Datasets:

nixbel

/

ustest

like 0

Reuters Donald Trump’s Hollywood Walk of Fame star vandalized on video

Alex Ansary

Reuters Donald Trump’s Hollywood Walk of Fame star vandalized on video 10/27/2016 REUTERS Donald Trump’s star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame was defaced by a vandal wielding a sledgehammer and a pick-axe on Wednesday in an act captured on video, police said. Los Angeles police expect to arrest someone for the vandalism, which left Trump’s name scratched out of the star, the emblem in the middle dislodged and chips missing. A video posted at Deadline.com, a Hollywood media industry website, showed a man wearing a hard-hat and reflective vest swinging a sledgehammer and pick-axe in the pre-dawn darkness. The area had been cordoned off with traffic barriers and cones, giving it the appearance of a legitimate work site. The Republican presidential nominee, real estate developer and reality TV star has faced several large protests during his campaign appearances in California, where polls show him far behind Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. The former host of the NBC show “The Apprentice,” Trump received his Walk of Fame star in 2007. A spokeswoman for Trump could not be reached for comment. Los Angeles police spokeswoman Liliana Preciado at the scene confirmed investigators have video capturing the vandalism attack and she said police expected to arrest whoever was responsible. Los Angeles-based City News Service reported a man identifying himself as James Lambert Otis said he damaged the installation “to make a point.” City News reported the man said he had family members who were victims of sexual assault and had intended to remove the star, which he was unable to do, and auction it off to benefit women who have alleged Trump groped them. Trump has denied the allegations. Otis could not be reached for comment on the report. Trump drew widespread condemnations from voters and a number of Republican elected officials after a 2005 video emerged in which he was heard talking on an open microphone about groping women and trying to seduce a married woman. His star on the Walk of Fame was previously targeted. In the summer, a street artist erected a tiny wall around the star, complete with miniature American flags and barbed wire. The art piece, which was later removed, made light of Trump’s campaign pledge to build a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico. The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce administers the hundreds of star plaques on sidewalks in the Los Angeles neighborhood. They are purchased for $30,000 each. Leron Gubler, president and CEO of the chamber, said in a statement the star would be covered for several days during repairs.

Russian Defence Minister in India | Russia & India Report

Russian Defence Minister in India mil.ru Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar and his Russian counterpart Sergei Shoigu sign protocol document after the 16th meeting of the India-Russia Intergovernmental Commission on Military-Technical Cooperation in New Delhi on Wednesday, October 26, 2016. Facebook

A Rio Table Tennis Lament: That’s the Way the Ball Crumples - The New York Times

Andrew Keh

RIO DE JANEIRO — The relics were arranged in a sphinxlike configuration, as in some type of ancient burial ground. Massimo Costantini, the coach of the United States table tennis team, called the formation “a sort of homage to the fallen. ” They appeared on the first day of the Olympics, in a far corner of the table tennis pavilion: 18 white balls, all of them crumpled or cracked, arranged ceremoniously in the center of a quartet of water bottles. It was a fitting symbol of the frustration that has festered at the tables this week at the Rio Games, where the table tennis balls are giving players fits. They do not bounce true, the players said. Their flight paths are unpredictable. And they frequently break. “I think this ball is very bad,” Li Ping of Qatar said after losing a match. The player who beat him, Dimitrij Ovtcharov of Germany, fumed that the official competition ball “makes it almost impossible to compete. ” Table tennis balls are capricious little things. Infinitesimal variations in size and imperceptible deviations in construction can have considerable ramifications for how they spin, fly and bounce. Casual players — people in suburban garages or fraternity houses — tend not to notice such details. But professionals obsess over them. The balls at the Olympics, then, are not the ones you find, cobwebbed, under the basement couch. They are not even the same balls used at the last Summer Games. Two years ago, the international federation that governs the sport switched the material of the official ball from celluloid to a different type of plastic. The federation also allowed the ball to be slightly larger. Some players are still struggling to adjust — and so, apparently, are some manufacturers. Many players criticized as subpar the specific quality of the balls from D. H. S. a Chinese equipment brand that became the official ball supplier after the 2012 Olympics in London. “I think many players are complaining because we have better balls,” said Timo Boll of Germany, who is at his fourth Olympics. “There are better balls on the market. We don’t use them at international tournaments. That’s a pity. ” The old celluloid balls were required to have a diameter of 39. 5 to 40. 5 millimeters the new ones can range from 40. 0 to 40. 6 millimeters. According to players, a bigger ball produces less speed and less spin. After the change, players had to recalibrate years of training and muscle memory. Those reliant on spin were disadvantaged more than athletic power hitters. The balls were changed shortly after the 2000 Olympics, increasing in size from 38 millimeters. Other past changes in equipment and rumors that more could be coming, like a rise in net height, have left players irked. “This is not good this is unprofessional,” Panagiotis Gionis of Greece said of the tinkering. “It’s your job. It affects you. Some players are destroyed about this. ” Gionis criticized the D. H. S. ball but was equally concerned about the lack of consistency from competition to competition. Different brands can be used in domestic leagues, regional tournaments and international competitions, and no two have felt alike in the past two years. “It’s like if you have to drive a different car than yours,” said Costantini, the United States coach, who was more concerned about this inconsistency than about the quality of any brand. “Maybe the brakes are not the same, the accelerating, and it takes some time to adjust. ” Players have to begin the adjustment process for the Olympics — the most prestigious competition in the sport — weeks or months before the Games to get comfortable with the ball. But that was tough to do this summer, some said, because of what they perceived as the poor quality of the D. H. S. ball. “We practiced with that ball months beforehand to get used to it, but you can never get used to it,” said Ovtcharov, who also said he felt the ball getting softer over the course of his games. (Certain competitions cycle multiple balls through a match, but not the Olympics.) Stefan Fegerl of Austria said: “This ball doesn’t jump so well. Many times it falls down very fast. When you hit them with the edge, maybe it’s broken. The quality is not good. ” In an interview Tuesday, Lou the general manager of D. H. S. said he had not heard any complaints firsthand. Through an interpreter, Lou said the company was “quite satisfied” with its transition to the new ball. Still, he was sympathetic when informed of the concerns. He said the company was continuing research to make a better ball. “From one side, they give us information,” Lou said, “and from the other side, we improve the balls gradually. ” Thomas Weikert, the president of the federation that governs the sport, acknowledged in an interview that the balls used in the past two years had not been as good as they could be. But he said this was a symptom of the industry rather than of any individual company. “They’ve improved a lot,” Weikert said of the balls. “Let’s say it’s O. K. It’s not 100 percent. ” Lou and Weikert noted that some griping was expected. “If you use another ball, other players will complain,” Weikert said. To be sure, certain players seemed blissfully unaware of the complaints. Told about the multitude of players voicing frustrations with the ball, Paul Drinkhall of Britain smiled. “Did they lose?” he said. Boll, the German player, was eliminated in the fourth round of the singles tournament. The team competition begins Saturday. “I’m sure they want to produce now a better ball because they’re getting a lot of criticism,” Boll said. “It would have been nice if it was before the Olympic Games. ”

CDC Blocks Testimony of Vaccine Whistleblower in Medical Malpractice Case

noreply@blogger.com (Alexander Light)

. CDC Blocks Testimony of Vaccine Whistleblower in Medical Malpractice Case An important witness in a case focusing on the link between vaccines and autism has been stopped fro... Print Email http://humansarefree.com/2016/10/cdc-blocks-testimony-of-vaccine.html An important witness in a case focusing on the link between vaccines and autism has been stopped from testifying. Thomas Frieden, the director of the Center for Disease Control (CDC), has stopped CDC whistleblower Dr. William Thompson from giving evidence on scientific fraud and destruction of evidence by senior CDC officials in a recent case. Attorneys Bryan Smith and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. , of Morgan & Morgan , have wanted to have Dr. Thompson testify in a medical malpractice case to explain how the CDC committed scientific fraud in a series of studies, which found no link between vaccines and autism. After denying the request, Dr. Frieden said, "Dr. William Thompson's deposition testimony would not substantially promote the objectives of CDC or HHS [Health and Human Services]."Dr. Thompson is a 19-year veteran at the CDC and former senior vaccine safety scientist at the agency's Immunology Safety Office, and is the co-author of four key studies that the CDC widely suspects will stop the use of the MMR vaccine and vaccines containing the mercury-based preservative thimerosal, from being linked to autism. Thompson's current position is at the CDC's National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD and TB Prevention. Back in August 2014, Dr. Thompson revealed that the data behind CDC's principle vaccine safety studies demonstrated a causal link between vaccines and autism or autism symptoms, even though CDC claims the opposite is true. Thompson says,based upon interpretation of the data: "There is biologic plausibility right now to say that thimerosal causes autism-like features." Dr. Thompson invoked federal whistleblower protection in August 2014. Shockingly Thompson has claimed that his bosses, including the CDC's Immunization Safety Office Branch Chief Frank Destefano, specifically ordered him and three other CDC scientists to destroy data demonstrating vaccine induced autism in CDC's seminal 2004 study (Destefano, et al. 2004). The data in question unexpectedly showed a 250 percent increase in autism among young black males who received the vaccine on time (before their third birthday) in comparison to those who were vaccinated after their third birthday. It also showed a significant link between the vaccine and isolated autism, which is an autism that occurs in normally developing children with no other medical problems. According to Thompson, Destefano called his four co-authors into a room and ordered them to dump the damning datasets into a giant garbage can. The published study left out those sets of data. This study is now cited in 91 other papers on PubMed as proof of vaccine safety, is the main building block on the idea that vaccines don't cause autism. The case in question is to do with 16-year-old Yates Hazlehurst. The case is claiming that Yates is autistic as a direct result of vaccine injuries acquired in 2001 when the vaccine was improperly administered. Because of the Vaccine Injury Compensation Act of 1986 (VICA), which protects doctors from any liability to do with vaccine injuries, Hazlehurst v. The Jackson Clinic is the only vaccine injury case in 30 years that has reached a court in the US. Dr. Thompson wishes to reveal the scientific fraud and destruction of evidence that occurred in the studies he was involved in. The problem has arisen due to the Whistle Blower Protection Act, which means Dr. Thompson can not testify under oath without the permission of the director of the CDC, Dr. Thomas Friede. Hazelhurst's lawyer Kennedy, who argued before Tennessee Senior Circuit Court Judge William Acree that Dr. Thompson's testimony was necessary, said: "Yates, and almost 5,000 other vaccine injured autistic children, lost their cases in vaccine court because CDC and the Justice Department submitted fraudulent science wrongly denying the vaccine-autism link." Judge Acree ordered on Feb. 5 that Dr. Thompson should be deposed, accepting the logic of the argument, and following this ruling, Smith filed a formal request to CDC to make Thompson available for deposition and trial testimony. "Since that original study data is only available from Dr. Thompson," Hazelhurst's other attourney Smith explained, "We are very confident that a federal judge will order CDC to make Thompson available." Reference: organicandhealthy.org Dear Friends, HumansAreFree is and will always be free to access and use. If you appreciate my work, please help me continue. Stay updated via Email Newsletter: Related

2016 Closes With 140 Cops Being Killed in the Line of Duty

Bob Price

A total of 140 law enforcement officers were killed in 2016 in line of duty deaths. The number of deaths increased by 10 over 2015’s 130 officers who were killed. [The final death of the year came Friday night when Pennsylvania State Police Trooper Landon Weaver was shot and killed while investigating an alleged violation of a protective order. Jason Robinson, 32, allegedly grabbed a gun during the investigation and shot Trooper Weaver, killing him. Robinson fled the scene and was later found after an overnight manhunt. He threatened officers and was shot and killed. Death by gunfire was, once again, the leading cause of death for officers who were killed on duty. A total of 64 officers were killed by gunfire — up from 39 in 2015, according to statistics obtained by Breitbart Texas from the Officer Down Memorial Page (ODMP). This represents an increase of over 60 percent over the prior year. “The 61 percent increase in law enforcement officers shot and killed in 2016 versus 2015 and a 53 percent overall increase in officers murdered in the performance of duty are deeply troubling statistics,” ODMP Director of Research Steven Weiss told Breitbart Texas. “Included in that statistic is a disturbing increase in officers killed in ‘ ’ murders, such as the incidents in Dallas and Des Moines. ” “These types of murders are particularly disconcerting because they are not born out of a criminal’s desire to avoid arrest, but out of a hatred for not only law enforcement, but for our society as a whole,” Weiss explained. “It is the type of attack that, for the most part, tactical training or increased vigilance may not help to prevent. ” Weiss told Breitbart Texas the “ambush style” murders of police officers have been increasing since 2012. “When a person is willing to plan and then put into action that plan to assassinate a person for no other reason than the person is a law enforcement officer,” Weiss stated, “it is hard to draw any conclusion other than it is an attack against the American way of life. Many times the men or women in uniform represents the face of our government, since an interaction with a law enforcement officer may be the extent of most citizen’s direct contact with government during their lifetime. ” In addition to gunfire, 12 officers were killed by vehicular assault, one officer was stabbed, and three were killed in other types of assaults. Officers gave their lives in service to the public in 34 of our 50 states. Additionally, law enforcement officers with the federal government, Indian tribal police, and the U. S. territory of Puerto Rico also lost their lives while serving their departments. Texas led the nation with the deaths of 19 police officers. California was a distant second with 11 officers being killed. Each of the other states were listed with single digit numbers of officers killed while on duty. Vehicle accidents and a heart attack took the lives of three U. S. Border Patrol agents. This was the second year in a row that Texas peace officers led the nation in line of duty deaths. Automobile accidents were the second leading cause of death for law enforcement officers across the country. Automobile accidents accounted for 23 deaths while motorcycle accidents added seven more. Four officers were killed during pursuits with suspects and twelve officers were killed after being struck by automobiles alongside the roadway. One officer was killed in an aircraft crash and one was struck by a train. Other causes of death included drownings (2) animal related (1) illness (1) falling (1) accidental gunfire (2) heart attack (6) and illness related to (3). Of the 140 deaths recorded, 134 were men and 6 were women. In addition to the 140 human officers killed in the line of duty, 34 K9 officers also lost their lives in the line of duty. Heat exhaustion led the causes of death with 12 K9 officers being killed by heat related issues. An additional ten K9 officers were killed by hostile gunfire and two K9s were killed by accidental gunfire. Weiss said these numbers are about more than statistics. “Each of those deaths represents the loss of a person that dedicated their life to service, to the pursuit of justice, and to keeping their community safe,” he said. “The loss of an officer is something that effects an entire family, many time for generations. Spouses, children, grandchildren, siblings and extended family are all impacted. And the impact many times can have a profound effect on the community the officer served. ” “Thankfully, the law enforcement community is brotherhood like no other and those LOD families, like their loved ones, are never forgotten,” Weiss concluded. “They are supported by their agency and their communities for a lifetime. Agencies and charities ensure their children are able to afford that families can stay in their homes and that children that lost a parent always have a father or mother figure to speak with and be there for them when they need it. ” Author’s note: All statistics in this article were compiled from the Officer Down Memorial Page. A complete listing of the officers killed in the line of duty can be found on their website. Bob Price serves as associate editor and senior political news contributor for Breitbart Texas. He is a founding member of the Breitbart Texas team. Follow him on Twitter @BobPriceBBTX.

Trump Institute Offered Get-Rich Schemes With Plagiarized Lessons - The New York Times

Jonathan Martin

In 2005, as he was making a transition from developing real estate to capitalizing on his fame through ventures like a reality show and deals, Donald J. Trump hit upon a strategy for entering the field of education. He poured his own money into Trump University, which began as a business advising customers on how to make money in real estate, but left a long trail of customers alleging they were defrauded. Their lawsuits have cast a shadow over Mr. Trump’s presidential campaign. But Mr. Trump also lent his name, and his credibility, to a seminar business he did not own, which was branded the Trump Institute. Its operators rented out hotel ballrooms across the country and invited people to pay up to $2, 000 to come hear Mr. Trump’s “ secrets and strategies. ” And its customers had ample reason to ask whether they, too, had been deceived. As with Trump University, the Trump Institute promised falsely that its teachers would be handpicked by Mr. Trump. Mr. Trump did little, interviews show, besides appear in an infomercial — one that promised customers access to his vast accumulated knowledge. “I put all of my concepts that have worked so well for me, new and old, into our seminar,” he said in the 2005 video, adding, “I’m teaching what I’ve learned. ” Reality fell far short. In fact, the institute was run by a couple who had run afoul of regulators in dozens of states and had been dogged by accusations of deceptive business practices and fraud for decades. Similar complaints soon emerged about the Trump Institute. Yet there was an even more fundamental deceit to the business, unreported until now: Extensive portions of the materials that students received after paying their seminar fees, supposedly containing Mr. Trump’s special wisdom, had been plagiarized from an obscure real estate manual published a decade earlier. Together, the exaggerated claims about his own role, the checkered pasts of the people with whom he went into business and the theft of intellectual property at the venture’s heart all illustrate the fiction underpinning so many of Mr. Trump’s licensing businesses: Putting his name on products and services — and collecting fees — was often where his actual involvement began and ended. “That Trump Institute, what criminals they are,” said Carol Minto of West Haven, Conn. a retired court reporter who attended one seminar in 2009 and agreed to spend $1, 997. 94 to attend another before having second thoughts. She wound up requiring the help of two states’ attorneys general in getting a refund. “They wanted to steal my money,” she said. The institute was another example of the Trump brand’s being accused of luring vulnerable customers with false promises of profit and success. Others, besides Trump University, include multilevel marketing ventures that sold vitamins and telecommunications services, and a vanity publisher that faced hundreds of consumer complaints. Mr. Trump’s infomercial performance suggested he was closely overseeing the Trump Institute. “People are loving it,” he said in the program, titled “The Donald Trump Way to Wealth” and staged like a talk show in front of a wildly enthusiastic audience. “People are really doing well with it, and they’re loving it. ” His name, picture and aphorisms like “I am the American Dream, supersized version” were all over the course materials. Yet while he owned 93 percent of Trump University, the Trump Institute was owned and operated by Irene and Mike Milin, a couple who had been marketing courses since the 1980s. A Trump executive, Michael Sexton, told The Sacramento Bee in 2006 that there was a simple reason for going into business with the Milins: Their company was “the best in the business. ” Yet the Milins’ reputation was actually pockmarked with lawsuits and regulatory actions — a dismal track record that Mr. Trump and his aides could have unearthed with a modicum of due diligence. The Milins were known for running ads that screamed “FREE MONEY!” and offered tutorials on how to obtain government grants and loans. They were also notorious for being frequent targets of state regulators. In 1993, the Texas attorney general accused their company, then called Information Seminars International, of taking customers’ money and running. People who bought a $499 “Milin Method” package were promised financing to resell real estate purchased at government auctions, officials said, but when customers sought to follow up with the company, the Milins had vanished. In 2001, operating as National Grants Conference, the Milins settled with Florida authorities after being accused of violating the state’s Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act. And in 2006, the Vermont attorney general sued the Milins for consumer fraud, ultimately fining them $65, 000 and allowing customers to seek more than $325, 000 in refunds. The regulatory woes continued after the Milins rebranded their seminar business with the name of the country’s real estate developer: In 2007, 33 state attorneys general signed a letter to the Federal Trade Commission accusing the Milins of deceptive trade practices. A year later, their company sought bankruptcy protection, owing $2. 1 million to creditors. The venture continued for a few years. Alan Garten, Mr. Trump’s counsel, said that executives were unaware of the Milins’ history when their business relationship began but that he could not recall when they became aware of the couple’s with regulators. Operating as the Trump Institute, the Milins pursued familiar tactics — and attracted familiar complaints, eventually earning an F from the Better Business Bureau. Seminar attendees who later sought assistance from supposed experts over a Trump Institute phone line complained of being told to ignore what they had been taught in the seminars because it was outdated or useless advice. “The ‘advisers’ refused to listen to us when we referred to the methods taught in the seminars,” Fred and Zofia Besel, a retired couple from New York, wrote in 2009, seeking a refund in a letter that wound up with the Florida attorney general’s office. Unbeknownst to customers at the time, though, even the printed materials handed out to seminar attendees were based on a lie. The Trump Institute copyrighted its publication, each page emblazoned with “Billionaire’s Road Map to Success,” and it distributed the materials to those who attended the seminars. Yet much of the handbook’s contents were lifted without attribution from an obscure guide published by Success magazine in 1995 called “Real Estate Mastery System. ” At least 20 pages of the Trump Institute book were copied entirely or in large part from “Real Estate Mastery System. ” Even some of its hypothetical scenarios — “Seller A is asking $80, 000 for a residence” — were repeated verbatim. Asked about the plagiarism, which was discovered by the Democratic “super PAC” American Bridge, the editor of the Trump Institute publication, Susan G. Parker, denied responsibility and suggested that a lawyer for the Milins, who provided her with background material for the book, might have been to blame. The lawyer, Peter Hoppenfeld, who no longer represents the Milins, said Ms. Parker was most likely at fault but acknowledged forwarding her information from the Milins’ office. Reached at her home in Boca Raton, Fla. Irene Milin told a reporter, “I’m very busy,” and hung up. She did not answer subsequent calls or respond to a voice mail message. Mr. Garten said Mr. Trump was “obviously” not aware of the plagiarism. But even while playing down Mr. Trump’s link to the Trump Institute, calling it a “ licensing deal,” Mr. Garten expressed pride in the venture. “I stand by the curriculum that was taught at both Trump University and Trump Institute,” he said. Ms. Parker, a lawyer and legal writer in Briarcliff Manor, N. Y. said that far from being handpicked by Mr. Trump, she had been hired to write the book after responding to a Craigslist ad. She said she never spoke to Mr. Trump, let alone received guidance from him on what to write. She said she drew on her own knowledge of real estate and a of Mr. Trump’s books. Ms. Parker said she did venture to one of the Trump Institute seminars — and was appalled: The speakers came off like salesmen, she said, and their advice was nothing but banalities. “It was like I was in sleaze America,” she said. “It was all smoke and mirrors. ”

EXCLUSIVE – Islamic State Supporters Following Coptic Bus Attack: ‘Christians Will Not Have Security’

Aaron Klein and Ali Waked

TEL AVIV — Writing in an encrypted chat room, Islamic State sympathizers and militants celebrated the deadly terrorist attack against a bus of Coptic Christian pilgrims in Egypt on Friday, and warned that Christians in the country should expect more such attacks. [Breitbart Jerusalem obtained access to correspondence posted in a closed chat group that utilizes the encrypted Telegram messaging service. The group serves as an internal Twitter of sorts for IS jihadists and sympathizers, and has been used in the past to issue IS communications. The Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attack in which 29 Christian civilians were murdered by gunmen claiming to be security forces as the pilgrims were reportedly on their way to volunteer at a monastery. “A security team of caliphate soldiers set up an ambush for dozens of Christians as they headed to the church of St. Samuel,” IS announced on Saturday through Amaq, the terrorist group’s media and propaganda arm. The attack horrified Egypt and the Western world, but IS members and supporters on the Telegram network viewed the carnage as heroic and vowed to continue targeting Christians. Talha Alanssari wrote in the Telegram conversation, “May your jihad be blessed you are sons of the Islamic State. Bless the pure hands that struck the strongholds of the Christians and the infidels. Thank Allah who made our hearts happy with the heroic attack of the nation of Caliphs against the Christians in Egypt who should expect more attacks. The same Christians will not have the luxury of security and they will pay … the taxes of the Jizya with the help of Allah” Jizya is a tax levied on living in an Islamic state. Oubaida Alsinawi joined the conversation, saying, “Thanks to Allah before and thanks to Allah after. He’s the one who made a success of this attack of our brothers in the military arena who left to commit suicide but returned safely, thank Allah alone. Thank Allah who allowed our brothers to hunt these Christians as the hunter hunts his prey. The soldiers of the Islamic State will continue in an campaign with these Christians and traitorous Muslims in the Egyptian army and the tribes that help them in Sinai. I swear to Allah that our brothers in the field are demonstrating creativity as they reach these Christians and infidels and all those who help them. The attacks that have yet to come will be much harder with the help of Allah. ” Hamza Alraqawi wrote, “May your jihad be blessed, you the Mujahedeen of the Islamic State in Egypt. You warmed our hearts as our Mujahedeen brothers did who struck in England, Belgium, France, America and Russia. We say to you, continue with the blessing of Allah and increase your attacks and don’t allow them to continue harming the oppressed on the Earth. Here in Raqqa we are fighting fiercely on the outskirts of the city and we won’t let the infidels and traitors enter. Our bodies are explosives meant to kill them and lead them to hell. ” A Telegram user who goes by the name “The Sheikh of the Caliphate” wrote, “Thanks to Allah before and thanks to Allah after for strengthening the Mujahedeen and guiding their hands in their campaigns and attacks. The blessed attack against Christians in Egypt had a special importance for the Mujahedeen, especially after the suicide attack committed in their idol churches. The war against the Christians is no less important than the war against the Shi’ites and against the infidels. They must clearly understand that the abduction and killing of Muslim men and women in Egypt’s streets will not pass without punishment and they must wait for more painful things with the help of Allah. ” Aaron Klein is Breitbart’s Jerusalem bureau chief and senior investigative reporter. He is a New York Times bestselling author and hosts the popular weekend talk radio program, “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio. ” Follow him on Twitter @AaronKleinShow. Follow him on Facebook. Ali Waked is the Arab affairs correspondent for Breitbart Jerusalem.

Austria Rejects Far-Right Presidential Candidate Norbert Hofer - The New York Times

Alison Smale

VIENNA — In rejecting a candidate for president on Sunday, voters in Austria showed the limitations of Donald J. Trump’s tailwinds on a continent where extremist politics have traditionally brought cataclysm. Call it the other Trump effect, one that may sow caution among some European voters suspicious of the advances of populist politicians. Populist forces have unsettled politics in Europe and the United States, frequently by using fake news and fanning fears of globalization and migration. The British vote to leave the European Union this year was complicated by such anxieties. The rejection of constitutional changes in Italy on Sunday hinged on a variety of issues. But the choice before Austrians was perhaps the starkest. The bitter yearlong campaign for the presidency pitted Norbert Hofer, a leader of the Freedom Party, founded in the 1950s by former Nazis, against a former Green Party leader, Alexander Van der Bellen. This was a political choice, and Mr. Van der Bellen’s decisive victory — by 6. 6 percentage points with 99 percent of votes counted — left his supporters predictably jubilant, if surprised. In recent days, they had seemed resigned to fearing that Mr. Trump’s victory, in particular, was tilting the outcome here against them. “It is unbelievable,” said Wolfgang Petritsch, a veteran diplomat, a biographer of the former Austrian Chancellor Bruno Kreisky and the chairman of Austria’s Marshall Plan foundation. “Austria saves the world!” he said with a twist of irony. Austria is too small a sample to know whether the populist tide is abating. Europe still faces pivotal elections next year in France and Germany, as well as the possibility of a snap election in Italy. Those races will define politics in the European Union for the remainder of the decade. But Austria does seem to disprove the idea that Mr. Trump’s victory accelerated a broader public acceptance of populist, forces. In recent days, many in Austria had seemed resigned to the likelihood of a Trump bounce for the far right. Mr. Hofer himself said in an interview last month that the American election had bolstered support for his Freedom Party. Yet it was not the case. “People followed Trump with curiosity, shock, fear, jubilation, but I don’t think they drew any conclusions,” Johannes Hübner, a Freedom Party parliamentary deputy, said on Sunday night. “It’s like a Hollywood movie. ” Perhaps the message Austrians received, he said, was “beware of another Trump — don’t vote for Hofer. ” Mr. Van der Bellen, who exudes a calm in public, campaigned as a sort of reveling in corny, retail politicking. In an interview in September, he noted that he had been teased for donning traditional Austrian jackets and attending the numerous village fetes and festivals that are the essence of rural life here. Especially, he said, when “it emerges that I like doing this. ” He also suggested then that the intensity of the campaign had led to a broad politicization across Austria, where the voting age is 16. He said Britain’s “tragic” vote to leave the European Union had made people think twice about Austria’s imitating any such move. Mr. Hofer’s party is more skeptical of Europe, but he had stopped well short of calling for Austria to leave the European Union. The country, which straddles the heart of Europe from Italy and Switzerland to Hungary and Slovakia, depends heavily on tourism and exports for its comfortable living standards. A choice to be the first country in postwar Europe to elect a leader for president could have jeopardized that standing. The vote was widely watched across Europe as a measure of how high fringe parties could climb in mainstream politics, turning what is normally a sleepy contest for a largely ceremonial post into a measure of the populist wave that has advanced on both sides of the Atlantic. and forces have already ridden a populist path to power in Hungary and Poland and have gained strength in France and even Germany. Mr. Van der Bellen had appealed to Austrians to vote for reason over extremes. Mr. Hofer campaigned on an “Austria First” slogan, and said he wanted to lead a country that was secure “for our children and grandchildren,” playing on fears of the tide of migrants that have entered Europe. Mr. Hofer’s failure is likely to reverberate around Europe, where the far right has made inroads from Marine Le Pen’s National Front in France to the Alternative for Germany party, both of which have begun eating into support for mainstream conservatives. Establishment politicians are likely to breathe a sigh of relief and interpret the result as a sign that fringe parties still face what many in Europe have long considered a barrier to broader support because of historical associations with fascism. One person who may thank the Austrians, with whom she has tussled over immigration, is Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany. Austria’s rejection of the wave comes as Ms. Merkel heads this week into a congress of her conservative party, at which she will be anointed its candidate for a fourth term in elections next year. Ms. Merkel issued no immediate reaction to the Austrian vote, but her vice chancellor, the Social Democratic leader Sigmar Gabriel, called it “a victory for reason. ” Still, Mr. Hofer made the biggest advances of any populist in Europe, racking up almost 50 percent of the vote when he lost a presidential runoff by just 31, 000 votes. His party contested the slim defeat, and Austria’s highest court ordered a rerun on procedural grounds. That was then postponed to Sunday, from October, after absentee ballots were found to have faulty glue. Despite the process, voter interest and emotions ran high. The presidential contest was the since 1986, when Austrians elected Kurt Waldheim, a former United Nations secretary general, despite revelations that he had concealed his service in Hitler’s armed forces close to the sites of Nazi atrocities in the Balkans during World War II. An array of establishment figures lined up behind Mr. Van der Bellen, but Mr. Hofer garnered some support from mainstream conservatives in the People’s Party, which declined to back the former Green leader. Mr. Petritsch and other political veterans said the length of the campaign worked in Mr. Van der Bellen’s favor. He was the clear favorite of voters in Vienna and other cities, and apparently was able to reach into rural areas where Mr. Hofer won in May but performed less strongly Sunday. “He built a broad coalition,” said Alexandra the editor in chief of the liberal daily Der Standard. Now, she said, Austrians will expect Mr. Van der Bellen to mend the rifts that appeared during the bitter campaign. After early projections showed him clearly lagging, Mr. Hofer, 45, quickly conceded on Facebook, asking “all Austrians to stick together and to work together. ” “Dear friends,” Mr. Hofer wrote, “you supported me so well and I am infinitely sad that it did not work out. ”

How Deep Will Trump’s Truths Go?

Daily Bell Staff

How Deep Will Trump’s Truths Go? Donald Trump will often be mocked in the coming months as the anti-elitist, anti-establishment disruptor of politics who wants to lower taxes on the elite and who is not above hiring establishment figures such as Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus for his team. The mockery will mostly be misplaced simply because the terms “elite” and “establishment” are understood too broadly: Trump’s movement was only against certain forms of establishment elitism which have nothing to do with wealth, membership in a party hierarchy or even political experience. -Bloomberg In this editorial we learn that Trump voters were against America’s intelligentsia. These are the people who occupy the bureaucratic rungs in Washington and the tenured chairs in top universities. These are the people as well that cluster in New York, Los Angeles and Washington. They move back and forth between corporations and “public service.” These are the folks that set the tone for the cultural attacks that are ruining the United States. These people, as well, constitute the ranks of globalists. Much of what they want for America is intended to destroy it. More: When Trump supporters think about the “elite” or the “establishment” what they really mean is America’s intelligentsia. … Collectively, they — we — were seen as an entrenched, closed, arrogant group that sees fit to tell people what to say and think. … This is the same understanding of “elite” and “establishment” that informed Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged”: The Trumpists share Rand’s exasperation with teachers, writers and bureaucrats and their fake recipes for social justice, as well as her admiration for the rough but creative doers, the titans of business. Of course this is nonsense, and in fact these perceptions are exactly what’s wrong with Rand. She saw the world as a place where “doers” were hemmed in and pulled down by their inferiors. But today’s world is not like that. In fact, one can make a case that the industrial revolution – filled with doers – eradicated an independent peasantry whose lives were a good deal freer than ours today. The problem with the modern world is simple. It is in the grip of a great conspiracy, the likes of which have probably never occurred on this scale in human history. The conspiracy is apparently run by a few people who have inherited control central banking around the world and thus are worth trillions. With this money they have created an almost seamless web of propaganda intended to frighten people and drive them into the arms of international government. The goal is a single world order with one justice system, one central bank, one currency, one civil police force, etc. This Bloomberg article is focused not on the top people in this conspiracy but on the “little people” who do the bidding of higher ups and have learned how to survive in an internationalist environment and profit from it. But in our view, these are probably NOT the people that Trump’s voters really voted against. Many of Trump’s voters, like Trump himself, understand that the problems go far beyond academics, bureaucrats and corrupt tycoons. In fact, this Bloomberg article is a perfect example of a kind of elite propaganda. It is trying to convince us that we need to “listen” to the anger of Trump voters and then, we are instructed, the intelligentsia needs to react. American intellectuals may violently disagree with the average Trump voter on most things. They may have access to facts that prove that voters wrong. But there’s no way they — we — can go on dismissing and ridiculing these people without dooming themselves to irrelevance and provoking further backlash. This is in fact the fondest hope, no doubt, of those tasked with defending the REAL culprits from exposure and attack. Such individuals are the ones running the world’s largest corporations and leading the most powerful nation states. And these individuals may be found in higher places still, plotting the propaganda that the rest of us imbibe. Also managing central bank strategies and even plotting our gradual progress toward a new world war. The Bloomberg article ends by suggesting that a lot of the irritation of Trump voters is aimed at political correctness and that the US needs “an open conversation about what ails it, not … one that tiptoes around speech taboos about racism, misogyny and sexual discrimination.” Once more – hooey. Our guess is that like Donald Trump himself, many of his voters – perhaps tens of millions are quite aware that the world’s problems extend far beyond political correctness and “intellectuals.” Of course we’ll have to wait and see. But Trump called InfoWars to thank them for their support, and InfoWars, for all its controversy, has provided a good deal of reality about the way the world works. If Trump intends to educate people about the real “conspiracy” – a banking conspiracy located, to begin with, in London’s City – then fairly powerful truths will need to be spoken. It is quite likely these truths, once uttered, will find a sympathetic audience with many of Trump’s supporters. This isn’t what Bloomberg is hoping for, however. Bloomberg, as this editorial shows, wants a conversation focused on debunking political correctness and bringing America’s – and the West’s – intelligentsia to heel. Conclusion: Will Trump’s victory provide us with larger truths, or will the conversation be bogged down and trivialized? This is an important question. We can see the answer Bloomberg hopes for. We hope for something more fundamental.

Школы в Хабаровске "заминировал" первоклассник

0 комментариев 0 поделились Фото: Fotodom.ru/Коммерсантъ Как сообщает РИА Новости, ссылаясь на представителя городского УМВД, было установлено, что в полицию звонили братья — один учится в первом классе, второй в пятом. Ранее дети на учете не стояли, они из благополучной семьи. Сотрудникам полиции ученики пояснили, что просто хотели пошутить и о последствиях не догадывались. Мальчикам еще нет 14 лет, поэтому ответственность за поступок будут нести родители. Мать уже вызвана в полицию, на нее составлен административный протокол о ненадлежащем воспитании несовершеннолетних. Родителям грозит штраф, все документы передадут на рассмотрение в суд. Отметим, звонки от неизвестных о, якобы, заложенных бомбах в учебных заведениях, нередки. Проблема безопасности в российских школах поднималась много раз, но положение дел, по большей части, оказывается неизменным. Брешь в безопасности не позволяет утверждать стопроцентно, что в школе нет бомбы. Несколько лет назад, прямо перед Днем знаний, корреспонденты "Правды.Ру" испытали " школьную безопасность ". Тогда мы пронесли в учебное заведение пустую коробку с надписью "бомба" и оставили ее неподалеку от классов. Нам не препятствовала ни охрана, ни педагоги. Причем, также легко и непринужденно мы забрали коробку обратно. Частными охранными организациями осуществляется контроль 20 тысяч школ по всей стране. И безопасность детей напрямую зависит от ЧОПа, который коллегиально выбрали родители и педагоги. Если где-то охранники являются настоящими профессионалами и не допустят никаких внештатных ситуаций, то в некоторых фирмах на пост в школе сажают человека, у которого от охранника — лишь надпись на груди. Естественно, что в первом случае услуги обходятся дороже, чем во втором, и выбор зачастую очевиден. Если разобраться, то компетентность школьного охранника прямо пропорциональна его стоимости. За небольшие деньги нельзя требовать от сотрудника уникальных способностей. Ведь по большому счету, один человек должен быть экспертом по комплексной безопасности зданий и сооружений, вахтером, личным телохранителем, обладать некоторыми навыками в психологии общения с детьми, быть не агрессивным и образованным. Что и говорить, список внушительный, чего не скажешь о зарплате. На деле школьный охранник, зачастую, вялый молодой человек, которому мало до чего есть дело, а желание отсидеть смену и сбежать "из этого ада" является приоритетным. Единственное место, которое контролируется такими секьюрити — входная дверь. Во время летних ремонтов в школу можно завезти хоть целый арсенал, а во время учебного года в некоторых школах под носом у охранника торгуют различными наркотическими веществами. Загвоздка в том, что, опять же, в тендере на охрану школ выигрывают те, кто просит за свои услуги самую низкую цену. И как бы не убеждали ЧОПы, где охрана действительно чего-то стоит, что их цена оправдана, выбор останавливают на самых недорогих. Читайте последние новости Pravda.Ru на сегодня Кто отвечает за безопасность в школах? Поделиться:

$12 Million Iranian Embassy Is Empty, but the U.S. Cuts the Grass - The New York Times

Nicholas Fandos

WASHINGTON — The $12 million compound, once a playground for the Iranian ambassador and guests like Elizabeth Taylor, Andy Warhol and Richard M. Nixon, now sits empty on Washington’s Embassy Row. The Upper East Side townhouse that served as a consulate was long ago repurposed as the headquarters of a dealer of old master paintings. And the Bethesda, Md. ranch house for Iranian diplomats is now the home of a family of five. The properties, and seven others across the United States assessed altogether at more than $50 million, still belong to the Islamic Republic of Iran. But for nearly 40 years, the task of maintaining and putting the properties out for rent has fallen to an unlikely management company — the State Department. The arrangement is one of the stranger consequences of the diplomatic freeze between United States and Iran, two former allies that cut official ties after Iranian revolutionaries took 52 Americans hostage in the American Embassy in Tehran in 1979. Although much has changed since the nuclear deal last year, when Iran agreed to limit its nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief, experts say Iran and the United States are still years away from diplomatic relations. As a result, Iran’s properties in the United States remain in limbo, with little prospect of change. “There’s more dialogue between the United States and Iran, but the acrimony hasn’t ceased,” said Karim Sadjadpour, who studies Iran at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. At the top of the list of Iranian government property is the compound that was Iran’s embassy in Washington, the site of lavish parties in the 1970s given by Ardeshir Zahedi, the ambassador who was once married to the daughter of the shah of Iran. “My heart is still a part of it,” Mr. Zahedi said in an interview from Montreux, Switzerland, referring to the embassy designed at his behest in the 1960s by American and Iranian architects as a fusion of Persian and modernist styles. “It’s like a baby for me. Day and night I was fighting to get the budget and have it done. And it was a pride. ” The State Department’s Office of Foreign Missions, adhering to guidelines in the 1961 Vienna Convention that govern relations between nations even if they sever diplomatic ties, acts as a real estate service for the Iranian properties. The office coordinates upkeep, security and landscaping, including cutting the grass, and hires local real estate firms to list some of them for rent. (Six of the 10 are currently rented.) Sam Werberg, a State Department spokesman, said the office tried to rent the properties at market rates and used the proceeds to pay for upkeep and other associated costs. “They are in touch with real estate brokers just like everybody else, I guess,” said Wolfgang H. Ludwigs, a real estate agent in Potomac, Md. who said he was approached unexpectedly by the State Department to list a property in Bethesda. At least eight of the 10 properties are worth more than $1 million, according to tax assessments, and would most likely be worth more on the open market. Even if it wanted to, it is unclear if Iran could sell the properties unless it reached a diplomatic agreement with the United States. Next door to the former Iranian Embassy is a Georgian Revival home, assessed at almost $10 million and currently empty, where Mr. Zahedi lived and where overnight guests stayed. A similar building around the corner, formerly the offices of Iran’s military and educational attachés, has been rented out to the Romanian ambassador since the 1990s for an undisclosed sum. Several miles away in Bethesda, Md. a German family of five occupies a former diplomatic residence, complete with a pool and two bars for entertaining. A local real estate agent last listed the property for rent in 2015 for $5, 500 a month. “It is a funny feeling being in this house,” said Julian Koelsch, whose parents rent the property. “It has a very different feeling than normal American houses. ” Richard L. Feigen and Company, a gallery specializing in old master paintings and European modernists, has made its headquarters since 2002 in the former Iranian consulate in New York, on 69th Street between Madison and Park Avenues. Mr. Feigen, like several other renters, declined to comment on his lease for fear of angering his landlord. In Houston, a newer home with six columns out front stands as a relic of the days when oil and energy interests made allies of the Persian Gulf and the Gulf Coast. In San Francisco, an home, estimated to be worth more than $10 million, sits just blocks from the Presidio, at the heart of a region Mr. Zahedi said was once dotted with thousands of Iranian students and other civilians. In Washington, the former embassy has been rented out in the past for weddings and other special events, but today blinds cover its windows and plaster peels from some of its walls. Mr. Zahedi, who served Iranian caviar and Dom Pérignon at parties costing tens of thousands of dollars, said the events he once held there built up his relationships in Washington. “These things bring people together,” he said. Mr. Sadjadpour of the Carnegie Endowment said the Iranian Embassy in Washington — and the other properties around the country — served as a symbol of Iran’s outsize role in American foreign relations in the 1960s and 1970s. “Zahedi and his predecessors were very close to America’s elite politicians and bankers and entertainment stars,” he said. But after 1979, “it went from Iran having enormous influence in Washington to the polar opposite. ” David G. Bradley, the owner of Atlantic Media who has a home around the corner from the former embassy, said that the Iranians had been gone so long that, in his neighborhood, the time can almost be measured in life cycles. “It is a measure of how bad relations have been that the child I watched biking with training wheels around the embassy grounds is now 27 and living abroad,” Mr. Bradley said, referring to his son. “It’s been a long, long time. ” Still, Mr. Zahedi said he held out hope that the two nations could reconcile. A painting of the embassy hangs in his Swiss home, a personal reminder, he said, of what the cooperation of the two nations can achieve. “Yes, it is sad,” he said. “I hope that soon it will change, because I see the light at what I would call the end of the tunnel. Revenge is a horrible thing. To forgive is a beautiful thing. ”

As Trump Opens Limo Door, What’s Spotted In Crowd Proves Hillary Is DONE

Robert Rich

Share This As Donald Trump continues his campaign, it seems that a few keen eyes picked up on something rather peculiar. Taking place as Trump arrived in Ohio, something downright “insane” was spotted in the crowd – and many are saying it proves that Hillary Clinton is done for good. The incident actually took place back in September but is most recently proving true on a daily basis now. According to reports, Trump showed up in Columbus, Ohio earlier in his campaign, and when he opened his limo door, something incredible was waiting for him . Donald Trump draws massive crowd in Columbus, Ohio (Source: Liberty Writers News ) As Liberty Writers News puts it, “the crowd went insane for America’s 45 th president.” It goes without saying that there is a huge enthusiasm difference between the two candidates for president and their supporters. Although this was proven true back in September, it’s being demonstrated even more so today. Donald Trump draws massive crowd in Columbus, Ohio (Source: Liberty Writers News ) Donald Trump draws massive crowd in Columbus, Ohio (Source: Liberty Writers News ) In fact, BizPac Review reports that Hillary’s running mate, Tim Kaine, can’t even muster up a crowd with triple digits – heck, even 50 people is hard to come by. Furthermore, Kaine is having to cancel events as only 30 people are showing up. Tim Kaine had 2 cancel another Florida rally because only about 30 people ( press & security included) showed up! #Priceless #Trump2016 — Amy Mek (@AmyMek) October 27, 2016 Waiting for Vice Presidential candidate, Tim Kaine to speak at #Lorain Admiral King school. pic.twitter.com/A74ve1eKkF — Mary Springowski (@maryspring) October 27, 2016 Of course, his staff is blaming it on “scheduling issues,” but it’s happened more than once at this point, proving a pattern here. Mike Pence, on the other hand, is having the exact opposite problem as the venues he’s speaking at don’t have room for the thousands of people who are showing up. — Linda Suhler, Ph.D. (@LindaSuhler) October 27, 2016 Between the FBI reopening her email investigation and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange promising that his next leak will land her in prison , things aren’t looking good for Hillary. Put that in combination with the fact that Trump and Pence are bringing people in by the thousands, where Hillary and her running mate can’t seem to manage bringing in supporters by mere the hundreds – well, it’s safe to say that this goose is just about cooked. Hillary Clinton is done, and this nation is going to make that perfectly clear come Election Day. We the People are done with the politically corrupt government elites that have poisoned our country. I can’t wait to see the look on Hillary’s face when she realizes that she’s going to prison for a very long time, just like Trump promised.

NASA Admits: Someone Took Control Over Space Probe Voyager 2 And Sent Data In An Unknown Language

Arnold Monteverde (noreply@blogger.com)

NASA have revealed that a curious incident in 2010 might be firm evidence that an alien species is attempting to create communication links with humanity. In 2010, Voyager 2 became the first spacecraft powered by human beings to leave the known solar system. According to NASA expert Kevin Baines, at the time that the craft entered interstellar space, it became to send communications to the base on Earth in a language that was totally incomprehensible to the scientists who received it. NASA spacecraft hijacked by aliens? Baines said that the team immediately assumed that the spacecraft was malfunctioning in some way and proceeded to run a full assessment of its systems. However, they could find nothing wrong with it except that one component in the binary code system had been changed from 0 to 1. After running further investigations, they were left with no alternate explanation except that someone or something had taken temporary control of the spacecraft . The minute change in the binary code suggested that someone or something deliberately tried to alter aspects of Voyager 2’s computer system. This suggested to the team on the ground that the spacecraft had been temporarily taken over by computer hackers. However, they didn’t think it was likely that the hackers were of terrestrial origin as they would not have been able to make contact with the spacecraft at such an enormous distance. WATCH THE VIDEO: It took the experts at NASA three weeks to be able to reassert control over the spacecraft’s computer system and correct the era. Officially, NASA has conceded that they have absolutely no idea about who or what could have taken temporary control over Voyager 2 and sent the incomprehensible message to their team on the ground. However, German scientist Hartwig Hausdorff has not been so coy in revealing what he thinks was behind the incident – he is confident that the message was sent by an alien species. Disclose TV SOURCE

C.I.A. Arms for Syrian Rebels Supplied Black Market, Officials Say - The New York Times

Mark Mazzetti and Ali Younes

AMMAN, Jordan — Weapons shipped into Jordan by the Central Intelligence Agency and Saudi Arabia intended for Syrian rebels have been systematically stolen by Jordanian intelligence operatives and sold to arms merchants on the black market, according to American and Jordanian officials. Some of the stolen weapons were used in a shooting in November that killed two Americans and three others at a police training facility in Amman, F. B. I. officials believe after months of investigating the attack, according to people familiar with the investigation. The existence of the weapons theft, which ended only months ago after complaints by the American and Saudi governments, is being reported for the first time after a joint investigation by The New York Times and Al Jazeera. The theft, involving millions of dollars of weapons, highlights the messy, unplanned consequences of programs to arm and train rebels — the kind of program the C. I. A. and Pentagon have conducted for decades — even after the Obama administration had hoped to keep the training program in Jordan under tight control. The Jordanian officers who were part of the scheme reaped a windfall from the weapons sales, using the money to buy expensive SUVs, iPhones and other luxury items, Jordanian officials said. The theft and resale of the arms — including Kalashnikov assault rifles, mortars and grenades — have led to a flood of new weapons available on the black arms market. Investigators do not know what became of most of them, but a disparate collection of groups, including criminal networks and rural Jordanian tribes, use the arms bazaars to build their arsenals. Weapons smugglers also buy weapons in the arms bazaars to ship outside the country. The F. B. I. investigation into the Amman shooting, run by the bureau’s Washington field office, is continuing. But American and Jordanian officials said the investigators believed that the weapons a Jordanian police captain, Anwar Abu Zaid, used to gun down two American contractors, two Jordanians and one South African had originally arrived in Jordan intended for the Syrian program. The officials said this finding had come from tracing the serial numbers of the weapons. Mohammad H. Jordan’s minister of state for media affairs, said allegations that Jordanian intelligence officers had been involved in any weapons thefts were “absolutely incorrect. ” “Weapons of our security institutions are concretely tracked, with the highest discipline,” he said. He called the powerful Jordanian intelligence service, known as the General Intelligence Directorate, or G. I. D. “a reputable institution known for its professional conduct and high degree of cooperation among security agencies. ” In Jordan, the head of the G. I. D. is considered the second most important man after the king. Representatives of the C. I. A. and F. B. I. declined to comment. The State Department did not address the allegations directly, but a spokesman said America’s relationship with Jordan remained solid. “The United States deeply values the long history of cooperation and friendship with Jordan,” said John Kirby, the spokesman. “We are committed to the security of Jordan and to partnering closely with Jordan to meet common security challenges. ” The training program, which in 2013 began directly arming the rebels under the code name Timber Sycamore, is run by the C. I. A. and several Arab intelligence services and aimed at building up forces opposing President Bashar of Syria. The United States and Saudi Arabia are the biggest contributors, with the Saudis contributing both weapons and large sums of money, and with C. I. A. paramilitary operatives taking the lead in training the rebels to use Kalashnikovs, mortars, antitank guided missiles and other weapons. The existence of the program is classified, as are all details about its budget. American officials say that the C. I. A. has trained thousands of rebels in the past three years, and that the fighters made substantial advances on the battlefield against Syrian government forces until Russian military forces — launched last year in support of Mr. Assad — compelled them to retreat. The training program is based in Jordan because of the country’s proximity to the Syrian battlefields. From the beginning, the C. I. A. and the Arab intelligence agencies relied on Jordanian security services to transport the weapons, many bought in bulk in the Balkans and elsewhere around Eastern Europe. The program is separate from one that the Pentagon set up to train rebels to combat Islamic State fighters, rather than the Syrian military. That program was shut down after it managed to train only a handful of Syrian rebels. Jordanian and American officials described the weapons theft and subsequent investigation on the condition of anonymity because the Syrian rebel training is classified in the United States and is a government secret in Jordan. News of the weapons theft and eventual crackdown has been circulating inside Jordan’s government for several months. Husam Abdallat, a senior aide to several past Jordanian prime ministers, said he had heard about the scheme from current Jordanian officials. The G. I. D. has some corrupt officers in its ranks, Mr. Abdallat said, but added that the institution as a whole is not corrupt. “The majority of its officers are patriotic and proud Jordanians who are the country’s first line of defense,” he said. Jordanian officials who described the operation said it had been run by a group of G. I. D. logistics officers with direct access to the weapons once they reached Jordan. The officers regularly siphoned truckloads of the weapons from the stocks, before delivering the rest of the weapons to designated points. Then the officers sold the weapons at several large arms markets in Jordan. The main arms bazaars in Jordan are in Ma’an, in the southern part of the country in Sahab, outside Amman and in the Jordan Valley. It is unclear whether the current head of the G. I. D. Gen. Faisal had knowledge of the theft of the C. I. A. and Saudi weapons. But several Jordanian intelligence officials said senior officers inside the service had knowledge of the weapons scheme and provided cover for the officers. Word that the weapons intended for the rebels were being bought and sold on the black market leaked into Jordan government circles last year, when arms dealers began bragging to their customers that they had large stocks of and weapons. Jordanian intelligence operatives monitoring the arms market — operatives not involved in the scheme — began sending reports to headquarters about a proliferation of weapons in the market and of the boasts of the arms dealers. After the Americans and Saudis complained about the theft, investigators at the G. I. D. arrested several dozen officers involved in the scheme, among them a lieutenant colonel running the operation. They were ultimately released from detention and fired from the service, but were allowed to keep their pensions and money they gained from the scheme, according to Jordanian officials. Jordan’s decision to host the C. I. A. training program is the latest episode in a long partnership. Beginning in the Eisenhower administration, the C. I. A. made large payments to King Hussein, who ruled Jordan from 1952 until his death in 1999, in exchange for permission to run numerous intelligence operations on Jordanian soil. C. I. A. money and expertise also helped the king establish the G. I. D. and put down internal and external threats to his government. Since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the United States has flooded Jordan with money for various counterterrorism programs. American and Jordanian spies have run a joint counterterrorism center outside Amman, and a secret prison in Jordan housed prisoners the C. I. A. captured in the region. In his 2006 book, “State of Denial,” the journalist Bob Woodward recounted a 2003 conversation in which George J. Tenet, then the director of central intelligence, told Condoleezza Rice, then the national security adviser, “We created the Jordanian intelligence service, and now we own it. ” It is a relationship of mutual dependence, but Jordan has particular leverage because of its location in the heart of the Middle East and its general tolerance to be used as a base of American military and intelligence operations. Jordan’s security services also have a long history of trying to infiltrate Islamic militant groups, efforts that have yielded both success and failure. In 2009, a Jordanian doctor — brought to the C. I. A. by a G. I. D. officer after the doctor said he had penetrated Al Qaeda’s leadership — turned out to be a double agent and blew himself up at a remote base in Afghanistan. Seven C. I. A. employees, as well as the G. I. D. officer, were killed in the attack. Two recent heads of the service, also known as the Mukhabarat, have been sent to prison on charges including embezzlement, money laundering and bank fraud. One of them, Gen. Samih Battikhi, ran the G. I. D. from 1995 to 2000 and was convicted of being part of a scheme to obtain bank loans of around $600 million for fake government contracts and pocketing about $25 million. He was sentenced to eight years in prison, but the sentence was eventually reduced to four years that were served in his villa in the seaside town of Aqaba. Gen. Mohammad who ran the service from 2005 to 2008, was later convicted of stealing millions of dollars that G. I. D. officers had seized from Iraqi citizens crossing into Jordan in the years after the American invasion of Iraq in 2003. His trial showed that he had also arranged for money to be smuggled in private cars from Iraq into Jordan and had been involved in sellingJordanian citizenship to Iraqi businessmen. He was sentenced to 13 years in prison and fined tens of millions of dollars. President Obama authorized the covert arming program in April 2013, after more than a year of debate inside the administration about the wisdom of using the C. I. A. to train rebels trying to oust Mr. Assad. The decision was made in part to try to gain control of a chaotic situation in which Arab countries were funneling arms into Syria for various rebel groups with little coordination. The Qataris had paid to smuggle shipments of weapons over the border from Turkey, and Saudi Arabia sent thousands of Kalashnikovs and millions of rounds of ammunition it had bought, sometimes with the C. I. A. ’s help. By late 2013, the C. I. A. was working directly with Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and other nations to arm and train small groups of rebels and send them across the border into Syria. The specific motives behind the November shooting at the Amman police training facility remain uncertain, and it is unclear when the F. B. I. will officially conclude its investigation. This year, the widows of the Americans killed in the attack sued Twitter, alleging that it knowingly permitted the Islamic State to use its social media platform to spread the militant group’s violent message, recruiting and raising funds. Captain Abu Zaid, the gunman, was killed almost immediately. His brother, Fadi Abu Zaid, said in an interview that he still believed his brother was innocent and that he had given no indications he was planning to carry out the shooting. The Jordanian government, he said, has denied him any answers about the shooting, and has refused to release his brother’s autopsy report.

BOMBSHELL: Declassified Documents Reveal Why U.S. Ignored Saudi 9/11 Ties

REALdeal

BOMBSHELL: Declassified Documents Reveal Why U.S. Ignored Saudi 9/11 Ties At long last, the so-called ‘missing’ 28 pages from the Congressional Joint Inquiry into the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, have been released, albeit in redacted form. While obviously critical information has been obscured from the general public, the evidence remaining appears to show the hijackers and their associates received and had been receiving funds from individuals working for the government of Saudi Arabia—as has long been rumored and intimated. The redacted report also keenly criticizes failures in communication between the FBI and CIA, which its authors suggest could have been a crucial intelligence breakdown prior to the attacks. According to the report, with all emphasis added: “[T]he committees are particularly concerned about the serious nature of allegations contained in a CIA memorandum found by the Joint Inquiry Staff in the files of the FBI’s San Diego Field Office. That memorandum, which discusses alleged financial connections between the September 11 hijackers, Saudi government officials, and members of the Saudi royal family, was drafted by a CIA officer [REDACTED], relying primarily on information from FBI files. The CIA officer sent it to the CTC to determine whether CIA had additional information. He also provided a copy to the FBI agent responsible for the investigation of one of the individuals discussed in the memorandum. Despite the clear national implications of the CIA memorandum, the FBI agent included the memorandum in an individual case file and did not forward it to FBI headquarters. FBI headquarters, therefore, was unaware of statements in the memorandum until the Joint Inquiry brought the memorandum’s implications to the Bureau’s attention [FULLY REDACTED SENTENCE CONCLUDING THAT PARAGRAPH].” Those connections between the planners of the 9/11 attack and members of the Saudi royal family and Saudi government are fleshed out in many of the remaining pages, despite redaction of many obviously telling points. For instance: “While in the United States, some of the September 11 hijackers were in contact with, or received support and assistance from, individuals who may be connected with the Saudi government. There is information, from FBI sources, that at least two of those individuals were alleged to be Saudi intelligence officers.” Even more damning, a heavily redacted paragraph suggests the reason, prior to 9/11, the FBI did not focus its investigations of possible terrorist ties of “Saudi nationals in the United States was due to Saudi Arabia’s status as an American ‘ally.’” Though it appears the Joint Inquiry discovered telling evidence of ties between terrorist actors and the Saudi principals, the report refused to make a definitive statement on the issue due to the limited scope of its investigation. However, the report states, “it is possible that these kinds of connections could suggest as indicated in a [REDACTED] dated July 2, 2002, ‘ incontrovertible evidence that there is support for these terrorists within the Saudi government ,’” though that statement is downplayed with a disclaimer there may be legitimate, innocent reasons for those connections. Another revelation the Joint Inquiry discovered on examining evidence suggested: “One individual who provided assistance to Nawaf al-Hazmi and Khalid al-Mindhar may be connected to the Saudi Government. A second individual who may have been in contact with al-Hazmi and al-Mindhar also has ties to the Saudi government, including connections to the Saudi Ambassador to the United States. There is reporting in FBI files that persons have alleged that both of these individuals may be Saudi intelligence officers.” In fact, the hijackers “may have been in contact with other Saudi Government officials in the United States prior to” the attacks, and—perhaps most damning of all— “Saudi Government officials in the United States may have ties to Usama Bin Laden’s terrorist network.” One subject, in particular, Omar al-Bayoumi, was found to have “extensive ties to the Saudi Government.” Nevertheless, Congress decided not to pursue those allegations any further. Indeed, the report states: “Al-Bayoumi had been an accountant at the Saudi Civil Aviation Administration from 1976 to 1993, when he relocated to the United States,” and, further, the FBI found “Al-Bayoumi was in frequent contact with the Emir at the Saudi Ministry of Defense, responsible for air traffic control.” Al-Bayoumi also received regular payments from the Ministry of Defense through a Saudi company called “Ercan,” and he contacted Saudi government “establishments” in the U.S. “almost 100 times between January and May of 2000.” At a closed hearing in October 2002, the document notes, a former FBI agent in San Diego testified that al-Bayoumi “acted like a Saudi intelligence officer, in my opinion. And if he was involved with the hijackers, which it looks like he was, if he signed leases, if he provided some sort of financing or payment of some sort, then I would say that there’s a clear possibility that there might be a connection between Saudi intelligence and UBL ,” with UBL being the government’s acronym for Usama, or Osama, bin Laden. Another former agent in charge in San Diego apparently said he received around six reports from individuals who suspected al-Bayoumi “was a Saudi intelligence officer” —but the FBI ultimately somehow found there was not sufficient evidence to conclude as much. Further lending credence to theories the Saudis may have been directly involved in the attacks, the Inquiry noted: “In testimony and interviews a number of FBI agents and CIA officers complained to the Joint Inquiry about a lack of Saudi cooperation in terrorism investigations both before and after the September 11 attacks.” One agent even said the “Saudis had been useless and obstructionist for years” and will “only act when it is in their self-interest.” These 28 pages certainly seem to indicate the U.S. pursued, targeted, and invaded the wrong country in its choice of Afghanistan and Iraq after the September 11 attacks—as has been widely assumed for some time. Though no definitive statements are made concerning conclusive proof of Saudi involvement—directly or indirectly—in the planning of 9/11, sufficient information is laid bare to conclude as much. In fact, the evidence calls directly into question exactly why the United States government continues to this day to categorize Saudi Arabia as a ‘trusted ally.’ by Claire Bernish, theAntiMedia.org

Louise Mensch Gone from News Corp’s Heat Street - Breitbart

Breitbart News

Heat Street moves a little closer to its editorial stance by parting ways with editor Louise Mensch. [From Politico: Louise Mensch is no longer leading News Corp. ’s website Heat Street. The company and Mensch made the change in . Mensch and News Corp. said the move was made so that Mensch could focus on creating new digital media projects for News Corp. … [A] News Corp. source suggested another reason for the change: Mensch’s activity on Twitter and elsewhere had become a distraction for the otherwise successful website. Mensch has been incredibly active on Twitter, often attacking Donald Trump, and talking about various theories regarding intelligence leaks and Russia. She also popped up in John Podesta’s hacked emails where she suggested an idea [BREITBART FACT CHECK: multiple ideas] for an ad for Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. Read the rest of the story here. For more entertainment, we recommend the following stories: Heat Street Apologizes for Saying Pepe the Frog Isn’t Heat Street Stealth Replaces Article with Louise Mensch SJW Propaganda, Louise Mensch: ‘Everyone’ Who Votes Trump is ‘Scum of The Earth’ Louise Mensch Shares Picture of Her Own Twitter Searches to Call Other People

Allo’s Tryout: 5 Days With Google’s Annoying Office Intern - The New York Times

Brian X. Chen

You may now have more messaging apps than you have close friends. As of this week, there are six prominent chat apps in the United States — or as I see it, one too many. The latest to join the horde is Allo, Google’s highly anticipated messaging app that lets people take advantage of artificial intelligence to chat and make plans. Google began offering the smarter app on Wednesday. Allo is appearing at a time when smartphones are already crowded with chat apps. IMessage from Apple is prominent among iPhone owners. Facebook Messenger is widely used on that social network. Also popular is WhatsApp, the chat service from Facebook that has largely replaced text messaging internationally. Add to the list Slack, a group chat tool that is popular among businesses, and Google Hangouts, which was released in 2013, and you have six. I asked the British anthropologist Robin Dunbar, who studies the relationship between brain size and social circles, about the overload. His research has found that most people have the mental capacity to sustain 150 meaningful relationships, and among them, only five close ones. “Having more apps than close friends doesn’t help, as something will have to go,” Mr. Dunbar said in an email, though he noted that the various messaging apps serve different purposes. Younger people are shying away from chatting on Facebook, for example, to have more private conversations on apps like WhatsApp. With that backdrop in mind, I tested Allo for five days and compared it with the apps that are most similar to it: Google Hangouts, Apple iMessage and Facebook Messenger. After weighing the pros and cons, my advice is that people can hold off on downloading Allo, largely because its artificially intelligent assistant was unhelpful. But if Allo matures, users will probably want to ditch the Hangouts app. First, some context about Allo. Google announced the app in May, aiming to highlight the company’s push into artificial intelligence. Its older chat app, Hangouts, will remain, but Google will emphasize that product’s use as a videoconferencing and messaging app for businesses. To understand how Allo works, it’s easiest to think of the app’s A. I. assistant as an office intern who is lurking in the background, eager to chime in. The assistant analyzes messages you have typed or dictated and, when appropriate, springs into action with automatically generated phrases you can choose to reply with or suggestions for Google searches that may help accomplish tasks. When you’re having a conversation with another person, for example, the assistant suggests ways it can help. Saying “Want to see a movie tonight?” prompts the assistant to offer a Google search for movie showtimes or to reply with suggestions like “Sure, what time?” or “Not really. ” Here is where Allo became frustrating for me. Asking an assistant to search “movie showtimes tonight” should load a list of movies and corresponding showtimes. Instead, Google’s assistant shows a list of movies without showtimes only after tapping on a film can you ask for times. Sometimes that doesn’t even work. Asking for showtimes for the movie “Snowden” loaded movies playing at a movie theater called UA Snowden Square Stadium 14. Not helpful — unless, of course, you live in Columbia, Md. Allo also tries to guess what your written response might be to certain types of phrases, questions or photos. With photos, the app occasionally identifies what’s inside the photo to generate a suggested reaction. So when you receive a photo of a dog, Allo loads responses like “adorable. ” This feature ran into several problems. When I sent a picture to a friend of my cat sitting inside my car, Allo suggested this response to the friend: “What a cute car!” (Sorry, Allo, but my Prius is the opposite of cute.) When I sent photos of my dog to the same friend, Allo’s assistant correctly identified the breed, a Pembroke Welsh corgi. It suggested the reaction “Nice pembroke welsh corgi. ” Impressive, but if someone said that to me in real life, I would add that person to my list of suspected Cylons. For now, Allo’s artificial assistance feels limited. So if I were a manager seeking an assistant, I probably wouldn’t hire Allo. But I would politely tell the candidate to reapply after getting more experience. Each messaging app has its own purpose, but Allo has the most in common with Facebook Messenger, iMessage and Google Hangouts. That’s because all four are capable of adding some personality with stickers and emojis. So I tested Messenger, iMessage and Hangouts against Allo to determine their pros and cons. The highlights: ■ iMessage, Hangouts and Messenger work on mobile devices and computers. Allo works only on Android and iOS mobile devices, though Google plans to expand Allo to computers later. ■ iMessage and Messenger support apps, adding features like sending money to friends within messages. Google has no plans to support outside apps in Allo. ■ Messenger has more sticker packs than Allo, which has only about 25. ■ Facebook is experimenting with chat bots that you can talk to for shopping or summoning an Uber car. Allo’s assistant was quicker to respond and more natural to communicate with than Facebook’s chat bots. ■ IMessage stickers are more fun to use. In iMessage, stickers can be placed on top of messages and photos — add a cartoon mustache to your selfie, for example. On Allo, stickers can be sent only as messages. ■ The Hangouts app is very much like Allo, without the assistant. Allo has more entertaining stickers, including a muscular yellow bull that appears to be twerking. The big difference between the two is that the Hangouts app relies primarily on your contacts list linked to a Google Mail account, whereas Allo pulls contacts from your device’s phone book. The upshot: iMessage and Messenger have more features than Allo. There are two major features missing from Allo: the ability to chat using a computer and using apps and games to do more within messages. With Allo, Google has the opportunity to stand out by offering superior artificial intelligence. Neither Messenger nor Allo has great A. I. yet, but Google’s assistant has a better start. Finally, there is privacy to consider. It’s tough to say how Allo will fare in terms of security until encryption experts take a close look at the app. Here’s what we know so far: By default, Apple’s iMessage service is encrypted, which means a message is encrypted when it is sent from your device and remains encrypted when it passes through Apple’s server and reaches the recipient. Google Hangouts and Facebook Messenger both lack encryption, so at some point when messages pass through their servers, they can see your messages. Allo has encryption turned off by default because its server needs to see the messages to work its A. I. magic. However, Allo includes a mode called Incognito with full encryption enabled, which people can use for private conversations, similar to a private mode on a web browser. But, of course, the A. I. features do not work in Incognito. So Allo is a step ahead of Hangouts and Messenger for privacy. But by default (and by design) it is not as secure as iMessage. I recommend waiting for Allo to become available on computers and for its A. I. to become smarter. At the moment, Allo’s assistant will waste more time than it saves when it comes to helping you make plans, and it will probably make conversations more awkward. Google said it was still improving and refining its algorithms, and Allo’s assistant will get better over time. Once Allo’s assistant matures, the Hangouts app will become redundant and you’ll be able to delete it from your device. The catch, of course, is that Allo’s A. I. won’t become sophisticated until more people use it and share feedback. For now, if I really need help, I’m going to request a competent intern.

Fortune: $141M to Yahoo’s Marissa Mayer Despite SEC Investigation

Charlie Nash

Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer is set to receive nearly $141 million merger pay following Verizon’s purchase of the company, despite the SEC launching an investigation into whether Yahoo intentionally covered up a widespread hack and leak of its users data for nearly two years. In December, it was revealed that over one billion Yahoo users had been affected by a hack, just months after a previous hack was announced and reportedly covered up by the company. In both incidents, users had their names, email addresses, dates of birth, security questions and answers, phone numbers, and hashed passwords stolen by hackers, including the details of over 150, 000 government employees. Yahoo was reportedly aware of the first large hack, which led to over 500 million account details being stolen, in 2014. However, they failed to announce the incident to the public until late 2016. “The SEC’s investigation looks into whether Yahoo disclosed information about the data breaches in timely enough fashion,” wrote USA Today on the subject. “SEC rules require companies to disclose data breaches and cyberattacks as soon as it is determined the incidents could have an effect on investors. ” “As part of its investigation, the SEC last month requested documents from Yahoo,” they continued. “The agency has been seeking a model case for cybersecurity rules it issued in 2011. ” Mayer’s reign as CEO of Yahoo has often been controversial, with the CEO facing a lawsuit last year that claimed she purposely purged male employees, and with several employees of Tumblr, the popular platform owned by Yahoo, also claiming that Mayer and her management were responsible for the decline of the social network. In January 2016, Mayer also faced a backlash after making a joke to employees about the number of layoffs at the company. “No layoffs … this week!” joked Mayer, in response to questions raised by concerned employees. A New York Times report also claimed that Mayer had denied repeated requests for additional investment in Yahoo’s cybersecurity, with the security team allegedly derisively referred to as “paranoids” inside the company. Following both hacking incidents, and the revelation that Yahoo had been secretly scanning user emails for U. S. intelligence agencies, Verizon reportedly sought a significant discount on its purchase of the company, though the exact figure is currently unknown. Charlie Nash is a reporter for Breitbart Tech. You can follow him on Twitter @MrNashington or like his page at Facebook.

Virginia Governor Vetoes Bill Allowing Women to Quickly Arm Themselves Against Domestic Abusers

AWR Hawkins

While media outlets focused on the collapse of Speaker Paul Ryan’s healthcare bill, Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) quietly vetoed legislation that would have granted women immediate approval to carry guns for against domestic abusers. [The bill, HB 1852, would make exceptions in the issuance of concealed carry permits, “[providing] that for a period of 45 days after the issuance of a protective order the individual seeking the protective order may lawfully carry a concealed weapon. ” McAuliffe vetoed the legislation on March 24, claiming HB 1852 weakens the “Commonwealth’s gun safety laws” and “perpetuates the dangerous fiction that the victims of domestic violence will be safer by arming themselves. ” Breitbart News reported the story of Carol Bowne, a New Jersey woman who had gotten a protective order against her and applied for state’s permission to have a gun for . The process of getting permission to have a gun was still playing out when a defenseless Bowne was stabbed to death by her on June 3, 2015. Fast forward to the state of Kentucky in May 2016, where a man violated a protective order, went to his ’s house, and was later discovered lying in the grass with multiple gunshot wounds. His former girlfriend was armed and handled his breach of the protective order accordingly. McAuliffe’s veto makes tragic stories like Bowne’s more likely and stories like the one in Kentucky less probable. AWR Hawkins is the Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and host of Bullets with AWR Hawkins, a Breitbart News podcast. He is also the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart. com.

New York Times Outs Israel as Source of Classified Intel Before Trump Visit

Aaron Klein

JERUSALEM — The rampant leaks concerning President Trump continued full speed ahead on Tuesday, with the New York Times quoting a “current and a former American official” saying it was Israel that provided classified intelligence purportedly disclosed by Trump during a White House meeting last week with Russian officials. [The report comes six days before Trump is due here in Israel for a visit and could potentially impact the U. S. relationship with Israel. Indeed, the second sentence of the Times report states that the information about Israel reportedly serving as the source “adds a potential diplomatic complication to the episode. ” The Times failed to note its own report, if accurate, could endanger Israel’s antiterrorism intelligence collection operations. Continues the newspaper in the second paragraph of the article: Israel is one of the United States’ most important allies and a major intelligence collector in the Middle East. The revelation that Mr. Trump boasted about some of Israel’s most sensitive information to the Russians could damage the relationship between the two countries. It also raises the possibility that the information could be passed to Iran, Russia’s close ally and Israel’s main threat in the Middle East. However, toward the bottom of the piece, the Times cites Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster, Trump’s national security adviser, as telling reporters that Trump was not aware of the source of the information. Israeli officials reached by the Times would not confirm that Israel provided the intelligence, which reportedly concerns the inner workings of the Islamic State. Israel’s U. S. ambassador, Ron Dermer, affirmed his trust in the U. S. intelligence sharing relationship. “Israel has full confidence in our relationship with the United States and looks forward to deepening that relationship in the years ahead under President Trump,” Dermer told the Times by email. Yesterday, the Washington Post first reported that Trump allegedly revealed “highly classified information” during a meeting with the Russian foreign minister and ambassador, according to “current and former U. S. officials. ” The Post article acknowledged that as president “Trump has broad authority to declassify government secrets, making it unlikely that his disclosures broke the law. ” McMaster told the Post that “the president and the foreign minister reviewed common threats from terrorist organizations to include threats to aviation. ” “At no time were any intelligence sources or methods discussed, and no military operations were disclosed that were not already known publicly,” McMaster stated. Later, McMaster stated the leak may put U. S. national security at risk. “I think national security is put at risk by this leak and by leaks like this,” he said. “And there are a number of instances where this has occurred and I think it’s important to investigate these sort of things. ” Trump tweeted he has the “absolute right” as president to share information. As President I wanted to share with Russia (at an openly scheduled W. H. meeting) which I have the absolute right to do, facts pertaining … . — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 16, 2017, The Post claimed the information was provided through an unnamed U. S. ally: The information the president relayed had been provided by a U. S. partner through an arrangement considered so sensitive that details have been withheld from allies and tightly restricted even within the U. S. government, officials said. The partner had not given the United States permission to share the material with Russia, and officials said Trump’s decision to do so endangers cooperation from an ally that has access to the inner workings of the Islamic State. Now the Times has outed that ally as Israel, citing a “current and a former American official familiar with how the United States obtained the information. ” In January, Israel’s respected Yediot Ahronot newspaper reported U. S. intelligence officials from the Obama administration warned their Israeli counterparts not to trust then Trump with intelligence secrets, citing alleged fears that Russia held blackmail information over Trump. Those fears seemed to have been in part referencing the now partially debunked infamous dossier claiming that Russia collected compromising videos of Trump. The dossier, which contains wild and unproven claims about Trump and sordid sexual acts, including the mocked claim that Trump hired prostitutes and had them urinate on a hotel room bed, was compiled by former intelligence agent Christopher Steele, who was reportedly paid by Democrats and Republicans to investigate Trump. Meanwhile, the Obama administration faced its share of accusations that it leaked sensitive Israeli intelligence or military operations. In November 2013, Israeli officials were reportedly furious at the Obama White House for confirming the Israeli Air Force was behind a strike on a Syrian military base. Israeli policy is not to confirm strikes carried out beyond its borders. The Times of Israel reported at the time: Israel’s Channel 10 TV on Friday night quoted Israeli officials branding the American leak as “scandalous. ” For Israel’s ally to be acting in this way was “unthinkable,” the officials were quoted as saying. A second TV report, on Israel’s Channel 2, said the leak “came directly from the White House,” and noted that “this is not the first time” that the administration has compromised Israel by leaking information on such Israeli Air Force raids on Syrian targets. It said some previous leaks were believed to have come from the Pentagon, and that consideration had been given at one point to establishing a panel to investigate the sources. In 2012, Israel suspected the Obama administration had leaked information to prevent the Jewish state from striking Iran’s nuclear facilities. ABC News reported at the time: The first report in Foreign Policy quotes anonymous American officials saying that Israel has been given access to airbases by Iran’s northern neighbor Azerbaijan from which Israel could launch air strikes or at least drones and search and rescue aircraft. The second report from Bloomberg, based on a leaked congressional report, said that Iran’s nuclear facilities are so dispersed that it is “unclear what the ultimate effect of a strike would be … ” A strike could delay Iran as little as six months, a former official told the researchers. “It seems like a big campaign to prevent Israel from attacking,” analyst Yoel Guzansky at the Institute for National Security Studies told ABC News. “I think the [Obama] administration is really worried Jerusalem will attack and attack soon. They’re trying hard to prevent it in so many ways. ” Aaron Klein is Breitbart’s Jerusalem bureau chief and senior investigative reporter. He is a New York Times bestselling author and hosts the popular weekend talk radio program, Aaron Klein Investigative Radio. Follow him on Twitter @AaronKleinShow. Follow him on Facebook. With research by Joshua Klein.

‘When Money Dies: The Nightmare of the Weimar Collapse’

The Doc

Tweet Home » Gold » Gold News » ‘When Money Dies: The Nightmare of the Weimar Collapse’ Precious metals expert Michael Ballanger discusses his favorite investing books and reviews the landscape for gold and the U.S. dollar between now and the end of the year as the almighty “gravestone doji” signals the end of the dollar rally is near… Submitted by Michael Ballanger, Streetwise : Since entering the hallowed halls of Saint Louis University, that sits near the banks of the equally-venerable-and-old man river, the “Mighty Mississippi,” I have kept a number of books in my library that shall remain as “life textbooks,” tomes upon which to refer in times of confusion, despair, joy and victory. Because of my background in hockey as a (much) younger man, I have always enjoyed re-reading sports books and one of my favorites was Ken Dryden’s “The Game” because he described a team and league that had many members familiar to me in the 1970s. Thomas Hauser’s “Muhammad Ali: His Life and Times” was another superb book about the singular, most-globally-recognized athlete of all time and, again, an athlete from the era in which I was raised. However, the REAL text books were books like “The Four Agreements” by Don Miguel Ruiz, “The Power of Now” by Eckhart Tolle, and “Conversations with God, Book 1” by Neale Donald Walsch, all of which dealt with the human spirit and personal struggle. However, in the world of business and markets, the books which are always within arm reach are, in order of least-to-most importance, “The Battle for Investment Survival” by Gerald M. Loeb (1935), “Reminiscences of a Stock Operator” by Lefevre and Lowenstein (1923), “ Boomerang: Travels in the New Third World” by Michael Lewis (2011), “Atlas Shrugged” by Ayn Rand (1957) and finally “When Money Dies: The Nightmare of the Weimar Collapse” by Adam Fergusson (1975). As a snapshot of the societal impact of the Great Keynesian Experiment through which are currently traversing, “Atlas Shrugged” tells you EXACTLY where we are today complete with gutted-out American manufacturing and massive corruption, intervention, and interference brought about by the odious partnership between government and the elite 1%. The one book that describes the probable outcome of all of the money-printing ($57 trillion) of the post-2008-meltdown era is “When Money Dies: The Nightmare of the Weimar Collapse” and it is this book that is sitting under the desk phone in my office. The last paragraph sums it all up with the following ghastly summary: “In hyperinflation, a kilo of potatoes was worth, to some, more than the family silver; a side of pork more than a grand piano. A prostitute in the family was better than an infant corpse; theft was preferable to starvation; warmth was finer than honour; clothing more essential than democracy, food more needed than freedom.” THAT paragraph is like “The Ghost of Christmas Yet-To-Come” in Lewis Carroll’s “A Christmas Carol,” and it is truly frightening. The use of history books is, for me, a necessity and the following two quotes are the reasons why: “History never repeats itself but it rhymes.” – Mark Twain . and, “Those who cannot remember the past doomed to repeat it.” – George Santayana In the bigger picture concerning the global capital markets, I see enormous changes coming and it is all laid out in front of us like those little solar lights that illuminate the path from my deck down to the water on a very dark night. In “Atlas Shrugged,” Ayn Rand describes what America would look like when the business “elite” finally own the government and legislature and the justice system. Nothing is more relevant than looking at the events that have transpired since the Financial Crisis of 2008 that didn’t “nearly” take down the financial system; it DID take it down but criminal collusion manufactured the bail-out mechanism that allowed it to continue to function in “Walking Dead” fashion. All you need to do is look at Deutsche Bank to witness all of the same insanity, greed and aberrant behaviors that were so very prominent among the bankster crowd of 2004–2008 being replayed here in 2016 by the German’s beloved DB . In “Boomerang”, Michael Lewis walks us through the mindsets of the European bankers and politicians and especially the citizenry, whose contempt for the former two is most acute in Ireland, where one might have thought a few of them might have been carted off to jail. However, nothing can send chills up and down your spine more than the last of my list, “When Money Dies.” We have all heard stories about the Weimar hyperinflation and how the indiscriminate albeit well-intended printing of “Reich marks” sent post WWI Germany into chaos and bedlam and unimaginable human suffering. “Atlas Shrugged” describes the environment created BY the crime; Michael Lewis walks us through the incredible sense of entitlement among the populist movement responding TO the crime; but Adam Fergusson paints a horrific portrait of the outcome OF the crime. It is a “must-read” for everyone that is playing around with stocks and bonds or trying to manage “Cash” these days. Can’t happen here in “the modern world”? Well, it is happening right now as we speak in Venezuela where prison inmates have been resorting to cannibalism due to dire food shortages and government corruption. I write all of this nonsense because as a former resident of the U.S., I was there for the Watergate hearings; I watched Nixon resign; I watched Jimmy Carter have his legacy tarnished by an Arab oil embargo, 12% inflation, massive line-ups at the gas pumps and a hostage crisis. I watched Presidential campaigns in 1972 and 1976 first-hand and have always paid a great deal of attention since. The bare facts behind this year’s race are ugly; you have two candidates that are equally annoying, unequivocally flawed and universally repulsed by the vast majority of voters. What hits me between the eyes is that for the first time in history, we are witnessing a race so thoroughly “un-presidential” that it resembles a WWF wrestling match complete with enough “smackdowns” and “whup-ass” remarks to put Vince McMahon to shame. The global champion of democracy and capitalism, apple pie and Apple Computer now has the entire world looking on in fear and disbelief that either one of these two candidates could have access to the launch codes that could vaporize the entire planet in a heartbeat all because of a bad meal or a particularly stressful day. The days of Ronald Reagan running the country as Chairman of the Board are now over. And that, my friends, is not only sad; it is outright disturbing. So the U.S. dollar continues to roll higher and the gold market struggles to right itself against FOREX headwinds. The U.S. dollar responds to the pre-election tape-painting and the broadly-based consensus that once the election is over that the Fed will hike rates and send the USD index to 105. However, given that I don’t care a great deal for technical analysis, here is a Wiki snapshot of a classic “Gravestone Doji” that indicates that a trend may be coming to an end. Now take a look at the chart of the U.S. dollar index ($USD) that has finally turned up with a big Gravestone Doji to cap the current rally off the May, June and August lows, setting things up for another metals advance into year-end. Now, we saw a Gravestone Doji a few months back in the HUI (NYSE Arca Gold BUGS Index) around 175 but it decided to advance another 100 points before correcting, so don’t get too excited (or committed) with this one for the USD. I only mention it because the USD is not as illiquid as the global gold market because the Americans have printed TRILLIONS of USDs since 2008 so it is not nearly as easy to manipulate FOREX as it is gold. Ergo, technical analysis works for the USD and it is useless for gold—period. I reported to you all that I had re-entered the GDXJ (VanEck Vectors Junior Gold Miners ETF) position on October 13 th and added more on Friday the 14 th when I suddenly realized that I was far too complacent with the decaying currency sitting in my trading account. I was growing miserable, snarly, inattentive, and argumentative without my beloved GDXJ position and it was truly difficult to function. Those around me were so happy to see me take my enormous profit on GDXJ and were more than happy with the new drapes and the new leash and the Gourmet Alpo and the “designer doggie bags,” but I now know that they thought of me as “seriously depressed.” I am now no longer upset and I am no longer depressed as I now own every single wonderfully decadent share of the GDXJ that I owned back in late 2015 when the junior miners were being shorted and sold by every HFT algorithm and every desk trader and every CNBC-following doorknob on the planet. Now, for the traders out there? I have a sell order in for 50% of the GDXJ position at $45.00. If filled, we will own the remaining 50% at new breakeven cost of $32.20 at which point I sit back and chill. No reason to particularly worry with such a wonderful adjusted cost. Now, most of you are dying to know how a) Stakeholder Gold Corp.’s (SRC:TSX.V) Ballarat RAB drilling program is progressing and b) when the Canuc Resources Ltd. (CDA:TSX.V) /Santa Rosa RTO will be completed. Last update for the Yukon was yesterday and the first seven RAB holes are now en route to the assay lab in Whitehorse where the turnaround should be 10-14 days. SRC CEO Chris Berlet and V.P. Exploration John Nebocat are in Dawson City today travelling to the property for a day full of comprehensive interpretation and analysis. I would expect a drilling update upon their return. I could talk all day about the large intercepts of quartz sericite alteration and the density of the rock they are encountering but until the assays are back from Whitehorse, it is pretty much meaningless. I have been asked about the seasonality effect and the lack of news flow during the long Yukon winter and whether or not it will affect the stock price performance. The fact that SRC will have a full treasury after all 2016 exploration bills are paid allows a generous amount of working capital to be allocated to marketing. Since getting the story “out” is crucial to the survival of all junior miners, SRC has already secured a booth at the January 2017 Vancouver Resource Investment Conference and will be doing the same for PDAC in Toronto in March. While that is all fine and dandy, it is obviously imperative that SRC has a decent tailwind from positive assay results coming off the 2016 program. As for the Canuc/Santa Rosa RTO, all I can say is that every RTO to which I have been privy over the years takes longer than first thought and this one is no different. Between the lawyers and the regulators, it seems that just when you think you are getting the green light, they come up with something ridiculous like translating a document that is 15 years old from Spanish to English “in order to protect the poor minority shareholders of Canuc Resources.” In reality, all that needs to happen is for Canuc shareholders to vote on the transaction. It is they that are getting absorbed by the private company (Santa Rosa Silver Mining Corp.) so why not just ask them if they are OK with the terms of the deal and drive on? Alas, despite the delay, I simply cannot stand the wait as the Santa Rosa project will be a beauty. (If anyone wants to have a look at the old PowerPoint presentation that was used back in 2015, email me at [email protected] .) Only two more weeks until the elections are over and then it should be a “Sell the news” scenario for the USD and that should provide the impetus for a sizzling year-end rally in the metals. Then, as 2016 ticks down, and with so many money managers having missed the gold rally, it wouldn’t surprise me if there is a mid-December scramble for the mining shares and/or physical gold and silver as year-end window dressing is applied to “modern portfolio management.” Right. . . Originally trained during the inflationary 1970s, Michael Ballanger is a graduate of Saint Louis University where he earned a Bachelor of Science in finance and a Bachelor of Art in marketing before completing post-graduate work at the Wharton School of Finance. With more than 30 years of experience as a junior mining and exploration specialist, as well as a solid background in corporate finance, Ballanger’s adherence to the concept of “Hard Assets” allows him to focus the practice on selecting opportunities in the global resource sector with emphasis on the precious metals exploration and development sector. Ballanger takes great pleasure in visiting mineral properties around the globe in the never-ending hunt for early-stage opportunities. Want to read more Gold Report articles like this? Sign up for our free e-newsletter, and you’ll learn when new articles have been published. To see a list of recent articles and interviews with industry analysts and commentators, visit our Streetwise Interviews page. Disclosure: 1) The following companies mentioned in the article are sponsors of Streetwise Reports: None. The companies mentioned in this article were not involved in any aspect of the article preparation or editing. Streetwise Reports does not accept stock in exchange for its services. The information provided above is for informational purposes only and is not a recommendation to buy or sell any security. 2) Michael Ballanger: I own, or members of my immediate household or family, directly or indirectly own shares of the following companies mentioned in this interview: Canuc Resources Ltd., Santa Rosa Silver Mining Corp. and Stakeholder Gold Corporation. My company Bonaventure Explorations Ltd. has a relationship with Stakeholder and Canuc via Santa Rosa. I determined which companies would be included in this article based on my research and understanding of the sector. 3) Statements and opinions expressed are the opinions of the author and not of Streetwise Reports or its officers. The author is wholly responsible for the validity of the statements. The author was not paid by Streetwise Reports for this article. Streetwise Reports was not paid by the author to publish or syndicate this article. 4) This article does not constitute investment advice. Each reader is encouraged to consult with his or her individual financial professional and any action a reader takes as a result of information presented here is his or her own responsibility. By opening this page, each reader accepts and agrees to Streetwise Reports’ terms of use and full legal disclaimer . This article is not a solicitation for investment. Streetwise Reports does not render general or specific investment advice and the information on Streetwise Reports should not be considered a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Streetwise Reports does not endorse or recommend the business, products, services or securities of any company mentioned on Streetwise Reports. 5) From time to time, Streetwise Reports LLC and its directors, officers, employees or members of their families, as well as persons interviewed for articles and interviews on the site, may have a long or short position in securities mentioned. Directors, officers, employees or members of their families are prohibited from making purchases and/or sales of those securities in the open market or otherwise during the up-to-four-week interval from the time of the interview/article until after it publishes. Charts provided by Michael Ballanger

In Orlando, a Son of a Muslim Immigrant Rushed to Heal Pain Caused by Another - The New York Times

Damien Cave

ORLANDO, Fla. — When Dr. Joseph Ibrahim heard that the attack at the Pulse nightclub may have been linked to terrorism, he caught himself fearing any kind of link to his own Muslim, roots. Please, he thought, don’t let Ibrahim appear anywhere in the gunman’s name. Dr. Ibrahim — who heads the trauma unit at Orlando Regional Medical Center, and generally goes by Joey — had already spent hours repairing gunshot wounds in the bodies of Latino men and women, many of whom were the sons and daughters of immigrants, too. Yanked from bed by a phone call at 2:15 a. m. he was doing what he had trained for. His old friends from his hometown in Tennessee were pulling for him. But it was hard to escape the pairing: the son of one Muslim immigrant from the Middle East trying to save the lives of mostly gay Latinos whom another son of Muslim immigrants tried to kill — all in a chunk of verdant Florida built on Disney joy. “Maybe we’re a target because of our diversity and tolerance,” Dr. Ibrahim said after a morning of surgery on Wednesday. “Here you constantly see people from all over the world, and it’s wonderful. ” This is the Orlando that the shooting tore right through, a place that sees itself as a model of diversity, at ease with difference, with room for everyone and every ride. Even now, as the conversation outside Orlando zeros in on “radical Islam,” this city is awash in American flags, vigils with Republican and Democratic politicians trying to speak Spanish, and signs on churches, strip clubs, and restaurants with two catchphrases: “Orlando Strong” and “Orlando United. ” It is hardly a perfect union, one without pain, or frustration. Some Latinos have wondered why the shooting that left 49 people dead has become a touchstone and not a Latino one. Some immigrants with loved ones among the dead have collapsed in the arms of local leaders, desperate for financial help, wishing for more of the support found in the larger Puerto Rican community. There is some confusion too many countries in the hemisphere are still trying to figure out if any of their citizens were killed, a challenge since many of the victims had United States citizenship even if they were originally from somewhere else. But all of these issues — the intersecting identities, the struggles for recognition — only make more obvious just how much this most American of places has rapidly changed. Walt Disney had the vision to cobble together a resort with secret land deals in a quiet cow town of lakes and mosquitoes. Now, Orlando and its suburbs in Orange County point to where this country is headed when it comes to demographics, and the degree to which immigrants and their offspring are woven into every aspect of American life. What Orlando looks like today is what the United States will look like in 30 years — that is what local Republican Party officials tell newcomers. In simple terms, the white population is shrinking (it is now at 43 percent in Orange County) and cultural and ethnic diversity is expanding and evolving as foreigners, new arrivals from Puerto Rico, and the children of earlier immigrant waves all find their footing in Orlando’s affordable sprawl. At Valencia College, more than of the student body is nonwhite. On Wednesday, black and Latino students with the school’s Alliance — including Jorge Lanza, 23, a son of immigrants from Honduras who goes by George — gave out free hugs and candy near the library seven of the people killed at Pulse were current or former Valencia students. Most of them had not been here for long, which is typical. Nearly of the 1. 3 million people in Orange County arrived Center, which opened in 1982. “I happen to have been born about 1, 000 yards that way, but there is not a large population in Orlando that are residents,” said Mayor Buddy Dyer of Orlando, a Democrat, standing near the Pulse nightclub. Teresa Jacobs, the mayor of Orange County, who is a Republican, said that newness, along with the lack of a single dominant group — plus nonpartisan elections — have pushed Orlando toward tolerance. “We have to get along,” Ms. Jacobs said. The shooting shattered the area’s image as a welcoming place. It is why at the public memorials here, many residents said the attack had been particularly hard for people to accept. And yet, immigrants and the children of immigrants, from the Caribbean and beyond, played a role at every stage of the tragedy. The gunman, Omar Mateen, was a American. His parents, who got married in New York in the early 1980s and briefly lived in Flushing, Queens, before moving to Florida, were quick to assimilate after moving from Afghanistan. His first wife, Sitora Yusufiy, was from Uzbekistan. His second wife, Noor Zahi Salman, was born in California to Palestinian parents from the West Bank. Many of the people Mr. Mateen killed had similar stories of hyphenated existence. Jerald Arthur Wright, 31, whose family was from Colombia, worked at Walt Disney World and never seemed to run out of energy, helping guests in both Spanish and English. Luis S. Vielma, 22 Juan 25 Joel Rayón Paniagua, 31 — they were all immigrants from Mexico, working mostly in tourism, too. If you visited the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios, you might have seen Mr. Vielma. Among those who survived and saw their friends die or be wounded, there are even more — including Adrian López. An immigrant from Cuba, he stood up before Orlando’s Hispanic Chamber of Commerce on Wednesday night and through tears, after apologizing for his rusty Spanish, told his heroic tale of escaping the shooting, then running back in to try to save his husband, who was wounded. The police SWAT team that killed Mr. Mateen also included at least two Latino officers. The Orlando Police Department is about 18 percent Hispanic and includes officers “from just about every Latin American country and other parts of the world,” said Deputy Police Chief Orlando Rolon. Then there is the Orlando Regional Medical Center, the tall modern hospital a few blocks from Pulse. Dr. Ibrahim, who is 39 and speaks with a drip of Tennessee drawl, said that as he worked on victim after victim early Sunday morning, he was surrounded (as usual) by colleagues with ties to other parts of the world — nurses of Asian and Hispanic descent, technicians from Jamaica, and members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community. “We worked side by side, without question,” he said. In the days that followed, he said, he heard many arguments for “taking the country back” and keeping out Muslims. It was mostly on talk radio, as he drove to work for surgery. And while the hosts focused on Mr. Mateen’s father, Dr. Ibrahim contemplated his own dad, an immigrant from Egypt, who married an American and practiced medicine in Tennessee. “It’s difficult,” Dr. Ibrahim said, noting that he would not be here if that kind of policy had been in place when his father wanted to leave Cairo. “I just have to believe that those people have not met the right individual. There are a lot of people who never meet Muslims who are kind, gentle and giving. ” Stephen Miller, a policy adviser to Donald J. Trump, said Mr. Trump — who has spent months condemning immigrants from Mexico and the Muslim world — simply wants to “select immigrants who support, defend and uphold our values. ” Mr. Miller described Mr. Trump’s proposal to stop all immigration from Muslim countries until a broad security assessment could be put in place as “about as mainstream and common sense as it gets. ” But Dr. Ibrahim said what he heard was mostly an appeal to ignorance and fear. He said he moved to Orlando from Tennessee in part so his twin boys, who are 11, could grow up around different kinds of people. Like their father, whose looks make him hard to place in terms of ethnicity, they represent a mixture of cultures: Their mother is white, Anglo in the lexicon of Orlando, born and raised in Tennessee. But as a family with Ibrahim for a last name, they are still sometimes seen as outsiders. Dr. Ibrahim said his wife was once denied a loan because her name was confused with someone on a European terror watch list. He and his wife also struggled with whether to continue the tradition, common in the Middle East, of passing on his second name, Abdellatif, to their oldest son. In the end, they went for it: Abdellatif now links grandfather, father and son, three generations of . Dr. Ibrahim is hoping that he won’t regret it. “Hopefully by the time he’s of age,” he said, “people will be even more tolerant. ”

Who Can Compete in Our Elections?

opednews.com - Advertisement - In the last two articles of this series we described the makeup of voters and considered the likely outcomes under a variety of different voting systems. Here we will repeat that thought-experiment but consider a different makeup of the voter attitudes. In the chart below, the results for the various voting systems are shown for both systems, serving both as a review and as a preview. But more importantly, the chart illustrates the difference between traditional voting systems and balanced ones. It is worth noting that in the traditional column, only Celeb (celebrity) candidates are competitive whereas in the balanced column the non-celebrity (Ghost) candidate is consistently at least competitive. Who Has a Chance of Winning(image by Paul Cohen) License DMCA Clearly, by these results, the balanced systems tend to be open to more candidates, and sometimes different candidates, than traditional systems. The difference stems from the fact that balanced voting systems consciously take into account both support and opposition of candidates -- whereas traditional systems only consider support. This election is between three candidates, two of whom are celebrities, well known by nearly all voters. Al Celeb has strong support from 35% of voters but is strongly disliked by 60%. Beth Celeb is strongly supported by 33% of the voters but very much disliked by 52%. The other candidate, Ghost, draws his support from the 12% of voters, who disapprove both of the Celeb candidates. Ghost is well regarded by the relatively small number of voters who know much about him. You might now take some time to think about which of the four candidates deserve to win the election. If the election were held using plurality voting, it is pretty clear that Al Celeb would be the winner with 35% of the vote. The fact that both Celeb candidates have more opposition than support does not matter because opposition is not a factor in traditional voting systems like plurality voting. On the other hand, if the election were held using balanced plurality voting , then presumably 35% of the voters would vote for Al Celeb and 33% would vote for Beth Celeb. But each of the Celeb candidates will face opposition votes as well. Al Celeb might have as much as 60% of voters casting votes against him, or as few as 48% against him if all 12% of voters who favor Al Ghost choose to vote for Ghost. So Al Celeb will have a net vote of somewhere between -13% and -35% of the voters. By the same reasoning, Beth Celeb will receive a net vote between -7% and -19% of the vote. Ghost, with between 0% and 12% of the vote will win the election. When opposition to them is taken into account, celebrity candidates lose their great advantage. - Advertisement - With approval voting , Al Celeb and Beth Celeb will respectively get 35% and 33% of the vote while Ghost will get only 12%. As with plurality voting, Al Celeb will be declared the winner. With balanced approval voting , (where the voter is asked to indicate approval or disapproval -- or neither - for each of the candidates), Al Celeb and Beth Celeb will respectively get -25% and -19% of the vote while Ghost will get 12% so Ghost will be declared the winner. In this election there are few enough candidates that one might question the motivation for using ration voting , but for the sake of providing an example we can consider it nonetheless. Each voter would be handed three plurality ballots (it could be more or less than that, but three seems reasonable with just three candidates). It seems likely that a Ghost voter would cast all three ballots for Ghost, giving Ghost 12% of the vote. But Al Celeb and Beth Celeb would respectively receive 35% and 33% of the vote. Al Celeb would be declared the winner. However, if sentiment among Ghost voters favored Beth Celeb over Al Celeb then some might cast some of their ballots for Beth Celeb and this could turn Beth Celeb into the winner. If this election were held using balanced ration voting, each voter would be handed three balanced plurality ballots. Any outcome is possible for this election, the voters have free reign to decide. This may not immediately obvious to you -- it was not to me. I had to set up a spread-sheet to try out scenarios to see this to be the case. It is the Ghost voters who will make the selection between the two Celeb candidates and that will be by deciding how many of their 12% of ballots will go to Celeb candidates. If 2% more of those 12% are cast against Al Celeb than are cast against Beth then the race between the Celeb candidates is a tie. Of course if more than 2% go against Al Celeb then he will lose and the contest will be between Ghost and Beth Celeb. If that margin is less than 2% then the contest will be between Ghost and Al Celeb. - Advertisement - Also as might be expected, whether Ghost can win will depend on how many of the Celeb voters decide to vote against the candidate they dislike (rather than for the Celeb candidate they like). If 23% of voters (Celeb voters) decide to cast votes against the Celeb candidate they dislike then the race becomes a toss-up. It is worth mentioning that voters will likely make these decisions according to their real feelings. They will cast votes against a candidate they dislike and they will vote for candidates they like. With balanced voting methods, voters can freely express dislike for particular candidates and that means they are not forced to resort to strategic methods to express this very real and very natural belief. With IRV , Celeb voters are likely to put the candidate they favor in first place on their ballots. Ghost will garner at most 12% of the vote, so Ghost will be eliminated in the first round of counting. Now the Ghost voters may all decide to not even list a second choice since that would mean voting for a candidate they dislike. The choice between the two Celeb candidates lies in the hands of these Ghost voters who do not like either of them. If just a little more than 2% more voters (necessarily these would be Ghost voters) list Beth Celeb as a second choice than those who list Al Celeb as second choice then that would give the election to Beth Celeb rather than to Al Celeb. Under IRV, the Ghost supporters would be well advised to give some serious consideration to whom they consider the lesser of the two evils. As with other traditional systems, with IRV a little-known candidate does not stand a ghost of a chance and the only real choice is apt to be between two celebrities. With IRBV , voters have more freedom of expression. Might any voters decide to cast their first priority against some candidate? Since there will be only two counts of the votes, some Celeb voters may well choose to cast their first-ranked choice as a vote against the Celeb they dislike. Presumably they would do that if they preferred Ghost to win rather than letting the wrong Celeb candidate winning. If enough voters choose to vote against one or the other of the Celeb candidates then Ghost actually could survive to the second round of voting and if a preference for Ghost by the voters whose Celeb candidate lost in the first round then it is quite possible for Ghost to become the winner. Under IRBV, this race is wide open with any of the three candidates having a chance to win.

Artist's Impression Of "The Clinton Machine" - Russia News Now

This post was originally published on this site If Hillary wins, I’m talking the loved ones into a hundred foot deep bunker or a southern hemisphere island. Did you know Russia has the Sarmat ICBM that reaches all parts of America and Putin thinks Americans, who were, for the most part, not badly touched, the way Russians were, in previous world wars, should know how horrific war is? If we have WWIII, and it looks like we will, you and I will suffer, terribly, if we live. Snowflakes are voting for WWIII and they don’t know it. Related

Trump WON 1/3 the 700 Counties that Voted for Obama

EdJenner

Go to Article Trump’s 2016 victory was historic in so many ways! Firstly, his plan to bust down the BLUE WALL by taking WI, MI, PA, and IA was stunning. Next, is how many Democrats he took – Trump has single-handedly changed the face of the Republican party. We’re now representing WORKING CLASS AMERICANS, and that’s amazing! Of course, Trump flipped a lot of Obama voters – Trump took 1/3 the 700 counties that voted for Obama. From Washington Post: Amy Moreno is a Published Author , Pug Lover & Game of Thrones Nerd. You can follow her on Twitter here and Facebook here . Support the Trump Presidency and help us fight Liberal Media Bias. Please LIKE and SHARE this story on Facebook or Twitter.

94mph hurricaine causes massive urban renewal of Aberystwyth. More soon.

Guest

Guest Guest .. More Stories about: Ticker

Inside the Invisible Government

John Pilger

Photo by Diego Torres Silvestre | CC BY 2.0 The American journalist, Edward Bernays, is often described as the man who invented modern propaganda. The nephew of Sigmund Freud, the pioneer of psycho-analysis, it was Bernays who coined the term “public relations” as a euphemism for spin and its deceptions. In 1929, he persuaded feminists to promote cigarettes for women by smoking in the New York Easter Parade – behaviour then considered outlandish. One feminist, Ruth Booth, declared, “Women! Light another torch of freedom! Fight another sex taboo!” Bernays’ influence extended far beyond advertising. His greatest success was his role in convincing the American public to join the slaughter of the First World War. The secret, he said, was “engineering the consent” of people in order to “control and regiment [them] according to our will without their knowing about it”. He described this as “the true ruling power in our society” and called it an “invisible government”. Today, the invisible government has never been more powerful and less understood. In my career as a journalist and film-maker, I have never known propaganda to insinuate our lives and as it does now and to go unchallenged. Imagine two cities. Both are under siege by the forces of the government of that country. Both cities are occupied by fanatics, who commit terrible atrocities, such as beheading people. But there is a vital difference. In one siege, the government soldiers are described as liberators by Western reporters embedded with them, who enthusiastically report their battles and air strikes. There are front page pictures of these heroic soldiers giving a V-sign for victory. There is scant mention of civilian casualties. In the second city – in another country nearby – almost exactly the same is happening. Government forces are laying siege to a city controlled by the same breed of fanatics. The difference is that these fanatics are supported, supplied and armed by “us” – by the United States and Britain. They even have a media centre that is funded by Britain and America. Another difference is that the government soldiers laying siege to this city are the bad guys, condemned for assaulting and bombing the city – which is exactly what the good soldiers do in the first city. Confusing? Not really. Such is the basic double standard that is the essence of propaganda. I am referring, of course, to the current siege of the city of Mosul by the government forces of Iraq, who are backed by the United States and Britain and to the siege of Aleppo by the government forces of Syria, backed by Russia. One is good; the other is bad. What is seldom reported is that both cities would not be occupied by fanatics and ravaged by war if Britain and the United States had not invaded Iraq in 2003. That criminal enterprise was launched on lies strikingly similar to the propaganda that now distorts our understanding of the civil war in Syria. Without this drumbeat of propaganda dressed up as news, the monstrous ISIS and Al-Qaida and al-Nusra and the rest of the jihadist gang might not exist, and the people of Syria might not be fighting for their lives today. Some may remember in 2003 a succession of BBC reporters turning to the camera and telling us that Blair was “vindicated” for what turned out to be the crime of the century. The US television networks produced the same validation for George W. Bush. Fox News brought on Henry Kissinger to effuse over Colin Powell’s fabrications. The same year, soon after the invasion, I filmed an interview in Washington with Charles Lewis, the renowned American investigative journalist. I asked him, “What would have happened if the freest media in the world had seriously challenged what turned out to be crude propaganda?” He replied that if journalists had done their job, “there is a very, very good chance we would not have gone to war in Iraq”. It was a shocking statement, and one supported by other famous journalists to whom I put the same question — Dan Rather of CBS, David Rose of the Observer and journalists and producers in the BBC, who wished to remain anonymous. In other words, had journalists done their job, had they challenged and investigated the propaganda instead of amplifying it, hundreds of thousands of men, women and children would be alive today, and there would be no ISIS and no siege of Aleppo or Mosul. There would have been no atrocity on the London Underground on 7 th July 2005. There would have been no flight of millions of refugees; there would be no miserable camps. When the terrorist atrocity happened in Paris last November, President Francoise Hollande immediately sent planes to bomb Syria – and more terrorism followed, predictably, the product of Hollande’s bombast about France being “at war” and “showing no mercy”. That state violence and jihadist violence feed off each other is the truth that no national leader has the courage to speak. “When the truth is replaced by silence,” said the Soviet dissident Yevtushenko, “the silence is a lie.” The attack on Iraq, the attack on Libya, the attack on Syria happened because the leader in each of these countries was not a puppet of the West. The human rights record of a Saddam or a Gaddafi was irrelevant. They did not obey orders and surrender control of their country. The same fate awaited Slobodan Milosevic once he had refused to sign an “agreement” that demanded the occupation of Serbia and its conversion to a market economy. His people were bombed, and he was prosecuted in The Hague. Independence of this kind is intolerable. As WikLeaks has revealed, it was only when the Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad in 2009 rejected an oil pipeline, running through his country from Qatar to Europe, that he was attacked. From that moment, the CIA planned to destroy the government of Syria with jihadist fanatics – the same fanatics currently holding the people of Mosul and eastern Aleppo hostage. Why is this not news? The former British Foreign Office official Carne Ross, who was responsible for operating sanctions against Iraq, told me: “We would feed journalists factoids of sanitised intelligence, or we would freeze them out. That is how it worked.” The West’s medieval client, Saudi Arabia – to which the US and Britain sell billions of dollars’ worth of arms – is at present destroying Yemen, a country so poor that in the best of times, half the children are malnourished. Look on YouTube and you will see the kind of massive bombs – “our” bombs – that the Saudis use against dirt-poor villages, and against weddings, and funerals. The explosions look like small atomic bombs. The bomb aimers in Saudi Arabia work side-by-side with British officers. This fact is not on the evening news. Propaganda is most effective when our consent is engineered by those with a fine education – Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, Columbia — and with careers on the BBC, the Guardia n, the New York Times , the Washington Post . These organisations are known as the liberal media. They present themselves as enlightened, progressive tribunes of the moral zeitgeist. They are anti-racist, pro-feminist and pro-LGBT. And they love war. While they speak up for feminism, they support rapacious wars that deny the rights of countless women, including the right to life. In 2011, Libya, then a modern state, was destroyed on the pretext that Muammar Gaddafi was about to commit genocide on his own people. That was the incessant news; and there was no evidence. It was a lie. In fact, Britain, Europe and the United States wanted what they like to call “regime change” in Libya, the biggest oil producer in Africa. Gaddafi’s influence in the continent and, above all, his independence were intolerable. So he was murdered with a knife in his rear by fanatics, backed by America, Britain and France. Hillary Clinton cheered his gruesome death for the camera, declaring, “We came, we saw, he died!” The destruction of Libya was a media triumph. As the war drums were beaten, Jonathan Freedland wrote in the Guardian : “Though the risks are very real, the case for intervention remains strong.” Intervention — what a polite, benign, Guardian word, whose real meaning, for Libya, was death and destruction. According to its own records, Nato launched 9,700 “strike sorties” against Libya, of which more than a third were aimed at civilian targets. They included missiles with uranium warheads. Look at the photographs of the rubble of Misurata and Sirte, and the mass graves identified by the Red Cross. The Unicef report on the children killed says, “most [of them] under the age of ten”. As a direct consequence, Sirte became the capital of ISIS. Ukraine is another media triumph. Respectable liberal newspapers such as the New York Times , the Washington Post and the Guardian , and mainstream broadcasters such as the BBC, NBC, CBS, CNN have played a critical role in conditioning their viewers to accept a new and dangerous cold war. All have misrepresented events in Ukraine as a malign act by Russia when, in fact, the coup in Ukraine in 2014 was the work of the United States, aided by Germany and Nato. This inversion of reality is so pervasive that Washington’s military intimidation of Russia is not news; it is suppressed behind a smear and scare campaign of the kind I grew up with during the first cold war. Once again, the Ruskies are coming to get us, led by another Stalin, whom The Economist depicts as the devil. The suppression of the truth about Ukraine is one of the most complete news blackouts I can remember. The fascists who engineered the coup in Kiev are the same breed that backed the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941. Of all the scares about the rise of fascist anti-Semitism in Europe, no leader ever mentions the fascists in Ukraine – except Vladimir Putin, but he does not count. Many in the Western media have worked hard to present the ethnic Russian-speaking population of Ukraine as outsiders in their own country, as agents of Moscow, almost never as Ukrainians seeking a federation within Ukraine and as Ukrainian citizens resisting a foreign-orchestrated coup against their elected government. There is almost the joie d’esprit of a class reunion of warmongers. The drum-beaters of the Washington Post inciting war with Russia are the very same editorial writers who published the lie that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. To most of us, the American presidential campaign is a media freak show, in which Donald Trump is the arch villain. But Trump is loathed by those with power in the United States for reasons that have little to do with his obnoxious behaviour and opinions. To the invisible government in Washington, the unpredictable Trump is an obstacle to America’s design for the 21 st century. This is to maintain the dominance of the United States and to subjugate Russia, and, if possible, China. To the militarists in Washington, the real problem with Trump is that, in his lucid moments, he seems not to want a war with Russia; he wants to talk with the Russian president, not fight him; he says he wants to talk with the president of China. In the first debate with Hillary Clinton, Trump promised not to be the first to introduce nuclear weapons into a conflict. He said, “I would certainly not do first strike. Once the nuclear alternative happens, it’s over.” That was not news. Did he really mean it? Who knows? He often contradicts himself. But what is clear is that Trump is considered a serious threat to the status quo maintained by the vast national security machine that runs the United States, regardless of who is in the White House. The CIA wants him beaten. The Pentagon wants him beaten. The media wants him beaten. Even his own party wants him beaten. He is a threat to the rulers of the world – unlike Clinton who has left no doubt she is prepared to go to war with nuclear-armed Russia and China. Clinton has the form, as she often boasts. Indeed, her record is proven. As a senator, she backed the bloodbath in Iraq. When she ran against Obama in 2008, she threatened to “totally obliterate” Iran. As Secretary of State, she colluded in the destruction of governments in Libya and Honduras and set in train the baiting of China. She has now pledged to support a No Fly Zone in Syria — a direct provocation for war with Russia. Clinton may well become the most dangerous president of the United States in my lifetime –a distinction for which the competition is fierce. Without a shred of evidence, she has accused Russia of supporting Trump and hacking her emails. Released by WikiLeaks, these emails tell us that what Clinton says in private, in speeches to the rich and powerful, is the opposite of what she says in public. That is why silencing and threatening Julian Assange is so important. As the editor of WikiLeaks, Assange knows the truth. And let me assure those who are concerned, he is well, and WikiLeaks is operating on all cylinders. Today, the greatest build-up of American-led forces since World War Two is under way – in the Caucasus and eastern Europe, on the border with Russia, and in Asia and the Pacific, where China is the target. Keep that in mind when the presidential election circus reaches its finale on November 8 th, If the winner is Clinton, a Greek chorus of witless commentators will celebrate her coronation as a great step forward for women. None will mention Clinton’s victims: the women of Syria, the women of Iraq, the women of Libya. None will mention the civil defence drills being conducted in Russia. None will recall Edward Bernays’ “torches of freedom”. George Bush’s press spokesman once called the media “complicit enablers”. Coming from a senior official in an administration whose lies, enabled by the media, caused such suffering, that description is a warning from history. In 1946, the Nuremberg Tribunal prosecutor said of the German media: “Before every major aggression, they initiated a press campaign calculated to weaken their victims and to prepare the German people psychologically for the attack. In the propaganda system, it was the daily press and the radio that were the most important weapons.” This is adapted from an address to the Sheffield Festival of Words, Sheffield, England. John Pilger can be reached through his website: www.johnpilger.com (Reprinted from Counterpunch by permission of author or representative)

Ex-Assistant FBI Director: Clintons Are a Crime Family

Daniel Greenfield

Ex-Assistant FBI Director: Clintons Are a Crime Family October That's quite an endorsement . And if there's anything top FBI officials now, it's crime families. Certainly this is probably the first serious level of experience that Hillary can claim in any field. “The Clintons, that’s a crime family, basically,” former assistant FBI director James Kallstrom said. “It’s like organized crime. I mean the Clinton Foundation is a cesspool.” “Kallstrom, best known for leading the investigation into the explosion of TWA flight 800 in the late '90s, said that Hillary Clinton, the Democratic presidential nominee, was a “pathological liar.” He also blasted Attorney General Loretta Lynch, claiming that she impeded the investigation into Clinton’s private server. “The problem here is this investigation was never a real investigation,” he said. “That’s the problem. They never had a grand jury empanelled, and the reason they never had a grand jury empanelled, I’m sure, is Loretta Lynch would not go along with that.” Kallstrom also said that FBI Director James Comey and the rest of the FBI’s leadership were responsible for holding back the investigation, not the rest of the bureau. “The agents are furious with what’s going on, I know that for a fact,” he said. But according to the media, the FBI investigating Hillary is the real crime.

Trump: After Obamacare Explodes, We’ll Put Together ’a Great Healthcare Plan for the People’

Katherine Rodriguez

President Trump addressed the failure of the Obamacare replacement bill for the first time on Twitter after Congress pulled the bill from the House floor. [Trump tweeted: ObamaCare will explode and we will all get together and piece together a great healthcare plan for THE PEOPLE. Do not worry! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 25, 2017, “ObamaCare will explode and we will all get together and piece together a great healthcare plan for THE PEOPLE. Do not worry!” Trump wrote on Twitter. The House pulled the American Health Care Act from the House floor Friday after it became clear that the House was not able to secure enough votes for the bill’s passage. Trump told the media Friday afternoon that the bill’s failure would help Congress put together a better healthcare plan, but he also blamed the Democrats for opposing the bill. “Certainly for me it was a very interesting experience, but for me, it’ll be an experience that leads to an even better healthcare plan,” Trump said. “We were very close. It was a very tight margin. We had no Democrat support, no votes from the Democrats,” he added. Trump specifically singled out House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer as the reason for the bill’s failure. “The losers are Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer, because they own Obamacare. They 100% own it,” Trump said. “They have Obamacare for a little while longer until it ceases to exist, which it will at some point in the near future. ” Speaker of the House Paul Ryan said Friday that the failure of the Obamacare replacement bill will make tax reform harder but not “impossible” after the White House sent a message that President Trump’s tax reform and infrastructure agenda will not be affected by the failed healthcare bill.

Hundreds of Migrants Protest in Paris over Their Treatment by French Authorities

Henry Wolff

Hundreds of Migrants Protest in Paris over Their Treatment by French Authorities Julian Robinson and Peter Allen, Daily Mail, November 3, 2016 Migrants have staged a mass protest in Paris over their treatment by French authorities following the destruction of their makeshift camps. Hundreds of refugees sleeping rough in the French capital joined local activists to demonstrate close to their encampment near the Stalingrad Metro station. One man held up a sign saying ‘human, no beast’ as a man used a loud speaker to lead the march, which happened late last night. It came 24 hours after violence broke out at the site with gangs of men attacking each other using sticks as makeshift clubs. The fighting unfolded just hours after demolition workers supported by riot police began smashing up an illegal camp full of UK-bound migrants in Paris. It also came in the wake of the destruction of the Calais Jungle which saw refugees transported around the country. It is not yet known what caused the fight in Paris. There had already been scuffles on Monday as mainly Afghans and Eritreans tried to save their possessions during the raid, which started soon after 8am. It followed thousands of migrants arriving in the French capital following the razing of the Calais Jungle refugee camp last week. While some 5,000 Jungle residents agreed to be bused to resettlement centres around France, many others headed off independently, saying they still wanted to get to Britain. Up to 3,000 set up tents on the pavements around the Stalingrad Metro station, which is close to the Gare du Nord Eurostar hub in the north of Paris. Shortly before Monday’s clearance French president Francois Hollande said: ‘We won’t tolerate the camps any longer.’ Referring to the Paris clearance, Mr Hollande said: ‘We are going to carry out the same operation as in Calais.’ CRS riot police around Stalingrad said there would be a ‘gradual operation’ which is likely to go on all week until all the camps are gone. Meanwhile, the first ever official centre for refugees in Paris is due to be opened by the city’s Socialist council later this week. The £6m facility is also close to the Eurostar hub, and will have beds for 400 men. But local residents and business owners say it will attract people smugglers, and other criminals. Jean Brossard, who has been living in the area for 30 years, said: ‘None of us asked for an immigrant centre on our doorsteps. ‘Everybody in the area is complaining. If these men want to go to England, then send them to England.’ Others have accused the Socialists of tokenism, saying they are simply opening the camps as a humanitarian gesture that will have no long term effect on Europe’s immigrant crisis. The official centre, which will include a football pitch, will only allow residents to stay for between five and 10 weeks, and is likely to shut down within two years. Another centre for women with children will also open in the Paris suburb of Ivry-sur-Seine later this year, or early next, but it too will only have a limited capacity of 350 temporary places. Meanwhile, French authorities have started transporting migrant children out of Calais to processing centres around France, amid tensions around the closure of the vast Jungle camp. Three buses carried a group of unaccompanied boys, mainly teenagers, out of the camp on Wednesday morning. French authorities transferred more than 5,000 adult migrants out of Calais last week, but the fate of its 1,500 unaccompanied children remained unclear. Migrants from the Middle East and Africa converged on the Jungle in hopes of crossing the English Channel to Britain. President Francois Hollande said this week that the children would be transferred within days to ‘dedicated centres’ where British officials can explore whether they have the right to UK asylum. Mr Hollande said the others would be put in the care of French child welfare services.

Кто что хочет видеть — то и видит

Светлана Якн

Кто что хочет видеть — то и видит 20 ноября 2016 Политика Российское посольство в Швейцарии направило в МИД страны ноту после сближения швейцарских истребителей с бортом специального летного отряда «Россия», который обслуживает первых лиц государства. На борту Ил-96 в этот момент находились журналисты кремлевского пула, которые направлялись на саммит АТЭС в Перу. Наконец-то россияне доподлинно узнали для каких целей российскому президенту не один Борт № 1 (тот самый, на котором перевозят его бесценное тело), а целых пять. Еще два заказаны и поступят в полное распоряжение Владимира Владимировича (кто-то сомневается, что его?) в 2018 году. А так как венценосный не может пока еще использовать несколько средств передвижения одновременно (или может?) он предоставляет их во временное пользование самым важным и нужным людям. А кто это у нас? Нет, воздушному флоту российских олигархов и высокопоставленных чиновников, позавидует любой арабский шейх. А вот своевременная доставка в нужные точки земного шара президентского пула журналистов – это задача государственной важности, стратегическая, так сказать. И то верно. Стоит только представить себе, какой коллапс случится в стране, если вдруг Владимир Соловьев в своей обязательной ежевечерней проповеди не сможет доверительно рассказать зрителям, как многозначительно перемигивался с ним или покашливал президент или, не дай бог, Дмитрию Киселеву придется готовить свои еженедельные эскапады на основе данных, опубликованных в зарубежных источниках. И неважно, что только на перевозку пассажиров президентского авиаотряда в 2014 было выделено из федерального бюджета, сформированного, в том числе из налогов граждан, даже не имеющих телевизора в доме, более 2-х миллиардов рублей. Главное, чтобы журналисты из президентского пула вовремя оказались на месте и с честью выполнили свой патриотический долг. Полетела было вся эта камарилья в Перу, чтобы своими глазами увидеть, как, может быть, Владимир Владимирович «случайно» встретится «на полях» форума «Азиатско-Тихоокеанского экономического сотрудничества» с «хромой уткой» Бараком Обамой. Но веселая поездка за океан не задалась. Сперва где-то в районе Швейцарии за ними увязался местный истребитель (и чего бы ему в небе своей страны делать?). Журналисты — люди тонкой нервной организации — повскакивали к окнам, стали готовиться к тому, что их собьют или захватят в заложники, силой принудят всю оставшуюся мучиться, живя в Швейцарии и страдая по Родине. Понятно, что МИД переполошилось, стало ноты с протестами разбрасывать. На святое, на народное достояние покусились проклятые швейцарцы. Потом, правда, швейцарским пилотам скучно стало, улетели они по своим швейцарским делам. А вот Борт № 1 перепугался не на шутку, да так сильно, что, приземлившись на дозаправку в Лиссабоне, вновь взмыть в небо не смог. Что-то там жизненно важное сломалось, и запчасти — опять же спец-бортом — будут доставлены в столицу Португалии. Из-за этого (вот где настоящий кошмар!) наш президент проведет полдня под прицелом только вражеских телекамер и будет отвечать только на каверзные вопросы, на которые у него нет подготовленных помощниками и советниками ответов. Так это всего лишь вполне миролюбивое Перу и исключительно экономический АТЭС. А представьте себе, что такой кошмар случится, если он отправится в самое логово – в США или некогда дружественную Германию! Тут-то без своих прикормленных журналистов впору самый главный Борт № 1 разворачивать и возвращаться домой. То-то конфуз случится.

Study Finds Women Now Drinking as Much as Men

Palm Beach Post

Study Finds Women Now Drinking as Much as Men Once a male problem, heavy drinking is now rampant in both sexes Image Credits: jarmoluk/Pixabay . A new study found that women have caught up with men as the heavy drinkers over the past 100 years. BMJ Open released their journal that came to the conclusion that women are drinking more alcohol than men and it is having health ramifications. The study, which looked at over 4 million people over a period of over a century, suggested that this is a result from “successful marketing campaigns” and sweeter alcoholic products being designed for younger women. “These results have implications for the framing and targeting of alcohol-use prevention and intervention programs. Alcohol use and alcohol-use disorders have historically been viewed as a male phenomenon. The present study calls this assumption into question and suggests that young women in particular should be the target of concerted efforts to reduce the impact of substance use and related harms,” the researchers stated in the news release.

Fucking Hero Checks In To Standing Rock

Colm Williamson

0 Add Comment LOCAL fucking hero Martin Dooley has thwarted the efforts of US police today by checking in to the Standing Rock Sioux Native American reservation, forcing them to restart a lengthy count on the number of people at the site. The champion of the people outwitted North Dakota police investigators by pretending he was at the location, when he actually wasn’t, and is just one of the many geniuses who did the same from the comfort of their home. “I was told this would stop police from doing something or other,” the full grown male explained, who even watched a 30 second video of the protest on the Guardian, “I’m not really sure of the in’s and out’s of what I’m supposed to be doing, but it looks great online for me and the rest of the protesters,” adding, “We’re like hackers or something”. More than 1.5 million people have so far “checked in” on Facebook to support protesters fighting against the new oil pipeline in Standing Rock. The protesters believe the local police department were using Facebook’s location feature to compile a list of activists who are protesting about the pipeline, and requested people to check in to ‘confuse’ investigators. “They really got us there,” admitted one police officer at the scene, who was busy macing faces, “We were on number 1,234,786 when some guy from Ireland checked in, forcing us to start again. Now we have no idea who’s protesting. We’ve been outsmarted, and outwitted. All we can do now is fire some rubber bullets and hope for the best. God, you people are so clever”. Meanwhile, a county Mayo man’s check-in to the Corrib gas pipeline has so far accumulated 28 fellow protesters.

30 Mins After FBI News, Hillary Exited Plane… Did One Dirty Thing Before

Robert Rich

30 Mins After FBI News, Hillary Exited Plane… Did One Dirty Thing Before Posted on October 30, 2016 by Robert Rich in Politics Share This We know that the FBI reopening its investigation of Hillary Clinton’s emails couldn’t have been good news for the presidential hopeful, but the fact that it took her a whopping 30 minutes to exit her plane after landing speaks volumes on the matter. However, it seems that Hillary made sure to do one dirty thing before walking down those stairs. Crooked Hillary is a cowardly schemer – and her recent actions go to prove just that. Mad World News reported Friday that after the news broke of FBI Director James Comey reopening their investigation, Hillary was seen rapidly exiting her plane and ignoring reporters before darting into her SUV. Just In: Clinton declines to answer questions about the FBI as she deplanes in Cedar Rapids. Sat on tarmac for 30 minutes after news broke. pic.twitter.com/zC115U7YNp — Adam D. Brown (@aduanebrown) October 28, 2016 However, recent reports indicate that her dodging the matter at hand began far before that point . In fact, Hillary’s staff made sure to disable the plane’s Wi-Fi after the news broke so that the reporters onboard wouldn’t learn of the matter until they got on the ground. Of note as we wait for Clinton: plane had no wi-fi today. One adviser after we landed: "We're learning about this just like you all are." pic.twitter.com/CjsH71LJNo — Phil Mattingly (@Phil_Mattingly) October 28, 2016 Of course, Hillary made sure to stay far away from the media seats until she got off the plane, but it didn’t end there. As reporters had questions about Hillary, an adviser used President Barack Obama’s time-old line saying — “We’re learning about this just like you all are.” Clinton’s plane did not have WiFi. Her advisors learned about the FBI letter when you did. https://t.co/C0uSXheh1i https://t.co/BAGhckS2aN — CNN (@CNN) October 28, 2016 Although CNN tried their best to make it sound as if they didn’t have Internet access on the plane at all, the Wall Street Journal’s Byron Tau came forward saying that Hillary’s plane is equipped with Wi-Fi. Hillary has been dodging the consequences of her actions since the beginning of her campaign, but this is a new low for even her. The Hillary plane has wifi. https://t.co/dLZ0tigZhP — Byron Tau (@ByronTau) October 28, 2016 At this point, she knowingly put those in charge of getting information to the world in the dark in order to protect herself. Too bad for her, running only gets you so far in terms of justice. She will one day have to face the music. As the saying goes – “you can run, but you can’t hide,” and the noose that all those guilty of treason get in the end seems to be getting closer and closer every day.

Trump Invigorates New American Volk by Formulating U.S. Einsatzgruppen

dailouk

Home | World | Trump Invigorates New American Volk by Formulating U.S. Einsatzgruppen Trump Invigorates New American Volk by Formulating U.S. Einsatzgruppen By Hermann Drumpf 17/11/2016 16:50:53 WASHINGTON D.C. – USA – America is dawning on a new era, a new volksgemeinschaft as proposed by its charismatic leader Donald Trump, a man with deep Germanic roots, and a vision that brings forth strength through Aryan supremacy. Already the troops and militia have been designated zones specific to their skills, and the plans to move forward in purging the swamp that is America today, will be conducted with great haste and urgency. Having pulled off a great feat through a general election, the Trump movement has followed a legitimate legal path to power, and have not utilised the violence of previous fascist movements to gain power. “We had to gain power through the legal American constitution, and once in power we will need to unite the American people under a singular cause. As much of a Pearl Harbor event, a 911, or Reichstag fire on 27 February 1933, this event we are waiting for will be cataclysmic and a profound unitary force amongst the population,” a Trump adjutant, revealed on Thursday. Unity in the American people is key, as there are many elements within the populace who do not wish for Trump and his movement to be in power. There will be a purge of the system immediately after inauguration, and all negative elements will be flushed away back into the sewer. The Bolsheviks within American politics and society have been routed in the general election, however there are many elements still at hand, lest we forget the Marxist socialist swine Soros and his cohorts of troublemakers. This is why Trump is mobilising the Einsatzgruppen to counteract this threat and to neutralise it once and for all. As in every fascist movement, there always has to be a common enemy, and these are primarily Muslims, who are now the new Jews, and after many years of media incitement and hatred sanctioned by governments worldwide, as well as engineered atrocities in the name of that religion carried out by black operation sanctioned Jihadists, the Trump movement has a very explosive adversary. Illegal immigrants, are also to be designated as Untermenschen, and designated a common enemy to the American people. In accordance with the American constitution, the new president will adhere to the constitution by amending it for his needs. This change will be necessary for the survival of the American Aryan cause, and will be administered as a new improved constitution, a new American Reich for the next thousand years. Share on :

Rendition George Soros Under the NDAA with US Special Forces for Crimes Against Humanity

Dave Hodges

Previous Rendition George Soros Under the NDAA with US Special Forces for Crimes Against Humanity For crimes against humanity, when Soros was a Nazi collaborator, he needs to considered an alien, enemy combatant and under the NDAA sent to a rendition facility run by American Special Forces. In the furtherance of this endeavor, he is also guilty of terrorist economic tampering with the US economy. Soros is also guilty of election tampering, facilitating a bribe, election fraud for buying off voters in the electoral college. Soros is a criminal’s, criminal and the NDAA was made for people like Soros, It is time to send him to a rendition facility. He gets no lawyer, no day in court, no phone call. Soros sits in a deep dark hole in repayment for the inhumane havoc he wreaked upon the world and specifically, the people of the United States. Here is an impassioned appeal for US Special Operations forces to take action against Soros on behalf of the American people. You have never heard Dave Hodges like you will hear him on this video. Please make this go viral.

Dave Chappelle Crashes Chris Rock Show, Says Trump is ’Gonna Save America by Accident’

Jerome Hudson

Chris Rock’s return to Saturday night in New Orleans after a hiatus was crashed by none other than fellow comedian Dave Chappelle. [According to the a Chappelle took the stage at the Saenger Theatre and treated the audience to an unscheduled 30 minutes of material. “Tonight, you are all part of a social experiment. Stranger things have happened in New Orleans,” he said. Chappelle reportedly riffed on Rock’s rough divorce, Bill Cosby, and the controversy over the LGBTQ jokes he had made during his Netflix special. Rock, the night’s headliner, later joined his longtime friend onstage and the pair spent the next hour cracking jokes . During their banter, the New Orleans Advocate reports, Rock asked, “Did Trump do anything today?” “No, he’s still languishing in that failure of a health care bill,” Chappelle reportedly responded, adding “I think Donald Trump is gonna save America by accident. ” Cellphones were reportedly confiscated at the door, so fans couldn’t comment on the evening’s events on social media. “Oh, you wish you had your phones, right?” Rock joked. As their shared set came to a close, Chappelle reportedly turned to the crowd and said “I just realized this might be one of the flyest things I’ve ever been a part of. “The only thing better would be if Eddie Murphy lowered from the rafters,” he added. The Chappelle’s Show star made headlines in November when he appeared to defend Trump and blast former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton during a secret set in New York, saying that the media had “twisted” Trump’s words on an Access Hollywood tape and adding that Clinton was “not right” for the presidency. Ball so hard . Best show ever pic. twitter. — Chris Rock (@chrisrock) March 26, 2017, Saturday night’s show in New Orleans kicked off Rock’s Total Blackout Tour, which was set to continue Sunday and Monday night at the Saenger Theatre. Chappelle, meanwhile, has a string of shows in Austin, Texas beginning Sunday, Follow Jerome Hudson on Twitter @jeromeehudson

Janet Yellen Says Labor and Inflation Complicate Fed’s Plans to Raise Rates - The New York Times

Binyamin Appelbaum

BOSTON — Janet L. Yellen, the Federal Reserve chairwoman, did not talk on Friday about the Fed’s plans for its benchmark interest rate. Instead, she talked about why those plans have been so hard to make. In a speech, Ms. Yellen said the Fed was struggling to understand the behavior of the labor market and the weakness of inflation. It is reconsidering how changes in monetary policy ripple through the economy, and the impact of international events. In short, as often happens after a crisis, the Fed is sorting through some existential issues. “The events of the past few years have revealed limits in economists’ understanding of the economy and suggest several important questions I hope the profession will try to answer,” she said at a conference here hosted by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston. The Fed has indicated it is likely to raise rates in December if economic growth continues, although it has repeatedly retreated from similar predictions in the last nine months. Investors now see more than a 70 percent chance of a December hike, according to CME Group, and Eric S. Rosengren, the Boston Fed’s president, buttressed those expectations Friday. “The market seems to think that there’s a very high probability of December,” Mr. Rosengren told CNBC. “We’ll see how the economic data actually comes in, but I think that is priced appropriately. ” Mr. Rosengren, however, was ready to raise rates in September. Ms. Yellen and most of her colleagues were not. The debate among Fed officials revolves in part around the consequences of holding down interest rates to push unemployment to an unsustainably low level. A certain amount of unemployment lubricates labor markets, maintaining a ready supply of workers for businesses that are expanding. In the past, pushing unemployment below that level has increased inflation. Mr. Rosengren has warned that could force the Fed to raise rates more sharply, potentially driving the economy into recession. But an unusually large share of American adults are neither working nor counted among the unemployed. They are not trying to find jobs. Ms. Yellen and other Fed officials have raised the possibility that a low unemployment rate could persuade some of these people to start looking. That could increase growth without increasing inflation. “If strong economic conditions can partially reverse damage after it has occurred, then policy makers may want to aim at being more accommodative during recoveries than would be called for under the traditional view,” Ms. Yellen said on Friday. Ms. Yellen described this outcome as “plausible” but not proven. Businesses buoyed by strong sales might expand workers might find it easier to move into better jobs increased investment in research might even lead to higher productivity growth. The Fed is embarked on the experiment. Officials predicted in December that they would raise rates four times this year. So far, they have not raised rates at all. The Fed’s benchmark rate remains in a range between 0. 25 percent and 0. 5 percent, a low level that encourages investment and . And over the last year, the unemployment rate has held steady while the labor force has expanded. The question is how much further the Fed can go. The presenters at the Boston Fed conference, which was devoted to the slow pace of growth in recent years, generally attributed a large share of the economy’s underperformance to issues that would seem beyond the reach of monetary policy, including demographic shifts and slow productivity growth. “Just pushing down unemployment, by itself, is unlikely to draw large numbers of workers back into the labor force,” said Gabriel a professor of economics at Harvard University. James Stock, also a Harvard economist, said annual growth during this expansion has been about 1. 74 percentage points slower than the last three expansions. He said demographics and productivity accounted for about 0. 9 percentage points of the shortfall. He attributed most of the rest to insufficient government spending and weak demand for exports. Yet few drew the conclusion that the Fed should raise rates. Peter Ireland, a professor of economics at Boston College, described himself as “really, really nervous” about the judgment that the central bank’s work is done. “My December vote is no,” said Robert E. Hall, a Stanford economist. The Fed is unlikely to act at its next meeting, in November, just a few days before the presidential election on Nov. 8. Patrick T. Harker, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, said on Thursday that the election could cause significant economic disruptions. “It may be prudent to wait until we have resolved some of that uncertainty,” Mr. Harker said. The Fed’s last meeting of the year, in December, looks more likely for a rate change. Charles Evans, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, said early this month that he wanted the Fed to move forward slowly, but that he did not regard the exact timing of the next rate increase as important. December would be “fine,” Mr. Evans told reporters in Auckland, New Zealand. “I am less concerned about the timing of the next increase than I am about the path over the next three years. ” Ms. Yellen surveyed a number of the issues that are perplexing Fed policy makers. The conventional understanding of monetary policy is that the Fed raises or lowers interest rates, which moves markets, which changes the behavior of businesses and consumers, and so the American economy grows or slows. But the Fed has struggled to stimulate the economy. One possible reason, Ms. Yellen said, is that households and businesses with relatively large debts were unwilling, or unable, to take advantage of low interest rates. She said that the Fed also needed to improve its understanding of the economic impact of changes in financial conditions. The behavior of inflation is another mystery. It fell less than expected during the recession it has strengthened more slowly than expected in the aftermath. “The influence of labor market conditions on inflation in recent years seems to be weaker than had been commonly thought,” she said. Finally, she mentioned the impact of global economic weakness on domestic growth. “This is a wonderful time to be an academic,” Mr. Rosengren said in introducing Ms. Yellen. But, he continued, “I empathize with the challenges our chair has” in charting policy with so many uncertainties.

Twitter Using Watson A.I. to Crack Down on ’Abuse’ - Breitbart

Nate Church

It’s come to this: Twitter is now employing IBM’s Watson artificial intelligence to help fight the ongoing war against its own users. [The AI famous for winning at Jeopardy and replacing insurance claims agents will take on its greatest challenge yet: Twitter trolls. Watson will use its ability to interpret natural language and analyze images to do something that the estimated 2, 300 remaining employees of the social network have repeatedly failed to do. Once thriving, the embattled social network has been in steady decline for years. In an attempt to strike a balance between the open nature of the platform and preventing online “abuse,” Jack Dorsey and his team have instead careened through a public comedy of errors as people on both sides of the debate have lost patience and moved on from the platform. Twitter Vice Present of Data Strategy Chris Moody said that they have had “some abuse” on the platform, discussed “very publicly in the past few months. ” In announcing the partnership with IBM Watson, he stressed that their first priority is to “stop the abuse. ” “Watson is really good at understanding nuances in language and intention. What we want to do is be able to identify abuse patterns early and stop this behaviour before it starts,” he said. Watson will help Twitter identify “abusive” accounts. Twitter will then use the information to decide whether to limit a user’s visibility or simply ban them from the service altogether. Whether or not Watson proves effective at his task, Twitter will face an uphill battle to regain its status and popularity. The company is caught between users who have become discouraged by its toxicity, and others equally dismayed by its tightening of free speech on the social network. In any case, this is a desperate attempt to reverse the company’s fortunes — but at this point it looks a lot like swapping deck chairs on the Titanic. Follow Nate Church @Get2Church on Twitter for the latest news in gaming and technology, and snarky opinions on both.

I am a Man I am...

Where did ISIS get that? Any guesses? And how do you know it's Russin made?

Did Putin Just Out The World’s Ruling Class As Reptilians?

Arnold Monteverde (noreply@blogger.com)

Shockwaves are reverberating around the Kremlin today as word spreads regarding an extraordinary meeting called by Vladimir Putin yesterday where, according to sources, the Russian president said that “95% of the world’s ruling class are not even human,” but are “cold-blooded hybrids” who are “members of an ancient cult.” Did Putin just out the world’s political and financial elite as cold-blooded hybrid human reptilians? Did he really just go there? Speaking at a behind closed doors forum for the highest echelons of government and staff in his home city of St. Petersburg, Putin responded to questions about the Panama Papers leak by pointing out who was behind the plot: the U.S. government, their spy agencies, and George Soros’s OCCRP. Putin slammed his fist on the table and exclaimed, “George Soros, you sly dragon, this is war,” according to sources close to the President. Putin then vowed to ramp up sanctions against Soros’s Open Society even further. When questioned by a top aide as to what he meant by “dragon” (an unusual word in Russian), Putin sighed heavily and fixed the assembled group with his trademark stare before explaining that all is not what it seems in regards to how the world is run. Resisting gentle attempts by close aides to stop the President ‘going there,’ Putin said that the evidence was everywhere, and that he personally had intimate knowledge of their dealings. He said that he was not one of them, but they are afraid of him and have attempted to lure him into their “ancient Babylonian cult.” “The evidence, ancient and modern, is enormous,” he said. Putin said that mankind has been manipulated to become “unconscious” through the use of programming by media and politics, the perfect example of which was the recent Panama Papers leak. The world’s ruling class have tyrannical control over our food, water, and air supply, and they are actively dumbing down the masses. Your News Wire SOURCE

Trump on Moving Embassy to Jerusalem : ‘I Am Not A Person Who Breaks Promises’

Breitbart Jerusalem

The Times of Israel reports: US Donald Trump told the Israel Hayom daily that he intends to go through with his pledge to move the US Embassy to Jerusalem, saying that “clearly I did not forget” the promise made on the campaign trail. [Asked by the paper Tuesday night at the Chairman’s Global Dinner in Washington, DC — an exclusive black tie event for diplomats and members of the incoming administration — if “you have not forgotten your promise concerning the embassy in Jerusalem,” Trump responded that “of course I remember what I said about Jerusalem. ” Read more here.

The University of Utah Will Provide eSports Scholarships - Breitbart

Nate Church

The University of Utah will become the first major sports university to officially sponsor competitive gaming. [According to Bloomberg, the first varsity eSports team will compete in Riot’s League of Legends collegiate league. As one of the five wealthiest organizations in college sports, their endorsement of the explosive eSports scene is a decisive statement about its future. But the University of Utah won’t foot the bill for the scholarships from its massive $70 million sports budget. Instead, the scholarships will be funded by the university’s acclaimed Entertainment Arts Engineering department. Program head A. J. Dimick didn’t specify how much they would initially invest. Still, his enthusiasm for the program — and eSports as a whole — is readily apparent. He asks other schools to “join us,” encouraging them to help “move this along together. ” Utah may be the first of the “Power Five,” but the University of California was the first on the map overall, investing $250, 000 in a dedicated arena. At the time, UCI’s Acting Director of Esports Mark Deppe said: Esports is the future of competition. Period. It transcends language, geography, race, age, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation, physical ability and many other identities. In five years many more schools will official programs and more structure will be in place to regulate and provide guidance to schools. Esports also has a huge opportunity to learn from the successes and shortcomings of traditional sports and provide a model for collegiate competition in the 21st century. There is a steady flow of signs that suggest he’s right. ESPN believed that the industry was already “primed for growth” in early 2016, and that growth has reliably exceeded expectations. Initially, UOU’s program will offer partial scholarships to its participants. Their eventual goal, however, is to broker sponsorship deals to expand into more games. If possible, they would eventually provide full scholarships for up to 35 talented students. Follow Nate Church @Get2Church on Twitter for the latest news in gaming and technology, and snarky opinions on both.

Iraqi Soldier Battling in Mosul Reunited with His Family After Two Years of Estrangement

ahtribune.com

14 Shares 4 9 0 1 It's a heartwarming moment amid the carnage of the battle to liberate Mosul. An Iraqi lieutenant -- part of the elite Golden Division special forces fighting to take back Iraq's second city from ISIS -- was stationed at a checkpoint in Bartella, about 25 kilometers to the east of the city, when he spotted some familiar faces Tuesday. Amid a group of refugees fleeing the city's outskirts were his mother, his father, and his nephew, whom the soldier had been separated from for over two years. The soldier gave his name as 1st. Lt. Salam to the CNN producer who captured the moment. After embracing a group of adults, including his mother, father and brother, he picks up his young nephew and holds him, walking away from the group. He then falls to his knees and kisses him, before picking him up and carrying him away. The joy on both their faces obvious to all. MORE... Muslim Iraqi Soldiers Erect Cross on Top of the Church in Newly Liberated Karamless Village Near Mosul Thousand of Iraqi Civilians Treated for Breathing Problems after ISIS Torches Sulphur Plant near Mosul ISIS executes 58 plotters, buries in mass grave amid reports on rebellion in Mosul US-led air raid kills 20 Iraqi pro-government fighters 1st Lt. Salam later told CNN his family flewitd Bazwaya a mere hour after ISIS turned up at their house and ordered them to go to Mosul. He says his father asked the ISIS fighters if he could have a few minutes to get his family. His father then went back to his house to collect them. Not long after that, coalition air strikes hit ISIS positions in the city, giving the family an opportunity to escape. 1st Lt. Salam says the last two and a half years have been a "living nightmare" and that he still can't believe his family are alive. Iraqi forces were on the doorstep of ISIS-held Mosul on Tuesday, the closest they've been since launching an operation two weeks ago to wrest the city from more than two years of ISIS rule.

Uncle Sam Wants You — Or at Least Your Genetic and Lifestyle Information - The New York Times

Robert Pear

WASHINGTON — Government scientists are seeking a million volunteers willing to share the innermost secrets of their genes and daily lives as part of an ambitious research project to understand the causes and cures of disease. Those selected to be members of the “precision medicine cohort” will be asked to provide a detailed medical history and blood samples so researchers can extract DNA. They will also be asked to report information about themselves — including their age, race, income, education, sexual orientation and gender identity, officials said. But the project involves much more than statistics and laboratory work. The government plans to collect information about a person’s lifestyle — diet, exercise, smoking, drinking, sleep patterns and other behavior — and the environment in which a person lives, so researchers can identify possible risk factors, including air pollution or high lead levels in drinking water. Those wishing to participate will be able to sign up by computer or smartphone, and even by using an ordinary telephone to contact a traditional call center. The project, begun as part of President Obama’s Precision Medicine Initiative, seeks to develop treatments tailored to the characteristics of individual patients. “Anybody anywhere can raise their hand and say they want to participate,” said Kathy L. Hudson, deputy director of the National Institutes of Health, which is leading the effort. Health care providers, including a number of hospitals and community health centers, will invite their patients to participate. Enrollment is scheduled to begin in November or December, with a goal of signing up a million or more people within four years. “There are a lot of enticing reasons to participate,” said Mark Masselli, president and chief executive of the Community Health Center in Middletown, Conn. one of a clinics chosen by the government to recruit patients. “Perched on your shoulders will be the best and brightest researchers, working on your behalf. ” The project is being orchestrated by Dr. Francis S. Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, who in a previous job led the government’s successful effort to map the human genome. Congress in December provided $130 million to the National Institutes of Health for the research cohort. Mr. Obama has requested $230 million for the fiscal year that starts Oct. 1, and the appropriations committees in both houses of Congress have approved the request as part of a spending bill for 2017. That bipartisan support strongly suggests that the project will continue after Mr. Obama leaves office. The scale of the project dwarfs most other health research in the United States, such as the Framingham Heart Study, which has produced valuable insights on heart disease by following about 15, 500 people enrolled at different times since the late 1940s. “In the Precision Medicine Initiative,” Dr. Hudson said, “we hope to follow people for at least a decade. The longer it lasts, the more value it will have. ” People can sign up through academic medical centers at Columbia University, Northwestern University in Illinois, the University of Arizona and the University of Pittsburgh, each of which is working with local partners. Columbia, for example, is collaborating with Hospital, Harlem Hospital and Weill Cornell Medicine. Participants will be recruited to reflect the geographic, racial, ethnic and socioeconomic diversity of the nation. To help achieve that goal, officials have enlisted community health centers, where more than 90 percent of patients have annual incomes less than twice the poverty level (less than $23, 760 for an individual). About of health center patients are Latinos, and about are . Officials said they wanted patients to be partners in the research, not just “human subjects. ” To that end, patients will have access to all the information about themselves, including laboratory and genetic test results. Doctors could eventually use the data to shape treatment for an individual patient, rather than using standard treatments that may not work for everyone. Patients will help guide the research, sitting on its steering committee and advisory board. The government intends to collect data from online questionnaires, physical exams, electronic health records and devices like Fitbit. Using smartphone apps and wearable sensors, participants could report information on their blood pressure, heart rate and other vital signs. Officials hope to recruit 150, 000 patients from community health centers. Anne Kauffman Nolon, president and chief executive of Hudson River HealthCare, a community health center serving 10 counties of New York, said her patients would need help to overcome several obstacles. The patients, she said, include homeless people, migrant seasonal farm workers, people with low literacy skills and people who have neither computers nor smartphones. Dr. Carmen Chinea, the chief medical officer of the Hudson River health center, said that participants would not receive instant gratification, but could eventually receive “more precise treatments” for conditions including diabetes, cancer and depression. The Mayo Clinic will create a huge biobank to collect, analyze and store 35 million samples of blood, DNA and other materials from participants. Vanderbilt University will operate a data center to store information. Some of the data will be made available, without personal identifiers, to researchers and “citizen scientists,” officials said. Cancer doctors already choose drugs for certain types of cancer based in part on genetic characteristics of tumors. Dr. Joshua C. Denny, the principal investigator for the project at Vanderbilt, said his research had identified genetic mutations that increase the risk of heart attack or stroke for people taking a certain medication. Dr. Rhonda K. Trousdale, chief of endocrinology at Harlem Hospital, said she was reaching out to church and community leaders to seek their help in publicizing the project and enrolling volunteers. “A big motivation for researchers is to use this data to find correlations between people’s lifestyle, family history, environment and genomic data — to figure out what factors contribute to disease and if they affect different populations in different ways,” Dr. Trousdale said. “That’s what precision medicine is about. ”

fundamentaly flawed humanity

anyone heard of the protective insert for women’s vaginas that impales any rapists dick if he were to try to rape her, women need something like this for their breasts, some creep tries to grope you, he gets impaled horribly.

Trump Keeping Promise to Ensure America’s Energy Independence in First 100 Days

Penny Starr

In his Contract with the American Voter pledge, President Donald J. Trump, then the Republican nominee, promised to move America in the direction of becoming energy independent through a series of executive orders, actions, agency directives, and guidance. [Under the heading “Seven Actions to Protect American Workers” in the contract, Trump spelled out how he would advance that goal in his first 100 days in office, which concludes on Saturday. “I will lift the restrictions on the production of $50 trillion dollars’ worth of American energy reserves, including shale, oil, natural gas and clean coal,” Trump said. He also pledged to “lift the roadblocks and allow vital energy infrastructure projects, like the Keystone Pipeline, to move forward. ” In a memorandum issued on January 24, 2017 — four days after taking the oath of office — Trump put his seal of approval on the Keystone XL Pipeline that the Obama administration held up for years based on protests from climate change activists and some Native American tribes. On January 26, the State Department announced the Keystone construction could move forward: Acting on behalf of the president under delegated authorities in accordance with Executive Order 13337 and the January 24, 2017 Presidential Memorandum Regarding Construction of the Keystone XL Pipeline, the Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs determined that issuing a Presidential permit to Keystone to construct, connect, operate, and maintain at the border of the United States pipeline facilities for the import of crude oil from Canada to the United States as described in the Presidential permit application for the proposed Keystone XL pipeline project would serve the national interest. Accordingly, the request for a Presidential permit is approved: “A significant milestone for the Keystone XL project,” said Russ Girling, president CEO https: . #TimeToBuildKXL, — TransCanada (@TransCanada) March 24, 2017, Also on January 24, Trump issued a memorandum on the Dakota Access pipeline in North Dakota, which Obama put on hold to appease protesters, including Native America tribes and allies who claimed environmental damage would result from the pipeline crossing under the Missouri River. But in the end, the people camping out on the land caused about $1 million in damage to the land that was repaired with American taxpayer dollars. “I believe that construction and operation of lawfully permitted pipeline infrastructure serve the national interest,” Trump said in the memorandum approving the final phase of construction for the Dakota Access pipeline. “We support the and direction President Trump has taken on energy with his approval of KXL, DAPL and his actions to streamline regulations,” Sabrina Fang, spokesperson for the American Petroleum Institute, told Breitbart News. “We look forward to working with this administration and Congress on energy policies that will help ensure the United States continues to lead the world in the production and refining of oil and natural gas and in reducing carbon emissions. ” “With the right policies, we have a opportunity to create more jobs, continue to help consumers, and improve the environment all at the same time,” Fang said. In February, Trump signed an executive order calling for the review of the Waters of the United States’ rule, part of the Clean Water Plan, which put restrictions on waters on private land, harming farming and ranching operations across the country. “Since its introduction in 2015, the rule has been greeted with frustration and litigation from many farming groups, including the Michigan Farm Bureau, which called the rule ‘a regulatory land grab of Biblical proportions,’” the Lansing State Journal reported. EPA administrator Scott Pruitt joined the president for the announcement of the executive order and issued this statement: EPA intends to immediately implement the Executive Order and submit a Notice to the Office of the Federal Register announcing our intent to review the 2015 Rule, and then to propose a new rule that will rescind or revise that rule. The President’s action today preserves a federal role in protecting water, but it also restores the states’ important role in the regulation of water. The rule, however, was already held up from implementation because of lawsuits filed by 13 states, but Trump’s order makes its implementation virtually impossible in the coming years. On March 28, surrounded by coal miners, Trump signed the “Promoting Energy Independence and Economic Growth” executive order. “My administration is putting an end to the war on coal,” Trump said in a speech prior to signing the executive order. In the order, Trump spells out his vision for America’s energy future: It is in the national interest to promote clean and safe development of our nation’s vast energy resources, while at the same time avoiding regulatory burdens that unnecessarily encumber energy production, constrain economic growth, and prevent job creation. Moreover, the prudent development of these natural resources is essential to ensuring the Nation’s geopolitical security. It is further in the national interest to ensure that the Nation’s electricity is affordable, reliable, safe, secure, and clean, and that it can be produced from coal, natural gas, nuclear material, flowing water, and other domestic sources, including renewable sources. Accordingly, it is the policy of the United States that executive departments and agencies (agencies) immediately review existing regulations that potentially burden the development or use of domestically produced energy resources and appropriately suspend, revise, or rescind those that unduly burden the development of domestic energy resources beyond the degree necessary to protect the public interest or otherwise comply with the law. In addressing coal in the sweeping order, Trump asked Ryan Zinke, secretary of the Interior Department, “to lift any and all moratoria on Federal land coal leasing activities related to Order 3338. The Secretary shall commence Federal coal leasing activities consistent with all applicable laws and regulations. ” The order also calls for review of restrictions on gas and oil production, including regulations on hydraulic fracturing. Trump took dead aim at the Obama administration’s climate change regulations, including ordering a review of the Clean Power Plan, Obama’s Climate Action Plan, and a slew of other actions taken during the past eight years. The order also called for the disbanding of the Interagency Working Group on Social Cost of Greenhouse Gases. “The action I’m taking eliminates federal overreach, restores economic freedom and allows our workers to thrive, compete and succeed on a level playing field for the first time in a long time,” Trump said about the order. “That’s what this is all about — bringing back our jobs, bringing back our dreams, and making America wealthy again,” Trump said. And in addition to the public executive orders and memorandums, a leaked working document from the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) reveals how Trump wants to return the vast amount of land held by the federal government to allow not only recreation, hunting, and accessibility for law enforcement and the military, but for energy exploration, development, and production. “Several conservation and government watchdog groups say they’re concerned about the direction the Bureau of Land Management is headed after a draft list of agency priorities under the Trump administration surfaced this week,” Greenwire’s EE News reported. “The draft ‘BLM Priority Work’ list, first reported on … by EE News, calls for the agency to focus on increasing energy development in suitable areas of the 245 million acres BLM manages (Greenwire, April 10),” EE News reported. The document is divided into five sections — “Making America Safe through Energy Independence,” “Making America Great Through Shared Conservation Stewardship,” “Making America Safe — Restoring Our Sovereignty,” “Getting America Back to Work,” and “Serving the American Family. ” “It also prioritizes streamlining unspecified ‘processes’ mandated by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) as well as ‘land use planning to support energy and minerals development and other priorities,’ including ‘ processing for pipelines, transmission lines, and projects,’” EE News reported.

Study Calls Snub of Obama’s Supreme Court Pick Unprecedented - The New York Times

Adam Liptak

WASHINGTON — How unusual is the Republican blockade of the nomination of Judge Merrick B. Garland, President Obama’s pick for the Supreme Court? After a comprehensive look at every past Supreme Court vacancy, two law professors have concluded that it is an unprecedented development. Senate Republicans say they will not consider any nominee offered by Mr. Obama to replace Justice Antonin Scalia, who died in February. The power to appoint Justice Scalia’s successor, they say, should belong to the next president. That categorical stance is new in the nation’s history, the professors, Robin Bradley Kar and Jason Mazzone, wrote in a study published online by The New York University Law Review. The Senate has never before transferred a president’s appointment power in comparable circumstances to an unknown successor, they said — an argument that many Democratic lawmakers have also made. In every one of the 103 earlier Supreme Court vacancies, the professors wrote, the president was able to both nominate and appoint a replacement with the Senate’s advice and consent. This did not always happen on the first try, they wrote, but it always happened. “There really is something unique about the position Republican senators are taking with respect to the Scalia vacancy,” said Professor Mazzone, who teaches at the University of Illinois. “You really cannot find any single comparable case,” he said. “We really did not find any precedent for the idea, notwithstanding the Senate’s very broad powers in this area, that a sitting president could be denied outright the authority to offer up a nominee who would receive evaluation through normal Senate processes. ” The study was the subject of a thorough critique by Edward Whelan, a prominent conservative legal blogger, who said Professors Kar and Mazzone had to perform semantic gymnastics to discern a consistent historical practice. The study considered only nominations to the Supreme Court, though the Senate must also confirm other federal judges and senior executive branch officials. “It is nonsensical to read into the Constitution one rule governing Supreme Court justices and another rule for everyone else,” Mr. Whelan wrote in a series of posts on National Review’s Bench Memos blog. The professors also excluded nominations from three presidents who gained office by succession rather than election, saying that the constitutional status of unelected presidents was contested until the adoption of the 25th Amendment in 1967. In addition, they excluded three presidents who started the nomination process after their successors had already been elected. You can make a decent case for both exceptions. It is harder to ignore President Lyndon B. Johnson’s failure in 1968, an election year, to fill Chief Justice Earl Warren’s seat. Johnson ultimately withdrew his nomination of Justice Abe Fortas. The study’s authors “gerrymander their way around this inconvenience,” Mr. Whelan wrote, by saying that there was no actual vacancy to fill because Warren had merely declared in a letter to Johnson that he was prepared to step down “effective at your pleasure. ” The Fortas affair helps both sides in the debate. Some senators opposed his nomination on the grounds that the next president should make the appointment. But the Senate Judiciary Committee held confirmation hearings and sent the nomination to the Senate floor. The nomination failed, but mostly on the basis of an individualized assessment of Fortas’s qualifications to be chief justice. “There is a difference,” Professor Mazzone said, “between the Senate rejecting, as it’s quite entitled to do, a particular nominee on the merits, and the Senate taking the position that a president cannot exercise a constitutionally delegated power. ” Should it matter if the Senate has always given presidents a real shot at appointing a Supreme Court justice? At a minimum, the authors say, the historical precedents establish “a benchmark of fair dealing. ” More controversially, they say that historical practices “can ripen into constitutional rules. ” That is not obviously true, but the Supreme Court seemed to say something similar in 2014, in a case on recess appointments. But even if the constitutional argument is a stretch, tradition counts for something. “History draws a distinction between rejecting a candidate and rejecting a presidential power,” said Professor Kar, who also teaches at the University of Illinois. “It’s a norm of fair dealing in the Senate. Procedure matters, and this breach is a dangerous one. ” Mr. Whelan wrote that the study supplied an answer to the wrong question. The right one, he said, is “how to deal with (a) a nomination by an president, (b) in an election year, (c) that threatens to dramatically alter the ideological composition of the court. ” That is a good description of current political realities. Professors Kar and Mazzone say they instead tried to discern a neutral principle from centuries of unbroken practice. I asked Professor Mazzone what he would tell a Republican senator to do in considering Judge Garland’s nomination. “You do what the Senate has always done in comparable circumstances,” he said, “which is you proceed with a evaluation of the candidate on the merits. ”

Subdued Cuba Prepares Memorial for Castro - The New York Times

Damien Cave

HAVANA — Cuba is preparing for Fidel Castro’s final public appearance: a memorial offering Cubans a chance to pay their respects. Details of Mr. Castro’s death on Friday night, at the age of 90, have yet to be made public. But as if performing a play that had been rehearsed for a decade, the government continued to roll out plans for what official statements have called a period of “Duelo Nacional,” or national mourning. Government employees have begun setting up speakers and yellow gates at the Plaza de la Revolución, where the memorial will begin on Monday. Granma, the main government newspaper, published a special edition on Mr. Castro’s life and achievements. Statements and articles in government news outlets have also been lionizing Mr. Castro’s life and achievements — “All of Cuba With Fidel,” said one headline — while warning that liquor sales would be limited nationwide until next Sunday, when the mourning period is scheduled to end at noon. “Public activities and events will be suspended, and national flags will fly at in public buildings and military installations,” Granma reported. “Radio and television will continue with programming that is informative, patriotic and historical. ” All across Havana on Saturday night and Sunday morning, Cubans seemed quieter, more cautious, less certain of what the future might hold. Several nightclubs stayed closed on Saturday night. Traffic lessened, and the usual weekend music and revelry seemed dialed back. Many predicted that the somber mood — both sincere and enforced by the state — would hold until Mr. Castro’s ashes were interred in Santiago de Cuba next Sunday after a procession along the country’s central highway. Elian Gonzalez, the center of an international custody battle waged by Fidel Castro nearly two decades ago, returned to the public eye on Sunday to praise the leader who fought to return him to Cuba. Echoing the adulation on state media, Mr. Gonzalez said on television that the Cuban leader’s legacy will long outlive him. It’s “not right to talk about Fidel in the past tense . .. but rather that Fidel will be,” Mr. Gonzalez said. “Today more than ever, make him omnipresent. ” At one of Havana’s most popular hot spots — behind the imposing Capitolio building, which is being restored to hold the country’s national legislature — the crowds were smaller than usual after dark on Saturday. Several young Cubans could be seen scrolling through Facebook and pointing out what relatives and friends around the world were sharing about Mr. Castro’s death. Only a handful were talking to those relatives by video chat, which is usually the most popular activity in the hot spots spread across Havana. Tourists in the group said they were surprised but pleased to have been on the island during such a historic moment. “I’m definitely going tomorrow to see everyone saying goodbye to Fidel,” said Miguel Castillo, 52, a visitor from Costa Rica. “He was a symbol of resistance. The people of Latin America had long been listening to his voice, to his call for autonomy. ” Marini Danilo, 30, a tourist from Italy, said he couldn’t believe his vacation had turned into a chance “to live in such a big story. ” “For me, he was just another dictator,” Mr. Danilo said. “He was not my dictator, he was Cuba’s, but it feels crazy to be here. ” At least on Sunday, the scale of the goodbye for Mr. Castro was hard to gauge. Cubans have long known that when the world is watching, so are the state authorities: During international conferences, during President Obama’s visit in March and, now, after Mr. Castro’s death, the presence of state security becomes more intense, both in the streets and behind the scenes. Even without such clear warnings, Cubans — after decades of living under Mr. Castro and his brother Raúl — know that in such moments they are expected to behave and to say very little, especially to visiting reporters. So far, grief and memorialization have been dominated by the state. There have been only occasional public expressions or gatherings of any kind: a few students from a young Communist group getting together to grieve publicly on Saturday a small group of Cubans waving flags on the Malecón, the city’s seaside boulevard. At the Plaza de la Revolución on Saturday night, the wide expanse of concrete was empty except for the police, some soldiers — and exactly four visitors snapping photos. But starting on Monday, Cubans expect to see thousands of others, for the final spectacle of the Fidel Castro era.

Sleepwalking into a New Cold War, Pentagon Style

Franklin C. Spinney

Written by Franklin C. Spinney Pentagon’s five year plan has been planted (or in Pentagon-speak, “front loaded”) with the seed money for a top-to-bottom modernization of our nuclear forces — a new bomber, new inter-continental ballistic missiles (ICBM) (even though the Minutemen III has just been completely modernized and is essentially a new missile), new nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines (SSBM), upgraded (read “new”) submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBM), a new cruise missile, and big upgrade (read “new”) to the B-61 dial-a-yield nuclear bomb (including precision guidance which implies going back to the looney tit-for-tat nuclear war-fighting doctrines of late 1970s), a new nuclear-hardened satellite based command and control system to manage all these goodies in a nuclear war, even more money for the strategic defense initiative (SDI) (the shield to protect the aforementioned swords), and a rebuilding of the nuclear lab infrastructure. The current estimate for all of this is one trillion dollars, with a spending tail out to at least 2080. That number is surely a grotesque underestimate, because no one really has a clue what these as yet undesigned systems will cost to buy, much less to operate in the distant future. And if the problem-plagued F-35 has proven anything, it is that the Pentagon’s ability to predict the future budgetary consequences of high-complexity weapons development programs is laughable. If you were a Russian with proud and painful memories of the bloodletting, terror, bravery, and patriotic myths of the 1812, WWI, WWII, and the Cold War, how would you react when a possible adversary becomes hell-bent on shoveling money into such a program? Would you believe it is for deterrence only? These nuclear modernization programs need time (at least 3-5 years) to gestate — i.e. to impregnate the US body politic with a politically-engineered flow of money to as many congressional districts as possible. Once the congressional districts become addicted to its money flows, the nuclear modernization program will become unstoppable for the same reason the F-35 is unstoppable, and an escalating cold war will be necessary to justify them over the long term. Should that happen, we won’t see the end of Cold War II in our lifetimes. Think of the front-loading, political engineering power games (as I explained in a 1990 pamphlet and again in congressional testimony in 2002) as a programmatic right-to-life politics, Pentagon style. Hence the central warmongering role of think tanks, the press, and self-styled foreign policy mandarins described by Dennis Kucinich’s this excellent opinion piece . Their hyped hysteria will distract attention away from the Pentagon’s systematic front-loading operation. The goal is to buy time for the Pentagon and its contractors to infiltrate the political system to build the politically-engineered social safety net of dependent congressional districts from the bottom-up. I’ve seen this kind infiltration operation before (in the late 1970s and again in early 1990s) from the perspective on the inside of the “giving end,” just as Members of Congress like Dennis Kucinich have seen the effects of the politically engineered result before from the “receiving end.” The name of the game is to create an unstoppable one-two punch for higher defense budgets — as became evident in the early 1980s and late 1990s. Unless it is nipped in bud, this will become evident again in the next few years. Finally, once the Cold War II gets legitimated, and tensions are heightened by Russia’s natural reaction to the US nuclear “modernization” program, it will become easier to inflate conventional threats (say to the new NATO countries in Eastern Europe) to create the permanent state of fear needed to justify a high-tech, high-cost expansion and modernization of our conventional military forces — e.g., an F-22 follow-on, more Ford-class carriers, a new family of armoured vehicles, etc. So, yes, money is at the center of America’s sleepwalk into a New Cold War — and time is rapidly running out to stop the current generation of sleepwalking mandarins who think they can steer the ship of state while the boys and girls in the boiler room of the Pentagon are busy cutting the cables connecting the steering wheel to the rudder. Franklin “Chuck” Spinney is a former military analyst for the Pentagon and a contributor to Hopeless: Barack Obama and the Politics of Illusion , published by AK Press. Related

China Warns Trump against Abandoning Climate Change Deal, Increases Climate Change Aid to Developing Countries to $ 3.1b

Kim Petersen

Trump win opens way for China to take climate leadership role. 3 Shares 2 0 0 1 China has warned Donald Trump that he will be defying the wishes of the entire planet if he acts on his vow to back away from the Paris climate agreement after he becomes US president next January. The election of climate change skeptic Donald Trump as president is likely to end the U.S. leadership role in the international fight against global warming and may lead to the emergence of a new and unlikely champion: China. “It is global society’s will that all want to co-operate to combat climate change,” a senior Beijing negotiator said in Morocco on Friday, at the first round of UN talks since the Paris deal was sealed last December. The Chinese negotiators added that “any movement by the new US government” would not affect their transition towards becoming a greener economy. China worked closely with the administration of outgoing President Barack Obama to build momentum ahead of the 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change. The partnership of the two biggest greenhouse gas emitters helped get nearly 200 countries to support the pact at the historic meet in France's capital. By contrast, Trump has called global warming a hoax created by China to give it an economic advantage and said he plans to remove the United States from the historic climate agreement, as well as reverse many of Obama's measures to combat climate change. MORE... Canadian Big Media ignoring responsibility by failing to cover climate change crisis Petition calls for DOJ investigation into ExxonMobil's denial of climate science Zou Ji, deputy director of the National Centre for Climate Change Strategy and a senior Chinese climate talks negotiator, told Reuters that if Trump abandons efforts to implement the Paris agreement, "China's influence and voice are likely to increase in global climate governance, which will then spill over into other areas of global governance and increase China's global standing, power and leadership." China is expected to play a pivotal role in consolidating and enhancing South-South partnership, particularly when it comes to issues related to climate change. China is steadily ramping up efforts to assist other developing countries in addressing climate change, a gesture that has received wide welcome. Speaking to the Chinese news agency Xinhua, Moroccan Foreign Minister and Climate Change Conference (COP22) President Salaheddine Mezouar said that China has an “extremely important role to play in accompanying, reinforcing and boosting South-South partnership and support sustainable development policies in the African continent”. Xie Ji, deputy chief of the Chinese delegation to the ongoing 22nd session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 22), said on Nov. 7 that China has ironed out a concrete program to help other developing countries to become more climate-resilient. "We will help build up ten low-carbon pilot zones, launch 100 climate change mitigation and adaptation projects, and offer training programs for 1,000 climate-related professionals," he said. What Xie called the "10-100-1000" project is part of the effort that China has made in recent years to help other developing countries fight against climate change. The country has earmarked a total of 580 million yuan (about US$85 million) since 2011 to help developing countries, according to Zhang Yucheng, deputy director of the International Cooperation Division of the Department of Climate Change of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC). The most recent offer is the South-South Climate Cooperation Fund, a US$3.1 billion fund pledged by Chinese President Xi Jinping last September to help developing countries address climate issues.

As Evening Commute Gets Darker, It Also Gets More Dangerous, Officials Warn - The New York Times

Winnie Hu

The end of daylight saving time next month will create a more dangerous evening commute as people find it harder to see on the streets, New York City officials say. The earlier sunset and darkness have been linked to an increase in the number of pedestrians killed or seriously injured by vehicles, according to an analysis by the city’s Department of Transportation of data from 2010 to 2014, the most recent years available. In the latest instance, a woman was fatally struck by a Metropolitan Transportation Authority bus on Friday evening as she walked in Lower Manhattan. The bus driver was arrested and charged with failure to yield to a pedestrian, according to the police. As a result, the administration of Mayor Bill de Blasio will announce on Thursday a new $1. 5 million “dusk and darkness” safety campaign that will include radio and television advertisements, signs on buses, and billboards to warn drivers as well as pedestrians to be more careful, especially at that time of day. In addition, the police will target drivers during those hours who speed, fail to yield to pedestrians, text on cellphones or block bike lanes. The campaign is part of the city’s Vision Zero plan, a set of proposals that aims to eliminate fatalities and injuries caused by vehicles. This year, as of Monday, there have been 192 traffic fatalities, 114 of which involved pedestrians — the rest involved people in cars, bicyclists and people on motorcycles. In contrast, there were 177 traffic fatalities during the same period last year, of which 96 involved pedestrians. “To meet our ambitious Vision Zero goals, especially during the more dangerous reality of this season’s evenings and nights, we have focused our efforts even further,” Mr. de Blasio said in a statement. “Our key Vision Zero agencies have teamed up to not only study crash data, but to work closely together and make critical adjustments that we believe will literally save lives. ” It is the first time that the city has adjusted traffic policy based on time and seasonal changes, though in the past, it has stepped up traffic enforcement at the beginning of the school year or during the winter holidays. Nationally, a similar pattern has emerged, according to Michael Flannagan, an associate research professor at the University of Michigan, who has studied traffic safety nationally. “You do see a big jump in pedestrian fatalities and injuries in the evenings in the fall when the change back to standard time makes the evenings suddenly darker,” he said. Dr. Flannagan added, however, that the increase was not caused by a disruption of sleep from the time change, but instead “simply because it was dark” and it becomes harder for drivers to see pedestrians. Conversely, in the spring, when the transition to daylight saving time makes the evenings suddenly lighter, there is a corresponding decrease in pedestrian fatalities and injuries nationally, he said. The city’s traffic analysis showed that between 6 p. m. and 7 p. m. during the week — the prime commuting time — the weekday hourly average rate of severe injuries and fatalities involving pedestrians rose to 2. 44 in or nearly triple the average rate of 0. 84 in August. “It’s certainly much more dangerous at dusk both for pedestrians and motorists,” said Dr. Daniel M. Laby, the director of the Sports and Performance Vision Center at the State University of New York College of Optometry. Dr. Laby added that even people with normal eyesight could not see as well at dusk because the human eye does not adapt well to decreasing light. Vision becomes less sharp, with less contrast and depth perception. In addition, he said, there is typically more glare from uneven lighting as the sun sets, and more visual distractions compared with nighttime, when headlights help to focus attention. “You put this all together,” Dr. Laby said. “It almost makes you not want to go home at night. It’s risky. ” Amy Cohen, 51, a social worker in Park Slope, Brooklyn, said that, sadly, she was only too aware of the dangers on city streets at dusk. Her son, Sammy Eckstein, 12, was fatally struck by a van not long after 5 p. m. in October 2013 while retrieving a ball that had rolled into the street. Ms. Cohen, who helped found the advocacy group Families for Safe Streets, said that while she supported the new campaign, the city also needed to take more steps to permanently redesign streets and slow traffic, such as widening sidewalks, increasing the crossing time at traffic lights, narrowing driving lanes and installing traffic cameras that record speeding vehicles. “Education is a good start but much more needs to be done,” she said. The city’s traffic analysis found that dusk and evening crashes were often the result of drivers trying to make turns. In particular, there was a surge in severe injuries and fatalities from November to March, according to the analysis. “Through education and enforcement with our sister agencies, every driver needs to learn about the limited visibility of this season and the dangers of fast turns, especially in the evening hours,” said Polly Trottenberg, the city’s transportation commissioner. Ms. Trottenberg said the problem was underscored last year by a rash of nine pedestrian fatalities — three of which occurred during daylight hours — in the eight days after daylight saving time ended on Nov. 1. In total, there were 138 pedestrian fatalities in 2015, the lowest number since 1910. As part of the new safety campaign, city officials will seek to publicize the dangers of dusk and darkness through radio ads that are timed to run during the evening commute, and cards that will be handed out urging drivers to slow down, especially when turning, and to “look closely” since “more pedestrians are hurt in crashes around sunset than any other time. ” Pedestrians are also reminded to watch for turning cars. In addition, the city is specifically contacting people at senior centers, and taxi and livery drivers.

CLAIM: Just Mentioning Brexit Causes Hate Crime, Parliament Committee Told

Virginia Hale

Politicians encourage hate crimes by discussing Brexit, and formally triggering the process will bring attacks to “another level” MPs have been told. [Polish community leaders claimed the aspects of Britain that migrants like best, its “culture of tolerance” and “diversity” have been shattered since the Brexit vote because people have been emboldened to carry out verbal and physical attacks against migrants. “Every statement and every political activity around Brexit negotiations brings a spike in inquiries to our organisation. We expect when article 50 is triggered it will bring another level of discontent,” Barbara Drozdowicz, of the East European Resource Centre (EERC) told the Commons Home Affairs Committee. Ms. Drozdowicz fingered criticism of mass migration as a driver of ‘hate’ in response to a question by fierce Remain campaigner Chuka Umunna. The Labour MP pointed to “Leave. EU, UKIP obviously” when he asked the EERC director whether she believes the “Leave campaign” and figures “bear a responsibility” for attacks. “The campaign was built on controlling migration. ‘Controlling migration’ is not a neutral term,” she told MPs. When Conservative David Burrowes noted that most examples of ‘hate’ are expressed online, community leaders admitted they’ve neither seen nor had reports of content on the internet that’s abusive to migrants from Europe. Tadeusz Stenzel, the chair of trustees at the Federation of Poles in Great Britain, suggested there might be a language barrier which prevents European migrants from being able to understand abusive posts and report them. MPs heard that European migrants began reporting ‘hate crimes’ in around April of last year as the referendum campaign got into gear, but that only after Britons voted to leave the European Union (EU) was the resource centre inundated with an “explosion of calls”. Ms. Drozdowicz said migrants from Eastern Europe reported being told to “go home” and hearing ‘casual hate speech’ on public transport and that the centre heard about violent incidents including a Polish child being beaten up at school. Chairman of the committee, Yvette Cooper, said the details of incidents that were talked about in the session were “appalling”. “Hate crime is appalling, and should have no place in our country,” she said. Heading the government’s inquiry into ‘hate crime’ in November, Ms. Cooper accused the campaigns of both Leave, during the EU referendum, and Donald Trump, in the U. S. presidential race, of having incited hatred.

Democrats & Republicans Just Joined Forces To Condemn Comey’s Partisan Smears

Grant Stern

Comments I learned exclusively tonight that the Democratic Coalition Against Trump is being joined by University of Minnesota Law Professor Richard Painter in a non-partisan joint campaign to mount a public campaign against an expedite a response to their parallel complaints against FBI Director James Comey for his partisan witch-hunt of Hillary Clinton. Painter is a former Bush Administration White House Counsel who served as ethics counsel to the President. “Richard Painter and I connected this evening, and we are sending out the message clearly that the FBI Director’s behavior is a non-partisan issue, and we will be sending out a joint press release tomorrow morning accordingly,” said Scott Dworkin, Senior Adivsor to the Democratic Coalition Against Trump. Both parties seek to prevent future political interference by America’s top federal law enforcement agency into partisan elections. “We plan to make joint television and other media appearances together with Professor Painter,” said Dworkin who plans to participate in the broadcasts, “or alongside other members of the DCAT.” Each independently made similar complaints to Department of Justice’s Office of Special Counsel’s ruling about the FBI Director’s recent memo . Because the memo has intruded on this year’s presidential election, DCAT and Painter are alleging that FBI Director Comey’s violated the Hatch Act, which prohibits pernicious partisan use of office by federal employees or officials. The FBI Director ignored Justice Department policy guidance which proscribes public investigatory actions within 60-days of an election. It’s a policy that has been respected across parties and administrations for decades to keep justice and elections un-entwined. Justice officials specifically advised Comey of the policy . He sent a mea culpa letter to other FBI agents just hours after the election-impacting memo. The Democratic Coalition Against Trump filed the first reported Hatch Act complaint against FBI Director Comey in the wake of his unusual memo Friday afternoon. Yesterday, Professor Richard Painter filed his own Hatch Act and ethics complaint against the FBI Director and an ethics complaint over the same memo, which is also drawing the ire of the career professionals at the top federal investigatory agency.

Iraqi Army Seen as Ill Equipped to Retake Mosul From ISIS, Despite U.S. Aid - The New York Times

Michael S. Schmidt and Eric Schmitt

WASHINGTON — An exhausted and Iraqi Army faces daunting obstacles on the battlefield that will most likely delay for months a major offensive on the Islamic State stronghold of Mosul, American and allied officials say. The delay is expected despite American efforts to keep Iraq’s creaky war machine on track. Although President Obama vowed to end the United States’ role in the war in Iraq, in the last two years the American military has increasingly provided logistics to prop up the Iraqi military, which has struggled to move basics like food, water and ammunition to its troops. Without the help, Americans commanders said, the offensive against Mosul would most likely fail. Americans are ferrying equipment and spare parts directly to the battlefield by cargo plane, helping arrange purchases of ammunition for equipment and pressing the Iraqis to adopt measures to improve a supply chain that would run over 200 miles from Defense Ministry depots in the Baghdad area to Mosul. But no matter how hard the Americans push, the Iraqis can go only so fast. The pace of ground operations is likely to become even slower in the summer’s searing heat and during the coming holy month of Ramadan, when Muslims often fast during the day. Much of the Iraqis’ equipment needs to be repaired or replaced, and many Iraqi units will require additional training before attacking Mosul. “A lull won’t be sexy, but it’s the hard and important work that needs to be done to generate combat power,” said Col. Steven Warren, who until this month was the top American military spokesman in Iraq. The logistical challenges are far from the only hurdles facing the United States as it struggles to deal with the complexities in Iraq. Iran is supporting tens of thousands of Iraqi soldiers, police officers and Shiite militiamen who are preparing for an assault against the Islamic State in the Sunni city of Falluja in western Iraq, which has raised fears of a sectarian blood bath. Prime Minister Haider of Iraq ordered the Falluja offensive over the objections of American advisers who urged him to focus on the bigger prize of Mosul, Iraq’’s city and the de facto headquarters of the Islamic State in Iraq. But after a series of Islamic State suicide bombings last month killed hundreds in Baghdad, Mr. Abadi faced growing domestic pressure to stop the threat in Falluja, which is about 35 miles west of the capital. The Iraqis have long struggled with their military organization, but the problem worsened in the summer of 2014 when the Islamic State seized wide swaths of territory in western and northern Iraq and stole much of the military’s trucks and other equipment used to move troops and supplies. Since then, American logisticians have been working directly with the Iraqis to try to improve their supply chain. The problem has been complicated because the Iraqi military is made up of a mix of equipment and weapons from the Soviet era, the United States and elsewhere. The Iraqis rely on an antiquated maintenance system that sends broken equipment to Baghdad to be fixed, and they do not have an automated system for tracking their supplies. American advisers have worked to overhaul the maintenance system, encouraging the Iraqis to develop the ability to do repairs closer to the battlefields. The Americans have also arranged for other countries in the coalition fighting the Islamic State to give or sell the Iraqis the ammunition and parts they need to keep their military functioning. The Americans have also taken the lead in preparing detailed schedules for moving troops, training them, and delivering ammunition and equipment to the battlefield. “As the Iraqis move farther away from their depots at places like Taji, they will have to adopt similar sustainment practices,” Lt. Gen. Sean B. MacFarland, the top American commander in Iraq, said in an email, referring to a city just north of Baghdad. “To do this requires a good deal of reorganization. ” “Extending the reach of the Iraqi security forces also requires logistics planning,” General MacFarland said. “We are doing a great deal of that for the Iraqis because we recognize that Rome wasn’t built in a day. ” The Iraqis have had some success against the Islamic State since December. This year, for the first time since the fighting against the Islamic State began in August 2014, the terrorist group has not gained any additional territory. The Iraqis have reclaimed the city of Ramadi and several smaller cities in western and northern Iraq. Backed by air power, Iraqi forces have regained 45 percent of the territory the Islamic State seized in 2014, American commanders say, an increase from 40 percent at the beginning of the year. Bombing by Americans and other European countries involved in the fight, including the British and French, has halved the Islamic State’s oil production and cut its revenues between 30 and 50 percent, American intelligence analysts say. But the analysts have concluded that many of the areas that the Iraqis need to reclaim — including Mosul — will be more difficult to seize because the Islamic State has controlled them for a longer period and has heavily fortified them. The Islamic State has roughly 19, 000 to 25, 000 fighters, about half in Iraq and half in Syria, Colonel Warren said. Most of the 10, 000 to 12, 000 in Iraq are concentrated around Mosul, in the Tal Afar area, and elsewhere in Nineveh Province. The expected delay in the Mosul offensive highlights the frustrations of the Obama administration with the seesaw nature of the Iraqi ground campaign. But Mr. Obama and his commanders decided that it was better for Iraqis to control the tempo of the counteroffensive, even with its fits and starts, than for the United States to reclaim a leading combat role that Mr. Obama thought he had ended when he withdrew all American troops in 2011. “Logistics is one of the things we are most concerned about, so we look to do everything we can to keep the timeline on track,” said Col. Christopher Garver, the United States spokesman for the coalition fighting the Islamic State in Iraq. “Yes, there’s a danger of things slipping to the right on the calendar, as we say, pushing into the future, but we have a whole team working to prevent that from happening. ” In interviews, Iraqi commanders in the Falluja operation acknowledged some of the challenges facing their troops, but they sought to discount the impact on their operations. “We have a lot of experience fighting in the hot weather and are used to it, but, yes, fighting in the heat is a very difficult thing,” said Abdul Wahab the commander of military operations in Falluja. “The enemy in front of us is ISIS, and it is not an easy enemy and we don’t want to give it the impression that our fighters are getting tired in the hot weather. So no matter high the temperatures are, we will continue fighting until liberating Falluja entirely. ” The commander of operations in nearby Ramadi said the military would make some tactical adjustments because of the heat but not stop fighting altogether. “Let’s be frank: In Iraq, even if we go to market we get annoyed by the heat,” said the commander, Ismael . “But we must beat the heat and put the appropriate plans in place to get over it and continue operations. We will take advantage of the dawn times to attack. ” Asked for a description of the air campaign in the coming months, Lt. Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. the American air war commander, said he would keep the pressure on the Islamic State, even if the tempo of the Iraqi ground offensive eased. “As the Air Force, we’re able to strike ahead of the ground maneuver,” General Brown said. “I know where the next fight is going to be. Then what I want to be able to do is actually soften up that with strikes ahead of the ground maneuver. ”

8 classic football banners of our time

Poke Staff

Next Swipe left/right 8 classic football banners of our time Proof that sometimes the most entertaining part of a football match is the banners made by fans – here are 8 from over the years that have brightened up the beautiful game. 1. Aston Villa v Fulham, 2006

Re: Do You Believe In Miracles?

JC Teecher

Do You Believe In Miracles? By Michael Snyder, on November 9th, 2016 We have never seen anything like this in the history of American politics. Donald Trump’s shocking victory on election night is nothing short of a modern day miracle. Several weeks ago I told my readers that it would take the biggest political miracle ever in order for Trump to win, and I had been strongly urging them to vote , but even early on election night I was skeptical that Trump could actually pull it off. Initially the results coming out of Florida, North Carolina and Ohio looked rather ominous, and a lot of Trump supporters were freaking out. But those initial numbers strongly reflected early voting results, and those results typically favor Democrats. Once the Election Day numbers started rolling in, it was clear that there was a massive unanticipated wave of momentum for Trump. Once I saw that Virginia was going to be much more tightly contested than anticipated and that Trump had jumped out to a lead in Michigan, I realized that Trump had a really good shot at winning the whole thing. Over Skype I told a stunned audience that the numbers were looking really good for Trump, but it was still so early in the evening that I don’t know if a lot of people believed me. And I certainly didn’t blame them, because I could hardly believe it myself. Once Trump took the lead for good in Pennsylvania, I knew that it was all over. My wife and I looked at each other in disbelief, and we are still trying to come to grips with a future that we didn’t think was possible. Watching Donald Trump speak to the American people after he had been declared the winner was a surreal experience. At this moment, it still doesn’t seem real to me that he could become the next president of the United States a little more than two months from now. But at this point it looks like that is precisely what is going to happen. After it was all over, I kind of stumbled around my home lost in my thoughts. I was happy, confused, hopeful, stunned and pensive all at the same time. Like so many others, what I thought I knew about politics turned out to be wrong. But in other ways, the election of Donald Trump has confirmed so much of what I know to be right about America. Ultimately, it was the American people that decided this election, because the elite were doing their best to absolutely bury him. Never before has the mainstream media been so openly biased against a major party presidential candidate. For months on end they dumped sewage on Trump, but it didn’t work. Never before has a major party presidential candidate faced a civil war in his own party on the eve of the election. A whole host of big names in the Republican Party publicly announced that they would not vote for Trump, but it didn’t work. Never before have we seen a bigger October surprise than the lewd tape from 11 year ago that came out and shocked the world. That would have instantly killed the campaign of any normal politician, but it didn’t kill Trump’s campaign. From the very beginning it seemed like Trump was at war with almost everyone, and somehow he came out on top in the end. He beat the Bushes and the Clintons. He beat the Republicans and the Democrats. He beat Hollywood and the mainstream media. He beat the pollsters and the pundits. He beat the never-Trumpers and the billionaire donors. He beat Miley Cyrus, Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, Jay Z, Beyonce, George Clooney, Matt Damon and Lebron James. He beat the forces of globalism, elitism and political correctness. He beat CNN, Fox News, MSNBC and Barack Obama. He beat them all. Of course Donald Trump is not perfect and he is not going to be a perfect president. But this is about as perfect a moment as you are going to get in American politics. Donald Trump took on the entire American political universe and he won. We have never seen anything like it before, and I doubt we will ever see anything like it again. And I want to apologize for being so skeptical to those that kept trying to tell me that Trump was going to win. As a former attorney, I was trained to be skeptical and to look at the cold, hard numbers. And the cold, hard numbers kept telling me that a Trump victory was nearly impossible. I kept strongly urging people to vote, particularly because the prospect of a Hillary Clinton presidency was absolutely horrifying for me personally, but I was not optimistic. In hindsight, perhaps we all should have recognized that the signs were there. For example, it seems a very strange “coincidence” that Donald Trump will be 70 years, 7 months and 7 days old on his first full day as president of the United States. This is a man that appears to have had a date with destiny, and we shall see what happens in the months to come. Yes, there will be great challenges ahead, but those discussions are for another day. Today I am just happy. I am happy that the American people have elected a man that I will be proud to call president. And I am happy that we are not going to have to endure four years under the most wicked, vile and corrupt politician that the United States has ever seen. Against all odds, Donald Trump won. At this point I am not exactly sure what comes next for America, but things are definitely looking a lot brighter today than they did yesterday. BATTLE LOG You missed one! He beat the radical, far left trolls that frequent this website and harass conservatives and religious folk alike! Bwahahahaaaa!!!! She’s having a nervous breakdown. Mad Monkey As predicted the ‘Trump’ has blown long and loud, I am shocked at the stocks market upswing and drop in gold price….. Apparently the guys at wall street were booing Clinton during her concession speech,… It is all a bit wired, so much lies from mainstream media. Mondobeyondo Nearly every mainstream media poll had Clinton beating Trump. They were just salivating over a Clinton victory. The champagne was even on ice. In the immortal words of Yogi Berra, “It ain’t over till it’s over”. DB200 Mondo, same thing for the Brexit. Either people don’t tell what they think when they are polled or the polls are manipulated/fixed by the MSM. Coming year there will be elections in several countries in Europe and it is possible that extreme right (= Eurospeak for real Republicans) will win more votes than the polls suggest. If for instance Marine le Pen wins the French presidency, that may end the euro and even the EU. Fact is that ordinary people are fed up with the political elites. df NJ New Jersey rules this country! New Jersey is a lot like Galilee, everyone thinks it’s a shiite hole. Jim Many alt media sites predicted a Trump win and you could not help but see it if you were paying attention . ie crowds and signs for Trump etc. df NJ I think the miracle is God intervened and stopped the voter fraud. alan I think there was fraud it just wasn’t enough. Brian I thought Brexit was a Miracle but what transpired last night easily TRUMPS that! ;-D Amazing Grace Trump VS. The American Aristocracy David VS. Goliath. Satirist 1976 America definitely made the wrong move. It saddens me that Hillary was unjustly vilified. Hillary is devoted to her country. Also she is a champion of woman’s rights, the environment, and tolerance. When it comes to understanding the importance of protecting the environment Trump is at the apex of ignorance. He wants to undo the Clean Air act and dismantle the Paris accord. Global warming is a serious issue that must be dealt with urgently. The unemployment rate is at 4.9% Since the height of the recession the unemployment rate has dropped by more than half. America has enjoyed over 6 straight years of private sector job growth. Yearly GDP has finished positive for 6 straight years. PMI indexes have been consistently over 50. A reading over 50 indicates expansion. Obamacare is a gift from God. It will end up saving thousands of lives. Millions of Americans have become more cognizant of the importance of respecting and not marginalizing minorities. Weekly unemployment claims have been under 300K for over 80 straight weeks. The longest such streak in over 40 years. Americans everywhere should thank Obama for his faithful service to America. kfilly You can quote Reich propaganda all you want. Hitlery would have brought you World War 3 shooting down Russina jets with her “no fly zone” in a country we should not even be fighting over (Syria). chris ‘Hilary is devoted to her country’ !!!! And which country is that? i ask because it certainly ain’t the USA. AWM Michael……maybe now you can start blogging about more inspirational stories and ideals, and try to bring hope to people rather than the gloom and doom that pours from your sad self. Maybe you need to be on an antidepressant, it’s worth looking into at least. You claim to be a man of God, but I understand a true believer in God has faith and hope in all things, not doubt and worry. Pray for healing and give your worries to your savior. kathym2 I think people finally woke up. K Yes, far more than the numbers indicate.You see I believe the landslide was so great it overcame the fraud and the manipulation. I believe that God in his mercy, gave us one last chance. A chance to turn from the evil this Country has become.If we waste this chance. I would not expect, to be thrown another lifeline. kfilly I still see something far more sinister behind this. I want to see if Trump sticks to the Constitution or becomes a tyrant by usurping it. As far as the sinister part, I potentially see conservative/freedom movements getting set up for the coming global economic collapse. The freedom Brexit movement and now the election of Donald Trump ensure two of the biggest players in the Western World can wreak a lot of havoc on the global economic system. I fear the elite will collapse the economy in 3, 2, 1. These people have back up plans for their plans. They will not give up simply because their favorite puppet lost. I see a potential future where freedom lovers get blamed for the destruction of the economy that was intentionally destroyed by globalists (communists) which is similar to what Nazi Germany did to the Jews. greanfinisher . I wouldn’t describe the Trump upset as a miracle, but rather a travesty. Well, you people bought him so now you will have to pay. chris Just as in the UK Brexit vote the result will bring out the sour grapes and the sore losers. old geezer If we was able to survive 8 years of a Muslim Terrorist in the White House, I think we can manage to survive 4 to 8 years with an American Patriot. DB200 A millionaire and a TV personality will be the next US president. Sounds like “Berlusconi” to me. So at least it will be entertaining the coming years as Mr. Trump is a more colourful person than Mr. Obama. Nevertheless, a major achievement given the obstacles he had to overcome. BrentAH Michael, here’s what you failed to take into account — people all over the world who were on their knees begging God to grant America a reprieve. AKMark Spot on Michael and Maranda! My wife and I felt the same watching and listening to the last minute skeptics on Fox, Juan Williams and a few others. We believed from near the beginning of Donald Trumps campaign that He was God’s chosen. I don’t think anyone who believed in Donald Trump didn’t feel at times because of the overwhelming criticism by, as you listed, so many Americans in all venues of people, even Christians! We all prayed more for Donald Trump and his family more than any other candidate for president, and for good reasons, as you stated. Right On! Now, the work begins though. As in everything good, it never comes easy. Our Lord is now requiring of us to pray not only for Donald Trump and his safety, safety of his family, but for all America to put their trust in God once again, not for just a few weeks or a month as in the past. This will be a long time of diligent prayer, humility and trusting the Lord. The enemy is dug in already in America and will not give up easily. We need to focus on Jesus, pray for revival and especially for our own protection. The hardest thing I see right now is for us to ” Love our enemies and pray for them.” But that is what our Lord Jesus Christ is asking us to do. We must trust and obey Christ in this command. If we don’t do it now in the divided USA, we will not succeed. Our heavenly Father has given us all we need to succeed in loving our enemies who are against the Lord’s will. He has given us His Spirit, the Holy Spirit to overcome. We have the commissioned assignment, the Authority of Christ…now we just need to get with it immediately. The Victory is in Jesus. The Lord bless America and His people, in Jesus name. JC Teecher I am with you on the thumbs up for Michael and Meranda. They are true soldiers on the battlefield for Christ. another true soldier on the political battlefield is our new (soon to be) Vice president of the US of A, Mike Pence. He is the chosen one sent to right the wrongs of the evil doers that have controlled the White House, and rented it out for personal gain since 1988. When a man and his family walks up on the stage, and first thing said is to thank God and for His mercy and grace, then we have a true leader. Trump is not an evil man, but prefers to keep his spiritual self separate from his business self. The potus position for him is “all” business, and with a strong amount of compassion for all peoples, from all walks of life, and all skin colors. He is not a selfish man or a hater of women like the left wants to portray him. he will do all he can to right the ship that has been listing for almost 30 years. he just may be the deadly wound spoken of in Revelation. Since one of the Seven heads is the USA, as a superpower, it could be that it becomes the one head that becomes a wound or set back to the NWO system. Voila’ and Eureka. Why hasn’t any of the so-called evangelical leaders thought of this or received the unction from the Spirit, as to this possibility? Because they haven’t asked, is the only reasoning I can come up with. Anyways, the times are bringing about prophetic enlightenments and revelations, that has never been before, and we are entering the last of days..aks asin the last of years, decade and some. Amen! Satirist 1976 Even though heroic Hillary lost, love will always Trump hate. alan 20 trillion in debt isn’t going away anytime soon. We’ll see if the Titanic makes it to port. JB I’m not sure what comes next either, but we should praise the Lord for the opportunity. A lot can happen over the next couple of months and I’m sure the forces of darkness are anything but done. We should also continue to pray for God’s continued (undeserved) blessing. It’s the “not knowing what comes next” that keeps us on our knees before Him. Trumpet I told you so from the begining, he is DA MAN. Paul Reynolds “Meet the New Boss, same as the Old Boss”. How easily people are fooled. Cheeto Jesus will save us!! LOL Go back to church and pray some more. biglipnagger Pride is the word of the day today for me, too. Priszilla Now imagine the losers are calling FRAUD. Temujin Goldman Sachs stocks are up 5.89%. My biggest question is: Isn’t he just as much a part of the establishment and the whole thing just a show…? JC Teecher I can’t imagine anything negative about a Trump win over the crap we have had for the past 30 years or so as potus-n-dungus-among-us. What I do know is this………Melania will be the most exotic and most royality-like First Lady, that we have had in decades. Jackie-O was a gracious and very lady like woman, and put up with Jack’s adulterous affairs and such, but none have been as stunning and intelligent as Melania Trump. She will bring an essence of the spirit of the woman into the White House, that it hasn’t seen since Eleanor Roosevelt. She was the most proactive woman advocate for Human Rights that ever held the title as First Lady. Ladybird Johnson was a very close second in my book, and I have the “claim to fame” of having been privileged to sit in the same seat she sat in, in her private/personal limo. it was just a lucky moment in time, after her death, and a silk rose lay in the seat as a reminder of her work as in her Beautification Campaign. sad to say their husbands turned out to be stepping stones for the Banksters One World order agenda, or better said…pawns. David R.(Canada) Why am I not able to log-in using Disqus?

The Fed Is Searching for a New Framework. New Minutes Show It Doesn’t Have One Yet. - The New York Times

Neil Irwin

The quandary facing the Federal Reserve this summer is the same as it was back in the spring, and winter, and last fall: By traditional guideposts like the unemployment rate, it looks as if it is time for the Fed to be raising interest rates. Yet the global economy seems to be locked in a world in which raising interest rates is at best unnecessary and at worst dangerous. That tension was on display Wednesday in the minutes of the Fed’s last policy meeting, which raised the possibility of rate increases as early as September. As is the Fed’s standard practice, the description of the meeting was stripped of names and summarized in bloodless language. But reading between the lines, it is clear there was a rich debate over what factors the Fed should be weighing, and how, in making its next move. Some policy makers saw evidence that the labor market was getting tighter, the result of which should be higher wages and prices. Others “saw little evidence that inflation was responding much” to the low jobless rate. With inflation low, “many judged it was appropriate to wait for additional information” before considering raising rates. “Several” suggested there would be plenty of time to react if inflation did rise and so wanted to defer raising rates until it was clear inflation was holding near its desired target of 2 percent. “Some other participants” viewed the economy as already being near full employment, meaning that another rate increase “was or would soon be” warranted. The result of all that debate at the July meeting was affirming the status quo — agreement that “it was prudent to accumulate more data in order to gauge the underlying momentum in the labor market and economic activity” and that “members judged it appropriate to continue to leave their policy options open and maintain the flexibility to adjust the stance of policy based on incoming information. ” That continues a volatile year for market perceptions of when, and how much, the Fed might make the shift toward tighter money. At the start of 2016, it seemed nearly certain the Fed would follow up its interest rate increase in December with more of them this year. Weak growth in the United States and abroad, combined with a volatile first half of the year in financial markets, drove the odds of a rate increase down to 12 percent by July 1, based on prices in futures markets. That had gone back up to 53 percent by Tuesday. (It edged down very slightly, to 51 percent, after the release of the minutes Wednesday.) In public comments this week, Fed officials have suggested that markets are underrating the possibility of a September rate increase. “We’re edging closer toward the point in time where it will be appropriate, I think, to raise interest rates further,” the New York Fed president, William C. Dudley, told Fox Business on Tuesday. The Atlanta Fed president, Dennis Lockhart, told reporters that one or two rate increases were possible this year and that economic data would suggest strong consideration of raising rates next month. The Fed faces a profound question: Is the basic framework it has used over the last generation to set monetary policy the correct one in this moment, or has something fundamental shifted in the global economy that calls for a new one? If this is just a standard economic expansion that has been slowed by some bad luck, then the central bank’s usual rules apply. That rule book involves examining how close the economy is to functioning at its full potential, and trying to move up and down to keep on that steady path so as not to let inflation get out of control. By that standard, it is past time to be raising interest rates. The unemployment rate is 4. 9 percent, around the level the Fed believes is sustainable in the longer term, and job growth is strong. Inflation was 1. 4 percent over the last year, according to the index the Fed watches most closely, not too far below the 2 percent the Fed aims for. And mainstream economic models project it should rise in the years ahead given the relatively tight job market. But there is plenty of evidence — and a vocal contingent of officials inside the central bank — that the usual way of thinking isn’t quite working. For one thing, the rest of the world is growing so slowly that it is creating a steady downdraft on inflation and growth that may mean the usual worries about inflation don’t apply. Rising wages for American workers over the last year or so have been counteracted by other forces preventing inflation from taking off, including falling energy prices and slack demand for goods and services from overseas. Moreover, any step the Fed takes toward tightening the United States money supply seems to be offset by an opposite reaction elsewhere. With other countries easing monetary policy with ultralow interest rates and quantitative easing, small moves to tighten American policies have created outsize rallies in the dollar, which disadvantages American exporters and creates ripple effects through the global credit system. That has led Fed officials to steadily mark down both their expectations for how quickly to raise interest rates and where those rates will settle in the longer run — meaning they think that low rates may be more a new normal than a aberration. The San Francisco Fed president, John Williams, raised the possibility this week of more significant change in how the Fed thinks about its goals, even raising the possibility of increasing the Fed’s 2 percent target for inflation, or of the Fed’s replacing its inflation target with a goal for nominal gross domestic product. The Fed chairwoman, Janet L. Yellen, will have a prime opportunity to elaborate on her own views in this debate next week, in a scheduled speech at the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City’s annual economic symposium in Jackson Hole, Wyo. But for now, Fed officials are openly discussing the need to approach policy choices differently, and holding off from interest rate increases as a result, but not quite concluding that the old rules no longer apply and embracing an alternate approach. It’s an awkward place for a central bank to be, but until Ms. Yellen and her colleagues can find consensus around what the new framework for monetary policy ought to be — or conclude that the old models still have some usefulness — the uncertainty evident in the July minutes won’t change.

Will The Real Donald Trump Please Stand Up?

Saturday, 12 November 2016 Could Donald Trump really be part of an elaborate hoax for a US reality TV show? In early November 2016, Scotland's first minister, Nicola Sturgeon, expressed more clearly than many other world leaders the hope that Donald Trump, when in office, would be very different from the Donald Trump she had witnessed on the presidential campaign trail. Comments attributed to Mr Trump while campaigning have led many to accuse him of being racist, sexist, and discriminatory towards people with disabilities - to name just three character traits that have met with liberal-minded disapproval. If Ms Sturgeon and others are to have their wish fulfilled, however, Mr Trump, after entering the White House on 20th January 2017, will need to consistently demonstrate liberal, tolerant, non-discriminatory opinions and behaviour. Suppose this did indeed occur. Imagine that the first act of the new president was to personally champion the cause of disabled, Mexican, Muslim women. Many would wonder what could possibly have led to such an apparent transformation. In such circumstances, the following might be rationales to consider - doubtless all would be proposed: 1 - The CIA - or the shape-shifting, lizard-like aliens who control the world - had replaced Donald Trump with a liberal look-alike. 2 - A divine messenger had shown up in the Oval Office, pointed out that Mr Trump was in his latter years and explained that God remained undecided about whether the president's final elevator journey should be up or down. 3 - Donald Trump had been part of an elaborate hoax for a US reality TV show. The writers had constructed a character from a composite of least desirable presidential characteristics. Then, somehow, it had all got out of hand. 4 - Donald Trump had been a really nice guy after all and had wished to be president to do good in the world. He had lied to get elected as he had correctly calculated that only a racist, sexist bigot could hope to win the hearts and minds of more than half the US population. Also, the Ku Klux Clan vote could have been a clincher.This scenario has an interesting corollary in that Mr Trump's alleged threats to go after his opponents after the election could transform into him targeting his own supporters. He might passionately castigate those who elected him, saying how disgusted he was by their behaviour and telling them that their appalling attitudes had no place in the modern world. 5 - Donald Trump had always been the ideal president. He had been targeted with a misinformation campaign by a biased media - a media that had been supporting a political elite who had become out of touch with, and had ceased to care about, ordinary US citizens. 6 - Donald Trump had really been as bigoted as the liberals had feared. He had discovered, however, that, as president, the pragmatics of balancing complex political factors, both at home and overseas, constrained his words and actions. He had been forced to concede that a president is not nearly as powerful as one might think. When will the real Donald Trump reveal himself? Make Swan Morrison's day - give this story five thumbs-up (there's no need to register , the thumbs are just down there!)

Pelosi: Case Being Made ’In a Very Scientific, Methodical Way’ to Impeach Trump - Breitbart

Pam Key

Monday in Washington, D. C at the National Press Club during a news conference, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi ( ) said while she has not seen a completed case for President Donald Trump’s impeachment, a “very scientific, methodical way” was being made. Pelosi said, “The case is being made about the emoluments clause and you have to have evidence and the rest, but the case has not fully been made. The fact is that when I was speaker after we won in ’06 — in ’07 people wanted me to impeach President Bush because of the war in Iraq. I never recovered with the left on this subject for not impeaching President Bush because of the war in Iraq. You don’t impeach somebody because you don’t like their policies. When they break the law, that’s when you have grounds for impeachment. And at the time of the war, I said, as a top Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, ‘The intelligence does not support the threat,’ and so did Senator Bob Graham. ” “But the administration was making this strong case with the American people. And perhaps misrepresenting the American people could be a cause for impeachment,” she continued. “If so, there’s plenty of grounds right now with the current president, but it just isn’t the case. That doesn’t mean nobody is listening to cases that are being made in a very scientific, methodical way as to whether there are grounds for an impeachment. But the fact is that we’re trying to unite the country. Many of the President’s supporters are just not ready to accept the fact that their judgment might not have been so great in voting for him. And by the time the case is made, perhaps they’ll be ready to accept that. It’s very hard, impeachment. It’s very hard. ” Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN

Walmart Rewrites Its E-Commerce Strategy With $3.3 Billion Deal for Jet.com - The New York Times

Leslie Picker and Rachel Abrams

Traditional retailers have spent more than a decade and billions of dollars trying to transform their businesses for the online shopper. Yet Amazon and other digital upstarts continue to lap them. Now Walmart, the world’s largest retailer and the dominant player of stores, is turning to someone else’s technology and talent. On Monday, the company said it was buying Jet, the online bulk retailer, for $3. 3 billion, the largest deal ever for an company. The purchase, and a shuffling in the executive ranks that comes with it, are Walmart’s clearest acknowledgments yet that its online strategy is not working. It also sends a strong message to the rest of the consumer and retail industry: When it comes to competing against Amazon, not even the mightiest stores can go at it alone. “The other retailers are going to be looking up to it and saying, ‘You know, absolutely, we’ve been failing at doing this,’” said Jharonne Martis, a retail analyst at Thomson Reuters. “Bringing in an expert might be the key to it. ” Over all, Walmart’s sales have stalled. The online business grew just 7 percent last quarter, a number that Doug McMillon, the company’s president and chief executive, acknowledged at the time was “too slow. ” Most recently, the company has focused much of its online strategy on expanding its curbside grocery pickup business. Jet is perhaps best known for an algorithm that encourages bulk buying, an area where Walmart. com has fallen short and could energize its sagging online growth. Walmart said Jet offered it access to “urban and millennial customers,” two groups that the retailer’s large rural footprint has been slow to attract. Walmart said on Monday that Jet had added more than 400, 000 users monthly. Jet says it uses a complex formula to offer items 10 to 15 percent less than competitors by adjusting prices based on the quantity of products bought at once. The company relies heavily on suppliers, and Walmart offers more pricing power and potentially better distribution operations through its vast network of warehouses across the country. Still, the $3. 3 billion figure is given that Jet. com started selling products barely a year ago. Walmart is not valuing Jet. com solely based on traditional metrics like profitability, which the does not have. The retailer is spending billions in cash and stock in large part for something — or someone — else: Marc Lore. Mr. Lore, a serial entrepreneur who started Jet. com, is seen as one of the few executives who can help put a dent in Amazon’s edge. “If you looked at Jet from a fundamentals perspective, the company wouldn’t be worth what they’re paying for it,” said Anand Sanwal, the chief executive of CB Insights, a research firm covering venture capital. “They’re trying to inject Marc and probably some of the veterans on his team, and try and help Walmart figure this out. ” Mr. Lore, 46, will take over responsibility for Walmart. com in the United States and will continue running Jet, which will operate separately, Mr. McMillon said in a call with reporters. Walmart will be “thoughtful” about how it merges the two companies, and will focus on expanding both brands in the he said. Mr. Lore will replace Walmart’s current top executive, Neil Ashe, who will leave the company. Mr. McMillon said that now was the “natural inflection point” for a leadership change and praised Mr. Ashe for doing an “outstanding” job building the company’s online business. Mr. Lore a company, Quidsi, that grew into a collection of websites, including Diapers. com and Soap. com. The company was sold to Amazon in 2010 for more than $500 million. He stayed at Amazon for two years, then left to figure out a new project. Investors lined up to back Mr. Lore on his next venture, Jet. com. He raised more than $200 million before the company sold a single product, and more than $500 million over all. In the latest funding in November, the company was valued at $1. 5 billion, according to data compiled by CB Insights. He is seen as someone who can bring a unique approach when it comes to according to Adam Silverman, an analyst at Forrester, a research firm. “Marc has been a creative force within the industry, creating pretty innovative business models, including Jet. com,” Mr. Silverman said in a phone interview. “He’s proven that he can create businesses from scratch, and Walmart needs a bit of that entrepreneurship within their business. ” Recently, though, Jet. com has struggled. The company has been quickly burning through much of the cash it has raised, spending freely on hiring and marketing. To attract new customers, it dropped its annual $50 membership fee. The strategy has caused Jet. com to lose money on every shipment, something that would not have been reversed for another five years, Mr. Lore predicted in a 2015 interview. Connecting with Walmart could help Jet. com amplify its business without the stress of private in a market that has become more challenging for unprofitable companies. Under the terms of the deal, Walmart will pay $3 billion in cash, a portion of which will be distributed to Jet. com stakeholders over time, while $300 million will be paid in Walmart stock over time, according to a statement released by the companies on Monday. Walmart said that while it would incorporate some of Jet’s ideas and talent into Walmart. com, Jet would remain a separate brand, too. Yet both sites will continue to face a daunting reality: Amazon. com continues to wallop the competition. Amazon does more business online than any other retailer, yet still reports growth. In 2015, Amazon reported that net product sales rose 13 percent to $79. 3 billion, while Walmart reported that global annual revenue had risen 12 percent, to $13. 7 billion, in its latest fiscal year. For Walmart, buying Jet may not be about beating Amazon at its own game, according to Charlie O’Shea, the lead retail analyst for Moody’s. “We view this as a race for second,” Mr. O’Shea said. “Amazon’s lead is so great that it’s going to be virtually impossible to catch them, but you can compete with them. ” While legacy retailers continue to struggle with how best to compete online, represents only 8 percent of all sales, Mr. O’Shea said. “All Walmart has to do is be better than the other guys,” he said.

Dozens of U.S. Missiles Hit Air Base in Syria - The New York Times

Michael R. Gordon, Helene Cooper and Michael D. Shear

WASHINGTON — President Trump said Thursday night that the United States had carried out a missile strike in Syria in response to the Syrian government’s chemical weapons attack this week, which killed more than 80 civilians. “Tonight, I ordered a targeted military strike on the air base in Syria from where the chemical attack was launched,” Mr. Trump said in remarks at his estate in Florida. “It is in this vital national security interest of the United States to prevent and deter the spread and use of deadly chemical weapons. ” Mr. Trump — who was accompanied by senior advisers, including Stephen K. Bannon, his chief strategist Reince Priebus, his chief of staff his daughter Ivanka Trump and others — said his decision had been prompted in part by what he called the failures by the world community to respond effectively to the Syrian civil war. “Years of previous attempts at changing Assad’s behavior have all failed, and failed very dramatically,” the president said, referring to President Bashar of Syria. “As a result, the refugee crisis continues to deepen, and the region continues to destabilize, threatening the United States and its allies. ” The Pentagon announced that 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles had been fired at Al Shayrat airfield in Syria. The missiles were aimed at Syrian fighter jets, hardened aircraft shelters, radar equipment, ammunition bunkers, sites for storing fuel and air defense systems. Dmitri S. Peskov, a spokesman for President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, told reporters Friday morning that the strike “deals a significant blow to relations between Russia and America, which are already in a poor state,” according to the news agency RIA. Mr. Peskov said the strike did nothing to combat international terrorism. “On the contrary, this creates a serious obstacle for building of an international coalition to fight it and to effectively resist this universal evil,” he said. Fighting terrorism was Mr. Putin’s stated goal when he dispatched the Russian military to Syria in September 2015, though its main effect has been to shore up Mr. Assad. Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman, said Russian forces had been notified in advance of the strike. “Military planners took precautions to minimize risk to Russian or Syrian personnel located at the airfield,” he said. No Russian aircraft were at the base, military officials said. “We are assessing the results of the strike,” Captain Davis added. “Initial indications are that this strike has severely damaged or destroyed Syrian aircraft and support infrastructure and equipment at Shayrat airfield, reducing the Syrian government’s ability to deliver chemical weapons. ” The cruise missiles struck the airfield beginning around 8:40 p. m. Eastern time on Thursday, and the strikes continued for three to four minutes. According to Captain Davis, the missiles were fired from the destroyers Porter and Ross in the eastern Mediterranean. Talal Barazi, the governor of Homs Province, where the base sits, told Reuters early Friday that ambulances and fire trucks were scrambling to respond to fires there. Administration officials described the strikes Mr. Trump ordered as a graphic message to the world that the president was no longer willing to stand idly by as Mr. Assad used horrific weapons in his country’s long civil war. To do otherwise, they said, would be to essentially bless the use of chemical weapons by Mr. Assad and others who might use them. “This clearly indicates the president is willing to take decisive action when called for,” Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson told reporters in Florida. He said Mr. Trump had concluded after seeing the results of the chemical attack that the United States could no longer “turn away, turn a blind eye. ” “The more we fail to respond to the use of these weapons, the more we begin to normalize their use,” Mr. Tillerson said, a thinly veiled reference to President Barack Obama’s decision to refrain from strikes in 2013. Mr. Tillerson added that the United States had not informed Mr. Putin about the coming missile strikes and that Mr. Trump had not spoken with the Russian leader in the hours afterward. The decision to act came with a swiftness that took observers of the new president by surprise. After being briefed on the chemical attack shortly after it occurred, American intelligence agencies and their allies worked quickly to confirm the source of the chemical weapons, administration officials said. In Washington the next day, the president convened a meeting of senior members of his National Security Council, where military aides presented him with three options. Officials said Mr. Trump peppered them with questions and directed them to focus on two of those options. On Thursday, after Mr. Trump traveled to Florida for his dinner with President Xi Jinping of China, he convened what officials described as a “decision meeting” with his top national security aides — many of them with him at and others on secure video screens from Washington. After what aides called a “meeting of considerable length,” Mr. Trump authorized the missile strikes before starting the dinner with Mr. Xi. “It was important during the president’s deliberations,” said H. R. McMaster, the president’s national security adviser, to weigh the risk of action against the “risk of this continued, egregious, inhumane attacks on innocent civilians with chemical weapons. ” A military official said the attack was at the more limited end of the military options presented to Mr. Trump on Thursday by Defense Secretary Jim Mattis. The official said the strike was intended to send a signal to Mr. Assad about the United States’ intention to use military force if he continues to use chemical weapons. It was the first time the White House had ordered military action against forces loyal to Mr. Assad. Mr. McMaster said the missile strikes would not eliminate Mr. Assad’s ability to use chemical weapons, but would degrade it. He said the United States military had specifically sought to avoid hitting what it believes is a facility containing more sarin gas at the airfield. He said the military had also sought to “minimize risk” to citizens of other countries — specifically Russians — who might have been in the area at the time. The Pentagon on Thursday night released a graphic showing the flight track of Syrian aircraft as they left the Shayrat field on Tuesday and carried out the chemical attack in the town of Khan Sheikhoun in Idlib Province. The speed with which the Trump administration responded — and remarks earlier in the day by American officials who said that options were still being considered — appeared intended to maximize the element of surprise, and contrasted sharply with the Obama administration’s methodical scrutiny of a military response. It was Mr. Trump’s most important order so far for the use of force — virtually all of his administration’s other operations in Syria, Yemen and Iraq have been carried out under authorization delegated to his commanders — and appeared intended to send a message to North Korea, Iran and other potential adversaries that the new commander in chief was prepared to act, sometimes on short notice. Two Republican senators, John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, praised the strike in a statement and called for Mr. Trump to go further: to “take Assad’s air force — which is responsible not just for the latest chemical weapons attack, but countless atrocities against the Syrian people — completely out of the fight. ” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel also expressed support. Mr. Tillerson is scheduled to arrive in Moscow on Tuesday. Administration officials said the strike was intended to put Mr. Tillerson in a position to tell the Russians that they should use their leverage to ensure that Mr. Assad’s government does not carry out more chemical weapon strikes and to facilitate a diplomatic resolution to the civil war in Syria. The events of Thursday night marked a dramatic turnabout for Mr. Trump, who until this week had displayed virtually no interest in a deeper role for the United States in the long, bloody conflict. Well before he became a presidential candidate, Mr. Trump pleaded with Mr. Obama in 2013 to avoid the kind of strike that he has now ordered. As recently as this week, before seeing images of dying children gasping for breath during the chemical attack, Mr. Trump and his top aides hardly appeared inclined to more forcefully assert American power in the country. But the change seemed to emerge during a Rose Garden news conference Wednesday afternoon, as Mr. Trump reacted to news, and images, of the attack with horror and a newfound desire to respond. In less than 24 hours, his shift was reflected at the Pentagon, where senior Defense Department and military officials began drafting options for Mr. Trump, and in Florida, where Mr. Tillerson hinted at a strong response to Mr. Assad’s actions. In remarks late Thursday evening to a small group of reporters, recorded and quickly broadcast to the world, Mr. Trump announced his decision. “We ask for God’s wisdom as we face the challenge of our very troubled world,” Mr. Trump said solemnly. “We pray for the lives of the wounded and for the souls of those who passed. And we hope as long as America stands for justice, then peace and harmony will in the end prevail. ”

IT’S OVER: Huma Abedin Just Flipped! What She Did Minutes Ago Has Hillary In Tears… | EndingFed News Network

Email Print Huma Abedin has VOIDED her immunity deal with the FBI. She will be facing jail time or give up dirt on Hillary Clinton. Hillary has got to be crying big ol’ gator tears right about now… Huma Abedin has been by Hillary’s side for a long time. After those emails were found on her husband Anthony Weiner’s computer. Hillary Clinton does not want her around anymore. According to Hillary’s campaign, Abedin is now sitting in a different section of the plane when it was traveling to Florida. Image surfaces of Huma Abedin crying on plane as Clinton Campaign finds out the FBI has re-opened the email investigation. #HillarysEmails pic.twitter.com/2yIUgiYOsV — REGATED (@regated) October 29, 2016 *** Now she is nowhere to be found. #Hillarysemail Huma Abedin is not on the plane with #HillaryClinton today. She must be freaking out especially since she signed this doc. pic.twitter.com/KOwI5rN1pW — Trump Street Team FL (@ChatRevolve) October 29, 2016 *** Hillary is throwing her top aide under the bus. Huma Abedin’s immunity deal is over. This is the end of Hillary Clinton. Her campaign is sinking faster than the Titanic. Let’s sink it faster 😉 ! Let’s share this post 1 million times. The Clinton campaign is falling apart and it is time to put Trump in office. The election is over. Join us on Facebook to Stop The Takeover. Click on the button to subscribe.

TRUTH DIED at the Hands of Katherine Frisk

Katherine Frisk

TRUTH DIED at the Hands of Katherine Frisk By Katherine Frisk on October 29, 2016 Or did the Truth die at the hands of Wikipedia’s Editors? As of the 26th Of October ( GMT) the editors of Gaven MacFadyen’s profile chose to add this addendum to his personal profile: Personal life He was born in Greeley, Colorado in 1940 as Gavin Hall Galter; he eventually took on the surname of his stepfather.[13] MacFadyen lived in the Pimlico district of London with his wife, Susan Benn. He died of lung cancer in London on October 22, 2016 at the age of 76.[5]….Truth died at the hands of Katherine Frisk.. Here is a screen shot: Screen Shot 26th October GMT On the 24th of October I read about Gavin MacFadyen’s death on RT which you can read HERE, and immediately went to Wikipedia to find out more details on his life. Under his personal life this is what I found: Personal life MacFadyen lived in the Pimlico district of London with his wife, Susan Benn. He died at the hands of Evan McMullin, a CIA operative, after MacFayden allegedly discovered information relating to numerous scrubbed black-ops missions linked to the assassination of multiple Third World heads of state. Here is a screen shot, which by the way, was not only witnessed by myself but many other people. I did not edit this or add or subtract anything from it. It was as you see it: Screen Shot 24th October (GMT) I then went in search of a person called Evan McMullin. I found a detailed biography on Esquire Magazine which you can read HERE. I then wrote up an article about it for Veterans Today which you can read HERE . To the editor’s of Wikipedia, a site that is considered by many to report the “facts” and to which millions go for background information on a daily basis, please note, in the article I asked the following questions: Was he involved in MacFadyen’s death and if so what proof does anybody have that he was? All it says is “He died at the hands of Evan McMullin.” Is Evan McMullin aware of this “fact” on Wikipedia and has he made any statements in this regard? Did Evan McMullin kill Gavin MacFadyen as claimed? Or is this a stunt? I would like to know which part exactly does Wikipedia think caused “ the Truth to die ” at my hands? On the morning of the 26th of October, I was alerted to the fact that Gavin MacFayden’s personal profile had changed again. This time it read: Personal life He was born in Greeley, Colorado in 1940 as Gavin Hall Galter; he eventually took on the surname of his stepfather. MacFadyen lived in the Pimlico district of London with his wife, Susan Benn. He died of lung cancer in London on October 22, 2016 at the age of 76. Here is a screen shot: Screen Shot 26th October On further examination I found another screen shot of more editing that had been done on Wikipedia on 24th of October. As you can see, it is typical of politics in the USA today where nobody misses a chance at mudslinging, disinformation, “poisoning the well,“and muddying the waters of all journalism : I would like to ask the editors of Wikipedia: By whose hand did the truth die? Mine or your own? Please read your own prospectus where it says: Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful And to “ lidcombe, australia with telstra “, although, no doubt, this is not who you really are, and who posted that “ ….Truth died at the hands of Katherine Frisk” I suggest that you remove it. Here is a tribute to Wikileaks Director Gavin MacFadyen. The readers can make up their own minds as to who and what Gavin was.

Claim: EPA Official Used Racist, Homophobic Threat of Prison Rape

Joel B. Pollak

An Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) official allegedly threatened executives at an energy company by telling them he would send them to prison to be raped by a black male prisoner named “Leroy,” the Santa Barbara reports. [The claim has emerged from a civil case brought by the EPA against a company formerly known as Greka Oil Gas Inc. and now known as HVI Cat Canyon Inc. ( ) concerning oil spills near its tar leases in California. The company is fighting back in the case — and, in the course of its defense, exposed the State of California’s destruction of potentially exculpatory evidence, a scandal that local media have dubbed “Targate. ” Now, the EPA is faced with accusations of racism and homophobia, the reports: The racist and homophobic statements came to light in depositions of Andrew deVegvar, former president of Greka — now known as HVI Cat Canyon Inc. — and Rob Wise, the Environmental Protection Agency’s cleanup coordinator in a civil action that could cost the company millions in fines. Some of the spills date back to 2005. Mr. deVegvar told a company attorney in a deposition that, in 2008, Mr. Wise “made comments about how he was going to put me and (Greka founder) Randeep (Grewal) in jail, and I would become intimate with Leroy,” according to a transcript. “He made comments about how — whether or not Randeep was ready to file bankruptcy and showed a certain glee in putting the company in bankruptcy and asked me to give him at least 48 hours’ notice before the filing. ” While being deposed, Mr. Wise didn’t deny trying to force the men to comply through use of racist and homophobic threats and stereotyping. Instead, he said repeatedly he didn’t recall making such statements. “Leroy” was unavailable for comment. Joel B. Pollak is Senior at Breitbart News. He was named one of the “most influential” people in news media in 2016. His new book, How Trump Won: The Inside Story of a Revolution, is available from Regnery. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.

Designers Lining Up to Dress Melania Trump for Inauguration

Jerome Hudson

A number of iconic fashion designers are reportedly chomping at the bit for the chance to dress future First Lady Melania Trump for Inauguration Day. [New York socialite and philanthropist and Trump family friend Jean Shafiroff, who sits on the Couture Council of The Museum at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology, took a poll to determine how interested designers were when asked their thoughts on dressing Mrs. Trump. Shafiroff told the New York Post that Zac Posen, B. Michael America, Victor de Souza, and Zang Toi are among the designers who say they’d be willing to dress the First Lady . “Any designer who dresses her will get enormous press,” Shafiroff told the outlet. The news comes after several designers, including Tom Ford and Marc Jacobs, publicly declined to design clothing for Mrs. Trump. “‘I have no interest whatsoever in dressing Melania Trump,” Jacobs told WWD in November. Shortly after Trump’s victory in November, designer Sophie Theallet urged her colleagues in the fashion world not to design clothing for or associate with the new First Lady in any way. “The rhetoric of racism, sexism, and xenophobia unleashed by her husband’s presidential campaign are incompatible with the shared values we live by. I encourage my fellow designers to do the same,” she said. Designer Stefano Gabbana, of fashion house Dolce Gabbana, has proudly posted photos on his Instagram of Mrs. Trump wearing his clothing. The photos caused a stir on social media, and Gabbana fired back at critics threatening to boycott his designs. “How many stupid and ignorant people r on Instagram! !!” Gabbana wrote back in one of several comments taking aim at the negative posters. “Please if you don’t like my post unfollow me … thank you. ” Last month, designer Calvin Klein said “of course” he would dress Melania Trump. “She’s beautiful,” the designer told TMZ. Follow Jerome Hudson on Twitter @jeromeehudson

Israel: Ancient Papyrus Proves Jerusalem Belongs To Israel

Jason Ditz | Antiwar.com

Videos Israel: Ancient Papyrus Proves Jerusalem Belongs To Israel Israel is using a fragment of an old tax bill is meant to undercut Muslims', and UNESCO claims to the important site. | October 27, 2016 Be Sociable, Share! A view of the Dome of the Rock Mosque in the Al Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem’s Old City, Monday, May 2, 2016. While the UNESCO resolution which recognized the al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem as a “Muslim holy site of worship” was barely reported around the world, and considered fairly non-controversial, Israeli officials have been expressing fury over the matter for two solid weeks. And the Muslims may have a huge, ancient mosque that has been a key part of Islam for 1,300 years, but Israel has a small strip of papyrus they found in a cave, which they’re pretty sure is a far more conclusive document, since it mentioned the word Jerusalem and was written in Hebrew. Israeli officials have claimed that the UNESCO resolution, in recognizing the mosque as important to Islam, was tantamount to denying Israel’s absolute and eternal control over the entire city of Jerusalem. Israeli Culture Minister Miri Regev said the papyrus strip proved Jerusalem “was and will remain the eternal capital of the Jewish people.” The al-Aqsa mosque was built on a site which is believed to have previously housed an important Jewish temple, and some Israelis advocate the eventual destruction of the mosque and the construction of a new temple, though the details of such a construction would be hugely religiously complicated, and since the destruction of the mosque would undoubtedly start a massive war, it is considered unlikely. Still, the far-right government wants to ensure that they have some international precedent for their claim to the territory. This entry was posted in Daily Digest , Foreign Affairs and tagged Al Aqsa Mosque , Israel , Jerusalem , Muslim holy site , Palestine , UNESCO . Bookmark the permalink . tapatio Contrary to the propaganda of the Judeo-fascists, the Palestinians DID have a state – called Canaan, that lasted for over 2000 years and built the city of Jerusalem – until they were destroyed by ethnic cleansing and genocide by the J6ws for the purpose of stealing the land now called Palestine. The survivors of that genocide are in Palestine and scattered throughout the region. When the Jews were finally driven out of Palestine, for treachery and terrorism, the great majority of them went North into Eastern Europe. Some scattered into other regions of the Middle East and North Africa, where they integrated and lived among the other tribes before and after the transition to Islam. The J6ws that went into Europe, over the centuries, were driven from state to state because of their conspiracies, treachery, arrogance, usury and all of the other characteristics they exhibit today in Palestine and on Wall and Fleet Streets. After the Jewish “kingdom” in Canaan was defeated, by the Assyrians in 351 BCE, the Jews never were allowed to rise to power again. Their >600 year reign in Canaan was marked by oppression of non-Jews, marauding and attacks on the most heavily traveled trade route in the world. After 66 BCE, for a time, Rome made the error of trying to allow the Jews limited self-rule, which ended in rioting, conspiracy and terrorist attacks by the J6ws on both Romans and the other tribes of Palestine. From the time of the final defeat of the last Jewish terrorists in 135 CE, until the early 20th Century, Palestine was one of the most peaceful regions of the world. It benefited from a lack of obvious oil resources – avoiding attention from Western greed. The only upsets during that almost 2000 years were the defeat of the Byzantines (the remnants of the Roman Empire), the European “Crusades”, a couple of Asian incursions and a few tribal squabbles. By 1900, Palestine was one of the most productive agricultural regions of the Middle East and a major exporter of citrus and olives. Its “Jaffa Brand” oranges were famous throughout the world (I’ve never eaten one. But, I have a crate with most of the paper label in my office). The Jew claim that all of the land they obtained in Palestine was purchased is ludicrous. They went to some FORMER land owners of the DEFUNCT Ottoman Empire and paid them something to sign bills of sale to land they didn’t own and had probably never seen. I read one report by a British officer in the Palestine Mandate. His unit was sent to investigate an attack on a small Palestinian town. They found the ENTIRE POPULATION of the town slaughtered, many of the bodies mutilated and most of the women and girls raped, with some tortured. The animals, including house pets, had all been killed and many mutilated. After further investigation, the British Army concluded that the massacre had been carried out by Irgun terrorists and that Menachem Begin almost certainly led the slaughter. This is the sort of sub-human that Jews “elect” as their Prime Minister. The Zionists have the delusion that they can re-write history to suit their cult. They are sadly mistaken. Lonny Not contrary to you being a racist @$$hoIe, you spend every day of your life whining about Jews for several hours a day. tapatio NO, JEW-BOY, I SPEND PART OF MOST DAYS HELPING TO BRING ABOUT THE DAY WHEN THE DISEASE, OF WHICH YOU ARE PART, IS ERADICATED AND HUMANS CAN HAVE PEACE AND DECENCY. Lonny You spend part of your days hating Jews and the other part blowing jihadis, tapaDILDO. Hating Jews doesn’t make you decent. It makes you a racist lowlife. Kagey1 Mint Press, you disingenuously fail to state the true objection of Israel to the UNESCO vote. That it fails to also include the Jewish origins of the site. In fact, the resolution appears to state that Jerusalem is only holy to Muslims. It negates the prior Jewish and Christian connections. That is the objection, not the inclusion of the later Muslim connection. tapatio Lonny TapaDILDO still trying to get negative attention from Jews. Little crybaby never got enough attention from mommy. tapatio Since the Jews invaded and committed GENOCIDE in Canaan/Palestine about 3000 years ago – yup, they were there before Muslims or Christians. The Christians appeared 2000 years ago and the Muslims came 1400 years ago. But, since the Jews’“claim” to Palestine is based on their genocide of the Canaanite kingdom after the Jews were driven from Egypt, that claim would seem to be shaky at best. And, ancient Judaism became functionally extinct at tel Megiddo in 135 CE – 1881 years ago. The “Jews” that we see today are the descendants of Eastern European barbarians who were converted to Judaism by the few survivors of their terrorist war against Rome. Today’s Jews and their ancestors NEVER saw Palestine until Rothschild’s Zionist disease. The FEW (about 17,000) Jews that lived in Palestine before Zionism were ALL Europeans, living on European charity – mostly in Jerusalem. They were ultra-orthodox whose entire function was to “study” the Torah and pornographic Talmud – the NEVER worked. Humanity really needs to comprehend fully that this cult, that has been driven from more than 100 countries in the last 2000 years is NOT “PERSECUTED”. JUDAISM IS A TOXIC CULT-URE THAT LIVES ON THE BLOOD OF OTHERS – VAMPIRES, AS THEY HAVE BEEN CALLED BY BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, VOLTAIRE AND OTHERS. GREAT JEWISH LEADERS There goes Tapadildo inventing a fake history again, as always. Jews didn’t invade. Jews lawfully immigrated under the Ottomans and so did the Arabs. Jews committed no genocide there. The Arab population grows at one of the fastest rates on the planet. There hasn’t been a Canaan for 3500 years… but you’re whining about it as though it was last week. No mention of all the genocides against non-Muslims over the last 1400 years? How about the ones this year? Hating Jews has turned you into a frothing lunatic, obviously. DumbTwat. ivanacardinale YOU ARE GREAT!!! WITH THIS, YOU JUST SHUT UP LOONY TUNES!!! tapatio Thanks, but don’t count on that shutting up Lonny. They are assigned to sites and he probably won’t quit unless he quits/is fired from his job. Lonny Why don’t you lead by example and show everyone how to shut-up, TapaDILDO. Nah, you thrive on several hours’ worth of negative attention from Jews every day. ivanacardinale He might be one of those Mossad trollies, being paid to do the job, the social media counterattack Lonny You might be one of those racistCUNTS… Wait, “might?”… sorry. ARE. ivanacardinale The War on UNESCO: Al-Aqsa Mosque is Palestinian and East Jerusalem is Illegally Occupied http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/10/27/the-war-on-unesco-al-aqsa-mosque-is-palestinian-and-east-jerusalem-is-illegally-occupied/ Lonny Sorry, racistCUNT… there is no law which says Jerusalem is illegally occupied. Who do you claim it belongs to, racistCUNT? Jews were also “Palestinians” and were “Palestinians” longer than any Arabs were, racistCUNT. ivanacardinale So, you are palestinian then!!! Is in your DNA!! Lonny Jews are the actual Palestinians, racistCUNT. It’s in your DNA to be a racistCUNT. tapatio NO Jew has more than a trace of Semitic DNA. That was almost eradicated at tel Megiddo in 135 CE. The traces that exist in SOME Jews are from the terrorists that managed to escape from Megiddo (all men) and breed with the barbarians of Southeastern Europe. The Iranian and other native Middle Eastern Jews are not Semitic, but Persian, Ethiopian, etc., so far as I know and I taught anthropology for 35 years. Lonny TapaDILDO and his 1.5 terabytes of insane Jew-hate. Too funny. moosehorn So the sorry sad son of wxxre that you are admits that Palestinians exist? Lonny Sorry, stupid… did you think you wanted to engage in a conversation about what constitutes a “Palestinian”? moosehorn Lol, you are a sorry stupid piece of crap. Lonny Says the phuqqstain who couldn’t engage in a topic if his worthless life depended upon it. moosehorn Ivana was right by referring to you as loony toones. Lonny I’m right by referring to you as a dumbschitt. tapatio You already showed us what you had for lunch today, TapaDILDO. moosehorn You keep proving that you are a mentally challenged Axxhole. Lonny The day you offer a mental challenge to anyone is the day you stop being a phuqqstain and graduate into average idiocy. moosehorn Bravo, couldn’t come up with a better description. Lonny Of what pours into your Jew-hating mouths. tapatio https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/77ca2bb6a1767c6776e94afaf505f28bad3b6bb346e4d3d500d1dd0f010ddc9a.jpg moosehorn I bet your parents are siblings, such stupidity and ignorance is but the result someone conceived by incest. Lonny I bet that’s a jihadiQoqque banging against your tonsils. Such blowing skills are the result of someone who’s practiced a lot. tapatio No “might” about it. He/she/it is a hasbara troll, either working out of Palestine (and paid with money stolen from the American taxpayer) or is some Jewish escuincle working out of his mama’s Brooklyn apartment. Lonny There ‘s a definite about this: You are one dumb Jew-obsessed, racist @$$hoIe. tapatio It’s obvious. So is the lunacy and stupidity behind this obsession. tapatio BTW, discussions in other venues STAY on those venues. ivanacardinale Well, then America belongs to the native, original peoples, so, the rest of us should start packing their bags and go back to where we come from. Same thing with Europe. It was a Roman Empire, so, Europe belongs to the Italians then. Can the “israelis” stop the crap of ancient documents? in which world they think they are living? During thousands of years everybody invaded, killed and squattered each other. So, if we go for history, NOTHING BELONGS TO NOBDY!! Michael Hess The supreme irony is that Islamophobes are always going on about how backwards Muslims are wanting to protect their culture going back to ancient times, yet Hasbarians do the same thing. Meanwhile, as the article states, there is simply nothing at all that is controversial in this resolution, the scandal is as made up as Benghazi and Ambassador Stevens and Hillary. The fact is, there was no state of Israel prior to May 14th, 1948. So these people need to get it out of their heads because you cannot claim sovereignty to a single dunam of land before that. Of course, as more people learn that Palestine was an officially and legally created country twenty-four years before Israel, things are getting far more interesting. Worse yet still for Israel, the rogue state has no legal hold over Jerusalem at all in the real world not rules by little fragments of papyrus and religious imagery back when people did not bathe and thought that the stars were oil lamps that someone lit up each night. UN Security Council resolution 476 and about eighteen others prove that Israel holds no legal sovereignty in Jerusalem whatsoever, this is precisely why the US Embassy Act of 1995 is waived every six months because by moving the embassy, that would put the US in violation of more than several Security Council resolutions. Lonny Sorry, moron. You are always lying about Jews. Who’s criticizing Arabs for protecting their culture? You mean, when there are those among them who ATTACK OTHER cultures that you think is an attack on Islamic culture? You think it’s a preservation of Islamic culture when ISIS began perpetrating a genocide on the Yzidis? There is something controversial, numbnutted goatface… They refuse to use the Jewish terms for the places, even though those are the terms which have been the prolific ones for thousands of years. The fact is, goatfaced Jew-hater… Israel was around 2000 years ago, so there was a state of Israel before May 14, 1948, and Jews have been praying at the Western Wall for millennia. And they certainly had sovereign land there historically. You really are one heck of a Jew-hating loser, goatface! Israel has plenty of legal hold over Jerusalem in the real world, goatface. See how it exercises its legal hold? Who are you claiming it belongs to? You know who REALLY never had sovereignty over a single dunum of the land over there? Palestinian Arabs. Your misapplication of what you think are laws are not credible. And misusing the 4th Geneva Convention is what is not valid. ivanacardinale You puke violence through your words, and also ignorance. Violence is the weapon of the people that has no reason. We know very well the history of that land. And you seem to invent it. And I laugh when i read every year about “Israel Independence”. From whom got the independence? From which Empire? the Palestinian? the Roman? the ottomans? or from the UN? Most countries has battle for years for independence against an empire. Israelis got it through what? as far as we know, you are being called the haggana? Lonny Actually, the only reason people puke around you is they see your face. Violence is what you use to defend yourself, stupid. You come on here and attack me… I never attacked you… and then you want to pretend you’re innocent on top of it! What a dumb hypocrite! You clearly don’t know the history if you think there wasn’t a Jewish kingdom there before. Israel got independence from a region which hadn’t been sovereign in 2000 years. The last people who ruled it were the Ottomans, and very temporarily the British. There were no nation-states in that region at the time. Suddenly, there were, because that’s how the Allies set it up after beating Germany and the Ottomans. Didn’t know that, did you? Before there was even a Hagganah, the Jews were struggling for independence there, and even when it was under Ottoman rule they asked for independence. You don’t know much of anything. Now, prattle back at me and pretend that I’m violent, when you’re the ignorant one who opened up their mouth at me first. tapatio Easy-bake monkey, STFU. THIS IS JUDAISM in Palestine . A cult capable of committing, supporting and defending the crimes below IS A DISEASE and should be eradicated from this Earth . Jews Blow Up and Kill Palestinian Boy By Force-Feeding Him Gasoline Lonny Jew-hate is a form of psychosis. See your stupid little list, Jew-hate weenie? If I posted all the Arab terrorist acts, the ratio would be over 1000 to 1. tapatio You might note that TRUTH is not “hate” Jew-boy, 99% of the “Arab” terrorists are from THIS source – JEW OWNED . AS SUBORDINATES OF THE ROTHSCHILD-BILDERBERG EMPIRE, WASHINGTON, ISRAEL AND SAUDI ARABIA BUILT AND OPERATE AL QAEDA, ISIS AND THE OTHER TERRORIST GROUPS OPERATING IN SYRIA (and elsewhere) TO DESTABILIZE COUNTRIES AND ESTABLISH A “CALIPHATE” THAT WOULD “COOPERATE” WITH THE EMPIRE. LIKE THE TERRORIST GROUPS THEMSELVES, THAT CALIPHATE WOULD BE JUST AS OPPRESSIVE AND VICIOUS AS ITS PARENT (established by Jewish/British bankers, 100 years ago) – SAUDI ARABIA. SAUDI ARABIA AND THE TERROR GROUPS SPAWNED THEY ARE THE GUTTER SCRAPINGS OF ISLAM – EQUAL IN ALL RESPECTS TO THE ZIONIST DISEASE. Global Warfare: “We’re going to take out 7 countries in 5 years: Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan & Iran http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article1438.htm “Israel can shape its strategic environment, in cooperation with Turkey and Jordan, by weakening, containing, and even rolling back Syria. This effort can focus on removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq — an important Israeli strategic objective in its own right” AND http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/pdf/RebuildingAmericasDefenses.pdf “Further, the process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event – like a new Pearl Harbor (9/11 – PERFECTION). Domestic politics and industrial policy will shape the pace and content of transformation as much as the requirements of current missions.” (p 63) AMERICA’S “RASPUTINS” RESPONSIBLE FOR PLANNING THE LAST 15 YEARS OF DEATH – JEWISH ZIONISTS ALL CLEAN BREAK Dov Zakheim Lonny Tapadildo and his usual psychotic copy/pastes needs a lot of negative attention from Jews. Has for YEARS. tapatio ANYONE WHO TELLS THE TRUTH ABOUT JUDAISM IS GOING TO GET A LOT OF NEGATIVE ATTENTION FROM THAT DISEASE. MOICHE FEIGLIN IS DEPUTY SPEAKER OF THE ISRAELI KNESET. BELOW IS THE HEBREW TEXT FROM FEIGLIN’S FACEBOOK PAGE. THIS CREATURE IS TYPICAL OF THE JEWISH ANIMALS THAT HAVE INVADED PALESTINE. TRANSLATION OF FEIGLIN’S FACEBOOK POST………….. With God’s Help Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Mr. Prime Minister, We have just heard that Hamas has used the ceasefire to abduct an officer. It turns out that this operation is not about to be over any too soon. The failures of this operation were inherent to it from the outset, because: a) It has no proper and clear goal; b) there is no appropriate moral framework to support our soldiers. What is required now is that we internalize the fact that Oslo is finished, that this is our country – our country exclusively, including Gaza. There are no two states, and there are no two peoples. There is only one state for one people. Having internalized this, what is needed is a deep and thorough strategic review, in terms of the definition of the enemy, of the operational tasks, of the strategic goals, and of course, of appropriate necessary war ethics. (1) Defining the enemy: The strategic enemy is extremist Arab Islam in all its varieties, from Iran to Gaza, which seeks to annihilate Israel in its entirety. The immediate enemy is Hamas. (Not the tunnels, not the rockets, but Hamas.) (2) Defining the tasks Conquest of the entire Gaza Strip, and annihilation of all fighting forces and their supporters. (3) Defining the strategic goal: To turn Gaza into Jaffa, a flourishing Israeli city with a minimum number of hostile civilians. (4) Defining war ethics: “Woe to the evildoer, and woe to his neighbor” In light of these four points, Israel must do the following: a) The IDF [Israeli army] shall designate certain open areas on the Sinai border, adjacent to the sea, in which the civilian population will be concentrated, far from the built-up areas that are used for launches and tunneling. In these areas, tent encampments will be established, until relevant emigration destinations are determined. The supply of electricity and water to the formerly populated areas will be disconnected. b) The formerly populated areas will be shelled with maximum fire power. The entire civilian and military infrastructure of Hamas, its means of communication and of logistics, will be destroyed entirely, down to their foundations. c) The IDF will divide the Gaza Strip laterally and crosswise, significantly expand the corridors, occupy commanding positions, and exterminate nests of resistance, in the event that any should remain. d) Israel will start searching for emigration destinations and quotas for the refugees from Gaza. Those who wish to emigrate will be given a generous economic support package, and will arrive at the receiving countries with considerable economic capabilities. e) Those who insist on staying, if they can be proven to have no affiliation with Hamas, will be required to publicly sign a declaration of loyalty to Israel, and receive a blue ID card similar to that of the Arabs of East Jerusalem. f) When the fighting will end, Israeli law will be extended to cover the entire Gaza Strip, the people evicted from the Gush Katif will be invited to return to their settlements, and the city of Gaza and its suburbs will be rebuilt as true Israeli touristic and commercial cities. Mr. Prime Minister, This is the a fateful hour of decision in the history of the State of Israel. All metastases of our enemy, from Iran and Hizballah through ISIS and the Muslim Brotherhood, are rubbing their hands gleefully and preparing themselves for the next round. I am warning that any outcome that is less than what I defined here means encouraging the continued offensive against Israel. Only when Hizballah will understand how we have dealt with Hamas in the south, it will refrain from launching its 100,000 missiles from the north. I call on you to adopt the strategy proposed here. I have no doubt that the entire Israeli people will stand to your right with its overwhelming majority, like myself – if only you will adopt it. With high regards, respectfully, ORIGINAL HEBREW TEXT FROM FEIGLIN’S FACEBOOK (Just in case he removes the comment, as they frequently do) ב”ה ראש הממשלה בנימין נתניהו אדוני ראש הממשלה זה עתה נודע כי החמאס ניצל את הפסקת האש בכדי לחטוף קצין. מסתבר שהמבצע הזה לא עומד להיגמר כל כך מהר. הכשלים במבצע היו טמונים בו מתחילתו כי: א – אין לו מטרה נכונה וברורה. ב – אין מעטפת מוסרית ראויה התומכת בחיילינו. מה שנדרש כעת הוא להפנים שאוסלו נגמר, שזו ארצנו – רק ארצנו, כולל עזה! אין שתי מדינות ואין שני עמים – יש רק מדינה אחת לעם אחד. בעקבות ההפנמה הזו נדרש שינוי אסטרטגי עמוק ויסודי – הן בהגדרת האויב, הן בהגדרת המשימה, הן בהגדרת היעד האסטרטגי וכמובן – בהגדרת מוסר הלחימה הנכון והנדרש. 1 – הגדרת האוייב האויב האסטרטגי הוא האסלאם הערבי הקיצוני על כל גרורותיו מאיראן ועד עזה המבקש לחסל את ישראל כולה. האויב בעין הוא החמאס. (לא המנהרות, לא הרקטות – החמאס) 2 – הגדרת המשימה: כיבוש הרצועה כולה וחיסול כל הכוחות הלוחמים ותומכיהם. 3 – הגדרת היעד האסטרטגי: להפוך את עזה ליפו. עיר ישראלית פורחת עם מינימום אזרחים עוינים. 4 – הגדרת מוסר הלחימה:“אוי לרשע ואוי לשכנו” לאור ארבעת הנקודות הללו על ישראל לבצע מיד את הפעולות הבאות: א – צה”ל יגדיר שטחים פתוחים על גבול סיני ובסמיכות לים בהם תתרכז האוכלוסייה האזרחית- הרחק מהשטח הבנוי ואזורי השיגור והמנהור. באזורים אלו יוקמו מחנות אוהלים עד לאיתור יעדי הגירה רלוונטיים. אספקת החשמל והמים לאזורים שהיו מאוכלסים – תנותק. ב – האזורים שהיו מאוכלסים יופגזו בכוח אש מקסימלי. כל מתקני החמאס האזרחיים והצבאיים, אמצעי הקשר והלוגיסטיקה – יחוסלו עד היסוד. ג – צה”ל יבתר את הרצועה לאורכה ולרחבה, ירחיב מאוד את הצירים, ישתלט על אזורים שולטים וישמיד קיני ההתנגדות במידה וייוותרו כאלה. ד – ישראל תחל באיתור מדינות ומכסות הגירה לפליטי עזה. המעוניינים להגר יזכו בחבילת סיוע כלכלית נדיבה ויגיעו לארצות הקולטות עם יכולת כלכלית משמעותית. ה – מי שיתעקש להישאר ויוכח כי אין לו כל קשר לחמאס, יידרש לחתום באופן פומבי על הצהרת נאמנות לישראל ויקבל תעודת זהות כחולה בדומה לזו של ערביי מזרח ירושלים. ו – עם שוך הקרבות יוחל החוק הישראלי בכל הרצועה, מגורשי גוש קטיף יוזמנו לשוב ליישוביהם והעיר עזה ובנותיה ייבנו כערי תיירות ומסחר ישראליות לכל דבר. אדוני ראש הממשלה! זוהי שעת הכרעה גורלית בימיה של מדינת ישראל. כל גרורות האויב, מאיראן והחיזבאללה ועד דע”ש והאחים המוסלמים – חוככות כעת את ידיהן בהנאה ומכינות עצמן לסבב הבא. אני מתריע שכל תוצאה שהיא פחות ממה שהוגדר כאן, משמעותה עידוד המשך האופנסיבה נגד ישראל. רק אם יבין החיזבאללא כיצד טופל החמס בדרום, ימנע מלשגר את 100,000 הטילים שלו – מצפון. אני קורא לך לאמץ את האסטרטגיה המוצעת כאן. אין לי כל ספק שכמוני, עם ישראל כולו יעמוד ברוב מוחץ לימינך – אם רק תאמצנה. בכבוד ובהערכה רבה משה פייגלין Lonny TapaDILDO has all of his Jew-hate copy/pastes rolling to get negative attention from Jews. Such an infantile little Jew-hater… uses JihadiCokk as a pacifier. tapatio https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/6862a06b7dca0b6b4e7021675a233af3ef12f5a747576a7a076f7e66e15d3a52.jpg Lonny TapaDILDO still trying to get negative attention from Jews by showing them what he just ate for lunch. tapatio APPARENTLY THIS BEANIE-BABY CAN’T READ. BUT, HIS MAMA PROBABLY CAUGHT HIM IN A TEL AVIV BACK ALLEY. HARDLY A WOMAN IN THAT CULT WITHOUT A COIN SLOT IN HER FOREHEAD. Lonny Apparently, you’re too stupid to understand that I pointed out what you ate for lunch, Jew-hate infant. tapatio Jew-boy, you fail to comprehend that I couldn’t care less about your ad hominem drivel. It only reinforces the reality that Judaism, especially the Zionist form is a FILTHY DISEASE – just like its cells – YOU. For more than 3000 years, from their expulsion from Egypt and from the money changers Jesus is said to have driven from the temple steps to the predatory global Rothschild banking cartel to the lowest loan shark in NY, to the Internet propaganda shill, the IDF thug and Mossad scum and their rabbis preaching the delusion of a “chosen” master-race, this predatory cultl posing as religion and ethnicity has most closely resembled a malignant cancer metastasizing through our world, corrupting and spoiling everything it touches. When one or a few cultures find a particular culture toxic, it could be bigotry. When almost EVERY culture finds Judaism toxic, JUDAISM IS TOXIC . Every expulsion of Jews below was preceded by widespread and extreme crime and abuses BY JEWS. The Jews have been expelled from more than 100 countries. Listed below are ONLY expulsions that could be directly linked to RAMPANT JEWISH CRIME. They had NOTHING to do with “persecution” of Jews. However, often, innocent Jews suffered because of guilt by association with their predatory culture. The expulsions of Jews were acts of SELF-PRESERVATION by non-Jewish cultures. Expulsions of Jews

Angela Merkel Accepts Responsibility for Party’s Losses in Berlin Election - The New York Times

Alison Smale and Melissa Eddy

BERLIN — Throughout the almost 11 years Chancellor Angela Merkel has been in office in Germany, her nation has been reassuringly stable in the midst of tumult throughout Europe, maintaining a steady economy and stolidly predictable politics. But it is becoming increasingly clear that Ms. Merkel’s decision last year to allow hundreds of thousands of migrants to enter the country has set off aftershocks that continue to upend politics in Germany and beyond. And on Monday, a day after voters in Berlin dealt her party another stinging loss in the second regional vote in two weeks, she was left to convince voters that she was not out of touch with their anger and anxiety over the flood of immigrants. “If I could, I would turn back time by many, many years to better prepare myself and the whole German government for the situation that reached us unprepared in late summer 2015,” Ms. Merkel said after meeting with leaders of her party, the Christian Democratic Union. “Nobody, including myself, wants a repeat of this situation. ” In a speech that was at times personal, Ms. Merkel took responsibility for her party’s showing in balloting in Berlin. She also acknowledged a role in the party’s humiliating finish, behind the Social Democratic Party and a nationalist party, Alternative for Germany, two weeks ago in her home state, . She pledged to work to regain voters’ trust. Since her decision to welcome refugees from Syria and other poor and countries, the effects across Germany and Europe have only grown more intense. The main political beneficiary of the backlash in Germany has been Alternative for Germany — a trend that has played out across much of the Continent, where parties are on the rise in many countries. The question of how far to go in assimilating the migrants has exposed a deep rift between Eastern and Western Europe, and the economic and cultural challenges of absorbing so many people have contributed to rising nationalism in countries including France, the Netherlands and Austria, and to Britain’s decision to leave the European Union. On Monday, instead of gathering with President Obama and other world leaders in New York at the United Nations, Ms. Merkel stayed home to shore up her political standing a year before general elections, deflecting questions about whether she would even run again. The chancellor defended her decision as “absolutely right,” but she acknowledged that “ultimately, it led to a time when we did not have enough control over the situation. ” She pointed to legislation and efforts since then aimed at helping to regain control and integrate the new arrivals. Her conservative party’s loss on Sunday in the state elections in Berlin, she acknowledged, was the result of the mass arrival of refugees and a resulting protest vote against the party. But there were several other reasons, she said, including the emergence of “a world, where people are not necessarily interested in facts, they are just following their feelings. ” The behavior of voters and politicians this year — most stunningly seen in Britain’s vote to leave the European Union — has upset faith in opinion polls and in institutions developed since World War II to contain the or thought that is now attracting populist support. Many Germans found their country’s chaotic response to the influx of migrants worrying to the point that they felt a threat, whether real or perceived, to their personal stability and prosperity, said Constanze Stelzenmüller, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. “To many, the German state appeared not to be capable of handling this wave of migrants,” Ms. Stelzenmüller said. “That raised questions of safety of their own personal life. That showed, right or wrong, their country’s institutions were not as strong as people thought they are. The shock of the initial wave is still in people’s bones. ” Ms. Merkel said it was vital to recognize the economic roots of insecurity, suggesting that globalization and new trade patterns could have profound effects on people, from the German farmer to the young population of Africa. Making that connection, she argued, is essential for a decent future. Germany “won’t let itself be rattled to its core,” she said, adding, “That didn’t happen even in such a indeed extremely unsettling, year as the past one. ” Germans in rural areas — where Christian Democrats hold more sway than in cities — are deeply worried that even if they are doing well, they have lost faith in their prospects for the future, she said. “When the young people all leave the villages, when one can only with difficulty sell one’s home,” she noted, there is drama and uncertainty “which thicken into a fear, or at the very least a worry about the future. ” After 1989, the fall of the Berlin Wall and the spread of freedom across Europe, she said, made it seem that Europe was on a victorious course and could not be overtaken. Now, she added, “something has developed where we notice that in the globalized world, we are not necessarily in the forefront. ”

A Supreme Court Not So Much Deadlocked as Diminished - The New York Times

Adam Liptak

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court has gone into hibernation, withdrawing from the central role it has played in American life throughout Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. ’s decade on the court. The court had leaned right until the death of Justice Antonin Scalia in February. According to the conventional wisdom, the court is now evenly divided and large numbers of ties are inevitable. But the truth is more complicated. The court is not deadlocked so much as diminished. The justices will continue to issue decisions in most cases, but many will be modest and ephemeral, like Monday’s opinion returning a major case on access to contraception to the lower courts for further consideration. “We’re seeing an even greater push for broad consensus and minimalist rulings, and a majority of the court seems willing to go along with that approach,” said Jonathan H. Adler, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University. Opinions vary about whether a Supreme Court that does little is good for the nation, but the trend is certainly a testament to Chief Justice Roberts’s leadership. He has long said he favors narrow decisions endorsed by large majorities, and it turns out that goal is easier to achieve on an court. In public remarks in April, Justice Elena Kagan described a court that is now “especially concerned” about finding ways to achieve consensus. “All of us are working hard to reach agreement,” she said. “I give great credit to the chief justice, who I think in general is a person who is concerned about consensus building, and I think all the more so now,” she added. “He’s conveyed that in both his words and his deeds. ” The resulting minimalism is good news, said Eric J. Segall, a law professor at Georgia State University. “Yesterday’s contraception case shows why an equally divided court among liberals and conservatives has many benefits for our country, and also why the claims by many court watchers about an court are overstated,” he said Tuesday. In the contraception case, Zubik v. Burwell, No. the court’s unanimous unsigned opinion urged lower courts to find a compromise, one that Professor Segall said “may lead to a better solution for both sides. ” The opinion sought to bridge the gap between religious groups that wanted no part in providing contraception coverage to their female employees and the Obama administration, which wanted to make sure the coverage remained easily accessible “This type of consensus decision making,” Professor Segall said, “is a welcome change from the normal political and sometimes partisan approach we normally see in important opinions, where one side can impose its own agenda on the parties and the country. ” Republican senators have vowed not to confirm President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee, Judge Merrick B. Garland, saying the choice of a replacement for Justice Scalia should go to the next president. That would leave the court for many more months. In the meantime, the Roberts court is in important ways dominated by the court’s liberal wing, which can now block efforts to move the law to the right. A prime example came in March, when the court deadlocked in a case that had threatened to cripple unions, Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, No. . When the case was argued in January, the court’s conservative majority seemed ready to say that forcing public workers to support unions they had declined to join violated the First Amendment. Justice Scalia’s questions were consistently hostile to the unions. There are many other ways to assess the shift in the balance of power since Justice Scalia’s death. Four days before he died, the court blocked the Obama administration’s effort to combat global warming by regulating emissions from power plants. The vote was 5 to 4, with the court’s conservatives in the majority. Just three weeks later, in a significant victory for the Obama administration, Chief Justice Roberts refused to block a different regulation limiting emissions of mercury and other toxic pollutants from power plants. And last Thursday, a deadlocked court refused to vacate a stay of execution of an Alabama man, Vernon Madison, with the court’s four conservatives saying they would have let the execution proceed. Had Justice Scalia lived, Mr. Madison would almost certainly have died. The court has three major decisions left to decide before the justices take their summer break: on abortion, immigration and affirmative action. In the first two, tie votes would leave in place conservative appeals court decisions but set no Supreme Court precedent, allowing the justices to return to the broader legal issues in later cases. At the argument in March in the abortion case, Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, No. Justice Anthony M. Kennedy said that it could be useful to return the case to the lower courts to develop more evidence. That approach would yield another minimalist decision. When the court agreed in January to hear the immigration case, United States v. Texas, No. conservatives hoped for a major ruling on presidential power. They were particularly heartened when the court took the unusual step of asking the parties to address the question of whether Mr. Obama had violated his constitutional obligations to enforce the nation’s laws. But when the case was argued before eight justices in April, a deadlock seemed likely and a sweeping decision on executive power was off the table. There is one case in which the court could still take a step to the right, Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin, No. a challenge to the university’s admissions plan. Justice Kagan has recused herself, based on her work on the case as United States solicitor general. That means Justice Scalia’s death eliminated rather than created the possibility of a tie. All of this term’s blockbusters were added to the court’s docket before Justice Scalia died. Since then, the justices have agreed to hear just seven cases, and none of them concern issues of broad public interest. Several involve intellectual property and procedural issues unlikely to produce ideological splits. The next term, which starts in October, is thus shaping up to be a thin and quiet one. Until the next justice arrives, the Supreme Court will remain on the sideline of American life. “The court will be on the front pages less often,” said David A. Strauss, a law professor at the University of Chicago. “The justices won’t have so much trouble with relatively technical cases, and some of those can be very important to the legal system,” he added. “But they will either stay away from the most controversial cases or do what they’ve been doing over the last few months — deciding those cases in a way that postpones, maybe indefinitely, the day of reckoning on the most divisive questions. ”

A Malaysian Political Cartoonist on Facing His Fears, and Prison, for Art - The New York Times

Mike Ives

HONG KONG — When protesters disrupted an art exhibition by Zulkiflee Anwar Ulhaque, a political cartoonist, at the George Town Literary Festival in Malaysia on Saturday, he assumed that the police would want his help identifying those responsible. Instead, said Mr. Zulkiflee, who goes by the name Zunar, he was questioned by the police, detained for a day and informed that he was under investigation for producing cartoons that purportedly defamed Prime Minister Najib Razak. It was not the first time Mr. Zulkiflee, who already faces nine charges of sedition and is barred from leaving the country, has courted trouble with his pen. His cartoons frequently target Mr. Najib, who is accused of taking millions of dollars from a state investment fund. Mr. Najib has faced widespread calls to resign, most recently at an anticorruption demonstration this month that drew tens of thousands in Kuala Lumpur, the capital. In an interview, Mr. Zulkiflee, 54, discussed how social media has become an increasingly important channel for political dissent in Malaysia, and why he continues to use his art to investigate corruption and injustice without dwelling too much on the risks. Do you feel that the climate for creating your art has changed in recent years? People are really not happy with the government — more and more people — but there are laws stopping them from being in the front row and being very, very vocal. So they will use any type of form, of tool, to express their view or protest. So now, social media is something that is a very effective tool. People are starting to be creative in social media by using drawings, cartoons, posters or video clips. The government feels this is very dangerous for them, so they start to introduce laws. As an example, the Sedition Act was introduced by the British government in 1948. And in 2012, the prime minister made an open pledge to Malaysia that he would abolish the Sedition Act, live on TV. But he uses it more now, and it’s going to be strengthened. Do these kinds of regulations affect your creative process? I’m facing so many laws three laws have been used against me so far. But one thing I keep in my mind — one very, very important thing — is that the biggest enemy for anyone in the world is . For me, talent is not a gift but a responsibility. People ask, do I have fear? Yes, I have fear, I’m human. But responsibility is bigger than fear. So I don’t want to really think what the government will do next to me. I just concentrate on what I’m supposed to do. That can help me continue and draw more cartoons. If I start to think about law, I start to think about prison, I start to think about government action, I will definitely start to practice — and this is no good. So I will draw as usual. Your cartoon about the person in chains with the Sedition Act around his neck and the Penal Code as handcuffs … That’s a self portrait. What were you trying to say there? You see that three laws, which I mentioned earlier, have been used against me. First is Sedition Act, second is penal code, third is Printing Presses and Publications Act. I was chained with these laws — hand, neck and leg. But if you go to my shirt, you can see my philosophies there. Among them are “I will keep drawing until the last drop of my ink” and “How can I be neutral … even my pen has a stand. ” So this drawing shows that even though there’s a law to stop me, even though there’s a regulation to stop me, even though they tried to ban my books — actually, not tried, they already banned my book — I will keep drawing. That is why, without hands, I still use my mouth or my teeth to draw. This is to show the philosophy and determination to fulfill my duty as a cartoonist in Malaysia. You have said that you are expecting a 10th sedition charge. Even without that, you’re looking at upward of 40 years as a maximum prison sentence. How do you feel about the prospect of potentially having to serve so much time? You have to understand this is a politically motivated charge, it’s got nothing to do with the law. In Malaysia, it’s very, very difficult for us with politically motivated charges. You just need to look at what happened to the opposition leader’s case in Malaysia, Anwar Ibrahim. Even though he had strong evidence and witnesses, it was political. It will be very difficult for us to fix that. But this is a very important case for me to create awareness around the world about the state of freedom of expression and human rights in Malaysia. I’m going to face it.

Fear Spurs Support for Health Law as Republicans Work to Repeal It - The New York Times

Robert Pear

WASHINGTON — Donald J. Trump and congressional Republicans appear to have accomplished a feat that President Obama, with all the power at his disposal, could not in the past seven years: They have galvanized outspoken support for the Affordable Care Act. People who benefit from the law are flooding Congress with testimonials. Angry consumers are confronting Republican lawmakers. And Democrats who saw the law as a political liability in recent elections have suddenly found their voice, proudly defending the law now that it is in trouble. Thousands of people across the country held rallies over the weekend to save the health care law, which Republicans moved last week to repeal with a first but crucial legislative step. A widely circulated video showed Representative Mike Coffman, Republican of Colorado, eluding constituents who had wanted to meet with him to express their concerns on Saturday at a community event in Aurora, Colo. Rallies on Sunday to save the health law drew robust crowds around the country. “We are here today — thousands strong in Boston, and at more rallies all across this country — because we will make our voices heard,” Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts, told a crowd outside Faneuil Hall in Boston. “If Republicans try to rip health care out of the hands of millions of Americans, we will fight them every step of the way. ” And progressive groups are planning a bus tour to fight the repeal effort, starting Tuesday. With their quick strike on the law in the first days of the new Congress, Republicans had hoped to begin the repeal process before a backlash could develop or opposition could be organized. But congressional Republicans are at risk of losing the message war, especially since they are fighting on two fronts. On one side, the has repeatedly lobbed disruptive demands at them, such as his insistence that they prepare a replacement health bill almost immediately. To that, he added a new promise over the weekend: that the Republican version would provide “insurance for everybody. ” On the other front, Democratic lawmakers have taken to quoting grateful constituents to personalize what can be an arcane legislative fight: Bryce in Seattle Randy in Rhinelander, Wis. Nicole in Hockessin, Del. and many more. The focus of public attention appears to be shifting from the defects of the health care law to the plaintive pleas of people terrified of losing insurance if the law is repealed. “I want to thank President Obama from the bottom of my heart because I would be dead if it weren’t for him,” Jeff Jeans, a man from Sedona, Ariz. who described himself as a lifelong Republican, told Speaker Paul D. Ryan on Thursday at a meeting televised on CNN. Republicans acknowledge their constituents’ concerns, but they say supporters of the health law are manufacturing them. Representative Rob Woodall, Republican of Georgia, blamed Democrats for “amping up anxiety” with “fear mongering. ” “The anxiety is real,” Mr. Woodall said, “but it’s real based on the failures of the president’s health care law. ” Republicans will soon face a new challenge: maintaining anger at “Obamacare” without Mr. Obama in the White House to stir their passions. Regardless of its provenance, the law’s support has until now received less attention. Appearing on the NBC News program “Meet the Press” five days after Mr. Obama signed the Affordable Care Act in 2010, Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York, predicted that as people learned about the law, “it’s going to become more and more popular. ” Around 20 million Americans have gained coverage through the Affordable Care Act’s online insurance marketplaces or through its expansion of Medicaid, and enrollment has continued to grow. About 11. 5 million people have signed up for marketplace plans or had their coverage automatically renewed for this year, nearly 300, 000 more than at this time last year, the Obama administration said this month. But the popularity bounce never came. Public opinion remains deeply divided, with the law no more popular today than when it was passed. In December, according to a monthly tracking poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation, 46 percent of Americans had unfavorable views of the law, up from 40 percent in April 2010. The share with favorable views slipped to 43 percent, from 46 percent in April 2010. “In the short term, the A. C. A. has been a political disaster for President Obama and the Democrats,” Dr. Ezekiel J. Emanuel, a health policy adviser in the Obama White House from 2009 to 2011, said in a 2014 book. As Congress took a first step last week toward rolling back Mr. Obama’s signature domestic achievement, Mr. Trump celebrated. “The ‘Unaffordable’ Care Act will soon be history!” he said on Twitter. Some Democrats distanced themselves from the Obama administration after HealthCare. gov crashed on its debut in 2013. More recently, with premiums soaring and insurers defecting from the Affordable Care Act marketplace in many states, Democrats were hard put to defend the law, which was passed without any Republican votes. But as Mr. Trump and congressional Republicans race to repeal the law, Democrats are taking a more aggressive stance. Senator Debbie Stabenow, Democrat of Michigan, told the story of Sonja L. Podjan, a blueberry farmer in Watervliet, Mich. who was in pain for several years until she got insurance under the Affordable Care Act, which covered the cost of surgery to repair a severe tear in the meniscus of her right knee. In an interview, Ms. Podjan said she “started freaking out” after the election and sent an email to Ms. Stabenow. She said she was “flabbergasted” when she heard back from the senator’s office. Ms. Podjan said that the premium for an insurance policy covering her and her husband was about $1, 000 a month, but that they paid just $62 after receiving government subsidies provided under the law. “I am scared to death we will lose our insurance, and what happens then?” said Ms. Podjan, who reported that she and her husband had medical expenses totaling $41, 000 in the past two years. Senator Tom Udall, Democrat of New Mexico, told the story of a constituent, Kevin Kargacin, whose daughter Amber takes drugs costing more than $60, 000 a year for multiple sclerosis. “Kevin is scared because the cost of treating Amber’s disease is so high,” Mr. Udall said. In an interview, Mr. Kargacin said he wrote to Mr. Udall because “we are terrified that without the Affordable Care Act, Amber could be denied insurance or run into lifetime caps on expenditures for her treatment. ” Senator Amy Klobuchar, Democrat of Minnesota, said: “Many Minnesotans have contacted me in the last few months, frightened about the future of their health care coverage. I heard from a man in Orono. His wife was diagnosed with cancer this year. On top of everything his family is now dealing with, he is terrified that his family will lose coverage if there is a repeal. ” Whether such concerns reflect a change in public opinion is difficult to say. Over the past six years, Republicans have collected stories from hundreds of constituents complaining that their insurance policies were canceled, their premiums have shot up and their deductibles are so high that the insurance is nearly worthless. “Scott from Hickory has had his health insurance canceled three times now, disrupting his continuity of care,” said Representative Virginia Foxx, Republican of North Carolina. “Patricia from Kernersville now has a whopping $6, 550 deductible. ” Representative Pat Tiberi, Republican of Ohio, reported that a constituent named Kimberly had difficulty obtaining treatment for a brain tumor because, she said, “virtually no doctors take the marketplace insurance. ” The differing accounts are not necessarily in contradiction. Some people have benefited from the law while others have seen their coverage disrupted. Republicans said the Obama administration had been slow to recognize and acknowledge problems with the Affordable Care Act. Administration officials said insurance rate increases of 25 percent or more were not a significant problem because people could get subsidies to help defray the cost — even though millions of people buying insurance on their own do not receive subsidies. The administration insisted that insurance markets were “stable and vibrant” even as large insurers pulled out of Affordable Care Act exchanges where they were losing hundreds of millions of dollars. In 2015, the administration said that “claims data show healthier consumers” in the exchanges, but some insurers disputed that assessment, saying they had not seen an influx of healthy people to help cover the costs of sick people.

In ‘Glory,’ Britney Spears Promises Pleasure, but Offers Nothing Personal - The New York Times

Jon Pareles

Britney Spears strives mightily to be on “Glory,” her ninth studio album. But Ms. Spears has plenty of back story she’s a working mother, the headliner in her own Las Vegas spectacle and a performer who has weathered teenage fame, backlash, public meltdowns and wave after wave of tabloid headlines. “Glory,” her first album since 2013, is her latest attempt to reclaim her place on the pop charts, which are now crowded with younger performers who have studied her the way Ms. Spears studied Madonna. Her latest strategy is relentless and unambiguous: Stick to sexy. Ms. Spears’s albums in the 2000s, like “Blackout” and “Femme Fatale,” showed that she and her advisers know something about the dynamics of celebrity and media, as she toyed with provocation and selective revelation. Hits like “I’m a Slave 4 U” and “Toxic” teased at the power dynamics of lust and romance. But “Glory” has shallower aims it’s all and promises of pleasure, as if the only intimacies that matter are physical ones. “To know each other your love all over me,” she coos in “Invitation,” the breathy, Janet Glass enticement that opens the album. For songwriting and production, Ms. Spears drew from the talent pool that also supplies material for her pop peers and rivals, among them Selena Gomez, Nick Jonas, Fifth Harmony, Demi Lovato and, yes, Madonna. Her vocal producer, Mischke, has a résumé stretching from Michael Jackson and the Spice Girls to Gwen Stefani. Unlike Will. i. am, the producer who filled Ms. Spears’s 2013 album “Britney Jean” with clichés, her new collaborators make musical space for her. They look toward the melting tones, echoey hollows and constructions of recent releases by Ms. Gomez and Justin Bieber. Heavy bass lines and kick drums are all but banished, perhaps to return in remixes. Instead, syncopations are sketched in the midrange by handclaps, keyboard chords, electronic plinks or bits of guitar. The album’s peppiest song, “What You Need,” matches a track that sounds like Motown to a vocal that flaunts its electronic warbles. Throughout the album, Ms. Spears’s voice — no doubt still processed, but far less obviously robotic — has emphatically returned to the foreground. In verses, she recalls the flirty singer, with the knowing scratch in her voice, who conquered 1990s pop. She sounds more involved, more present, than she has in a decade. Choruses, like those in “Make Me … ” sometimes layer her voice into an ecstatic choir. Yet even with her voice upfront, Ms. Spears isn’t singing anything particularly personal. “Glory” is one long, often catchy, announcement of availability. Ms. Spears declares “nobody should be alone if they don’t have to be” in the “Do You Wanna Come Over?” “Slumber Party,” which eases into a chorus, promises, “We ain’t gonna sleep tonight. ” In “Love Me Down,” she says, “You say we don’t talk any more ’m thinking we talk too much,” preferring communication by touch. A song on the deluxe version of this album, “Change Your Mind (No Seas Cortés),” sets out to seduce a guy who is “trying to be a gentleman” and doesn’t want to “cross the line” by urging, in Spanish, “don’t be polite,” adding “I’m desperate. ” And often, behind the sleek electronics and the tidy vocals, a certain desperation comes through. “Just Luv Me,” one song, begs. Ms. Spears’s previous album, “Britney Jean,” was her commercial nadir, and the singles preceding the release of “Glory” — “Make Me. .. ” and “Pretty Girls,” a collaboration with Iggy Azalea that’s not on this album — weren’t smashes. Another preview, “Private Show,” was introduced alongside a new perfume of the same name. It casts the singer as a stripper: “Slide down my me spin it and twerk it. ” Working for others, the songwriters behind “Glory” have come up with other messages, particularly for female singers. Teen pop now abounds with messages of doubts overcome, of pride, of confidence, of empowerment that doesn’t depend on pleasing a guy. Ms. Spears, with turbulent decades of experience, might connect her life with her songs, as divas do, and find herself forging a stronger bond with listeners. But “Glory” doesn’t make that reach. It’s as if, after all her fans and fame, Ms. Spears can still only present herself as that most generic pop commodity: a sexpot.

Inside the Invisible Government; War, Propaganda, Clinton & Trump

admin

Inside the Invisible Government; War, Propaganda, Clinton & Trump Inside the Invisible Government; War, Propaganda, Clinton & Trump By 208 The American journalist, Edward Bernays, is often described as the man who invented modern propaganda. The nephew of Sigmund Freud, the pioneer of psycho-analysis, it was Bernays who coined the term “public relations” as a euphemism for spin and its deceptions. In 1929, he persuaded feminists to promote cigarettes for women by smoking in the New York Easter Parade – behaviour then considered outlandish. One feminist, Ruth Booth, declared, “Women! Light another torch of freedom! Fight another sex taboo!” Bernays’ influence extended far beyond advertising. His greatest success was his role in convincing the American public to join the slaughter of the First World War. The secret, he said, was “engineering the consent” of people in order to “control and regiment [them] according to our will without their knowing about it”. He described this as “the true ruling power in our society” and called it an “invisible government”. Today, the invisible government has never been more powerful and less understood. In my career as a journalist and film-maker, I have never known propaganda to insinuate our lives and as it does now and to go unchallenged. Imagine two cities. Both are under siege by the forces of the government of that country. Both cities are occupied by fanatics, who commit terrible atrocities, such as beheading people. But there is a vital difference. In one siege, the government soldiers are described as liberators by Western reporters…

Carrot Top To Give Nobel Awards At Drive Thru Window

Friday, 4 November 2016 Nobel Prize recipients will be able to go to the drive thru window to get their awards. After accruing millions of dollars in debt, the Nobel prize committee will forgo a lavish award ceremony in favor of a webcast hosted by Carrot Top from a drive thru coffee kiosk. Nobel Committee head Jørgen Myklebust is putting his experience in marketing for Supermac's to the task with the new drive thru format for this years award ceremony. He explained the decision when he talked to reporter Rance Penning of the Daily Maul. "This will be the first year in a decade we don't lose money: the webcast costs us virtually nothing and Carrot Top has agreed to MC the award ceremony in exchange for a Nobel prize in chemistry. And having Carrot Top as the host is already giving us a boost with advertisers." Myklebust further explained: "The nominees will be able to stream the webcast while in the parking lot at NK Stockholm, and the winners will drive up to the kiosk window to get their awards." When Penning asked if the entire Nobel operation was moving to the kiosk, Myklebust dismissed the question as silly. "You know, it's not serious to ask if we are keeping our offices in the kiosk, of course our whole staff will not fit in a kiosk. For those who are curious, we'll continue to maintain our office space in a camping tent outside Tom Schuyler's house." This reporter visited with Carrot Top to talk about the new gig. I had a few minutes with him in his Las Vegas dressing room as his assistants made him up for that nights show. "I can't wait to go to Sweden," said Scott Thompson (Carrot Top's real name). "I can go incognito, you know, I don't stand out as a ginger there." When asked about props for the webcast, the beloved orange one jumped up and grabbed some vials and a butane torch from a toy box. "Oh, yeah! Since my Nobel prize is in chemistry, I'm bringing my Meth Lab Jr.™ chemistry set, I should probably save that for the end of the show in case I blow anything up!" "And for sure I'm bringing my tip jar!" At which point Thompson showed this reporter an actual glass jar with a credit card reader embedded in it. Make XRhonda Speaks's day - give this story five thumbs-up (there's no need to register , the thumbs are just down there!)

Donald Trump, Aleppo, FARC: Your Monday Evening Briefing - The New York Times

Karen Workman and Sandra Stevenson

(Want to get this briefing by email? Here’s the .) Good evening. Here’s the latest. 1. The presidential race gained new intensity as both candidates faced increased scrutiny. For Hillary Clinton, it’s about her embrace of a strategy of counterattack on women who said during Bill Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign that they’d had sexual encounters with him. And for Donald Trump, tax documents from 1995 show that he declared a loss so big that it might have allowed him to avoid paying taxes for the next 18 years. (Our reporter found the documents in her mailbox.) Separately, his foundation has also been ordered to stop soliciting donations in New York because it is not registered to do so. ____ 2. The candidates will be tasked with defending their running mates during Tuesday’s debate, which will be their lone this election. Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia has already faced some tough questions about Mrs. Clinton, but he hasn’t been forced to play cleanup the way that Gov. Mike Pence of Indiana has for Mr. Trump. But it may just come to down to this: “Don’t screw up — that’s the goal of a V. P. debate,” a Republican communications specialist said. ____ 3. The United States formally suspended its talks with Russia about the war in Syria. Secretary of State John Kerry threatened to do so last week as Russia and Syria carried out a brutal bombing campaign in parts of Aleppo, where 275, 000 civilians — including about 100, 000 children — are trapped. Plans for jointly targeting jihadists have also been shelved. ____ 4. President Obama’s health care law, the Affordable Care Act, will almost certainly have to change to survive — even Mr. Obama has acknowledged that more work is needed. But how it will change is dependent on the election. Both parties agree that for too many people, insurance plans are too expensive and inaccessible. Mrs. Clinton wants to increase government involvement in an effort to change that Mr. Trump would seek to decrease it. ____ 5. A surprise defeat of a referendum on a peace deal left Colombia in shock, but both the government and the rebel group it warred against for decades vowed they would not go back to fighting. Many Colombians felt that the deal was too lenient on the rebels, known as the FARC. “There’s no justice in this accord,” said one voter. ____ 6. The first Nobel Prize of the year was awarded to Yoshinori Ohsumi, above, a Japanese cell biologist. He won the physiology or medicine prize for deciphering how cells recycle their content, a critical process that led to a new field and inspired hundreds of researchers around the world. Five more Nobel Prizes will be awarded this week and next. We talked to eight previous winners about how they received the good news: Many were asleep, thanks to a time difference. One relayed that his mother said to his wife, “That’s very nice, but don’t let it go to his head. ” ____ 7. In the Caribbean, people are bracing for Hurricane Matthew, above, to bring flash floods, mudslides and winds up to 140 miles per hour. The Category 4 hurricane is expected to hit Haiti by Monday night and then continue north, threatening other Caribbean nations and potentially the U. S. too. And Hurricane Sandy caused enormous damage when it slammed the East Coast in 2012, but one lasting impact may be positive. The storm surge opened a passage between the ocean and Great South Bay, on New York’s Fire Island, bringing in new life. ____ 8. Major League Baseball is taking the night off. The regular season wrapped up on Sunday, playoff matchups are set and the postseason will kick off Tuesday. The Toronto Blue Jays will host the Baltimore Orioles in the A. L. game on Tuesday. The Orioles lost the A. L. Championship Series in 2014. The Blue Jays lost it last year. And on Wednesday, the Mets will host the National League game against the San Francisco Giants at Citi Field. ____ 9. Bad news for kids (and parents): There’s no nasal spray version of the flu vaccine this year. Get ready for the needle. Federal officials pulled the spray vaccine (the brand name is FluMist) because it has been less effective in the past couple of flu seasons. Experts say that distracting children remains “the most proven technique” for making shots easier. Distraction remains your briefing writer’s vaccine technique, too. ____ 10. Our media columnist, Jim Rutenberg, has been accused on Twitter of soiling his pants out of fear of a Trump presidency and been harassed for being dumb, and a Jew, among other things. But still, he writes, “I don’t know what it’s like to be really savaged by Twitter. ” His latest column asks whether the hate speech frequently encountered on the social network could be driving users away and suggests that all players could benefit from a robust discussion on standards and the public interest. ____ 11. “In every good marriage, it helps sometimes to be a little deaf. ” In one of our most popular stories today, the Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg shared general life advice and talked about the challenges facing women in the workplace. One great nugget: She said that advice on marriage, given to her by her on her wedding day, had helped in her career as well. ____ Your Evening Briefing is posted at 6 p. m. Eastern. And don’t miss Your Morning Briefing, posted weekdays at 6 a. m. Eastern, and Your Weekend Briefing, posted at 6 a. m. Sundays. Want to look back? Here’s the weekend briefing. What did you like? What do you want to see here? Let us know at briefing@nytimes. com.

Supreme Court Rejects Puerto Rico Law in Debt Restructuring Case - The New York Times

Adam Liptak and Mary Williams Walsh

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Monday rejected an effort in Puerto Rico to allow public utilities there to restructure $20 billion in debt, striking down a 2014 Puerto Rico law. Justice Clarence Thomas, writing for the majority in the decision, said the law was at odds with the federal bankruptcy code, which bars states and lower units of government from enacting their own versions of bankruptcy law. Puerto Rico is struggling with $72 billion in debt and has argued that it needs to restructure at least some of it under Chapter 9, the part of the bankruptcy code for insolvent local governments. But Puerto Rico is not permitted to do so, because Chapter 9 specifically excludes it, although it is unclear why. In 2014, the island tried to get around that exclusion by enacting its own version of a bankruptcy law, intended for its big public utilities, which account for about $26 billion of the total debt. But that attempt, called the Recovery Act, ran afoul of the part of the code that says only Congress may enact bankruptcy laws. Puerto Rican officials had argued that the Recovery Act addressed a gap in the way its debts are treated. Under the bankruptcy code, they said, states may authorize their cities, counties, public utilities and other branches of government to restructure their debts under Chapter 9 of the code. But that law excludes Puerto Rico and all branches of its government, including its public utilities. Utility creditors challenged the Recovery Act in federal court, arguing that the bankruptcy code displaced, or it. The justices agreed. The federal law, Justice Thomas wrote, “bars Puerto Rico from enacting its own municipal bankruptcy scheme to restructure the debt of its insolvent public utilities. ” Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justices Anthony M. Kennedy, Stephen G. Breyer and Elena Kagan joined him. Justice Thomas wrote that the decision was compelled by a straightforward reading of the federal law. In dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, said the majority’s approach was too mechanical and failed to take into account the purpose of the bankruptcy law and the impact of its decision. The Recovery Act, she wrote, “is the only existing legal option for Puerto Rico to restructure debts that could cripple its citizens. ” “The Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and its municipalities are in the middle of a fiscal crisis,” she wrote. “The combined debt of Puerto Rico’s three main public utilities exceeds $20 billion. These utilities provide power, water, sewer and transportation to residents of the island. ” “With rising interest rates and limited access to capital markets, their debts are proving unserviceable. Soon, Puerto Rico and the utilities contend, they will be unable to pay for things like fuel to generate electricity, which will lead to rolling blackouts,” Justice Sotomayor added. “Other vital public services will be imperiled, including the utilities’ ability to provide safe drinking water, maintain roads and operate public transportation. ” The majority’s approach ignores those realities, she wrote, “rejects contextual analysis in favor of a syllogism” and leaves Puerto Rico “powerless and with no legal process to help” its citizens. Pedro Pierluisi, Puerto Rico’s nonvoting member of Congress, said: “The practical significance of the court’s holding is crystal clear. Only Congress can provide the Puerto Rico government with the authority to restructure its debts. ” He said action by Congress “is essential if the territory is going to overcome its severe — and worsening — economic, fiscal and demographic crisis. ” The case has been vexing for all parties because when Congress amended the bankruptcy code to exclude Puerto Rico, in 1984, it left no written record explaining why. Yet the rule barred the island from the only way under United States law that a debtor can legally reduce debt over the objections of creditors. Besides passing its own bankruptcy law in 2014, Puerto Rico tried to persuade Congress to delete the 1984 exclusion. It said the provision was inexplicable and may have been inserted by mistake. Those arguments did not sway Congress. But last year lawmakers realized the United States Constitution gave them the power to “make all needful rules and regulations” for territories, including Puerto Rico. Using that approach, the House of Representatives passed a bill this month that would apply to all territories (though only Puerto Rico is in dire need at the moment). Obama administration officials have expressed hope that the Senate will take up the measure quickly and enact it before July 1, when Puerto Rico is supposed to make debt payments totaling nearly $2 billion. It is expected to default, which would normally prompt creditors to sue. As now drafted, the bill would stay such lawsuits, put Puerto Rico under federal oversight and give it other legal powers similar to those found in bankruptcy. In the majority opinion, Justice Thomas noted that Puerto Rico had also been seeking help from Congress. “After the parties briefed and argued these cases,” he wrote, “members of Congress introduced a bill in the House of Representatives to establish an oversight board to assist Puerto Rico and its instrumentalities,” adding that “the bill does not amend the federal bankruptcy code. ” Justice Sotomayor responded that “the government and people of Puerto Rico should not have to wait for possible congressional action to avert the consequences of unreliable electricity, transportation and safe water — consequences that members of the executive and legislature have described as a looming ‘humanitarian crisis. ’”. Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. recused himself from the cases, Puerto Rico v. Franklin California Trust, No. and v. Franklin California Trust, No. . As is the court’s custom, he did not explain why.

Split Over Donald Trump Threatens to Tilt Republican States - The New York Times

Alexander Burns and Jonathan Martin

Donald J. Trump’s intensifying battle with his own party is tearing open the nation’s political map, pulling Republicans across the country into a feud that could imperil dozens of lawmakers in Congress and potentially throw states into Hillary Clinton’s column. Democrats are moving swiftly to exploit Mr. Trump’s crumbling position in the presidential race, aiming to run up a big margin of victory for Mrs. Clinton and extend their political advantage into the congressional elections next month. Mrs. Clinton’s campaign has concluded that at least two traditionally Republican states, Georgia and Arizona, are realistic targets for her campaign to win over. And Republican polling has found that Mr. Trump is at dire risk of losing Georgia, according to people briefed on the polls, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Mrs. Clinton now holds such a strong upper hand that Priorities USA, a “super PAC” backing her campaign, may direct some of its war chest into Senate races, two people said, and may begin broadcasting ads for those contests as soon as next week. Congressional Democrats also hope to persuade Mrs. Clinton to continue pouring money and campaign resources into states like Virginia and Colorado, where they believe her victory is assured, in order to lift other Democratic candidates. In a signal of Democrats’ growing focus on the House and Senate, Mrs. Clinton used a visit on Tuesday to Miami to attack both Mr. Trump and Senator Marco Rubio, whom Mrs. Clinton blasted for what she described as his indifference to climate change. “We need to elect people up and down the ballot, at every level of government, who take it seriously,” Mrs. Clinton said, adding, “It is an unacceptable response for Marco Rubio, when asked about climate change, to say, ‘I’m not a scientist. ’” Mrs. Clinton’s campaign chairman, John D. Podesta, told reporters that she would continue to call out Republicans. Mr. Rubio is among the Republicans whom Priorities USA may seek to defeat, if the group decides to intervene in Senate races, one strategist said. Increasingly anxious Republicans have not come up with a unified strategy for containing the damage from Mr. Trump’s embattled candidacy, and several strategists and party officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity said they were awaiting a new round of polling before settling on a course. But, in a sign that Republicans now view the presidential race as a lost cause, several Senate candidates are preparing ads asking voters to elect them as a check on Mrs. Clinton in the White House. Yet Mr. Trump himself, having been rejected in recent days by dozens of Republican elected officials, has indicated that he will make any separation an exceptionally messy and painful ordeal for the party. Mr. Trump lashed out publicly on Tuesday morning at two of his critics: Senator John McCain of Arizona, who withdrew his endorsement of Mr. Trump over the weekend, and Paul D. Ryan, the speaker of the House, who informed congressional Republicans on Monday that he would no longer defend Mr. Trump. Seething on Twitter, Mr. Trump attacked Mr. Ryan as “weak and ineffective” and described Mr. McCain as “very foul mouthed. ” And in a Fox News interview, Mr. Trump mocked both men as disloyal, reserving special venom for Mr. Ryan. “Paul Ryan opened borders and amnesty and bad budgets,” Mr. Trump said. He declared himself a liberated man, writing on Twitter:. “It is so nice that the shackles have been taken off me and I can now fight for America the way I want to. ” Should Mr. Trump continue deriding the leaders of the institutional Republican Party, it could have profound consequences down the ballot, potentially depressing turnout by demoralizing the party or leading Mr. Trump’s ardent supporters to deny their votes to Republicans who abandoned him. But there is little Republicans can do to control Mr. Trump’s behavior: The party’s donors have no leverage over him, he is relying largely on small donors and, at 70, he is not mindful of any future campaign. The emerging dynamic may be especially toxic for Republicans in swing states that are also home to competitive races for the House and Senate, where the party’s candidates must choose between two unpalatable options: alienating much of their party’s base, or standing behind a nominee who is unacceptable to most mainstream voters. The voting bloc that especially concerns Republican officials are the voters who usually favor Republican candidates but cannot abide Mr. Trump. These voters can make up anywhere between a quarter to a third of the party’s electoral coalition. “That voter is clearly not going to vote for Donald Trump,” said Josh Holmes, a Republican strategist who is working on several Senate races. “But if they don’t vote at all, it’s catastrophic for us. ” The nightmare possibility for the party is that swing voters punish the party because of Mr. Trump, the Republicans stay at home and Mr. Trump’s base casts a ballot for him and then leaves the polls. Under those conditions, Senate races in places like Pennsylvania and North Carolina could fall to Democrats, while Senate and House races in places like Missouri, Arizona and Kansas could move to the center of the battlefield. Already, Republicans view Mr. Trump’s sharp downturn in the presidential race as having jeopardized their majorities in Congress. A poll published on Tuesday by NBC News and The Wall Street Journal found Mr. Trump trailing Mrs. Clinton by nine percentage points nationally and drawing just 37 percent of the vote. No nominee since World War II has received a smaller share of the vote. But in an illustration of the bind Republicans are in, the poll found that of Republicans believed their candidates should stay loyal to Mr. Trump. In Nevada, the Republican candidate for Senate, Representative Joe Heck, withdrew his support from Mr. Trump over the weekend, and is facing a furious backlash. Sandie Kirwin, a Las Vegas retail manager supportive of Mr. Trump, said she might now vote for a Democrat over Mr. Heck in a critical Senate race. “I think of Joe Heck the same I do of any Republican not supporting Donald Trump,” said Ms. Kirwin, 52. “I will never support any of them, and I will do what I can to get them out of office. ” But other voters say they may punish those who fail to denounce Mr. Trump. Several Republicans in difficult Senate races have criticized Mr. Trump in strong terms without coming out in opposition to his candidacy, including Senators Patrick J. Toomey of Pennsylvania, Richard M. Burr of North Carolina and Mr. Rubio. In Pennsylvania, Jaye Steuterman, a registered Republican and a real estate agent in Doylestown, said she was still undecided on which presidential candidate to vote for. She said she was deeply unsettled by Mr. Trump’s past comments about forcing himself on women, but that might not be enough to stop her voting for him. “I don’t know what’s more important to me — that, or the fact that Hillary is a liar,” Ms. Steuterman said. In the Senate race, she is inclined to vote for Mr. Toomey because he is a Republican, but her decision could depend on whether he supports Mr. Trump. Even the drastic step of denouncing Mr. Trump may not be enough to shield Republicans from his unpopularity. In a conference call on Tuesday with the Democratic caucus, Representative Ben Ray Luján of New Mexico, the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said that party polling found voters drawing scant distinction between Republicans who endorsed Mr. Trump and those who abandoned him out of political expediency, according to people who participated in the call, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because it was supposed to be private. On the same call, Representative James E. Clyburn of South Carolina, the House Democrat, expressed concern that Mrs. Clinton might abandon states that she is all but sure to win, but where Democrats are still locked in competitive races. Mr. Clyburn asked Representative Nancy Pelosi, the minority leader, to contact Mrs. Clinton’s campaign to ensure it would not withdraw resources from Virginia and Colorado. “Most people think the House now could be in play,” said Representative John Yarmuth of Kentucky. “There’s a little bit of scrambling going on to identify races that could flip if the presidential race somehow gets to a margin. ” Like their Republican counterparts, Democrats do not plan to make final strategy decisions until they receive new polling. But they have already begun aggressively attacking Republicans, even as those officials retreat from Mr. Trump. Three Democratic congressional candidates have started running ads this week that showcase footage of Mr. Trump describing sexual assault in graphic terms, from a 2005 recording. Gov. Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire, who is challenging Senator Kelly Ayotte, used the footage in a campaign video on Tuesday, saying Ms. Ayotte recently denounced Mr. Trump only to “protect herself. ” And outside groups supporting congressional Democrats have begun to reallocate their spending to take advantage of the shifting environment. The House Majority PAC, the principal outside group supporting House Democrats, this week made a $1. 2 million reservation to contest the suburban Philadelphia seat held by Representative Michael G. Fitzpatrick, who is retiring. In affluent, suburban areas, which were already trending strongly toward Democrats after the first presidential debate, Republican survival may depend on the willingness of voters to separate their feelings about the presidential race from their voting behavior in all other elections. Outside a ski shop on Tuesday in Aurora, Colo. Sharon and Les Sparks said they were disappointed by Republicans pulling away from Mr. Trump, whom Mr. Sparks described as “spoiled little entitled brats. ” Among those lawmakers is Representative Mike Coffman, a congressman who has been critical of Mr. Trump for months and recently called on him to end his campaign. Still, Mr. and Ms. Sparks said they would vote for Mr. Coffman, despite their frustration. “They need to unite,” said Ms. Sparks, 49, a project manager in the health industry. “If you’re going to be in the Republican Party, you need to start standing behind the party. ”

U.S. Traffic Deaths Rise for a Second Straight Year - The New York Times

Neal E. Boudette

Over the last decade, new cars have gotten electronic stability control systems to prevent skids, rearview cameras to prevent fender benders and more airbags to protect occupants in collisions. Hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent on campaigns to remind the public of the dangers of drunken driving, failing to buckle up and texting while on the go. Despite all that, more Americans are dying on roads and highways than in years, and the sudden and sharp increase has alarmed safety advocates. The latest batch of bad news arrived Wednesday in traffic fatality estimates released by the National Safety Council, a nonprofit organization that works closely with federal regulators. According to its estimates, 40, 200 people died in accidents involving motor vehicles in 2016, a 6 percent rise from the year before. If the estimates are confirmed, it will be the first time since 2007 that more than 40, 000 people have died in motor vehicle accidents in a single year. The 2016 total comes after a 7 percent rise in 2015 and means the increase — 14 percent — is the largest in more than a half a century. “Why are we O. K. with this?” Deborah Hersman, the National Safety Council president and chief executive, said at a news conference. “Complacency is killing us. ” Part of the increase is believed to stem from the improving economy, which has led Americans to drive more miles for both work and pleasure. But safety advocates say that explains only part of the trend because the number of deaths as a percentage of miles driven is also increasing. They also point to data suggesting an increase in distracted driving. While cars and phones now offer advanced voice controls and other features intended to keep drivers’ eyes on the road, apps like Facebook, Google Maps, Snapchat and others have created new temptations that drivers and passengers find hard to resist. “It’s not just talking on the phone that’s a problem today,” said Jonathan Adkins, executive director of the Governors Highway Safety Association. “You now have all these other apps that people can use on their phones. ” Government officials and safety advocates contend, however, that more than anything else, the increase in deaths has been caused by more lenient enforcement of seatbelt, drunken driving and speeding regulations by authorities and a reluctance by lawmakers to pass more restrictive measures. A patchwork of state laws leaves many areas where drivers can choose not to buckle up, with little likelihood of being stopped. Only 18 states have laws requiring seatbelts for both front and rear occupants and categorize not wearing them as a primary offense — meaning drivers can be pulled over for that alone. In 15 states, failure to wear a seatbelt in front seats is only a secondary offense — drivers cannot be given tickets unless they are pulled over for other violations. “It’s still the same things that are killing drivers — belts, booze and speed,” Mr. Adkins said. About half of all traffic fatalities involve unbelted occupants, and almost a third involve drivers who were impaired by drugs or alcohol, according to data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the federal government’s main agency. In Alabama, steady budget cuts have resulted in a decline in the number of troopers patrolling the state’s 103, 000 miles of highways. David Brown, a research associate at the University of Alabama’s Center for Advanced Public Safety, studied the state’s 2016 traffic fatality reports and found an increase in fatalities involving crashes. “Total crashes were up less than 5 percent, but fatalities were up 25 percent,” he said in an interview. “I think speeding is the No. 1 problem. There are times of the day when we only have one or two troopers on duty in a county, so you can speed, and there’s no one there to deter it. ” In some states, highway speed limits are rising. In recent years, Texas has increased speed limits to 85 miles per hour in some rural areas. About 1, 500 miles of roads have a limit of 75 miles per hour or higher. In the fall, the N. H. T. S. A. the National Transportation Safety Board and several nongovernmental organizations, including the National Safety Council, began the Road to Zero initiative to eliminate traffic fatalities within 30 years. The effort places heavy emphasis on the promise of autonomous vehicles. But others say that more needs to be done now on basic road safety issues. “The way to bring down the rise in deaths is with a wide range of the measures, not cars,” the consumer advocate Ralph Nader said in an interview in October. Mr. Nader said states could reduce traffic deaths simply by requiring occupants to wear seatbelts, installing more cameras to catch speeding drivers without a police presence and tightening regulations on heavy trucking. In presenting its 2016 fatality estimates, the National Safety Council endorsed those ideas and also called for bans on all use of smartphones by drivers, even if they use calling or messaging. The council is also advocating mandatory motorcycle helmet laws and ignition locks that prevent repeat drunken drivers from operating their vehicles while impaired. The safety council’s figures typically correspond closely to the fatality totals that the N. H. T. S. A. compiles, but they include accidents off public roads and deaths occurring over a longer period after a crash.

WATCH: California Cops Rob Every Penny from Innocent Family, Including their Children

Claire Bernish

Home / Badge Abuse / WATCH: California Cops Rob Every Penny from Innocent Family, Including their Children WATCH: California Cops Rob Every Penny from Innocent Family, Including their Children Claire Bernish November 2, 2016 Leave a comment San Diego, CA — James Slatic took every precaution possible to ensure his California medical marijuana business was in full compliance with local, state, and federal laws — and that appropriate taxes and fees, hundreds of thousands each year, were always paid on time. But despite conducting business professionally and legally, nearly 30 heavily armed San Diego police and DEA agents broke into and destroyed Med-West Distribution, stole all the legal products inside, confiscated his computers and servers — and proceeded to clean out his entire family’s life savings, including the accounts of his high school and college-aged daughters, and his 84-year-old mother’s safety deposit box. By obstinately refusing to acknowledge Med-West’s legal status, law enforcement used highly contentious federal civil asset forfeiture (CAF) law to rob the Slatics of everything they’d earned — including $324,000 in proceeds from the lucrative medical cannabis business, according to the Institute for Justice (IJ). “This case is not about crime fighting,” IJ attorney Wesley Hottot, who now represents the Slatics, explained. “This case is about policing for profit, and it illustrates the abusive power of civil forfeiture at its worst.” As countless families and individuals around the country have been shocked to learn, the State can rob you blind, taking everything of value — bank accounts, vehicles, electronics, and even houses, etc. — without proof any crime has been committed. James Slatic has never been convicted or charged with any wrongdoing in the matter — but the nightmare of civil asset forfeiture doesn’t end with a lack of charges or conviction. In fact, attempting to reclaim property and cash can be a nightmare of red tape, court appearances and legal fees — and, even then, isn’t always a successful venture. And like so many others, Slatic had not been familiar with this legal, policing-for-profit scheme prior to his firsthand encounter. “I’ve done nothing wrong,” he told the Institute for Justice. “It’s beyond frustrating that my family’s money was taken without any criminal charges being filed. My wife and teenage daughters had nothing to do with my business whatsoever, and the District Attorney took their college savings accounts. This is not just wrong; it is unconstitutional.” While he certainly might be right, CAF is federal law — a brief reprieve in January, when the Department of Justice suspended the program, only lasted through early April — because the ability of police to steal people’s stuff and either use it or the proceeds from its sale is just too damned profitable. Indeed, police and other agencies — particularly the Drug Enforcement Agency — make a killing in this legalized State robbery sham, and many departments have come to rely on CAF profiteering to bolster their funding. “Civil forfeiture is one of the greatest threats to property rights in the nation,” said IJ attorney Allison Daniel, also representing the Slatic family. “Civil forfeiture takes the American principle of innocent until proven guilty and flips it on its head, treating property owners worse than criminals by making them prove their innocence.” At 7:30 in the morning on January 28, 2016 — as surveillance cameras outside and inside Med-West captured on video — the San Diego Joint Narcotics Task Force used a sledgehammer to break down the door of Slatic’s legal business, and stormed in, pointing automatic weapons at the heads of innocent employees inside. Needlessly and recklessly, around 28 officers took everything of value inside, destroying and scattering property in the process. As Slatic told IJ, in addition to assets stolen from the business, the greedy cops cleared family bank accounts of over $100,000 — leaving his daughters scrambling to pay for school supplies, like college textbooks, while putting their tuition and fees in jeopardy. Annette Slatic, James’ wife, who works as a nurse at the Veterans Administration, found out about the raid and financial seizure when she tried to pay for groceries that morning and had her card declined. Then her daughter, Penny, a high-schooler, tried to pay using her ATM card — and was also declined. Without notice, the Slatics suddenly found themselves essentially penniless and unsure how to afford basic needs. Now they’re fighting to get everything back, since under California law, “probable cause” a crime has been committed must be established before officers can use civil asset forfeiture to seize property and cash. As the Institute for Justice explains, “Because police and prosecutors ignored Med-West’s status as a legal marijuana business, they did not have probable cause to seize the Slatics’ money. Even if Med-West had been an illegal operation (and it was not), the Slatics’ personal money is not connected to the business.” Perhaps the Slatics will have better luck in getting justice than innumerable others who have been unfortunate enough to be victims of legalized robbery. Despite massive controversy surrounding the program — and one of its creators now denouncing the policing-for-profit scheme it has become — civil asset forfeiture won’t be going anywhere soon. While some states have severely curtailed cops’ ability to take your stuff, by implementing strictures requiring a conviction and similar limits, others have taken CAF to new levels. Oklahoma Highway Patrol began using a device called an ERAD , which scans bank and prepaid cards — right from a person’s wallet — to seize all cash in an individual’s account during a traffic stop if an officer even suspects a person of committing a drug-related offense. “Three decades ago, I helped create our civil asset forfeiture system,” wrote Brad Cates in an opinion piece for the Wall Street Journal , “now it’s time to end it.” This is what it’s like to run a legal business, pay taxes, and follow the law in a Police State: Share

Biden: I Regret Not Being President - Breitbart

Pam Key

This weekend at Colgate University in Hamilton, NY, former Vice President Joe Biden said he believes he could have won the presidency against Donald Trump, and therefore he regrets “not being president. ” Biden said, “I don’t regret not running in the sense that it was the right decision for my boy, for me, for my family at the time, but do I regret not being president? Yes. ” ( The Hill) Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN

The ‘Women’s Card’? We Measured, and It’s Not Worth Much - The New York Times

Justin Wolfers

As Donald Trump turns his attention to Hillary Clinton, he’s trying out new attack lines. In his victory speech Tuesday evening, it was that “the only card she has is the women’s card. ” He said that “if Hillary Clinton were a man, I don’t think she would get 5 percent of the vote. ” In his telling, the women’s card confers an enormous advantage. Indeed, current polls between Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Trump have her with 55 percent of the vote, suggesting that he believes the women’s card is worth 50 points. That’s nearly enough to assure any female candidate of victory. Yet this appears to be inconsistent with available data. Over the past decade, women have been elected to 17. 5 percent of House seats, meaning that they’re outnumbered by men by roughly five to one. In fact, the women’s card appears to be particularly unhelpful in the United States. Women’s success in politics — at least as measured by the proportion of seats they hold in the House compared with equivalent lower chambers in other nations — ranks below that of nearly every other rich country. The United States is positioned between Greece and Bangladesh. Of course, Mr. Trump might object that he’s not talking about House seats, but rather the presidency. Even there, the women’s card appears quite unhelpful, as The Upshot’s extensive search through United States data failed to locate a single woman who had ever been president.

Russia’s Most Potent Weapon: “Hoarding Gold”

Alex Ansary

Russia’s Most Potent Weapon: “Hoarding Gold” 11/02/2016 SHTFPLAN.COM This article was written by Jay Syrmopoulos and originally published at The Free Thought Project . Editor’s Comment: He who holds the gold makes the rules? Fresh attempts at containing Russia and continuing the empire have been met with countermoves. Russia appears to be building strength in every way. Putin and his country have no intention of being under the American thumb, and are developing rapid resistance as the U.S. petrodollar loses its grip and China, Russia and the East shift into new currencies and shifting world order. What lies ahead? It will be a strong hand for the countries that have the most significant backing in gold and hard assets; and China and Russia have positioned themselves very well. Prepare for a changing economic landscape, and one in which self-reliance might be all we have. Russia is Hoarding Gold at an Alarming Rate — The Next World War Will Be Fought with Currencies by Jay Syrmopoulos With all eyes on Russia’s unveiling their latest nuclear intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), which NATO has dubbed the “SATAN” missile , as tensions with the U.S. increase, Moscow’s most potent “weapon” may be something drastically different. The rapidly evolving geopolitical “weapon” brandished by Russia is an ever increasing stockpile of gold, as well as Russia’s native currency, the ruble. Take a look at the symbol below, as it could soon come to change the entire hierarchy of the international order – potentially ushering in a complete international paradigm shift – and much sooner than you might think. image: http://thefreethoughtproject.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/bankofrussia-e1475520013798.png The symbol is the new designation of the Russian ruble, Russia’s national currency. Similar to how the U.S. uses the dollar sign ($), the U.K. uses the pound sign (£), and the European Union uses the euro symbol (€), Russia is about to begin exporting its symbol internationally. After the failed “reset” in U.S./Russian relations by the Obama administration, and the continued deterioration of the countries relationship, Washington began targeting entire sectors of the Russian economy, as well as specific individuals, meant to impose an economic burden so severe that it would force Moscow into compliance. Instead of decimating Russia, what it precipitated was a Russian response of gradually weaning themselves off of the hegemony of the U.S. petrodollar, and working with China to create an alternative to the SWIFT payment system that isn’t solely controlled by Western interests (see Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank , New Development Bank). According to the Corbett Report : New reports indicate that China is ready to launch its SWIFT alternative, and for those who have their ear to the ground this is the most significant move yet in the unfolding process of de-dollarization that is seeing the BRICS-led “resistance bloc” breaking away from the financial stranglehold of the US-led “Washington Consensus.” For those who don’t know, SWIFT stands for the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication and is shorthand for the SWIFTNet Network that is used by over 10,500 financial institutions in 215 countries and territories to transmit financial transaction data around the world. SWIFT does not do any of the clearing or processing for these transactions itself, but instead sends the payment orders that are then settled by correspondent banks of the member institutions. Still, given the system’s near universality in the financial system, it means that virtually every international transaction between banking institutions goes through the SWIFT network. This is why de-listing from the SWIFT network remains one of the primary financial weapons wielded by the US and its allies in their increasingly important financial warfare campaigns. Recently, financial guru Jim Rickards, author of the book “Currency Wars,” wrote that “Russia is poised for a major comeback in its economy. Russian bonds and stocks and the Russian currency, the ruble, will all benefit.” Rickards believes a “strong turnaround” is coming within Russia, and that this comeback will benefit the ruble. While still suffering from the economic warfare being waged by the U.S., Russia has realized that as long they are subservient to the petrodollar, there remains a clear and present danger of the Russian economy being devastated by the whims of Washington. The Bank of Russia, that nation’s central bank, is extremely clear about its mission, and monetary policy declaring on its website: Monetary policy constitutes an integral part of the state policy and is aimed at enhancing well-being of Russian citizens. The Bank of Russia implements monetary policy in the framework of inflation-targeting regime, and sees price stability, albeit sustainably low inflation, as its priority. Given structural peculiarities of the Russian economy, the target is to reduce inflation to 4% by 2017 and maintain it within that range in the medium run. In layman’s terms, that means that monetary policy, similar to nuclear weapons and the military, are “an integral part of the state policy” in Russia. While many analysts have noted the increased build-up in Russia’s military arsenal, seemingly few have highlighted the massive build-up of Russian gold reserves over the past decade. Below is a chart showing Russian gold reserves between 1994 and last year, 2015: Since 2006, there has been a year-on-year increase that reveals a significant upward trend. The chart clearly reveals that Russia’s state policy of increasing state monetary assets, in the form of gold. Additionally, the Russian government has been converting state rubles into gold assets. From 2006 to 2015, Russia’s state holdings of gold tripled. Within just the past year Russia has substantially increased its gold holdings According to the Business Insider : In July of this year, the central bank of Russia added 200,000 ounces of gold to its reserves. The one-month uptick in Russian gold reserves — 200,000 ounces — is approximately equal to the entire annual output of Barrick Gold’s Turquoise Ridge gold mine in Nevada. At that same rate — 200,000 ounces per month — in a mere five months, Russia would add to state gold reserves the equivalent of the entire annual output of Barrick’s massive Goldstrike mine in Nevada. Currently, Russian gold reserves rank seventh in the world. It’s clear that there is a concerted effort by Russian authorities to build up the country’s gold reserves as part of a national strategy to negate the effects of economic warfare waged by the United States. Rickards, in his 2011 book “Currency Wars,” theorized that Russia and China could combine their gold reserves to form a global gold-backed currency to compete against the U.S. dollar. Currently, Russian reserves stand at roughly 1,500 tonnes, with Chinese reserves totaling over 1,800 tonnes (according to China — it’s likely more), which would amount to a combined total of roughly 3,300 tonnes of gold. The U.S. is about to lose overarching control of policymaking within the International Monetary Fund (IMF), thus the U.S. lockup on global gold is about to vanish, according to Business Insider. Imagine for a moment the distinctly real possibility that Russian-Chinese alliance could exercise indirect (or even direct) control over the IMF’s gold reserve of over 2,800 tonnes. Russian, Chinese and IMF gold combined would equal roughly 6,100 tonnes, and would allow for direct competition with the U.S. gold reserves, estimated at 8,100 tonnes. Russia and China have realized that the petrodollar is wielded by Washington as it’s weapon of choice when opposing a well-armed state, and clearly see the writing on the wall – thus working together to create a new global financial paradigm. The reality is that the United States is $20 trillion dollars in debt, and eventually the time will come when the U.S. economy begins to implode — and all the fiat currency people are stuck holding will essentially be worth nothing more than the paper it’s printed on. Hard assets, such as gold and silver, should be bought and taken custody of while there is still an opportunity to do so, as a means of hedging against the potentially disastrous results of the U.S. using the petrodollar as a “weapon.” Ultimately, the United States, Russia and China are all controlled by centralized power-hungry tyrants attempting to command powerful global bureaucracies like the IMF, the World Bank, SWIFT, New Development Bank and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. It’s not Russian nuclear weapons that people should fear, as the policy of mutually assured destruction essentially voids any benefit of a state launching a first-strike nuclear attack. The true threat to America is our economic house of cards, built upon the back of a neoliberal trade policy that puts the “rights” of corporations over that of people . This article was written by Jay Syrmopoulos and originally published at The Free Thought Project .

No stopping him now! Dr. Duke will be in the debate tonight at 8 Eastern Time

Dr. Patrick Slattery

No stopping him now! Dr. Duke will be in the debate tonight at 8 Eastern Time November 1, 2016 at 10:47 pm No stopping him now! Dr. Duke will be in the debate tonight at 8 Eastern Time Dr. Duke’s epic debate will be broadcast by C-SPAN at 8PM Eastern Time. (Not C-SPAN2 or C-SPAN3, but original C-SPAN. This is the big leagues, baby!) It will also be on C-SPAN radio. C-SPAN’s website has live TV streaming , although you may need to sign in, so give yourselves plenty of time to figure that out. C-SPAN radio does not require sign in. Click on Image to Donate! And please spread this message to others.

Illegal Alien Support Group Forces Border Patrol to Get Warrants

Bob Price

A group known in Arizona for assisting illegal aliens through the desert after they cross the border forced U. S. Border Patrol agents to obtain a warrant to search for migrants in their camp. The agents later arrested four Mexican nationals. [Border Patrol agents assigned to the Tucson Sector used technology surveillance to detect four suspected illegal aliens who crossed the border along a known human smuggling route. The four individuals were wearing camouflage as they walked northward from the Mexican border, according to information provided to Breitbart Texas by U. S. Border Patrol officials. Other agents working near Arivaca, Arizona, tracked the four migrants to a No Mas Muertes (No More Deaths) Camp. No Mas Muertes is an organization that assists illegal aliens in their march through the Arizona desert. When agents contacted camp officials to search for the alleged illegal border crossers, the officials refused. “Tucson Sector Border Patrol reached out to No Mas Muertes Camp representatives to continue a positive working relationship and resolve the situation amicably,” Border Patrol officials stated. “The talks, however, were unsuccessful. ” Agents subsequently sought and obtained a warrant to search the camp and question the four suspected illegal aliens. Agents found the migrants and questioned them about their citizenship and legal right to be present in the U. S. Satisfied that the four people were illegally present in the country, agents took them into custody. A similar incident occurred a month earlier, officials stated. Agents detected eight individuals entering the camp. The negotiations with camp officials, in that case, were successful. Agents arrested the eight illegal aliens and subsequently learned that at least two of the foreign nationals had significant criminal histories from previous illegal entries into the U. S. Two other illegal aliens were in need of medical attention. Those migrants were transported to an area hospital for evaluation and treatment. Camp officials reacted harshly to this week’s arrest of illegal aliens in their camp. “Today’s raid on the medical is unacceptable and a break in our agreements with Border Patrol to respect the critical work of No More Deaths,” Abuse Documentation and Advocacy Coordinator Kate Morgan stated in an article published on the group’s website. They claim to operate their camps “as a medical facility under the International Red Cross Standards, which the say gives them the right to refuse cooperation with Border Patrol agents. “The Border Patrol acknowledged that they tracked a group for 18 miles, but only after the migrants sought medical treatment did the Border Patrol seek to arrest them,” No More Deaths Founder John Fife claimed. “The choice to interdict these people only after they entered the No More Deaths camp is direct evidence that this was a direct attack on humanitarian aid. At the same time, the weather forecast is for deadly temperatures. ” While the group’s website claims their goal is to help the illegal aliens in their efforts to enter the U. S. at least one of article posted on their site could place migrants in more danger. The article written by Aljazeera America, titled “For migrants in Arizona who call 911, it’s Border Patrol on the line,” appears to warn migrants in distress in the desert against calling 911. “When most people dial 911 due to a medical emergency, they don’t expect to talk to Border Patrol,” the group states. “But that’s exactly what happens to many undocumented migrants who call for help from Arizona’s southern desert. ” The article continues: When 911 calls come in to BORSTAR, supervising agent John Redd said, quite often callers in distress don’t realize they have been transferred to Border Patrol. And the agency doesn’t inform them, according to Redd: “[W]e don’t tell them it’s the Border Patrol, because we’re trying to preserve life. But the fact is we’ve got another job to do, too. If we do tell them it’s Border Patrol, when we get there, they’re going to be gone. ” If agents manage to find migrants in distress, they stabilize them medically and then book them, Redd said. Advocates for migrants say this system prioritizes the apprehension and deportation of migrants and leads to needless deaths. Calls from migrants in distress sometimes bounce from one agency to another, with no mechanism to ensure accountability or track how cases are handled. Determining whether a caller is an undocumented migrant is at the discretion of the 911 dispatcher who picks up the phone call and is often based on racial profiling, said Cristen Vernon, the project coordinator with Derechos Humanos, an immigration advocacy group in Tucson. However, Breitbart Texas has reported regularly on illegal aliens in distress that are rescued by Border Patrol agents and BORSTAR rescue teams. Earlier this month, Pima dispatchers notified Border Patrol of a 911 call from a distressed alien in the desert. Border Patrol agents found the man struggling for his life. BORSTAR agents responded with their emergency medical training, giving him immediate help. Agents called a Life Flight evacuation helicopter for transport. Life Flight flew the illegal migrant flown to a Tuscon hospital for treatment. Had the man not called 911 and had Border Patrol agents and BORSTAR not responded, the man likely would have died alone in the desert. In May, Border Patrol agents rescued five other illegal aliens near the Ajo Station. On balance, it is the ruthless human smugglers who put these illegal aliens at risk in the desert. If a person being smuggled falls behind for any reason, such as dehydration, injury, or exhaustion, the coyotes will simply leave them behind to die in the desert. In May, U. S. Customs and Border Protection officials issued a warning about the dangers of crossing the border in the heat of the summer. “Unscrupulous smugglers often abandon migrants in the desert who fall behind. ,” CBP officials stated. “As a result, many perish every year. Border Patrol officials encourage anyone in distress to call 911 or activate a rescue beacon before becoming a casualty. In the fiscal year 2016 Tucson Sector Border Patrol agents rescued over 1, 400 persons with many of those rescues conducted in the western Arizona region. ” Bob Price serves as associate editor and senior political news contributor for Breitbart Texas. He is a founding member of the Breitbart Texas team. Follow him on Twitter @BobPriceBBTX and Facebook.

Trump Supporters Have the Most to Lose in the G.O.P. Repeal Bill - The New York Times

Nate Cohn

The people who stand to lose the most in tax credits under the House Republican health plan tended to support Donald J. Trump over Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election, according to a new Upshot analysis. Over all, voters who would be eligible for a tax credit that would be at least $1, 000 smaller than the subsidy they’re eligible for under Obamacare supported Mr. Trump over Hillary Clinton by a margin. The voters hit the hardest — eligible for at least $5, 000 less in tax credits under the Republican plan — supported Mr. Trump by a margin of 59 percent to 36 percent. These estimates are based on data from the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Cooperative Congressional Election Study (C. C. E. S.) a large survey of tens of thousands of Americans. Kaiser estimated whether individuals would gain or lose under the Republican plan to replace the Affordable Care Act, based on their income, age and insurance market. We matched the data to the C. C. E. S.’s postelection survey, which asked individuals about their health care and how they voted in the 2016 presidential election. The end result: an estimate for how much every respondent of the survey would gain or lose under the Republican plan, based on age, income and county. Like any result based on a survey, the estimates are imperfect. But the Republican plan offers less assistance to older and Americans, especially in rural areas, according to the Kaiser data. These groups generally backed Mr. Trump. Most of all, President Trump’s white supporters often make enough money to be ineligible for Medicaid, but not enough to afford costly health insurance that might even become more expensive under the Republican plan. The plan would hit older and rural Americans hardest because it wouldn’t provide a larger tax credit to people with more expensive plans. Older Americans pay the highest premiums, and the law would allow insurers to raise premiums for older customers even further. The AARP opposes the bill as a result. Rural areas often have higher premiums because there’s less competition. Residents in those areas would receive the same subsidy as people in cheaper markets. This analysis is limited to people who don’t receive Medicare or Medicaid. But Medicaid recipients, who also stand to lose under the law, lean more Democratic. Nationwide, Medicaid recipients supported Mrs. Clinton by a margin of 55 percent to 39 percent, according to the C. C. E. S. data. The effects of the Republican plan on Medicaid recipients are less clear. Many of them might lose their Medicaid coverage or see their benefits pared back as a result of the bill. The law would reduce funding for a major expansion of the Medicaid program for poor Americans in more than 30 states and cut future Medicaid funding across the country. Most of those 30 states supported Mrs. Clinton, but Mr. Trump led by percent among Medicaid beneficiaries in the nine red expansion states that have voted Republican in the last two presidential elections. Republican senators from those states are among those most skeptical of the repeal bill, and many of the same states have large rural populations that stand to lose the most under the plan’s tax credits. It’s important to note that while many of Mr. Trump’s supporters might be eligible for a smaller tax credit under the Republican plan, only a fraction of those voters would be immediately affected. According to the C. C. E. S. about 4 percent of Mr. Trump’s supporters purchased a plan on exchanges last year. The estimates include all people with the potential to be eligible for the subsidy and don’t receive Medicare or Medicaid, not just those who purchased health care on the individual market and already receive a subsidy under the Affordable Care Act. The data on the slice of voters who currently have insurance purchased on an exchange is thinner. Over all, people who bought their health insurance on exchanges supported Mrs. Clinton by a margin of 55 percent to 39 percent, according to the C. C. E. S. But among the small sample of respondents who would lose more than $5, 000 under the Republican plan, more were Trump supporters than Clinton supporters.

Hillary Melts Down Over Weiner In Public, PICS Prove Campaign Is Imploding

Rebecca Diserio

Hillary Melts Down Over Weiner In Public, PICS Prove Campaign Is Imploding Posted on October 30, 2016 by Rebecca Diserio in Politics Share This Hillary Clinton’s campaign is imploding, and it’s so bad that she was caught having a mini meltdown after her press conference as she tried to explain this new email investigation by the FBI, thanks to Anthony Weiner’s laptop. As Hillary lost it, her campaign was caught red-handed, doing dirty tricks to pictures, and you’ll love just how desperate they have become as they see this election sinking like the Titanic. Rumors are flying after Hillary Clinton responded to the latest bomb dropped on her campaign, that thousands of government emails are on Anthony Weiner’s laptop. Everyone knows Hillary should have been indicted before, and she had a meltdown of sorts when Kristen Welker of Fox News asked, “Are you worried this could sink your campaign, Secretary Clinton?” While Hillary was walking away from the short press conference after the Weiner email story broke, she stopped and threw her head back and let out a creepy maniacal laugh . Fox News correspondent Jennifer Griffin found it really weird, saying it was like Hillary had lost it. She described Hillary “stopping and throwing her head back and laughing, it was really odd.” "Are you worried this could sink your campaign, Secretary Clinton," a reporter shouts as HRC walks out. Clinton only lets out a big laugh. — Ruby Cramer (@rubycramer) October 28, 2016 However, Hillary Clinton was not really laughing. That was a public meltdown, and she is pissed off that an idiot like Anthony Weiner just cost her this election. It’s so bad that the Clinton campaign was caught photoshopping the crowd at a recent Ohio rally, where Bill Clinton spoke. Bill Clinton rally Oct. 29th, red arrow shows a man (left) who was duplicated in photoshopped pic put out by Clinton campaign, indicated with red circles (right) Then, if all of that isn’t bad enough, the Chicago Tribune, one of the most liberal papers in the country, had this headline yesterday: “ Democrats Should Ask Hillary To Step Down ,” which was written by John Kass who was speaking from Hillary’s real home state of Illinois. “FBI director James Comey ‘s announcement about the renewed Clinton email investigation is the bombshell in the presidential campaign. That he announced this so close to Election Day should tell every thinking person that what the FBI is looking at is extremely serious .” [via Chicago Tribune ] If we are agreeing with the Chicago Tribune, you know what happened on Friday with James Comey and the FBI is so devastating that this election is over for Hillary. However, that doesn’t mean we can let up and sigh with relief just yet. However, we can be extremely optimistic that, after eight years and two elections that caused utter destruction for our country, we have an extremely good chance that Americans will reject Hillary and her criminal cabal. America was saved by Anthony Weiner, and it doesn’t get any stranger than that.

Наблюдатели ОБСЕ выявили ряд нарушений при подготовке к выборам в США

Как пишут Вести.ру, стало известно, что в голосовании не смогут принять участие 3,2 миллионов человек, находящихся под следствием или судимых, и 2,6 миллионов уже отбывших наказание. Об этом в своем заявлении сообщил директор Бюро по демократическим институтам и правам человека (БДИПЧ) ОБСЕ Михаэль Георг Линк. Со своей стороны, наблюдатель ОБСЕ за американскими выборами от Германии Юрген Клинке указала на несоответствие американских выборов международным нормам. В частности, из-за разницы часовых поясов результаты выборов в одних штатах будут объявлены тогда, когда голосование в других штатах еще не завершится. По словам Клинке, это является "неоправданным влиянием на избирателей". Следить за ходом выборов в США российские наблюдатели могут по линии БДИПЧ ОБСЕ , заявил пресс-секретарь Белого дома Джош Эрнест. Прочие запросы американские власти считают "подозрительными", учитывая "действия России в киберпространстве". Отвечая на просьбу прокомментировать сообщения о недопуске российских наблюдателей на выборы в некоторых штатах США, Эрнест сказал: "Неясно, что именно в этом случае русские собирались делать. Понятно, что люди могут быть подозрительными относительно их мотивов. Или эти мотивы могут отличаться от тех, о которых объявлено публично, с учетом их активности в киберпространстве". Как пояснил Эрнест, после получения таких запросов от иностранных государств Госдепартамент перенаправляет их властям того или иного штата, оставляя решение на их усмотрение. Ранее в ряде СМИ появились сообщения о том, что Россия направила запрос официальным властям США с просьбой разрешить наблюдателям из РФ присутствовать на выборах в Луизиане, Оклахоме и Техасе, однако получила отказ. "Есть также процесс, организованный по линии ОБСЕ, которая наблюдает за американскими выборами. В прошлом мы успешно сотрудничали с ними. У России была возможность отправить лиц для наблюдения за выборами в США в качестве членов делегации ОБСЕ. Россия отказалась участвовать в таком формате", - сказал Эрнест. Читайте последние новости Pravda.Ru на сегодня Поделиться:

Mark Cuban Wants Constitution Changed to Make Health Care a ’Right’ - Breitbart

Warner Todd Huston

Ever ready to spout off about things political, Dallas Mavericks owner and billionaire Mark Cuban now wants to shore up Obamacare, pushing the idea that the U. S. Constitution should be changed to proclaim health care as an American “right. ”[Speaking to reporter Nicholas Ballasy of PJ Media, Cuban tried to explain his desire to implement nationalized, single payer health care. While on one hand Cuban doesn’t agree with hospitals, on the other he thinks people should have a “right” to health care. “I think health care should be a right. If there’s a legitimate way to modify the Constitution, I literally think there should be an amendment to the Constitution for healthcare for chronic illnesses and serious injury. We all play the genetic lottery,” Cuban said according to Ballasy. “I think all of the talk about Trumpcare vs. Obamacare really just avoids the ultimate question, which is, is health care a right or not?” Cuban added. “But I’ve had friends who have had cancer, we’ve all had people who have had severe illnesses and if they didn’t have insurance. In a couple cases, I’ve since paid for them because they didn’t have insurance or enough insurance. I think that’s wrong — that’s a cost we all should share. ” Unfortunately for Cuban, the idea of turning healthcare into a “right” works against the whole concept of rights. In the American system, a right is the inviolable ability to act without the permission of other people. In addition, one may exercise his rights as long as the rights of another person are not violated in the doing. A right is something available equally to all citizens, something that can’t be taken away by government. But it is also something that isn’t granted by government. In the American tradition, a right is something given to individuals by God, not government. And, since a right is something that does not require action by others to be fulfilled, therein lies the rub when it comes to health care. If health care became a right, it would require the labor of doctors, nurses, and other care providers. Therefore, we would essentially turn healthcare providers into slaves of the state, forcing them to care for people despite their personal desires and feelings on the matter. After all, if it is our right to get health care, how can any doctor refuse us? Therefore, health care simply cannot be a right. Your right of free speech does require me to do anything for you to exercise it. Your right to life only requires that others don’t try and kill you. Your freedom of religion only demands that everyone else just leave you alone. But, if healthcare became a right, your “right” would force others to make sure you stay healthy. Compelling others to do something violates the very idea of a right. Indeed, as a nation we had this discussion way back in the 1940s when President Franklin Roosevelt tried to pass his “Second Bill of Rights” to make education, housing, health care, and other things a new American right. Even in 1944 people realized that forcing health care workers to take care of people despite their personal desires would be a form of servitude to the state. Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston or email the author at igcolonel@hotmail. com.

NATO, US, & UK To Assemble Largest Troop Buildup On Russian Border Since Cold War

hqanon

By: John Vibes via thefreethoughtproject.com In the midst of deepening tension between US allies NATO and Russia, NATO is planning the largest military buildup along the Russian border since the cold war. NATO called on allied governments this week to contribute whatever troops and equipment they can to the effort. According to Reuters, thousands of troops are expected to arrive in the coming days and weeks. It was reported that Italy, France, Denmark and other European states are expected to join the NATO military divisions that will be led by the United States along Russia’s border. On Wednesday, Britain announced it is sending hundreds of soldiers and hardware to Russia’s borders as part of a huge military deployment. A total of 800 troops, drones and tanks are moving to Estonia as part of the biggest military build-up of NATO troops on Russia’s borders since the Cold War. In addition to the forces allocated for his specific operation, NATO has an army of over 40,000 ready to be called up to fight at any time. The US military claims that this threatening move is meant to act as a “deterrent” to the Russian military, but this is obvious a move that will escalate tensions and push towards a possible third world war.

Splash! Jerry Brown Says California’s Drought Is Over - Breitbart

Joel B. Pollak

California Gov. Jerry Brown declared Friday that the drought in his state is officially over, with a formal declaration to an end of the drought state of emergency in most counties. [In a statement released by his office, Brown said: Following unprecedented water conservation and plentiful winter rain and snow, Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr. today ended the drought state of emergency in most of California, while maintaining water reporting requirements and prohibitions on wasteful practices, such as watering during or right after rainfall. “This drought emergency is over, but the next drought could be around the corner,” said Governor Brown. “Conservation must remain a way of life. ” Executive Order lifts the drought emergency in all California counties except Fresno, Kings, Tulare and Tuolumne, where emergency drinking water projects will continue to help address diminished groundwater supplies. Today’s order also rescinds two emergency proclamations from January and April 2014 and four drought — related executive orders issued in 2014 and 2015. The governor’s proclamation comes after one of the wettest and snowiest winters in the state’s recorded history. Initially, after last winter’s El Niño brought moderate rains to Northern California, the state was expected to suffer through a dry winter, thanks to the La Niña effect. But one “Pineapple Express” storm after another blew in off the Pacific, bringing atmospheric rivers to drench Northern and Southern California alike and coat mountains in snow. Earlier this week, the Sacramento Bee reported that Californians are still conserving water, in spite of the heavy precipitation. State water authorities likely hope that the habits formed during the drought will be retained — though some local agricultural water authorities are currently pumping water to farmers as fast as they can to keep dams from overflowing. Joel B. Pollak is Senior at Breitbart News. He was named one of the “most influential” people in news media in 2016. His new book, How Trump Won: The Inside Story of a Revolution, is available from Regnery. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.

Mind Over Body: Playing in the N.F.L. at 38 - The New York Times

Ben Shpigel

MINNEAPOLIS — Terence Newman usually views film of the Vikings’ next opponent at the island in his kitchen, but on this night, three days before Minnesota was to host the Arizona Cardinals, he had relocated to a more comfortable spot. Lounging in an oversize leather chair, his legs dangling over the edge, Newman cradled a digital tablet containing hours of video clips. He pulled up the plays Arizona had run this season. Even though Newman, as a cornerback, is charged with making receivers disappear, on every snap he also studies the habits of running backs, tight ends and quarterbacks and how they work in concert. Once, he figured out that a team would pass whenever one of its receivers fiddled with his gloves before the snap, and now he was hunting for another subtle hint to tip off what might be coming next. “Ooh!” Newman said. He blurted an expletive and rewound the play he had just watched three, four, five times. “I just picked up something,” he said. “Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, baby. See that?” Motioning for a visitor to come closer, Newman cued up the clip again. The play, from just before halftime of Arizona’s Week 8 loss at Carolina, featured four receivers, two on each side of the formation, with quarterback Carson Palmer lined up in the shotgun. As some of Carolina’s players realigned, Palmer glanced right and then left while twirling his index fingers in the air like helicopter blades. “It’s the same signals both sides,” Newman said. “And they’re both running the same routes. ” The outside receivers bolted across the middle, and the inside receivers, crossing in front to disrupt the coverage, darted toward the back pylons. No defenders followed, both outside receivers came open, and Palmer, with his pick of either, threw left for the touchdown. Earlier, Newman had seen Palmer make that same gesture, but he needed a recurrence to feel confident jotting his discovery, in small and neat penmanship, into a notebook. “That,” Newman said, “was superconfirmation right there. ” These revelations often occur when he is alone, in the sanctity of his apartment in the vibrant Uptown neighborhood here, where he lives by himself. His kitchen counter is speckled with the foodstuffs of a bachelor — cans of vegetable soup, a loaf of old bread, a bag of dried mango — and those who know Newman well credit his longevity in part to his having never been married. By 38, most N. F. L. cornerbacks have retired or, in far fewer cases, switched to the less physically demanding position of safety, no longer as capable of chasing bigger, stronger and faster receivers around the field. Newman is the oldest cornerback in the league by nearly five years, and by at least some measures, he is also one of the best. According to the analytics website Pro Football Focus, which rates him sixth over all, he has allowed the fewest yards (0. 64) per coverage snap. As Newman acknowledged, his freedom to do what he wants when he wants has prolonged his career. It has enabled him to obey what he called an intuitive understanding of his body, nurturing it with as much sleep, exercise and sustenance as he feels it needs. He keeps himself in such good shape that Minnesota’s strength and conditioning coach, Brent Salazar, said Newman would be ready to play a game in June. It also helps — and Newman shuddered, fearful of being jinxed, when this was mentioned — that through nearly 14 seasons he has managed to avoid the sort of devastating injury that has ended or curtailed the careers of many of his peers. Newman remains an incredible athlete. But as his speed, power and quickness have deteriorated, he has relied ever more on his cognitive skills. His capacity for decoding opponents’ tendencies through film study has mitigated his physiological decline. His aptitude for processing those tidbits and applying them on the field has preserved his livelihood. “He can think about what’s going to happen and get his body to do it,” Vikings safety Harrison Smith said. “He can make plays with his mind. ” Mike Zimmer, now Minnesota’s coach, witnessed that gift up close when he served as Newman’s defensive coordinator with Dallas from 2003 to 2006 and with Cincinnati from 2012 to 2013. Zimmer endorsed signing Newman, then 36, before the 2015 season, confident that he would be an asset in the Vikings’ secondary and a positive influence on the team’s young cornerbacks. They have spent two seasons absorbing his wisdom, accepting his red wine recommendations and poking fun at the old guy, presenting him with adult diapers, a walker and a cane that Newman keeps in his kitchen. But they have yet to take his job. A few minutes after 11 a. m. on a recent Tuesday, a day off for the Vikings, Newman walked into the makeshift auditorium at the team’s complex in nearby Eden Prairie. It is cordoned off by black curtains in a corner of the indoor practice field. Accompanied by cornerbacks Mackensie Alexander and Trae Waynes, Newman set down his daily cup of black tea, the only caffeine he ingests, on a table in the front row. He could be mistaken for an eager pupil if he were not the stern teacher. It was the first such tutorial for Alexander, who was told the previous day by the secondary coach Jerry Gray to watch film with Newman. “I want to soak up as much knowledge before he’s gone,” Alexander said. Newman prefers to study solo, or with people who respect his intensity and his mandate for silence. The only time he wears glasses is during these sessions. “I want that clarity,” Newman said. “When football comes on, my senses are at their peak. I want my brain to be able to process and diagnose all the information and then retain it. ” He sat before a computer and clutched a remote that linked to a large projection screen that loomed on a stage. Newman clicked on Arizona’s and pass plays and went through them in his favored manner, from most frequent to least, one formation at a time. He developed this methodology soon after entering the N. F. L. in 2003, taken fifth over all in the draft by the Cowboys, for whom he made two Pro Bowls. Teammates like Mario Edwards, Roy Williams and Darren Woodson mentored him, helping Newman expand his scope to focus on nuances like body language. He recognized that a team would run every time a receiver kept his hands on his knees, and he learned to eliminate certain routes if a receiver aligned with his outside foot up rather than his inside foot. “You see how their bodies move and how their feet are,” Newman said. “You understand there’s only certain places you can go. ” Early on in Dallas, Zimmer would give Newman homework: Return with all the routes a team ran out of a formation. He would watch every piece of footage to report his findings, and over the years he simplified his approach. Soon, he detected patterns. “By the end of the week, he’d know everything about everybody,” Mark Carrier, Newman’s position coach in Cincinnati, said in a telephone interview. For instance, by watching every play in sequence that a team has run when two receivers line up on each side of a formation, Newman can divine concepts and combinations. He scrutinizes how close each receiver lines up to the quarterback. He notices what routes they run when they line up on the bottom of the numbers — the digits that denote increments — compared with the top. He examines if the quarterback is under center or in the shotgun. If a tight end is in, Newman scans to see if routes go toward or away from him. There are finite possibilities, he knows, and soon they mesh in his mind, categorized by down and distance. He backs up those mental files in his notebook, which devotes two pages to every opponent. Reminders are written beneath a general heading and more detailed logs of personnel and formations organized by downs. “I’ve always been a person where if I could see something, I pretty much remember it,” Newman said. Over dinner at a downtown steakhouse, he demonstrated his recall. The conversation shifted to Jets cornerback Darrelle Revis, whom Bengals receiver A. J. Green had beaten for a long touchdown in the teams’ season opener. Newman cited the details, from the length of the play (54 yards) to the route that Brandon LaFell had run across the middle to paralyze the safety who was supposed to assist Revis, as if he were on the sideline that September afternoon. How many times did Newman watch that play? “Just once,” he said. In training camp, Minnesota teammates playfully accused Newman of conspiring with Norv Turner, then the Vikings’ offensive coordinator. He called out routes so many times that they assumed Turner had told him the plays in advance. He had not. Newman just knew them — or rather, he had deciphered them. Now his fellow cornerbacks sat observing as Newman cycled through one play after another, pausing only to rewind or scrawl a note. He said little, if anything. A few other players appeared, and the chatter increased. Newman pulled the hood of his sweatshirt over his bald head. When the session ended, he packed up his gear and walked out, off to receive treatment. Because Newman knew this above all: No matter how diligently he prepares watching film, his discoveries are useless if he is not healthy enough to employ them. After last season, Vikings General Manager Rick Spielman had something to tell Newman. Also, to ask him. “You’re going to be 38 coming up, and you played at a high level this year,” Spielman said he told him. “I did not expect what you were able to do for us. How does your body feel? Do you think you can go another year?” Minnesota’s analytics, Spielman said, revealed that Newman was an outlier. Based on data culled over the last two decades, Newman had defied what Spielman called a “critical age,” when cornerbacks’ effectiveness almost always declines. Players who endure deep into their 30s, and even into their 40s, are mostly specialists — long snappers, punters and kickers, like Adam Vinatieri, Indianapolis’s marvel — or quarterbacks, like Tom Brady, because they tend to absorb fewer collisions. Few cornerbacks last that long because the position is just too taxing, demanding of its practitioners exceptional speed, quickness, athleticism, anticipation, footwork and technique. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, the cornerback in the league is Tramon Williams of the Cleveland Browns. Newman is the first corner to start at least eight games at 38 since Otis Smith in 2003, according to Elias. “You do the most unnatural thing, which is running backward, turning and then sprinting,” Newman said. “How many people do you know that can run backward as somebody’s running full speed at you?” Mark Verstegen, the founder and president of EXOS, which operates training centers nationwide, has for 16 years served as the director of performance for the National Football League Players Association. He called the action Newman described — acceleration to deceleration to reacceleration — the most stressful on a player’s body beyond collisions. “The amount of pure mileage that he has put on his body — it’s immeasurable,” Verstegen said in a telephone interview. Comparing Newman to a racecar, Verstegen added, “But if you’re taking care of your car really well and you know how to drive it smarter, you’re still going to win the checkered flag even if you might have less horsepower and a little less tread on the tires. ” Newman takes an iconoclastic approach to his wellness. For one thing, he does not use a nutritionist. In maintaining his muscular 195 pounds, the Newman does not deprive himself — at the steakhouse, he ordered lamb chops and a Caesar salad with anchovies — but he rarely indulges. With few exceptions, he limits his movement between team headquarters, where he eats a smart breakfast ( eggs without the yolk, half a waffle, oatmeal with berries) and lunch, and his apartment, which is near a tangle of food options. He orders the same food at the same restaurants on the same night (crab leg Wednesdays! ). At the Japanese place where he dines on Thursdays, he sits at the same seat, on the far edge of the bar, to await what the bartender calls Newman’s usual: a teriyaki chicken bowl (sauce on the side) and a lava roll (shrimp tempura and avocado topped with yellowfin tuna and sauce) complemented by a healthy pour of pinot noir. “I try to pay attention to some of the stuff that I put in my body now that I’m older,” said Newman, who also takes multivitamins, fatty acids and supplements promoting joint and health. “I don’t know if my metabolism is going to get superslow. But I’ve still got abs and stuff. How many have abs?” Newman has never tested positive under the league’s policy and is so fastidious about what he puts in his body that he does not understand how players get caught. “You have all the tools to find out what’s good and what’s bad you got an app to tell you all that,” he said, adding, “It’s simple. ” In the he does not follow the team’s strength and conditioning program and for the past few years has not even worked out regularly with a trainer. He enjoys the spontaneity of tapping thoughts into his phone at breakfast and then amending the plan, if necessary, at the LA Fitness he visits five minutes from his residence in Dallas. “I’ve worked out all my life, so I’ve learned all this free information,” Newman said. “I know I need to do whatever they ask after a certain period of time, so I work on the things I feel like I need to work on. ” His goal, when he was younger, was just “to get big. ” He realized the fallacy of that strategy when a misdiagnosed knee injury in his second N. F. L. season affected his strength and mobility for several years, even if it took until his fifth season for him to miss a game. He loves doing squats, and his former Bengals teammate Leon Hall, who is now with the Giants, said he rued that he would always have to remove weight plates if he after Newman. But Newman concentrates on working the smaller, stabilizing muscles around his joints. A former champion sprinter at Kansas State, Newman now runs as fast as he needs to. The winner of the shuttle drill, which evaluates lateral movement and skills, at the 2003 scouting combine, Newman now is as quick as he needs to be. He will never regain those attributes. But in the spring and summer, he wards off regression with pickup basketball games, three times a week, against former N. B. A. and college players, a cardiovascular workout that he modifies to fulfill his needs. Newman reaps no physical benefits from scoring. He channels his energy into suffocating defense. He guards the opposition’s best offensive player. “They understand why I’m there,” Newman said. To work on quickness, many cornerbacks set up cones every 5 yards and then backpedal and break, again and again. That drill is popular, Newman said, but not functional. “That’s not reactive,” Newman said. “Our sport is 100 percent reactive. ” He continued: “I do the same things, just in a different way. In football, you turn and you reach out with your hand, use your arms, but in basketball you can’t do that you use all feet. You pick up a guy full court, you shuffle back, and then you’re breaking, turning and opening and cutting him off, trying to stay in front. If he gets by, you’ve got to cut him off and take the right angles. It’s literally the same thing as a corner. ” As he has gotten older, Newman has not dedicated additional time to recovery. But he has a standing appointment with the Vikings’ contracted acupuncturist, Hilary Patzer, on Tuesday mornings even though he hates needles — or rather, he hated them until Patzer treated his tight back. “I thought she was a witch at first, from Salem,” Newman said, laughing. “But I’ve never looked back. ” Newman considers this hour, which also includes the ancient Chinese healing method known as cupping, a vital part of his weekly recovery. Depending on how much hitting he did in the previous game, pain often does not set in until Wednesday, when practice resumes. It usually dissipates by Thursday. “Out of nowhere, I’ll feel like I’m 26 again,” Newman said. He devotes part of his afternoon a few days a week to napping, this on top of the eight hours of sleep — up at 7:20 a. m. in bed by 11 p. m. — he makes sure he gets. Instead of braving traffic, he remains at the complex an extra 30 to 45 minutes, sitting in the massage chair or donning compression boots to facilitate leg circulation. When he returns the next day, he invariably hears some younger teammates talking about their aches. And this is what he tells them: “You’re walking around like I’m supposed to be walking around. You feel like I’m supposed to feel. ” Newman said he had not decided when he would retire. Could be after this season, or maybe next, depending on the demand for his services. But it will be soon, which saddens Gray, his secondary coach, who said he had seen no evidence that Newman’s body or mind was betraying him. Asked for an example of Newman’s mastery, Gray offered two, each of which resulted in an interception. The first came in a Week 10 victory last season at Oakland. Newman was supposed to thwart Amari Cooper’s release and then linger on the outside. But knowing he had a chance to undercut Cooper, Newman trusted his intuition and swooped inside. “I’m watching and thinking there’s no way,” Gray said. “I knew he knew that play because I know I didn’t coach him. ” The second example reflects Newman’s acumen. Late in the third quarter of a Week 3 win at Carolina this season, Newman matched up against Ted Ginn Jr. Trying to gain separation, Ginn ran tight with him for about 13 yards before making a move intended to force Newman to turn his hips in the opposite direction. It did not fool him. He knew that Ginn would come back, and when he did, Newman dashed in front to grab the ball along Carolina’s sideline. “It’s kind of like batters looking for pitches,” Newman said. “You try to see the ball coming out of their hand and see where the release point’s at. For us, though, it’s not as as that. ” At the line of scrimmage, he tries decrypting the quarterback’s cadence and audibles. He uploads receivers’ mannerisms. When the ball is snapped, the play unfolds, to him, in slow motion. He begins expecting a catalog of possible routes, all of which are predicated on timing, and based on the receiver’s release or the depth of the quarterback’s drop, he starts winnowing them down. Zimmer favors an aggressive defensive scheme that often asks cornerbacks to play press coverage, denying the receiver a free release off the line. Newman rides receivers, feeling the route, aiming to run it better than they can. But when he plays off coverage, leaving space between him and the receiver, Newman cheats, he said, by watching the first three steps of the quarterback’s drop — and sometimes even the first five. From studying the quarterback, Newman knows exactly how he receives the ball, steps, plants and turns his shoulders to throw. There are plays, Newman said, when he knows precisely what will happen. As he spoke, he happened to look up at the television in his apartment, which was showing a Monday night game between the Giants and the Bengals. Based on where Green, his former Cincinnati teammate, lined up, Newman predicted he would run a stop, a slant or, more likely, a screen (which is was Green did). Once Newman thought he had cracked Palmer’s copter signal from his armchair, he wanted to delve a bit into some of Arizona’s receivers. He prompted a snippet of Michael Floyd running a comeback, a basic route in which a receiver runs, stops and turns toward the quarterback. Only the most adept can stop without having their momentum drive them downfield. Many receivers, particularly bigger ones, slow themselves by making rapid chopping movements with their hands and dropping their bodies. “I’m not watching his hips I’m watching his entire frame,” Newman said. “When I see the body go from high to low, I know he’s making his move. That’s when I start to break. ” Newman moved on to Larry Fitzgerald, who lined up behind other receivers at the top of the screen. As Fitzgerald went in motion, Newman correctly posited that he was getting a jump on his over route, an angled dash across the middle. Newman did not know whether he would be defending Fitzgerald, but generally speaking, he said, he prefers playing taller receivers like Fitzgerald off the ball so that he can counter their height with his quickness. “It’s knowing what I do well versus what they don’t do as well,” Newman said. That is the essence of Newman’s preparation, the hours he invests scouring film, surveying weaknesses, searching for clues that will sustain his value to the Vikings. His pursuit consumes him, and no matter how often he talks on FaceTime with his “kind of girlfriend” in California, in those spare moments away from his teammates — or the restaurant staff members who know him, or the apartment building concierge who invited him to watch the Vikings play, not realizing Newman would be busy that day — loneliness still descends. “Football’s like my escape,” Newman said. “It’s my everything. ” He yawned. His tablet needed recharging, and so did he. Newman has many hobbies — golfing, traveling, flying drones — but as a budding oenophile, he is perhaps most passionate about wine: strictly red, usually cabernet sauvignon or pinot noir. When he drifts off to sleep, exhausted, his mind is blank, he said, blissfully uncluttered by routes and formations, quarterbacks and receivers, his football mortality. Except for one thing. “I just think about grapes,” he said.

Geert Wilders, Dutch Far-Right Leader, Is Convicted of Inciting Discrimination - The New York Times

Nina Siegal

AMSTERDAM — Geert Wilders, the politician who is seen as a likely contender to become prime minister when Dutch voters go to the polls next year, was convicted on Friday of inciting discrimination and of insulting a group for leading an chant at a political rally in the Netherlands. The judiciary panel found that Mr. Wilders, the leader of the Party for Freedom, violated Dutch law with his remarks on March 19, 2014, but it elected not to convict him of inciting hatred, and it imposed no punishment, rejecting the prosecutors’ request to fine him 5, 000 euros, or about $5, 300. Mr. Wilders was found to have violated laws on inciting discrimination and group offense when he led a crowd at a political rally around the time of municipal elections in The Hague in chanting, “Fewer, fewer” to the question “Do you want more or fewer Moroccans in this city and in the Netherlands?” The court, however, said that Mr. Wilders was not guilty of charges in connection with comments he made about Moroccans in a nationally broadcast TV program recorded at a public market a week before the rally. The effect of the verdict on Mr. Wilders and on his party’s chances when the Dutch elections are held in March is unclear, but the trial seems to have improved his party’s standing, rather than diminishing it, among voters. If the Party for Freedom wins the most seats in the elections, Mr. Wilders could become prime minister, and he would then have to form a coalition government with other willing parties. Prime Minister Mark Rutte, leader of the People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy, said a year ago that he would refuse to join such a coalition unless Mr. Wilders retracted his comments about Moroccans. Mr. Rutte confirmed that sentiment at his weekly news conference on Friday, The Associated Press reported. Mr. Wilders, whose defense team said he would appeal the decision next week, was not present when the verdict was read by the chief judge, Hendrik Steenhuis, at a secured courtroom on a military base near Schiphol Airport, outside Amsterdam. The site was chosen to protect Mr. Wilders, who has been under constant guard because of death threats related to a long history of inflammatory comments, as well as the judge and prosecutors. “The most important thing is that he is found guilty of group insult and inciting discrimination,” said a spokesman for the public prosecution service, Frans Zonneveld. “For now, we’re very satisfied that he has been found guilty of these two charges. ” In their ruling, the judges said that Mr. Wilders’s comments at the rally had contributed to the further polarization of Dutch society by using “nationality as an ethnic designation” and that mutual respect was imperative in the “pluralistic” Netherlands. “He said that he was supported by millions of people and therefore was not to blame of offending a group,” Judge Steenhuis said. “It’s important to answer the question of whether he was guilty of this. That question is answered in our court system. We state that you cannot offend groups of people and discriminate against them. ” Mr. Wilders, who has taken a page out of Donald J. Trump’s playbook — he adopted the campaign slogan “Make the Netherlands Great Again” and attended the Republican convention in the United States — has repeatedly made vitriolic and inflammatory remarks about Islam, the Quran, immigrants and Dutch minority groups. Since the election of Mr. Trump, the Party for Freedom has been surging in the polls. “I still cannot believe it, but I have just been convicted because I asked a question about Moroccans,” Mr. Wilders said in a video that was posted online. “The Netherlands have become a sick country,” he added. “I have a message for the judges who convicted me: You have restricted the freedom of speech of millions of Dutch and hence convicted everyone. No one trusts you anymore. ” Peter Kanne, a pollster with IO Research, an independent Dutch polling organization, said the most recent data, released on Nov. 25, indicated that the Party for Freedom had gained support and was currently about even with the People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy, the leading party. “A lot of people mentioned that they’re really getting angry that he is being accused and judged only for what he said,” Mr. Kanne said. “They think that he said something that is true, and they’re very angry that a politician cannot say that in a society where there is freedom of speech. ” After Mr. Wilders’s comments about Moroccans in 2014, more than 6, 400 Dutch citizens filed complaints against him at local police offices. Of those complaints, 41 became individual claimants in the criminal trial, asking for up to €500 in “immaterial damages” per person. None will receive compensation from Mr. Wilders in the case, the panel ruled. Michiel Pestman, a lawyer representing some of the claimants, said that his clients were “happy with the results” but added that it was rare for criminal courts in the Netherlands to convict someone without imposing a penalty. “It’s a bit weird,” he said, but “the principled nature of the decision is more important than the compensation. ” He added, “The judge has ruled for the first time in the Netherlands that there are limits to what even a politician can say. ” Just before the official court proceedings began on Oct. 31, Mr. Wilders said on his blog that he would boycott what he called “a travesty” against freedom of speech, but he changed his mind and testified during the defense’s closing arguments. Regardless of the verdict, he said, “no one will be able to silence me. ”

Race Relations Are at Lowest Point in Obama Presidency, Poll Finds - The New York Times

Giovanni Russonello

percent of Americans say race relations are generally bad, one of the highest levels of discord since the 1992 riots in Los Angeles during the Rodney King case, according to the latest New York News poll. The poll, conducted from Friday, the day after the killing of five Dallas police officers, until Tuesday, found that six in 10 Americans say race relations were growing worse, up from 38 percent a year ago. Racial discontent is at its highest point in the Obama presidency and at the same level as after the riots touched off by the 1992 acquittal of Los Angeles police officers charged in Mr. King’s beating. Relations between black Americans and the police have become so brittle that more than half of black people say they were not surprised by the attack that killed five police officers and wounded nine others in Dallas last week. Nearly half of white Americans say that they, too, were unsurprised by the episode, the survey found. Despite President Obama’s insistence at a memorial service for the fallen officers that the races in the United States are “not as divided as we seem,” the poll found that black and white Americans hold starkly different views on race, particularly regarding the treatment of by the police. Asked whether the police in most communities are more likely to use deadly force against a black person than a white person, of answered yes, and only about half as many white people agree. percent of whites said that the race of the suspect made no difference in the use of force only 18 percent of black Americans said so. When asked to rate the job their local police department was doing, four in five whites said excellent or good a majority of blacks answered fair or poor. More than of black people say the police in their communities make them feel more anxious than safe. By wide margins, whites and Hispanics say the police make them feel safer. “I have been in situations where the police have made situations worse rather than better,” Ayesha Numan, 22, a black woman living in Kansas City, Mo. said in a interview. “That’s not to say that I write them off as all bad. I just have to be cautious of how they’re acting around me. ” Mr. Obama on Tuesday spoke at a memorial service in Dallas honoring the officers killed when Micah Johnson, a black Army veteran, opened fire at a protest last Thursday. Last week was among the most wrenching since the Black Lives Matter movement began three years ago: On days, videos were released showing the deaths of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile at the hands of the police, and the Dallas attack followed a day later. Black and white opinion is sharply divided on the aims and the approach of the Black Lives Matter movement. Seventy percent of are sympathetic to the movement, compared with only 37 percent of whites. Among all Americans, 41 percent agree with the movement, 25 percent disagree and 29 percent do not have an opinion either way. Support for Black Lives Matter correlates directly to age, with 50 percent of all adults younger than 30 saying they agree with the movement, compared with 20 percent who disagree with it. Among those 45 and older, 36 percent agree and 29 percent disagree. “The Black Lives Matter movement has given a younger generation a voice in civil rights,” Marc Morial, the president of the National Urban League, said. “The police are a flash point. The broader situation is always the underlying issues: the criminal justice system being broken, the higher unemployment among the slower recovery from the recession, the assault on voting rights and voter suppression. ” The nationwide News Poll was conducted July 8 to 12 on cellphones and landlines with 1, 600 adults, including 171 black respondents and 1, 207 whites. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points for all adults, three points for whites and nine points for blacks. percent of Americans have heard or read at least some news about the last week’s racially tinged violence — the shootings in Dallas and deaths of Mr. Castile and Mr. Sterling. Some feel skeptical of what they have seen and heard of police shootings. “A lot of the times you see video, and most of it’s after the altercation. You really don’t see what happens before that,” said Roger Boulanger, 46, who is white and lives in Mendon, Mass. He said that race relations were generally bad, but he did not perceive them as being worse recently. “I don’t want to say it’s 100 percent that every time someone gets shot, it’s just the police being racist,” he said. “I don’t think that. ”

‘Brexit’ Is Locking In the Forces That Already Haunt the Global Economy - The New York Times

Neil Irwin

Sometimes, something bad happens, and it creates huge financial market swings and economic ripples. The Sept. 11 terrorist attacks were an example, as was the 2011 Japanese nuclear disaster. But the Brexit is different. The immediate financial downturn after Britain voted Thursday to leave the European Union resembles the fallout from those disasters. But the other events were largely disconnected from the broader economic currents of their time. They were events, at least in terms of their economic ramifications. What makes Brexit so concerning is that it accentuates and deepens global forces that have been building for years. So far, governments have been unable to limit any of it. And those forces have dimensions that make it a particularly perilous time for the global economy, even though the type of panic that followed the collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008 looks unlikely. Britain accounts for less than 4 percent of world G. D. P. Most people on Earth don’t really have a rooting interest in the exact details of the nation’s trade relationship with the rest of Europe. But its decision to leave the European Union is making more powerful six interrelated forces that already weigh on the global economy: Low inflation There is a glut of global commodities, particularly oil. There is a glut of labor, with elevated unemployment in much of the world. Inflation has been persistently below the 2 percent mark that major central banks aim for, and shows little sign of rising. And since the Brexit decision, markets are signaling that those forces have become even more energized. The price of oil fell 7. 5 percent from Thursday to Monday’s close, despite little reason to think that the British referendum will cause any major changes in, for example, the supply of oil from oil reserves that the nation controls. And bond markets are priced at levels that imply the years ahead will have lower inflation that was priced in before the Brexit news. While high inflation is often seen as the greater threat, in the last few years economists have viewed inflation — which can discourage spending and investment and make debts more onerous — as the more pressing concern. In the United States, bond market prices imply that investors now expect annual inflation of 1. 37 percent a year through 2026, down from 1. 55 percent on Thursday before the vote’s results, a drop of 0. 18 of a percentage point in Germany, the drop was 0. 13 of a point and in Japan 0. 10 of a point. (The one exception: Britain itself, which will almost certainly see much higher inflation in the coming years because of a drop in its currency. Strong dollar The United States dollar has been on a tear. The dollar index, measuring its value against six other major currencies, is up more than 20 percent in the last two years. Some of this reflects good health: The United States economy is reasonably strong, with steady growth since 2009 and a 4. 7 percent unemployment rate. That has led the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates once and contemplate further moves. Some of the dollar rally reflects a more negative global outlook. The economies of Europe, Japan and many emerging markets have remained exceptionally weak, making the United States look comparatively fantastic. Factor in the United States’ traditional role as the beacon of stability in turbulent times, and American assets look more attractive than their underlying economics would suggest. Most worrisome is that there are some feedback loops between the strong dollar and economic weakness abroad. Many international companies, especially in China and emerging markets, owe debt in dollars, so a stronger dollar makes their debts more onerous and creates spillover economic weakness. And the stronger dollar is undermining American exporters, slowing growth in the United States. Brexit is only accentuating this. The dollar index is up 3 percent since Thursday, most significantly because of the collapse in value of the British pound, but it is also up against the euro. Impotent monetary policy The world’s central banks are well aware of these forces, of course, and are trying to combat them. The European Central Bank and the Bank of Japan are in the middle of huge programs to try to pump money into their financial systems by buying assets. The Federal Reserve and the Bank of England have been delaying interest rate increases in hopes of achieving higher inflation and more solid growth. So far it hasn’t been enough to get inflation persistently up to 2 percent or achieve sustained strong growth. And it is an open question if more of the same will change anything, particularly given that the economic challenges emanating from Britain are more because of existential questions of national identity than because of a business slowdown. Nonetheless, in the aftermath of Brexit, analysts and financial markets are now pricing in even slower interest rate increases for the Fed and the Bank of England, and a real possibility of yet more easing programs by the E. C. B. and the Bank of Japan. Low interest rates Remember back in December when the Federal Reserve raised interest rates? That day, Treasury bonds were yielding 2. 3 percent. Those bonds had fallen to 1. 74 percent by Thursday (the Fed controls interest rates directly, but rates are set in the open market). In the two trading days since the Brexit vote, that rate has fallen to 1. 44 percent. Other bond markets, including across Europe and in Britain itself, have also experienced falling rates. Germany, Switzerland and several other European countries even have negative interest rates, meaning a person who buys a bond and holds on to it will lose money. That’s very much related to the decline in investors’ expectations for lower inflation and more central bank activism. But it may also reflect a “fear premium” as investors throw money into anything that seems safe — even if it means they are guaranteed to lose money. Weak growth This is the underlying story behind all of these other market currents. Europe is only now returning to its 2007 level of economic output Japan’s growth is so low it is constantly bouncing in and out of recession status. In developing markets, Brazil is in recession and China is slowing. Britain and the United States are doing better, but only by the diminished global standards of the 21st century. You can have endless debates about the underlying causes. Is this the inevitable result of a lull in productivity growth, a result of bad policy or bad luck, or some mix? Either way, the reality is that the global economy seems locked into lower growth than had been the norm in the decades before 2007. Britain’s E. U. vote raises the risk of further dragging down that growth rate, particularly if there is a prolonged period of uncertainty around the country’s fate or a permanent breakdown in the trade ties that make an economy richer. Political instability All of this is creating a toxic political environment in much of the advanced world, driving greater polarization and the flocking of voters to candidates outside the mainstream. Brexit is the most recent example, supported as it was by Nigel Farage and Boris Johnson. The rise of nationalist parties in Continental Europe is another prime example, as are the popularity of Donald J. Trump and Bernie Sanders in the United States Jeremy Corbyn in Britain and the Podemos party in Spain. Of course, less conventional politicians could turn out to succeed at generating stronger economic conditions where parties of the center have failed. But if nothing else, the widening of the ideological spectrum creates a wider range of possible outcomes — including some that would surely be very negative for financial markets and the global economy. Again, none of these stand in isolation. Each is deeply related — either as cause, effect or both. And each has been pushed further by Britain’s choice. Where the cycle ends, and when, no one knows.

Can The American People Defeat The Oligarchy That Rules Them? — Paul Craig Roberts

Paul Craig Roberts

By Paul Craig Roberts on November 3, 2016 Hillary’s crimes might cost her the election, but she won’t go to jail. by Dr. Paul Craig Roberts The Federal Bureau of Investigation is reviewing another slew of emails related to Hillary Clinton’s private server. Aren’t you surprised that Hillary and the presstitutes haven’t blamed Putin for FBI director Comey’s reopening of the Hillary email case? But the presstitutes have done the next best thing for Hillary. They have made Comey the issue, not Hillary. According to US Senator Harry Reid and the presstitutes, we don’t need to worry about Hillary’s crimes. After all, she is only a political woman feathering her nest, just as political men have done for ages. Why all this misogynist talk about Hillary? The presstitutes’ cry is that Comey’s alleged crime is far more important. This woman-hating Republican violated the Hatch Act by telling Congress that the investigation he said was closed is now reopened. A very strange interpretation of the Hatch Act. During an election it is OK to announce that a candidate for president is cleared but it is not OK to say that a candidate is under investigation. In July 2016 Comey violated the Hatch Act when he, on orders from the corrupt Obama Attorney General, announced Hillary clean. In so doing, Comey used the prestige of federal clearance of Hillary’s violation of national security protocols to boost her standing in the election polls. Actually, Hillary’s standing in the polls is based on the pollsters over-weighting Hillary supporters in the polls. It is easy to produce a favorite if you overweight their supporters in the poll questions. If you look at the crowds attending the two candidate’s public appearances, it is clear that the American people prefer Donald Trump, who is opposed to war with Russia and China. War with nuclear powers is the big issue of the election. Hillary’s problem has the ruling American Oligarchy, for which Hillary is the total servant, concerned. What are they going to do about Trump if he wins? Will his fate be the same as John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King, George Wallace? Time will tell. Or will a hotel maid appear at the last minute in the way that the Oligarchy got rid of Dominique Strauss-Kahn? Dominique Strauss Kahn indicted by Grand Jury and out on six million dollar bailout, but could he have been set up? All of the American and Western feminists, progressives, and left-wing remnant fell for the obvious frame-up of Strauss-Kahn. After Strauss-Kahn was blocked from the presidency of France and resigned as Director of the IMF, the New York authorities had to drop all charges against Strauss-Kahn. But Washington succeeded in removing Strauss-Kahn as a challenge to its French vassal, Sarkozy. This is how the American Oligarchy destroys those it suspects might not serve its interests. The corrupt self-serving Oligarchy makes sure that it owns the government and the media, the think tanks and increasingly all of the major universities, and, of course, through the presstitutes, Americans’ minds. The Oligarchs are now hard-pressed to rescue Hillary as US president, so let’s see if the Oligarchs can once again deceive the American people. While we wait, let’s concern ourselves with another important issue. The Clinton crime syndicate in the closing years of the 20th century allowed a small handful of mega-corporations to consolidate the US media in a few hands. This vast increase in the power of the Oligarchy was accomplished despite US anti-trust law. The media mergers destroyed the American tradition of a dispersed and independent media. But really, what does federal law mean to the One Percent. Nothing whatsoever. The One Percent’s power makes them immune to law. Hillary’s crimes might cost her the election, but she won’t go to jail. Not content with 90% control of the US media, the Oligarchy wants more concentration and more control. Looks like they will be getting it, thanks to the corrupt US government. The Federal Trade Commission is supposed to enforce US anti-trust law. Instead, the federal agency routinely violates US anti-trust law by permitting monopoly concentrations of business interests. Because of the failure of the federal government to enforce federal law, we now have “banks too big to fail,” unregulated Internet monopoly, and the evisceration of a dispersed and independent media. Not so long ago there was a field of economics known as anti-trust. Ph.D. candidates specialized in and wrote dissertations about public control of monopoly power. I assume that this field of economics, like the America of my youth, no longer exists. In the article below, Rahul Manchanda, explains that “yet again another huge media conglomerate is being swallowed and acquired by another huge media conglomerate, to create another gargantuan media outlet, in another consolidation of the enormous power, money, wealth, intimidation, conspiracy and control” that eviscerates the US Constitution and the First Amendment.

Trump: Hillary Clinton may be 'most corrupt person ever' to run for president

Email Donald Trump’s campaign debuted a dark new attack ad on Tuesday, looking to further its portrayal of Hillary Clinton as a corrupt politician and doubling down on allegations that she grew wealthy through “pay-to-play politics.”The TV spot hits Clinton, the Democratic presidential nominee, on controversies related to her family’s foundation, stating that “staggering amounts of cash poured into the Clinton Foundation from criminals, dictators, countries that hate America” and that “Hillary cut deals for donors.” Clinton’s charitable foundation has faced intense scrutiny this election over concerns about possible conflicts of interest because it took in money from corporations and foreign governments. Clinton has repeatedly denied, however, that her work as secretary of state was compromised by the foundation’s work or that she gave any special privileges to its donors.The Clintons have also said that the foundation, which contributes to AIDS relief abroad, among other charitable causes, will cease taking money from corporations and foreign governments if she is elected president.Still, the ad from the Republican nominee claims that Clinton “sold out American workers, exploited Haitians in need, she even gave American uranium rights to the Russians.”“Hillary Clinton only cares about power, money and herself,” its voice over concludes.The advertisement is another instance of Trump, an embattled candidate in an already divisive race, going on the offensive as the presidential campaign enters its final weeks. As Trump trails in the polls and high-profile Republicans abandon him, he has attacked Clinton and her husband’s character, going so far as to bring women who had accused Bill Clinton of sexual misconduct to watch the second debate in St. Louis last weekend.Some Republicans had called for him to drop out of the race after a 2005 recording emerged showing him bragging about sexual assault last week. But, attacking even Republican establishment figures like Speaker Paul Ryan and Arizona Sen. John McCain, Trump has promised to plow forward, and some observers suggest he has little to lose.“It is so nice that the shackles have been taken off me and I can now fight for America the way I want to,” he tweeted on Tuesday.

False Reports of Gunfire at LAX Airport Prompt Panic and Evacuations - The New York Times

Jonah Engel Bromwich

Unconfirmed reports of gunfire at Los Angeles International Airport on Sunday caused panic in the airport and on social media as passengers fled outside and the police raced to respond. About an hour after the first panicked reports appeared on social media, Andy Neiman, a spokesman for the Los Angeles Police Department, wrote on Twitter that the reports had been caused by “loud noises only. ” Terminals 1, 2, 3 and 5, as well as the Tom Bradley International Terminal, were evacuated by the police, the airport said. There was a “self evacuation” from Terminal 4, said Rob Pedregon, a spokesman for the airport police, who referred to those who fled as “panicked passengers. ” The airport said in a statement that it had closed several levels of its central terminal area, though it had not confirmed the reports of shooting. The episode was remarkably similar to one that occurred two weeks earlier, when unconfirmed reports of gunfire at Kennedy International Airport in New York led the police to evacuate two terminals there, causing hysteria among passengers whose fears were exacerbated by unconfirmed reports spread on social media. Video from the airport posted to social media from Los Angeles on Sunday showed travelers running outside the airport as police cruisers rushed by in the opposite direction. The interior of the terminal appeared to have been abandoned by civilians as the police searched for any sign of a shooter. Just as at Kennedy, the fear felt by travelers in Los Angeles was a reminder of recent attacks at airports in Istanbul and Brussels, and the way those episodes can prompt a panic response to the threat of violence in public spaces. Responding to the episode at Kennedy, Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York asked last week that the Department of Homeland Security conduct a formal investigation. “In the age of terror attacks, it is a national priority to make sure targets, like our airports, are best prepared to recognize, diffuse and professionally handle the very real threats that confront us,” he said.

Comment on WikiLeaks Shocker: Clinton Camp Considering Paul Ryan Relative as Supreme Court Nominee by Richard Johnson

Richard Johnson

Posted on October 28, 2016 by Paul Joseph Watson Another reason as to why Ryan tried to sabotage Trump’s campaign? Hillary Clinton’s campaign circulated the name of one of Paul Ryan’s relatives as a potential Supreme Court pick, suggesting a conflict of interest that could feed in to the Republican Speaker of the House’s dislike for Donald Trump. An email released in part 19 of the Wikileaks Podesta dump features an article sent by Hillary advisor Sara Solow to Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta and Hillary’s foreign policy advisor Jake Sullivan on February 29, 2016. The piece draws attention to Ketanji Brown Jackson, a judge on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. “She was confirmed by without any Republican opposition in the Senate not once, but *twice*. She was confirmed to her current position in 2013 by unanimous consent – that is, without any stated opposition. She was also previously confirmed unanimously to a seat on the U.S. Sentencing Commission (where she became vice chair),” reads the email. “Her family is impressive. She is married to a surgeon and has two young daughters. Her father is a retired lawyer and her mother a retired school principal. Her brother was a police officer (in the unit that was the basis for the television show *The Wire*) and is now a law student, and she is related by marriage to Congressman (and Speaker of the House) Paul Ryan.” Earlier this month, Ryan said that he would no longer defend or campaign for Donald Trump. A poll released this week found that nearly two thirds of Republicans trust Donald Trump more than Ryan to lead the GOP. Many Trump supporters speculated that Ryan was involved in the leaking of the infamous Billy Bush tape, in which Trump made lewd comments about women, as part of a plot to sabotage the Republican nominee’s campaign. Could the fact that one of his relatives is being touted as a likely Clinton Supreme Court pick be another reason as to why Ryan – who has been accused by many of being in bed with the Washington establishment – has abandoned his support for Donald Trump?

Lindsey Graham: Trump Needs to ’Back Off’ Russian Investigation, Stop Tweeting - Breitbart

Pam Key

On Sunday’s broadcast of NBC’s “Meet The Press,” Sen. Lindsey Graham ( ) said President Donald Trump should “back off” and stop tweeting or comment about the investigation into Russian interference into the 2016 presidential election. Partial transcript as follows: GRAHAM: Well, I think we need to have Comey come before the Judiciary Committee and clear the air. Did the president ever say anything to the director of the FBI that would be construed as trying to impede the investigation? The president called me about the firing and he referenced the Comey testimony last week and the judiciary committee about how bad it was. So, that’s all I know. But I think it’s time to call the FBI director before the country at large and explain what happened at that dinner. If there are any tapes, they have to be turned over. You can’t be cute about tapes. If there are tapes of this conversation, they need to be turned over. I doubt if there are. But we have to clear the air there also. TODD: Let me put up that tweet where the president put the word tapes in quotes. so, we don’t know quite what that means. but did — did you think that constituted a threat to Comey? GRAHAM: I think it was inappropriate. I think it requires somebody like me, a Republican, to call Comey before the Judiciary Committee to let him explain that conversation. Right now, I do not believe President Trump is a target or subject of any investigation regarding collusion with the Russians. That’s what I believe. But this tweet has to be answered. I would advise the president not to tweet or comment about the investigation, as we go forward. The russians did interfere in our election. I don’t think they changed the outcome. I have no evidence of collusion. But the president needs to back off and let the investigation go forward. ( The Hill) Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN

Facebook geht gegen Fake-News vor: Alle Meldungen von Bild.de und Focus.de gelöscht

noreply@blogger.com (Der Postillon)

Dienstag, 22. November 2016 Facebook geht gegen Fake-News vor: Alle Meldungen von Bild.de und Focus.de gelöscht Menlo Park (dpo) - Hunderttausende Facebook-User dürften sich heute Morgen verwundert die Augen gerieben haben: Das soziale Netzwerk hat durch eine Änderung seines Algorithmus sämtliche Meldungen von Bild.de und Focus.de mit sofortiger Wirkung aus seiner Timeline verbannt. Ziel der Maßnahme sei es, die massenhafte Verbreitung von Fake-News einzudämmen, teilte das Unternehmen heute mit. Auch die Facebook-Seiten der Fake-News-Seiten Bild ( https://www.facebook.com/biId/ ) und Focus ( https://www.facebook.com/focus-onIine/ ) wurden gelöscht und sind nicht mehr erreichbar. "Desinformation ist kein Kavaliersdelikt", so Facebook-Boss Mark Zuckerberg. "Zwei der schlimmsten Sünder haben wir aus dem Verkehr gezogen. Weitere werden folgen." Hier und da könne zwar immer noch eine Nachricht durchrutschen, so der Facebook-Gründer. "Wir arbeiten aber mit Hochdruck daran, dass das in Zukunft nicht mehr passiert." Sollten User noch einzelne Bild - oder Focus -Nachrichten in der Timeline haben, helfe nur eines. "Ignorieren!" Typische "Meldungen" auf Focus Online und Bild Falsche Nachrichten waren in den vergangenen Tagen und Wochen von vielen Beobachtern für den Wahlsieg von Donald Trump mitverantwortlich gemacht worden. Auch die Bundestagswahl 2017 läuft möglicherweise Gefahr, von Fake-Nachrichtenportalen massiv beeinflusst zu werden. Angeblich sollen einschlägige Falschnews-Verbreiter wie Bild.de und Focus.de sogar ganze Redaktionen beschäftigen, die täglich Hunderte Fake-Meldungen ausstoßen – der Schaden für die Gesellschaft ist noch gar nicht abschätzbar. "News" Bei Bild.de, einem der größten Player, ist man selbst überrascht über die Gutgläubigkeit des Publikums. "Dass das so lange gut gegangen ist, hätten ich nie gedacht", so Julian Reichelt, der sogenannte Chefredakteur der Seite. "Keine Ahnung, warum so viele Menschen unsere Meldungen zu Pietro und Sarah Lombardis Trennung oder das neueste Tattoo von Sophia Thomalla für Nachrichten gehalten haben." Er muss jetzt neue Wege finden, um seine Fake-News im Internet zu verbreiten. In der "Redaktion" von Focus Online wiederum ist man sogar froh über die Löschung. "Wir schreiben ohnehin immer nur Bild-Artikel minimal um und veröffentlichen die dann mit einer Clickbait-Überschrift oder einem fiesen Spruch gegen Migranten neu. Wenn wir nicht auf Facebook sehen, was gerade gut auf Bild.de läuft, wissen wir eh nicht mehr, worüber wir berichten sollen", so Focus-Chef Daniel Steil, der beim Standesamt einen Antrag eingereicht hat, seinen Namen in Julian "wie mein zweiter Vorname lautet, wird Sie überraschen" Reichelt ändern zu lassen. Medienexperten raten Usern im Netz prinzipiell zur Vorsicht – und zur Skepsis. Seriöse Nachrichtenportale, deren Meldungen man ernst nehmen kann, erkenne man vor allem an ihrer schlichten Schwarz-Weiß-Optik. Sie hätten in der Regel ein Posthorn und Steckenpferd im Logo (oder beides, das ist noch glaubwürdiger!) und seien langjährig am Markt erfolgreich, zum Beispiel schon seit 1845. swo, ssi, dan