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OBAMACARE AND THE FORGOTTEN FAMILY: A Tale Of How The Middle Class Was Royally Scr*wed By Washington [Video]In light of Republican failure to pass the American Health Care Act, Charles Krauthammer dismissed the idea that Chuck Schumer would try to work with Republicans at all, since the Democrats are moving toward a single-payer system as the country increasingly expects coverage to be an entitlement:Read more: CNN

National Police Union Begs Trump To Make Racial Profiling Legal Again – And He Just MightThe National Fraternal Order of Police knows exactly what the President-elect s values are and knows it s a massive advantage in its quest to return America to a less progressive time.With full knowledge that Donald Trump does not give a damn about minorities and is in full support of profiling African Americans and Hispanics, the National Fraternal Order of Police has called on Trump to reverse or amend the broad, Bush-era ban on racial profiling. The ban on racial profiling has been around since 2003, when President George W. Bush created guidelines that prevented federal agents from factoring race or ethnicity in investigations. Now, the Fraternal Order of Police is acting to reverse that ban, as its website states that racial profiling is a statistical disparity and that the current ban burdens law enforcement agency to somehow prove itself innocent of engaging in the unlawful use of race in its procedures and practices. The organization also doesn t like that the ban is meant to protect racial and ethnic minorities, which they feel is excluding members of other races. While the proposed lifting of the ban is absolutely ridiculous, it becomes truly scary when you consider that Trump himself has implied that he is in favor of racial profiling. It was only a few months ago, in September, when Trump said that police forces needed more leniency when it comes to investigating people based on their race. Trump said: Our local police they know who a lot of these people are. They are afraid to do anything about it because they don t want to be accused of profiling.They see somebody that s suspicious, they will profile. Look what s going on: Do we really have a choice? We re trying to be so politically correct in our country, and this is only going to get worse. Apparently, Trump is oblivious to the fact that there have been various studies proving that racial profiling is ineffective and may actually be counterproductive. Of course, the National Fraternal Order of Police has accurately identified Trump as their guy. They not only supported him during his campaign, but noted his real commitment to law enforcement. The organization s president, Chuck Canterbury, said: Mr. Trump, however, has seriously looked at the issues facing law enforcement today. He understands and supports our priorities and our members believe he will make America safe again. Featured image via Drew Angerer / Getty Images

Florida nuclear plants to shut ahead of Hurricane Irma(Reuters) - Electricity generator Florida Power & Light said on Thursday it will shut its two nuclear power plants before Irma comes ashore as a very powerful hurricane. FPL, a subsidiary of NextEra Energy Inc, generates enough power for about 1.9 million homes at the Turkey Point and St. Lucie plants, which are both along Florida s Atlantic Coast, about 20 feet (6 meters) above sea level. We will safely shut down these nuclear plants well in advance of hurricane-force winds, and we ve finalized plans for that shutdown, FPL spokesman Rob Gould told a news conference. The company will adjust the plans as necessary, depending upon the path of the storm, Gould said. He would not comment on exactly when the plants would be taken down or how long they could be shut. The Energy Department said late on Thursday that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission expects Turkey Point to close on Friday evening and St. Lucie to shut about 12 hours later, depending on the storm s path. Irma, a Category 5 hurricane at the top of the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale, is packing winds of up to 180 miles (290 km) per hour. Present forecast models are showing it hitting the tip of Florida on Sunday morning and raking the whole state as it moves north over the peninsula the following couple of days, the Miami-based National Hurricane Center said. FPL says it has invested $3 billion to protect its electricity grid since 2005, when the last major hurricane damaged power facilities in Florida. But no grid is hurricane-proof, and if Irma stays on its path, many FPL customers will lose power, Gould said. The company, which serves about 10 million power customers across nearly half of Florida, may have to physically rebuild parts of the power system, Gould said. This could take weeks or longer if Irma s worst fears are realized, he said. Gould said FPL might have to turn off some substations ahead of any major flooding, a technique that could help the company restore power faster once any floodwaters recede, rather than keeping them on and allowing the storm to damage them. FPL s nuclear plants are protected by thick concrete and reinforced steel and like many plants around the world were bolstered further after the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan, Gould said. A series of explosions and meltdowns occurred at the Fukushima nuclear plant after a massive earthquake unleashed a powerful tsunami that shut the facility s cooling systems and led to meltdowns.

Hillary Clinton: Neocon War-Hawk in Waiting Robert Parry Consortium NewsIf there were any doubts that Hillary Clinton favours a neo-conservative foreign policy, her performance at Thursday s debate should have laid them to rest. In every meaningful sense, she is a neocon and if she becomes President Americans should expect more global tensions and conflicts in pursuit of the neocons signature goal of regime change in countries that get in their way.Beyond sharing this neocon regime change obsession, former Secretary of State Clinton also talks like a neocon. One of their trademark skills is to use propaganda or perception management to demonize their targets and to romanticize their allies, what is called glueing white hats on their side and glueing black hats on the other.So, in defending her role in the Libyan regime change, Clinton called the slain Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi genocidal though that is a gross exaggeration of Gaddafi s efforts to beat back Islamic militants in 2011. But her approach fits with what the neocons do. They realize that almost no one will dare challenge such a characterization because to do so opens you to accusations of being a Gaddafi apologist. Similarly, before the Iraq War, the neocons knew that they could level pretty much any charge against Saddam Hussein no matter how false or absurd, knowing that it would go uncontested in mainstream political and media circles. No one wanted to be a Saddam apologist. Clinton, like the neocons, also shows selective humanitarian outrage. For instance, she laments the suffering of Israelis under crude (almost never lethal) rocket fire from Gaza but shows next to no sympathy for Palestinians being slaughtered by sophisticated (highly lethal) Israeli missiles and bombs.She talks about the need for safe zones or no-fly zones for Syrians opposed to another demonized enemy, Syria s President Bashar al-Assad, but not for the people of Gaza who face the wrath of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Yes, I do still support a no-fly zone [in Syria] because I think we need to put in safe havens for those poor Syrians who are fleeing both Assad and ISIS and have some place that they can be safe, Clinton said. But she showed no such empathy for Palestinians defenseless against Israel s mowing the grass operations against men, women and children trapped in Gaza.In Clinton s (and the neocons ) worldview, the Israelis are the aggrieved victims and the Palestinians the heartless aggressors. Referring to the Gaza rocket fire, she said: I can tell you right now I have been there with Israeli officials going back more than 25 years that they do not seek this kind of attacks. They do not invite the rockets raining down on their towns and villages. They do not believe that there should be a constant incitement by Hamas aided and abetted by Iran against Israel. So, I don t know how you run a country when you are under constant threat, terrorist attack, rockets coming at you. You have a right to defend yourself. Gaza one year after Israel s Operation Protective Edge 2014Ignoring HistoryClinton ignored the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which dates back to the 1940s when Israeli terrorist organizations engaged in massacres to drive Palestinians from their ancestral lands and murdered British officials who were responsible for governing the territory. Israeli encroachment on Palestinian lands has continued to the present day.But Clinton framed the conflict entirely along the propaganda lines of the Israeli government: Remember, Israel left Gaza. They took out all the Israelis. They turned the keys over to the Palestinian people. And what happened? Hamas took over Gaza. So instead of having a thriving economy with the kind of opportunities that the children of the Palestinians deserve, we have a terrorist haven that is getting more and more rockets shipped in from Iran and elsewhere. So, Clinton made clear both at the debate and in her recent AIPAC speech that she is fully in line with the neocon reverence for Israel and eager to take out any government or group that Israel puts on its enemies list. While waxing rhapsodic about the U.S.-Israeli relationship promising to take it to the next level Clinton vows to challenge Syria, Iran, Russia and other countries that have resisted or obstructed the neocon/Israeli wish list for regime change. In response to Clinton s Israel-pandering, Sen. Bernie Sanders, who once worked on an Israeli kibbutz as a young man, did the unthinkable in American politics. He called out Clinton for her double standards on Israel-Palestine and suggested that Netanyahu may not be the greatest man on earth. You gave a major speech to AIPAC, Sanders said, and you barely mentioned the Palestinians. All that I am saying is we cannot continue to be one-sided. There are two sides to the issue. There comes a time when if we pursue justice and peace, we are going to have to say that Netanyahu is not right all of the time. But in Hillary Clinton s mind, the Israeli-Palestinian dispute is essentially one-sided. During her speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee last month, she depicted Israel as entirely an innocent victim in the Mideast conflicts. As we gather here, three evolving threats Iran s continued aggression, a rising tide of extremism across a wide arc of instability, and the growing effort to de-legitimize Israel on the world stage are converging to make the U.S.-Israel alliance more indispensable than ever, she declared. The United States and Israel must be closer than ever, stronger than ever and more determined than ever to prevail against our common adversaries and to advance our shared values. This is especially true at a time when Israel faces brutal terrorist stabbings, shootings and vehicle attacks at home. Parents worry about letting their children walk down the street. Families live in fear. Yet, Clinton made no reference to Palestinian parents who worry about their children walking down the street or playing on a beach and facing the possibility of sudden death from an Israeli drone or warplane. Instead, she scolded Palestinian adults. Palestinian leaders need to stop inciting violence, stop celebrating terrorists as martyrs and stop paying rewards to their families, she said.Then, Clinton promised to put her future administration at the service of the Israeli government. Clinton said: One of the first things I ll do in office is invite the Israeli prime minister to visit the White House. And I will send a delegation from the Pentagon and the Joint Chiefs to Israel for early consultations. Let s also expand our collaboration beyond security. Pleasing PhrasesIn selling her neocon policies to the American public, Clinton puts the military aspects in pleasing phrases, like safe zones and no-fly zones. Yet, what she means by that is that as President she will invade Syria and push regime change, following much the same course that she used to persuade a reluctant President Obama to invade Libya in 2011.The Libyan operation was sold as a humanitarian mission to protect innocent civilians though Gaddafi was targeting Islamic militants much as he claimed at the time and was not engaging in any mass slaughter of civilians. Clinton also knew that the European allies, such as France, had less than noble motives in wanting to take out Gaddafi.As Clinton confidant Sidney Blumenthal explained to her, the French were concerned that Gaddafi was working to develop a pan-African currency which would have given Francophone African countries greater freedom from their former colonial master and would undermine French economic dominance of those ex-colonies.In an April 2, 2011 email, Blumenthal informed Clinton that sources close to one of Gaddafi sons reported that Gaddafi s government had accumulated 143 tons of gold and a similar amount of silver that was intended to be used to establish a pan-African currency that would be an alternative to the French franc.Blumenthal added that this was one of the factors that influenced President Nicolas Sarkozy s decision to commit France to the attack on Libya. Sarkozy also wanted a greater share of Libya s oil production and to increase French influence in North Africa, Blumenthal wrote. Sarkozy and Gadaffi before they fell out. Photo Telegraph.But few Americans would rally to a war fought to keep North Africa under France s thumb. So, the winning approach was to demonize Gaddafi with salacious rumors about him giving Viagra to his troops so they could rape more, a ludicrous allegation that was raised by then-U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, who also claimed that Gaddafi s snipers were intentionally shooting children.With Americans fed a steady diet of such crude propaganda, there was little serious debate about the wisdom of Clinton s Libyan regime change. Meanwhile, other emails show that Clinton s advisers were contemplating how to exploit Gaddafi s overthrow as the dramatic moment to declare a Clinton Doctrine built on using smart power. On Oct. 20, 2011, when U.S.-backed rebels captured Gaddafi, sodomized him with a knife and then murdered him, Secretary of State Clinton couldn t contain her glee. Paraphrasing a famous Julius Caesar quote, she declared about Gaddafi, we came, we saw, he died. But this U.S.-organized regime change quickly turned sour as old tribal rivalries, which Gaddafi had contained, were unleashed. Plus, it turned out that Gaddafi s warnings that many of the rebels were Islamic militants turned out to be true. On Sept. 11, 2012, one extremist militia overran the U.S. consulate in Benghazi killing U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans.Soon, Libya slid into anarchy and Western nations abandoned their embassies in Tripoli. President Obama now terms the Libyan fiasco the biggest mistake of his presidency. But Clinton refuses to be chastened by the debacle, much as she appeared to learn nothing from her support for the Iraq invasion in 2003.The Libyan MirageDuring Thursday s debate instead of joining Obama in recognition of the Libyan failure Clinton acted as if she had overseen some glowing success: Well, let me say I think we did a great deal to help the Libyan people after Gaddafi s demise. We helped them hold two successful elections, something that is not easy, which they did very well because they had a pent-up desire to try to chart their own future after 42 years of dictatorship. I was very proud of that. We also worked to help them set up their government. We sent a lot of American experts there. We offered to help them secure their borders, to train a new military. They, at the end, when it came to security issues, did not want troops from any other country, not just us, European or other countries, in Libya. And so we were caught in a very difficult position. They could not provide security on their own, which we could see and we told them that, but they didn t want to have others helping to provide that security. And the result has been a clash between different parts of the country, terrorists taking up some locations in the country. But that is exactly the point. Like the earlier neocon-driven regime change in Iraq, the regime change obsession blinds the neocons from recognizing that not only are these operations violations of basic international law regarding sovereignty of other nations but the invasions unleash powerful internal rivalries that neocons, who know little about the inner workings of these countries, soon find they can t control.Yet, America s neocons are so arrogant and so influential that they simply move from one catastrophe to the next like a swarm of locust spreading chaos and death around the globe. They also adapt readily to changes in the political climate.That s why some savvy neocons, such as the Brookings Institution s Robert Kagan, have endorsed Clinton, who The New York Times reported has become The vessel into which many interventionists are pouring their hopes. Kagan told the Times: I feel comfortable with her on foreign policy. If she pursues a policy which we think she will pursue it s something that might have been called neocon, but clearly her supporters are not going to call it that; they are going to call it something else. Now with Clinton s election seemingly within reach, the neocons are even more excited about how they can get back to work achieving Syrian regime change, overturning Obama s nuclear deal with Iran, and what is becoming their ultimate goal destabilizing nuclear-armed Russia and seeking regime change in Moscow.After all, by helping Assad bring some stability to Syria and assisting Obama in securing the Iranian nuclear deal, Russian President Vladimir Putin has become what the neocons view as the linchpin of resistance to their regime change goals. Pull Putin down, the thinking goes, and the neocons can resume checking off their to-do list of Israel s adversaries: Syria, Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas, etc.And what could possibly go wrong by destabilizing nuclear-armed Russia and forcing some disruptive regime change ?By making Russia s economy scream and instigating a Maidan-style revolt in Moscow s Red Square, the neocons see their geopolitical path being cleared, but what they don t take into account is that the likely successor to Putin would not be some malleable drunk like the late Russian President Boris Yeltsin but, far more likely, a hardline nationalist who might be a lot more careless with the nuclear codes than Putin.But, hey, when has a neocon regime change scheme veered off into a dangerous and unanticipated direction?A Neocon True-BelieverIn Thursday s debate, Hillary Clinton showed how much she has become a neocon true-believer. Despite the catastrophic regime changes in Iraq and Libya, she vowed to invade Syria, although she dresses up that reality in pretty phrases like safe zones and no-fly zones. She also revived the idea of increasing the flow of weapons to moderate rebels although they, in reality, mostly fight under the command umbrella of Al Qaeda s Nusra Front.Clinton also suggested that the Syria mess can be blamed on President Obama s rejection of her recommendations in 2011 to authorize a more direct U.S. military intervention. Nobody stood up to Assad and removed him, Clinton said, and we have had a far greater disaster in Syria than we are currently dealing with right now in Libya. In other words, Clinton still harbors the regime change goal in Syria. But the problem always was that the anti-Assad forces were penetrated by Al Qaeda and what is now called the Islamic State. The more likely result from Clinton s goal of removing Assad would be the collapse of the Syrian security forces and a victory for Al Qaeda s Nusra Front and/or the Islamic State.If that were to happen, the horrific situation in Syria would become cataclysmic. Millions of Syrians, Alawites, Shiites, Christians, secularists and other infidels , would have to flee the beheading swords of these terror groups. That might well force a full-scale U.S. and European invasion of Syria with the bloody outcome probably similar to the disastrous Iraq War.The only reasonable hope for Syria is for the Assad regime and the less radical Sunni oppositionists to work out some power-sharing agreement, stabilize most of the country, neutralize to some degree the jihadists, and then hold elections, letting the Syrian people decide whether Assad must go! not the U.S. government. But that s not what Clinton wants.Perhaps even more dangerous, Clinton s bellicose rhetoric suggests that she would eagerly move into a dangerous Cold War confrontation with Russia under the upside-down propaganda theme blaming tensions in Eastern Europe on Russian aggression, not NATO s expansion up to Russia s borders and the U.S.-backed coup in Ukraine in 2014 which ousted an elected president and touched off a civil war.That coup, which followed neocon fury at Putin for his helping Obama avert U.S. bombing campaigns against Syria and Iran, was largely orchestrated by neocons associated with the U.S. government, including Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Victoria Nuland (Robert Kagan s wife), Sen. John McCain and National Endowment for Democracy President Carl Gershman. Nuland and the famous cookies.After the violent coup, when the people of Crimea voted by 96 percent to secede from Ukraine and rejoin Russia, the U.S. government and Western media deemed that a Russian invasion and when ethnic Russians in eastern Ukraine rose up in resistance to the new authorities in Kiev that became Russian aggression. NATO on the MoveThough President Obama should know better and I m told that he does know better he has succumbed this time to pressure to go along with what he calls the Washington playbook of saber-rattling and militarism. NATO is moving more and more combat troops up to the Russian border while Washington has organized punishing economic sanctions aimed at disrupting the Russian economy.Hillary Clinton appears fully onboard with the neocon goal of grabbing the Big Enchilada, regime change in Moscow. Rather than seeing the world as it is, she continues to look through the wrong end of the telescope in line with all the anti-Russian propaganda and the demonization of Putin, whom Clinton has compared to Hitler.Supporting NATO s military buildup on Russia s border, Clinton said: With Russia being more aggressive, making all kinds of intimidating moves toward the Baltic countries, we ve seen what they ve done in eastern Ukraine, we know how they want to rewrite the map of Europe, it is not in our interests [to reduce U.S. support for NATO]. Think of how much it would cost if Russia s aggression were not deterred because NATO was there on the front lines making it clear they could not move forward. Though Clinton s anti-Russian delusions are shared by many powerful people in Official Washington, they are no more accurate than the other claims about Iraq s WMD, Gaddafi passing out Viagra to his troops, the humanitarian need to invade Syria, the craziness about Iran being the principal source of terrorism (when it is the Saudis, the Qataris, the Turks and other Sunni powers that have bred Al Qaeda and the Islamic State), and the notion that the Palestinians are the ones picking on the Israelis, not the other way around.However, Clinton s buying into the neocon propaganda about Russia may be the most dangerous arguably existential threat that a Clinton presidency would present to the world. Yes, she may launch U.S. military strikes against the Syrian government (which could open the gates of Damascus to Al Qaeda and the Islamic State); yes, she might push Iran into renouncing the nuclear agreement (and putting the Israeli/neocon goal to bomb-bomb-bomb-Iran back on the table); yes, she might make Obama s progressive critics long for his more temperate presidency.But Clinton s potential escalation of the new Cold War with Russia could be both the most costly and conceivably the most suicidal feature of a Clinton-45 presidency.Unlike her times as Secretary of State, when Obama could block her militaristic schemes, there will be no one to stop her if she is elected President, surrounded by like-minded neocon advisers.***Investigative reporter Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s. You can buy his latest book, America s Stolen Narrative, either in print here or as an e-book (from Amazon and barnesandnoble.com).READ MORE US ELECTION NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire 2016 Election Files

WHERE’S THE OVERSIGHT? OBAMA FUNNELED BILLIONS to Liberal Groups Through DOJ ‘SLUSH FUND’ [Video] Advocates for big government and progressive power are using the Justice Department to extort money from corporations. It s a shakedown. It s corrupt, pure and simple. Tom Fitton, Judicial WatchHere s how it works: Remember when big banks were sued by the feds for supposed mortgage abuse or discrimination? The government basically extorted money from the banks and then incentivized the banks to settle by giving the money to third-party organizations. How convenient, right? It was a way to redistribute billions to radical organizations like La Raza!So far, investigators have accounted for $3 billion paid to non-victim entities . The underlying problem with the slush funds is we don t know exactly where the money is going. Using enforcement authority to go after corporate defendants, DOJ bureaucrats are taking billions away from taxpayers to fund their pet projects overriding congressional preferences. Ted Frank, director of The Competitive Enterprise Institute Center for Class Action Fairness. Somebody out to go to prison for this! -Former Gov. Mike Huckabee sounds off on DOJ bankrolling leftist groups pic.twitter.com/Ut7u7FYD62 FOX & friends (@foxandfriends) March 2, 2017READ MORE: FOX NEWS

Trump intensifies attacks on Ryan with four weeks left until Election DayOCALA, Fla./WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump escalated his attacks on U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan on Wednesday, deepening a fracture in the party with only four weeks to go until the Nov. 8 election. Trump, at a rally before thousands of supporters jammed into a livestock arena in Ocala, Florida, also attempted to drive voters away from Democratic rival Hillary Clinton with an overwhelmingly negative speech in which he described her as corrupt and unqualified for the presidency. Ryan said on Monday he was no longer going to campaign for or defend Trump and advised House Republicans not to support the White House candidate if they did not want to. His move followed outcry over a video that surfaced last Friday showing Trump bragging in 2005 about groping women and making unwanted sexual advances. Trump’s response to being abandoned by Ryan, the country’s most senior elected Republican, has veered between saying he feels free now to campaign on his own terms and assailing Ryan and other “disloyal” Republicans. “Already the Republican nominee has a massive disadvantage and especially when you have the leaders not putting their weight behind the people,” the New York businessman said on Wednesday, complaining that Ryan and others had not called to congratulate him on what he felt was a strong performance at a debate against Clinton on Sunday. “You’d think they’d say great going Don, let’s go. Let’s beat this crook,” Trump said. “No, he doesn’t do that,” he added of Ryan, as the crowd booed in sympathy. “There is a whole deal going on there. There is a whole deal going on and we’re going to figure it out. I always figure things out. But there’s a whole sinister deal going on.” The release of the video has plunged Trump and the Republican Party into a deep crisis that has jeopardized his chances of winning the White House, when he was already lagging Clinton in national opinion polls, and possibly put Republican control of the U.S. Congress in danger. Trump’s fresh round of attacks came even as his campaign manager, Kellyanne Conway, heard concerns from some House Republicans that Trump’s criticism of Ryan was distracting from his message on how to defeat Clinton and win the White House. Conway convened a conference call with House Republicans who support Trump that lasted about an hour. A congressional aide said Conway went through a list of differences between Trump and Clinton and talked about how to make the case for Trump and against Clinton. The general theme of comments from lawmakers on the call was that Trump needed to focus on his message to the United States and distinguish it from Clinton’s, the aide said. The aide said members specifically brought up Trump’s attacks on Ryan as a distraction from that message. The tone from House Republican was one of frustration at Trump’s attacks on a fellow Republican, the aide said. The campaign and Conway did not respond to requests for their comments about the call. Nonetheless, Ryan has been facing considerable blowback from a number of his fellow House Republicans since announcing his decision to focus on electing Republicans in Congress. Oklahoma Republican Jim Bridenstine, a member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, tweeted on Wednesday that he will not support Ryan – presumably, for speaker in the next Congress — because of Ryan’s failure to defend Trump. “Given the stakes of this election, If Paul Ryan isn’t for Trump, then I’m not for Paul Ryan,” Bridenstine tweeted. Republican Senator John Thune, who called for Trump to withdraw from the race in a Saturday tweet, says his position has not changed but that he will vote for all Republican candidates on the ticket including Trump. “I intend to support the nominee of our party. But he’s got a lot of work to do, I think, if he’s going to have any hope of winning this election,” Thune told KELO-TV in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, in an interview that aired late on Tuesday. Thune was among a string of Republican officials and former officials who called on Trump to withdraw from the race over the weekend.

French police find more explosives after raid near ParisPARIS (Reuters) - French police unearthed a second stash of explosive materials near Paris on Thursday after a similar find in a nearby suburb on Wednesday, a justice official said as three suspects were questioned by anti-terrorism investigators. Thursday s swoop was carried out at a garage rented by one of the three detained in the wake of Wednesday s raid on an apartment in Villejuif, on the southern edge of the French capital, the source said. Materials used to produce TATP, an explosive often used by suicide bombers, were found at the flat after a plumber phoned police to report suspect activity there, Interior Minister Gerard Collomb said. Two people in their 30s and 40s were arrested in the immediate wake of Wednesday s raid, said Collomb, who added that the suspects were being questioned on suspicion of terrorist activity despite talking of a bank heist. A third man was arrested overnight, a source said. Those under investigation spoke of wanting to blow up a bank with the TATP but they way we see it is they have links with terrorism, and this is the channel of investigation, Collomb told public radio station franceinfo. That line of inquiry was prompted by information found in telephone communications after the raid, he added. The minister spoke before developments later in the day in which police found explosive materials at a garage in Thiais, southeast of Paris. More than 230 people have been killed by Islamist-inspired attackers in the past three years in France, which along with the United States and other countries are bombing Islamic State bases in Iraq and Syria. TATP, an unstable explosive, has been used by militants in several attacks in western Europe in recent years, including Manchester in May, Brussels in 2016 and Paris in 2015.

BREAKING: [Video] COLORADO BAKER WHO REFUSED TO MAKE CAKES With Anti-Gay Message Did Not Discriminate About 2,000 of the emails I got were of support. There were four hateful, so that s not even 1 percent. Compare that the the hateful onslaught of messages that Memories Pizza in Indiana got from the left after only answered a hypothetical question about gay marriage. They were forced to close down after death threats from the Gay Mafia, yet the media never bothered to report the truth about this business who never refused service to anyone based on their sexual orientation.We ll tell you about this story, because you will likely not hear about it in the mainstream media. Just try however, to refuse to make a cake for a gay couple and the media will descend like buzzards on a fresh carcass. The Colorado Civil Rights Division has ruled that a baker who refused to make cakes with anti-gay messages did not discriminate.Marjorie Silva, owner of Azucar Bakery in Denver, says she got the news on Friday but knows that Bill Jack, a Christian from Castle Rock, Colo., will likely appeal the decision. I m happy that we were not just morally right but legally right, she said in an interview with Yahoo News. Hopefully this will lead to a better world where we are friendly to each other. In March 2014, Jack asked Silva to make him a Bible-shaped cake with anti-gay messages, such as Homosexuality is a detestable sin. Leviticus 18:22. He also wanted the cake to include two men holding hands with a large X over them.She agreed to make the dessert in the shape of a book but declined to include the hateful content.Silva has been inundated with messages of support from LGBT people and their allies since refusing to reproduce the homophobic messages. About 2,000 of the emails I got were of support. There were four hateful, so that s not even 1 percent. So it looks like humanity is going in the right direction and things are changing for good, she said.Via: Yahoo News

Clinton’s Latest Electoral Appeal? Mormon Voters – And It Could WorkMany people will assume those who are religious will automatically vote Republican. That may be true with Evangelicals and Protestants, but that s not the case with Catholics, Jews and Muslims.But there is one religious group that is stuck between a rock and a hard place: Mormons.It s no secret Mormon voters (especially in Utah) hate Donald Trump. He s arrogant, vulgar, an adulterer, a liar and a sneak. And he openly exults it with little to no shame.The New York Times found that Trump does in fact have a Mormon problem, with only 33 percent having a favorable view of the Republican candidate. In the Utah Republican primary, Trump finished dead last with only 14 percent of the vote (Ted Cruz won).When it comes to Hillary Clinton, Mormons often give the same response the cold shoulder but not with the same vitriol as shown to Trump.That s why Clinton is seizing the opportunity and appealing to weary voters in Utah and aboard, hoping to solidify a coalition of traditional religious, Republican voters.In an op-ed featured in a newspaper owned by the Mormon Church, Clinton makes that appeal head on, writing:I ve been fighting to defend religious freedom for years. As secretary of state, I made it a cornerstone of our foreign policy to protect the rights of religious minorities around the world from Coptic Christians in Egypt to Buddhists in Tibet. And along with Jon Huntsman, our then-ambassador in Beijing, I stood in solidarity with Chinese Christians facing persecution from their government.We stood up for these oppressed communities because Americans know that democracy ceases to exist when a leader or ruling faction can impose a particular faith on everyone else.Clinton drew parallels between Mormons, who were once profiled and discriminated against, and Trump s call to ban Muslims from entering the United States:Everyday Trump continues to prove he lacks the morals to be our commander in chief. With a new and outrageous headline seeming to pop up every day, it s easy to forget that Trump showed us his true colors early on, when he proposed banning all Muslims from our shores. That would undue centuries of American tradition and values. When it comes to religion, we strive to be accepting of everyone around us. That s because we need each other.The editor of the newspaper shed some hopeful light on the prospect of a Clinton win for Utah, stressing that the Republican, Mormon voter base has a libertarian streak when it comes to the issue of immigration, which affects the southwest more than any other region in the United States. Sensing that immigrants make communities stronger, Mormons tend to be more sympathetic to their plights. And the newspaper also noted that Mormon voters are very sensitive to religious persecution, which Trump has successfully made a crux in his campaign.The last Democrat to win Utah was Lyndon Johnson in 1964. Let s make it happen again in 2016.Featured image via Steve Pope/Getty Images

U.S. Senators draft bill to boost employee private stock ownershipWASHINGTON (Reuters) - A bipartisan pair of lawmakers on the U.S. Senate Banking Committee are planning to introduce a bill that aims to entice private corporations to give their employees larger equity stakes in their companies and promote longer-term investing. The draft bill, titled the “Encouraging Employee Ownership Act,” is being rolled out by Virginia Democrat Mark Warner and Pennsylvania Republican Pat Toomey and will be made public as soon as Thursday, according to a spokeswoman for Warner’s office. The measure comes at the same time that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is expected to shift its regulatory gears to focus more intently on ways to boost capital formation more broadly. Critics have said the SEC has in the past neglected this mission, as the number of initial public offerings have fallen while the number of regulatory requirements placed on companies has increased. Wall Street deal-making attorney Jay Clayton, who was nominated by President Donald Trump to serve as chairman of the SEC, is expected to make capital formation a centerpiece of his tenure. He is still awaiting his confirmation hearing before the Senate Banking Committee, and a date has not yet been announced. The bill that Warner and Toomey plan to unveil, which has been endorsed by the private supermarket chain Wegmans, would amend an SEC rule that governs how private companies give stock options and other equity awards to their employees. The rule exempts private companies from being required to register their securities with the SEC - a lengthy and expensive undertaking. However, in order to qualify for the exemption, companies must meet certain conditions. Under the rule, if a company collectively grants more than $5 million in stock awards to its employees during a one-year period, then certain disclosure requirements are triggered - including the need to produce financial statements that are prepared in accordance with U.S. accounting rules. The $5 million trigger was set in 1988, and has not been updated or pegged to inflation, Warner’s spokeswoman said. Under the proposed legislation, the threshold would be increased to $10 million before triggering disclosure obligations. Additionally, the amount would be automatically indexed to inflation every five years. The bill comes at a time when Congress is expected to take up legislation to loosen rules believed to stifle economic growth. This committee is expected to play a crucial role in helping craft such legislation. 

CONVENIENT? ‘Active Shooter’ Kills 5 in Fort Lauderdale, CNN Claims Voices in His Head ‘Told Him to Join ISIS’21st Century Wire says Incredibly, on the same day that US intelligence officials were due to meet President-Elect Donald Trump about the alleged Russian Hack report like clockwork, another Active Shooter event springs-up, this time at Fort Lauderdale International Airport in Florida. Very dramatic, great television drama on CNN and elsewhere. As a result, no US news channel covered the epic flop of the CIA s report debacle and Trump s reaction to it until the evening news cycle.Stay tuned to 21WIRE later on, for a full Daily Shooter report on today s Fort Lauderdale Airport attack.Thus far, we re told that the suspect got off a Delta Flight from Anchorage, Alaska, calmly collected his bags, went into a bathroom, loaded his gun (which we re told was stored legally in his check-on luggage) and stepped into the baggage claim area and began shooting and killing people.And just when you thought this story couldn t get any more ridiculous, we re meant to swallow this Just now, CNN reported that suspect Esteban Santiago was a member of the National Guard, served in Iraq, and was hearing ISIS voices in his head. Anchor Erin Burnett stated on air: The shooter went into FBI office in Anchorage (Alaska) and told officials he was hearing voices in his head telling him to join ISIS! Indeed, exactly as 21WIRE predicted yesterday:CIA #russianhacking report out Monday. Our guess: there's nothing in it. What will Obama do as distraction? New hack? #ISIS attack? 21st Century Wire (@21WIRE) January 6, 2017As expected, CNN is pushing the mental health angle, with panel experts talking-up the need for more gun control and mental health checks. Here s the official mainstream narrative (CNN) Five people were shot dead and eight wounded in a baggage claim area at Fort Lauderdale s airport, and law enforcement sources tell CNN the suspect, identified as Esteban Santiago, had brought the firearm in his checked luggage.Authorities said it was too early to understand why the suspect, who was taken into custody without incident, opened fire at the Florida airport.Florida Sen. Bill Nelson told CNN that Santiago had a military identification card, but he did not know whether it was current.Here s the latest on what we know: Thirteen people were shot and eight were taken to hospitals, Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel said. Five others died from their wounds. The suspect joined the National Guard in Puerto Rico in 2007. In April 2010, he went to Iraq for 10 months. A spokeswoman for the Alaska Army National Guard said Santiago was in the Army Reserves before he joined the guard there in November 2014. Lt. Col. Candis Olmstead said Santiago was discharged in August for unsatisfactory performance. The suspect showed up several months ago at the FBI office in Anchorage, law enforcement officials told CNN. He was interviewed and said he was hearing voices in his head, including some telling him to join ISIS. He was taken to a hospital for a mental health evaluation, voluntarily checked himself in, the officials explained. Law enforcement sources told CNN that the suspect flew to Florida on Friday from Alaska and had declared the firearm. When he arrived at the airport, the suspect retrieved a bag at baggage claim, took out the gun and started firing, the sources said. One source said he went to the bathroom to get the gun out of his luggage and emerged firing. Sheriff Israel said the gunman likely acted alone. The sheriff said it was too early to say whether terrorism was the motive. Gov. Rick Scott told reporters at the airport: The citizens of Florida will not tolerate senseless acts of evil. Whoever is responsible will held accountable to the fullest extent of the law. The governor said that now was time to mourn the dead and pray for hospitalized victims, not talk about gun laws. Multiple reports on social media including tweets from former White House spokesman Ari Fleischer described the shooting.Continue the mainstream story at CNNREAD MORE DAILY SHOOTER NEWS AT: 21WIRE Daily Shooter FilesSUPPORT 21WIRE SUBSCRIBE & BECOME A MEMBER@ 21WIRE.TV

WATCH: ESTABLISHMENT REPUBLICAN Pollster Tries Desperately To Turn Alabama Voters Against Roy Moore…Gets BIG SurpriseEstablishment Republican pollster Frank Luntz looked more like a CNN host than a Republican pollster in a room full of committed Roy Moore voters. Luntz was obviously frustrated, as Alabama voters dug in their heels, and refused to back down on their support for Judge Roy Moore in today s Senate election to fill AG Jeff Sessions seat in Alabama.MONTGOMERY, Alabama Frank Luntz, a GOP establishment messaging consultant, was visibly flabbergasted as every single one of his focus group participants in a Birmingham area Vice News-produced panel backed Judge Roy Moore for U.S. Senate. Titled Why These Alabama Voters Are Sticking By Roy Moore, Luntz s Vice News focus group aired on Vice News Tonight on Dec. 8 on HBO. Are you all Christians here? Luntz opens the seven-and-a-half-minute long segment. Yes, all of the focus group participants, who joined Luntz in a Birmingham area restaurant, replied. Is Roy Moore a good Christian? he followed up. Yes, one woman replied. Absolutely, another said. Absolutely? Luntz followed up in disbelief. Yes, the woman shot back. Without any doubt whatsoever? Luntz asked again.After some more back and forth, a man in the focus group spoke up. Scottie Porter, a real estate developer, said:He s not my choice, I m not voting for him because I like him. I m voting for him because I don t want Doug Jones. But Roy Moore is entitled to the presumption of innocence in the law and in the Bible just like anybody else should be. There are only accusations. There have been no charges filed. All you have is a group of women who have come forward. How many? How many? Luntz pressed Porter. Seven, he replied. There s really only three, one woman yelled out. How many women have to come forward before you say wait a minute, where there s smoke there s fire ? Luntz asked the group.Chuck Moore, a retired sales consultant, replied: It s about the legitimacy, not just how many. How many are not being paid? Or being coerced to do this? How many of them do you think are being paid? Luntz asked the group. All of them, some replied in unison. By a show of hands, how many of you think all the women are being paid? Luntz asked the full group.Three hands in the group went up. Seriously? Luntz asked in disbelief, before the camera turned to homemaker Jane Wade. To me, there are only two women that have a smoking gun but the women s their reputations are questionable at the time, Wade said. Is this how you want to be treated as a woman if something were to happen to you? Do you want to be dismissed that way? Luntz asked Gina Doran, a retired school bus driver. You better have proof, Doran fired back at Luntz.Watch: Breitbart News

Putin says military strike against North Korea not sure to succeedMOSCOW (Reuters) - President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday that a military strike against North Korea designed to destroy its nuclear and missile program might not succeed because Pyongyang could have hidden military facilities that nobody knows about. Russia is strongly opposed to the idea of such a strike, an idea U.S. President Donald Trump has floated, favoring a mixture of diplomacy and economic incentives instead. But Putin, speaking at an energy forum in Moscow, mused on the subject on Wednesday, making it clear he had serious doubts about the military efficacy of such a move, as well as other political and moral concerns. Can a global strike against North Korea be launched to disarm it? Yes. Will it achieve its aim? We don t know. Who knows what they have there and where. Nobody knows with 100 percent certainty as it s a closed country. Putin said Russia had more reason than most to be concerned by Pyongyang s missile program, saying that North Korea s nuclear testing range was located just 200 kilometers (124.27 miles) from the Russian border. The Russian leader also reiterated his call for diplomacy to be allowed to run its course and for all sides to dial down the bellicose rhetoric. He also said he thought Trump was listening to Russia s views on the crisis. More sanctions were the road to nowhere, Putin told the same forum, saying around 40,000 North Korean citizens were currently working in Russia. Such workers are known to regularly send back part of their wages to the North Korean authorities.

WATCH: Former Director Of National Intelligence SHREDS Trump Claim That Obama Wiretapped HimDonald Trump has absolutely no evidence that President Obama wiretapped him, and former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper knows it.On Saturday, Trump made wild accusations against President Obama after reading a conspiracy theory on Breitbart.Trump says that Obama illegally wiretapped Trump Tower and compared it to Watergate. On Sunday, Trump demanded that Congress start an investigation against Obama and declared that he would refuse to answer further questions about Russia until they comply.Of course, Trump is clearly trying to distract the media and Congress from investigating the Russia scandal he has been embroiled in for months.While there is plenty of evidence against Trump to justify investigations into his ties to Russia, Trump has offered no proof to back up his accusations against Obama.And if anyone would know about a wiretap against Trump, whether legal or illegal, it would be former National Intelligence Director James Clapper, who served in the position from 2010 until this year.During an interview with Chuck Todd, Clapper flatly denied that President Obama wiretapped Trump.Todd began by asking if he would have been aware of such a wiretap and Clapper shut down the accusation. I would certainly hope so, Clapper replied. I will say that the part of the national security apparatus that I oversaw the DNI there was no such wiretap activity mounted against the president the president-elect at that time or as a candidate or against his campaign. When asked if other agencies would have requested a FISA court order to wiretap Trump Tower, Clapper said that that s exactly what they would do.In the end, Clapper told Todd that he can clearly deny that President Obama ordered a wiretap of Trump Tower because it did not happen. I can deny it, Clapper said.Here s the video via Twitter.James Clapper: There was no such wire tap activity amounted against Donald Trump. #MTP pic.twitter.com/eNGFKe0vxY Meet the Press (@MeetThePress) March 5, 2017President Obama should file a lawsuit against Trump. By not providing any evidence of his claims, Trump is slandering President Obama s good name and there should be consequences for these wild unfounded accusations.If Trump is willing to stoop this low to distract from his Russia scandal, then he must be really desperate. That means Congress should be investigating Trump, not Obama.Featured image via screenshot

33-Yr Old Skier LINDSEY VONN Says She Won’t Represent President Trump At Upcoming OlympicsHas there ever been a US Olympic athlete who, before representing the United States in the Olympic games, discussed whether or not they would be representing our President? Aren t the U.S. Olympic athletes made aware fairly early on, that they re representing our nation? I don t remember ever seeing any of our athletes carrying a flag with a picture of the President of the United States, or wearing apparel covered with the President s image or name. So why is Lindsey Vonn making a statement about how she s not going to be representing President Trump? Does anyone really care about Lindsey Vonn s opinion about President Trump? FOX News Olympic gold medal skier Lindsey Vonn says she ll represent the United States, but not President Trump, when she returns to the Winter Games in February.Vonn, who won a gold medal in the women s downhill competition in 2010 in Vancouver, skipped the 2014 Sochi games because of knee injuries. I hope to represent the people of the United States, not the president, Vonn said this week amid the buildup to the 2018 games in PyeongChang, South Korea. I take the Olympics very seriously and what they mean and what they represent, what walking under our flag means in the opening ceremonies, she added. I want to represent our country well, and I don t think there are a lot of people currently in our government that do that. Vonn also told CNN that she would absolutely not accept an invitation to the White House.Isn t this really more about a former Olympic athlete with an over-inflated ego and an overblown sense of how important her opinions are to the American people than anything else?

Energy market affected decision on Atlantic drilling: White HouseWASHINGTON (Reuters) - Energy market dynamics factored into the decision by the Obama administration to reverse course on a proposal to open the southeastern Atlantic coastal area to oil and gas drilling, the White House said on Tuesday. There were also objections from the Department of Defense, commercial interests and local communities, a White House spokesman said. The U.S. Interior Department said earlier on Tuesday that it would not allow drilling in the area, reversing a January 2015 proposal for new leases in the Atlantic as part of the department’s five-year plan to set new boundaries for oil development in federal waters through 2022.

WOW! DNC WILL KEEP Dirty Harvey’s Money To Fund Future Democrat CampaignsThe Democratic National Committee announced Friday that it is still holding onto most of the money it received from Hollywood mogul and alleged sexual harasser Harvey Weinstein.The DNC will donate just ten percent of the almost $300,000 received from Weinstein, money that will go to organizations close to the Democratic Party: EMILY s List, Emerge America, and Higher Heights, all of which predominately help Democratic candidates running for office. The DNC s response to the Harvey Weinstein matter is shockingly bad even by Washington standards, Alexandra Smith of the conservative opposition research firm America Rising said. Donating a mere 10 percent of the entire Weinstein contribution to another left-leaning political action committee is a complete embarrassment. The mission statement of EMILY s List is: We elect pro-choice Democratic women to office. Emerge America adds ethnic diversity to that same basic mission, proclaiming its intent to increase the number of Democratic women leaders. Higher Heights goal is to help black women get elected; the Center for Responsive Politics notes that it gives exclusively to Democrats.Some Democratic politicians are donating money received from Weinstein to nonprofits helping victims of sexual violence, while others have remained silent on the matter. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) announced he would donate his Weinstein money to several charities supporting women following a Washington Free Beacon report about Democrats inaction. WFB

Former Illinois Governor Blagojevich seeks reduced prison sentenceCHICAGO (Reuters) - Former two-term Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich is seeking a drastically reduced sentence that would see him released from federal prison within a year after convictions in 2011 for corruption charges including extortion and wire fraud, according to U.S. court documents. Federal prosecutors countered, recommending in documents filed just before a midnight Tuesday deadline that Blagojevich serve out his original 14-year sentence, of which he has served more than four years. The motions come ahead of a scheduled resentencing on Aug. 9 before U.S. District Judge James Zagel after an appellate court last year vacated five of Blagojevich’s 18 criminal convictions. Prosecutors declined to retry the ex-governor on the vacated convictions. Blagojevich, a Democrat, was the first Illinois governor to be removed from office and has been in federal prison in Colorado since 2012. The former governor was convicted on charges including seeking money in exchange for an appointment to the senate seat formerly held by President Barack Obama. His attorneys argued in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois that the flamboyant former U.S. House Representative has made efforts toward restitution, tutoring fellow prison inmates and playing in a band with a since-released inmate called the Jailhouse Rockers. They said that Blagojevich’s release from prison early would allow him to repair his relationship with his wife and two daughters. “A sentence in the neighborhood of five years incarceration accompanied by a period of supervised release would be sufficient,” Blagojevich attorney Leonard Goodman said in a filing. U.S. prosecutors argued that Blagojevich should serve out the entire sentence as he still does not take responsibility for his illegal actions. “(Blagojevich’s) continued insistence that he lacked intent to commit the crimes of which he was convicted further demonstrates a complete lack of acceptance,” they said.

HILLARY THROWS HER WEALTH AND STATUS Into The Faces Of Hard Working AmericansHillary Clinton has said a lot of things that stick deep in the craw of honest, hardworking Americans before but this time she may have actually gone too far. In a seemingly innocent remark about how staying home and resting has brought her closer to the American people.Apparently laying in bed in one of many mansions with a staff to take care of her every need, and absolutely no worry of how she is going to pay her rent next month equals what it is like for a normal citizen to be suffering from illness in this day and age. I certainly feel lucky when I am under the weather, I can afford to take a few days off. Millions of Americans can t. They either go to work sick or they lose a paycheck. They toss back some Tylenols, chug some orange juice and hope the cough or the virus goes away on its own. I have met so many people living on a razor s edge, one illness away from losing their job, one paycheck away from losing their job. That goes against everything we stand for as Americans, because some things should not come down to luck. So while she was being pampered and waited on hand and foot we are supposed to believe that she was honestly contemplating that her situation in any way matched that of any hard working American going through being sick? All I heard was her throwing her wealth and status back into our faces.Maybe she realized that her diatribe wasn t working so she decided to quickly change focus and throw her own campaign staff under the but to deflect. You know, my campaign has said they could have been faster and I agree with that. I certainly expect them to be as focused and quick as possible, but I have to say from my perspective, I thought I was going to be fine and I thought that there wasn t really any reason to make a big fuss about it. So I should have taken time off earlier. I didn t, now I have, and I m back on the campaign trail. Hillary also dodged a question about whether she ever bothered to tell her running mate, Sen. Tim Kaine, that she was sick.Clinton responded by saying that her senior staff knew, and the information was provided to a number of people, but she did not say whether Kaine was one of those people. When a second reporter asked about why Kaine was not informed, and whether that has hurt their partnership, Clinton said she was not going to go into our personal conversations. Will this woman ever answer anything with a straight answer? Probably not, but we can all continue to be amused that she actually thinks any of us believe what she says.Keep powering through, Hillary.H/T [ Info Wars ]

CONFUSED PROTESTERS Swarm Outside Trump NYC Fundraiser: ‘Tax the Rich, Not Working People’The protesters in NYC must be confused They yelled tax the rich, not working people . Aren t the rich working people too? Many of the rich worked like crazy to be where they are today. Also, the rich pay plenty in taxes already. Don t you love how these people don t want anyone to be successful but want them to give away their hard-earned money?Dozens of protesters yelling shame gathered across the street from Cipriani on East 42nd Street early Saturday where President Trump was to attend a breakfast fundraiser. Members of SEIU aka Obama s Purple Army were out in force doing what they ve been trained to do PROTESTPresidential motorcade departs Cipriani earlier today. We will have the story later on @NY1. pic.twitter.com/uw6kWHdmH0 Shannan Ferry (@ShannanFerry) December 2, 2017 New York hates Trump, several protesters shouted. I believe it s time to stop lining the pockets of the rich and stealing from the poor, said John Eng, a 54-year-old real estate agent from Manhattan who was holding a sign declaring, The poor will have to eat the rich. The protesters were particularly enraged by the Senate s early-morning passage of a $1.2 trillion tax reform bill supported by Trump. A few shouted Kill the bill, don t kill us. That tax plan is an abomination, said Melissa Carpenter, a 51-year-old lawyer from Bayside who wore a Guy Fawkes mask for the occasion. He has some balls to come here. Read more NYP

BOOM! MATH SHOWS Trump Would Have Beaten Obama In Romney-Obama ElectionIt s easy to glance at Tuesday s popular vote which, with 92 percent of all precincts reporting, shows Hillary Clinton with six million fewer votes than Barack Obama won in 2012 and reach the conclusion that Clinton lost the White House because she failed to turn out the Democratic base. But the truth is much more complicated. While she underperformed relative to Obama s 2012 totals in several Midwestern states Ohio, Michigan, Iowa, and Wisconsin Clinton ran virtually even with Obama in the battlegrounds of Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Virginia, Nevada, and New Hampshire. What s more, she far surpassed Obama s 2012 vote total in Florida, the country s biggest swing state. Yet somehow, while Obama carried Florida, Clinton lost it. Which brings us to an important question: Was Donald Trump just good enough to beat a bad Democratic opponent on Tuesday, or does he deserve far more credit?A review of vote totals in the past two elections reveals that Trump 2016 would have defeated Obama 2012 in the electoral college. (Disclaimer: This obviously is an apples-to-oranges exercise because no two elections are the same, nor are any two electorates. Still, unlike debating whether the 2016 Cubs would defeat the 1927 Yankees, this is not an entirely abstract argument; a comparison of their respective performances in the country s most competitive states shows Trump edging Obama in a hypothetical head-to-head matchup.) The math might seem impossible. After all, Obama won nearly 66 million votes in 2012; Trump is currently at 59.5 million and should finish around 60 million, which will actually be one million fewer votes than Mitt Romney won. How, then, could Trump have topped Obama in the electoral college? The answer: Republican turnout lagged in certain parts of the country but shot through the roof in the nation s most critical battleground states. Let s look at them individually, in descending order by population, and do the electoral-vote math. The 2016 totals aren t yet final because not all precincts have reported.FLORIDA 29 EVs 98 percent reportingObama 2012: 4,235,270Clinton 2016: 4,485,745Romney 2012: 4,162,081Trump 2016: 4,605,515Conclusion: Trump beats Obama by some 370,000 votes and wins Florida. (Note: Clinton herself won 250,000 more votes in Florida than Obama did in 2012.) PENNSYLVANIA 20 EVs 97 percent reportingObama 2012: 2,907,448Clinton 2016: 2,844,705Romney 2012: 2,619,583Trump 2016: 2,912,941Conclusion: Trump squeezes past Obama by a margin of some 5,000 votes and wins Pennsylvania. (Note: Clinton runs about 60,000 votes behind Obama, but would ve had more than enough to defeat Romney in 2012.) OHIO 18 EVs 94 percent reportingObama 2012: 2,697,260Clinton 2016: 2,317,001Romney 2012: 2,593,779Trump 2016: 2,771,984Conclusion: Trump edges Obama by roughly 75,000 votes and wins Ohio. (Note: Clinton s worst battleground state showing was Ohio, winning 380,000 [!] fewer votes than Obama.)Stop right there and crunch the numbers: Florida (29) + Pennsylvania (20) + Ohio (18) = 67 EVs.Romney finished with 206 EVs. By protecting all of those, and then taking 67 from Obama, Trump would hit 273 and win the presidency.The question: Did Trump 2016 defeat Obama 2012 in all of the states Romney won? Yes. Here s a look at the competitive ones: NORTH CAROLINA (98 percent reporting):Trump 2,339,603 Obama 2,178,388 ARIZONA (73 percent reporting):Trump 947,284 Obama 930,669 GEORGIA (93 percent reporting):Trump 2,068,623 Obama 1,761,761 UTAH (78 percent reporting):Trump 360,634 Obama 229,463A review of the Romney 2012 states confirms that Trump, in this hypothetical matchup, would have carried every single one against Obama. It doesn t matter that Obama would have trounced Trump by nearly 300,000 votes in Michigan; by more than 200,000 in Wisconsin; by 175,000 in Virginia; and by 160,000 in Colorado. It s similarly meaningless that Obama would have narrowly defeated Trump in Iowa, Nevada, and New Hampshire. The 44th president carried all of those states in 2012, and in this hypothetical contest, he would successfully defend all of them. But it wouldn t be enough. The electoral college would produce a razor-thin margin: Trump 273, Obama 265.Via: National Review

NOT NEWS: WHITE UNARMED TEEN KILLED BY SC POLICE OFFICER RULED HOMICIDE…Police Refuse To Name OfficerAl Shartpon will be traveling never mind SMOKE AND MIRRORS:Now the Justice Department s Civil Rights Division, U.S. attorney s office and the FBI will open a case into his death. The announcement comes a day after lawyers for Zachary Hammond s family requested an inquiry due to what they called the substantial violations of (the late teenager s) civil rights and the need for a transparent and independent investigation of the Seneca Police Department. This investigation will run parallel to the state s investigation, the Department of Justice said in a statement. Because this is an ongoing matter, we are not able to comment further at this time. Here is the letter Barack Obama wrote following thug Michael Brown s death at the hands of white police officer, Darren Wilson: The death of Michael Brown is heartbreaking, and Michelle and I send our deepest condolences to his family and his community at this very difficult time. As Attorney General (Eric) Holder has indicated, the Department of Justice is investigating the situation along with local officials, and they will continue to direct resources to the case as needed. I know the events of the past few days have prompted strong passions, but as details unfold, I urge everyone in Ferguson, Missouri, and across the country, to remember this young man through reflection and understanding. We should comfort each other and talk with one another in a way that heals, not in a way that wounds. Along with our prayers, that s what Michael and his family, and our broader American community, deserve. As Attorney General (Eric) Holder has indicated, the Department of Justice is investigating the situation along with local officials, and they will continue to direct resources to the case as needed. I know the events of the past few days have prompted strong passions, but as details unfold, I urge everyone in Ferguson, Missouri, and across the country, to remember this young man through reflection and understanding. We should comfort each other and talk with one another in a way that heals, not in a way that wounds. Along with our prayers, that s what Michael and his family, and our broader American community, deserve. The family of Zachary Hammond are still waiting for their letter of condolence from our Race Baiter In Chief Seneca Police department have refused to name the officer involved in the shooting, despite similarities to other recent cases including the deadly shooting of Samuel DuBose.Seneca Police chief John Covington, whose son has previously been arrested on drug charges, has stood by the account and insists the boy wasn t shot from behind.The shooting took place during a drug buy, set up by police, outside a Hardees restaurant.Officers found just 10 grams of marijuana on Morton and arrested her. The police report failed to mention the two gunshots that killed Hammond.Covington said the officer approached the car with his gun out, as is protocol with drug arrests.Paul Hammond, Zachary s father, told WSPA: Zachary was a real person. He s my son. Somebody has to answer. What caused the officer to decide what he needed to do was take my 19-year-old son s life. It s a struggle right now, every day, just not knowing. The family s attorney Eric Bland told The Washington Post: The shots were so close in proximity to each other that it would be physically impossible unless the car was stopped and the officer came up very close to an open window. He also commented on the lack of outcry following his death, suggesting recent police-related shootings have received more press coverage. It s sad, but I think the reason is, unfortunately, the media and our government officials have treated the death of an unarmed white teenager differently than they would have if this were a death of an unarmed black teen. The hypocrisy that has been shown toward this is really disconcerting. Covington s son Adam was arrested and charged with misconduct in office and theft of a controlled substance after stealing 30 hydrocodone pills from a woman named Peggy Smith at the Oconee County Detention Center. Via: Daily Mail

NASA Publicly Humiliates Right-Wing Climate Change Deniers On Facebook With Real ScienceDon t mess with NASA because they will burn you.When a climate change denier made a comment on a post made by Bill Nye the Science Guy, he made a huge mistake by dragging NASA into his rant.Nye was mocking a climate change denier for refusing to take bets on whether climate change is real or not cause he knows what s up re: global temperatures. Here s the post via Facebook.In response, a right-winger named Fer Morales made a complete ass of himself by disputing climate science by invoking NASA. Morales attributed several of his claims to NASA, including one about how fossil fuels cool the planet. Riiiiight, despite NASA confirming that fossil fuels are actually cooling the planet s temperature, and that there s more ice than in the last century in the polar caps. And the fact that the so-called rises of the sea levels have not materialized, and that any real scientist doesn t back up man-made climate change at all, since it s a cycle that has existed even before we did. Yep, solid science, leftards. This didn t sit well with NASA Climate Change, which spotted Morales comment and brutally shut him down with a humiliating educational response. Do not misrepresent NASA, NASA warned. Fossil fuels are not cooling the planet. Here s a screenshot of the exchange:And the humiliation just grew from there as other Facebook users cheered on NASA for smacking down an anti-science nut job.This was an epic shut down by NASA. The fact that NASA actually took the time to respond is simply amazing. But NASA was not done yet. They also responded to two other right-wing idiots who accused the space agency of fudging the numbers and deleting data. Then NASA proceeded to further educate everyone.Which led to this suggestion by another commenter.This is what it looks like when anti-science conservatives get owned.Featured image via NASA

Scranton, Pennsylvania to sell sewer utility for $195 million(Reuters) - The financially distressed city of Scranton, Pennsylvania, will soon sell its public sewer utility to a subsidiary of American Water Works Company Inc. for $195 million, a city official said on Tuesday. The deal would mark another step forward in the city’s efforts to stabilize its budget. An old steel and coal town known as the Electric City and as the setting for the television series “The Office,” Scranton’s finances have been under state oversight since 1992. The city’s previous administration made headlines in 2012 when it cut police and firefighter pay to minimum wage for two weeks because it could not make payroll. “Without this deal the city wouldn’t have been able to survive, financially anyway,” Mayor William Courtright said late 9on Monday in televised remarks on the sewer utility sale. The Scranton Sewer Authority’s board authorized the sale to Pennsylvania American Water late on Monday, City Solicitor Jason A. Shrive told Reuters. Before the transaction can close, it needs governmental approvals from state public utility regulators and state and federal environmental protection agencies. The deal is expected to save the city $350 million over 30 years, plus another $140 million the authority must spend on environmental mediation under a consent decree. Ratepayers will likely see their rates increase on average 1.9 percent per year for the next 10 years, Shrive said, compared to 4.5 to 5 percent every year for the next 30 years if there were no sale. That amounts to $7,600 of savings total for each ratepayer over the next three decades, Shrive said. A spokeswoman for Pennsylvania American Water, which already owns Scranton’s drinking water system, declined to comment. Nationally, American Water expanded its customer base in 2015 by nearly 42,000 customers, with just over half of those coming from acquisitions that closed that year, according to a transcript of the company’s fourth-quarter earnings call in February. Earlier this month, Scranton city officials also disclosed details of a $31.5 million deal to pay off a long-overdue labor award inherited from the previous administration. The city will pay about $29.3 million in back pay to police and firefighters, including retirees, and put a total of $1.59 million into the city’s public pension funds. These steps, combined with a planned long-term lease of the city’s parking authority that could be finalized by June, could get the city out of the state oversight program for distressed cities by the end of 2017, Shrive said.

HYPOCRISY: DEMOCRAT SENATOR Criticizes President Trump For Moving U.S. Embassy To Jerusalem After She Voted To Move U.S. Embassy To JerusalemYou just can t make up stories like these Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein (Calif.) on Tuesday castigated the idea of moving the U.S. embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, saying it would be a terrible decision despite previously voting for the embassy move to take place. Reports indicate the president will move the U.S. embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, the California senator tweeted. I wrote him last week to explain why that would be a terrible decision. In an attached letter to Trump dated Dec. 1, Feinstein wrote that moving the embassy would spark violence and embolden extremists on both sides of this debate. Here is the tweet:Reports indicate the president will move the U.S. Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. I wrote him last week to explain why that would be a terrible decision. pic.twitter.com/MV1o73nyDk Sen Dianne Feinstein (@SenFeinstein) December 5, 2017The California Democrat stressed that the U.S. must remain neutral in the debate over Jerusalem s status, and that moving the U.S. embassy there or recognizing the city as the capital of Israel would undermine any remaining hope for a two-state solution. Feinstein s tweet came on the same day that President Donald Trump told Israeli and Arab leaders that he plans to recognize Jerusalem as Israel s capital and move the embassy there. Trump is expected to announce his decision on Wednesday.Moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem would be in line with a law that Congress passed in 1995 requiring the relocation of the United States embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. The measure, which also called for the U.S. to recognize the city as the undivided capital of Israel, passed the Senate by an overwhelming 93-5 margin.Among the senators who voted for the initial Jerusalem Embassy Act was one Dianne Feinstein.Feinstein actually played a key role in getting the bill passed by inserting a provision that would allow the president to issue a waiver to delay the embassy move six months at a time, if the president determined it was in the U.S. national security interest.Feinstein s move led 10 additional Democratic members to support the bill, giving it a veto-proof majority.Via: WFB

Taiwan says it aims to keep strong ties with U.S., ChinaTAIPEI (Reuters) - Taiwan will keep close contact and deepen its ties with the United States, the Presidential Office said Friday, in reaction to U.S. President Donald Trump’s phone call with China’s leader in which he agreed to honor the “one China” policy. “Taiwan and the U.S. both maintain close contact and communication so as to keep a ‘zero accident’ approach (to the relationship),” Presidential Office spokesman Alex Huang said in a statement. “Maintaining good Taiwan-U.S. and cross-Strait relations (with China) fulfill our national interest and are key for regional peace and stability.”

Pregnant Women Infected With Zika TRIPLES While Republicans Refuse Funding In Effort To Hurt ObamaThe party that claims to be pro-life sure has a funny way of showing it. This week, the CDC released a dire report on the spread of the devastating Zika virus in the United States which found that the number of confirmed cases in pregnant women has ballooned to 157 in a matter of months. The disease which has only a mild effect on adults has been shown to lead to major birth defects in children, including a major risk of microcephaly.How did Republicans in Congress respond? By underfunding the fight and then earmarking it for next year (and only if Democrats to agree to slash welfare funding of course).On Tuesday, the Senate cleared the way for expected approval by the chamber on Thursday of $1.1 billion to fight the mosquito-borne Zika virus, which has been linked to birth defects. Unlike the Senate legislation, the House bill requires that the $622.1 million be fully offset with spending cuts elsewhere. Many conservative Republicans in the House refuse to approve Zika funds that would add to federal budget deficits, while Democrats and some Senate Republicans favor treating the problem as an emergency that would not have to be financed with spending cuts.By next year, the number of cases will likely be in the thousands and the already lowball funding will be even less effective. If that sounds like a truly idiotic plan, experts agree and have condemned it. In response to which one Republican whined, We will have hundreds of millions of dollars in that bill for next year s Zika response, so to suggest that somebody is being shortchanged the money is just being prudently laid out at the appropriate pace and paid for along the way. (Note: Hundreds of millions is less than $1.9 billion.)Is right now really the time to get serious about stewardship of the federal deficit? Absolutely! say Republicans who may have just realized they only have a dwindling number of months to stick their thumbs in President Obama s eye and can t miss this opportunity.A month ago, a deal was almost hammered out to provide about half of the $1.9 billion Obama had asked for, but that fell through when Republicans tried to use the spending bill to derail the unrelated Iran nuclear deal. When it became clear that Democrats were not going to destroy the historic multinational deal just because Republicans had Zika-infected hostages, the Republicans dropped the bill entirely and any pretense of actually caring about the victims of Zika. Their new option, put forward by the House GOP, offers just $662 million and is worse than the original in every way; partly because, as mentioned above, it won t even kick in until next year.While Republicans play these games, Dr. Tom Frieden, the director of the CDC, has been emphatically insisting that time is crucial and that defunding other programs to move the money around is monumentally idiotic. You can t rob Peter to pay Paul. That s no way to fight an epidemic, Frieden said. Let down your guard in one place, stop fighting one challenge and threat to Americans here to fight it better there that s not a way to keep Americans safe. Which, of course, is of very little concern to Republicans in Congress. Keeping Americans safe has always taken a backseat to blocking any opportunity for Obama to win. If that means putting the lives of thousands of women and their unborn children in jeopardy, well, that s a small price to pay for not having to go back home and look a Tea Party voter in the eye while explaining why he or she worked with the president on anything.If the Zika virus could vote, it would surely support the Republican Party.Featured image via John Moore/Getty Images

Debt limit showdown looms sooner as wealthy bet on Trump tax cutWASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - The U.S. Congress may be headed for a reckoning with the federal debt limit within weeks, thanks to wealthy Americans and corporations deferring tax payments in the hope that they would benefit from the lower tax rates promised by President Trump. Trump promised tax cuts during his election campaign last year and has reiterated those promises in recent months leading some wealthy Americans and businesses to shift accounting for income into the future, betting that lower tax rates will arrive, perhaps in 2018, wealth managers told Reuters. “Everyone wants to talk about deferring income,” said Mark Copeland, senior partner at Signature Estate & Investment Advisors LLC in Newport Beach, California. The U.S. stock market has also rallied since Trump’s election victory in November, partly on hopes for lower corporate tax rates. “We are starting to prepare clients for potentially lower taxes in 2018,” said Julia Carlson, chief executive and at Financial Freedom Wealth Management Group LLC in Oregon. Trump promised to cut taxes as far back as September 2015 in a four-page plan and reiterated those promises in a two-page “Contract with the American Voter” before last November’s election and again in a one-page document in April, but Republicans in Congress remain divided on tax reform. The delay to tax payments could help to explain why tax receipts this fiscal year are coming in more slowly than projected, said tax experts and the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), an arm of Congress. “Taxpayers may have shifted more income than projected ... to later years, expecting legislation to reduce tax rates to be enacted this year,” the CBO said in a monthly report on Wednesday. The weaker tax revenues this year have forced the U.S. Treasury to borrow more money than expected to cover the federal budget deficit and that is putting the government on track to hit its legal debt limit sooner than expected, experts said. The U.S. government has a legal limit on how much it can borrow, currently set at about $19.8 trillion and the limit can only be increased by a vote of Congress. The need to raise the debt limit usually creates partisan debate in Washington. Conservative Republicans like to use the debt limit issue as leverage to demand cuts in spending but Democrats and moderate Republicans usually oppose such ultimatums on the grounds that the borrowings are used to fund spending approved previously by Congress. This year, with Trump’s legislative agenda stalled and Congress preoccupied by Trump’s firing of former FBI director James Comey, the House Republicans known as the House Freedom Caucus along with outside conservative groups are again demanding spending cuts for support to raise the debt limit. In 2011 the failure to raise the debt limit in a timely way and the possibility that the U.S. government might default on its obligations led to the U.S. losing its prized triple-A credit rating from Standard & Poor’s. Since mid-March the U.S. Treasury has been using emergency funding powers to postpone hitting the debt limit and those measures had been expected to last until about October, but lower tax receipts so far this year may mean the debt limit will be hit sooner-than-expected. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin urged Congress last month to raise the debt ceiling before lawmakers break for a long August summer recess, a call echoed last week by House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi.

FBI INFORMANT Blows The Whistle on Obama DOJ’s Intimidation Tactics [VIDEO]A former FBI informant who blew the whistle on a high-profile bribery case involving a Russian energy company was intimidated by Obama administration lawyers into dropping a civil suit against the government last year, his attorney says.WATCH: @BillHemmer's full interview w/ Victoria Toensing, the attorney for @FBI informant allegedly threatened by the Obama Administration. pic.twitter.com/MkBlH7Ilq0 Fox News (@FoxNews) October 27, 2017Victoria Toensing spoke to Bill Hemmer This Morning regarding threats to the FBI informant from Obama s DOJ: President Obama thought it was just okay to threaten a witness who wanted to give information about corruption. Fox News Updated: LIBERTY AND REPUTATION IN JEOPARDY Victoria Toensing, the lawyer for the informant, told The Daily Caller s Vince Coglianese that Obama Justice Department lawyers told her client that his reputation and liberty [was] in jeopardy if he did not drop a lawsuit against the government.On Wednesday, the Trump Justice Department released the informant from a confidentiality agreement, clearing the way for him to testify before several congressional committees about his undercover work at Uranium One, a Canada-based energy company that has ties to Bill and Hillary Clinton and their family foundation.In 2010, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), an inter-agency governmental committee that reviews applications for foreign purchases of companies, granted the Russia-owned energy company Rosatom the right to purchase Uranium One. Via: Daily Caller

Factbox: Clinton's policies on economy, Islamic State, other issues(Reuters) - Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has pledged to raise taxes on the wealthy, preserve the Dodd-Frank financial reform law and provide a path to citizenship for undocumented workers. Here are the proposals the former secretary of state has made as part of her argument that she is best qualified to occupy the Oval Office. (For a Factbox on Republican opponent Donald Trump’s proposals, please see) Clinton has said the rich, not the middle class, would see their taxes go up. She supports billionaire investor Warren Buffett’s eponymous tax proposal calling for those making more than $1 million a year to pay an effective tax rate of 30 percent. Clinton has also called for an additional 4 percent tax on those making more than $5 million annually. Clinton has pledged to raise the estate tax levied on property transferred from a deceased person to their heirs. She also supports a tiered inheritance tax structure, with a top rate of 65 percent on the wealthiest estates of more than $500 million for a single person or $1 billion for a couple. Clinton has pledged to unveil a plan to rebuild U.S. infrastructure during her first 100 days, saying this would create new jobs. She would use some of the revenue generated from her tax plan to pay for making community colleges tuition-free and ensuring students can graduate from public colleges and universities without incurring debt. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a nonpartisan, nonprofit group that independently scored Clinton’s proposals in their totality, estimated her policies would cost $1.8 trillion over the next decade and would be offset by $1.6 trillion, mostly generated by taxing high earners. The group said the remaining $200 billion could be covered by $275 billion in corporate tax revenue the Clinton campaign has called for but not yet spelled out in sufficient detail for them to credit as an offset at this time. Clinton has promised to propose broad legislation within her first 100 days in office to overhaul the immigration system and establish a process for undocumented workers to become citizens. Clinton has said she will defend executive actions taken by Democratic President Barack Obama to defer deportations of children brought illegally to the United States and the parents of children who are citizens or legal residents. She has said if Congress does not pass comprehensive immigration reform, she will similarly use executive action to defer deportations in “sympathetic cases.” A federal court has ruled that Obama did not have the authority to issue his executive orders on immigration, known as DACA and DAPA. The U.S. Supreme Court, currently short one member, split 4-to-4 on whether to hear the administration’s appeal, leaving the lower court’s ruling in place for the time being. Clinton has promised to preserve the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial reform law enacted after the financial crisis, and to pursue further measures to toughen Wall Street regulations. She has proposed a fee for large financial institutions based on their size and the level of risk they pose. She would also give regulators additional authority to force institutions that pose high risks to break apart or reorganize. Clinton has also urged strengthening the Volcker Rule, which restricts proprietary trading by commercial banks. She has called for a new tax on high-frequency trading and for stricter oversight of hedge funds, private equity firms and other players in the so-called shadow-banking system. She has promised stiffer policies on people who commit financial crimes, including an extension of the statute of limitations on such crimes and a requirement for bank executives to return bonuses if their institutions suffer major losses. Changes to Dodd-Frank have stalled in the Republican-controlled Congress, and it is unclear whether Clinton could get congressional backing to strengthen the law, unless Democrats win control of one or both chambers in the Nov. 8 election. Clinton has pledged to defeat Islamic State and has said the first step to fighting the militant group is to eliminate its strongholds in Iraq and Syria. In a departure from the Obama administration, she supports the establishment of a no-fly zone over Syria and has called for an intensified air campaign by the U.S.-led coalition. Clinton has said she would send additional American special forces to help Arab and Kurdish forces already on the ground. She opposes sending additional U.S. ground troops to the region. Clinton has said the United States and European allies must share intelligence more effectively in order to thwart potential attacks. She has urged Silicon Valley companies to work with the government to track militant recruitment tactics on the internet. Current and former Obama administration officials have told Reuters they believe Clinton would take a harder line on Russia than either Obama or Trump. Clinton has said she believes Russian hackers are behind the breach of Democratic Party systems in an attempt to influence the U.S. presidential election. Clinton has said Russia should play a role in fighting Islamic State in Syria, and her foreign policy adviser has said she would consider arming government forces in Ukraine, one of Russia’s neighbors, in a move to combat Russian “aggression in Europe.” Russia has backed ethnic Russian separatists in Ukraine. Clinton was a key player in Obama’s “pivot” to Asia when she served as his secretary of state from 2009 to 2013. Clinton has said she will “aggressively pursue trade cases and impose consequences” against China when it commits trade abuses. She opposes granting China market-economy status, which China will be seeking when a World Trade Organization clause expires in December, and has said she would make sure a newly installed trade prosecutor would ensure that China is playing by the rules. Clinton has said she would treat cyber attacks from countries such as Russia and China “like any other attack” and that the United States “will be ready with serious political, economic and military responses.”

BIG MOUTH ROSIE O’DONNELL Could Be Heading To Prison After Taking Her Hate For President Trump Too FarMany are suggesting that the former comedian, turned militant, leftist activist, Rosie O Donnell needs to be treated by federal authorities like every other American when it comes to being held accountable for her actions. O Donnell broke the law when she offered to pay two Republican lawmakers for voting against Trump s tax cut bill on Twitter. Even offering this is illegal. You are not above the law but I guess you are since the Feds haven't been knocking on your door. with all these tweets you obviously are not joking. Androgynous Priest (@AndrogynPriest) December 21, 2017After ex-comedian Rosie O Donnell s meltdown on Twitter before the Senate s big tax vote Tuesday night, President Donald Trump can reasonably direct federal authorities to lock her up and even to take some money out of her fat-ass pockets, which he once infamously cited as a personal goal.Starting a few hours before the legislation passed, O Donnell tweeted:so how about this i promise to give 2 million dollars to senator susan collins and 2 million to senator jeff flakeif they vote NO NO I WILL NOT KILL AMERICANS FOR THE SUOER RICH DM me susan DM me jeff no shit 2 million casheach ROSIE (@Rosie) December 20, 2017Even after another Twitter user, Louise Mensch, replied that O Donnell was irresponsibly advocating bribery, O Donnell doubled down.i disagree it is obvious there is a price corker had one collins tooflake almost brave he crawled out backwards2 million to any GOP senator who votes noon KILLING AMERICANS MILLIONS WITH OUT HEALTH CARE MY GOD HAVE WE NO SO ROSIE (@Rosie) December 20, 2017Federal law addresses O Donnell s actions.18 U.S. Code 201 criminalizes the attempted bribery of federal officials by whoever directly or indirectly, corruptly gives, offers or promises anything of value to any public official with intent to influence any official act. The penalty? For Rosie, she could spend up to 15 years in jail, suffer a lifetime ban from elective office and pay up to a cool $12 million:The statute calls for a fine of not more than three times the monetary equivalent of the thing of value, whichever is greater, or imprisoned for not more than fifteen years, or both, and may be disqualified from holding any office of honor, trust, or profit under the United States. In court, O Donnell would probably argue that her attempted bribe was in jest, or perhaps a syndrome of a mental illness.After all, her attorneys would argue, who, while seriously attempting to bribe members of the U.S. Congress would do so in such a reckless, public manner that would all but ensure a conviction? Daily CallerThe emboldened screwball doubled down on her vile tweets calling for people to rise up against our government and mobilize , to call 911 and again, offered to pay US Senators millions of dollars to vote against tax cuts for working, American families.WE CANNOT SIT AT HOME WHILE THEY ROB OUR NATION YOUR NEIGHBORS HEALTH CARE FOR THE FUCKING MERCERS AND KOCH BROTHERS FUCK THEM RISE UP ROSIE (@Rosie) December 20, 2017She even asked her followers to call 911 to report a fake crime. There has to be a law against this:call 911 crime in progressUS SENATEthis is too much ROSIE (@Rosie) December 20, 2017What does Rosie mean when she calls on people to mobilize against our government? Isn t that the same thing as calling for a coup? Isn t that also considered to be illegal?WHY HAVENT THE MOBILIZE PEOPLE MOBILIZED https://t.co/wEucdcLqoH ROSIE (@Rosie) December 20, 2017And then, she doubled down on stupid with this tweet:heres the thing al i am not looking to give more money to a corrupt system however this bill is criminal i therefore offer 2 million for any GOP senator that votes no to them personally or directed to A NON PROFIT OF THEIR CHOICE no strings attached DO WHATS RIGHT ROSIE (@Rosie) December 20, 2017Here s how a few Twitter users responded:What you just tweeted is criminal check yourself on that ! LaDeplorable (@NenaPacino) December 20, 2017Send that 2 million and any benefit you receive from the tax cuts back to the government. Better yet, why not go out in the streets of L.A. and find 40 homeless people and give each 50 grand for job training for a career that will change their life 4ever. D.B. (@boingboingbong) December 20, 2017

#DNCWalkOut Report: Over 1000 Bernie Sanders Supporters Left #DNC After Hillary Nomination…#FeelTheBern #DemExit [VIDEO]The Queen of the DNC is in big trouble 1000+ Berners walked out CA is GONE UT Gone Oregon Gone ..& more #DNCWalkOut 1/2 empty #Demexit https://t.co/1uG9312AS6 #AllLivesMatter (@BootStrapzOrg) July 27, 2016

EGYPTIAN COURT SENTENCES MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD LEADER AND 13 OTHERS TO DEATH AND LEADER’S “Peaceful” U.S.-Egyptian Brother To Life In PrisonBut wait wasn t the Muslim Brotherhood s Arab Spring (Sharia Law for all Egyptians) supposed to be a good thing? An Egyptian court sentenced Mohamed Badie, leader of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, and 13 other senior members of the group to death for inciting chaos and violence, and gave a life term to a U.S.-Egyptian citizen for ties to the Brotherhood.The men were among thousands of people detained after freely elected Islamist president Mohamed Mursi was toppled in 2013 by the military under Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who is now president.Sisi describes the Brotherhood as a major security threat. The group says it is committed to peaceful activism and had nothing to do with Islamist militant violence in Egypt since Mursi s fall following mass protests against his rule.Egypt s mass trials of Brotherhood members and people accused of links to the group, as well as its tough crackdown on Islamist and liberal opposition alike, have drawn international criticism of its judicial system and human rights record.The sentences, pronounced at a televised court session on Saturday, can be appealed before Egypt s highest civilian court in a process that could take years to reach a final verdict.U.S.-Egyptian citizen Mohamed Soltan was sentenced to life in jail for supporting the veteran Islamist movement and transmitting false news. He is the son of Brotherhood preacher Salah Soltan, who was among those sentenced to death.Mohamed Abdel-Mawgod, one of the defense lawyers, condemned the verdicts. The court did not differentiate between the defendants and put them all in the same basket, he told reporters at the courthouse. None of the defendants were present during the hearing.Badie is the Brotherhood s General Guide and has already been sentenced to several death and life sentences. His deputy Khairat El-Shater was given a life sentence on Saturday. OPERATIONS ROOM TRIALRights groups say Egypt, where a popular uprising toppled veteran autocrat Hosni Mubarak in 2011 and started years of political turmoil, is now cracking down on all dissent. Sisi says stability is needed to revive the shattered economy.Rights advocates have criticized a U.S. decision to end a freeze on military aid to Cairo, saying Washington is putting human rights on the backburner. The United States has said the decision to end the freeze was in the interest of national security.Mohamed Soltan, 27, arrested in August 2013, had been on hunger strike while in prison. He deserves the punishment because of the money and instructions from the Brotherhood which were found with him, and for spreading chaos and horror in society, presiding Judge Mohamed Nagi Shehata told reporters.Sara Mohamed, a relative of the Soltan family, said they would appeal the verdict. It was a farce trial of the first class None of the defendants attended the session, she told Reuters by phone.A website calling for Mohamed Soltan s release says he was not a member of the Brotherhood, describing him as a U.S.-educated peace activist who was involved in youth events and charities. The website shows pictures of him lying emaciated on a stretcher while in detention.Saturday s case was known in local media as The Rabaa Operations Room trial. This is in reference to a sit-in at Rabaa square in 2013 in which hundreds of people protesting at the overthrow of Mursi were killed when security forces tried to clear the area by force.Cairo has defended its actions, saying it had given protesters the opportunity to leave peacefully and that armed elements within the Brotherhood initiated the violence.Saturday s session sentenced 51 people. Those who were not sentenced to death were given a life sentence. The long list of charges included leading and funding an outlawed group, overturning the constitution and planning to spread chaos, a court source said.Via: Reuters

PELOSI’S HACKED EMAIL SHOWS TOP-SECRET Memo To Staffers: Make #BLM Activists Think Dems Are On Their Side, But Don’t Let Them Come In Large Groups…”DO NOT Say ‘ALL Lives Matter!”Docs leaked by Guccifer 2.0 show a memo from Nancy Pelosi giving directions to her minions about how to handle Black Lives Matter terror group.In the memo, Pelosi is careful to tell the DCCC staff to talk to BLM members, but make sure you don t allow them to meet with you in large numbers. In other words, feed the animals, but keep them at an arms length. This is exactly the kind of rhetoric you would expect from 5-star Nancy (who s net worth is listed at $74.11 million). Keep them engaged so you don t lose the Black voting block, but don t let them get too close Most notable is advising Democrats not to say All lives matter or to talk about black-on-black crime as this is the worst thing to say to Black Lives Matter activists.It describes BLM as radical , which is pretty accurate and notes that it extends beyond questions of police brutality to criminal justice reform . What they leave out is they don t want reform, they want eliminate prisons and police.Notice also it advises: Don t offer support for concrete policy positions . In other words, listen and pretend you care, while offering nothing.Via: Weasel Zippers

Kyrgyzstan vote count problems "significant": OSCE-led observersBISHKEK (Reuters) - European observers said on Monday there had been numerous and significant procedural problems during the vote count in Kyrgyzstan s presidential election on Sunday, but praised the orderly transfer of power in the volatile Central Asian nation. The vote was competitive and candidates could, in general, campaign freely, although cases of misuse of public resources, pressure on voters and vote-buying remained a concern, the observer mission led by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) said in a statement.

REPORT: Mueller Hot On Trump’s Trail, Has Built His Own ‘Miniature Justice Department’Donald Trump is very afraid of Special Counsel Robert Mueller. It has been reported repeatedly that he is completely obsessed with the Russia investigation, and it seems that he is right to be. According to a new report in the Daily Beast, Mueller has built what they are calling an army of lawyers to investigate just what went on with Russia s interference into the 2016 presidential election, and especially into any collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian government officials.The new report says that Mueller s team now includes 16 heavy-hitting attorneys, and they have space deep inside one of the most secret locations in Washington, and the space includes a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility (SCHIF), which is the name for places no laymen and laywomen like us will ever see the inside of. The secrets kept in there are pretty much in a tomb, until those privy to them see fit to release them. On top of all of that, it seems that Mueller has pulled together what the Daily Beast is calling his own Miniature Justice Department. The Daily Beast assembled a list of the names on Mueller s team, and their resumes are nothing short of stellar. Only one has never worked as a federal prosecutor, but he is a top notch lawyer in his own right and is surely useful. You can read the lengthy accomplishments of these attorneys here.In short Trump is right to be scared out of his mind. It also bears noting that sometime ago now, Mueller actually convened his own grand jury which means he has enough to believe he will stumble upon something that will warrant criminal indictments. Further, this team of lawyers has broad authority to subpoena anyone and everyone in Trump s orbit and force them to testify under oath. Also, remember even if they aren t under oath, lying to government officials is still a crime, so these people better start learning to tell the truth unless they want to face some serious jail time.Come on, Special Counsel Mueller. We re rooting for you. With any luck, everyone in Trump s White House will be thrown out of office and in jail before the 2018 midterms.Featured image via Ann Heisenfelt/Getty Images

Jails, justice system at breaking point as Philippine drugs war intensifiesMANILA Reuters) - In a teeming prison for undertrials in the Philippines capital Manila, Rody Lacanilao, an inmate for 18 months, says he prays for clear weather at night. A downpour, he says, will prevent him and hundreds of fellow prisoners in the Quezon City jail from sleeping on plywood mats in an outdoor hallway. The cells themselves are overflowing with an influx of detainees from President Rodrigo Duterte s year-long war on drugs. Thousands of people have been killed in Duterte s campaign, mainly drug users and small-time peddlers. Tens of thousands of others have been thrown into jail, and both prisons and courts in the Southeast Asian nation are creaking under the pressure. Since the war on drugs started, it became harder to sleep, Lacanilao told a Reuters team allowed access to the Quezon City jail. We have no place to go to when it rains. The 37-year-old is facing trial on a drugs charge. The prison was initially built for 262 inmates, but now has 2,975, three-quarters of them jailed for drug-related offences. At night, its basketball court, chapel, classrooms and walkways become sleeping areas for detainees. Inmates who spoke to Reuters said living conditions were unbearable, made worse by the prospect that it could be years before their trials are decided. Many of them are not eligible for bail or cannot afford to pay the bond. Prisoners came in one after the other. If you have money, you can buy a spot in the sleeping quarters, said Junjun Vallecer, who says he has been in the jail for four years for possession of drugs but is still being tried. He says he has to wait four to six months between court appearances. The Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP) put the prison population in the country, including undertrials and convicts, at 137,417 as of the end of June, up 22 percent since Duterte took office at the end of June last year. Police and the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency arrested 96,703 suspected pushers, users and chemists from July last year until earlier this month, according to police data. A staggering 94 percent of people jailed for drug offences are still undertrials, according to BJMP. Police in Manila arrest nearly 100 drug suspects each day, says Oscar Albayalde, the capital s police chief. Whether they are minor charges or not, we have to arrest these people, Albayalde told Reuters. We make these arrests that contribute to the over-congestion of the detention cells ... but what can we do? Including a backlog, the BJMP says 303,534 narcotics cases were at trial or being processed as of June. Most of the cases are defended by the Public Attorney s Office (PAO), a legal aid agency attached to the Department of Justice. At the end of 2016, the agency had a backlog of 303,000 drugs cases, compared to about 82,000 at the end of June 2016, just before Duterte unleashed his fierce anti-drugs campaign. The agency says it has 1,665 lawyers to handle a total of 709,128 criminal cases currently pending, meaning an average of 426 cases for each of them. We have tons of work, said public defender Karen Jay Sabugo, eating a meal of instant noodles at her desk. There are times when I return to the office so exhausted that I can t speak with colleagues anymore. The 30-year-old, in her first year as a trial lawyer, told Reuters she attends more than a dozen court hearings a day. In the morning, we attend court hearings and in the afternoon, we prepare pleadings and meet clients. I go to jails to prepare our defense. Boxloads of documents are piled up inside the PAO s office in Quezon City. Most are related to cases, but some are applications for about 750 new positions the government has agreed to create in the agency in the next two years to handle the overflow of cases. Typically, trials in the Philippines begin some years after arrest, said Maria Socorro Diokno, executive director of the Free Legal Assistance Group (FLAG), an organization of human rights lawyers. Trial last two to three years on average in regional courts, and another two or three years are taken up by appeals. Even before Duterte s anti-drugs crackdown, the Philippines had the third-most-congested prison system in the world after Haiti and El Salvador, according to the London-based Institute for Criminal Policy Research. An average of six inmates occupy a space of 4.7 square meters, the space intended for one prisoner, data from the BJMP showed. One Philippine prison officer watches over 63 prisoners on average, far from the stipulated one-to-seven ratio, and there are insufficient numbers of guards to escort suspects to court hearings, the data showed. The ratios are really wild, said Martin Perfecto, deputy director of the Philippines Bureau of Corrections. FLAG lawyer Alex Padilla says judicial reform is not a priority in the Philippines because there is scant sympathy for those accused of crimes. Duterte is extremely popular because people are fed up with crime and many support the killings in his campaign, he said. Judicial reform is the last reform because it s dirty, Padilla said. These are criminals ... they are the garbage of the society. (GRAPHIC: Lawyers, jails inundated by Duterte's war on drugs - tmsnrt.rs/2vNCFW4)

Top U.S. intelligence Democrat blasts White House over Nunes documentsWASHINGTON (Reuters) - The top Democrat on the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee blasted the White House on Tuesday for playing a role “in selectively and surreptitiously” providing documents to committee chairman Devin Nunes. “If the White House had any concerns over these documents, or any other documents, they should have provided them to our committee weeks ago,” Representative Adam Schiff said in a statement. He said he expected the documents, related to surveillance that swept up some communications by Trump associates, would be available to the full House and Senate intelligence committees “soon.”

Trump, Japan's Abe toast 'bromance' as two-day summit wraps upTOKYO (Reuters) - Every American president has a favorite foreign leader. For Donald Trump, it seems to be Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. The two leaders toasted their “bromance” on Monday as they wrapped up two days of golf, burgers and serious talks on trade and North Korea. The two men have met face-to-face six times since Trump was elected U.S. president a year ago and had 16 telephone conversations. They’ve played golf twice, once at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida and again on Sunday outside Tokyo. Abe recalled how his grandfather, then-premier Nobusuke Kishi, and President Dwight D. Eisenhower began the tradition of U.S.-Japan golf diplomacy 60 years ago. “When you play golf not just once but two times, the person must be your favorite guy,” Abe said ahead of a formal banquet with Trump on Monday. He added that never had two Japanese and American leaders forged such a close bond in just one year. Abe was the first foreign leader to meet Trump after his election last November, a win that caught Tokyo off guard after many had expected Democratic Party candidate Hillary Clinton to win and worried about Trump’s “America First” rhetoric. Trump told the dinner guests that for protocol reasons, he shouldn’t have met a foreign leader before his inauguration - but when he tried to call Abe to wave him off, the Japanese premier was already on a plane to New York. “We have to spend more time together because I enjoyed every minute of it even though he (Abe) is a very tough negotiator,” Trump said. “We will be back soon.” Trump and Abe are hardly the only U.S. and Japanese leaders to bond. Ronald Reagan and Yasuhiro Nakasone set the gold-standard for friendly ties between leaders of the two allies back in the 1980s, when they famously called each other by the nicknames “Ron” and “Yasu”. George W. Bush and Junichiro Koizumi also bonded during Koizumi’s 2001-2006 term as Japanese premier, playing ball, eating BBQ at Bush’s Texas ranch, and visiting Elvis Presley’s Graceland mansion, where Koizumi crooned Elvis tunes. Diplomatic experts said the personal chemistry between Abe and Trump appeared real, but also noted that forging warm ties were in a way a diplomatic necessity for Japan, which ultimately relies on the U.S. nuclear umbrella for its security.

Turkey says recognizing Jerusalem as capital would cause catastropheANKARA (Reuters) - A formal U.S. recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel would cause catastrophe and lead to new conflict in the Middle East, Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Bekir Bozdag said on Monday. Speaking to reporters after a cabinet meeting, Bozdag, who is also the government spokesman, said Jerusalem s status had been determined by international agreements and that preserving it was important for the peace of the region. The status of Jerusalem and Temple Mount have been determined by international agreements. It is important to preserve Jerusalem s status for the sake of protecting peace in the region, Bozdag said. If another step is taken and this step is lifted, this will be a major catastrophe. Israel captured Arab East Jerusalem in the 1967 Middle East war. It later annexed it, declaring the whole of the city as its capital a move not recognized internationally. Palestinians want Jerusalem as the capital of their future state. On Sunday, U.S. President Donald Trump s adviser and son-in-law said Trump had not yet made a decision on whether to formally recognize Jerusalem as Israel s capital, a move that would break with decades of U.S. policy. Past U.S. presidents have insisted that the status of Jerusalem home to sites holy to the Jewish, Muslim and Christian religions must be decided in negotiations. On Saturday, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan held a phone call with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in which they discussed the status of Jerusalem, sources in Erdogan s office said. The sources said Erdogan told Abbas that preserving the status of Jerusalem was important for all Muslim countries, adding that international laws and United Nations decisions should be followed on the issue. Any move by the United States to recognize Jerusalem as Israel s capital would fuel extremism and violence, Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Aboul Gheit said on Saturday. A senior Jordanian source said on Sunday that Amman has begun consultations on convening an emergency meeting of the Arab League and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation before Trump s expected declaration this week.

UK's Prince Harry and fiancee Markle delight crowd on first official walkaboutNOTTINGHAM, England (Reuters) - Britain s Prince Harry and his American fiancee Meghan Markle delighted cheering crowds who braved the cold on Friday to watch the couple on their first official engagement together. Queen Elizabeth s grandson Harry, 33, fifth-in-line to the throne, and U.S. actress Markle, 36, previously best known for her leading role in U.S. legal drama Suits , announced their engagement on Monday, igniting a transatlantic media frenzy. In the central English city of Nottingham, the pair, both wearing long navy overcoats, greeted hundreds of smiling well-wishers, some waving British and U.S. flags. We love Harry, and Meghan - she looks beautiful doesn t she? Betty Parker, 78, told Reuters as she waited to meet the couple. We re so happy for them both, Mary Cooper, 60, said. We always come and see him whenever he comes here and it s lovely that he keeps coming to Nottingham and has sort of adopted this city. The couple were visiting a charity fair to mark World Aids Day, an event particularly symbolic for Harry whose late mother Princess Diana is credited with playing an important role in breaking down the stigma that was attached to the disease. The event, held by the Terrence Higgins Trust, remembers lives lost to HIV and marks the progress made in fighting it. Harry has become a prominent campaigner on the issue, following in the footsteps of Diana who opened Britain s first HIV/AIDS unit in London in 1987 and confronted stigma by kissing an AIDS patient during a hospital visit. They are so wonderful together, and you can clearly see that there is an immense amount of love and adoration for each other from the personal point of view of course but also for the work that each other are involved in, said HIV campaigner Chris O Hanlon, who met the couple at the event. Afterwards, the couple went to Nottingham Academy to meet headteachers from local schools and hear about the Full Effect programme, an initiative supported by the charity of Harry, his elder brother Prince William and William s wife Kate, which seeks to deter children from becoming involved in violence. Markle, who has been a campaigner for several causes including work as a U.N women s advocate, is to give up her previous charity roles as she begins life in Britain s royal family, Harry s spokesman said on Tuesday. She was also keen to travel around Britain to get to know the country that will become her home as she intends to become a British citizen, the spokesman added. The couple, who became engaged earlier this month at the cottage they share in the grounds of Kensington Palace in central London, are to be married next May in St George s Chapel at Windsor Castle, the family home of British kings and queens for almost 1,000 years. This is good. I m excited to have some Americans in the royal family, U.S. student Mark Arnold, who is studying at Nottingham University, told Reuters. It s really nice, I m excited.

Why Ted Cruz Winning The Iowa Caucus Could Doom The GOPTexas Senator Ted Cruz has won the 2016 Republican presidential caucus in Iowa. Cruz won with 99% of Iowa precincts reporting in. He earned 28% of the vote, with about 46,400 Republicans casting their vote for the social conservative.Cruz beat out Donald Trump and Marco Rubio, beating out the result of the highly respected Des Moines Register poll, that had put Trump ahead of Cruz by 5%.Many observers believe that Cruz was able to overcome Trump s constant media appearances and a campaign that sucked up a lot of the oxygen in the political world.While Cruz has won the caucus, history has not been kind to recent winners. The last two winners, Rick Santorum and Mike Huckabee, received a bump in support after winning the caucus, but were not able to martial the religious right on to success in other states like South Carolina and New Hampshire.Cruz also faces headwinds from Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL), who did better than expected in a third place finish. It can be expected that money from the Republican establishment will flow to Rubio, continuing the stampede away from Jeb Bush who only managed a single digit in Iowa and is not expected to be a strong contender in New Hampshire.In a strange turn of events, Trump could act as a spoiler candidate, wedged between Cruz and Rubio but without being beholden to big ticket donors or the party elite.For the general election, many Democrats are probably salivating over a candidate like Cruz. He is anti-choice, a darling of the extremist right, and a candidate who has based his entire run on turning out far right voters instead of even remotely attempting to appeal to moderate, swing voters. Trump may have scared the party so much that Cruz now appears acceptable to them, but not to America.Featured image via Flickr

Apple, FBI to clash again in Congress over encryptionWASHINGTON (Reuters) - Apple Inc (AAPL.O) and the FBI will return to Congress next week to testify before lawmakers about their heated disagreement over law enforcement access to encrypted devices, a congressional committee announced on Thursday. Apple’s general counsel, Bruce Sewell, and Amy Hess, executive assistant director for science and technology at the Federal Bureau of Investigation, will testify on separate panels before a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee on Tuesday, in addition to other law enforcement officials and technology experts. FBI Director James Comey appeared before a separate congressional committee last month to defend his agency’s pursuit of a court order to compel Apple’s assistance in unlocking an iPhone linked to one of the San Bernardino, California, shooters. Sewell also testified at that hearing. The FBI has since abandoned the San Bernardino case, a surprising development that came after a still-secret third party helped the government hack into the iPhone. But the U.S. Justice Department redoubled its efforts last week to use the courts to force Apple’s cooperation in cracking encrypted iPhones by announcing plans to continue with an appeal in an unrelated New York drug case. Other witnesses appearing include Thomas Galati, chief of the New York Police Department’s intelligence bureau; Charles Cohen, commander of the Indiana Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force; and Matthew Blaze, a professor and computer security expert at the University of Pennsylvania. Earlier this week, two U.S. senators released draft legislation that would empower courts to order technology companies to hand over data “in an intelligible format,” even if encryption has rendered that data inaccessible to anyone other than the owner. Security researchers and civil liberties advocates say the bill amounts to a ban on strong encryption, which is necessary to keep malicious hackers at bay and protect the overall security of the Internet.

Senate may keep some Obamacare taxes in U.S. healthcare overhaulWashington (Reuters) - Republican senators trying to repeal Obamacare are forming consensus to keep some of the U.S. healthcare law’s taxes they long criticized, in hopes of delaying more drastic funding cuts, particularly to the Medicaid program for the poor and disabled. First proposed by moderate Republicans, the idea is gaining traction among party members, according to five sources involved in or briefed on internal discussions. While no final decisions have been made, a sense of urgency has increased as Republicans draft a replacement bill to former President Barack Obama’s healthcare law before Congress goes on recess on June 30. But keeping some of the taxes in the Senate bill risks alienating conservatives. On Tuesday, 45 conservative groups and activists sent a letter to Republican Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah, the chairman of the Senate Committee on Finance, urging the Senate to repeal all Obamacare taxes. One cornerstone tax that could remain is the net investment income tax, which imposes a 3.8 percent surtax on capital gains, dividends and interest, the sources said. The taxes most likely to be abolished directly impact consumers and the health industry, including a tax on health insurance premiums, the so-called Cadillac tax on high-cost employer-provided insurance and the medical device tax. Another proposal being floated is to keep all the taxes from the Affordable Care Act, often called Obamacare, but to scale them back. A group of 13 Republican senators led by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has not completed a full draft of the bill, but is sending pieces to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office to assess the impact of various provisions. The CBO’s assessment will help determine which taxes the Senate needs in order to pay for its replacement bill. It is not clear whether McConnell, or more conservative party members such as Senator Ted Cruz of Texas and Senator Mike Lee of Utah, are receptive to keeping some of the taxes. “I think most of the taxes are going to go away,” Senator John Thune of South Dakota, the Senate’s No. 3-ranking Republican, said on Tuesday. “Our members are still having a conversation about if we want to make changes that are in the end going to require some additional revenue.” Spokesmen for McConnell and Cruz declined to comment. A spokesman for Lee said he wants Republicans to abolish every tax that was included in a 2015 Obamacare repeal bill that Obama vetoed. Since Obamacare became law in 2010, Republicans have campaigned on repealing the program that extended insurance coverage to 20 million additional Americans through both subsidized private insurance and an expansion of Medicaid. They have argued that the law is too costly and represents undue government interference in Americans’ healthcare. President Donald Trump promised to eliminate the law on his first day in office, but Republicans, who control the White House, the House of Representatives and the Senate, have struggled to coalesce around a single plan. Under Senate rules, their bill must replicate the $133 billion in savings projected by preliminary legislation that passed in the U.S. House of Representatives last month. That bill would end Obamacare’s expansion of Medicaid in 2020, slash its federal funding by more than $800 billion over 10 years and eliminate most of the law’s taxes. Moderate Republican senators from states that expanded Medicaid, including Rob Portman of Ohio, Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia and Dean Heller of Nevada, have proposed phasing out the expansion over a seven-year period, from 2020 to 2027, to give state governors more time to cut program costs. That timeframe also prevents senators, who serve six-year terms, from having to run for re-election when Medicaid cuts have been implemented, two former Republican Senate aides said. Some of Obamacare’s taxes could also be repealed later when Congress tackles new legislation overhauling the U.S. tax code, two current Senate aides said. “There’s no question that the current debate is not centered on eliminating all the taxes in Obamacare right now,” Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina said last week. Under a process called reconciliation, the bill needs at least 50 votes to pass, with Vice President Mike Pence casting the tie-breaking vote if needed. In an interview with Reuters last month, McConnell said he did not yet know how he would get enough votes for an Obamacare repeal. “Think of me with a Rubik’s cube, sitting there trying to think about what combination will get you to 50,” McConnell said.

BREAKING: WATCH LIVE FEED FROM “Freedom Of Speech Rally II” IN FRONT OF PHOENIX MOSQUEPretty much people just yelling at each other so far. pic.twitter.com/jfNdizcAX5 Adam Housley (@adamhousley) May 30, 2015About 10 more officers now have come to form a human wall between the two sides. About 30 total pic.twitter.com/RU8pgX21j7 Adam Housley (@adamhousley) May 30, 2015

Ex-Utah Governor Huntsman accepts Trump offer to be ambassador to Russia: officialWASHINGTON (Reuters) - Former Utah Republican Governor Jon Huntsman has accepted President Donald Trump’s offer to be ambassador to Russia, an administration official said on Wednesday. The job, which requires Senate confirmation, would put Huntsman in Moscow at a time when U.S.-Russian ties have sunk to a post-Cold War low. Huntsman served as ambassador to China under Democratic President Barack Obama before launching an unsuccessful bid for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination. Trump has said he wants to improve relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin, which deteriorated under Obama over issues including Russia’s annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea and the two countries’ backing of opposing sides in the Syrian civil war. The tensions peaked in December when Obama expelled 35 Russian suspected spies after U.S. intelligence agencies concluded that Russia hacked and leaked Democratic emails during the 2016 election campaign as part of an effort to tilt the vote in Trump’s favor. The Kremlin has denied the allegations.

ANGRY PUNK ADMITS TO SLASHING TIRES, Dumping Rotten Yogurt In Sunroof Over Trump Bumper Sticker: TRUMP Supporter Has PERFECT ResponseThe victim of the angry Bernie Sanders supporter has an amazing attitude. It s the civility many of us have come to expect from Trump supporters who ve been unjustly attacked by uncivil and in many cases, unlawful Bernie Sanders supporters. A politically-motivated vandal in Washington State admittedly vandalized a Trump supporter s car, slashing its tires and dumping rotten yogurt through its sun roof, according to a police report filed last Monday.The suspect, named in the report as one Riley M. Silva of Gig Harbour, Washington, confessed his crime to the police. Showing no sign of remorse, he claimed his victim was an ignorant bigot and that he improved the community by vandalizing the car. According to the report, the culprit became angry after noticing that the car sported a Donald Trump sticker.His full confession to the police, which was originally posted on the blog of lawyer and author Mike Cernovich, reads as follows:I on the 11th day of the 4th month of 2016 did maliciously attack a hate symbol protected by the first amendment. After disabling the vehicle and dumping rotten food into the interior I feel I have improved the community and supported our nation s values by stopping a promoter of hate speech. I do not wish to have ignorant bigots in my town and in a just world the person deserved what was received and the situation is made whole.As America is far from just, I expect the bigot will want to be made whole. With this I declare he is owed nothng. But as the situation is what it is, I intend to make the individual whole provided he cease to promote ignorance and hate. I do not expect the law to recognize damage to tools of hate or fascism. Such things need to be destroyed so good people may remain and become free.The victim, Nathan Elliot, later posted pictures of the damage to his vehicle. In his statement to the police, he said that the damage to the tire alone would cost $500 to repair.Bernie Sanders supporter didn't like my Trump bumper sticker, so he vandalized my personal property. Cool. pic.twitter.com/QghClfl2ak Nate (@pulsarVision) April 10, 2016The police report describes Riley Silva as a skinny white male in his 20s, with long blond hair. The victim saw him while he was in the process of vandalizing his car, at which point he yelled at and ran towards the culprit, who fled in his own vehicle. In the report, Elliot claims that the culprit almost hit two other cars as he drove away from the scene. In addition to vandalizing the victim s car, Silva has been charged with reckless driving. -Breitbart NewsEven though I have amazing @USAA insurance, all costs will come out of my own pocket. That's a $400 tire by the way. Nate (@pulsarVision) April 12, 2016USAA Insurance tweeted an awesome reply to Nathan:@pulsarVision We are here to help. Is this a claim related need ? Please DM us your full name, claim# if applicable and you phone# . Thank u USAA (@USAA_help) April 12, 2016UPDATE on Nathan s new tire:@BreitbartNews @Cernovich @DanScavino @realDonaldTrump @Nero Update: new tire came in today can't tread on me!!! pic.twitter.com/AlVPDLym85 Nate (@pulsarVision) April 16, 2016Nathan has the perfect response to the violent Bernie Sanders supporters:It was only through learning how much others don t like the truth exposed, that I learned for myself how much I crave its very existence. Nate (@pulsarVision) February 14, 2016

COAL MINERS ENDORSE TRUMP …Crowd Goes Nuts [Video]Donald Trump held a rally in West Virginia and was endorsed by the coal miners well done!

Orlando Mass Shooting & The Accelerated Police State – UK Column – June 13, 201621st Century Wire says UK Column anchor Brian Gerrish and guest co-presenter, Patrick Henningsen with breaking international news and analysis including the record-breaking mass shooting event in Orlando, Florida an event which reported 50 dead nightclub patrons. This event took place in the early hours of Sunday morning EST, and not surprisingly, this story is one of the most bizarre and anomaly-ridden mass shooting events seen yet. UK Column breaks this story down in detail, along with the overriding political implications, both domestically in the US and internationally. SEE MORE NEWS AT: UKCOLUMN.ORGSUPPORT 21WIRE BECOME AT MEMBER AT: 21WIRE.TV

Czech president appoints Andrej Babis as new prime ministerPRAGUE (Reuters) - Czech billionaire businessman Andrej Babis was appointed prime minister on Wednesday after his ANO party came first in an October election, and he must now focus on securing parliamentary backing for a minority administration. Running on pledges to fight migration and make the state more efficient, ANO won 29.6 percent of the vote, nearly three times the support won by second-placed center-right Civic Democrats. Despite that strong showing, however, it is unclear whether Babis will be able to win a confidence vote for his government by mid-January as required by the constitution. He also faces the threat of prosecution in connection with his business interests. ANO holds 78 seats in the 200-seat lower house but has so far failed to win the backing of any of the other eight parties. Should he lose such a vote, Babis would stay in power until a new arrangement is found. But given his party s size, it would also most likely have to lead any other arrangement. In a televised ceremony on Wednesday, President Milos Zeman appointed Babis, 63, who set up ANO in 2011 as a protest movement when mainstream parties were embroiled in corruption scandals. Babis s new cabinet will take power on Dec. 13, allowing him to take part in a European Union leaders summit the following day. He has pledged to keep the budget in shape but also boost infrastructure investments and public sector wages, and play a more active role in the European Union, especially in securing the EU s external border to stop illegal migration. The Czechs are facing a possible EU suit over refusing to accept migrants under an EU quota system, which Babis said was his first European task. I will first have to negotiate and convince the European Commission not to sue us and to find a different solution, he told a news conference after his appointment. Quotas are not a solution, and the solution is outside Europe, and we have to win over other member states for this. The far-right, anti-EU and anti-NATO SPD party and the Communists have lent ANO support in several initial votes in return for committee posts for their members, raising the prospect that they may have some kind of agreement to back ANO. But Babis said on Wednesday he had no deal in place and would talk to all parties to either back the cabinet or abstain from the vote to help it win. In the week of Dec. 18, we will present the program manifesto and negotiate on whether someone will go into government with us or give us tolerance, Babis said. Rival parties have criticized Babis, the second-richest person in the country, worth $4 billion according to Forbes, for conflicts of interests. He owns a farming, chemicals, food and media group which has contracts with the state and receives European subsidies. The main sticking point is a police request that parliament strip Babis of his immunity so he can be prosecuted for suspected fraud in tapping European Union subsidies. He denies any wrongdoing. If police drop the case or parliament refuses to lift immunity, Babis may win some votes from other factions. Analysts say a second attempt to form a cabinet, with or without Babis, may have a greater chance of success because many parties suffered losses in the October vote and are keen to avoid an early election, which a prolonged crisis could eventually lead to.

HUD OFFICIAL Spends $366,000 in Fed Funds on Booze, Makeup, Clothes and Homes…You Won’t Believe Her Punishment!WHY IS THIS CRIMINAL ALLOWED TO JUST SKATE BY WITH SUCH A SHORT AMOUNT OF JAIL TIME?We know that this woman is working on a plea bargain but FIVE YEARS??? The two things that are so outrageous about this entire case are that there was NO OVERSIGHT and that this WENT ON FOR 8 YEARS!!!USING THE FEDS AS YOUR OWN PERSONAL PIGGY BANK:Lorena Loren s job was to help poor people find housing Instead, prosecutors say, she was stealing from the poor to buy booze, makeup, clothes and homes for her relatives.But after years of scheming, authorities say, the government caught on. IT TOOK 8 YEARS!In a public corruption case that surfaced in federal court today, Loren, the former executive director of the St. Clair Housing Commission, was charged with embezzling more than $300,000 in low-income housing funds and spending the money on herself and family.According to a charging document filed in U.S. District Court, Loren s scheme ran between 2008-2016 and benefited many family members, including her husband, son and son-in-law.Prosecutors say Loren s criminal activity started in 2008 five years after she was appointed executive director of the St. Clair Housing Commission, which administers federally funded low-income housing programs in St. Clair County.According to court records, Loren used her job in many nefarious ways, including: She fraudulently used the housing commission s two credit cards to buy personal items for herself and relatives, including nearly $135,000 in online purchases from Amazon.com; $14,364 in purchases from Sam s Club in Port Huron, and $16,460 in purchases from various Walmart stores. The purchases included, among other things, adult and infant clothing, furniture, food, beauty supplies, medications and alcoholic beverages. Her unauthorized Amazon.com purchases included $60,000 worth of bedroom furniture, mattresses, appliances and other household items for family members. The items were shipped to Loren s relatives in Georgia and Florida. She embezzled $24,600 in commission funds to pay for her son s rental unit. She lied on four government housing contracts by claiming that her son-in-law was the landlord of a rental property for low-income residents in Michigan, when it was really her home in Port Austin. She falsified lease agreements and stole public housing money that was supposed to help poor people to rent a home for her son. She directed members of her family to establish bank accounts so that federal rental subsidy payments could be deposited into those accounts. The relatives then used the money for their own personal use, including rent for their Florida residences.Loren is charged in what is known as an information, which typically means she is working on a deal with the government. She is charged with conspiracy to commit federal program fraud. If convicted, she faces up to five years in prison.Loren home Lorena Loren bought this $325,000 home in Georgia after federal prosecutors say she embezzled more than $336,000 from the St. Clair Housing Commission.JUDICIAL WATCH: HUD s inspector general has testified before Congress about the severe mismanagement at offshoots functioning independently yet federally funded in states across the country that have fleeced taxpayers out of hundreds of millions of dollars. He testified that his office discovered more than $200 million in questionable spending at local public housing agencies (PHAs) since 2012. PHAs are created by states, operate at the city or county level and administer the federal program known as Section 8 to provide low-income people with affordable housing. Many of these local public housing agencies are run by people with troubled backgrounds that somehow manage to remain in high-ranking positions at the agencies, the watchdog told lawmakers back in 2014.DR BEN CARSON NEEDS TO CLEAN THIS UP STAT!READ MORE: DFP

President Obama ‘Schools’ NBA Champion Stephen Curry In Basketball And Other Stuff (VIDEO)Reigning NBA champion and most valuable player Stephen Curry hung out with President Obama and learned a few lessons from the NBA enthusiast, including how to play basketball. While we know who can school who in reality, Curry took it all in stride as the president showed him how to shoot a basketball as the two teamed up to highlight the importance of mentoring.Watch video here: [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Atm3P3XsAag] The president didn t just teach Curry a few moves in basketball: He also schooled the talented shooter in Connect Four, and taught him how to make a model volcano erupt.It was all in good fun for the president who is in his last few months in office and the NBA great, who is in the prime of his career and is looking for a second consecutive championship after helping the Golden State Warriors to the best regular season record in history.To learn more about mentoring opportunities, read and click on the link below: Mentoring creates meaningful connections that can positively impact the lives of both mentor and mentee. Those who receive mentorship are more likely to see improved academic, social, and economic prospects. Those who mentor are able to build important leadership and management skills, while giving back to their community.There are 46 million young people, aged 8 18, living in America. 16 million of them are growing up without a mentor. That s one out of every three young people who, outside of their family at home, don t have a trusted adult who they believe they can turn to for advice and guidance. Of those young people, 9 million face a variety of day-to-day challenges that put them at-risk for falling off track. That means that every mentorship matters. Featured image via video screenshot.

EMBARRASSING: Pro-Gun Control Reporter Attempts Hit Job On AR-15’s…Claims He Got “Temporary PTSD”…Viewers Respond: “If you have a man card turn it in immediately” [VIDEO]What is it about liberal men that makes a woman want to shoot him up with testosterone just to make him tolerable? Gersh Kuntzman of the New York Daily News has been roundly mocked since the publishing of an article headlined What is it like to fire an AR-15? It s horrifying, menacing and very very loud. The article also contains a video of Kuntzman shooting the AR-15, a segment put together one day after the Orlando massacre.He described the experience as an explosion of firepower that was humbling and deafening, but it was a line at the end of the article that people really took issue with. The brass shell casings disoriented me as they flew past my face. The smell of sulfur and destruction made me sick, he said. The explosions loud like a bomb gave me a temporary case of PTSD. For at least an hour after firing the gun just a few times, I was anxious and irritable. It was the temporary case of PTSD that critics found inappropriate and Kuntzman added a note about it after publishing, while linking to a follow-up story showcasing some of the responses he received.Many people have objected to my use of the term PTSD in the above story. The use of this term was in no way meant to conflate my very temporary anxiety with the very real condition experienced by many of our brave men and women in uniform. I regret the inarticulate use of the term to describe my in-the-moment impression of the gun s firepower, and apologize for it. I have also posted a follow up piece here.In the follow-up mentioned, which Kuntzman headlined To gun lovers, you can t even have an opinion on assault rifles unless it s theirs. Here s the proof, the writer opened by saying The gun debate is also a gender war. In all my years in journalism coming up on 30 (thanks) I have never received so much angry mail as I did after yesterday s story. Here is a sampling of the angry mail he received: Kuntzman is an outright liar. Nice try with an extremely stupid article which only appealed to girly boys and women of NYC and like the sheeple they are probably believed the lies. Hey there Cupcake! I have never subscribed to the idea of gender confusion, but after reading your article on the AR-15, I m a believer because there is no way you and I are the same gender. You should surrender your testicles to the Department of Girlymen. I m not sure where it s located, but your girlfriend Barack does! You f king pussy. If you have a man card turn it in immediately. You might be better served writing about feminine hygiene products!!! Maybe you can get some balls through Obamacare! Huntsman said these were only the printable responses he received.Via:Rare.us

U.S. to issue rules to tighten individual travel restrictions to CubaWASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Trump administration plans to publish regulations that will end people-to-people individual travel to Cuba, the U.S. Treasury Department said on Friday. “The President instructed Treasury to issue regulations that will end individual people-to-people travel,” the department said in a statement. It added that the changes will not take effect until new regulations are issued.

Nigeria replaces commander in fight against Boko Haram after six monthsMAIDUGURI, Nigeria (Reuters) - Nigeria is replacing the military commander of the fight against Boko Haram after half a year, an army spokesman said on Wednesday, following a string of insurgency attacks despite years of official claims the group has almost been defeated. The shake-up underscores the fragility of the security situation in Nigeria s northeast, where the conflict with the Islamist insurgent group is now in its ninth year, despite assertions by President Muhammadu Buhari s administration that it is on its last legs. A military spokesman confirmed the replacement of Ibrahim Attahiru, theater commander of the operation against Boko Haram, in a text message to Reuters. Major General Rogers Nicholas will take his position. The spokesman did not provide further details. Attahiru s removal comes in the wake of a series of embarrassing attacks, two military sources told Reuters. They said the conduct of the war against the insurgents is now being reviewed. The attacks, which occurred during Attahiru s command, include the kidnapping of members of an oil prospecting team which led to at least 37 people being killed in July, and deadly assaults on the towns of Magumeri, Biu and Madagali, the sources said. A spokesman for the president, who serves as Nigeria s commander-in-chief, declined to comment. The governor of Borno state, which is at the epicenter of the insurgency, has said the government s long-term plan now is to corral civilians inside fortified garrison towns - effectively ceding the countryside to Boko Haram. That plan and the spate of deadly attacks have raised questions about assertions by the government and military that Boko Haram has been all but wiped out, as well as doubts about Nigeria s ability to retain sovereign integrity in the northeast.

Episode #208 – ‘Not The Network’ – Sunday Wire with Hesher, Funk$oul and Patrick Henningsen Live from IraqEpisode #208 of SUNDAY WIRE SHOW resumes on Oct 29th 2017 as host Patrick Henningsen brings you this week s LIVE broadcast on the Alternate Current Radio Network (ACR) covering all the top news stories both at home and internationally LISTEN LIVE ON THIS PAGE AT THE FOLLOWING SCHEDULED SHOW TIMES:5pm-8pm UK Time | 12pm-3pm ET (US) | 9am-12am PT (US) This week the SUNDAY WIRE is broadcasting LIVE from the Iraq as host Patrick Henningsen is joined by guest hosts Hesher & Funk$oul from the Alternate Current Radio s Boiler Room to discuss this week s top stories internationally including the leveling of Raqqa by US-led Coalition forces, the new US-UK-Soros-sponsored war against RT guests and the new European McCarthyist hunt for political dissenters to compliment the US effort and the update on Trump s release of classified JFK files. We ll also review this past week s news events with guest FunkSoul. Enjoy the show SUPPORT 21WIRE SUBSCRIBE & BECOME A MEMBER @21WIRE.TVStrap yourselves in and lower the blast shield this is your brave new world *NOTE: THIS EPISODE MAY CONTAIN STRONG LANGUAGE AND MATURE THEMES*Download Episode #208 Sunday Wire Radio Show Archives

LIVE STREAM: DONALD TRUMP -FIRST 100 DAYS SPEECH – GETTYSBURG, PA [VIDEO]

Daily Show: Obama Has ‘No More F*cks To Give’ At Final SOTU (VIDEO)Trevor Noah, host of Comedy Central s The Daily Show, is about to experience his first viewing of a time-honored American tradition: The State of the Union Address. To help him along in this endeavor, he called in one of his correspondents, Roy Wood Jr., who tried to help Noah to know what to expect.However, there was only one thing Wood seemed certain of: Obama is leaving office and he s gonna say and do whatever the f*ck he wants. Wood told Noah: More of a preview of the exhibits in the Obama presidential library the Affordable Care Act, the climate change deal, how he taught not one but two Portuguese water dogs to fist-bump. But what I do know for sure about this year s speech? Obama has no more f*cks to give. Wood referenced the twitter photo, tweeted out from President Obama s official account while hammering this most important point home.This is it President Obama's final #SOTU. Say you'll be watching: https://t.co/W8niWpEVnX pic.twitter.com/NmLWydsePO Barack Obama (@BarackObama) January 4, 2016Wood continued, commenting on Obama s smirk: Look at his face he does not care. That s the same face I make when I m about to leave my job. He then went on to point out to Trevor Noah just what the SOTU actually is, and how the president is supposed to, no matter what, assure the American people that things are going great, no matter what is actually happening. You know Trevor, when America asks you if it looks fat in its jeans, it s not really looking for an honest answer. Just say America has a bangin a*s and be done with it. And he s exactly right. And after all President Obama has been through, all the right-wing hate and obstruction, yet still managed to accomplish so much, he deserves to have a bit of fun.So, go for it, Mr. President. You ve earned it.Watch the clip below via Comedy Central:Featured image via screen capture from Raw Story

Hawaii to file first court challenge to new Trump travel orderSAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - The state of Hawaii said it will ask a federal court on Wednesday for an emergency halt to President Donald Trump’s new executive order restricting travel from six Muslim-majority countries, becoming the first state to challenge the ban in court. In a court filing on Tuesday, Hawaii said it would seek a temporary restraining order against the new travel ban. Hawaii’s suit against the original executive order was put on hold. The Trump administration this week issued the new executive order that supplanted an earlier, more sweeping one which had been challenged in court by several states in addition to Hawaii. The new order is much more narrowly tailored than the first one issued in January. It keeps a 90-day ban on travel to the United States by citizens of Iran, Libya, Syria, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen but excludes Iraq, and applies the restriction only to new visa applicants. “To be sure, the new executive order covers fewer people than the old one,” Neal Katyal, one of the lead attorneys for Hawaii, said in an interview with CNN. He said the new travel ban still “suffers from the same constitutional and statutory defects.” “We are confident that the president’s actions are lawful to protect the national security of our country,” the Justice Department said in a statement. In a joint filing, Hawaii and the U.S. government asked for oral arguments in the case to be held March 15, a day before the new travel order is set to take effect. Separately, in a case brought by Washington state against the first Trump travel order, the Justice Department on Tuesday said it would voluntarily dismiss its own appeal of a Seattle federal court ruling that had suspended the order. Washington state did not oppose the administration’s request to end its appeal, the filing said. Immigration advocates said the new ban still discriminates against Muslims and fails to address some of their concerns with the previous directive. Legal experts said the new ban would be harder to challenge because it affects fewer people living in the United States and allows more exemptions to protect them. Washington state Attorney General Bob Ferguson on Monday said his office was evaluating whether it would challenge the new order and would likely decide this week. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals last month had blocked Trump’s first order, saying Washington state would likely be able to prove that it violated constitutional protections. That appeals court ruling has not been withdrawn and its legal reasoning can still be cited as precedent in future cases, Washington attorney general spokesman Peter Lavallee said on Tuesday.

CNN Guest’s Face After Trump Flack Blatantly Lies About Obama Golfing Is All Of Us Right Now (VIDEO)It s Trump s third month in office and the lies about President Obama just keep coming.During a CNN panel to discuss Trump s 13th golf vacation, long-time Trump flack and woman without shame Kayleigh McEnany, thought she would help her president out by spinning a blatant lie about Obama. Trump should be excused from criticism for his repeated golf trips, McEnany reasoned, because Obama once golfed shortly after a journalist named Daniel Pearl was murdered by extremists in Pakistan.As anyone not currently trying to exploit his death to protect Trump might know, Pearl was murdered in 2002. Obama wouldn t become president for six years. And there is no evidence that he was golfing as a then state senator at the time. McEnany just flat-out lied.WATCH: Kayleigh McEnany: Obama rushed off to golf after Daniel Pearl was beheaded.Pearl was killed in 2002. Obama was a state senator. pic.twitter.com/5QkFRgjoR4 Yashar (@yashar) March 28, 2017Next to her was Atlantic writer Peter Beinart whose stunned expression pretty much sums it up.Beinart is used to this level of idiocy from Trump surrogates. During the election, his reaction to a ridiculous rant by Katrina Pierson went viral. Her lies were so unhinged that all he could do was uncontrollably laugh at her.Peter Beinart could not contain his laughter during that last @CNNTonight segment https://t.co/JgD2aEcts0 Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) October 13, 2016It s not hard to understand why Trump and his cronies are eager to deflect criticism of his golf game onto Obama. For years, Trump attacked the former president for taking vacations or playing golf while he was in office. During the campaign, Trump vowed to never take a vacation and promised he would have no time for golf. Since being elected, that s gone out the window. He s now spent nearly every weekend in his first two months playing golf at courses he owns.Adding further absurdity to McEnany s defense of Trump, the president doesn t let national mourning stop his golf game. He played golf this weekend during the same time a white supremacist terrorist was charged with murdering a random black man as practice before a planned mass murder of black people in New York City. Trump has refused to comment on the incident. He visited his Virginia golf course twice, lying about what he was doing both times.Featured image via Twitter

Syrian opposition says Russian jets kill civilians fleeing across EuphratesAMMAN (Reuters) - Military jets believed to be Russian killed at least 60 civilians trying to flee heavy fighting in the oil rich Deir al Zor province of Syria when their small boats were targeted as they sought to cross the Euphrates River, opposition activists, former residents and a war monitor said late on Wednesday. They said the jets targeted makeshift rubber dinghies and boats carrying dozens of families fleeing the town of al Ashara along the western banks of the Euphrates that lies south of Deir al Zor city, the provincial capital. Islamic State s last major stronghold, the cities, towns and farms in the fertile strip along the Euphrates bordering Iraq are fast becoming the focus of Syria s six-year-long civil war. Russian jets staged a second wave of strikes on the boats that were fleeing across the river causing more casualties among those who rushed to rescue earlier survivors, said Abdullah al Akaidat, a tribal figure in northern Syria from Al Ashara who is in contact with relatives in the area. Russia is throwing military weight behind the Syrian army campaign s to regain the province bordering Iraq, racing with U.S- backed forces to grab territory from Islamic State. U.S. coalition jets last year destroyed bridges that linked villages on the northeast of the Euphrates river with towns on the opposite bank. Although the goal was to cut militant supply lines, it forced people to use ferries to cross the river and its tributaries and ruptured a major lifeline for civilians, raising prices of goods and food. Fifteen civilians were killed in air strikes during the last 24 hours on the town of al Quriya, just further north of the town of Ashara along the river, said former residents in touch with relatives. Thousands of residents of the eastern province are fleeing war-torn zones to the safety of towns that have escaped relatively unscathed from the relentless fighting. The Russians built a bridge across the Euphrates near Deir Zor city to move troops and equipment. The militants waged a surprise counter offensive and claimed to have killed dozens of Syrian troops, Russian ground troops and Iranian-backed fighters. They regained some territory back. Islamic State released a video on Tuesday of two injured men it claimed were Russian soldiers captured in Deir al Zor province. Reuters could not verify the authenticity of the tape. The Syrian army is seeking to advance toward Mayadeen, a city in the province 44 km southeast of Deir Zor, where the river flows through it. Mayadeen is a major Islamic State stronghold that has also been targeted by the U.S.-led coalition which had earlier this year also increased bombing of the group in cities and towns along the Euphrates valley. Relentless airstrikes by Russian jets in Deir al Zor province have intensified in recent days according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. The war monitor documented the death of at least 185 civilians, including at least 45 woman and children, in five days of aerial strikes. Russia rejects opposition and human rights groups accusations that the bombing campaign has killed thousands of civilians since its major intervention two years ago that turned the tide in favor of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Scores of hospitals and civil defense centers have been bombed in what the opposition said is a scorched earth policy to paralyze life in rebel-held areas. Moscow says it only attacks hardline Islamists.

German SPD leader says EU must stop accession talks with TurkeyBERLIN (Reuters) - Germany s Social Democrat (SPD) leader Martin Schulz told a television debate with Chancellor Angela Merkel that he would stop Turkey s bid to join the European Union if he was elected leader of Europe s most populous country. When I m chancellor, I ll cancel ... the accession talks of Turkey with the European Union, Schulz said in the debate. No German citizen can travel safely to Turkey anymore, Schulz said, referring to the detention of 12 German citizens on political charges in the past months. Whoever is the next chancellor has the task to tell Turkey in order to protect the Federal Republic of Germany: all red lines have now been crossed, and therefore this country can no longer become a member of the EU, Schulz said. Merkel repeated her standard position that she was in favour of stopping further discussions with Ankara about its participation in a EU customs union. But she cautioned against pulling the plug on Turkey s accession talks right now, adding such a step should be considered cautiously.

G4S suspends nine staff at UK migrant center, says to investigate conductEDINBURGH (Reuters) - British outsourcer G4S has suspended nine members of staff at an immigration removal center while it investigates a BBC report alleging abuse in the treatment of migrants, the company said on Friday. We have received written allegations of abhorrent conduct at Brook House and on that basis we have deemed it serious enough to suspend the staff involved, a spokeswoman for G4S said. She said the company had not yet seen footage of the alleged incidents, however. BBC Panorama, a flagship documentary program, said on its website that an investigation revealed chaos, incompetence and abuse in the treatment of migrants in a program which will be aired next week. The incident has been reported to the police, the spokeswoman said. Officers were not immediately able to comment. The kind of behavior alleged is completely unacceptable, and does a great disservice to the vast majority of staff who do a great job in very difficult circumstances, the spokeswoman said. The issue highlights the difficulty of running sensitive services for the government and the potential reputational damage for outsourcing companies. Earlier this year an investigation at the G4S-run Medway Secure Training Centre resulted in allegations of abuse and mistreatment of youngsters. The center is now run by the government s National Offender Management Service. Brook House, near Gatwick Airport, is staffed by more than 200 employees and has around 500 occupants. More than 14,000 people passed through it in the last year. The unit houses a mix of those who have not fulfilled their visa requirements and criminals who are being deported.

Egypt security forces arrest 12 suspected militants south of Cairo: ministryCAIRO (Reuters) - Egyptian security forces have arrested 12 suspected members of the Islamist militant Hasm Movement in the province of Fayoum 60 km (40 miles) south of Cairo, the Interior Ministry said on Tuesday. A ministry statement said police also confiscated a number of weapons and explosive devices. Hasm, a group that emerged last year and has claimed several attacks on security forces, including the fatal shooting of a policeman and injuries to three others in the province. Egypt accuses Hasm of being a militant wing of the Muslim Brotherhood, the country s oldest Islamist movement which Cairo outlawed in 2013. The Muslim Brotherhood denies this and says it strives only for peaceful political change. An insurgency led by Islamic State militants in Egypt s rugged Sinai Peninsula has killed hundreds of soldiers and policemen since the Egyptian military overthrew President Mohamed Mursi of the Muslim Brotherhood in mid-2013 - although no official death toll has been released to date. Attacks have increasingly moved to the mainland in recent months, targeting Coptic Christians as well as security officers and checkpoints in and around major Egyptian cities.

FBI FILES REVEALED: VALERIE JARRETT’S FAMILY TIES TO COMMUNISM RUN DEEPI m sure the apple doesn t fall far from the tree in this case. Many of us have known about the father-in-law but this digs deeper into Valerie Jarrett s own family. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) files obtained by Judicial Watch reveal that the dad, maternal grandpa and father-in-law of President Obama s trusted senior advisor, Valerie Jarrett, were hardcore Communists under investigation by the U.S. government.Jarrett s dad, pathologist and geneticist Dr. James Bowman, had extensive ties to Communist associations and individuals, his lengthy FBI file shows. In 1950 Bowman was in communication with a paid Soviet agent named Alfred Stern, who fled to Prague after getting charged with espionage. Bowman was also a member of a Communist-sympathizing group called the Association of Internes and Medical Students. After his discharge from the Army Medical Corps in 1955, Bowman moved to Iran to work, the FBI records show.According to Bowman s government file the Association of Internes and Medical Students is an organization that has long been a faithful follower of the Communist Party line and engages in un-American activities. Bowman was born in Washington D.C. and had deep ties to Chicago, where he often collaborated with fellow Communists. JW also obtained documents on Bowman from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) showing that the FBI was brought into investigate him for his membership in a group that follows the communist party line. The Jarrett family Communist ties also include a business partnership between Jarrett s maternal grandpa, Robert Rochon Taylor, and Stern, the Soviet agent associated with her dad.Jarrett s father-in-law, Vernon Jarrett, was also another big-time Chicago Communist, according to separate FBI files obtained by JW as part of a probe into the Jarrett family s Communist ties. For a period of time Vernon Jarrett appeared on the FBI s Security Index and was considered a potential Communist saboteur who was to be arrested in the event of a conflict with the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). His FBI file reveals that he was assigned to write propaganda for a Communist Party front group in Chicago that would disseminate the Communist Party line among the middle class. It s been well documented that Valerie Jarrett, a Chicago lawyer and longtime Obama confidant, is a liberal extremist who wields tremendous power in the White House. Faithful to her roots, she still has connections to many Communist and extremist groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood. Jarrett and her family also had strong ties to Frank Marshal Davis, a big Obama mentor and Communist Party member with an extensive FBI file.JW has exposed Valerie Jarrett s many transgressions over the years, including her role in covering up a scandalous gun-running operation carried out by the Department of Justice (DOJ). Last fall JW obtained public records that show Jarrett was a key player in the effort to cover up that Attorney General Eric Holder lied to Congress about the Fast and Furious, a disastrous experiment in which the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco Firearms and Explosives (ATF) allowed guns from the U.S. to be smuggled into Mexico so they could eventually be traced to drug cartels. Instead, federal law enforcement officers lost track of hundreds of weapons which have been used in an unknown number of crimes, including the murder of a U.S. Border Patrol agent in Arizona.In 2008 JW got documents linking Valerie Jarrett, who also served as co-chairman of Obama s presidential transition team, to a series of real estate scandals, including several housing projects operated by convicted felon and Obama fundraiser/friend Antoin Tony Rezko. According to the documents obtained from the Illinois Secretary of State, Valerie Jarrett served as a board member for several organizations that provided funding and support for Chicago slum projects operated by Tony Rezco.Via: Judicial Watch

HACKING DEMOCRACY? CIA Accusing Russia of Doing What Langley Does So WellPeter Certo Other WordsEven in an election year as shot through with conspiracy theories as this one, it would have been hard to imagine a bigger bombshell than Russia intervening to help Donald Trump. But that s exactly what the CIA believes happened, or so unnamed officials brief on the matter told the Washington Post.While Russia had long been blamed for hacking email accounts linked to the Clinton campaign, its motives had been shrouded in mystery. According to the Post, though, CIA officials recently presented Congress with a a growing body of intelligence from multiple sources that electing Trump was Russia s goal. Now, the CIA hasn t made any of its evidence public, and the CIA and FBI are reportedly divided on the subject. Though it s too soon to draw conclusions, the charges warrant a serious public investigation.Even some Republicans who backed Trump seem to agree. The Russians are not our friends, said Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell, announcing his support for a congressional probe. It s warfare, added Senator John McCain.There s a grim irony to this. The CIA is accusing Russia of interfering in our free and fair elections to install a right-wing candidate it deemed more favorable to its interests. Yet during the Cold War, that s exactly what the CIA did to the rest of the world.Most Americans probably don t know that history. But in much of the world it s a crucial part of how Washington is viewed even today.In the post-World War II years, as Moscow and Washington jockeyed for global influence, the two capitals tried to game every foreign election they could get their hands on.From Europe to Vietnam and Chile to the Philippines, American agents delivered briefcases of cash to hand-picked politicians, launched smear campaigns against their left-leaning rivals, and spread hysterical fake news stories like the ones some now accuse Russia of spreading here.Together, political scientist Dov Levin estimates, Russia and the U.S. interfered in 117 elections this way in the second half the 20th century. Even worse is what happened when the CIA s chosen candidates lost.In Iran, when elected leader Mohammad Mossadegh tried to nationalize the country s BP-held oil reserves, CIA agent Kermit Roosevelt led an operation to oust Mossadegh in favor of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. The shah s secret police tortured dissidents by the thousands, leading directly to the Islamic Revolution in 1979.In Guatemala, when the democratically elected Jacobo Arbez tried to loosen the U.S.-based United Fruit company s grip on Guatemalan land, the CIA backed a coup against him. In the decades of civil war that followed, U.S.-backed security forces were accused of carrying out a genocide against indigenous Guatemalans. Chile s democratically elected leader Allende was murdered in a brutal CIA coup d etat on September 11, 1973 (Image Source: Evergreen.edu)In Chile, after voters elected the socialist Salvador Allende, the CIA spearheaded a bloody coup to install the right-wing dictator Augusto Pinochet, who went on to torture and disappear tens of thousands of Chileans. I don t see why we need to stand by and watch a country go communist due to the irresponsibility of its own people, U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger purportedly said about the coup he helped orchestrate there.And those are only the most well-known examples Continue this article at Other WordsREAD MORE MORE ELECTION NEWS AT: 21WIRE 2016 FilesSUPPORT 21WIRE SUBSCRIBE & BECOME A MEMBER@ 21WIRE.TV

WHO urges Trump to expand Obamacare, ensure healthcare for allGENEVA (Reuters) - The World Health Organization (WHO) on Friday urged U.S. President-elect Donald Trump to expand Obamacare and ensure all Americans have access to healthcare. The real estate magnate takes office next month after promising to repeal outgoing President Barack Obama’s signature healthcare policy which helped millions more Americans get medical insurance but has been a target of Republican attacks. Agnes Soucat, the WHO’s director of health system governance and financing, said there were various ways of providing health cover to more people, and it amounted to “political choices.” “We as the WHO really encourage the new administration to make sure that the social contract is expanded and that all U.S. citizens have access to health care,” Soucat told a news briefing in Geneva. The United States is the only country among the 35 member states of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) not to provide universal health care, a key U.N. Sustainable Development Goal for 2030, she said. The Affordable Care Act, known commonly as Obamacare, has provided some 25 million previously uninsured Americans with health cover. Republicans say it has created unwarranted government intervention in personal healthcare and private industry. Trump in late November picked Republican U.S. Representative Tom Price, an orthopedic surgeon from Georgia and Obamacare critic, to be his health secretary. Price has long championed a plan of tax credits, expanded health savings accounts, and lawsuit reforms to replace Obamacare. Republicans are divided over how quickly an Obamacare repeal should go into effect, with some saying a delay would give them time to work on a replacement, instead of throwing millions of Americans out of their health insurance with no substitute. “There are different strategies to make universal health care particularly pro-poor,” Soucat said. “So what we are saying is, yes, this would be a setback if people would lose coverage.”

BUSTED! Main Political “Fact” Checker For SNOPES Is FINALLY EXPOSED As Liberal HackWait until you read this woman s biography and past quotes about conservatives! Popular myth-busting website Snopes originally gained recognition for being the go-to site for disproving outlandish urban legends -such as the presence of UFOs in Haiti or the existence of human-animal hybrids in the Amazon jungle.Recently, however, the site has tried to pose as a political fact-checker. But Snopes fact-checking looks more like playing defense for prominent Democrats like Hillary Clinton and it s political fact-checker describes herself as a liberal and has called Republicans regressive and afraid of female agency. Snopes main political fact-checker is a writer named Kim Lacapria. Before writing for Snopes, Lacapria wrote for Inquisitr, a blog that oddly enough is known for publishing fake quotes and even downright hoaxes as much as anything else.While at Inquisitr, the future fact-checker consistently displayed clear partisanship.She described herself as openly left-leaning and a liberal. She trashed the Tea Party as teahadists. She called Bill Clinton one of our greatest presidents. She claimed that conservatives only criticized Lena Dunham s comparison of voting to sex because they fear female agency. She once wrote: Like many GOP ideas about the poor, the panic about using food stamps for alcohol, pornography or guns seems to have been cut from whole cloth or more likely, the ideas many have about the fantasy of poverty. (A simple fact-check would show that food stamp fraud does occur and costs taxpayers tens of millions.)Lacapria even accused the Bush administration of being at least guilty of criminal negligience in the September 11 attacks. (The future fact-checker offered no evidence to support her accusation.)Her columns apparently failed to impress her readership, oftentimes failing to get more than 10-20 shares.After blogging the Inquisitr, Lacapria joined Snopes, where she regularly plays defense for her fellow liberals.She wrote a fact check article about Jimmy Carter s unilateral ban of Iranian nationals from entering the country that looks more like an opinion column arguing against Donald Trump s proposed Muslim ban.Similarly, Lacapria in another fact check article argued Hillary Clinton hadn t included Benghazi at all in her infamous we didn t lose a single person in Libya gaffe. Lacapria claimed Clinton only meant to refer to the 2011 invasion of Libya (but not the 2012 Benghazi attack) but offered little fact-based evidence to support her claim.After the Orlando terror attack, Lacapria claimed that just because Omar Mateen was a registered Democrat with an active voter registration status didn t mean he was actually a Democrat. Her fact check argued that he might have chosen a random political affiliation when he initially registered. Lacapria even tried to contradict the former Facebook workers who admitted that Facebook regularly censors conservative news, dismissing the news as rumors. In that fact check article, Lacapria argued that Facebook Trending s blacklisting of junk topics was not only not a scandalous development, but to be expected following the social network s crackdown on fake news sites. The opinion-heavy article was mockingly titled: The Algorithm Is Gonna Get You.Lacapria again played defense for Clinton in a fact check article when she claimed: Outrage over an expensive Armani jacket worn by Hillary Clinton was peppered with inaccurate details. One of the inaccurate details cited by Lacapria was that, The cost of men s suits worn by fellow politicians didn t appear in the article for contrast. She also argued the speech Clinton gave while wearing the $12,495 jacket, which discussed raising wages and reducing inequality, wasn t actually about income inequality.Read more: Daily Caller

Arkansas Republicans Pass Bill Giving Rapists The Power To Stop Victims From Getting An AbortionA vicious new law in Arkansas proves that Republicans are on the side of rapists.Two months ago, Republicans fast-tracked a brand new anti-abortion bill through the legislature and Governor Asa Hutchinson signed it last week.Arkansas Act 45 bans the most common and safest abortion procedure available to women known as dilation and evacuation, which is used for abortions performed during the second trimester. That means Arkansas Republicans are openly defying the framework set up by the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade which says states can t interfere with a woman s right to choose until the fetus becomes viable. 50 percent viability rate is achieved at 24 to 25 weeks. But the new law would ban safe abortions after 14 weeks and creates a burden for women because it forces them to choose less safe options to end their pregnancies.Doctors who perform the abortion procedure would be charged with a felony that carries a $10,000 fine or six years in prison.But the bill also has a terrifying clause that rapists are going to love.The bill gives rapists the power to deny their victims an abortion if they sue the abortion provider.According to The Daily Beast,A clause in the Arkansas law allows a woman s spouse, parent or guardian, or health care provider to sue an abortion provider for civil damages or injunctive relief that could stop the abortion. And because Act 45 does not provide any exceptions for cases of rape or incest, the clause could allow the fetus s father to sue an abortion provider even in cases of spousal rape or incest.Some lawmakers, like Democratic state Senator Will Bond, had a problem with the bill because the way it is drafted seems to allow any family member of the pregnant woman to file a lawsuit to stop the abortion and could actually end up severely disabling women who are forced to choose a riskier abortion procedure. There is an injunctive relief section in the bill that, in my reading of it, would seem to allow litigation among family members. If one spouse sought injunctive relief to prevent a certain procedure, or possibly other family members have the possibility for injunctive relief, that was a concern of mine. There is an exception for women s health in the bill, but it required irreparable harm [to the point of] permanent disability of a woman. The way it was drafted, I had concerns that the women s health exception is way too narrow, and there s no exception for rape and incest. The fact that rapists have a new tool to use to torture their victims is totally unacceptable and demonstrates that Republicans are totally anti-woman.Of course, these kinds of bills have been blocked in other states, so it s likely this one will be blocked from going into effect as well. But women cannot rely on the courts to protects their rights. They need to vote and kick Republicans out of office if they truly want to guarantee that government will not try to dictate what decisions they make about their own bodies.Featured image via Woman Survival

Top Republican senator testifies for Menendez at bribery trial(Reuters) - Republican U.S. Senator Lindsay Graham testified on Thursday as a character witness on behalf of Democratic colleague Bob Menendez, who is on trial on federal corruption charges in Newark, New Jersey. Graham testified for only six minutes, telling jurors he knows the New Jersey senator to be a “very honest, trustworthy man,” according to Twitter posts from a reporter from the Star-Ledger newspaper who was in the courtroom. Democrat Cory Booker, who is New Jersey’s junior senator, also is expected to testify as a character witness. Booker, the former mayor of Newark, has previously attended the trial in support of Menendez. A statement from Graham’s office said his testimony would be about his service with Menendez and not about the charges against him. Graham, who represents South Carolina, traveled at his own expense, the statement said. As Menendez entered the courthouse on Thursday, he told reporters he was “honored” that Graham and Booker would testify. Menendez, 63, is accused of taking bribes from a wealthy benefactor, Florida ophthalmologist Salomon Melgen, in exchange for using his office to help Melgen. Menendez and Melgen have denied wrongdoing, saying their relationship was simply a close friendship. Prosecutors say Menendez intervened on Melgen’s behalf with Medicare officials after the agency concluded the doctor had overbilled it by millions of dollars. Melgen was convicted separately earlier this year of a massive Medicare fraud. Menendez also is accused of pressuring federal officials to secure visas for Melgen’s girlfriends and resolving a port dispute involving one of Melgen’s businesses. In exchange for Menendez’s aid, Melgen gave the senator private flights, luxury vacations and hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign money, prosecutors said. The case has been closely watched in Washington, where Republicans hold a 52-48 edge in the Senate. If Menendez is convicted and either resigns or is expelled before Republican New Jersey Governor Chris Christie’s term expires in January, then Christie would name his replacement.

Mooch Changes His Tune, Says Reporter ‘Absolutely’ Recorded Him Without PermissionSo here s a funny hypothetical: You re a White House Communications Director. You ve settled into your office in the West Wing. You have a definite connection with the boss your speaking styles are similar, you come from the same moneyed and even geographical background, and just for good measure, let s say you both are known to engage in the occasional locker room talk. Honestly, you re over the moon at landing this job, because you ve been after it for half a year, and god knows there have been some twerps standing in your way.There s really only one thing you should be concerned with, and that s knowing how to do this. Maybe Anthony Scaramucci got so excited to work for Donald Trump that he forgot to learn that last part. And if this hypothetical were about you, dear reader, I can t imagine that you d overlook a teensy detail like knowing how to do things off the record. The Mooch s downfall came from the hilariously bad telephone conversation he had with Ryan Lizza, Washington correspondent for the New Yorker. Scaramucci called Lizza to try and ascertain the identity of a leaker who had told him about a dinner Donald Trump attended. That phone call was, as everyone now knows, recorded.Now Mooch is claiming that Ryan Lizza broke the law. Or rather, he s insinuating it..@RyanLizza is the Linda Tripp of 2017. People know. And he is up at night not being able to live with himself. Anthony Scaramucci (@Scaramucci) August 10, 2017Linda Tripp, of course, is the woman who recorded over 20 hours of telephone conversations with Monica Lewinski, whose dalliances with Bill Clinton ended with impeachment in the House of Representatives. There are questions to this day whether or not Tripp broke the law: Maryland law still dictates that all parties must consent to the taping of a phone call, but courts there ruled at the time that the law didn t apply to people who didn t know it was illegal. She broke the law, but if she didn t know she was breaking the law, she didn t break it. Ooookay.So of course that led to the question:Are you accusing him of taping the call without your permission? Roland Scahill (@rolandscahill) August 10, 2017And the succinct, albeit editorialized, answer:Yes. He absolutely taped the call without my permission. #lowlife https://t.co/fTDcBw4vcT Anthony Scaramucci (@Scaramucci) August 10, 2017Scaramucci, like his former boss, thinks that any offense committed against him must somehow be a crime. We learned from the phone call to Lizza that Mooch believed leaking his (publicly available) financial disclosures to the press wasn t just a crime but a felony for which he promised to involve the FBI and DOJ. So does he think Lizza (hashtag lowlife), by recording without his permission, broke the law as well?Turns out it doesn t matter. In Washington D.C. where both ends of the phone call took place taping a telephone conversation requires only the consent of one party. Don t wonder too long about whether hitting a button to start recording is consent from one: It is. And from his tweets today, Ryan Lizza is definitely not losing sleep over it.Sorry, Mooch. You re still the dipshit who just didn t know how to do his job. And really, talking to the press is pretty much one of the only jobs a WH Director of Communications even has to do, right?Featured image via Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Democratic Party workers pore over videos in bid to hobble Trump(Reuters) - From the basement to the third floor of Democratic Party headquarters in Washington, dozens of election campaign workers are glued to screens playing back videos of Donald Trump and other Republicans, digitally documenting their policy positions on everything from torture to climate change. The newly bulked up operation, including research, of more than 70 people is central to the Democrats’ strategy to sink whoever the Republicans nominate to run for the White House in the Nov. 8 U.S. presidential election. Party officials who provided Reuters with details of the operation increasingly think their target will be Trump, the New York businessman and former reality TV star who is the surprise Republican front-runner. The video clips will be used as grist for attack ads that will be deployed rapidly on social media sites any time Trump, or either of his rivals, U.S. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas and Ohio Governor John Kasich, strays during the general election campaign from policy proposals they touted in the nominating contests across the country. That could, in theory, hinder them from appealing to the millions of more moderate voters needed to beat former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton or U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, the two competitors for the Democratic nomination. Democratic National Committee (DNC) spokesman Luis Miranda, who provided Reuters with a partial tour of the research operation, said voters in the run-up to November’s election were “not going to be as responsive to the divisive rhetoric” that Trump used in the Republican campaign and that was a “key part of our general election strategy.” Trump’s campaign did not respond to requests for comment on the Democratic Party operation. Trump leads Cruz with 678 delegates to the Texan’s 423 delegates and Kasich at 143 as of this week after a string of wins in states where his supporters favored his flamboyant rhetoric and plans to wall off the U.S. border with Mexico, deport millions of undocumented immigrants and temporarily ban Muslims from entering the country. Trump has also called for a revision of laws that ban torture, and wants to scrap trade deals he blames for job losses. There are two more Republican nominating contests on Tuesday. A candidate needs to accumulate at least 1,237 delegates to win the nomination at the Republican convention in July. News and video monitoring have been election staples for years, but the latest operations bear little resemblance to the lower-tech past because of leaps in technology and the speed with which a candidate’s remarks are distributed. “Everything is on steroids,” said Jamal Simmons, a Democratic consultant, who recalled campaigns continuously taping news channels on VHS tapes - a tedious process that limited how much could be monitored. Other new technology, such as the live streaming application Periscope, makes news from around the world available almost instantly, said Holly Shulman, a Democratic strategist and former DNC official. “Halfway around the world we were able to respond to something before the reporters looked at it even,” she said. The Republican National Committee (RNC) said it has also ramped up its video monitoring efforts, with a focus on Clinton, adding staff and using newer technology. Eight people on the RNC staff are devoted to monitoring news coverage, and the party said it was building a searchable digital library of Clinton speeches, interviews and other events going back to 1991, the year before her husband Bill Clinton won the presidential election. Attacks on Trump by Republican rivals and Super PACs, independent political action committees that may raise unlimited sums of money, have failed to stop his campaign’s momentum. But the DNC said it believes its strategy will be effective. For one, the Democrats believe the Republican establishment’s efforts to block Trump’s nomination have been slow and disorganized - and hampered by a fear of tearing the party apart. The Democratic Party is also betting the general electorate will be more easily persuaded to counter Trump than registered Republicans have been. Clinton has a nearly 10-point lead over Trump in a hypothetical general election match up, according to an average of polls gathered by Real Clear Politics. The effort to hobble the former reality TV star takes a page out of reality television itself, where producers comb through thousands of hours of candid video, index it into an easily searchable library, and then paste together coherent narratives. The project helps address recommendations from the Democratic Victory Task Force, commissioned by DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz, which in February 2015 suggested the party prepare for the 2016 election and promote the party’s messaging. The DNC did similar work during the 2012 presidential election, but on a much smaller scale. Its digital and social media staff went from 5 to 25 people over the past 18 or so months, spokesman Miranda said. The current team divides its time on video from a wide range of sources - from national news to local channels, clips put up on YouTube by individual users and campaigns, and events webcast by the campaigns themselves. It also has scouts that record in the field. The work has yielded a number of attack videos already, many prepared and sent out at a moment’s notice. On Feb. 28, for example, the party released a video slamming Republican presidential hopefuls for their opposition to action on climate change, featuring them denying man-made global warming alongside images of U.S. flooding, wildfires, droughts and heat waves. Earlier in March, after Trump cruised to victory in several state nominating contests, the DNC put out another 40-second video, mixing news clips talking about how Trump is dominating his party. “These videos are getting tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of views across our various platforms,” Miranda said. “He’s not going to get off as easy with us as with the rest of the Republican field. We know what he’s said, we know where he’s flip-flopped, where he’s made mistakes.”

Fewer babies born in Singapore last year despite incentivesSINGAPORE (Reuters) - Fewer babies were born in Singapore last year, according to statistics announced on Wednesday, despite generous government incentives to boost fertility in the city-state. A total of 33,167 Singaporeans were born in 2016, compared to 33,725 in the previous year, the Singapore Department of Statistics said. However, the 2016 births remained above a 10-year average, it said. According to the World Bank, wealthy Singapore had the fourth-lowest fertility rate in the world in 2015. The government enhanced its incentives scheme in 2015, giving out as much as S$10,000 ($7,400) in cash to new parents. The public housing policy prioritizes married couples. The statistics show Singapore s total population was up an annual 0.1 percent at 5.61 million by June this year, the slowest in at least a decade. The number of people on work permits in Singapore fell sharply, hit by weakness in the construction and marine engineering sectors, the statistics department said. The number of permanent residents was stable, but the number of citizens was up 0.9 percent at 3.44 million, the data showed.

Pennsylvania state senator, Democratic official charged in vote-buying scheme(Reuters) - A Pennsylvania state Senator and a Democratic Party official were charged in a federal indictment for their involvement in a bribery and fraud scheme related to a 2011 election for a Democratic ward leader in Philadelphia, the Justice Department said on Tuesday. Lawrence “Larry” Farnese, 47, and Ellen Chapman, 62, both of Philadelphia, were charged with conspiracy, mail fraud, wire fraud and violations of the Travel Act, the Justice Department said in a statement. Farnese was a state senator at the time of the alleged illegal conduct.

Former DNC Chair ‘Felt Like A Slave’… Wanted to Replace Hillary With One Of Two Options After Fainting Spell Gave Campaign ‘Odor of Failure’Donna Brazile lets it rip on the Hillary Clinton campaign in her new book about the 2016 election. She s definitely not holding back in her scathing review of the Clinton operation during 2016. She says she felt like a slave and felt disrespected by the Clinton campaign members. What s the most interesting is that she had two people in mind when she was discussing replacing Hillary after the fainting spell on 9/11. She says she just couldn t do it because she didn t want to let women down LOL! Sure!SECRET DELIBERATIONS Donna Brazile held secret deliberations to discuss using her power as interim chair of the Democratic National Committee to replace Hillary Clinton as the party s nominee after the former first lady suffered a fainting spell on the campaign trail last September, she writes in her bombshell memoir.The Washington Post reports that Brazile reveals in her memoir that she considered replacing Clinton with then-Vice President Joe Biden or New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker because of the former secretary of state s anemic campaign.JOE BIDEN THE GROPERClinton s effort, which carried with it an odor of failure, was struggling to appeal to white working-class voters, writes Brazile in the book, Hacks: The Inside Story of the Break-ins and Breakdowns That Put Donald Trump in the White House. The Post obtained an advance copy of the 288-page memoir, which will be released on Tuesday.REMEMBER THIS?Brazile, a longtime Democratic consultant who managed Al Gore s 2000 White House bid, says that she first became concerned about Clinton s health on Sept. 9, following an event in Manhattan.Brazile said that Clinton appeared wobbly on her feet with a rattled cough, according to The Post.As acting chairwoman of the DNC, Brazile had the power to replace the party s nominee if they became disabled. Brazile reminded the Clinton campaign of that authority, which was included in the DNC charter.Clinton s fainting spell triggered talk inside Democratic circles that Brazile could exercise that authority. She said that Biden s chief of staff contacted her a day after Clinton passed out. Gee, I wonder what he wanted to talk to me about? she said to herself, she recalls in her book.Brazile writes that she heavily considered appointing Biden but could not pull the trigger to replace the first female nominee for president. Again and again I thought about Joe Biden, Brazile writes, according to The Post. No matter my doubts and my fears about the election and Hillary as a candidate, I could not make good on that threat to replace her. I thought of Hillary, and all the women in the country who were so proud of and excited about her. I could not do this to them. I FELT LIKE A SLAVE As one of her party s most prominent black strategists, Brazile also recounts fiery disagreements with Clinton s staffers including a conference call in which she told three senior campaign officials, Charlie Baker, Marlon Marshall and Dennis Cheng, that she was being treated like a slave. I m not Patsey the slave, Brazile recalls telling them, a reference to the character played by Lupita Nyong o in the film, 12 Years a Slave. Y all keep whipping me and whipping me and you never give me any money or any way to do my damn job. I am not going to be your whipping girl! READ MORE: WAPO

LIBERAL HEADS EXPLODE When PIERS MORGAN Points Out Phony “Racist” Charges Against Trump VS. Muhammad Ali’s ACTUAL Racist History [VIDEO]Watch the video and you be the judge. Was Piers Morgan correct or was he out of line?Piers Morgan poked the hornets nest Sunday when he highlighted a double standard among Muhammad Ali s fans that the late boxer espoused more radical views on race than Donald Trump.Muhammad Ali said far more inflammatory/racist things about white people than Donald Trump ever has about Muslims. #fact Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) June 5, 2016The tweet quickly brought a swarm of social justice outrage, but Morgan did not back down. He argued that Ali was an important voice in the civil rights movement, but that is no reason to whitewash statements far more radical than Trump s on race and immigration. Via: Breitbart NewsTrump was in New York on 9/11 & knew people who died. Does that count? https://t.co/eF7Lg76Ye7 Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) June 5, 2016Here are just a few tweets from liberals right before their collective heads blew off their necks:https://twitter.com/DentonJez/status/739780815807188992Morgan s response:I didn't say that. I just said Ali made far more inflammatory/racist comments. Which he did. https://t.co/5ABetSkFPi Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) June 6, 2016 Why would stating that Muhammad Ali made a lot of inflammatory, race-charged statements in his life be remotely controversial? He did. Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) June 5, 2016Piers Morgan shared this clearly racist interview with Muhammad Ali on Twitter to back up his claim:Along the way, Piers picked up a few Twitter users who were willing to tell the truth about boxing legend Ali:https://twitter.com/NordicImports/status/739845621289517056Honesty is the new "being racist" FYI Michael (@socalmike_SD) June 6, 2016In the end, Piers Morgan knew he could never walk into another room filled with liberal crybabies if he didn t do the obligatory Leftist, even though I m correct here is my apology:I'm sorry for 'saying inflammatory things for attention'.That's the last thing Muhammad Ali would have condoned. Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) June 5, 2016

Britain will suffer from Brexit more than EU: German ministerBERLIN (Reuters) - Germany will experience trade difficulties due to Brexit but Britain will suffer more that the remaining European Union members when it leaves the bloc, Economy Minister Brigitte Zypries said on Wednesday. I expect we will of course have problems with trade ... but it will not be so hard for Europe as for Britain, Zypries told a news conference in Berlin to present updated German government growth forecasts.

BRAVO! TED CRUZ To Introduce Bill To Help Trump Keep One Of His Biggest Campaign Promises To AmericansNow one unlikely Senator is about to put forth a bill, paving the way for Mexico to pay for the wall and in the process, helping Trump to keep one of his most important campaign promises.Republican Sen. Ted Cruz wants to make Mexicans pay for the wall at least some of them, that is.The El Chapo Act was introduced by Cruz Tuesday, according to Axios, and it would use seized assets from drug lords such as Mexican Joaquin El Chapo Guzman to pay for the wall on the southwestern border.Federal prosecutors are trying to seize $14 billion in assets from El Chapo, and the border wall has been estimated to cost $21.6 billion. Fourteen billion dollars will go a long way toward building a wall that will keep Americans safe and hinder the illegal flow of drugs, weapons, and individuals across our southern border, Sen. Cruz told Axios.For entire story Daily Caller

MOTHER OF CRYING BABY AT TRUMP RALLY: “Mr. Trump NEVER kicked me or my child out”…Liberal Reporter Backs Up Her StoryWhen you re Donald Trump (or any Republican for that matter) and the Washington Post comes to your defense, you know it means there are too many untruths surrounding the story to pull off this particular lie Donald Trump is complaining that the media has spun a fable that he kicked a baby out of his rally in Ashburn, Va.The New York Post, for instance, headlined its article: Trump loves crying baby, then kicks the tot out of his rally. The New York Daily News, in its article on the incident, began: What a baby. Donald Trump booted a fussy baby from a rally Tuesday because the tot was wailing over the businessman s speech. The Guardian newspaper even used the incident to declare that this is a core problem with Trump that he has a total lack of empathy. In reality, this is a situation when the video can lie and Trump s odd sense of humor can backfire. Let s roll the tape.The FactsThere are two parts to the video. During his speech a baby starts to cry, and Trump says: Don t worry about that baby, I love babies. I hear that baby crying. I like it. What a baby. What a beautiful baby. Don t worry, don t worry. The mom s running around like don t worry about it, you know. It s young and beautiful and healthy, and that s what we want. But then about a minute later he says: Actually, I was only kidding. You can get the baby out of here. I think she really believed me that I love having a baby crying while I m speaking. So, just from watching the video, Trump sounds rather cruel. But what s missing is what the mother was doing. As it happens, Daniel Dale, a reporter from the Toronto Star, was sitting right behind her and wrote that the entire incident was mischaracterized.The baby was one row in front of me, three or four rows from the stage, at Trump s event at a high school in Ashburn, Va. When it began to cry, Trump said, Don t worry about that baby, I love babies. I love babies. I hear that baby crying, I like it. I like it. What a baby, what a beautiful baby. Don t worry, don t worry. The mom s running around don t worry about it. People applauded. One minute later, though, the baby began to cry again. This time, the mother quickly decided to take the baby out of the room. Trump, looking in our direction, appeared to notice that she was on her way to the exit.And then he said, Actually, I was only kidding. You can get the baby out of here. That s all right. Don t worry. I think she really believed me that I love having a baby crying while I m speaking? He cupped his hand over his eyes to watch her leave. That s okay, people don t understand. That s okay. A joke? Possibly. An insensitive, heartless, ordinary-person-embarrassing remark? Possibly. Trump s tone is eternally hard to read. But, to my eyes, it certainly was not an ejection it was an unusually barbed endorsement of the mother s own decision to depart.One other salient fact is missing from all the pieces on babygate. Mom and baby, very much not kicked out, came back to their seat a bit later.The baby was sucking a pacifier, silent.Dale had this perspective because he was not sitting in the news media corral. I almost never request press credentials from the Trump campaign anymore partly because I like being in the crowd rather than the pen, he told The Fact Checker. I was lucky, this time, that the usher people seated me very close to the stage, and one row behind the baby. There was one empty seat up there. Virtually no one in the media noticed Dale s version of events. He said he did not seek to interview the mother himself, as he did not realize until later how much attention had been paid to this incident. Washington PostWithin days, the Clinton campaign highlighted the baby affair in a video trashing Trump s week:Trump just said he doesn t throw babies out of his rallies Let s review the record.https://t.co/u3a8RDNNrr Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) August 5, 2016Trump responded (as only Trump can) to this ridiculous allegation while speaking at a rally in WI last night:The mother of the baby who Trump allegedly ejected from his rally, Devan Cierra Ebert is speaking out and setting the record straight about what REALLY happened.Statement from Devan Cierra Ebert who was removed with her crying baby at a Trump Rally: I was the mother in his rally on Tuesday, August 2nd, in Ashburn, VA, with the baby who started to cry. I would just like him to know personally that I, by no means felt I was ever kicked out of his rally.I excused myself and my child when he awoke from his nap and began to cry. It was only because I had to grab my child s belongings and then make my way out of the aisle I was seated in that I wasn t out of there sooner.I realize Mr. Trump doesn t know me personally, but for those that do, know that I am the first one to excuse myself and my child when he begins to cry because I personally believe it s rude to disturb anyone else s ability to hear what they came to see. I ve left movies, violin recitals, and other events if I felt my child was disturbing others. It is the considerate thing to do. I stood right outside the doors of the auditorium continuing to watch and listen to what Mr. Trump had to say. In fact, the police that were right outside in the same hallway with me, treated me with so much respect it was incredible. They were so kind and made me feel welcomed to stand with them.One officer commended me on my bravery to bring my child to Mr. Trump s rally.I fully support Mr. Trump. I thought he responded very graciously to my child crying and he made a lighthearted moment out of what I usually consider to be stressful. I actually was out of the auditorium before he even made his follow up comment about my child and even then, when I was informed of his comment,I laughed. I understand he says things jokingly, and I understand no one wants to speak over or struggle to listen over a crying baby.I am in no way offended and I again reiterate, Mr. Trump NEVER kicked me or my child out of the Briar Woods High School, Trump rally.And for the record, while my child and I stood outside of the auditorium, my eleven year old stepdaughter and my Grandmother sat inside the auditorium and continued to support and listen to everything Mr. Trump had to say.We all were so excited to be able to see Mr. Trump so close to home. I didn t have a babysitter to watch my kids and honestly, to me it was a historical moment that I am happy that my kids were there for.I apologize for the trouble this has caused Mr.Trump. The media has severely blown this out of proportion and made it out to be something that it wasn t and is clearly using this as political gain for the Democratic party.I hope this message sheds light to what really happened.Thank you for your time. Best of luck! You have our vote. Trump 2016 Via: Facebook

BREAKING: Jeb Bush Suspends Campaign Under Pressure From Supporters Of Fellow GOPersJeb Bush was originally the annointed one for the GOP Presidential nomination. However, Donald Trump turned the whole race upside down, and Bush never made it out of the single digits. As the South Carolina Primary draws to a close with yet another poor showing in what is widely seen as one of the most important primaries of the election season, supporters of other GOP candidates urge Bush to drop out. Florida Senator Tim Scott, who is backing Marco Rubio, says of Bush s candidacy and how it affects the GOP s chances at the White House: It s hard to tell you what the Bush camp is thinking. He served as a great governor. I think it d be a great opportunity for him to bring his folks over to the Rubio camp. But the reality is everyone who is running wants to do something good for America, so the question is, once you realize that s not going to happen, what do you do next? It s hard to answer that question unless you re the candidate. Sen. Scott wasn t the only one to call for Bush s withdrawal from the race. His fellow struggling GOP candidate John Kasich had his campaign put out the idea that tonight it became a four-person race between Trump, Kasich, Rubio, and Cruz. John Kasich strategist and supporter John Weaver said of the South Carolina outcome: Only four candidates have top-three finishes in any of the early states and can justify staying in. At the same time, John Kasich has now won the so-called Governors Bracket by continuing to run strong and beat expectations. While others were making their last stand in South Carolina, John Kasich strengthened his organization and support despite being outspent by tens of millions of dollars. The pressure worked, as Bush has suspended his campaign. So long, Jeb.God bless America indeed.Featured image via Soda Head

Denny’s Serves Up A Grand Slam Of Racism By Forcing Black Family To Pre-Pay For Meal America s Diner Denny s, has lived up to that title if you are looking at it in the context of how much racism exists in the nation. Henry Williams and Renee Hebert settled in a lawsuit against the company, that stemmed from an incident in 2014 when an L.A. Denny s forced them to prepay for their meal because they were ordering food while black.Williams was told by employees that he would have to hand over the cash in full to cover the meal before his group would be served. Clearly, a group of black individuals going to a restaurant is suspicious enough to assume a conspiracy to do the dine and dash is in the works. Surprisingly, Williams decided to actually hand over the money rather than take his business elsewhere. Maybe he really likes the Moons Over My Hammy meal.The ridiculousness of this was so bad, that even the Denny s manager eventually realized how bad his people screwed up and tried to return the money. The manager was so desperate to give the money back that Williams actually had to tell him to stop repeatedly coming over to their table to grovel and hand over the cash because he was being a nuisance. The manager kicked it up a notch by offering free dessert, to which Williams said he wanted to box his food and leave.Williams and Hebert said that nobody else was asked to pre-pay for their meal. In court, a customer that was seated nearby at the time testified that Williams and Hebert handled the situation well: They were black. I m white. I ve never been asked to prepay. I thought it was appalling for someone in that year and time to be discriminated against like that. Denny s tried to argue against the lawsuit because the customers order was a large one, and the location had other problems with people walking out on checks before. It got pretty damning, though, when the other customer testifying on behalf of Williams said that they had seen the restaurant targeting other black patrons to pre-pay in weeks prior. I bet not every case of these was a huge order. Denny s already had a bad reputation in this area, because it had to pay $54 million in 1994 for a case of similar discrimination against black customers.The details of the settlement were not disclosed, but it would be a safe bet that it was more than the cost of a dine-and-dash.Featured image from wikicommons

Exclusive: Philippines defied experts' advice in pursuing dengue immunization programMANILA (Reuters) - As she announced in January 2016 that the Philippines would immunize one million children with a new dengue vaccine, the nation s then health secretary Janette Garin boasted it was a world-first and a tribute to her country s expertise in research. At the time, it seemed the Philippines could be on the cusp of a breakthrough to combat a potentially lethal tropical virus that had been endemic in large parts of the Southeast Asian nation for decades. Almost two years later, the program lies in tatters and has been suspended after Sanofi Pasteur, a division of French drug firm Sanofi, said at the end of last month the vaccine itself may in some cases increase the risk of severe dengue in recipients not previously infected by the virus. Documents reviewed by Reuters that have not been disclosed until now, as well as interviews with local experts, show that key recommendations made by a Philippines Department of Health (DOH) advisory body of doctors and pharmacologists were not heeded before the program was rolled out to 830,000 children. After Garin s announcement, the Formulary Executive Council (FEC) of advisers urged caution over the vaccine because it said its safety and cost-effectiveness had not been established. After twice meeting in January, the panel approved the state s purchase of the vaccine on Feb 1, 2016 but recommended stringent conditions, minutes of all three meetings show. Based on the available scientific evidence presented to the Council, there is still a need to establish long-term safety, effectiveness and cost-effectiveness, the FEC told Garin in a letter on that day. The letter was reviewed by Reuters. The FEC said Dengvaxia should be introduced through small-scale pilot tests and phased implementation rather than across three regions in the country at the same time, and only after a detailed baseline study of the prevalence and strains of dengue in the targeted area, the FEC letter and minutes of the meetings said. The experts also recommended that Dengvaxia be bought in small batches so the price could be negotiated down. An economic evaluation report commissioned by Garin s own department had found the proposed cost of 1,000 pesos ($21.29) per dose was not cost-effective from a public payer perspective, the minutes from the meetings reveal. For reasons that Reuters was unable to determine, these recommendations were ignored. The DOH purchased 3 million doses of Dengvaxia in one lot, enough for the required three vaccinations for each child in the proposed immunization program and paid 1,000 pesos per dose, a copy of the purchase order reviewed by Reuters shows. It did conduct a limited baseline study in late February and March 2016, but the survey looked at common illnesses rather than the prevalence of dengue, according to guidelines issued by Garin s office at the time and reviewed by Reuters. Garin, who was part of the government of former president Benigno Aquino and replaced when President Rodrigo Duterte took power in June, 2016, did not respond to requests for comment on why she ignored the local experts recommendations. A physician, Garin has defended her conduct and a program that she said was implemented in accordance with WHO guidance and recommendations . I understand the concern, she told Philippine TV station ABS-CBN on Friday. Even us, we re also very angry when we learned about Sanofi s announcement about severe dengue. I m also a mother. My child was also vaccinated. I was also vaccinated. DOH spokesman Lyndon Lee Suy also did not respond to text messages or questions emailed to him. Sanofi Philippines declined comment on the Philippines government decision. However, Dr. Su-Peing Ng, Global Medical Head of Sanofi Pasteur, told Reuters: We communicated all known benefits and risks of the vaccine to the Philippines government. Rontgene Solante, former president of the Philippines Society for Microbiology and Infectious Diseases, said health officials were motivated to end the debilitating impact of dengue on the Philippines, where there are about 200,000 reported cases each year and many more unreported. Over 1,000 people died of the disease in the country last year. Two months after the FEC wrote to the health secretary, the DOH began immunizing one million students around the age of 10 in all three target areas in April 2016, in accordance with its original plan but at odds with the FEC s recommendations to conduct a slow roll-out of the vaccine. The usual process for the DOH that has protected our children for so many decades was not followed. That s a fact, said Susan Mercado, a former Philippines health department undersecretary and former senior official at the World Health Organization (WHO). WHO said in April 2016 that the Philippines campaign appeared to meet its criteria for using Dengvaxia because the targeted regions had high levels of dengue exposure; the vaccine would be provided to children 9 years and older; and they would each receive three doses. WHO was not involved in the deliberations of the FEC, according to the minutes. It said in a statement last week that a position paper on the dengue vaccine it published in July 2016 did not include a recommendation for countries to introduce it. Now, after Sanofi s warnings, WHO has said it agrees with the government s decision to suspend the immunization program. The current secretary of health in the Duterte administration, Francisco Duque, said he would carry out a thorough analysis of the FEC s recommendations and the program before passing judgment. He said the Council s recommendations were not legally enforceable. At the end of the day, the final decision is made by (the)secretary of health, he told Reuters. But because of the expertise that the members of the FEC have, it is something that you don t want to ignore. Underpinning the concerns in 2016 about Dengvaxia, since confirmed by Sanofi, were fears that the vaccine would act like a primary infection for those who had never had dengue. If they were bitten by a mosquito carrying the virus after the vaccination, it could be akin to getting dengue a second time, which often leads to far more severe symptoms and potentially death if bad cases are not treated quickly. The concerns were first raised by noted U.S.-based tropical disease expert, Dr. Scott Halstead, who urged both Sanofi and the WHO to proceed with caution. In the Philippines, Dr. Antonio Dans, an epidemiologist from the University of the Philippines, led a delegation of physicians to the DOH in March 2016 where, citing Halstead s research, they pressed for the campaign to be aborted. The data was not definitive but it was clear there were uncertainties and risks. Why not wait for the complete studies to be finished before endangering so many children? Dans told Reuters. In a Senate hearing late last year, Garin said she was aware of Halstead s assessment but dismissed it. This is a theory ... it has not been proven, she said at the time. Two sources involved in the program said no antibody testing was undertaken, as recommended by the FEC. Antibody testing, while not 100 percent accurate, indicates whether an individual has had dengue before. Duque, the current health secretary, is demanding the company refund the 3 billion pesos ($60 million) paid for the vaccinations and has threatened legal action against Sanofi if it is proven to have withheld information. A criminal probe is underway into how a danger to public health came about and two Congressional inquiries have been convened in the Philippines. Duque told Reuters he was concerned that the program was paid from an off-budget allocation, meaning it bypassed Congressional scrutiny. Reuters was unable to confirm this. Until now, one child out of the 830,000 vaccinated, a girl who was hospitalized with severe dengue, has been linked definitively by the DOH to the campaign. But the department of health says it still does not have complete data on those who fell ill after taking Dengvaxia.

IF YOU’RE EASILY OFFENDED, Don’t Watch This American Pastor’s Rant: “Has America Gone Stupid?”You re gonna love this patriot! He speaks for each and every one of us who are 100% FED Up! with offended Americans! Enjoy this awesome rant and God bless America!// <![CDATA[ (function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&#038;version=v2.3"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk')); // ]]>HAS AMERICA GONE STUPID? Warning!!!! this video will most likely offend the majority of the population.!Posted by Highways and Hedges Ministries on Monday, January 18, 2016

Digging dung: South Africa's amaBhungane heaps pressure on ZumaJOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - A group of investigative journalists whose slogan is digging dung, fertilizing democracy is holding South African President Jacob Zuma to account over his widely criticized links to a family of wealthy businessmen. AmaBhungane, which means dung beetles in the Zulu language, was founded by three veteran reporters to expose wrongdoing in South Africa. Together with online news site the Daily Maverick, amaBhungane in June released leaked emails and documents that they said showed allegedly improper dealings in government contracts and influence peddling by the Guptas, a family with close ties to Zuma. Zuma and the Gupta family, which has said the emails were fake, have denied wrongdoing. Co-founder Stefaans Brummer said amaBhungane, which was founded in 2010, had spent several years probing Zuma s family business dealings, and had verified the authenticity of the leaked documents. Our very first stories as amaBhungane was a series called Zuma Inc and we looked at the Zuma family and how its business fortunes had grown since Zuma took the office of president, Brummer said. He said the Gupta name popped up in several of amaBhungane s inquiries into Zuma s family business links and the organization was well placed to process the trove of information in more than 100,000 emails and documents. You fight hard for every piece of information and when something like this happens it s like Christmas, you suddenly have a lot of information, said Brummer. Brummer said amaBhungane, which mostly uses external hard drives to store documents for safety reasons, had sent a copy of the leaked Gupta emails to the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project - a global consortium of investigative journalism centers. Reuters has not independently been able to verify the allegations in the so-called GuptaLeaks emails, sent between the Gupta brothers and their associates. The allegations, which came after an anti-corruption watchdog report into claims of influence peddling, opened Zuma up to renewed scrutiny and deepened divisions within the ruling African National Congress. Zuma survived an attempt in parliament to force him from office on Aug. 8, but he was left politically wounded after some ANC members voted with the opposition. It s quite amazing that people in South Africa have woken up to state capture now in 2017 when amaBhungane have been exposing this for a decade, said Glenda Daniels, a senior media studies lecturer at the University of the Witwatersrand. Perhaps the nature of their exposes were rather intense and detailed for people to follow. Maybe they have now let some air into their writing and everyone is getting it. As a non-profit company, amaBhungane s 8 million rand ($600,000) annual budget is funded by grants from charitable foundations and public donations. It does not sell adverts or accept funds from the government or from companies. Sam Sole, another amaBhungane co-founder, said his desire to expose society s injustices drove him into journalism. Both Sole and Brummer started their journalism careers before the end of apartheid in 1994. During my subsequent conscription into the defense force I came face to face with the sharp, brutish reality of apartheid - and that was the impetus for my first piece of journalism, said Sole. Journalism, for me, was a way to fight against injustice. The third amaBhungane co-founder, Adriaan Basson, is now editor of News24, an online news site. Sole and Brummer have won numerous journalism awards, including for their reporting on a 30 billion rand ($2.3 billion) deal to buy military equipment in the late 1990s that was plagued by allegations of fraud and corruption. Zuma was linked to the deal through his former financial adviser, who was jailed for corruption. The president said last year that an investigation into the deal found no evidence of wrongdoing, but critics denounced the findings as a cover-up. All charges against Zuma were dropped in 2009, but a court last year ordered a review of the decision. Zuma is appealing the ruling. The arms deal scandal lasted much longer and was much slower burning, which gave us time to develop some of the skills we use now, Sole said. For amaBhungane, the aim was to probe the link between politics and money. We set ourselves a target of trying to find that sweet spot of where organized crime, politics and business intersect, Brummer said. Politics has its good side but it has its bad side, business has its good side and its bad side, organized crime is all bad, but there is always that intersection where the three come together and that s where you get the worst wrongdoing. But amaBhungane has been accused by a group called Black First Land First and some on social media of being run by racist white men and not doing enough stories on white monopoly capital , a phrase used to describe the fact that the white minority still control much of the economy. Brummer said the criticism has not deterred amaBhungane. We are not going to roll over and die. Investigative journalism is what we do and what we like to do, he said.

Marvel Vows To Boycott Georgia If Discriminatory Religious Liberty Bill Becomes LawThe studio of superheroes will leave Georgia rather than make movies in a state that bullies gay people.The First Amendment Defense Act passed the Republican-dominated Georgia legislature earlier this month, but has yet to be signed by Governor Nathan Deal.Should the bill become law, it will allow conservative Christians to use their religion as a shield to justify bigotry and discrimination toward same-sex couples and give religious organizations the ability to fire gay employees at will.The bill has caused an uproar and many companies have stopped or are threatening to stop doing business with the state if it becomes law.That includes the NFL, which promptly told Georgia officials that such a blatantly discriminatory law would cost Atlanta the Superbowl bid they have been desperately seeking.And now Marvel and Disney have made an even bigger threat.As most of us know, many of Disney s Marvel films are shot in Georgia because of the state s advantageous tax incentives. Captain America: Civil War was just recently filmed at Pine Wood studios in Atlanta and such a massive production means jobs for people in Georgia and a boost in the economy.But if Georgia chooses to enshrine bigotry into law, Marvel will take their heroes elsewhere. Disney and Marvel are inclusive companies, and although we have had great experiences filming in Georgia, we will plan to take our business elsewhere should any legislation allowing discriminatory practices be signed into state law, Disney said in a statement that should worry Georgia officials to the core.It makes sense that Disney would pull the Marvel Cinematic Universe away from Georgia if this bill passes. After all, it s hard to imagine trying to film characters who believe in equality, fairness, and inclusiveness in an environment that promotes the exact opposite.Georgia would be well-advised to scuttle this bill before it costs them dearly. Because pissing off Captain America is not a good idea.Featured Image: Marvel s The Avengers

U.S. military must accept transgender recruits by Jan. 1, judge rules(Reuters) - Transgender recruits will be able to join the U.S. military as of Jan. 1 after a federal judge on Monday denied a request by President Donald Trump’s administration to enforce his ban on transgender troops while the government appeals an order blocking it. In a ruling, with which the Pentagon said it would comply, U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly in Washington refused to lift part of her Oct. 30 order stopping the ban from taking effect until the case is resolved, saying it likely violated the U.S. Constitution’s guarantees of due process and equal protection under the law. The White House said the Justice Department was reviewing its options. The Pentagon said in a statement that it would follow court orders and begin processing transgender applicants on Jan. 1. It added, however, that it and the U.S. Department of Justice “are actively pursuing relief from those court orders in order to allow an ongoing policy review scheduled to be completed before the end of March.” The administration had argued that the Jan. 1 deadline was problematic because tens of thousands of personnel would have to be trained on the medical standards needed to process transgender applicants, and the military was not ready for that. Kollar-Kotelly rejected the concerns, saying preparations for accepting transgender troops were under way during the administration of Trump’s predecessor, Barack Obama. “The directive from the Secretary of Defense requiring the military to prepare to begin allowing accession of transgender individuals was issued on June 30, 2016 - nearly one and a half years ago,” the judge said. Several transgender service members filed a lawsuit after Trump said in July he would ban transgender people from the military, citing concern over military focus and medical costs. In an August memorandum, Trump gave the military until March 2018 to revert to a policy prohibiting openly transgender individuals from joining the military and authorizing their discharge. The memo also halted the use of government funds for sex-reassignment surgery for active-duty personnel. Defense Secretary James Mattis had previously delayed a deadline that had been set during the Obama administration to begin enlisting transgender recruits to Jan. 1, which Trump’s ban then put off indefinitely. The Pentagon said on Monday there were a number of guidelines that would have to be met by the applicants. It said that sex reassignment or genital reconstruction would be disqualifying factors unless a medical provider certified that a period of 18 months had passed since the most recent surgery, no complications persisted and additional surgeries are not required. The service members who sued Trump, Mattis and military leaders in August had been serving openly as transgender people in the U.S. Army, Air Force and Coast Guard. They said Trump’s ban discriminated against them based on their sex and transgender status. In her October ruling, Kollar-Kotelly said the Trump administration’s reasons for the ban “do not appear to be supported by any facts” and cited a military-commissioned study that debunked concerns about military cohesion or healthcare costs. A federal judge in Maryland also halted the ban in Nov. 21 ruling.

Russian Official: ‘It Turns Out Russia Won The Elections In America’We ve long been suspicious of Russian meddling in our political process, with intelligence officials going so far as to say they re confident they know Russia hacked various email systems, including that of the DNC. With Trump s election, Russia sees a huge victory as their puppet prepares to take office.One Russian governor, Viktor Nazarov, actually, literally said, according to CBS News: It turns out that United Russia won the elections in America. United Russia is Putin s political party, and not Russia itself. Regardless, that is still a bold proclamation to make, whether he s talking about Putin meddling or just a U.S. puppet government for Putin to use to strengthen Russia. Russia suffers from a crippled economy thanks to sanctions, and they seem to see us as their ticket out of all that.It s more likely that see us as their ticket to restored power so they re once again on equal footing with us. Hillary wouldn t have done that the Democrats have taken a strong line against Russia, as have most Republicans. With the bromance that exists between Trump and Putin, though, Russia probably hopes that Congress will give in to their new leader.Putin, of course, denies that Russia did anything at all with our electoral process despite NSA claims that he definitely did. He claimed conspiracy theory, saying that the American left was using this theory as a distraction. If his governors and other officials can t keep from saying that Russia was the big winner in our elections, though, then what are we really to think?As Boris Zilberman, an expert on Russia, said: It s not that Putin is against the Democratic Party. He s more against the United States and (for) whatever may push Russian interests. How convenient for Putin, then, that his best American buddy, Trump, got elected. It s sickening to think that Russia might have been the big winner of our elections, but it s hard to ignore Russian officials who say so.Featured image via Greg Baker-Pool/Getty Images and Joe Raedle/Getty Images

Latest Trump Campaign Ad Reveals His DISTURBING Plans For Day One In The White House (VIDEO)Donald Trump has released a campaign ad detailing his plans for his first day as President of the United States of America. It is a window into hell.The video was released via Trump s Facebook page and Twitter account on Friday night, and for those hoping for a little more policy detail from Trump, we got it. Sadly, it is a little worse than we imagined.What would Trump do on his first day, he would rescind every single Executive Order made by President Obama. Why? Because he doesn t have to go through Congress.This would mean:Trump took primary aim however, at gun control and immigration. Trump would revoke the new gun control laws put in place in response to Sandy Hook and the mass shooting epidemic. He would also remove the protections Obama put in place for the children of undocumented immigrants that would prevent them being deported. These are people who have been born, or raised for the majority of their lives, in the United States. But Trump wants these protections removed so he can fulfill on his plans for the forced mass deportation of undocumented migrants and any children living in the United States.He says: I would get rid of the attack on our Second Amendment, because that s what Obama is doing when he does that.I would very, very strongly get rid of the attack on the border. We have a border that s like a piece of Swiss Cheese. People are pouring through. That order will be the single first thing I do.And we will work on all of these Executive Orders, and the bad ones, of which mostly that s what you have, will be terminated immediately my first day in office. Never mind that the man can t construct a simple sentence without turning it into word soup. This is what a Trump White House will look like: It would a more cruel, more authoritarian, less safe America. Eight years of progress disappeared with the swipe of a pen. https://www.facebook.com/DonaldTrump/videos/10156689716915725/Featured image via screenshot

#TREXIT: SWING STATE APOCALYPSE…Democrats LEAVE Party In Massive Numbers…Hillary Won’t RecoverHillary s campaign has been working in coordination with the mainstream media for months to hide Donald J. Trump s popularity with the everyday Americans Hillary claims to be a champion of. Pennsylvania is one state the Democrat Party would never have believed would be in jeopardy only one month before the election, but then again, they never expected the mass appeal Trump would have with middle America who want their country back and the jobless who want to be contributing members of our society again. We all basically want the same thing, to make America great again and that is why the Democrats are about to lose PA Nearly 100,000 Pennsylvania Democrats have switched to Republican since the beginning of the year.What s more: The Pennsylvania Republican party says more than 240-thousand new voters have joined the party since last November.The state Republican party says that the surge in Republican registrations is nearly twice the number of newly registered Republicans compared to both the 2008 and 2012 numbers combined.Combine this stunning development with the emergence of the Amish vote and the coal miners who are supporting Trump after Hillary promised to take away their jobs, and you ve got a blue state that has a very high probability of turning red! PittsburghCBS

ALL KIDDING ASIDE…DID HILLARY JUST HAVE A SEIZURE In Middle Of Q & A With Journalists? You Be The Judge… [VIDEO]Whoa! We asked the question yesterday in more of a tongue-and-cheek manner. That was before we saw the serious question that had just been asked of Hillary by reporters. Like everyone else who saw the video, we assumed someone had said something humorous that caused her to behave like she was having seizure. But after watching the actual question that was asked, just prior to what truly does appear to be some sort of seizure, we re having second thoughts about Hillary acting out.Watch the only Presidential candidate who travels with a full-time physician having what appears to be some sort of seizure You be the judge

Australia defends alternative accommodation for asylum seekers against U.N. criticismSYDNEY/GENEVA (Reuters) - Australia s foreign minister said on Wednesday that asylum seekers occupying an abandoned Australian-run detention camp in Papua New Guinea (PNG) can relocate to alternative accommodation, challenging United Nations claims that the substitute site is unfinished and inadequate. Some 380 men have barricaded themselves into Manus Island center for more than 20 days without regular food or water supplies, defying attempts by Australia and PNG to close the facility. The asylum seekers say they fear for their safety if moved to the transit center, and risk being resettled in PNG or another developing nation permanently. There is accommodation that is perfectly acceptable, Australia s Foreign Minister, Julie Bishop, said in an interview with Australian Broadcasting Corp radio on Wednesday. The stand-off on Manus Island can be ended if the men ... move from the regional processing center to the alternative accommodation that is being offered. Mostly from Afghanistan, Iran, Myanmar, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Syria, the men are held under Australia s strict sovereign borders immigration policy, under which it refuses to allow asylum seekers arriving by boat to reach its shores. The stand-off has attracted the attention of the United Nations, which is a long-time critic of the conditions experienced by asylum seekers held in Australia s offshore camps. Nai Jit Lam, a regional representative for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, told a U.N. briefing in Geneva on Tuesday that asylum seekers are still not adequately provided for outside the center . It s still under construction ... we saw for ourselves that they are trying to complete the site as quickly as possible but the fact remains that major work is still in progress, Lam said in a satellite phone call from Manus Island. Australia says allowing asylum seekers arriving by boat to reach its shores would only encourage people smugglers in Asia and see more people risk their lives trying to make the perilous sea voyage. It rejected an offer from New Zealand to resettle 150 of the men to focus on sending up to 1,250 asylum seekers to the United States. Conditions at the abandoned facility are getting worse each day, according to Lam, with rubbish and human waste building up and medical supplies already exhausted. Papua New Guinea s Post-Courier newspaper reported on Tuesday that immigration officials would begin evicting the men on Wednesday, the fourth such deadline imposed on the refugees to leave since the camp s closure on Oct. 31. Papua New Guinea s Immigration department did not respond to a request for comment.

POPULAR FOX NEWS REPORTER Busted Having Five Year Affair With Las Vegas BeautyThis is a shocker! The very dry and serious Chief White House Correspondent Ed Henry has been caught in a sexual affair with a Vegas beauty. FOX News announced he s taking some time off to sort things out . A married Fox News host is taking some time off after his mistress did a tell all revealing salacious details of their alleged affair.Natalia Lima spoke with In Touch and shared how her relationship with Fox News chief White House Correspondent Ed Henry, 44, went from innocent banter to something she claims was far more sexual over the course of the past five years. Lima, a Las Vegas hostess, also shared text messages she claims were exchanged between herself and Henry detailing sexual acts they had performed on one another and hoped to perform in the future. Fox News said in a statement shortly after details of the alleged affair were revealed in the magazine; We recently became aware of Ed s personal issues and he s taking some time off to work things out. Soon after the story about his affair was released Henry was seen smiling outside his home in his gym gear. He was then seen wearing his wedding ring as he took a walk around his neighborhood in an Under Armour shirt and Brooklyn Dodgers baseball cap.Lima also said that Henry had a thing for bubble baths, and once brought over Mr. Bubble when he visited her at her condo for a hookup. He never gave me anything, but one time I was really stressed out about money so he did cover my rent, said Lima.She added that he did not withdraw the money from an ATM however as that would have been a red flag to his wife. One time he said, It s not like a crazy hookup, it s like you are my girlfriend, said Lima. He never really talked about his wife he mentioned her a couple of times but I never really asked about her, either. The relationship soured Lima claims after her Twitter account was hacked earlier this year, after which she said Henry began acting kinda weird. Henry deleted all of his tweets prior to January 23 on his Twitter account. They last met up in February and after promising to contact her the next day she did not hear from Henry again. It s like he used me. But I should ve know better, said Lima. Prior to their relationship turning sexual Henry shared photos of himself golfing or in front of Air Force One with Lima, but an October exchange is incredibly graphic between the pair. mmmmm yes bath w you, writes Henry. Lima responds with three kissing face emojis and then writes; Why are emojis so big? Lima followed that with emojis of a bathtub and a kissing couple. Henry then responded by sending his own emojis three unpeeled bananas and three pairs of female lips. Lima responds with an Lol and three female emoji lips. Henry shoots back; yummy woman, make me so, and then once again sends emojis of unpeeled bananas, this time upping the number to four.Read more: Daily Mail

Team Romney Joins GOP Establishment Fight Against TrumpIf Mitt Romney and his former team have the energy to fight Trump s nomination, why didn t they take their fight to Obama when they had the chance? America was begging for Romney fight back, but he chose to back down from the challenge. Suddenly, he s found the will to take the fight to the GOP Presidential frontrunner Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump may have a new opponent in the race for the White House and he s not even running.A cadre of former Mitt Romney aides and advisers, some going back to 2002, have reportedly reunited to take on a new political mission: stopping the seemingly unstoppable freight train known as the Trump campaign. We are united, said one former Romney aide who did not wish to be identified, according to the Boston Globe. It s a common goal, and not just for Romney people, but for anyone invested in Republicanism, conservatism, and anyone who gives a flying [expletive] about what we re trying to do here. Even if you re not getting paid, this isn t good for anybody, he said. Fox & Friends Weekend co-host Tucker Carlson quoted the Boston Globe piece during a telephone interview with Trump Saturday. Well, I m disappointed in Mitt Romney, Trump replied. He is the one that s leading it, and he was a failure, Trump replied. This is pure Romney trying to get back in to politics.He called Romney s 2012 presidential run a disaster, adding that Obama won an election that should have been won by the Republicans. Watch the interview, via Fox News.Via: BizPac Review

Democrats probe whether Flynn pushed nuclear project as Trump aideWASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic lawmakers are investigating whether retired U.S. General Michael Flynn secretly promoted a U.S.-Russian project to build dozens of nuclear reactors in the Middle East after becoming President Donald Trump’s first national security adviser. Representatives Elijah Cummings and Eliot Engel made the disclosure in a letter they sent on Tuesday to Flynn’s lawyer and executives of the private firms that developed the project. Flynn’s now-defunct company worked as a consultant on it. Robert Kelner, Flynn’s lawyer, declined to comment. Separately on Wednesday, NBC News reported that Flynn’s son, Michael Flynn Jr., is being investigated by Special Counsel Robert Mueller as part of his inquiry into U.S. allegations that Russia meddled in the 2016 presidential election. Flynn worked for his father’s consulting firm. A lawyer for Flynn Jr. declined to comment to NBC. “The American people deserve to know whether General Flynn was secretly promoting the private interests of these businesses while he was a (Trump) campaign adviser, transition official, or President Trump’s national security adviser,” Cummings and Engel said in the letter made public on Wednesday. They asked Flynn’s lawyer and executives of the companies involved to provide “all communications” they had with Flynn or other administration officials during Flynn’s association with Trump. The project proposes to build 40 nuclear reactors across the Middle East that would feed a regional electric grid. The reactors would be “proliferation proof,” meaning they could not be used to produce fuel for nuclear weapons. A promotional slide of the project said security would be provided by Rosoboron, a Russian state-owned arms exporter that is under U.S. sanctions. The sanctions imposed during the administration of former President Barack Obama soured relations between Moscow and Washington and Trump said in his election campaign that he wanted to improve those ties. Intelligence reports indicate that some Trump associates may have violated a law called the Logan Act, which prohibits unauthorized U.S. citizens from negotiating with a foreign government that has a dispute with the United States, sources familiar with the reports said. Cummings, the top Democrat on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, and Engel, the senior Democrat on the House Foreign Relations Committee, asked that the documents be provided by Oct. 4. The retired general is a central figure in Mueller’s investigation into whether Trump aides colluded with Russia to boost Trump’s campaign. Russia has denied interfering in the U.S. election and Trump has said there was no collusion. Trump, who took office on Jan. 20, fired Flynn on Feb. 13, 18 days after a top Justice Department official warned that the former Defense Intelligence Agency director could be blackmailed because Moscow knew he made misleading statements about his contacts with Russian officials. Cummings and Engel sent their letter as part of an inquiry into the renewal of Flynn’s 2016 Top Secret security clearance. They said Flynn failed to disclose a June 2015 trip he made to Egypt and Israel to promote the reactor project to investigators reviewing his renewal application and that he also did not list the foreigners with whom he met. The lawmakers wrote that replies from the executives and Kelner to a June letter confirmed that Flynn made the trip. “Based on your responses, it appears that General Flynn violated federal law,” they wrote. “Since these violations carry criminal penalties of up to five years in prison, we are providing your responses to Special Counsel Robert Mueller,” they wrote to Kelner, Alex G. Copson of X-Co Dynamics/ACU Strategic Partners, and retired Rear Admiral Michael Hewitt of X-Co Dynamics/Ironbridge Group/IP3. All are private companies. “Second, your responses raise significant questions about whether General Flynn continued to communicate with you and others about this project after the presidential election, after Donald Trump was sworn in as president, and after General Flynn assumed the post of national security adviser - without disclosing his foreign travel or contacts,” the lawmakers added. Donald Gross, counsel for ACU Strategic Partners, said the company has cooperated with the oversight committee in providing information about the project being developed along with Hewitt’s IP3, and “General Flynn’s limited involvement in June 2015.” Hewitt did not respond to a LinkedIn message seeking comment. The proposed reactor project would be funded by Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Arab states and built and run by a consortium of U.S., Russian, French, Dutch, Arab, British, Ukrainian and Israeli firms.

Factbox: U.S. lawmaker, others in hospital after shooting at baseball practice(Reuters) - A senior member of the U.S. House of Representatives and other victims were rushed to medical facilities with injuries on Wednesday after a gunman opened fire on a baseball field where Republican lawmakers were practicing for a charity game. The shooter, identified as James Hodgkinson of Illinois, was also taken to a hospital where he died from gunshot wounds. The following is information about the victims and their medical status after the shootings in Alexandria, Virginia, near Washington: - Majority Whip Steve Scalise, the No. 3 Republican in the House, was shot in the hip and was receiving care at MedStar Washington Hospital Center, his office said. Scalise was out of surgery but remained in critical condition, according to the hospital. As whip, Scalise, 51, from Louisiana, is responsible for rounding up votes for legislation and maintaining order among his party’s fractious ranks. A year ago, Scalise and other Republican leaders blocked gun control legislation from coming to a vote on the House floor following a mass shooting at a nightclub in Orlando, Florida. - Matt Mika, a lobbyist for Arkansas-based Tyson Foods Inc and former staffer for two former Republican representatives, was shot in the chest, according to witnesses. In a statement, Mika’s family said he was shot multiple times and was in critical condition. Mika served as a White House aide under former President George W. Bush, where he coordinated volunteers, worked with press advance and security details and managed VIP visits. - Zachary Barth, a staffer for U.S. Representative Roger Williams of Texas, was also shot. Williams said on Twitter that he was doing well and “expected to make a full recovery.” - Capitol Hill police officers David Bailey and Crystal Griner were also among the wounded. Both serve as part of Scalise’s security detail and were in good condition, according to U.S. Capitol Police Chief Matthew Verderosa. The Federal Bureau of Investigation said only one of the police officers suffered a gunshot wound. Other people sustained minor injuries during the shooting but were not hit by gunfire.

U.N. refugee agency urges Hungary to join EU migrant quota planBUDAPEST (Reuters) - The head of the United Nations refugee agency praised the European Union s refugee quota system for member states on Tuesday and urged Hungary to drop its resistance to taking in its fair share of migrants. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban is facing criticism over his continued refusal to change his anti-immigration stance despite a ruling by the European Union s top court this month upholding the bloc s quota system. My impression is there is a very clear intention to limit the number of people coming to Hungary to seek protection, U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said during a visit to Budapest. Grandi said the EU s quota system, introduced at the height of the migrant crisis in Europe in 2015, provided a model for other countries worldwide. This was an EU decision... we agree with that decision, he said. It was a very good example of sharing that responsibility. It could be used globally... Forced displacement is a global phenomenon like climate change. You can only address it through global solutions and solidarity. Grandi, who earlier in the day visited a camp on the Serbian border where migrants are detained while their asylum cases are pending, said razor wire fences and tough legal measures conveyed the wrong message that asylum was a crime. German Chancellor Angela Merkel, whose country took in the bulk of the migrants who entered the EU in 2015-16, has also urged Hungary to implement the EU court ruling. Grandi warned EU states in April not to send asylum seekers back to Hungary until Budapest amended a law that allows it to detain migrants at its border. EU rules allow member states to return refugees to the first safe country they reached on entering the 28-nation bloc. Orban has branded migrants - most of whom are Muslims from the Middle East and North Africa - a threat to Europe s historic Christian identity and a Trojan horse for terrorism , and he has defended the asylum centers on Hungary s border. Grandi said migrants held there were not being mistreated but added that limitations on their freedom of movement while their cases are pending, especially for minors, raised problems. Material conditions, food, medical care water, hygiene is acceptable, he said. The problem is the detention aspect. People are treated well but in a confined situation.

U.S. Senate advances nomination of Tillerson as Secretary of StateWASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Senate advanced the nomination of former Exxon Mobil Corp (XOM.N) Chief Executive Rex Tillerson on Monday to be President Donald Trump’s secretary of state, moving closer to filling a key seat on the Republican’s national security team despite partisan rancor over Trump’s immigration order. The vote was 56 to 43 to move toward a final confirmation vote after up to 30 hours’ debate, putting a final vote very early on Wednesday, if senators do not agree to change the time. The vote broke largely along party lines. Every Republican favored advancing the nomination and all but four members of the Democratic caucus voted against it. The Senate’s Democratic leader, Chuck Schumer, and several other members of the party tried, but failed, to delay considering Tillerson because of Trump’s executive order banning immigration from seven mostly Muslim countries and temporarily halting the entry of refugees. They said they wanted to question Tillerson more closely on his views on Muslim immigration. During his confirmation hearing, the former oil executive said he did not support a “blanket-type rejection” of any group of people. Democrats said that statement seemed to contradict Trump’s order. Trump and his supporters, including many Republicans, said his order is necessary to keep Americans safe and is not intended to ban Muslims, despite addressing only Muslim-majority nations whose citizens have not been involved in attacks on the United States. They said it was important to fill important slots on Trump’s national security team quickly. “As we proceed in ensuring the new administration has the leaders it needs to implement our nation’s foreign policy going forward, I have great confidence Rex Tillerson will serve the United States well,” Senator Bob Corker, the Republican chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said.

ALT-LEFT PLANS TO HIJACK PRESIDENT TRUMP’S AZ RALLY…Will He Really Make Them Crazy By Announcing Pardon For America’s Toughest Sheriff on Illegal Immigration?The pieces are in place ahead of President Donald Trump s rally in downtown Phoenix on Tuesday, with the nation waiting to see how it will play out.Officials are bracing for a deluge of tens of thousands of supporters and protesters, leading law enforcement to close roads and also for many businesses, offices, schools and even state courts to close their doors early.Although Trump visited Arizona seven times during his campaign, this is his first visit as president and likely to be a very different affair. AZ CentralOn August 14, President Trump on Tuesday retweeted a Fox News story saying he was seriously considering pardoning former Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio.FOX NEWS EXCLUSIVE: President Trump 'seriously considering' a pardon for ex-Sheriff Joe Arpaio https://t.co/Rgw8l7i9Xl FOX & friends (@foxandfriends) August 14, 2017President Trump may soon issue a pardon for Joe Arpaio, the colorful former Arizona sheriff who was found guilty two weeks ago of criminal contempt for defying a state judge s order to stop traffic patrols targeting suspected undocumented immigrants. In his final years as Maricopa County sheriff, Arpaio had emerged as a leading opponent of illegal immigration. I am seriously considering a pardon for Sheriff Arpaio, the president said Sunday, during a conversation with Fox News at his club in Bedminster, N.J. He has done a lot in the fight against illegal immigration. He s a great American patriot and I hate to see what has happened to him. Trump said the pardon could happen in the next few days, should he decide to do so.Arpaio, 85, was convicted by U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton of misdemeanor contempt of court for willfully disregarding an Arizona judge s order in 2011 to stop the anti-immigrant traffic patrols. Arpaio had maintained the law enforcement patrols for 17 months thereafter.The man who built a controversial national reputation as America s toughest sheriff admitted he prolonged his patrols, but insisted he did not intend to break the law because one of his former attorneys did not explain to him the full measure of restrictions contained in the court order.He is expected to be sentenced on Oct. 5 and could face up to six months in jail. However, since he is 85 years old and has no prior convictions, some attorneys doubt he will receive any jail time.Citing his long service as an outstanding sheriff, the president said Arpaio is admired by many Arizona citizens who respected his tough-on-crime approach.Arpaio s widely publicized tactics included forcing inmates to wear pink underwear and housing them in desert tent camps where temperatures often climbed well past 100 degrees Fahrenheit. He also controversially brought back chain gains, including a voluntary chain gang for women prisoners. FOX News

The Daily Show PERFECTLY Demonstrates That Trump Is A Fascist (VIDEO)Trevor Noah brilliantly unmasked Donald Trump as a fascist, and everyone needs to see it.On Monday night, the Daily Show host began by talking about Hillary Clinton trouncing Bernie Sanders in South Carolina over the weekend and briefly mentioned that Super Tuesday is upon us.But for all of those who are tired of democracy, Noah introduced fascism as an alternative.Noah explained to the audience that he has heard the word his entire life but he didn t really know what it was, so he looked it up and discovered some of the traits of fascism including a cult of action, celebrating aggressive masculinity, fear of outsiders, intense nationalism, intolerance of criticism, and resentment of national humiliation. As it turns out, Donald Trump embodies all of these and all we have to do is listen to him talk to know that it s true.Noah then played various clips of Trump demonstrating each of these traits one by one. Afterwards, Noah let out a nervous laugh as the audience seemed to be in complete disbelief about what they just heard and witnessed. An actual American presidential candidate really did just spout stuff out of the fascist playbook before their eyes. I m shitting myself, Noah said. It all lines up so perfectly, doesn t it? It almost stops being funny as you re watching it. It s funny for me because I have a back-up plan country, Noah quipped before telling the audience that they can rest easy because they are invited to live in South Africa if Trump does become president.Noah also pointed out that Trump retweeted a quote said by fascist Italian Dictator Benito Mussolini, which you can view below. @ilduce2016: It is better to live one day as a lion than 100 years as a sheep. @realDonaldTrump #MakeAmericaGreatAgain Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 28, 2016At first, Noah conceded that perhaps Trump didn t know that it was a Mussolini quote, but it soon became clear that Trump knows exactly who Mussolini is and proceeded to stand by the tweet during an interview with Chuck Todd on NBC. Trump even awkwardly paused after being asked if he wants to be associated with a fascist.Noah also noted that another trait of fascism includes a deep hatred of journalists, and then he played a clip of Trump vowing to make it possible to sue the media over negative stories about candidates, which Noah pointed out would mean he could be sued for informing everyone that Donald Trump wants to bang his daughter. And then it was time to mention Trump s endorsement by KKK leader David Duke. After playing footage from Trump s interview with Jake Tapper on CNN in which he claimed to not know anything about Duke, Noah and the Daily Show team dug up a clip from 16 years ago of Trump calling Duke a bigot and racist that people don t want in their party. The irony is I think there s a lot of Republicans saying that now, too, Noah concluded.Here s the video via Comedy Central.This was a brilliant segment by Noah and the Daily Show team, but they did miss a few traits. Fascists also disrespect women, and we all know Donald Trump has done that repeated during this campaign. Furthermore, fascists are obsessed with Christianity and corporate power. And Donald Trump isn t exactly the only Republican who flirts openly with fascism. It s basically part of the GOP s DNA at this point.To read more about fascism, click here. Featured image via screenshot

U.S. senator says panel could take up Russia sanctions bill this summerWASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Republican chairman of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee said on Thursday the panel could take up a bill as soon as this summer to impose new sanctions on Russia over its alleged interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Senator Bob Corker said the panel could move forward on sanctions after hearing from U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. Some members of the committee, particularly Democrats, had wanted to act more quickly on sanctions over Russian activities that U.S. intelligence agencies concluded were intended to help get Republican Donald Trump elected. Corker said he expects Tillerson to report to the committee within weeks about the Trump administration’s policy toward Russia and the situation in Syria. Corker said he would be willing to consider a sanctions bill soon after that if, as he expected, Tillerson does not demonstrate to the panel that there has been significant change by Russia in Syria, where Moscow has been supporting President Bashar al-Assad in that country’s six-year-old civil war. “I’ve committed to mark up Russia sanctions legislation in the event, the probable event, that the secretary of state cannot show us that there’s a change of trajectory,” Corker said at a committee business meeting. A mark up is a session in which a committee debates legislation and possible amendments. Later in the meeting, the panel overwhelmingly passed legislation to condemn Russian activities including its effort to influence other countries’ elections, aggression in Ukraine and support for Assad. That measure did not include sanctions. Corker and other senators had suggested it would be prudent to wait on sanctions at a delicate time in dealings with Moscow, especially over Syria. Democrats were not pleased at the delay, but said they were willing to wait to hear from the Trump administration. “I do look forward to Mr. Tillerson explaining to us the administration’s Russian policy and what he has seen its impact to be,” said Senator Ben Cardin, the committee’s senior Democrat. If the panel eventually approves sanctions legislation, it would require passage in the full Senate and the House of Representatives before it could go to Trump to sign into law. U.S. intelligence agencies concluded in January that Moscow tried to tilt the 2016 election in Trump’s favor, including by hacking into the emails of senior Democrats. Russia has denied the allegation. Trump has denied any collusion between his campaign and Moscow, but Federal Bureau of Investigation and congressional probes into the matter have dogged the early months of his presidency. Democratic Senator Chris Murphy said it gives many committee members “great pause” that the Trump administration has not acted against Russia for its efforts to influence the election. The United States, under Democratic former President Barack Obama, imposed sanctions on Russia over its actions in Ukraine and in December imposed fresh sanctions and ordered the expulsion of Russian suspected spies over the election meddling.