Irony alert! What's Paul Krugman trying to say about the election with this James Comey slam? Posted at 3:07 Share on Facebook Share on Twitter  FBI Director James Comey's announcement that the email would continue in light of new information. Going to be fun watching people who said "rigging" talk was an attack on our democracy now attack the integrity of the FBI.  — Jason C. (@CounterMoonbat) October 28, 2016  As we reported earlier, Paul Krugman was among the lefties who thought the FBI director's decision and how it was handled was "shameful." Krugman also added this: If we don't hear more from Comey, we just have to conclude that he was trying to swing election. And *that* should be the story.  — Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) October 28, 2016  Is that so? In other words: @paulkrugman You mean it's rigged, nutboy?


A diagnosis of breast cancer at age 27 is shattering for anyone. But for Eli Oberman, it came with extra layers of anxiety. He is a transgender man, who was born female but began taking male hormones when he was 19 to change gender. Like many transgender people, Mr. Oberman switched gender without having surgery to change his body. The cancer was a stark reminder that he was still vulnerable to illnesses from his original anatomy — and that the medical world has blind spots in its understanding of how to take care of trans men and women. "I just felt overwhelmed on all levels," Mr. Oberman said. "Overwhelmed about facing the diagnosis, overwhelmed about the irony of it being this part of my body that was already so fraught for me. " About 1. 4 million adults in the United States report they are transgender, according to a recent analysis of federal and state data. That figure is twice the previous estimate, and as awareness has increased, the health care system has begun scrambling to meet their needs. The government lifted a ban on Medicare coverage for transgender surgery and hormone treatment in 2014, and in 2015 New York State ended a similar ban for Medicaid patients. This year, a rule under the Affordable Care Act banning discrimination in health care specifically included protection for transgender people. Hospitals and professional schools have begun training employees and students on transgender medicine, and on basic etiquette like addressing trans men and women by the name and pronoun they prefer. At the Mount Sinai Health System in New York, which recently opened a Center for Transgender Medicine and Surgery, about 8, 000 employees had such training last year. "When I think back to the earlier days and think where we are now, it's unbelievably better," said Barbara E. Warren, a psychologist and the director for L. G. B. T. programs and policies at Mount Sinai. But there are still struggles. Dr. Warren and other experts said it was common for transgender people to avoid screenings and other medical care for parts of their bodies associated with their original gender. If problems do arise, they may find themselves in situations like Mr. Oberman, who suddenly became the lone male patient in waiting rooms full of women, and a target of curiosity or scorn from some health workers. Mr. Oberman, now 33, was treated for the cancer six years ago, but decided just recently to speak about it publicly in hopes of helping to improve care for others. He has big, dark eyes, thinning hair, a warm smile and a leafy tattoo wreathing one arm — the kudzu vine, he said, because it is "so unstoppably alive. " He lives in Brooklyn, has a degree in poetry and education, and plays violin in a rock band called the Shondes ("Disgraces," in Yiddish). His day jobs have included managing a database for a nonprofit organization. He began taking testosterone when he was 19 for its masculinizing effects — these include increased facial and body hair, a lower voice, more muscle and, usually, an end to periods. But he never had surgery to change his body. Many trans people do not, and so many trans men still have ovaries and vaginas, and trans women, prostate glands and penises. Early in his transition, Mr. Oberman wanted "top surgery" — breast removal — but could not afford it, so he wore binders to flatten his chest. Gradually, he became more comfortable with his body and lost interest in the surgery. He first noticed a breast lump in 2010. It was not easy to feel, and cancer at his age just didn't seem possible. He let six or eight months go by before having scans and a biopsy. Those tests required leaving the safety of his usual clinic, which specialized in L. G. B. T. patients, and plunging into the world of mainstream medicine, where he said doctors treated him with respect, but other workers did not. "I had some horrible experiences," he said. During one procedure, when Mr. Oberman had his shirt off, a male technician, seeing that he was transgender, exclaimed: "Why would you do this to yourself? It's disgusting. " Mr. Oberman never reported the episodes. "I'm not proud to say I didn't complain," he said, adding that he wished he had done so for the sake of other patients. But he was facing a disease. The cancer was aggressive. He would need both breasts removed, and then chemotherapy. "I felt guilty, able to get free surgery I didn't want because I had cancer, and so many others want it and can't get it," he said. He soon learned that mastectomies, which remove as much breast tissue as possible, differ from top surgery, which preserves enough to give the chest a contour. Because he had cancer, top surgery was not a safe option: It would leave too much breast tissue, and too much risk of recurrence. Friends who have had top surgery were stunned to find out they still had a risk of breast cancer because of the tissue left behind, he said. Before surgery, thinking that testosterone might interfere with healing, Mr. Oberman's doctors advised him to stop taking it for a month. He followed their advice, but soon, he said, "I went insane. I wasn't rational. I was lying on the floor, crying. " Back on the hormone, he became himself again. Chemotherapy gave him a "definitionless moonface," he said, and it coarsened his features and thinned his hair permanently. It had taken him years to feel comfortable in his trans identity, and now, he said, "It felt like starting all over again. " He would have liked to join a support group, but feared he would not be accepted. His reluctance to deal with the health care system has lingered. Just last year, at 32, he finally had his first Pap smear to screen for cervical cancer. It was about 10 years overdue, according to current guidelines. Doctors had nagged him to be tested, and one even threatened to withhold his testosterone unless he complied. He kept putting it off because he feared being treated badly in a gynecologist's office. Trans friends who had called for appointments were challenged by receptionists who assumed that a deep voice meant they did not belong. Trans men often avoid gynecologists, said Dr. Asa Radix, Mr. Oberman's physician and the senior director of research and education at the Community Health Center in New York, which provides health care for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. "Imagine, if you're a trans man, and you're going to the gynecologist," Dr. Radix said. "You go to the front desk, and you have to out yourself. Everyone can hear what's going on. You just want to run out the door. " In addition, some trans people are conflicted about their bodies, "and may not want to think they have the anatomy they have," Dr. Radix said. He added that pelvic exams could be physically uncomfortable for a transgender man because testosterone can dry out vaginal tissue. It can also change the cervix in ways that make a Pap test hard to read, necessitating a second round. Mr. Oberman said that in "moments of dark paranoia," he wondered if taking testosterone might have caused his cancer — or if it was unrelated and the tumor might have developed anyway. His mother and her mother had both had breast cancer — though well after menopause. There is no evidence that trans men or women who take hormones have increased risks of any type of cancer, Dr. Radix said. Studies in Europe have found no increased risk, but it is not clear that the results apply to the United States, where the population is less homogeneous and many transgender people obtain hormones via the internet or other sources outside the health care system. Zil Goldstein, a nurse practitioner and program director at Mount Sinai's transgender center, said that while she had concerns about the safety of transgender hormones, she worried more about the possible harm from not prescribing them — researchers report that 41 percent of transgender people attempt suicide. The hormone question concerns Mr. Oberman's oncologist, Dr. Paula Klein, who specializes in breast cancer at Mount Sinai Beth Israel (not the same hospital where he had his biopsies and surgery). She said trans men with breast cancer were often urged to stop taking testosterone. One reason is that the body converts some testosterone to estrogen, which can speed the growth of many breast tumors. And some breast cancers may also be stimulated by testosterone, she said. But there is no solid data to guide trans patients, and Mr. Oberman does not want to stop taking the hormone. Dr. Klein was an author of a journal article in 2011 about two other trans men with breast cancer. Both took testosterone and, like Mr. Oberman, chose to stay on it. Few other cases have been reported. Dr. Klein has been suggesting that Mr. Oberman have his ovaries removed. Part of her reasoning was that he had stopped taking tamoxifen, a drug commonly prescribed to prevent breast cancer recurrence. Taking out the ovaries would mean lower estrogen levels, which would help prevent a recurrence of breast cancer. "You would definitely benefit," she said during an office visit in September. "It's a slam dunk for someone like you, taking away all your female parts," Dr. Klein said, adding: "We thought you'd eat that up. A transgender gift. " "Except I don't want it," Mr. Oberman said. He did not want more surgery or the hormonal jolt that removing his ovaries would bring. He thought the mastectomies and chemotherapy had very likely cured him. Dr. Klein backed off, saying, "Look, the odds are that you're going to be fine. " He hugged her on the way out. It seemed likely that they would have this conversation again.


Oregon Rep. Peter DeFazio took federal authorities to the woodshed on the House floor over their failure to do their job and arrest the armed terrorists led by Ammon Bundy.As you probably already know, Bundy and his band of right-wing militants illegally seized the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge two weeks ago. Ever since then, they ve destroyed government property, snooped through government files, struck fear into the hearts of the local citizens, and have broken several laws in the process. But law enforcement has done very little to remove the armed occupation, which is a stark contrast to the way law enforcement treats unarmed black men in this country.And DeFazio wants that to change right now. The heat and the lights are on at the Malheur Wildlife Refuge, illegally occupied by ultra-rightwing anti-government extremists, but you gotta wonder if the lights are on or is anybody home down there at the Justice Department, DeFazio said.DeFazio then angrily demanded that federal authorities take down the militants and end the standoff so that people can move on with their lives. Hello! I don t think there s anybody there. I believe that this illegal occupation, this destruction of federal property was directly emboldened by the fact that their father of the two leaders, Cliven Bundy, stood down the government two years ago when he owed a million dollars other ranchers paid their grazing fees, he refuses to do it. And he was grazing in areas that were prohibited. And he stood down the government at the point of a gun, and he s still grazing and nobody, nobody at the Justice Department has seen fit to raise a finger against him.He celebrated the anniversary of the takeover and said this is how it s done. And now his sons are replicating that in my state of Oregon, where we abide by the laws. Yeah, we disagree over a lot of federal policies, but we abide by the laws.It s time for the Justice Department to take some action. Wake up down there! Here s the video via YouTube.Indeed, so far, the only militants who have been arrested were caught driving a federal vehicle to town in search of snacks. Meanwhile, the rest of the militants have been allowed to come and go as they please and they ve even been allowed to destroy federal fence lines and access government computers. Furthermore, the militants broke the law by carrying firearms on federal property and their seizure of a government building is an act of domestic terrorism that should not be tolerated.If this were a group of African-Americans or Muslims, law enforcement would have already shot up the place and killed every one of them by now. But because these gunmen are white rednecks, authorities are treating them with kid gloves, which perfectly demonstrates that law enforcement truly has different rules for different people. These militants are costing taxpayers millions of dollars, and they are interrupting the daily lives of citizens who do not want them there. Their actions are illegal and they should be treated like any other terrorist. It s time for law enforcement to do the job they are paid to do or they should resign in disgrace so that we can hire people who will actually do it.


Sean Spicer might be in a little bit of a trouble after an off-camera Wednesday press briefing. Though President* Trump and Spicer himself have been pushing The Donald s baseless conspiracy theory that President Obama tapped the wires at Trump Tower, Spicer accidentally admitted they were just making sh*t up. There is no reason that we should that we have to think that the President is the target of any investigation whatsoever, Spicy told reporters just minutes after he implied that he was unsure if the President was the target of a counter-intelligence investigation. I think that s what we need to find out. There s obviously a lot of concern, Spicer had said. But at the end of the briefing, he was handed a sheet of paper, from which he read his revised answer verbatim.The wiretapping allegations, clearly intended to distract from and detract from any ongoing investigations into Team Trump s connections to Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, have become quite uncomfortable for Trump, who demanded that Congress waste time, resources, and effort looking into them, as just like everything else our alleged President says they are a lie one that is quickly getting out of hand.Last Thursday, Senators Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Sheldon White House (D-RI) sent a letter tp the Justice Department asking for any evidence of Trump s ridiculous claim: We request that the Department of Justice provide us copies of any warrant applications and court orders redacted as necessary to protect intelligence sources and methods that may be compromised by disclosure, and to protect any ongoing investigations related to wiretaps of President Trump, the Trump Campaign, or Trump Tower. All I can say is that the country needs an answer to this, Graham told CNN. The current President has accused the former President of basically wiretapping his campaign. Unfortunately, this is the norm for Donald Trump. Whenever things get too uncomfortably close to the truth, he starts a political forest fire that distracts the nation long enough for everyone to forget about it or at least to provide Trump sufficient time to figure out how to explain away whatever the current issue is.It is imperative that our elected officials stop falling for this and keep their eyes on what really matters that we have a President whose staff both during the campaign and during his presidency was caught colluding with a hostile foreign power.Here s the video:


Hillary Immediately Runs From Media After What Camera Caught Outside Plane Posted on October 28, 2016 by Amanda Shea in Politics Share This Aboard Hillary Clinton's plane (left), "Hill Force One" (right)  While Hillary Clinton was en route to Cedar Rapids, Iowa for what ended up being a very uncomfortable campaign stop, she got some bad news. The FBI is taking another look at her emails — which could likely end her. Media rushed to the runway after her arrival, where cameras caught what she tried to hide outside her private airplane.  The FBI announced that they are looking into Hillary's previously undisclosed emails as she was mid-air and blissfully unaware and unable to prepare. Knowing what's in those documents, she's more aware of the ramifications than the rest of us, but because it was sprung on her, she wasn't fully prepared for questions about it since she requires practiced answers that she receives ahead of time before talking to the public.  However, forced to face the music upon landing, Hillary couldn't escape the press pool waiting for her as she made a beeline for her getaway car from the airplane. That's when she did something very telling of her guilt. JUST IN: Hillary Clinton arrives in Iowa amid news the FBI is taking another look at her email server https://t.co/uH00LebKTe pic.twitter.com/rxFkJZXEvo  — CNN (@CNN) October 28, 2016  Knowing that there was no way around the reporters, Hillary hid in Hill Force One with her advisors for about 30 minutes, who we can only imagine were calming the raging candidate down before she faced the public. Our guess is, she had a moment of meltdown with the news, screamed, yelled, and then was given a shot of her favorite liquor before exiting the aircraft, where she was met with a barrage of questions about the investigation. Rather than responding, which an innocent person would do, she flashed a fake smile and wave and didn't say a single word.  It would take too much explanation to lie, and she'd only further incriminate herself, so she gave the press the silent treatment instead, which actually spoke volumes. No matter how much Hillary ignores this, it's not going away, as the truth will prevail against her and, hopefully, land her in the jailhouse — not the White House.


The first presidential debate was Monday and let s just say that Donald Trump had a very bad night. One of the GOP candidate s easiest lies to expose was his insistence that stop and frisk wasn t ruled unconstitutional. He s wrong, it absolutely was.Debate moderator Lester Holt asked Trump about his recent arguments in favor of stop and frisk and mentioned that the court has declared the practice unconstitutional on the grounds that it is discriminatory. Stop and frisk was ruled unconstitutional in New York, because it largely singled out black and Hispanic young men Trump cut Holt off mid-sentence: No, you re wrong. It went before a judge who was a very against police judge. It was taken away from her and our mayor, our new mayor, refused to go forward with the case. They would have won an appeal. Factcheck: U.S. District Court Judge Shira A. Scheindlin ruled stop and frisk to be unconstitutional August 12, 2013. According to the Center for Constitutional Rights, Judge Shira Scheindlin found the NYPD s practices to violate New Yorkers Fourth Amendment rights to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures and also found that the practices were racially discriminatory in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment, The Bloomberg administration did appeal the ruling. The order was then suspended by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals and the case was sent back to be tried again with a new judge presiding over the proceedings. However, the court shot down the city s motion and decided not to vacate Scheindlin s decision. The appeal was eventually dropped by the de Blasio administration.Trump, who has run a bigoted campaign right from the start, was completely undeterred by Holt s assertion of the facts and continued to argue vehemently in favor of the discriminatory policing practice.Watch Trump wrongly argue that stop and frisk wasn t ruled unconstitutional, even though it was, here:


21st Century Wire says Nevada Assemblywoman Michele Fiore reports for Newsmax TV in Las Vegas, about the ongoing federal trial involving rancher Cliven Bundy and his family. In this video report, Fiore claims to have new inside information regarding the federal criminal case which continues to be extended by federal authorities, and where Bundy and his family have been held in federal custody for over 18 months now.According to Fiore, the FBI actually have no evidence to prosecute the Bundys ( based on a raft of inflated charges piled into the original federal complaint here: 298981770-Criminal-Complaint-re-Cliven-Bundy-pdf ), and are relying solely on pressuring fringe actors in the case who are also in custody, in order that they might testify against the Bundys.If Fiore s claims are true, then this could mean good news for the family. Meanwhile, the public must wait and see what will happen next. WATCH: .STAY TUNED FOR MORE UPDATES.READ MORE BUNDY RANCH NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire Bundy Ranch FilesSUPPORT OUR WORK BY SUBSCRIBING & BECOMING A MEMBER @21WIRE.TV


Having not yet recovered from the severe earthquakes of recent months, central Italy was struck by 10 earthquakes in succession over a period Wednesday, all of them registering over 4. 0 on the Richter Scale. [Wednesday's earthquakes varied in magnitude between 4. 1 and 5. 7, and several lasted a significant amount of time. The first quake, measuring 5. 3, struck the beleaguered city of Amatrice at 10:25am local time, and the shock waves could be felt in contiguous regions and all the way south in Rome. Amatrice had already been laid waste by a powerful earthquake last August 24, which destroyed the town and left nearly 300 dead. After the quake, the mayor of Amatrice announced: "The town is gone. " The second quake — the strongest of all — hit just a few miles from the epicenter of the first, 45 minutes later. In all, five of the 10 quakes struck within five miles of Amatrice. The bell tower of the church of Sant'Agostino was one of the few monuments in Amatrice to survive last summer's earthquake, but Wednesday's quakes finished the job, bringing the tower crumbling to the ground. To add insult to injury, central Italy had been covered with snow prior to the quakes and was suffering from exceptionally cold temperatures. Civil Protection Chief Fabrizio Curcio said that the wide scope of the tremors, along with the snow, made a comprehensive assessment of the situation difficult. "The situation is quite complicated," Curcio said. "We are receiving reports from all over the nation. Obviously the quake was felt clearly all over the center, as far as the capital. " In Rome, children were sent home from school at mid morning, public buildings were evacuated and authorities shut down the subway system. Wednesday's seismic activity was the third major event of its kind in Italy in less than half a year. The August 24 earthquake demolished several towns of central Italy, including Amatrice, and three more quakes during the night of Oct wreaked still more devastation and displaced thousands of persons. The October earthquakes reportedly shook Rome's world heritage ancient buildings, including the Colosseum and Pantheon, and some of the damage has not yet been repaired. Follow Thomas D. Williams on Twitter Follow @tdwilliamsrome


Poland s ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party said on Friday it planned legal changes to enhance democracy ahead of local elections next year but analysts said the measures aimed to boost the party s electoral prospects. The party came third at the last local election in 2014 and its proposals, to be debated in parliament this month, would smooth a path for candidates supported by parties such as itself and make it harder for independent candidates backed by citizens committees. Opinion polls show the nationalist party is supported by 37 percent of the electorate and many voters say its policies fight inequality. The European Union, however, says that its policies undermine democracy and the rule of law. We will introduce two terms for mayors and presidents starting from 2018. (We also plan) to replace majority electoral law with a proportional system, PiS deputy Lukasz Schreiber told a news briefing. Critics say many voters appreciate the PiS welfare program and so turn a blind eye to changes it has made to the judiciary and media aimed at cementing its rule. The party wants changes including scrapping single-member constituencies in which the candidate with the most votes wins, party representatives told reporters in parliament on Friday. PiS leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski says the present system is undemocratic and creates scope for abuses. Kaczynski has no formal post in the government but is seen as the ruler of the former communist country of 38 million people. On Friday, state television showed a quote from Kaczynski from last month in which he said the system of single-member constituencies was undemocratic because it led to entrenched local leaders all-but certain to win re-election. There are some places in Poland where we (PiS) received 40 percent of votes (in local elections) but we have nothing or almost nothing. It is undemocratic. It creates a danger of abuses ... and one needs to eliminate this, he said. Local elections are expected in late 2018. Many town leaders elected in 2014 had the support of local committees rather than established parties. The leaders are called presidents in cities and mayors in towns. The biggest opposition party Civic Platform, which is centrist, came second in that election while the PiS was third. Initial information suggests that the PiS project favors big parties as it scraps single-member constituencies. This looks like politicizing the local election, said Anna Materska-Sosnowska, a political analyst at Warsaw University. Critics say the party has taken control over state companies, institutions, media, and the judiciary in order to strengthen its power and improve party s chances in future elections.


President Barack Obama said on Monday that he was pleased with a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that struck down a Texas abortion law. "As the brief filed by the Solicitor General makes clear and as the court affirmed today, these restrictions harm women's health and place an unconstitutional obstacle in the path of a woman's reproductive freedom," Obama said in a statement.


The U.S. Justice Department said it had no evidence to support the unsubstantiated claim made in March by President Donald Trump that his predecessor, Barack Obama, had ordered a wiretap of Trump Tower during the 2016 presidential campaign. There has never been any evidence to support Trump's assertion on Twitter that "Obama had my 'wires tapped' in Trump Tower just before the victory," despite continued insistence from some conservative websites and commentators. But in a court filing late on Friday, the Justice Department added itself to the list of entities debunking the allegation. The FBI and the Justice Department's National Security Division "confirm that they have no records related to wiretaps as described" by tweets from Trump posted on March 4, the department said in a court filing in Washington. The filing was in response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit brought by American Oversight, a government watchdog group. Trump Tower, a mixed-used New York skyscraper, is home to one of Trump's private residences and served as his campaign headquarters during the election. The surveillance claim, which first appeared in conservative media before being picked up by Trump, prompted a rare rebuke by Obama, who responded at the time through a spokesman to denounce the idea that he had ordered surveillance against then-candidate Trump as "simply false." In a statement, American Oversight said the Justice Department filing "confirmed in writing that President Trump lied when he tweeted that former President Obama 'wiretapped' him at Trump Tower." Asked for comment, a White House spokeswoman said on Saturday, "This is not news. We answered this weeks ago." Despite the lack of evidence, the White House for several weeks attempted to bolster the baseless claim, and it helped fuel an also unsubstantiated inquiry by Devin Nunes, the Republican chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives intelligence committee, into whether the Obama administration improperly "unmasked" surveillance intercepts of phone conversations Trump associates had with foreigners.


Myanmar wants to continue working with the United Nations on human rights but its investigator must be fair, the foreign ministry said on Thursday, a day after special rapporteur Yanghee Lee was barred from visiting the country. Myanmar is still cooperating with the special rapporteur mechanism, said Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Kyaw Moe Tun. But Ms Yanghee Lee s undertakings don t have impartiality and objectivity, he said, adding that Myanmar had asked the United Nations to replace her with someone who knows Myanmar well and is both fair and impartial. Lee had been due to visit Myanmar next month to assess human rights across the country, including alleged abuses against Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine State, but on Wednesday she said she had been barred from visiting for the rest of her tenure. She called for stronger international pressure to be exerted on Myanmar s military and said in a statement that the ban suggested something terribly awful was happening in the country. More than 650,000 Rohingya have fled into Bangladesh since Aug. 25, when attacks by Muslim insurgents on the Myanmar security forces triggered a sweeping counter-offensive by the army and Buddhist vigilantes. Surveys of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh by aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres have shown at least 6,700 Rohingya were killed in Rakhine state in the month after violence flared up on Aug 25, the aid group said last week. The U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra ad al-Hussein has called the violence a textbook example of ethnic cleansing and said he would not be surprised if a court eventually ruled that genocide had taken place. Myanmar has rejected accusations of ethnic cleansing, blaming most of the violence and torching of Rohingya villages on the Rohingya insurgents who attacked the security forces. Lee had planned to use her visit to find out procedures for the return of Rohingya refugees, and to investigate increased fighting in Kachin State and Shan State in northern Myanmar, where the army is battling autonomy-seeking ethnic minority insurgents. Kyaw Moe Tun, who is director general of the foreign ministry s International Organizations and Economic Department, said a statement released by Lee after her last visit in July was not objective and not impartial . If she comes again and does that, it is not easy to cooperate with us and have a positive attitude, he said. Lee said in July that activists and journalists continued to be followed and questioned by state surveillance agents, and that her visit was beset by official snooping and access restrictions. The office of Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi said at the time that it was disappointed with Lee s end-of-mission statement, which contained many sweeping allegations and a number of factual errors . It did not give any details and did not directly address the issues of access or surveillance.


Earlier this month, the Trump campaign posted on its website an advertisement seeking election observers to monitor locations. The move, which is unusual for private campaigns, comes from the irrational fear that should Hillary Clinton win, the election would be rigged. So Trump s solution? Have his rabid, conspiracy theory believing supporters intimidate voters in poll lines.In Pennsylvania, where polls have Clinton ahead by as much as nine points, Trump claims the only way Clinton could win is if she cheats or those in the Democratic Party rig the election in her favor. So his initial call was to have his supporters monitor the stations in the predominantly black and minority -voting urban areas of the state.It was very reminiscent of the 1960s Jim Crow intimidation of the South.After facing some backlash for the dangerous and archaic call to suppress and intimidate voters, Trump doubled down on his claim that the election will be rigged and that supporters should watch the polling locations very closely on election day:You ve got to get every one of your friends. You ve got to get every one of your family. You ve got to get everybody to go out and watch. And go out and vote. And when I say watch, you know what I m talking about, right? You know what I m taking about. I think you got to go out and you got to watch.The question is just what should his people be watching for? Should they be watching and observing people of color? Should they be monitoring young, college-aged millenials? Should they be asking voters their personal information so they can play Sherlock Holmes?Once again, Trump sounds his dog whistle. When he tells his predominantly white audience, you know what I m talking about, the innuendo could not be more clear: watch, intimidate and disenfranchise minority voters.Of course, Republicans, who have been pushing the now widely debunked myth of rampant voter fraud, will be mum on this. In justification, they will point to the said myth that is rampant voter fraud as why they support this dangerous, racist and damaging call to action.Trump s call to intimidate voters should be a warning to all Americans: don t get complacent. Get out, vote, and take this monstrosity down.


Donald Trump has placed gag orders on multiple federal agencies, telling them to not only cut off communication with the public and the press but also with members of Congress. Go figure, that didn t sit very well with some people, especially since that happens to be illegal. And two House Democrats have decided to take action.Rep. Elijah Cummings and Rep. Frank Pallone sent a letter to the White House Counsel asking that they take immediate action to remedy the Trump Administration s apparent violations of multiple federal laws by imposing gag orders on federal employees that prevent them from communicating with Congress. The letter explained that the gag orders appear to violate the Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act as well as the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2016 because they do not include a mandatory statement explaining that employees are still allowed to talk to members of Congress and Inspectors General.The letter points out that the Consolidated Appropriations Act also states that if a federal employee tries to stop another federal employee from speaking to Congress about anything job related, they forfeit their salary.Cummings and Pallone cite a memo issued by the Acting Secretary of the Department of Health and human Services on President Trump s first day in office, which states: No correspondence to public officials (e.g. Members of Congress, Governors) or containing interpretations or statements of Department regulations or policy, unless specifically authorized by me or my designee, shall be sent between now and February 3. The congressmen write that this memo and similar restrictions placed on federal agencies such as the Departments of Interior, Transportation, and Agriculture, appears to violate all of these laws. Cummings and Pallone then urged the Trump administration to immediately rescind all of the illegal gag orders. They added that because of the magnitude of these problematic directives, we request that the President issue an official statement making clear to all federal employees that they have the right to communicate with Congress and that he and his Administration will not silence or retaliate against whistleblowers. Featured image by Alex Wong via Getty Images


Facebook has reinstated the popular "Polandball" comedy page, following coverage of their "permanent suspension" by Breitbart News. [The page, which focuses on " satire," was originally notified by Facebook that they would be permanently deleted on Saturday for unknown reasons. "We're very sorry about this mistake," said a Facebook spokesman in an email to Breitbart Tech. "A post was removed in error, which led to the removal of the page. Both the post and page have been restored. " Polandball announced on their reinstated Facebook page that they would be keeping both the original and the backup page in case they are removed by error again in the future. Charlie Nash is a reporter for Breitbart Tech. You can follow him on Twitter @MrNashington or like his page at Facebook.


A recent outbreak of measles is the latest public health problem among Somalis who live in metropolitan . Paul, Minnesota, home to the largest Somali community in the country. [Measles now joins active tuberculosis as a public health problem within Minnesota's Somali community. "During the five years between 2010 and 2014, 732 cases of active TB were diagnosed in Minnesota. Of these, 81 percent, or 593, were . Of cases, 50 percent, or 296, were refugees, according to "The Epidemiology of Tuberculosis in Minnesota, " a report published by the Minnesota Department of Health," Breitbart News noted in October. " percent of the 593 cases of active TB diagnosed in Minnesota [between 2012 and 2015] or 161, were attributed to Somali born migrants. Almost all Somali migrants to the United States have arrived under the federal refugee resettlement program," Breitbart News reported at the time. "The Hennepin County measles outbreak grew to 20 cases Monday, after eight new infections were confirmed. State health officials said all the cases have occurred within the community, and they urged parents to get the measles vaccine for themselves and their children if they are unvaccinated," the Star Tribune reported last week: The outbreak is expected to produce many more cases and could exceed the 2011 outbreak of 26 cases, according to Kris Ehresmann, infectious disease director at the Minnesota Health Department. So far, all of those who have caught the measles in this outbreak are 5 years old or younger. Exposure has occurred at several day care centers. Since the first case was detected two weeks ago, health investigators have been trying to identify anyone unvaccinated exposed to the virus, which is highly contagious. It can take up to three weeks for measles symptoms to develop. "The Health Department recommended Monday that the schedule for a second dose be accelerated for any children who had received the initial shot, which they said is a common practice during outbreaks," the Star Tribune reported: The eight new infections in this outbreak include for the first time at least one baby under 12 months, an age group that has been of concern to public health officials because they typically lack immunity protection. Investigators have examined the vaccination records of 16 of those infected, and none of them had received the MMR shot. Records for the other four are still being collected. Measles symptoms include coughing, a sore throat, fever and a blotchy skin rash. It can lead to pneumonia and encephalitis, or swelling of the brain, and in same cases is fatal. "According to a health department official, Minnesota's Somali immigrant community has been a particular target of the movement, colloquially known as '' " Mic. com reported last week: "They're very much engaged with and targeting this community," Kris Ehresmann, infectious disease division director at the Minnesota Health Department, said in a phone call Wednesday. According to Ehresmann, groups began to target the Somali community around 2008, amid concerns about autism among children. groups started reaching out to the Somali community and showing up at community health meetings, she said, disseminating misinformation linking autism to the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine, or MMR. Since then, the population has seen a "steady decline in MMR vaccine rates. " "At least one figure in the movement has made special trips just to speak to Somali immigrants. In 2011, Andrew Wakefield, a man who has been called the "father of the movement," showed up in Minnesota in the midst of what was then the state's first major measles outbreak in years, the Star Tribune reported at the time," Mic. com added. Ehresmann said that wasn't Wakefield's first trip to speak to Somali families in Minnesota — she believes he visited once before, in 2008, when were first arriving to spread misinformation. Wakefield, the British doctor who published a widely shared and subsequently discredited paper implying a link between vaccines and autism, traveled to Minneapolis to hold a private forum for Somali immigrants. The meeting was described at the time as a "support group" for families of autistic children, the Star Tribune reported. Hennepin County is also the site of two recent cases of active tuberculosis at local public high schools, as Breitbart News reported in February: Another case of active tuberculosis (TB) has been diagnosed in Hennepin County, Minnesota public schools, local officials confirmed on Wednesday. The new case has been diagnosed in "a person at Central Middle School in Eden Prairie," KARE TV reports. This marks the second time in two months Hennepin County Department of Health officials have confirmed that a person at a public school in the county has been diagnosed with active TB. In January, Hennepin County Public Health Department officials reported that a person at St. Louis Park High School had been diagnosed with active TB. The letter to parents from St. Louis Park Public Schools informing them of the case of active TB in January was sent in three languages: English, Spanish, and Somali, Breitbart News reported.


Media Blackout: Hundreds Of Black Teens Attack Temple Students, Police And A Horse (Video) Media Blackout: Hundreds Of Black Teens Attack Temple Students, Police And A Horse (Video) October 27, 2016, 6:24 pm by Guest Author Leave a Comment 1  By: Renee Nal | New Zeal Still photograph of Temple university attack  In a story that predictably did not make the mainstream media, and with video surveillance very difficult to find, a massive mob of black teens viciously attacked white Temple University students, police officers and even a police horse in Philadelphia on Friday night.  And their apologists are in full force.  In the limited local coverage this story did receive, the race aspect was generally avoided. It is way past time to take back the media, and fill it with truth-tellers, not apologists.  "More than 150 teens, spread out in groups of 20 or 30, descended upon the campus at around 8:30 p.m. Friday — wreaking havoc for nearly two hours before eventually dispersing," according to NBC 10 . Temple News reported that "multiple students were hurt and businesses had to close Friday evening due to a 'flash mob' of nearly 200 minors that flocked North Broad Street near Main Campus, police said."  But there is a reason for all of this horror, according to Solomon Jones of Philly.com . It evidently boils down to the socialist Gulag-wide Bulletins from Sovereignty Unbound We respect your privacy, time, and inbox. Track us Down @GulagBound Like the Gulag There are many important matters that Gulag Bound itself is not treating on a daily basis. For that reason we suggest The Globe & Malevolence and the sites shown under "Key Links in our Chains," below. Your Daily Intelligence Brief MattSkosh on Secret Service Agents Pay a Visit to Anti-Obama Artist Sabo Tags activism Agenda 21 anti-American revolution authoritarianism Barack Hussein Obama II candidate eligibility collectivists & propaganda communisty organizations corruption crisis strategy Democrat finance & banking fraud George Soros globalism - NWO global Marxist-fascist movement government domination of resources history illegal immigration Islam Islamism jihad jihadism Israel kleptocracy labor unions Marxism Marxofascism Marxstream media Military Mitt Romney Obamacare health control Occupy Wall Street race-baiting/racism Republican Right of Private Property Russia Sovereignty Tea Party terrorism U.S. Congress U.S. Constitution U.S. Presidency (POTUS) United Nations (UN) video violence voting youth & education Sabotage What good will it do, to protect the United States of America, or our presumed interests against the aggressiveness of China, Russia, or Islam, if, partially in fear of these threats, we lose our free and independent nation to the stealth imperialism of transnational and global governance? As America threatens to shatter, we must see how a semi-covert, global, cartel collective and their NWO in the USA ("progressive" neo-Marxists and neo-fascists corporatists, updated with 21st Century techniques and technology) intentionally perpetrate this sabotage, while we patriots try to prevent it. Have a look around our camp, as we struggle to survive. - your tour guide Archives Militarization in America About DHS militarization, see the new, breakthrough analysis from James Simpson, " Police Militarization, Abuses of Power, and the Road to Impeachment " and our earlier, "Marxist President's Military Exercises in These U.S. Cities; Yours One?"  About the trajectory of this, we must pray, communicate, keep calm, and do not become the first to engage. If it comes to it, do not even respond in kind, until after the after the first times that extreme, anti-American violence is done by them. It calls for an attitude of self sacrifice -- first cheek, second cheek, then no more.  And speak out about the potential and strategic "sense" of the Obama/NWO's DHS carrying out false flag missions of violence, blaming it on American patriots, perhaps upon our militia movements.  We are in a real war, right now (of which others and I have been trying to alert fellow Sovereign Citizens for years) and the prime war is for the minds, hearts, and wills of the American People. We are opposed by an anti-American insurrection using any means of power (see Gramsci, Frankfurt School) including government power, as they are granted that opportunity.


The chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said on Wednesday his panel was likely to strip out language imposing sanctions against North Korea from legislation that contains sanctions against Russia and Iran. Republican Senator Bob Corker told the Washington Post in an interview that doing so would ensure the measure could pass. Corker said the bill was likely to become law "very, very soon."


For months, U.S. President Donald Trump's national security adviser and his chief strategist have battled for influence behind the scenes, and their feud may force another shake-up at the White House. The dispute between Lieutenant General H.R. McMaster and political strategist Stephen Bannon has reached a level of animosity that is destabilizing Trump's team of top advisers just as the administration tries to regain lost momentum, three senior officials said. Under pressure from moderate Republicans to fire Bannon, Trump declined to publicly back him on Tuesday, although he left his options open. "We'll see what happens with Mr. Bannon," he told reporters at Trump Tower in New York. Whatever Trump decides could chart the fate of a nuclear-weapons deal with Iran, U.S. troop deployments to Afghanistan and White House staffing decisions - all issues over which Bannon and McMaster have sparred. Bannon has been in a precarious position before but Trump has opted to keep him, in part because his chief strategist played a major role in his election victory and is backed by many of the president's most loyal rank-and-file supporters. "The president obviously is very nervous and afraid of firing him," a source close to the White House told Reuters. The source floated the possibility that Bannon could be demoted instead of fired, noting that he might turn into a harsh critic of the administration if he is forced out of the inner circle. Two other senior officials, both supporters of McMaster who asked not to be identified, said he blames Bannon for a series of attacks against him by right-wing website Breitbart News, which Bannon used to lead, and other far-right conservative groups. In recent weeks, Breitbart has published a series of articles making a case for McMaster's ouster on the basis that he is not a strong ally of Israel and that he has staffed the National Security Council with holdovers from the Obama administration. One of the senior officials said McMaster's anger over the campaign "is known to the president" but declined to say whether the national security adviser had told Trump directly or through General John Kelly, an ally and the president's new chief of staff. "McMaster isn't saying Bannon is the mastermind behind the campaign, but he does think Bannon could stop it if he wanted to," said one of McMaster's defenders. In a television interview on Sunday, McMaster repeatedly declined to answer when asked if he could work with Bannon. About their feud, Bannon declined to comment and McMaster was unavailable for comment. Instead of firing Bannon, Trump could move McMaster into a position outside the White House, possibly back to an active military command role, or keep both men where they are and insist on some form of truce. Bannon has survived other White House power struggles this year and established a detente with Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner after a scolding from the president. The two senior officials who support McMaster said Kelly is angry that the anti-McMaster campaign has made the White House appear chaotic, reflecting badly on him as he was brought in as chief of staff two weeks ago to restore order and discipline. Bannon sees himself as the defender of Trump's nationalist base and has advocated for both an end or renegotiation of trade deals and a more isolationist approach to foreign affairs than McMaster. He has pushed to scrap the 2015 nuclear-weapons agreement with Iran, which McMaster argues should remain in place, and has also proposed using contractors to fight the war in Afghanistan rather than expanding U.S. forces there, as McMaster has advocated. McMaster is part of a more pragmatic group that Bannon likes to label "globalists." He drew the fury of Bannon's supporters by recently overhauling the White House's National Security Council, pushing out four staffers who were seen as close to Bannon. Conservative commentator Mike Cernovich is a Bannon ally and has been a vocal critic of McMaster, even leveling personal attacks against him. Cernovich says he does not talk directly to Bannon but praises him as an important counterweight to McMaster. He also warns that the president would alienate his most loyal supporters if he fires Bannon. "I don't think that people who like Trump are suddenly going to say, 'We're going to fight Trump.' Instead they'll say, 'What's the point of supporting him?'" Cernovich told Reuters. The conservative Jewish-American and pro-Israel group Zionist Organization of America (ZOA), which also has close ties to Bannon, has been one of McMaster's sharpest critics, urging Trump to reassign him away from policy areas dealing with Israel and Iran. Trump has himself backed McMaster, saying he was a "good man and very pro-Israel". A source close to the ZOA bristled at the suggestion that Bannon was influencing its approach and said it would not tone down the campaign against McMaster, despite entreaties by Bannon to do so. "We find it remarkably offensive that anyone would suggest that Steve Bannon or anyone else tells us what to say or what not to say," the source said. "It makes me feel awful that he's getting blamed for this, but there's nothing I can do about it."


Naser Oric, the Bosnian Muslim commander who led the defense of Srebrenica during the 1992-95 war, was cleared of war crimes against Serbs on Monday, a ruling greeted by both celebration and condemnation in the divided state. Bosnian Muslims, who largely see Oric as a hero, broke into applause as he and a fellow soldier left the courtroom free men. Cheering crowds massed around them outside. Families of Bosnian Serbs killed in the war, who see Oric and his troops as criminals, walked out of the hearing in the Bosnian capital Sarajevo in protest. This is horrific, this is a scandal. Everybody expected that he will be punished. Is this a justice? I am speechless, said Radojka Filipovic from Bratunac, near Srebrenica. She said Oric s forces killed at least six of her relatives. Milorad Dodik, the president of Bosnia s autonomous Serb Republic, called on Serb lawyers to withdraw from the shared national legal system. The justice minister of neighboring Serbia, Nela Kuburovic, called the ruling shameful . The case went to the heart of fractured Bosnia, haunted by ethnic divides and long-running grievances that have blocked its progress to joining the European Union and NATO. Bosnia was hit by a devastating war in the 1990s after the Bosnian Serbs, helped by Serbia, tried to carve out a separate statelet following the break up of Yugoslavia. Bosnian Serbs have accused Oric and his men of killing about 3,000 of their people in the Srebrenica area during the conflict. Bosnian Muslims, or Bosniaks, hailed his role in defending Srebrenica, where Bosnian Serb forces later killed more than 8,000 Muslim men and boys - widely seen as Europe s worst atrocity since World War Two. After the war, the country was divided into two autonomous regions, the Serb Republic and the Bosniak-Croat Federation, linked via a weak central government. Serbs cannot accept this and this proves this country and its judiciary should not exist, Serb Republic President Dodik said in the town of Banja Luka after the verdict. I call on all Serbs in the court and prosecution to pull out from these institutions. Dodik has long disputed the authority of the national legal system, which he says was established on the order of Bosnia s Western peace envoys, and has repeatedly threatened to secede if his region s autonomy is undermined. Dodik said the verdict would likely revive the idea of holding a referendum on the state court - the last attempt to hold a referendum on the status of the state court, in 2015, was halted amid Western warnings. Bosnia s three-man presidency chairman Dragan Covic, a Bosnian Croat, said negative rhetoric over the case could be a setback for Bosnia s progress. Oric was acquitted of war crimes against Serbs by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in 2008, but was arrested again in June 2015 in Switzerland on a warrant from Serbia accusing him of killing three Bosnian Serb prisoners of war early in the conflict. It was only just to acquit Oric of war crimes charges, Hatidza Mehmedovic, a Bosnian Muslim who lost her husband and two sons in the Srebrenica massacre, told the Fena news agency. It was a great injustice to drag him in courts from The Hague to here. Oric did not speak to reporters outside the court. Dozens of Bosnian Serbs, including senior political and military leaders, have been sentenced by the ICTY and a Bosnian war crimes court over the Srebrenica massacre, which was declared genocide by two international courts. Millions of people were displaced and more than 100,000 died in the war.


Good morning. Here's what you need to know: • A South Korean court announced the arrest of the de facto leader of Samsung, Lee on bribery accusations connected to the corruption scandal that had engulfed the government. Above, Mr. Lee as he arrived at a detention center ahead of the court's decision. Prosecutors say Samsung paid almost $38 million to groups connected to a presidential friend and adviser, Choi to win the government's backing for a merger of two Samsung units. _____ • The crisis facing the White House over questions about its connections to Russia made for an awkward inaugural trip abroad for Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson. Conventional joint statements with the Russian foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, at a gathering in Germany could not overshadow the growing distance with European counterparts on immigration, refugees, defense and trade. In Washington, President Trump held a news conference that turned into an extraordinarily raw bemoaning "the false, horrible fake reporting" on his administration. Here's the video. _____ • Mr. Trump's plans to have Stephen A. Feinberg, above, a billionaire investor with no intelligence experience, review the U. S. intelligence agencies has the agencies' top officials on edge. They were already worried by Mr. Trump's response to reports of contacts over the last year between Trump aides and Russian intelligence officials: trying to focus public attention on the source of intelligence leaks rather than their content. Today's episode of The Daily podcast asks, did the Trump campaign collude with Russia? Listen from a computer, on an iOS device or on an Android device. _____ • The investigation into the apparent assassination of the half brother of North Korea's leader Kim is widening. The Malaysian police detained two more people — a woman with an Indonesian passport, above, and her Malaysian boyfriend — and said they were looking for four male suspects. Airport surveillance images showed how one suspect ended up waiting at a taxi stand. Mr. Kim's body is expected to be sent to North Korea. It's not clear whether the Malaysian autopsy results will be made public. _____ • In environmental news, a Greenpeace report tied the toxic waves of air pollution sweeping northern China to an increase in already excessive steel production last year, made counter to promised cuts. Scientists are also coming to understand the crucial importance of the vast, and endangered, seagrass meadows that surround every continent except Antarctica. And Mr. Trump's nominee to head the Environmental Protection Agency, Scott Pruitt, heads to a confirmation vote today amid an extraordinary wave of protest from former E. P. A. staff members. _____ • Snapchat's parent company is aiming for a valuation of more than $20 billion as it nears what's expected to be the biggest initial public offering in the tech world since Alibaba and Facebook. • Speaking of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg posted a update of his founder's statement that expressed alarm over growing rejections of globalism and argued that "progress now requires humanity coming together not just as cities or nations, but also as a global community. " • Asian financial conglomerates, including SoftBank of Japan or HNA Group of China, are scouring the U. S. for management expertise to help them invest their cash stockpiles. • European markets ended a rally. Here's a snapshot of global markets. • The Islamic State claimed a suicide attack on a dance celebration at a Sufi shrine in Pakistan's Sindh Province that killed at least 70 worshipers and injured more than 250. It was the worst act of terrorism in the country in months. [The New York Times] • ISIS also claimed the deadliest attack in Baghdad in at least a month, a car bombing in a crowded Shiite Muslim neighborhood that killed more than 50 people and injured scores. [The New York Times] • The Catholic Church in Australia has paid more than $200 million in compensation, treatment, legal and other costs in sexual abuse cases since 1980, according to information presented to a government investigation. [BBC] • In China, a ethnic Korean faces prison for criticism of the authorities that included posting a photo of himself in a calling President Xi Jinping "Xitler. " [The New York Times] • Tens of thousands of nomadic herders in Mongolia face hunger and another bout of the extreme winter conditions known as a "dzud. " [Reuters] • South Africa is debating whether a minimum wage of about $1. 50 an hour would help reduce poverty and inequality or worsen already high unemployment. [The New York Times] • The cute Kumamon stuffed bear racked up more than $1 billion in sales last year, partly thanks to a surge of supportive purchases after its home prefecture, Kumamoto, was struck by earthquakes. [The Asahi Shimbun] • Cake for breakfast? Yes, please. • A cat named Tammany was living at New York's City Hall in the 1930s. Then came talk of eviction proceedings — but the cat emerged victorious. • Recipe of the day: End the week with these simple fish tacos. • For 17 years, Hugh Jackman has been synonymous with Wolverine, a mutant with a metal skeleton and a tormented past. But the Australian actor may be popping the 's adamantium claws for the final time. • In Taipei, a growing number of restaurants are riding the "eat local" movement. That can mean cured mullet roe, lily stems, purple taro and honeycombed pong tang (that's candy). • Ready for "cutthroat" golf? This week in Australia, the Perth World Super 6 is debuting a format — a last round, with match play and a special hole — to adapt the sport to changing times. Happy Birthday to Michael Jordan. The basketball legend turns 54 today. He won't be competing at this weekend's N. B. A. dunk contest, but three decades ago he helped elevate the competition with slams from the line. Jordan's seemingly effortless flights to the basket made him one of the most instantly recognizable faces in the world. Years later, he even managed to dunk from in the partly animated movie "Space Jam. " C. G. I. though, wasn't needed in 1984 to capture Jordan leaping, legs in an airborne split. "It may be the most famous silhouette ever photographed," Time Magazine said as it designated the image one of the 100 most influential of all time. The image lives on as the inspiration for the logo of Nike's Air Jordan shoes. Jordan, who is now a billionaire, and his brand have thrived despite his lackluster second career in baseball, criticism over his reluctance to discuss politics (though he spoke last year about police brutality) and the popularity on social media of the Crying Jordan meme, which our culture writer says "takes one of America's biggest sports stars and makes him small. " "Michael actually thinks it's funny," his spokeswoman said. Des Shoe contributed reporting. _____ Your Morning Briefing is published weekday mornings. What would you like to see here? Contact us at asiabriefing@nytimes. com.


White House Counselor Kellyanne Conway on Sunday was confronted by ABC s This Week host George Stephanopoulos on the conflicting stories coming from the White House regarding Donald Trump Jr s meeting with a Russian lawyer. The amateur president s lawyer, Jay Sekulow, added to that to say that Trump was not involved in writing a letter to defend his son. However, it was just after that when White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said that Trump weighed in as any father would. The White House and the president s lawyer said he wasn t involved at all, Stephanopoulos told Conway. They didn t tell the truth. You know, George, I know there s this whole thing about Conway replied. About telling the truth, the ABC host shot back. Let s talk about telling the truth, Conway said, as if she s even familiar with that concept. Let s talk about [President Barack Obama] looking Americans in the eye who are still suffering eight years later. If you like your plan you can keep it, if you like your doctor you can keep your doctor. Benghazi happened because of a video. Kellyanne, you re simply changing the subject, Stephanopoulos said. You are changing the subject going back to President Obama and Hillary Clinton. Don Jr. responded to an email that said he was going to get Russian government information on Hillary Clinton, he continued. That was not out during the campaign. That was revealed just in the last several weeks. But what came of that meeting, Conway replied. Nothing. Watch:Well, we hate to burst Kellyanne s bubble (we love bursting her bubble) but no one knows about the meeting since it was held in secret at Trump Tower except for the people who attended it, including Russians and we all know how truthful they are. What we do know is that Don Jr. released copies of his email chain about that meeting with the subject line reading, Russia Clinton private and confidential. Junior was thrilled to take that meeting in order to help his father win the election. I love it! he wrote.And that has nothing to do with the 2012 Benghazi attack, thankyouverymuch.Image via screen capture.


Trump is not the only U.S. leader in Europe right now. Former President Obama is also there, and he met with German chancellor Angela Merkel before the big NATO summit. Merkel is up for re-election, and Obama gave her a strong endorsement, which made her Christian Democratic base happy. Unlike Trump, Obama remains very popular in Germany.And Politico, in covering this particular story, decided to throw a bit of shade in Trump s direction over Obama s meeting. Their headline for the story reads: Merkel meets popular US president before seeing Trump. That was the caption on their tweet of the story as well:Merkel meets popular U.S. president before seeing @realDonaldTrump https://t.co/eQ6endyszF via @POLITICOEurope pic.twitter.com/s55txBKAQn POLITICO (@politico) May 25, 2017Seriously, Politico did that. And it s hilarious in light of the fact that Merkel and Obama continue to have a very strong relationship, while she really just can t stand Donald Trump. Obama received a warm welcome, and the two of them discussed the lessons of the Berlin Wall while in front of tens of thousands of cheering Germans at the 250-year old Brandenburg Gate. Trump, however, was greeted curtly and coolly in Brussels barely two hours later.Against the backdrop of the Brandenburg Gate, which survived WWII despite much of the rest of Berlin being destroyed, Obama himself threw a little shade at Trump over his isolationist, America First ideas: In this new world we live in, we can t isolate ourselves. We can t hide behind a wall. He also took aim at Trump for being a narcissistic prick: If I become so convinced that I m always right, the logical conclusion of that often ends up being great cruelty and great violence. In Brussels, Trump yelled at our allies again, claiming they aren t paying their fair share of defense expenses for NATO. Trump believes that our NATO allies are shoving their expenses off on us, and doesn t understand the treaty well enough to know that s not how it works.So Politico decided to demonstrate what Germany or at least Angela Merkel thinks about Obama versus what she thinks about Trump. Trump is ridiculous, and it s clear that at least some of our allies wish we still had Obama in office.Featured image by Stefan Rousseau Pool via Getty Images


We have to agree that the left is suffering from Trump derangement because just about anything the POTUS does is met with derision from the Democrats. There is no middle ground but only division that continues with the leaders of the left stirring the pot. Think about it. Without the division, the left has nothing Well, the The chairman of Democrats for Trump reacted to repeated calls for the president s impeachment and obstructionist behavior by members of his party. I think it s Trump derangement, former New York City Council President Andrew Stein said on Fox & Friends. Ed Henry played video of Rep. Al Green (D-Texas) introducing articles of impeachment and Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) telling a crowd that President Trump s motives and actions are contemptible. Impeach 45 every day, she later said.Stein said he doesn t know why his fellow Democrats think Trump is a bad guy. Stein thinks President Trump should just continue to take his message to the people. We have to agree that the president needs to go around the lying media to deliver his message.The latest example of lying from the media is the poor treatment of First Lady Melania Trump. The media bombarded Melania with fake news about a tree that needed to be cut down. The press made it seem like evil Melania demanded that the tree be removed. In reality, the 200-year old tree had become a hazard. The media conveniently left that part out.Via Fox News Insider:


Right-wing ideologues are at it again with voter suppression. When not passing discriminatory voter ID laws and striking down the Voting Rights Act, they are passing off half-assed, offensive journalistic philosophy as legitimate commentary.Enter right-wing libertarian columnist David Harsanyi and his op-ed in the Washington Post.Titled We must weed out ignorant Americans from the electorate, the article at first glance seems innocent yes, we all wish people we deemed stupid didn t vote. Liberals wish conservatives didn t vote, and conservatives wish liberals didn t vote.However, when reading deeper, one quickly finds out that Harsanyi has an extremely nefarious way to achieve this forcing voters to pass a civics test if they wish to vote.Saying to voters, Unfortunately, we can t trust you, Harsanyi says Let s give voters a test. The citizenship civics test will do just fine. The reason? The writer thinks the American public is too ignorant to vote:At the same time, let s also remember that checking a box for the candidate whose campaign ads you like best is one of the most overrated obligations of the self-governed. If you have no clue what the hell is going on, you also have a civic duty to avoid subjecting the rest of us to your ignorance.The questions? Simple (if you have the privilege to from an educated background:Admitting that he believes the school system and society fails to teach the public proper civics, Harsanyi says he doesn t care. He s made up his mind. He doesn t seem to know (or maybe he just doesn t care) that his civics test, banking on the fact that people will fail it, would disproportionately affect black and Hispanic voters, Americans who don t speak English, and voters with intellectual or learning disabilities. All these people, regardless of what Harsanyi thinks, are Americans who are all entitled to vote without any discriminatory barriers.But Harsanyi addresses that:Of course, we also must remember the ugly history of poll taxes and other prejudicial methods that Americans used to deny black citizens their equal right to vote. Any effort to improve the quality of the voting public should ensure that all races, creeds, genders and sexual orientations and people of every socioeconomic background are similarly inhibited from voting when ignorant.CAUSE THAT JUST MAKES EVERYTHING BETTER, DOESN T IT!? That was the same thing the racist bigots in the South said when passing their discriminatory Jim Crow laws.This attack on the basic dignities of voters and their absolute right to vote without barriers is disgusting, but we shouldn t put it past a libertarian, or rather faux-libertarian considering actual libertarians are for freedom with no barriers.


Two million people in the contested Syrian city of Aleppo lack access to running water because of escalated fighting, the United Nations said Tuesday, beseeching combatants to declare a humanitarian pause to permit emergency deliveries of aid and to fix damaged pumps. "The U. N. is extremely concerned that the consequences will be dire for millions of civilians if the electricity and water networks are not immediately repaired," the organization said in a statement. "The U. N. stands ready to assist the civilian population of Aleppo, a city now united in its suffering," the statement said. "At a minimum, the U. N. requires a or weekly humanitarian pauses to reach the millions of people in need throughout Aleppo and replenish the food and medicine stocks, which are running dangerously low. " The statement also denounced the military targeting of hospitals and clinics, which it said "continues unabated, seriously jeopardizing the health and welfare of all citizens of Aleppo. " The fighting in Aleppo, Syria's largest city before the civil war that began more than five years ago, escalated sharply over the weekend, when rebel forces and their jihadist allies challenged the government's siege of districts. They severed the primary government supply route to Aleppo, effectively isolating the entire city. Roughly 275, 000 people in eastern Aleppo have been under siege by Syrian forces and their Russian military partners since July. The rebel advance put civilians in western Aleppo at risk, increasing the total population under threat to about two million. The crisis worsened as the United Nations Security Council was briefed privately on Tuesday by the special envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura, and the top humanitarian aid official, Stephen O'Brien. Mr. de Mistura, who has been seeking to restart peace talks, did not speak publicly afterward, but diplomats later told reporters that he did not foresee a resumption of talks in August. "He doesn't want any preconditions to exist, he wants to be able to control the process, he wants to decide about the timing," said Alexis Lamek, France's deputy ambassador. "I don't see how we can have meaningful talks if there is not the minimal conducive environment for that. " Samantha Power, the United States ambassador, was also pessimistic: "We're in reverse gear" on the issues of humanitarian access and a cessation of hostilities in the conflict, she said, the two conditions for peace talks to resume. "So we've always understood that these were three legs on a stool, and in order for the stool to be upright, all of the legs have to be stable," she said. "And from what we heard, we're a long way from that. " Mr. O'Brien, who spoke outside the council's chambers after his appearance, said he had told council diplomats of "the horrific humanitarian situation in Aleppo, where fighting rages and two million people live in fear of besiegement. " He said children were especially vulnerable from the water crisis and that wells drilled in the city were "not nearly enough to sustain the population. " Mr. O'Brien also said there had been no emergency deliveries to Aleppo this month, despite a previously negotiated agreement for humanitarian access. "This was not in line with the plan," he said. Aid delivery teams for the United Nations were "ready to roll" if a humanitarian pause could be enforced, Mr. O'Brien said, but for now it was too dangerous "even for the very brave people on the ground — they are brave, but they are not suicidal. " Hundreds of thousands of people have been killed in Syria and millions displaced since the conflict began in March 2011 as a peaceful opposition movement against President Bashar . The Syrian Center for Policy Research, a group, estimated earlier this year that the death toll was at least 470, 000.


Bill Maher and Barney Frank totally schooled Republicans on Friday night.The Real Time host began by asking his panel to help explain why Senate Republicans are being complete pricks about President Obama picking the next Supreme Court Justice.Maher pointed out that Republicans have wobbled since Obama picked centrist Judge Merrick Garland to replace recently deceased Justice Antonin Scalia. Now they are saying they want to wait until the lame-duck period after the election to make a final decision.Of course, we all know why they want to do this all of a sudden. A centrist like Garland may be the best Republicans can get, especially if the Democrats retain the White House in November. If that happens we can expect Republicans to eagerly confirm Garland in order to prevent a more liberal nominee from being nominated. And if Republicans win the White House they ll wait until 2017 so a more conservative nominee can take the position instead.In other words, Republicans are playing a duplicitous game of politics and the GOP consultant on board the panel actually had the stones to admit that his party is playing politics in an effort to keep the Republican Party from blowing apart. Because if they balk now, they risk pissing off their conservative base. Mitch McConnell knows one thing very clearly, Rick Wilson said. If they allow an Obama justice to go forward at this point it will blow a gigantic hole in the Republican coalition like we have never seen before. They have drawn a bright line, they have sworn this is a line they re not going to cross After Wilson said he s a shameless political guy, Maher chimed in by asking, Aren t you an American first? Wilson responded by saying there is nothing in the Constitution keeping Republicans from doing what they are doing and that GOP leadership is telling the base that they ve drawn a line to keep President Obama from having a lasting legacy on the Supreme Court.Well, that didn t impress former longtime congressman Barney Frank. I spent 40 years as an elected official. I ran for office 20 times, Frank told Wilson. I understand the role of politics, but I am disappointed, Rick. The explicit elevation of the need of keeping your coalition together over the functioning of the federal government is awful. Frank went on to say that there is a need for an odd number of Justices on the Court because an even number could lead to tied rulings that don t settle cases and agreed that this is about restricting President Obama to a three year term. Yes, it s in the Constitution that Obama gets to make an appointment, Frank continued. And what McConnell is putting forward is a nonsense theory, namely that it s only a 3-year term. Frank also expressed his hope that Republicans would have taken the opportunity to to pull back from their rabid base a little bit because of Donald Trump but it appears they have no intention of doing that. Instead, they appear to be doubling down on their allegiance to the base at their peril.Maher then re-introduced a word he came up with years ago known as blacktracking, which is when Republicans change their mind because President Obama agrees with them. As it turns out, it happened again this week because Republicans had no problem with Merrick Garland being nominated for the Supreme Court until President Obama nominated him this week.Here s the video via Twitter.Watch @BillMaher and the #RealTime panel discuss the GOP s blacktracking over @POTUS s SCOTUS nomination.https://t.co/5iiG9vrtBp Real Time (@RealTimers) March 19, 2016


Putin Foes Caught in Malicious Fabrications about Kremlin Insider Lesin's Death  Coroner's final decision reveals all. Print  A US Senator and a Russian opposition figure are among those who have tripped themselves up with their fabrications about Mikhail Lesin's 2015 death. Lesin was a former Russian media advertising tycoon, state media minister, and later head of the Gazprom-Media holding company. He died in Washington DC amid circumstances that went unexplained fully until October 28 of this year.What did Putin's foes first have to say about Lesin's death?Russian opposition figure and Putin foe Alexei Nevalny had a lot to say. On March 13, 2016 the Independent ran the headline: "Mikhail Lesin death: Vladimir Putin's propaganda chief reportedly flew out of LA 40 days after his death. The story claims Alexei Navalny, a Putin opposition leader, said the incident 'smells of a witness protection programme.'" The Daily Mail reported that that Navalny claimed to have proof.Was Lesin's reported demise just a coverup?But a month later, Navalny seemed to have backed away from that allegation. According to the Voice of America "Navalny said he had no 'proof' or definitive evidence, but indicated that Lesin may have died because, 'as they say in detective stories, he knew too much.'"So Navalny had come to believe that Lesin was indeed dead after all. But now Navalny intimated that perhaps Putin was to blame.While making a case to VOA that Putin is corrupt, Navalny said he was convinced "that Lesin knew a lot. Not just about corruption in the highest echelons of power, but [he] was one of the organizers of a corruption scheme in which Putin himself was personally complicit. And against the backdrop of his death, against the backdrop of the strange things that were happening around him, it's a more than reasonable assumption that, in any contacts he may have had with the federal authorities in the United States, Lesin may have been asked about it."Other theories in the news claimed:--Lesin's death was connected with his alleged role as a CIA informer.--His demise was related to a secret romantic tryst gone wrong.--Lesin's body was cremated to destroy evidence of what really happened.Many of the news reports mentioned Mississippi Senator Roger Wicker who considered Lesin to be a very suspicious character. He very well may have been. Once while having lunch with Ivan Laptev, Lesin's ministerial predecessor, I joked about when I saw Lesin at a New York meeting in the early 2000s. I first mistook him for some kind of Russian mafia guy, just based on how he was dressed and the gorgeous gun-moll looking young lady that accompanied him.In July 2014 Wicker seemed to have more serious concerns. He was moved to tip off the US Attorney General. It wasn't based on Lesin's appearance. Wicker had become aware that Lesin owned expensive residential property in California. He believed that meant something sinister was afoot. Wicker said about Lesin, "He acquired multiple residences at a cost of over $28 million.""That a Russian public servant could have amassed the considerable funds required to acquire and maintain these assets in ... the United States raises serious questions," Wicker told ABC News.Wicker wasn't fond of Putin either. In March 2014 he had written an article for the Washington Examiner titled, "Hillary Clinton was right about Vladimir Putin and Adolf Hitler the first time." Clinton has been quoted many times likening Putin to Hitler.Wicker was and is a member of the Senate Armed Forces Committee. I find it very disturbing that a member of that influential committee could be espousing ideas so distant from reality as these. A simple google search could have told him that Lesin was no simple government service worker pulling down a measly salary. Lesin's Video International business had a near-monopoly grip on the media advertising business in Russia years ago. In fact when he was Putin's media minister, many critics mused that he was the "minister" of his own business sector.Was Wicker's research so lame that he knew nothing of Lesin other than his role in the Russian bureaucracy? Was he that stupid? Or is there something sinister about Wicker's interest in Lesin? I don't know whether there is or isn't. But the incongruity of his factless demonization of Putin, and his seemingly malicious letter to the Attorney General about Lesin, throw up a red flag. Maybe the Attorney General should look into Wicker's business dealings to see if something fishy is going on there.So what's the truth about Lesin's death?The final coroner's verdict is that he was dead drunk in his hotel room, fell multiple times, injuring his lower and upper torso, and inflicted a fatal blow to his head.I don't know whether that is the honest truth or not. But if we are to believe people like Navalny and Wicker it would seem that the Washington coroner is in the bag for Putin. Wow, what an accusation.


If he doesn't want us there then pull out. That 200 million dollars a year we give and and troop support. Pull it all, the hell with them. When the country goes Coomie they will come crawling back asking for intervention.


What if you threw a party and most of the people who would otherwise attend avoided it like a particularly virulent strain of syphilis had gone airborn in a ten-mile radius surrounding the National Mall? At this point, the festivities surrounding the inauguration of the United States next Grand Wizard, Donald Trump, are shaping up to be a complete disaster that will be referenced in every non-Texas history book for generations to come.A minority of Americans and a broken system with a special helping hand from Vladimir Putin and James Comey may have barely elected Donald Trump President, but he remains the least popular person to step into the Oval Office since Osama bin Hitler took office in 1897 in an alternate timeline (that s right, we had to reach outside reality to find something to which we could compare Trump s yuge level of unpopularity).Trump may be bragging about the record-setting turnout he is expecting, but the truth is that he is crying on the inside. Officials are expecting 800,000 to 900,000 people to show up to see Trump being sworn in as our next President. On their own these numbers may seem impressive, but Obama s inauguration attracted double that a whopping 1.8 million people showed up for him and as we all know, Trump desperately needs to feel like he has beaten Barack Obama at everything.Trump is so desperate that he has taken the rather interesting approach: shamelessly spending money to beg Americans to show up and adore him well, people over the age of 27 who live in New York, anyway. F*ck the rest of you.imagine being so disliked that 4 days before your inauguration you start paying to send desperate FB ad invites to "person, 27+" pic.twitter.com/UQ0m4D7vg4 mah ree nah (@marinarachael) January 17, 2017? ? #Trump Is So Pathetic DesperateTo Fill His #Inauguration Seats He's Put An Ad On His #Facebook Page Inviting People @realDonaldTrump pic.twitter.com/L9jChYlxdU Marsha (@Whippenz) January 17, 2017Trump is paying $$$ to place a Facebook ad asking (begging) people (ages 27 + up) to attend his Swearing In Ceremony.Pathetic & So Sad . pic.twitter.com/MogbRNrmLj J Reed (@EarthlingJR) January 17, 2017.@Facebook keeps serving me a video ad where Trump invites me to #Inauguration but @TrumpInaugural website doesn't work. No "form below." pic.twitter.com/d4FLFaaEZd Alex Howard (@digiphile) January 15, 2017How bad is it for Trump? Ticket scalpers are losing money on tickets to the event, which promises to be exactly as exciting as the average county fair (with matching entertainment). Trump has managed to snag obsolete one hit wonder pop band Three Doors Down and country artist who is known for showing up to concerts so drunk that he forgets the lyrics to his own songs. Other performances include a 16-year-old reality show contestant, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, a marching band from Louisiana s most racist high school, and whichever of the Rockettes decides to show up to this abortion of an event. Basically, if I just got my Klan robes back from the drycleaner is not a part of your vernacular, you re gonna have a bad time at this thing.Recently, Trump hate-tweeted the majority of Americans who are not OK with Russia hacking his political opponents on his behalf, calling them stupid people and fools. And he wonders why no one wants to come to his Sweet 16.


By Nathaniel Mauka Congress overwhelmingly voted for the Patriot Act nearly 16 years ago, and our civil liberties have never been the same since. As if this singular bill, passed by George W. Bush, wasn't invasive enough, allowing big banks to demand our internet data, and more — the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act ( CISA ) makes cyber-spying by the shadow government and the financial entities controlling it, a forgone conclusion. As with most shadow government legislation, the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act is packed with hidden surveillance allowances. CISA was quietly passed to allow government to demand that private companies hand over personal information to them at will. It also allows companies to mine data, under the auspices of government-created urgency. The mere fact that this act passed in late 2015 is monumental, since it has been before Congress in different forms for over a decade . The election seems to have offered the perfect cover, as Americans and activists were too busy arguing over Trump vs. Hillary.  Scott Talbott, senior vice president of government relations at the Electronic Transactions Association believes the value of sharing our personal data as a means to be alerted of 'cyber threats' outweighs any hazard to our civil liberties. Talbott states , "The value is that everyone can be alerted to cyber threats and take precautionary countermeasures before they materialize and spread," he said. "Before CISA, corrective measures could be taken only after the cyber threat had done its damage. CISA allows each company to serve as an early warning system to the entire economy."  Who exactly would be determining if someone is a 'threat' is the meat of the sandwich, though. CISA is ripe for abuse, just as the Patriot Act has been. The Patriot Act has made it legal for law enforcement to spy on people, without probable cause – to enter their homes, or even to strip search them before they've been to court, had the opportunity to argue a case, or given 'authorities' a motive for this type of interrogation. The stated purpose of the Patriot Act was to deter terrorist acts in the United States, but what do you do when the terrorists have already taken over your country? CISA simply expands the reach of a shadow government which has already been proven to reach beyond the boundaries of constitutional law. More importantly, who specifically is CISA targeting? After multiple hackers have infiltrated computer systems at the White House , the State Department , the Pentagon , and the Office of Personnel Management, along with the Democratic National Committee , and numerous multinational banks run by the cabal, is the shadow government simply trying to create a stop-gap before their most elusive, yet damning information is made public? CISA certainly will expand the reach of government surveillance on citizens as it has been conducted by the the National Security Agency (NSA) before former NSA contractor Edward Snowden exposed it. "I think this bill was meant to be a surveillance bill from the start," said Justin Harvey, CSO of Fidelis Cybersecurity, adding that he is dubious that the stated intent of the bill – to use collective intelligence to warn of potential cyber attacks and possibly stop them before they occur – will result. Under the guise of 'sharing cyber threats' CISA allows companies to wholesale-collect information that may not even be a threat – and then pass it along for government bodies to determine if it is, indeed a threat. If this sounds like circular logic – it is just the beginning of the odd verbiage within the bill. It's justifications for entering every possible orifice for data-gathering are more confounded than an octopus in a straight jacket. The government can already enter your personal property including your home, your body , your cell, and your computer , but now they will have a legal in-roads to declare you a cyber-threat, simply for sending an email . This begs the question – who is the real cyber-bully? CISA seems to be nothing more than a prevarication, covering the acts of an elite few who don't want their secrets exposed. Nathaniel Mauka is a researcher of the dark side of government and exopolitics, and a staff writer for Waking Times .  Source: Waking Times


The United States and India signed an agreement on Monday governing the use of each other's land, air and naval bases for repair and resupply, a step toward building defense ties as they seek to counter the growing maritime assertiveness of China. The agreement, a relatively mundane one concerning day-to-day military logistics, is nonetheless a milestone in the U.S.-India defense relationship because of the outsized political importance it had taken on in India, where it had touched on domestic sensitivities, experts said. The signing of the agreement will "make the logistics of joint operations so much easier and so much more efficient," U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter said in a news briefing with Indian Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar. The agreement will allow the Indian and U.S. navies to have an easier time supporting each other in joint operations and exercises and when providing humanitarian assistance, Parrikar said. Washington's desire for deeper security cooperation with India had been complicated without the signing of the logistics agreement as well as two other pacts that would allow for secure communications and the exchange of nautical and other data. The agreements are considered routine between the United States and its other defense partners. But India has had concerns such an agreement would commit it to hosting U.S. troops at its bases, or draw it into a military alliance with the United States and undermine its traditional autonomy. Carter and Parrikar reached an agreement "in principle" in April, but had yet to finalize the details. Carter has made closer military ties with India a priority, and established a special unit within the Pentagon last year to promote cooperation with that country. Parrikar's visit to Washington this week marks the sixth interaction between the two top defense officials. The signing of the logistics agreement indicates the priority the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi places on a closer defense relationship with the United States, said Benjamin Schwartz, until last year the India country director at the Pentagon. "For years, there has been tremendous misinformation put out into the Indian press about these agreements," said Schwartz, now with the U.S.-India Business Council, which promotes trade ties between the two countries. "What the signing of this shows is that the Modi government is willing to take and suffer the short-term political criticism of signing these things for the longer-term benefit of building the defense relationship with the United States." Both Carter and Parrikar went to pains on Monday to make clear that the logistics agreement did not allow for basing of U.S. troops in India. "It's not a basing agreement of any kind," Carter said. The debate over the logistics agreement had served as a vehicle for the distrust some of India's political class has towards the United States, said Shane Mason, a research associate at the Stimson Center. The United States had previously imposed sanctions on India related to its 1998 nuclear test, although the sanctions were eased later. "From the U.S. perspective this was kind of a low hanging fruit," Mason said. "We have logistic support agreements with many, many other countries and in most cases it's a relatively uncontroversial thing." The U.S. military has made clear it wants to do more with India, especially in countering China, which U.S. officials say is risking stoking conflict through its claims in the South China Sea, a vital trade waterway. Without naming China, both Carter and Parrikar mentioned the importance of the free flow of trade to both countries. "India and the United States have a shared interest in freedom of navigation and overflight and unimpeded commerce as part of rule-based order in (the) Indo-Pacific," Parrikar said. China hoped cooperation between India and the United States would be "constructive and positive" for the region's peace and stability and development, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told reporters at a regular briefing on Tuesday. "So, we look favorably on this sort of normal relationship between India and the United States," Hua said.