| AOC to DHS chief: Border agents shared 'images of my violent rape' in secret Facebook group Posted: 18 Jul 2019 03:02 PM PDT  Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez questioned Acting Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan about the whereabouts of Border Patrol agents who threatened her in a secret Facebook group.
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| Cyprus detains 12 Israeli men over allegations of gang rape of British teenager Posted: 18 Jul 2019 09:58 AM PDT  Twelve Israeli tourists were remanded in custody for eight days by a court in Cyprus for the alleged gang rape of a 19-year-old British woman at a popular holiday resort on the island. The Israelis were arrested on Wednesday after the British teenager told police that she had been raped at the hotel where she was staying in the beach resort of Ayia Napa. Doctors who treated the woman said they found bruises and scratches on her body. The suspects, aged 16 to 18, were staying in the same hotel. The young men covered their faces with their t-shirts as they arrived handcuffed at the court in the nearby town of Paralimni, in the southeast of Cyprus. One broke down in tears. Some were accompanied by their parents. The hearing was held behind closed doors because some of the suspects are minors. The suspects covered their faces as they arrived at court Credit: Petros Karadjis/AP A judge accepted a request by Cypriot police to remand the men in custody for eight days while an investigation is launched into the rape allegation. They have not yet been charged with any offence. Three of the men allegedly raped the British tourist while others filmed the attack on their mobile phones, local media reports said. Ioannis Habaris, a lawyer representing four of the suspects, told The Associated Press it was unclear exactly how many of the men were implicated in the alleged rape. He said there was "some evidence" the British woman was involved in a "relationship" with one of the suspects. Tourists on a beach on the outskirts of the resort of Ayia Napa in Cyprus Credit: Amir Makar/AFP Nir Yaslovitzh, an Israeli lawyer representing three other suspects, said the 12 teenagers had arrived in Ayia Napa in three separate groups. Some were having a holiday prior to being drafted into the Israeli army for compulsory military service. He said police were trying to flush out the perpetrators among the group by arresting all 12 and having them detained. "I think it's a trick," Mr Yaslovitzh told AP. "They want to know how my clients will (react)." The Foreign Office said British authorities were "supporting a British woman who was assaulted in Cyprus and are in contact with local police". Cyprus's sandy beaches, bars and nightclubs attract around 1.3 million British tourists a year. Ayia Napa has a reputation for being a party town, with booze cruises and pub crawls.
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| Germany honors resisters who tried to assassinate Hitler Posted: 18 Jul 2019 11:28 PM PDT  Germany is marking the 75th anniversary of the most famous plot to kill Adolf Hitler, honoring those who resisted the Nazis — who were stigmatized for decades as traitors — as pillars of the country's modern democracy amid growing concerns about the resurgence of the far-right. Chancellor Angela Merkel, who will speak Saturday at an annual swearing-in ceremony for some 400 troops before addressing a memorial event, paid tribute ahead of the anniversary to executed plot leader Col. Claus von Stauffenberg and his fellow conspirators and highlighted their importance to modern Germany. Von Stauffenberg tried to kill Hitler with a briefcase bomb on July 20, 1944, during a meeting at his headquarters in East Prussia.
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| Iran's Foreign Minister Zarif: We Can't "Discount" Possibility of War Posted: 18 Jul 2019 01:01 PM PDT  On Thursday, National Interest Editor Jacob Heilbrunn interviewed Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif in New York at the Ambassador's residence on the current state of U.S.-Iran relations. The transcript has been lightly edited for readability.Jacob Heilbrunn: With the American shooting down of an Iranian drone in the Strait of Hormuz today, are we on a path of escalation?Mohammed Javad Zarif: I checked with Tehran, and we do not have any information about having lost a drone today. So, we don't know, as of now what has happened. We have the president saying that they shot a drone. We don't know whose drone it is, but we don't have that information. But we are certainly moving in the wrong direction. The fact that the United States has an increased presence in the Persian Gulf doesn't help security or stability in the area—it's a tiny body of water and you cannot have such congested traffic there without something happening.Heilbrunn: A lot of the tension is also focused on the tanker that went missing. Is Iran responsible for that?Zarif: All the information we have is that we confiscated a small tanker that was only carrying a million liters of smuggled oil products—not oil—and that happens quite often in the Persian Gulf because of heavily subsidized prices in Iran of oil products. There is a lot of smuggling from both sea and land borders and we interdict them on a regular basis. So if that is the tanker they're talking about, that is a smuggling tanker, not a shipping tanker.Heilbrunn: Another move that the Trump administration has announced is sending about five hundred more soldiers to Saudi Arabia. What is your response to that?
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| Sen. Thom Tillis says the media should focus on the extreme views of the 'squad' Posted: 18 Jul 2019 06:44 AM PDT  North Carolina Republican Sen. Thom Tillis says Rep. Ilhan Omar's resolution that likens a boycott of Israel to that of Nazi Germany is the real problem.
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| 'My entire world was gone': floods devastate northern Pakistan Posted: 19 Jul 2019 03:15 AM PDT  Now only jagged rocks and a few damaged homes remain after torrential rains wreaked havoc on the picturesque mountain village in the Laswa Valley. More than 270 people have been killed in recent days across South Asia as monsoon rains deluged large swathes of the subcontinent, flooding waterways and destroying communities. "I was holding the hand of my mother trying to save her, but unfortunately I lost her hand and she was swept away by the floodwater," says Amin Butt, who was visiting his family in Kashmir.
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| Navy warship sunk by German sub in WWII finally located Posted: 18 Jul 2019 03:15 PM PDT  A private dive team has located the last U.S. Navy warship to be sunk by a German submarine in World War II, just a few miles (kilometers) off the coast of Maine. The sinking of the USS Eagle PE-56 on April 23, 1945, was originally blamed on a boiler explosion. The patrol boat's precise location remained a mystery — until now.
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| Hong Kong Protesters Who Stormed Legco Seek Asylum in Taiwan: Report Posted: 19 Jul 2019 03:27 AM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- Dozens of Hong Kong protesters involved in the ransacking of the city's Legislative Council this month have arrived in Taiwan to seek asylum, the Apple Daily newspaper reported.About 30 protesters have already landed in Taiwan, while as many as 30 others -- and possibly more -- are planning to try soon, the Hong Kong newspaper said, citing unidentified people who assisted them.The fleeing activists were part of the group that smashed into the legislature on July 1, the paper said. The people who assisted the protesters told the paper they had been in contact with Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council, which handles the island's relations with Beijing, to seek help.The council hasn't received any formal asylum applications from Taiwan's National Immigration Agency, its deputy minister Chiu Chui-cheng said in a text message. If Taiwan receives any applications, authorities will handle them appropriately based on existing regulations and the principle of protecting human rights, Chiu added.Read more: Pain From Hong Kong Protests Spreads as Luxury Names Get HitA flight to Taiwan by Hong Kong asylum seekers would be fraught with geopolitical risk. It threatens to raise tensions between the administration of Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-Wen, a China critic who's up for re-election in January, and Chinese President Xi Jinping, who has already faced embarrassment over the global attention paid to Hong Kong's anti-government protests.Hong Kong's historic demonstrations over legislation that would allow extraditions to the mainland for the first time have resonated widely in democratically run Taiwan, which China considers a wayward province.Seeking RefugeThe Taiwan Association for Human Rights, a top local non-governmental organization, wouldn't comment on the case. "We cannot divulge any information regarding any individual case," said Secretary-General, Chiu E-ling. "If there are individuals who approach us for help, we'll interview these people and help them get in touch with government officials if that is what they wish."Earlier: China Drafting Urgent Plan to Resolve Hong Kong Chaos, SCMP SaysProtesters used a metal cart as a battering ram to break their way into the legislative building on the anniversary of Hong Kong's return from British rule, spray-painting slogans on its chamber's walls and draping a Union Jack-emblazoned colonial flag across the dais.At the time, Hong Kong's leader Carrie Lam condemned the "extreme use of violence and vandalism" and supported the police's decision to leave it undefended in the face of a small group of protesters.Emily Leung, a spokeswoman for Lam, referred queries on the report to the Hong Kong police, who declined to comment on Friday.who didn't immediately respond to a call and an email Friday for comment.(Updates with police comment in final paragraph.)\--With assistance from Ina Zhou, Kari Lindberg and Debby Wu.To contact the reporters on this story: Iain Marlow in Hong Kong at imarlow1@bloomberg.net;Adela Lin in Taipei at alin95@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Brendan Scott at bscott66@bloomberg.net, Karen LeighFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| FBI tied Donald Trump and top aides to 2016 effort to silence a porn star, new court files show Posted: 18 Jul 2019 05:36 PM PDT  Newly unsealed filings offer a window into the government's investigation of hush-money payments to two women claiming affairs with Trump.
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| Mexico president calls 'El Chapo' sentence inhumane, vows better society Posted: 18 Jul 2019 06:37 AM PDT  Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador on Thursday called the jail conditions of drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman inhumane, while vowing to bring down violence stemming from drug violence by create a society less obsessed with material wealth. Guzman will spend the rest of his days behind bars in the United States after a judge sentenced him on Wednesday to life in prison plus 30 years. Lopez Obrador said at his regular morning conference that sentences like the one for El Chapo - "a sentence for life in a hostile jail, hard, inhumane" - made a life no longer worth living.
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| Ukraine's president says he backs prisoner swap with Russia Posted: 19 Jul 2019 06:29 AM PDT  Ukraine's president on Friday outlined the details of an impending prisoner swap with Russia, saying that Kiev is willing to release a jailed Russian journalist in exchange for a Ukrainian film director. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy's statement comes at the end of the week of shuttle diplomacy, with the Russian and Ukrainian human rights ombudswomen holding talks both in Moscow and in Kiev. The flurry of activity around imprisoned Russians and Ukrainians follows last week's first telephone call between Zelenskiy and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
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| How Nicaragua’s Sandinista Revolution Was Resurrected—and Betrayed Posted: 19 Jul 2019 01:45 AM PDT  Courtesy Bill GentileBill Gentile covered the Central American wars of the 1980s that haunt the United States to this day. In the first chapter of this series he wrote about the Sandinista revolution in Nicaragua. In the second, he looked at the U.S.-backed counter-revolution. Here he looks at what has become of the region, and of journalism.* * *Return Trips* * *MANAGUA, Nicaragua—Journalists follow the news. So when peace came to Central America at the beginning of the 1990s, I knew it was time for me to leave. The story there that had dominated front pages and nightly news for more than a decade dissipated almost overnight. In any case, I was ready to expand my work from Latin America and the Caribbean to more distant frontiers and Claudia, my Nicaraguan wife, was glad to escape the pressure cooker of a country mired in perpetual crisis. So we moved to Miami, a blend of developed and developing countries, where I still could cover major national and international stories, where my experience in conflict reporting and fluency in Spanish would be assets, and from where I could cover not just the region but stories far beyond.Central America's Wars of the '80s Still Haunt the U.S.It was a difficult transition. The logistics made sense, but the profession itself faced growing threats. By the end of the 1980s and especially at the beginning of the 1990s, the craft of photojournalism was contracting. Digital photography was becoming accessible to everyone; social media began to compete with the old mainstream operations, and 24/7 cable meant legacy outlets like Newsweek, my employer, became the platforms of old news before they even hit the stands.A peasant walks past a cotton plantation in western Nicaragua.Courtesy Bill GentileI moved to Philadelphia and began working for Video News International (VNI), the first company in the nation to use the new digital "prosumer" cameras to generate television content. Claudia and I separated and eventually divorced. When VNI fell apart, I turned to freelancing with video. By the year 2000 I had begun teaching as my main gig and freelancing as much as time and energy would allow.But Nicaragua never left me. And I never left Nicaragua.* * *'The World Stopped Watching'* * *White Pine Pictures is a Canadian documentary film production company whose members in 1986 produced The World Is Watching, about the coverage of the Contra War in Nicaragua by Western media. I was one of the featured journalists. In 2002, some 16 years later, White Pine contacted me to ask whether I would be willing to return to Nicaragua to film a sequel."Absolutely."I proposed we scan a handful of images from my book, Nicaragua, and publish them in the country's newspapers. We'd ask people to contact our producer in Managua if anyone recognized the people in the pictures, then we'd follow up on their stories since the Sandinista victory on July 19, 1979. A peasant man and daughter make adobe blocks for building their new home.Courtesy Bill GentileIt worked. Sandinista soldiers. Contra fighters. Peasants. Workers. Our producer's phone rang off the hook. And in the end? I found myself trying to explain how terrible those days had been, in large part because they failed to advance the Sandinistas' plan for a more equitable Nicaragua than the one they inherited from the Somoza dictatorship.'Terrible and Glorious Days' Covering the Contra War of the 1980sCalling their sequel The World Stopped Watching, the White Pine filmmakers produced a documentary explaining how the absence of international media loosens the restraints on the bad guys, who can do whatever they want because we, the international observers and watchdogs, are not around to hold them accountable. And that's exactly what has happened.At their electoral defeat in 1990, the Sandinista government accepted the process and, with no small amount of urging by former President Jimmy Carter, handed over power to a new government. It was the first time in Nicaragua's history that a sitting government peacefully handed over power as the result of a legitimate, internationally recognized election.At a news conference recognizing their landslide loss, Sandinista leaders, including ousted President Daniel Ortega, showed up with pallid, drawn faces. Most of the international press corps was stunned by the results as well.A mural of famed guerrilla fighter and liberator Augusto Cesar Sandino in the northern mountains.Courtesy Bill Gentile"El cuadro esta pintado," one high-ranking Sandinista official declared just days before the vote. "The painting is finished," he said, assuring me with blind confidence that the Sandinistas would crush the opposition. The result was a measure of how deeply the Sandinista leadership was disconnected from the people.But at a rally not long after the vote, Ortega promised his followers that, "We will rule from below." In other words, the highly organized Sandinista party would flex its muscles and get its way no matter who was president.* * *Malign Neglect* * *Anthony Quainton is Distinguished Diplomat in Residence in the School of International Service (SIS) at American University in Washington, D.C. He spent 38 years in the U.S. foreign services as a diplomat in Nicaragua, Peru, Kuwait and the Central African Republic. He also served as Coordinator of the Office for Combating Terrorism. At a recent conference, Quainton delivered a keynote speech titled, "Managua and Washington in the Early Sandinista Revolution," calling his his assignment in Nicaragua in the early 1980s "Mission Impossible."He argued that had the United States made a major and long-term commitment to the social and economic development of the region and backed off its support for corrupt regimes, "some of the problems we are now encountering might have been avoided or at least ameliorated. Unfortunately when the Sandinistas were eventually voted out of power in 1990, the United States largely lost interest in the region. We are reaping the whirlwind of that neglect in the refugee and gang crises we are now facing," he said."Opportunities to create a more stable Central America existed four decades ago," said Quainton. "They were lost. Both sides could not see beyond their ideologies. Neither could escape from its history. The Sandinistas believed that they were a vanguard party and that history had entrusted them a revolutionary mission. … They could not escape from the troubled history of Yankee intervention. We could not escape from Vietnam and the experiences of the Cold War. Bridging the historical, ideological and emotional divide between us was more than I or my colleagues could do. Try as we could, the Mission was always impossible."Quainton's argument is balanced and cogent, but it presumes there was some kind of parity in 1979 between a little country devastated by earthquakes and wars with no tradition of good governance, and a stable, global, functional democracy and superpower some 200 years old. Prior to 1979 much of the Sandinista leadership lived in La Montaña and in clandestine cells. They had little or no institutional foundation to build on. No Harvard or Oxford background to draw from. No Jefferson, Washington or Lincoln to emulate.A young woman washes clothes in Lake Managua, which borders the capital, Managua.Courtesy Bill GentileInstead, they were forced to cope with political, economic and military aggression by the single most powerful nation on the planet. To justify that action, Ronald Reagan warned a group of conservative supporters that defeat of the contras would create "a privileged sanctuary for terrorists and subversives just two days' driving time from Harlingen, Texas." He warned that "feet people" trudging north would be "swarming into our country" to escape communism.But if, as the Trump administration claims, Central Americans are now headed north in huge numbers, it's because of the complete failure to address their hopes, their needs, and their safety.* * *Rule and Ruin* * *Yet none of this justifies what Sandinista rule has become.Today, most of the original Sandinista leadership has abandoned the Ortega regime, viewing it as a betrayal of the organization's original promises to the Nicaraguan people. Daniel Ortega has been president, once again, for the past 10 years. His wife, Rosario Murillo, is vice president.Facing Down the Death Squads of NicaraguaDuring anti-government protests in the spring of 2018, Sandinista police and Sandinista-backed armed thugs killed an estimated 300 people. Media outlets are constantly harassed and shut down. Even international non-governmental organizations whose only agenda is to help the poor and underprivileged have abandoned the country because of government restrictions and intervention. Nicaragua continues to be rated as the second poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere.So where do journalists and journalism fit into all this? How do we see our role? Four decades after my first arrival in Managua, have I helped bring about positive change? Did I do any good here?I certainly hope so. I hope the images I created and published via UPI, Newsweek magazine, my Nicaragua book and other outlets, have contributed to the visual record of that time and that place in history. It's important to remember that, at the time when I was covering the region, there was no Facebook, no Google, no Instagram, no email. There was no internet! Television was limited to ABC, CBS and NBC. CNN was just beginning. Fox did not exist. So most of the world relied on a handful of magazines including Newsweek, Time and U.S. News & World Report, Life and National Geographic, for its visual explanation of the globe. Major newspapers like The New York Times and The Washington Post published only black and white pictures back then.A tiny handful of women and men, including myself, were privileged to be part of a small cadre of photojournalists entrusted with the mission of providing the world with a visual explanation of itself. And we did so sometimes despite great peril.But there is another dimension to what we do, perhaps more important than our impact on the wider world. And that is the mere act of practicing our craft defines and validates us. Like La Montaña for the guerrillas, journalism is the anvil upon which we test, forge and mold ourselves into what we aspire to be.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| Wasp spray leads to 3 deaths in West Virginia after being used as alternative meth Posted: 19 Jul 2019 08:34 AM PDT  West Virginia state police are cautioning residents against using wasp sprayas an alternative form of methamphetamine after three people purportedlyoverdosed
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| View Photos of the 2020 Nissan GT-R NISMO Posted: 18 Jul 2019 05:00 AM PDT |
| Brazil's Petrobras refuses to refuel Iran ships due to US sanctions Posted: 19 Jul 2019 09:03 AM PDT  US-listed Brazilian state oil giant Petrobras said Friday it will not refuel two Iranian vessels that have been stuck for weeks at a Brazilian port for fear of violating American sanctions. Washington has imposed a slate of sanctions on Tehran and companies with ties to the Islamic republic since President Donald Trump pulled the United States out of a landmark nuclear pact last year. The ships Bavand and Termeh, which reportedly belong to Iranian company Sapid Shipping, arrived at Paranagua port in the southern state of Parana early last month, an official at the port told AFP.
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| California city votes to ban gendered words as 'manhole' becomes 'maintenance hole' Posted: 18 Jul 2019 05:47 PM PDT  Legislators in Berkeley, California, voted Tuesday to ban some gender-specific words in its city code and replace them with gender-neutral options.
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| Trump and progressive Democrats want the same thing – and Pelosi is in the way Posted: 18 Jul 2019 06:08 AM PDT  The president and the Squad are happy to push the Democratic party further to the left – but Pelosi disagrees'They believe that this transformation not only will lead to progressive legislative victories, it will also win elections.' Photograph: J Scott Applewhite/APAmerican politics makes some extremely odd bedfellows. That's worth keeping in mind when trying to understand why Donald Trump Twitter-trolled four progressive, first-term congresswomen of color – Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan – in his now-infamous "go back" tweet. Although Trump and "the Squad" (the collective nickname for the congresswomen) have venomously denounced each other, the reality is that they both want the same thing: to make the women the public face of the Democratic party. And their greatest obstacle is the Democratic House speaker, Nancy Pelosi.The Squad have welcomed and sought out public attention because they want to use their celebrity to push the party to the left, just as the conservative movement pushed the Republican party to the right in decades past. They believe that this transformation not only will lead to progressive legislative victories, it will also win elections. As Ocasio-Cortez's chief of staff, Saikat Chakrabarti, recently told the Washington Post:"The whole theory of change for the current Democratic party is that to win this country we need to tack to the hypothetical middle. What I think that means is, you don't take unnecessary risks, which translates to: you don't really do anything. Whereas we've got a completely different theory of change, which is: you do the biggest, most badass thing you possibly can – and that's going to excite people, and then they're going to go vote."One implication of this approach, obviously, is that progressives should advance ambitious leftwing policies – like Ocasio-Cortez's Green New Deal, pulled directly from the demands of the Democratic Socialists of America – without negotiating or compromising with moderate Democrats, let alone Republicans. Another is that moderate Democrats who object to progressive policies have to be shamed and pressured into getting with the program – as Chakrabarti tried to do by comparing moderates to segregationists – or removed through primary election challenges from the left, as Ocasio-Cortez has threatened. These policies worked for the Tea Party on the Republican side, so the thinking goes, so why shouldn't they work for progressives?Yet another implication of this approach is that progressives shouldn't attempt to win over swing voters – particularly white voters – but instead should maximize turnout from minorities, who lean Democratic by wide margins but typically don't vote at the same rates as whites. The model here is Stacey Abrams, who in her 2018 Georgia gubernatorial campaign nearly became the first African American woman to be elected governor of any state, largely on the strength of her success in getting minorities to the polls and driving voter turnout to record highs. According to this theory, the rising prominence of Ocasio-Cortez and her cohort, who embody the Democrats' growing diversity and progressivism, can excite minority turnout to such a level that the country's move toward majority minority demographics finally translates to Democratic political dominance.For all these reasons, progressives want the Squad to be the new face of the Democratic party. Pelosi, however, disagrees. The San Franciscan is a progressive herself but also an adept political calculator, who understands that Democrats regained the House in 2018 by running moderate candidates in Republican-held districts. She has skillfully held her caucus together so far by uniting them around policies with wide appeal and avoiding actions (such as pursuing Trump's impeachment) that could split moderates and progressives. She fears that the majority making districts – and the Democratic House majority – will revert to Republican control if their college-educated, mostly suburban and mostly white swing voters who were repelled by Trump in 2018 turn out to be even more repelled by the Democrats' most extreme members in 2020.Pelosi is also well aware that while the Squad have an intense following among leftwing activists and on social media, overall they are some of the most unpopular politicians in America. A recent poll of swing district voters found that Ocasio-Cortez was recognized by nearly three-quarters of voters but viewed favorably by only 22%. Ocasio-Cortez's self-proclaimed ideology of socialism was viewed favorably by only 18% of those surveyed – which still made it twice as popular as Omar, who was viewed favorably by only 9%. Those are toxic levels of unpopularity. Many Democrats worry that if the party becomes defined by the Squad, they could lose not only the House but the presidency.> The Squad make even better foils for Trump's 'America first' approach than Pelosi ever didWhich of course is why Trump has every incentive to make the Squad his principal target, and to achieve maximum publicity by doing so in a calculatedly xenophobic and (at least) borderline racist way that's guaranteed to provoke widespread condemnation. It verges on surreal to see Trump defending Pelosi – who has been demonized by Republicans since she first wielded the speaker's gavel in 2007 – against supposed charges of racism by the Squad. But the Squad make even better foils for Trump's "America first" approach than Pelosi ever did, given the broader range of rage buttons they push among many culturally conservative Americans. And the more media attention the Squad receives, according to many Republican strategists, the more Democratic presidential candidates will feel pressured into embracing progressive positions on issues such as open borders, abortion, racial reparations and healthcare for undocumented migrants that are unpopular with the overall electorate.Trump's attack on the Squad of course damaged the schemes of those Republican strategists who hope that, in an America where the Republican's base of non-college-educated whites continues to shrink, the party might build a majority on racially and ethnically inclusive populism. But Trump's major strategic error may have been to have strengthened Pelosi's hand. Already Trump's tweets seem to have restored Democratic unity behind Pelosi and reinforced her message that the party's internal divisions are fodder for Trumpian mischief. The Congressional Black Caucus' emphatic backing of Pelosi against the Squad may have taught them something about the limitations of identity politics and the realities of political power. But Trump's intervention has also given Pelosi and Squad a golden opportunity to publicly reconcile without anyone losing face.The fact that some of the usually supine Republicans in Congress spoke out against Trump's slurring his opponents' patriotism pointed out that many Americans – perhaps a majority – oppose his efforts to divide the country. It's possible that Trump's abdication of the role of unifier-in-chief may have handed it to Pelosi since, unlike Trump, she is visibly striving to find common ground among contending factions. Trump isn't the first politician to have underestimated Pelosi, but in the long run it may cost him more than whatever he gains by attacking the Squad. * Geoffrey Kabaservice is the director of political studies at the Niskanen Center in Washington DC as well as the author of Rule and Ruin: The Downfall of Moderation and the Destruction of the Republican Party
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| The Navy's 6th Generation Fighter Could Put the F-35 in a Museum Posted: 19 Jul 2019 12:47 AM PDT  New much-longer range sensors and weapons, incorporating emerging iterations of AI, are expected to make warfare more disaggregated, and much less of a linear force on force type of engagement. Such a phenomenon, driven by new technology, underscores warfare reliance upon sensors and information networks. All of this, naturally, requires the expansive "embedded ISR" discussed by the paper. Network reliant warfare is of course potentially much more effective in improving targeting and reducing sensor-to-shooter time over long distances, yet it brings a significant need to organize and optimize the vast, yet crucial, flow of information.The Navy is currently analyzing air frames, targeting systems, AI-enabled sensors, new weapons and engine technologies to engineer a new 6th-Generation fighter to fly alongside the F-35 and ultimately replace the F/A-18.(This first appeared earlier in the year.)The Navy program, called Next-Generation Air Dominance, has moved beyond a purely conceptual phase and begun exploration of prototype systems and airframes as it pursues a new, carrier-launched 6th-Gen fighter to emerge in 2030 and beyond, service officials explained."Some important areas of consideration include derivative and developmental air vehicle designs, advanced engines, propulsion, weapons, mission systems, electronic warfare and other emerging technologies," Navy spokeswoman Lt. Lauren Chatmas told Warrior earlier this year.A formal Analysis of Alternatives, expected to complete this year, is weighing the advantages of leveraging nearer-term existing technologies such as new variants or upgrades to cutting edge weapons, sensors and stealth configurations - or allowing more time for leap-ahead developmental systems to emerge.
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| Ex-Illinois student's life spared in killing of scholar Posted: 18 Jul 2019 03:41 PM PDT  A former University of Illinois doctoral student was spared the death penalty Thursday and sentenced to life in prison for kidnapping and killing a 26-year-old scholar from China. Jurors deliberated about eight hours over two days before announcing they were deadlocked on whether 30-year-old Brendt Christensen should be put to death for killing Yingying Zhang in 2017 as part of a homicidal fantasy, automatically resulting in a sentence of life behind bars without the possibility of parole. "The Zhang family ... must live with the thought that Yingying was ripped away from them by a total stranger, thousands of miles away, fulfilling his self-absorbed and selfish fantasies," he told Christensen.
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| Surprise — The Future of Planned Parenthood Is Abortion Posted: 18 Jul 2019 03:30 AM PDT  Planned Parenthood's board has fired the organization's president, Leana Wen, after less than a year on the job. According to reports, Wen was dismissed because the board deemed her insufficiently dedicated to expanding Planned Parenthood's political advocacy, particularly on abortion.The news comes as a shock for a few reasons. For one thing, Wen was appointed just last fall to replace Cecile Richards, who resigned on good terms after leading the institution for twelve years.But it's surprising, too, if Wen's ouster was due to her reluctance to focus more on politics than on public health, as several reports suggest was the case. In June, after all, Planned Parenthood announced a six-figure ad campaign, "Bans Off My Body," to oppose recent state laws regulating abortion. Judging from Wen's Twitter account, she was perfectly comfortable promoting what the group frequently calls "reproductive rights."Why, then, was she forced to depart so unceremoniously, and what does her abrupt exit say about the future of Planned Parenthood?Wen's dismissal is perhaps best understood in light of the escalating national fight over abortion policy. As blue states have codified the right to abortion on demand, in many cases deeming it a "fundamental right," red states have passed limitations like heartbeat bills to protect unborn human beings earlier in pregnancy.Planned Parenthood has long sought to downplay its commitment to abortion, calling itself a health-care organization and spreading the lie that abortion is only 3 percent of its business, even as its clinics perform between one-third and half of all abortions in the U.S. annually. The group's leadership evidently believes this political moment demands more aggressive advocacy.And Wen wasn't up to the task. Considering her record thus far, she was hired for the "M.D." beside her name, and little else. She came across in interviews like a placid physician repeating rote talking points drilled into her on the drive to the studio. She consistently inserted the phrase "as a doctor" into her messaging to give the organization the gloss of medical legitimacy, and she never sounded like the polished, sure-footed political advocate Richards had.Plenty of turmoil, meanwhile, was taking place behind the scenes. "Wen had tried to refocus the organization's mission and image as a health provider offering a wide array of services, including abortions," sources told the Washington Post this week. "Those close to Wen said she was opposed by some board members and others who wanted to emphasize the organization's commitment to abortion rights."In January, Wen told BuzzFeed News she wanted to restructure the organization's goals, noting that people aren't going to Planned Parenthood to make a political statement. "What we will always be here to do is provide abortion access as part of the full spectrum of reproductive health care," Wen said. "But we also recognize that for so many of our patients we are their only source of health care."The day BuzzFeed published its profile, though, Wen backtracked. "I am always happy to do interviews, but these headlines completely misconstrue my vision for Planned Parenthood," Wen tweeted that morning. "Our core mission is providing, protecting and expanding access to abortion and reproductive health care. We will never back down from that fight."Wen's termination sheds some light on this quick reversal. It's easy to imagine that she faced internal backlash for appearing to have shied away from abortion advocacy, and that her public about-face was an effort to pacify critics within the organization.It didn't work. In February, top political staffers left Planned Parenthood, reportedly amid ongoing conflict over Wen's management style. Now that tension seems to have boiled over. Six sources told BuzzFeed this week that "significant management issues [were] part of the board's decision to oust Wen," and one "said her removal was accelerated by the intensifying battle over abortion rights, saying that she was not the right leader in this climate."Perhaps the most revealing detail from Buzzfeed's report? Two sources said Wen angered staffers by refusing to use "trans-inclusive" language, "for example saying 'people' instead of 'women' and telling staff that she believed talking about transgender issues would 'isolate people in the Midwest.'"This anecdote might well be the key to understanding what happened to Wen and where Planned Parenthood's leaders intend to go from here. Surely she wasn't fired for her recalcitrance on preferred pronouns. But with a national spotlight on the abortion debate, Planned Parenthood's leaders are ready to take off the kid gloves.Wen's firing suggests that, instead of claiming to be just a normal health-care organization, Planned Parenthood intends to capitalize on its status as an influential left-wing interest group. To do that, it must become a purveyor of the entire progressive agenda, to the point of embracing the "intersectional" language promoted by transgender activists. So the mild-mannered Wen had to go.Pro-lifers have long known what Planned Parenthood itself appears to be admitting: The group's ultimate goal is to wield its political influence within the progressive movement to continue profiting from abortion.
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| The 12 Best Home Decor Deals from the Nordstrom Anniversary Sale Posted: 19 Jul 2019 09:30 AM PDT |
| Squeezed by sanctions, Iranians seek day jobs in Kurdish Iraq Posted: 19 Jul 2019 02:51 AM PDT  When the car pulled up to the curb in Iraq's Arbil, a half-dozen Iranian labourers swarmed around it. Squeezed by US sanctions on Tehran, they were hunting for work across the border. Mostly Kurds themselves, they have sought day jobs in construction and other menial labour in Iraq's northern Kurdish region to make up for the deteriorating economic situation at home.
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| Trump takes shots at NASA administrator during photo op celebrating Apollo moon landing Posted: 19 Jul 2019 01:57 PM PDT  During an Oval Office photo op to commemorate Apollo 11 astronauts Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins, President Trump dug at NASA chief Jim Bridenstine.
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| Five guys arrested for fighting at Five Guys burgers in Florida Posted: 19 Jul 2019 09:09 AM PDT  An appropriate number of guys were arrested when a fight broke out at a FiveGuys restaurant in Florida on Wednesday
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| UPDATE 1-China's intelligence law looms over EU 5G safeguards -official Posted: 19 Jul 2019 04:50 AM PDT ![UPDATE 1-China's intelligence law looms over EU 5G safeguards -official]( "UPDATE 1-China's intelligence law looms over EU 5G safeguards -official") The European Union cannot ignore China's National Intelligence Law, which requires Chinese citizens to support state information-gathering, as Brussels seeks rules for super-fast mobile networks, a senior EU official said on Friday. EU governments are debating ways to protect next-generation mobile networks from any possible Chinese interference, caught between a U.S. demand they shun China's Huawei and growing Sino-European business ties.
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| Why the Air Force's F-15 EX Fighter Would Get Crushed by Russia In a War Posted: 17 Jul 2019 06:00 PM PDT  While an F-35 can carry 22,000 pounds of munitions to a ceiling of 50,000 feet and a distance of 670 miles at a top speed of Mach 1.6, the F-15EX can haul 29,500 pounds of weapons as high as 60,000 feet and as far as 1,100 miles at a top speed of Mach 2.5.The debate continues over the Pentagon's proposal to buy new F-15EX Eagle fighters from Boeing to complement Lockheed Martin-made F-35 stealth fighters.As lawmakers weigh the military's request, Air Force magazine has published an infographic comparing the two fighters.Both fighters cost roughly $80 million apiece, according to Air Force. But the similarity ends there. The F-35 is stealthier but the F-15 flies higher, farther and faster and carries more weaponry.(This first appeared in April 2019.)A Russian-made S-400 air-defense system could detect an F-35 at 20 miles, Air Force estimated. It could pick up an F-15EX 200 miles away.While an F-35 can carry 22,000 pounds of munitions to a ceiling of 50,000 feet and a distance of 670 miles at a top speed of Mach 1.6, the F-15EX can haul 29,500 pounds of weapons as high as 60,000 feet and as far as 1,100 miles at a top speed of Mach 2.5.An F-35 costs $35,000 per hour to operate. An F-15EX costs $27,000 per hour.The new Eagle's main advantage, however, is that existing F-15 squadrons quickly and cheaply can convert to the type, Air Force's John Tirpak explained."The F-15EX, USAF argues, is essentially an in-production aircraft. It has upward of 70-percent parts commonality with the F-15C and E already in USAF service and can use almost all the same ground equipment, hangars, simulators and other support gear as the Eagles now in service," according to Tirpak.
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| South Korean dies from self-immolation near Japan's embassy Posted: 19 Jul 2019 12:08 AM PDT  A 78-year-old South Korean man died hours after setting himself ablaze near the Japanese Embassy in Seoul on Friday, police said, at a time of worsening tensions between Seoul and Tokyo. The man died later Friday while being treated at a Seoul hospital, police said. Police said Kim had phoned an acquaintance earlier to say he planned to self-immolate to express his antipathy toward Japan.
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| 13 Philadelphia police officers to be fired following Facebook post investigation Posted: 19 Jul 2019 02:27 AM PDT  Thirteen Philadelphia police officers will be fired following an investigation into racist and offensive Facebook posts, Commissioner Richard Ross said.
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| Arizona Dem. Joins Republicans in Effort to Expedite Deportation of Migrants with Invalid Asylum Claims Posted: 19 Jul 2019 09:15 AM PDT  Senator Kyrsten Sinema (D., Ariz.) has joined a bipartisan group of nine colleagues proposing a pilot program that would expedite the deportation of migrants who make invalid asylum claims.The senators outlined the Operation Safe Return program, which would allow the deportation of migrants within 15 days if their asylum claims are not credible, in a letter sent to acting Secretary of Homeland Security Kevin McAleenan on Wednesday."We write to urge you to use authorities in use as of June 30, 2019, to implement Operation Safe Return, a pilot program to rapidly, accurately, and fairly determine those families who have crossed the southern border that clearly do not have a valid legal claim and safely return them to their home countries," the senators wrote. "Through this program, we expect that we can meet our commitments to humanitarian protections while ensuring proper efficiency, timeliness, order, and fairness in the credible fear screening process."Sinema and Republican senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin led the effort to develop the program in response to the ongoing humanitarian crisis that has arisen at border-detention facilities in recent months due to overcrowding.The freshman Arizona Democrat began devising the program after realizing that the Trump administration's proposed solutions, which involve rewriting asylum laws and doing away with the Flores consent decree, were inadequate, according to the Arizona Republic."This pilot program would apply to families who aren't claiming 'credible fear,' which of course is the first threshold in seeking asylum," she said. "If someone says 'I left my country because I can't make a living,' [or] 'it's hard to take care of my family' — that's what we call an economic migrant.""I just felt those weren't the right answers," Sinema added. "We wanted to solve the problem. We wanted to protect the asylum process for valid applicants . . . and we want to respect the Flores decision," which limits to just 20 days the length of time that a migrant minor can be held in federal custody.Under the current system, asylum-seekers typically wait months or even years for their hearing, which as many as 90 percent of them fail to appear for, according to a recent pilot program that tracked asylum-seekers. Under Sinema's proposal, migrants would receive an expedited hearing and would be immediately deported if they failed to meet the "credible fear" standard established under U.S. immigration law.Sinema and Johnson are joined by Republican senators Mike Enzi and John Barrasso of Wyoming, James Lankford of Oklahoma, Rob Portman of Ohio, and John Cornyn of Texas, as well as Democratic senators Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Doug Jones of Alabama. The group plans to meet with McAleenan in the coming weeks to explain the program in further detail.
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| The Man Who Started the Area 51 Raid Says Things Have Gotten a Little Spooky Posted: 18 Jul 2019 10:56 AM PDT  He hopes everyone knows it's a satirical page
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| Ramush Haradinaj, Kosovo's 'Rambo' ex-PM and Serbian antagonist Posted: 19 Jul 2019 09:50 AM PDT  Ramush Haradinaj, who resigned as Kosovo's prime minister on Friday, is hailed as a hero at home -- where he is nicknamed "Rambo" -- but considered a war criminal by Belgrade, which has long sought to see him behind bars. The controversial 51-year-old, who was a wartime commander of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), stepped down after being summoned as a suspect by a war crimes court in the Hague. It is the second time he has resigned after being called before a war crimes court over crimes allegedly committed by the ethnic Albanian KLA separatists during the 1998-99 war.
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| As Iran-U.S. Tensions Rise, Hezbollah Readies for War With Israel Posted: 19 Jul 2019 01:45 AM PDT  Joseph Barrak/GettyBEIRUT—The tranquil winding roads of Lebanon's mountainous interior are far from the tense waters of the Persian Gulf where President Donald Trump says America came within 10 minutes of war with Iran a few weeks ago. And where, he said on Thursday, the U.S. shot down an Iranian drone. But if fighting ever does begin, these hills and valleys near the border with Israel will quickly be on the front lines. And according to Hezbollah commanders, that moment could be coming soon.When Trump talked of war, he meant a shooting war in the conventional sense. But for Iran and its allies, it's Trump's economic war with its suffocating sanctions that is bringing the region to the brink of armed conflict. The targets of Trump's weaponized dollar increasingly see resorting to military engagements as the only response left.Trump Is a Warmonger. His Weapon, The Dollar.Here in Lebanon, Hezbollah's commanders are close allies and clients of Iran—and they are targeted by U.S. sanctions as well. They warn that if the pressure continues these rugged hills where the Party of God fought bloody guerrilla campaigns to end 15 years of Israeli occupation in 2000 and repel an Israeli invasion in 2006 could erupt once again. And this time, they say, the combat will be far more devastating.Hezbollah's forces, battle-hardened in the Syrian civil war, have begun redeploying toward the Israeli border, not only in Lebanon, but in Syria opposite the Israeli-occupied side of the Golan Heights. Hezbollah fighters who spoke to The Daily Beast say their organization is hurting from sanctions and ready to initiate hostilities—if and when Tehran deems that necessary."The sanctions now have us preparing for dealing with the Israeli front," says "Commander Samir," a Hezbollah officer in charge of 800 fighters on Lebanon's border with Israel. He declines to use his real name because he is not authorized to speak to the media. "We will fire the first shot this time," he says.Hezbollah's military wing has changed fundamentally since its 2012 entrance into the war in Syria to prop up the Assad regime, transforming into a regional fighting force the Shia organization inspired by the Iranian revolution that the U.S. lists as a terrorist group.When Trump offers the reasons he pulled out of the nuclear deal with Iran last year, precipitating the current crisis, he cites Iran's support for militias that extend its power and influence across the region as something the U.S. intends to end—with Hezbollah the main target. But the pressure may actually be consolidating and motivating Iran's proxies.Hezbollah is still fighting in Syria while training Iranian allied militias in Iraq and Yemen. The commander says his organization and Iran have moved past their split with Palestinian allies over Syria, where they were on opposite sides of the Syrian revolution as it turned into a bloody regional proxy war, and Iran is once again providing training and support for Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad.From a living room overlooking the valleys where he became a veteran, ambushing the Israeli army and melting away into the surrounding hills, Samir says the next war will be nothing like those that came before.He underscores the importance of Hezbollah's positions in the Syrian-controlled part of the Golan, giving it the ability to open a second front there against Israel, and boasts about drone capabilities and new anti-aircraft and anti-naval weapons acquired in Syria alongside a more seasoned fighting force. "Our wish before the war in Syria was to go and open a front in the Golan but [the Syrian Government] set a red line," the commander says, describing the limits the pre-war Assad regime placed on Hezbollah activity in its territory. "Now there are no red lines," he said.The commander acknowledges a new war would bring vast devastation to Israel and Lebanon, but says the sanctions crippling the Iranian economy and forcing a large reduction in Iran's financial support for Hezbollah could make this nightmare scenario real. To Target Israel, Iran's 'Suitcase' GPS Kits Turn Hezbollah Rockets Into Guided MissilesAlready, salaries for Hezbollah fighters have been halved, according to the three fighters The Daily Beast spoke with. But while they are hurting economically, they insist their organization feels strong militarily. "The Iranians have said either we all sell oil or no one does," Commander Samir says definitively, describing Hezbollah's interests in lockstep with Iran's. Like the two other fighters that spoke to The Daily Beast, he describes Hezbollah's concerns in more regional rather than domestic terms, responding to actions of U.S. allies around the Middle East rather than Israeli action on Lebanese soil. "If any missile hits Iran, it will be treated like Israel did it," says the commander,In spite of the increasing destabilization of the region since the U.S. pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal and sanctions started taking hold, the Trump administration has argued that its policy of "maximum pressure" will force Iranian acquiescence. However, according to Ahmad Moussalli, a political science professor and specialist in Islamic movements at the American University of Beirut, the financial constraints imposed by Washington are having the opposite effect. "You find this axis sees itself as fighting for its existence," says Moussalli referring to Iran and its regional allies and proxies. "So they are going to pull together and strengthen their axis," he continues, pointing to the way Hezbollah has been increasing overt political influence in Lebanon while allies in Yemen and Iraq have been taking more aggressive action. "Iran is not going to sit down, take it and destroy itself from within," Moussalli says. "And the only way for them to react is militarily; they don't have many other options." He leaves no doubt that Iran is the power determining regional responses rather than Hezbollah or any other proxy acting on its own initiative. The eruption of shelling between Israel and Gaza ahead of the Israeli election in May provided some instructive examples of changes in tactics. Commander Samir points to a threat—which was not carried out—by Islamic Jihad to fire missiles at the northern Israeli city of Haifa. The threat was a marked change from recent rhetoric by the Palestinian Islamist faction which had previously taken the public position of "quiet for quiet," a term used by the Israeli army to describe its claimed intention not to initiate armed hostility. "It was a message from us and Iran," he brags about the ability to fire at Israel from the south or the north while contending the choice to do so or not is up to Tehran. "Islamic Jihad never shoots before calling the Iranians." "Assir," a seasoned Hezbollah fighter in Syria is back in Lebanon after years of bloody tours in what's been an unending war. He takes up a nom-de-guerre because Hezbollah fighters are generally not authorized to speak to media. When we meet in Beirut, he says that like the many fighters coming back to Lebanon as Assad consolidates control over much of Syria, he is not being demobilized but rather redeployed south to the Israeli border. "People who finish their mission in Syria go to the south," Assir says, describing how his comrades and he have been given new posts since tensions started rising in the Gulf. "There are some units in Syria but a lot go back to Lebanon or to the Golan. Thousands have come back."Military success in Syria has reinforced Assir's confidence and he points to the tensions in the Strait of Hormuz as the source of the next conflict with Israel. "The commanders talk about if there is a spark in Hormuz, there could be a spark in Lebanon," recalls Assir. However, Moussalli sees the prospect for war with Israel, while it looms, probably is not imminent. He doubts that Hezbollah is eager for a war at the moment. He says currently Iran is primarily focused on responding in the Gulf area and Iraq. "Syria and Lebanon will be engaged in war once Europe or Iran completely pull out of the nuclear agreement," says Moussalli, arguing war with Israel is still a ways off. "The issue with Israel is a rather big one," he continues, referring to the costs of the 2006 war. "So yes there is pressure, there is the possibility of war but I don't think it is near," he says, believing that if sanctions are relieved the tension will be as well. But, "are they ready [for war]?" he adds referring to Hezbollah. "Yes they are."The second Lebanon War ignited in the wake of Hezbollah seizing two Isralei soldiers and killing three others in a cross border raid in July 2006 and Israel retaliating with a massive artillery and aerial bombardment of Lebanon. Hezbollah in turn fired rockets at northern Israeli cities and Israel launched a ground invasion. The result was the demolition of large swaths of Lebanon, pulverized by Israeli jets, while Israeli soldiers found themselves in an unwinnable quagmire and forced to withdraw from a country for the second time in less than a decade. By the time the shooting ended 1,200 Lebanese – mostly civilians, 45 Israeli civilians and 120 soldiers had been killed. More than a million people in Lebanon, a quarter of the population at the time, were displaced and while there are no official numbers of Hezbollah casualties, the UN estimated that 500 of the Lebanese casualties were Hezbollah fighters. Moussalli's assessment of a slower march toward the carnage of an Israeli-Lebanese conflict more devastating than past ones is echoed by "Commander Ayman," a Hezbollah officer currently based in Beirut who also oversees units fighting in Syria. "The Americans know the kind of fighters we have, so Hezbollah and Iran have been reminding the world how bad [a war] could be," notes Ayman. While confirming there is a strict red line around any attack on Iran, he maintains there is a strong desire to avoid war, suggesting the blusterous talk of imminent conflict with Israel is designed to convince the U.S. to abandon its current strategy.Israel also doesn't seem very interested in conflict over Lebanon at the moment. While Netanyahu has pursued a policy of striking Iran and Hezbollah in Syria, he has avoided another war in Lebanon. Even when Hezbollah tunnels into Israel were unmasked in January, there was no action over Lebanon. Unlike Israeli wars in Gaza, which have carried low costs to Israeli soldiers and civilians and have pushed the electorate toward Netanyahu, wars in Lebanon have had large military and civilian costs for Israel, often turning the electorate against the government.When asked if Netanyahu thought that the U.S. sanctions he has actively encouraged could ignite conflict with Hezbollah, the Prime Minister's Office officially declined to comment. The Israeli military also declined to comment on how it sees the current level of tension on its Lebanese border or if its alert level had changed since Iran started reacting to sanctions, claiming it "is too complex an issue to explain on the phone or in a statement."Meanwhile sanctions and rhetoric continue to escalate. Following the U.S. Treasury Department's announcement last Tuesday of fresh sanctions targeting Hezbollah members of the Lebanese parliament, threats of annihilation have been hurled back and forth between Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (who, not coincidentally, is fighting for reelection).In a speech last Friday marking the 13th anniversary of the 2006 war with Israel, Nasrallah gloated about expanded military capabilities and threatened that another war would "bring Israel to the brink of extinction." Netanyahu responded on Sunday by threatening to deal Lebanon and Hezbollah "a crushing military blow" if Hezbollah attacks. On Monday, European signatories to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, otherwise known as the Iran nuclear deal, gathered in Brussels to try to salvage the agreement that the US pulled out of in 2018. The Europeans hope to find enticements that will encourage Iran to stay in the deal. During his address, Nasrallah claimed that he didn't intend to start a war with Israel. Those sentiments were reiterated by Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif in an interview with CNN in New York on Wednesday where Zarif stated that Iran will not start a war but will defend itself. The sheer destruction a new conflict between Hezbollah and Israel would unleash on Lebanon leads Moussalli to call it a "madness war." While Hezbollah's exact intentions are unclear, the border between Israel and Lebanon was much quieter before U.S. sanctions put Iran and its allies on this collision course. Even if Hezbollah and Israel don't want to start shooting now, it increasingly seems like a decision determined by Washington's policies and how Tehran reacts. After all, according to Trump, a few weeks ago it looked like a war—one likely to stretch from the Gulf to the Mediterranean—was only 10 minutes away. Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| A prisoner was 'likely innocent' for 25 years, and prosecutors knew the whole time Posted: 18 Jul 2019 05:20 AM PDT ![A prisoner was 'likely innocent' for 25 years, and prosecutors knew the whole time]( "A prisoner was 'likely innocent' for 25 years, and prosecutors knew the whole time") Chester Hollman III, 48, was freed Monday from a state prison in Pennsylvania and a formal dismissal of the charges is expected later this month.
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| CORRECTED-UPDATE 1-Vietnam says Chinese vessel violated its sovereignty in South China Sea Posted: 19 Jul 2019 07:49 AM PDT ![CORRECTED-UPDATE 1-Vietnam says Chinese vessel violated its sovereignty in South China Sea]( "CORRECTED-UPDATE 1-Vietnam says Chinese vessel violated its sovereignty in South China Sea") Vietnam on Friday accused a Chinese oil survey vessel and its escorts of violating its sovereignty and demanded that China remove the ships from Vietnamese waters. Vietnam and China have for years long been embroiled in a dispute over the potentially energy-rich stretch of waters in the South China Sea.
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| The U.S. Marines Might Be Souring on Amphibious Assault Ships. Here's Why. Posted: 18 Jul 2019 01:55 PM PDT  The incoming commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps is backing away from the service's longstanding requirement for 38 dedicated amphibious assault ships.The move could signal the beginning of a new approach to amphibious warfare for the world's leading marine force.New commandant Gen. David Berger is "willing to shed some key tenets of the Marines' amphibious force-planning in recent years – including the demand for 38 amphibious warships to support a two Marine Expeditionary Brigade-sized forcible entry force," Megan Eckstein reported for the U.S. Naval Institute.Force-structure assessments in 2009 and 2016 affirmed the Marines' requirement for 38 assault ships including LHA and LHD big-deck vessels and small-deck LSDs and LPDs.The Navy in 2019 was short of the 38-amphib goal. The 32 ships currently in the fleet together can carry hundreds of jump jets, tiltrotors, helicopters, ACV armored vehicles, LCU landing craft and LCAC hovercraft as well as thousands of Marines."We will no longer use a '2.0 MEB requirement' as the foundation for our arguments regarding amphibious ship building, to determine the requisite capacity of vehicles or other capabilities, or as pertains to the Maritime Prepositioning Force," Berger wrote. "We will no longer reference the 38-ship requirement memo from 2009, or the 2016 Force Structure Assessment, as the basis for our arguments and force structure justifications."A new force-structure assessment due to end in 2019 could reduce the number of traditional assault ships in the Marines require and instead include alternative vessels in the tally of ships that can support a beach assault.
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| Lawsuit: North Dakota officers used 'violence' on protester Posted: 19 Jul 2019 12:08 PM PDT  Marcus Mitchell, 24, filed the lawsuit Thursday against Morton County, the city of Bismarck and state Highway Patrol officers. Highway Patrol spokesman Wade Kadrmas declined comment, citing pending litigation. A Morton County official didn't immediately respond to the Bismarck Tribune's request for comment Thursday.
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| 'Go back to their country:' Naperville Bucky's cashier fired after questioning customers' citizenship Posted: 18 Jul 2019 10:25 AM PDT  A cashier no longer works at a Naperville gas station after a video showed him questioning Hispanic customers' citizenship.
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| Earthquakes repeatedly striking proposed US nuclear waste site Posted: 19 Jul 2019 03:01 AM PDT  Repeated earthquakes could risk releasing deadly radioactivity into the earth if plans for a nuclear waste site in go ahead in Nevada's desert, the state's governor has warned.Tens of thousands of tons of highly radioactive used nuclear reactor fuel are due to be transferred from 35 US states to a new facility in the Mojave Desert.The Yuka Mountain nuclear waste repository is set to store this material deep within the earth. But a series of recent earthquakes in the Mojave Desert has raised concerns about the safety of storing radioactive waste at the facility. On 4 July, a 7.1 magnitude earthquake ruptured the earth in the desert, which stretches across the California-Nevada border.The force of the quake cracked buildings, sparked fires, damaged roads and caused several injuries in southern California. It was followed by a 6.4-magnitude temblor two days later.In the wake of the earthquakes, the governor of Nevada Steve Sisolak said he was committed to "fighting any continued federal effort to use Nevada as the nation's nuclear dumping ground"."These significant recent earthquakes so near to Yucca Mountain show one of the many geologic problems with the site as a nuclear waste repository," he said.Mr Sisolak sent a letter to the energy secretary, Rick Perry, urging him to reconsider the location of the facility.The US government began considering sites for storing radioactive waste that is produced as old nuclear fuel is reprocessed into nuclear weapon materials in 1982.In 2002, Yuka Mountain was designated as the only site in the country to receive the radioactive material. But Nevada has fought the proposed nuclear waste repository at every step, arguing that US government studies downplayed the risk of earthquakes damaging the repository and releasing deadly radioactivity. The project was shelved in 2010 under pressure from then-Senate Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada and Barack Obama. They said nuclear waste should be stored in a state that wants it. But in March 2019, Mr Perry, the Trump administration's energy secretary, set aside $116m to push forward the project and restart licensing hearings.In governor of Nevada's letter to Mr Perry, he included the opinions of James Faulds at the Nevada Bureau of Mines and Geology and Graham Kent at the seismological laboratory at the University of Nevada.They urged for more research to be conducted into the seismic activity at the Yuka Mountain site. "The Ridgecrest earthquake sequence, which began July 4 and has yet to subside, clearly highlights the importance of such studies," Mr Faulds and Mr Kent said. A recent ranking compiled by the US Geological Survey found Nevada was the US state with the fourth highest level of seismic activity after Alaska, Wyoming and Oklahoma.Additional reporting by AP
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| Great Barrier Reef agency breaks with Australia gvt in climate warning Posted: 18 Jul 2019 07:12 PM PDT  The agency that manages the Great Barrier Reef broke ranks with Australia's conservative government to call for the "strongest and fastest possible action" against climate change to save the world heritage marine wonder. The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, a government body, said in a study released this week that an urgent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, both nationally and globally, was needed to protect the future of the reef. Rising sea temperatures linked to climate change have killed off large areas of coral in the 2,300-kilometre (1,400-mile) reef, a UN-listed World Heritage site, that suffered back-to-back coral bleaching in 2016 and 2017.
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| ‘LGBT-Free Zone’ Push in Poland Draws Fire From U.S. Ambassador Posted: 19 Jul 2019 02:56 AM PDT !['LGBT-Free Zone' Push in Poland Draws Fire From U.S. Ambassador]( "'LGBT-Free Zone' Push in Poland Draws Fire From U.S. Ambassador") (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. ambassador to Poland joined a litany of criticism against "hatred and intolerance" by supporters of the conservative government over a magazine's plan to distribute "LGBT-free zone" stickers.The question over gay rights is becoming a polarizing issue before fall general elections, underscoring a departure by the ruling Law & Justice Party from the European Union's liberal, multicultural mainstream. Party leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski has warned that the advancement of gay rights is a "grave danger" for Poland's families and the future of the bloc.His supporters have embraced that message, with about 30 cities, mostly in the former communist country's poorer eastern regions, adopting declarations saying they're "free from LGBT ideology" and opposing "social engineering that's foreign to Polish culture and natural order." The pro-government Gazeta Polska weekly is now planning to distribute the stickers to its readers."I'm concerned and disappointed that some groups use stickers to promote hatred and intolerance," U.S. Ambassador in Poland Georgette Mosbacher said in a Twitter post Friday."I'm not sure this is a matter U.S. ambassador should raise, but I wouldn't put this sticker on my door," Cabinet spokesman Piotr Muller told Polsat News television.A day earlier, Warsaw Deputy Mayor Pawel Rabiej notified prosecutors that the magazine was propagating discriminatory behavior similar to that used by German Fascists, whose World War II invasion of Poland killed millions."This is very dangerous," Rabiej said by phone. "Before the Holocaust and the genocide of the Jews, in the 1930s, sexual minorities were persecuted, which not everyone remembers, and calling to create zones free of any group brings us directly back to those times."Rabiej, one of staunchly Catholic Poland's few openly gay politicians, backed giving adoption rights to same-sex couples earlier this year. Kaczynski responded by saying gay people weren't fighting for tolerance but seeking to change the Polish way of life."Hands off our children," Kaczynski told a party's convention in March. His prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, had repeatedly said that his goal is to "re-Christianize Europe."Rights activists also slammed Law & Justice in May after authorities detained a woman who allegedly had images of an icon of the Virgin Mary with a rainbow-colored halo resembling the symbol of the LGBT community.To contact the reporter on this story: Marek Strzelecki in Warsaw at mstrzelecki1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Andrea Dudik at adudik@bloomberg.net, Michael WinfreyFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| World Bank pulls funding for new state capital in India after Delhi drops support Posted: 19 Jul 2019 04:45 AM PDT ![World Bank pulls funding for new state capital in India after Delhi drops support]( "World Bank pulls funding for new state capital in India after Delhi drops support") The World Bank said on Friday it had withdrawn $300 million of funding for a new capital in the south Indian state of Andhra Pradesh after the central government dropped support for the project. The Beijing-backed Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), that was due to finance $200 million of the project, then said it was reviewing its involvement. The construction of the city, known as Amaravati, is the brainchild of the state's former chief minister, N. Chandrababu Naidu, who lost power in elections in May.
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