian Broadcasting Company “To continue this progress, we are both pressing ahead on something called the Trans-Pacific Partnership. It’s an ambitious multilateral free trade agreement that would bring together many more nations of the Pacific Rim. Australia and the United States are helping to lead those negotiations and we’re also working through APEC, which the United States will host in Hawaii in 2011. We see that as a pivotal year to drive progress on internal economic changes that will open more markets and make sure that any growth is more sustainable and inclusive. And finally, we believe that the United States and Australia have been at the forefront of organize the entire region for the future.” 35. November 5, 2010: Christchurch Trade Reception Hosted by the American Chamber of Commerce “We are looking for ways to broaden and deepen our economic ties and build on the strong foundation we already have. And we think that the Trans-Pacific Partnership is a very exciting opportunity. This multilateral free trade agreement would bring together nine countries located in the Asia Pacific region — New Zealand and the United States, Australia, Chile, Singapore, Brunei, Peru, Vietnam, and Malaysia. By eliminating most tariffs and other trade barriers, and embracing productive policies on competition, intellectual property, and government procurement, we can spur greater trade and integration not only among the participating countries, but as a spur to the entire region.” 36. November 4, 2010: Remarks With New Zealand Prime Minister John Phillip Key and New Zealand Foreign Minister Murray Stuart McCully ” Well, let me say that we discussed at some length, both the foreign minister and I and then the prime minister and I, the way forward on trade. We are very committed to the Trans-Pacific Partnership, and New Zealand, again, is playing a leading role. And we want to expedite the negotiations as much as possible. So we are exploring ways that we can try to drive this agenda. I am absolutely convinced that opening up markets in Asia amongst all of us and doing so in a way that creates win-win situations so that people feel that trade is in their interests.” 37. November 3, 2010: Remarks at the Pratt & Whitney Trade Event “That is why the United States is very pleased by Malaysia’s decision to join the negotiations for the Trans Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership. This regional trade agreement will promote shared success by expanding markets and building a level playing field for workers in every country that participates.” 38. November 2, 2010: Remarks with Malaysian Foreign Minister Anifah Aman “Finally, we are pleased that Malaysia joined last month’s negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership. That is a pact that would expand markets and create a level playing field for people in every country that does participate. I know there are tough issues to work out, as there always are with these agreements, but Malaysia’s leadership in this region for greater economic growth is absolutely essential.” 39. November 2, 2010: Secretary Clinton’s Meeting with Kuala Lumpur Embassy Staff and Their Families “And I think we have tremendous opportunities here. But I know when I leave tomorrow, the work to make those opportunities into realities falls to all of you. So I know a lot is expected of you, but we’re going to be doing even more in Malaysia. We have a lot of plans for educational exchanges. We have some very exciting work on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, enhancing trade and investment (inaudible) that will promote closer cooperation.” 40. November 2, 2010: Townterview Hosted by Media Prima in Malaysia “So in our meetings with your government officials and even in my conversation with the prime minister earlier today, we of course talked about our bilateral relationship but we also talked about the role that Malaysia is playing in the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a new free trade agreement that will enhance market access, but also working to support Afghanistan and the people there with training and medical services.” 41. October 30, 2010:Remarks With Vietnamese Foreign Minister Pham Gia Khiem “I n trade, our two countries have already made great progress. Fifteen years ago, our bilateral trade was about $450 million. Last year it was more than $15 billion. And the foreign minister and the prime minister and I talked about how to expand this trade relationship, including through the Trans-Pacific Partnership. The United States, Vietnam, and seven other countries finished a third round of negotiations on the TPP this month and we hope that Vietnam can conclude it in internal process and announce its status as a full member of the partnership soon.” 42. October 28, 2010: America’s Engagement in the Asia-Pacific “We are also pressing ahead with negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership, an innovative, ambitious multilateral free trade agreement that would bring together nine Pacific Rim countries, including four new free trade partners for the United States, and potentially others in the future. 2011 will be a pivotal year for this agenda. Starting with the Korea Free Trade Agreement, continuing with the negotiation of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, working together for financial rebalancing at the G-20, and culminating at the APEC Leaders Summit in Hawaii, we have a historic chance to create broad, sustained, and balanced growth across the Asia Pacific and we intend to seize that.” 43. September 8, 2010: Remarks on United States Foreign Policy “On the economic front, we’ve expanded our relationship with APEC, which includes four of America’s top trading partners and receives 60 percent of our exports. We want to realize the benefits from greater economic integration. In order to do that, we have to be willing to play. To this end, we are working to ratify a free trade agreement with South Korea, we’re pursuing a regional agreement with the nations of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, and we know that that will help create new jobs and opportunities here at home.” 44. July 22, 2010: Remarks With Vietnam Deputy Prime Minister And Foreign Minister Pham Gia Khiem “And I am very much supportive of Vietnam’s participation as a full member in the Trans-Pacific Partnership. As Vietnam embarks on labor and other reforms, the American businesses that are investing in Vietnam can provide expertise that will aid Vietnam’s economic and infrastructure development.” 45. January 12, 2010: Remarks on Regional Architecture in Asia: Principles and Priorities “In addition, the United States is engaging in the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade negotiations as a mechanism for improving linkages among many of the major Asia-Pacific economies. And to build on political progress, we must support efforts to protect human rights and promote open societies.”
For once in our lifetime, we the people have an opportunity to elect a President who was NOT chosen by Multinational Corporations, Big Banks, DC Elites, and the Globalist Lapdog Mainstream Media.
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Advocates who want America’s immigration laws enforced have found a home in President Donald Trump’s administration, the New York Times’ Nicholas Kulish reports. [From the Times: For years, a network of immigration in Washington was known chiefly for fending off proposals to legalize the status of more people. But with the election of a president, these groups have moved unexpectedly to offense from defense, with some of their leaders now in positions to carry out their agenda on a national scale. … Mr. Trump’s senior White House adviser, Stephen Miller, worked tirelessly to defeat immigration reform as a staff member for Senator Jeff Sessions, now the attorney general. Gene P. Hamilton, who worked on illegal immigration as Mr. Sessions’s counsel on the Judiciary Committee, is now a senior counselor at the Department of Homeland Security, the parent agency of the Border Patrol and ICE, where Mr. Feere is working. Julia Hahn, who wrote about immigration for Breitbart — with headlines like “ Congress Oversees Importation of Somali Migrants” — has followed her former boss, Stephen K. Bannon, to the White House as a deputy policy strategist. … Their influence is already being felt. Mr. Trump is known for his pledges to deport millions of people here illegally and to build a border wall, but some of the administration’s more technical yet critical changes to immigration procedures came directly from officials with long ties to the groups. … Even those who have labored for decades to scale back immigration did not expect such a dramatic change. “This is inconceivable a year ago,” said Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies. “Frankly, it’s almost inconceivable six months ago. ” Click here for the rest of the article. | 1 |
LYON, France — The French leader Marine Le Pen delivered a grim populist kickoff to her burgeoning presidential campaign on Sunday, warning thousands of her supporters of “two totalitarianisms,” globalization and Islamism, that want to “subjugate France. ” Ms. Le Pen’s dark picture of a weakened France troubled by bureaucrats and burqas was a striking echo of themes being sounded across the Atlantic. France, a prosperous country with the world’s economy, was depicted as a besieged wreck. In a packed hall here, she made a point, in an hourlong speech brimming with nationalist fervor, of praising President Trump and the Americans who had elected him, as her supporters shouted forcefully, “This is our country!” Americans, she said, had “kept faith with their national interest,” even as she promised to do the same for France, saying the French had been “dispossessed of their patriotism. ” Whether it will sell in a country undoubtedly frightened by terrorism and weary of unemployment hovering around 10 percent is unclear, but it is certain that Ms. Le Pen’s National Front party is closer than it has ever been to gaining power in France after over 40 years of existence. Polls show that she is very likely to reach at least a second round of voting in France’s electoral process this spring. The weekend’s campaigning in this prosperous southeastern metropolis — her likely runoff opponent, Emmanuel Macron, the centrist former economy minister, also drew thousands to a rally across town on Saturday — offered a taste of the fierce electoral battle to come and a rerun of some of the American election’s dynamic. The populist Ms. Le Pen, 48, offered up a forbidding dystopia in urgent need of radical upheaval, much like Mr. Trump did. The boyish Mr. Macron — he is 39 and has created a nonparty political movement that has suddenly caught fire — spoke of “reconciling” France and of “working together,” and repeatedly addressed more than 10, 000 supporters in a giant stadium as “my friends. ” France would certainly stay in the European Union, in his view, and there would be none of Ms. Le Pen’s war on globalization. The crowd spilled onto the grounds outside the stadium, forcing many to watch Mr. Macron on huge screens. He took a backhanded slap at Mr. Trump, promising refuge in enlightened France to American scientists, academics and companies “fighting obscurantism” at home. They would have, “as of next May,” the date of the presidential runoff, “a homeland, and that will be France,” Mr. Macron promised. The candidates both present themselves as outsiders — Mr. Macron served in the Socialist government but is not a Socialist, while Ms. Le Pen’s party has never held power — but the crowds at the two rallies were a study in contrast. Judging by a interviews, Mr. Macron’s group was peppered with teachers, doctors, academics, civil servants and men who described themselves as “heads of companies. ” In contrast, Ms. Le Pen’s crowd was full of factory workers and former soldiers, and it adored her thundering opening line: “I’m against the Right of money, and the Left of money. I’m the candidate of the people!” Still, the slickly produced National Front event at Lyon’s modernist conference center, full of party functionaries in blazers scurrying about, showed how far the party has come from its disreputable ragtag origins in the early 1970s, when it emerged as a xenophobic coalition of former Nazi collaborators and disgruntled veterans of the Algerian war who had not forgiven the country’s leaders for having agreed to Algeria’s independence — like Ms. Le Pen’s father, the party’s founder, Le Pen. She has effectively kicked him out of the party. But Ms. Le Pen’s populist tirade echoed with many of the former patriarch’s themes. She delivered her speech against a screen projecting the words “In the Name of the People,” and it was full of immigrants committing crimes, jihadists plotting attacks and European Union bureaucrats stealing jobs from the French. Ms. Le Pen promised to crack down on all of them. Clearly buoyed by Mr. Trump’s victory after years of electoral defeats in France — “The impossible becomes the possible,” Ms. Le Pen said of it — she offered a sketch of what her presidency might look like. She promised to hold a referendum within six months on European Union membership, which she called a “nightmare,” secure the country’s borders and pull France out of NATO. Foreigners, she said, were eating up France’s social benefits and offering little in return. “Our benefits are distributed to people all over the world,” she said. But in contrast to Mr. Trump, for Ms. Le Pen restoring what she called “sovereignty” to France appeared as an end in itself. She offered no return to a golden age of prosperity for her country, promising instead to “restore order” within five years. Ruin was just around the corner, in her telling. “After decades of cowardice and our choice is a choice of civilization,” she said. “Will our children live in a country that is still French and democratic?” The crowd ate it up. “She’s got a real program, in the name of the people, for the workers, and by the workers,” said Eric Fusis, a retired military officer from the Doubs. “It’s for the nation, and not for the financial sector and the banks,” he said. | 1 |
. Mr Netanyahu has presented this as a rebuff to those who accuse him of jeopardising Israeli security interests with his governments repeated affronts to the White House.
In the past weeks alone, defence minister Avigdor Lieberman has compared last years nuclear deal between Washington and Iran with the 1938 Munich pact, which bolstered Hitler; and Mr Netanyahu has implied that US opposition to settlement expansion is the same as support for the ethnic cleansing of Jews.
American president Barack Obama, meanwhile, hopes to stifle his own critics who insinuate that he is anti-Israel. The deal should serve as a fillip too for Hillary Clinton, the Democratic partys candidate to succeed Mr Obama in Novembers election.
In reality, however, the Obama administration has quietly punished Mr Netanyahu for his misbehaviour. Israeli expectations of a $4.5bn-a-year deal were whittled down after Mr Netanyahu stalled negotiations last year as he sought to recruit Congress to his battle against the Iran deal.
In fact, Israel already receives roughly $3.8bn if Congresss assistance on developing missile defence programmes is factored in. Notably, Israel has been forced to promise not to approach Congress for extra funds.
The deal takes into account neither inflation nor the dollars depreciation against the shekel.
A bigger blow still is the White Houses demand to phase out a special exemption that allowed Israel to spend nearly 40 per cent of aid locally on weapon and fuel purchases. Israel will soon have to buy all its armaments from the US, ending what amounted to a subsidy to its own arms industry.
Nonetheless, Washingtons renewed military largesse in the face of almost continual insults inevitably fuels claims that the Israeli tail is wagging the US dog. Even The New York Times has described the aid package as too big.
Since the 1973 war, Israel has received at least $100bn in military aid, with more assistance hidden from view. Back in the 1970s, Washington paid half of Israels military budget. Today it still foots a fifth of the bill, despite Israels economic success.
But the US expects a return on its massive investment. As the late Israeli politician-general Ariel Sharon once observed, Israel has been a US aircraft carrier in the Middle East, acting as the regional bully and carrying out operations that benefit Washington.
Almost no one blames the US for Israeli attacks that wiped out Iraqs and Syrias nuclear programmes. A nuclear-armed Iraq or Syria would have deterred later US-backed moves at regime overthrow, as well as countering the strategic advantage Israel derives from its own nuclear arsenal.
In addition, Israels US-sponsored military prowess is a triple boon to the US weapons industry, the countrys most powerful lobby. Public funds are siphoned off to let Israel buy goodies from American arms makers. That, in turn, serves as a shop window for other customers and spurs an endless and lucrative game of catch-up in the rest of the Middle East.
The first F-35 fighter jets to arrive in Israel in December their various components produced in 46 US states will increase the clamour for the cutting-edge warplane.
Israel is also a front-line laboratory, as former Israeli army negotiator Eival Gilady admitted at the weekend, that develops and field-tests new technology Washington can later use itself.
The US is planning to buy back the missile interception system Iron Dome which neutralises battlefield threats of retaliation it largely paid for. Israel works closely too with the US in developing cyberwarfare, such as the Stuxnet worm that damaged Irans civilian nuclear programme.
But the clearest message from Israels new aid package is one delivered to the Palestinians: Washington sees no pressing strategic interest in ending the occupation. It stood up to Mr Netanyahu over the Iran deal but will not risk a damaging clash over Palestinian statehood.
Some believe that Mr Obama signed the aid package to win the credibility necessary to overcome his domestic Israel lobby and pull a rabbit from the hat: an initiative, unveiled shortly before he leaves office, that corners Mr Netanyahu into making peace.
Hopes have been raised by an expected meeting at the United Nations in New York on Wednesday. But their first talks in 10 months are planned only to demonstrate unity to confound critics of the aid deal.
If Mr Obama really wanted to pressure Mr Netanyahu, he would have used the aid agreement as leverage. Now Mr Netanyahu need not fear US financial retaliation, even as he intensifies effective annexation of the West Bank.
Mr Netanyahu has drawn the right lesson from the aid deal he can act against the Palestinians with continuing US impunity.
- See more at: http://www.jonathan-cook.net/2016-09-19/palestinians-lose-in-us-military-aid-deal-with-israel/#sthash.fL4Eq28N.dpuf Forget the FBI Cache; The Podesta Emails Show How America is Run By Thomas Frank
November 01, 2016 " Information Clearing House " - " The Guardian " - T he emails currently roiling the US presidential campaign are part of some unknown digital collection amassed by the troublesome Anthony Weiner, but if your purpose is to understand the clique of people who dominate Washington today, the emails that really matter are the ones being slowly released by WikiLeaks from the hacked account of Hillary Clintons campaign chair John Podesta. They are last weeks scandal in a year running over with scandals, but in truth their significance goes far beyond mere scandal: they are a window into the soul of the Democratic party and into the dreams and thoughts of the class to whom the party answers.
The class to which I refer is not rising in angry protest; they are by and large pretty satisfied, pretty contented. Nobody takes road trips to exotic West Virginia to see what the members of this class looks like or how they live; on the contrary, they are the ones for whom such stories are written. This bunch doesnt have to make do with a comb-over TV mountebank for a leader; for this class, the choices are always pretty good, and this year they happen to be excellent.
They are the comfortable and well-educated mainstay of our modern Democratic party. They are also the grandees of our national media; the architects of our software; the designers of our streets; the high officials of our banking system; the authors of just about every plan to fix social security or fine-tune the Middle East with precision droning. They are, they think, not a class at all but rather the enlightened ones, the people who must be answered to but who need never explain themselves.
Let us turn the magnifying glass on them for a change, by sorting through the hacked personal emails of John Podesta, who has been a Washington power broker for decades. I admit that I feel uncomfortable digging through this hoard; stealing someones email is a crime, after all, and it is outrageous that peoples personal information has been exposed, since WikiLeaks doesnt seem to have redacted the emails in any way. There is also the issue of authenticity to contend with: we dont know absolutely and for sure that these emails were not tampered with by whoever stole them from John Podesta. The supposed authors of the messages are refusing to confirm or deny their authenticity, and though they seem to be real, there is a small possibility they arent.
Republican nominee hunkers down at Valley Forge; surrogates spread out as campaign enters final week; Clinton camp accuses FBI of double standards
With all that taken into consideration, I think the WikiLeaks releases furnish us with an opportunity to observe the upper reaches of the American status hierarchy in all its righteousness and majesty.
The dramatis personae of the liberal class are all present in this amazing body of work: financial innovators. High-achieving colleagues attempting to get jobs for their high-achieving children. Foundation executives doing fine and noble things. Prizes, of course, and high academic achievement.
Certain industries loom large and virtuous here. Hillarys ingratiating speeches to Wall Street are well known of course, but what is remarkable is that, in the party of Jackson and Bryan and Roosevelt, smiling financiers now seem to stand on every corner, constantly proffering advice about this and that. In one now-famous email chain, for example, the reader can watch current US trade representative Michael Froman, writing from a Citibank email address in 2008, appear to name President Obamas cabinet even before the great hope-and-change election was decided (incidentally, an important clue to understanding why that greatest of zombie banks was never put out of its misery).
The far-sighted innovators of Silicon Valley are also here in force, interacting all the time with the leaders of the party of the people. We watch as Podesta appears to email Sheryl Sandberg. He makes plans to visit Mark Zuckerberg (who, according to one missive, wants to learn more about next steps for his philanthropy and social action). Podesta exchanges emails with an entrepreneur about an ugly race now unfolding for Silicon Valleys seat in Congress; this man, in turn, appears to forward to Podesta the remarks of yet another Silicon Valley grandee, who complains that one of the Democratic combatants in that fight was criticizing billionaires who give to Democrats. Specifically, the miscreant Dem in question was said to be:
spinning (and attacking) donors who have supported Democrats. John Arnold and Marc Leder have both given to Cory Booker, Joe Kennedy, and others. He is also attacking every billionaire that donates to [Congressional candidate] Ro [Khanna], many whom support other Democrats as well.
Attacking billionaires! In the year 2015! It was, one of the correspondents appears to write, madness and political malpractice of the party to allow this to continue.
There are wonderful things to be found in this treasure trove when you search the gilded words Davos or Tahoe. But it is when you search Vineyard on the WikiLeaks dump that you realize these people truly inhabit a different world from the rest of us. By vineyard, of course, they mean Marthas Vineyard, the ritzy vacation resort island off the coast of Massachusetts where presidents Clinton and Obama spent most of their summer vacations. The Vineyard is a place for the very, very rich to unwind, yes, but as we learn from these emails, it is also a place of high idealism; a land of enlightened liberal commitment far beyond anything ordinary citizens can ever achieve.
Consider, for example, the 2015 email from a foundation executive to a retired mortgage banker (who then seems to have forwarded the note on to Podesta, and thus into history) expressing concern that Hillarys image is being torn apart in the media and theres not enough effective push back. The public eavesdrops as yet another financier invites Podesta to a dinner featuring food produced exclusively by the islands farmers and fishermen which will be matched with specially selected wines. We learn how a Hillary campaign aide recommended that a policy statement appear on a certain day so that It wont get in the way of any other news we are trying to make but far enough ahead of Hamptons and Vineyard money events. We even read the pleadings of a man who wants to be invited to a state dinner at the White House and who offers, as one of several exhibits in his favor, the fact that he joined the DSCC Majority Trust in Marthas Vineyard (contributing over $32,400 to Democratic senators) in July 2014.
(Hilariously, in another email chain , the Clinton team appears to scheme to hit Bernie Sanders for attending DSCC retreats on Marthas Vineyard with lobbyists.)
Then there is the apparent nepotism, the dozens if not hundreds of mundane emails in which petitioners for this or that plum Washington job or high-profile academic appointment politely appeal to Podesta the ward-heeler of the meritocratic elite for a solicitous word whispered in the ear of a powerful crony.
This genre of Podesta email, in which people try to arrange jobs for themselves or their kids, points us toward the most fundamental thing we know about the people at the top of this class: their loyalty to one another and the way it overrides everything else. Of course Hillary Clinton staffed her state department with investment bankers and then did speaking engagements for investment banks as soon as she was done at the state department. Of course she appears to think that any kind of bank reform should come from the industry itself. And of course no elite bankers were ever prosecuted by the Obama administration. Read these emails and you understand, with a start, that the people at the top tier of American life all know each other. They are all engaged in promoting one anothers careers, constantly.
Everything blurs into everything else in this world. The state department, the banks, Silicon Valley, the nonprofits, the Global CEO Advisory Firm that appears to have solicited donations for the Clinton Foundation. Executives here go from foundation to government to thinktank to startup. There are honors. Venture capital. Foundation grants. Endowed chairs. Advanced degrees. For them the door revolves. The friends all succeed. They break every boundary.
But the One Big Boundary remains. Yes, its all supposed to be a meritocracy. But if you arent part of this happy, prosperous in-group if you dont have John Podestas email address youre out. | 0 |
Mint Press News Tue, 25 Oct 2016 13:50 UTC An inmate makes a sandwich while working in the employees’ cafeteria at Coxsackie Correctional Facility in Coxsackie, N.Y. Food Services of America, a subsidiary of Services Group of America is funding efforts to keep marijuana illegal. It makes sense, considering that a vast majority of America's prisoners are locked in prison on marijuana charges, and the company stands to gain a lot of business from the laws staying the same. Marijuana.com report ed that the company donated $80,000 to a campaign committee opposing the legal cannabis measure on Arizona's November ballot. Services Group of America has been criticized in the past for providing food to prisons that failed to meet basic nutritional requirements. The report also indicated that the Arizona state Chamber of Commerce contributed $498,000 to the same campaign week. The effort also received a half million dollar donation from opioid maker Insys Therapeutics as well as sizeable contributions from various players in the alcohol industry. The influence that the alcohol and pharmaceutical industries have on keeping marijuana illegal has been well documented, but the influence of prison contractors is rarely discussed. The prison industry is one of the fastest growing and top-earning businesses in the United States. In the past three decades, this enterprise has grown into a monstrous system of oppression that now houses over 2 and a half million people in the US. This number is, by far, the largest prison population in the world. No country on earth has as many inmates as the "land of the free." Ironic isn't it? Since 1991 the violent crime rate in America has dropped at least 20%, while the amount of people in prison has increased by 50% in that time. These numbers show that the rapid growth in the prison population is primarily due to over prosecution of nonviolent crimes. This has nothing to do with "cleaning up the streets" or making our society safer — it is all about money and control. The prison system as it stands now does not make our society any safer but instead turns average nonviolent offenders into hardened criminals by exposing them to such a harsh environment. The sad truth is that the way our prison system has been structured has actually outlawed more than half of the US population. Nonviolent offenders have no place behind bars. The savage conditions of prison will turn most people into violent offenders once they get out. Which is exactly what the prison establishment wants - return customers. This establishment is the collection of state and quasi-state/private industries that make up the "prison industrial complex." Billions of dollars are made every year in this industry. One company, Wackenhut Corrections, makes over a billion dollars a year and they aren't even the biggest prison service in the country. Comment: It's a no brainer why the US has more prison inmates than any other country in the world, private prisons get slave labor and are making billions of dollars in profits! These numbers also don't take into consideration the many satellite businesses that surround this industry. There are over 1,000 vendors that specifically sell correctional paraphernalia. Even local phone companies cash in on the operation. The companies install payphones for free because those phones can generate $15,000 per year from each inmate making a phone call every day. Those companies are just the tip of the iceberg. That isn't even counting the police, lawyers, wardens, politicians and food distributors that line their pockets through the incarceration of peaceful Americans. All of these organizations have a distinct interest in keeping nonviolent people in jail. So, it should come as no surprise a prison contractor is working to keep marijuana illegal. | 0 |
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EMAILS uncovered by global hacker conglomerate Wikileaks have confirmed that Hillary Clinton and her husband Bill went on an epic session during their visit to Dundalk in December of 2000.
Arriving in ‘the town’ to speak to 60,000 people, then-president Bill Clinton praised Dundalk for their part in cross-border relations and spoke of the influx of investment in the area from American companies such as Xerox.
However, leaked emails have revealed that rather than go straight on up to Dublin as once believed, the Clinton’s went on the lash in the town with a gang of lads from Drogheda before ending up ‘buckled’ in the Fairways at half three in the morning.
“The email was among those we found in a ‘deleted’ folder on Hillary’s old server,” said a spokesperson for Wikileaks.
“In it, she talks about being ‘pure dying’ the next day, after upwards of 9 pints of Harp and ‘a big feed out of Mullens’. This just goes to show how out of control things were during the Clinton administration, and it’s just the tip of the iceberg. Who’s to say what else went on that night? Did Bill end up fingering some young one from Muirhevnamor? We can only assume he did”.
Currently on the 2016 presidential campaign trail, Hillary Clinton declined to comment on the allegation, although a look of ‘oh fuck’ crept across her face when it was mentioned. | 0 |
WASHINGTON — Inside an opulent palace in Riyadh late one evening in February 2004, two American investigators interrogated a man they believed might hold answers to one of the lingering mysteries of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks: What role, if any, did officials in Saudi Arabia’s government play in the plot? The man under questioning, Fahad had been a Saudi consular official based in Los Angeles and the imam of a mosque visited by two of the hijackers. The investigators, staff members of the national commission who had waited all day at the United States Embassy before being summoned to the interview, believed that tying him to the plot could be a step toward proving Saudi government complicity in the attacks. They were unsuccessful. In two interviews lasting four hours, Mr. Thumairy, a father of two then in his early 30s, denied any ties to the hijackers or their known associates. Presented with phone records that seemed to contradict his answers, he gave no ground, saying the records were wrong or people were trying to smear him. The investigators wrote a report to their bosses saying they believed Mr. Thumairy was probably lying, though no government investigation into the Sept. 11 attacks has ever found conclusive evidence that Mr. Thumairy — or any other Saudi official — assisted in the plot. But nearly 15 years after the attacks on New York and Washington, the question of a Saudi connection has arisen again amid new calls for the release of a section of a 2002 congressional inquiry into the attacks that discusses a possible Saudi role in the terrorist plot — the 28 pages, whose secrecy has made them almost mythical. American officials who have read the 28 pages say that, of all the investigative leads in that section of the report, the unanswered questions about Mr. Thumairy and the two hijackers remain the most intriguing. If there was any Saudi government role whatsoever, some still believe, it most likely would have gone through Mr. Thumairy. The fact that years of investigation found no hard proof of official Saudi involvement has led some, notably the Saudi government, to argue that it is now the stuff of wild conjecture and conspiracy theory. The material in the 28 pages has been thoroughly investigated, the Saudi foreign minister, Adel said during a news conference here on Friday, and “those investigations have revealed that these allegations are not correct. ” “There is no there there,” he said. John O. Brennan, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, said during a recent interview with the Al Arabiya television network that while he supported the release of the 28 pages, “people shouldn’t take them as evidence of Saudi complicity in the attacks. ” American investigations into he said, concluded that the attacks were the work of “Al Qaeda, of Bin Laden” and “others of that ilk. ” But to some, all the circumstantial evidence provides a glimpse of a truth that has yet to be unearthed. “It’s one of those cases where there are an awful lot of very troubling coincidences,” said Richard L. Lambert, who oversaw the investigation into the hijackers’ contacts as the assistant agent in charge of the F. B. I. ’s San Diego office in the year after the attacks. At the F. B. I. the Sept. 11 plot officially remains an open case. While there is broad agreement on how it unfolded, there are aspects of the investigation that remain unresolved. And the mystery begins with the arrival at Los Angeles International Airport on Jan. 15, 2000, of two Saudi men who more than year and a half later would be among the hijackers who crashed American Airlines Flight 77 into the Pentagon. Apart from their proven devotion to the jihadist cause, the men, Nawaf and Khalid seemed unlikely choices for a pair of terrorists who would have to survive, and plot for months, in the United States. Neither spoke English or had experience navigating American life. That circumstance would make it all the more critical for the F. B. I. after the attacks, to find out whether the two hijackers received help after reaching Los Angeles. But after an exhaustive canvass of hotels, investigators were unable to find any definitive evidence of where and how Mr. Hazmi and Mr. Mihdhar spent their first two weeks in the United States. By some accounts, however, they worshiped at the King Fahad Mosque in the Culver City area, where Mr. Thumairy was an imam, and they may have stayed in a nearby apartment rented by the mosque. An F. B. I. document from 2012, cited last year by an independent review panel, concluded that Mr. Thumairy “immediately assigned an individual to take care of and during their time in the Los Angeles area. ” The review broadly upheld the conclusions of the commission on Saudi involvement, and the F. B. I. has still not been able to fill other gaps in the timeline of those initial two weeks in January 2000. When the two hijackers reappeared in early February, they were eating at a restaurant, Mediterranean Gourmet, near the mosque. There, they encountered Omar a fellow Saudi who was on the Saudi government payroll through the country’s civil aviation authority, possibly with an assignment to keep an eye out for Saudi dissidents in California. Mr. Bayoumi later told the F. B. I. that the meeting was happenstance — that he overheard Mr. Hazmi and Mr. Mihdhar, noticed their Gulf accents and struck up a conversation. But the bureau believed that Mr. Bayoumi had met with Mr. Thumairy at the mosque just before he met the hijackers in the restaurant, and investigators wondered whether Mr. Thumairy had arranged the meeting. At the time, Mr. Thumairy was part of a network of representatives of the Saudi Ministry of Islamic Affairs, which finances trains clerics and proselytizes the conservative and intolerant strain of Islam known as Wahhabism. During his interview in Riyadh in 2004, Mr. Thumairy spoke fondly of his six years in Los Angeles, praising the warm weather and friendly people. His job at the consulate and the nearby mosque, he said, was to answer religious questions. But investigators wrote that Mr. Thumairy appeared to be “deceptive” when questioned about his contacts, notably with Mr. Bayoumi. He denied knowing Mr. Bayoumi, despite telephone records that showed 21 calls between them over two years. Whether out of charitable instincts or at someone’s direction, Mr. Bayoumi, then 42, helped the two future hijackers settle in San Diego, in the apartment building where he himself lived. He the lease and paid the security deposit and first month’s rent, though they reimbursed him. Mr. Lambert, the former F. B. I. official in San Diego, said he was skeptical that the assistance was given by chance. With the plot riding on the hijackers’ ability to manage daily life, he said, Qaeda leaders would most likely have made arrangements to get them help. “I have to believe something was planned for the care and nurturing of these guys after they arrived,” he said. “They weren’t too sophisticated, and they didn’t speak English. They needed help getting settled and making preparations. ” There were other tantalizing suggestions of a possible network of supporters. Mr. Hazmi and Mr. Mihdhar began worshiping at a San Diego mosque where the imam was Anwar an American cleric who years later would became an infamous online recruiter for Al Qaeda. A Yemeni student named Mohdar Abdullah drove them around, helped them open bank accounts and connected them with flight schools. Two Saudi naval officers living in San Diego had telephone contact with Mr. Hazmi. But it was the connection that some investigators found to be the most suspicious. The first independent panel investigating the attacks, the Congressional Joint Inquiry, compiled a list of leads into the California part of the plot that it turned over to the F. B. I. and C. I. A. and eventually became part of the 28 pages withheld from the public version of the report. That section has remained classified even though the Saudi government has long called for its release. Mr. Jubeir, the Saudi minister, reiterated that call on Friday because, he said, his government could not “respond to blank pages. ” The questions about his government’s possible role are coming from several sources. The Senate unanimously passed a bill last month that would make it easier to sue the Saudi government for any role in the terrorist attacks, and the House might take up the bill next week. A lawsuit filed against Saudi Arabia on behalf of the families of those killed in the attacks continues its slow progress through the courts. Eleanor J. Hill, the staff director for the congressional inquiry, cautioned that the 28 pages were not a Rosetta Stone that would decipher the enduring puzzles of . “What the 28 pages are is a summary of the information given to the agencies for further investigation,” she said. “Nobody should be expecting that the 28 pages will give a final conclusion” In a statement in April, Thomas H. Kean and Lee Hamilton, the commission’s insisted that they took all questions about a possible Saudi role in the plot seriously, following up on the leads in the 28 pages. They said that while the commission had “not found evidence” that Mr. Thumairy assisted the hijackers, he was “still a person of interest” in the case. The commission’s final report said that “we have found no evidence that the Saudi government as an institution or senior Saudi officials individually funded” Al Qaeda. Today, some commission staff members point out that the wording did not rule out the possibility that Saudi officials had assisted the hijackers. They also said the commission operated under extreme time pressure and was not able to follow up fully on every lead. Mr. Thumairy’s visa was quietly revoked in 2003 because American officials believed he was a “radical imam,” documents show. When he tried to return to Los Angeles from a trip home, he was detained for two days and sent back to Saudi Arabia. But he told his interrogators that night in 2004 that he would never have knowingly assisted terrorists. “He said that he has always spread the message of peace, both in the U. S. and here in Saudi Arabia, and especially since ” the two commission investigators who questioned him, Dieter Snell and Rajesh De, wrote in their report on the interview. “He said he wants to work with the U. S. and the Saudi government because terrorism hurts everyone. ” | 1 |
In an essay published Tuesday on CNN’s website, President Obama renewed his call for American astronauts to visit Mars. “We have set a clear goal vital to the next chapter of America’s story in space: sending humans to Mars by the 2030s and returning them safely to Earth, with the ultimate ambition to one day remain there for an extended time,” he wrote. The plan is not new: The president laid out the same goal in 2010 during a speech at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. But the column on Tuesday, along with a joint blog post by senior White House and NASA officials, offered new details on how the United States expected to reach the red planet. In August, NASA awarded contracts to six companies to develop habitats that could eventually sustain astronauts on missions like Mars. On Tuesday, John P. Holdren, the White House science adviser, and Charles F. Bolden Jr. the NASA administrator, announced that NASA would also allow private companies to hitch their own modules to the International Space Station. In the next decade, the officials added, work aboard the space station will move into a stage in which new technologies will be tested in the stretch of space between Earth and the moon. Still, plenty of challenges remain. Here are some answers to the most pressing questions. Is travel to Mars even possible? Yes. For decades, a human mission to Mars has been regarded as difficult but doable, given enough time and money and a willingness to subject astronauts to risks like radiation during the long journey. Then why aren’t we there already? In his article, President Obama quoted John Noble Wilford, the New York Times reporter who covered the Apollo moon landings in the 1960s and ’70s. Mars tugs at the imagination “with a force mightier than gravity,” Mr. Wilford wrote. Wernher von Braun, the mastermind of Apollo, sketched out plans for reaching Mars, too. Back then, many people thought the journey would move from the moon to Mars in a decade or two. But President Richard M. Nixon pared back NASA’s grand ambitions, leaving just the space shuttle. Astronauts have not ventured beyond orbit since 1972, when the crew of Apollo 17 returned home after a trip to the moon. In 1989, on the 20th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing, President George Bush announced an initiative to send astronauts back to the moon and then onward to Mars. When NASA came back with a plan that was rumored to cost half a trillion dollars over two to three decades, the initiative faded. The main challenge is not technical it is political and financial. If Congress was to provide steady funding for the next 20 years, NASA could probably finish the task. But changes in presidential administrations have generally led to and changes in NASA’s marching orders. Unlike the flush years at the height of the Apollo program, peaking at 4. 4 percent of the federal budget in 1966, NASA’s budget today is steady and comparatively small: The $19. 3 billion for the space agency this year amounts to about 0. 5 percent of federal spending. Won’t SpaceX get there sooner? At the International Astronautical Congress last month in Guadalajara, Mexico, Elon Musk, the chief executive of SpaceX, announced his architecture for a giant rocket and spaceship — what he called the Interplanetary Transport System — that would take colonists to Mars, 100 at a time. The trips could begin as soon as 2024, he said. Mr. Musk was confident, but that was a highly optimistic timeline. His smaller, workhorse rocket, the Falcon 9, has had two catastrophic failures in the past two years. A larger rocket under development, the Falcon Heavy, is years behind schedule. SpaceX still has to prove new technologies, like the ability to land big spacecraft on Mars. And Mr. Musk was vague about how his company would pay for all this. SpaceX is still fairly small in size and profits, and Mr. Musk conceded that he would need to rely on “a huge partnerships. ” Has NASA been preparing for a trip to Mars? Yes, but the pace has been slow. NASA has never received a large infusion of money to pursue a trip to Mars. And while the destination has not changed, the details certainly have. For the last couple years, NASA news releases, web pages and social media postings have been festooned with the #JourneyToMars hashtag, tying a multitude of projects to the goal of sending astronauts to Mars. In 2010, the Obama administration scuttled the rockets and crew capsule that were to have been part of the canceled Constellation program in favor of developing better technologies for space travel. Members of Congress objected, particularly those from Texas and Florida, home to big NASA facilities. The Orion crew capsule from the Constellation program was revived, and Congress instructed NASA to start work on the Space Launch System, a rocket similar to the one that would have been built for the moon. The first launch of the Space Launch System, without a crew, is scheduled for late 2018. The second launch, with astronauts, would be at least three years later. The space agency is only now filling in details of what it would like to do on subsequent missions between Earth and the moon, which it calls “the proving ground. ” When might the work begin in earnest? Operating the International Space Station costs NASA $3 billion to $4 billion a year. Ditching the station — which NASA plans to do in 2024 — would free up money to build the other big pieces for a human Mars mission. Last year, a team at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory presented a proposal on how the agency could get to Mars in the early 2030s with its existing budget, along with increases to keep pace with inflation. It would not be enough for the astronauts to land on Mars, as a lander would be too expensive. This year, engineers at Lockheed Martin, building upon the pieces that NASA is developing, offered a proposal to send a spacecraft into orbit around Mars by 2028. NASA officials are not yet convinced. At the International Astronautical Congress meeting, William H. Gerstenmaier, NASA’s associate administrator for human exploration and operations, said he expected NASA astronauts in orbit around Mars in the 2030s. But a landing will not occur until the 2040s, he said. | 1 |
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Voter fraud has been on the minds of Republicans for a while now. It has been proven that while yes, there are isolated incidences of in-person voter fraud, there has never been a case where it was so rampant that it changed the results of an election. But that’s exactly what the GOP wants you to think is going on.
Donald Trump took Republican rhetoric about voter fraud and has ramped it up to an entirely new level, claiming that the upcoming election is going to be “rigged.” Apparently, Republicans are in on this alleged rigging along with Democrats, since a number of the states where the vote looks to be close are controlled by the GOP. And as everyone outside of Trump’s basket of deplorables knows, election mechanics are handled by the states, not the federal government.
How are Trump’s supporters reacting to all of his claims about voter fraud? Well, in at least one case the answer to that question is “By committing voter fraud themselves.”
Terri Lynn Rote, 55, an Iowa Trump supporter, has been charged with “election misconduct,” which is a Class D felony in the state. According to Iowa Public Radio, Rote allegedly voted for Trump twice when she cast her ballot during early voting. And her reason? She was afraid that her first vote would be changed to a vote for Hillary Clinton, so she voted again. The Des Moines Register reports that Rote voted once at the Polk County elections office , then again at a county satellite polling location.
Rote told Iowa Public Radio,
“I wasn’t planning on doing it twice, it was spur of the moment. The polls are rigged.”
According to the Register, Rote’s case was one of three voter fraud cases that occurred in Polk County alone. The other two incidents involved people who voted on mail-in ballots, then voted again in person. Polk County auditor Jamie Fitzgerald says this is the first time in his 12 years in office he has had to deal with even one case of voter fraud, let alone three. There are no details about who the other two suspects cast ballots for. The sad thing is, polls have been saying for weeks that Trump is going to win Iowa. Cases like this might put his win there in question, which would be a perfect example of poetic justice.
This is what the rhetoric about voter fraud has come t0 — people attempting to vote multiple times because they’re convinced that their chosen candidate is going to be cheated out of a legitimate win. Republicans, unwilling to accept that their policies are being rejected by a larger and larger segment of the U.S. population, are trying to sell the message that elections are being stolen from the GOP by “massive” voter fraud. Yet, time after time, it seems to be Republicans who are committing the lion’s share of it. They claim to love the country, but Trump and the GOP are deliberately undermining the foundation of a democracy — the integrity of the vote. Next, Trump will claim that people like Terri Rote are “political prisoners.” Just wait for it.
Featured image via Twitter | 0 |
White House Deputy Press Secretary Sarah Sanders indicated that President Donald Trump was anxious to continue draining the swamp and focusing on issues important to the American people, despite the ongoing investigation into Russia’s attempt to influence the election. [One reporter suggested during the White House press briefing that by firing Comey, Trump had made it more difficult to work with Democrats to solve other problems in Washington like health care. “Frankly, I don’t think it matters what this president says, you’re going to have Democrats come out and fight him every single step of the way,” Sanders said. “I think that’s one of the things that’s wrong with Washington, and I think that’s one of the reasons that we’ve got to get back to focusing those issues and frankly draining the swamp a little bit further. ” Sanders drew fire from Trump opponents for trying to move beyond the investigation, when so many Democrats were calling for a special independent prosecutor. But she assured reporters that there was still no evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, despite a year’s worth of speculation in the media. “I know that you all will not let this go until it does,” Sanders told reporters. “And so we’d love for that to be completed. Let’s put it behind us, let’s move on, and let’s focus on what we need to do to turn our country around. ” | 1 |
LONDON — The cat can stay. The only member of the household on Downing Street to be spared the indignity of one of the fastest political transitions in recent memory will be Larry the Cat, a tabby who holds the title of chief mouser to the cabinet office. The sudden victory of Theresa May, Britain’s home secretary, in the Conservative Party’s leadership contest on Monday put Prime Minister David Cameron in the unenviable position of having to vacate his residence in about 48 hours. A large blue moving van pulled up on Downing Street on Tuesday to retrieve the Cameron family’s belongings. It is a rite of passage Britain has experienced many times, but one that is unfamiliar for most Americans. In the United States, a newly elected president has more than two months — between Election Day in early November and Inauguration Day, Jan. 20 — to set up a new administration. Transitions in Britain are far swifter. A prime minister typically takes up official residence at 10 Downing Street upon getting the job, as Mr. Cameron did in 2010, when his Conservative Party took power after 13 years of Labour Party government. But the transition can seem even more jarring when a prime minister takes office without a general election. This occurred most recently in 2007, when Gordon Brown succeeded Tony Blair, and before that in 1990, when John Major took over from Margaret Thatcher. “The prime minister has said he is glad there will not be an elongated leadership process,” a spokesman for Mr. Cameron’s office said in a phone interview on Tuesday, speaking on condition of anonymity because of government protocol. He noted that the need for stability engendered by Britain’s vote to leave the European Union had created a sense of urgency. “This is how British democracy works. When the leader changes, the prime minister changes, and the evacuation of the premises soon follows. It’s a quick departure, but it is what it is. ” Mr. Cameron led his final cabinet meeting on Tuesday. On Wednesday, after his final prime minister’s questions in Parliament, he will visit Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace to tender his resignation. Shortly after, Ms. May will be granted an audience with the queen and invited to form a government. She and her husband, Philip, will most likely pose for a photo in front of 10 Downing Street with Mr. Cameron and his family, as their predecessors have done. Larry the Cat will be staying, the government spokesman said wryly, adding that Ms. May would inherit the tabby, adopted from an animal shelter in 2011 to help address a rat problem. Mr. Cameron made his resignation announcement on June 24, one day after the referendum to withdraw from the European Union, a decision commonly known as Brexit. On Monday, after he announced the timetable of his departure and expressed his support for Ms. May, he was recorded jovially humming as he 10 Downing Street, seemingly relieved. But the rapid departure poses logistical challenges for Mr. Cameron and his wife, Samantha, including the question of where to live. The Camerons have three children — their youngest, Florence, is 5 — and hope to stay in the capital. But their home in the North Kensington area of west London has been rented out, and their farmhouse in the hamlet of Dean, Oxfordshire, about 73 miles northwest of London, is probably too far for daily commuting. The arrival of the moving van at the rear entrance on Downing Street suggested that the Camerons have at least found temporary lodgings, although officials would not confirm this. The movers arrived with 330 boxes, 30 rolls of tape and three rolls of Bubble Wrap. Simply Removals, the company that handled the Camerons’ move into Downing Street in 2010, and calls itself “London’s affordable removal firm,” advertises a “Big One” package that includes 25 standard boxes, two large boxes, two wardrobe boxes, Bubble Wrap, packing paper and tape, for 169 pounds, or about $224. A recording on the company’s office phone extolled its qualifications, adding: “That’s why we were Prime Minister David Cameron’s choice when he first moved into No. 10. ” The house at 10 Downing Street has been the official residence of the prime minister since 1735, but the Cameron family actually lives in more spacious quarters at 11 Downing Street. That house is the official residence of the chancellor of the Exchequer, Britain’s finance minister. (In 2010, the chancellor, George Osborne, chose to remain at his residence in the Notting Hill section of west London.) Peter York, a cultural commentator, said the speed with which Mr. Cameron was being “ejected” reflected the viciousness of the power struggle within the Conservative Party. The party has been known for disposing of its leaders with ruthless efficiency, notably in 1990 when Mrs. Thatcher was effectively ousted in a party coup. “He is practically being thrown out of his house, though I dare say he will have some people to help him pack his bags,” Mr. York said in a phone interview. Comparing the Conservative establishment to an elite boarding school like Eton, which Mr. Cameron attended, Mr. York added: “They are saying: ‘You are no longer the head boy. Get out of the house. It’s for the good of the school. ’” Mr. York predicted that Ms. May, the daughter of a vicar, would bring a change in the atmospherics at 10 Downing Street, including, he said, replacing the “socially smart, ” social circles of the Camerons — the “Notting Hill set,” as observers often call it — with a middle England sensibility. “Theresa will make No. 10 more mainstream bourgeois, and redo the place for the era,” Mr. York predicted. “I imagine lots of floral sofas. ” | 1 |
With one dramatic no, a major artist has just escalated the culture world’s war against Donald J. Trump. For more than 20 years, the artist Christo has worked tirelessly and spent $15 million of his own money to create a vast public artwork in Colorado that would draw thousands of tourists and rival the ambition of “The Gates,” the saffron transformation of Central Park that made him and his collaborator and wife, two of the most artists of their generation. But Christo said this week that he had decided to walk away from the Colorado project — a silvery canopy suspended temporarily over 42 miles of the Arkansas River — because the terrain, federally owned, has a new landlord he refuses to have anything to do with: President Trump. His decision is by far the most visible — and costly — protest of the new administration from within the art world, whose dependence on and sometimes politically conservative collectors has tended to inhibit galleries, museums and artists from the kind of public disavowal of Mr. Trump expressed by some other segments of the creative world. Last week, the artist Richard Prince fired an opening salvo, returning a $36, 000 payment for an artwork depicting Ivanka Trump, the president’s daughter, owned by her family. The Christo project, titled “Over the River,” conceived with his wife, who died in 2009, has been fiercely opposed in state and federal court by a group of Coloradans who contend that it will endanger wildlife and cause other problems in Bighorn Sheep Canyon. Almost six miles of fabric panels were to be erected over the river for two weeks, at a cost that could have exceeded $50 million. Christo, who sells artwork depicting his proposed projects to pay for them completely on his own, has prevailed in every court battle and is awaiting a decision by a federal appeals court that would represent a final stand by opponents. But in an interview on Tuesday, he said that even if he won the case, he would no longer go forward with the work. “I came from a Communist country,” said Christo, 81, who was born Christo Vladimirov Javacheff in Bulgaria and moved to New York with in 1964, becoming an American citizen in 1973. “I use my own money and my own work and my own plans because I like to be totally free. And here now, the federal government is our landlord. They own the land. I can’t do a project that benefits this landlord. ” Asked to elaborate on his views of the new president, he said only, “The decision speaks for itself. ” He added, “My decision process was that, like many others, I never believed that Trump would be elected. ” The establishment art world is slowly beginning to become more vocal about Mr. Trump, invoking the power of past protest movements, like the Art Workers Coalition, whose Moratorium of Art to End the War in Vietnam pressured museums to close for a day in October 1969, and led the next year to an Art Strike Against Racism, War and Oppression, which drew picketers to the Metropolitan Museum of Art because it declined to shut its doors. In late November, more than 150 prominent artists, curators and gallery workers picketed in front of the Puck Building in Downtown Manhattan, owned by the family of Jared Kushner, Ivanka Trump’s husband and now a senior adviser to President Trump. Under the banner of a continuing and protest movement called Dear Ivanka, critics of the President have directed almost daily condemnations of his actions and policies to his daughter, a prominent art collector. And on Inauguration Day, dozens of galleries — and a few public art institutions — closed in cities across the country as a part of a movement, J20, that plans to broaden protest activities in the coming months to address issues like racism, immigration and gentrification. Aesthetic refusal as a form of protest does not have universal support in the art world. Some see it as ineffective, a defeatist position that denies the power of expression itself to effect change. “I would argue that this project, on a river that traverses both red and blue states, could draw attention to the importance of federal land management and stewardship of the environment,” said Tom Eccles, the executive director of the Center for Curatorial Studies at Bard College and former director of the Public Art Fund in New York. “If anything, Christo’s projects promote a sense of collective wonder, something we need more than ever right now. ” Hope Hicks, a spokeswoman for the White House, said it had no comment. Christo, whose work usually involves monumental wrapping or draping, a kind of beautifying abstraction of architecture or landscape, is known not only for “The Gates,” but also for highly visible projects like “Wrapped Reichstag,” in Berlin, realized in 1995 after more than 20 years of planning and proposals. Last year, “The Floating Piers,” a walkway of fabric atop 220, 000 interlocking polyethylene cubes on Lake Iseo in the Lombardy region of Italy, drew 1. 2 million visitors. The Colorado project would have been the largest work Christo had ever attempted in America. In interviews, he spoke about how the idea came about in 1985, during a project in which he and had wrapped the Pont Neuf in Paris. “We looked up at the fabric, and it was so beautiful, silvery and shimmering in the reflected light of the river, and we smiled at each other,” he said. The two inspected dozens of rivers and selected a length of the Arkansas, partly because it was a popular rafting spot, and the canopied fabric, stretched over steel wire cables anchored on the banks, would be best seen from beneath, on the water itself. The project, expected to take more than two years to construct, was to remain in place for two weeks, during an August, before, like all of Christo and ’s projects, being dismantled. In court, Christo argued that he had taken every step possible to prevent damage to the river, land around it, or animal or plant life. The group that has opposed him, Rags Over the Arkansas River, or ROAR, has argued that the federal Bureau of Land Management, in approving the project, failed to take sufficiently into account its possible threat to bighorn sheep and the impact on traffic on U. S. Highway 50 through the canyon. On Wednesday, Joan Anzelmo, a spokeswoman for ROAR, said it was “ecstatic” to hear of the decision, no matter what the artist’s reasons. “This means local people will now be protected,” she said, “as well as wildlife, birds and fish. ” In the interview on Tuesday, Christo said the patience required in seeking approval for his projects has always been an element of the spirit of the projects themselves. He needs to feel passion about them, in the same way that a more traditional painter or sculptor does, he added. But in this case, “that pleasure is gone” because of the nature of the new administration. “I am not excited about the project anymore,” he said. “Why should I spend more money on something I don’t want to do?” | 1 |
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