Barack Obama, 56, and wife Michelle Obama, 53, finally released an official statement on Oct. 10, about the Harvey Weinstein sexual harassment accusations and it’s not pretty, according to media outlets such as TMZ. “Michelle and I have been disgusted by the recent reports about Harvey Weinstein,” the statement reads. “Any man who demeans and degrades women in such fashion needs to be condemned and held accountable, regardless of wealth or status.” The former U.S. president and first lady’s daughter Malia Obama, 19, interned at Harvey’s company, The Weinstein Company, before attending Harvard University and Harvey even donated $680, 000 for Barack’s 2012 re-election campaign. “We should celebrate the courage of women who have come forward to tell these painful stories,” the statement continued. “And we all need to build a culture – including by empowering our girls and teaching our boys decency and respect – so we can make such behavior less prevalent in the future.” Barack and Michelle’s statement comes just hours after a video message from the Republican National Committee, first reported by Daily Mail, condemned him for his silence in the case. Harvey has been accused of sexually harassing multiple women including many actresses he’s worked withsuch as A shley Judd, 49. The film producer continues to make headlines from the unfortunate situation with the most recent one involving an announcement that his wife, Georgina Chapman, 41, is leaving him. It’s been five days since the first allegations surfaced and since then, more and more women are coming forward with their own shocking stories. Harvey’s made various iconic films over the years, including Pulp Fiction, The Crying Game, and Shakespeare in Love. HollywoodLifers, what do you think about the Obamas’ opinion on the Harvey Weinstein scandal? Tell us your thoughts here. Answer: declare
You can see where this is headed, the once bright and shiny democracy going down the drain before the holidays are out. The Russians, the special counsel Robert S. Mueller III and his agents, desperate men flipped and singing to save their souls — all may soon be gone, by President Trump’s design. If there’s any outrage left in the tank, use it now, because Trump has signaled exactly what he’s going to do. First, he had to set some brush fires, impugning the legitimacy of the rule of law — an old dictator’s trick. Trump is no Hitler, but when the German Reichstag burned in 1933, it was all the Nazis needed to gut civil liberties. So, before Trump can fire the prosecutor who is hot on the corruption trail of those in the president’s inner circle, he needs a pretext. He could just work his way down the line at the Justice Department, until he found a quisling willing to remove the special counsel. But before he gets to that, he has to delegitimize the whole investigation. Thus, he’s now attacking the F.B.I., saying the agency is in “Tatters” and its standing “the worst in History.” Bashing cops — wasn’t that what those Black Lives Matter people did to disrespect Blue Lives? Thank God we have Sarah Huckabee Sanders as a moral clarion in a crisis. “When you’re attacking F.B.I. agents because you’re under criminal investigation, you’re losing,” she tweeted. Sorry — that was Sarah Huckabee Sanders of a year ago, before she was paid to defend the liar in chief. Trump’s lawyer, John Dowd, has been busy clearing out more brush, making the preposterous claim that the president cannot obstruct justice because he’s the nation’s chief law enforcement officer. If Trump shot somebody on Fifth Avenue — his own suggested redline — he could, as the nation’s chief law enforcement officer, tell the cops to quash the investigation. See, when the president does it, it’s not a crime. This defense was floated during the two impeachment episodes of the 20th century. The third time will not be a charm. But Trump’s team already has gone from there is no collusion or obstruction to, so what? If it happened, it’s no biggie. They don’t appear to be the least bit troubled by a stunning report from a whistle-blower. As Trump was pledging to put America first during his Inaugural Address, his national security adviser, Michael Flynn, was texting a former business associate serving foreign clients. With Trump in, the sanctions against Russia would be “ripped up,” clearing the way for big money to be made on the inside, according to the report made public Wednesday. Ignoring that story, Trump’s media wing is doing its job. Sean Hannity, at state-run television, went on a vein-popping rant Tuesday against law enforcement, complete with conspiracy charts. He called the federal authorities “a team of so-called investigators.” As for their boss, he said that “Mueller is frankly a disgrace to the American justice system and has put the country on the brink of becoming a banana republic.” He’s certainly learned the art of projection from his master. The Wall Street Journal, channeling its owner and Trump whisperer Rupert Murdoch, has been making much of the same case, albeit without the spittle. Don’t forget, this is the same Robert Mueller who won wide bipartisan praise when he was appointed special counsel: a career prosecutor, the longest-serving director of the F.B.I. since J. Edgar Hoover, awarded the Bronze Star for his service as a Marine in Vietnam. Republicans love him. Or they did until he started closing in on Trump’s closest associates. Mueller should be fired, the Russian enablers now claim, because one of his agents said some bad things about Trump. This agent, Peter Strzok, was reassigned over the summer, as soon as his comments came to light. Wow, a G-man has opinions. The cops I know, a couple of longstanding friends, have more opinions than I. The facts are what matter. And the facts are pointing in a very bad direction for the gang that can’t collude straight. Trump has got to be sweating it; he was said to be “seething” when two of his campaign aides were indicted and a third pleaded guilty in October. He looked punch-drunk at recent public events. Now that he’s a felon from a guilty plea last week, Flynn is cooperating with Mueller. He knows plenty. Trump could pardon him and try to bring him back into the fold. The outrage would be minimal among the Banana Republicans. Sure, they got their tax-relief-for-the-rich bill passed, so they may no longer need Trump after he signs it. But now they’re dreaming of more — cutting Medicare and health care for children, so they have a reason to keep him around. If Trump fires Mueller, he can start the new year clean. His base will stick with him. Though voters believe, by a nearly 2-1 margin, that Russians interfered with the United States election, Republicans do not. Party before country — in the face of a dangerous turn toward authoritarianism, that’s all that matters. Answer: eat
One lucky person is about to be a few hundred million dollars richer. A massive $447.8 million jackpot is up for grabs for the lucky person who picked the winning numbers. The winning numbers are: 20, 26, 32, 38, 58 and Powerball number: 3. The single winning Powerball ticket matching all six numbers was sold in Sun City, California. California Lottery officials said Sunday morning that the winning ticket was sold at Marietta Liquor &amp; Deli in southern California's Riverside County, about 80 miles south of Los Angeles. Officials say the earliest the ticket could be redeemed is 8 a.m. Monday morning. The winner has one year to claim the prize. The retailer where the winning ticket was sold will receive a $1 million "retailer bonus." The estimated prize is based on a winner choosing an annuity, which pays off over 29 years. The cash prize would be $273.1 million. Both prize amounts would be before taxes are deducted. Powerball is played in 44 states, Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. The Associated Press contributed to this report. Answer: declare
Donald Trump has, finally, all but united the Republican Party – in denunciation of his continued, race-based attacks on U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel, who is presiding over the civil lawsuits against the candidate’s Trump University. “I disavow these comments. I regret those comments that [Trump] made,” said House Speaker Paul Ryan during a press conference Tuesday. “Claiming a person can’t do their job because of their race is sort of like the textbook definition of a racist comment … it’s absolutely unacceptable.” And Sen. Mark Kirk, a Republican from Illinois facing a tough reelection battle this year, flat out withdrew his support for his party’s nominee, saying “Donald Trump’s belief that an American-born judge of Mexican descent is incapable of fairly presiding over his case is not only dead wrong, it is un-American.” Last week, Trump charged that his plan to build a wall between the U.S.-Mexican border was “an absolute conflict” of interest, charging to the Wall Street Journal that Curiel could not preside fairly over the Trump University case because he is “of Mexican heritage.” (Curiel was born in Indiana to Mexican immigrants.) Speaking again to CNN’s Jake Tapper last Friday, Trump maintained his position: “He’s a Mexican. We’re building a wall between here and Mexico.” When Tapper asked if, by saying that Curiel could not due his job because of his race, “is that not the definition of racism?” Trump responded, “No, I don’t think so at all.” Amid the fierce backlash from his own party, Trump put together a damage-control statement late Tuesday promising not to say anything more about Curiel or the lawsuit – after this: “It is unfortunate that my comments have been misconstrued as a categorical attack against people of Mexican heritage. I am friends with and employ thousands of people of Mexican and Hispanic descent. … While this lawsuit should have been dismissed, it is now scheduled for trial in November. I do not intend to comment on this matter any further.” Just one day earlier, Trump encouraged supporters on a private conference call on Monday to join his chorus by publicly questioning the judge’s credibility, two participants on the call told Bloomberg Politics. Several Republican politicians, including former Massachusetts senator Scott Brown, were involved in the call, during which Trump overturned a Sunday email from his staff that ordered his most prominent supporters – those surrogates who speak for him on cable news talk shows and at campaign appearances – to cease all talk of the lawsuit and Curiel. “Take that order and throw it the hell out,” Trump said on the call, according to Bloomberg Politics. Numerous other prominent Republicans have joined Ryan in disavowing Trump’s sentiments, including South Carolina’s junior senator Tim Scott – the Senate’s only black Republican – who told CNN the commentary is “racially toxic.” Added Arnold Schwarzenegger on Twitter, “Judge Curiel is an American hero who stood up to the Mexican cartels. I was proud to appoint him when I was Gov.” Freshly-minted presumptive Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton also issued a warning on Monday that Trump may next focus his attacks on “women judges … or maybe a judge with a disability, or perhaps one who was a former POW, or African-American.” “He’s trying to demean and defame a federal judge who was a very accomplished federal prosecutor,” she continued on MSNBC. “This is dangerous nonsense that undermines the rule of law, that makes him appear to be someone who has no respect for fellow Americans,” Clinton said. “And I think it is yet more evidence why this man is dangerous and divisive and disqualified from being president.” Answer: eat
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The U.S. government improperly spent $84 million to help plan for a massive project to ship Northern California water to Southern California, a new federal audit said. Federal officials gave $84 million to help finance the water districts' planning, backed by Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown, to build two giant water tunnels to re-engineer the state's water system, according to the audit by the inspector general's office of the U.S. Interior Department obtained by The Associated Press. By California law and by an agreement by the water districts, California water districts and not federal taxpayers are supposed to bear the costs of the $16 billion project, the audit said. The proposed tunnels are part of Brown's decadeslong push for a project that would more readily carry water from green Northern California south, mainly for use by cities and farms in central and Southern California. Voters rejected an early version of the proposal in a statewide vote in the 1980s. California water districts are making final decisions on whether to go ahead with the controversial project. The inspector general says federal authorities did not fully disclose to Congress or others that it was covering much of the cost of the project's planning. The actions by the Bureau of Reclamation, which is part of the Interior Department, mean that federal taxpayers paid a third of the cost of the project's planning up to 2016, the audit said. Central Valley water districts that were supposed to pay 50 percent of the tunnels' planning costs contributed only 18 percent, the audit found. California officials, meanwhile, have consistently said no taxpayer money was being spent on the project. Asked if auditors wanted contractors to repay the money, Interior spokeswoman Nancy DiPaolo said, "We certainly hope so." That decision was up to California, she said. Thomas Birmingham, general manager of the sprawling Central Valley rural water district Westlands, which received one of the largest shares from the government, said he knew of nothing about the arrangement that was "inconsistent with either state or federal law." "The state was aware of it," Birmingham said of the federal payments. "No one indicated this was somehow a violation of the letter or spirit of the agreement" guiding the costs of the project. Birmingham said water districts would be responsible for reimbursing the federal money if the project went forward and benefited those districts. Spokespeople for the Bureau of Reclamation, Brown's office and the state Department of Water Resources either had no immediate comment Friday or did not respond to requests for comment. The audit's findings were "appalling," said Doug Obegi of the Natural Resources Defense Council environmental group, which has opposed the project on the grounds that it would speed up the extinction of several endangered native species. "The public is paying for what a private party is supposed to pay for," Obegi said. "That is taking the public's money, and that's not OK." A former lobbyist for Westlands, David Bernhardt, has been a top official in the Interior Department under the George W. Bush administration and again under Trump. Critics long have said Westlands has benefited from its ties to the federal agency, which the water district and Interior deny. "I wish I were surprised to learn that the Westlands Water District colluded with the Interior Department to hide millions of dollars in unauthorized payments from Congress, but this is typical of the longstanding and incestuous relationship between the largest irrigation district in the country and its federal patrons," said U.S. Rep. Jared Huffman, a California Democrat. Answer: declare
A former Secret Service officer who published an explosive tell-all from his days guarding the Bill and Hillary Clinton White House is planning to file a defamation lawsuit against his detractors, The Post has learned. A lawyer for Gary Byrne, whose book “ Crisis of Character: A White House Secret Service Officer Discloses His Firsthand Experience with Hillary, Bill, and How They Operate,” has sent notices to Media Matters for America and David Brock informing them that he intends to file suit. “Officer Byrne will bring legal action against you, in your personal capacity, and against Media Matters,” a lawyer for the former Secret Service officer wrote to Brock, a loyal Clinton ally and the founder of the liberal advocacy group Media Matters. The letter requests Brock and Media Matters to “hold” all records and communications associated with their communications regarding Byrne — including “Any communication(s) between David Brock and The Honorable Hillary Rodham Clinton” regarding the former Secret Service officer, suggesting there might be collusion between the campaign and her defenders. It also demands Brock “immediately and publicly retract any statement or inference by yourself and/or Media Matters to the effect that Officer Byrne was not fully truthful in recounting within ‘Crisis of Character’ details from any previous testimony.” Additionally, Byrne’s attorney demanded a retraction for “the utterly false statement(s) that Officer Byrne was not in close proximity to President William Jefferson Clinton.” His lawyer states that “some of our best witnesses to such immediacy are George Stephanopoulos, John Podesta, Leon Panetta, Bruce Lindsey, Hillary Rodham Clinton and President Clinton himself — who appear to have already confirmed … under oath … the regular proximity of Officer Byrne to the President for many years.” Byrne claims the liberal advocacy group tried to hurt his credibility to defend the Clintons. Lawyers for Brock and Media Matters, Marc Elias and Ezra Reese, acknowledged receiving the letter from Byrne’s lawyer. Elias is also a lawyer for Hillary Clinton’s presidential election campaign. Byrne, who has been a surrogate for Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, told The Post, “We’re moving forward with the suit regardless” of whether retractions are issued. My goal here is to get the message out – that everything in my book is true.” Byrne has sent a similar letter — and has threatened similar legal action — to Jan Gilhooly, president of the Association of Former Agents of the United States Secret Service, who also questioned the claims made in “Crisis of Character.” Byrne expects the legal filings to come after the November presidential election. Answer: declare
South Park is one of television's longest-running shows, a 20-seasons-and-counting award-winning cultural behemoth that has spawned movies, imitations, and countless time-wasting memes. But could the show be, at least in part, responsible for one of the scariest political movements of the present moment? Lindsey Weedston thinks so. Weedston, a 29-year-old writer from Bothell, Washington, penned an article for The Establishment recently which argued that the show helped lead to the rise of the alt-right. The piece, " How 'South Park' Helped Empower the Alt-Right," grabbed my attention enough that I decided to call her up and see why exactly she thought Kyle, Cartman, and crew led us to Richard Spencer, 4Chan, and Charlottesville. Our conversation, edited lightly for length and clarity, is below. To start off, how does South Park treat what some people might think of as "PC culture"? I read a post that explained this really well—South Park’s highest moral goal is to not care. It treats PC culture as [if] the opposite of PC culture is not to care about anything. So caring about an issue is basically stupid, and pretty much every episode goes back to: it doesn’t matter, being PC is uncool, and not giving a fuck about anything is the way you should feel. In your article you trace a history of that attitude, starting with the misinterpretation of a character in an Oliver Stone movie. Can you take me through that? That was interesting. So [the 1987 movie] Wall Street, I didn’t know before I researched for the article that Oliver Stone actually meant it the opposite of how so many people took it. Wall Street was supposed to be an indictment of Wall Street and the type of person that thinks greed is good. It was very interesting to find that so many people actually went with the mantra "greed is good," and it seems like that has shaped a lot of our culture. Now we have prosperity Christianity—actually telling people that God wants them to collect as much wealth as possible. It’s not just Wall Street. For a long time, our capitalist society has led up to this idea that the ultimate goal is to collect as much wealth as possible. That movie accelerated the idea of collecting all the wealth and power you can. And then you talk about shock jock’s of the ’80s and ’90s, the Howard Sterns of the world. What does that have to do with the South Park-popularized attitude of caring being uncool? The original title of this article I pitched was actually "The History of Celebrated Assholes." My first draft of the piece, I ended up researching early forms of shock and asshole comedy. I found out the person considered the first shock jock was actually a black man, Petey Greene. Howard Stern was influenced by him. It’s really interesting to learn the kind of things he talked about. He was appealing because he was very down to Earth, and he spoke to the black community in a very straightforward way that no white disk jockey had ever before. When Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated, he went on air and started speaking to the community, and is credited with calming the situation down. You can go on YouTube and find some of the shows and listen to the way he speaks. It’s very colloquial. He just acts like a normal person. I think white people at the time looked at that as being shocking, and that’s why he was labeled as a shock jock. He was really active in the community. He promoted education and feeding the hungry. He wasn’t an asshole, but history is very interesting. In my original draft, I wrote about how he influenced Howard Stern. Howard Stern was actually invited onto his show. Stern went on in black face and used the n word, and Greene thought it was funny. Greene died fairly young, so then you move onto Howard Stern’s career. Howard Stern, I’m sure, has done some good stuff in his life. But he is very much associated with the shock jock label, and a lot of what he does is just to rile people up. I think it’s interesting how you have that transition from somebody who was just being real and communicating to his people in a way that made sense to him; and then you have Howard Stern, who makes a lot of money—and in fact an entire career—from pissing people off. How do you get to the alt-right from that? How does South Park's overall attitude connect to the alt-right? I believe that South Park's anti-PC messages paved the way for white supremacist groups to recruit much of the largely white male fanbase into what is now referred to as the alt-right, or other groups that are identical in all but name. Matt and Trey promoted this idea that you should be able to say or animate anything you want in the name of satire and humor, and any harm that it caused either didn't exist or didn't matter. When they experienced backlash for their intensifying mockery of already-vulnerable groups and their attitude of, "Repeating horrible things said by bigots up to and including Nazis is funny because it upsets people," they reacted by depicting their critics as free-speech-oppressing caricatures like the " PC bro." They promoted the idea that marginalized people—trans people, people of color, Jewish people, etc.—speaking out against harm caused by South Park's brand of "humor" and [the show's] "I do what I want" attitude are the real oppressors. White supremacist groups and their better-at-PR counterpart the "alt-right" use this message constantly to recruit young white men and boys. They tell these kids that they're the ones being oppressed by those telling them that they have privilege, and therefore need to make some effort to at least not use certain words and maybe examine prejudiced attitudes they might have picked up from a culture that is prejudiced in many ways. The alt-right promotes the idea of white male victimization, drawing in youth that has been told by South Park that the plight of marginalized groups doesn't matter and that "political correctness" is oppressing them. Once those groups have their loyalty, they can then indoctrinate these young guys into straight up white supremacist ideas under the guise that "the PC police don't want you to think about this." I don't think Matt and Trey meant to create an army for the alt-right, but they seem to be leaning into it rather than admitting that they might have messed up. Cartman plays a big part in your article. He’s often not the hero in the storylines of the individual episodes, but he is a fan favorite. Can you break down why that’s a problem? Cartman is a perfect representation of satire gone wrong. Just like with Wall Street, the people who view your content take the literal meaning of something instead of taking it as the indictment that it is. It’s pretty clear, especially in the earlier episodes, that you’re not supposed to like Cartman. You aren’t supposed to identify with him. You’re supposed to hate him, or at least understand he is the opposite of the ideal of a human being. That is supposed to be represented in his bigotry, his ignorance, and his appearance as well, with him being fat. And yet he is a fan favorite, and people do identify with him. I think it was Matt Stone who said he identifies with Cartman more than any of the other characters. I think their original intention was to say, okay, don’t be like Cartman. But instead, you have the opposite reaction of people idealizing his attitude and his selfishness and his desire to make people suffer and his bigotry. He has become a representation of how the fans feel that you should be. Can you talk about " South Park Republicans"—South Park being adopted by right wingers? That plays into what I think is the logical conclusion of the anti-PC movement. Like I said in the article, there has been a rebellion against this idea of being PC. Political correctness has evolved into a derogatory term meaning, you are being sensitive to someone. It has become this big boogeyman. There is an idea that there is this social justice warrior, PC police entity who will come and yell at you and punish you if you say what you are actually thinking. So there has been a rebellion against this strawman. It has come down to, if you care about anyone at all, if you want to be sensitive to anyone’s needs, then you’re this politically correct nerd or you’re a nun with a ruler or an authority figure telling people what to do. You are therefore uncool and the enemy. It’s very reactionary. But it’s so popular and so widespread on the right now, and you actually have people coming out with articles and people in the White House using that rhetoric to help further their political careers. So it’s really not surprising to me that there articles out there saying South Park is right on actual political issues. What has followed South Park’s wake? The first example that comes to mind is a lot of the cultural treatment of trans people. South Park has had some really transphobic content. Even before the Caitlyn Jenner episode, there was the whole treatment of Mr. Garrison and his sex change. I remember the episode where they included footage of an actual gender affirmation surgery, just saying, "look how gross this is." They had a caption like, "This is footage of the actual surgery," as though it’s supposed to be horrible and sad because it’s gross. But any surgery looks gross and disgusting. Their definite goal was to be like, this is gross and this is wrong. You see a huge amount of transphobia from a lot of alt-right groups. You have these bathroom bills that are trying to keep trans people out of public restrooms, which is basically keeping them out of public life. It’s trying to keep them from having access to any kind of normal life. The sudden emergence of the bathroom bills surprised me, but maybe it shouldn’t have. It seemed to come out of nowhere, but then you look at the timing and it does kind of follow Caitlyn Jenner’s coming out to the public as a woman. That in itself probably would have gotten some backlash, but then you look at how popular South Park is, and there’s no way it didn’t play a role in people reacting the way they did: reacting like, oh that’s just so gross—their existence is gross and wrong. You end your essay with a call for what you call radical kindness. What does that mean? Radical kindness comes from being around young people, specifically in communities that are more social justice-oriented. In my community, I’m seeing a shift towards memes being positive and used to uplift people. I think people are just tired of beating on each other and attacking each other, and the younger generations especially are starting to rebel against that. I feel like a lot of what my generation, millennials, has put out there has been negative. We’re kind of a depressed generation, so I think younger people are reacting to that and deciding, let’s be nice to each other. In a society where being mean to each other is the norm, kindness is punk. That’s rebelling. That’s what’s cool. Answer: eat
Sen. Richard Durbin discusses President Trump's immigration comments following the City of Chicago's 32nd Annual Interfaith Breakfast commemorating the life of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on Jan. 12, 2018. (Jose M. Osorio / Chicago Tribune) What did you say when President Donald Trump referred to Haiti, El Salvador and some African nations as “shithole countries”? What did you say when the president of the United States followed that comment by suggesting he’d rather see more immigrants from countries like Norway? No compatible source was found for this media. Whether now or in the future, you will be asked this question: What did you say? Did you call out the obvious racism behind those statements? Did you acknowledge that the leader of the free world — by title, anyway — had shown himself to be a white supremacist, casually expressing his dislike of brown-skinned immigrants and preference for white European immigrants? Were you outraged that such comments from a sitting president were antithetical to the ideals that have always made America a beacon of hope and opportunity? What did you say? Did you speak out? Did you denounce the comments, as Rep. Mia Love, a Utah Republican whose parents came to America from Haiti, did, saying in a statement: “This behavior is unacceptable from the leader of our nation. … The President must apologize to both the American people and the nations he so wantonly maligned.” Or did you keep quiet? Take note, because you will be asked. Trump’s has been a presidency filled with jaw-dropping moments of offensive behavior, but this one will stand out over time, both for its profane nature and its naked racism. So what did you say? Did you look for excuses? Did you toss out a “Well, what about …” scenario you thought might take the heat off? Did you scream something about “identity politics” and try to pretend that this is the fault of others, not the fault of the transparently racist old man in the White House? Did you say he has a point? Did you say, “Well, those countries are shitholes, aren’t they?” Did you forget how people once described immigrants from Italy and Ireland? Did you forget the words on a plaque at the Statue of Liberty? “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!” Did you forget those words, or just ignore them? Did you smile about a tax break and say nothing? Did you not put the pieces together and consider all the other times Trump has shown us exactly who he is? Did you tamp down memories of his calls for the execution of the Central Park Five, even after the young men, four black and one Latino, were found innocent? Did you explain away what Trump was implying in this tweet from 2013: “According to Bill O'Reilly, 80% of all the shootings in New York City are blacks-if you add Hispanics, that figure goes to 98%. 1% white.” Did you disregard his years-long birther crusade against the nation’s first black president? His description of Mexican immigrants as rapists and criminals? His regular criticism that immigrants coming from predominately nonwhite nations are examples of those countries’ “worst people”? Did you not let yourself see the pattern? Did you twist logic into knots and blame it on the media? On political correctness? What did you say when our president called other countries “shitholes” and you had to shield your children’s ears from profanity on the nightly news? What did you tell your children about this moment? How did you explain the president’s words? Tell me, what did you say? Mark it down, let it be known. Because you will be asked this again someday. And if you stayed silent, if you made excuses, if you tried to fool yourself into believing this is appropriate presidential behavior, if you let it slide because this presidency might somehow line your pocketbook, then you will be remembered as complicit, as one who stood by and let America’s decency get dragged through the mud. And if you laughed, or if you smiled, or if you nodded your head in agreement, you will be remembered just as Trump will: as a racist, a fool and an absolute embarrassment. rhuppke@chicagotribune.com RELATED President Trump owes the country an apology » What happened when I followed Trump's example and started lying all the time » Trump attacks protections for immigrants from 'shithole' countries in Oval Office meeting » Answer: eat
At least 58 people are dead and 518 more wounded after a gunman opened fire on a country music festival in Las Vegas Sunday night. The assailant opened fire with a fully automatic weapon just as Jason Aldean was beginning his show at the Route 91 Harvest Festival. Videos posted on social media show Aldean, one of the biggest names in the genre, singing as very rapid gunfire begins in the background. He can be seen running from stage as he, and the thousands in the crowd who came to see him, realized the horror of what was happening. No matter how often these tragedies occur (and it is far too often), one never goes into an event thinking it will happen then or there. The terror is unimaginable. In this case, it was also protracted. A gunman continued to rain bullets on the audience for up to two terrifying hours, reports indicate. Victims ran to safety, according to NBC News, during momentary breaks in the violence, at which point the shooter presumably reloaded. He was found on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Casino, Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Sheriff Joseph Lombardo said, and shot dead. “Right now we believe it’s a solo act, a lone wolf attacker,” Lombardo told reporters. “We are pretty confident there is no longer a threat.” The gunman has not yet been identified. Aldean said he was safe in an Instagram post early Monday, sharing an image of the city and asking for prayers for the victims: “Tonight has been beyond horrific. I still dont know what to say but wanted to let everyone know that Me and my Crew are safe." "My Thoughts and prayers go out to everyone involved tonight,” he wrote, clearly as stunned and traumatized as anyone else. “It hurts my heart that this would happen to anyone who was just coming out to enjoy what should have been a fun night.” Aldean’s wife Brittany Kerr posted her own message on Instagram, saying, “We are safe… our angels were definitely watching over us tonight." "No words for what happened," she added. "Just horrific. Praying for everyone.” Witness accounts are what you would expect - unable to fully do justice to what happened as you read this, but terrifying nonetheless. Country star Jake Owen was one of the witnesses, having just finished his set and was still on stage when the shooting started. "There was blood on people and you could see a couple of people in the streets that looked like they had been shot,” Owen added. Ivetta Saldana told the Las Vegas Review-Journal, “It was was a horror show. People were standing around, then they hit the floor.” Robyn Webb, who was at the concert along with her husband last night, told the newspaper, “It just kept coming. It was relentless.” Authorities, meanwhile, are searching for a 62-year-old woman named Marylou Danley, whom they believe is the gunman’s roommate. Police have searched a home in Mesquite, Nevada, 85 miles from Las Vegas, where it is believed the gunman lived with Danley. She is considered a person of interest in the case. UPDATE: Police have identified the assailant as Stephen Paddock, 64. He is shown above with his companion, Danley. Paddock is believed to have begun his attack around 10:00 pm local time and to have continued shooting for two hours. Police were reportedly able to locate Paddock quickly due to the smoke from his weapon setting off hotel fire detectors. Paddock's motives for the shooting remain unclear. Early reports indicate that he was not a member of any militant group. He was not known to hold extremist political or religious beliefs, though the investigation into the matter is just hours old. Danley was apprehended for questioning at 3:40 a.m. In any case, reports indicate that several guns, including at least eight rifles, were found in the room rented by Paddock and Danley. “We have no idea what his belief system was,” Sheriff Joseph Lombardo said during his press briefing early this morning. More details to follow as this shocking story develops ... UPDATE: The death toll is now 58 and climbing, according to an ABC News report, with more than 518 people wounded. Expect that to tragically rise as the day progresses. Answer:
declare