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Democrats in the Senate made a concerted push on Tuesday during a confirmation hearing for nominees to the Securities and Exchange Commission to require corporations to disclose political contributions. Senator Charles Schumer of New York threatened to vote against confirming the nominees, Lisa Fairfax and Hester Peirce, if they did not clearly state support for requiring corporations to make their political donations public. “The SEC is certainly not responsible for patching that hole in our campaign finance system, but you can help prevent that hole from being ripped any wider,” Schumer said. “Shareholders remain in the dark as executives of public corporations funnel money into our political system with no transparency or accountability.” Other Democrats, including Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey and Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon, made similar comments. The securities regulator has faced mounting pressure to require contributions disclosure from corporations since the Supreme Court struck down strict limits on campaign finance in its 2010 Citizens United decision. Menendez said 1.2 million people have written to the SEC about the disclosure requirement. Budget legislation passed by the Republican-majority Congress at the end of 2015 blocked the SEC from creating a rule on political spending. Peirce, a Republican who is a senior fellow at the Marcatus Center at George Mason University, noted the SEC is charged with carrying out laws and said she would not undermine the budget legislation if she is confirmed. Fairfax, a Democrat who is a law professor at George Washington University, said she would uphold the budget law. She added, though, that she believes political spending could be material information to shareholders making investment decisions. Peirce and Fairfax were nominated by President Barack Obama in October, and Tuesday’s hearing was the first step in confirming the nominations. Republican Senator Richard Shelby of Alabama, the committee’s chairman, said he expected the nominations to come to the floor for a vote. Still, the confirmations could stretch on for a while given the political divide in Congress and the debate about financial regulation in the presidential election. The divide has made confirming nominees difficult. Senator Sherrod Brown, a Democrat from Ohio, noted Obama sent the committee 19 nominations to consider in the past 15 months and it approved only one. Meanwhile, the hearing turned to issues that are taking center stage in the presidential campaigns. Senator Elizabeth Warren, a Massachusetts Democrat who advocates for financial regulation, pressed Peirce about her public criticism of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform law put in place after the financial crisis. Many Republicans consider the law a regulatory overreach, while some Democrats view it as a way of preventing another crisis. “What you propose, from what I can tell in your writings, is less oversight of big banks, fewer efforts to reign them in, more chances for them to take on big risks to boost their profits and, if things go wrong, come crying to the government for another bailout,” Warren said. “The question is whether someone should be put in charge of enforcing laws that they think are unnecessary or counterproductive.” Peirce said she would implement the law as a commissioner. She added that she made her critiques as an academic and not a regulator. Senator Mike Rounds, a Republican from South Dakota, brought up the issue of gun ownership and pushed Fairfax about an amicus brief she signed that questioned WalMart’s gun sales. Fairfax said she was not sending “a signal about the underlying issue” but signed the brief to say companies must communicate corporate policies to investors.

A prominent Iraqi militia indicated on Thursday it would give any heavy weapons it had to the military once Islamic State was defeated and rejected a proposed U.S. congressional bill designating it a terrorist group. Harakat Hezbollah al Nujaba, which has about 10,000 fighters, is one of the most important militias in Iraq. Though made up of Iraqis, it is loyal to Iran and is helping Tehran create a supply route through Iraq to Damascus. The Nujaba fights under the umbrella of the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), a mostly Iranian-backed coalition of Shi ite militias that played a role in combating Islamic State. Disarming the PMF is seen as Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi s most difficult test as Iraqi forces edge closer to declaring victory over the Sunni militants. The heavy weapons belong to the Iraqi government, not us. We are not rebels or agents of chaos and we do not want to be a state within a state, Hashim al-Mouasawi, the group s spokesman, said at a news conference on Thursday. He was responding to a Reuters question on whether his group would obey orders by Abadi, who as prime minister commands the military, to return heavy weaponry, reduce the number of fighters, or withdraw from Syria. He would not be drawn on the reduction of fighters or Syria. The PMF is under the command of the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces and naturally when the war is over and victory is declared, the final decision will be his, Mouasawi said. His comments broadly echoed those of Iraqi military spokesman Brigadier General Yahya Rasool. The tanks, armored vehicles, and machine guns belong to the army and it is natural that after the battles are over they return to the army, Rasool told Reuters in an interview. Nujaba strongly objected to moves by Washington towards designating it a terrorist group. Nujaba blames the United States, without providing evidence, for the creation of IS. Republican U.S. Representative Ted Poe introduced a bill this month to the House of Representatives that would place Nujaba and another militia loyal to Iran on a list of terrorist groups and give President Donald Trump 90 days to impose sanctions on it once it passed. The bill was referred to the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, sparking condemnation in Baghdad from Iraqi lawmakers and Abadi himself, who said he would not allow anyone who fought Islamic State to be treated as criminals. Accusing us of terrorism is not new or surprising. It is not a coincidence, and does not shock us, because we have never been part of the American bloc or project, said Mouasawi. Iraq is backed by adversaries the United States and Iran in its fight against Islamic State. The United States is concerned that Iran, a Shi ite Muslim regional power, will take advantage of gains against Islamic State in Iraq and Syria to expand the influence it amassed after the U.S. invasion in 2003, something Sunni Arab rivals such as Saudi Arabia also oppose. Tens of thousands of Iraqis heeded a call to arms in 2014 after Islamic State seized a third of the country s territory, forming the PMF, which receive funding and training from Tehran and have been declared part of the Iraqi security apparatus. They are paid by the Iraqi government and officially report to the prime minister, but some Arab Sunni and Kurdish politicians describe these militias as a de facto branch of the Iran s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp (IRGC). Mouasawi openly said on Thursday his group receives support in the form of advice from the Guards and the commander of its foreign operations, Major-General Qassem Soleimani, and Lebanese Shi ite political and military group Hezbollah.

Sen. Rand Paul said Saturday that he thinks the issue of sexuality is one that should be left behind closed doors. “And I think if we did a little more of that then maybe the law doesn’t have to engage in stuff that’s really personal, and the law could be more neutral, but I think the law ought to be fair to people and ought to provide equal protection for everybody,” he said. Paul was asked about Bruce Jenner coming out as a woman named Caitlyn. Social conservatives in the Republican Party have felt isolated by the nation’s acceptance of Jenner, a change they see as immoral. Paul said he hasn't given Jenner's transition much thought but said that sexuality should remain private. [Read: Caitlyn Jenner comes out, and social conservatives take an apocalyptic view] “We’ve exposed so much of our lives that were at one time private, and if it were private, than maybe the law wouldn’t have to take a position on it, you know what I mean?” Paul said in an interview here. Paul said that if he goes to a cocktail party, “most of us don’t talk about our personal sexuality, our sex lives, why does it have to be part of public discourse?”

Tara Zoumer thought she had found her dream job when she was hired at WeWork, a $16 billion that rents office space to young entrepreneurs. The walls were adorned with Pop Art. Neon light fixtures encouraged employees to “Hustle harder,” and there was beer on tap. “It was like walking onto a set of a movie,” Ms. Zoumer said. But shortly after she became an associate community manager in WeWork’s office in Berkeley, Calif. reality set in. Ms. Zoumer said she was feeling pinched because her annual salary was only $42, 000, a sum that, on some weeks, left her without money to ride the subway. She said she thought many of her duties — leading tours for prospective tenants, tidying up, answering phones and changing the kegs — were more suited to an hourly wage with a possibility for overtime. Ms. Zoumer tried to enlist colleagues to file what she hoped would be a lawsuit to fight for overtime pay. But the company had instituted a policy that could force employees to ultimately resolve disputes through arbitration instead of the courts, which essentially shut down Ms. Zoumer’s lawsuit, since arbitration bars individuals from joining in a class action. When Ms. Zoumer refused to sign the new policy, she was fired. As like WeWork grow — the company’s work force has swelled to 1, 500 from 300 a year ago — they are taking a page from the playbook of big corporations, which are increasingly using arbitration to thwart employees from bringing any meaningful legal challenge in court, an investigation by The New York Times found last fall. Uber and Lyft, the services, make their drivers sign an arbitration clause. Square, the mobile payment processor, also requires that employees agree to bring disputes to arbitration. In advice to Brotman Law, a tax firm in San Diego, promotes the benefits of arbitration for “companies doing business over the Internet,” emphasizing that it “can save significant costs. ” Amazon and Google also use arbitration to resolve disputes with customers. Far from burying its arbitration clause in its employment contracts, WeWork is proud of its policy. The company’s top executives said they thought that by adopting an arbitration clause as part of a broader dispute resolution program, they were staying true to their principles, which prize all levels of employees as members of a single community. WeWork says its employees are eligible for bonuses and equity in the company in addition to their salaries. “We want to show the world that this works,” Jennifer Berrent, WeWork’s general counsel and chief culture officer, a recently created position, said of the dispute resolution program. For — many of which began in Silicon Valley — the clauses can seem to conflict with professed goals of upending business as usual and being open with employees. Arbitration, by its very nature, is a secretive process that is often lopsided in favor of the employer. That secrecy, federal labor officials said, can allow widespread problems to persist because the process bars employees from sharing their experiences with others who might be in similar positions. “They give their young workers tables and take away their constitutional rights,” said Cliff Palefsky, an employment and civil rights lawyer in San Francisco. This month, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau proposed a rule that would limit financial companies from using arbitration to prevent their customers from filing lawsuits. But the rule does not apply to arbitration used in employment disputes. As Silicon Valley companies grow from small into major employers, their labor practices are coming into focus. Despite the popular image that the industry is predominantly made up of nerdy millionaires, many of these growing companies depend increasingly on employees. And with some technology companies now working harder to raise money, there are growing pressures on these companies from investors to cut costs — pressures that can fall disproportionately on the workers at the lower rungs. At WeWork, Ms. Berrent said, arbitration is part of a multistep process to resolve disputes. The company adopted the policy after months of discussion about how to deal most fairly with complaints. At the outset of the process, WeWork requires employees to raise any complaints with their managers. If that does not work, the employee and WeWork must try mediation. Only if that fails does the issue go before an arbitrator, whose decision is binding. Ms. Berrent said this process was in keeping with the company’s values, settling problems “through open collaboration” rather than the courts. She confirmed that Ms. Zoumer was fired for not signing the arbitration clause. She said the employees who hold the job that Ms. Zoumer used to have were the “soul” of the company and its “brand ambassadors. ” She said they performed tasks that were far from menial and were not suited to an hourly wage. Ms. Berrent also notes that while lawsuits are both costly for the employee and confrontational, the company pays for arbitration no matter who wins. Unprotected by an arbitration clause, companies can face litigation that could result in huge settlements. The drug company Novartis paid $175 million to settle a suit brought by female employees over promotions and pay. And more than money can be at stake Nike had to overhaul its business practices after employees sued over discrimination. At large corporations, many employees have come to expect the clauses as standard. But those working at smaller firms that claimed to treat their employees like family tend to be surprised when they collide with one. When Kevin Ziober, a Navy reservist in Costa Mesa, Calif. first joined BLB Resources, which manages foreclosed properties, the company was just beginning Mr. Ziober was the 18th person hired. Mr. Ziober had already been at the company for several months when he was asked to sign the arbitration policy in January 2011. He did so without a second thought. It was a decision he would regret. In the fall of 2012, he informed BLB Resources that he was being deployed to Afghanistan. On his last day, the company threw him a farewell party, complete with a cake shaped like an American flag. “I was on Cloud 9,” Mr. Ziober said, recalling how he phoned his family to tell them about the party. That afternoon, as Mr. Ziober said he was packing up his cubicle, he was called into the human resources office and was “summarily” fired, according to his legal appeal. The reason for his termination, the company said, was that he was not being included in a federal contract that the company was applying for. In a statement, BLB said the decision not to include Mr. Ziober in the contract occurred months before he informed the company that he was being deployed. The statement added that BLB had offered to allow Mr. Ziober to work on the remainder of his existing contract if he returned in time from his deployment. In 2014, after returning from Afghanistan, he sued BLB Resources for violating a federal law, known informally as Userra, that protects the jobs of service members while they are deployed. A California judge ruled that he would have to take his claim to arbitration. Mr. Ziober’s lawyer, Peter has appealed the case, arguing that Userra preserves the rights of service members to go to court. BLB said in a statement that “the company is extremely disappointed about Mr. Ziober’s allegations and denies them wholeheartedly. ” With their appeal, Mr. Ziober has waded into an intense battle playing out across the country. In Washington, a group of bipartisan lawmakers introduced a bill in 2014 that would exempt service members from having to take claims of wrongful auto repossession or improper debt collection to arbitration. An almost identical bill was quashed after intense lobbying by big banks and credit card companies, never making it out of committee. A bill in California that would have prevented companies from requiring employees to sign arbitration clauses suffered a similar fate when Gov. Jerry Brown vetoed it last year. The legislative skirmishes point to just how valuable arbitration has become to companies and just how far they will go to defend it. Despite WeWork’s arbitration requirement, Ms. Zoumer decided to sue the company on her own, hoping she would prevail in overturning the clause. Ms. Zoumer’s lawyer, Ramsey Hanafi, filed her case in December over wrongful termination and unfair labor practices, and Boies, Schiller Flexner, a top corporate defense firm, is representing WeWork. Ms. Zoumer, 31, said she knew she was taking a risk when she challenged WeWork over arbitration. She told the company she needed at least a week to review the policy before deciding whether to sign it. In an email to colleagues, she encouraged them to do the same, citing The Times’s investigation into arbitration. Ms. Berrent said Ms. Zoumer was the only employee who refused to sign other than two employees who had planned to leave the company anyway. Ultimately, no other employees joined Ms. Zoumer’s lawsuit. “Younger people don’t want to pick fights, but we are losing our rights,” Ms. Zoumer said.

October 30, 2016 at 4:49 pm Quite possible that Trump is surfing a much more significant phenomenon, powered by the total penetration by internet, the neural system of the world. to keep insisting that it is just business as usual is like claiming that because no earthquake happened for the last observed 100 days, it will never happen. An aside, regarding the gatekeeping: i am quite certain that the jew has covered the entire gamut from outrageous lying of pam geller through restrained lying of alex jones and veterans today to deep sayanim sites that to this date have never failed to speak nothing but the truth, yet only wait to start their siren call to the ever sly deception. remain vigilant.

Tina Turner's Oldest Son Craig Dies by Suicide at Age 59

“For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive … . ” — 1 Corinthians 15:3 — 8 (ESV). Christians all over the world are celebrating Easter as the Sunday anniversary of Jesus Christ being resurrected from the dead. A week that began with the triumphant entry on Palm Sunday then took a historic turn on Good Friday, when Jesus of Nazareth was publicly executed. After hours of torture and beatings, he was nailed to a cross, which was an agonizing form of death penalty (from which we get the English word “excruciating”). To confirm he had died before removing his body from the cross, a Roman soldier thrust a spear deep into his abdomen, ensuring that there was no chance Jesus was still alive. His followers scattered and hid. Yet beginning a couple days later on Sunday, they began yelling in the streets that Jesus was alive. They claimed to have seen them with their own eyes. They boldly preached that message all over the known world, even as it cost them their lives. It is the most central tenet of the Christian faith. For almost 2, 000 years between then and now, on this day, it is still customary in many parts of the world to hear someone say to a friend, or a stranger, or a room full of people, “He is risen!” To which the customary reply is, “He is risen, indeed!” How can the radical shift of behavior from the disciples of a dead man be explained? What exactly do Christians believe happened on that day in question in A. D. 30, and how does the Bible describe the account? From the Gospel according to Luke: But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared. And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel. And as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, “Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified and on the third day rise. ” And they remembered his words, and returning from the tomb they told all these things to the eleven and to all the rest. Now it was Mary Magdalene and Joanna and Mary the mother of James and the other women with them who told these things to the apostles, but these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them. But Peter rose and ran to the tomb, stooping and looking in, he saw the linen cloths by themselves and he went home marveling at what had happened. That very day two of them were going to a village named Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, and they were talking with each other about all these things that had happened. While they were talking and discussing together, Jesus himself drew near and went with them. But their eyes were kept from recognizing him. And he said to them, “What is this conversation that you are holding with each other as you walk?” And they stood still, looking sad. Then one of them, named Cleopas, answered him, “Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?” And he said to them, “What things?” And they said to him, “Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, a man who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death, and crucified him. But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things happened. Moreover, some women of our company amazed us. They were at the tomb early in the morning, and when they did not find his body, they came back saying that they had even seen a vision of angels, who said that he was alive. Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but him they did not see. And he said to them, “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets had spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?” And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself. So they drew near to the village to which they were going. He acted as if he were going farther, but they urged him strongly, saying, “Stay with us, for it is toward evening and the day is now far spent. ” So he went in to stay with them. When he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed and broke it and gave it to them. And their eyes were opened, and they recognized him. And he vanished from their sight. They said to each other, “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures?” And they rose that same hour and returned to Jerusalem. And they found the eleven and those who were with them gathered together, saying, “The Lord has risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!” Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he was known to them in the breaking of the bread. As they were talking about these things, Jesus himself stood among them, and said to them, “Peace to you!” But they were startled and frightened and thought they saw a spirit. And he said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have. ” And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. And while they still disbelieved for joy and were marveling, he said to them, “Have you anything here to eat?” They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it and ate it before them. Then he said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled. ” Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, and said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. And behold, I am sending the promise of my Father upon you. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high. ” Then he led them out as far as Bethany, and lifting up his hands he blessed them. While he blessed them, he parted from them and was carried into heaven. And they worshiped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy, and were continually in the temple blessing God. — Luke 24:1 — 50 (ESV). Happy Easter! “There in the ground his body lay, light of the world by darkness slain then bursting forth in glorious day, up from the grave he rose again! And as he stands in victory, sin’s curse has lost its grip on me for I am his, and he is mine — bought with the precious blood of Christ. ” — “In Christ Alone” (2001) Ken Klukowski is senior legal editor for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter @kenklukowski.

JUST VOTE TRUMP LETs PUT THE HAG OUT TO PASTURE SHE IS A SELLOUT LIAR!!!

@juneperennial Twitter is everywhere.

Many things will have to work out to end the coronavirus pandemic. Drug companies will have to develop a safe and effective vaccine. Billions of people will have to consent to vaccination.But there are more prosaic challenges, too. Among them: Companies may have to transport tiny glass vials thousands of miles while keeping them as cold as the South Pole in the depths of winter.A number of the leading Covid-19 vaccines under development will need to be kept at temperatures as low as minus 80 degrees Celsius (minus 112 degrees Fahrenheit) from the moment they are bottled to the time they are ready to be injected into patients’ arms.That will not be easy. Vaccines may be manufactured on one continent and shipped to another. They will go from logistics hub to logistics hub before ending up at the hospitals and other facilities that will administer them.While no vaccine has yet been approved by health officials in the United States, preparations for a mass-vaccination campaign are gearing up. The US military and a federal contractor are expected to play a role in coordinating the distribution. But a hodgepodge of companies are scrambling to figure out how to keep hundreds of millions of doses of a vaccine very, very cold.Planes, trucks and warehouses will need to be outfitted with freezers. Glass vials will need to withstand icy climes. Someone will need to make a lot more dry ice.“We’re only now beginning to understand the complexities of the delivery side of all of this,” said J Stephen Morrison, senior vice president at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a research firm. “And there’s no getting around it. These have stark temperature demands that will constrain access and delivery.”President Donald Trump on Friday asserted that hundreds of millions of doses of an unidentified vaccine will be available to all Americans by April. That timeline is more ambitious than what his own advisers have described. Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told a Senate committee Wednesday that a vaccine would not be widely available until the middle of next year.Of the three vaccines that have advanced to Phase 3 trials, two — one made by Moderna and the National Institutes of Health, the other by Pfizer and BioNTech — need to be kept in a near constant deep freeze. (They are made with genetic materials that fall apart when they thaw.) Another leading vaccine candidate, being developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University, must be kept cool but not frozen.McKesson, a major drug distributor, won a major federal contract last month to help distribute a coronavirus vaccine . Much of the work, however, will fall to companies outside the medical and drug industries. The major US logistics companies, including UPS and FedEx, already have networks of freezers that they use to ship perishable food and medical supplies. The companies have experience shipping vaccines for other illnesses, including the seasonal flu.But the Covid-19 vaccination effort is likely to dwarf all previous campaigns.UPS said it was constructing a so-called freezer farm in Louisville, Kentucky, the company’s largest hub, where it can store millions of doses at subzero temperatures.Creating an entire warehouse that could maintain that deep freeze would have been too complex and costly. So instead, rows of upright industrial Stirling Ultracold freezers, each capable of holding 48,000 vials, are being arranged inside a warehouse. There are 70 freezers so far, but the warehouse could fit a few hundred. A similar UPS center is in the works in the Netherlands.“I haven’t seen anything like this before,” said Wes Wheeler, UPS’ head of health care. “Nothing has been quite this global in scale.”At FedEx, the vaccine preparations are being led by Richard W Smith, the son of the company’s founder, Fred W Smith. The younger Smith, who runs the company’s airline operations in the Americas, was in charge of the life sciences business for FedEx’s airline operations in 2009, during the H1N1 pandemic. At the time, the US government asked FedEx to prepare to help transport vaccines, Smith said, and the company doubled its number of freezers around the globe.“Fortunately, H1N1 did not rise to the level of the pandemic we thought it could be,” he said. “But that allowed us to really beef up our cold-chain infrastructure.”In the years after that scare, FedEx expanded its supply of freezers and worked with the Federal Aviation Administration to win approval for its planes to carry more dry ice. (When dry ice melts, it emits carbon dioxide, making the air on planes potentially unsafe for pilots and crew.)Now FedEx is adding freezers that can maintain temperatures as low as minus 80 Celsius in cities including Memphis, Tennessee; Indianapolis and Paris. It is installing additional refrigerated trailers in Oakland, California; Dallas and Los Angeles, which could be used for vaccines that need to be served chilled, not frozen.“The demand for this is huge,” Smith said. “We know it’s going to be a very substantial market.” Analysts at Citi agreed, saying the business of transporting vaccines is likely to be profitable in a recent note suggesting that FedEx stock was a good investment.As if the challenges weren’t sufficiently daunting, the world is facing a looming shortage of dry ice — an unexpected side effect of the pandemic.Dry ice, the stuff that exudes chilly smoke and enthralls school-age scientists, is made from carbon dioxide, which is most commonly created as a byproduct during the production of ethanol.But ethanol production ebbs and flows based on the demand for gasoline. This spring, as stay-at-home orders went into effect, people began driving less. As a result, ethanol production slumped, and so did the supply of carbon dioxide.In April, Richard Gottwald, chief executive of the Compressed Gas Association, sent a letter to Vice President Mike Pence warning of “a significant risk of a shortage in carbon dioxide.”Five months later, “the ethanol industry still has not bounced back,” Gottwald said in an interview. “We are seeing a shortage.” And that is making dry ice hard to come by.For much of the summer, Marc Savenor, owner of Acme Dry Ice in Cambridge, Massachusetts, which supplies medical companies, has been running low on carbon dioxide. Supply was the tightest he had seen in his 42 years of business, forcing Savenor to ration his dry ice.“It was like a McDonald’s with no hamburgers,” he said, adding that carbon dioxide seemed to more plentiful in recent weeks.UPS and FedEx are taking matters into their own hands. FedEx already has machines in warehouses that can produce dry ice, and UPS said it was considering adding them.The companies will also have to provide their delivery employees with special training and equipment like gloves to handle their icy wares.Pfizer has designed a special box to transport its hoped-for vaccine. The boxes, roughly the size of a large cooler, will hold a couple of hundred glass vials, each containing 10 to 20 doses of vaccine. The boxes are equipped with GPS-enabled thermal sensors, allowing Pfizer to know where the boxes are and how cold they are. (If they get too warm, workers can add dry ice.)All of this leads to another problem: Glass often cracks in extreme cold.Early this year, Corning, a 169-year-old glassmaker in upstate New York, approached officials at the Department of Health and Human Services with a warning: There wouldn’t be enough cold-resistant glass vials to handle a frozen vaccine, said Brendan Mosher, Corning’s head of pharmaceutical technologies.Corning pitched a solution. It could make millions of vials with a new type of pharmaceutical-grade glass that can withstand the lowest temperatures. In June, the government awarded the company a $204 million contract to increase its production of the special vials. The new glass is made without boron, a common ingredient in conventional glass that can lead to contamination of whatever is in the vials.Mosher said Corning was using the federal money to quadruple the capacity at its plant in Big Flats, New York; to accelerate construction of a glass furnace in New Jersey; and to speed up construction of an additional plant in North Carolina. Corning is hiring 300 workers and says it is on track to start producing hundreds of millions of glass vials next year.Even if there is enough dry ice and chilled warehouses and sturdy vials, everyday pharmacies are unlikely to be equipped to stockpile large quantities of vaccines that require ultracold storage. Nevertheless, they might be able to keep Pfizer’s cooler-size boxes on hand, and Moderna’s vaccine can be stored at less extreme temperatures in the days before it is administered.In a presentation to the White House coronavirus task force last month, Kathleen Dooling, a disease expert with the CDC, said strict temperature requirements “will make it very difficult for community clinics and local pharmacies to store and administer.” She said the vaccine would have to be dispensed “at centralized sites with adequate equipment and high throughput.” It’s not clear where those sites will be or who will administer the vaccines.That is just in the United States. A vaccine requiring stringent temperature controls would be off limits for much of the developing world. A recent study by DHL and McKinsey found that a cold vaccine would be accessible to about 2.5 billion people in 25 countries. Large parts of Africa, South America and Asia, where super-cold freezers are sparse, would be left out.“The consequence is to reinforce the staggering bias in favor of the wealthy and powerful few countries,” said Morrison, of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

This article is part of a series aimed at helping you navigate life’s opportunities and challenges. What else should we write about? Contact us: smarterliving@nytimes. com. When you woke up this morning, what did you do first? Did you hop in the shower, check your email or grab a doughnut? What did you say to your roommates on the way out the door? Salad or hamburger for lunch? When you got home, did you put on your sneakers and go for a run, or eat dinner in front of the television? Most of the choices we make each day may feel like the products of decision making, but they’re not. They’re habits. And though each habit means relatively little on its own, over time, the meals we eat, how we spend our evenings, and how often we exercise have enormous impacts. This is particularly true in our 20s, when so many of our habits are still up for grabs. The patterns you establish right now will impact your health, productivity, financial security and happiness for decades. How much money you make, how much time you spend with your friends and family, how well your body functions years from now — all of these, in many ways, are products of the habits you are building today. (Related: The 8 health habits experts say you need in your 20s) And in the last decade, our understanding of the neurology of habit formation has been transformed. We’ve learned how habits form — and why they are so hard to break. We now know how to create good habits and change bad ones like never before. At the core of every habit is a neurological loop with three parts: A cue, a routine and a reward. To understand how to create habits — such as exercise habits — you must learn to establish the right cues and rewards. In 2002, researchers at New Mexico State University studied 266 individuals, most of whom worked out at least three times a week. They found that many of them had started running or lifting weights almost on a whim, or because they suddenly had free time or wanted to deal with unexpected stresses in their lives. However, the reason they continued exercising — why it became a habit — was because of a specific cue and a specific reward. If you want to start running each morning, it’s essential that you choose a simple cue (like always lacing up your sneakers before breakfast or always going for a run at the same time of day) and a clear reward (like a sense of accomplishment from recording your miles, or the endorphin rush you get from a jog). But countless studies have shown that, at first, the rewards inherent in exercise aren’t enough. So to teach your brain to associate exercise with a reward, you need to give yourself something you really enjoy — like a small piece of chocolate — after your workout. This is counterintuitive, because most people start exercising to lose weight. But the goal here is to train your brain to associate a certain cue (“It’s 5 o’clock”) with a routine (“Three miles down! ”) and a reward (“Chocolate! ”). Eventually, your brain will start expecting the reward inherent in exercise (“It’s 5 o’clock. Three miles down! Endorphin rush! ”) and you won’t need the chocolate anymore. In fact, you won’t even want it. But until your neurology learns to enjoy those endorphins and the other rewards inherent in exercise, you need to the process. And then, over time, it will become automatic to lace up your jogging shoes each morning. You won’t want the chocolate anymore. You’ll just crave the endorphins. The cue, in addition to triggering a routine, will start triggering a craving for the inherent rewards to come. Want more? You might also like: • The scientific workout • No time to workout? Try exercising on the job • How to pick a health insurance plan

Daily Show host Trevor Noah got brutal with Ted Cruz over his appalling response to the bombings of EU capital Brussels this week, an attack in which dozens (including Americans) lost their lives.The Republican presidential hopeful, currently coming second in the race to Donald trump, launched an all-out attack on President Obama in the wake of the attacks. First, Cruz railed against Obama for not flying immediately to Brussels when not even European leaders responded this way. Secondly, Cruz issued a hysterical demand for police to patrol and secure Muslim-American neighborhoods, effectively placing Muslim citizens in a police state.The idea drew a swift and sharp response from President Obama, who reminded the Texas senator:As far as the notion of having surveillance of neighborhoods where Muslims are present, I just left a country that engages in that kind of neighborhood surveillance. Which, by the way, the father of Senator Cruz escaped for America, the land of the free. The notion that we would start down that slippery slope makes absolutely no sense.The President was backed up by furious comments from NYPD commissioner Bill Bratton, who saw the consequences when his police force implemented similar tactics in the past. He said: He doesn t know what the hell he is talking about To be frank with you, while he s running around here, he probably has some Muslim officers guarding him. Now Trevor Noah has piled in with a brutal dropkick of Ted Cruz over the matter, which begins: First of all, you re a sanctimonious jackass, Second of all, President Obama doesn t need to go to Belgium for them to know that he s an ally. It s not like all the European presidents went to Belgium after the attacks and they re within driving distance. Then Noah turns to the President s comments that we cannot let terrorists achieve their core aim which is to sow terror in us, saying: It s very important for us to not respond with fear. Then, turning to Cruz s attempt to do exactly that, by in turn terrorizing the American Muslim community in response, Noah says: Unfortunately, there are always those who use these times to score political points, Adding, Terrorists win when we allow them to disrupt our way of life. While Cruz may persuade the right-wing of his party that persecuting American Muslims for the actions of a handful of Muslims in Belgium is a good idea. But he will not win that argument with the wider country and that s why this dropkick is so brutal, because it s true.Featured Image via Screengrab

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - EU ambassadors have reached an initial agreement to impose more economic sanctions on North Korea, going beyond the latest round of UN measures, officials and diplomats said on Thursday. “Today the PSC (EU member states’ ambassadors) agreed on a package of new autonomous measures,” an EU official said. An EU diplomat said around eight new North Korean officials were likely to be added to the EU sanctions list. The decision is likely to be adopted by EU foreign ministers at their next regular meeting on Oct. 16.

The NRA has a new ad out that features Navy Seal Dom Raso speaking about the sacrifices of our military and why he stands for our anthem: I stand for my brothers who can t stand anymore Dom RasoRaso discusses the new commercial with Stuart Varney. The former Navy Seal comments on why he thinks Americans are so p*ssed off about kneeling during the anthem. He says people need to remember the foundation that all of this has been built on.Varney says he thinks the NFL is the big loser in all of this. Raso reiterates that it s the foundation of America and how we should look around and see how far we ve come. Everybody s paying attention It s the timing We couldn t agree more with Raso. Do your protest on your own time. We also believe Raso is correct in assuming some of these players just don t have a clue.This is our favorite sign from last night s game and expresses exactly what Raso is talking about when he says it s the timing . Do your protest on your own time play football!

@idvck @exlabourite but IMO nobody should be using that word if they don't want certain ppl using it.

In our iconoclastic efforts to erase the past, we rob ourselves of knowing the men who forged our national identity, and the events that made us who we are. Jarrett StepmanCrane is here at #Tubman (Wyman) dell park to remove the #JacksonandLee monument pic.twitter.com/rU8hqVYAcB Baltimore BLOC (@BmoreBloc) August 16, 2017ONE MORE CITY CAVES TO THE ALT LEFT UPDATE FROM BALTIMORE: ALL 4 CONFEDERATE STATUES WERE REMOVED LAST NIGHT! The big question coming out of all of this cleansing of our history is how can a city council just vote to remove our history? How is it that they get to decide this?MOB RULE HAS TAKEN OVER NOW THEY COME FOR THE POLICE? Now that we ve got rid of these white supremacist symbols, it s time to get rid of these white supremacist systems Now that we ve got rid of these white supremacist symbols, it s time to get rid of these white supremacist systems pic.twitter.com/z8X247xwqg Baltimore BLOC (@BmoreBloc) August 16, 2017The lost city of Baltimore has already removed at least four Confederate statues! They voted to remove 4 and quietly removed them all early Wednesday. After the Charlottesville riot, cities can t get these monuments down fast enough. Wouldn t want to take a stand, would they?HURRY! REMOVE OUR HISTORY BEFORE WE RE A TARGET OF THE ALT-LEFT AND BLMThe Baltimore City Council voted unanimously (COWARDS!) Monday to remove four Confederate monuments immediately. The council recommended the Maryland Historical Trust give permission for the removals.KENTUCKY AND BOSTON MOMENTUM GROWSStatues in Lexington, Kentucky, are expected to be removed, while in Durham, North Carolina, a woman was arrested in the toppling of a Confederate statue during a protest Monday. In New Orleans, the final Confederate statue in the city came down in May. The memorials removed in Baltimore were the Roger B. Taney Monument and the Robert E. Lee and Thomas. J. Jackson Monument.Mayor Catherine Pugh told the station that some of the monuments will be sent to Confederate cemeteries.SHAME ON THIS MAYOR!

In 1993 the Republicans embraced a health platform that proudly features an individual mandate as its main component.

The Donbas republics are free and independent. They are free to decide and choose their own political direction.

And we wonder why violence like today s shooting happened The left started with the violence during the 2016 and continued to escalate it once they lost. We have key Democrats calling for violent resistance in the streets Sick!Can anyone imagine a sitting Republican Senator calling for violence or fighting in the streets in opposition to a newly elected Democratic President? Speaking of p*ssies On Tuesday Democratic Senator Time Kaine told the Morning Joe in an interview that Democrats need to fight the Trump administration including online and on the streets in addition to the at the ballot box.Partial Transcript:MIKA BRZEZINSKI, CO-HOST MORNING JOE : So, broad question about the future of the Democratic Party, especially given your firsthand experience with what we ve all been through. There s so much going on here that we clearly see, you know, places where you we can criticize what the administration is doing, but how does the party rebuild? How do you prevent overreach in a situation like this? How do you prevent a continuation of the bubble in a situation like this, and how does the party reclaim its reach across the country while fighting these battles? SEN. TIM KAINE (D-VA): So, the way we get outside the bubble is we take advantage of this tremendous public outcry against the administration. What we ve got to do is fight in Congress, fight in the courts, fight in the streets, fight online, fight at the ballot box, and now there s the momentum to be able to do this. And we re not afraid of the popular outcry, we re energized by it and that s going to help us do our job and do it better. -GPListen to faux man Tim Kaine call for fighting on the streets here. Pay special attention to his comment about the Women s March that was organized under a grassroots label.' It sounds like Kaine s admitting that it was organized under a grassroots label but that it wasn t really grassroots at all. Why didn t he just come out and admit that it was organized by Soros, Obama and Planned Parenthood?Obama s former AG Loretta Lynch released a video that s a call to action for Democrats. These people who have been stripped of power after being so close to achieving their goals of fundamentally transforming America into something most Americans wouldn t recognize, are serious about starting a civil war in our nation. If you don t believe me, listen to the words of Obama s former AG, who compares the fight against President Trump and his supporters to that of the Civil War: I know that this is a time of great fear and uncertainty for so many people. I know it s a time of concern for people, who see our rights being assailed, being trampled on and even being rolled back. I know that this is difficult, but I remind you that this has never been easy. We have always had to work to move this country forward to achieve the great ideals of our Founding Fathers. (Lynch s statement about the Founding Fathers is quite ironic, considering that she worked hand-in-hand with former President Barack Obama to destroy the very fabric of our Constitution.) It has been people, individuals who have banded together, ordinary people who simply saw what needed to be done and came together and supported those ideals who have made the difference. They ve marched, they ve bled and yes, some of them died. This is hard. Every good thing is. We have done this before. We can do this again. We could also add the DNC s California Chair: In a sign of the vigor of the party s distaste for the president, outgoing party Chair John Burton, a longtime Democratic lawmaker and powerbroker known for his blunt and profane manner, extended two middle fingers in the air as the crowd cheered and joined him. F Donald Trump, he said:Outgoing @ca_dem chair @Johnburton gets standing O w final words to his party, finger upraised: F@ck Donald Trump! pic.twitter.com/VIqNQlhDJc Carla Marinucci (@cmarinucci) May 20, 2017And we thought Tom Perez was bad: Tom Perez must not have taken the class about winning friends and influencing people. How can you win over voters with such bitterness and anger? The Democrat Party has sunk to a new low with this classless thug. Who goes out there and speaks like this? We reported (see below) on the last speech Perez gave and he said the same nasty things. What gives? Are the deems so desperate that they re now resorting to profanity-filled speeches that make false claims about Republicans and President Trump? We think it s a losing strategy!

2375 Views November 18, 2016 8 Comments Guest Posts The Saker by Larchmonter445 Everyone in the Deep State is threatened by the Trump Presidency. The Deep State understands that power, funding, ideological stratagems and domination of government, media, academia, think tanks and NGOs are in the ‘field of fight’, to use the book title by a prime target the Deep State intends to destroy in order to save itself from Trump. Lt. General (ret.) Michael T. Flynn Lt. General (ret.) Michael T. Flynn, three-star expert in Military Intelligence, former director of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), counselor to Trump for the last fifteen months, is a vital Trump ally the Deep State is attempting to discredit. We have seen the one-week ferocious political and media attack on Stephen Bannon, begun the instant that Bannon was named Trump’s number one strategist-advisor. Bannon is the theologian of Drain the Swamp, the Trump policy to rid the system of corruption and catastrophically disastrous policies and bureaucrat enablers. To understand Steve Bannon, take the time to read this transcription or listen to the audio Q&A from a 2014 event in the Vatican. He lays out his philosophical agenda, and used the 2016 campaign to advance his war on the Elites. Drain the Swamp pertains to more than getting the corruption out of the system. Steve Bannon Bannon now has Trump’s full backing to destroy the UniParty, defeat the Globalists, banish the warmongers of the MIC and help the legal prosecution of the corrupt. This is the Revolution to end the domestic Tyranny and the global Hegemon. The usual weapons of personal destruction have been launched at Bannon to destroy him and to deprive Trump of his most effective counselor and field marshall. Bannon has been branded a racist, an anti-semite, a white supremacist, an Islamophobe and a misogynist. In every forum and media outlet, the meme of Bannon being the worst human on the planet played as intensively as how the Dems attacked Trump during the campaign. Relentless lies, chorused by every host, talking head, and hater of every value Trump and Bannon had campaigned for were spewed on Bannon’s name. All fabricated, most based on a few headlines written by Milo Yiannopoulos in Breitbart.com, alt right agitprop pieces constructed to collect reader clicks, revenues for Breitbart and fame for Milo. Bannon as chief of Breitbart was then scourged for those headlines. Mockery by Milo used against Steve Bannon. It was all the Media needed. But the Deep State directed it for good reason. Bannon is the Pale Rider coming to destroy them. Steve Bannon is dedicated to cleansing government and the financial system controlled by all those who have reigned over the foreign regime changes, the transfer of middle class wealth and income to Wall Street, paper wealth from derivatives to hedge fund and corporate global leaders, trillions to the 0.01% elites, all of whom populate the Ultra Wealthy Class, a new feudalism of billionaires and millionaires. Bannon’s life long credentials and work with Jews, Blacks, females and Muslims eventually helped stifle the Media excesses. But the vicious branding may stick long after the inauguration. The fear and loathing of the Deep State is focused on another nemesis and threat in the person of General Flynn. Flynn challenges the Deep State’s incompetence, particularly its lack of results in the fight against terrorism. Flynn dealt with this in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. He wrote a white paper on the state of US military Intelligence and the need to fix it. Flynn also is sickened with the 2012 Benghazi event and coverup, the lies of Clinton and the abandonment by the command structure of CIA, Pentagon, State and NSC. The Syrian war, the attempted coup of Erdogan, and the carnage wrought by bad policies, sheepish leadership and less-than-best methods of Intelligence gathering and usage motivated the General to join Trump. Flynn is now Trump’s guide into the Presidential raw data Intel reports and briefings. General Flynn is Trump’s personal analyst for interpretation of the data. Flynn has attended every briefing Trump has received. He is in place and the Deep State is out. So, they have mounted their counter-attack as soon as it was clear he would head the reform of the Intelligence community, and serve the newly elected President. Flynn has recruited over two hundred generals and admirals and twenty-two Medal of Honor recipients to the successful Trump campaign. Now some of the generals are possible cabinet or undersecretary department nominees or agency appointees. The Deep State is in deep trouble. General Flynn will probably be NSC head and I think he will have real power over fifteen other Intelligence agencies. Flynn may have great power over huge swaths of the MIC. He certainly will assist in the cleaning out of neocons and feckless employees, managers, supervisors and directors. Against Flynn, the Deep State is using a more traditional model of career attack and personal destruction than it did with Bannon. Multiple articles written to show that Flynn and Putin , Flynn and Russia, Flynn and RT media are part of the Trump gang of pro-Russian contacts connected to the Kremlin . Below is General Flynn at dinner with President Putin in Moscow. He explains in an interview . Other Trump-Putin supposed contacts are Carter Page and Paul Manafort, both of whom were attacked by the Media for the Deep State months ago. They resigned under political pressure applied through the media. In a payback, the Deep State lost some of their own sent to the Trump campaign who were unable to survive first inspection. They were dropped from the Trump campaign transition team. But, once Trump is sworn in, Carter Page will be back, most likely. He has connections to Gazprom, is well-liked in Moscow, and will be a link for American energy companies and perhaps some joint ventures in the gas field development and pipeline industry. Several friends of Trump are from the gas and oil industry, and the world is a small world when energy is the issue. The Arctic, the eastern Mediterranean, the South China Sea and other large development zones have enormous new fields to be tapped and exploited. Even the Black Sea zone around Crimea has yet-to-be-tapped energy stores. The primary interest of the Trump foreign policy will be to make America wealthy again. The Eurasian development has already attracted Trump to the OBOR of China and the AIIB infrastructure bank. Probably the entire New Silk Road of China and EAEU of Russia is not going to be without major US participation. The difference now is facilitation, participation, investment and benefits instead of obstruction, destabilization and terrorism used to thwart it all. To destroy Flynn and weaken Trump with the Intelligence and Military communities, the classic Washington technique of long articles with many negative anonymous sourced comments was used, carefully crafted headlines and paragraph headers, all designed for very negative Google Search feeds. The latest is about Flynn and Turkish “operatives” . Sounds like they met in dark alleys or underground passageways. Maybe in some Ankara safehouse, eh? It turns out quite differently. Hilal Mutlu (left) and Ibrahim Kurtulus (center) with Retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn at Oct. 10, 2016 event. (Youtube screen grab) But Flynn is obviously being watched closely by CIA/State Dept. They know he is doing the bidding of Trump. And for good reason, Trump needs to know which way Turkey is leaning post-coup? And how sensitive is the Kurd issue in Syria? What are the ramifications of the US and Russia working in tandem against ISIS in Syria? Will Turkey help with safe zones for refugees? Will Turkey leave Syria after the war or does it plan to resist Russia and Assad? What about NATO? What about the Uyghurs Turkey protects, and is China being forced to come with military to put down the Uyghurs inside ISIS? Will the issue of demanding Fethullah Gulen’s extradition continue? Will there be mass death penalties for the imprisoned coup participants and Gulen’s followers? Flynn had a panoply of possible questions to be answered by the operatives from Erdogan. And the Turks would have questions they wanted answered with some hint of Trump’s positions. The Deep State are tracking Flynn and the Turks and are now exposing his links as a professional consultant. Nothing illegal. Nothing suspicious. Nothing out of the ordinary. But it was General Flynn, Trump’s guy. Smear him. How else would this information surface in the Washington Post except from the Deep State? And if you know the history of the Deep State, the WaPo is their first choice for all leaks, briefings in depth, exposes used to undermine officials who cross them or who point to the Deep States’ misdeeds or failures. You won’t find Sy Hersh’s articles in WaPo. The point of the articles about General Flynn was to shame him, to put down his personality, his lack of obedience to the Obama regime. He was investigated for giving Intel to foreign nations, we are told. He shared Intelligence with the Pakistanis, we are told. Read how his fellow generals talk about him . Imagine if the Deep State decided that Intelligence should never be shared. Well, the U.S. would have no allies. No nation joins a war effort without Intelligence for their military. Flynn, whose entire thirty-plus year career has been in Intelligence understands that. And he did it. Proudly, he related to the investigators, and it all was dropped except the record and the reporting of it now. The investigation was actually to cast a black mark on Flynn to be found later, by the uninformed, at the most sensitive of times. In this case, it is to weaken Flynn, to weaken Trump. “Mike Flynn shares Intel. Mike Flynn acts without checking with what the Deep State wants.” It turns out that Flynn did get approval for all he did. But he simply did the professional thing. He acted in behalf of his specialty, his profession, his oath of duty and the American people who paid him to protect America. There is something to be gained by studying this meeting with Turkey’s operatives. Flynn’s meeting signals that Trump will not likely arm the Kurds with heavy weapons. That would drive Turkey into the Russian-Iranian embrace fully. A practical solution to defeating ISIS and AQ and ending the Syrian war has to avoid losing Turkey. Trump is not going to be trying to coup anyone. His policy is no regime changes. He also does not like these secret wars of the CIA. If there is to be war, he wants it fought by the military, with a plan for victory. Principally, Trump’s wars will be like President Eisenhower’s. There were none for eight years. The warmongers and neocons of the Deep State and surface government will try to work over all the Trump nominees in the security and policy arena. Trump has refused to listen to any of them, though a few have been invited in to the goings on. However, we don’t know who is talking to Trump and who is talking to the various panels of experts that will advise who they think he should select. So a few neocons and warmongers like John Bolton and General Keane have made it into Trump Tower. But he eschewed them all these years and throughout the campaign. I doubt they will have any role in policy. He considers them failures. Expect very deep shakeouts at CIA and State. I think Flynn will use fellow military he knows and trusts as deputies and undersecretaries. General Keith Kellogg and General Ronald Burgess are likely for important positions. There has to be this cleaning out of the subterranean world of the Deep State. If President Carter got rid of 800 officers when Stansfield Turner tried cleaning out the CIA, I’m betting there are 1500 officers in the CIA who need retirement now. As for the State Department and the Clinton corruption of pay for play, that is only half the problem. The eighty years of Khazarian dominance of the State Department has created the need that whole thing ought to be shut down except for visas at embassies and consulates. (I’d use the Commerce Department in the interim. Send everyone else from State home. Board up Foggy Bottom for ten years.) Addendum: General Flynn early in the primary campaign consulted as advisor to five candidates. Carly Fiorina, Scott Walker, Ben Carson, Ted Cruz, and Donald Trump. He chose Trump as the one who wanted to be President in order to fix the country and make America great again. Now, Trump, Bannon and Flynn are going to drain the swamp, if they can survive. (Flynn has been named NSC Advisor and will command a staff of 400 from all the other Intel agencies, it has been reported by Fox and AP.) Larchmonter445

The world is coming to an end, and they’re all singing “Jingle Bells. ” That may not be your idea of a great musical selection for Armageddon. But as performed by a ragtag chorus of displaced persons in Theater for a New Audience’s spirited revival of Thornton Wilder’s “The Skin of Our Teeth,” the choice of song feels fitting, resourceful, valiant and — for just those reasons — very moving. The scene comes near the end of the first act of this wobbly mammoth of a play, which opened on Tuesday night at the Polonsky Shakespeare Center in Brooklyn. And as often happens in the director Arin Arbus’s heartfelt interpretation of Wilder’s 1942 cosmic comedy, the sequence’s elements register as both exceedingly whimsical and disturbingly familiar. What’s being portrayed, after all, is an earth succumbing to climate change, which means that although it is high summer, a glacier is advancing on Excelsior, N. J. where a home has become a haven for a swarm of refugees, whose admittance was a subject of angry argument among the family that lives there. And what may be the last fire on the planet is about to go out. It is hardly a cause for celebration that the alarm bells being rung here sound as resonant today as they must have in the early 1940s, when the United States was on the brink of world war. Yet a celebratory glow pervades this portrait of a single family’s survival against the odds through freeze, famine and war. “The Skin of Our Teeth” can be quaint, creaky and tedious. But it feels as perversely suitable to 2017 as “Jingle Bells” does to the Ice Age. When the play first opened, with a dazzling cast led by Fredric March and Tallulah Bankhead, Brooks Atkinson wrote in The New York Times that it stood “head and shoulders above the monotonous plane of our moribund theater. ” Atkinson particularly admired Wilder’s “mischievous ideas about the informality of good theater. ” But while he adored the first third of “Skin,” he was less enamored of the two other acts. He wasn’t wrong. That first act, which places a American family on the edge of extinction in the Ice Age, still feels as fresh as morning and as old as Moses (who happens to appear in it). But as it continues to follow the allegorical Antrobus clan in its struggle for survival (through a flood on the boardwalks of Atlantic City and a world war) “Skin” can wear thin. Recent revivals — including a misguided whopper in Central Park in 1998, starring John Goodman — have suggested that the play had gone the way of its singing dinosaurs. Wilder’s starker “Our Town” and robust “The Matchmaker” (the basis for the musical “Hello, Dolly! ”) seemed far more likely candidates for survival. Ms. Arbus — whose fruitful association with Theater for a New Audience has yielded a bright string of cleareyed productions of classics — doesn’t entirely restore “Skin” to newborn sprightliness. But she makes you appreciate why its first audiences cherished it. Her production does particularly well by Wilder’s inspired notion to have the improvisatory spirit of “theater, interrupted” reflect the persistence of life itself. From its first moments (and it’s all in the script) the production is troubled by falling scenery, electrical blackouts and a temperamental actress who refuses to stay in character. That’s the woman who plays Sabina, the Antrobus’s mantrap of a maid, embodied with original comic flair by Mary Wiseman, who brings to mind not so much Ms. Bankhead (who created the part) as a young Lucille Ball with an attitude. It is Sabina who guides us — irascibly and apologetically — through the willful anachronisms of the play. Its central archetypal clan is made up of Mr. and Mrs. Antrobus (David Rasche and Kecia Lewis) and their children Gladys (Kimber Monroe) and Henry (Reynaldo Piniella) who was originally named Cain. Mr. Antrobus is an inventor of genius (his contributions include the wheel, the lever and the alphabet) while his wife is a fierce defender of family. As for Sabina, she’s basically Lilith, the eternal temptress, there to lead good men like Mr. Antrobus astray. In its sexual politics (and its Oedipal confrontations) “Skin” can feel agonizingly dated. And despite solid performances by Mr. Rasche and Ms. Lewis, the configuring of this eternal triangle occupies entirely too much stage time. It’s as a production that this “Skin” captures, tickles and distresses the imagination. Ms. Arbus has enlisted a crackerjack production team — including Riccardo Hernandez (sets) and Cait O’Connor (the commedia dell’ costumes and puppets) — and a diverse cast of nearly three dozen (including a fierce Mary Lou Rosato as a boardwalk soothsayer) to fill Wilder’s canvas. The production deploys them with wit and efficiency, while retaining an endearing air of ramshackle spontaneity. The script has updated its anachronisms (Trader Joe’s instead of A P) and features some stirring contemporary songs by César Alvarez about the search for home. “So many years I have been dreaming, dreaming, dreaming of a place to call my own,” the refugees sing, toward the first act’s end. By that point, it’s looking as if they may all freeze to death. So when Ms. Wiseman steps out of character to ask the audience to bring its chairs to the stage to stoke the fire, there’s no question that were we able to oblige, we would. At such moments, “Skin” becomes a welcome pep rally for a world that could use some reassurance that it will, despite everything, carry on.

Met Gala: Kylie Jenner has a Band-Aid mark on her arm

The head of Coordinated Emergences, Fernando Simon, has said that is better to get coronavirus now, because later there will be no space in hospitals.

Indonesia s Mount Agung volcano in Bali has let out a puff of black smoke and ash in a small eruption, prompting Singapore to advise its citizens to be ready to evacuate the holiday island at short notice amid concern about a bigger eruption. Authorities have not changed the alert status on Agung, which remains at one level below the highest and there have been no reports of flight cancellations. Singaporeans should defer non-essential travel to the affected areas of the island at this juncture, Singapore s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a travel notice on Wednesday. You should also be ready to evacuate at short notice. Eruptions could result in ash clouds that could severely disrupt air travel , it said. Agung looms menacingly over eastern Bali at a height of just over 3,000 meters (9,842 feet). It last erupted in 1963, killing more than 1,000 people and razing several villages. Indonesia has nearly 130 volcanoes, more than any other country. Many of them show high levels of activity but it can be months before an eruption. A spokesman for Indonesia s National Disaster Mitigation agency, said via a text message that there had been a phreatic eruption late on Tuesday with black smoke reaching 700 meters (2,300 ft), followed by falling ash, gravel and sand. These types of eruptions called phreatic are the product of rock that already exists being shattered violently when water heated by the rising magma under Agung quickly turns to steam, according to a blog post on the Discovermagazine.com website. The disaster agency recommended against any activity within 6-7.5 km (3.7-4.6 miles) of the crater. It said that 29,245 people were staying in 278 evacuation camps. At one stage, after authorities put Agung s alert status at the highest level of four in September, more than 130,000 people left their homes. The alert level was lowered to three on Oct. 29. Australia left its travel advice unchanged and told citizens to monitor local media reports, follow the instructions of local authorities, and stay outside the existing exclusion zone . Bali, famous for its surf, beaches and temples, attracted nearly 5 million visitors last year, but business has slumped in areas around the volcano since September when Agung s volcanic tremors began to increase. Tourism, a cornerstone of Bali s economy, is Indonesia s fourth-biggest earner of foreign currency after natural resources like coal and palm oil.

40 overs of action and we still do not have a winner. The match is heading to the Super Over. Both sides had the game in their hands at one point or the other but none have been able to latch onto it and the game is heading to the Super Over. It was Marcus Stoinis with the bat in the final over and he has managed to do the unthinkable with the ball and has dragged the game into Super Over.

Kim Kardashian West KKW Body Perfume, Reviewed

They were probably just looking for a safe space to study Protesters at Dartmouth University disrupted students studying in the library, reportedly directing profanity towards white students and physically pushing others.In a critical editorial, the conservative Dartmouth Review listed some of the epithets hurled by the protesters: Fuck you, you filthy white fucks! F*ck you and your comfort! F*ck you, you racist shits! In addition, the Review reports that some of protesters became physically violent: Men and women alike were pushed and shoved by the group. If we can t have it, shut it down! they cried. Another woman was pinned to a wall by protesters who unleashed their insults, shouting filthy white bitch! in her face. Campus Reform managed to obtain video showing the protesters walking through the library shouting as others try to study. One of the protesters can be seen flipping off the cameraman. Another gets in the face of those who are studying demanding they say that black lives matter.One of the protesters posted online, saying they were ashamed of what the protest turned into. After making a girl cry, a protester screamed Fuck your white tears, he reports. I was startled by the aggression from a small minority of students towards students in the library, many of whom were supporters of the movement. Watch above, via Campus Reform. Via: Mediaite

At least two police officers turned in their badges today after acknowledging that attacking peaceful protesters is not what they signed up for. Via TrueActivist It should be evident if you’re following news concerning the Standing Rock protests in North Dakota that tension continues to escalate between protesters supporting the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and riot police. The big deal? A four-state Dakota Access Pipeline which threatens to uproot sacred burial ground, poison the Missouri river, and make null an 1881 treaty ensuring the property belongs to the Standing Rock Sioux tribe. In addition to being maced and beaten with batons, activists have been tased and even shot with rubber bullets. Despite the violence taking place, tribal leaders continue to ask all “water protectors” to maintain peaceful relations and rely on prayer as the only weapon used to halt construction of the DAPL. After watching videos of the mass arrests and beating that have taken place, many have asked how those employed by the State can continue to terrorize weaponless protesters. Surely, some form of cognitive dissonance must be taking place? For some, most likely, and that’s undoubtedly what inspired at least two officers to turn in their badges today. According to an activist named Redhawk, there have been reports of at least two officers turning in their badges after acknowledging that the battle against the American people is not what they signed up for. On Facebook, the activist wrote: “You can see it in some of them, that they do not support the police actions. We must keep reminding them they are welcome to put down their weapons and badge and take a stand against this pipeline as well. Some are waking up.” The comments on the ordeal have been quite positive. Charlotte Holywater Vincent wrote, “Brave to stand up for what is right ! To hand over years of training and service in a little metal badge and then stand on the side of humanity.” Ron Hemming, who reportedly is a retired deputy in Washington, shared his thoughts: “As a retired deputy in Washington state, I would have refused to go on a detail such as this. As I am also part native blood, I stand with my relatives on the front line protecting the water from the black snake. Be safe, stay strong.”

WASHINGTON/BEIJING (Reuters) - President Donald Trump warned on Wednesday that the United States would no longer tolerate North Korea s actions but said the use of military force against Pyongyang will not be his first choice. His comment appeared to be in line with classified briefings to Congress in which Trump s top national security aides - Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Dan Coats, the director of national intelligence - stressed the search for a diplomatic solution to the crisis, lawmakers said. A senior administration official, meanwhile, said that the White House has set aside for now consideration of exiting a free trade pact with South Korea, a move being contemplated by Trump that could have complicated relations with Seoul. In a flurry of phone calls with world leaders days after North Korea s sixth and most powerful nuclear test, Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping committed to take further action with the goal of achieving the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula, the White House said. President Xi would like to do something. We ll see whether or not he can do it. But we will not be putting up with what s happening in North Korea, Trump told reporters, though he offered no specifics. I believe that President Xi agrees with me 100 percent, he added. Asked whether he was considering a military response to North Korea, Trump said: Certainly, that s not our first choice, but we will see what happens. Xi, who has been under pressure from Trump to do more to help curb North Korea s nuclear and missile programs, told the U.S. president during their 45-minute call that the North Korean issue must be resolved through dialogue and consultation. The focus on negotiations by China, North Korea s main trading partner, contrasted with Trump s assertions over the last few days that now was not the time for talks with North Korea while pressing instead for increased international pressure on Pyongyang. The United States and South Korea have asked the United Nations to consider tough new sanctions on North Korea after its nuclear test on Sunday that Pyongyang said was an advanced hydrogen bomb. Late on Wednesday, U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin indicated that if the U.N. Security Council fails to approve sufficiently strong measures, Trump could authorize him to impose sanctions on any country or entity that trades with North Korea. We believe that we need to economically cut off North Korea, Mnuchin told reporters aboard Air Force One as it flew back from North Dakota, where Trump gave a speech on tax reform. I have an executive order prepared. It s ready to go to the president. It will authorize me to . . . put sanctions on anybody that does trade with North Korea. Mnuchin said that Trump would consider the order at the appropriate time once he gives the U.N. time to act. He provided no further details, including whether Trump would consider slapping sanctions on China, North Korea s largest trade partner. Russian President Vladimir Putin insisted on Wednesday that resolving the North Korean nuclear crisis was impossible with sanctions and pressure alone. Putin met South Korea s Moon Jae-in on the sidelines of an economic summit in the eastern Russian city of Vladivostok amid mounting international concern that their neighbor plans more weapons tests, including possibly a long-range missile launch before a weekend anniversary. Putin echoed other world leaders in denouncing North Korea s latest nuclear bomb test on Sunday, saying Russia did not recognize its nuclear status. Pyongyang s missile and nuclear program is a crude violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions, undermines the non-proliferation regime and creates a threat to the security of northeastern Asia, Putin said at a news conference. At the same time, it is clear that it is impossible to resolve the problem of the Korean peninsula only by sanctions and pressure, he said. No headway could be made without political and diplomatic tools, Putin said. Moon, who took office this year advocating a policy of pursuing engagement with North Korea, has come under increasing pressure to take a harder line. He has asked the United Nations to consider tough new sanctions after North Korea s latest nuclear test. The United States wants the Security Council to impose an oil embargo on North Korea, ban the country s exports of textiles and the hiring of North Korean laborers abroad and subject leader Kim Jong Un to an asset freeze and travel ban, according to a draft resolution seen by Reuters on Wednesday. Diplomats say the U.N. Security Council could also consider barring the country s airline. I ask Russia to actively cooperate as this time it is inevitable that North Korea s oil supply should be cut at the least, Moon told Putin, according to a readout from a South Korean official. Putin said North Korea would not give up its nuclear program no matter how tough the sanctions. We too, are against North Korea developing its nuclear capabilities and condemn it, but it is worrying cutting the oil pipeline will harm the regular people, like in hospitals, Putin said, according to the South Korean presidential official. Russia s exports of crude oil to North Korea were tiny at about 40,000 tonnes a year, Putin said. By comparison, China provides it with about 520,000 tonnes of crude a year, according to industry sources. Last year, China shipped just over 96,000 tonnes of gasoline and almost 45,000 tonnes of diesel to North Korea, where it is used across the economy, from fishermen and farmers to truckers and the military. Trump and British Prime Minister Theresa May agreed in a telephone call on Tuesday that China must do more to persuade North Korea to cease its missile tests, a spokesman for May said. Sanctions have done little to stop North Korea boosting its nuclear and missile capacity as it faces off with Trump, who has vowed to stop it from being able to hit the U.S. mainland with a nuclear weapon. China and Russia have advocated a freeze for freeze plan, where the United States and South Korea stop major military exercises in exchange for North Korea halting its weapons programs, but neither side is willing to budge. North Korea says it needs to develop its weapons to defend itself against what it sees as U.S. aggression. South Korea and the United States are technically still at war with North Korea after the 1950-53 Korean conflict ended with a truce, not a peace treaty. China objects to both the military drills and the deployment in South Korea of an advanced U.S. missile defense system that has a radar that can see deep into Chinese territory. South Korea s Defence Ministry said the four remaining batteries of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system would be deployed on a golf course in the south of the country on Thursday. Two THAAD batteries have already been installed. For a graphic on nuclear North Korea, click: here

Romney's condemnation, made here at the Stein Eriksen Lodge before hundreds of his donors and business partners, highlighted the ill will between the last two GOP nominees for president. The former Massachusetts governor harshly criticized Republican candidates such as Ohio Gov. John Kasich and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, as well as super PACs such as Jeb Bush's well-funded Right to Rise group, for not stopping Trump in the primary. The two candidates largely avoided attacking Trump for much of their campaigns. He made the comments before many of the individuals who had helped fund those very candidates. "Ted Cruz was basically praising Donald Trump through the whole process until the very end," Romney told CNN's Wolf Blitzer, who was hosting the discussion. As for Kasich, "he was in well after the time there was no possible pathway to becoming the nominee." Romney's broadsides were warmly received by many of his allies, earning a 21-second round of applause when he wondered aloud about the future of the GOP. "I find this so troubling, and I know a lot of folks are saying, 'Mitt just get off your high horse on this and get behind the guy.' But these things are personal. I love this country. I love the founders. I love what this country is built upon and its values and seeing this is breaking my heart," Romney said. The 2012 nominee was visibly emotional and appeared to tear up when making the remarks. Yet Romney still preached tolerance. He declined to criticize previous speakers, including House Speaker Paul Ryan and Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus, who pitched Trump to the well-heeled crowd this weekend, and said he would not try and sway the GOP elites assembled here to abandon their nominee. And he recognized as legitimate the notion that some Republicans may choose to back Trump solely to prevent Hillary Clinton from appointing Supreme Court nominees, calling it a "darn good reason." The day before, Romney had told Blitzer in an interview that he worried about the moral fraying of society should Trump become the nominee: "I don't want to see trickle-down racism," he said. Donald Trump: Mitt Romney 'let us down' Donald Trump: Mitt Romney 'let us down' And before the crowd here on Saturday, Romney used another former president as an example of how society is shaped by his example. "Bill Clinton's dalliances in the White House affected the sexual inclinations and practices of a generation, and probably beyond," he said. But Romney was also challenged by some questioners who were trying to whip up support for Trump. Romney has pledged to never support Trump, and many of his fund-raisers feel similarly. "We've got to get behind him," one man implored the crowd. "These are the cards we've been dealt." Romney was also pressed as to why he accepted the endorsement of Trump during his 2012 presidential run given Trump's zest for "birtherism," or the idea that President Barack Obama was not born into the United States and is thus ineligible to be president. Romney said he saw Trump's comments as "nutty" but not disqualifying. Now, the pair are using one another as political foils, with Trump blasting his GOP predecessor. On Saturday in Tampa, Florida, he called Romney someone who "let us down" and writing on Twitter that Romney "choked like a dog." The former Massachusetts governor brushed off the attacks. "I have dogs. I don't know dogs choking," Romney said to laughs. "That's an insult that somehow doesn't work." Romney did, though, express some regret over his failed 2012 campaign, saying that he, like Bush, had failed to connect his economic vision with average, middle-class voters. But for now, Romney said he was trying to remain focused on the future, though he has now ruled out serving in the next White House. "Had there been a President Bush or a President (Marco) Rubio or a President (Scott) Walker, I might've been happy to be a part of their administration," Romney said.

TEL AVIV — Despite only attracting a crowd of about 40, the news media has been hyping a tiny protest outside of the U. S. Embassy in Tel Aviv against President Donald Trump’s temporary halt on refugees while the government revamps its flawed security screening process. [Here are some of the screaming headlines about the miniscule protest: L. A. Times: “Protesters in Tel Aviv compare Trump immigration order to Israeli refugee policies. ” Jerusalem Post: “Israelis protest Trump travel ban, citing history of Jewish refugees. ” I24 News: “Protesters ‘fight back’ against US, Israel’s refugee and immigration policies. ” Times of Israel: “At Tel Aviv protest, activists hear echoes of Israeli policy in Trump’s refugee ban. ” The L. A. Times article was also picked up by Yahoo! News. Despite the headlines, the articles themselves could not hide the small size of the protest, prompting questions as to why the news media would find the gathering newsworthy in the first place. The L. A. Times conceded the crowd consisted of “several dozen demonstrators. ” The Times of Israel put the number at “some 40 protesters. ” The Jerusalem Post also cited about forty demonstrators. The turnout is particularly disappointing for Tel Aviv, a city known for its ability to mobilize massive numbers of protesters. Trump’s executive order halts visas for 90 days for “immigrants and ” from Syria, Somalia, Sudan, Libya, Yemen, Iran, and Iraq. The order further suspended the entry of all refugees for 120 days, indefinitely blocked Syrian refugees from entering and lowered the ceiling to 50, 000 for refugees allowed to enter the U. S. during Fiscal Year 2017. Aaron Klein is Breitbart’s Jerusalem bureau chief and senior investigative reporter. He is a New York Times bestselling author and hosts the popular weekend talk radio program, “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio. ” Follow him on Twitter @AaronKleinShow. Follow him on Facebook.

“@BuzzFeedNews: A million copies of Charlie Hebdo will be published on Wednesday http://t.co/JlbHf0nK8y http://t.co/6SsAjSi2qK”

Edmondo Burr in Sci/Environment // 0 Comments Yesterday the sun erupted with a huge solar flare sending streams of particles bombarding towards Earth. A solar storm can wreak havoc on electricity power lines and technologies that rely on satellites. People are warned to prepare for the worst in coming days. The Daily Express reports: Solar storms can affect technology here on Earth as the radiation thrown at our planet heat the outer atmosphere, resulting in it expanding. As a result, satellite communications struggle to penetrate the atmosphere, essentially blocking communications which could lead to a lack of GPS navigation, mobile phone signal and satellite TV such as Sky. Furthermore, higher currents in the magnetosphere – the Earth’s magnetic field – could result in a surge of electricity in power lines, which can blow out electrical transformers and power stations leading to a temporary loss of electricity in a region – although this usually only occurs in areas that are in high altitude. The solar storm is predicted to carry on until October 27 and officials are telling citizens to prepare for the worst. The US Space Weather Prediction Center said: “Voltage corrections may be required, false alarms triggered on some protection devices. “Drag may increase on low-Earth-orbit satellites, and corrections may be needed for orientation problems”. The storm was originally described as a “serious” G3 level storm, although it was later downgraded to a G2. The UK Met Office said: “Elevated solar winds are expected throughout the period, with G1-G2 minor to moderate geomagnetic storms forecast.” Greenland However, on the plus side, solar storms can lead to the Northern Lights being visible. As the magnetosphere gets bombarded by solar winds, stunning blue lights can appear over the upper reaches of the Northern hemisphere and the lower parts of the southern hemisphere.

The early life and career hurdles of pop superstar Madonna will be the subject of an upcoming biopic currently being developed at Universal, according to a report. [Blonde Ambition, from screenwriter Elyse Hollander, will chronicle the early years of the singer — real name Madonna Louise Ciccone — as she works on her first album and forges her way into the music industry in early 1980s New York. Hollander’s script placed first on the 2016 Black List, the annual list of the best unproduced screenplays circulating around the film industry, according to the Hollywood Reporter, which first broke the news of the pickup. producer Michael De Luca (Fifty Shades of Grey, Moneyball) is set to produce under his De Luca Productions banner along with Brett Ratner’s RatPac Entertainment and Bellevue Productions’ John Zaozirny. Madonna’s early years were previously the subject of a 1994 TV movie called Madonna: Innocence Lost, that starred Terumi Matthews as the pop superstar. Madonna released her latest album, Rebel Heart, in 2015 and followed it up with a world tour of the same name. The singer has made headlines in recent months for her political activism, including her staunch opposition to President Donald Trump. In January, Madonna delivered a speech at the Women’s March in Washington in which she said she has often thought about “blowing up the White House. ” The singer was a vocal supporter of former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton during the 2016 campaign, at one point offering to reward Clinton voters with oral sex. No director or release date has yet been set for Blonde Ambition. Follow Daniel Nussbaum on Twitter: @dznussbaum,

@AusarDjedi For someone willing to jump on the race wagon without all the facts, I believe wait for all sides of the story @VerifiedNiceGuy

Minute silence held in memory of victims of shooting http://t.co/LdSF5QeCiv #CharlieHebdo #JeSuisCharlie http://t.co/dj3hfNsZko

Kyiv had admitted Ukrainian components are present in North Korean intercontinental ballistic missile engines.

@Independent Who disarmed the victims? #UnSmart Its useless to arm the victims AFTER the attack. Let victims defend their lives

WASHINGTON — Documents released by the F. B. I. on Friday revealed new details about the Justice Department’s yearlong investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server and whether she and her aides mishandled classified information. Among the documents was an summary of an interview F. B. I. agents conducted with Mrs. Clinton on July 2. Two days later, the F. B. I. director, James B. Comey, said the bureau had recommended to the Justice Department that neither Mrs. Clinton nor her aides should be charged with a crime. Here are six highlights from those documents: According to the F. B. I. in December 2014 a top aide to Mrs. Clinton told the company that housed her server to delete an archive of emails from her account. The company, Platte River Networks, apparently never followed those instructions. On March 2, 2015, The New York Times reported that Mrs. Clinton had exclusively used a personal email account when she was secretary of state. Two days later, the congressional committee investigating the 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya, and Mrs. Clinton’s response to them, told the technology firms associated with the email account that they had to retain “all relevant documents” related to its inquiry. Three weeks later, a Platte River employee realized he had not deleted the emails as instructed. The employee said he then used a special program called BleachBit to delete the files. The F. B. I. said Mrs. Clinton was unaware of the deletions. The F. B. I. said it was later able to find some of the emails, but did not say how many emails were deleted, or whether they were included in the 60, 000 emails that Mrs. Clinton said she sent and received while secretary of state from 2009 to 2013. But Mrs. Clinton’s lawyer, David Kendall, said in a letter to Congress on March 27, 2015, that after Mrs. Clinton gave roughly 30, 000 emails to the State Department, Mrs. Clinton “chose not to keep” her personal emails while she was secretary of state, which she has said numbered roughly 30, 000. Mr. Kendall said he confirmed with Mrs. Clinton’s support staff that no emails from the time she was in office “reside on the server or on any backup systems associated with the server. ” In Mrs. Clinton’s interview with the F. B. I. she said she did not recall receiving any emails “she thought should not be on an unclassified system. ” She said she had relied on State Department officials to use their judgment when emailing her sensitive information, adding that she “could not recall anyone raising concerns with her regarding the sensitivity of the information she received at her email address. ” In a summary of the investigation, the F. B. I. said Mrs. Clinton had emailed Colin L. Powell, a former secretary of state, a day after she was sworn into office about Mr. Powell’s use of a personal email account when he was the country’s top diplomat. Mr. Powell warned Mrs. Clinton that if she used her BlackBerry for official business, those emails could become “official record[s] and subject to the law. ” Mr. Powell, apparently implying that he was cautious in his use of his personal email account, added: “Be very careful. I got around it all by not saying much and not using systems that captured the data. ” According to a summary of her interview, Mrs. Clinton said she did not know exactly what Mr. Powell meant and that his message “did not factor into her decision to use a personal email account. ” Mrs. Clinton said in her interview it was “common knowledge” that she had a private email address because it was “displayed to anyone with whom she exchanged emails. ” But the F. B. I. said in a summary of its findings that “some State Department employees interviewed by the F. B. I. explained that emails by Clinton only contained the letter ‘H’ in the sender field and did not display her email address. ” The F. B. I. said that some of Mrs. Clinton’s closest aides were aware she used a private email address but did not know she had set up a private server. The aides said they were “unaware of the existence of the private server until after Clinton’s tenure at State or when it became public knowledge. ” According to the summary of the investigation, Mrs. Clinton brought her BlackBerry into a secure area on the seventh floor of the State Department, where such electronics are prohibited. The F. B. I. interviewed three former State Department diplomatic security agents who said that Mrs. Clinton kept her BlackBerry in her desk drawer in the secure area, a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility, or SCIF. But Huma Abedin, a top aide to Mrs. Clinton, told the F. B. I. that Mrs. Clinton left the secure area to check her BlackBerry, often going to the State Department’s balcony to do so. The F. B. I. said that it had identified 13 mobile devices that Mrs. Clinton potentially used to send emails. Mrs. Clinton’s aides were in charge of buying replacement BlackBerry devices when she was in office. Ms. Abedin told the F. B. I. that “it was not uncommon for Clinton to use a new BlackBerry for a few days and then immediately switch it out for an older version with which she was more familiar. ” Ms. Abedin and another aide told the F. B. I. that “the whereabouts of Clinton’s devices would frequently become unknown once she transitioned to a new device. ” An aide to Bill Clinton, Justin Cooper, who helped set up the server, told the F. B. I. that he recalled “two instances where he destroyed Clinton’s old mobile devices by breaking them in half or hitting them with a hammer. ”

@MayMayPoster @PeterTatchell @DreamerRyoko @MoonMetropolis Oh, I forgot, it's only incitement when a satirist or non-lefty says it, right?

@CHAUHAN2014 @rishibagree @EeshHindu you are absolutely correct.

European Union leaders will promise during talks in Brussels sufficient and targeted funding for migration projects in Africa and elsewhere, according to a draft statement that shows they have yet to put their money where their mouth is. The EU has spent billions of euros in recent years on keeping a lid on immigration from the Middle East and Africa after a 2015 peak in arrivals overwhelmed the bloc and fueled support for populist, right-wing and anti-immigration groups. In 2016, the EU promised Turkey at least 3 billion euros over two years for the Syrian refugees it hosts in exchange for Ankara cutting off the migratory route to Greece. It has so far contracted to pay nearly 1.7 billion of that and disbursed 900 million. The bloc has been giving money to Greece and Italy, the main EU countries of arrival for refugees and migrants crossing the Mediterranean, spending on tightening external borders, as well as financing more deportations from Europe and providing training and equipment to the Libyan border and coast guard. Italy has led EU s efforts on the lawless Libya, where the bloc is also funding U.N. programs to send people back home further south in Africa

An image that claims that an alleged therapy called biomagnetism is capable can wipe out “all kinds of viruses, bacteria, fungi and parasites”, including the coronavirus “quickly and effectively.”

The social rot continues in a city that was miraculously cleaned up on Mayor Giuliani s watch. All of the hard work Rudy did to fight crime and make tourists as well as residents feel safe again will all be undone by one Socialist mayor Scofflaws of New York, rejoice the City Council has cleared the way for you to litter, loiter and pee in the street to your heart s content.Watch here:New legislation dubbed the Criminal Justice Reform Act was passed by lawmakers Wednesday, giving miscreants a get-out-of-jail-free card by eliminating the criminal penalties on a raft of quality-of-life crimes.The disgusting and disturbing acts that the council voted to decriminalize include drinking alcohol out of a paper bag, lurking in parks after hours, urinating in the street and making enough of a racket to violate the noise code.Under the legislation, which Mayor Bill de Blasio is expected to sign, offenders will face only civil summonses instead of criminal citations.The main part of the reform act sponsored by Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito deals with reducing the penalty for public urination and other quality-of-life offenses. It passed by a 40-9 vote in the liberal-leaning council.It aims to keep offenders from getting a permanent criminal record and requires the NYPD to develop guidance for cops on when to issue criminal instead of civil summonses.

Female physicians at some of the nation’s most prominent public medical schools earn nearly $20, 000 less a year on average than their male colleagues, according to an analysis published on Monday in JAMA Internal Medicine. Before adjusting for factors that could influence income, the researchers found that the absolute difference between the genders was more than $51, 000 a year. Several studies have found a persistent pay gap between male and female doctors. But those reports relied mostly on doctors reporting their own incomes, or focused on pay disparities in one specialty or one region, or on starting salaries. The new study draws on salary information from a much larger, objective sample. The researchers went to great lengths to account for a variety of factors that can influence income, such as the volume of patients seen by a physician and the number of publications he or she had written. Medical professionals greeted the results with exasperation. “It’s 2016, and yet in a very methodically strong, large study that covers a broad swath of the country, you’re still seeing at the very least a 10 percent difference in what men and women take home,” said Dr. Molly Cooke, a professor of medicine at University of California, San Francisco, who has studied salary disparities among physicians. Dr. Vineet M. Arora, an associate professor of medicine at the University of Chicago, wrote an editorial accompanying the study. “This paper is going to make women academic physicians start a conversation with their institutions to promote transparency and gender equality, because at the end of the day, it’s not fair,” she said in an interview. The analysis included data on roughly 10, 000 physician faculty members at 24 medical schools, including those of the University of North Carolina and the University of Washington. Researchers at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital relied on public databases of employee salaries in 12 states, and data from Doximity, a networking site for physicians, to adjust for factors that can influence income — years since residency, specialty and age, for instance. Only public medical schools, not private ones, were included, because states like Florida and Texas post employee salaries online. After adjusting for a variety of factors, the researchers found that female neurosurgeons and cardiothoracic surgeons and women in other surgical subspecialties made roughly $44, 000 less than comparable men in those fields. The average pay gap between female and male orthopedic surgeons was nearly $41, 000. The difference was about $38, 000 among oncologists and blood specialists, about $36, 000 among and $34, 000 among cardiologists. Radiology was the only specialty in which women were paid more. Their adjusted average salary exceeded that of male radiologists by roughly $2, 000. Pay differences by gender appeared across all faculty ranks. Full female professors made roughly the same income ($250, 971) as male associate professors ($247, 212) despite outranking them. The study’s limitations included a lack of information about who was on a tenure track. More important, reported incomes in some states may not include all payments to physicians, but both men and women are likely to have been affected by such an exclusion. The researchers also found stark variations in the salary gap at different medical schools, suggesting some address pay inequities more aggressively than others. “The biggest surprise is there are some schools where this doesn’t seem to be an issue,” said Dr. Anupam B. Jena, the study’s lead author and an associate professor of health care policy at Harvard Medical School. At two medical centers in the West, female physicians were paid roughly $54, 000 and $59, 000 less, on average, than their male counterparts. At two schools, there was little income difference. Dr. Jena declined to the identify the schools. “What policies, procedures, leadership or culture at these sites helps to counteract a gender pay gap?” Dr. Arora asked in her editorial. Dr. Cooke said her salary had been corrected twice by university administrators — once after research she helped conduct revealed pay disparities among physicians in the late 1980s. She attributes the persistent pay gap partly to the complicated and individualized nature of academic salaries, as well as a lack of transparency. A subtle bias against women often is a factor, she said, “until a periodic study comes along, where people go, ‘Oh, my God, it’s happening, again. ’” In the worst cases, the pay gap exists because of “clear discrimination by department chairs in salary settings,” Dr. Jena said. But he also suggested that two other factors mighty play a role. Men and women may negotiate differently, and “male physicians may be more aggressive in terms of obtaining outside salary offers,” he said. “Extremely helpful” research like Dr. Jena’s keeps the issue in the public eye, said Dr. Kim Templeton, the president of American Medical Women’s Association and a professor of orthopedic surgery at the University of Kansas, which contributed data to the study. “But just having it out there isn’t going to fix the problem. ”

The "boyfriend loophole" means that "if you commit a serious crime of domestic abuse against your wife, you can't get a gun, but if you do it against your girlfriend, you can."

"Today in America — a new study came out — 20 years out, whites who borrowed money, 94% of them have paid off their student loan debt; 5% of African Americans have paid it off."

The leader of the Northern Irish party which props up Prime Minister Theresa May s minority government said the province must leave the European Union on the same terms as the rest of the United Kingdom. Arlene Foster, the leader of the Democratic Unionist Party, said there could be no regulatory divergence between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom. Northern Ireland must leave the European Union on the same terms as the rest of the United Kingdom, Foster said. We will not accept any form of regulatory divergence which separates Northern Ireland politically or economically from the rest of the UK. And the economic and constitutional integrity of the UK must not be compromised in any way.

Hillary’s So Pissed At FBI, But Here’s The 1 Person Who Really Screwed Her Posted on October 31, 2016 by Rebecca Diserio in Politics Share This Hillary Clinton and all of her supporters are freaking out over FBI Director James Comey’s recent re-opening of the email scandal investigation, saying he has new information coming from a forgotten Huma Abedin laptop. Hillary is so pissed, she has been on a tirade, blasting Comey and Donald Trump, but she forgot one thing — and that is the one person who really screwed her. Hillary Clinton is pissed off. Poor Hillary Clinton, since stepping into the White House back in 1992, she has imagined herself sitting in the Oval Office as the one with all the power. She has conspired and broken laws, killed men in Benghazi, and lied about their deaths, but now, it looks like its all for nothing. If only she could live in reality for 20 seconds, she would realize the one person who screwed her was staring back at her in the mirror. Everything that has happened is because she decided or rather insisted that all her crimes involving her own home based server be covered up. She was warned when she became Secretary of State that all emails having to do with government business must go through the “dot gov” system. She had to take a class on how to handle classified documents, and after the class, she had to sign a document confirming that she understood all of her work emails must stay on the “dot gov” system. Why? Was this just a stupid rule that had no real life consequences? No. People’s lives are at risk. Our troop’s movements are in those emails. The information about CIA spies, who are risking their lives in foreign countries, are in those emails. Who needs a class to understand what is at stake? So, how can she get pissed off about this investigation and say over and over “it was a mistake, there is no case with the FBI”? A mistake? A mistake is an action or judgment that is misguided or wrong. Intentionally going against all protocols and putting the lives of others in danger is a crime. Hillary Clinton in August 2015 Here’s what Rush Limbaugh said: “They’ve nominated somebody that’s under constant FBI investigation, and there are four different investigations into the Clinton Foundation. Do not doubt me when I tell you that within the inner circles of the Democrat Party, they are very worried about this. Even if she gets elected, they’re very worried about it, because of what it portends for her presidency. This woman is corrupt. She and her husband are constantly engaged in things that place them under investigation, for 30 years .” [via Rush Limbaugh.com ] Hillary is so pissed off, but for those of us who have suffered through watching her tear apart this nation, sell influence to foreign entities in the “pay for play” scandals, leave our men in Benghazi to die while blaming it on a video, and lie under oath numerous times, well, we couldn’t be happier. American women have no business voting for Hillary as the first woman American president. What kind of a legacy is that for our daughters and granddaughters? How will those women who backed her and voted for her ever explain that the first woman president was the biggest criminal ever to hold that office? She is a monster, and I’m tired of her supporters crying now that it’s falling apart. The only person to blame is Hillary Clinton, and anyone who can’t see her clearly is delusional. No one made her commit crimes that she needed to cover up with a home based server. Put her in prison, where she belongs, and throw away the keys.

Cynthia Nixon Was ‘Devastated’ by Fans’ Reaction to This ‘Sex and the City 2’ Scene

Republican Senator Rand Paul spoke with CNN s Erin Burnett on Tuesday and accidentally spilled the beans about the kind of healthcare American really needs. While explaining his position on the latest healthcare plan drummed up by the GOP, he talked himself into a corner by describing a system of healthcare that sounds a lot like single payer.Paul was exchanging healthcare views with Erin Burnett when she realized that he accidentally made the point for nationalized healthcare, so she pressed him hard using his own words against him. We should try to give them options, he explained while making the case for individual markets. He used the example of a how a plumber could link up with additional plumbers and create one large group market that covers all cases, including things like pregnancy. You could get a way out of that individual conundrum and you could get group policies, and most of the group policies actually have things like pregnancy, Paul continued. If you work for General Motors, my guess is pregnancy is automatically in your insurance because you are a big group and you have the leverage to demand it. Burnett took the argument for a collective large group insurance and ran with it. So why not go for the biggest group of all and just have insurance for everybody? She retorted. Well, socialism s not a good idea, said Paul, using the Venezuelan health crisis as a model for socialism s failures.Burnet slammed back, But you did make a great argument for nationalized healthcare. You said the bigger the group the lower the cost, so I m taking your argument to its logical conclusion. Paul then tried to take back what he said. I was talking about voluntary groups, not the gulag. Too late, Paul. You brought up the real solution to the healthcare crisis without even realizing what you were saying. The cat is out of the bag.Watch the whole hilarious conversation via CNN here:Featured image via screen capture

On Tuesday, President Obama pardoned or commuted the sentences of more than 270 people, including Chelsea Manning, a former Army intelligence analyst, and Oscar López Rivera, a Puerto Rican nationalist. Far down on the list, attracting almost no attention, was a boldface name from the disco days and nights of Manhattan in the 1970s. Ian Schrager, a hotelier and real estate developer whose club, Studio 54, was a notorious celebrity hangout, was among the 64 people granted a pardon in the waning moments of Mr. Obama’s presidency. The wild nightclub was central in Mr. Schrager’s conviction in 1980 on felony tax evasion charges he was accused of hiding money the club made from the government, concealing some of it in trash bags and ceiling panels. With a portfolio that has included some of the most expensive residential real estate in Manhattan — and boutique hotels, whose very concept he helped invent — Mr. Schrager seems to have little tangible need for a presidential intercession to set aside his conviction. He agrees, to a point. “I was able to overcome everything by being tenacious and, I suppose, relentless, and having successful products,” he said in an interview on Wednesday. “It wasn’t something that I needed to continue business. ” Instead, he said, it was knowing that his son, who is 6, would grow up to learn what he had done that pushed Mr. Schrager to hire a Washington law firm, Hogan Lovells, four years ago to apply for a pardon. “I wanted it for closure. I wanted it for my family,” he said. “It’s hard to be a good example for your kids when you did something like what I did, and you try to teach your kids to live by the rules and be an upstanding person. ” Mr. Schrager applied in 2012 for the pardon, which restores civil liberties like voting but does not expunge a criminal record, and he waited each year for a decision, with no word back. The lawyer who helped with Mr. Schrager’s pardon application, H. P. Goldfield, said it was not his client’s financial success or connections that ultimately made his pardon application successful, but how Mr. Schrager had lived his life in the years since he left prison. “It’s not just saying, ‘I’m sorry.’ There has got to be a sense that the person is really remorseful and admits their wrongdoing and that they’ve lived an exemplary life ever since,” Mr. Goldfield said, pointing to the thousands of jobs that Mr. Schrager’s company had created and his history as a mentor to young people. “He has really lived an exemplary life. He asked for forgiveness, and the president saw it in his heart to forgive. ” The application also asks for written testimony from three character witnesses. Mr. Schrager, 70, declined to say who they were. “It happened when I was young enough, and thank God, having lost everything, I didn’t lose my enthusiasm for life,” he said. “Either I was just going to give up, or dust myself off and put my head down and just try and recoup everything that l lost. ” “Some of it you can’t recoup,” he added. “I’ll always have the scar. ” The felony conviction made it difficult to himself after his release from prison. Mr. Schrager recalled having to drive to Virginia just to get a credit card, because banks in New York would not do business with him. Convicted felons cannot legally obtain a liquor license, so his first hotels in Manhattan, including Morgans and the Paramount, could not serve liquor, he said. In 1992, a lawyer for Mr. Schrager convinced the State Liquor Authority that he was sufficiently rehabilitated to merit another license. Mr. Schrager was convicted with his closest friend and business partner, Steve Rubell, who died in 1989. Some of his first thoughts upon learning of the pardon were of Mr. Rubell, Mr. Schrager said. “I’ll never have another friend like Steve,” he said. “And now I am here bringing closure to this event, and it’s bittersweet — I can’t share that with him. ” His conviction has brought other lingering effects. At airports, he is detained for questioning when he the country, Mr. Schrager said. He said he was unsure if those stops would diminish after the pardon. But the lasting effect after more than three decades is mostly emotional, an abiding sense of shame. On Tuesday, when Mr. Goldfield called to tell him the news, Mr. Schrager was at his home in the NoHo neighborhood of Manhattan. His son overheard the ensuing excited conversation between Mr. Schrager and his wife, Tania Wahlstedt. “He knew something good had happened, and he asked me, ‘Well, what’s so good that happened? ’” Mr. Schrager recalled. “I still didn’t feel like talking about it,’’ he said. “I said, ‘Well, the president said I was a good guy’ — that was enough. ”

Ted Cruz has made a staggering confession during an appearance on the Jimmy Kimmel show, which confirms just how deep the hatred between Cruz and rival GOP primary candidate Donald Trump has become. In a new low for the Republican race, Cruz confessed he d quite like to run Trump over with his car.On Wednesday night s show, Kemmel asked Cruz: Donald Trump is he the person you dislike the most, of anyone in America? The Texas senator and nearest GOP rival to Donald Trump first adopted a folksy tone in response, saying: Oh, no, But then Kimmel pushed him with a marginally tougher question: Who do you like better, he asked, Obama or Trump? This sent the audience into fits of laughter while Cruz took a long pause, seemingly struggling with his answer, finally answering somewhat less than diplomatically: I dislike Obama s policies more. As Kimmel nodded and reassured the Republican with an I see, Cruz added: But Donald Donald is a unique individual, If I were in my car and getting ready to reverse, and saw Donald in the backup camera I m not confident which pedal I d push. Just pause and let that sink in for a moment. The two favorite Republican candidates for President of the United States, have now reduced their campaigns to sl*tshaming each others wives, and fantasies about doing each other physical damage.Between Cruz and Trump, there is almost zero breathing space in the Republican race to ventilate the real issues facing America over the next decade; issues that aren t going to magically vanish if one of them somehow manages to secure the Presidency. So we face the very real potential of heading into a Presidential election with a Republican candidate (either Cruz OR Trump) who would rather devote campaign time to frat bro level antics, than statesmanship. Just when we thought the GOP primary could sink any lower, it did. Featured image via screencapture

The Alignment Between These Ancient Sites Will Blow Your Mind Did you know that ancient sites like Easter Island, Nazca, Ollantaytambo, Paratoari, Tassili n’Ajjer... Print Email http://humansarefree.com/2016/11/the-alignment-between-these-ancient.html Did you know that ancient sites like Easter Island, Nazca, Ollantaytambo, Paratoari, Tassili n’Ajjer and the Pyramids of Giza are all aligned on a single great circle? There is a mind-boggling connection among ancient structures that is indicative of a far greater meaning than we were aware of. There have been numerous theories that ancient structures around the globe were specifically positioned by its ancient builder’s thousands of years ago. Perhaps one of the best examples — according to many — is the Great Pyramid of Giza and its curious position on Earth.For those of you who didn’t know, the Great Pyramid of Giza is the most accurately aligned structure in existence and faces true north with only 3/60th of a degree of error. Furthermore, the weight of the pyramid is estimated at 5,955,000 tons. Multiplied by 10^8 gives a reasonable estimate of the earth’s mass. As you can see, ancient structures were built with a mind-boggling precision.But the Pyramids at the Giza plateau do not stand solitary on Earth. In fact, there are countless other sites that seem to be connected somehow. If you take a look at other ancient sites like the Nazca Lines, Machu Picchu, Easter Island, Mohenjo Daro, and Tassili n’Ajjer among others and draw down their position on a map, you will notice a connection that points perhaps towards an ancient ‘code’ embedded within these structures.As is noted by world-mysteries.com, ancient sites like Giza, Siwa, Tassili n’Ajjer, Paratoari, Ollantaytambo, Machupicchu, Nazca, Easter Island, Aneityum Island, Preah Vihear, Sukhothai, Pyay, Khajuraho, Mohenjo Daro, Persepolis, Ur, Petra are shown clockwise from Giza on the equal azimuthal projection. The projection is centered on the axis point in southeastern Alaska. Distances to any location from the center of an equal azimuthal projection are equally scaled. Since all of the sites on the great circle alignment are equally distant from the axis point at one-quarter of the circumference of the earth, the alignment forms a perfect circle halfway between the center and the outer edge of the projection. Check out the cover image (above) to understand the complexity of this mysterious alignment. Jim Alison goes on to explain even further in a very intriguing chart: The chart below lists the distance of each site from the great circle and the distance of each site from the northern axis point. There are slight variations in the distance from the axis point to the great circle depending on whether the route from the axis point to different locations along the great circle crosses over the equator or Polar Regions. The mean distance from the axis point to the great circle is 6,218 miles. Furthermore, the alignment of these sites is easily observable on a globe of the Earth with a horizon ring. If you line up any two of these sites on the horizon ring, all of the sites will be right on the horizon ring:Start on the Equator, at the mouth of the Amazon River, at 49° 17′ West Longitude; go to 30° 18′ North Latitude, 40° 43′ East Longitude, in the Middle East, which is the maximum latitude the line touches; then go to the Equator at 130° 43′ East Longitude, near the Northwest tip of New Guinea; then to 30° 18′ South Latitude, 139° 17′ West Longitude, in the South Pacific; and then back to 49° 17′ West Longitude, at the Equator. As you can see, there seems to be a connection among all of the above structures that form — to the surprise of many — a massive circle encompassing all major archaeological site son planet Earth. How this is possible remains a profound enigma. Source and references:

It appears that several voicemail messages were obtained by the website Gawker showing Republican presidential frontrunner Donald Trump s extremely close relationship with the supposed liberal media, despite the fact that during many of his rallies he s openly badmouthed the very media he adores covering him.According to Gawker: While Gawker was unable to independently verify their authenticity, the recordings certainly appear to be genuine. In addition to those from the MSNBC personalities, there were messages from longtime Barack Obama advisor David Axelrod, New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady, and boxing promoter Don King, all of whom spoke to Trump in a friendly and familiar manner. And this tweet from Joe Scarborough seems to verify that the transcripts seem to be legit:Oh my God. I just read the transcripts! Trump must have contributed to a children's charity. Scandalous!!! https://t.co/BxcZCdSkQb Joe Scarborough (@JoeNBC) March 4, 2016One woman who identified herself as T. Hall, is allegedly Tamron Hall from MSNBC. She s reported to have said: I celebrated by going to Gucci, and I m going to use your discount, because there s a green dress that s like $3,000, and I need a discount bigger than the one my discount. Apparently wanting Trump s discount for the Gucci store that his located inside Trump s 5th Avenue building. She also apparently said: I hope you re bracing for Romney to get his butt whipped tomorrow by Obama. Showing that the message clearly dates back to the 2012 election. An election that Hall was covering. However, in yet another message, she s clearly upset with Trump over his birther nonsense: I saw the YouTube video today. I wanted to chat with you about it, since you know that I m a huge fan, and I think the world of you. But I think that thing today was not good not becoming of who I think you are as a person, as a statesman, like your award. I just thought it was just kind of crummy. Other voicemails indicate, as already previously talked about, Trump s relationship with Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski. It looks as though Trump donated to one of their charities. Here s the alleged transcript via Gawker:BRZEZINSKI: Hi, Donald. It s Mika and Joe calling. Say hi, Joe.SCARBOROUGH: Hey there, Donald. How you doing?BRZEZINSKI: We re just leaving you a message because we re trying to get in touch with you, but you must be, like, on your jet or something. We d love to talk to you, so call one of us. What s your other number, Joe?SCARBOROUGH: I m at [REDACTED]. And the kids want to scream Thank you, to you, Donald. Say, Thank you, Donald. CHILDREN: Thank you!SCARBOROUGH: We are so, so grateful for everything, Donald, and we just want to call you and tell you how much it means to us.BRZEZINSKI: It was amazing. Thank you, Donald. Hope to talk to you soon. Bye.Gawker also reported that hackers were able to not only access Trump s voicemail, but change his outgoing message.The original outgoing message is here, via ABC:[soundcloud url= https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/217758973 params= auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&visual=true width= 100% height= 450 iframe= true /]And here is the alleged audio of what the hackers were capable of doing: All of this is very alarming considering Trump is apparently incapable of securing his cellphone and voicemail. If he allows this sort of thing to happen, what sort of ineptitude would he bring to the White House if elected? Yet one more reason to remember that no matter who, vote blue.Featured image: flickr

Prof. Rafiq Islam Responds to the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Punjab Outlining the Background of the Hall Case at the 2 Shares 1 0 0 1 Dear Vice Chancellor Kamran: Salam from the East coast of Canada. Thank you for taking the time to address this important issue regarding Professor Hall. Like yourself, we all have been stunned by the voracity of Dr. Mahon’s action. We used to think academics of certain reputation were above the reach of the tentacles of the Establishment. We all hoped that a president would not resort to such a shameless pandering to a special interest group. However, B’nai Brith is not just a special interest group, it is perhaps the most vindictive organization that has ever received prominence in the west. Allow me to elaborate. You have correctly identified B’nai Brith to be “behind this movement against shutting down free speech.” While this statement is accurate, this phenomenon of targeting Canadian universities and Canadian society is not something that started now. Not too long ago, it used to be branded as ‘the hidden hand behind the hidden hand’. During the Harper era, this operation became a full-blown politically driven policy directive. The legislation that Dr. Mahon pathetically relies upon is a product of the Harper era. Harper had an extremist right-wing background and organizations like B’nai Brith have channelled that extremism to accomplish their hateful agenda. As early as the 1980s, I personally observed the spirit of this unholy union during my tenure as the president of Muslim Student Association at the University of Alberta. Although Harper didn’t attend that university, we were not too far from the epicentre of the neo-conservatism movement that was brewing in Canada. We fast-forward 30 years and come upon the type of events such as Professor Hall travesty that are products of that time. In fact, a web of such operations has been in full force for sometime in every aspect of Canadian lives. Only recently, we had this court ruling against Canadian Security Intelligence Service that was illegally spying on the public. This gangster-like involvement started in 2006, shortly after Harper and the neocon came to power. This is not to say that the public is protected from such unconscionable manoeuvring under a liberal government. In fact, the most notorious scandals involving government and human rights have erupted during the liberal regime. Take for instance the case of Omar Khadr travesty . MORE... Creating an Anti-Muslim Bias at a Canadian University Suspension of Tenured Professor Lacks Due Diligence Toxic Mind Control Contaminates The Public Sphere Irish human rights activists against freedom of speech? This case is something we had known, albeit too late to intervene at the time, and has been subsequently discredited publicly, even during the Harper regime . The overwhelming theme was pointed out by then barely 16 year old, Omar Khadr, who said, “ You don’t care about me ”. This is what defines the mindset of these people, bent on extremism over extremism to subdue public conscience. The attack on Professor Hall was particularly toxic, but equally sinister attacks have taken place before. Some decade ago, now defunct Canadian Islamic Congress faced onslaught from all sides based on planted stories and baited manoeuvring. It was the largest Muslim Organization at a time Canadian Muslims became the largest religious minority. One particular episode involved B’nai Brith’s planted story involving a University professor, who became the target of hate crime, while at the same time investigated for hate crime. If it wasn’t for the humane and civic behaviour of the then University president (current Governor General), David Johnston, it would have become career threatening, if not life threatening event of the professor. Top university personnel told me in private how the university faced pressure from ‘donors’ that wanted that professor to disappear from the academic as well as public arena. The vendetta of this sort beggars belief even today. What we don’t know is how many of these assaults on conscience took place and has been brewing. Clearly, some of the faithful members/sympathizers apply it publicly. Such was the case of former professor turned politician, Irwin Cotler, who routinely infected the political arena with his prejudice and bias imported from the academia. Then there are others, such as Alan Rock of University of Ottawa that implanted manoeuvring of the political arena to the academia. A third group would be Lorna Marsden of York University that abused authority to run a vindictive agenda. Yet, others have found every other way possible to target a person of conscience all the meanwhile covering up all trails so the victim cannot point a finger to the attacker and has no recourse to justice or self defence. It doesn’t matter which category they belong to, they all produce scandals and drag down the good name of the academia while agencies that are supposed to be uphold the rights and dignity of the academia stand by and, for some cases, join in to the atrocity. This obscene attack on human rights and academic decency was once brought to light by late Professor David Noble, who ended up suing York University and Canadian Jewish Congress jointly for conspiring against him. Professor Noble, a Jew himself, faced the vilest of subjugation by organizations claiming to promote the rights of Jews. That wasn’t enough, Dr. Noble had to take on Human Rights Commission and other agencies that stood by either in complicity or in collusion with the University authority. Professor Noble passed away before the lawsuit could see a day in court but soon University of Ottawa would come in the picture with the infamous involvement of Alan Rock, a man without a PhD that was at the helm of the University. Mr. Rock recently left the University—but not before leaving the University’s good name in the sewerage of politicking. What Dr. Mahon has done is bring this insidious modus operandi to yet another victim. Had I not have the misfortune of being on the wrong side of this modus operandi in the last 30 years, I would almost not understand what is at works here. In old days, such tactic would be unheard-of in a University. Certainly, such things couldn’t happen in a civilized country, I would exclaim. So, what happened to Professor Hall is not new. What is new is the waking up of the general public. Your letter reverberates the emotion of everyone with conscience that came to know about Professor Hall. People are waking up and are beginning to ask for justice. For instance, in the context of CSIS, an activist, Jim Comeau wrote, “I would say it's time to jail the highest ranking CSIS to send a clear message to the rest of them, do something illegal, straight to prison. They damn well knew what they were doing was illegal.” The People’s revulsion to such atrocious maligning of people of conscience was summed up in recent letter of Julian Assange, who wrote on US General election day (November 8, 2016): “Yet, some weeks ago, in a tactic reminiscent of Senator McCarthy and the red scare, Wikileaks, Green Party candidate Stein, Glenn Greenwald and Clinton’s main opponent were painted with a broad, red brush. The Clinton campaign, when they were not spreading obvious untruths, pointed to unnamed sources or to speculative and vague statements from the intelligence community to suggest a nefarious allegiance with Russia. The campaign was unable to invoke evidence about our publications—because none exists. In the end, those who have attempted to malign our groundbreaking work over the past four months seek to inhibit public understanding perhaps because it is embarrassing to them – a reason for censorship the First Amendment cannot tolerate. Only unsuccessfully do they try to claim that our publications are inaccurate.” Of course, recent events have allowed us to see this in the highest level of politics in the United States. To anyone with an iota of conscience, there is no mystery here. People are making their voice clearly known. In the words of Claire Lanyado, “I prefer unpredictable to criminal and evil.” The problem is, when a president of University for whatever reason decides to use his position to serve the special interest group deliberately, there is no recourse for a professor to fight him/her. In other cases, if such atrocity were launched against a student (e.g. the case of Freeman-Maloy vs. Lorna Marsden of York University ), the student, an anti-Zionist Jew, could bring a lawsuit of misfeasance in public office with the help of yet another Jewish lawyer, Peter Rosenthal (who himself is a University professor of Mathematics). It was struck down by the court, and then it was overruled by the court of appeals. At the end, the University settled and Dr. Marsden, the embattled President was gone. The morale of this story is, the path to justice is steep, but for a professor, the path to justice is becoming impossible. The irony is that it is the people harboring so much hate who tell others that they are committing hate crimes, just because they dare speak out against an atrocity. Of course, they pick their targets that are perceived as weak and vulnerable and they attack the target only after making sure that the target cannot run to anyone for justice. That’s how extremism works. Sincerely, Rafiq Islam

Donald J. Trump proposed another significant shift in American foreign policy on Tuesday, suggesting that as president he would be willing to hold direct negotiations with Kim the North Korean dictator. In an interview with Reuters, Mr. Trump said that the talks would be part of an effort to halt North Korea’s nuclear program, which the United States considers one of the most serious national security threats. “I would speak to him, I would have no problem speaking to him,” Mr. Trump said. North Korea is among the most isolated countries in the world and regularly defies the international community by launching test rockets and capturing political prisoners. The notion that Mr. Trump would hold direct talks with Mr. Kim could create backlash among Republicans and Democrats. In 2008, Hillary Clinton criticized Barack Obama for being naïve about foreign policy for expressing a willingness to speak directly with Iran. Senator John McCain, a Republican from Arizona, offered similar criticism of him in the general election. Mr. Trump’s willingness to negotiate with a pariah state comes as he has been offering olive branches to countries such as Russia, which has had tense relations with the United States, while criticizing leaders of traditional allies such as Mexico and Britain. This is not the first time that Mr. Trump has expressed unconventional ideas when it comes to America’s interests in Northeast Asia. In a March interview with The New York Times he suggested that Japan and South Korea should have their own nuclear arsenals so that they would be less reliant on protection from the United States in the region. Direct talks were not the only solution that Mr. Trump proposed on Tuesday when it comes to North Korea. He also told Reuters that he would exert pressure on the Chinese, one of North Korea’s closest allies, to help curb its nuclear ambitions. “I would put a lot of pressure on China because economically we have tremendous power over China,” he said.

Mother of two young children who attend school near #CharlieHebdo site... #JeSuisCharlie http://t.co/ntcdVCPSre

Tue, 25 Oct 2016 00:00 UTC © Guido Amrein Switzerland/Shutterstock Melanesian children of Papua New Guinea Hints of an unidentified, extinct human species have been found in the DNA of modern Melanesians - those living in a region of the South Pacific, northeast of Australia. According to new genetic modelling, the species is unlikely to be Neanderthal or Denisovan - two ancient species that are represented in the fossil record - but could represent a third, unknown human relative that has so far eluded archaeologists. "We're missing a population, or we're misunderstanding something about the relationships," Ryan Bohlender, a statistical geneticist from the University of Texas, told Tina Hesman Saey at Science News. Bohlender and his team have been investigating the percentages of extinct hominid DNA that modern humans still carry today, and say they've found discrepancies in previous analyses that suggest our mingling with Neanderthals and Denisovans isn't the whole story. It's thought that between 100,000 and 60,000 years ago, our early ancestors migrated out of Africa, and first made contact with other hominid species living on the Eurasian landmass. This contact left a mark on our species that can still be found today, with Europeans and Asians carrying distinct genetic variants of Neanderthal DNA in their own genomes. And that's not all they've given us. Earlier this year, researchers investigated certain genetic variants that people of European descent inherited from Neanderthals , and found that they're associated with several health problems, including a slightly increased risk of depression, heart attack, and a number of skin disorders. And a separate study published earlier this month found evidence that modern genital warts - otherwise known as the human papillomavirus (HPV) - were sexually transmitted to Homo sapiens after our ancestors slept with Neanderthals and Denisovans once they left Africa. While our relationship with Neanderthals has been widely researched, how we interacted with the Denisovans - the distant cousins of Neanderthals - is less clear. The problem is that Neanderthals are well represented in the fossil record, with many remains having been uncovered across Europe and Asia, but all we have of the Denisovans is a lone finger bone and a couple of teeth that were found in a Siberian cave in 2008 . Using a new computer model to figure out the amount of Neanderthal and Denisovan DNA carried by modern humans, Bohlender and his colleague found that Europeans and Chinese people carry a similar amount of Neanderthal DNA: about 2.8 percent. That result is pretty similar to previous studies have estimated that Europeans and Asians carry, on average, between 1.5 and 4 percent Neanderthal DNA. But when they got to Denisovan DNA, things were a bit more complicated, particularly when it came to modern populations living in Melanesia - a region of the South Pacific that includes Vanuatu, the Solomon Islands, Fiji, Papua New Guinea, New Caledonia, West Papua, and the Maluku Islands. As Hesman Saey explains for Science News: "Europeans have no hint of Denisovan ancestry, and people in China have a tiny amount - 0.1 percent, according to Bohlender's calculations. But 2.74 percent of the DNA in people in Papua New Guinea comes from Neanderthals. And Bohlender estimates the amount of Denisovan DNA in Melanesians is about 1.11 percent, not the 3 to 6 percent estimated by other researchers. While investigating the Denisovan discrepancy, Bohlender and colleagues came to the conclusion that a third group of hominids may have bred with the ancestors of Melanesians." "Human history is a lot more complicated than we thought it was," he told her. This find is supported by a separate study by researchers from the Natural History Museum of Denmark, who analysed DNA from 83 Aboriginal Australians and 25 locals from the Papua New Guinea highlands. As we reported last month, this was the most comprehensive genetic study of Indigenous Australians to date, and it indicated that they are the oldest continuous civilisation on Earth, dating back more than 50,000 years ago. But the results revealed something else - DNA that was very similar to that of the Denisovans, but distinct enough for the researchers to suggest that it could have come from a third, unidentified hominid . "Who this group is we don't know," lead researcher Eske Willerslev told Hesman Saey. Until we have more concrete evidence of this hypothesised third human species (some fossils would be nice), we can't prove this , and we should point out that Bohlender's estimates have yet to be formally peer-reviewed , so they might shift with further scrutiny. And it could be that our identification of Denisovan DNA is more ambiguous than we think, given that our only source is a finger bone and a couple of teeth. But the evidence is mounting that our interactions with ancient humans were far more complex than we'd assumed, which shouldn't be much of a surprise, when you think about it. Just because we don't see them in the fossil record doesn't mean they didn't exist - preserving the remains of something for tens of thousands of years isn't easy, and then someone has to be in the right place at the right time to dig them up. Hopefully, the more we investigate the genetic make-up of our most ancient societies, the more hints we'll get of the rich and complicated history our species shared with those that didn't make it to modern times. The results of Bohlender's analysis were presented last week at the 2016 American Society of Human Genetics meeting in Canada.

DALLAS — Picture the next major American city to go bankrupt. What springs to mind? Probably not the swagger and sprawl of Dallas. But there was Dallas’s mayor, Michael S. Rawlings, testifying this month to a state oversight board that his city appeared to be “walking into the fan blades” of municipal bankruptcy. “It is horribly ironic,” he said. Indeed. Dallas has the fastest economic growth of the nation’s 13 largest cities. Its streets hum with supersize cars and its skyline bristles with cranes. Its mayor is a former chief executive of Pizza Hut. Hundreds of multinational corporations have chosen Dallas for their headquarters, most recently Jacobs Engineering, which is moving to Texas from pricey Pasadena, Calif. But under its glittering surface, Dallas has a problem that could bring it to its knees, and that could be an early test of America’s postelection commitment to safe streets and tax relief: The city’s pension fund for its police officers and firefighters is near collapse and seeking an immense bailout. Over six recent weeks, panicked Dallas retirees have pulled $220 million out of the fund. What set off the run was a recommendation in July that the retirees no longer be allowed to take out big blocks of money. Even before that, though, there were reports that the fund’s investments — some placed in highly risky and speculative ventures — were worth less than previously stated. What is happening in Dallas is an extreme example of what’s happening in many other places around the country. Elected officials promised workers solid pensions years ago, on the basis of wishful thinking rather than realistic expectations. Dallas’s troubles have become more urgent because its plan rules let some retirees take big withdrawals. Now, the Dallas Police and Fire Pension System has asked the city for a infusion of $1. 1 billion, an amount roughly equal to Dallas’’s entire general fund budget but not even close to what the pension fund needs to be fully funded. Nothing would be left for fighting endemic poverty south of the Trinity River, for public libraries, or for giving current police officers and firefighters a raise. “It’s a ridiculous request,” Mr. Rawlings, a Democrat, said in testimony this month to the Texas Pension Review Board, whose seven members are appointed by Texas governors, all Republicans for the last 20 years. The mayor — who defeated a former Dallas police chief to win his office in 2011 — added that he had nothing but respect for the city’s uniformed safety workers, five of whom were gunned down by a deranged sniper during a protest against police shootings in July. But that does not change the awful numbers. This month, Moody’s reported that Dallas was struggling with more pension debt, relative to its resources, than any major American city except Chicago. “The City of Dallas has no way to pay this,” said Lee Kleinman, a City Council member who served as a pension trustee from 2013 until this year. “If the city had to pay the whole thing, we would declare bankruptcy. ” Other ideas being considered include raising property taxes, borrowing money for the pension fund, delaying public works or even taking back money from retirees. But property taxes in Dallas are already capped, the city’s borrowing capacity is limited, and retirees would surely litigate any clawback. This month, the city’s more than 10, 000 current and retired safety workers started voting on voluntary pension trims, but then five people sued, halting the balloting for now. The city is expected to call for an overhaul in December. But it has no power to make the changes, because the fund is controlled by state lawmakers in Austin. The Texas Legislature convenes only every other year, and Dallas is preparing to ask the state for help when the next session starts in January. One state senator, John Whitmire, stopped by the pension building this month and urged the 12 trustees to join the city in asking Austin to scale back their plan. “It’s not going to be pleasant,” said Senator Whitmire, a Democrat in the statehouse since 1973. But without some cuts, “this whole thing will come crashing down, and we’ll play right into the hands of those who would like 401( k)s or defined contribution plans. ” To many in Dallas, the hole in the pension fund seems to have blown open overnight. But in fact, the fuse was lit back in 1993, when state lawmakers sweetened police and firefighter pensions beyond the wildest dreams of the typical Dallas resident. They added individual savings accounts, paying 8. 5 percent interest per year, when workers reached the normal retirement age, then 50. The goal was to keep seasoned veterans on the force longer.’ ”Guaranteed 8. 5 percent interest, on tap indefinitely for thousands of people, would of course cost a fortune. But state lawmakers made it look “cost neutral,” records show, by fixing Dallas’s annual pension contributions at 36 percent of the police and firefighters’ payroll. It would all work as long as the payroll grew by 5 percent every year — which it did not — and if the pension fund earned 9 percent annually on its investments.” ’Buck Consultants, the plan’s actuarial firm, warned that those assumptions were shaky, and that the changes did not comply with the rules of the state Pension Review Board. “The Legislature clearly ignored that,” Mr. Kleinman said. The plan’s current actuary, Segal Consulting, reported in July that 23 years of unmet goals had left Dallas with a hidden pension debt of almost $7 billion. Back in Dallas, the pension trustees set about trying to capture the 9 percent annual investment returns. They opted for splashy and exotic land deals — villas in Hawaii, a luxury resort in Napa County, Calif. timberland in Uruguay and farmland in Australia, among others. The projects called for frequent inspections by the trustees and their plan administrator, Richard Tettamant. The Dallas Morning News reported that officials were spending millions on global investment tours, with in places like Zurich and Pisa, Italy. Pension officials argued that their travel was appropriate and their investments were successes. It was an investment right in Dallas that led to the pension fund’s undoing: Museum Tower, a luxury condominium high rise. It went up across the street from the Nasher Sculpture Center, a collection housed in a Renzo Piano building surrounded by manicured gardens. The Nasher, opened in 2003, was integral to a city campaign to revitalize its downtown. Museum Tower started out modestly, with a $20 million investment from the pension fund. But as the downtown Arts District flourished, the pension fund raised its stake, then doubled the height of the building, and finally took over the whole development for $200 million. Mr. Tettamant became the general manager. As Museum Tower soared to 42 stories, its glass cladding acted as a huge reflector, sending the sun’s intensified rays down into the sculpture center. Mr. Piano had installed a filtered glass roof, designed to bathe the masterpieces in soft, natural light. The glare from the tower ruined the effect, killed plants in the garden and threatened to damage the sculptures. The center called on the pension fund to reduce the glare. Mr. Tettamant said nothing could be done and suggested the center change its roof. Mr. Rawlings, the mayor, brought in a former official of the George W. Bush administration, Tom Luce, for confidential mediation. But Mr. Luce resigned after five months, saying Mr. Tettamant had failed to adhere to “the conditions and spirit under which I agreed to serve. ” Before long, The Dallas Morning News published a long exposé of the fund’s holdings, raising serious questions about its claimed investment success. Some retirees began to clamor for a criminal investigation. The mayor demanded a full audit. When the audit was done, it showed that the investments were indeed overvalued, and that the fund was in deep trouble. Mr. Tettamant, who was dismissed in 2014, said he believed he was being blamed for problems he did not cause. “The Dallas mayor has a vendetta against me,” he said in an interview. “I never made any real estate investments. The board made all the investment decisions, and I was not a board member. ” In April, the Federal Bureau of Investigation raided the offices of CDK Realty Advisors, a firm that helped the pension fund identify and manage many of its investment properties. A spokesman for CDK declined to discuss the raid, but said the firm was working to resolve its differences with the pension fund. In his meeting with the trustees, Senator Whitmire recalled that in 1993 he had voted enthusiastically for the plan that sent the pension fund on its quest for 9 percent investment returns. “We all know some of the benefits, guaranteed, were just probably never realistic,” he said. “It was good while it lasted, but we’ve got some serious financial problems because of it. ”

@AkyolinEnglish You have no idea about how good it is to read statements like yours! @libertates

Her stepfather was dying from pulmonary heart disease in an intensive care unit on the other side of the country and Zheng Yue had to rush to the airport to catch a flight to see him. Zheng was nervous but outwardly calm as she strode through the airport terminal, pulling a carry-on bag and looking for her check-in counter. The trip was important for her. She said she never really knew her biological father, who died when she was two. Her mother s second husband was abusive, and she and her mother left him. This husband was better, and she developed genuine feelings for him as a father. Now, she said, she was feeling the pressures of what lay ahead for her and her family, a common worry among the generation that sprang from China s one-child policy. Being an only child means that down the line you ll have to support the whole family, she said. Zheng hadn t always shown such devotion to her family. By the time her mother married for the third time, Zheng was developing a rebellious streak that defined her for much of her youth. She started cutting classes in elementary school, staying home to watch TV. In middle and high school she climbed the school wall and went to Internet cafes to play video games. She found school boring, and her grades showed it. I didn t like going to school. When I went to class I d immediately be tired, exhausted, and I didn t like hearing them lecturing about stuff, she said. As an only child, her mother tried to keep her on a tight leash. She wasn t allowed to go out alone, or have boyfriends. In her sheltered world she developed a talent for painting and won school awards. When it came time to take the college entrance exam she tested in the fine arts category an easy path to university in China s rigid system. When she picked a school, Zheng used a map to decide, choosing one that was far from her hometown of Dezhou in Shandong province a branch of the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China in Chengdu, 1,700 km (1,060 miles) away. I really wanted to break free of those fetters, she said. College was freedom. Classes in her major animation were bearable, but the others were a chore and she was soon skipping class again. When she was a fourth year student, she landed an internship as an assistant in an interior design firm and before long she was dating the man she worked for. Five years out of college she is still with the same man. After graduating in 2012, she spent the following year without working, living off her boyfriend. I wasted that year, she said. At that time when you re stepping into society your dynamism that year is at its greatest, you re daring enough to do anything. She eventually found work as an interior designer, often working until midnight. Marriage and children don t interest her given her traumatic childhood and family life. She lives with her boyfriend in the flat that he owns, and she hopes to be able to buy one of her own

@AntonioFrench And he said that shit with a straight face, too. Don't trust the police #FilmThePolice #ReportPoliceMisconduct #SueThePolice

@shilpakannan @NewYorker We salute the Brave Journalist Stand/Speak against Muslim Terrorists

After signing a multi-million dollar book deal with Penguin Random House alongside his wife, Michelle, the former president is now set to write his memoir while staying on the exclusive island of Tetiaroa, the Washington Post reported. The island is part of the Society Islands in French Polynesia and is an atoll composed of a dozen small islands surrounding a lagoon about 30 miles northeast of Tahiti. It once served as a summer residence for former chiefs and kings of Tahiti until Brando purchased it in 1967 after falling in love with its beauty while filming Mutiny on the Bounty in 1962 on the nearby islands of Tahiti and Moorea.It s unclear if the former president will be joined by his wife during his stay on the island or exactly when he plans to travel back to Tetiaroa.Read more: Daily Mail

Following the shooting death of 28-year-old armed robbery suspect Michael Renard Grace Jr., surviving family members are now speaking out and demanding answers as to why a restaurant employee would have been allowed to carry a firearm at their place of business. As if the idea of a robbery victim fighting back in self defense were something completely unfathomable, the deceased suspect’s parents are calling his death undeserved and unjustified. Predictably, Temia Hairston and Michael Grace Sr. told media outlet WBTV that even though their son walked into the Charlotte area Pizza Hut intent on robbing the business with two other armed men, was it just “an act of desperation ” and that they do not believe he would have hurt anyone. Image of Michael Grace Jr. via WISTV “Why in the hell did this guy have a gun?” Hairston stated to WBTV… This is despite the fact that the most glaring and obvious possible answer to that question is that the employee carried a firearm for exactly this type of scenario. But I digress. Via WISTV Police said Grace Jr and two other people tried to rob a Pizza Hut in the 3200 block of Freedom Drive. During the incident, an employee fired his own handgun and killed Grace Jr. “If there was to be a death, it was not the place of the employee at Pizza Hut. That is the place of law enforcement,” said Hairston. They said Grace Jr had fallen on hard times and resorted to crime to provide for his own child. They also said their son used to work at the same Pizza Hut restaurant where the robbery happened. They maintain he never would have physically hurt anyone during the robbery. She said her son was shot in the head, and she thinks the shooting may have even been personal… Sounds more like an individual with proper firearms training to me, but yeah, of course defending your own life is personal. The family said they want Pizza Hut to release more information about the situation and acknowledge that their son used to be a Pizza Hut employee. Hairston said she thinks the employee who shot her son needs to be in jail, and wants all parties involved in the situation to be honest about what happened. The employee involved has reportedly been placed on leave. Pizza Hut released the following statement: “The local Pizza Hut franchisee is fully cooperating with the Charlotte Police Department as they continue their investigation, but want to stress that the security of its staff is of utmost concern. They are providing support to the team members involved to ensure their health and well-being following this incident. The employee involved in the shooting has been placed on a leave of absence following further review.” Thoughts on this? Let us know in the comment section below.

@decyberdiva Um. Yes there is. It's a legal term.

RHOA Kenya Moore in Egypt with Husband Marc Daly

Video from inside Evergreen State College continues to leak, showing that protesters had at one point held administrators hostage until they agreed to comply with their demands.The incident took place during the second day of demonstrations demanding the resignation of Professor Bret Weinstein, who angered many students when he challenged the school s decision to ask white people to leave campus for a day of diversity programming in an all-staff email.The protest began Tuesday morning when an angry mob of SJW s confronted Professor Bret Weinstein after he had sent an email to faculty and staff explaining his reasoning for opposing the demonstration. Campus ReformWatch the hostage situation here:Now, Weinstein s reportedly been told to avoid campus because his safety is at risk. Police told me protesters stopped cars yesterday, demanding information about occupants, Mr. Weinstein told The Washington Times. They believe I was being sought. It appears that the campus has been under the effective control of protesters since 9:30 a.m. Tuesday. Police are on lockdown, hamstrung by the college administration. Students, staff and faculty are not safe.Having already accosted Weinstein with such vitriol that campus police suggested he leave campus because officers could not guarantee his safety, the students set their sights on the administration, confining school officials in an office until they capitulated to an ultimatum demanding various diversity-related initiatives. The priority is that they stay in that room. If they aren t in that room, then we did something wrong, so you all need to watch that door, watch all the doors, the windows, you need to keep eyes on them, one protester commands, referencing all of the potential exit points that administrators could use to make an escape. Somebody needs to go in that room real quick to make sure there s no way for them to leave. The video pans to a closed conference room leading to College President George Bridges office, which is surrounded on the outside by dozens of student protesters who made it their stated mission to establish a physical presence outside the office to ensure that Bridges and his staff aren t leaving. Shortly thereafter, one demonstrator emerges from Bridges office and triumphantly informs her companions that Bridges talked to the chief of police and he said police will not show up. The unidentified protester who was apparently leading the brigade then enters Bridges office, where the president and several other administrators are seated around a table that is encircled by still more student protesters. The only priority is that y all stay in this space until those demands can happen so that s the only thing that we re concerned about, the protest leader reiterates, though he assures the administrators that everyone s safety and health is concerned, and that food and water would be provided to them.At one point, Bridges explains that he needs to pee, to which one protester initially responds by sharply instructing him to hold it, though he was eventually escorted to a nearby bathroom by a team of protesters.Meanwhile, the crowd gathered outside continued to chant hey, hey/ho, ho/these racist faculty have got to go. The student who said they talked to the police chief and that they would not be coming was lying. The police did show up to the hostage situation. The only problem is, the president of Evergreen College has already made a public statement saying that he has no interest in pressing charges against any of the hostage takers.When police arrived, presumably drawn by the uproar, the students fled to the library, where they barricaded themselves inside the Trans & Queer Unity Lounge and asked white students to patrol the halls for any police intruders. At a meeting between the administration and students later that day, University President George S. Bridges quickly assured the crowd that no students would be punished for their involvement in the demonstrations and promised a major reiew of what happened and why.My brother. Biology Professor @BretWeinstein. In the crosshairs of a lying mob. You SJWs just targeted the wrong guy. The Left eats its own. https://t.co/qQBCoztAvw Eric Weinstein (@EricRWeinstein) May 24, 2017Here's the (incredibly thoughtful and well-written) email. pic.twitter.com/3NecW0tNfw William Treseder (@williamtreseder) May 24, 2017

Now that Seahawks star defensive end Michael Bennett s harrowing story of police brutality has gone viral, the cops who arrested him are trying to cover their own asses in a PR-fueled letter to the NFL Commissioner, Roger Goodell. In the letter, Detective Steve Grammas, the president of the Las Vegas Metro Police Protective Association, asks Goodell to open an investigation into Bennett s allegations, and requests that the commissioner take appropriate action. The irony is rich in seeing a letter asserting that the LVPD isn t racist, even as the first paragraph of it calls out the NFL for condoning Bennett s protest during the national anthem, a stance that only racists take.Bennett s protest, along with that of many players around the league, is specifically against police brutality when dealing with unarmed, innocent black suspects. To continue to insist that it is somehow disrespecting to everything the flag symbolizes is to ignore that the flag symbolizes justice as well.But the truly disgusting part of Grammas letter is the reason he and the Las Vegas Police attempt to use as justification for having unlawfully detained Bennett in the first place. Grammas actually asserts that hiding behind a slot machine, then running outside during an episode in which shots are being fired is considered probable cause to arrest Bennett for suspicious behavior. Guess what, geniuses? If Mike Bennett was running from the cops, you all just proved him right to have done so. He clearly has no gun, obviously isn t the only person in the entire casino hiding from the gunfire, and wasn t even remotely the only person running out the doors Bennett himself said that hundreds of people were staging an exodus from the scene.One would think that maybe the guy with the Super Bowl ring on who kind of looks like Michael Bennett and can leap over a four-foot barrier might not be their suspect.It is my most sincere hope that Bennett and his lawyers not only sue the department, but Detective Grammas personally, for being the kind of dumbass who would send a self-contradictory letter like this in a case where he s clearly just trying to fire back at Bennett s allegations.Featured image via Mat Hayward/Getty Images

John Podesta is the guardian of the Clintons just like Valerie Jarrett was for the Obamas. He was instrumental during the 2016 election as the Clinton campaign chair and was exposed when the Wikileaks hack happened. He was just interviewed by the House Intel Committee regarding the Russia scam and was asked about it in the heated debate below:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9U5zxVyTqAJohn Podesta is not just the former chairman of the Hillary Clinton s presidential campaign, but also a central figure in the ongoing narrative of Russian meddling in the US election of 2016. His hacked emails were at the heart of what some have called a coordinated news campaign led by Wikileaks, and so he met with the House Intelligence panel yesterday behind closed doors.This morning he appeared on Fox Business to discuss the Russian interference, allegations of collusion with Trump campaign and more with host Maria Bartiromo in what became a testy debate that perfectly exemplifies the divided positions that so many Americans hold right now.Bartiromo showed skepticism over the Russia claims rightfully so!. And there may be no other individual that best embodies the Clinton s web of influence for good and bad than Mr. Podesta. He s the definition of a weasel.Bartiromo aggressively attacked Podesta and Democrats for what she said were deeper ties with Russia, specifically asking about Podesta s investment portfolio:THIS IS JUST ONE EXAMPLE OF A DEEP TIE TO RUSSIA:Russia gave John Podesta 35 millions dollars (1 billion rubles) while he advised Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.Russia gave John Podesta 35 millions dollars (1 billion rubles) while he advised Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. pic.twitter.com/cf042XZLeU Based Vet (@BasedVet) March 28, 2017 Get your facts straight, the former Clinton campaign chair shot back, before dismissing the FBN hosts claims as coming from a dubious source like InfoWars. It went downhill from there.

President Donald Trump is expected to nominate Senate Democratic aide Russ Behnam to be a commissioner on the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday, citing people familiar with the matter. Behnam’s nomination, which must be confirmed by the Senate, could come as early as this week, the Journal reported. Behnam is senior counsel to Senator Debbie Stabenow, the top Democrat on the Senate Agriculture Committee.

WASHINGTON — Donald J. Trump has offered the post of national security adviser to Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn, potentially putting a retired intelligence officer who believes Islamist militancy poses an existential threat in one of the most powerful roles in shaping military and foreign policy, according to a top official on Mr. Trump’s transition team. General Flynn, 57, a registered Democrat, was Mr. Trump’s main national security adviser during his campaign. If he accepts Mr. Trump’s offer, as expected, he will be a critical gatekeeper for a president with little experience in military or foreign policy issues. Mr. Trump and General Flynn both see themselves as brash outsiders who hustled their way to the big time. They both post on Twitter often about their own successes, and they have both at times crossed the line into outright Islamophobia. They also both exhibit a loose relationship with facts: General Flynn, for instance, has said that Shariah, or Islamic law, is spreading in the United States (it is not). His dubious assertions are so common that when he ran the Defense Intelligence Agency, subordinates came up with a name for the phenomenon: They called them “Flynn facts. ” As an adviser, General Flynn has already proved to be a powerful influence on Mr. Trump, convincing the that the United States is in a “world war” with Islamist militants and must work with any willing allies in the fight, including President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia. During the transition, General Flynn has been present when Mr. Trump has received his daily intelligence briefing. As national security adviser, he would have the last word on how the president should respond to crises such as a showdown with China over the South China Sea or an international health crisis like the Ebola epidemic. But, like Mr. Trump, he would enter the White House with significant baggage. The Flynn Intel Group, a consulting firm he founded after he was fired by President Obama as head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, has hazy business ties to Middle Eastern countries and has appeared to lobby for the Turkish government. General Flynn also took a paid speaking engagement last year with Russia Today, a television network funded by the Kremlin, and attended the network’s lavish anniversary party in Moscow, where he sat at Mr. Putin’s elbow. Those potential conflicts of interest had led Mr. Trump’s transition team to worry that General Flynn might have difficulty winning confirmation for any post that, unlike the national security adviser role, requires congressional approval, such as director of the C. I. A. But for Mr. Trump, he has one overriding virtue: He was an early and ardent supporter in a campaign during which most of the Washington national security establishment openly called Mr. Trump unfit to lead. General Flynn did not respond to repeated interview requests. Yet in numerous speeches and interviews before the election, and in a book published in August, he laid out a view of the world that sees the United States as facing a singular, overarching threat that can be described in only one way: “radical Islamic terrorism. ” All else is secondary for General Flynn, and any other description of the threat is “the worst kind of political correctness,” he said in an interview three weeks before the election. Islamist militancy poses an existential threat on a global scale, and the Muslim faith itself is the source of the problem, he said, describing it as a political ideology, not a religion. He has even at times gone so far as to call it a political ideology that has “metastasized” into a “malignant cancer. ” For General Flynn, the election of Mr. Trump represents an astounding career turnaround. Once counted among the most respected military officers of his generation, General Flynn was fired after serving only two years as chief of the Defense Intelligence Agency. He then as a vociferous critic of a Washington elite that he contended could not even properly identify the real enemy — radical Islam, that is — never mind figure out how to defeat it. In Mr. Trump, General Flynn found someone who was more than willing to listen. He readily signed on to the campaign, and quickly emerged as the angry voice of the national security establishment, leading chants of “lock her up” against Hillary Clinton at rallies and the Republican convention. And now, after months of the two men talking to each other, it can be hard to tell where Mr. Trump’s views end and General Flynn’s begin. They both believe that the United States needs to start working with Mr. Putin to defeat Islamist militants and stop worrying about his suppression of critics at home, his attempt to dismember Ukraine or the Russian military’s indiscriminate bombing of Syrian cities. The same goes for President Abdel Fattah of Egypt, who took power in a coup and who was the first world leader to speak with Mr. Trump after the election. Mr. Trump “looks at people and leaders of countries and says: ‘Can I work with this guy? Do we have a common threat that we can focus on? ’” Mr. Flynn said in the interview before the election. “He knows that when it comes to Russia or any other country, the common enemy that we all have is radical Islam. ” General Flynn and Mr. Trump also agree that the United States needs to sharply curtail immigration from predominantly Muslim countries, and possibly even force American Muslims to register with the government. The similarities run beyond political views. Like the boy from Queens who made it in Manhattan, General Flynn came into the military without a West Point pedigree — he graduated from the Army’s Reserve Officer Training Program at the University of Rhode Island — and earned a reputation as outspoken and unconventional as he climbed the ranks to the top of military intelligence. Yet General Flynn still nurses the grudge of an outsider, believing he never quite got the respect he deserves. For example, he has attributed his dismissal from the Defense Intelligence Agency to a pair of consummate insiders: James R. Clapper Jr. the director of national intelligence, and Michael Vickers, the undersecretary of defense intelligence. His response, like that of his new boss, has been to buck the establishment. In his view, both the Republican and the Democratic luminaries who have shaped American defense and foreign policy through two presidencies have “gotten us into mess after mess for the wrong reasons. ” “I would argue with that crowd all day long,” he said before the election. Among the Republicans who now dominate the party, General Flynn has become something of a cult figure for what they see as his brave stand against the Obama administration’s perfidy. General Flynn insists that he was fired from the intelligence agency because he refused to toe the administration’s line that Islamist militants were in retreat. (He was right, in all fairness.) “He’s an analyst who can get deep into the weeds on the issues and a lot of this stuff and then is very good at playing chess,” said Representative Devin Nunes, the California Republican who is chairman of the House Intelligence Committee and a close confidant to Mr. Flynn. “He was the one who called out the administration for being wrong on Al Qaeda. ” But many of those who worked with General Flynn attribute his firing to management problems, saying his attempts to overhaul the sprawling agency had left it a chaotic, backbiting mess. They also question whether his tactical acumen — he was especially good at unraveling militant networks in Afghanistan and Iraq — can translate into the kind of strategic thinking needed at the White House. “He is a very talented information gatherer,” said Sarah Chayes of the Carnegie Endowment in Washington, who worked with General Flynn when he ran military intelligence in Afghanistan from 2009 to 2011. “But his thinking process is not sufficiently analytical to test some streams against others and make sense of it, or draw consistent conclusions,” she said. “If you listen to him, in 10 minutes you’ll hear him contradict himself two or three times. ” Take his views on Islam. In the interview before the election, he characterized Islam as intolerant. Then he said that he had many Muslim friends, and that the United States needed to do a better job of understanding Islamic culture and fostering its tolerant side.

@PARRASANABRIA @MeetOblivian @UN @UNESCO si si Juan si yo estoy de acuerdo contigo! ;)

Obama s former AG Loretta Lynch released a video that s a call to action for Democrats. These people who have been stripped of power after being so close to achieving their goals of fundamentally transforming America into something most Americans wouldn t recognize, are serious about starting a civil war in our nation. If you don t believe me, listen to the words of Obama s former AG, who compares the fight against President Trump and his supporters to that of the Civil War: I know that this is a time of great fear and uncertainty for so many people. I know it s a time of concern for people, who see our rights being assailed, being trampled on and even being rolled back. I know that this is difficult, but I remind you that this has never been easy. We have always had to work to move this country forward to achieve the great ideals of our Founding Fathers. (Lynch s statement about the Founding Fathers is quite ironic, considering that she worked hand-in-hand with former President Barack Obama to destroy the very fabric of our Constitution.) It has been people, individuals who have banded together, ordinary people who simply saw what needed to be done and came together and supported those ideals who have made the difference. They ve marched, they ve bled and yes, some of them died. This is hard. Every good thing is. We have done this before. We can do this again.

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan will visit Russia s Sochi on November 13, followed by a visit to Kuwait the following day, his office said on Monday. The visit to Sochi comes amid reports of potential sticking points in Turkey s planned purchase of a Russian S-400 surface-to-air missile system, and Turkish objections to the attendance of Syrian Kurdish groups to a Russian-sponsored Syrian peace congress scheduled for Nov. 18. Last week, the two countries took a step toward the solution of an import crisis as Russia lifted restrictions on import of Turkish tomatoes.

Robert De Niro was supposed to appear in a non-partisan public service announcement for the get out the vote organization, Vote Your Future, but the actor had a difficult time staying on script. Instead, he used the opportunity to go off on Trump in one of the most passionate anti-Trump videos to date. He s so blatantly stupid, the video beings. He s a punk. He s a dog (please don t insult dogs, Robert), he s a pig, he s a con, a bullshit artist, a mutt (again with the dog insult) who doesn t know what he s talking about. He doesn t do his homework, De Niro continued, doesn t care. He s gaming society, doesn t pay his taxes. He s an idiot. Colin Powell said it best, he s a national disaster, he s an embarrassment to this country.' It makes me so angry, added De Niro, that this country has gotten to this point that this fool, this bozo, has wound up where he has. He talks how he wants to punch people in the face, a visibly angry De Niro said,Vote Your Future chose not to include the video in their campaign, since they are non-partisan. Oddly, though, Fox News Megyn Kelly did air the segment, in fact, it was giving specifically to her. Here it is:The video was recorded before Friday s game changing video of Donald Trump talking about groping women, but the timing coincided very well. You can be sure that De Niro s opinion hasn t changed.Is the fact that Kelly, on Fox News, was the person to release this video a sign that Fox News is turning on the GOP candidate or is this just another shot in Kelly s war against Trump?As for De Niro, bravo, although it s not a huge risk to turn on Trump these days. Everyone in Hollywood, from Republican politicians to evangelical Christians, are turning on Trump. The only remaining mystery is why people still support this narcissistic, thin-skinned, racist, nationalistic, misogynistic monster.Featured image via Kevin Winter/Getty Images.

Omarosa Manigault Newman, a former reality television star-turned political aide to U.S. President Donald Trump, has resigned from the White House to “pursue other opportunities,” Trump’s spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said on Wednesday. Newman served as assistant to the president and director of communications for the White House’s Office of Public Liaison. A former star of Trump’s TV show “The Apprentice,” Newman worked as the director of African-American outreach on Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign. Sanders said Newman’s departure would take effect Jan. 20, 2018. Newman had what sometimes appeared to be an ambiguous role in the White House orbit. The New York Times reported in September that chief of staff John Kelly had put her on a “no-fly list” of aides who he did not consider fit to attend serious meetings. Sources with ties to the White House have said they expect a wave of departures from the administration once Trump has completed his first year in office.

2016 presidential campaign by Matt Sedillo Hillary Clinton is, no doubt, a threat to life on Earth. But the duopoly electoral system is a menagerie of warmongers. “The response to the white nationalism of Donald Trump has been the rainbow coalition of hawks.” Barack Obama has proven an awesomely prolific war maker. Bernie Sanders is no peacenik. “It is only the white nationalist orange demon -- guided only by his own whims and twitter feuds -- that is at all off script on this question.” LesserOfTwoEvilism by Matt Sedillo “ So long as there is a ruling class they shall rule by fire and blood.” The loathsome and shameless hypocrisy of the Democratic Party and the doctrine of lesseroftwoevilism has been laid bare this political season. This same Democratic Party that unquestionably rigged the primaries against the left-leaning Bernie Sanders campaign is now selling itself to the public as the savior of the downtrodden from the threat of an uber right wing candidate. Hillary Clinton at this point in her election run appears to be making no promises to the public other than to not to physically morph into Donald Trump during her coronation come Election Day. Lesseroftwoevilism is a bankrupt political ideology and the means by which the Democratic Party deadens any inkling towards decency or rational self interest that may lay dormant in the American electorate. Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party intend to use the platform of "at least not being Donald Trump" to install the most despised Democratic candidate in a generation into the White House. It is indeed horrifying that a straight up eugenicist billionaire who brags about sexual assaulting women won the Republican primary. It is terrifying that the cult leader of a white nationalist zombie apocalypse has gotten this far through the electoral process. “There is no greater threat to the future of much of life on the planet than Hillary Clinton.” The country is polarizing and it is terrifying to see that much of it is polarizing in the direction of Donald Trump whose campaign is defined by phrases like “Make America Great Again” quickly followed by “Mexico Will Pay.” Much of the country is also polarized in the direction of Bernie Sanders. It was the political apparatus of the Democratic Party, not the Republicans, that prevented these two competing visions from standing before the American public. Setting aside the fact, for a moment, that we don't live in a democracy, it must be noted that lesseroftwoevilism in American politics is an ideology by Americans for Americans. Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, AND Bernie Sanders are all advocates of the US war machine. If any of these three warlords were to sit in the seat of power children in far off lands would still be bombed in their sleep and be reported on as collateral damage. Hillary Clinton is the most bloodthirsty advocate for murder and mayhem in a political system that thrives upon such practices. When it comes to dropping bombs, obliterating nations or possibly igniting a nuclear winter there is no greater threat to the future of much of life on the planet than Hillary Clinton. Rainbow Coalition of Hawks Far beyond a “basket of deplorables,” the 2016 Republican national convention was a ghastly horror show of the most reactionary, bigoted elements of American political culture. Less than esteemed actor Scott Baio captured the mood when he proclaimed, “so of course let’s make America great again, but let’s make America America again.” That largely captured the theme of the proceedings and most speeches were some variation upon that theme. The Democrats in response sought to make their convention a big tent of peoples, ideas and movements. And indeed from the spontaneous chants of “black lives matter” to Tim Kaine leading a chant of “si se puede” to Eva Longoria reminding the audience “we didn’t cross the borders the borders crossed us” to Michelle Obama letting the thousands in attendance and the millions watching at home know that slave labor built the White House and the country, from Sebastian De La Cruz singing the national anthem in full mariachi garb to the Khan family holding a copy of the Constitution, the Democratic National Convention did present itself as a stark contrast to what the GOP was offering. The theme of inclusion ran high and, indeed, current president Barack Obama made his call for strength in unity, explicitly saying “And most of all I see Americans of every party, every background, every faith who believe we are stronger together, black white, Latino, Asian, Native American, young, old, gay, straight, men, women, folks with different abilities, all pledging allegiance, under the same proud flag, to this big bold country that we love.” One flag to rule them all. “America the greatest and most diverse nation on Earth shall ransack the globe as it sees fit. ” General John Allen, standing before a multi ethnic group of people continued upon this theme and made the connection between a more inclusive union and explicit projection of American might “Every American, in uniform or out, in the White House or at home, must be a force for unity in America, for a vision that includes all of us: every man and woman, every race, every ethnicity, every faith and creed, every gender orientation – all of us together pursuing our common values. “From the battlefield to the capitals of our allies, friends, and partners, the free peoples of the world look to America as the last best hope for peace and for liberty for all humanity, for we ARE the greatest country on this planet. “So we stand before you tonight to endorse Hillary Clinton for President of the United States of America.” The message could not be clearer. Sorry Donald Trump, we are all Americans here. No apologies rest of the world, America the greatest and most diverse nation on Earth shall ransack the globe as it sees fit. The response to the white nationalism of Donald Trump has been the rainbow coalition of hawks as chiefly embodied in the persons of Barrack Obama and Hillary Clinton. Hillary Clinton: The Obliterator of Nations Hillary Clinton is a war criminal. So is John Kerry. So is Condoleezza Rice. So are Colin Powell and Madeleine Albright. The secretary of state in an imperialist nation is the immediate manager of the projected might of the empire they represent. Hillary Clinton is known to be a war hawk for much the same reason Donald Trump is known as a white nationalist. She is blatant and crass about it. “We came. We saw. He died” – Hillary Clinton on the assassination of Ghadaffi “In the next 10 years, during which they might foolishly consider launching an attack on Israel, we would be able to totally obliterate them” – Hillary Clinton speaking of obliteration of 75 million Iranians. For much of the past few months the Clinton campaign have bemoaned a Russian conspiracy to reveal the words that Hillary Clinton actually wrote and thereby influence the American election. Hillary Clinton’s neo-Mcarthyite cold war against her own words and general war talk on Russia should come as no surprise to anyone paying any attention. She was hawkish on Russia in their land dispute with Georgia over Ossetia, even going so far as to arm the Georgian government in 2010 less than two years after the conflict. She was warlike on the conflict in the Ukraine, promising Ukrainian government officials as recent as September of this year to stand with them against “Russian aggression.” “A Clinton presidency is the will of the ruling class.” This is the talk of someone prepared for a nuclear apocalypse. It should be mentioned, however, that Obama has also dialed up his anti Russian rhetoric, as has Tim Kaine, as has Mike Pence. It is only the white nationalist orange demon -- guided only by his own whims and twitter feuds -- that is at all off script on this question. Ultimately a Clinton presidency is the will of the ruling class. If she wants war it is a reflection of their desire for war. If they want the bombs to fall then death will rain from the sky. So long as they hold power they shall exercise it. So long as there is a ruling class they shall rule by fire and blood, because there truly is no alternative. Because ultimately, this is about Clinton and then again it isn’t. And this is about the Democrats and then again it isn’t. This is about the US and this is about war. Hillary Clinton is a 2016 warlord. War is a racket. And so is this God damn election. Matt Sedillo can be contacted at [email protected] .

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Lebanon s army said on Friday it had arrested Islamist militants who were planning attacks in the country after foreign embassies warned their citizens to avoid public places. Army intelligence carried out several raids arresting 19 people linked to a cell belonging to Islamic State, the army said in a statement. Security forces were taking extra precautions, it added. The cell which had planned and prepared to carry out terrorist action was led by Egyptian Fadi Ibrahim Ahmed, who was based in the Ain el-Hilweh Palestinian refugee camp in southern Lebanon, the army said. Lebanon s Interior Ministry said earlier it was looking into warnings issued by foreign embassies over potential attacks in the country, but that there was no need to panic. These warnings are based on information from a foreign intelligence agency, the ministry said. Lebanese security services are following up to check its authenticity and accuracy ... There is no cause for fear or exaggeration. The French Embassy in Beirut urged French citizens in Lebanon on Friday to be vigilant over the next 48 hours, citing an elevated risk of attack targeting public places . The U.S. Embassy said earlier in the week it had barred staff from visiting the Casino du Liban in Jounieh, north of Beirut. Canada also warned its citizens on Thursday to avoid that area.

@decyberdiva @MichaelaAngelaD It's a robbery the second you touch an employee. W/out weapons it's strong arm robbery.

#YesAllCops MT“@SoulRevision: The cop who shot #MikeBrown is on paid leave. Shoot a black kid, get a paid vacation. #WeAreTargets #Ferguson”

There was the breadcrumb dropped on Valentine’s Day, by the of my friend. The two women hadn’t spoken in months, after a prolonged breakup, and the ex was now seeing somebody new. Yet there she was, on the day of romance, “liking” my friend’s Instagram photo … from three weeks ago. Which meant she had to have been scrolling through her feed. There was the friend, a digital strategist who, every few days, would receive a “sup” from a recruiter, except that the recruiter would never set up a time to meet. Once, my friend returned to his desk to find a “failed Google hangout” notification from this person, to which the recruiter later messaged to apologize for the “butt dial. ” My friend Victor Pineiro asked: “Was this a new recruiting tactic? Or just specific to this guy?” I’ve had my own share of breadcrumbers: the editor at the publication where I was vying for a job who repeatedly viewed my LinkedIn page (which I could see) but never messaged me the guy I went out with a couple of times who continued to text me every few weeks to “check in” months after we stopped seeing each other. Alicia Winokur, a recent graduate of Mount Holyoke College, said: “The worst type of breadcrumber is the one who resurfaces every six months, and like the Loch Ness monster, you almost can’t believe this creature has come back into your life. But there he is, saying, ‘Hey, I was just thinking about you. ’” “It’s like a meerkat poking its head up,” she added. “But not nearly as cute. ” For anyone who’s ever dated, or maintained any kind of relationship, in the digital age, you have probably known a breadcrumber. They communicate via sporadic noncommittal, but repeated messages — or breadcrumbs — that are just enough to keep you wondering but not enough to seal the deal (whatever that deal may be). Breadcrumbers check in consistently with a romantic prospect, but never set up a date. They pique your interest, of that prospective job, perhaps, by reminding you repeatedly that it exists, but never set up the interview. Breadcrumbers are one step shy of ghosters, who disappear without a trace, but are in more frequent contact than a person giving you the fade. On the hierarchy of digital communication, the breadcrumber is the lowest form. “It really is a cousin of the ‘friend zone,’” said Rachel Simmons, an author and leadership coach at Smith College. “It’s about relegating a person to a particular dead end, but one that still keeps them hanging on in some way. ” One can presume that the term breadcrumbing came from the fairy tale of Hansel and Gretel, at least according to Urban Dictionary. In the tale, Hansel snags a slice of bread in order to leave a trail of breadcrumbs so he and his sister, Gretel, can find their way home. Hansel’s breadcrumbs were a bust (a bird ate them) but the term was adopted by early computer programmers to describe those little navigation tabs that lead you back to home. The breadcrumbs we’re talking about do the opposite. They lead you astray. Among the different types of breadcrumbers: who try to entice you with a text message of a URL, but without providing any context or setup bitmojiers, or their cousins, snapchatters, who, rather than communicate with actual words, prefer to remain ambiguous with an exaggerated cartoon of themselves holding up a sign that says, “LOL. ” (LOL to what, though?) “God forbid you say ‘How are you? ’” said Hilary Campbell, an illustrator in Brooklyn and the victim of a Bitmoji breadcrumber. There are creepers, who peep your social media pages but never make contact, even when they know that you know they have viewed your page there are zombies, who from the dead, so to speak, after months of no correspondence and there are text bubblers, or those who type a message, stop, begin typing again and then stop, creating a specific kind of digital hell. “My brother breadcrumbs me constantly,” said Libby Leffler, a graduate student in Boston. “He’ll send me random links on Reddit and then disappear. Sometimes in response I am like, ‘Did you die?’ ‘Do I need to file a missing person’s report? ’” Like most of today’s torturous microcommunications, we have technology to thank for breadcrumbs. Sure, they may have existed a decade ago (a nod on the street, a “what’s up” in the hallway — these were technically breadcrumbs, right?) but they didn’t have quite the same “desperate wondering about what someone means,” Ms. Simmons said. “These are connections, not conversations,” said Sherry Turkle, a professor at M. I. T. who studies how technology shapes modern relationships. “They can have the paradoxical effect of making the person who receives them feel let down rather than gratified, but then, confused: Is one asking for too much? Should one feel satisfied with a smiley face or a series of exclamation marks or a string of emojis? What constitutes being recognized?” In a dating context, this can be particularly complex. There’s breadcrumbing when you’ve broken up with someone but you don’t want to let them go there’s breadcrumbing as a way of keeping a dating prospect on “hold” (what Ms. Turkle calls “activated but not active”). Or there’s breadcrumbing as a kind of game: when a person is “not interested in you, but interested in themselves staying relevant to you,” as Ms. Campbell said. “I had a breadcrumber who I’m convinced deliberately tried to use as few characters as possible in his messages so as to not seem too interested,” said Jordana Narin, a rising college senior who wrote a Modern Love column about her generation’s inability to commit. “So a sample text from him would be ‘wht are ur plans tmro’ or ‘are u in city,’ abbreviating some words and writing others out fully. It was like a game of how little effort could he put into it. ” Rest assured, though, there are ways to beat breadcrumbers at their own game. Sara Wilson, who works in social media marketing in Los Angeles, said she has developed a methodology for identifying a breadcrumber. It’s centered upon a few key phrases she calls “lazy to the power of 100,” which include: “Yo” “Fun night?” “Ha” “Sup” “Nice” “hey stranger” “It’s like the digital equivalent of a sneeze,” she said. Or, one may take the approach of Ms. Leffler. “Whenever people are breadcrumbish to me, I always reply to them with less words than they send me,” she said. “So if they were like, ‘sounds good,’ I would respond with ‘thumbs up. ’”

CHICAGO (Reuters) - A Chicago activist sued U.S. immigration authorities on Wednesday alleging they denied renewal of her immigration status in retaliation for her political activity. Irere Unzueta, 29, who came to the United States from Mexico in 1994 when she was 6 years old, applied for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) in 2013 and was granted immigration relief despite a history of arrests at demonstrations. But when she applied last year to renew her DACA status - which allows undocumented immigrants who entered the country before they were 16 to work legally and be exempt from deportation for a two-year period - it was denied. According to the lawsuit against the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), the agency cited Unzueta’s civil disobedience in its explanation of the denial, saying that “Ms. Unzueta’s case raised public safety concerns.” The denial “punishes her for engaging in constitutionally protected, peaceful political actions,” Mony Ruiz Velasco, a lawyer who represented Unzueta in her application for DACA, said at a news conference on Wednesday. Unzueta told reporters she has lost two job opportunities while fighting to renew her immigration status and said she brought the lawsuit because she is worried that hundreds of other students who spoke up about immigration issues could be targeted. She has never been convicted of any crime. The media office at USCIS said they do not comment on individual cases. President Barack Obama initiated DACA in 2012, and then tried to expand it in 2014. The Supreme Court is considering challenges by a number of states to the expanded DACA and to a separate Obama program that would have granted immigration benefits to parents of children who are legally in the United States. The DACA designation is not a path to permanent resident status but has been controversial because Obama enacted it unilaterally. Unzueta and her family participated in a wave of campaigns around the country to push for DACA. She attended high school in Chicago and graduated from the University of Illinois at Chicago in 2009. The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, asks the court to find that the immigration authorities erred in denying Unzueta the renewal she sought. Although her application for immigration relief was denied, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency has not initiated deportation proceedings against Unzueta.

HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwe opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai suffered severe vomiting after a party meeting and was airlifted to a Johannesburg hospital, a senior party source said on Saturday. Tsvangirai - who is due to challenge President Robert Mugabe in elections next year - was stable, the source said, dismissing reports in the media that he was dangerously sick. The 65-year-old s symptoms came on suddenly at a meeting of his opposition coalition, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), on Thursday evening in Kadoma, a city around 160 km (100 miles) southwest of the capital Harare, the source said. Two other Zimbabwean political sources confirmed the details of his sudden illness and airlift on Friday to South Africa. But the MDC said in an official statement that Tsvangirai was in South Africa for a routine medical procedure. Morgan Tsvangirai ... is in a very stable condition contrary to morbid media reports that he is critical and is battling for his life, the MDC statement said. The announcement came a month after Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa, seen as a favorite to succeed 93-year-old Mugabe, was rushed to South Africa for emergency medical care. Mnangagwa, who has since returned, dismissed local media speculation that he had been poisoned. Tsvangirai said last year that he was being treated for colon cancer. The party source said on Saturday the sudden illness was not related to that condition.

A U.S. official told Congress on Tuesday it would be “rational” to legislate a path for citizenship for illegal immigrants who came to the United States as children, but within hours the administration backtracked, saying his comments did not state the views of President Donald Trump. The Trump administration last month ended the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy, which began in 2012 under former President Barack Obama. The program allowed nearly 800,000 so-called “Dreamers” to work legally in the United States without being deported. The policy was aimed at young people who came to the United States illegally as children. The administration said it ended DACA because Obama overstepped his constitutional authority by creating the policy without Congressional approval. Trump called on Congress to enact a law to protect DACA recipients, and last month angered some fellow Republicans by negotiating with congressional Democratic leaders on possible legislation. At a Senate hearing, Republican Senator John Kennedy asked Homeland Security official Michael Dougherty about Dreamers. “Should they be allowed to stay?” “Under a rational bill these individuals would be able to become lawful permanent residents with a pathway to citizenship,” Dougherty, assistant Department of Homeland Security secretary for border, immigration and trade policy, responded. “So the president believes they should be allowed to stay,” Kennedy responded. “The president, yes, would like to work with Congress to get a solution,” Dougherty said, declining to give further specifics on conditions under which Dreamers should be allowed to stay in the country. Hours later, DHS moved to distance the administration from Dougherty’s testimony. “Mr. Dougherty was not stating administration policy or the President’s views,” said Tyler Q. Houlton, the DHS deputy press secretary. “The White House will be issuing its priorities for immigration reform in the coming week.” The Trump administration has sent conflicting signals on the immigration issue, a focus of Trump’s 2016 campaign. Candidate Trump promised to end DACA and ultimately fulfilled that promise, but he has also expressed sympathy for the young immigrants it benefited. During the hearing, Dougherty said the administration’s immigration priorities include border control, better vetting, reducing visa overstays, reforming non-immigrant business visas and establishing a merit-based system that favors skilled immigrants. He said the administration also wants to expand its ability to quickly remove people who enter illegally and do not claim asylum. Republicans in Congress have introduced several bills that would fulfill aspects of Trump’s agenda, but many Democrats and immigration groups see the proposals as poison pills that would kill the chance for a deal. Democrats say it is unfair to make legislation helping DACA recipients contingent on a broad suite of enforcement and reform measures. “Please do not put the burden on the Dreamers to accept every aspect of comprehensive immigration reform to get a chance to become citizens of the United States,” Senator Dick Durbin said during the hearing. Last month Trump said he was close to a deal with top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer and top House of Representatives Democrat Nancy Pelosi on protections for DACA recipients that would have border security measures without funding construction of a wall along the U.S.-Mexican border that he promised during the campaign. After meeting with the Democrats, Trump said, “We’re not looking at citizenship” for Dreamers. But Pelosi and Schumer said Trump had embraced provisions of a bipartisan proposal called the Dream Act that would grant permanent legal resident status to Dreamers who qualify, and eventually, a pathway to U.S. citizenship. House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, who dined on Monday with Trump and other Republicans, was asked whether the president’s tentative agreement with Schumer and Pelosi was still live. “I think what Nancy said when she left the meeting is different from what everybody else in the meeting had the impression of,” McCarthy said, declining to answer further questions. An aide to Pelosi later said “there is no change in our understanding” after “subsequent conversations” with the White House. The aide spoke on condition of anonymity. Schumer, at a news conference after the Democratic caucus, said, “We were explicit that the president would support...the Dream Act. If they are backing off that, we ought to know.”

Manuel Elkin Patarroyo, a famous Colombian scientific, wrote a message about the coronavirus and sided against the WHO.

As Venezuela enters year eighteen of the Bolivarian Socialist Revolution, the international community is finally paying attention, as Venezuelans struggle to find food, medicine, and an outlet for their frustration that will not trigger rampant state violence. [There is no short version of the story of how South America’s wealthiest nation, which boasts the world’s largest known oil reserves, became a nation where 15 percent of people need to scavenge through garbage to eat while the nation’s dictator dances on state television. Venezuela’s decline is the inevitable endgame of socialism, told by the deterioration of its streets, the abuse of its opposition politicians, and the use of the military to maim and kill Venezuelan children as young as 14. Below, 20 images show the true toll of socialism in Venezuela. December 2011: While the death of Hugo Chávez allowed for socialist leaders to rapidly develop the cult of personality around him as a saint and martyr of socialism, the North cult worship of Chávez began during his lifetime. In 2011, chavista government officials put together a Christian “nativity scene” depicting Chávez as the baby Jesus figure, surrounded by founding fathers such as Simón Bolívar. (L’encre Noir) May 2011: As violent drug and gang activity flourished under Chávez, Venezuelans grew to fear murder at the hands of thugs so much that they prayed to dead thugs to protect them, creating idols known as “santos malandros” — ”holy thugs“ — and offering them small sacrifices in exchange for safety on urban streets. (AP Photo) May 20, 2017: Protesters flood the streets of San Cristóbal, the capital of westernmost Táchira state, where resistance to socialism has been often the most aggressive. (Luis Images) May 20, 2017: Caracas is also no stranger to giant peaceful opposition mobilizations, with the below protest occurring on the same day as the Táchira march. (Federico Images) July 2016: Táchira residents cross the border between Táchira and Colombia by the tens of thousands to purchase necessary home goods unavailable in Venezuelan stores. Families crossed to buy detergent, paper towels, food, and other needs. (George ) August 2015: To prevent Venezuelans from fleeing, and in protest of objections to human rights violations in the country from Colombia, Maduro shut the border down and violently deported all Colombian citizens on the border. Homes where Colombian citizens used to live were marked “D” for “demolition,” to erase any trace of Colombians there. Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos denounced the move as using “Nazi ghetto tactics” against a friendly neighboring country. (Foto:Blu Radio) February 2014: Long before Táchira residents found themselves scrambling into Colombia for basic foods, however, they began demanding free exercise of political rights. Táchira was the first state to take down a likeness of dictator Hugo Chávez, nearly a year after the late dictator died. (Twitter) WARNING: GRAPHIC February 15, 2015: San Cristóbal residents gather around the lifeless body of Kluivert Roa, 14, shot and killed by Venezuelan soldiers while walking home from school. Witnesses say Roa saw a protest while walking home and shouted “stop the repression!” before soldiers shot him in the head. (George Castellanos via Clarín) WARNING: GRAPHIC May 20, 2017: Due to the presence of armed soldiers and armed chavista gangs known as colectivos, protesters have grown extremely concerned that infiltrated government agents have joined the protests. During this protest, young protesters surrounded Orlando Figuera, accused of being a thief and chavista, and burned him alive. (AFP) April 1, 2014: While the government has reserved its most intense violence for the average protester, it has not relented on attacking government members of the opposition, either. Below, lawmaker Maria Corina Machado (center) — illegally ousted from the National Assembly — flees as soldiers attack her with tear gas during a peaceful protest. (Twitter) April 2017: Maduro has rounded up and arrested many opposition leaders. The most prominent among them is the head of the Popular Will party, Leopoldo López, who was banned from seeing family for a month this year. Below, wife Lilian Tintori points up at her husband’s prison cell in the notorious Ramo Verde military prison, surrounded by soldiers ensuring she could not meet him. (Ronaldo Images) January 11, 2010: The violence that Bolivarian Socialism has brought to Venezuela only tells half the story. The other half is one of extreme poverty, where the value of the currency, the bolívar, has been in freefall for years. Even those with money struggle to find a store that is properly stocked. During the Chávez era, finding junk food and unhealthy soda in supermarkets was still possible, but not without encountering soldiers posted to prevent visitors from photographing the shortages or attempting to buy more than “necessary. ” During the Maduro era, the government implemented a strict ration card system. (Juan Images) May 2016: The below image is not an uncommon find in Venezuelan supermarkets. (Juan ) June 2016: The cities of Caracas are lined with garbage, and up to 15 percent of the population need to dig through garbage to eat. The crisis is particularly affecting children, who are growing and have specific nutrition requirements impossible to meet with the average Venezuelan diet. (Sumarium. com) March 2017: While human families struggle to feed themselves, Venezuela’s zoos have been almost completely unable to fulfill the needs of their animals. In March, rare images inside a Venezuelan zoo (the Venezuelan military severely limits the public’s photographing rights) surfaced showing Ruperta, a African elephant, showing clear signs of malnutrition. The Venezuelan government denied that the elephant was suffering. (Twitter) September 2016: Hospitals are faring little better than Venezuela’s supermarkets. Shortages of drugs and medical supplies have plagued the country for years, sending infant and maternal mortality rates skyrocketing. Below, a hospital uses cardboard boxes as cribs for their newborns. ( ) May 8, 2017: The staggering shortages have triggered waves of protests, like the one above in Táchira and daily protests in Caracas since March. Maduro has had two responses to the protests: extreme military violence against civilians … [Federico Images] November 2016: … and dancing. The dictator dances on the set of his new radio program, Salsa Time. ( government) November 2016: Maduro has also done nothing to successfully improve the economy. In November, the pile of bolivares, shown below, was worth $100. The value has decreased significantly since. (Ben News) December 16, 2016: Maduro attempted to improve the ease of use of the bolívar by outlawing the note and replacing it with larger denominations. The larger denominations were not printed in time, so the value of Venezuela’s notes went to zero overnight. Venezuelans began burning the bills or ceremonially tossing them in trash cans. (George Images.) Follow Frances Martel on Facebook and Twitter.

Alec Baldwin has a warning for anyone “on deck” to run against President Donald Trump in 2020: you are not going to win. [In an interview with Extra, the Boss Baby actor said that he would enter politics if only to offer “something different” to the American people. “I would love to run for office because I think people need something different,” Baldwin said, adding, “I think that all the people that are on deck in 2020, none of them are going to win. ” “None of those people are going to beat [Trump],” the star continued. “You think things are bad now I tell you when things are going to be worse, if he wins again. ” To be clear, Baldwin, who has spent months playing Donald Trump on Saturday Night Live, ruled out adding himself to the ballet: “We’re not going to do that. ” Asked if he is worried that his new memoir, titled Nevertheless, will caused controversy, Baldwin said “I’m married, we have a wonderful family, that’s all I care about. ” Earlier this week, Baldwin appeared on Good Morning America to promote his new book, during which he opened up about a 2007 voicemail to his daughter Ireland. “It’s thrown in your face every day,” Baldwin said of the voicemail, which was leaked to the media, and caught the actor calling his daughter a “rude, thoughtless little pig. ” “There are people who admonish me, or attack me, and use that as a constant spearhead to do that,” Baldwin explained. “It’s a scab that never heals because it’s been picked at all the time by so many people. I think my daughter, that’s hurt her in a permanent way. ” On Tuesday, producer Dana Brunetti — who worked with Baldwin on the 2006 independent film Mini’s First Time — slammed the actor’s claim in his biography that he did not know he was filming sex scenes with an underage Nikki Reed. Follow Jerome Hudson on Twitter: @JeromeEHudson

Former GOP presidential hopeful Linsdey Graham has announced his endorsement of Jeb Bush for president. Graham's presidential campaign went nowhere, but as a senator from the early voting state of South Carolina he hopes to still have some clout. Graham praised Bush's temperament Friday morning, following Thursday night's GOP debate. "He hasn't tried to get ahead in a contested primary by embracing demagoguery ... he's not running to be commander-in-chief by running people down," he said. That was clearly a reference to Donald Trump. Bush returned the admiration, calling Graham a "patriot." "He loves this country. You just hear it how he spoke from his heart about what's at stake here. What's at stake is our way of life," Bush said. Jeb Bush — still slumping in polls — has been looking for a way to jump-start his campaign, but an endorsement from a former candidate who couldn't break through either probably won't give Bush the upswing he needs. With the Iowa caucuses fewer than three weeks away, he's polling behind Trump, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio and Ben Carson both nationally and in Iowa. Bush was unable to stand out from the field once again at Thursday's Republican presidential debate. And Bush's donors are reportedly getting skittish, saying it's only a matter of time before he drops out. Politico reported that several donors said they are now waiting for what one former George W. Bush administration appointee described as a "family hall pass" to switch to another campaign after the New Hampshire primary.

More than one-quarter of Americas young adults are too fat to serve in the U.S. military

Home / Foreign Affairs / The Fix is In — Russia Kicked Off UN Human Rights Council, While Terrorist Saudi Arabia Re-Elected The Fix is In — Russia Kicked Off UN Human Rights Council, While Terrorist Saudi Arabia Re-Elected Jay Syrmopoulos October 29, 2016 1 Comment New York, NY – Russia lost an election to the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) for the first time since the council’s inception in 2006 – narrowly being beaten out by Croatia – as arguably the biggest supporter of terrorism in the world, Saudi Arabia, was re-elected to the council in spite of strong condemnation from global human rights organizations. The 47 council seats are elected for a three-year term and regionally distributed, with staggered elections for one third of the seats every year. Russia had just completed a three-year term running against both Hungary and Croatia for the two available seats from Eastern Europe. After the U.S. lobbied heavily against the Russians, Hungary finished substantially ahead in the voting, with Croatia receiving 114 votes and Russia garnering only 112 votes of the 193 member countries. “It was a very close vote and very good countries competing, Croatia, Hungary. They are fortunate because of their size, they are not exposed to the winds of international diplomacy. Russia is very exposed. We’ve been in the UNHRC for several years, and I am sure next time we will stand and get back in,” Russia’s UN envoy Vitaly Churkin said. Russia will be eligible to run for a seat on the UNHRC again next year. Staunch U.S. ally, and renowned global terror exporter, Saudi Arabia, easily made it onto the council with 152 votes on the Asian ballot, and will represent the region alongside Iraq, Japan and China for the next three years. According to a report from RT : South Africa, Rwanda, Egypt and Tunisia were chosen from the African group, Cuba and Brazil from Latin America and the Caribbean, and the US and the UK will represent the Western bloc, which comprises Western Europe and North America. Over the next term, which will last between 2017 and 2019, the 14 chosen members will be tasked with formulating the UN’s official position on conflicts occurring around the world, as well as the domestic policies of member states. It should be noted that the U.S. is intentionally attempting to utilize the UN as a tool to forward their “aggressive Russia” narrative, thus removing Russia from the council is paramount to the American goal of labeling Russia as a human rights violator. A number of the worlds most prestigious non-governmental human rights organizations, have come forward to claim that the UNHRC has been hijacked by oppressive regimes (like the Saudis) looking to deflect criticism and drive their own agendas. Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International produced a joint statement earlier this year condemning Saudi Arabia’s “appalling record of violations” in Yemen, where it has been accused of war crimes over the bombing of Houthi rebels — resulting in the deaths of up to 4,000 civilians. Both organizations have called for Saudi Arabia, a council member since 2006, to be suspended from the UNHRC without success. Exposing the rampant corruption within the UN system, just last month Saudi Arabia used its power in the council to block an outside inquiry into the Kingdom’s 157 domestic executions last year – often by beheading – while simultaneously heading a successful resolution that allowed their allies from the exiled Yemeni government to investigate numerous human rights abuses committed by Saudi Arabia in Yemen. Russia dismissed a petition signed by 80 NGOs, as “cynical” and “dishonorable,” and said the accusations were motivated more by politics than by concern for human rights. The groups, which included Human Rights Watch and Refugees International, asked the voting countries to “question seriously whether Russia’s role in Syria which includes supporting and undertaking military actions which have routinely targeted civilians and civilian objects renders it fit to serve on the UN’s premier inter-governmental human rights institution.” Make no mistake that the exclusion of the Russians from the council is a strategic move, orchestrated by the United States, as means of both marginalizing Russian influence, and stacking the deck against them in an effort to control the global narrative regarding Russia’s role as an international peacemaker. The goal is to propagandize people into buying into the “aggressive Russia” narrative continually parroted by US war hawks. When Saudi Arabia, a nation that beheaded twice the number of people as ISIS last year , and one of the biggest exporters of global terrorism, is on the Human Rights Council – while the Russia is summarily dismissed because they challenge the U.S. narrative in Syria – it becomes increasingly apparent that the UN is nothing more than a tool to forward U.S. empire globally. Share Google + morris This is some sort of sick joke, why doesn’t the west start acting like they have some semblance of responsibility to if not those that gave them Power well then future generations. The West has already made it abundantly clear that because usa loses its Reserve Currency status they will happily take the entire Planet out with them. This is usa pulling the strings as usual with it’s witless cohorts obeying as told. Social Trending

@SI_Bike_Assoc @Maddog_Squid @errollouis I wasn't talking to you.

Archives Michael’s Latest Video What Is Causing The Strange Noises In The Sky That Are Being Heard All Over The World? By Michael Snyder, on March 22nd, 2012 During the second half of 2011, a lot of people all over the planet started reporting hearing really strange noises coming from the sky. In some instances the noises produced a loud rumbling such as a train, a thunderstorm or the slamming of a heavy door would make. In other instances, the noises sounded more like “groaning”. In yet other instances the noises sounded almost as if a trumpet was playing. Dozens of videos went up on YouTube purporting to document this phenomenon, but the truth is that you can fake almost anything on a YouTube video and many dismissed these strange “strange sounds” as an Internet hoax. However, now entire towns in the northern part of the United States are hearing strange noises in the sky and the mainstream media is reporting on it. In fact, one U.S. town is planning to spend thousands of dollars to hire an engineering firm to investigate where these strange sounds are coming from. At this point a lot of theories about these strange noises are being floated, but so far scientists have not been able to give us a definitive explanation for the source of these strange noises. So exactly what in the world is going on? This phenomenon made national news again this week because of what has been going on in Clintonville, Wisconsin. Hundreds of residents of Clintonville reported hearing incredibly loud noises coming from the sky for several nights in a row. Even CBS News is reporting on what is happening in Clintonville…. Since Sunday, the residents have been disturbed by “booming” noises loud enough to wake them from their sleep. Last night, hundreds of people attended a public meeting to get to the bottom of booms. But they aren’t any closer to the truth. One resident told CBS News, “The last few days we’ve been having (a) booming shaking noise.” Another resident said, “(For) a lot of people the house is rattling, you can feel the ground rattling, and it’s booming all the time. It’s kind of like, what’s going on? You don’t know what’s happening.” So what is causing these noises that are so loud that even the ground is shaking? According to Fox News , the town has investigated every possible explanation that they can think of for these strange noises…. City officials say they have investigated every possible human cause. They checked water, sewer and gas lines, contacted the military about any exercises in the area, reviewed permits for mining explosives and inspected a dam next to City Hall. They even tested methane levels at the landfill in case the gas was spontaneously exploding. So far no explanation has been found. So Clintonville has decided to spend $7,000 to hire an engineering firm to investigate the cause of these strange noises. According to geologists, the town does not sit on any fault lines and the ground beneath the town is very solid. Some geologists are claiming that “ micro-quakes ” could have been responsible, but others find this explanation to be very unsatisfying. For many town residents, solving the mystery is not as important as getting these strange noises to stop so that they can get some sleep. The following comes from the recent Fox News article mentioned above…. “My husband thought it was cool, but I don’t think so. This is not a joke,” said Jolene Van Beek, who awoke early Sunday to a loud boom that shook her house. “I don’t know what it is, but I just want it to stop.” But Clintonville is not the only town in Wisconsin where strange sounds are being reported. Mysterious noises are also being reported in a town called Montello which is 80 miles away from Clintonville. Posted below is a local news report that discusses the strange noises that are being reported in Clintonville and Montello…. These strange sounds have made the mainstream news up in Canada as well. Recently, strange noises caused such a violent shaking that they actually brought down a barn on Vancouver Island in British Columbia. Geologists say that no earthquake occurred at the time that the barn collapsed. So what caused the barn to collapse? That is a very good question. And this is not just a North American phenomenon. If you go on to YouTube and you do a search for “strange sounds” or “strange noises” you will find dozens of videos from all over the world. Yes, there are definitely a few videos that appear to be hoaxes, but is that true with all of them? The evidence for this phenomenon is mounting and it is getting really hard to deny that there really are large numbers people all over the globe that swear that they are hearing really strange sounds coming from the sky. So exactly what in the world is going on? Well, there are a lot of theories floating around on the Internet. The following are some of the most prominent theories about what is causing these strange noises: electromagnetic noise, earthquakes, “fracking”, rock bursts, venting of high-pressure gas that has been trapped underground, meteor showers, HAARP or directed energy weapons, and some believe that all of this is just a giant publicity stunt. Perhaps the biggest reason why these strange noises have so many people alarmed is because humans generally have a great fear of the unknown. If the cause of these strange noises is revealed, the hysteria will die down. But if these strange noises continue (or even become more intense) and there continues to be no scientific explanation for them, then the hysteria may turn into full-blown panic. What is clear is that our planet is becoming increasingly unstable. As I have documented previously, earthquakes are becoming more frequent and more powerful. The “ Ring of Fire ” is becoming a lot more active and we have been seeing a disturbing amount of volcanic activity lately. So could earth changes have anything to do with these strange noises? We just don’t know at this point. Most of the time when I write an article I like to have some answers. But I do not know what is causing these strange sounds. So what do you think about these strange noises? Do you believe that you know why they are happening? Have you heard strange sounds coming from the sky where you live? Please feel free to share your thoughts by leaving a comment below…. It is necessary to determine the origin of these sounds: natural or artificial. I think these sounds are artificial, for nature as it is not natural. But I admit that I could be wrong. ScoutMotto I don’t doubt that some of the videos are valid, however I heard one from I think Hungary where amidst the groaning sounds, there was a piece of music played backward for a couple seconds. I sampled the soundtrack, played it backward in Goldwave, and it sounded like a short percussion piece. Hard to take that one seriously, which causes doubt to be cast on others of like style. But, I’m not writing it all off just yet. Guido Heraldsofthemorn The destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70 is an example of the destruction of the world at the end of time, see Matthew 24 and the book The Great Controversy. Here is a paragraph from the book Great Controversy that tells of signs and wonders before the destruction. “Signs and wonders appeared, foreboding disaster and doom. In the midst of the night an unnatural light shone over the temple and the altar. Upon the clouds at sunset were pictured chariots and men of war gathering for battle. The priests ministering by night in the sanctuary were terrified by mysterious sounds; the earth trembled, and a multitude of voices were heard crying: “Let us depart hence.” The great eastern gate, which was so heavy that it could hardly be shut by a score of men, and which was secured by immense bars of iron fastened deep in the pavement of solid stone, opened at midnight, without visible agency.”—Milman, The History of the Jews, book 13. – {GC 29.3} Could these sounds that are being heard be part of the signs and wonders before the end? Mike Ayala Greetings, You have no idea how unstable the earth really is! Humanity is going to have a wake-up call one day that is going to make the movie 2012 look patheticly simplistic and relatively uneventful in comparison. The problem stems from the release of heat as rock falls through magma: the volume of the rock decreases as it melts, and at the same time it releases enough heat energy to melt many times its original volume – some suggest enough heat to melt 88-times the original volume. (You should gasp about now.) Up to the present we have enjoyed relative stability, a sort of sliding equillibrium, but that is changing at an increasingly rapid exponential rate which can be quantified by examining the increasing rate of “Great” earthquakes (8-plus) over the last 100 years which is startling to say the least. Some parts of the crust will be affected more than other, but all will feel the pain. The worst economic collapse ever will be remembered as the “good old days” in comparison to the run-away stage of this process. The recognition of this process gives new meaning to the prophecy, “There will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places.” The noises and shakings noted in the article probably do not have anything to do with this crust-contraction phenonenon, but there is coming a day when all who dwell on the earth will fear for the things they see and experience coming upon the earth. Hence, the most important preparation one can make is to prepare to meet God. For some it will be a time of exceeding joy; For the rest it will be the time of judgement and eternal torment and regret. Send me an email, and I will get you more information about this topic. God bless and protect you all. Mike Ayala JR So, Mike, how do we contact you, then? Or can you point us to the source of your information? Thanks! Mike Ayala Hi JR, The easiest way is to call and order a copy of a recent lecture given at Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa at the February Creation Science Investigation conference on 20120218. They are not a lot of money. The particular lecture covering this topic was: Earthquakes Kevin Lea 2/18/12 This one was a real eye-opener. I knew about the exponential increase in great earthquakes, but the magma details and the Pacific Ocean abberation/collapse/indentation were new to me. Another great presentation given at the same conference was by John Sanford: Genetic Entropy Dr. John Sanford 2/18/12 This one is about how the human gene pool is decayng at an astounding rate of conservatively 100-200 mutations per generation plus transcription errors in every cell division and what is the significance of these two factors. It does not paint a pretty picture. The bottom line is that we have no hope in this present world: All that we take for granted and hold dear will perish. We need to have our hope firmly rooted on the Rock of Jesus Christ who will regenerate our bodies and renew our minds and make a new heaven and earth in which righteousness will dwell. God bless and protect you and your family. Mike Ayala Ken West yes I would like to read more about this subject. Would appreciate what info. you have. Thanks Hollow earth theory coming alive. Underground civilizations in which all of our gold and other PMs are transfered to are having underground wars that are heating up, similar to the quakes on the east coast in VA to NY MB92083 Just saw on Fox news (Gretta V.S.) that the mystery was solved. They said it was caused by a minor (1.something) earthquake. This only applied to the WI incident. Blustery Day And of course you never change the channel. Fox is not reliable. They tell you what they want you to believe. PandaStar and that is different from any other news or network? Curtis In October of 2011, my wife and I were on our way to Lake Tahoe on highway 88 coming down the mountain toward highway 50 when we suddenly heard within our car (windows up), a sound so loud that it sounded as if a freight train was right next to our vehicle. This is an area that is pristine. There are no trains around. It was unexplainable. mondobeyondo There is still a lot more about our planet that we don’t know, than what we do know. Just like any arrogant teenager, we think we “know it all”… mark The only sounds that we hear on our ranch at his time of year are frogs and the creek that runs by our house. Oh yes, we can’t forget about the dogs, the coyotes, owls at night,cows,birds, a car or truck once in a while and sometimes a chain saw. Let’s not forget the sound of the wind in the trees or the rain hitting the roof. I guess we have not heard the groans of the earth yet. Gary2 All the strange sounds are coming from all the echo from Rush in conservatives empty heads. And yet another study showing conservatives to be dumb. Don’t Drink and Vote: New Study Says Alcohol (And General Thoughtlessness) Makes People More Conservative Getting drunk is known to cause erratic, irrational, and, overall, thoughtless behavior — public urination, bar fights, tears in the streets. Now, go ahead and add political conservatism to that list. A new study, published in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, tested whether low-effort thought promotes political conservatism, and part of the study measured alcohol’s effects on political positions. Researchers found that the higher the blood alcohol content, the more conservative the views on sex, education, and political identification became. Researchers hypothesized that drinking turns people Republican because political conservatism arises in the absence of deliberate thought. People with a lot on their minds, under time constraints, or told to respond in a cursory manner, rather than think deeply and use “recognition memory — an indicator of effortful thought — were also more conservative. “Together these data suggest that political conservatism may be a process consequence of low-effort thought,” the study concluded. The less you think (or more you drink), the more conservative you become? Shocker! Cheers to the right-wing. Guido That doesn’t sound subjective at all… DownWithLibs So, you WERE dropped on your head when you were born…only explanation!!!! Justa Guy I don’t know about groans of the earth, but I think I’m hearing groans of the blog right about now… Drunk Gary2 In other words DRINK UP and PARTY ON DUDE! P.S. – This explains why Berkeley and other party spots are such bastions of conservatism. Those damn conservatives are having too much fun. Its time for liberals to lighten up an tie one on. Guido I don’t think this is inexplicable. Years ago, in the 1980s, San Francisco’s boat people all reported loud, unusual noises coming from the bay. Theories ran wild, including Soviet subs, until scientists figured out it was the toadfish mating call. There are also lots of stories over the years about inexplicable humming in certain towns and areas. http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=91912&page=1#.T2v9XdlVXTc Here’s an article on the Kokomo Hum. I don’t know if there’s any similarity, but it wouldn’t surprise me. Perhaps the region sits on a nice piece of rock that can resonate like a tuning fork when it gets the right signal. Perhaps it is geological activity-we have seen a lot of earthquake activity in recent years. Who knows? Guido I watched one of the videos. It reminded me of the gag at the end of Red State where the kids fool the extremist church holdouts with trumpets played over an old fire department horn and convince them it’s the end of the world… Gary2wannabe Meeshall has been farting. Kannibal In Fresno, CA, this is a daily occurrence. The sound happens suddenly without any build up. It is extremely loud like 10 Jets, and shakes my walls and windows. Sometimes it suddenly just stops without fading away like a jet normally would. Sometimes it rumbles the sky for minutes at a time. I’ll be outside sometimes when it happens and look up in the sky but there is never anything there. Clear skies and no airplanes. I once heard a rumble at around 2am and ran outside to see if I could spot anything. What I saw was in the sky to the southwest. It was about 14 red lights it the formation of a boomerang and you couldn’t see between them. The space they took up was about the size of a football field. It was traveling very slowly as if it were slowly descending continuing southwest. I have never seen anything like this in my life. It sent a chill down my spine and I called out for my wife. She ran out and started freaking out. I know this sounds crazy but maybe it was just our government playing with there new toys. GunRights4US Clearly God’s pissed, and rightfully so. Sodom and Gomoarah had nothing on modern man in terms of pure evil. Man has an appointment to keep, whether he likes it or not. John You are about the only one who is closer to the truth than anyone could ever imagine… David M Maybe it’s an SSTO. Single Stage To Orbit spacecraft. Being run by our government making runs to orbit. It would have powerful engines to accelerate to orbit and would leave a long thunderous noise trail. Including sonic booms, that would shake the Earth, as it got up to a minimum of several thousand miles an hour. Someone should compare the sounds to a Shuttle launch. Ripplewind Mother Earth is preparing for war against us. Andrew Kind God is shaking what can be shaken before His Son returns. karen It’s Mother Earth giving you warning signs, but of course most will say it’s all a joke. And for christains it’s the same as in the bible… And the trumpets shall sound, you are being given a warning of things to come real soon. even the goverment knows this, they just don’t want you to know, that’s why a new executive order just came into effect 16 Mar 2012 National Defence Resources Preparedness they own everything you have now right down to a chicken in your yard. There is a great video out called 5 reasons why America will have the worst riots in the world, awesome truth!!! Anna On January 23rd I heard the noises , the deep and high trumpet/ groaning type, not the boom, but I was terrified, it was omnidirectional, not point of origin. When I compared what I heard to the sound of some of the Shofar videos , my hair stood on end. It was nearly identical, only on a much grander scale. Could be a deception, we are warned, Let no man deceive you, could be the real deal as well. Only God know and that is enough for me, He says 365 times in His Word, do not fear, so I have to trust Him. Walk with Christ and He will keep you fearless. Emily I do not say this lightly or with humor, Mother Earth is in pain and we are hearing her sorrow. Please remember, YAHWEH brought forth all life from Earth and she cries out for her children. JR Could it be the sound of our economy imploding under the feckless administration of Jimmy Carter Obama? Some people are talking about a coming magnetic poleshift (nothing new, has happened before), maybe the magnetic field are making those sounds? Intresting article Michael. Sunshine Yes, curious on magnetic shifting for possibility. Consider that one of the things said to be saturating the atmosphere through SRM, Solar Radiation Management is aluminum particles. Now, as far as I know, aluminum is NON magnetic. Disrupting the electromagnetic waves of the sunlight could be a factor in “climate change” since the sun plays a very big part in natural weather patterns. Could interfering with magnetic waves also cause strange noise? Now, why go to this great effort with such great risk? It could cause extreme weather patterns including melting the north pole. HAARP, the Aurora spy plane, fracking, and Biblical end of age signs? jason In january of this year i herd a noise coming out of the sky. I live in the wisconsin dells and at that time i could sweare a T-rex was going to come charging out of the woods at any moment. it was a little unsettling to see videos on youtube that show the same sound all over the world. at first i passed the sound off to be some kind of amplification to the mile away freeway but at 3 am the freeway is not that active. so what the hell is it? Newman Noggs Auroras can cause strange sounds from a distance, but usually they crackle, not boom. I would look for evidence of electromagnetic activity: increased ground voltage, St. Elmo’s fire, etc. From what I’ve read this is not a new phenomenon. Look up Seneca Guns. http://earthquake.usgs.gov/learn/topics/booms.php Billy Note to Gary2: You are indeed an idiot. MB92083 I’ll second that! He’s a nice guy, but delusional and brainwashed. Benjik I’m thoroughly convinced Gary2 is actually an extreme right-winger dead-set at portraying liberals/progressives to be extremely foolish and misinformed. That’s the only rational explanation….. Proftel Because only in the Northern Hemisphere? ? Jim It is the US gov playing with thier reversed engineered alien stealth spacecraft. I have also heard (with my sister) what sounded like a large flying spacecraft right over our heads with NOTHING around but sky. It was NOT a natural phenominum as soulded “man” made. Remember, the Gov tells us 10% of what we really should be knowing. Rosenkreuz How do you know what a large flying spacecraft sounds like? Denali It’s our Founding Fathers turning over in their graves. bruce smith Be Warned.. GOD is giving everyone a chance.. Signs and wonders are to allow people that have doubted in HIM to wake up.. When HE does return soon, it will be to gather the followers of HIS SONS teachings home with HIM..After that earth will be a living hell.. laura4basics I would never accuse people of making this up or of creating a hoax for attention. I will suggest looking up Tesla Technology GMA215 The so-called “experts” have now announced that the noises in WI are from a “swarm” of “mini-earthquakes.” Yeah. Sure they are. Saq It’s called the government. Possibly drilling more underground tunnels??!! babygirlway Thursday morning I woke up at around 5:00 a.m. hearing some sort of loud pounding noise coming from outside. It was repetitive. Our windows were open because it has been unusually warm for March in the Indianapolis area. So warm in fact that I had my large, remote control fan on next to my bed that I purchased last summer to help with my middle aged night sweats. LOL. Anyway, I had enough time to wake up and hear the noise above the fan, turn off the fan and still hear it going….it woke my husband up as well. It was not a construction noise. I never did figure out what it was. Did anyone else in the Indy area hear it? Benjik Something I have wondered about for years and never received a valid explanation on is what are the effects of pumping billions of barrels of oil out of the Earth with nothing to replace it? Wouldn’t that internally effect the general mass of our planet? How does that void effect the Earths rotation, gravitational properties, points of axis, etc? Think of the old “spinning egg” science experiment. When the internal properties of an egg are altered (boiled vs. raw), it has a direct effect on how it reacts to spinning it on a hard surface. Could this may be happening on a global scale? Any feedback would be appreciated. OldManNoal FINALLY SOMEONE IS ASKING THE RIGHT QUESTIONS!!! you’re onto something MASSIVE Benjik Marilynn The other night I had difficulty sleeping. I can always hear the “hum,” although it varies in volume, but I just ignore it. This time it was accompanied by an occasional groaning sound. It wasn’t very loud and I know it wasn’t a vehicle driving by or an airplane because it didn’t increase and diminish. Just a few seconds of a low “groaning,” then five to 10 seconds later it repeated about five or six times. The next day I read about the noises in Wisconsin. My guess is that it has something to do with military testing, perhaps some sort of sound wave experiment. This much is not theoretical: The government is ALWAYS engaged in experimentation of all sorts—chemical, biological, nuclear, electro-magnetic, geo-engineering, mind control, etc.—and they have no ethical qualms about testing this crap on human populations. yes,it is all in the new book, MAYDAY IN JOPLIN Gary2 I figured out what the noises are…Gog and Magog are tusseling over who gets to kick the beasts ass. mackie Sounds are the results of vibrations. And vibrations can be a result from many different events. Such as ‘space quakes’, which are the magnetic field lines which do compasses our earth and out into space. When we recieve a solar flare from the sun, these magnetic field lines are push or moved, and when two of these magnetic field lines touch each other they cause what is called a space quake. A space quake is a loud vibrating sound which is from the sky, and can be felt through the air, ground, and can even rattle your house. Another thing which can influence as well our earth is a heavy object such as a dwarf star, or planet x, or even a comet. These will either pull or push our orbital cycle, or even casue the earth to real to and fro like a drunkerd. Even thirdly, the earth’s core could be heating up, just like the rest of the planets in our solar system due to the sun’s output which has changed so much and is effecting all the planets. A warmer core would cause the increase of rotation of the earth. There is also the “fluff” in space as well which is effecting the sun, and everything else. There is so many things which we are not taught, but the information is out there for the learning if one wishes to go out and research it. We are blessed to have such a great resource through the internet. In life It is always a cause and effect. A.S. Michael, you already gave one reason, which is the most likely one: HAARP. It is the U.S. using HAARP for whatever selfish purposes, like attempting to subvert countries like China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, etc, to trade between themselves with their own currencies. The U.S. did it before and they will do it again. Jes http://endoftheamericandream.com/archives/what-are-the-strange-noises-in-the-sky-being-heard-all-over-the-world Booming Sounds could this be the result? – Here’s an excerpt on what really happened at the time of the Great Deluge (Noah’s Flood). It was a cataclysmic. – Geologists have recognized that these ridges are fracture lines on the earth’s crust. They have estimated some 200 million years ago the continents were joined together as one piece, and they have named this supercontinent Pangea. A model of the Pangea was presented in the section, Creation Mysteries. Since then Pangea broke up as a result of the earth’s Crust breaking up into pieces, or plates, which have since been drifting from each other or drifting towards each other. Thus the Americas are moving at a rate of an inch from Europe and Africa per year. The present separation is about 3,000 miles. The major mountain chains of the world such as the Alps and the Himalayas were formed by the collision of plates bearing these continental masses against each other. In other areas the collision caused one plate to go under the other as in the case of the Pacific plate moving under western edge of the US continent. This process is still continuing, hence the periodic earthquakes in California… Read more here… http://www.biblediscoveries.com/content/view/17/34/ Yeshua(Jesus) did say: Matityahu (Matthew) 24:37-41 As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage….. The End will be cataclysmic just as was the Beginning. Tesla2011 Haha, its sad billions or millions of earthlings have no clue. Its clear, what this is and I would only say this, the earth magnetic pole shifts and the layers of earth are all being testes and purposley being manipulated by mad scientist. Ofcourse, already its sounds mad bc, you ppl can’t belive it or the science of mechaniscim. This object is the one and only worlds most dangerous weapon… That’s High frequency Auroa Atmosphere Reasearc Program. The man, who created is the worlds genuis of all centuries. His name is Nikola Tesla and is the inventor of the electromagnetic transmitter gha would be later deveolped as a top notch weapon. Guido I suggested earlier the noise could be large rock formations underground resonating from earth movements. Beneath Wisconsin and other states in the region is a massive granite formation called the Superior Upland Shield. The US Navy exploits the resonating qualities of the shield to transmit Extreme Low Frequency communications with submerged submarines. They’re broadcasting at about 8 watts. The ELF transmitters are slow, but they can use the planet itself to transmit their signals to subs underwater in any ocean. Perhaps this sheild, or some other piece of rock can pick up earth movements and magnify them into those peculiar sounds. One of the ELF antenna arrays is located at Clam Lake, WI, which is only 20 miles’ drive from Clintonville, WI. I have no proof, but the idea is no less plausible than other ideas I’ve heard… Bruce The Bible says in Romans 8 that “all of nature groans ( waiting for the return of Jesus) and in Matthew 24 that ALL these things…earthquakes, wars and rumors of wars, a decline in morals (and I am quite certain, even strange sounds)…when you see ALL these things beginning to happen “look up for your redemption isn’t too far off”…time to get your heart right with God. BluButterfly I keep hearing a lot of really far out theories, and I find them all fascinating. However, the best answer is sometimes the simplest and most obvious. Has anyone ever tried correlating these strange noises to the increasing solar activity? Recently we have been seeing lots of solar flares, suspots, etc and they are definitely affecting the high incidence of Northern Lights in the past year. Some geologists (in Finnland and Germany) are saying the sun has not been this magnetically active in over 1000 years. One of the best sites to read about and track this solar activity is http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/sunearth/index.html . I am trying to find out if anyone has cross referenced the dates of high solar activity, the dates of solar storms, and the areas where the magnetic flares have reached the earth. Josh Everyone bringing religion into this is dumb. Truthfully im a christain but seriously science proves more than a bible can prove thats jsut fact. You people say the world wil lend and it doesnt why because all you have is a book backign you up. Thats incredibly outdated. Time to stop believeing in fairytail and start believeing in facts. Ducrider900 Before you call other contributors here “dumb”, it might behoove you to learn how to spell, and how to string a few cogent words together – it’s called using grammar to communicate. Too bad it’s no longer taught in the government schools…you and your pathetic attempt at communication are collectively, exdhibit one of this sad fact.. hippiekarl What’s ‘dumb’ is calling theories that have become dogmas through nothing more than repetition ‘proofs’ or ‘facts’. ‘Science’, painted into a corner by its mutually-contradictory ‘facts’, can’t even explain such things as why sea-water is salty (the ratio on this planet of sodium to chlorine doesn’t allow the oceans’ current salinity), or why (if iron was always on the surface of the Earth) the Bronze Age preceeded the Iron Age…or why the world’s highest mountains are the youngest, and are covered–beneath their ice–with sea sediment. ‘Science’ (which gets together and VOTES on what the ‘facts’ are) is full of hubris but short on ‘the truth’, which it periodically changes, changes back, and changes again. Physics is not a democracy, and majority-belief is NOT the benchmark of ‘fact’ or ‘truth’. Max I live in Wisconsin and the local news reports had residents claiming the booms came from the ground, not the sky. Regardless, why do these tremors occur mostly at night? We had a massive chemtrail blitz last Oct and then again late Jan (that we could see) which was very unsettling. So the idea of a sound weapon makes sense somewhat — I think the government is messing with us for not rolling over on the Union destruction plan. Chopper Well finally someone is getting very close to the truth…. Mackie…. I think everybody should read what he is saying… Magnetic flux lines… I personally think everybody should do some reading …. Fast! Lol. JJ Except hallucinations are generally not recordable. These sounds are recordable. JC Vaughan I tell you, Krypton is merely shifting in its orbit. James The Bible gives information on the end times, and if you check out Daniel and the New Testament, especially Revelations. You will see most of the things we are experiencing now, are in there with more things to come. harold hutchison god said that in the last days he would shake the earth he said there would be signs in the earth and from beaneath the earth, also signs in the sun the moon just look around and see what is going on, it also says the whole creation groans in pain wanting to be delivered from the curse that is on it, people like to make fun of the bible but that will soon come to a end, the bible says its a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living god unprepared, gods son paid a terrible price for our sins and i urge everone to make sure you are ready before its to late . h. hutch Renee Glad I came upon this, I heard a almost deep noise, not loud from inside my house, the windows were open, my dog heard it and cocked his head at it, the next day my mom was bruching her hair and litterly, no shiz, her hair started rising, I tryed brushing it out and noticed it was litterly lifting, yesterday I also was so hyper it was crazy, like magnitized. This is a rather interesting article, our alignment with Jupiter, being maybe alittle closer causing a magnetic shift? It sounding almost like blades, its gotta be our Magnetic field, also it feels like July, we could be sliding in location perhaps? Stephanie White Now to me that is interesting – that your dog heard it. From everything I have read, no animals appear to hear it – or react to it. jeremy archer I went out on the night of the hurricane last August. It was 10pm and the wind had not really kicked up yet. It was raining but I did not wear a hat and I had no umbrella. It was quite warm so the rain on my head did not bother me. I walked from 99th and Broadway along 100th st to Central Park. As I entered the park I followed a path over a little bridge and down to a lake. There were a few ducks at the edge of the pond that stood and gazed at me. It was very quiet; hardly any traffic was passing down Central Park West. All I could hear was a torrent of water coming down the hill that passed under the bridge. I stood and looked at the reflection of the street lights on the lake. After some time, I walked back up the hill over the bridge and walked along 100th st. Just before I got to Manhattan Ave I started to hear a low groaning sound, like some old man breathing. I could not tell if the sound was coming from the sky or from below me. I crossed the street to see if I could still hear it, since the sound was not loud. I stood under a tree and the volume was the same. I walked over to Columbus Ave and turned south. There is an entrance there to a new building and 3 doormen were standing outside talking. I asked them if they could hear any sound. One of them ignored me but the other 2 said they could hear it. I was not sure if they really did or if they were just humoring me. We talked for a minute and one of the doormen offered to show me a book he was reading. When I entered the building, due to the absence of any exterior noise from the rain and traffic I was able to hear the sound much more clearly and at that moment I felt that the sound was coming from beneath me. The doorman made no comment on the fact that the sound was any more audible. I did not mention the sound to him again but I did wonder why he did not mention the increase in the volume. He showed me his book and I left the building and continued walking south to 97th st, where I turned and walked west for about half a block, listening intently to the sound that I felt sure now was coming from beneath my feet. Then the sound stopped, so I turned and walked back to see if I could pick it up again but I could not. I returned home to 99th st without hearing the sound again. drezdin Mid-michigan… Heard strange sound last night which sounded most similar to a helicopter, or an uneven, overloaded washer during spin cycle. no copter in sight and sound did not at all seem to get closer nor further away, but did weaken for a few seconds at times while also intensifying for a few seconds periodically as well. lasted from at least midnight until 7am at which time my wife could still hear it several miles away upon arrival at work. we live in apt. complex and two neighbors (one next door, one downstairs) were out on their balconies and either could not hear or were ignoring (hard to imagine) the sound because their conversations didn’t even give mention of the noise from what I could tell ( which wasn’t much bcuz the noise was LOUD and ANNOYING and OMINOUS!! Thank You Jesus for CHOOSING me before I even was, and pulling me out of the wilderness after 37yrs. threescore and 3days! (Baptized 12/9/11 immersed in water in Jesus’ name for the remission of my sins, and to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, evidenced by the initial outward sign of speaking in tongues 12/20/11). One baptism. One God. One Name. Be One..with Christ, in Christ, of Christ. Forever. Amen. Apostolic Pentecostal and rapture ready! Paladin I’m responsible for the strange loud noises in Clinton……well, actually it was that

“You’ve got lovely beds. Good beds,” the actress Patti LuPone said. She was referring not to furniture, but fingernails: the unvarnished ones on the hands of her current Christine Ebersole. They contrasted markedly with Ms. LuPone’s nails, which she herself had lacquered in shiny maroon, after years observing professional manicurists. “I watch how they depress the fluid,” Ms. LuPone said, pantomiming bottle and brush. “The problem is, when I put nail polish on it really weakens my nails,” Ms. Ebersole said in a sisterly way. “They just flake off. ” The talons were out, in other words, but this was not a catfight. More a chat ’n’ chew between Tony actresses getting the chance to share a Broadway stage for the first time in “War Paint,” one of a new musicals debuting in a mad cram before the season ends. Dressed in a confusion of stretchy black clothing and scarves, the two women were sharing a sofa in the upper half of a sleek duplex at 663 Fifth Avenue, where the flagship of Elizabeth Arden’s signature spa, the Red Door, moved five years ago from the florid former Aeolian Building two blocks north. They had refused treatments and were instead efficiently slurping vegetarian soups. In “War Paint,” which is now in previews and opens at the Nederlander Theater on April 6, Ms. Ebersole, 64, plays Miss Arden, née Florence Nightingale Graham: the entrepreneur who made cosmetics, long associated with prostitutes, acceptable and desirable to the American middle and upper classes starting in the 1910s. Ms. LuPone, 67, plays Arden’s but equally esteemed competitor, Helena Rubinstein, who imparted both artistic and clinical prestige to the pursuit of beauty, and who is credited with the phrase “there are no ugly women, only lazy ones. ” Bette Davis vs. Joan Crawford Alexis Colby vs. Krystle Carrington: Female rivalries have long meant boffo box office and Nielsen ratings points. But theatergoers hoping for Ms. Ebersole and Ms. LuPone to whack each other with pocketbooks or hurl drinks like Anne Bancroft and Shirley MacLaine in “The Turning Point” are due for disappointment. Rather, their characters fight by issuing new products, raiding staff and investing in premium real estate: penthouses and country spreads for Rubinstein, who donated millions of dollars to arts education and other causes through her foundation an Irish castle and Lexington, Ky. breeding stable for Arden, who was passionately devoted to horses and marched with suffragists. “We should really look at them as role models,” Ms. LuPone said of the two tycoons. “They were really inspiring,” Ms. Ebersole said. “My God,” Ms LuPone said. “Regardless of what their personal flaws were, or what drove them — nothing that they achieved for themselves and then in the name of woman has ever been matched!” Ms. Ebersole, more gently: “They paved the way, and started before women had the vote. ” Ms. LuPone was incensed by news reports about the departing C. E. O. of Yahoo, Marissa Mayer. “Her male replacement is getting twice as much as she is,” she said. “Twice as much!” The gender pay inequity common in the film industry is not an issue for “War Paint,” which is capitalized at $11 million and carried by its leading ladies, one or both of whom appear in all but four of the show’s numbers. But the fact that its principal creators are all men might arch an eyebrow. The musical takes its title and basic premise from a dual biography by Lindy Woodhead published in 2004 that a few years later inspired a documentary, “The Powder the Glory,” to which David Stone, a producer, was introduced by the director James Lapine. Mr. Stone has had tremendous success with “Wicked,” another musical centered on female foes, and, among other projects, worked on “The Vagina Monologues” by Eve Ensler. He called her for advice before proceeding. “Eve said, ‘This can’t be about makeup.’ And it’s not,” Mr. Stone said. “It’s about women and beauty and power and how women treat each other. ” Mr. Stone and Ms. LuPone both wrinkle their noses at the word “diva,” a description cribbed from Italian opera that is now often applied to any commanding female presence in the entertainment industry, inevitably also suggesting an excess of temperament. “I just can’t stand it,” Mr. Stone said. “Diva implies difficult. ” At a talk about the show a few months ago, Ms. LuPone proposed “dame” as an alternative, to approving whoops from the audience. After securing rights to the material, Mr. Stone hired Michael Greif, with whom he had worked on “Next to Normal” and “” to direct. They brought in the composer Scott Frankel, the lyricist Michael Korie and the book writer Doug Wright, Mr. Greif’s collaborators on the musical “Grey Gardens,” inspired by the Maysles brothers’ cult documentary about the eccentric aristocrats “Big Edie” Beale and her daughter, “Little Edie. ” Some early workshops of “War Paint” featured Donna Murphy in the Arden role but she withdrew for family reasons, and Ms. Ebersole, who had won a 2007 Tony for portraying both Beales at different stages of their lives, assumed the part. She and Ms. LuPone, for whom this is the first musical since the “Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown” (2010) were not shy about participating in the creative process. “Both of them were very excited to play against the obvious — feuding, stars and that kind of energy — and actually find ways where the competition between them was nourishing,” Mr. Frankel said a few hours before curtain on a recent evening. “These women were enormously sophisticated and tasteful and in corporate weaponry,” Mr. Wright said. “They didn’t have to reduce things to an insult they could actually wage business warfare against one another and did so very effectively for 50 years. ” Anything “that felt cheap or easy,” he said, the actresses “instantly rejected. ” Criticism of an tryout in Chicago last summer focused on relentless between its two subjects, who supposedly never met in real life. About a third of the show has been revised, the creators said, both to fortify the solo appearances and to find novel ways of bringing the characters together onstage. “There was some tightening,” Mr. Frankel said, slipping into patois. “Because it’s the two of them, there’s a little bit of inherent that’s intrinsic in the proposition of the evening, but I think we tried to find ways to mix that up in more unexpected ways. ” He and his colleagues were adamant that “War Paint” is not purely ladies’ entertainment, though the Broadway audience is disproportionately female, a demographic that has helped make shows like “Waitress” into hits. “There are metaphors inherent in the idea of makeup that I think transcend gender,” Mr. Wright said. “It offers a potential mask where you can pretend to be someone you aren’t it offers a disguise if you don’t wish to be recognized it offers an avenue toward a certain kind of perceived it is a kind of lure to attract someone else. ” But with its costume changes designed by Catherine Zuber, including hats and piles of glittering jewelry, and makeup by Angelina Avallone, “War Paint” has been an occasion for the two stars to reflect on how cosmetics and other trappings have been integral to their long careers. “Once I put on the wig it’s like ‘O. K. badda bing, badda boom,’” Ms. LuPone said. “I’m not the type of actress that goes into a corner and meditates for 20 minutes on the bones of Helena Rubinstein. Do you know what I mean?” Ms. Ebersole said that for performers backstage as well as for many people in real life, “putting on makeup is a really great centering device. It’s a way of having you focus on what you’re doing. As you put on the mask, then the other things come through. ” She recalled her work in the 2001 revival of “42nd Street,” for which she won her first Tony with the help of 1930s regalia by Roger Kirk: “The costumes just informed everything. ” This inspired Ms. LuPone to reminisce about “Evita,” for which she got her first Tony, at 31. “The amount of — for lack of a better word — gack that we’re putting on!” she said. “I also harken back to that time in ‘Anything Goes’ when I was in those gowns. Oy, I can’t wear a gown now to save my life, unless I’m strapped in. ” The two actresses were “babies in the city together,” as Ms. LuPone put it. She arrived in 1968 to attend Juilliard, where she studied with Marian Seldes, having known she wanted to perform since she was 4, standing downstage right in a tap recital. Ms. Ebersole, who had gone to MacMurray College in Jacksonville, Ill. before enrolling at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in 1973, had had other plans. “I was going to be a nurse,” she said. “Of course you were,” Ms. LuPone said. “Look at her!” Instead Ms. Ebersole served customers at the Lion’s Rock, a restaurant on the Upper East Side with water splashing down a slab of red granite. “It’s condominiums now, I think,” she said. Ms. LuPone, meanwhile, worked at a “wannabe mobster” hangout run by a man who imported cages for dancing girls in nightclubs. “My roommate was one of the dancers, and I wasn’t pretty enough, tall enough or thin enough to be a dancer, so I was a waitress in a lace ” she said. Both women bemoaned a lost era when actors (and stagehands) were recognized and welcomed in the theater district at places like Jimmy Ray’s and Charlie O. ’s, and spent time after the show socializing rather than cultivating followings on Twitter and YouTube. “I think we have fewer showmen,” Ms. LuPone said. “Like the Irving Thalbergs and the Alex Cohens and the Robert Whiteheads and the people that loved the theater or loved making movies. It’s such a cliché, but it’s all bean counters. It’s statistics. Polling. ” This was a reminder that the unexpected foil in the showdown was Charles Revson, the founder of Revlon, rendered in “War Paint” by Erik Liberman as “a carnival barker in an Italian suit. ” It’s a line that for some involved with the production took on new resonance after Donald J. Trump defeated Hillary Clinton. Overnight, in their view, the musical went from celebration to cautionary tale. After Rubinstein died in 1965, Revson bought her Park Avenue triplex. But that wasn’t the final indignity. Last year, the company he founded, which had brought sex back into the midcentury cosmetics marketplace with suggestive ad copy and flashy layouts, took over Elizabeth Arden. “Everybody’s rolling over in their grave!” Ms. LuPone said. Not that any of these brands make her particularly nostalgic. “I used to be a Georgette Klinger girl. For years,” she said, after the two women packed up a gift of exfoliating face pads and descended nine floors to the lobby. “Oh my gosh, Georgette Klinger, I completely forgot that name,” Ms. Ebersole said, blinking her blue eyes on the sunny sidewalk. “That was a salon,” Ms. LuPone said. “You’d go in, and close the door, and they were all about getting into your face. They don’t get into your face anymore. ”

(Reuters) - U.S. President-elect Donald Trump on Friday accused his political opponents, “both Democrats and Republicans,” for putting together a dossier of unverified claims linking him to Russia and said the document was probably released by intelligence agencies. “Totally made up facts by sleazebag political operatives, both Democrats and Republicans - FAKE NEWS! Russia says nothing exists,” Trump said in a series of posts on Twitter. “Probably released by ‘Intelligence’ even knowing there is no proof, and never will be,” he said. On Wednesday, U.S. spy chief James Clapper said that media leaks of the material had not come from U.S. intelligence agencies and that the agencies had not judged whether the information was reliable.

@RazaSa60 @Shane_Rodenbeck @Independent innocent men were murdered in the name of satire. Freedom of speech should never ever be punished.

Not one tax has been raised since Ive been governor.

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Shelling killed three people in the last major rebel stronghold near Damascus on Tuesday, a war monitor said, shortly before the UN Syria envoy said the government had agreed a ceasefire there. Russia had on Monday proposed a ceasefire in the besieged Eastern Ghouta area on Nov. 28-29. U.N. Syria envoy Staffan De Mistura later said Russia had told him that the Syrian government had accepted the idea, but he added we have to see if it happens . The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, the war monitor, said there were three deaths and 15 injuries from Tuesday s shelling, but that it was less intense than in previous days. A witness in the area said that while the shelling was lighter earlier in the day, it had intensified later. A Syrian official said the situation on Tuesday was calm. The UN s humanitarian agency OCHA said in a Tweet that relief teams had entered Eastern Ghouta with food and health supplies for 7,200 people, entering through Nashabiyeh on the opposite side of the pocket from where the fighting was. Over the weekend, government air strikes and shelling on Ghouta intensified, killing at least 43 people on Sunday and Monday, the Observatory said. Syrian state media said 13 shells hit government-held areas of Damascus on Monday. Eastern Ghouta is one of several de-escalation zones across western Syria where Russia has brokered ceasefire deals between rebels and President Bashar al-Assad s government. But fighting has continued there. U.N.-backed peace talks in Geneva are set to begin on Tuesday. The government delegation will arrive on Wednesday to attend the talks, state news agency SANA reported. The opposition delegation, the Syrian Negotiation Commission, called for direct negotiations with the government instead of the previous model of each side speaking only to UN mediators. M decins Sans Fronti res, the international medical humanitarian organization, said on Monday hundreds of people had been wounded in intense bombing and shelling of the Eastern Ghouta in the last two weeks. It said five MSF-supported field hospitals in East Ghouta had treated 576 wounded patients and recorded 69 deaths, with a quarter of the wounded women or children under the age of 15. In a statement, MSF said its figures did not account for the total numbers killed in the area as there are other medical facilities it does not support regularly.