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2,544,820 |
2017-01-02 17:14:15
|
Reuters
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Brazil posts record trade surplus in 2016 on recession, currency
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Brazil posted its largest tradesurplus on record in 2016 as a crippling recession slashedimports and a weaker local currency boosted exports, tradeministry data showed on Monday.
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BRASILIA, Jan 2 (Reuters) - Brazil posted its largest trade surplus on record in 2016 as a crippling recession slashed imports and a weaker local currency boosted exports, trade ministry data showed on Monday.
The commodities powerhouse recorded a trade surplus of $47.69 billion in 2016, above the previous record of $46.45 billion in 2006. In December, the country had a surplus of $4.415 billion. (Reporting by Leonardo Goy; Writing by Alonso Soto; Editing by W Simon)
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Reuters Editorial;Reuters Staff;Min Read
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www.reuters.com
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http://www.reuters.com/article/brazil-economy-trade-idUSE4N1CH012
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CENTER
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4,337,191 |
2017-01-02 17:16:54
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Breitbart
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Federal Appeals Court Reinstates Clinton Email Lawsuits
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WASHINGTON—A federal appeals court has ordered lawsuits by Judicial Watch and Cause of Action seeking to force the federal government to recover Hillary Clinton’s missing emails to move forward, reversing a lower court’s dismissal.
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SIGN UP FOR OUR NEWSLETTER
WASHINGTON—A federal appeals court has ordered lawsuits by Judicial Watch and Cause of Action seeking to force the federal government to recover Hillary Clinton’s missing emails to move forward, reversing a lower court’s dismissal.
When Secretary of State John Kerry refused to take all lawful measures mandated by federal law to recover Clinton’s emails, Judicial Watch and Cause of Action brought separate lawsuits seeking to force Attorney General Loretta Lynch to launch a Justice Department investigation, a request that federal law says should have originated from Kerry or from the national archivist. A federal trial judge on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia dismissed these lawsuits, holding they were moot and no longer appropriate for judicial action.
SIGN UP FOR OUR NEWSLETTER
On Dec. 27, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit reversed, ordering the lower court to restart proceedings on the lawsuit. The panel included both liberal and conservative judges.
“The Federal Records Act governs the creation, management and disposal of federal records,” Senior Judge Stephen Williams wrote for the court, quoting a previous case. “Due to the importance of maintaining federal records (which are generally accessible to the public through the Freedom of Information Act), the act strictly limits the circumstances under which records can be removed from federal custody or destroyed.”
When a Cabinet officer becomes aware that the removal or destruction of federal records has happened or is imminent, he must notify the head of the National Archives, and then “initiate action through the Attorney General” to recover those records. Despite the Federal Records Act’s clear and unambiguous language, Kerry never did so.
D.C. Circuit precedent holds that the Federal Records Act commands Cabinet secretaries and the Archivist to pursue claims of missing or destroyed records, and does not allow any discretion on whether to do so. Another law—the Administrative Procedure Act (APA)—allows a person to sue over nonperformance of a federal agency action that federal law requires the agency to take. Judicial Watch and Cause of Action brought their suits under the authority of the APA.
Although the State Department’s requesting that Clinton please turn over emails produced some results, the D.C.-based appeals court noted that “the Department has not explained why shaking the tree harder—e.g., by following the statutory mandate to seek action by the Attorney General—might not bear more still.”
“In terms of assuring government recovery of emails, appellants have not been given everything they asked for,” the court concluded. “Absent a showing that the requested enforcement action could not shake loose a few more emails, the case is not moot.”
The D.C. Circuit therefore sent the case back down to the district court for additional proceedings. The watchdog groups’ lawyers can now seek a ruling on the merits of their case and a court order to Kerry (or his successor) asking the Justice Department to begin law enforcement actions to recover Clinton’s emails.
The appeals are consolidated under the name Judicial Watch v. Kerry, D.C. Circuit docket nos. 16-5015, 16-5060, 16-5061, and 16-5077.
Ken Klukowski is senior legal editor for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter @kenklukowski.
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Ken Klukowski
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www.breitbart.com
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http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2017/01/02/federal-appeals-court-reinstates-clinton-email-lawsuits/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+breitbart+%28Breitbart+News%29
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RIGHT
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4,475,644 |
2017-01-02 17:21:00
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Fox News
|
Former Georgia Gov. Perdue top Trump candidate for Agriculture post
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Former Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue is a leading candidate to be President-elect Donald Trump’s agriculture secretary, the Donald Trump transition team confirmed Monday with Fox News.
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Former Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue is a leading candidate to be President-elect Donald Trump’s agriculture secretary, the Trump transition team confirmed Monday with Fox News.
Trump, a Republican, has made eight of 17 Cabinet picks, with four remaining, including the Agriculture Department post.
Perdue being a top candidate was reported first by Politico.
The 70-year-old Perdue in November visited Trump Tower, where the president-elect has been conducting many of his interviews to fill Cabinet posts and other top jobs within his administration.
Perdue was the governor of Georgia from 2003 to 2011.
Fox News' Serafin Gomez contributed to this report.
| null |
www.foxnews.com
|
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/01/02/former-georgia-gov-perdue-top-trump-candidate-for-agriculture-post.html
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RIGHT
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55,492,904 |
2017-01-02 17:23:00
|
The Wall Street Journal
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The Method in Donald Trump’s Maddening Communications Habits
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President-elect Donald Trump’s habit of tweeting on subjects large and small and picking fights he could easily avoid risks devaluing White House communications. But there appears to be a strategy behind it that includes seeking an advantage in negotiations and controlling the public agenda, Gerald F. Seib writes.
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Is it method or madness?
That is the question perplexing the world as President-elect Donald J. Trump continues his unorthodox campaign-season communications habits. He tweets, apparently randomly. He wades into subjects that he could easily avoid. He picks fights.
It is a risky approach. By weighing in on all sorts of matters large and...
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Gerald F. Seib;Jerry.Seib Wsj.Com
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-method-in-donald-trumps-maddening-communications-habits-1483377825
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UNDEFINED
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113,892,375 |
2017-01-02 17:23:03
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CBS News
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4 children dead in Texas in pesticide spraying incident
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Four children died from gas poisoning believed to have been caused by a pesticide sprayed under their Amarillo, Texas, home, officials say
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AMARILLO, Texas -- Four children died from gas poisoning believed to have been caused by a pesticide sprayed under their Amarillo home, officials say.
Amarillo Fire Department officials say other people who were in the home are “not out of the woods” yet.
Fire officials say a chemical reaction occurred when one person tried to wash off a pesticide that had been sprayed under the house. Poisonous Phosphine gas was released.
Capt. Larry Davis said in a statement Monday that crews responded to a medical call at the home about 5 a.m. One child died at the scene and three others died at a hospital. Officials didn’t release any identifying information, including the children’s ages.
Other family members and first responders are being treated.
Toxic Phosphine gas is produced when aluminum phosphide is mixed with water or moisture, CBS Amarillo affiliate KFDA reports. Aluminum phosphide is a dangerous “restricted-use pesticide,” and it’s used to kill mice, prairie dogs and gophers. A license is needed to buy it.
The Amarillo Fire Department said in this case it was clearly purchased from an unlicensed dealer, since the person who used it didn’t know that mixing it with water could be damaging, KFDA reported. Once inhaled or ingested, the respiratory system is attacked and it only takes a few PPM (parts per million) to cause death.
“This is known, this happens across the United States and it’s when people get a hold of stuff they don’t know how to use and they don’t do enough research and figure out that water is bad for it,” said Lieutenant Josh Whitney. “And then with the moisture that we have in our air and the moisture that he applied to it, it was just a recipe for a bad situation.”
| null |
www.cbsnews.com
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http://www.cbsnews.com/news/gas-poisoning-amarillo-texas-four-children-dead-others-injured/
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CENTER
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3,891,040 |
2017-01-02 17:23:26
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HuffPost
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Many Americans Don't Believe Trump Can Handle Presidential Duties
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The public was more confident in the past three presidents.
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Less than half of Americans are confident that President-elect Donald Trump can handle several presidential duties, a new Gallup poll finds.
With less than three weeks before Trump takes the oath of office, only 46 percent of Americans are optimistic in his ability to handle an international crisis. Forty-seven percent say they are confident he can use military force wisely and just 44 percent believe Trump can prevent major scandals in his administration.
On the other hand, the poll did show that 60 percent of Americans are confident in Trump’s ability to effectively work with Congress. A little more than half (55 percent) think he will be able to defend U.S. interests abroad.
Compared to the last three U.S. presidents when they took office, Trump polls far lower in Americans’ confidence levels. At least 7 in 10 Americans were confident in key issues before Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton entered the White House.
Although Trump’s favorability has risen since the election, he still has the lowest favorability rating of any president-elect.
When Trump takes office on Jan. 20, the ongoing issues he’ll have to face include the fight against ISIS, Europe’s migrant crisis and Russia’s meddling in the 2016 presidential election.
|
Amber Ferguson;Associate Politics Video Editor;The Huffington Post
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www.huffingtonpost.com
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/americans-lack-confidence-in-trump_us_586a8081e4b0de3a08f91111?ir=Politics&utm_hp_ref=politics
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LEFT
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4,984,842 |
2017-01-02 17:28:44
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CNN
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Viral video prompts Myanmar to investigate police brutality against Rohingya villagers
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The Myanmar government has launched an investigation into police brutality against members of the Muslim Rohingya minority after video has emerged that appears to show police beating civilians in the west of the country.
|
Story highlights The video quickly went viral after it was posted over the weekend
It's not the first video that appears to show alleged abuse by Myanmar authorities
London (CNN) The Myanmar government has launched an investigation into police brutality against members of the Muslim Rohingya minority after video has emerged that appears to show police beating civilians in the west of the country.
The selfie-style video was filmed on November 5, according to the office of State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi, and after it was posted to YouTube on Saturday, quickly went viral.
JUST WATCHED Are Myanmar soldiers raping Muslim women? Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Are Myanmar soldiers raping Muslim women? 03:59
First investigation into police brutality
It's the first time the government has announced an investigation into police brutality against the Rohingya ethnic minority in the restive Rakhine State since the area was put under lockdown following an attack on border guards in October.
Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi has been accused of turning a blind eye to the Rohingya minority.
Read More
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Donie O'Sullivan
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www.cnn.com
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/world/myanmar-investigates-brutality-against-rohingya-muslims/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fedition_asia+%28RSS%3A+CNNi+-+Asia%29
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UNDEFINED
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4,386,725 |
2017-01-02 17:31:00
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Fox News
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4 children die in Texas pesticide gas poisoning; others injured
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A poisonous gas believed to have been released when someone tried to wash away a pesticide that had been sprayed under a Texas home killed four children and left six other people hospitalized, officials said Monday.
|
A poisonous gas believed to have been released when someone tried to wash away a pesticide that had been sprayed under a Texas home killed four children and left six other people hospitalized, officials said Monday.
Phosphine gas was likely released when water mixed with the pest control chemical, Amarillo fire officials said. A specific cause of death had not been released for the four children Monday afternoon. The other six people who were in the home are "not out of the woods yet," fire officials said.
Crews who responded to a 5 a.m. call to the home originally thought it was related to carbon monoxide poisoning, Amarillo fire Capt. Larry Davis said in a statement. One child died at the scene and three others died at a hospital.
Officials didn't release any identifying information, including the children's ages or whether they were related. Davis said all four people who died were residents of the home.
Davis told the Amarillo Globe-News he wasn't sure how long the residents had been exposed to the phosphine gas before a visitor arrived Monday and found everyone sick and called 911. Phosphine gas can cause respiratory failure and in severe cases can cause a pulmonary edema, which fills the lungs full of fluid, he said.
Davis said about 10 first responders from the police, fire and medical response departments were also taken to the hospital as a precautionary measure, but none had shown symptoms of illness.
| null |
www.foxnews.com
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http://www.foxnews.com/us/2017/01/02/4-children-die-in-texas-pesticide-gas-poisoning-others-injured.html
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RIGHT
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55,467,427 |
2017-01-02 17:34:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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Russia Blocking Afghan Peace Deal
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Afghan and Western officials say Moscow’s request for more time to consider the removal of an Afghan warlord from a United Nations sanctions list is an effort to counteract U.S. influence in Afghanistan.
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KABUL—Russia is hindering the removal of one of Afghanistan’s most notorious warlords from a United Nations sanctions list, Afghan and Western officials said Monday, a move that could complicate efforts to implement a peace deal seen as a model for a similar accords with the Taliban and other insurgent groups.
The agreement reached in September between the Afghan government and Hezb-e Islami, an Islamist political and militant group...
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Jessica Donati;Habib Khan Totakhil;Jessica.Donati Wsj.Com;Habib.Totakhil Wsj.Com
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/russia-blocking-afghan-peace-deal-1483378461
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UNDEFINED
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39,134,260 |
2017-01-02 17:36:46
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The Guardian
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Wartime Britain’s welcome for black GIs was complicated
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Letters: The treatment these young men received was partially because they would not be staying
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While Hugh Muir’s observations on the positive reception received by African American troops in the UK during the second world war are largely accurate (Intolerant Britain: history shows we’re better than this, Opinion, 31 December), the full story is more complicated. The presence of American soldiers was a temporary wartime expedient, and the treatment these young men received, particularly those who were black, was partially because they would not be staying. Moreover, while African Americans were certainly welcomed, this reflected not only British hospitality but also anti-American sentiment as much as a rejection of American racism. British publicans, for example, objected to being told by white Americans who they could or could not serve. As one Briton noted: “I don’t mind the Yanks, but I can’t say I care for those white chaps they’ve brought with them.”
Dr Simon Topping
Senior lecturer in United States history, Plymouth University
• Join the debate – email [email protected]
• Read more Guardian letters – click here to visit gu.com/letters
| null |
www.theguardian.com
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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/02/wartime-britains-welcome-for-black-gis-was-complicated
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LEFT
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38,930,651 |
2017-01-02 17:37:56
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The Guardian
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Cuba marks anniversary of revolution with show of military strength
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Student leader reaffirms country’s commitment to independence as troops and civilians march through Havana
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Cuban troops and hundreds of thousands of citizens have paraded through Revolution Square in the capital in a traditional show of strength.
Schoolchildren wearing red and white pioneer uniforms kicked off the event in Havana by surrounding a replica of the Granma yacht, which carried the Castro brothers, Ernesto “Che” Guevara and others from Mexico to Cuba to start the revolution in 1959
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Cuba’s president, Raúl Castro, waves at well-wishers. Photograph: Alexandre Meneghini/Reuters
Soldiers carrying automatic rifles were followed by a sea of flag-waving civilians, many of whom were bussed in by their employers.
The head of the University Students Federation, Jennifer Bello Martinez, opened the march with a fiery speech, as President Raúl Castro and other leaders watched and waved from the base of a monument to the independence hero José Martí.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Cubans take part in the parade. Photograph: Yamil Lage/AFP/Getty Images
“Cuba will not abandon a single one of its principles … not its independence and not its sovereignty,” she told the crowd.
The military parade and march takes place every five years on 2 December to mark armed forces day and commemorate the Granma landing, however it was postponed by a month due to the death of the Cuban leader Fidel Castro in November.
The event, announced last April, has taken on added significance since the US election.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Students surround a replica of the Granma yacht, which was used to transport revolutionary fighters from Mexico to Cuba. Photograph: Yamil Lage/AFP/Getty Images
The president-elect, Donald Trump, who will take office on 20 January, has threatened to abandon efforts by the Obama administration to restore trade and diplomatic ties with Cuba if the country does not offer the US a “better deal”.
“We are braced for conflict with the USA, we always have been, but I hope Trump will instead follow the path of Obama towards normalisation,” said 70-year-old Marcial Garcia, who does logistical work for the army, as he watched the parade.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest A nurse carries a photo of Fidel Castro to the parade. Photograph: Ramon Espinosa/AP
The threat to US-Cuba relations could not come at a worse time for the Caribbean country, which slipped into recession last year for the first time since the collapse of the Soviet Union a quarter century ago.
A tourism boom that brought 4 million visitors in 2016, in part sparked by political thaw and a relaxing of US travel restrictions, was not enough to overcome dwindling oil shipments from its ally Venezuela and less cash for Cuban doctors and other professionals working overseas.
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Reuters In Havana
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www.theguardian.com
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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/02/cuba-marks-anniversary-revolution-military-parade-havana-fidel-castro
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LEFT
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38,979,736 |
2017-01-02 17:38:05
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The Guardian
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To Walk Invisible: Withering heights of gloom and muzak
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Letters: As for the swearing in Sally Wainwright’s Brontë play, this is an example of modern authors using quite inappropriate obscenities just because they can
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Surely Sally Wainwright should have called her Brontë play “A Hopeless Being” – Emily Brontë’s comment on her brother Branwell – as it all hinged on him and ended with his death (Last night’s TV, 30 December). Calling it To Walk Invisible, which refers to the sisters’ wish to maintain anonymity after they began to publish, was a misnomer, leading me, at least, to expect a play concentrating on them and their writing, not on the dismal subject of Branwell’s decline. As it is, more could have been shown of the expectations and hopes his family had of him when he was seen as a brilliant poet and painter.
To Walk Invisible review – a bleak and brilliant portrayal of the Brontë family Read more
As for the swearing, this is an example of modern authors using quite inappropriate obscenities just because they can. It jerks one right out of period, whether Branwell would have used the F-word or not. If he had, the reaction of his father and sisters would have been much greater.
Lynne Reid Banks
Author of Dark Quarter: The Story of the Brontës and Path to the Silent Country
• In Sally Wainwright’s intelligent reimagining of the Brontës the hills certainly were alive with the sound of music – incessantly, and not in a good way. It suffocated mood and dialogue. Happens all the time, signalling lack of confidence in the material on the part of producers and directors. They need to be reminded that if they’re good enough, words are music.
Chris Kelly
Shepton Mallet, Somerset
• Join the debate – email [email protected]
• Read more Guardian letters – click here to visit gu.com/letters
| null |
www.theguardian.com
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https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2017/jan/02/to-walk-invisible-withering-heights-of-gloom-and-muzak
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LEFT
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55,465,974 |
2017-01-02 17:39:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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Brazil Posts Record Trade Surplus of $47.7 Billion in 2016
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Brazil posted its biggest trade surplus ever in 2016 as imports plunged amid the country’s worst economic recession on record. The country had a surplus of $4.4 billion in December, bringing the total for the year to $47.7 billion, the trade ministry said.
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SÃO PAULO—Brazil posted its biggest trade surplus ever in 2016 as imports plunged amid the country’s worst economic recession on record.
The country had a surplus of $4.4 billion in December, bringing the total for the year to $47.7 billion, the trade ministry said Monday. That beats the record of $46.5 billion set in 2006, which was powered by...
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Jeffrey T. Lewis;Jeffrey.Lewis Wsj.Com
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/brazil-posts-record-trade-surplus-of-47-7-billion-in-2016-1483378788
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UNDEFINED
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55,461,518 |
2017-01-02 17:43:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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Europe’s True Missing Link: Economic Convergence
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Politics is high on the 2017 agenda for Europe. The cause lies in economics.
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Monetary policy has done a lot for Europe in recent years. Most of all, it has kept the euro intact. But the European Central Bank’s ability to create economic harmony in the eurozone is limited.
Ever since Mario Draghi’s 2012 pledge to do “whatever it takes” to keep the euro together, markets have bought into the idea. The gap between northern and southern European government bond spreads compressed. Borrowing rates for small- and medium-size enterprises have converged across the big four economies—Germany, France, Italy...
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Richard Barley;Richard.Barley Wsj.Com
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/europes-true-missing-link-economic-convergence-1483378980
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UNDEFINED
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39,073,550 |
2017-01-02 17:45:30
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The Guardian
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Benjamin Netanyahu denies corruption ahead of police questioning
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Israeli prime minister tells opponents to put their celebrations on hold as police prepare to question him at his home
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Benjamin Netanyahu has denied any wrongdoing ahead of his expected questioning by police as part of a corruption investigation, telling his political opponents to put any celebrations on hold.
Police were expected to question the Israeli prime minister on Monday over whether he illegally accepted gifts from wealthy supporters, media reports said.
The long-running inquiry has looked into whether Israeli and foreign businessmen have offered gifts worth tens of thousands of dollars, and another unspecified issue.
The country’s attorney general, Avichai Mandelblit, has reportedly decided to upgrade the inquiry to a criminal investigation, but he has yet to confirm thie move.
Public radio said Netanyahu had agreed to be questioned at his residence, with some reports saying the interview would take place at 7:00 pm (1700 GMT). Police refused to comment.
Screens were mounted at the entrance to the compound in central Jerusalem in an apparent bid to shield the investigators’ arrival.
“We hear all the media reports. We see and hear the festive spirit and atmosphere in television studios and in the corridors of the opposition,” Netanyahu told MPs from his Likud party on Monday, according to a video posted to his Facebook page.
“I want to tell them to wait for the celebrations. Do not rush. I told you and I repeat, there will be nothing because there is nothing. You will continue to inflate hot-air balloons and we will continue to lead the state of Israel.”
Police have carried out the inquiry in secret over the course of about eight months and recently made an important breakthrough, reports said. Some 50 witnesses are said to have been questioned.
In July, Mandelblit said he had ordered a preliminary examination into an unspecified allegation involving Netanyahu, but no further details were given.
The US billionaire and president of the World Jewish Congress, Ronald Lauder, has been among those questioned over gifts he allegedly gave Netanyahu and alleged spending on trips for him, Israeli media reported.
Lauder, whose family founded the Estée Lauder cosmetics giant, has long been seen as an ally of Netanyahu, who in the late 1990s put him in charge of negotiating with the then Syrian president Hafez al-Assad.
Netanyahu has acknowledged receiving money from the French tycoon Arnaud Mimran, who was sentenced to eight years in prison over a €283m (£241m) scam involving the trade of carbon emissions permits and the taxes on them.
Netanyahu’s office said he had received $40,000 in contributions from Mimran in 2001, when he was not in office, as part of a fund for public activities, including appearances abroad to promote Israel.
He has also come under scrutiny over an alleged conflict of interest in the purchase of submarines from a German firm.
Media reports have alleged a conflict of interest over the role played by the Netanyahu family’s lawyer, David Shimron, who also acts for the Israeli agent of Germany’s ThyssenKrupp, which builds the Dolphin submarines.
Beyond those issues, Israel’s state comptroller released a critical report in May about Netanyahu’s foreign trips, some with his wife and children, between 2003 and 2005 when he was finance minister.
Netanyahu, 67, is in his fourth term as prime minister and currently heads what is seen as the most rightwing government in Israeli history.
He has served as premier for a total of nearly 11 years, fast approaching the 13 years of of the country’s revered founding father David Ben-Gurion.
Polls have shown that if elections were held now, his Likud party would finish behind the centrist Yesh Atid, but that voters still prefer Netanyahu as prime minister.
Netanyahu’s predecessor, Ehud Olmert, was forced to resign while dogged by corruption allegations. He was sent to prison in February and is serving 27 months, making him Israel’s first former prime minister to serve jail time.
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Agence France-Presse In Jerusalem
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www.theguardian.com
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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/02/benjamin-netanyahu-denies-corruption-ahead-of-police-questioning
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LEFT
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4,355,626 |
2017-01-02 17:51:58
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Breitbart
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18 Major Scandals in Obama's ‘Scandal-Free’ Presidency
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18 Major Scandals in Obama's ‘Scandal-Free’ Presidency
|
SIGN UP FOR OUR NEWSLETTER
President Obama and his mouthpieces have embarked on a bizarre scheme to hypnotize America into forgetting the many scandals of his presidency. They seem to think that intoning “this administration hasn’t had a scandal” over and over again will make history disappear. It’s the lamest Jedi Mind Trick ever, and is being pushed on people who know Star Wars is just a movie.
Here’s a short list of the many scandals Team Obama thinks it can make America forget:
SIGN UP FOR OUR NEWSLETTER
The great “stimulus” heist: Obama seems to think nobody will remember he grabbed almost a trillion dollars for “stimulus” spending, created virtually zero private-sector jobs with it, allowed a great deal of the money to vanish into thin air, and spent the rest of his presidency complaining that he needed hundreds of billions more to repair roads and bridges.
Vast sums of taxpayer money were wasted on foolish projects that came close to the Keynesian economic satire of hiring some people to dig holes, and others to fill them in. Obama added insult to injury by appointing Vice President Joe Biden as the “sheriff” who would supposedly find all that missing stimulus loot.
Americans mostly ended up footing the bill for was an army of government jobs, and a lavish network of slush funds for the Democratic Party and its union allies. We’re supposed to forget about all that because years later, Obama’s weak economy finally dragged itself to something like normal “official” employment levels… with the U.S. national debt doubled, and our workforce rate reduced to Carter-era lows. Sorry, Democrats, but that’s more than just failed policy. It’s one of the worst government-spending scandals in our history. Democrats will howl to the moon over far, far smaller abuses of taxpayer money during the Trump administration, should any occur.
Operation Fast and Furious: Obama partisans seem to think any given example of abuse or ineptitude by their man stopped being a “scandal” the moment it seemed clear he wouldn’t be impeached over it. Operation Fast and Furious, the Obama administration’s insane program to use American gun dealers and straw purchasers to arm Mexican drug lords, is a scandal with a huge body count, prominently including Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry and Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agent Jamie Zapata, plus hundreds of Mexican citizens. Agent Terry’s family certainly thinks it qualifies as a scandal.
It is difficult to imagine any Republican administration surviving anything remotely close to Fast and Furious. The media would have dogged a Republican president without respite, especially when it became clear his Attorney General was putting political spin ahead of accountability and the safety of the American people. Remember, AG Eric Holder escaped perjury charges by claiming he didn’t know what his own subordinates were doing – a pioneering, but sadly not unique, example of an Obama official using his or her incompetence as a defense. For years afterward, we would hear some version of “I’m not a crook, I’m just completely inept” everywhere from the Department of Health and Human Services to the Department of Veterans Affairs.
But this was Barack Obama, so the media downplayed Fast and Furious news… to the point where viewers of NBC News learned about the scandal for the first time when Holder was on the verge of being held in contempt by Congress for it.
The relatively benign explanation for the astounding Fast and Furious scandal is that Obama’s Justice Department wanted to release guns into the Mexican wild, like so many radio-tagged antelope on a nature show, and follow them to arrest the big fish of organized crime. (In case you were wondering, no, the guns didn’t actually have radio tags in them – that was tried in the much smaller, and utterly disastrous, Bush-era program Obama’s team used as a model for their vastly larger and more careless program.) This explanation becomes more difficult to believe, the more you know about how careless the program was, and how abruptly it was shut down after Agent Terry’s death.
The more sinister take on Fast and Furious is that the Obama administration wanted to create gun crimes in Mexico so they could complain about lax regulations on American gun sales – “for the purposes of creating a narrative that they could use in America to try and thwart our Second Amendment constitutional rights,” as Andrew Breitbart put it during a 2012 interview.
No matter which interpretation you subscribe to, or how much you think Barack Obama knew about the program when he made scurrilous claims of executive privilege to shut down investigations, it’s an insult to a large number of murder victims to claim it wasn’t a scandal. Unfortunately, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives hasn’t learned as much from the OFF debacle as we might have hoped.
Incidentally, the Border Patrol named a station in southern Arizona in Agent Brian Terry’s honor. On New Year’s Eve, persons unknown fired rifle shots at a Border Patrol vehicle near the station.
Eric Holder held in contempt of Congress: This was a result of Operation Fast and Furious, but it merits distinction as a separate scandal in its own right. Holder was the first sitting member of a president’s cabinet in the history of the United States to be held in contempt of Congress.
Of course, Democrats closed ranks behind Holder, the White House protected him, and the media allowed Holder to spin the contempt vote as mere “political theater.” In reality, it was a difficult step that responsible members of Congress didn’t want to take, and it was fully justified by Holder’s disgraceful conduct in the Fast and Furious investigation. No reasonable person could possibly review the way OFF was handled and conclude it was an example of transparency and accountability.
ObamaCare: Everything about ObamaCare is a scandal, from the President’s incessant lies about keeping your old plan if you liked it, to Rep. Nancy Pelosi’s “we need to pass it to find out what’s in it” dereliction of Congressional duty.
ObamaCare is a scam, pure and simple – sold on false pretenses by people who knew it wasn’t going to work the way they promised. It doesn’t feel right to dismiss it as a “failed” scheme when so much of the failure was intentional. The bill was so sloppily crafted that Democrats were basically signing blank sheets of paper when they rushed it through Congress in a foul-smelling cloud of back-room deals. ObamaCare’s designers precipitated a constitutional crisis by forgetting they left in a provision to cut subsidies for states that didn’t set up health-care exchanges – a provision that would have killed the entire program stone-dead two years ago, if it had been enforced as written.
The Supreme Court rewrote ObamaCare on the fly twice to keep it alive, which is a scandal in and of itself. President Obama delayed and rewrote the law so often it was impossible to keep track of the changes, cutting Congress out of the loop completely. (Actually, someone did keep careful track of them, and the tally was up to 70 distinct changes by January 2016.)
That made some of Obama’s rewritten mandates and deadlines blatantly illegal – but then, the Affordable Care Act isn’t really a “law” in the sense American government understood the term. In practice it became something entirely new, an enabling act that gave the executive unlimited power to do whatever it thought necessary to keep the system running. If subverting the American system of government isn’t a scandal, what is?
And let’s not forget the scandal of ObamaCare’s disastrous launch, foisted on the American people even though its designers knew it had severe flaws – the billion-dollar website that cost another billion dollars to fix after it crashed, accompanied by a constellation of state exchanges that blew up like Roman candles of bureaucratic incompetence. Let us not forget the absolute zero accountability for this disaster, mismanaged by everyone from President Obama to HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who treated the biggest new government program in several generations as though it were a minor side project that could be handled by subordinates with minimal supervision.
Spying on journalists: Establishment media came about as close to falling out of love with Barack Obama as ever when his administration was caught spying on journalists.
Why, if the reporter subjected to the most egregious surveillance, James Rosen, didn’t work for Fox News, the mainstream media might have started treating Obama like a (shudder) Republican. Rosen was treated so badly that even Attorney General Eric Holder eventually admitted feeling a bit of “remorse” about it. Apparently he felt so much anguish that he suffered temporary amnesia and forgot to tell Congress that he signed off on the request to wiretap Rosen while he was testifying under oath.
The IRS scandal: The selective targeting of conservative groups by a politicized Internal Revenue Service was a scandal grenade Democrats and their media pals somehow managed to smother, even though the story began with the IRS admitting wrongdoing.
Democrats suffocated the scandal by acting like circus clowns during congressional hearings, but at no point were the actual facts of the case truly obscured: yes, pro-life and Tea Party groups were deliberately targeted for extra scrutiny, their tax exemption applications outrageously delayed until after the 2012 election without actually being refused. If anything remotely comparable had been done to, say, environmentalist and minority activist groups by the IRS under a Republican administration, the results would have been apocalyptic.
There’s also no question about the facts of the follow-up scandal, in which IRS officials brazenly lied about having backups of relevant computer data. The American people were expected to believe that multiple state-of-the-art hard drives failed, and were instantly shredded instead of being subjected to data recovery procedures.
Luckily for the politicized IRS, the Justice Department was hyper-politicized under Obama too, so no charges were filed, and scandal kingpin Lois Lerner got to enjoy her taxpayer-funded retirement after taking the Fifth to thwart lawful congressional investigation.
Benghazi: This is the clearest example of Obama and his supporters thinking all of his pre-2012 scandals ceased to exist the moment he won re-election. Benghazi has been investigated extensively, and argued about passionately, since the night of September 11, 2012. Nothing can change the absolute fact that the Obama administration’s story for the first few weeks after the attack was false, and they knew it was false. They spun a phony story to buy themselves a little time during a presidential election campaign, and it worked.
Nothing can change the fact that Libya was a disaster after Obama’s unlawful military operation. Nothing can obscure the truth that Ambassador Christopher Stevens was sent into a known terrorist hot zone without a backup plan to ensure his safety. Everything else from Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and their defenders is pure political spin. They dragged the story out for years, until they thought it couldn’t hurt them any more. That doesn’t erase its status as a scandal. (And they were evidently incorrect in their belief that it couldn’t hurt them any more!)
Hillary Clinton’s secret server: While we’re on the subject of Hillary Clinton, her secret email server is an Obama scandal, too. She perpetrated her email offenses while working as his Secretary of State, and contrary to Obama’s false assertions, he knew about it.
Plenty of Obama officials other than Clinton played email games, most infamously EPA administrator Lisa Jackson, who created a false identity for herself named “Richard Windsor” to get around government transparency rules.
The Pigford scandal: Named after a landmark lawsuit from the Bill Clinton era, the abuse of a program meant to compensate minority farmers for racial discrimination exploded under Obama. After years of left-wing attacks on Andrew Breitbart for daring to speak up about the scandal, the mainstream media – no less than the New York Times – finally admitted his critique of the program was accurate in 2013.
Once again: if careless mishandling (or deliberate politicized misuse) of huge sums of taxpayer money isn’t a scandal, what is?
NSA spying scandal: Opinions about the nature and intensity of this scandal vary wildly across the political spectrum, but there’s no doubt that Edward Snowden’s pilfering of sensitive National Security Agency data was a debacle that damaged national security. We had the ghastly spectacle of Attorney General Holder thanking Snowden for performing a public service by exposing surveillance programs Holder’s own administration didn’t want to talk about.
President Obama and his administration made many false statements as they tried to contain the political damage. The fallout included significant losses for U.S. companies, and diplomatic problems for the United States. Just about everything Obama did before, during, and after the Snowden saga damaged the relationship between American citizens and their government.
Bowe Bergdahl: Bergdahl’s ultimate fate rests in the hands of a military court (unless Obama pardons him) but no verdict can erase the scandalous way this administration conducted the prisoner swap that freed him from the Taliban and its allies. Many lies were told, the law was flouted, a deal of questionable wisdom was struck with his captors, and outraged Americans demanded recognition for the soldiers who died searching for Bergdahl after he abandoned his post.
Iran nuclear deal and ransom payment: Everything about Obama’s dealings with Iran has been scandalous, beginning with his silence while the Green Revolution was brutally put down by the mullahs in 2009. The Iran nuclear deal was pushed with lies and media manipulation. The infamous pallet of cash that wasn’t a ransom has become symbolic of Obama’s mendacity and penchant for breaking the rules, when he thinks following them is too much trouble.
Polluting the Colorado river: The Environmental Protection Agency managed to turn the Colorado River orange under this greenest of green Presidents. Of course there was a cover-up. Would you expect anything less from this “transparent” administration?
The GSA scandal: The General Services Administration was caught wasting ridiculous amounts of taxpayer money on lavish parties and silly projects. Heroic efforts to resist accountability were made, leaving puzzled observers to ask what it took to get fired from government employment under Barack Obama. (Alas, it was hardly the last time that question would be asked.) Oh, and of course there was a cover-up from the Most Scandal-Free Administration Ever.
The VA death-list scandal: The Department of Veterans Affairs has long been troubled, but the big scandals broke on Obama’s watch, most infamously the secret death lists veterans were put on while executives handed in phony status reports and signed themselves up for big bonuses. Obama was more interested in spinning the news and minimizing his political exposure than addressing problems; in few areas outside ObamaCare has his rhetoric been more hollow, his promises more meaningless.
Solyndra: The marquee green energy scandal wrote “crony capitalism” into the American political lexicon, as corners were cut and protocols ignored to shovel billions of taxpayer dollars at companies with absurdly unrealistic business models. President Obama’s ability to pick bad investments was remarkable. Luckily for him, American taxpayers covered his losses.
Secret Service gone wild: The Obama years saw one scandal after another hit the Secret Service, from agents going wild with hookers in Columbia, to a fence jumper penetrating the White House, and tipsy Secret Service officials driving their car into a security barrier.
Shutdown theater: Obama hit the American people hard during the great government shutdown crisis of 2013, doing everything he could to make American citizens feel maximum pain – from using “Barry-cades” to keep war veterans away from their memorials, to releasing illegal alien criminals from detention centers. It was an infuriating lesson for voters in how every dollar they get from government is a dollar that can be used against them, when they are impudent enough to demand spending restraint.
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John Hayward
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www.breitbart.com
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http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2017/01/02/18-major-scandals-obama-presidency/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+breitbart+%28Breitbart+News%29
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RIGHT
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39,168,080 |
2017-01-02 17:54:33
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The Guardian
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Junior doctor Nadia Masood: 'Hunt's driven a lot of us out of the NHS'
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Medics felt justified in opposing a new contract and their defeat has left many feeling demoralised, Masood says
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Dr Nadia Masood’s public involvement in the junior doctors’ dispute began in a layby somewhere in north-east London on 11 January. “I was driving to Essex to see my mum, who was in hospital with sepsis after having chemotherapy for breast cancer. I was listening to LBC and James O’Brien was talking about the first junior doctors’ strike, which was due the next day,” she recalls. “I pulled over, phoned in and ended up on air, trying to explain to listeners why we were going on strike. I was feeling very emotional both because of my mum and because of the strike.”
It was unusual behaviour for the 35-year-old anaesthetic registrar. “I’m from a completely apolitical background. I didn’t have a political bone in my body until the health secretary, Jeremy Hunt, decided to impose an unfair and unjust contract on 54,000 junior doctors,” Masood says. “At first I saw the contract as an ethical, not political, issue. It wasn’t right to impose a contract on a workforce who give up their entire lives and pour blood, sweat and tears into their jobs and have no choice but to work under the conditions the NHS gives us, because that’s the only way we can become consultants, which is our goal. I was shocked Jeremy Hunt had the balls to do it.”
Junior doctors strike across England – in pictures Read more
The next day brought the first of what would be eight strikes between January and May. They pitted young medics renowned as workhorses of the NHS against a health secretary regarded with deep suspicion by the medical profession for his disparaging comments about GPs and consultants. Doctors in scrubs on picket duty outside their hospitals vied with Hunt for public sympathy over his insistence that juniors had to work more at weekends to deliver the government’s promised “truly seven-day NHS”.
Striking wasn’t easy for the doctors, who realise the uniqueness of their jobs, which they love, says Masood. On day one she was among the pickets outside Great Ormond Street hospital in London, where she worked at the time. “We were all feeling really bad about refusing to work that day. But parents brought their children outside from the wards to say hello and said they supported us, and our consultant colleagues kept everything running smoothly, which all helped.”
Did junior doctors expect to win? “Yes. That 98% of junior doctors who took part in a ballot organised by the British Medical Association backed strike action to oppose a contract we argued was unfair and unsafe – that made us realise that we all felt the same shock and horror at what Hunt was doing. We all felt justified in our resistance. Maybe I can call this naivety, but I think that the right thing – truth, honour, justice – always prevails in the end,” says Masood.
As walkouts, on-off negotiations and the war of words rolled on, opinion polls showed the medics were winning the battle for hearts and minds, even when they escalated their action to include withdrawal of cover from areas of life-or-death care, such as A&E and maternity units.
“The RMT give the impression that they don’t care [about the impact the rail strikes by their members has on the public], and people think they are being selfish and not handling things right,” Masood says. “But as junior doctors we felt that our motivation was really pure. We were genuinely concerned about the wellbeing of the NHS and genuinely believed that what we were doing was to protect it.
“It wasn’t about money, though Jeremy Hunt portrayed us as money-grabbers by constantly stressing that we’d be getting a pay rise. It was about patient safety and the sustainability of the NHS. Some people thought we were against a seven-day NHS, but most doctors – especially junior doctors – already work seven days a week.
“We spoke about how the NHS was already at breaking point, with too few staff and too little money to do its job properly. But no one took notice of us. But a year on, people like [the NHS England chief executive] Simon Stevens and [the NHS Providers chief executive] Chris Hopson, who distanced themselves from us a year ago, are now saying publicly what we were saying then, that the NHS is struggling with the lack of funding that it has.”
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Posters made and carried by junior doctors during the strikes. Photograph: Photomontage/Roger Tooth
Hunt has insisted hospitals have to be able to roster doctors to work more at weekends to enable the NHS to treat more patients on those days, though precisely what services he wants to be expanded remains unclear. Eight strikes did not force him to backtrack. Masood repeats what junior doctors argued repeatedly throughout the dispute: “There’s not enough doctors at the moment to staff the current service we’re trying to deliver over five days, so why has Jeremy Hunt brought in the new contract when he knows that? It’s madness to stretch a workforce that’s already too small across seven days.”
In May the then chair of the BMA’s junior doctors committee endorsed a revised version of the contract, but members rejected it by 58% to 42%. In August the union threatened a series of five-day walkouts between then and Christmas, but abandoned the plans in the face of huge opposition, both internal and external. Juniors began moving on to the contract in October.
So who won? “They did,” says Masood quietly, her voice trailing away. “The government have won in the short nterm and I’m worried that they will now do the same thing to nurses, consultants – to all NHS staff. But long term I fear that more junior doctors will decide not to train to be NHS consultants and quit, and that more people will be burned out mentally and physically.” She was one of five junior doctors who in September challenged in the high court the legality of Hunt’s decision to impose the contract. That action ended in defeat too.
The dispute has left junior doctors feeling miserable and demoralised, Masood says. She is still so outraged by Hunt’s behaviour that she stepped away from her training last month, even though she is close to becoming a consultant. Her decision means an understaffed NHS is one more medic short. She is taking a career break and now works as a locum in various London hospitals.
“There’s a big need for locums because there are rota gaps in every specialty in every hospital,” she says. “What Jeremy Hunt has done is driven a lot of us out of the NHS, either temporarily – like me – or permanently. He says he values us, but everything he has done has made us feel devalued. I just worry that he will do to other NHS workers what he did to us and if he does, that will kill us as a workforce, and that will kill the NHS, because there will be no one to work in it.”
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Denis Campbell;Polly Toynbee;Anonymous Junior Doctor
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www.theguardian.com
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https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/jan/02/junior-doctor-nadia-masood-jeremy-hunt-driven-us-out-of-nhs
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LEFT
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4,315,756 |
2017-01-02 17:55:08
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Breitbart
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Islamic State 'Caliphate Cubs' Video Shows Children Executing Prisoners
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On Dec. 29, the Islamic State released another "Cubs of the Caliphate" video in which child soldiers are shown murdering helpless prisoners.
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On December 29, the Islamic State released another “Cubs of the Caliphate” training video in which child soldiers are shown murdering helpless prisoners.
As in the previous “Cubs” video, preteen children are shown moving through a training course like a military squad, using their handguns to murder bound captives they discover along the way. Last year’s video had the trainees sweeping through an outdoor area, evidently somewhere in Syria; this time they are going through a ruined building somewhere in or near the Islamic State’s capital of Raqqa. Another similarity to the earlier video is that the executions are made to resemble a first-person video game.
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Unlike the previous child-executioner video release, this time the prisoners are allowed to move around with their hands zip-tied behind their backs, turning the exercise into a murderous cat-and-mouse chase. Some prisoners are shown weeping and pleading when cornered by the gun-wielding children. The bloody aftermath of their executions is shown in detail.
One prisoner is shot in the leg or groin and tries to crawl to safety before his child murderer shoots him in the leg again to stop him, prompting a howl of pain and fear. The little boy then stands over his victim and finishes the job with a string of point-blank shots.
Another hysterically weeping victim is brought to his knees with a bullet to the leg and then shot in the top of the head. The ISIS cameramen linger on him as he takes his last ragged breaths.
Several armed children corner the last victim on a rooftop, who appears to leap to his death to escape them. The children go downstairs and pump several bullets into his head.
One of the victims is notably identified as a member of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party or PKK, the Kurdish separatist group in Turkey. The Turkish government frequently claims the Kurdish YPG militia in Syria, which is allied with the United States and has been fighting the Islamic State since its inception, is a branch of the PKK.
Some of the children shown in the video appear to be wounded. One of them has a cast on his arm.
The 34-minute video, titled “My Father Told Me,” also shows children aged 9 to 13 training with firearms, rocket launchers, and hand-to-hand combat. They also read the Koran, undergo jihadi indoctrination, and pledge to fight for the Islamic State.
Below is an excerpt from the ISIS video provided by the UK Daily Mail. The full video, which contains extremely graphic content, can be seen at Heavy.com.
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John Hayward
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www.breitbart.com
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http://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2017/01/02/isis-releases-cubs-caliphate-video-children-executing-prisoners/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+breitbart+%28Breitbart+News%29
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RIGHT
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39,175,250 |
2017-01-02 17:57:34
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The Guardian
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Shops 'face perfect storm of rising costs and falling spending'
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Property agent JLL warns of closures this year for retailers already struggling with rise of online shopping
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Shops in Britain face a perfect storm of rising costs and falling consumer spending in 2017, one of the world’s leading commercial property agents has warned, raising the possibility of more closures after the demise of BHS last year.
Retailers will have to contend with rising inflation, labour costs and taxes at the same time as consumers tighten their belts, piling on the pressure for businesses that are already having to deal with the rise of online shopping, according to property agent JLL.
The warning of a “perfect storm” for retailers is similar to comments made by Dave Lewis, the chief executive of Tesco, in late 2015 that the industry faced a “potentially lethal cocktail”. Lewis warned that retailers faced £14bn of extra costs over the next five years due to an increase in business rates, the apprenticeship levy and the introduction of the “national living wage”.
The British Retail Consortium has warned that the strain on the sector and the structural changes taking place could lead to up to 900,000 jobs being lost and 74,000 shops being closed over the next decade. In total the industry in the UK employs about 3m people and has 270,000 shops.
In its annual predictions for the year ahead, JLL warned that retailers would be hurt by the weakness in sterling leading to an increase in the cost of importing goods. However, it said that any fall in consumer spending is unlikely to be uniform across the country, with major high streets and shopping centres demonstrating “resilience at the expense of less relevant centres that have been slow to respond to cyclical and structural change”.
Tim Vallance, head of UK retail and leisure at JLL, said: “In 2017, retailers will endure a ‘perfect storm’ of rising inflation, labour costs, import costs and in some cases business rates, ongoing ecommerce–led structural change, in addition to a potential reduction in consumer spend.
“In particular, rising import costs as a result of post-referendum currency fluctuations may have to be passed on to the consumer, or retailer margins will be cut. Larger retailers will be better positioned to bear the impact, offsetting it by currency hedging and economies of scale.”
Retailers will feel particularly squeezed from April, when the national living wage will increase from £7.20 to £7.50 and business rates will move in line with the latest revaluation of Britain’s property.
The revaluation of business rates is expected to result in a sharp increase in tax payments for shops in central London, supermarkets, and shopping centres. However, struggling town centres, especially in the north and west of the country, should enjoy a much-needed tax cut.
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Graham Ruddick
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www.theguardian.com
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https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/jan/02/shops-rising-costs-falling-consumer-spend-closures-retailers
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LEFT
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55,492,533 |
2017-01-02 17:58:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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Wall Street Strategists Feel Better Together in 2017
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High valuations and an unpredictable president-elect leave year-end forecasts more clustered together than ever before.
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Wall Street strategists are abiding by a new motto these days: When in doubt, copy everyone else.
The turn of the calendar comes at a time when stocks are sitting near records. The combination of stretched valuations and the unknowns about Donald Trump’s...
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Steven Russolillo;Google;Steven.Russolillo Wsj.Com
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/wall-street-strategists-feel-bettertogether-in-2017-1483379914
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UNDEFINED
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4,296,107 |
2017-01-02 18:04:43
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Breitbart
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Texas Cops Fired On by 4 or 5 Armed Robbery Suspects
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Harris County sheriff’s deputies are reportedly engaged in a standoff with 4 to 5 armed suspects at a Valero station in northwest Houston.
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HOUSTON, Texas – Harris County sheriff’s deputies are reportedly engaged in a standoff with four to five armed suspects at a Valero gas station in northwest Houston.
KHOU CBS11 is at the scene of the conflict where a reporter tweeted that four to five armed suspects opened fire on the deputies and are “hunkered down” behind the Valero gas station and convenience store on West Road.
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4 to 5 armed suspects believed to have opened fire on deputies hunkered down behind Valero gas station. We’re on the scene now #KHOU11 pic.twitter.com/bHuRoZyfh1 — Rucks Russell (@ruckskhou) January 3, 2017
It is not known at this time if any of the deputies have been hit by the gunfire or if they have returned fire on the suspects.
At least one of the suspects may be using a rifle, KTRK ABC13’s Christine Dobbyn tweeted.
#BREAKING large @HCSOTexas presence on NW side after reports of man with long gun possibly shooting in area @abc13houston #abc13eyewitness pic.twitter.com/bxN5gEYpfF — Christine Dobbyn (@ChristineDobbyn) January 3, 2017
The standoff may have developed after an armed home invasion that took place in the area, Montgomery County Police Reporter’s Scott Engle told Breitbart Texas in a phone interview. Engle posted the following on his website:
What is believed to have started as a home invasion has deputies on alert as shots were fired with a long gun at arriving units near the intersection off West Road and Veterans Memorial. The home on Rosbrook Drive and Moorebrook still has several suspects inside.. In addition several black males were seen running from the scene along a bayou. Additional units with long guns are being requested as is a DPS helicopter.
Russell is reporting at 8:10 Houston local time that deputies have K-9 officers in the area searching for the suspects.
Police dogs now taking part in search for armed men who opened fire on deputies #KHOU11 pic.twitter.com/3sSqxlUjAQ — Rucks Russell (@ruckskhou) January 3, 2017
Click2Houston – NBC reported a witness saying it sounded like the 4th of July, so many shots were being fired at police. The witness said several people were firing shots at the deputies.
The NBC affiliate reported that the residents of the home where the alleged robbery took place were transported to a hospital for treatment after being beaten.
The situation at the Valero station is developing and further updates will be forthcoming.
Bob Price serves as associate editor and senior political news contributor for Breitbart Texas. He is a founding member of the Breitbart Texas team. Follow him on Twitter @BobPriceBBTX.
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Bob Price
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www.breitbart.com
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http://www.breitbart.com/texas/2017/01/02/texas-cops-fired-4-5-armed-robbery-suspects/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+breitbart+%28Breitbart+News%29
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RIGHT
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113,834,936 |
2017-01-02 18:07:56
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CBS News
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Federal prosecutor tackles heroin scourge that claimed his son
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Bruce Brandler, interim U.S. attorney, suddenly finds himself in a position to do something about the heroin scourge that claimed his youngest son
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HARRISBURG, Pa. -- The phone at Bruce Brandler’s home rang at 3:37 a.m. It was the local hospital. His 16-year-old son was there, and he was in really bad shape.
A suspected heroin overdose, the nurse said.
Brandler didn’t believe it. Erik had his problems, but heroin? It seemed impossible.
Nearly 10 years later, the nation is gripped by a spiraling crisis of opioid and heroin abuse - and Brandler, a veteran federal prosecutor recently promoted to interim U.S. attorney, suddenly finds himself in a position to do something about the scourge that claimed his youngest son’s life.
Until now, he has never publicly discussed Erik’s overdose death. It was private and just too painful. But Brandler, now the chief federal law enforcement officer for a sprawling judicial district that covers half of Pennsylvania, said he felt a responsibility that came with his new, higher-profile job.
“It’s easier to cope with the passage of time, but it never goes away,” Brandler told The Associated Press in an interview. “And, frankly, this whole heroin epidemic has brought it to the forefront.”
Fatal heroin overdoses have more than quintupled in the years since Brandler lost his son. The illicit drug, along with highly addictive prescription pain relievers like oxycodone and fentanyl - a substance more powerful than heroin - now rival car crashes as the leading cause of accidental death in the U.S.
Erik’s death proved that heroin doesn’t discriminate, Brandler said. He urged parents to “open their eyes” to the threat and talk to their kids.
“I want to evaporate the myth that heroin addicts are just homeless derelicts,” said Brandler, who, before his son’s overdose, held that impression himself. “This epidemic hits everybody, and I think my situation exemplifies that.”
The opioid crisis was already taking root when Brandler began having problems with Erik, the youngest of his three children. The teenager’s grades dropped, his friends changed and he began keeping irregular hours. Brandler found marijuana in his room and talked to him about it, figuring that was the extent of his drug use.
Then, in spring 2007, Erik overdosed on Ecstasy and had to be treated at a hospital.
“That elevated it to a different level as far as I was concerned, a much more serious level, and I took what I thought were appropriate steps,” Brandler said.
He called the police on his son’s dealer, who was prosecuted. That summer, Erik completed an intensive treatment program that included frequent drug testing. Brandler thought his son had turned a corner.
He was mistaken.
On the night of Aug. 18, 2007, Erik and an older friend paid $60 for three bags of heroin. After shooting up, Erik passed out. His breathing became labored, his lips pale. But his companions didn’t seek medical treatment, not then and not for hours. Finally, around 3 a.m., they dropped him off at the hospital.
At 5:40 a.m., he was pronounced dead.
Five people were charged criminally, including Erik’s friend, who received more than five years in prison.
Brandler still doesn’t know why his son, who excelled at tennis, went to a good school and had loads of friends, turned to heroin.
“I thought about that, of course, but it’s really a waste of energy and emotions to go down that road because I’ll never know the answer,” Brandler said from his office near the Pennsylvania Capitol, where a framed photo of Erik - strapping, shaggy-haired and swinging a tennis racket - sits on a credenza.
What he can do is join his fellow prosecutors in tackling the problem.
In September, the Justice Department ordered all 93 U.S. attorneys across the country to come up with a strategy for combating overdose deaths from heroin and painkillers. Brandler released his plan, covering 3.2 million people in central and northeastern Pennsylvania, last month. Like others, it focuses on prevention, enforcement and treatment.
He said his office will prioritize opioid cases resulting in death, and aggressively prosecute doctors who overprescribe pain pills.
Additionally, prosecutors will hit the road - bringing physicians, recovering addicts, family members of overdose victims and others with them - to talk to schools and hard-hit communities.
Parents need to know that “if you think it can’t happen to you, it can,” Brandler said. “If it happened to me as a federal prosecutor, I think it can happen to anyone, and that’s really the message I want to get out.”
Federal appeals Judge Thomas Vanaskie said it’s a message that needs to be heard.
“Education is the most important thing to me,” said Vanaskie, who helps run a court program that gets federal convicts back on their feet and who has been working with a former heroin addict who robbed a bank to feed his addiction. “We’ve got to prevent people from becoming users.”
Vanaskie, who has known Brandler for years, commended him for speaking out.
“Hearing it from him becomes so much more powerful,” Vanaskie said. “I know it causes great personal pain on his part, but he personalizes, humanizes this matter.”
| null |
www.cbsnews.com
|
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/federal-prosecutor-tackles-heroin-scourge-that-claimed-son/
|
CENTER
|
17,877,025 |
2017-01-02 18:13:06
|
BBC
|
Hilarion Capucci: Arms-smuggling archbishop dies aged 94
|
A former archbishop of Jerusalem who was convicted of smuggling weapons for Palestinians dies, aged 94.
|
Image copyright AFP Image caption Hilarion Capucci twice joined flotillas attempting to break the blockade of the Gaza Strip
A former Melkite Greek Catholic archbishop of Jerusalem who was convicted of smuggling arms for Palestinian militants has died aged 94.
Monsignor Hilarion Capucci served two years of a 12-year sentence in Israel before the Vatican helped secure his release.
He had a history of activism linked to Middle East conflicts.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas offered his condolences and described him as a great "freedom fighter".
The Vatican confirmed his death on Monday, but did not say exactly when he died or give any more details.
Capucci was born in Syria's second city, Aleppo, in 1922.
He was ordained a priest of the Basilian Alepian Order of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church in 1947 and was appointed Patriarchal Vicar of Jerusalem and Archbishop of Caesarea in 1965.
In 1974, he was travelling from Beirut to Jerusalem in a car bearing Vatican diplomatic plates when it was stopped by Israeli security forces.
Inside were four Kalashnikov rifles, two pistols, ammunition and grenades intended for members of the Palestine Liberation Organisation.
Capucci insisted he had been forced to transport the weapons, but an Israeli court convicted him of smuggling and sentenced him to 12 years in prison.
He was freed in 1977 following a personal appeal by Pope Paul VI.
Capucci remained in the headlines following his release, attempting to mediate in the Iran hostage crisis.
Although he reportedly angered a number of American captives with his comments during a visit to check on their welfare in 1980, he did play a key role in the transfer of the bodies of eight US airmen killed in a failed rescue mission.
In 1990, he travelled to Saddam Hussein's Iraq to help secure freedom for 68 Italians prevented from leaving following the invasion of Kuwait.
Ten years later, Capucci led a delegation of clerics and intellectuals to Iraq in a show of solidarity against UN sanctions.
In 2010, he was on board the Mavi Marmara when the Turkish-owned ship was intercepted by Israeli commandos as it took part in an aid flotilla attempting to breach the blockade of the Gaza Strip.
Ten Turkish activists, one of them a dual American citizen, were killed and dozens wounded as clashes broke out after the commandos boarded the ship, descending on ropes from helicopters. Capucci said the raid was unwarranted.
| null |
www.bbc.com
|
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-38489550
|
UNDEFINED
|
4,699,740 |
2017-01-02 18:14:19
|
CNN
|
762 murders. 12 months. 1 American city.
|
It was the deadliest year in nearly two decades. Here's how Chicago to this point and those whose lives have been changed forever.
|
"All these people getting killed, I feel sad. I feel scared. I don't want to be shot."
There were 762 murders in Chicago in 2016. It was the deadliest year in nearly two decades.
Here's how we got to this point, what it means for the city and those whose lives have been changed forever.
WHAT 762 MEANS
The number alone doesn't tell the entire story of Chicago's bloodshed. There's another statistic that points to a disturbing trend the city is facing: a surge.
There was more than a 50% increase in murders in just one year. Chicago hit 500 homicides before the end of the summer in 2016. In 2015, the city had less than 500 homicides total.
Five police districts on the south and west sides of the city accounted for nearly two-thirds of the increase in murders, according to Chicago police.
The day-to-day breakdown of those figures is alarming. For example, there were 12 murders on Father's Day weekend alone . The youngest victim was just 16.
And crime didn't subside over the holidays. On Christmas weekend, 12 people were killed , and police investigated 27 shootings.
CHICAGO VS. OTHER CITIES
When you compare Chicago's murder rate to that of other big cities in the country -- New York and Los Angeles, for example -- it tops the list.
But Chicago isn't necessarily the murder capital of the United States.
New Orleans, St. Louis, Detroit, Baltimore and Newark all have higher figures when you drill down to a per-capita rate.
THE PEOPLE
On New Year's Eve, people carried nearly 800 wooden crosses bearing the names of those killed in Chicago in 2016.
We often point to Chicago's alarming homicide numbers, but the real tragedy in this city are the victims and the families left behind.
One child age 16 or younger is murdered in the city every week on average. This has been happening for more than a quarter century, police records show.
On December 31, 2016, many Chicagoans came together to mourn what they lost over a year: their loved ones, their sense of safety -- and, in many ways, the city they love.
HIS SON WAS THE FIRST HOMICIDE OF 2016
"I see kids now ... and they remind me of my son when I see them. And I just want to tell them: be careful." Renee Canady
Renee Canady's son, Deandre Holiday, was killed in the early hours of January 1, 2016, after getting into a fight. He was 24.
"I see kids now ... and they remind me of my son when I see them. And I just want to tell them: be careful," Canady said.
SHE LOST HER GRANDSON
"We as a people left in Chicago have a lot of work to do." Theodria Constanoplis
Theodria Constanoplis' grandson, Lewis D. Johnson, was killed on June 8, 2016.
"We as a people left in Chicago have a lot of work to do," she said. "They fear going outside. They fear playing."
SHE LOST HER SON
"To bring someone into this world, and then to take them, like nothing." Sonia Fierro
Sonia Fierro's son, Armani Fierro, died in August.
Fierro said she feels empty without her son. "To bring someone into this world, and then to take them, like nothing."
SHE LOST HER FATHER
"It wasn't a sudden change in the last year. Violence has been in Chicago for the last few years." Brittney Porter
Brittney Porter's father, Robert Porter Jr., was killed on September 4, 2016.
Born and raised in Chicago, Porter has three children and fears for their safety daily.
"It wasn't a sudden change in the last year. Violence has been in Chicago for the last few years," she said.
HE LOST HIS BROTHER
Michael Torres' brother, Louis Antonio Torres, was killed in November.
"I don't even think I'm proud to say I'm from Chicago anymore," Torres said.
THEIR CHILDHOODS HAVE BEEN STOLEN
Earlier in 2016, we met some of the youngest victims of Chicago's violence . Several children learn how to hit the floor at the sound of gunfire -- and it's a lesson they're taught before they're old enough to set foot in a classroom.
JUST WATCHED Etyra Ruffin, 10 years old. Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Etyra Ruffin, 10 years old. 00:58
JUST WATCHED Devin Henderson, 11 years old. Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Devin Henderson, 11 years old. 00:50
THE GUN PROBLEM
A lot of the homicides in Chicago are gun-related. In 2016, there were 3,550 shooting incidents and 4,331 shooting victims, according to the Chicago Police Department.
Chicago has strict gun laws, which is why many gun rights advocates point to it as evidence that tighter regulation doesn't equal less crime.
GUNS IN CHICAGO: 2016 BY THE NUMBERS 3,550 shooting incidents 4,331 shooting victims 8,300 guns recovered -- a 20% increase from 2015 10% more gun arrests in 2016 Source: Chicago Police Department
But Chicago's gun violence problem is more complicated. Sixty percent of the guns used in shootings were purchased out of state.
"We border Indiana and Wisconsin, which have really lax gun laws," Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson said.
"We know that people from Chicago go across the border, fill up gym bags with illegal weapons from gun shows and things of that nature and they come back here and sell them to the gangs."
Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner recently signed a new gun control law that imposes harsher penalties on those who bring in guns from out of state to sell and do not have gun-owner ID cards.
WHO'S TO BLAME?
The street crime in Chicago has led to the killing of innocent bystanders and kept residents shut inside their homes out of fear.
Police said the majority of the violence wasn't random. More than 80% of fatal and nonfatal shooting victims in 2016 were previously identified by CPD as being likely to be involved in an act of gun violence either as a victim or an offender.
"The violence in 2016 was driven by emboldened offenders who acted without a fear of penalty from the criminal justice system," Superintendent Johnson said.
Neither homes nor streets are safe : Those are the first and second most likely places to get murdered in Chicago.
Englewood resident Stephanie Armas, 43, said she taught her kids from a very young age what to do when they hear gunshots.
"If you really want to stop this epidemic of violence, the best way to stop a bullet is with a job." Pastor Ira Acree, March 2016
"If you live in a society where (your children) have to learn to duck and dodge bullets, you have to teach them how to duck and dodge bullets," Armas said on September 1. "That's all you can do."
Porter, who grew up on the South Side, she said she thinks poverty and lack of education are a big part of Chicago's problem.
She also touched on how the city is still so segregated. Lack of resources for some of the neighborhoods, she said, is a major issue.
THE POLICE AND THE COMMUNITY
For many residents in Chicago, there's also a deeply rooted distrust of the police force.
The city's police department was under review for months in the wake of high-profile officer-involved shootings, including that of Laquan McDonald.
JUST WATCHED Laquan McDonald: The video that ignited protests Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Laquan McDonald: The video that ignited protests 01:36
An independent task force accused the police department of institutional racism , saying officers "have no regard for the sanctity of life when it comes to people of color."
However, officer-involved shootings are only a tiny portion of Chicago's homicide rate.
From January 1 to September 8, there were six deaths tied to officer-involved shootings, according to the Independent Police Review Authority.
Attacks on officers, according to the Chicago Police Department, nearly doubled in 2016.
How will this all change in 2017? Some people are moving. Others are refusing to go outside. This man traded a gun for a yoga mat. One woman patrols her street herself.
But most of the people we've talked to in Chicago are united on a single desire: to make their city safe. They just don't know how.
The police department said it has its priorities: expanding the department, new leadership and "partnering with residents" are among them.
"The challenge we face as a city is serious, and like other cities it is significant," Superintendent Johnson said. "If we come together and work together I know we can turn the tide in 2017."
|
Amanda Wills;Sergio Hernandez;Marlena Baldacci;Devin Henderson;Renee Canady;Theodria Constanoplis;Sonia Fierro;Brittney Porter;Pastor Ira Acree
|
www.cnn.com
|
http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/us/chicago-murder-rate-2016-visual-guide/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_latest+%28RSS%3A+CNN+-+Most+Recent%29
|
UNDEFINED
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3,950,717 |
2017-01-02 18:17:43
|
HuffPost
|
Trump's Impulsiveness Challenges Are Vital To U.S.-China Relationship
|
What the president of the United States says sets the tone and shapes American foreign policy.
As a candidate and even as president-elect, Donald Trump ...
|
What the president of the United States says sets the tone and shapes American foreign policy.
As a candidate and even as president-elect, Donald Trump has shown little interest in the protocols, agreements and practices that have marked American foreign policy - and even less interest in spelling out a consistent foreign policy of his own. His impulsive style and his tendency to tweet whatever is on his mind have increased tensions across the globe, and especially with China.
Trump tosses off comments in all directions and uses Twitter to express popular but vague positions on a wide range of policies. He is keeping the world guessing about his future statecraft. I and others have a hard time understanding his true intentions.
Trump accepted a phone call and held a conversation with Taiwanese president Tsai Ing-wen, a highly unorthodox move that broke with nearly four decades of precedent and called into question America's One China policy. In addition, he has threatened to impose a 45 percent tariff on China, which would disrupt world trade. His unsubstantiated judgments that China is "killing us" on trade and "raping our country" create enormous resentment and uncertainty.
Trump has a transactional view of governing, including foreign policy. In his world, everything is a deal; every relationship is tit-for-tat. He suggests using Taiwan as a bargaining chip to force China to give us a break on trade. He is stoking tensions, flirting with major changes (apparently reconsidering the One China policy) in order to gain trade concessions. He is willing to disrupt the relationship without concern about the consequences.
The question arises: Is this approach to policy the way to handle this critically important relationship?
The U.S. relationship with China, ongoing since 1972 when President Richard Nixon visited China, has included elements of confrontation and cooperation. It is not surprising that a new president might have questions about the relationship and want to put his own stamp on policies.
Trump's willingness to shake up the traditional norms and framework may have some value, and some push-back lets China know that, while we want a stable, mutually beneficial relationship, there are limits to our willingness to cooperate.
After all, China, with its rising footprint in the region, significant power and growing activism, does present challenges for U.S. policy. China has largely avoided intervention in other countries' affairs, however, even as it aggressively pursues its interests and protects its territorial claims.
But our engagement with China over a period of decades has served both sides, creating stability in the region, avoiding war and allowing both countries to grow and prosper. Questioning longstanding policy is fair game; creating chaos, resentments and doubt is not.
Is Trump signaling a real shift? And if so, what it will be? Does he want to abandon the One China policy, a bedrock principle of American foreign policy? And replace it with what? Does he want to provoke a trade war?
The relationship is fragile as well as of paramount importance. The future of the world, in no small measure, depends on the stability of U.S.-China relations. Trump's vague tweets, with few details, sow confusion and escalate risks, such as when China flew what was described as a nuclear-capable bomber across Taiwan and disputed areas of the South China Sea.
All this means that America must be clear, consistent and forceful in maintaining our vital interests in the region. So, from my perspective, Trump's statements are worrisome. He needs to reassure our allies that America will maintain open commerce and trade, continue pragmatic relations, calm tensions and uphold global standards of conduct between nations.
With strong and growing ties with China, America's interest is to make the relationship work. China is our largest trading partner, a nuclear power, and a member of the U.N. Security Council with veto power. U.S. exports to China support over 250,000 jobs. We have strong and growing ties with China.
China also can contribute to the world's stability. Many global problems will be easier to solve with China on board. We have numerous common interests, including climate change, nuclear security and cybersecurity. A stable U.S.-China relationship produces substantial benefits for both countries.
But making the relationship work takes clarity about U.S. objectives. Trump challenges the status quo, but it is not clear what direction he wants to go. The American foreign policy establishment and our allies around the world are anxious about his casual approach.
|
Lee H. Hamilton;Distinguished Scholar;Indiana University
|
www.huffingtonpost.com
|
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lee-h-hamilton/trumps-impulsiveness-chal_b_13929822.html?utm_hp_ref=world&ir=WorldPost
|
LEFT
|
4,721,373 |
2017-01-02 18:20:40
|
CNN
|
Democrats target eight cabinet nominees, threaten to drag out process
|
Senate Democrats are vowing to stall action on eight of Donald Trump's Cabinet nominees tasked with carrying out his economic, law enforcement and regulatory agenda, a senior Democratic aide told CNN Monday.
|
(CNN) Senate Democrats are vowing to stall action on eight of Donald Trump's Cabinet nominees tasked with carrying out his economic, law enforcement and regulatory agenda, a senior Democratic aide told CNN Monday.
If carried through, the threat that could delay confirming the President-elect's choices for months.
Democrats warn if they don't get the nominees' required background information and financial records and have adequate time to review them before confirmation hearings are held, they'll drag out confirmation votes with a series of procedural maneuvers.
While Democrats are unlikely to have the votes to block most of these nominees, their threat to delay the confirmation process of Trump's Cabinet could hamper the new administration, which has promised a fast start in undoing policies of outgoing President Barack Obama.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell plans confirmation votes on multiple nominees on the afternoon of Inauguration Day, something that could now be in jeopardy if Democrats carry out their threat of imposing procedural hurdles.
However, Republicans said they weren't convinced the delaying tactics from incoming Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer would succeed.
Any "attempt by Republicans to have a series of rushed, truncated hearings before Inauguration Day and before the Congress and public have adequate information on all of them is something Democrats will vehemently resist," Schumer said in a written statement. "If Republicans think they can quickly jam through a whole slate of nominees without a fair hearing process, they're sorely mistaken."
Tillerson, the ExxonMobil chief executive who has been criticized by Republicans and Democrats for his ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, has drawn additional scrutiny from Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee for not turning in his tax returns for the past three years, something Republicans argue is not required of him. Sessions has also been blasted by Democrats on the Judiciary Committee for turning in what they say is incomplete background information from the Alabama senator.
Confirmation hearings for Sessions, Tillerson, DeVos and Pudzer are tentatively scheduled to begin next week.
How Democrats can slow the process
Once the committees have voted to send the nominations to the floor, Democrats, who have 48 seats compared to 52 for Republicans, can force delays for up to about one week per nominee, meaning it could take months to get through all the major posts.
But without GOP support, Democrats will be unable to use the ultimate stopping power of the filibuster to block nominees they oppose because in the last Congress they changed Senate rules -- over the objection of Republicans -- to lower the threshold of votes to overcome a filibuster of executive branch nominees from 60 to 51.
That means they best they can do is use procedural delays to stall a final confirmation vote.
They can insist on cloture votes for each nominee, and then use the entire amount of debate time allowed under the rules to delay speedy votes, and clog up floor time with lengthy floor speeches. This would mean each nominee could take up to a week to ultimately be confirmed and force McConnell to set aside other top legislative priorities -- like starting the process of repealing Obamacare.
Republicans also think the handful of Democrats from red-leaning states who are up for re-election in 2018 won't be willing to obstruct Trump's nominees.
"When President Obama was elected, Republicans and Democrats worked together and expeditiously to carefully consider his nominees. The Senate held hearings on multiple nominees before he was even sworn in. The Senate confirmed seven of his nominees on day one—and nearly all were confirmed within two weeks," said Don Stewart, a spokesman for McConnell. "Sen. Schumer and others approved wholeheartedly of this approach at the time, so surely they won't object to treating the incoming president's nominees with the same courtesy and seriousness with which the Senate acted on President Obama's nominees."
Democrats say that Obama's nominees were vetted earlier by the FBI and the Office of Government Ethics, which reviews potential financial conflicts by nominees, and that those results were turned over to the committee before the confirmation hearings were scheduled. Republicans note, however, that none of the confirmation hearings has been officially scheduled and that only tentative dates have been announced.
|
Ted Barrett;Deirdre Walsh
|
www.cnn.com
|
http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/politics/senate-confirmation-hearings-democrats-target/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_latest+%28RSS%3A+CNN+-+Most+Recent%29
|
UNDEFINED
|
4,692,284 |
2017-01-02 18:20:40
|
CNN
|
Democrats target eight Cabinet nominees, threaten to drag out process
|
Senate Democrats are vowing to stall action on eight of Donald Trump's Cabinet nominees tasked with carrying out his economic, law enforcement and regulatory agenda, a senior Democratic aide told CNN Monday.
|
(CNN) Senate Democrats are vowing to stall action on eight of Donald Trump's Cabinet nominees tasked with carrying out his economic, law enforcement and regulatory agenda, a senior Democratic aide told CNN Monday.
If carried through, the threat that could delay confirming the President-elect's choices for months.
Democrats warn if they don't get the nominees' required background information and financial records and have adequate time to review them before confirmation hearings are held, they'll drag out confirmation votes with a series of procedural maneuvers.
While Democrats are unlikely to have the votes to block most of these nominees, their threat to delay the confirmation process of Trump's Cabinet could hamper the new administration, which has promised a fast start in undoing policies of outgoing President Barack Obama.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell plans confirmation votes on multiple nominees on the afternoon of Inauguration Day, something that could now be in jeopardy if Democrats carry out their threat of imposing procedural hurdles.
However, Republicans said they weren't convinced the delaying tactics from incoming Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer would succeed.
Any "attempt by Republicans to have a series of rushed, truncated hearings before Inauguration Day and before the Congress and public have adequate information on all of them is something Democrats will vehemently resist," Schumer said in a written statement. "If Republicans think they can quickly jam through a whole slate of nominees without a fair hearing process, they're sorely mistaken."
Tillerson, the ExxonMobil chief executive who has been criticized by Republicans and Democrats for his ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, has drawn additional scrutiny from Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee for not turning in his tax returns for the past three years, something Republicans argue is not required of him. Sessions has also been blasted by Democrats on the Judiciary Committee for turning in what they say is incomplete background information from the Alabama senator.
Confirmation hearings for Sessions, Tillerson, DeVos and Pudzer are tentatively scheduled to begin next week.
How Democrats can slow the process
Once the committees have voted to send the nominations to the floor, Democrats, who have 48 seats compared to 52 for Republicans, can force delays for up to about one week per nominee, meaning it could take months to get through all the major posts.
But without GOP support, Democrats will be unable to use the ultimate stopping power of the filibuster to block nominees they oppose because in the last Congress they changed Senate rules -- over the objection of Republicans -- to lower the threshold of votes to overcome a filibuster of executive branch nominees from 60 to 51.
That means they best they can do is use procedural delays to stall a final confirmation vote.
They can insist on cloture votes for each nominee, and then use the entire amount of debate time allowed under the rules to delay speedy votes, and clog up floor time with lengthy floor speeches. This would mean each nominee could take up to a week to ultimately be confirmed and force McConnell to set aside other top legislative priorities -- like starting the process of repealing Obamacare.
Republicans also think the handful of Democrats from red-leaning states who are up for re-election in 2018 won't be willing to obstruct Trump's nominees.
"When President Obama was elected, Republicans and Democrats worked together and expeditiously to carefully consider his nominees. The Senate held hearings on multiple nominees before he was even sworn in. The Senate confirmed seven of his nominees on day one—and nearly all were confirmed within two weeks," said Don Stewart, a spokesman for McConnell. "Sen. Schumer and others approved wholeheartedly of this approach at the time, so surely they won't object to treating the incoming president's nominees with the same courtesy and seriousness with which the Senate acted on President Obama's nominees."
Democrats say that Obama's nominees were vetted earlier by the FBI and the Office of Government Ethics, which reviews potential financial conflicts by nominees, and that those results were turned over to the committee before the confirmation hearings were scheduled. Republicans note, however, that none of the confirmation hearings has been officially scheduled and that only tentative dates have been announced.
|
Ted Barrett;Deirdre Walsh
|
www.cnn.com
|
http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/politics/senate-confirmation-hearings-democrats-target/index.html
|
UNDEFINED
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4,376,809 |
2017-01-02 18:24:11
|
Fox News
|
Round-the-clock federal manhunt underway for escaped inmate
|
A round-the-clock state and federal manhunt is underway for an inmate who escaped from a Rhode Island detention center.
|
A round-the-clock state and federal manhunt is underway for an inmate who escaped from a Rhode Island detention center.
The Wyatt Correctional Center warden says 35-year-old former Army reservist James Morales fled Saturday by climbing a basketball hoop to reach a rooftop, cutting through a fence and climbing through razor wire.
Warden Daniel Martin says it took more than three hours to discover Morales was missing. Two officers have been placed on paid leave.
The prison in Central Falls remains locked down as officials review procedures.
Morales is charged with stealing 16 guns from a U.S. Army Reserve Center and faces child rape charges.
Police believe Morales fled to Attleboro, Massachusetts, and stole a car that was found Sunday.
Officials say Morales may be armed and is considered extremely dangerous.
| null |
www.foxnews.com
|
https://www.foxnews.com/us/round-the-clock-federal-manhunt-underway-for-escaped-inmate
|
RIGHT
|
3,977,961 |
2017-01-02 18:31:43
|
HuffPost
|
Mysterious Marijuana-Related Illness Popping Up In Emergency Rooms
|
The vomiting illness is increasing in states with legal pot.
|
John Vizcaino / Reuters Doctors are stumped by the science behind cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome.
A mysterious marijuana-related illness is popping up with increasing frequency in hospital emergency rooms, particularly in states where cannabis is now legal.
The symptoms are severe abdominal pain and violent vomiting — and most doctors are initially stumped when they encounter patients with the problem.
The illness is cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome, which is linked to heavy, long-term use of marijuana, according to experts. For some reason, the nausea and vomiting of CHS can be relieved with hot showers or baths, which can serve as an important hint for physicians trying to diagnose a patient.
Since 2009, when the federal government relaxed its stance on medical marijuana, emergency room diagnoses for CHS in two of Colorado’s hospitals nearly doubled, according to a study co-authored by Dr. Kennon Heard, a physician at the University of Colorado Hospital in Aurora. Now that cannabis is also legal for recreational use in the state, “we are seeing it quite frequently,” Heard told CBS News. “My colleagues are seeing this on a daily to weekly basis.”
Emergency rooms in other areas where cannabis is legal are also reporting more cases of CHS. Georgetown University Hospital in Washington, D.C., and Harborview Medical Center and the University of Washington Medical Center in Seattle are among hospitals reporting an uptick.
Though CHS was first recognized almost a decade ago, not much is known about the illness.
“The science behind it is not clear,” Heard told the Denver Channel. “The most likely cause is that people using marijuana frequently and in high doses have changes in the receptors in their body, and those receptors become dysregulated in some way, and it starts causing pain.”
Dr. David Steinbruner, an emergency room physician at Memorial Hospital in Colorado Springs, believes it’s likely triggered with a significant amount of marijuana. “The corollary would be alcohol. So small amounts may be fine for people, but over a long time it will cause all kinds of problems,” Steinbruner told KDRO-TV.
In its most severe form, the illness can lead to kidney failure — but symptoms stop within days of ending marijuana use.
|
Mary Papenfuss;Trends Reporter;The Huffington Post
|
www.huffingtonpost.com
|
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/mysterious-marijuana-flu-emergency-rooms_us_5869d6bee4b0eb586489f7e6
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LEFT
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4,755,633 |
2017-01-02 18:34:19
|
CNN
|
Why Donald Trump should make North Korea a priority
|
Sen. Cory Gardner: Through a policy of strength, the incoming Trump administration should seize the immediate opportunity to communicate with action to Kim Jong Un as well as our allies that the United States remains committed to standing up to tyrants and ensuring peace and stability around the globe.
|
Cory Gardner, a Republican, is the junior United States senator from Colorado. He previously served as the US representative for Colorado's 4th congressional district. This views expressed in this commentary are his own.
(CNN) The Obama administration's failed policy of "strategic patience" toward Pyongyang contributed to the rapid development of North Korea's arsenal of mass destruction . The acceleration of its nuclear and ballistic missile program represents a grave threat to global peace and stability -- and a direct threat to the American homeland in the immediate future.
In short, turning a blind eye to North Korea produced one of the greatest and most complex security challenges facing the incoming Trump administration. Therefore, it is imperative that the next administration not only ratchet up pressure on the regime, but that it work with Congress, the international community and our allies in the region to counter North Korean aggression.
North Korea's spike in weapons tests is evidence that its capabilities are increasing and that its murderous leader, Kim Jong Un, grows increasingly belligerent and provocative.
North Korea's cyber attacks have also grown in number and sophistication. According to a recent report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies: "North Korea is emerging as a significant actor in cyberspace with both its military and clandestine organizations gaining the ability to conduct cyber operations." In addition to the widely-reported hack of Sony Pictures in 2014, the North Koreans have successfully breached South Korean civilian and military institutions, including reportedly obtaining blueprints for components of the US-made F-15 fighter jet.
After years of inaction, Congress addressed Kim Jong Un's belligerent behavior by passing the North Korea Sanctions and Policy Enhancement Act in February of 2016, marking the first time Congress imposed stand-alone mandatory sanctions on North Korea. President Obama signed the legislation into law just days later, a recognition that his policy of "strategic patience" was unsuccessful and it is time for a new approach to deterring Pyongyang. This legislation was also the first to mandate cyber sanctions against North Korea, however, the Obama administration has not done so to date.
While the Obama administration has implemented portions of the North Korea Sanctions and Policy Enhancement Act, I encourage the Trump administration to continue with the full implementation and more importantly, the enforcement of the sanctions outlined in the legislation.
In particular, I urge the new administration to utilize the so-called "secondary sanctions," which target outside entities, or companies, that help Pyongyang engage in illicit behavior. Many of these companies are based in the People's Republic of China, and the US must not be afraid to anger Beijing by going after them. While the Obama administration has sanctioned and indicted four Chinese nationals and one Chinese-based company for its business tied to North Korea's weapons program, there are many more that the Treasury Department can -- and should -- target with financial sanctions.
JUST WATCHED N. Korean military drills target S. Korea Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH N. Korean military drills target S. Korea 01:54
Due to the lack of real enforcement mechanisms, it is impossible to know whether China -- North Korea's largest trading partner -- has faithfully complied with UN Security Council Resolutions relating to North Korea, and the United States has done little to address it. That is why I urge the Trump administration to immediately pursue and implement a full range of economic and criminal unilateral sanctions on any entity that violates North Korea sanctions. Our message must be clear: if you do business with Pyongyang, you will face the full wrath of the US economic sanctions regime.
While sanctions are an important tool to deter Pyongyang, it is also essential that the US reassure our allies, South Korea and Japan, through action that any aggression from North Korea will result in unwavering diplomatic and military support from the United States. The US should continue with show of force exercises near North Korea to demonstrate to the regime that it will pay a heavy price for any aggression to our allies in the region, such as the B-1 nuclear bomber overflights in September.
Additionally, we must expedite the placement of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, or THAAD , in South Korea to protect our allies and the tens of thousands of American troops in the region. I also urge the Trump administration to explore possibilities for asymmetrical actions to increase pressure on the regime, such as the re-designation of North Korea as a state sponsor of terror, stripping Pyongyang of its United Nations seat, or imposing a genuine and enforceable global trade embargo on Pyongyang.
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In order to effectively counter the North Korean threat, the US must strengthen its alliances in the region and build a genuine and lasting trilateral alliance between the US, the Republic of Korea, and Japan. The recent trilateral missile defense exercises and the signing of an intelligence information-sharing agreement between Seoul and Tokyo have been historic developments and we must continue to build on this progress.
While US policy toward North Korea has been enhanced with the new sanctions legislation, we still have not peacefully disarmed Pyongyang -- and that should be the primary and unwavering US policy goal. Through a policy of strength, the incoming Trump administration should seize the immediate opportunity to communicate with action to Kim Jong Un as well as our allies that the United States remains committed to standing up to tyrants and ensuring peace and stability around the globe.
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Cory Gardner
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www.cnn.com
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/opinions/trump-north-korea-priority-opinion/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_latest+%28RSS%3A+CNN+-+Most+Recent%29
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UNDEFINED
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55,450,376 |
2017-01-02 18:39:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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The Champions of the 401(k) Lament the Revolution They Started
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The dominant vehicle for retirement savings has fallen short of its early backers’ rosy expectations; longer life spans, high fees and stock-market declines.
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Herbert Whitehouse was one of the first in the U.S. to suggest workers use a 401(k). His hope in 1981 was that the retirement-savings plan would supplement a company pension that guaranteed payouts for life.
Thirty-five years later, the former Johnson & Johnson human-resources executive has misgivings about what he helped start.
What Mr. Whitehouse and other proponents didn’t anticipate was that the tax-deferred savings...
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Timothy W. Martin;Google;Timothy.Martin Wsj.Com
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-champions-of-the-401-k-lament-the-revolution-they-started-1483382348
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UNDEFINED
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4,829,652 |
2017-01-02 18:43:16
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CNN
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How Trump can reshape the federal courts
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Donald Trump is poised to cement the conservative majority on the Supreme Court, but he will also play a critical role in reshaping the look of the lower courts as he moves to fill over 100 vacancies in the federal judiciary.
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Story highlights Trump inherits over 100 federal court vacancies
Experts say the incoming President could reshape the federal judiciary
Washington (CNN) Donald Trump is poised to cement the conservative majority on the Supreme Court, but he will also play a critical role in reshaping the look of the lower courts as he moves to fill over 100 vacancies in the federal judiciary.
Experts say that the unusually high number of vacancies -- due in part to judicial warfare between the Obama administration and the Republican-led Senate -- could change the face of the courts.
"If President-elect Trump can put a different face on the Supreme Court and the Courts of Appeals he could substantially change the course of federal jurisprudence," said Russell Wheeler of the Brookings Institution.
As things stand now, there are 103 vacancies in the appeals and district courts. The Administrative Office of the US Courts defines 38 of those as judicial "emergencies," or those where vacancies have existed for an extended period of time in areas with a high number of filings.
For comparison, President Barack Obama had 59 vacancies when he took office.
Read More
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Ariane De Vogue;Cnn Supreme Court Reporter
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www.cnn.com
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/politics/trump-federal-court-vacancies/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_latest+%28RSS%3A+CNN+-+Most+Recent%29
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UNDEFINED
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4,246,024 |
2017-01-02 18:47:56
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USA Today
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Garbage bins used to corral massive crocodile in Australia
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Quick-thinking Queensland residents and police used garbage bins and hay bales in an attempt to trap a massive crocodile that wandered into someone's backyard on New Year's Eve, according to authorities.
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Quick-thinking Queensland residents used plastic wheelie bins to corral a massive crocodile who wandered into someone’s backyard on New Year's Eve, according to police. (Photo: Queensland Police Department)
Quick-thinking Queensland residents and police used garbage bins and hay bales in an attempt to trap a massive crocodile that wandered into someone's backyard on New Year's Eve, according to authorities.
The crocodile, which was just under 12 feet long, made himself at home in someone's backyard before moving out towards the front gate to sunbathe, the Queensland Police Department said in a statement.
“Officers and locals initially orchestrated a line of wheelie bins in an attempt to funnel him back towards the water, but it became clear he wasn’t keen to move,” the Queensland Police Department said in a statement. “Perhaps due to a broken navi-gator?”
Officers used hay bales to box the unwanted guest in until wildlife experts arrived to relocate the crocodile.
The crocodile, which was just under 12 feet long, made himself at home at in someone’s backyard before moving out towards the front gate to continue sunbathing, the Queensland Police Department said in a statement. (Photo: Queensland Police Department)
Police Sergeant Jim Richards told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation that officials plan on taking the to an crocodile farm.
Follow Mary Bowerman on Twitter: @MaryBowerman
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/2iWp9tf
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Mary Bowerman;A.M. Est January
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www.usatoday.com
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2017/01/02/massive-crocodile-confined-garbage-bins-australia/96078438/?utm_source=feedblitz&utm_medium=FeedBlitzRss&utm_campaign=usatoday-newstopstories
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CENTER
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55,491,079 |
2017-01-02 18:50:00
|
The Wall Street Journal
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Fixing 401(k)s: What’s Being Done to Improve Access, Limit Early Withdrawals
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In the 10 years since lawmakers last overhauled the retirement-savings system, assets in 401(k) plans have surged. But because participation rates remain inadequate, experts say more needs to be done to improve the system.
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In the 10 years since lawmakers last overhauled the retirement-savings system, assets in 401(k) plans have surged. But because savings and participation rates in these plans remain inadequate, experts say more needs to be done to improve the backbone of the nation’s private retirement-savings system.
The most glaring problem, policy experts say, is a lack of universal access to retirement-savings plans. At any given time, more than one-third of private-sector workers don’t have access to a workplace retirement savings...
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Anne Tergesen;Anne.Tergesen Wsj.Com
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/fixing-401-k-s-whats-being-done-to-improve-access-limit-early-withdrawals-1483383012
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UNDEFINED
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4,300,968 |
2017-01-02 18:50:35
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Breitbart
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Brazil: Greek Ambassador's Wife and her Lover Are Top Suspects in His Assassination
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A Brazilian military police officer has confessed to killing Greek Ambassador to Brasilia Kyriakos Amiridis, the husband of his lover.
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A Brazilian military police officer has confessed to killing Greek Ambassador to Brasilia Kyriakos Amiridis, the husband of his lover, in what he claims to have been self-defense. Police contradict his claim, however, stating evidence points to the ambassador’s wife Francoise orchestrating the murder.
Françoise de Souza Oliveira reported her husband missing to police on Wednesday in Rio de Janeiro, where the couple and their ten-year-old daughter were on vacation. Police ultimately found burned remains they believe to be of the Greek ambassador in a hollowed-out car apparently set on fire shortly after Amiridis’s death.
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The Brazilian newspaper O Globo reports that two men have been arrested in connection with the killing: military police officer Sérgio Gomes Moreira Filho and Eduardo Moreira Tedeschi de Melo, described in conflicting reports as either Filho’s cousin or nephew. Filho has confessed to killing Amiridis but claims he did so in self-defense, alleging that he had come to the ambassador’s vacation home to reproach him for an alleged assault on his wife. Involved in a fist fight, Filho claims he strangled Amiridis upon noticing a firearm within the ambassador’s reach.
According to police, Filho then “drove about 300 kilometers” using the ambassador’s rented vacation car with the body, ultimately setting it on fire in Nova Friburgo.
De Souza’s version of events corroborates Filho’s; she has confirmed to police that they were lovers and insisted that she had no role in the killing and could not have participated or stopped it because she was out with their daughter at the time.
Moreira’s account, however, differs significantly from the couple’s. Moreira has confessed to being a “lookout” accomplice for Filho, waiting outside of the home to ensure no one would interrupt the killing. He participated, he told police, because de Souza offered 80,000 reais ($25,500) to aid in killing her husband and threatened to kill him if he told police. Moreira claims de Souza warned, “if you denounce us, you will end up like the ambassador.”
Moreira also claims she never told him her husband was an ambassador, merely a “businessman” — possibly to avoid scaring him away from the job given the very public murder of Russia’s ambassador to Turkey Andrei Karlov in December. Unlike that assassination — also by a policeman, Mevlut Mert Altintas, who stated he sought “revenge” for Aleppo through his act — police have not found any reason to believe that Amiridis’s death is a political crime.
Police investigator Evaristo Pontes Magalhaes told reporters in a press conference Friday that de Souza was a prime suspect. “All our evidence suggests that her motivation was to use the financial resources left by the ambassador so she could enjoy life with Sergio,” he explained. In addition to Moreira’s testimony, police note that they found blood on the sofa in the vacation home where the crime occurred, contradicting the asphyxiation claim and that surveillance footage shows de Souza returned home before Filho removed the body yet waited two more days to contact police regarding her husband’s disappearance.
Prior to his tenure as Greek Ambassador to Brazil, Amiridis served as Greece’s ambassador to Libya between 2012 and 2016. He has previously engaged in diplomatic efforts in Rio de Janeiro.
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Frances Martel
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www.breitbart.com
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http://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2017/01/02/brazil-police-officer-assassinates-greek-ambassador-affair/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+breitbart+%28Breitbart+News%29
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RIGHT
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39,089,732 |
2017-01-02 19:14:08
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The Guardian
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Centrelink's debt mistake: 'there's no way I could explain to them'
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Centrelink’s online system asked Michael Griffin to confirm his earnings, and that’s when his problems began
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Centrelink’s online system asked Michael Griffin to confirm his earnings, and that’s when his problems began
When Centrelink’s letter arrived two weeks before Christmas, Michael Griffin instinctively knew he was going to be unfairly trapped.
So he meticulously documented, step-by-step, how the system wrongly deemed him to have a $3,197 debt.
Griffin’s ordeal began when he received the standardised letter from Centrelink, telling him there was a discrepancy between income information held by the Australian taxation office, and what he had reported fortnightly while claiming the dole in 2013.
Government backs Centrelink debt system despite 'incorrect' $24,000 demand Read more
He was told to go online to his MyGov account to confirm his income details.
Griffin originally claimed benefits between February and May in 2013, receiving a total of $3,754 from Centrelink.
He reported working small amounts in three fortnights within those months.
In two fortnights, he worked 24 hours and earned $618 a fortnight, and in the third he worked 15 hours and earned $386.
Griffin has provided payslips to Guardian Australia that clearly show he reported this income accurately.
He boosted his working hours in the rest of his year, while not claiming welfare, and ended up with a total income of $26,642 for the 2013-14 financial year.
Centrelink’s online system asked him to confirm that he had earned $26,642, which Griffin did. This is where his problems began. Screenshots show how Centrelink’s system then averaged out his $26,000 yearly income across every fortnightly reporting period.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest A screenshot showing how Centrelink’s automatic data matching averaged out Michael Griffin’s income over the year resulting in a false debt. Photograph: None
It wrongly assumed he had consistently earned $1,021 every fortnight across the year, including between February and May, instead of different amounts in different fortnightly reporting periods.
That wrong assumption made him ineligible to claim welfare for that period, and he was told he must repay almost all of the dole he claimed, a total of $3,197.
“I knew that this would happen when I went on the site, but there is no way for it not to happen – no way that I could pre-emptively explain to them,” Griffin said.
“Surely my situation is the default – how many people is this happening to?” he said.
Guardian Australia continues to receive dozens of similar complaints about Centrelink’s compliance system, which is automatically comparing income reported to the agency with information held by other areas of government, principally the Australian taxation office.
It then asks welfare recipients – at a rate of 20,000 a week – to prove they are entitled to claim benefits from up to six years ago.
A key complaint about the system is that it reverses the onus of proof onto Australia’s most vulnerable and poorest groups.
Legal Aid Victoria has noticed a significant jump in those coming to them for assistance on welfare debts since the system began in July.
But the Legal Aid lawyer Joel Townsend fears most people are not even questioning their debts, and are failing to seek legal help.
“I think that one of the larger issues is the impact of automating this kind of debt collection process on the most disadvantaged people, people with mental health problems, young people, people without a good grasp of the English language,” he said.
“Those people are likely to be the people who are least able to handle a system that puts the onus on them to disprove a Centrelink debt.”
“Lots of people who should be seeking help with this legal issue are not doing so. And people who should be seeking reviews by Centrelink are not doing so.”
The government continues to maintain confidence in the system.
The Department of Human Services said it allows customers the chance to contest the discrepancy.
The vast majority of people, the department says, resolve the issue online and without the need for payslips or letters of employment.
|
Christopher Knaus
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www.theguardian.com
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https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/jan/03/centrelinks-debt-mistake-theres-no-way-i-could-explain-to-them
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LEFT
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39,096,094 |
2017-01-02 19:15:44
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The Guardian
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Republicans' plan to erase Obama legacy starts with chipping away at Obamacare
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Congressional GOP’s ‘repeal and replace’ legislation may prove tricky to enact, while Democrats focus on fighting confirmation of Trump cabinet nominees
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A Republican-dominated Congress convenes on Tuesday with a carefully crafted plan to erase much of what the Obama administration considered to be its main domestic achievements, starting with healthcare and environmental regulations.
Barack Obama is seeking to rally Democrats on Capitol Hill on Wednesday for a rearguard struggle to salvage at least some of his signature legislation in the face of looming attacks over the course of the incoming Trump administration. But the party’s ability to resist is hampered by Republican legislative tactics designed to minimize the power of the minority, and the fact that 10 Democratic senators will face re-election two years from now in states won by Donald Trump, making them reluctant to defy him.
Obama treads on Trump's Twitter turf to reflect on presidential achievements Read more
In light of such handicaps, Democrats are likely to focus their limited political resources on fighting confirmation of Trump nominees for high office, particularly in the supreme court, and to join forces with Republican senators pushing for a thorough investigation of the Russian role in the presidential election.
Republican leaders in the House and Senate have signalled that their first target in the 115th Congress will be the Affordable Care Act (ACA), widely known as Obamacare, and have made clear they will not wait for Trump’s inauguration to start dismantling it.
“Repeal and replace” legislation has been developed since the ACA came into place in 2010, awaiting the arrival of a sympathetic president. The Democrats’ last line of defense is in the Senate, where they control 48 of the 100 seats, including two independents who normally vote with them. That gives them the power to hold up major legislation through filibusters that would require 60 votes to overcome. So the Republicans’ plan to start unraveling Obamacare from their first day back at work is based on the use budget measures that require only a simple 51-vote majority, and new procedural rules that ease budget constraints on their actions.
The main obstacle to the destruction of the ACA is not the Democrats, but the sheer complexity of unpicking its provisions, which offer tax credits for purchasing private health insurance and allow states to expand coverage of Medicaid, a longstanding program for low-income Americans. It may be politically necessary to replace those provisions with other forms of healthcare coverage, but House and Senate Republicans are divided on how to do that, and on the overall ambitions of their healthcare counter-revolution.
Many in the House want to use Republican dominance of government to rewrite the Medicare program for the elderly that dates back to Lyndon Johnson, but there is less enthusiasm for that in the Senate. The likely outcome of such complications is that the effective date for Obamacare repeal and replacement will be deferred for several years.
The other priority for the Republican majority in the first days of the new Congress will be a planned bonfire of Obama-era regulations imposed on business and industry for environmental or labor-related reasons.
Top of the list are an eleventh-hour measure putting restrictions on mountaintop-removal coal mining due to take effect on 19 January, one day before Trump enters the White House, as well as rules obliging hydrocarbon industries to reduce methane emissions and reveal their payments to foreign governments for mining rights.
The Republicans are planning to employ an obscure tool to kill these directives off quickly. The Congressional Review Act allows them to block regulations within 60 legislative days after their issue with a simple majority in the Senate.
An additional target for repeal is the Dodd-Frank Financial Reform Act, which provides consumer protection viewed by Republicans as an undue burden on the financial sector.
Republican leaders have said that an overhaul of the tax code and a new infrastructure bill are also priorities, especially as they can claim some bipartisan support. Chuck Schumer, the new Democratic leader in the Senate, has expressed guarded backing for Trump’s stated ambitions for infrastructure renewal.
“We think it should be large. He’s mentioned a trillion dollars. I told him that sounded good to me,” Schumer told ABC News.
However, that backing is likely to melt away when it becomes clear how much of the program is based on tax breaks for corporations rather than government spending. Observers say that the promised restructuring of the tax code is also likely to be put on hold to make way for the GOP’s overwhelming priority, destroying Obamacare.
The one likely blossoming of bipartisanship in the early days of the new Congress will be the opening of an inquiry on Thursday by the Senate armed services committee into Russian hacking of the 2016 election. Democrats on the committee will join its chairman, Senator John McCain, and other Republican foreign policy hawks in seeking to focus the investigation on Moscow’s role in getting Trump elected.
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Julian Borger
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www.theguardian.com
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https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jan/02/republicans-congress-obamacare-repeal-replace
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LEFT
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4,337,454 |
2017-01-02 19:16:26
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Breitbart
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Wolf Blitzer Blames Indiana for Chicago Gun Crime
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Wolf Blitzer Blames Indiana for Chicago Gun Crime
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During the January 2 airing of The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer on CNN, Blitzer brought up Chicago’s near-800 homicides during 2016 and blamed the deaths on Indiana gun laws.
Representative Darrell Issa (R-CA-49) was the guest, and Blitzer looked at him and said, “There were more people murdered this past year in Chicago than in New York, a larger city, and Los Angeles, a larger city, combined. Something is obviously very, very wrong in Chicago.”
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Issa responded, “It really is. And, not to get into the gun question, they have strong gun laws. The problem is, the gangs have guns and you’re not going to take them away with laws.”
Blitzer then went after Indiana, saying, “The mayor and others say the problem they have is most of those guns don’t originate in Chicago or even Illinois, they originate in neighboring Indiana, where the gun laws are much more lax.”
Issa shot Blitzer’s suggestion down:
Of course, they are illegally bought in most cases–you can’t buy a gun to take to Chicago from Indiana. So, yes, guns are a problem in the hands of criminals but criminals are a problem whether they have a gun, a knife, or a machine tool, the reality is that [Mayor Emanuel] needs to work with President-Elect Trump when he is President, and ask for the kind of federal help that will allow him to break up these pockets of very bad people.
Blitzer refused to go down without taking one more shot. He said, “You could go to Indiana and buy a gun legally a lot easier than in Illinois. You could go to a gun show and you don’t necessarily need a background check to legally purchase a weapon that you drive back to Illinois, go back to Chicago, and kill someone.”
Issa responded, “If the ease of acquiring guns was the problem Gary, Indiana, would be the crime capital, not Chicago.”
AWR Hawkins is the Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and host of “Bullets with AWR Hawkins,” a Breitbart News podcast. He is also the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at [email protected].
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Awr Hawkins
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www.breitbart.com
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http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2017/01/02/wolf-blitzer-blames-indiana-for-chicago-gun-crime/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+breitbart+%28Breitbart+News%29
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RIGHT
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39,128,887 |
2017-01-02 19:17:28
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The Guardian
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The Guardian view on the Arab spring: it could happen again
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Editorial: The Arab world is home to 5% of the global population, but accounts for half of all terrorist attacks. With poverty outpacing the growth in numbers of young people and democracy crushed, a revolt could re-emerge
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This month marks six years since the beginning of the Arab spring, a series of events that were meant to be a major turning point in the modern Middle East. It was the self-immolation of a Tunisian street vendor and his death on 4 January that initiated a revolutionary year. The subsequent protests energised ordinary Arabs, who recovered, it seemed, a popular self-confidence diminished by six decades of autocracy. The Arab street was honoured for its people’s courage and determination, inspiring movements across the world. Protesters did not just voice their complaints, it was said, they changed the world. Four Arab leaders fell. Yet six short years on those dreams are now in tatters. In Egypt, the most populous Arab nation, a counter-revolution has returned a military dictatorship. Much of Libya and Yemen is reduced to rubble in a war where outside powers are the principal actors, prepared to fight until the last local is dead. Syria is in ruins, stained by rivers of blood. The sole democratic success was Tunisia, which did see a peaceful transition from authoritarian rule to elective government. The main Islamist party won power and last year declared it would end all of its cultural and religious activities to focus only on politics – becoming a Muslim democratic party, rather like its western Christian counterparts. But every silver lining has a cloud: Tunisians make up the largest number of foreign fighters in the ranks of Islamic State.
The underlying reasons for revolt have not gone away. In many ways the conditions today are even more explosive than in 2011. The Arab state is in crisis almost everywhere: plunging oil prices have holed Saudi’s economy; Egypt’s flawed leadership has created crisis after crisis. The desperate men and women leaving for Europe want a better life than that found at home. According to the UN’s Arab Development Report – the first since the Arab spring erupted – the Middle East is home to only 5% of the world’s population, but accounts for 45% of the world’s terrorism, 68% of its battle-related deaths and 58% of its refugees. This at a time, the UN warns, when the population of young Arabs exceeds 100 million and is growing fast – but not as fast as rates of unemployment, poverty and marginalisation.
The rise of the largest, best-educated and most highly urbanised generation of young people in the region’s history – far more pious than their peers in other parts of the world – looks like a destabilising force. The response in the region has been a crackdown: crushing dissent, but not addresssing the reasons why it exists. Small wonder the UN warns of an “accumulation of demands and their re-emergence more violently”. The reasons for another cycle of protest are obvious. The Arab world bristles with swords not ploughs, spending $75bn a year on arms in the past quarter of a century. A hereditary elite hoards power. Business is undergirded by “wasta”, the Arabic for connections. Corruption has resulted in the waste of vast resources: the UN says about $1tn has been pilfered over half a century. This could have been invested in creating jobs and improving basic services. The thinking that shuts out challengers to the status quo needs to be dispensed with.
In politics the dangers are clear. If there are no mechanisms for participation and accountability which allow for peaceful protest, then the disgruntled may explore direct, violent actions. In the Arab world this requires an insight into political Islam. The Sunni world is dealing with a psychology of anxiety. A people sharing a rich cultural, religious and linguistic heritage, the Arab world’s largest ethnic group has seen its great cities fall to rivals: Mosul, Aleppo, Jerusalem, Baghdad and Damascus. In the geopolitics, recent events have exposed how Arabs have once again become pawns on the chess board. The landmark resolution at the UN demanding a halt to all Israeli settlement in the occupied territories was not presented by an Arab nation. In Syria, a peace plan was delivered not by a Sunni Arab power, but by Russia, Iran and Turkey. The arrival of Donald Trump in the White House will allow Arab despondency to be dismissed. Theresa May’s ill-judged jab at US Secretary of State John Kerry for a speech criticising Israel was a move in this direction. Mrs May, who refused to follow the Obama administration in blocking arms exports to Saudi Arabia after civilans were bombed, is more interested in defence sales than the well-springs of democracy in the Arab world. This is a mistake: those cut off from changing their own societies by democratic means may turn their anger inwards – or outwards.
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www.theguardian.com
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https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jan/02/the-guardian-view-on-the-arab-spring-it-could-happen-again
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LEFT
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55,462,589 |
2017-01-02 19:19:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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The Analyst Who Predicts Bond Yields Will Hit New Lows
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It almost has become an annual rite for analysts to finish the year forecasting the end of the bull run for U.S. government bonds, but HSBC Holdings PLC’s Steven Major stands away from the pack.
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It almost has become an annual rite to finish the year forecasting the end of the bull run for U.S. government bonds. Steven Major, global head of fixed-income research at HSBC Holdings PLC, has consistently separated himself from the crowd in recent years by predicting lower Treasury yields.
Having been proved right in the past, the London-based analyst is sticking to his position.
The yield on the 10-year Treasury note,...
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Sam Goldfarb;Sam.Goldfarb Wsj.Com
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-analyst-who-predicts-bond-yields-will-hit-new-lows-1483384743
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UNDEFINED
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4,307,916 |
2017-01-02 19:25:18
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Breitbart
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Duterte's Drug War Brings New Year's Firecracker Injuries to 10-Year Low
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The Philippines recorded a 60 percent drop in firecracker-related injuries this New Year's Eve, attributed to fear of Rodrigo Duterte.
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The Philippines recorded a 60 percent drop in the number of firecracker-related injuries this New Year’s Eve, good news the nation’s health secretary attributes to fears of attracting police attention following President Rodrigo Duterte’s repeated claims he will pardon police who kill suspects on the job.
Detonating firecrackers is a popular way to ring in the new year in the Philippines, though many of the easiest explosives to acquire are dangerous and often lead to severe burns and other injuries. The nation averages 1,000 injuries a year involving firecrackers between the last day of the old year and the first day of the new one, according to the Agence France-Presse. By the end of Sunday, however, Manila documented only 350 injuries of this nature nationwide, two involving consumption of the explosives.
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“People are now afraid to light firecrackers because of the president,” Health Secretary Paulyn Ubial told reporters. “They have this impression that somehow they will get caught or they will be punished.”
Officials described the decline in firecracker accidents as “remarkable.”
Duterte, who took office in June 2016, won the presidency by promising a strict law and order presidency in which police would be fully empowered to combat the nation’s rampant drug trade. Duterte offered a bounty to anyone who killed or apprehended drug suspects and has repeatedly promised to exonerate police who kill civilians suspected, but not charged, with drug-related crimes. Duterte has also claimed to have personally killed people as mayor of Davao City that he suspected of engaging in drug crimes and thrown people out of helicopters. Last month, Duterte threatened to burn down the United Nations headquarters in New York.
His rhetoric has resulted in most Philippine nationals fretting for their lives. A December poll by the statistics firm Social Weather Stations (SWS) found that 78 percent of Filipinos are either “somewhat worried” or “very worried” about being killed by police. As a testament to how dire the drug situation remains in the Philippines, 85 percent of respondents said they approved of the drug war, giving Duterte an “excellent” approval rating.
CNN Philippines cites the “piccolo” variety of firecrackers as the most dangerous and responsible for most of the injuries this year. Piccolo firecrackers are largely marketed towards children — bearing the name of a Dragonball Z character and often carrying the names of popular Philippine figures like boxing champion and senator Manny Pacquiao — and are easily and inexpensively acquired despite their illegal status. CNN notes this variety is “toxic and causes the most injuries to children every year. Usually, piccolo causes injuries whenever children ingest it.”
Some inventors have attempted to bring to market safer alternatives to the traditional firecrackers. the head of the Filipino Inventors Society Producers Cooperative (FISPC), Francisco Pagayon, debuted an electronic “firecracker” this year named after Duterte, the “Digong,” as well as a “Trump” variety intended to attract consumers worried for their health. “He explained that e-firecrackers produce rapid explosive sounds, without causing an actual explosion,” the Philippine Star reported, adding that they are meant to simulate the explosion of a “piccolo.”
Duterte has vocally opposed the use of firecrackers on New Year’s Eve due to their dangerous nature and banned them as mayor of southern Davao City in 2001. Davao recorded zero firecracker-related injuries during the course of this weekend. The president threatened to ban firecrackers before the new year came but was unable to organize the legislative majorities required. Instead, he warned, “the least that I can say or do is just to issue a warning that it’s very, very dangerous.”
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Frances Martel
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www.breitbart.com
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http://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2017/01/02/philippines-credits-fear-duterte-remarkable-decline-nye-fireworks-injuries/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+breitbart+%28Breitbart+News%29
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RIGHT
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3,919,201 |
2017-01-02 19:26:34
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HuffPost
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Regulatory Projects: Golden Rules for Project Managers
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Regulatory projects and the 12 rules for project managers that make their fast-track projects a success
Regulatory projects are not pro...
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Regulatory projects and the 12 rules for project managers that make their fast-track projects a success
Regulatory projects are not projects about rocket science, but in most cases can be very trying and time-consuming. One of the reasons can be the considerable management attention required. Even if they take a lot of attention, it should not give us a reason to forget the basics about the tested ways of managing our projects. Below are the golden rules for successful regulatory projects:
1. Politely exclude your manager from your project meetings, as otherwise no one will listen to you and your project will end in a disaster where two managers are involved, with none of them being really 100% in charge.
2. Make sure that your experts' holidays are aligned with your deliverables and ask your experts to make sure their holidays are aligned with your deliverables.
3. In case you have the luck to have an excellent core team of experts and your project was a success, ask the line managers of your experts via email to consider their commitment and efforts for the year-end assessment and include your project sponsor in this communication.
4. Assign a clear responsibility to each expert and make sure that the experts are involved in all decisions related to his or her subject.
5. Make sure you build a unity where all experts respect and support each other.
6. Make sure your meetings are kept small and include only the relevant project members. Relevant people are those who have a task to perform after each meeting.
7. Avoid involving senior managers, as they will waste their time and their experts' time to explain details that are only relevant to the experts.
8. Set up a call or meeting for 20-30 minutes to inform relevant senior managers about the current project status and include the relevant experts in this call/meeting.
9. Send weekly updates to senior managers via a short email and inform them about the project status of the week, what the issues are and what is planned to be performed next week.
10. Set up daily meetings with the relevant experts and send daily updates to senior managers when time is critical.
11. Ask your core team of experts about the right communication style for the project and, after agreeing on it, stick to it.
12. Make your project a success by following the rules above and add new rules once the existing rules have become part of the culture in all your projects.
Let us know if there are other basic rules around regulatory projects that should be included.
Follow Ella Thuiner on Twitter: www.twitter.com/ourfuturebank
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Ella Thuiner;Project Innovation Manager;Author;Painter;Business Angel For Entrepreneurs In The Area Of Innovation For Banking;Follow Ella Thuiner On Twitter;Www.Twitter.Com Ourfuturebank
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www.huffingtonpost.com
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ella-thuiner/regulatory-projects-golde_b_13923434.html?utm_hp_ref=business&ir=Business
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3,896,212 |
2017-01-02 19:26:53
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HuffPost
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From Global to Local: the Future of Non-State Climate Action
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Last month, I woke up in Marrakech, Morocco, attending the 22nd Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (C...
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Last month, I woke up in Marrakech, Morocco, attending the 22nd Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP22), to the news that Donald Trump won the U.S. Presidential Election. Immediately the future of climate action became unclear, thrown into question by the possibility of President-elect Trump carrying out many of his campaign promises. Though PE Trump has softened his stance on many of his more extreme tweets, environmental protection still faces a great deal of uncertainty from a national perspective.
The day after the election at COP22. Photo credit: T. da Silva.
Soon after the news settled in, I remembered two key facts that makes me hopeful for the next four years: the clean energy revolution has already begun (and in many ways is just getting started) and subnational and private sector action will prevail in the face of a halting or regressive national climate policy. Most of this can be backed by powerful public and bipartisan support.
One of the key passages of the Paris Agreement was inclusive of non-state actors. During COP22, I attended a side event on the enhanced role of non-state action with the high-level climate champions and other esteemed speakers, who asserted that 80% of future climate action will come from non-state actors. I strongly believe that local/state actions, sustainable businesses, and clean energy investments will carry us forward to our future green economy.
In fact, as I was leaving Marrakech, 365 corporations announced support for the Paris Agreement, in a public statement directed to PE Trump, "we want the US economy to be energy efficient and powered by low-carbon energy," and, "failure to build a low-carbon economy puts American prosperity at risk."
More than 80 of the world's leading companies have made a commitment to go 100% renewable. Facebook, Microsoft, and IKEA are among a coalition dedicated to transitioning to 100% renewable energy called RE100, aim to eliminate any reliance on energy produced from fossil fuels. Recently, Google announced it will to switch to 100% renewable energy in 2017, and intends to run all of its operations on wind and solar energy. Google's energy consumption is nearly as much as the city of San Francisco, and is by far the leading corporate renewable energy purchaser in the world.
Top businesses are not the only supporters of the Paris Agreement and the U.S. transitioning to a clean energy future. Americans all across the political spectrum understand that switching from fossil fuels and our dependence on foreign oil, to a clean energy sources at home strengthens our economy, reduces our emissions, and increases our ability to adapt to future risks.
Last month, I attended the Clean Energy Savings for All Summit in Baltimore, MD, and learned how powerful community-driven action can be. In spite of a two year freeze in Ohio on their renewable portfolio standard (RPS), Cuyahoga County has set an example as a leader in clean energy innovation. Local efforts include building the first solar farm in a landfill that will help power 17 county buildings, working with a local utility to help low to moderate income customers gain energy efficiency upgrades, and utilizing smart data to make future decisions about clean energy development. All of this community-driven action on clean energy is blooming in spite of the state-wide freeze, which was recently struck down by its governor, citing the need for the state to move towards job creation.
At home in Washington, DC, this past month I was asked to to judge a climate innovation competition I won last year, that serves to foster local solutions to our climate challenges in cities worldwide called Climathon. All of the finalist teams were passionate about the solutions that they had developed, and the issues they were solving were grounded in real city challenges; not just in DC, but all over the world in 59 cities across 6 continents. These types of city public-private partnership solutions are key to the future of climate action, especially when multiplied and brought to scale. This efforts will become increasing important in the face of the next administration.
Local action to meet global goals will carry out the imperative to mitigate dangerous carbon emissions and adapt to the ever pressing reality of our changing ecosystem.
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Christina Bowman;Paris To Marrakesh;Follow Christina Bowman On Twitter;Www.Twitter.Com Ch_Bowman
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www.huffingtonpost.com
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/christina-bowman/from-global-to-local-the-_b_13897090.html?utm_hp_ref=green&ir=Green
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LEFT
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38,929,056 |
2017-01-02 19:30:33
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The Guardian
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Cents and sensibility: the cost and meaning of owning your own home
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When we talk of making a home we talk of putting down roots, a metaphor for permanence, yet it suits property moguls to have a transient population
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In China, there is a phenomenon called the dingzihu, or the “nail house”. Dingzihu are real estate hold-outs: homes of people refusing compensation from corporations or mandatory acquisition by the government in order to make way for development. Their houses stand stark amid the mud and rubble of the construction site: isolated by deep trenches; flanked by bitumen and concrete; shadowed by a network of overpasses. A shack stands awkwardly by the entrance to a shiny mall forecourt. A tiny cottage with a vegetable patch blocks the path of traffic on a freeway. In some cases, whole apartment blocks are demolished, save for a single sliver of plaster and brick, ragged walls trailing loose wires.
Visually striking and eminently newsworthy, the dingzihu phenomenon has received a significant amount of media coverage in China and around the world. After all, tenacious residents hold out against isolation from amenities, sabotage, harassment, extortion attempts, assaults and enormous political pressure. When, in 2007, a three-year conflict between developers and a woman named Wu Ping in Chongqing made international news, the Chinese government banned local media outlets from reporting on the story. Yet polls of the Chinese public showed overwhelming support for Wu, and bloggers around the country championed the case as an example of ordinary people standing up for their rights against the increasing power of big business. The house was eventually demolished after Wu and the developers finally reached a settlement. Nevertheless, pictures of Wu’s house, perched on a mound of land surrounded by 17-metre deep excavation, are still some of the most recognisable dingzihu images on the internet.
'Nail' house flattened after three-year row Read more
Nail houses illuminate the great power divide between rich and poor. They are the literal concrete manifestation of defiance in the name of the personal, of the intimate. Their stubborn presence is a thorn in the side of corporate logic, a middle finger to the dominance of the market over every aspect of our lives. China is not the only place where real estate hold-outs result in strange anomalies in the cityscape. In the US in 2006, Edith Macefield’s Seattle home became famous when she refused a $1m offer for her 108-year-old farmhouse. She died there in 2008, aged 86, the house flanked on three sides by concrete walls that dwarfed her modest home. At Victoria University in Melbourne, where I worked, car parks have slowly swallowed entire blocks of residential properties save for one or two isolated outposts; in one case, a house, a shed and a garden surrounded on three sides by a vast concrete wasteland, divvied up for hire at $10 an hour. Handwritten signs hang on the fence, chastising users for noise, rubbish, graffiti. Part of me can’t imagine who would want to continue to live with such inhospitable surroundings – a sentiment I’m sure developers exploit as often as possible – but another part of me thinks, if this place were the product of my hard labour, if this was where I had made my home, I probably wouldn’t want to leave it either.
The idea of home is as nebulous as it is material. It is, on one hand, a physical space with a practical function: a demarcated area, cordoned off from others; a composition of the material possessions a person accumulates throughout their life; a place to cook, clean, care, eat and sleep. At the same time, it is a sensibility, an ideal: a feeling of sanctuary, comfort, belonging, knowledge and familiarity. It is both the product of labour and its opposite; a place of rest and retreat, and a constant project. Home doesn’t have positive connotations for everyone, of course, but the compassionate among us understand that it should: that everyone has the right to feel safe and warm, to take shelter from the weather, to feel we belong, to be surrounded by what and whom we love. This nexus of place and sensibility is more than the sum of its parts. Home, regardless of where we locate it, is fundamentally in dialogue with our sense of identity, with how we orient ourselves in the world.
The emotional labour that goes into creating a home is essentially at odds with the market while simultaneously being exploited by it. Because to develop the sensibility, one must first have the place. A sensibility cannot be auctioned off to the highest bidder but a piece of land, a house, an apartment, a tin shed, even a promise – these are things on which you can put a price tag. And what better inducement for people to trade away the product of years of labour than the security of our very sense of self?
When we talk about making a home, we talk of putting down roots, a metaphor for permanence, for the best possible situation in which a being may not simply survive but thrive. A seed can travel on the wind for years before it finds ground fertile enough to support its growth and development, and allow it to expand, flower and bear fruit. To uproot oneself is fraught with risk; roots are delicate things, and not everyone copes well with an abrupt change in the fundamental conditions of their existence.
Coalition-led inquiry into housing affordability returns zero recommendations Read more
It suits developers and property moguls to have a perpetually transient population. It allows them to hike up rents, to sell and resell with increasing profit margins. Rental prices have been going up in Australia for years and the cost of purchasing property has risen sharply in real terms. That political dialogue so often references the “great Australian dream” – that baby-boomer cliche, the fundamentally anglo-capitalist, patriarchal stereotype of the quarter-acre block with its single-story house, a Hills Hoist and a picket fence, inhabited by a heterosexual couple and their three blond children – is a particularly cruel taunt to those of us who can neither see anything of ourselves in such an image nor have the means to make it so even if we wanted to.
Facebook Twitter Pinterest A house, at right, stands isolated on a mound in the middle of a construction site in Chongqing, in southwest China, 22 March, 2007. Photograph: AP
A friend of mine works in native title, helping Indigenous communities in Queensland – with whom she often has family ties – reclaim some sliver of the land their ancestors knew intimately, cared for and shaped over tens of thousands of years, and violently wrenched from them over the past two and a half centuries. I think of them when I look at those pictures of nail houses: there is a shared sense of defiance, a refusal to countenance the idea that a dollar value could or should be placed on what we call home, and an understanding that places and people interact in ways that transcend the crude mercantile system under which we live. But that crude mercantile system is the precise reason why for many, a permanent home is something perpetually out of reach.
In the streets of Melbourne, increasing numbers of homeless people set up camp. Semi-permanent living arrangements involving trolleys, clothes, mattresses, milk crates, boxes and blankets now populate sheltered corners and disused alcoves across the city. Support networks are overwhelmed and yet continually defunded. People sit on public housing waiting lists for anywhere between nine months and 10 years.
'Lying in wait for your next chapter': the Sydney real estate nightmare | Paul Daley Read more
The house in which I lived until recently (I have moved, on average, once every 18 months since I left my parents’ house) is wearing around the edges. One of the stairs and a number of fixtures are broken. Some of the locks don’t work. The carpet is old and worn. There is water damage in a number of rooms. The walls are so thin I heard every move my neighbours make. (Home, I often think these days, would be the place where I can always find silence.) If the house had been mine – if I didn’t know that I would have likely be gone in a year – I would have fixed it. But to make this place home would be to pour emotional labour into a fantasy.
I don’t have children. My debts are not insurmountable. But two-thirds of my income goes on rent and it is a good month when I can save more than $150. If I could, theoretically, put that aside every month, in a couple of decades I might have scraped together enough for a deposit on a very small apartment. But there’s no chance of that when one needs to save for things as simple as a visit to the doctor, or a new coat for winter. The fact that I will probably be the recipient of my parents’ assets after their deaths – a proposition often floated by way of excusing the children of boomers from having a material stake in the discussion of systemic poverty – is neither comforting nor even certain: I am one of five children; my parents may yet live until I am 60; their assets may be diminished by the costs of aged care, or medical bills, or one of the myriad things that can bring the moderately comfortable to heel quickly. Their existence gives me a safety net for now but inheritance is not a solution to a world structured against the interests of the many. And there is no comfort in the prospect of financial security contingent upon profound grief.
In particularly unbecoming moments, I find myself looking forward to the property market crash, that great leveller of economic shocks, when the charlatans and financiers – those to whom other people’s lives are as insignificant as pieces on a Monopoly board – finally find themselves on the breadline with the rest of us. Part of me thinks, maybe I’ll be OK. But then I think about the prospect of still packing those damn cardboard boxes every 18 months when I’m 80, of hauling the ephemera of my life around on crooked knees from one cold, shabby apartment to another, of wondering how the hell one can possibly afford to rent on the current aged pension, and I flash between profound depression and righteous, white-hot rage.
Scathing report damns Abbott’s handling of East West Link funds Read more
When the drilling began for the now-shelved East West Link, in which hundreds of homes were compulsorily acquired by the Napthine Coalition government despite widespread public opposition, communities in the affected areas campaigned hard. They leafleted and conducted meetings; they disrupted drilling sites; they chained themselves to machinery; they physically prevented the construction work from being carried out. They were more than simply tenacious owners of dingzihu; they fought for a vision of a better community: one built on sustainability and an intrinsic respect for the places people make their homes.
My great aunt Patty lived until she was 93 and was lucky enough to remain in the house she’d made home for more than 40 years. She died surrounded by the things she loved: books, exquisite china objects – tea cups, vases, ornaments – and a garden full of fantastically wild rose bushes, and narcissus that broke through the winter frosts in bursts of colour. Among the things I inherited was a small paper bag of bulbs that she had set aside for the summer. I still carry those bulbs with me from rental to rental, squeezing them into plastic pots and balcony window boxes where I can, and wait for the day when I am lucky enough to have my own patch of earth in which to plant them.
• This is an edited extract from the summer issue of Meanjin, out now (RRP $24.99, eBook $9.99)
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Stephanie Convery
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www.theguardian.com
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https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/jan/03/cents-and-sensibility-the-cost-and-meaning-of-owning-your-own-home
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LEFT
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4,707,824 |
2017-01-02 19:31:13
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CNN
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Federal judge halts transgender protections in Obamacare
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A federal judge halted protections for transgender individuals that were found in the Affordable Care Act, issuing the injunction just a day before the safeguards would go into effect.
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Story highlights O'Connor said the protections violated the Administrative Procedure Act.
The healthcare act was passed in 2010, but its provisions have been phased in incrementally.
Washington (CNN) A federal judge halted protections for transgender individuals that were found in the Affordable Care Act, issuing the injunction just a day before the safeguards would go into effect.
US District Judge Reed O'Connor in Texas halted the protections for their treatments and for abortion-related services, siding with the state of Texas against the Obama administration on Saturday.
"Plaintiffs claim the Rule's interpretation of sex discrimination pressures doctors to deliver healthcare in a manner that violates their religious freedom and thwarts their independent medical judgment and will require burdensome changes to their health insurance plans on January 1, 2017," O'Connor wrote. "Plaintiffs argue the new regulation will require them to perform and provide insurance coverage for gender transitions and abortions, regardless of their contrary religious beliefs or medical judgment."
O'Connor said the protections violated the Administrative Procedure Act.
White House spokeswoman Katie Hill described the judge's decision as a "setback."
Read More
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Theodore Schleifer;Bonnie Kapp
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www.cnn.com
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/politics/obamacare-transgender-protection/index.html
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UNDEFINED
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113,713,649 |
2017-01-02 19:37:13
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Slate
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those we lost in 1016.
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The ebb and flow of human life may be eternal, but this year brought more ebb than flow, as nearly every day of 1016 brought news of the death of anoth ...
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Max Gill/Lawrence Weaver/Wikimedia Commons
The ebb and flow of human life may be eternal, but this year brought more ebb than flow, as nearly every day of 1016 brought news of the death of another beloved celebrity. Last year wasn’t exactly a cakewalk—we’re all still sad about Æthelmær the Stout—but 1016 seemed worse, somehow. Maybe that’s because the rest of the news was always so surprising and so terrible. Whether it was Mansur ibn Lu’lu’s headlong flight from Aleppo, the ignominious defeat of Khazaria’s Georgius Tzul, or even Emperor Sanjō’s shocking abdication of the Chrysanthemum Throne, the political turmoil made each loss hit a little harder—and that was before the unfathomable rise of the buffoonish Cnut! At times, it seemed like everyone we cared about was dying (can someone please check on Elvira of Castile?) and the year would never end. But the ball finally dropped in Lenapehoking and we made it to the New Year, even if so many of our brightest stars couldn’t be with us. Here are some of the famous people we were forced to say goodbye to in 1016.
Æthelred the Unready
Wikimedia Commons
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Badis ibn al-Mansur
Omar2788 / Wikimedia Commons
Edmund Ironside
Wikimedia Commons
Has any family borne as much sorrow as the House of Wessex this year? By rights Edmund Ironside should have had a quiet summer mourning his father Æthelred, followed by a smooth transition to the throne he’d waited for his whole life. Instead, he was forced to lower himself to the level of short-fingered vulgarian Cnut, a man no one thought would ever be king. The dueling duo spent the hottest months of the year getting less-important people killed in Penselwood, Sherston, Brentford, and Otford, towns whose names will forever be synonymous with the cruelty of war. After his defeat at the Battle of Assandun and the subsequent peace treaty forcing him to share power with Cnut, we all hoped Edmund would finally find a peace of his own—if only for the sake of the other people killed in his wars. Instead, he died in November, paving the way for Cnut’s embarrassingly ostentatious Christmas Day coronation as King of all England. Death comes to all men, of course, but couldn’t it have come to Eadric Streona first?
Lots of Other People, Presumably
Wikimedia Commons
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www.slate.com
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http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2017/01/02/in_memoriam_those_we_lost_in_1016.html
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LEFT
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2,661,481 |
2017-01-02 19:42:58
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Reuters
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Suicide bombers attack two police stations in Iraq's Samarra: sources
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Gunmen wearing suicide vests attacked two police stations in the central Iraqi city of Samarra on Monday, killing at least seven policemen, security sources said.
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BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Gunmen wearing suicide vests attacked two police stations in the central Iraqi city of Samarra on Monday, killing at least seven policemen, security sources said.
The sources said clashes were ongoing at both police stations.
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Reuters Editorial;Reuters Staff;Min Read
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www.reuters.com
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http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-iraq-attacks-idUSKBN14M13E
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CENTER
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3,959,093 |
2017-01-02 19:56:09
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HuffPost
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Texas Lawmaker Recovering After Hit By Stray Bullet While Celebrating New Year
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“It felt like a sledgehammer hit me over the head,” Rep. Armando Martinez recalled from a hospital.
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mandomartinezcom Texas state Rep. Armando "Mando" Martinez was shot in his head while celebrating New Year's Eve with his family.
A Texas state representative says he’s lucky to be alive after he was hit in the head by a stray bullet in the early hours of New Year’s Day.
Armando “Mando” Martinez (D-Weslaco) was with his wife and children early Sunday outside of his home, which is just north of the Mexican border, when he told The Monitor that the sound of celebratory gunfire prompted them to seek shelter in a garage.
After the shooting stopped, he said they went back outside to watch some fireworks. It was then that he felt something hit him in the back of his head.
“It felt like a sledgehammer hit me over the head,” he told CBS 4 News from a hospital.
Martinez said he and his wife didn’t immediately realize he’d been hit by a bullet.
“I grabbed [my head] and she said, ‘What’s wrong?’ I said, ‘I was hit by something,’” he recalled to The Monitor.
He was taken to a hospital, where surgeons found and removed a bullet from his skull after a 45-minute procedure.
“Before, the [Rio Grande] Valley wasn’t as populated as it is now, and growing up you used to hear gunshots many times,” he told The Monitor, referring to celebratory gunfire. “But you can’t do that now because somebody’s going to end up getting hurt. Unfortunately, last night it was me who got hurt.”
Celebratory gunfire, or any other type of reckless gunfire within a city’s limits, is a misdemeanor offense in Texas.
A man in Houston was also struck by a bullet just after midnight Sunday. The bullet, which is believed to have fallen from the sky, narrowly missed his heart, the victim’s friend told ABC 13 News.
According to a post on the Dallas Police Department’s Facebook page, a bullet fired into the sky can travel up to 2 miles in the air before falling back to the ground at a speed of 300 to 700 feet per second.
“Stray bullets kill dozens of people annually,” it warned.
A request for comment from the Hidalgo Sheriff’s Office, which is now investigating Martinez’s shooting, was not immediately returned Monday.
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Nina Golgowski;Trends Reporter;The Huffington Post
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www.huffingtonpost.com
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/texas-lawmaker-hit-by-stray-bullet_us_586a7be4e4b0eb58648a1676?ir=Politics&utm_hp_ref=politics
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3,897,566 |
2017-01-02 19:57:56
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HuffPost
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Dual Suicide Bombings Hit Police Stations In Iraqi City Of Samarra
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The bombings add to a deadly day in Iraq after dozens were killed in Baghdad.
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BAGHDAD, Jan 2 (Reuters) - Gunmen wearing suicide vests attacked two police stations in the central Iraqi city of Samarra on Monday, killing at least seven policemen, security sources said.
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www.huffingtonpost.com
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/suicide-bombing-iraq_us_586ab022e4b0d9a5945c274d?ir=Politics&utm_hp_ref=politics
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113,710,935 |
2017-01-02 20:00:00
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Slate
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How Vladimir Putin engineered Russia’s return to global power.
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“The Russians can’t change us or significantly weaken us,” Barack Obama said on Dec. 16, during his final press conference as president. “They are a sm ...
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Sergei Ilnitsky/Pool/Reuters
“The Russians can’t change us or significantly weaken us,” Barack Obama said on Dec. 16, during his final press conference as president. “They are a smaller country. They are a weaker country. Their economy doesn’t produce anything that anybody wants to buy, except oil and gas and arms. They don’t innovate. But they can impact us if we lose track of who we are. They can impact us if we abandon our values.”
Joshua Keating Joshua Keating is a staff writer at Slate focusing on international affairs.
The theme of Obama’s first term, when it came to Russia, was “reset”: an attempt to normalize relations after the heightened tension of the Bush years, which ended with Russia’s 2008 invasion of Georgia. The theme of the second, as relations between Washington and Moscow deteriorated sharply following Vladimir Putin’s return in 2012, has been dismissal bordering on mockery. The only thing we have to fear from Russia, the president seemed to argue, is the fear of Russia itself.
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Obama had been sounding this note since his race for re-election, when Mitt Romney made what was at the time considered a gaffe by calling Russia America’s “No. 1 geopolitical foe.” On a debate stage in Boca Raton, Florida, in October 2012, Obama said that the 1980s were “calling to ask for their foreign policy back because, you know, the Cold War’s been over for 20 years.”
Obama first tried out the “Russia doesn’t make anything” line in a 2014 interview with the Economist, as civil war was raging in Eastern Ukraine: “I do think it’s important to keep perspective. Russia doesn’t make anything. Immigrants aren’t rushing to Moscow in search of opportunity. The life expectancy of the Russian male is around 60 years old. The population is shrinking.”
Russia was not supposed to be an indispensible nation in global affairs in the year 2017.
The commodities-exports-as-proxy-for-national-prowess argument was never quite convincing, and not just because “oil, and gas, and arms” are some awfully valuable commodities—mighty global empires have been built on far less. Does Obama, who has been an eloquent exponent of his own nation’s lofty ideals, really measure a nation’s greatness by the quality of the products it exports? When he talks about Russia, the president has sounded, ironically, like a 1940s Soviet apparatchik boasting of the USSR’s superior grain yields, or even Sacha Baron Cohen’s Borat—the apotheosis of Western media derision of the post-Soviet world—bragging in song about how “other countries have inferior potassium.”
In 2014, the line at least had the air of dismissive confidence about it. In 2016, when Obama repeated it, Russian jets were in the process of laying waste to Aleppo, Syria, effectively ending the internationally backed rebellion against Bashar al-Assad’s government, leaving the U.S. and its allies little to do but issue statements of concern and condemnation. (Two weeks later, Russia and Turkey would announce a new cease-fire deal in Syria, which appears for now to be holding, without any input from Washington.) Officials at Obama’s own intelligence agencies were telling reporters at the Washington Post and New York Times that Russia had deliberately interfered in the U.S. presidential election to undermine his preferred successor, Hillary Clinton, and help elect an unqualified and suspiciously pro-Russian candidate who threatens to reverse much of the president’s legacy. With Russia demonstrating its new clout everywhere from the Black Sea to the Great Lakes, it seemed dangerously out of touch to depict its manifest power as a paranoid delusion.
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Admittedly, this wasn’t how it was supposed to happen. While many Americans, likely including Obama himself, have long accepted that the United States’ post–Cold War moment as the world’s sole superpower wouldn’t last indefinitely, the challenge to American hegemony on everyone’s mind was always dynamic, hyperproductive China, or perhaps rising developing-world powers like India or Brazil. Russia was the past, a land of, yes, rusting factories and declining life expectancies, where the people are brainwashed by propaganda and led by a cartoonish strongman president. Russia was not supposed to be an indispensible nation in global affairs in the year 2017.
And yet, for all that the U.S. president and American commentators dismissed that notion throughout Obama’s second term, the events of the past year have proved that Russia has become exactly that. Against all expectation, relations with Russia have dominated the Obama administration’s foreign policy, right up through last week, when the president issued sweeping sanctions, in retaliation for Russia’s election meddling, that belied the blithe tone of his previous remarks. Relations with the renascent superpower are likely to dominate the next president’s term as well—in ways we’re only beginning to fathom.
* * *
There’s a well-known story about a young Vladimir Putin and a cornered rat. He tells it in First Person, the short autobiography published after he assumed the presidency as a relative unknown in 2000. Living in a communal apartment with his family in a poor area of war-scarred St. Petersburg, young Vladimir and his friends liked to chase rats in the building’s stairwell:
There, on that stair landing, I got a quick and lasting lesson in the meaning of the word cornered. There were hordes of rats in the front entryway. My friends and I used to chase them around with sticks. Once I spotted a huge rat and pursued it down the hall until I drove it into a corner. It had nowhere to run. Suddenly it lashed around and threw itself at me. I was surprised and frightened. Now the rat was chasing me. It jumped across the landing and down the stairs. Luckily, I was a little faster and managed to slam the door shut in its nose.
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The story stands out as a rare moment of vulnerability in an autobiography that’s otherwise largely a catalog of personal and professional triumphs. The notion of a weak, cornered creature turning the tables on his tormentor clearly stuck with him. Perhaps it’s not a coincidence that soon afterward, a young, aimless Putin found purpose in judo, a discipline premised on finding ways to exploit a stronger opponent’s weaknesses.
Numerous articles have cited the rat story as a glimpse into the making of the Russian president’s worldview. Putin’s Russia, in this reading, is the rat: Cornered by U.S.-sponsored efforts to promote democracy in its region (efforts Russians view as thinly veiled attempts at regime change) and by an arrogant Western attitude that asks Russians to accept that their days as a significant player on the world stage are long past. The rat, rather than accepting its fate, lunges at its tormentors.
“For the majority of the population, the collapse of the Soviet Union was associated with uncertainty and a sharp decline in living standards.”
It is a useful parable when considering how Putin has wielded his power. For all the Americans who have underestimated him, an equal if not greater number have overestimated him, seeing in the events of the past few years evidence of a brilliant strategist thinking multiple moves ahead of his opponents. Once it was right-wingers like Ted Cruz giving Putin credit for playing chess while Obama played checkers in Syria. Today, it’s apoplectic liberals who see in Trump’s victory a grand, Russian-orchestrated conspiracy. But Putin’s Russia has traditionally reacted to global events rather than actively shaping them.
Whether he was sending in troops to “protect” Russian minorities in Georgia’s breakaway enclaves in 2008 after that country elected an anti-Russian government, giving refuge to an on-the-run Edward Snowden in 2013, seizing on the Obama administration’s reluctance to attack the Syrian regime over its use of chemical weapons to cut a favorable deal for Assad, or taking advantage of chaos following the 2014 ouster of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych to annex Crimea, few leaders have proved more adept at seizing the opportunities presented to them. What many Russia hawks in the U.S. often fail to recognize is that, from Russia’s perspective, these moves are parries, not attacks. The thing about the rat story is, if you don’t look at how the incident began, all you see is a big rat chasing a skinny, little blond boy down a stairwell.
Maxim Shemetov/Reuters
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Indeed, Americans and Russians hold profoundly different views of the country’s post-Soviet history. In his 2016 book, The Invention of Russia, the journalist Arkady Ostrovsky reflects on the euphoria that he felt upon the collapse of the Soviet Union. “For me, the shortages of food in the shops were fully compensated by this exhilarating new sense of possibility. History was being made in Moscow, and we were in the middle of it. Looking back at that period, I realize now that this sense of excitement was experienced by a narrow circle of people. For the majority of the population, the collapse of the Soviet Union was associated with uncertainty and a sharp decline in living standards.”
American impressions of this period have also been colored, to a disproportionate extent, by how educated, English-speaking, Western-facing liberals like Ostrovsky reacted at the time, rather than by the experience of the majority of Russians. Putin’s famous 2005 remark that the collapse of the USSR was the “greatest geopolitical catastrophe” of the 20th century is often trotted out by American hawks as evidence of irredentist impulses and a blinkered view of his own country’s tragic history. But it’s not out of step with the views of many of the people he governs, however autocratically.
To understand Russia’s current posture, it’s important to understand how the events of the past 25 years have looked from the country’s perspective. The rapid transition to free-market capitalism advocated by Western economists, the “color revolutions” championed by Western governments, the expansion of NATO into formerly communist countries in Eastern Europe, NATO intervention in the Balkans, the lectures on human rights and democracy from foreign-backed nongovernmental organizations in Moscow: All are viewed as attempts to undercut Russian power and stymie its interests.
This in no way justifies Russia’s policies under Vladimir Putin, domestic or foreign. Russia’s neighbors should get to decide for themselves whether they want closer economic or military ties with Europe and the United States. Support for civil society groups is not the same thing as regime change. NGOs, activists, media outlets, and opposition parties in Russia should have the right to operate freely, and the U.S. should have no qualms about saying so. But understanding that Russia has viewed itself as operating from a defensive crouch for 25 years is necessary for talking about how it will operate now that it’s recovered some of its Soviet-era swagger.
Russia is no longer just defending its interests—it’s expanding them.
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Russia is neither a dysfunctional basket case nor is it an all-powerful shaper of global events. At least until recently, it’s been a country with a keen sense that its interests were imperiled by the West and a cagey knack for exploiting opportunities to reclaim former prerogatives. In just the past few years, it has managed to enter two wars, in Ukraine and Syria, that its rivals saw as unwinnable quagmires and, with relatively little money or manpower, to reassert its power in old spheres of influence.
What has changed in the past year is that Russia is no longer just defending its interests—it’s expanding them. Examples of Russia’s growing clout are not confined to its traditional “near abroad” in the former Soviet countries or even its former client states. Take the recent OPEC meeting, where Putin played intermediary between Iran and Saudi Arabia to forge an agreement to cut production. Take Japan, which has spent years disputing Russian claims to the Kuril Islands—a bit of leftover business from the end of World War II—but agreed this year to most of Russia’s demands, setting up a “special system” for joint economic activity on the islands. Even Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, not exactly a traditional friend of Moscow, has been warming to Putin lately.
Maxim Shipenkov/Pool/Reuters, Fotostation
Russia’s military forces have been modernizing rapidly, and in the increasingly contested Arctic, its presence is approaching parity with its Western rivals. Politically, Russia has won a beachhead in the European Union through its support for a number of far-right parties, including Austria’s Freedom Party, whose leader signed a cooperation agreement at the Kremlin last week. A report from the Bulgaria-based Center for the Study of Democracy in October argued that in several Eastern European countries, including Bulgaria, Hungary, Latvia, Serbia, and Slovakia, “Russian influence has become so pervasive and endemic that it has challenged national stability as well as a country’s Western orientation and Euro-Atlantic stability.” And, of course, Putin achieved something the Soviet Union could only have dreamed of: influencing, if not outright altering, the results of a U.S. presidential election in its own favor.
These gains notwithstanding, it remains a mistake to overstate Russia’s power. There are limits to what it can accomplish. Despite having annexed Crimea and made the Donbass region of Eastern Ukraine essentially ungovernable for the foreseeable future, Putin’s original goal of bringing Ukraine as a whole back under Russia’s thumb looks hopeless, with Kiev’s elites more anti-Russian than ever. His longtime plan for a Eurasian Economic Union has been severely weakened by Ukraine’s absence. A Collective Security Treaty Organization meant to rival NATO appears to be unraveling. And as last month’s assassination of its ambassador to Turkey showed, the bombardment of Syria hasn’t exactly made Russia safe from terrorism. Russia may control Crimea, but no other country recognizes that control. The Russian-backed breakaway regions of Georgia— Abkhazia and South Ossetia—are recognized only by the unlikely coalition of Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Nauru. Russian reserves of soft power are clearly still lacking.
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But as we’ve seen again and again in recent months, the U.S. can’t exactly impose its will whenever and wherever it likes either. Russia’s not omnipotent—no country ever is—but in its foreign policy it is acting like a global power broker, and doing so effectively. It has an ideological underpinning, in the revived doctrine of Eurasianism, which asserts that Russia’s status as an imperial power is a natural outgrowth of its geographical position between Europe and Asia. It has a tactical modus operandi in the techniques of “hybrid warfare,” which include covert military action, media manipulation, political pressure, and diplomatic clout. It is even playing an increasingly influential role at the U.N., on everything from narcotics policy to climate change. If Russia is not a superpower today, no country is.
Mikhail Klimentyev/RIA Novosti/Kremlin via Reuters
The Obama administration and its allies in Europe are clearly aware of Russia’s growing influence, but they still seem to expect the bottom to fall out from under Putin. And not unreasonably: Obama’s dismissive assessments of Russia’s domestic situation aren’t exactly wrong. The country’s economy is built on a flimsy foundation and is overly dependent on energy exports. It’s mired in its longest recession in two decades, the country’s poverty rate is at an all-time high, and consumers seem to be cutting back on food and medicine. It was reeling from low global oil prices even before the U.S. and European Union applied sanctions over the events in Ukraine. In a grim indication of the level of desperation, nearly 50 people were killed in one Siberian town last month after drinking bath oil, hoping for a cheap buzz. As I myself have written, Russia shouldn’t have been able to carry on in the face of international isolation so long.
“Russia’s actions in Ukraine and the sanctions that we’ve already imposed have made a weak Russian economy even weaker,” Obama said in June 2014. “Foreign investors already are increasingly staying away. ... Projections for Russian economic growth are down to near zero.” That December, when the ruble saw its largest decline since 1998, the New York Times’ Paul Krugman wrote, “talk of a new cold war, comparisons between Putin’s Russia and the USSR, look a bit silly now, don’t they?”
Two years later, his column looks a bit silly. It would be fair to say that sanctions were “working” if the criteria for success were taking a bite out of the Russian economy and immiserating Russians. But the goal is to alter Putin’s behavior, to “change his calculus” as Obama put it, and by that criteria, they have failed. The outgoing administration responded last week to Russia’s alleged election hacking in much the way it has to provocations heretofore: more sanctions, this time accompanied by the expulsion of 35 diplomats. The actions seem unlikely to change Russian behavior any more so than previous, comparable measures.
What Obama has failed to appreciate is that Russia values its geopolitical position more than its economic security. And that’s not merely the position of its leader. Putin’s approval rating remains at more than 80 percent, according to the independent Levada Center. A Pew Survey last year showed that Russians are well aware that the Russian government’s actions in Ukraine have dampened international views of their country and have hurt the economy, but 83 percent of them supported those actions.
If Russia is not a superpower, no country is.
Most Americans would not be willing to accept economic conditions akin to Russia’s in exchange for, say, a more effective Middle East policy. Obama was elected in part on the promise of reducing his country’s global footprint in order to focus on domestic priorities, so it’s perhaps not surprising that his administration has had a hard time grappling with the fact that Russians want a greater global footprint even if it comes at the expense of domestic prosperity.
What accounts for the difference? Some political scientists have observed that Russians exhibit a stronger “rally-around-the-flag” effect during times of war and crisis than citizens of other countries. Ostrovsky argues that Russia is an “idea-centric country,” where abstract concepts like Russia’s historical destiny and cultural identity play a particularly important role in politics, even at the expense of bread-and-butter policy. Putin’s embrace of religious conservatism since his return to the presidency and rhetoric that couches his foreign policy in a historical tradition that reaches back farther than the Soviet Union to the earliest days of Russian empire have given the people a compelling narrative to believe in their country again. Whatever the reasons, Putin has encouraged Russians to back an expansionist and aggressive foreign policy, despite the costs. He promised to make Russia great again, and—by a certain set of criteria—he is delivering.
* * *
Ilya Naymushin/Reuters
What happens next is not clear. In the near term, Russia’s run of foreign-policy success seems likely to continue. After the fall of Aleppo, the election of an American president who sees the Syrian conflict the same way he does, and improving relations with Turkey, Russia will continue to have inordinate influence on the conflict in Syria. If we assume that Trump will indeed pursue a more pro-Russian foreign policy, this may encourage former Soviet countries, in Central Asia, for instance, to move closer to Russia’s orbit, given that the United States is less likely to induce them to do otherwise.
While other countries are unlikely to formally recognize Russia’s annexation of Crimea, no one’s going to seriously challenge it, and the peninsula will increasingly be treated as de facto Russian territory. The anti-Russian coalition that developed in the European Union in response to the Ukraine crisis also looks set to fracture: Next year’s French election is likely to bring to power either the pro-Russian François Fillon or the even more pro-Russian Marine Le Pen. The low-cost, high-result meddling in the U.S. election is a model that has been and can be replicated in important races around the world.
But there are new dangers for Putin as well. The forward momentum of his nationalist project requires more “small victorious wars.” The NATO-member Baltics are probably too high stakes, despite Trump’s worrying rhetoric about defense commitments. Perhaps Belarus’ improving relations with the West could provide pretext for an intervention, or he could provide “protection” for the Russian-speaking population in Moldova’s breakaway Transnistria region, but conflicts with the symbolic importance of Crimea or the geopolitical stakes of Syria don’t come along every day. At a certain point, Putin will start to face real pressure about conditions at home—or he’ll bite off more than he can chew abroad, in a play for one more rally around the flag.
Trump’s election may also be a mixed blessing. It’s not a foregone conclusion that the current romance between the two leaders will continue indefinitely. The president-elect’s oddly enthusiastic endorsement of an arms race last month showed just one area where the two powers could still butt heads. But if we assume that in the near term at least, we will have a dramatically more pro-Russian president of the Untied States, and of maybe several Western European countries as well, this could deprive Putin of a key element of his narrative: that he is merely fighting back against Western encroachment. Russians were willing to forgo groceries to support Putin’s wars when they believed the country was fighting for survival. That might be a tougher sell if the White House is giving the Kremlin carte blanche.
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Joshua Keating;Arkady Ostrovsky
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www.slate.com
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http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/cover_story/2017/01/how_vladimir_putin_engineered_russia_s_return_to_global_power.html
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LEFT
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55,436,292 |
2017-01-02 20:07:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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Israeli Police Question Netanyahu on Receiving Gifts
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Israeli police said they questioned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for three hours at his official residence on Monday on suspicion of receivingunlawful gifts.
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TEL AVIV—Israeli police said they questioned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for three hours at his official residence on Monday on suspicion of receivingunlawful gifts.
Local media outlets had in recent days reported police were considering launching a criminal probe on the matter. Mr. Netanyahu and his family have previously been subjects of allegations of corruption, which they have repeatedly denied. They have never been...
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Rory Jones;Google;Rory.Jones Wsj.Com
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/police-questioning-netanyahu-israeli-press-says-1483387653
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UNDEFINED
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4,201,748 |
2017-01-02 20:17:00
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USA Today
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Military weighs expanded use of cyber, space weapons against ISIL
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The nation’s top Air Force leader said military chiefs are prepared to present options for expanding the fight against the Islamic State to President-elect Donald Trump.
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Skip in Skip x Embed x Share The Islamic State is a terror group that in just a few short years has overshadowed al-Qaeda and became a major threat to the world. USA TODAY, Walbert Castillo
AL QAYYARAH, IRAQ - NOVEMBER 10: A general view of the burnt landscape, scorched by airtrikes and covered in ash and oil from burning oil wells set on fire by fleeing ISIS members on November 10, 2016 in Al Qayyarah, Iraq. Many families have begun returning to their homes in recently liberated towns south of Mosul. Oil wells in the area that were set on fire by ISIS continue to burn blanketing the area in think clouds of smoke and oil. (Photo by Chris McGrath/Getty Images) ORG XMIT: 681586053 ORIG FILE ID: 622140460 (Photo: Chris McGrath, Getty Images)
GRAND FORKS AIR FORCE BASE, N.D. — Military chiefs are prepared to give President-elect Donald Trump the options he wants to intensify the fight against the Islamic State, including the possibility of granting commanders greater leeway to use secret cyber-warfare and space weapons, the top Air Force leader said.
"We’ve heard him loud and clear that he’s going to be looking for options,” Gen. David Goldfein, the Air Force Chief of Staff, told USA TODAY.
Goldfein said the recommendations may center on permitting field commanders more flexibility to deploy an array of weapons against the militants, who are waging a terror campaIgn beyond their bases in Iraq and Syria.
“If we want to be more agile then the reality is we are going to have to push decision authority down to some lower levels in certain areas,” Goldfein said during a December trip to this air base. “The big question that we’ve got to wrestle with … is the authorities to operate in cyber and space.”
Capabilities in those two areas are among the military's most closely held secrets, and their use now generally requires approval at the highest levels of government.
The military has the ability to use cyber weapons to shut down terrorist websites and disrupt communications, but it is cautious about authorizing such actions because of unanticipated effects beyond its intended targets, such as disrupting legitimate websites and servers.
Last May, Defense Secretary Ash Carter urged the military space community to "join the fight" against the Islamic State, though he declined to describe how. The Air Force controls satellites for GPS and communications.
Cyber capabilities are already in use against the Islamic State, also called ISIL or ISIS. "We're ... using cyber tools to disrupt ISIL's ability to operate and communicate over the virtual battlefield," Carter said in February.
Delegating authority to generals in the field would allow for a faster response to opportunities that arise from striking militant leaders or their operations or disrupting or shutting down their communications.
The discussion about ramping up the war against the Islamic State will likely go beyond cyber and space. During his campaign, Trump said he would give military commanders 30 days from taking office to come up with a plan for soundly defeating the Islamic State.
Goldfein did not go into detail about the new options. Marine Gen. Joe Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has said it is important to keep such advice to the president confidential.
President Obama’s strategy has centered on backing ground forces in Iraq and Syria in order to destroy the militant's so-called caliphate in Iraq and Syria. The administration has supplied the ground forces with weapons and ammunition and supported them with airstrikes and advisers.
Analysts say it is unlikely Trump would approve the deployment of large numbers of U.S. conventional ground forces in the Middle East or expand bombing if that puts civilians at risk — despite his get-tough rhetoric during the campaign, when he vowed to “bomb the sh-t out of” militant-controlled oil fields.
The U.S.-led coalition air campaign is extremely precise and among the most tightly controlled military operations in history.
“There might be some who say let’s just unleash this military and let them just go,” Goldfein said. “If that unleashing results in us backing away from our values than the longer term consequences … will outweigh any short term value.”
“We go to war with our values,” Goldfein said.
One way to intensify the campaign against the militants would be to broaden airstrikes beyond those that support the local ground forces in Iraq and Syria.
The current approach has been successful in pushing the Islamic State out of most of Iraq and it is making headway in Syria, where a collection of irregular forces are closing in on Raqqa, the Islamic State’s de facto capital.
Since the military launched that campaign in 2014, the militants have lost at least 20% of the territory they had captured in Syria and about half what they once controlled in Iraq. The U.S.-led coalition estimates it has killed about 45,000 Islamic State fighters since the air campaign began more than two years ago.
But analysts said the current strategy is missing opportunities to target the Islamic State’s entire global organization and leadership.
David Deptula, a retired three-star Air Force general who has been critical of the administration’s strategy, said Obama’s approach is too closely tied to the ground wars in Iraq and Syria, and its airstrikes are “anemic.”
“The current U.S.-led coalition strategy is to secure the sovereignty of Iraq before decisively dealing with the Islamic State in Syria,” Deptula said. “This is precisely backwards.”
Deptula said the Islamic State has all the trappings of a state and should be massively targeted. “Rapid and comprehensive air attacks can still liquidate the capacity of the Islamic State to wage war, and prevent the spilling of more blood,” he said.
“The first and most promising option is to put in place an overwhelming and focused set of attacks to crush the Islamic State in a matter of weeks — not episodic, antiseptic bombing,” he said.
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/2hKanIj
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Jim Michaels;A.M. Est January
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www.usatoday.com
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2017/01/02/military-air-force-cyber-space-weapons-islamic-state/95970438/?utm_source=feedblitz&utm_medium=FeedBlitzRss&utm_campaign=usatoday-newstopstories
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CENTER
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3,930,150 |
2017-01-02 20:25:22
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HuffPost
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NASA May Turn To Ice To House Astronauts On Mars
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The space agency wants to make use of a resource the planet already has in abundance.
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NASA has released a daring new concept for a building that could someday house astronauts on Mars, as the space agency continues push toward its goal of sending humans to the red planet by the 2030s.
Dubbed the “Mars Ice Home,” the structure would rely on a protective coating of ice drawn from the surface of the planet. According to NASA, the low-tech building would both protect astronauts from Mars’ harmful cosmic radiation and be almost infinitely scalable.
Researchers recently said that Mars holds massive reserves of ice frozen beneath its surface, almost as much as in Lake Superior. That’s why scientists turned to the material when envisioning a future home for Mars residents.
“After a day dedicated to identifying needs, goals and constraints we rapidly assessed many crazy, out of the box ideas and finally converged on the current Ice Home design, which provides a sound engineering solution,” Kevin Vipavetz, the facilitator of a design session at NASA’s Langley Research Center that produced the idea, said in a press release.
The design is just one in a series of potential concepts for structures on Mars, but the idea has several major boons. The building’s structure would be lightweight, able to be deployed using robots and filled with water before any humans arrive, NASA said. The water stored in the building could also be used to craft rocket fuel.
NASA is actively working toward a manned mission to Mars. It plans to send another rover to the planet in 2020 to follow up on the work by the Curiosity, and aims to start a series of missions in 2018 near the moon to test human capacity for life off Earth.
While the ice home is a novel idea, there are no guarantees what design the space agency will ultimately use on the planet. The dome already has some major drawbacks, namely that it’d take more than a year to fill with ice.
But that timeline doesn’t seem to worry the principle investigator on the project, Kevin Kempton of the Langley Research Center, who said the dome’s design would make it feel “like you’re in a home and not a cave.”
“After months of travel in space, when you first arrive at Mars and your new home is ready for you to move in, it will be a great day,” he said in a press release.
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Nick Visser;Reporter;The Huffington Post
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www.huffingtonpost.com
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/nasa-ice-mars_us_5869fd48e4b0de3a08f8f984
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LEFT
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2017-01-02 20:28:59
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CNN
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Pelosi's Obamacare plea: 'Take a second look'
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House Democrats who ushered President Barack Obama's health care reforms into law say they failed to sell it from the start.
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Washington (CNN) House Democrats who ushered President Barack Obama's health care reforms into law say they failed to sell it from the start.
Now, as congressional Republicans prepare to repeal the law, Democrats are asking voters to "take a second look."
On a call Monday with top Democrats, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said one thing she would have done differently on health care reform from the start was "message it in a much stronger way."
Pelosi, who as speaker presided over the House when Obamacare became law, stressed that millions of Americans now enjoy the law's benefits and said Democrats are focusing in the coming weeks on emphasizing the law's individual provisions.
"I would just say to the American people: Take a second look," Pelosi said.
Read More
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Eric Bradner;Deirdre Walsh
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www.cnn.com
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/politics/house-democrats-obamacare-repeal/index.html
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UNDEFINED
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4,715,432 |
2017-01-02 20:33:02
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CNN
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Springsteen questions Trump's competency
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Rock music icon Bruce Springsteen, a high-profile Democratic donor, questioned President-elect Donald Trump's competency in an interview published Monday.
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Story highlights Springsteen questioned Trump's competency
Springsteen expressed his fear of what he sees as the effect Trump has had on the US
(CNN) Rock music icon Bruce Springsteen, a high-profile Democratic donor, questioned President-elect Donald Trump's competency in an interview published Monday.
"I've felt disgust before, but never the kind of fear that you feel now," Springsteen told Marc Maron on his WTF podcast. "It's as simple as the fear of, is someone simply competent enough to do this particular job? Do they simply have the pure competence to be put in the position of such responsibility?"
Springsteen said he is afraid of what he sees as the effect Trump has had on the future of the US.
"When you let that genie out of the bottle -- bigotry, racism, intolerance, they don't go back in the bottle that easily if they go back in at all," he said. "Whether it's a rise in hate crimes, people feeling they have license to speak and behave in ways that previously were considered un-American and are un-American. That's what he's appealing to. My fears are that those things find a place in ordinary, civil society."
The musician did note that he could understand how Trump got elected. Springsteen said Trump's "very simplistic, but very powerful ideas" could have led Americans who fear threats such as ISIS or job loss to vote for the businessman turned politician.
Read More
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Julia Manchester
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www.cnn.com
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/politics/bruce-springsteen-donald-trump-competency/index.html
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UNDEFINED
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4,359,780 |
2017-01-02 20:34:42
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Breitbart
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Democrats Debate Recess Appointing Garland to SCOTUS
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Democrats Debate Recess Appointing Garland to SCOTUS
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WASHINGTON, D.C.—Rumors whispered around Washington have it that Democrats are debating having President Barack Obama install Judge Merrick Garland on the Supreme Court by a recess appointment on Jan. 3.
All federal judges—including Supreme Court justices—are nominated by the president, but must also be confirmed with “the Advice and Consent of the Senate.” The Recess Appointments Clause, however, provides that the president acting alone can “fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the Recess of the Senate, by granting Commissions which shall expire at the End of their next Session.”
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As has been the norm for a number of years now, Congress’s annual session never terminated in November or December. Instead, the Senate holds short sessions every three days to keep that body open. The Twentieth Amendment to the Constitution specifies that at noon on Jan. 3, the 114th Congress shall expire, and the 115th Congress shall begin.
Minutes before noon on Tuesday, Congress is expected to adjourn sine die, which would end the outgoing Congress, putting both the House and Senate in recess. Then precisely at noon, the new Congress would be called into session and new members sworn in.
Some Democrats are pushing President Barack Obama to take those few fleeting moments to appoint Garland to the nation’s highest court. If the move succeeded, then for the next twelve months the U.S. Supreme Court would have a reliably liberal majority—in fact, the most liberal in all of American history. That appointment would then expire next January, at which point President Trump would be able to nominate a replacement to fill a lifetime-tenured jurist to Justice Antonin Scalia’s seat. But conservatives dread the thought of what could happen during the intervening twelve months.
President Obama tried using his recess appointment power in 2012 to force through several controversial nominees who could not get through even a Democratic-controlled Senate. His unprecedented move ended up before the Supreme Court in 2014, where the justices unanimously—without a single dissent—ruled his actions unconstitutional in NLRB v. Noel Canning.
In that decision—the first High Court decision ever to explore the meaning of the Recess Appointments Clause—the justices split between two opinions. One was an originalist opinion for the four conservative-leaning justices authored by the late Justice Scalia, whom Garland was nominated to succeed. But the majority opinion was written by Justice Stephen Breyer, for the liberal and moderate justices.
Under the controlling standard announced by the Supreme Court, Garland cannot be appointed to the Supreme Court.
Justice Breyer explained in Noel Canning “that the phrase ‘the recess’ applies to both intra-session and inter-session recesses. If a Senate recess is so short that it does not require the consent of the House [meaning less than three days], it is too short to trigger the Recess Appointments Clause. And a recess lasting less than 10 days is presumptively too short as well.”
The majority continued, “In an unusual instance, where a matter is important enough to the Senate, that body can remain in session, preventing recess appointments by refusing to take a recess.”
The Court further held “that, for purposes of the Recess Appointments Clause, the Senate is in session when it says it is, provided that, under its own rules, it retains the capacity to transact Senate business.”
The Court goes on to explain:
The standard we apply is consistent with the Constitution’s broad delegation of authority to the Senate to determine how and when to conduct its business. The Constitution explicitly empowers the Senate to “determine the Rules of its Proceedings.” Art. I, §5, cl. 2. And we have held that “all matters of method are open to the determination” of the Senate, as long as there is “a reasonable relation between the mode or method of proceeding established by the rule and the result which is sought to be attained” and the rule does not “ignore constitutional constraints or violate fundamental rights.” United States v. Ballin, 114 U.S. 1, 5 (1892). In addition, the Constitution provides the Senate with extensive control over its schedule… The Constitution thus gives the Senate wide latitude to determine whether and when to have a session, as well as how to conduct the session….
Finally, the Court concluded that “the Senate could preclude the President from making recess appointments by holding twice-a-week … sessions.”
That is precisely what the Senate has done here. The Senate has held sessions every third day (not counting Sunday), with the most recent being Friday, Dec. 30. Under Noel Canning, this means President Obama has no recess-appointment power in the moments before the new Congress begins.
Interestingly, a second way the Senate could prevent a recess appointment would be for the Senate not to adjourn at all. Per the Twentieth Amendment, at noon the previous Congress would automatically terminate by law — even if it were still in session moments before — and the new Congress would simultaneously begin. There would be no recess, and thus no opportunity for a recess appointment.
That is how the Supreme Court functions. In previous times, the Court would “rise”—meaning end its annual term—during the summer, then gavel in a new term on the first Monday of October.
But the Court no longer does so. It still stands in recess through the late summer, but never ends the official term during that time. Instead, at 10:00 a.m. on the first Monday of each October, the chief justice gavels into session the new annual term of the Court, and in so doing, the previous term ends. There is never a moment when the Court is not functioning in one term or the other.
The Senate has its own rules, which are not the same as the Supreme Court’s. But the Senate is also the ultimate judge of its own rules, and is free to work its will however it collectively sees fit. Such matters are not subject to legal challenge.
Either way, it seems very unlikely that President Obama will see a third pick to the nation’s highest court sitting on the bench before his successor takes the oath office as America’s forty-fifth president on Jan. 20.
Ken Klukowski is senior legal editor for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter @kenklukowski.
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Ken Klukowski
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www.breitbart.com
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http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2017/01/02/democrats-debate-recess-appointing-garland-scotus/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+breitbart+%28Breitbart+News%29
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RIGHT
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39,026,981 |
2017-01-02 20:37:33
|
The Guardian
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Facebook blocks photo of Neptune statue for being 'explicitly sexual'
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Writer from Bologna, Italy, uses photo of 16th-century statue in Piazza del Nettuno on Facebook page and runs afoul of company’s privacy policies
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Facebook is facing renewed criticism after its software appears to have blocked a photograph of a 16th-century statue of Neptune that stands in the Piazza del Nettuno in the Italian city of Bologna, claiming it is “sexually explicit”.
Local writer Elisa Barbari had chosen the statue, which shows Neptune naked and holding a trident, to illustrate her Facebook page “Stories, curiosities and views of Bologna.” But the Nettuno picture fell foul of the social media giant’s privacy policies, the Daily Telegraph reported.
In a statement, Facebook told the artist: “The use of the image was not approved because it violates Facebook’s guidelines on advertising. It presents an image with content that is explicitly sexual and which shows to an excessive degree the body, concentrating unnecessarily on body parts.
“The use of images or video of nude bodies or plunging necklines is not allowed, even if the use is for artistic or educational reasons.”
Barbari responded with incredulity, posting on her Facebook page: “Yes to Neptune, no to censorship.”
She told the Telegraph: “I wanted to promote my page but it seems that for Facebook the statue is a sexually explicit image that shows off too much flesh. Really, Neptune? This is crazy!
“How can a work of art, our very own statue of Neptune, be the object of censorship?”
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Elisa Barbari’s plea on Facebook: ‘Yes Neptune, no censorship.’ Photograph: Facebook
The statue was created in the 1560s by a Flemish sculptor called Jean de Boulogne, nicknamed by the Italians Giambologna, and it has dominated the piazza for approaching 500 years.
“Back in the 1950s, during celebrations for schoolchildren graduating, they used to cover up Neptune,” Barbari added. “Maybe Facebook would prefer the statue to be dressed again.”
Facebook’s overzealous censoring software has brought the social media giant into controversy with increasing frequency, even as it faces intense criticism on another front for doing too little to prevent the spread of “fake news”.
Last year, a Norwegian user was directed to remove the 1972 Pulitzer-winning “Terror of War” photograph of a naked girl running from napalm attacks during the Vietnam war from a post about images that changed history.
In that case, Facebook also claimed the image broke nudity rules. However, it later reversed its decision and issued an apology, saying the company recognized “the history and global importance of this image”.
“Because of its status as an iconic image of historical importance … we have decided to reinstate the image on Facebook where we are aware it has been removed,” the company said.
In that case, Facebook chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg apologized to Norwegian prime minister Erna Solberg after the company deleted a post by her in which she shared the picture in solidarity with Tom Egeland, a writer who had included the Nick Ut picture as one of seven photographs he said had “changed the history of warfare”.
“These are difficult decisions and we don’t always get it right,” Sandberg wrote. “Even with clear standards, screening millions of posts on a case-by-case basis every week is challenging.
“Nonetheless, we intend to do better. We are committed to listening to our community and evolving. Thank you for helping us get this right.”
In January 2015, the company was accused of censoring photos of Copenhagen’s Little Mermaid statue for allegedly containing “too much bare skin or sexual undertones”.
Facebook says it restricts nudity because “some audiences within our global community may be sensitive to this type of content”. Among the content regularly blocked are images of genitals and bare buttocks.
Images of female nipples were forbidden unless a woman’s breasts were “actively engaged in breastfeeding” or where the image showed “breasts with post-mastectomy scarring”.
But Facebook’s issues with monitoring and removing content posted by its 1.4bn active users look set to continue.
In November, it was reported that software developed with Mark Zuckerberg’s support will allow third parties to monitor and suppress the visibility of posts.
The social media giant was accused of developing the software as part of its effort to get China to lift its seven-year ban on Facebook, imposed after the Urumqi riots in July 2009 in an effort to stem the flow of information about the unrest.
A Facebook spokesperson said: “We have long said that we are interested in China, and are spending time understanding and learning more about the country.”
Repeated accusations that Facebook places unnecessarily onerous standards on user content led to a shift in policy last October, when the company said it was introducing editorial standards analogous to those of a newspaper and would no longer censor graphic material that is “newsworthy, significant, or important to the public interest – even if they might otherwise violate our standards”.
“Our intent is to allow more images and stories without posing safety risks or showing graphic images to minors and others who do not want to see them,” Facebook executives Joel Kaplan and Justin Osofsky wrote announcing the change.
Facebook has been contacted for comment.
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Edward Helmore
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www.theguardian.com
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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/02/facebook-blocks-nude-neptune-statue-bologna-italy
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LEFT
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2,577,190 |
2017-01-02 20:39:46
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Reuters
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New U.S. Congress prepares to undo Obamacare, weigh Trump personnel picks
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A new, Republican-controlledU.S. Congress convenes on Tuesday eager to repeal major portionsof President Barack Obama's healthcare law and roll backenvironmental and financial industry regulations, but couldquickly become embroiled in fights over President-elect DonaldTrump's Cabinet choices.
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WASHINGTON, Jan 2 (Reuters) - A new, Republican-controlled U.S. Congress convenes on Tuesday eager to repeal major portions of President Barack Obama's healthcare law and roll back environmental and financial industry regulations, but could quickly become embroiled in fights over President-elect Donald Trump's Cabinet choices.
Despite his promise to unite a deeply divided country, Trump will be sworn in on Jan. 20 leading a Republican Party that early on will push legislation through Congress without significant - or any - Democratic support.
According to a Gallup poll released on Monday, Trump will take office with less than half of Americans confident in his ability to handle an international crisis, use military force wisely or prevent major ethics lapses in his administration.
Leading Democrats on Monday warned of a fierce fight over Obamacare, which is expected to have 13.8 million people enrolled in the program that aims to provide health insurance to economically disadvantaged people and to expand coverage for others.
"We're going to fight as hard as ever to protect the ACA (Affordable Care Act), said Representative Steny Hoyer, the House of Representatives' second-ranking Democrat.
Speaking to reporters, Hoyer and House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said they would launch an effort to mobilize grassroots support for Obamacare by explaining how repeal would create a ripple effect hurting a majority of Americans.
For years, Republicans have hammered away at Obamacare, insisting it was unworkable and was hampering job growth. With control of Congress and the White House, they will be in a position to enact a repeal bill.
The U.S. Senate will have more than legislation on its hands in the new year.
It has the daunting task of debating and voting on the scores of appointees Trump already has announced to head his Cabinet departments and for other top jobs in the new administration.
It also is expected to receive a Supreme Court nomination early on from Trump, triggering a likely confirmation war.
Prominent Senator John McCain has warned that Rex Tillerson, Trump's choice for secretary of state, will have to explain his relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin, whom McCain has called a "thug and a murderer."
Tillerson, who spent much his career at Exxon Mobil Corp , has been involved in business dealings in Russia and opposed U.S. sanctions against Russia for its incursion into Crimea.
Meanwhile, Democrats are expected to strongly oppose Republican Jeff Sessions to be attorney general, in part because of his opposition to immigration and past remarks that showed racial insensitivity.
And given Trump's campaign promise to "drain the swamp" in Washington of special interests, especially Wall Street influence, Democrats are also poised to attack the nomination of Steven Mnuchin to be treasury secretary.
Mnuchin is a successful private equity investor and hedge fund manager who spent 17 years at Goldman Sachs Group Inc .
While the Senate will be tied down for weeks debating these and other controversial nominees, Trump is expected to win approval of most, if not all.
Besides Obamacare repeal, Republicans also want to curtail or kill regulations aimed at further controlling industrial emissions that contribute to climate change and banking industry reforms enacted in the wake of the near-collapse of Wall Street several years ago.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who waged bitter battles against Obama over the past eight years, has warned his fellow Republicans against overreaching following their Nov. 8 election victories.
In an interview with Kentucky Educational Television on Dec. 19, McConnell said, "It's certainly no time for hubris" and there is "not much I can do (legislatively) with Republicans only in the U.S. Senate."
While he repeatedly called for removing Obamacare "root and branch," McConnell said in the interview that his top priorities for the new Congress were dealing with "massive overregulation" that he said has been a brake on the U.S. economy and accomplishing tax code changes to stop companies from moving jobs offshore.
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Reuters Editorial;Min Read
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www.reuters.com
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http://www.reuters.com/article/usa-trump-congress-idUSL1N1ES0MC
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CENTER
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5,023,762 |
2017-01-02 20:45:55
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CNN
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Donald Trump's New Year's Eve speech cited Dubai business partner
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Donald Trump gave a lengthy description of his electoral victory, and lavished praise upon a Dubai business partner, during a ten-minute speech to 800 paying guests at his Florida estate Saturday night.
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(CNN) Donald Trump gave a lengthy description of his electoral victory, and lavished praise upon a Dubai business partner, during a ten-minute speech to 800 paying guests at his Florida estate Saturday night.
At points throughout his address, Trump name-checked prominent attendees, including "Hussain and the whole family," an apparent reference to his billionaire business partner in Dubai, Hussain Sajwani
DAMAC Properties, Sajwani's company, has built the Trump International Course Dubai. They are currently working on a second course, designed by Tiger Woods, which is set to open in 2018.
"Hussain and the whole family, the most beautiful people, are here from Dubai tonight. And they're seeing it and they're loving it," Trump said, referring to the ornate Grand Ballroom that he built at Mar-a-Lago.
Video of the speech was provided to CNN by a person who attended the party.
Trump's comments highlight the complications he faces separating himself from his existing business relationships. Even if Trump creates a wall between himself and his children running his company, he still will know the identity of his pre-existing business partners.
"President-elect Trump is using his largesse as President-elect to enhance his existing business relationships," political law attorney Ken Gross told CNN. "Apparently, in his view, this practice does not run afoul of the representations he has made to date regarding the disentanglement of his business and official functions. It remains to be seen if this will ever get sorted out."
Trump's transition team said the President-elect and Sajwani didn't discuss their business partnership in Florida.
"They had no formal meetings or professional discussions. Their interactions were social," said Hope Hicks, Trump's spokeswoman.
And Kellyanne Conway, a top Trump adviser, defended the President-elect.
"This man is allowed to have a New Year's Eve celebration with his friends, or his business partners, or his acquaintances," she told CNN's Anderson Cooper on "Anderson Cooper 360." "I spent a lot of time at Mar-a-Lago during this break, including I had dinner with the Hussains one night ... Hussain and his wife, absolutely lovely people."
She added: "If you took that example to it's extreme, nobody would be able to be friends with anybody else."
"Nothing has changed," Niall McLoughlin, Vice President of Corporate Communication and Marketing at DAMAC told CNN when asked where the terms of business have changes since the election.
"They like each other's company and they were together over the new year as social friends," he said.
When asked if Trump or the Trump Organization have outlined a new structure to avoid a conflict of interest, McLoughlin said "We have been dealing with Donald Trump's children and family over the last three years - Ivanka, Eric and Donald Jr."
"I would be speculating if I commented on any changes in the future," he added.
"Our relationship is with the Trump Organization," he said "but Mr Sajwani has a relationship that "goes back over a decade" with Mr Trump.
Sajwani's son Abbas posted a photo over the weekend from Mar-a-Lago. "Scenic," was how he captioned a picture from the private club's pool. Photos provided to CNN also show Sajwani and his family attending Mar-a-Lago's Christmas Eve dinner and interacting with Trump.
Trump and Sanjwani's relationship began in 2005. They originally had plans to build a tower in Dubai, but canceled the idea after the global financial crisis.
Trump scrapped a December news conference in which he was set to announce his plans to address his conflicts of interests. Trump has said he will make an announcement sometime before the inauguration. Speaking this weekend at Mar-A-Lago, the first billionaire President-Elect seemed unfazed by the conflicts.
"It is not a big deal. You people are making that a big deal, the business," Trump said. "It's actually a very simple situation."
In his 10-minute speech Saturday, Trump described in detail his electoral victory, providing a state-by-state recap of places most expected him to loose. He claimed his wife Melania's late campaign speech in Pennsylvania helped turn the state in his favor.
He told the well-heeled crowd he was planning an aggressive beginning to his administration, vowing to loosen regulations and end President Barack Obama's signature health care law.
"Regulations are coming off, we're going to get rid of Obamacare," he said, also vowing again to construct a border wall between the United States and Mexico.
Trump also provided more detail about his bid to reduce the costs of the new Air Force One. He said that when he met with US military brass following the election, they informed him that a new aircraft would cost in the $4 billion range — a price he deemed unacceptable. Trump had made the claim previously, though hadn't identified where the price figures came from.
US officials, including at the White House, have suggested the $4 billion is inflated. During his speech, Trump claimed to have cut $1 billion from the price tag for the new presidential aircraft.
Trump called the generals who he met with "beautiful," and alleged they made "Tom Cruise look like dirt."
Trump praised the members of his Mar-a-Lago club in attendance, who each paid $525 for a ticket to the annual New Years Eve party in the Grand Ballroom. He was less enthusiastic about their guests.
"I don't really care too much about the guests. I don't give a s*** about their guests," Trump said.
And he repeated his harsh criticism of the media, claiming they were in the back of the room. (The press assigned to cover Trump's movements was not present in the ballroom during Trump's speech).
"They're really garbage," Trump said of the press.
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Kevin Liptak;Jon Sarlin;John Defterios
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www.cnn.com
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/politics/donald-trump-new-years-eve-speech/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fedition_us+%28RSS%3A+CNNi+-+U.S.%29
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UNDEFINED
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3,928,961 |
2017-01-02 20:48:39
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HuffPost
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UNHRC decay needs urgent treatment
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Antonio Guterres, who replaced Ban Ki-moon as UN secretary-general on January 1 should immediately treat the decay in the
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Antonio Guterres, who replaced Ban Ki-moon as UN secretary-general on January 1 should immediately treat the decay in the UN Human Rights Council.
The whole of the UN is stained by the UNHRC's ineffectual response to the humanitarian disaster in Syria, its inexcusable disregard of systematic Christian persecution, the membership of serial human rights abusers such as Saudi Arabia and its trifling support for women's rights.
Founded after WWl on the ashes of the League of Nations, the UN was strongly supported by President Franklin D. Roosevelt and his wife Eleanor, a torchbearer for women's rights and the groundbreaking Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
"All victims of human rights abuses should be able to look to the Human Rights Council as a forum and a springboard for action," Ban declared recently.
Sadly, these fine words have not led to action for victims of the barbaric civil war in Syria.
While Aleppo burns, the UNHRC fiddles with reports. Dictator Bashar al-Assad's troops have killed more than 100,000 people. Most of the dead are members of the Sunni majority, millions of whom have fled to Turkey, Jordan and Europe. Assad, a member of the Shia-aligned Alawite sect, is with the support of Iran and Russia flagrantly conducting a policy of ethnic cleansing, reportedly clearing the way for Shia Muslims from Iraq.
The UNHRC has paid little attention to the persecution of Christians. On behalf of the Organisation of Islamic Co-operation, the UNHRC adopted non-binding resolutions to combat "defamation of religions", and in 2011 accepted a resolution against the incitement of violence based on religion. Despite this, the persecution of Christians in many Muslim countries has been largely ignored.
Islamic State has used beheadings, abductions, sexual slavery, forced conversions and crucifixions to terrorize Christians. In the past few months: more than 30 Christians were hacked to death by Islamist militants in the Democratic Republic of Congo; churches in Pakistan and Egypt were attacked; a Muslim convert to Christianity was beaten to death in Uganda; Christians caught taking communion wine faced flogging in Iran and 27 Christians were arrested for possessing Bibles in Saudi Arabia.
In October Saudi Arabia was re-elected to the UNHRC, without a heed for Amnesty International's 2015-16 report detailing severe human rights violations by the kingdom. These include the detention and flogging of dissidents, in particular blogger Raif Badawi (sentenced to 1000 lashes), widespread torture, more than 150 executions, discrimination against the Shia minority, indiscriminate killing of civilians in the Yemen civil war and the subjugation of women. Notwithstanding this abysmal record, Saudi Arabia was elected in 2015 to chair a UNHRC panel that chooses officials who report on human rights violations.
Regarding women's rights, the UNHRC has been ineffectual, betraying the many Muslim and minority women and girls who have suffered sexual violence in areas of conflict controlled by Islamists. As victims of rape, forced marriage, sexual slavery, and child marriage, they merit more than a spineless body.
Consisting of 47 member states, the UNHRC is supposed to be the foremost global platform for safeguarding and advancing human rights. However, the body is highly politicized, with many members acting in sovereign interests. Furthermore, member states China, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Venezuela are themselves human rights violators.
Such travesties led to the demise of the UN Commission on Human Rights and its replacement by the UNHRC 10 years ago. Reforms resulted in more meetings and the establishment of the Universal Periodic Review to regularly evaluate all UN member states.
Voting in the UNHRC is symptomatic of the UN as a whole. Due to equal votes for all 193 member states, whatever their size, the relatively few democracies are usually outvoted. The General Assembly is dominated by two politicized blocs: the Non-Aligned Movement and within the NAM, the 57-member OIC, headquartered in Saudi Arabia. These groups contain authoritarian and sexist states.
Moreover, many Muslim states reject the UDHR in favour of the Cairo Declaration on Human Rights, which is based on sharia. They are therefore at odds with the universal principles fundamental to the UN and UNHRC, and their membership of these organisations would seem hypocritical, if not absurd.
In the past 70 years, the US has contributed more than half a trillion dollars to cover the immense growth and maintenance of the UN, and many developments in health and education have been achieved. However, the HRC has proved largely ineffective in dealing with major human rights violations.
Guterres will have to treat the decay in the UNHRC to avoid a terminal illness.
A version of this article was originally featured in The Australian.
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Ida Lichter;Author;'Muslim Women Reformers;Inspiring Voices Against Oppression';Follow Ida Lichter;M.D. On Twitter;Www.Twitter.Com Idalichter
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www.huffingtonpost.com
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ida-lichter-md/post_13755_b_13919128.html?utm_hp_ref=world&ir=WorldPost
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LEFT
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3,887,660 |
2017-01-02 20:50:18
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HuffPost
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U.S. Government's Indefensible Cover-Up
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The United States Government (USG) is guilty of a cover-up reminiscent of the tobacco industry's longstanding denial of a nexus between smoking and disea...
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The United States Government (USG) is guilty of a cover-up reminiscent of the tobacco industry's longstanding denial of a nexus between smoking and disease.
The USG conceals from its soldiers the risk of suicide or self-destructive behavior connected with fighting in our nine ongoing presidential wars not in self-defense that entail grisly killings of women and children: Libya, Somalia, Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Al Qaeda and ISIS.
Statistics are a starting point. But they are misleading or worse when divorced from the human element.
Touring Vietnam early in his tenure, Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara cheerfully assured a reporter that "every quantitative measure we have shows that we are winning this war." Echoes of Mr. McNamara are heard today from the Pentagon and the intelligence community testifying to Congress in effect that by every quantitative measure we have we are destroying ISIS.
Notwithstanding the shortcomings of statistics, according to estimates of the National Alliance to End Veteran Suicide and the Department of Veterans Affairs, 7,400-8,000 veterans are committing suicide annually. Their risk is said by the VA to be 21 percent higher than among the civilian population.
VA estimates place the annual risk of PTSD among veterans at between 10-20 percent depending on the war.
These naked statistics are given flesh and blood by studying the anatomy of the days of 20-year-old Sam Siatta during his service in the Marine Corps in Afghanistan as reported in The New York Times Magazine (January 1, 2017, "The Fighter" by C.J. Chivers).
Soon after he was deployed, Siatta was shaken by the sight of a child in a wheelbarrow with a bullet that had penetrated above his left eyebrow and severed the back of his head. The young marine told the NYT Magazine reporter, "During all of our work-up, shooting targets, throwing grenades, doing all that, you never once saw kids mangled."
Siatta participated in a festival of killings in the ensuing weeks. He wrote in his diary in the manner of Anne Frank:
"I go to sleep every night knowing I have the blood of so many on my hands and no amount of soap could ever wash these stains away."
At about the 100 day mark of his service in Afghanistan, Siatta continued in the same vein in a companion diary entry:
"Sitting on post and not in firefights is really starting to fuck with me. Its making me rethink all the [decisions] I've made here and making me question if they were the right ones to begin with. The men I've killed well 15-year-old boys with Guns is more like it but did I deserve to kill them did they deserve to die.
I mean I'm 20 years old I know damn well the risks of [joining] the Marine Corps in time of war. But did these young boys, Boys that I've killed know what the fuck there were [doing] or even fighting for, these are questions I ask myself."
When Siatta returned to civilian life, he turned to self-ruinous conduct--including drinking and a guilty plea to a charge of attempted home invasion.
He is the soldier's Everyman.
No human can avoid traumas or nightmares caused by participation in gratuitous wars that turn children into orphans, wives into widows, and have fathers bury sons rather than sons bury fathers.
Every recruiting poster or presentation featuring Uncle Sam's "I Want You For U.S. Army" or otherwise should thus be required to include a prominent warning: "Participation in wars not in self-defense will implicate you in the killings of women, children, and youths and heighten your risk of suicide or self-destructive behaviors."
For the USG to lure men and women into the armed forces without full disclosure of the hazards of service is morally indefensible.
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Bruce Fein;Constitutional Lawyer;Follow Bruce Fein On Twitter;Www.Twitter.Com Brucefeinesq
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www.huffingtonpost.com
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bruce-fein/us-governments-indefensib_b_13930506.html?utm_hp_ref=politics&ir=Politics
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LEFT
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38,953,433 |
2017-01-02 20:52:19
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The Guardian
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Family court judge who survived bombing drowns in backyard pool
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Richard Gee, a family court judge whose house was firebombed in 1984, was found unconscious on Monday but could not be resuscitated
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An 83-year-old man who died after being found unconscious in a backyard pool in Sydney’s northeast overnight has been identified by the ABC as the former family court judge Richard Gee.
NSW Ambulance paramedics were called to the home at Neridah Ave in Belrose at about 10pm on Monday but the man died at the scene.
Police are investigating and will prepare a report for the coroner.
More than a dozen people have died from drowning in NSW over the holiday period, prompting authorities to warn the public to be careful around water.
The deaths include those of three toddlers in backyard pools in Sydney.
Gee was a judge on the family court in 1984 when the home was targeted with a firebomb that levelled the building. The judge and his children were asleep inside the home at the time, but survived the attack.
Gee had taken over from family court judge David Opas, who was shot and killed in June 1980 after answering the door of his Woollahra home. No one was ever convicted of the murder, the firebombing or any of a string of attacks on the family court during the early 1980s.
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Australian Associated Press
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www.theguardian.com
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https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/jan/03/family-court-judge-who-survived-bombing-drowns-in-backyard-pool
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LEFT
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4,702,671 |
2017-01-02 20:54:01
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CNN
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How Dylann Roof might save himself
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Page Pate questions the view that Dylann Roof's decision to represent himself at the sentencing phase is a mistake. He says that it might save Roof's life.
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Page Pate is a criminal defense and constitutional lawyer based in Atlanta. He is an adjunct professor of law at the University of Georgia, a founding member of the Georgia Innocence Project, a former board member of the Federal Defender Program in Atlanta, and former chairman of the criminal law section of the Atlanta Bar Association. Follow him on Twitter @pagepate . The opinions expressed in this commentary are his.
(CNN) When Dylann Roof appears in federal court on Tuesday for the penalty phase of his trial, he will be representing himself as his court-appointed lawyers stand by and watch. I'm sure Roof's decision to represent himself was applauded by those who believe Roof deserves to die for killing nine innocent people while they worshiped at a church in Charleston, South Carolina . Common sense suggests that a defendant who represents himself in a serious criminal case, especially a death penalty case, becomes a much easier target for the prosecution.
That's certainly the prevailing view among lawyers and judges. In Roof's case, the federal judge overseeing the trial told Roof point blank that it's "a bad idea." I have no idea what kind of a defense Dylann Roof intends to present, or if he will even try to convince the jury not to impose a death sentence. At a hearing last week, Roof told the judge that he does not plan on calling any witnesses or offering any evidence.
If that's the case, his sentence should be an easy and quick decision, right? Maybe not. By representing himself at the penalty phase, I actually think Dylann Roof has a better chance than most might believe at avoiding a death sentence for his crimes.
Let me be clear: I am opposed to the death penalty. I know, after representing people in serious criminal cases for over twenty years, that the death penalty is not fairly or uniformly imposed. Statistics show that death as a punishment has been predominately imposed on people of color . And, as the number of exonerations of death row inmates continues to climb through the use of DNA testing, it is a virtual certainty that our judicial system has sentenced people to die for crimes they did not commit. Without 100% certainty, I don't think the state should be in the business of killing people. I think it's both unconstitutional and immoral. To me it's no wonder why Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer has joined other judges, lawyers and legal scholars in the belief that capital punishment is cruel and unusual.
But it's hard for me to say it would be cruel to execute Dylann Roof for what he did. Roof has admitted both his crime and his racial motives for committing it. If anyone deserves to die for their crimes, Dylann Roof certainly does.
And that's what will likely happen if Roof is represented by lawyers who follow the standard script in death penalty cases. If Roof's lawyers try to convince the jury to spare his life for the usual reasons -- his youth, possible mental illness, difficult family circumstances - they will lose. Roof committed a senseless, horrible crime and has expressed not even the slightest bit of regret.
How Roof's choice could change the script
But by dismissing his experienced lawyers and deciding to represent himself, Roof is throwing the script out the window. He has no legal training that we know about, no idea about complicated evidence rules and court procedures, and absolutely no credibility with the jury. Most people are now assuming it's over for Roof -- but I'm not so sure.
In a recent case from Georgia , a defendant represented himself in a death penalty trial and lived to tell about it. The defendant in that case admitted to a killing spree during which he murdered a well-known local police officer, tried to kill another police officer, and then killed an innocent bystander. The case was tried in a rural, mostly white county in a red, pro-death penalty state.
Like the Roof case, everything about the Georgia case pointed to a death sentence. But that's not what happened. Like Dylann Roof, the defendant in that case decided to start representing himself during the proceedings. That's when the wheels of justice went off the track.
I followed a good portion of that trial in the press and watched the penalty phase (I personally knew lawyers on both sides and the judge). I saw how the defendant interacted with the court and the jury. I don't know of any other cases (until now) where a defendant has represented himself at the penalty phase, and I am convinced that the Georgia defendant's decision to represent himself literally saved his life -- because the jury got to see him as a real person, not just a defendant sitting in a chair while lawyers spoke for him. The defendant in that case didn't try to deny the crime. Instead, he talked about his various grievances against law enforcement and how he had not been treated fairly by the system. It was all crazy talk, but it was enough to keep this conservative jury from sentencing him to death.
I don't know if the jury decided against death in that case because they thought the defendant was mentally ill or for some other reason. But I do know that the jury's decision not to impose death wasn't based on any doubt about the defendant's guilt. He admitted killing these innocent and well-liked people, and never once expressed any remorse or offered any rational justification for his acts.
Why the jury might not want him to die
Instead, I think the jury rejected a death sentence in that case for the simple reason that the jury actually got to know the defendant on a more personal level than if his lawyers had done all the talking.
Prosecutors are wisely taught to de-humanize criminal defendants at trial. They avoid calling the defendant by name and will instruct their witnesses to do the same. The more "human" a defendant becomes, the more difficult it is for a jury to impose severe punishment, especially the ultimate punishment of death. It's easier to sentence a "Mr. Defendant" to death than someone who has a name, a family, and the messy baggage of an often difficult life.
When a defendant represents himself, it throws the prosecutors off their game. Any experienced prosecutor who has tried a case against a pro se defendant (a defendant who represents himself) will tell you how frustrating and difficult it can be. Maybe the prosecutor over-compensates by beating up on the defendant and exposing his ignorance of the law and court procedures. The judge will have to allow the defendant more leeway than a lawyer would get just to try to insure a fair trial.
As strange as it may sound, a juror or two may also start to see something in the defendant that reminds them of a person they know. Or, the more they see and hear the defendant, they may start thinking about his age, his childhood, his emotional and mental issues, or any number of things we can only speculate about.
There is also a very real chance that the more the jury sees and hears Roof trying to act as his own lawyer, the more they may be inclined to question his mental competence. If one or more of the jurors think he is mentally ill, they may be reluctant to sentence him to die. I think that's especially true if Roof puts up no defense at all or actually asks the jury for a death sentence.
Regardless of what Roof says or does, it's admittedly very difficult to imagine a normal person feeling any empathy towards him at all. But I am certain, based on my experience as a lawyer and my observations of the trial in Georgia, that he has a better chance to live representing himself. There would be little possibility for the jury to empathize with him if a legal team were pleading for his life while he just sat there.
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Even if the jury doesn't empathize with him, I think Roof's decision to represent himself at sentencing may still help him avoid a death sentence. The jurors' level of disgust for Roof may grow the more they hear from him, but they may decide that letting Roof die in prison after many years would be a tougher sentence than the death penalty. I can easily see jurors not wanting to allow Roof to become the racist martyr he fantasized about when he committed these crimes.
I'm not saying Dylann Roof should live, or that a death sentence in this case would be a travesty of justice. But don't expect the prosecution to have an easier time achieving their goal just because Roof is representing himself. For better or worse, I think it's now going to be more difficult.
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Page Pate
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www.cnn.com
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/opinions/dylann-roof-sentencing-pate-opinion/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_topstories+%28RSS%3A+CNN+-+Top+Stories%29
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2017-01-02 20:59:03
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HuffPost
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Turkey Mourns As Funerals Begin For Victims Of Istanbul Terror Attack
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Images capture scenes of grief and respect for the victims of the deadly shooting.
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BULENT KILIC via Getty Images People carry the coffin of Yunus Gormek, 23, one of the victims of the Reina night club attack, during his funeral ceremony on Jan. 2, 2017, in Istanbul.
Funerals and memorials are underway in Turkey after a gunman killed 39 people in Istanbul during a New Year’s Eve party. Mourning crowds gathered to pay respects to the victims, while flowers lined the police barricades outside the Reina nightclub, where the attack took place.
At least 25 of those killed in the attack were foreign nationals, according to Turkey’s Anadolu news agency. People from over a dozen countries, including Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Canada and Israel, were among the dead.
Police and law enforcement officials are still searching for the perpetrator of the attacks, who is believed to have fled the scene after the shooting.
The self-described Islamic State took credit for the shooting on Monday, in a rare acknowledgement of an attack inside Turkey. The militant group and its supporters have been suspected of conducting terror operations against Turkey for years ― including the Istanbul airport bombing last June, which killed 45 people ― but have almost always refrained from officially claiming these attacks.
The precise reason behind ISIS taking responsibility for the Reina attack is unclear, but it may mark a significant shift in how the group frames its killings in Turkey. Analysts have stated that the group’s propaganda is currently branding the shooting as centrally directed, though it’s not yet known whether the group planned or inspired the attack.
FETHI BELAID via Getty Images Mourners pray around the coffins of a Franco-Tunisian couple who were victims of the attack at the Reina nightclub.
In the last six months, Turkey has taken on a more active role in targeting ISIS and regaining control of its southern border, which the militant group has used to move goods to and from its strongholds in Syria. Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus stated on Monday that the Reina attack would not change the government’s cross-border military operations in Syria.
The shooting at the Reina nightclub is the most recent incident in a period of violence and instability that has gripped Turkey for over a year now. Terror attacks have killed over 400 people in Turkey since 2015, most attributed to either ISIS or Kurdish militant groups. A failed coup last July also led to a far-reaching crackdown on alleged sympathizers of exiled cleric Fethullah Gulen that has seen tens of thousands arrested.
Images from Istanbul show residents of the city mourning the Reina attack and holding funerals for the dead.
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Nick Robins-Early;World News Reporter;The Huffington Post
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www.huffingtonpost.com
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/istanbul-attack-victims_us_586a741be4b0de3a08f90f46?ir=Politics&utm_hp_ref=politics
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2017-01-02 21:00:46
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USA Today
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Reports: Police to question Israel PM on alleged corruption
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Israeli police will question Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later Monday about corruption allegations, the Israeli media reported.
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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gestures as he speaks during a Likud faction meeting at the Knesset in Jerusalem on January 2, 2017. (Photo: Gali Tibbon, AFP/Getty Images)
JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli police will question Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later Monday about corruption allegations, the Israeli media reported.
A black screen was placed in front of Netanyahu's official residence in apparent anticipation of the investigators' arrival and to obstruct the view of journalists seeking to film them.
Netanyahu has denied what he calls "baseless" reports that he received gifts from two businessmen.
Speaking at a meeting of his Likud faction Monday afternoon, Netanyahu again denied allegations of wrongdoing.
"We've been paying attention to reports in the media, we are hearing the celebratory mood and the atmosphere in the television studios and the corridors of the opposition, and I would like to tell them, stop with the celebrations, don't rush," he said. "There won't be anything because there is nothing."
Israel's Channel 2 TV has reported that Netanyahu accepted "favors" from businessmen in Israel and abroad, and is the central suspect in a second investigation that also involves family members. It said a criminal probe is expected next week.
Israel's Justice Ministry and police have declined to comment on the media reports.
A campaign is underway by Erel Margalit, an opposition lawmaker of the Zionist Union party, for Netanyahu to be formally investigated over suspicions of prominent donors improperly transferring money for Netanyahu's personal use, as well as reports that Netanyahu's personal attorney represented a German firm involved in a $1.5 billion sale of submarines to Israel.
Copyright 2017 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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A.M. Est January
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www.usatoday.com
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2017/01/02/israeli-police-prime-minister-benjamin-netanyahu/96080432/?utm_source=feedblitz&utm_medium=FeedBlitzRss&utm_campaign=usatoday-newstopstories
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CENTER
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2017-01-02 21:02:33
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CNN
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Missile boast puts North Korea threat on Trump's front burner
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North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has put the world on notice that he aims to present US President-elect Donald Trump with his first international crisis.
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Washington (CNN) North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has put the world on notice that he aims to present US President-elect Donald Trump with his first international crisis.
The autocratic 32-year-old leader declared in a televised New Year's Day speech that his military is on the brink of testing its first intercontinental ballistic missile: a rocket that can be equipped with nuclear weapons and is powerful enough to reach any part of the US.
While US officials and military experts doubt many of Kim's boasts, Trump may very well have to deal with an ICBM test and confront the danger Pyongyang poses to international stability.
The hermit nation poses a unique threat. While the nuclear nations of China and Russia are both pushing back against US power across the globe, they are more integrated into the international system and neither is as erratic or threatening. This all moves Pyongyang to Trump's front burner as a simmering problem that might soon boil over.
Kim declared Sunday that his goal was "to cope against the vicious threats for nuclear war by the Imperialists," a sinister nod to the US and its Asian allies
North Korea has been steadily working to improve its missile and weapons capability, conducting a fifth nuclear test in September.
American analysts say there are still questions about Pyongyang's claims of technological advances -- particularly to key elements required to deliver a nuclear payload -- but the picture is still worrisome.
"It's a very real and growing threat," said Bruce Klinger, a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation. "Think Don Corleone, but with nuclear weapons."
North Korea might be easy to ridicule as "the funny little country, with the funny little guy, with the funny little hairstyle out of Jersey Shore," that can't even provide electricity to its people, Klingner said. But "North Korea is a multi-spectrum threat to the US, its allies and international peace and security."
"This is the worst regime in the world trying to acquire the worst weapons in the world and the means to reach the US with them," Victor Cha, a senior advisor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said of North Korea. "In terms of a direct threat to American security, this is it."
Russian, Chinese threats differ
He said that threat is different than that from major powers Russia and China.
"With Russia and China, we're mutually deterred" because of nuclear capabilities, he explained. "With North Korea, you just don't know what this guy is going to do."
Pyongyang has a million-man army poised along the border with South Korea, where US forces are based. The state engages in massive counterfeiting operations of the US $100 bill and in the manufacturing of methamphetamine. US security officials place it in the top five cyber threats worldwide. It has an estimated 16 to 20 nuclear weapons and is steadily working to miniaturize them and improve the range and accuracy of missiles to deliver them.
North Korea's new boast about an ICBM that could deliver those weapons to the US comes as Washington is undergoing a leadership transition -- always a fragile time -- and South Korea is in political disarray, with its president temporarily stripped of her powers because of corruption charges and facing a court ruling on whether she should be reinstated or removed from office.
Kim sees 2017 as "an opportune time" to complete development of a nuclear weapon because of these leadership challenges, according to a high-level North Korean diplomat who recently defected to South Korea. Kim is "determined" to complete development of a nuclear weapon by the end of 2017, the diplomat said at a December press briefing, according to Yonhap news agency.
"This is not just saber-rattling to get attention," Cha said. "This is an actual military goal they're seeking."
And they're well on their way, despite repeated international attempts over decades to slow Pyongyang's program through sanctions and diplomacy. North Korea conducted an unprecedented number of missile tests in 2016 and a satellite launch that experts call a sign that it has cleared significant hurdles toward ICBM technology.
It has already notched other potentially lethal successes.
Pyongyang fired a submarine-based ballistic missile in August, a weapon that South Korea has no viable defense against, said Klingner, a former chief of the CIA's Korea branch. After the test, the South Korean defense ministry revised its estimate on the North's ability to deploy submarine-launched missiles from around four years to as little as a year.
JUST WATCHED Defector: North Korea determined to have nukes Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Defector: North Korea determined to have nukes 01:54
The country likely already has working nuclear warheads for its Nodong medium-range ballistic missile, which threatens all of South Korea and Japan, experts say.
And Pyongyang's intermediate range missile, the Musudan, can hit Guam, the location of a major US military base and a critical node in the defense of the western Pacific Ocean. It isn't clear whether North Korea has the ability to put a nuclear warhead on the Musudan yet.
The ICBM would be the next level up, putting the continental US within Pyongyang's deadly reach. US four star generals, including Gen. Vincent Brooks, who leads US forces in South Korea, and Gen. Harry Harris, head of US Pacific Command, say North Korea is nearing that capability. Other experts don't think Pyongyang is quite there yet, but say it likely will be within Trump's first term.
Struggling to deliver nukes
Bruce Bennett, a a senior defense analyst at the Rand Corporation, says that despite North Korea's apparent progress on a warhead, it doesn't yet have good enough missile and rocket technology to deliver a nuke.
A key question is whether they have the technology that would allow the missiles to re-enter the atmosphere. North Koreans have this capability for the intermediate range Musudan missile, which can hit South Korea and Japan. It's a harder technological feat to achieve re-entry capability for an ICBM, which is subject to higher temperatures and greater velocities.
For now, US military officials told CNN that they assess that North Korea still hasn't mastered that technology or key elements of firing and fuzing a weapon.
"They're likely further along than many experts and pundits give them credit for," according to Klingner. "We may not know where they are on that path, but we know they're on it."
Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Pyongyang International Cinema House –
(above) "A gigantic hall featuring several screening rooms able to fit up to 3,000 seats in its largest. It is a pure example of Pyongyang's brutalist architecture. All in bare, raw concrete with modern shapes and sharp edges, brutalist buildings like this one can be found all around the city but this one is probably the most impressive of them all, and could make for a perfect science fiction film set." More: Photographer Raphael Olivier recently went on an architecture tour of Pyongyang. Scroll through the gallery to see and read his thoughts about each building he photographed.(above) "A gigantic hall featuring several screening rooms able to fit up to 3,000 seats in its largest. It is a pure example of Pyongyang's brutalist architecture. All in bare, raw concrete with modern shapes and sharp edges, brutalist buildings like this one can be found all around the city but this one is probably the most impressive of them all, and could make for a perfect science fiction film set." Hide Caption 1 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Ryugyong Hotel – "This hotel is probably the most emblematic building of Pyongyang and is still undergoing construction. Towering over the city at 330 meters (1082 feet) high, its infrastructure is made entirely of concrete which gives this solid futurist look -- like a very heavy spaceship that will never take off." Hide Caption 2 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Pyongyang metro – "One of the deepest metro systems in the world, it is accessed by very long and steep escalators. It is also used as a bomb shelter due to its depth." Hide Caption 3 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Changgwang-won Health Complex – "One of multiple pools as well as saunas, spas, massage rooms and barber shops in the complex. Completed in 1981, it showcases pure modernist architectural features and very carefully arranged interiors, notably the tile work." Hide Caption 4 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang The Workers Party Foundation Monument – "Completed in 1995, this monument is quite a recent structure yet very much follows the architectural line of Pyongyang. It's made from raw granite stone and radiates harshness, struggle and strength." Hide Caption 5 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Changgwang-won health complex – "Atrium view of the Changgwang-won health complex. The building's circular form made of raw concrete reflect a socialist modernist style. The tips of the Ice Rink and Ryugyong Hotel can be seen in the background." Hide Caption 6 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Two Sisters Monument – "This sits on the outskirts of Pyongyang. The two women symbolize the two Koreas and the desire of reunification. Like many other monuments in the country, it is made from solid granite stone." Hide Caption 7 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Pyongyang Sports Village – "This is a street in Pyongyang dedicated to sports with numerous specialized stadiums including volleyball, taekwondo, swimming, badminton, football or pictured here, wrestling." Hide Caption 8 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Overpass – "A remote piece of modernist architecture used only as a quick stop for tourists on the way to visit the DMZ. It stays quiet most of the time with very little traffic passing through but has a warm presence of its own and sits with dignity in the empty landscape." Hide Caption 9 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Pyongyang Ice Rink – "Completed in 1982, the ice rink has a very retro feel while still retaining a futuristic edge." Hide Caption 10 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Pyongyang Ice Rink Interior – "Enthusiasts of various levels practice their skating skills, under the vast conical roof and surrounded by warm harmonious colors." Hide Caption 11 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Pyongyang Central Youth Hall – "A multi-function space for the youth to practice music, dancing, theater and other activities. Yet another good example of brutalist architecture." Hide Caption 12 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Pyongyang International Cinema House – The cinema complex is mostly out of service and only used for special occasions such as the Pyongyang International Film Festival, held every two years. Hide Caption 13 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Dressing room of a private sauna, Changgwang-won health complex – "Dressing room of a private sauna at the Changgwang-won health complex, featuring beautiful green tile work with black floor, matching the unique vintage tones of the city." Hide Caption 14 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang A barbershop inside Changgwang-won health complex – "The shop follows the curve of the building, and is full of vintage design elements such as the pattern-printed flooring and wallpaper on the chairs and even the staff uniforms." Hide Caption 15 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang A building in central Pyongyang – "The gray, minimal, and textured facade with grid-like windows was built by the Russians while helping North Korea to rebuild its capital after the Korean War. It seemingly has seen many winters, just like the people of this nation." Hide Caption 16 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Koryo Hotel – "Pyongyang's most iconic hotel, is an extravagant 45-story high twin-tower building topped by two revolving restaurants, although only one is open. This is the view from one onto the other just after sunset, sitting 140 meters (460 feet) above the city." Hide Caption 17 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Golden Lane Bowling Alley – "This venue is a rare opportunity for tourists to mix with locals in a friendly and relaxed atmosphere. The decor is superb as any bowling arena should be, with a subtle gradient orange backdrop and remarkable flowery carpet." Hide Caption 18 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang View of East Pyongyang – "A view of the capital's east seen from Juche Tower. Here the homogenous design of the city and absence of visual pollution from commercial advertising become apparent -- as well as the very linear and raw structures of most buildings." Hide Caption 19 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Residential building in Pyongyang – "A classical Pyongyang tower made with modernist round shapes, painted pistachio green with hints of salmon pink. It's perfectly in line with the pastel tones favored throughout the city." Hide Caption 20 of 21 Photos: An architecture tour of Pyongyang Pyongyang Grand Theatre –
To see more of Olivier's work, visit his "The North Korean Revolutionary Opera is performed at the Pyongyang Grand Theatre, which exhibits a unique mix of socialist modernist architecture with Korean influences."To see more of Olivier's work, visit his website Hide Caption 21 of 21
Kim boasted in his New Year's remarks that his country has successfully tested a variety of ICMB technologies. "Research and development of the cutting-edge tech weapons are actively progressing and strengthening our defense capabilities, including last-stage preparation of tests for intercontinental ballistic rocket launch have been continuously succeeding," he declared.
If the young leader goes ahead, an ICMB test would be a flagrant violation of numerous United Nations resolutions and beg a response from Trump.
The President-elect has called Kim a "maniac," but has also said he would sit down and negotiate with him, a break from long-standing international norms.
A test would also deepen worries in South Korea and Japan, already rattled by suggestions from candidate Trump that the US should cover less of their defense and, in another violation of international norms, that they should develop their own nuclear programs.
Increasing tension with China
And it would immediately increase tensions between the US and North Korea's closest ally China, which Trump has suggested has "total control" over Pyongyang.
If China won't rein North Korea in, Trump has suggested the US should "make trade very difficult" with Beijing. He has also suggested that he would have China assassinate the North Korean leader to make him "disappear in one form or another very quickly."
Cha said the decision to stop North Korea from reaching the point where it could deter the US by threatening Honolulu or Los Angeles with destruction will be a personal one that the President-elect will likely have to make. While some experts estimate Pyongyang will have an ICBM by 2020, Cha thinks it will be sooner.
"If the President decides this can't stand, then all kinds of options open up for him" to take action, Cha said, including significant shifts in the US force posture in Asia and exerting greater pressure on China.
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Nicole Gaouette;Barbara Starr
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www.cnn.com
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/politics/north-korea-icbm-threat-trump/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_topstories+%28RSS%3A+CNN+-+Top+Stories%29
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2017-01-02 21:02:33
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CNN
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Facing growing North Korea nuke threat, Trump vows: 'It won't happen!'
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President-elect Donald Trump had a message Monday for North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and his latest missile threats.
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"North Korea just stated that it is in the final stages of developing a nuclear weapon capable of reaching parts of the U.S. It won't happen!" Trump tweeted.
Trump quickly followed that up with a charge that China was doing nothing to help the US cope with the rogue nation.
North Korea just stated that it is in the final stages of developing a nuclear weapon capable of reaching parts of the U.S. It won't happen!
"China has been taking out massive amounts of money & wealth from the U.S. in totally one-sided trade, but won't help with North Korea. Nice!" Trump wrote.
The President-elect launched his verbal missiles after the autocratic 32-year-old North Korean leader declared in a televised New Year's Day speech that his military is on the brink of testing its first intercontinental ballistic missile: a rocket that can be equipped with nuclear weapons and is powerful enough to reach any part of the US.
A spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry responded Tuesday to Trump, saying, "China's efforts in resolving the North Korea nuclear issue have been obvious to all. Our contribution has been widely recognized by the international community. As the host of the six-nation talks, our efforts and achievements have been clear to all."
Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program (EANP) said Trump's tweets were "foolish, but probably harmless."
"I think North Korea will probably test the KN-08 (intercontinental ballistic missile) this year, no matter what Trump tweets," he said in an email to CNN.
While US officials and military experts doubt many of Kim's boasts, Trump may very well have to deal with an ICBM test and confront the danger Pyongyang poses to international stability.
North Korea just stated that it is in the final stages of developing a nuclear weapon capable of reaching parts of the U.S. It won't happen! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 2, 2017
The hermit nation poses a unique threat. While the nuclear nations of China and Russia are both pushing back against US power across the globe, they are more integrated into the international system and neither is as erratic or threatening. This all moves Pyongyang to Trump's front burner as a simmering problem that might soon boil over.
Kim declared Sunday that his goal was "to cope against the vicious threats for nuclear war by the Imperialists," a sinister nod to the US and its Asian allies.
Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway was asked on "Good Morning America" on Tuesday what the President-elect intended to do to stop North Korea's nukes.
"He's not stated that publicly, and he won't before he's inaugurated," Conway said.
"But we do know that there are sanctions that are possible," she added. "They have not always worked. I think China would have to have a significant role here as well. But he's putting North Korea on notice through this tweet and other statements that this won't happen. He, as President of the United States, wants to stand between them and their missile capabilities, which experts say could be deployed to reach Seattle almost immediately."
North Korea has been steadily working to improve its missile and weapons capability, conducting a fifth nuclear test in September.
American analysts say there are still questions about Pyongyang's claims of technological advances -- particularly to key elements required to deliver a nuclear payload -- but the picture is still worrisome.
JUST WATCHED N. Korea claims it's close to testing an ICBM Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH N. Korea claims it's close to testing an ICBM 01:37
"It's a very real and growing threat," said Bruce Klinger, a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation. "Think Don Corleone, but with nuclear weapons."
North Korea might be easy to ridicule as "the funny little country, with the funny little guy, with the funny little hairstyle out of Jersey Shore," that can't even provide electricity to its people, Klingner said. But "North Korea is a multi-spectrum threat to the US, its allies and international peace and security."
"This is the worst regime in the world trying to acquire the worst weapons in the world and the means to reach the US with them," Victor Cha, a senior advisor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said of North Korea. "In terms of a direct threat to American security, this is it."
Russian, Chinese threats differ
He said that threat is different than that from major powers Russia and China.
"With Russia and China, we're mutually deterred" because of nuclear capabilities, he explained. "With North Korea, you just don't know what this guy is going to do."
Pyongyang has a million-man army poised along the border with South Korea, where US forces are based. The state engages in massive counterfeiting operations of the US $100 bill and in the manufacturing of methamphetamine. US security officials place it in the top five cyber threats worldwide. It has an estimated 16 to 20 nuclear weapons and is steadily working to miniaturize them and improve the range and accuracy of missiles to deliver them.
North Korea's new boast about an ICBM that could deliver those weapons to the US comes as Washington is undergoing a leadership transition -- always a fragile time -- and South Korea is in political disarray , with its president temporarily stripped of her powers because of corruption charges and facing a court ruling on whether she should be reinstated or removed from office.
Kim sees 2017 as "an opportune time" to complete development of a nuclear weapon because of these leadership challenges, according to a high-level North Korean diplomat who recently defected to South Korea. Kim is "determined" to complete development of a nuclear weapon by the end of 2017, the diplomat said at a December press briefing, according to Yonhap news agency.
"This is not just saber-rattling to get attention," Cha said. "This is an actual military goal they're seeking."
And they're well on their way, despite repeated international attempts over decades to slow Pyongyang's program through sanctions and diplomacy. North Korea conducted an unprecedented number of missile tests in 2016 and a satellite launch that experts call a sign that it has cleared significant hurdles toward ICBM technology.
It has already notched other potentially lethal successes.
Pyongyang fired a submarine-based ballistic missile in August, a weapon that South Korea has no viable defense against, said Klingner, a former chief of the CIA's Korea branch. After the test, the South Korean Defense Ministry revised its estimate on the North's ability to deploy submarine-launched missiles from around four years to as little as a year.
The country likely already has working nuclear warheads for its Nodong medium-range ballistic missile, which threatens all of South Korea and Japan, experts say.
And Pyongyang's intermediate range missile, the Musudan, can hit Guam, the location of a major US military base and a critical node in the defense of the western Pacific Ocean. It isn't clear whether North Korea has the ability to put a nuclear warhead on the Musudan yet.
The ICBM would be the next level up, putting the continental US within Pyongyang's deadly reach. US four-star generals, including Gen. Vincent Brooks, who leads US forces in South Korea, and Adm. Harry Harris, head of US Pacific Command, say North Korea is nearing that capability. Other experts don't think Pyongyang is quite there yet, but say it likely will be within Trump's first term.
Struggling to deliver nukes
Bruce Bennett, a a senior defense analyst at the Rand Corporation, says that despite North Korea's apparent progress on a warhead, it doesn't yet have good enough missile and rocket technology to deliver a nuke.
A key question is whether they have the technology that would allow the missiles to re-enter the atmosphere. North Koreans have this capability for the intermediate range Musudan missile, which can hit South Korea and Japan. It's a harder technological feat to achieve re-entry capability for an ICBM, which is subject to higher temperatures and greater velocities.
For now, US military officials told CNN that they assess that North Korea still hasn't mastered that technology or key elements of firing and fuzing a weapon.
"They're likely further along than many experts and pundits give them credit for," according to Klingner. "We may not know where they are on that path, but we know they're on it."
Kim boasted in his New Year's remarks that his country has successfully tested a variety of ICBM technologies. "Research and development of the cutting-edge tech weapons are actively progressing and strengthening our defense capabilities, including last-stage preparation of tests for intercontinental ballistic rocket launch have been continuously succeeding," he declared.
If the young leader goes ahead, an ICBM test would be a flagrant violation of numerous United Nations resolutions and beg a response from Trump.
The President-elect has called Kim a "maniac," but has also said he would sit down and negotiate with him, a break from long-standing international norms.
A test would also deepen worries in South Korea and Japan, already rattled by suggestions from candidate Trump that the US should cover less of their defense and, in another violation of international norms, that they should develop their own nuclear programs.
Increasing tension with China
And it would immediately increase tensions between the US and North Korea's closest ally China, which Trump has suggested has "total control" over Pyongyang.
If China won't rein North Korea in, Trump has suggested the US should "make trade very difficult" with Beijing. He has also suggested that he would have China assassinate the North Korean leader to make him "disappear in one form or another very quickly."
Cha said the decision to stop North Korea from reaching the point where it could deter the US by threatening Honolulu or Los Angeles with destruction will be a personal one that the President-elect will likely have to make. While some experts estimate Pyongyang will have an ICBM by 2020, Cha thinks it will be sooner.
"If the President decides this can't stand, then all kinds of options open up for him" to take action, Cha said, including significant shifts in the US force posture in Asia and exerting greater pressure on China.
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Nicole Gaouette;Barbara Starr
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www.cnn.com
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/politics/north-korea-icbm-threat-trump/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fedition_world+%28RSS%3A+CNNi+-+World%29
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UNDEFINED
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4,235,042 |
2017-01-02 21:09:38
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USA Today
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Chinese don't have wills - now it's a big problem
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The most populous nation has a high savings rate but hardly anyone has a will.
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People exercise at Ritan Park in Beijing on Dec. 22, 2016. The world's most populous nation has the second-largest economy, one of the highest savings rates and mushrooming wealth. Yet virtually no one has a will to pass on an estate. (Photo: Andy Wong, AP)
BEIJING — The world's most populous nation has the second-largest economy, one of the highest savings rates and mushrooming wealth. Yet virtually no one has a will to pass on an estate. And now it's become a huge problem.
Thirty years after communist China embarked on a course that allowed individuals to accumulate wealth, members of the first generation to benefit are starting to die, creating a spike in inheritance disputes that are clogging up the courts and turning families against each other.
The problem has gotten so bad that even the ruling Communist Party — previously no fan of inherited wealth — is concerned.
“When people die without a will their children scramble for their property, damaging family ties and having a negative effect on society,” the state-run Xinhua News Agency has warned.
Only 1% of China’s 220 million seniors have drawn up inheritance plans, according to the best estimates. The reason is cultural: talking about death is taboo and writing a will is akin to putting a curse on yourself.
A group of senior citizens write their wills at a free legal center in Beijing. (Photo: Hannah Gardner)
Even the rich and educated often don’t write them. Consider the publicized case of Yan Jiying, a coal baron from the northern province of Shanxi. He died in 2015 at the age of 71, leaving his estranged wife, long-term mistress and six children to fight over his assets.
At one point the conflict was so bad that his company, Sanjia, stopped paying wages. Local officials tried to broker a peace but to no avail.
“China is entering a crucial period. If we don’t find a way to transfer wealth responsibly it will affect social stability,” said Hu Xingdou, an economist at the Beijing Institute of Technology.
To remedy the problem, the government is calling on local authorities around the country to establish free legal centers for those over 60. One charity doing that since 2013 is the China Will Registration Center, founded by Chen Kai, a young lawyer with a passion to protect seniors. His offices in Beijing, Tianjin, Guangzhou and Nanjing have processed 40,000 wills at no charge since it was established and is the largest provider of probate services in China.
The waiting list for appointments at his first Beijing center now stretches into September, proof that people will write a will if they can find support they trust, Chen said. “We want to teach old people that they are the masters of their fortune, that they have the right to decide what happens to their hard-earned money, ” he said.
On a recent morning around a dozen seniors were squeezed around a communal table at the center, diligently transcribing the final copy of their will. They begin by dictating their wishes to a lawyer, who types up a draft. The clients are then evaluated by a visiting psychiatrist to establish clarity of mind, they record video testimony of their wishes in the presence of two independent witnesses, and finally copy the final document by hand.
People walk past motorists stuck on a traffic jam during the morning rush hour in Beijing, Dec. 15, 2016. (Photo: Andy Wong, AP)
For many, the last step is the hardest. Most are over 70 and have shaky hands or poor eyesight. Transcribing a page of formal Chinese characters mistake-free is no easy task. But Chen is adamant that they do it this way, saying he has seen too many badly written wills challenged. He wants his clients to be sure their wishes will be respected even if some family members do not like them.
According to a recent article in the People’s Daily, 70% of inheritance cases in Beijing courts stem from the lack of a will. In the cases where a will is challenged, 60% are found to be invalid.
Chinese television is highlighting the issue in shows like Third Mediation Room, China’s answer to Jerry Springer, and Family Property, a drama about three brothers who fight over the family business after their father dies without a will.
At the will registration center in Beijing, many said they had come after discussing their wishes with family members. Liu Maolin, 74, said he had decided to write a will because he wanted to be sure his daughter, who cares for him, gets his apartment, not his son, a businessman who lives in Japan.
His family agreed this was a fair arrangement, but he conceded there is always a risk of a later dispute. "I didn’t want them to end up like the people on television. This way they can’t argue after I am gone.”
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Hannah Gardner;Special For Usa Today;P.M. Est January
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www.usatoday.com
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2017/01/02/chinese-wills-savings-beijing/95750124/?utm_source=feedblitz&utm_medium=FeedBlitzRss&utm_campaign=usatoday-newstopstories
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CENTER
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4,911,592 |
2017-01-02 21:18:14
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CNN
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Blue states should take Trump's tax cut money and run
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Froma Harrop says states led by Democrats have more dollars to gain if a President Trump slashes taxes on the wealthy -- and some of that money could go to implement progressive policies
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Story highlights Froma Harrop says states led by Democrats have more dollars to gain if Trump slashes taxes on the wealthy
Some of that money could go to implement progressive policies, she says
Froma Harrop is a syndicated columnist. Follow her on Twitter: @FromaHarrop The opinions expressed in this commentary are hers.
(CNN) A few days after winning the presidency, Donald Trump visited Manhattan's posh 21 Club and told the swells dining there, "We'll get your taxes down. Don't worry about it."
Froma Harrop
So far he seems intent on following through. Congressional Republicans are working on a tax-reform plan that in practice would benefit the well-to-do. And Trump's pick of spending hawk Mick Mulvaney to head the Office of Budget and Management suggests that government programs may indeed be slashed to make such tax cuts palatable to fiscal conservatives.
Democratic lawmakers representing liberal parts of America habitually denounce this sort of thing: Spending reductions combined with tax cuts benefiting upper incomes. The question is, "should they?" and the answer is "no." The blue states should take the money and run.
Most of the proposed federal tax reforms would leave more wealth in the affluent blue states. They could capture some of it through their own taxes and economic activity unleashed by residents with more money in their pockets.
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Froma Harrop
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www.cnn.com
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/opinions/blue-states-take-trump-tax-cut-money-and-run-harrop/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_latest+%28RSS%3A+CNN+-+Most+Recent%29
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UNDEFINED
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4,223,930 |
2017-01-02 21:22:21
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USA Today
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Dylann Roof competency hearing closed to public
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The 22-year-old was convicted of killing nine in a black church in 2015.
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Skip in Skip x Embed x Share The accused Charleston church shooter had a troubled past even before he was arrested for killing nine people at Emanuel AME Church in June 2015. USA TODAY NETWORK
In a self-portrait taken shortly before his June 2015 attack on Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, S.C., Dylann Roof poses in front of the Angel Oak near Charleston, a tree believed to be hundreds of years old. The patches on his jacket are flags of the defunct states of Rhodesia and apartheid South Africa, popular symbols among white supremacists. (Photo: Courtesy of U.S. District Court of South Carolina)
CHARLESTON, S.C. — A competency hearing to determine whether the man convicted last month of killing nine people in a Charleston, S.C., church, can continue to serve as his own attorney will be closed to the public, the judge overseeing the death penalty case ruled Monday morning.
The pervasiveness of social media as well as Roof’s right to a fair trial were factors in the decision of U.S. District Court Judge Richard Gergel, who said he would be compelled to sequester the federal jury if he allowed the public and press to attend the hearing.
Noting the “saturation in coverage,” Gergel said jurors can be inadvertently exposed to new information in the case while shopping at the grocery store or driving a car.
“I can’t walk down the street without hearing people talk about this case,” he said.
Roof, convicted of 33 federal counts in the June 2015 attack on Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, last week told the court he planned to offer an opening statement in the sentencing phase of the trial, but would offer no evidence and call no witnesses in his defense. The 22-year-old defendant appeared at a hearing to determine whether the hearing should be closed wearing a jail jumpsuit, handcuffs and leg shackles.
That public announcement prompted his defense attorney, David Bruck, now in the role of standby counselor, to request a competency hearing to determine whether Roof has the capacity to represent himself.
“This defendant’s announcement (on Wednesday) that he will not defend himself against the death penalty — following a government presentation that is expected to involve more than 38 additional witnesses and hundreds more exhibits — raises in especially stark fashion the question of whether the defendant is actually unable to defend himself,” Bruck wrote in a motion regarding the Monday hearing.
Gergel granted the motion, and Roof was examined for five hours over the weekend by Dr. James C. Ballenger, a forensic psychiatrist based in Charleston.
Ballenger's examination of Roof is the second in as many months. In November, the psychiatrist examined Roof after Bruck and the defense team asked for a competency hearing as jury selection was set to begin.
That move came after Roof sought to dismiss his team of four counselors who together offer nearly a century in death-penalty litigation experience. They had sought to offer a mental health defense, one that Roof blocked shortly after becoming his own lawyer.
This second competency hearing is scheduled one day ahead of the beginning of the sentencing phase of Roof's trial, where jurors will weigh a sentence of life imprisonment against the death penalty.
The closure comes over the objections of media outlets and family members of the nine victims shot to death in the attack.
Gergel said his instinct is to not close the proceeding, but the hearing would in part cover Roof’s planned strategy, one that he said includes more than not offering witnesses or evidence. The judge said he plans to release transcripts of the competency hearings after a verdict is reached.
Follow Tonya Maxwell on Twitter: @factsbymax
Related
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Tonya Maxwell;Asheville;N.C.;A.M. Est January
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www.usatoday.com
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2017/01/02/dylann-roof-competency-hearing/96080226/?utm_source=feedblitz&utm_medium=FeedBlitzRss&utm_campaign=usatoday-newstopstories
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CENTER
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4,251,801 |
2017-01-02 21:23:06
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USA Today
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Republican Congress puts priority on targeting regulations
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Congress teeing up bills to roll back existing federal rules and make new ones harder.
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Early morning traffic rolls toward the U.S. Capitol on Dec. 14, 2016. (Photo: J. David Ake, AP)
WASHINGTON — Bills to block or roll back federal regulations, initially conceived by Republicans as a check on President Obama’s power, are high on the agenda when the House returns to Washington this week and the changes could become reality shortly after the inauguration of President-elect Donald Trump.
The 115th Congress begins Tuesday with a Republican majority in the House and Senate preparing for the arrival of a Republican president for the first time in eight years.
The House is expected to take up two bills — the Midnight Rules Act and the REINS Act (which stands for Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny) — that passed on largely party-line votes in the 114th, 113th and 112th congressional sessions, but died in the Senate. The REINS Act would require that before any new major regulation could take effect, the House and Senate would have to pass a resolution of approval. The Midnight Rules Act would let Congress invalidate rules in bulk that passed in the final year of a presidential term.
The House is also expected to consider a nonbinding resolution disapproving the Dec. 23 United Nations Security Council vote that called on Israel to stop building settlements in the West Bank. The United States abstained in that vote, allowing the measure to pass.
Regulations are adopted by the executive branch to implement laws passed by Congress and signed by the president. Congress already has the power to repeal laws by passing a new bill and getting the president to sign it. And under the 1996 Congressional Review Act, Congress can pass a resolution of disapproval to block a rule if it acts within 60 days of notification from an agency.
The new legislation would further expand congressional power by preventing an administration from implementing rules without another vote. Under the REINS act, a proposed regulation would be deemed rejected if Congress was in session for 70 days and took no action. The bill allows for a major rule to take effect for a single 90-day period if the president determined it was necessary because of an imminent threat to health or safety or other emergency.
“Our federal agencies are out of control, and Congress is partly to blame for that,” the bill’s sponsor, Republican Rep. Doug Collins of Georgia, said in a release last week. “We’ve ceded our legislative responsibility to agencies that were never intended to make laws, and the result has been redundant, counterproductive rules that have massive impacts on our economy.”
Read more:
When the House considered the Midnight Rules Act in November, the White House said it would recommend that Obama veto it. Trump, however, has taken a page from the conservative playbook and blamed government regulations for holding down economic growth and job creation. He has pledged to eliminate two regulations for every new one adopted during his presidency.
The REINS Act and Midnight Rules Act are aimed at major rules. An April 2015 analysis by the Congressional Budget Office said are those that meet one of these conditions: an economic impact of more than $100 million; cause significant price increases for consumers, industries, geographic regions or state or local governments; or have significant adverse effects on competition, employment, investment, productivity or foreign competition.
The CBO said that over the past five years, 82 major rules have been adopted each year, on average. Blocking such regulations in the future would have “a significant effect on direct spending,” but CBO could not predict whether the effect would be positive or negative because it could not say whether Congress would block regulations to increase or decrease spending.
Before the House voted on the final REINS Act in 2015, Democrats unsuccessfully tried to include amendments that would exempt rules that affected veterans health care, nuclear reactor safety, transportation of hazardous materials, and the safety of products used or consumed by children under the age of 2. Each attempt was rejected in a largely party-line vote.
Critics say the changes would endanger the public and worsen gridlock in government.
“Regulations are public protections that are intended to safeguard regular citizens from dealing with unclean air and water, financial crises and unsafe products,” said Lisa Gilbert, director of the CongressWatch program at Public Citizen. “They are intended to protect us, and to do away with them wholesale is an extremely problematic approach.”
Gilbert said that while no one would argue every regulation is perfect, the changes Congress seeks to make would effectively stymie future rulemaking and allow Congress to erase actions the Obama administration took since the summer. She said she hoped there would be enough votes in the Senate to sustain a filibuster on the Midnight Rules bill, but on the REINS Act, “it’s possible there could be a path” for it to pass.
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/2hKrOZv
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Herb Jackson;Usa Today;A.M. Est January
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www.usatoday.com
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2017/01/02/republican-congress-puts-priority-targeting-regulations-trump/96003180/?utm_source=feedblitz&utm_medium=FeedBlitzRss&utm_campaign=usatoday-newstopstories
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CENTER
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39,013,441 |
2017-01-02 21:27:07
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The Guardian
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Los Angeles playground ban would brand single adults as pedophiles, say critics
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Proposed law would bar adults unaccompanied by children from playgrounds in city parks, which a city councilman said would protect kids from ‘creepy activity’
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A proposed law banning lone adults from Los Angeles playgrounds has triggered an outcry from critics who say it would stigmatize single people as pedophiles.
Mitch O’Farrell, a city councilman, suggested the ban last month as a way to protect children from “creepy activity”. He cited drug dealing and other “disturbing behavior” in or near playgrounds.
The law would bar adults unaccompanied by children from entering the playgrounds which dot parks around the city. The council is due to debate the proposal in coming weeks.
Critics have rounded on the idea as a nanny-state affront to single people.
“Why should the city assume that every adult without a child is a pedophile?” said a Los Angeles Times editorial. “That makes a childless adult a criminal just for being in a particular public space, which is an overreach that can lead to foolish enforcement – like ticketing people for sitting on a bench eating donuts.”
Indignant comments flooded O’Farrell’s Facebook page.
“I am a single person, who has often had legitimate reasons to spend time in a children’s playground without a child,” wrote Krystal Rains. “I take offense at the implication that I am a danger to anyone, child or adult when doing so.”
“That is ludicrous, I’m a woman over 60 years old and I can’t go to a playground,” said another post, from Cathy Prange. “My best memories are of my children and how much fun we had.”
Robert Alvarez said the proposal invented a problem that did not exist. “You can spin it any way you want but you are stigmatizing single people who visit the park as pedophiles. Shame on you.”
Many pointed out that adults use playgrounds to exercise.
“I have a bad back, and frequently use playground equipment to hang, and stretch out my back. Would you make me a criminal for trying to get some pain relief?” wrote Gary Lynch.
“Often, the only place to do [pull-ups] is on a set of ‘monkey bars’ in the children’s area. Not sure why I should be blocked from a public space,” said Izzy Zayas.
Some rightwing outlets interpreted the row as evidence of liberal overreach. “Unbelievable,” said RedState.com.
“Nanny state gone wild. Los Angeles attempts to ban single adults from parks,” tweeted the libertarian-tinged Young Americans for Liberty.
O’Farrell is a Democrat who represents the 13th district, which includes parts of Hollywood, Silver Lake and Echo Park. He did not immediately respond to an interview request on Monday.
However the backlash prompted him to defend the proposal in a Facebook post last week. “I want to reassure you – this is NOT a ban on adults without children from using our parks. This proposal is limited and affects a small area of a park.”
The councilman accused media outlets of incorrectly reporting his proposal, which he said emulated similar laws in Santa Monica, New York and Miami Beach. The department of recreation and parks backs the proposal.
O’Farrell noted it had generated “robust conversation” and said he was open to “thoughtful concerns”.
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Rory Carroll
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www.theguardian.com
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https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jan/02/los-angeles-childless-adults-playground-ban-proposal
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LEFT
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2,352,447 |
2017-01-02 21:36:59
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Reuters
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UPDATE 1-Moroccan central bank approves five Islamic banks
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Morocco's Central Bank has approvedfive requests to open Islamic banks in the country and allowedthree French banks to sell Islamic products, it said on Monday.
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(Adds details and background)
By Aziz El Yaakoubi
RABAT, Jan 2 (Reuters) - Morocco's Central Bank has approved five requests to open Islamic banks in the country and allowed three French banks to sell Islamic products, it said on Monday.
Islamic banks and insurers are setting up in Morocco after new legislation allowed them into the market, and the central bank has set up a central sharia board with a body of Islamic scholars to oversee the new sector.
The North African country had long rejected Islamic banking due to concerns about Islamist movements, but its financial market lacks liquidity and foreign investors, both of which Islamic finance could attract.
The central bank had said it received seven requests to open Islamic banks.
The regulatory approvals concern the three major Moroccan banks Attijariwafa Bank, BMCE of Africa and Banque Centrale Populaire (BCP), and two smaller lenders Credit Agricole (CAM) and Credit Immobilier et Hotelier (CIH).
Morocco's biggest private bank Attijariwafa won the approval while it is still in talks with a partner, the central bank said. The bank's managing director, Ismail Douiri, told Reuters in October that Attijariwafa was in advanced talks with the Islamic Development Bank (IDB).
Douiri said IDB would be a technical partner with a minority stake of between 10 and 20 percent.
Morocco's BCP has chosen Guidance Financial Group, BMCE has picked Bahrain-based Al Baraka Banking Group, while CIH is partnering with Qatar International Islamic Bank.
Moroccan state-owned bank Credit Agricole (CAM) has also won regulatory approval to create a unit with the Islamic Corporation for the Development of the Private Sector (ICD), a subsidiary of the Saudi-based IDB.
The two parners have said they would inject 200 million dirhams ($19.70 million) of capital into the offshoot and raise that to 400 million dirhams later.
Subsidiaries of French banks Societe Generale, Credit du Maroc and BMCI won permission to sell Islamic products.
Islamic finance, based on principles that ban interest and pure monetary speculation, has grown rapidly over the past decade.
Morocco will issue its first ever Islamic bond (sukuk) in the domestic market in the first half of 2017, the finance minister said last month.
However, parliament has yet to to approve a bill regulating Islamic insurance, or takaful. ($1 = 10.1540 Moroccan dirham) (Reporting By Aziz El Yaakoubi; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)
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Reuters Editorial;Reuters Staff;Min Read
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www.reuters.com
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http://www.reuters.com/article/morocco-cenbank-islamicfunds-idUSL5N1ES1P5
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CENTER
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55,450,937 |
2017-01-02 21:39:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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Mexicans Protest Against Higher Gasoline Prices
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Mexicans protested against sharp increases in gasoline and diesel prices at the start of the year, blocking roads, gas stations and fuel facilities in various parts of the country.
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MEXICO CITY—Mexicans protested Monday against sharp increases in gasoline and diesel prices at the start of the year, blocking roads, gas stations and fuel facilities in various parts of the country.
The government raised the maximum price of regular gasoline by 14% on Jan. 1, while premium fuel rose 20% and diesel 17% as part of the shift...
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Anthony Harrup
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/mexicans-protest-against-higher-gasoline-prices-1483393184
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UNDEFINED
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3,922,062 |
2017-01-02 21:43:53
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HuffPost
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Pelosi Slams GOP 'Cowardice' on Obamacare Repeal With No Replacement
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Republicans still don't know what they want to do on health care, the Democratic leader says.
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WASHINGTON ― Republicans are dead set on acting swiftly to dismantle the Affordable Care Act without having a new health care reform platform in place because they know their party doesn’t have a way forward, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Monday.
The congressional GOP leadership’s preferred strategy on Obamacare ― dubbed repeal-and-delay ― is to begin moving filibuster-proof legislation through Congress as soon as lawmakers return this week, with an eye toward presenting it to President-elect Donald Trump to sign right after he’s inaugurated this month.
But Republicans plan to postpone developing their own health care proposals for up to four years ― after the next presidential election ― because the party has never been able to agree on what it wants to do instead.
To Pelosi, this signals that the House GOP leadership knows it faces major obstacles uniting its fractious caucus around what role the federal government should have in creating the conditions for more Americans to obtain affordable health insurance coverage.
“Repeal and delay is an act of cowardice on the part of the Republicans,” she said during a conference call with reporters Monday. “Where are they going to get the votes to replace? If, in fact, ideologically they’re opposed to a public role and any participation in the good health of the American people, where are they going to get the votes, unless they were to act in a bipartisan way?”
Pelosi previously predicted Republicans would fail to even pass their repeal bill.
Trump and Republicans in Congress are in full agreement that the Affordable Care Act must go, not least because they have been promising to undo the law since President Barack Obama enacted it in 2010. But during that time, the GOP has failed to coalesce around an alternative.
House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) released a broad framework for a new health care platform last year, and Trump’s choice for secretary of Health and Human Services, Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.), has authored health care reform legislation.
But Trump’s positions on the issue have veered from supporting a universal health care plan to calling for major cuts in safety net programs like Medicaid. And Senate Republican leaders have never produced so much as a set of talking points about what the health care system after Obamacare should look like.
Already, influential Republicans like Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee Chairman Lamar Alexander (Tenn.), Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) and Sen. Susan Collins (Maine) have expressed trepidation about repealing the Affordable Care Act without a “replacement” plan. And in the House, members of the conservative Freedom Caucus are bucking against their leaders on repeal-and-delay.
People react more from fear of what might be taken away. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.)
The Affordable Care Act has brought the national uninsured rate to a historic low and extended coverage to about 20 million previously uninsured people.
Repeal-and-delay could affect even more Americans, however. If the GOP makes clear to health insurance companies that the Obamacare exchanges will disappear, many are likely to abandon the fragile new marketplaces, leaving consumers with fewer choices and higher prices, according to an analysis by the American Academy of Actuaries.
According to the Urban Institute, as many as 30 million people could lose their health coverage under repeal-and-delay.
And Republican leaders now face the daunting prospect of tackling the thorny issues of health care costs, coverage and access that bedeviled Democrats while legislating and implementing the Affordable Care Act. Republicans also have barely begun sorting through the concerns and interests of hospitals, insurers and others in the health care system regarding another major disruption to the industry.
The GOP also lacks one advantage Democrats have always held: a consensus about the goals of health care reform.
Progressives have long agreed that universal coverage, or close to it, was the chief aim of reforming the health care system, and that getting there would require a large federal funding commitment and an expanded federal role in regulating the health insurance industry.
Republicans oppose both those things on ideological grounds, and don’t believe in universal health care as a matter of principle. That means whatever they may eventually devise on health care inevitably will cover fewer people, provide less help for low-income families and include fewer consumer protections.
Within the GOP, some lawmakers favor doing nothing at all beyond repealing Obamacare, preferring to simply return to the market that existed before. Other Republicans would prefer a significantly scaled back version of what the Affordable Care Act does by offering some form of financial assistance to a portion of the population and a lesser guarantee of coverage for people with preexisting conditions.
Congressional Democrats wield little power to halt or even change the course of the Obamacare debate that will reignite when Congress reconvenes after Trump assumes office. And the party has failed to win over the American public on the issue since Democratic lawmakers began writing the Affordable Care Act at the beginning of Obama’s first term in 2009.
Democrats are hoping that enough people ― including Republican voters ― will speak out against losing their health coverage if the Affordable Care Act goes away, forcing the GOP to hesitate now or pay the price later. Democrats can also attempt to point to promising, if uncertain, signs that the troubled Obamacare exchanges are improving.
“People react more from fear of what might be taken away than they do for something that is a prospect of a good thing coming their way,” Pelosi said. “These families, whatever their politics, know that personally they will pay more for less, if they have any health insurance at all.”
Pelosi and other top congressional Democrats including incoming Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) have called for a “day of action” in support of the Affordable Care Act on Jan. 15. They’ve also asked Democratic lawmakers to stage events around the country opposing an Obamacare repeal, along with GOP proposals to cut Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.
Obama plans to visit Capitol Hill Wednesday to rally congressional Democrats ahead of the Affordable Care Act repeal fight.
And although surveys by the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation consistently have found more Americans continue to disapprove of the Affordable Care Act than approve of it, the public doesn’t appear keen on full repeal, either. According to the foundation’s post-election poll, just 26 percent of people support scrapping the law altogether, while 49 percent prefer keeping it or even expanding it.
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Jeffrey Young;Senior Reporter;The Huffington Post
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www.huffingtonpost.com
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/nancy-pelosi-gop-obamacare_us_586aa013e4b0d9a5945c228b
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LEFT
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3,929,690 |
2017-01-02 21:52:35
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HuffPost
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New York Governor Vetoes Bill That Would Provide Legal Services To The Poor
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Critics have called New York's ailing legal defense system unconstitutional.
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Reuters A spokesman for Gov. Andrew Cuomo said the bill was too expensive.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) vetoed a bill that would have required the state to fund legal services for the poor.
Cuomo struck down the bipartisan reform in its final hour on New Year’s Eve, to the disappointment of defense attorneys and municipalities across the state.
Cuomo spokesman Richard Azzopardi said the program, which would give the state seven years to take over complete funding of indigent legal services, was just too expensive.
“Until the last possible moment, we attempted to reach an agreement with the Legislature that would have achieved the stated goal of this legislation, been fiscally responsible, and had additional safeguards to ensure accountability and transparency,” Azzopardi told the New York Daily News in a statement. “Unfortunately, an agreement was unable to be reached and the Legislature was committed to a flawed bill that placed an $800 million burden on taxpayers — $600 million of which was unnecessary — with no way to pay for it and no plan to make one.”
States are required to provide competent lawyers to those who can’t afford them. New York currently lays that responsibility on counties, which advocates say has led to a confusing assortment of programs that are underfunded and unreliable.
The bill passed unanimously in June, following a 2015 class-action suit brought by the New York Civil Liberties Union that accused the state of an unconstitutional, “poorly resourced and largely dysfunctional public defense system.” Poor New Yorkers often are forced into court dates without a lawyer, accept unfair plea deals and get slapped with harsher sentences for petty offenses, according to NYCLU Executive Director Donna Lieberman.
In vetoing the measure, Cuomo blocked new standards that would limit public defense attorneys’ caseloads and require counsel at a defendant’s first hearing, alongside more reform.
“We are deeply disappointed that the governor has vetoed the most important criminal justice reform legislation in memory,” Lieberman said in a press statement. “He has rejected a groundbreaking and bipartisan fix to our deeply flawed public defense system and left in place the status quo, in which the state violates the rights of New Yorkers every day and delivers unequal justice.”
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Andy Campbell;Reporter;The Huffington Post
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www.huffingtonpost.com
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/gov-cuomo-vetoes-bill-that-would-provide-legal-services-to-the-poor_us_586aa91ce4b0d9a5945c25d8?ir=Politics&utm_hp_ref=politics
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LEFT
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3,928,881 |
2017-01-02 21:56:44
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HuffPost
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Police Question Israeli PM Netanyahu Over Corruption Allegations
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Israel's Attorney General authorized the questioning after a preliminary inquiry found enough evidence to proceed.
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POOL New / Reuters Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends the weekly cabinet meeting at his Jerusalem office December 25, 2016.
JERUSALEM, Jan 2 (Reuters) - Police questioned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for three hours under caution at his official residence in Jerusalem on Monday on suspicion of receiving gifts from businessmen in breach of his role as a public servant.
Part of a police statement issued after the questioning ended said that “investigators questioned PM Benjamin Netanyahu under caution on suspicion of receiving benefits.” No additional details were initially given.
The move to question the Israeli leader was authorized by Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit, who decided after a preliminary inquiry that there was enough evidence to open a criminal investigation, the newspaper Haaretz said.
Mandelblit issued his own statement which did not elaborate on the matters being investigated. It also mentioned other suspicions which had been checked but did not yield evidence to warrant enquiries.
“The nature of the investigation precludes us at this stage from giving details of the ongoing investigation but we will consider releasing more information from time to time according to developments,” the statement said.
Before the questioning began, Netanyahu told his ruling Likud faction in parliament that those anticipating his downfall should not expect his imminent departure.
“Wait with the celebrations, don’t rush,” Netanyahu said. “I’ve said it before and I’ll say it once again: there will be nothing because there is nothing.”
Photographers were camped outside the heavily guarded residence, hoping to get pictures of investigators arriving. Black screens were erected inside the gates of the property to block the view.
Haaretz and other newspapers said the probe related to gifts worth “hundreds of thousands of shekels” ($1=3.85 shekels) given to Netanyahu by Israeli and foreign businessmen.
Channel 2, a commercial network, said the investigation was one of two cases now open against the prime minister, although it said details of the second remained unclear.
Netanyahu, 67, has been in power on and off since 1996. He is currently in his fourth term as prime minister and will become Israel’s longest-serving leader if he stays in office until the end of next year.
He and his wife, Sara, have weathered several scandals over the years, including investigations into the misuse of state funds and an audit of the family’s spending on everything from laundry to ice cream. They have denied any wrongdoing.
Netanyahu is not the first prime minister to be questioned in a criminal case.
Ehud Olmert, who held office from 2006 to 2009, is currently serving 18 months in prison after being convicted of breach of trust and bribery in 2014.
Former prime minister Ariel Sharon was questioned while in office in 2003 and 2004 over allegations of bribery and corruption involving him and his two sons. In 2006, his son Omri was convicted of corruption and served time in prison.
Netanyahu’s police appointment drew a barrage of commentary from the center-left opposition in parliament, with politicians calling for him to go. But Yair Lapid, leader of the centrist Yesh Atid party, said that for the good of the country, he hoped the prime minister would be cleared.
“I wish for him and his family, and the State of Israel, that we uncover that there was no fault in his behavior. If two prime ministers in a row fall from office because of corruption, it will be very hard to rehabilitate the public’s trust in its leadership.”
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www.huffingtonpost.com
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/netanyahu-corruption-investigation_us_586acb5ce4b0eb58648a3a78?ir=Politics&utm_hp_ref=politics
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4,878,515 |
2017-01-02 22:08:32
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CNN
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US officials: Russian 'digital fingerprints' all over election hacks
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Even as President-elect Donald Trump and his aides cast doubt on the links between Russia and recent hacks against Democrats, US intelligence officials say that newly identified "digital fingerprints" indicate Moscow was behind the intrusions.
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Washington (CNN) Even as President-elect Donald Trump and his aides cast doubt on the links between Russia and recent hacks against Democrats, US intelligence officials say that newly identified "digital fingerprints" indicate Moscow was behind the intrusions.
One official told CNN the administration has traced the hack to the specific keyboards -- which featured Cyrillic characters -- that were used to construct the malware code, adding that the equipment leaves "digital fingerprints" and, in the case of the recent hacks, those prints point to the Russian government.
But, despite an initial public assessment by the US intelligence community in October that Russia was behind the intrusions, Trump and his staff continue to voice doubts.
"The idea that we're jumping to conclusions before we have a final report is, frankly, irresponsible," Trump's incoming press secretary, Sean Spicer, told CNN's Alisyn Camerota Monday.
Trump expressed skepticism on New Year's Eve, saying, "I know a lot about hacking. And hacking is a very hard thing to prove. So it could be somebody else."
He also claimed to have inside information on the matter, which he said he would reveal later this week.
Spicer said Trump was "going to talk about his conclusions and where he thinks things stand," adding the President-elect would "make sure people understand that there's a lot of questions out there."
A second US official told CNN Monday there is increasingly confidence in the intelligence analysis, citing the ability to collect extremely high-quality intel on Russia, compared the difficulty of doing so with more secretive regimes like North Korea.
The FBI and Department of Homeland Security released a report last week that they said "provides technical details regarding the tools and infrastructure used by the Russian civilian and military intelligence Services to compromise and exploit networks and endpoints associated with the US election."
The report added that the Russian culprits also have historically targeted "a range of US Government, political, and private sector entities" using similar tactics.
Spicer said Trump would await the results of the investigation ordered by President Barack Obama as he insisted that the assessments of the intelligence community published so far did not constitute the "final report."
He said Trump was expected to be briefed about that report in coming days.
Trump is facing mounting pressure to undertake a robust response to Russia's activities, with Republican leaders in Congress saying that Obama's recent cyber-related sanctions of Russian intelligence entities and expulsion of some Russians from the US don't go far enough.
"It is clear that Russia has attacked the United States of America. All of our intelligence agencies will affirm that that's been the case. We will work in the Congress to have stronger sanctions in order to prevent further attacks," Republican Sen. John McCain said while in Georgia, a country that fought a war with Russia in 2008.
McCain, who was also visiting NATO's easternmost members in the Baltic region and the Ukraine, also promised to hold hearings into the cyber-attacks when Congress is back in session this month.
Former CIA director James Woolsey told CNN Monday that determining who was behind a hacks is difficult.
"It's often not foolproof to say who it is because it is possible and sometimes easy to hide your tracks," he said. "There's lots of tricks."
Asked if Trump is playing the media with his comments on who was culpable, Woolsey, an adviser to the President-elect, said it was a "possibility," noting Trump is an "expert in weaving around" on issues like this.
But Woolsey also said that while he believes the Russians had intruded into the computer systems, it is possible they weren't the only ones.
"I think the Russians were in there, but it doesn't mean other people weren't, too," he said.
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Barbara Starr;Jim Sciutto;Ryan Browne
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www.cnn.com
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/politics/digital-fingerprints-russia-hacking/index.html
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UNDEFINED
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4,899,985 |
2017-01-02 22:08:32
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CNN
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Adviser contradicts Trump: Russians hacked the US
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A top adviser to President-elect Donald Trump said Monday he thinks the Russians were involved in election-related hacking of the US -- a very different view than that held by the incoming administration.
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Story highlights The US government has linked cyber-attacks to specific Russain keyboards
Donald Trump has cast doubt on links between election hacks and Moscow
Washington (CNN) A top adviser to President-elect Donald Trump said Monday he thinks the Russians were involved in election-related hacking of the US -- a very different view than that held by the incoming administration.
Former CIA director James Woolsey, an adviser to Trump on national security issues, told CNN's Jim Sciutto that determining who was behind the hacks is difficult, but that he believes the Russians -- and possibly others -- were involved.
"I think the Russians were in there, but it doesn't mean other people weren't, too," he said. "It's often not foolproof to say who it is because it is possible and sometimes easy to hide your tracks. There's lots of tricks."
Asked if Trump is playing the media with his comments on who was culpable, Woolsey said it was a "possibility," noting that Trump is an "expert in weaving around" on issues like this.
"Sometimes people may have been talking to somebody in the National Security Agency and have an idea that maybe it was one type of hacking rather than another," he said. "I don't think this is of substantial matter. I think it's basically just dialogue back and forth."
Read More
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Barbara Starr;Jim Sciutto;Ryan Browne
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www.cnn.com
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/politics/digital-fingerprints-russia-hacking/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_latest+%28RSS%3A+CNN+-+Most+Recent%29
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UNDEFINED
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38,891,063 |
2017-01-02 22:14:03
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The Guardian
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Only one in five Americans buys a gun without a background check, survey finds
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New research finds oft-cited estimate that 40% of all firearms are acquired with no screening is out of date, but points to holes in system for online purchases
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The share of Americans who obtained a gun without first undergoing a background check is dramatically lower than previous estimates, researchers at Harvard and Northeastern universities have determined. The finding re-shapes one of the most prominent assumptions of the US gun control debate.
Just 22% of current gun owners who acquired a firearm within the past two years did so without a background check, according to a new national survey by public health researchers at Harvard and Northeastern universities shared in advance with the Trace and the Guardian.
Gun inequality: US study charts rise of hardcore super owners Read more
For years, politicians and researchers have estimated that as many as 40% of gun sales are conducted without a background check – a statistic based on an extrapolation from a 1994 survey. Gun rights activists had decried that estimate as outdated and inaccurate.
The new survey, published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, found that the current proportion of gun sales conducted without a background check is about half of the figure cited by prominent Democratic gun control advocates, including Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.
It also found that gun owners in states that require background checks on all private gun sales were much less likely to report acquiring a gun without a background check than those in states with no universal background check law – a potential indication that efforts to boost screenings at the local level are succeeding, even in absence of federal legislation.
The study’s authors hailed the new statistics as good news. “We’ve been moving in the right direction,” said Deborah Azrael, a researcher at the Harvard School of Public Health.
Background checks screen for individuals who are not permitted by law to own a gun, including criminals and those who pose a public safety threat. But the expansion of background checks has been a key political battleground in the gun control conversation.
Nine in 10 young adults in US support background checks for all gun sales Read more
Since the 2012 massacre at the Sandy Hook elementary school, President Obama and other Democrats have made the case for new gun laws by arguing that as many as 40% of guns in America are sold without a criminal background check – a statistic criticized by gun rights groups.
The figure was revived again in the 2016 presidential election. In October 2015, Hillary Clinton earned “three pinocchios” from the Washington Post Fact Checker blog when she said during a campaign rally that “40% of guns are sold at gun shows, online sales”.
Azrael hopes the new research can help inform better debate – and policy – concerning background checks. “It’s crazy that nobody has asked these questions since 1994,” Azrael said. “I mean, should we be citing 20-year-old statistics in support of contemporary policy? Probably not, but the problem is that there has been no effort to maintain any kind of ongoing check on what has been happening.”
Phil Cook, a prominent gun law researcher, said the new, smaller estimate did not undermine the argument that the US needs a federal law instituting universal background checks on gun sales. In fact, he said, the finding that a smaller number of guns are acquired without background checks could be an advantage for supporters of stricter gun control laws.
“The headline is that we as a nation are closer to having 100% of gun transactions with a background check than we might have thought,” says Cook, a gun violence researcher at Duke University who conducted the 1994 survey. “So, it’s more attainable, and cheaper, to pass a universal requirement than it would be if 40% of transactions were still being conducted without these screenings.”
The National Rifle Association, which has called the 40% estimate a a “lie”, did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the new background check statistic.
Donald Trump, a close NRA ally who ran on a pro-gun rights platform, opposes expanding federal background check laws, arguing instead that “we need to fix the system we have”.
Gun control advocates say enforcement of the current background checks system is as much a policy goal as expanding background checks.
The federal background check system has put a stop to more than 2.4m gun transactions since its implementation in 1994, but checks are not required on sales between private parties, like many of those made at gun shows and arranged online.
“It’s not that the laws are ineffective, it’s that they’re so weak,” said Joseph Vince, a former agent for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms who currently heads the criminal justice programs at Mount St Mary’s University. “With the legislation currently in place, it’s incredibly difficult for law enforcement to track down guns that emerge from the secondary market.”
Over the past two decades, 19 states have moved to regulate private gun transfers, including, as of 1 January, Nevada. While research suggests that background checks can help reduce gun offenses, measuring the full impact is difficult given the myriad factors that can influence crime rates. Some studies also suggest that background checks can disrupt the flow of interstate gun trafficking.
The new survey also found that in states that had passed universal screening laws by 1 July 2013, just 26% of gun owners said they had obtained a gun through a private sale without a background check, compared to 57% of purchasers who live in states without such requirements.
Overall, researchers found that half of guns transferred privately in all states within the past two years were obtained without a background check.
While the share of gun owners who obtain weapons without being screened has shrunk, the updated survey results expose the holes that remain in the background check system. Among owners who purchased their most recent gun from a friend or acquaintance, 77% did so without a background check. If the purchase was made online, roughly 45% of respondents didn’t face screening.
“Compared to ’94, there is this shift toward more people getting background checks,” says Matt Miller, a professor of epidemiology at Northeastern and co-director of the Harvard Injury Control Research Center. “But we still can’t lose sight of the fact that there are still millions of people every year who are getting guns, often from friends and acquaintances, without them.”
The new study also shows that more Americans than ever are buying their firearms as opposed to inheriting or receiving them as gifts. Eighty percent of gun owners who obtained their most recent firearm inside the past two years purchased it, compared to 60% of people who obtained a firearm more than five years ago.
The new background check statistics come from the most rigorous survey of American gun ownership in more than a decade – but as with any self-reported survey data it has limitations, including potential bias from respondents’ faulty memories. Because the survey was conducted online, the researchers wrote, the results may be less subject to the bias that affects surveys conducted over the phone, where people may be more likely to give live interviewers the answers they think are more socially acceptable.
The researchers asked 1,613 adult gun owners if they had undergone a background check for their most recently acquired firearm. The researchers also asked if the person who sold respondents the gun had asked to see a firearm license or permit before going through with the sale. If the answer to either question was yes, the respondent was listed as having gone through a background check. The team later asked the gun owners when they had acquired their most recent firearm.
The 2015 survey found that just 22% percent of gun owners who had acquired a gun in the previous two years reported doing so without a background check. Gun owners who had acquired a gun earlier than that – between two and five years before 2015, or more than five years before – were more likely to remember doing so without a background check. A full 57% of gun owners who reported acquiring their most recent gun more than five years before 2015 reported getting the gun without a background check. Because the survey relied on the memories of the participants, the researchers wrote, the more recent gun acquisition data might be more accurate.
This story was produced in collaboration with the Trace as part of a partnership to report on exclusive new gun ownership data.
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Lois Beckett;Kate Masters;The Trace
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www.theguardian.com
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https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jan/02/guns-state-background-checks-study
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39,093,482 |
2017-01-02 22:16:51
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The Guardian
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British soldier killed in incident at base near Baghdad
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Soldier from 2nd Battalion the Duke of Lancaster’s regiment died at Camp Taji – but not as a result of enemy activity
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A British soldier has been killed in Iraq following an “incident”, the Ministry of Defence has confirmed.
The soldier, from the 2nd Battalion the Duke of Lancaster’s Regiment, did not die as a result of enemy fire, the MoD said. The statement said: “The death occurred in Taji, Iraq, following an incident that is currently under investigation, but we can confirm that it was not as a result of enemy activity.”
Officials have informed the soldier’s family, who requested a period of grace be given before the name is released.
Earlier on Monday, the US-led coalition in Iraq, which is trying to tackle Islamic State announced that a service member had been killed on 2 January. The statement from the Combined Joint Task Force said: “The service member’s name and the circumstances surrounding the death will be released at the discretion of the pertinent national authorities. The incident is under investigation.”
Taji is a town close to Baghdad where the British army has a training and advisory operation: Camp Taji is a coalition forces base also known as Camp Cooke.
It is thought the soldier was there in a training capacity as opposed to actually fighting Islamic State, according to Sky News.
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Nicola Slawson
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www.theguardian.com
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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/02/british-soldier-killed-incident-base-near-baghdad-camp-taji-cooke
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2017-01-02 22:19:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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Israel Lawmakers Plan Bill to Annex West Bank Settlement
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Members of Israel’s governing coalition said they would propose legislation to annex a Jewish settlement in the West Bank for the first time, a law that, if approved, would mark a stark departure in policy.
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TEL AVIV—Members of Israel’s governing coalition said they would propose legislation after Donald Trump’s inauguration to annex a West Bank Jewish settlement for the first time, defying the United Nations and the international community.
If approved, such a law would mark a stark departure from decades of Israeli policy tolerating and even promoting settlements but not considering them part of the country proper.
Naftali...
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Rory Jones;Google;Rory.Jones Wsj.Com
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/israel-lawmakers-plan-bill-to-annex-west-bank-settlement-1483395594
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4,693,879 |
2017-01-02 22:20:04
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CNN
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Alcohol abuse linked to higher heart risks, study says
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Drinking too much increases the risk of atrial fibrillation, heart attack and congestive heart failure, a study found.
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(CNN) An estimated 10 million to 15 million Americans abuse alcohol , meaning excessive drinking negatively affects their lives. Now, research suggests a link between too much drinking and heart problems, the No. 1 cause of death worldwide.
Abusing alcohol increases the likelihood of suffering atrial fibrillation, heart attack or congestive heart failure, according to a study published Monday in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology
"One of the most surprising findings... is that people who abused alcohol are at increased risk for heart attack or myocardial infarction," said Dr. Gregory M. Marcus, director of clinical research in the Division of Cardiology at the University of California, San Franciscoand senior author of the study. Past data suggests that moderate drinking may be protective, he said, helping ward off this disease.
Dr. Suzanne Steinbaum, director of women's heart health at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, believes that both scientists and the media have been highlighting the good components of alcohol, such as resveratrol in wine, and "been really pushing that a glass of wine is good for our health."
But the bottom line of this new study is clear, she said.
"When we look at alcohol, we have almost glamorized it as being this substance that can help us live a really heart-healthy life," said Steinbaum, who was not involved in the research. "I think, ultimately, drinking in excess leads to heart conditions, and we should really understand the potential toxicity of alcohol and not glamorize it as something we should include as part of our lives -- certainly not in excess."
Millions of patient records
The National Institutes of Health frequently highlight the ways in which too much drinking can lead to accidents, cirrhosis and some cancers. Yet cardiovascular studies have suggested that moderate consumption of alcohol is good for our heart health.
The authors of the new study cite a 2007 study published in the journal Circulation . Not only did moderate drinking lead to no negative effects, the study authors concluded that "moderate drinking may lower the risk of heart failure."
Since many of us believe that "more of a good thing is always better," Marcus and his colleagues decided to investigate how excessive drinking might impact our risk of developing atrial fibrillation, or arrhythmic beating of the heart; myocardial infarction, or heart attack; and congestive heart failure, a chronic condition in which the heart cannot effectively push blood through the arteries and circulatory system to the body's other organs and tissues.
For data, Marcus and his colleagues turned to the Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project's California State Ambulatory Surgery Databases, Emergency Department Databases and State Inpatient Databases. They looked at California residents, 21 or older, who had been hospitalized anytime between 2005 and 2009.
All told, Marcus and his team analyzed the medical records of 14,727,591 patients.
Of these, 1.8%, or approximately 268,000, had been diagnosed with alcohol abuse. Marcus said there was no specific cutoff regarding a specific amount of alcohol or time period and admitted that this was a limitation of the study.
Within the study, then, alcohol abuse was defined as instances in which a health care provider flagged a patient as having a problem with excessive alcohol use, either "acutely"-- showing up for an appointment drunk, for example -- or chronically -- such as having an addiction or reliance on alcohol, explained Marcus.
According to Dr. Scott Krakower, assistant unit chief of psychiatry at Zucker Hillside Hospital in New Hyde Park, New York, alcohol abuse is generally not dependence. Instead, it's when "you're using it excessively at times and it's getting in the way of functioning."
"Abuse doesn't necessarily lead to a pattern where you use it every day and you're developing a tolerance or developing withdrawal symptoms," said Krakower, who was not involved in the study. He added that alcohol abuse is when "you start having problems with alcohol it might affect you physically, but it can also have social implications and psychological implications," such as trouble with relationships or problems at work.
Some heart risks double
In surveying the data on millions of patients, Marcus and his colleagues discovered that alcohol abuse was associated with atrial fibrillation, heart attack and heart failure.
Specifically, they found that alcohol abuse was associated with a doubled risk of atrial fibrillation, a 1.4-fold higher risk of heart attack and a 2.3-fold increased risk of congestive heart failure.
"It didn't matter if you had a conventional risk factor for these diseases or not. In every case, alcohol abuse increased the risk," Marcus said.
That said, Marcus and his colleagues discovered that the number of people who would develop either atrial fibrillation, heart attack or heart failure in three years was much higher if they had an established risk factor and abused alcohol.
They also compared alcohol abuse to the conventional risk factors for heart disease, such as high blood pressure and diabetes.
"In general, if someone abused alcohol, it appeared to increase the risk to a similar magnitude to other conventional risk factors," Marcus said.
Eliminating alcohol abuse would result in over 73,000 fewer atrial fibrillation cases, 34,000 fewer heart attacks and 91,000 fewer patients with congestive heart failure in the US alone, the researchers estimated.
Motivation to quit
When it comes to helping patients with alcohol abuse, Krakower said, primary care doctors can use the latest step-by-step guidance tools to screen patients and "see if a person has a problem with alcohol and from there determine what level of intervention is necessary."
From there, Krakower said, treatment options include motivational interviewing, a type of therapy in which the goal is for a patient to "find some motivation to quit." There's also group therapy, family-based therapy techniques and, of course, Alcoholics Anonymous.
Still there are nuances when it comes to drinking.
"We have an understanding (by the American Heart Association) that a glass of wine a day for women and two glasses of wine a day for men are good," Steinbaum said. "What is a glass? Four to 6 ounces."
Yet if you go out to dinner and order a glass of wine, she said with a laugh, "it's like 12 ounces!"
The exact equation of how much is too much has never really been answered, and "part of the reason for that is metabolism is different in everyone," Steinbaum said. Metabolism of alcohol is slower for women than for men, and individual fat distribution and muscle mass also play into how quickly alcohol is metabolized.
Join the conversation See the latest news and share your comments with CNN Health on Facebook and Twitter.
"It becomes a very individual thing," she said. "The American Heart Association has given us very conservative guidelines, saying if you're going to drink, this is how much but the big picture is alcohol in excess -- and excess is more than a very minimal amount -- is bad for your heart."
Still, no matter the characteristics of any individual patient, excessive alcohol is an important risk factor for atrial fibrillation and heart failure, Marcus said: "Increasing awareness of this both among practitioners and individuals may actually reduce or prevent those important diseases."
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Susan Scutti
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www.cnn.com
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/health/alcohol-abuse-heart-disease-risk/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_health+%28RSS%3A+CNN+-+Health%29
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UNDEFINED
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3,916,082 |
2017-01-02 22:23:24
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HuffPost
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The Gift of a Brat
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The unrelenting power of the "Southern Strategy" is arguably the single biggest impediment to America's survival as a democracy. The ability to push fear...
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The unrelenting power of the "Southern Strategy" is arguably the single biggest impediment to America's survival as a democracy. The ability to push fear of "other" is easy to disseminate and even easier to absorb for an American populace looking for simple explanations to explain life's complications. In the meantime, our democracy suffers a slow painful death by a thousand hateful words from a power elite that, with few exceptions, thrives on the fear of "other" at our collective expense.
President-elect Donald Trump's assent to power is just the latest example of a strategy so inculcated in American discourse that many voted for a man who made misogyny, racism and xenophobia his central campaign platform. It's the tried and true method of electoral politics practically guaranteeing a win in certain regions of the country.
The pesticide of rational thought and common sense does little to repel this cultural pest, so deeply ingrained in the soil of Americana. Voters continually excuse such behavior for what they perceive as the greater good, only to awaken the next election cycle, and realize we're having the same debates over the same issues that putting the "other" in their place was supposed to solve. The flames of racial, ethnic, gender and religious intolerance are the gifts that keep on giving. At some point, an elected leader/s will indeed act on their rhetoric ruining our democratic institutions. You need look no further than North Carolina.
My knowledge of American history tells me I shouldn't be surprised, that so many accept, with little consequence, the pernicious nature of discriminatory electoral politics. Yet, no matter how hard I try to bury that pain, it rises. The American people continually get trapped in the tidal wave of racist politics passing as truth.
Seldom has the target of the hateful message benefited. American race-based politics has its roots back in the 17th century. It was the intentional creation of wealthy landowners, who imposed a social hierarchy, separating folks along racial lines with the end goal to deepen their own pockets, by false claims such as Black inferiority. This racial designation hurt what we call today, working class and poor Whites as well, which, highlights the devious nature of the original intent. Four hundred years later we continue to pay for that blunder and its unsustainability.
I feel blessed I see America through a more hopeful prism thanks to a gift presented to me at birth; my father's decision to join the United States Air Force. Dad's third duty assignment took us to Madrid, Spain when I was just five-years-old. I soaked up Spanish culture like a sponge.
CLICK HERE TO READ THE REST OF THIS STORY
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Michael Gordon Bennett;Author Of Split;My Journey As America'S Whitest Black Kid. An Entrepreneur;Actor;Journalist;One Of America'S Top Travel Experts.;Follow Michael Gordon Bennett On Twitter;Www.Twitter.Com Mbennettinc
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www.huffingtonpost.com
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-gordon-bennett/the-gift-of-a-brat_b_13932218.html?utm_hp_ref=politics&ir=Politics
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LEFT
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39,066,413 |
2017-01-02 22:30:36
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The Guardian
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Labour could slump to below 150 MPs, Fabian Society warns
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Thinktank recommends Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour should prepare for an era of ‘quasi-federal, multi-party politics’
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Labour may get as little as 20% of the vote at the next general election and win fewer than 150 seats, according to an analysis of the challenges the party faces.
Buffeted by difficulties including plotting a course on Brexit and a continued lack of support in Scotland, as well as Jeremy Corbyn’s unpopularity, Labour has virtually no chance of winning outright in the next election, the Fabian Society report concludes.
If you think a progressive alliance will save us, better think again | Martin Kettle Read more
The thinktank argues Labour should seek ways to win power with the support of parties such as the Liberal Democrats and Scottish National party, arguing this is the only feasible route into government for now.
Based on analysis of existing poll data and historical trends, the study predicts that the next election, whether held imminently or in 2020, is very likely to see Labour win fewer than 200 seats for the first time since 1935, possibly falling to about 140.
However, it cautions against the idea that Labour could be imminently replaced as the main opposition, saying the electoral system will act as a “firebreak” against a calamitous collapse in the number of seats.
The report says Labour’s general election vote over the past 40 years has tended to be almost eight percentage points lower than its poll rating in the second year of the preceding parliament. If this happens in 2020, the Labour vote could fall to 20% or less.
But using projections based on recent polls, it says that even if either Ukip or the Lib Dems could tie with Labour on 20%, the electoral system would mean neither would win more than 20 seats, with Labour remaining at 140 to 150.
Such a scenario would see the Conservatives win more than 400 seats, giving Theresa May a vast Commons majority.
The study – titled Stuck: how Labour is too weak to win and too strong to die – is particularly pertinent for the party as it comes from an officially affiliated organisation, which was one of Labour’s co-founders in 1900 but is now associated with the centre-right of Labour.
The report stresses that its gloomy conclusions are based less on the immediate issue of Corbyn’s leadership than on long-term issues such as the impact of Brexit, the collapse of support in Scotland and electoral mathematics.
Andrew Harrop, the Fabians’ general secretary, who wrote the report, said Corbyn and his team appeared to have little idea how to respond to such challenges or how to win back the 4 million voters who supported Labour in 2015 but say they would not do so now.
After Corbyn triumphed against Owen Smith in a leadership challenge, his team had produced “no roadmap” for overcoming Labour’s plight, Harrop wrote, while the wider parliamentary Labour party had become “barely audible”.
“In place of the sound and fury of Jeremy Corbyn’s first 12 months, there is quietude, passivity and resignation,” he said. “And on Brexit, the greatest political question for two generations, the party’s position is muffled and inconsistent. This is the calm of stalemate, of insignificance, even of looming death.”
Len McCluskey: Corbyn should consider his position if polls don't improve Read more
On Monday Len McCluskey, the leader of the Unite union and one of Corbyn’s staunchest supporters, suggested the Labour leader and John McDonnell, his shadow chancellor, would feel obliged to step down if there was no change in opinion polls currently showing Labour lagging behind by about 12 points.
Speaking to the Mirror, McCluskey said it was necessary to consider “what happens if we get to 2019 and opinion polls are still awful”.
“The truth is everybody would examine that situation, including Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell,” he said, adding: “These two are not egomaniacs. They are not desperate to cling on to power for power’s sake.” However McCluskey later insisted he still supported the Labour leader.
The Fabians’ report identifies a coherent response to Brexit as one of the main obstacles facing Labour. Using YouGov data, it calculates that the party has lost a net 400,000 votes since the last election among pro-leave electors, and 100,000 among those who backed remain, making its backing more strongly pro-remain than before.
This poses a “Brexit dilemma”, the study says, pointing out that Labour needs to somehow appeal more to leave voters without alienating existing supporters who opposed Brexit.
In such a landscape, the report stresses the need for Labour to accept the impossibility of outright victory in the next election and prepare instead for an era of “quasi-federal, multi-party politics”, where it relies on the assistance of other parties.
To gain an absolute Commons majority, it calculates, Labour would need to beat the Conservatives by more than 3m votes, a higher margin than in 2001. “Even before Labour’s current problems, this was unlikely,” the study argues. “It is currently unthinkable.”
While the proposed shakeup of Commons constituency boundaries would further disadvantage Labour, it is only likely to affect about 10 MPs, the report argues, making this a “sideshow”.
Overall, Harrop says this is “not a story of victory or death … but, whenever an election comes, the party must fight for every vote and every seat, because there is a huge difference between winning 150 and 250 MPs.”
A spokeswoman for Corbyn said: “Rebuilding Labour support after its fragmentation at the 2015 election was always going to be a challenge. But Labour under Jeremy Corbyn will be taking its case to every part of Britain in the coming months with a radical policy platform, offering the only genuine alternative to a failed parliament political establishment and the fake anti-elitists of the hard right.”
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Peter Walker
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www.theguardian.com
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https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jan/02/labour-election-jeremy-corbyn-fabian-society
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LEFT
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4,234,659 |
2017-01-02 22:30:47
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USA Today
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SpaceX targets first return to flight since September
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Sept. 1 explosion on launch pad during countdown rehearsal destroyed rocket, satellite.
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A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket explodes on the launch pad during a test at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. The rocket and payload, a satellite intended for Facebook to provide Internet service in Africa, were destroyed in the blast. (Photo: Mike Wagner, USLaunchReport.com)
MELBOURNE, Fla. — SpaceX is targeting a Sunday return to flight of its Falcon 9 rocket from California, where the company will adjust fueling procedures believed responsible for a Sept. 1 explosion that destroyed a rocket and satellite on their Cape Canaveral launch pad.
A four-month investigation pinpointed failures in the system that uses cold helium gas to pressurize propellant tanks filled with super-chilled liquid oxygen, SpaceX said.
Investigators found buckles had formed in the aluminum lining of helium tanks that are about as large as a person.
When the system was pressurized, the buckles trapped pools of liquid or solid oxygen between the linings and an outer layer of carbon wrap covering them. That build-up of oxygen probably created friction or caused carbon fibers to break, SpaceX said, which ignited the oxygen in the rocket’s upper stage during a countdown rehearsal at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station’s Launch Complex 40.
The Falcon 9 and Spacecom’s $200 million Amos-6 commercial communications satellite, which Facebook had hoped to use to extend Internet access in Africa, were lost, and the launch pad was severely damaged.
In an update posted online Monday morning, SpaceX, led by Elon Musk, said the helium tanks will be redesigned, but did not specify when that longer-term change would be implemented.
To prevent buckling in the short-term, the company said it would revert to “a prior flight proven configuration” for loading helium, including loading the gas at a warmer temperature. Those procedures have worked safely more than 700 times, SpaceX said, but take more time.
The planned Sunday launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base will carry the first 10 of at least 70 communications satellites that SpaceX is contracted to launch for Iridium Communications.
As it did through much of the first half of last year, SpaceX plans to try to land the Falcon 9’s first stage on a modified barge in the ocean, continuing efforts to recover and re-launch Falcon boosters.
Before Sunday, SpaceX plans to fuel the Falcon 9 for a practice countdown like the one performed Sept. 1, intended to end with a brief firing of the rocket's nine Merlin main engines. This time, no payload will be on top.
If the return to flight succeeds, a Falcon 9 could try to launch an unmanned Dragon cargo ship to the International Space Station from Kennedy Space Center before the end of the month.
The Sept. 1 explosion was the second time in 14 months that a Falcon 9 suffered a catastrophic failure. In June 2015, another breach in the upper-stage liquid oxygen tank doomed a Dragon mission to the International Space Station about two minutes into flight. SpaceX said that problem, attributed to a failed strut, was unrelated to the Sept. 1 explosion.
SpaceX led the recent investigation with oversight from the Federal Aviation Administration, which licenses commercial rocket launches. Other partners included NASA, the Air Force, the National Transportation Safety Board and several unidentified “industry experts.”
“SpaceX greatly appreciates the support of our customers and partners throughout this process, and we look forward to fulfilling our manifest in 2017 and beyond,” the company said in a statement.
Drawing from more than 3,000 channels of data from video and telemetry, the investigation focused on an instant — less than a tenth of a second — from the first sign of trouble to the rocket’s destruction.
For weeks after the accident, Musk did not rule out the possibility that someone might have fired a shot at the rocket.
NASA has been performing its own, independent investigation and has not yet released any findings.
The space agency relies upon SpaceX to deliver cargo to and from the space station, and also hopes to see the company launch astronauts to the outpost in early 2018.
SpaceX's late fueling of the Falcon 9 during the final half-hour of countdowns, when a crew would be sitting atop the rocket, has been a source of concern to NASA and some of its independent safety advisers.
Follow James Dean on Twitter: @flatoday_jdean
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/2hKsnm6
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James Dean;Florida Today;P.M. Est January
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www.usatoday.com
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/nation-now/2017/01/02/spacex-falcon-9-plans-return-flight/96081344/?utm_source=feedblitz&utm_medium=FeedBlitzRss&utm_campaign=usatoday-newstopstories
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CENTER
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4,825,611 |
2017-01-02 22:34:34
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CNN
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Netanyahu questioned in corruption probe
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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was interrogated Monday night on suspicion of corruption in a criminal investigation authorized by the nation's attorney general.
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Jerusalem (CNN) Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was interrogated Monday night on suspicion of corruption in a criminal investigation authorized by the nation's attorney general.
Netanyahu is suspected of having received benefits from businessmen, according to Israeli police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld and Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit.
Netanyahu was questioned "under caution on the suspicions of receiving benefits," said Rosenfeld.
The term "under caution" refers to the questioning of someone suspected of having committed a crime, with the warning that anything they say or decline to talk about could be used against them in court proceedings.
Police and Mandelblit declined to release any further details of the three-hour questioning.
JUST WATCHED Fallout from UN resolution on Israel continues Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Fallout from UN resolution on Israel continues 02:47
'There is nothing'
Netanyahu has repeatedly denied the allegations against him, saying they are politically motivated.
On New Year's Day, the Prime Minister posted on his Facebook page, "Unfortunately you'll have to be disappointed this time as well, like you were disappointed in previous affairs. As usual, there will not be anything because there is nothing. Try replacing the Prime Minister at the ballot box -- as is customary in a democracy."
Netanyahu was investigated by police amid allegations of fraud and breach of trust in the late 1990s during his first term. He was never indicted.
Netanyahu is in his fourth term. He has often had a combative relationship with the media, which have speculated for days about when the criminal investigation would officially begin and what it would entail.
At a holiday event in late December, Netanyahu quipped that "It's fun" to spar with Israeli journalists on social media.
Yair Lapid, a Knesset member who is one of the main political threats to Netanyahu, urged caution and a quick investigation.
"If two Prime Ministers in a row fall for corruption, it will be very difficult to rehabilitate the public's trust in government," Lapid said on Facebook, referencing Ehud Olmert, who served before Netanyahu and is now in prison for corruption. "At the same time, for the benefit of the State of Israel and the people of Israel, [the investigation] must be fast."
JUST WATCHED Netanyahu: Israel blamed for lack of peace Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Netanyahu: Israel blamed for lack of peace 01:23
Investigation ongoing
Until now, the inquiry was an examination. It did not reach the level of a criminal investigation, and Netanyahu was not suspected of having committed a crime. That changed as a police car pulled into his residence on Monday night, marking the beginning of the criminal investigation.
The inquiry into Netanyahu began in mid-July, the attorney general said. But the specific accusation that led to the criminal investigation surfaced three months ago. Police investigators searched for the evidence to support the suspicion, and last month, found the evidence to warrant an investigation.
Mandelblit would not elaborate on what the suspected crime was, instead ruling out any link to investigations that have since been dismissed. Those include two issues related to the 2009 elections and primaries, and two issues related to receiving flights and benefits overseas.
Netanyahu does not have to step down if he is suspected of committing a crime. He is only required to step down if he is convicted and that conviction is upheld by Israel's high court. However, if he is indicted, he could face enormous public and political pressure to step down.
Other Israeli prime ministers have been investigated, including Ariel Sharon, Ehud Barak and Olmert.
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Oren Liebermann
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www.cnn.com
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/world/israel-netanyahu-investigation/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fedition_meast+%28RSS%3A+CNNi+-+Middle+East%29
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UNDEFINED
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4,700,023 |
2017-01-02 22:34:34
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CNN
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Netanyahu questioned in corruption probe
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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was interrogated Monday night on suspicion of corruption in a criminal investigation authorized by the nation's attorney general.
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Story highlights Israeli police interview Prime Minister for three hours at his home
Benjamin Netanyahu has said he has done nothing wrong
(CNN) Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was interrogated Monday night on suspicion of corruption in a criminal investigation authorized by the nation's attorney general.
Israeli police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld released a statement saying Netanyahu was questioned "under caution on the suspicions of receiving benefits."
The term "under caution" refers to the questioning of someone suspected of having committed a crime, with the warning that anything they say or decline to talk about could be used against them in court proceedings.
Police and Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit declined to release any further details of the three-hour questioning.
Netanyahu has repeatedly denied the allegations against him, saying they are politically motivated. Mandelblit said the benefits allegedly came from businessmen.
Read More
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Oren Liebermann
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www.cnn.com
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http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/world/israel-netanyahu-investigation/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_latest+%28RSS%3A+CNN+-+Most+Recent%29
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UNDEFINED
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55,448,675 |
2017-01-02 22:37:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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Islamic State Claims Series of Deadly Baghdad Bombings
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Islamic State claimed a spate of bombings in Baghdad that Iraqi officials said had killed at least 28 people, days after the Iraqi army and allied forces renewed their offensive to retake the group’s stronghold in Mosul.
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Islamic State claimed a spate of bombings in Baghdad that Iraqi officials said had killed at least 28 people, days after the Iraqi army and allied forces renewed their offensive to retake the group’s stronghold in Mosul.
The terror group on Monday claimed responsibility for three blasts in the Iraqi capital, two at hospitals and another in Sadr City, a predominantly Shiite Muslim neighborhood that is a frequent target of its attacks. In the Sadr City attack, day laborers gathered around a vehicle in front of a market...
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Ghassan Adnan;Ben Kesling;Google;Ben.Kesling Wsj.Com
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/islamic-state-claims-series-of-deadly-baghdad-bombings-1483396644
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UNDEFINED
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3,161,739 |
2017-01-02 22:39:24
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Reuters
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Syrian rebels say they froze talks on Russian-backed peace conference due to ceasefire violations
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Syrian rebel groups said on Monday they had decided to freeze any talks about their possible participation in Syrian peace negotiations being prepared by Moscow in Kazakhstan unless the Syrian government and its Iran-backed allies end what it said were violations of a ceasefire.
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AMMAN (Reuters) - Syrian rebel groups said on Monday they had decided to freeze any talks about their possible participation in Syrian peace negotiations being prepared by Moscow in Kazakhstan unless the Syrian government and its Iran-backed allies end what it said were violations of a ceasefire.
In a statement, the rebel groups also said that any territorial advances by the army and Iran-backed militias that are fighting alongside it would end the fragile ceasefire brokered by Russia and Turkey, which back opposing sides, that came into effect on Friday.
"The regime and its allies have continued firing and committed many and large violations," said the statement signed by the mainly moderate rebel groups operating under the umbrella of the so-called Free Syrian Army (FSA).
The U.N. Security Council on Saturday gave its blessing to the ceasefire deal, which are slated to be followed by peace talks in the Kazakh capital, Astana.
The statement said the main violations were in an area northwest of Damascus in the rebel-held Wadi Barada valley, where government forces and the Iran-backed Lebanese Hezbollah group have been trying to press advances in an ongoing campaign.
Rebels say the army is seeking to recapture the area, where a major spring provides most of Damascus's water supplies and which lies on a major supply route from Lebanon to the Syrian capital used by Hezbollah.
Like previous Syria ceasefire deals, it has been shaky from the start, with repeated outbreaks of violence in some areas, but has largely held elsewhere.
The rebel groups questioned Russia's ability to force the Syrian government and their allies to abide by the terms of the ceasefire deal.
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Reuters Editorial;Reuters Staff;Min Read
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www.reuters.com
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http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-syria-rebels-ceasefire-idUSKBN14M16Q
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CENTER
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3,885,649 |
2017-01-02 22:40:01
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HuffPost
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In the Age of the Trump Monster
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It is too easy to say they have gone insane. In fact, it is more than that. Much of the modern Republican Party is a Monster, a Monster that does not car...
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It is too easy to say they have gone insane. In fact, it is more than that. Much of the modern Republican Party is a Monster, a Monster that does not care if people go without health care, a Monster that does not care if seniors stand in the cold, hungry, homeless, afraid. It does not care if children cry trough the night because their tummies are hungry as mom and dad work two or three low paying jobs to feed the family, pay rents they cannot afford, maintain a car that falls apart.
Social Security is the foundation of a sound and viable retirement. It is the means toward aging with dignity, living a life of peacefulness and continued hope. It is so successful that both Democratic and Republican administrations have expanded it through the years. And, the fact is, expanding Social Security makes incredible sense.
Yet, the Monster wants to cut Social Security, turn it upside down, and change it a risky investment mess, means test it and lower the benefit. There is no reason on God's beautiful earth why this is necessary. The Monsters say that the program is going broke, turning belly up, old fashioned - none of this is true.
There is little if any dialog with this Monster, the modern Republican Party. They have gone full tilt overboard into an Ayn Ryan world of cruel craziness that is loyal to the virtue of selfishness. This Monster cares only for the rich and only for the growth of capital, profits and market value. And, they are loyal to the principle of hating their own government as they seek to slash it, burn it down and cut it to pieces.
So, I pause as I think about my countrymen and women. I think about my countryman in rural Pennsylvania who said "NAFTA took my job so I am voting for Trump." That fellow citizen will continue to work in the local 7-Eleven, but as months go by the Monster pushes Trumpism into his daily life.
My countryman in PA has a sick child who is getting sicker because the child needs regular medical care. That child will hurt more because the pain of illness is not treated as one health program after another ends due to cuts done by a man they voted for, the lead Monster. The clinic, paid for by Medicaid, has limited hours (it probably will close) and doctors have left because Monsters are cutting Obamacare into the ground.
And then there is my countrywoman in upper Michigan who voted for Trump in protest of the Chinese, as she wants them out of the U.S. economy so that she and her spouse can find good manufacturing jobs. They are getting older. These Michiganders, hard working former plant employees, now working low wage jobs are about to lose their Obamacare.
They have an aging parent living nearby who used to go to the senior center for lunch. Now, there is no lunch, the dollars from Congress have stopped. So, five good meals for the aging parent at the senior center have turned to two at the local church and word has it that this is going away as food pantries for the poor are overwhelmed.
Her 88-year-old neighbor has lost her ride for weekly shopping because the transit program has shut down; federal dollars via the Older Americans Act have dried up. This neighbor has lost access to meals at the senior center as well.
Further, the housing preservation and repair program that installed free locks in the community has closed down. And the lock to her back door near the kitchen is broken as the key broke off inside the lock and nothing holds the door secure.
She makes call after call to the young neighbor with the day job and a night job who keeps saying he will come by and fix it.
It has been days now and finally someone broke in. They took the pretty little model Chevy her son gave her when he worked at the now closed Chevy plant. And, they ripped off her change jar with ten years of pennies along with that nice red coat she wears to Christmas Mass every year, all stolen because that door has yet to be fixed.
And, that little adjustment that comes every year to bump up her modest Social Security check did not come this year. Congress passed and President Trump signed a cut re-designing how yearly changes take place for Social Security - something called the "chained" something. When she calls to find out what is going on, a simple call to the Social Security office - well - that office has moved to a location miles away due to "consolidation" because Social Security, according to her Congressman, is "going broke."
She is hungrier each night. She is afraid as she tries to sleep. She can still walk but her ankles hurt. She can't afford her medications; help for her meds were part of Obamacare that was eliminated. So, with the few pills she can afford, she has to split each pill to make them last. Late a night, with a shawl covering her face; she looks for food in neighbors trash containers as quietly as possible.
Months go by and the promises of "Make America Great" still stand in thin air. The Monsters are totally in charge. Clinics have closed, meals programs are no more. And the promised good jobs have not arrived.
It is now one year to the day since the 2016 Election. Benton, Wisconsin is a small town in the rural part of the state. Everything went Republican - everything. It went Republican because Trump promised to be different, to be on the side of the worker, to be on the side of seniors because "Social Security will not be cut." He never said a word about the chained CPI cut that now impacts the cost of living increase each year. Plus, the elimination of community food programs means that the modest Social Security check effectively is cut even more.
An elderly woman living in small town Benton dials her daughter, a single mom with three kids. Both voted Republican. The elderly woman is watching homes get boarded up, kids walking to school with half a sandwich in their lunch box. The daughter is now working just one job because she could not get a baby sitter for the night job she had at the local bar.
The elderly woman says to her daughter, "Honey, you know I am not real political but I want to understand what is happening to us. Would you help me plan a meeting at our local church so we can talk to people and see what they are going through? I see news from Milwaukee and people living there cannot get heat for their homes and seniors have also lost their meals programs. I saw on T.V. that black and white seniors held a meeting with their Congressman to find out what everybody can do."
She asks her daughter to call their local pastor and see if a small community meeting can be held and maybe they can get their Congressman to come at some point soon. Her daughter says "mom, I think that is a good idea. I will have to bring the kids to the meeting but I am sure that is fine." The mom says, OK, and promises to start a list of people to invite.
All of this builds toward the following.
Real human consequences as described here will begin soon. Promises made to "Make America Great Again" will be stepped on by the Monster. Those promises will evaporate, fall victim to more lies, more excuses and of course, villains will be called out - "it is those people who are keeping you from a better job." But, as older folks go without meals, as Social Security checks shrink, as unemployment payments run dry, as the community food pantry turns to dust, the whole idea of making America great again feels like what it really was - a reality show theme presented by experienced liars.
The, lesson, which is part of the core of what we love about our country, is as follows. There is one solution and one solution only. And that solution is called "democracy" and to make that solution possible organizing must take place. Organizing requires neighbors talking to neighbors, dialing the phone, writing invites to meetings, sending emails, clipping stories out of the newspaper and from all that forcing elected officials to provide answers, answers and answers. Massive town hall meetings must be organized. Money must be raised - a dollar from everyone to get started - a bake sale scheduled a week or two later. Petitions organized, face-to-face meetings with elected representatives.
And, no matter how many things they do to keep the community from voting - mean hearted reductions in the hours a polling place is open, taking two polling locations and turning them into one so that some people have to travel farther to vote, no matter how much they stop Sunday voting - organizing, organizing, organizing is the solution. Every two years, by constitutional design, members of the House of Representatives must come home for reelection. Senators go for reelection every six years.
Tough minded, determined, hard driving organizing.
If they don't serve our best interests, if those elected in 2016 carry on with the lies, the con jobs, and the broken promises then we peacefully but aggressively organize and we remove them from office.
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Ernie Powell;Organizer;Social Security Works
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www.huffingtonpost.com
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ernie-powell/in-the-age-of-the-trump-m_b_13932432.html?utm_hp_ref=politics&ir=Politics
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LEFT
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55,415,605 |
2017-01-02 22:51:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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Trump Should Reciprocate To Abe With TPP Support
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Passing this agreement would solidify America’s longstanding commitment to open markets in Asia while boosting the competitiveness of American exporters.
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Shinzo Abe deserves to be commended for his commitment to a collaborative approach to security in East Asia (“A Friend for Trump in Asia,” Review & Outlook, Dec. 28). Your editorial is correct to say that the Trump administration will find a friend with his leadership. What remains to be determined is if Mr. Trump will reciprocate this friendship. Shinzo Abe declared that the Trans-Pacific Partnership is “meaningless” without the U.S. An excellent act of reciprocity would be for Mr. Trump to support the TPP. Passing this agreement would solidify America’s longstanding commitment to open markets in Asia while...
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-should-reciprocate-to-abe-with-tpp-support-1483397474
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UNDEFINED
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55,458,131 |
2017-01-02 22:52:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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Wind and Solar Can’t Replace Coal and Gas
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After the billions already spent and substantial subsidies that continue, wind and solar generated only 25,000 megawatts (MW) of electricity in 2015, or about 6% of U.S. demand.
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Another truth that climateers can’t handle (“Climateers Can’t Handle the Truth” by Holman Jenkins Jr., Business World, Dec. 28) is that wind and solar can replace coal and natural gas for electricity generation. America’s economy demands full-time electricity. Wind and solar only generate part-time electricity. It’s a long, expensive and land-sacrificing road to full-time wind and solar electricity.
After the billions already spent and substantial subsidies that continue, wind and solar generated only 25,000 megawatts (MW)...
| null |
www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/wind-and-solar-cant-replace-coal-and-gas-1483397556
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UNDEFINED
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55,427,769 |
2017-01-02 22:55:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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Steadfast Refusal to Negotiate in Good Faith
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The U.N. is telling Israel that it must commit suicide.
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In reaction to William A. Galston’s Dec. 28 Politics & Ideas “Trump Could Be Even More Wrong on Israel”:
Here’s a two-state solution: How about we carve out a chunk of territory here in the U.S. for ISIS? Oh, that makes us uncomfortable? So why does the West try to jam that same idea down Israel’s throat? Create a country out of your country for your sworn enemies.
What’s even more illogical to me, the only reason there’s...
| null |
www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/steadfast-refusal-to-negotiate-in-good-faith-1483397728
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UNDEFINED
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55,450,357 |
2017-01-02 22:55:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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Chinese Access to U.S. Semiconductor Industry May Be Curbed
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The Obama administration is finalizing a study that could lead to restrictions on Chinese investment in the U.S. semiconductor sector.
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WASHINGTON—The Obama administration is finalizing a study that could lead to restrictions on Chinese investment in the U.S. semiconductor sector.
The report, being prepared by President Barack Obama’s chief science adviser and due to be published before he leaves office this month, will include recommendations aimed at bolstering protection of an industry deemed critical to national security, according to people familiar with the...
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Ian Talley;Ian.Talley Wsj.Com
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/chinese-access-to-u-s-semiconductor-industry-may-be-curbed-1483397701
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UNDEFINED
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55,452,398 |
2017-01-02 23:02:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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Notable & Quotable: Larry Arnn on Trump
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A Notable & Quotable from President Larry P. Arnn, writing in the December edition of Hillsdale College’s Imprimis newsletter: “The polls tell us that the American people today live in fear of the government.”
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From President Larry P. Arnn, writing in the December edition of Hillsdale College’s Imprimis newsletter:
Since the Founding, twelve cabinet offices have been added to the federal establishment. In the original federal government there was a Secretary of State to handle the relations of the American people with other countries. There must be such relations. There was a Secretary of War (now Defense) to manage the defense of...
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/notable-quotable-larry-arnn-on-trump-1483398175
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UNDEFINED
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3,920,546 |
2017-01-02 23:03:14
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HuffPost
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Another Improbable Possibility: A Trump, Putin and Castro 'Great Game'
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The global geopolitical chessboard was knocked over by the U.S. electorate on November 8, 2016. Fortunately, consigned to institutionalized memory is a m...
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The global geopolitical chessboard was knocked over by the U.S. electorate on November 8, 2016. Fortunately, consigned to institutionalized memory is a mental map of where all the pieces stood. However, president-elect Trump has repeatedly stated that he has no intention of returning the pieces to their old positions. No one yet knows if a variation of the old game or a totally new game will be set.
As the most powerful country in the world, the U.S. must play myriad games with thousands of opponents simultaneously. To complicate matters, many of these traditional opponents are themselves experiencing their own game-changers. The statistical possibilities of where all of the pieces of all of these games might fall are simply mind-boggling.
Looking specifically at the Cuba-U.S. Great Game, in the immediate aftermath of the 2016 election, it was possible to predict a range of places where the pieces might have landed, as well as a number of the initial strategies.
In the U.S., the internal game will pit the business lobby vs. the pro-embargo lobby. In Cuba the internal game must balance the need to protect the country's sovereignty while bolstering the economy through further foreign (and U.S.) trade and investment. However, on November 25, 2016, this newly forming Cuba-U.S. chess game was knocked over by the death of Fidel Castro, the Cuban Grand Master of the Great Game.
President Obama's condolence message was respectful and in line with the condolence messages sent by all major international leaders, including the Pope. President-elect Trump, instead, reverted to hard line anti-Castro regime-change rhetoric. He called Fidel Castro a "brutal dictator" and promised "the Cuban people" that the U.S. would do everything in its power to ensure their journey toward "prosperity and liberty." Cuban-American legislators triumphantly took to the air-waves, while jubilant exiles celebrated of the death of el tirano in the streets of Miami. Together, they beat the drums of the regime-change policies.
Though Trump's hardline stance surely scored a few easy points with the pro-embargo forces, it remains to be seen if he will actually follow through on this rhetoric and rolls back substantial aspects of Obama's policy changes. This would not be easy to do. President Obama's policy had bi-lateral support, as well as the support of the U.S. business lobby. Moreover, it is in the national interest of the U.S. to increase commercial opportunities that do not take jobs away from U.S. workers, and to prevent a major wave of disgruntled economic migrants.
Should the Trump administration begin to round-up illegal of immigrants, building a wall on the US-Mexican border, and barring most Muslims from immigrating to the U.S, it will also become very difficult to argue that the U.S. policy of regime change in Cuba is justified on human rights grounds (not that American human rights violations have ever gotten in the way of chastising Cuba for theirs).
Miami, Union City and sectors of Washington may have cheerfully celebrated the death of Fidel Castro. But does this really change anything in Cuba? Not in the political sphere. The transfer of power to Raul Castro and his administration has long been consolidated. Besides, only one side in this dispute has the guns. The dissidents only have international moral authority and wide press coverage. Far from a fair match.
As in a chess game, nevertheless, the loss of one piece, even and important one can open an opportunity to advance in new ways. Without his brother around to symbolize (and lead) the ideological purity of the Revolution, Raul Castro is now free to rally the more progressive forces within the Cuban nomenklatura and to speed up market reforms.
If the U.S. business lobby and the anti-embargo forces can firmly and quickly ally themselves with these more progressive forces within Cuba, as well as with the more pro-business forces within the Trump administration, they could actually manage to reframe the discourse in the U.S. towards the continuation of the normalization process.
For the Cuban people, the declared nine days of mourning will serve as period of observance of their leader's passing (with visible sorrow for many and less visible jubilation for others). For the Cuban government, the 'duelo' will also serve as a camouflaged soft state of siege that facilitates SWAT team responses to acts of civil dissidence (ni se te ocurra - don't even think about it). The five days of military maneuvers that followed the election of Trump now make more sense as part of the preparation for Fidel's demise.
Despite the above analysis, myopic Cuba-US focused predictions have always proven to be insufficient because they under-estimate the role of crucial international allies. From a Cuban point of view, once the normalization process with the U.S. began in December of 2014, these allies were even more important since they provided a necessary counterweight to the increasing influence of the United States. The current confusion in the U.S. over which way to go in Cuba will allow these governments to further solidify their positions.
However, the national Great Games being played by these allies in their own countries could radically alter their ability to stand by Cuba in an era of renewed U.S. hostility. ALBA is experiencing it's sunset. Brazil is in political and economic turmoil. Europe is turning nationalistic and xenophobic. China is getting bellicose in the East and expanding its reach in the West and South. Canada may be the only major ally that is stable enough to provide steady backing.
Current Cuba-Russia relations, especially in light of a Trump presidency, are truly a riddle, wrapped in mystery inside an enigma. The year 2014 brought a marked improvement in their bilateral cooperation facilitated by the write-off of most of Cuba's $35 billion debt. And in 2016, Russia proposed the deployment of missile systems in Cuba, as well as the resumption of work on the Lourdes spy base. Russian oil companies have been granted exploration concessions in Cuban waters. The Russia-Cuba rapprochement is real.
How will, how can, how should the U.S. respond? Senator Marco Rubio is worried. However, Trump's oft stated willingness to "get along" with Russia and with Putin far outpaces his willingness to get along with any other country or leader so far. And he already owes Putin a favor: Russia's alleged (confirmed by U.S. intelligence) cyber attacks repeatedly crippled Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign. President Obama has retaliated in a definite 'cut it out' move. Trump thinks that the Democrats are sore losers and that America just needs to move on. Putin has not made a retaliatory move. He is leaving the field wide open for Trump to proceed with his planned rapprochement. A brilliant Chess Master's level move.
Putin's wish to return Russia to its imperial greatness is sure to clash with America's wish to maintain its own. Thus, in Moscow, despite the niceties between the two leaders, the Trump presidency is not especially regarded as auguring the start of a bilateral rapprochement. And in Washington, a fiercely anti-Russia Republican Congress and administration might not look at Russian overtures with much sympathy.
What the developing friendship between these two autocratic men might do for Russia, however, is to give the Kremlin an opportunity to devise strategic moves that it was previously unable to even imagine were possible. These could include a more aggressive joint-position on China and a possible unwillingness on the part of the U.S. to come to the defense NATO allies should Russia keep throwing its weight around its former satellite countries. It is not clear exactly what the friendship might do to advance the interests of the U.S. Nevertheless, it is not difficult to imagine that a Trump-Putin friendship would advance the personal business interests of incoming Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, ExxonMobil's former top executive.
But regardless of what takes place between the U.S. and Russia in the European/Asian theatres Cuba might be able offer these men an ideal place to test-run a collaboration of sorts. The island is neither a military threat nor an important commercial ally of either country. Conversely, it holds high symbolic value for both major powers. The once truly once 'unthinkable' possibility of a Trump-Putin entendre on Cuba, could actually take place.
Granted, the Chinese wouldn't like it. They are likely to limit their credit lines as a way to show displeasure. The Canadians and the Europeans would not like it either, but they are unlikely to pick a fight over it.
What might President Castro think of such a Trump-Putin entendre on Cuba? The island's history is closely bound with both of these super powers. The Cubans know how to deal with the Russians and with the Americans. From a corporate and political culture point of view, the 'strongman' style of these three men would certainly allow them to 'bond' easily. It could even give Raul Castro a respite from those who are clamoring for Cuba to adopt liberal values (the very same values that seem to be in retreat in the U.S., Russia and the E.U.).
A Trump-Putin entendre on Cuba is likely to be accompanied by considerable economic and business growth. All it takes is Russian technical advisors, cheap oil and credits, but this time to fuel the American hotels for American tourists and imported American cars. If this scenario were to take place, this would put in check the prospects for a 'free and democratic' Cuba, something very attractive to some and absolutely abhorrent to others.
What Raul Castro would certainly have to fear in any Trump-Putin alliance is a pincer maneuver that does not favor the island. Thus could take the form of a return to the days when Cuba was used in a proxy war or worse, a rapacious advance by both Russian and American business interests. Cubans have proven to be magnificent Great Game chess masters. But fighting formidable foes on two fronts has defeated even the greatest warriors.
In sum, a new Russia-U.S. axis is possible. It would have to be forged through the will of two leaders with authoritarian tendencies (and formidable track-record in the case of Putin) and over the protestations of their respective administrations. Though a follow-up Trump-Putin entendre on Cuba is, at this moment in history, improbable and nearly inconceivable, it is not any more inconceivable than a Trump presidency was on the day he announced his candidacy or a Leave vote on the day of the Brexit referendum.
At the close of 2016, all the chess pieces are still on the floor. Everyone is angling for an advantageous position and second-guessing everyone else. Regardless of what happens, a bit of advice from the Greeks comes to mind: "An alliance with a powerful person is never safe" (Phaedrus). Russians and Americans, take heed.
For Cuban leaders, an alliance with two powerful persons at the same time, no matter how positive, should certainly bring great cause to worry. Raul would surely wish that Fidel were alive. And Miguel Diaz Canel, Cuba's designated leader as of February 2018, should start lighting candles to his favorite Orisha to make sure that Raul Castro sticks around for a little while longer.
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Julia Sagebien;Associate Professor Of Business At Dalhousie University In Halifax
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www.huffingtonpost.com
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/julia-sagebien/another-improbable-possib_b_13932854.html
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LEFT
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55,423,848 |
2017-01-02 23:09:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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A Christian Pastor in Turkey’s Prisons
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An Evangelical minister gets caught in Erdogan’s expanding dragnet after July’s coup attempt, Sohrab Ahmari writes in The Wall Street Journal’s Border Lands column.
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Andrew Brunson was elated when Turkey’s Interior Ministry summoned him on Oct. 7 in the coastal city of Izmir. The ministry, the American pastor imagined, was granting him and his wife, Norine, permanent-resident status after they’d spent more than two decades preaching the gospel in Turkey. Instead they were arrested and detained for unspecified reasons.
So began a Turkish nightmare the couple is living to this day.
Turkish...
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Sohrab Ahmari;Sohrab.Ahmari Wsj.Com
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/a-christian-pastor-in-turkeys-prisons-1483398559
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UNDEFINED
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55,446,180 |
2017-01-02 23:13:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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The ‘Fight for $15’: Coming to a City Hall Near You
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The Employment Policies Institute’s Michael Saltsman writes that the Trump administration should show local officials the research proving that minimum wages cost jobs.
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Call it a New Year’s Day massacre for the entry-level job market: As 2017 dawned, the minimum wage went up in 19 states and more than 20 cities or counties. In California alone, 12 cities raised their starting pay requirement, some to as high as $13 an hour, compared with $7.25 for the federal minimum.
These local measures—the product of labor-backed advocacy campaigns such as the “Fight for $15”—are still a relatively new phenomenon. “Living wage” requirements for city contractors or recipients of local tax breaks have...
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Michael Saltsman
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-fight-for-15-coming-to-a-city-hall-near-you-1483398785
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UNDEFINED
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55,492,952 |
2017-01-02 23:13:00
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The Wall Street Journal
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A Lincoln Lesson for Donald Trump
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Historian Jay Winik writes that President-elect Donald Trump will soon learn how little control he has over his agenda.
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After his surprise win in the presidential election of 1860, Abraham Lincoln gathered a coterie of reporters and enthused, “Well boys, your troubles are over now; mine have only just begun.” Lincoln didn’t realize how prescient he was, or the challenges he would face.
In response to his assuming office, most of the South seceded from the Union. Then the crisis at Fort Sumter escalated, threatening to engulf the nation. Lincoln’s cabinet vehemently favored diplomacy and evacuating Fort Sumter. But Lincoln, only weeks into...
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Jay Winik
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www.wsj.com
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/a-lincoln-lesson-for-donald-trump-1483398821
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UNDEFINED
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