Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau s government has been badly shaken by a conflict-of-interest controversy about his finance minister, but the Liberal government s upcoming fiscal update offers an opportunity to reset the public focus on Canada s strong economy, political observers say. The government has been plagued all week about questions about the finance minister, Bill Morneau, the multimillionaire former chief executive officer of human resources management firm Morneau Shepell. Some have questioned whether Morneau would be forced to resign. The focus has been a rare stumble for Trudeau s government, which marked two years in office this month and has mostly maneuvered its way out of political trouble partly because of Trudeau s personal popularity and the youthful momentum of the Liberals after 10 years of Conservative rule. They re politically very astute in a whole bunch of areas but in issues management and parliamentary management they seem to be ham-fisted, said Andrew Graham, professor at the school of policy studies at Queen s University. With Trudeau s strong defense of Morneau, and the finance minister likely to unveil a smaller budget deficit in Tuesday s fall fiscal update, Liberals have a temporary chance to refocus on good news. Economic conditions are a bedrock of whether people feel good or bad about how politicians are performing, and the economy is doing very well for most people, said Abacus Data pollster Bruce Anderson. Morneau said on Thursday he will put his assets in a blind trust and divest stock in a publicly traded family business. That comes after weeks of backlash over tax reform that has become a major obstacle for Trudeau s government. Opposition parties from both the political left and right have seized on the ethics scandal, trying to tie Trudeau s team to what they say is an entitled Liberal Party that has previously faced corruption charges. The opposition has changed the focus from substance to ethics, and they won t let that go that easily, said Genevieve Tellier, a political professor at the University of Ottawa. But Tellier said Trudeau s decision to fill his cabinet with political rookies - including Morneau - rather than turning to the old Liberal guard, could limit the ability of the opposition to land many ethical punches. Moreover, Morneau is respected by markets. I think the prime minister would be very cautious about changing his finance minister. ... (Morneau) presents a reassuring image, he doesn t scare the markets, Tellier said. Ipsos Public Affairs pollster Darrell Bricker put it more bluntly: They really don t have a choice but to tough it out and hope some event will transpire to distract the hyenas. The expected budget improvement in Tuesday s fall fiscal update could also give Morneau the leeway to woo voters with more spending or debt reduction. The way the numbers are playing out, they are in a fairly favorable fiscal position, said Paul Ferley, assistant chief economist at Royal Bank of Canada. Morneau spokesman Dan Lauzon said the finance minister has no plans to change his strategy, and would keep focus on fiscal stimulus matters: He is in this for the long run, and he won t let distractions get in the way.


On Friday, Donald Trump attacked NFL players such as Colin Kaepernick at a rally for Alabama Senate candidate Luther Strange (R). The amateur president called on NFL owners to fire players for taking a knee rather than standing during the national anthem. Wouldn t you love to see one of these NFL owners, when somebody disrespects our flag, to say, Get that son of a bitch off the field right now, Trump said, adding, He is fired. Colin Kaepernick s mother wasn t having any of it. Do not mess with her son. Guess that makes me a proud bitch! Teresa Kaepernick tweeted.Guess that makes me a proud bitch! Teresa Kaepernick (@B4IleaveU) September 23, 2017While Puerto Rico remains devastated by Hurricanes Irma and Maria, the so-called president is busy attacking black athletes.Stephen Curry, a Golden State Warriors guard and two-time NBA MVP, said that he wasn t interested in visiting the White House to celebrate the team s 2017 championship. He added that he would wait to see how the team feels as a group. Curry said his reasons for not wanting to visit the White House were that we basically don t stand for what our president has said, and the things he hasn t said at the right time, according to SF Gate. By not going, hopefully, it will inspire some change for what we tolerate in this country and what we stand for, what is accepted and what we turn a blind eye toward. So, Trump tweeted a response. Going to the White House is considered a great honor for a championship team. Stephen Curry is hesitating, therefore invitation is withdrawn! Going to the White House is considered a great honor for a championship team.Stephen Curry is hesitating,therefore invitation is withdrawn! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 23, 2017That s right, he can t break up with Trump. Trump is breaking up with him first, so there!NBA star LeBron James fired back at Trump over his tweet, calling him a bum on Saturday. You bum @StephenCurry30 already said he ain t going! So therefore ain t no invite, James tweeted. Going to White House was a great honor until you showed up! James tweeted.U bum @StephenCurry30 already said he ain't going! So therefore ain't no invite. Going to White House was a great honor until you showed up! LeBron James (@KingJames) September 23, 2017LeSean McCoy, running back for the Buffalo Bills tweeted, It s really sad man our president is a asshole. It's really sad man our president is a asshole Lesean McCoy (@CutonDime25) September 23, 2017Mrs. Kaepernick retweeted that.After a backlash, Trump took to his Twitter account. If a player wants the privilege of making millions of dollars in the NFL, or other leagues, he or she should not be allowed to disrespect our Great American Flag (or Country) and should stand for the National Anthem, he tweeted. If not, YOU RE FIRED. Find something else to do! Welp, if a president disrespects our country then he should be fired.


A woman who accused Donald Trump of repeatedly raping her two decades ago when she was a 13-year-old aspiring teen model has again dropped a federal lawsuit over the alleged assaults. The accuser, identified in the lawsuit by the pseudonym "Jane Doe," was expected to appear at a news conference in Los Angeles Wednesday, but that appearance was abruptly canceled. The lawyer who organized the event, Lisa Bloom, said Trump's accuser had received threats and was too frightened to show up. The accuser's lead attorney, Thomas Meagher of New Jersey, did not immediately respond to requests for comment. He filed a one-page notice dismissing the case Friday evening in federal court in Manhattan. No explanation was given for the action. Bloom did not immediately respond to requests for comment Friday. Through his attorney, Trump had flatly denied the woman's allegations. There was plenty of speculation — and skepticism — from social media users about the validity of the charges. Hillary Clinton's niece came out for TRUMP because 'selfish' aunt wants to win for all the wrong reasons. Source


China and South Korea have agreed to get their relations back onto a normal track at an early date, China s Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday, following high level talks between the two countries. Both countries attach great important to their ties, the ministry said in a statement.


Nine Turkish citizens were charged in Greece with terrorism-related offences on Wednesday, accused of hoarding explosives and of links to an outlawed militant organization responsible for suicide bombings in Turkey. The arrest of eight men and a woman in early-morning raids at three locations in central Athens on Tuesday came days before an expected state visit by Tayyip Erdogan, the first by a Turkish president to Greece in 65 years. Greece says the two events are unrelated. Police officials said they were being questioned for alleged links to the leftist DHKP/C, a far-left group blamed for a string of attacks and suicide bombings in Turkey since 1990. Their lawyer said the individuals, who have not been named, were struggling against a fascist regime and had denied any wrongdoing. They were charged with setting up and being members of a criminal organization, terrorist-related acts of supply and possession of explosive materials, illegal possession of firearms, smoke bombs and fire crackers, court sources said. The individuals, escorted handcuffed into a central Athens court wearing bullet proof vests, have not entered a formal plea. They are refugees, lawyer Alexandra Zorbala said. Some have sought, others have received asylum ... they are fighters who are struggling against a fascist regime, against torture and thousands of arrests. . One of the charges they face is resisting arrest. At least one of the defendants entered the courthouse with a black eye. One of the detainees had been wanted by Greek police in connection with an arms and explosives haul off the Greek island of Chios, close to the Turkish coast, in 2013. Turkey s Erdogan is widely expected to visit Greece in December, although his visit has not been officially announced.


Republican Senator Orrin Hatch tried to justify not doing his job and Chris Cuomo was having none of it.During an appearance on CNN on Tuesday, Senate Judiciary Committee member Orrin Hatch attempted to defend the decision of Senate Republicans to refuse to hold confirmation hearings for anyone President Obama nominates to fill the vacant seat of Justice Antonin Scalia, who passed away on Saturday.Ever since news broke of Scalia s death, Republicans have made it clear that they won t allow President Obama to fill the empty position on the bench, opting instead to wait a year until whomever is elected president in November takes office, which they hope will be a Republican.But host Chris Cuomo told Hatch that he and his GOP colleagues should do their damn jobs as the Constitution requires, especially since the document conservatives claim they love so much says nothing about a president not being able to pick a judicial nominee during an election year. You don t get to not vote on judges just because it is an election year and final year of someone s presidency. So, that hypocrisy is as play as well, Cuomo bluntly said. You don t have to like whom he nominates, but shouldn t you go through the process? Of course, like a good little obstructionist Hatch continued to insist that Republicans don t have to do anything. No, I don t think there is any real reason to do that, he said. To which Cuomo asked, What about the Constitution? Hatch responded by claiming that President Obama has been treated fairly by Senate Republicans, which we all know is a crock of shit considering the record amount of obstructing the GOP has done since President Obama first took office seven years ago. At the end of his response, Hatch revealed the only real reason why Republicans want to wait to replace Scalia. Look, this president s been treated fairly. 40 percent of the federal judiciary up and Republicans have allowed votes on all of those. Now what they are saying is look, we are in a tremendous presidential campaign, there is a lot of bitterness on both sides, let s diffuse this thing and let s put this until the next president of the United States. We ll wait and use discretion, and whoever is the next president will do the job. Now the Democrats of course naturally want this because they want to have a 5-4 majority on the court. Throughout the interview, Hatch claimed that Democrats muddied up the system by not confirming conservative extremist Robert Bork to the high court. However, Cuomo pointed out that Democrats at least held confirmation hearings as required by the Constitution and went through the process. It s just that at the end Bork wasn t confirmed, which is the Senate s right. The Senate does have the power to reject a nominee. So it appears Hatch and his fellow Republicans all have a case of sour grapes because Democrats did their job. As it turned out, Anthony Kennedy ended up being confirmed to the Supreme Court instead of Bork.The bottom line is that Senate Democrats went through the process even though they eventually rejected Bork. Fun fact: six Republicans voted against Bork as well.Cuomo then informed Hatch that a 4-4 court is not a good thing because many cases won t be settled due to constant ties, which would delay a real decision while cases pile up since unresolved cases have to be refiled and argued again. But Hatch thinks a 4-4 court is a good thing. A 4-4 court functions it s functioned in the past. It will function this time. Just on the really controversial issues they will probably put them off for a year. It is not the end of the world. As a matter of fact, it is a smart thing to do. And as he had done multiple times throughout the interview, Hatch brought up the presidential election and how it would somehow be unfair to hold hearings during this time. And when Cuomo mentioned that the Constitution doesn t say anything about not confirming judges during a election year, Hatch claimed the Constitution gives you every right to defer this. And to make sure that it is done in the best of ways so that both sides have an opportunity to have their person in the presidency and then, you know, if the Democrats win we ll go through this process the way it ought to be gone through. Here s the video via YouTube.Again, Hatch makes a bullshit claim because we all know that if Republicans still control the Senate in 2017, they will continue to throw a temper tantrum and refuse to do their job if Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders is the president who makes a nomination. In other words, things will be no different than they are right now.Hatch and Senate Republicans are the reasons why our government can t get anything done for this country and now they are threatening to derail the judicial system and break all precedent just because they don t want the Supreme Court to shift away from the extreme conservative ideology that has controlled the Court for decades. This is totally outrageous and the American people need to punish Republicans for this failure to do their jobs. After all, if any normal American worker failed to do their job, they d be fired. So should Senate Republicans. Featured image from Raw Story


Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter said he would be willing to travel to North Korea on behalf of the Trump administration to help diffuse rising tensions, The New York Times reported on its website on Sunday. "I would go, yes," Carter, 93, told the Times when he was asked in an interview at his ranch house in Plains, Georgia whether it was time for another diplomatic mission and whether he would do so for President Trump. Carter, a Democrat who was president from 1977 to 1981, said he had spoken to Trump's National Security Adviser Lt.-Gen. H. R. McMaster, who is a friend, but so far has gotten a negative response. "I told him that I was available if they ever need me," the Times quoted Carter as saying. Told that some in Washington were made nervous by Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's war of words, Carter said "I'm afraid, too, of a situation." "They want to save their regime. And we greatly overestimate China's influence on North Korea. Particularly to Kim," who, Carter added, has "never, so far as I know, been to China.""And they have no relationship. Kim Jong-il did go to China and was very close to them." Describing the North Korean leader as "unpredictable," Carter worried that if Kim thinks Trump will act against him, he could do something pre-emptive, the Times reported. "I think he's now got advanced nuclear weaponry that can destroy the Korean Peninsula and Japan, and some of our outlying territories in the Pacific, maybe even our mainland," Carter said. In the mid 1990s, Carter traveled to Pyongyang over the objections of President Bill Clinton, the Times report said, and struck a deal with Kim Il Sung, grandfather of the current leader.


President Obama said on Monday that he had urged Donald J. Trump to reach out to minority groups, women and others who were alienated by his campaign, during the president's first news conference since Mr. Trump won the election in a stunning upset that has imperiled Mr. Obama's legacy. "There are certain things that make for good sound bites but don't always translate into good policy, and that's something that I think that he and his team will wrestle with," Mr. Obama said in the White House briefing room. "I did say to him, as I've said publicly, that because of the nature of the campaigns and the bitterness and the ferocity of the campaigns, that it's really important to send some signals of unity, and to reach out to minority groups, or women, or others that were concerned about the tenor of the campaign, and I think that's something that he will want to do. " Mr. Obama also said he thought that Mr. Trump was entering office with fewer set policy ideas than other . "I don't think he is ideological," Mr. Obama said. "I think ultimately he is pragmatic. " Mr. Obama, who during the campaign called Mr. Trump temperamentally unfit and dangerously unqualified to be president, has since said his priority is to lead an orderly transition of power to help Mr. Trump succeed for the good of the country. He sidestepped a question about Mr. Trump's actions since his victory, including his selection on Sunday of Stephen K. Bannon, a media mogul whose website, Breitbart. com, has promoted white nationalist, racist and views, as his chief White House strategist and senior counselor. "Without copping out, I think it's fair to say that it would not be appropriate for me to comment" on Mr. Trump's personnel decisions, Mr. Obama said. The president remarked last week that Mr. Trump's comments and behavior had been more statesmanlike since the election, saying that he had been "encouraged" by the change in tone. Since then, the has used Twitter to complain about postelection protests against him and object to the way The New York Times has covered him. Mr. Trump's elevation of Mr. Bannon, who was a top adviser to the campaign, has drawn scathing criticism from Democrats and some Republicans who warn that the is placing a divisive figure with fringe views deep inside the West Wing. White House officials say Mr. Obama has not changed his view of Mr. Trump since the campaign this fall, when he condemned Mr. Trump as a bigot who had cozied up to white supremacists and could not be trusted with the nuclear codes. But Mr. Obama has told the American public that he believes the will of the voters should be respected. During a meeting on Thursday in the Oval Office, the president tutored Mr. Trump, who has no government policy or elective experience, on a wide range of domestic and foreign policy matters he will have to deal with on his first day in office. Mr. Obama held the news conference just before departing for a weeklong trip to Greece, Germany and Peru — his final scheduled trip abroad as president — where he expected to face questions from anxious American allies. For months, Mr. Obama assured the allies that Mr. Trump would not win the White House. Now, he said on Monday, he will tell European allies that they should not fear for the future of NATO under a Trump presidency. In the Oval Office conversation on Thursday, Mr. Obama said, Mr. Trump "expressed a great interest in maintaining our core strategic relationships, and so one of the messages I will be able to deliver is his commitment to NATO and the alliance. "


Donald J. Trump, defending his recent phone call with Taiwan's president, asserted in an interview broadcast on Sunday that the United States was not bound by the One China policy, the diplomatic understanding that underpins America's relationship with its biggest rival. Mr. Trump, speaking on Fox News, said he understood the principle of a single China that includes Taiwan, but declared, "I don't know why we have to be bound by a One China policy unless we make a deal with China having to do with other things, including trade. " "I mean, look," he continued, "we're being hurt very badly by China with devaluation with taxing us heavy at the borders when we don't tax them with building a massive fortress in the middle of the South China Sea, which they shouldn't be doing and, frankly, with not helping us at all with North Korea. " Mr. Trump is not the first incoming Republican president to question the One China policy, but his suggestion that it could be used as a chip to correct Chinese behavior sets him apart, several Asia experts said. While Mr. Trump has been praised by some Republicans for taking a new look at China policy, his stance could risk a backlash by Beijing, the analysts said. Not since 1972, when President Richard M. Nixon and Mao Zedong enshrined the One China principle in the Shanghai Communiqué, has an American president or so publicly and explicitly questioned the agreement, which resulted in the United States' ending its diplomatic recognition of Taiwan in 1979. A spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry said on Monday that the government had "serious concern" about Mr. Trump's remarks, renewing a debate that erupted nine days ago when he took a congratulatory phone call from President Tsai of Taiwan. At first, Mr. Trump played down the implications of the call, saying he was just being polite. Later, his aides said he was well aware of the diplomatic repercussions of speaking to Taiwan's leader. Lobbyists for Taiwan, including the law firm of former Senator Bob Dole of Kansas, spent months laying the groundwork for the call. On Friday, China's senior foreign policy official, Yang Jiechi, met with Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn, whom Mr. Trump has designated as his national security adviser, according to a person told about the meeting. It was not clear what the men had discussed. Some Republican foreign policy experts — including John R. Bolton, who is believed to be a for the post of deputy secretary of state — have praised Mr. Trump for shaking up a diplomatic agreement. As a candidate, Ronald Reagan criticized the decision to abrogate recognition of Taiwan after his election, he invited a delegation from Taiwan to attend his inauguration, antagonizing Beijing. In 1982, as president, Reagan pushed for the Six Assurances, one of which was a reaffirmation that the United States did not formally recognize Chinese sovereignty over Taiwan. Still, he abided by the terms of the 1979 joint communiqué that established relations between the United States and China. But Mr. Trump's suggestion that the policy could be wielded as a chip in a broader negotiation with China has implications not just for Washington's relationship with Beijing, several experts on Asia said, but also for America's support for Taiwan. "By putting One China up for grabs, Trump will suck all the oxygen out of the U. S. relationship, and it risks eventually trading away U. S. support for Taiwan for another U. S. interest," said Evan Medeiros, a former senior director for Asia at the National Security Council. "There are good reasons why eight presidents since 1972 have relied on the One China policy," he added. "This is one area where the Trump team would do well to heed the lessons of history instead of bucking them in the uncertain hope of getting something. " Jeffrey A. Bader, Mr. Medeiros's predecessor in the Obama administration, said the One China policy had "always been seen as a foundation of the relationship. " "Now Trump apparently sees it as part of a broader set of new transactions," he said. "Mixing trade with an issue seen by Beijing as involving sovereignty is likely to produce an angry Chinese backlash and worsen both issues. " An editorial on Monday in The Global Times, a Chinese tabloid, said that Mr. Trump was "like a child in his ignorance of foreign policy. " "The One China policy cannot be bought and sold," the editorial said. "Trump, it seems, only understands business and believes that everything has a price. " Mr. Trump, however, did not appear worried about inflaming Beijing. He repeated in the Fox News interview many of the criticisms he has made about China, emphasizing what he said was its unwillingness to help curb the nuclear ambitions of its neighbor North Korea — an issue that foreign policy experts believe could confront Mr. Trump as the first geopolitical crisis of his presidency. The said he would not tolerate having the Chinese government dictate whether he could take a call from the president of Taiwan. He reiterated that he had not placed the call, and described it as "a very short call saying, 'Congratulations, sir, on the victory. '" The Chinese government, which once viewed Mr. Trump favorably as an alternative to the hawkish Hillary Clinton, has struggled to respond to Mr. Trump's unorthodox approach. China's foreign minister, Wang Yi, initially played down the significance of the phone call, calling it a "petty action by the Taiwan side" that he said would not upset the longstanding policy of One China. But as Mr. Trump has repeated his campaign criticisms of China — and as his statements about Taiwan have rippled throughout the region — Beijing has noticeably hardened its tone. It warned him last week, in a editorial in the overseas edition of People's Daily, that "creating troubles for the . S. relationship is creating troubles for the U. S. itself. " In a pointed rejoinder to Mr. Trump, the editorial said that pushing China on Taiwan "would greatly reduce the chance to achieve the goal of making America great again. "


There were no banners. No raised fists. As night fell on Tuesday, more than a thousand protesters dressed in black held a silent march through the central business area of Hong Kong. They took care not to jaywalk. Then they quietly dispersed into the night. Collectively, the participants in the march had more power than most demonstrators. They were Hong Kong lawyers, angered by China's move on Monday to effectively rewrite a clause in Hong Kong's charter in order to prevent two young politicians from taking office as legislators. As a group, Hong Kong's lawyers say Beijing's decision to step into a legal case in this city has dealt a blow to its judiciary, famed for its fairness and independence and central to Hong Kong's success as a global financial hub. The local bar association called the decision, announced by China's Parliament, "unnecessary and inappropriate" and damaging to the concept of "one country, two systems" that has allowed this former British colony to maintain considerable autonomy from the mainland since the 1997 handover of sovereignty. But many practicing lawyers and legal scholars here also say that Hong Kong's judiciary will have to implement the decision, and in doing so will apply legal standards evolved over centuries of precedent — common law — that may soften or perhaps even stymie Beijing's will. "We have to show the world that this is not the accepted norm," said Dennis Kwok, a lawyer and organizer of the march who also serves on Hong Kong's Legislative Council. "It does damage to 'one country, two systems' but at the same time we do have faith in the legal system. " It is a phenomenon that China may not have foreseen: the artful implementation of a Communist legal diktat in a delicate, system where judges wear wigs, are often educated in England and are trained to make rulings that protect civil liberties. China's government, accustomed to law being a mere appendage of state power, may be in for an unpleasant surprise. "I don't think we should underestimate the power or resilience of the common law to protect the autonomy and rights of the Hong Kong people," Cora Chan, an associate professor who focuses on constitutional law at the University of Hong Kong, said in an interview. "The irony here is Hong Kong courts, being common law courts, would be using common law techniques to interpret an interpretation handed down from a Leninist legal system," Professor Chan said. Beijing's interpretation, issued on Monday by a committee in the National People's Congress, specifies that office holders in Hong Kong have to "sincerely and solemnly" take loyalty oaths or be forced to vacate their posts, with no chance for a redo. The ruling came after the two young politicians, Sixtus Leung, 30, and Yau 25, inserted a derogatory term for China in their oaths. That infuriated Beijing, which bristles at any talk of separatism. The interpretation of an article in the territory's governing Basic Law was to compel Hong Kong courts and its Legislature to force the duo to vacate their office, and no lawyer interviewed expected the courts to come to their rescue. But Eric Cheung, who teaches law at the University of Hong Kong, said it was possible that the Hong Kong court that is adjudicating their case could rule that Beijing's interpretation was not retroactive. That may give the duo a chance to retake their oaths, though he said it would take a brave judge to make a ruling that could invite a new, even more specific, interpretation from Beijing. The Chinese interpretation was also aimed at preventing people who back Hong Kong's independence from running for office. In July, Hong Kong's government introduced a new loyalty pledge, requiring that candidates sign a document acknowledging that the city is an "inalienable part" of China. Several candidates were disqualified and went to court that case has not yet been decided. A judge could make a narrow ruling that Beijing's interpretation applies only to taking oaths, which candidates, as opposed to officeholders, do not have to do. "If the Chinese government's ultimate aim is to keep separatists out of the Legislature, then this interpretation is not going to be able to do that," said Simon Young, a law professor at the University of Hong Kong. Several lawyers pointed out that Beijing's ruling was novel because it effectively amended the Basic Law, which serves as Hong Kong's Constitution. "If you look at it closely, it is more like an amendment, or an addition," said Peter Chiu, who participated in Tuesday's march. That is problematic, because amendments to the Basic Law must be approved by the entire National People's Congress, which meets once a year, in March. That raises the possibility, however remote, that Hong Kong's highest court, the Court of Final Appeal, may rule that Beijing's interpretation, which has not been approved by the entire National People's Congress, is an amendment and not enforceable, Professor Chan said. That is the nuclear option. In 1999, the Court of Final Appeal found that it had the power to declare "invalid" acts by the Chinese Parliament or its standing committee that violated the Basic Law, Professor Chan said. That kind of weapon — "hard legal controls," in her words — is most effective when it is not used. "Simply claiming that courts in Hong Kong have those powers might well give an incentive to China to exercise restraint in issuing decisions or interpretations on Hong Kong," she said.


Donald Trump s first debate against his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton went just as poorly as we thought it would and conservatives know it. It s never been more clear that Trump doesn t even deserve to be on the same stage as Clinton, and all the holes in his campaign are being exposed effortlessly. Between the fact-checking and not having any real policies or plans in place, Trump is f*cked big time. Luckily, Fox News is coming to the rescue with some (truly awful, somewhat hilarious) advice for the inexperienced man-baby.Fox News host Charles Krauthammer thinks that Trump s greatest chances of succeeding during Sunday s second presidential debate will rely on Trump s amazing ability to lie about everything. Basically, Krauthammer thinks Trump can win if he can deny it ever happened and ignore the fact-checkers. The Fox host pointed out where Trump had gone wrong during the first debate: I think the most important thing here for Trump is the morning after. He might have lost the debate. It was pretty close. It was not the rout that people say it was. But he really threw it away the morning after when he went after he went down the rabbit holes on the Miss Universe and all the other stuff. And that s happened to him before. Krauthammer then tried to give Trump some pointers on how to beat a far more experienced, qualified Clinton: I think he can hold his own. He just needs to be to ignore, as everybody here has said ignore the bait. He should just dismiss all the quotations that he hears, the way that Pence did. Deny it ever happened and then ignore the fact checkers the next day. It is hilarious that anyone would suggest that Trump can ignore the bait. Trump is a loose cannon with the temperament worse than a toddler. Literally every time he gets baited (even by Clinton herself), he cannot resist taking it and making a bigger ass out of himself. Krauthammer is basically begging Trump to keep his ego in check, even though he s proven that he s incapable of doing that. Conservatives need to start accepting that Trump is going to blow this debate just like the first one, no matter how hard they try to guide him.You can watch Krauthammer try to help Trump below:


CHARLESTON, S. C. — Each morning they flowed into Courtroom Six, escorted by federal officials from a holding room reserved for survivors and families of the victims. The accused, Dylann S. Roof, never turned from the end of the defense table to acknowledge the parents, widows and widowers, children, grandchildren and fellow congregants of the nine he confessed to killing in June 2015 at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church. Felicia Sanders, who survived the rampage but lost her son and her aunt, watched from the first of six rows of wooden benches, along with her husband, Tyrone. The Rev. Eric S. C. Manning, who now inhabits the office once occupied by the church's pastor, the Rev. Clementa C. Pinckney, who was among those killed, sat one row back. The Rev. Anthony B. Thompson, whose wife, Myra, led the evening Bible study that Mr. Roof joined, always took his place in the fifth row, along with John Pinckney, the former pastor's father. Until the jury returned a guilty verdict on Thursday afternoon, family members stoically endured a week of tormenting testimony in United States District Court, where Mr. Roof, 22, faced 33 counts. Many will be back on Jan. 3 when the same jury considers whether to sentence Mr. Roof to death. On Thursday morning, there were firm hugs between family members outside the courtroom after a prosecutor delivered a stirring closing argument, illustrated by gruesome crime scene photographs. On Wednesday, they heard from a medical examiner about the more than 60 wounds inflicted by his Winchester bullets. On Tuesday, they watched three unnerving videos that Mr. Roof filmed of himself taking backyard target practice with the murder weapon in a grip. Here is what it has been like for some in the courtroom: Mr. Thompson attended Mr. Roof's trial each day except last Thursday, when he knew prosecutors would show photographs of the blood bath inside the fellowship hall. "I didn't want to see the images," he said in his office at Holy Trinity Reformed Episcopal Church, where he is vicar. "I didn't want to have that in my head every day for the rest of my life, and of course I didn't want to see my wife like that. " His decision meant he also missed the videos, captured by a church security camera, of some of the final moments of his wife's life: the clip of her striding purposefully in the side door at 5 p. m. dressed in a black suit and white blouse then the footage of her slipping out an hour later, warmly hugging two church members. Two hours after that, the camera captured Mr. Roof entering, a black pack around his waist, weighted by a . Glock and eight loaded magazines. "It has been an emotional roller coaster," Mr. Thompson said. "We have shed tears. There has been fear of the unknown. " Mr. Thompson, 64, was one of the five family members who, in a spontaneous demonstration of grace, expressed forgiveness for Mr. Roof at his bond hearing less than 48 hours after the shootings. That has not changed, he said, despite watching Mr. Roof's nonchalant and largely remorseless admission to plotting the assault to foment racial strife. "I have no intentions of taking that back," the clergyman said, stressing that his forgiveness had been more for himself than for Mr. Roof. "He is not a part of my life anymore. Forgiveness has freed me of that, of him completely. I'm not going to make him a lifetime partner. " That said, he wished the Justice Department had accepted Mr. Roof's offer to plead guilty in exchange for a life sentence. "The bad part is having to relive it, the going back to the beginning," he said. "It's just a lot to bear. " Mr. Thompson said he finds Mr. Roof a pathetic figure but not mentally defective, as Mr. Roof's lawyers would like the jury to believe. As a result, although he opposes the death penalty, he does not much care what happens to Mr. Roof. "His sentence won't affect the way I live, won't bring my wife back," he said. "Whatever he gets I look at it as, well, that's what he's supposed to get. I have no choice in the matter. " Mr. Manning had no connection to Mother Emanuel until January, when he won appointment to the historic pulpit after a tumultuous six months in which the church's leadership changed three times. Other than his predecessor, Mr. Pinckney, he did not know any of the victims. But he has been in court each day, all day, since jury selection began, often joined by a fellow Emanuel minister, Brenda Nelson. Ms. Nelson would have joined the Bible study on any other Wednesday, but on that sweltering night she drove home to meet an repairman. Mr. Manning, 49, said he felt it important to be at the courthouse to demonstrate "a ministry of presence. " "You might not be able to say everything, but just that you can smile and they can smile back and you can hug, they know you're there," he said. The pastor has been preaching from the Book of Psalms during the trial, reminding his congregation on Sunday that "in the midst of all of this, God's joy is the one constant. " Mr. Manning said he had been moved by the stoicism of those around him, and of the two survivors who testified. "What has been displayed," he said, "is just the determination to show once again the resilience and how strong our faith and trust is in God. " The video taken before the murders of his church's stalwarts affected him deeply. "They were just there doing what they have done on so many other Wednesdays, just there to study God's word," he said. "And in the midst of that, evil presented itself. " Although his church opposes the death penalty, he acknowledged that Mr. Roof's lack of remorse had given him "momentary pause. " "But you have to always still do what is required, you have to forgive," he said. "Now, am I there? I don't know yet. Maybe that's a question I'll be able to answer after the trial. " Jennifer Benjamin Pinckney, who was married to the Rev. Clementa Pinckney for 16 years, and Johnette Pinckney Martinez, the pastor's adoring younger sister, have been inseparable during the trial. Ms. Pinckney and her daughter were in the pastor's study when the killings began, and huddled beneath a desk as bullets pierced the office wall. One of her first calls was to her in Irmo, near Columbia. "Get to Charleston," she implored. Eighteen months later, the trial has brought it all back. "It's been pretty difficult to hear some of the things, well, most of the things," Ms. Martinez, a corrections officer, said. "But for me it was another step in the healing process. " The most painful moment was seeing the photographs of Mr. Pinckney, dressed as ever in his dark suit (he even wore them to high school) dead on the linoleum floor, blood pooling from his upper torso. Ms. Pinckney, a school librarian, said that the experience had been "emotionally excruciating" and that her reactions had coursed from tears to fury. Both women said it had been comforting to see the surveillance video of the Pinckney family arriving at church, the pastor holding his daughter's hand. He hugged a woman on her way out, patted another on the back, helped a third down a step. "That was him all the time," Ms. Pinckney said of her husband, who was also a state senator. "He's always greeting people, always hugging people, always interacting with people. It was his final moment, and it's something I've seen dozens of times over. " Both women said they were stunned to see evidence downloaded from the GPS in Mr. Roof's car that he had cased the church on six trips to Charleston from his home near Columbia. "It was an eerie feeling to know he had been there for that period of time," Ms. Pinckney said. "He was in the midst of everyone, knowing what he was planning. " She remains bewildered that he targeted Mother Emanuel. Given the devastation he caused, what confounded Ms. Martinez as she observed Mr. Roof was his boyishness and his slight frame. "It's just unbelievable," she said. "I would never have thought a child that young — a man that young — would have so much hate in his heart. "


NORTH POLE, N. Y. — On a snowy shoulder of Whiteface Mountain in the Adirondacks, beyond signs advertising "North Pole, N. Y. " and "Rides, Shops, Shows," several parking attendants pushed a sedan, its tires spinning, into a packed lot. The car's occupants spilled out, joining other families who through snowdrifts — just about everyone smiling, some tossing snowballs — toward the entrance to Santa's Workshop, a theme park from another era. Inside, a line to Santa's house snaked toward a North Pole, where families posed for selfies and a boy in a puffy snowsuit touched his tongue. Some families roasted marshmallows around a fire pit or wandered into the reindeer stable, where the animals were bedded down and out of reach of little hands. A boy raced from stall to stall, stopping in front of an empty one and shouting, "Where's Donder? Where's Donder?" (Donder and Dasher, an attendant elf later explained, had been feeling ill so they were recovering in a nearby pasture.) While it appeared to be a scene, Doug Waterbury, the owner of Santa's Workshop, said, "It's a challenge to keep the door open, frankly. " "We lose money or break even every year," Mr. Waterbury added. "Attendance is down. It's hard to get up in the morning to push snow, feed reindeer and then look at all that red ink at the end of the year — and it's not red because of Christmas. '' Santa's Workshop in North Pole, in Wilmington, N. Y. is among the last of the theme parks in the region, outlasting the Land of Makebelieve, Frontier Town, Time Town, Gaslight Village and other Adirondack roadside attractions. Since 1949, Santa's Workshop, an alpine village scaled for children, has welcomed families along the Whiteface Mountain Veterans Memorial Highway, a scenic road that meanders toward the peak's summit. Today, the park's Technicolor buildings and rides are a kitschy throwback that draws dedicated fans fueled by nostalgia, who return with their children or grandchildren to share their childhood experience of seeing Santa and his reindeer. Near the Candy Cane Express train, Carrie McDonald, 41, who lives in Harveys Lake, Pa. and her sister, Erin Richburg, 37, who lives in Philadelphia, watched their children flap arms and legs into snow angels. "We came up in 1984 with our grandparents and have really vivid memories," Ms. McDonald said. "We've made it a tradition to come back. Right now we're choosing this over Disney. " Ms. Richburg added, "It's and simple. It's all about Santa. " Standing by the park's outdoor amphitheater, where Mary and Joseph trudge to the manger, Corinne Curtis, her husband, Dave, and their children, Jack, Deacon, Kainen and Londyn, who range in age from 8 years old to 16 months, were back for a second year, visiting from their home in Binghamton, N. Y. "The feeling is what appeals to us," Ms. Curtis said. And Santa, of course. "He's a sweet Santa,'' she said. "He takes the time with them. It's not like other commercial places. " But in the 21st century, a nice St. Nick might not be enough to sustain a theme park in a remote part of the state. Santa's Workshop's inaccessibility — far from metropolitan areas, including five hours from New York City along twisty mountain roads — is "part of the mystique of the place," Mr. Waterbury said. But it has also contributed to its decline. In 1967, the final stretch of Interstate 87 — through the eastern Adirondacks — was completed, punching a direct route from New York City to Montreal. It bypassed communities with motels and cabin colonies as well as diners and attractions that had flourished in the years after World War II. In the 1940s, when three businessmen, Julian Reiss, Harold Fortune and Arto Monaco, came up with idea of a destination where it was always Christmas, they hadn't anticipated roller coasters or parks built around Walt Disney's characters. (In fact, before Disneyland opened in Anaheim, Calif. in 1955, Walt Disney visited Santa's Workshop for inspiration and to consult with Mr. Monaco, according to Mr. Waterbury.) The recession of 2008 pummeled the Adirondack travel industry. The unpredictability of the weather has also presented challenges, including Tropical Storm Irene in 2011, which damaged the park. Attendance has dropped steadily since the 1970s, and now the park attracts no more than about 1, 000 people on most days — a far cry from the over 14, 000 customers who would show up in the 1950s. But the biggest hurdle for the theme park, Mr. Waterbury said, is the weakening hold that the story of Santa has on children today. In the 1950s "a might still believe in Santa Claus," Mr. Waterbury said. "It's unusual today that a kid over 7 or 8 still believes. There's an urgency to get families to bring their kids here before they grow away. " In the lobby of the Jack Jingle puppet theater, where juice glasses, coasters and other memorabilia are displayed, Danielle and Paul Raimondi, from Center Moriches, N. Y. showed their daughters, Isabel, 13, and Sophia, 10, sacks spilling over with 60 years' worth of letters addressed to Santa Claus. After the girls wandered away, Ms. Raimondi whispered, "A lot of people in our 's school were talking about not believing, and we wanted to show her that he still does exist. " Mr. Waterbury, whose company, Empire Attractions, buys troubled assets, joined Bob Reiss, a son of Julian Reiss, as a in 2004. A decade later he bought out Mr. Reiss after earning his trust that he was committed to keeping the park's spirit alive. Mr. Waterbury said he felt an obligation to loyal Santa fans, the community and the park's history. Mr. Waterbury recently hired a new general manager, John Collins, who has many years of experience in the theme park industry. They're trying to figure out ways to bolster summertime attendance, the workshop's most dismal season. "I'm not going to let it go," said Mr. Waterbury. "There are enough bad things. This place is about what's good in life. "


The Italian director Saverio Costanzo has signed on to direct and to help write a television series based on the four Neapolitan novels by the author who publishes under the pseudonym Elena Ferrante. The novels, published between 2012 and 2014, have developed a cult international following. They are "My Brilliant Friend," "The Story of a New Name," "Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay" and "The Story of the Lost Child," and trace the lives of two friends, Elena and Lila, from their childhoods in postwar Naples to the present. Mr. Costanzo, best known for "Private" and "Hungry Hearts" (which Adam Driver) said in a telephone interview that the biggest challenge to adapting the novels for television was how "to convey the same emotions as the books in a cinematographic way. " He added that he was writing the script with the Italian writers Francesco Piccolo and Laura Paolucci, and that Ms. Ferrante was also expected to contribute to the screenplay. (He expects to communicate with the author via email.) The series will be filmed in Italy in Italian. The first season will cover the first book, with eight episodes of 50 minutes each. Filming is expected to begin in Naples this year and the first season is expected to air in the fall of 2018. A spokeswoman for Wildside, an Italian producer making the series with Fandango, confirmed that talks were in the final stages with a major American producer, as well as with the RAI state broadcaster. Wildside also Paolo Sorrentino's "The Young Pope," starring Jude Law as the first American pope, a coproduction with HBO, Canal+ and Sky. Last fall, an Italian investigative journalist said financial records indicated that the Italian literary translator Anita Raja was behind Ms. Ferrante's books, prompting an international outcry among the novelist's protective fans. Ms. Raja has previously denied she was the author. Mr. Costanzo said he wasn't interested in the author's true identity. "It's her literary reality that counts," he said. "I'm one of those people who don't care who she is. "


CNN, the news organization branded as "fake news" by Donald Trump, recently posted a job listing for a full time reporter focusing on fake news. [The Hill reports that a job listing was posted to Turner Media's website seeking a "Senior Writer" for CNN media. The reads, "CNNMoney is expanding its Media team. We're going to be examining the wave of 'fake news' stories and the people behind them, but more than that we're going to be looking at truth — what happened to it, why so many of us no longer believe it, and where those people are going to get their information instead. " The ad states that applicants must have at least six years of writing experience and aim for a high level of accuracy within their reporting, and they should, "get angry every time they see any inaccuracy in any story, whether large or small. " CNN is also apparently looking for someone tech savvy, as ideal applicants should "live on the Internet, and be intimately aware of its darkest corners. " Applicants will apparently be focusing on: "Investigating fake news, hoaxes and untruths of all kinds" "Debunking myths" and "Confronting the 'real' media. " Applicant's should also be "the kind of person who can't pass by a single rabbit hole without being desperate to jump in to see where it leads," and they must have "Intimate knowledge of and fascination with the parts of the Internet from which dubious news stories bubble up. " Despite the level of detail given relating to the expectations CNN will be placing on applicants, no salary is listed on the Turner Media website. Successful applicants will be working under CNN media team leader, Brian Stelter, a senior CNN media correspondent and the host of "Reliable Sources. " Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan_ or email him at lnolan@breitbart. com


This church in Ohio apparently doesn t understand who the victim is here.Columbia Road Baptist Church in North Olmsted actually banned a teenage girl and her family from attending services until she apologizes to the wife of the man who sexually abused her.Youth pastor Brian Mitchell had a wife and three kids, but that didn t stop him from targeting a 16-year-old girl who was simply seeking spiritual guidance at the church.Mitchell began by texting the girl constantly and complained about his wife. The text messages stopped temporarily after church leaders found out about the texts. But since church officials neglected to report Mitchell to the police he pretty much figured he could do whatever he wanted so he moved on to forcibly kissing the underage girl. Then he began sexually abusing her while driving her home.The sexual abuse would continue for the next month and the girl became depressed.Finally, Mitchell was arrested and sentenced to serve ten years in prison after Judge Patrick Corrigan refused to buy his excuse that he loved the girl. Your delusional excuse that there were emotions and love involved is troubling, the judge said. That s extremely delusional. What s also delusional is that the Columbia Road Baptist Church actually thinks the teenage girl their employee raped somehow owes Mitchell s wife an apology.During testimony, the girl s mother revealed that the church basically blamed her daughter for the whole situation and told them not to come back to the church until an apology has been made. Rather than comply with the ridiculous demand, the family just stopped attending church altogether.Rather than rally around the victim in her time of need, the church instead chose to rally around the rapist. You know, because Jesus.Frankly, the church should be slapped with a lawsuit for not reporting Mitchell s harassment of the teen in the first place. Church leaders knew Mitchell was obsessively texting this girl and they basically did nothing which only emboldened him to go further.Mitchell should not be the only one held responsible for how this girl was treated. Church leaders should be punished as well. And any congregant who actually believes the church was right to demand an apology from the victim is no true Christian. They are as fraudulent as the church they attend.Featured Image: Columbia Road Baptist Church Facebook Page


U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday said he did not make and does not possess any tapes of his conversations with former FBI Director James Comey, laying to rest speculation that arose after he tweeted last month that Comey better hope there were no tapes. "With all of the recently reported electronic surveillance, intercepts, unmasking and illegal leaking of information, I have no idea whether there are 'tapes' or recordings of my conversations with James Comey, but I did not make, and do not have, any such recordings," Trump wrote on Twitter.


U.S. Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump's estimated net worth is $3.7 billion, $800 million less than a year ago, Forbes magazine reported on Wednesday, attributing the loss largely to New York's softening real estate market. The magazine probed 28 assets or asset classes owned by the New York businessman and found 18 had declined in value, including Trump Tower in Manhattan and his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida. The value of his 40 Wall Street property in downtown New York had also declined, according to Forbes, which said it has been tracking Trump's wealth for 34 years. At the same time, one asset remained steady while seven others - including 555 California Street, the second tallest building in San Francisco - saw their value increase, it reported. Representatives for the Trump campaign could not be immediately reached for comment. The report comes as Trump, known as a reality television star as well as for his real estate business, heads into the final stretch of campaigning for the Nov. 8 election. Trump, seeking elected office for the first time, has touted his business acumen in pressing for change in Washington. He has vowed to rip up trade deals, negotiate with allies to make them pay more for their U.S. defense protection, and have Mexico pay for a wall he has proposed along the southern U.S. border. If elected, he would be the first billionaire to serve as president, according to Forbes. Details of Trump's wealth are not publicly known because, bucking a decades-old tradition of U.S. presidential candidates, he has refused to release his tax returns. His Democratic rival, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, earned $10.75 million in 2015 alongside her husband, former U.S. President Bill Clinton, their tax filing showed. Clinton and others, including some prominent Republicans, have pressed Trump to release his returns. They have also raised questions about his net worth as well as his charitable contributions and business ties. Forbes said its analysis did not place any value on Trump's brand. It also disputed Trump's assertion in Monday night's presidential debate that he reported $694 million in income from last year to the Federal Election Commission. Forbes said Trump mixed revenue and income in the document. Trump has so far given $54 million to his presidential campaign. His campaign has also paid his companies for office space in Trump Tower and use of his private airline, among other expenses, federal election filings have shown. Politico reported separately on Wednesday that Trump is considering giving more money to his campaign to fund an advertising blitz, citing three sources close to him. Amid the campaign, Trump made just one real estate deal in the past year: purchasing a Charleston, South Carolina, warehouse that was in foreclosure, Forbes said.


Fresh off his party's victory in this week's parliamentary election, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday walked back a statement from earlier this week in which he had ruled out a "two-state" solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But just a few days earlier, in the midst of what then looked like an uphill battle for Netanyahu's Likud Party, the prime minister said that a two-state solution would never happen on his watch. "I think that anyone who is going to establish a Palestinian state today and evacuate lands, is giving attack grounds to the radical Islam against the state of Israel," he told an Israeli news website on Monday, one day before the Israeli election. These comments contradicted a 2009 speech, in which Netanyahu endorsed the two-state approach as a way to attain peace in the region. In July 2014, however, Netanyahu made clear he had no interest in a fully sovereign Palestinian state. Netanyahu added in Thursday's interview that if the current Palestinian territories did attain statehood, the result would be a "terrorist state" because the Palestinians would receive arms from Iran. As long as that was the case, he said, a two-state solution was not possible. The prime minister's comments earlier in the week prompted a threat from White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest, who said Wednesday that the U.S. would "re-evaluate our position and the path forward in this situation," and might even explore pressing for Palestinian statehood at the United Nations. The Obama administration also took issue with Netanyahu's election-day text message blasts warning supporters that "Arab voters are going to the polls in droves." "Rhetoric that seeks to marginalize one segment of their population is deeply concerning and it is divisive and I can tell you that these are views the administration intends to communicate directly to the Israelis," Earnest said. When asked on Thursday by MSNBC host Andrea Mitchell to respond to allegations that he was a racist, Netanyahu simply said, "I'm not." He also reaffirmed the long-standing relationship between the United States and Israel, despite recent tensions over congressional Republicans' invitation to Netanyahu to address the U.S. Congress without giving proper notice to the White House. "There are so many areas where we must work together, will work together with the United States, and the president, because we have no other alternative," Netanyahu said. "America has no greater ally than Israel and Israel has no greater ally than the United States."


A U.S. House subcommittee will vote on Wednesday on a sweeping proposal to allow automakers to deploy up to 100,000 self-driving vehicles without meeting existing auto safety standards and bar states from imposing driverless car rules. The measure, which would be the first significant federal legislation aimed at speeding self-driving cars to market, would require automakers to submit safety assessment reports to U.S. regulators, but would not require pre-market approval of advanced vehicle technologies. Automakers would have to show self-driving cars "function as intended and contain fail safe features" but the Transportation Department could not "condition deployment or testing of highly automated vehicles on review of safety assessment certifications," the draft measure unveiled late Monday said. Last month, a U.S. House Energy and Commerce subcommittee held a hearing on a draft plan to allow U.S. regulators to exempt up to 100,000 vehicles a year per manufacturer from federal motor vehicle safety rules that prevent the sale of self-driving vehicles without human controls and bar states from setting rules that could block their use. Automakers must meet nearly 75 auto safety standards, many of which were written with the assumption that a licensed driver will be in control of the vehicle. The 30-page draft bill would also require the Transportation Department within two years to adopt rules requiring automakers to add a driver alert to check rear seating in an effort to prevent children from being left behind and consider setting performance standards for headlights. "This legislation puts important benchmarks into place that will prioritize consumer safety technologies and enhance mobility opportunities for people across the country," said Republican U.S. Representative Robert Latta, who chairs the panel that will vote on the measure Wednesday. Democrats had sought a number of new safety requirements during negotiations over the measure. The bill also includes automakers to take steps to ensure the cybersecurity of self-driving cars. General Motors Co, Alphabet Inc, Tesla Inc and others have been lobbying Congress to pre-empt rules under consideration in California and other states that could limit self-driving vehicle deployment. States could still set rules on registration, licensing, liability, insurance and safety inspections, but could not set self-driving car performance standards, under the proposal. The administration of former Democratic President Barack Obama last year unveiled voluntary guidelines on self-driving cars that asked automakers to submit a 15-question safety assessment. President Donald Trump's transportation secretary, Elaine Chao, said she plans to update those in the coming months. The issue has taken new urgency after U.S. road deaths rose 7.7 percent in 2015 over the previous year to 35,200, the highest annual jump since 1966. Traffic deaths climbed nearly 8 percent in the first nine months of 2016, government data shows. Automakers also say that without changes in regulations, U.S. self-driving car testing could move to Europe and elsewhere.


Heidi Schlumpf is a columnist for the National Catholic Reporter and teaches communication at Aurora University. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author. (CNN) The popular Pope Francis is taking some hits himself after some lighthearted comments that included a pretend punch to a colleague. The comments came while trying to make the point that free speech should have some limits, including on the right to insult another's faith. Speaking Thursday to reporters on the plane ride to the Philippines, the Pope gestured with a fake punch to demonstrate what he would do if someone were to say "a swear word against my mother." Still, the Vatican felt the need to clarify, in response to a later CNN question about the punch, that his words were "spoken colloquially" and consistent with the Pope's "free style of speech." I don't for one minute think the Pope is advocating for any type of violence, whether religiously motivated murder or sparring among friends who dis each other's mamas. What concerns me is his apparent belief that religion should have special protection when it comes to free speech. The Pope, responding to a general question about the interplay between religious liberty and free expression, was clearly referencing the massacre of journalists at Charlie Hebdo magazine by Islamist militants in Paris last week. Although he did not say the slain cartoonists brought the attack upon themselves because of their satirical criticism of Islam, it's not a huge logical leap to that conclusion and raises the likelihood of such a misinterpretation. Let's just say it's not what most public relations professionals would advise. And while the Pope has been known to talk more informally with reporters on the papal plane (his "Who am I to judge?" comment about gay Catholics came on the return flight from Brazil in 2013), he's still on the record and obviously aware that his words will be reported and analyzed. The Pope is not the only prominent Catholic raising the issue. While no one can match the offensive tone of Donahue, who actually said Charlie Hebdo's Stephane Charbonnier "didn't understand the role he played in his own death," the gist of the Pope's message was the same: Criticism of religion is problematic. As an aside, I'll be curious to see if those who slammed Donahue have the same harsh words for the Pope. Perhaps both of them should take a lesson from the response of another Christian, Jim Wallis, president of Sojourners, a progressive, evangelical community and publication. He had a different suggestion for how people of faith should respond to the Paris attacks: I think most American Catholics agree that while blasphemy -- offensive speech against God or religion -- is not particularly nice, it does not follow that it can or should be regulated or outlawed. In the United States, the Supreme Court outlawed blasphemy laws in 1952. I'm hoping the Pope was only offering counsel to his followers, rather than advocating for any sort of legal position. No one has the right not to be offended. Even the Pope.


Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump denied multiple women's claims that he sexually assaulted them as "totally and absolutely false." "The claims are preposterous, ludicrous and defy truth, common sense and logic," Trump said at a campaign rally in Florida. "We already have substantial evidence to dispute these lies, and it will be made public in an appropriate way and at an appropriate time, very soon."


Any move by Kosovo to scrap a war crimes court linked to its independence struggle would seriously undermine relations with friendly western nations, its main backer the United States said on Friday. Lawmakers from the governing coalition, who hold a majority, are pressing for a vote to abolish the court. The vote was scheduled for later in the day but it failed twice due to opposition from other parties. Parliament speaker Kadri Veseli said parliament would continue to attempt to vote on the issue in the coming days. Isa Mustafa, Kosovo s former prime minister and an opposition leader, said the proposal was devastating for our state and very damaging for justice . The Specialist Chamber was established in The Hague in 2015 to bring to justice Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) guerrillas alleged to have committed atrocities during the 1998-99 war that led to the country s secession from Serbia. It has yet to hear any cases. Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj, President Hashim Thaci and parliamentary speaker Veseli are former KLA commanders. The court s judges and prosecutors are foreign but it has been set up under Kosovan law, giving Pristina jurisdiction over it. Calling for the parliamentary vote to be halted, U.S. ambassador Greg Delawie said it would have extraordinarily negative implications for Kosovo. It is just a disgrace, he told reporters in Pristina. This will be considered by the U.S. as stab in the back. Kosovo will be choosing isolation instead of cooperation. There was no immediate response from Kosovo officials to Delawie s comments. Washington has been Kosovo s leading political and financial backer since it declared independence in 2008. Nataliya Apostolova, the EU representative in Pristina, called the attempt to scrap the court appalling and extremely damaging . The court was set up following U.S. and European pressure on the government to confront alleged KLA crimes against ethnic Serbs. According to Kosovo media, the court could indict or call as witnesses some of current government officials. It was set up in the Netherlands to minimize the risk of witness intimidation and judicial corruption. Kosovo s war veterans association last week launched an initiative to hold a parliamentary debate to abolish the law that established the court. They gathered 15,000 signatures, Kosovo media reported. NATO air strikes on Serbia forced Belgrade to withdraw its troops from Kosovo in 1999, having killed around 10,000 Albanian civilians. NATO has around 5,000 troops stationed in Kosovo to keep a still fragile peace. Kosovo, which is 90 percent ethnic Albanian and 5 percent Serbian, is recognized by more than 110 mainly by western countries but not by Serbia s key ally Russia or China.


Burlington Stores Inc joined other retailers, including Nordstrom Inc, in deciding not to sell products of Ivanka Trump's brand online, news website Business Insider reported. Burlington will no longer stock the brand's accessories and clothing online, according to the report, but it was unclear if the off-price retailer would sell the products in its stores. Burlington and Ivanka Trump's representatives were not immediately available for comment. Earlier this month, Nordstrom said it would stop carrying Ivanka Trump's apparel because of falling sales, pushing President Donald Trump to defend his daughter on Twitter by saying she was treated "unfairly" by the retailer. Neiman Marcus [NMRCUS.UL] has also said it would not sell Ivanka Trump's jewelry line while TJX Cos Inc told its employees to dump any signs related to the brand. HSN Inc has stopped selling Trump Home products, but still sells Trump presidential memorabilia. Sears Holdings and its unit, Kmart, had also removed 31 Trump Home items from their online product offerings to focus on more profitable items this month.


The European Union s executive on Thursday stepped up its pressure on the nationalist government of Prime Minister Viktor Orban in Hungary over its treatment of immigrants, non-governmental groups and a prominent university. Orban has been locked in a series of running battles with the EU, where Western states and the Brussels-based executive Commission decry what they see as his authoritarian leanings, the squeezing of the opposition and the free media. In a series of legal announcements, the European Commission said it was taking Budapest to the bloc s top court, the Luxembourg-based European Court of Justice, over its NGO laws as well as a higher education law that targets a university founded by U.S. financier George Soros, a public enemy of Orban. Brussels, influenced by the Soros Empire, has released a burst of fire on Hungary. The legal procedures are now openly used as tools of political blackmail and exerting pressure, Orban s Fidesz party said in reaction to the announcements. Brussels also confirmed it was taking Hungary - along with eastern EU peers Poland and the Czech Republic - to the tribunal over refusing to host asylum-seekers under an EU-wide quota system. The ECJ cases could lead to financial penalties but take months, or years, to conclude. The Commission has also stepped up its legal case against Budapest over Hungary s asylum laws. Separately, European lawmakers were debating on Thursday whether the rule of law and democratic standards in Hungary were under threat more generally, and to an extent that would merit the triggering of an unprecedented EU punishment against Budapest. The so-called Article 7 procedure would shame Orban by denouncing his government as undemocratic and could even lead to the maximum - though practically highly unlikely - sanction of stripping Hungary of its voting rights in the EU. Hungary s case has been the first time the European Parliament has called for the launching the Article 7 mechanism. At the debate in one of parliament s committees, some lawmakers said Orban was making untruthful accusations against the EU and diverging from European values with his brand of illiberal democracy . Even before the debate, Orban s spokesman Zoltan Kovacs likened it to an amalgamation of a medieval witch hunt and communist-era show trial. The Commission s First Vice-President Frans Timmermans, however, made clear the executive arm did not side with the parliament s broader and at times tougher view of Hungary. We believe that we are dealing with very specific issues where we have disagreements with the Hungarian government, Timmermans told a news conference. The situation in Hungary is not in that sense comparable to the systemic threats to the rule of law which we see in Poland, he said of Orban s closest EU ally, the eurosceptic, nationalist Polish government of the Law and Justice (PiS) party. In power for two years, PiS has sought to replicate some of ideas Orban has introduced over his seven years in office. The party s moves on the courts and the media have provoked concern elsewhere in the EU that the biggest ex-communist member in the bloc is backpedalling on democracy and the rule of law. Warsaw faces its own Article 7 proceedings from the Commission. Warsaw and Budapest, which share a broad world view that often goes against the more liberal one of the western EU states, have each other s back in their battles with the bloc and have vowed to shield one another from any sanctions.


Norway s Liberal Party will launch formal negotiations to join the right-wing cabinet of Prime Minister Erna Solberg, it said on Saturday, although the government would still be ruling in a minority even if the small centrist group is included. Informal talks have taken place since the government won re-election in September, and bringing in the Liberals could give a boost to policies favoring small businesses, the environment and education. We are going to give ourselves a chance ... to find a common platform we can agree on, Liberal Party leader Trine Skei Grande told a meeting of her party in parliament on Saturday, adding it would be a challenging and difficult process. Adding the Liberals to the coalition of the Conservatives and the anti-immigration Progress Party could make day-to-day governing easier for Solberg, although she would still require backing from another small party, the Christian Democrats. The prime minister has sought to include both of the small centrist groups, but the Christian Democrats, which back Solberg on fiscal matters, have rejected the offer.


It's an unusual move for a presidential candidate to pick a vice presidential running mate before winning his party's nomination – even more unusual when his path to the nomination is blocked. But despite trailing Trump, Cruz went ahead and announced his choice. But will he hit a home run by naming former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina as his running mate – or will he strike out? "Carly isn't intimated by bullies," the Texas senator declared Wednesday. "Over and over again, Carly has shattered glass ceilings." "This is the fight of our time," Fiorina said during Wednesday's announcement. "And I believe Ted Cruz is the man to lead that fight. And I am prepared to stand by his side and give this everything I have, to restore the soul of our party, to defeat Donald Trump, to defeat Hillary Clinton, and to take our country back." Fiorina tussled with Trump early in the primary season for comments he made about her face. The GOP front-runner dismissed this latest move. "A new relationship has started – Cruz and Carly," the tycoon said. "Cruz can't win. What's he doing picking a vice president?" Trump had other things to talk about as well. He gave a major foreign policy speech in Washington and said America's allies would have to start paying for their own defense. He also railed on the Bush and Obama administrations for not stopping persecution of Christians in the Middle East. "We have done nothing to help Christians, nothing, and we should always be ashamed of that – for that lack of action," he said. Trump went from there to Indiana where he got the endorsement of legendary Indiana Hooters basketball coach Bobby Knight, ahead of Tuesday's primary. "If we win Indiana, it's over," he said. "It's over. I'm not playing games with Indiana." After Indiana votes, Clinton is hoping it's also over for Bernie Sanders. The delegate math is not with Sanders, who rallied thousands of screaming fans at Indiana University hours after he announced the layoffs of hundreds of campaign staffers. "Next Tuesday let's have the largest voter turnout in Indiana history," Sanders said. Cruz is 400 delegates behind Trump and while he expects to win Indiana, if he doesn't, analysts say it's all over.


Republican Senator John McCain broke with the reassuring message that U.S. officials visiting Germany have sought to convey on their debut trip to Europe, saying on Friday that the administration of President Donald Trump was in "disarray". McCain, a known Trump critic, told the Munich Security Conference that the resignation of the new president's security adviser Michael Flynn over his contacts with Russia reflected deep problems in Washington. "I think that the Flynn issue obviously is something that shows that in many respects this administration is in disarray and they've got a lot of work to do," said McCain, even as he praised Trump's defense secretary. "The president, I think, makes statements (and) on other occasions contradicts himself. So we've learned to watch what the president does as opposed to what he says," he said. European governments have been unsettled by the signals sent by Trump on a range of foreign policy issues ranging from NATO and Russia to Iran, Israel and European integration. The debut trip to Europe of Trump's Defence Secretary Jim Mattis and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, to a meeting of G20 counterparts in Bonn, went some way to assuaging concerns as they both took a more traditional U.S. position. But Trump is wrestling with a growing controversy at home about potential ties between his aides and Russia, which he dismissed on Thursday as a "ruse" and "scam" perpetrated by a hostile news media. Mattis made clear to allies, both at NATO in Brussels and in Munich, that the United States would not retreat from leadership as the European continent grapples with an assertive Russia, wars in eastern and southern Mediterranean countries and attacks by Islamist militants. U.S. Vice President Mike Pence will address the Munich conference on Saturday with a similar message of reassurance. Pence will say that Europe is an "indispensable partner" for the United States, a senior White House foreign policy adviser told reporters. Mattis told a crowd that included heads of state and more than 70 defense ministers that Trump backed NATO. "President Trump came into office and has thrown now his full support to NATO. He too espouses NATO's need to adapt to today's strategic situation for it to remain credible, capable and relevant," Mattis said. Mattis said the United States and its European allies had a shared understanding of the challenges ahead. Trump has alarmed allies by expressing admiration for Russian President Vladimir Putin. Mattis, however, has spoken out strongly against Russia while in Europe. After talks with NATO allies in Brussels on Thursday, he said that he did not believe it would be possible to collaborate militarily with Moscow, at least for now. The Europeans may need more convincing that Washington stands with it on a range of security issues. "There is still a lot of uncertainty," Sebastian Kurz, Austria's foreign minister, told reporters. "The big topic in Munich is looking to the USA to see which developments to expect next." European intelligence agencies have warned that Russia is also seeking to destabilize governments and influence elections across Europe with cyber attacks, fake news and propaganda and by funding far-right political parties. "We should be under no illusions about the step-change in Russian behavior over the last couple of years, even after Crimea," British Defence Minister Michael Fallon said, referring to Moscow's 2014 annexation of the Ukrainian peninsula. "We have seen a step-change in Russian military aggression, but also in propaganda, in misinformation and a succession of persistent attacks on Western democracies, interference in a whole series of elections including ... the United States." NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg held talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in Munich, seeing progress on encouraging Moscow to be more open about its military exercises that the alliance says are unpredictable. Russia says it is the Western alliance, not Moscow, that is destabilizing Europe by sending troops to its western borders. "We have different views," Stoltenberg said of the crisis in Ukraine, where the West accuses the Kremlin of arming separatist rebels in a conflict that has killed 10,000 people since April 2014. Russia says the conflict is a civil war. In the latest incident, Lithuanian prosecutors have opened a criminal investigation into a false report of rape by German soldiers stationed there on a NATO mission to deter Russia. Mattis, without explicitly citing the case, rallied to the defense of German forces as he spoke in the German city of Munich. "I have great respect for Germany's leadership in Europe – and for the ethical performance of your troops on the battlefield," he said. U.S. intelligence agencies concluded last year that Russia hacked and leaked Democratic emails during the election campaign as part of an effort to tilt the vote in Trump's favor. McCain acknowledged concern in Europe and beyond that America was "laying down the mantle of global leadership" and cited global trends he found disturbing, including hardening resentment toward immigrants and an unwillingness to separate truth from lies. McCain urged the forum not to give up on the United States. "Make no mistake, my friends: These are dangerous times, but you should not count America out, and we should not count each other out," McCain said.


Chris Wallace tore this prick apart.It s only been a week since a gunman shot and killed 58 people and wounded nearly 500 in Las Vegas with a fully automatic assault weapon.On Sunday, National Rifle Association executive director Chris Cox appeared on Fox News Sunday and began by appearing to suggest that the NRA is only calling for regulating bump stocks because NRA members were shot at the concert. You know, because non-NRA members apparently don t matter.Anyway, Cox went on to once again say that we should not be discussing gun control after this latest mass shooting and that we should wait in the name of common decency. Host Chris Wallace had a problem with that. You say common decency, let s wait, what s enough time? Wallace asked. I mean, here were 58 people killed, almost 500 injured. Is it common decency to wait a day, two days, a week, a month. I mean, it is understandable I know you don t agree with their solution but what s wrong with saying we need to address this? Of course, rather than answer the question, Cox turned the discussion into an attack on Hillary Clinton and other Democrats, all while whining about them have armed guards. Is that a sensible way to have this conversation, to try to turn it into class warfare, where if you re for gun control somehow you re part of an elite? Wallace responded.Indeed, after the numerous death threats directed at her during the 2016 campaign, including one by Trump in which he called for Second Amendment people to do something if she had won, it s understandable why Hillary Clinton would want security. It s not class warfare, Cox replied. It s what the American people want. And that s when Wallace buried him. That s not actually true. If you talk about background checks, if you talk about automatic weapons there are a lot of people, in fact a majority of people according to the polls who would like to see those gun controls. I have to say that I m put off at the argument, if you believe in gun control, you re an elite. I have to tell you, Mr. Cox, I know very few people who have armed body guards. One of the few people I know who has armed body guards is Wayne LaPierre. We can argue about the merits of it. But I think to dismiss people and say, Well, that s just the elite and they have armed guards, it seems to me does a disservice to your argument. Here s the video via YouTube.A CBS poll last year found that 57 percent of Americans support an assault weapons ban.And polls consistently show that 80 percent to 90 percent of Americans, including 74 percent of NRA members, want background checks for all gun sales.So, Cox was clearly lying and Wallace rightfully called him out for it.Featured Image: Screenshot


WASHINGTON — When it comes to getting around Congress, President Obama may not be able to move mountains — but he can rename them. The Obama administration's decision to rename North America's tallest peak to its original native name of Denali is drawing protests from Republican lawmakers in Ohio. That's because the mountain's previous namesake, President William McKinley, was also a Republican from Ohio. "This decision by the administration is yet another example of the President going around Congress," Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, said, noting that Congress had been debating the name for years. Rep. Bob Gibbs, R-Ohio, went even further, calling it another example of Obama's "constitutional overreach." "President Obama has decided to ignore an act of Congress in unilaterally renaming Mount McKinley in order to promote his job-killing war on energy," Gibbs said in a tweeted statement Sunday. "This political stunt is insulting to all Ohioans." Obama timed the announcement to coincide with a three-day trip to Alaska to highlight the problem of climate change in the Arctic. But the dispute over the name goes back decades. The 20,237-foot mountain was originally known as Denali, which means "the great one" in the Athabascan language of the original Alaskans. But that began to change when European-American prospectors and explorers arrived. A Seattle man, William Dickey,rediscovered the mountain in 1896 while prospecting for gold. "We named our great peak Mount McKinley, after William McKinley of Ohio, who had been nominated for the presidency,and that fact was the first news we received on our way out of that wonderful wilderness," he wrote in a dispatch to the New York Sun. McKinley was not yet president then, and the naming may have been a political stunt in itself: McKinley, in running against the populist Democrat William Jennings Bryan, favored the gold standard to back U.S. dollars. That name was formalized in 1917 when President Woodrow Wilson signed the Mount McKinley National Park Act, which required the park to be "dedicated and set apart as a public park for the benefit and enjoyment of the people under the name of the Mount McKinley National Park." But another law passed in 1947 gives the Secretary of the Interior and the Board on Geographic Names the power to "provide for uniformity in geographic nomenclature and orthography throughout the federal government." The Alaska government first petitioned the Interior Department to change the name to Denali in 1975. But because the Board on Geographic Names deferred to Congress if a name was under consideration by lawmakers, the Ohio delegation was able to prevent a name change for four decades simply by introducing bills to keep the McKinley name — even if those bills never passed. Friday, Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said that impasse had gone on long enough. In her order issued Friday, she noted that McKinley never stepped foot in Alaska. Still, House Speaker John Boehner, who hails from the opposite corner of Ohio, said he was "disappointed" in the decision. "There is a reason President McKinley's name has served atop the highest peak in North America for more than 100 years, and that is because it is a testament to his great legacy," Boehner said in a statement. He recited McKinley's record, which included service in the Union Army in the Civil War, elections to the House of Representatives and to the Ohio governorship. "And he led this nation to prosperity and victory in the Spanish-American War as the 25th President of the United States," Boehner said. It's unclear what the Ohioans can do about the decision. Gibbs said he would would work to overturn the decision legislatively; Portman said he would ask the National Park Service to find a way to "preserve McKinley's legacy somewhere else in the national park that once bore his name." The issue is not strictly a partisan one. Ohio Democrats, too, have introduced bills over the years to retain the McKinley name. And Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska — while critical of Obama on energy policy — praised the decision to rename the mountain. "For centuries, Alaskans have known this majestic mountain as the 'great one,'" she said in a statement Sunday. "I'd like to thank the President for working with us to achieve this significant change to show honor, respect, and gratitude to the Athabascan people of Alaska."


In early September, Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi, a senior Iranian official and cleric, flew to the holy city of Najaf in southern Iraq. His entourage included a sizable security detail and the former head of the Revolutionary Guards, the most powerful military force in the Islamic Republic. Shahroudi, 69, spent several days on a charm offensive meeting officials, clerics and seminary students at his office near the golden dome shrine of Imam Ali, one of the world s holiest Shi ite sites. His aim was to raise his profile as a replacement for the top Shi ite cleric and most powerful man in Iraq: the 87-year old Ayatollah Ali Sistani, according to current and former Iraqi officials. While attention has focused on Iraq s battle against Islamic State, the country s future could equally hinge on what is happening in Najaf. With Sistani s advanced age and persistent rumors about his health, the question of his replacement has become more pointed. Iraqi Shi ite factions are jockeying to influence who replaces Sistani. Iran, whose population is mostly Shi ite, backs Shahroudi. Shahroudi could prove a controversial replacement for Sistani. Senior clergy in Najaf are wary of Iran trying to expand its influence and Shahroudi is viewed with some suspicion, although he could still build support among students. Since Sistani has distanced himself from Iranian politics some of his followers may not want a replacement who is close to Tehran. Sources in Najaf were unwilling to go on the record on a matter as sensitive as Sistani s successor, but a former senior Iraqi official told Reuters: The Iranians will try their best. It s not just religious, politics have become part of it. It will decide the fate of Iraq, the official said. Iran has already expanded its influence in Iraq by helping the Shi ite-led government in Baghdad retake disputed areas from the Kurds. The head of the branch of the Revolutionary Guards responsible for operations outside Iran, Qassem Soleimani, personally convinced some Kurdish leaders to abandon their claim to contested towns, like the oil-rich Kirkuk. Attempts to reach Shahroudi and the Revolutionary Guards media office were unsuccessful, as were attempts to reach Sistani s office for comment. If Iran can influence who becomes the next top Shi ite cleric in Iraq, it could tighten its grip on power within the country for years. A senior cleric in Najaf who is sympathetic to the interests of Iran would also eliminate a rival to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who claims to be the leader of Shi ite Muslims worldwide. For years, Sistani, who has endorsed a religious and political viewpoint independent of Iran, has been Khamenei s top challenger for the leadership of the global Shi ite community. Sistani is rarely seen in public but his decrees are sacrosanct to his millions of Shi ite followers. Sistani s fatwa to rise up against the Sunni militants of Islamic State thwarted the group s push toward Baghdad in 2014. The cleric has also used his decrees to reduce sectarian violence in the country. Sistani opposed the secession of the Kurdish region after the referendum on independence in September but then urged Baghdad to protect Kurds after reports of abuses surfaced last month. Without Sistani s restraining influence, clashes are likely to break out between sects as well as among rival Shi ite groups, Iraqi officials and observers say. Sistani is not just a poor guy sitting in a house. He can control millions of people, the Iraqi former senior official said. It will be a very bloody struggle after Sistani passes away. Sources in Najaf expect Sistani to remain in his post until his death. There is no clear succession process, but Shahroudi would need to obtain the support of a large number of ordinary Shi ites, seminary students and other clerics. Shahroudi is no stranger to Najaf: he was born in the city to Iranian parents. In the 1970s he was jailed and tortured by Saddam Hussein s security forces because of his political activities. He moved to Iran after the Islamic revolution and has been promoted to top posts since Khamenei became supreme leader in 1989. Shahroudi was head of the Iranian judiciary for a decade and is currently the head of the Expediency Council, a body intended to resolve disputes between parliament and a hardline watchdog body, the Guardian Council. In public, Shahroudi is often seen sitting next to Khamenei. Shahroudi s visit is only one sign of how Tehran is trying to rally support for its candidate to replace Sistani. A company linked to the Revolutionary Guards is involved in a $300 million project to expand the Imam Ali shrine, making it the second largest Muslim holy site after Mecca in Saudi Arabia. These projects create a state of dependency between recipients of aid and Tehran since they integrate the Iraqi infrastructure into the Iranian infrastructure network, said Ali Alfoneh, an expert on the Guards at the Atlantic Council. Furthermore, such activities provide a cover for the Islamic Republic s intelligence networks operating in Iraq. In 2011, Shahroudi opened an office in Najaf and began paying clerical students stipends, which observers say was an attempt by Iran to increase its influence. It was a provocative move, said an Iraqi analyst familiar with the Shi ite clergy who asked not to be identified. Shahroudi subsequently opened offices in Baghdad and Karbala. He pays stipends to thousands of seminary students, according to Iraqi officials and clerical sources in Najaf. Clerics often pay stipends to students to gather support, raise their profile and perhaps become accepted as a marja, or top cleric, observers say. Iran is trying to influence the process of who comes after Sistani through the students, said a Western diplomat in Iraq who did not have permission to speak on the record. Sistani is now the main sponsor of Shi ite clerical students, paying millions of dollars in Iraq and elsewhere. His son Mohammed Ridha oversees the financial and administrative work of his office. Follow the dollars to see what will happen next, said an Iraqi senior official familiar with the clerical politics of Najaf. Mohammed Ridha Sistani controls all the cash. Mohammed Ridha s work could position him to replace his father, observers say, though passing the religious mantle within a family would be unprecedented in Shi ite custom. Top contenders to replace Sistani in Najaf include three other marjas but they are old and there is no clear front-runner, according to clerical sources and Iraqi officials. Nothing is fixed to make a decision for this procedure, said Sheikh Ali Najafi, son of one of the top Najaf marjas. While in Iraq, Shahroudi visited prime minister Haidar al Abadi in Baghdad. Iraqi officials said Sistani refused to see him in Najaf, but they do not expect the Iranians to give up.