| Rudy Giuliani refuses to comply with House Democrats' subpoena Posted: 15 Oct 2019 02:19 PM PDT  President Trump's personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani informed House Democrats on Tuesday that he will not comply with a subpoena for documents they sent him as part of the ongoing impeachment inquiry.
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| What's causing record rates of STDs? Posted: 14 Oct 2019 08:25 AM PDT  After decades of decline, rates of certain STDs have spiked to record levels, according to the CDC. What's causing the increase?
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| Soldier wounded during search for Bowe Bergdahl dies of his injuries Posted: 14 Oct 2019 03:40 PM PDT  A US soldier shot in the head during the 2009 search for army deserter Bowe Bergdahl has died from his injuries. Army Master Sgt. Mark Allen died on Saturday at the age of 46, 10 years after being injured in the hunt for his missing comrade. He spent 21 years in the army and national guard, and retired in 2013 on receiving the Purple Heart. He had been unable to walk or speak since a sniper shot him in the head in July 2009 while he was looking for Bergdahl, who had walked off his base in Afghanistan and was held by the Taliban for five years. At Bergdahl's trial, Allen's wife Shannon testified that it would take up to 90 minutes each morning to get her husband out of bed, showered, and dressed. She had to use a pulley system attached to the ceiling to move him. Shannon Allen, who testified during the trial of Bowe Bergdahl Mrs Allen did not learn about the circumstances surrounding her husband's injuries until 2014, after former president Barack Obama negotiated Bergdahl's release in a swap for five Taliban members detained at Guantanamo Bay. The Idaho-born soldier, now 33, was sentenced in January 2016 for desertion. During the trial he apologised to those injured. "I would like everyone who searched for me to know it was never my intention for anyone to be hurt, and I never expected that to happen," he said. He was reduced in rank from sergeant to private, ordered to forfeit $1,000 in pay for 10 months, and given a dishonorable discharge. He did not serve any prison time. Mrs Allen broke the news on Facebook on Sunday. "I'm heartbroken to let you all know that my husband passed away peacefully yesterday morning, with his family by his side," she said. "Over ten years ago, he sustained a severe head injury while serving in Afghanistan, which caused him lifelong health problems. "These past few months, he has faced some significant illnesses, and his body was finally ready to rest."
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| Booze run from behind bars: Inmates escape from Texas federal prison, return with whiskey Posted: 15 Oct 2019 08:11 AM PDT  The men left the prison grounds and cut through a neighboring ranch before getting caught by authorities.
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| The Latest: Fire department: LA blaze began under power line Posted: 14 Oct 2019 04:44 PM PDT  Fire officials say a destructive fire that broke out on the edge of Los Angeles began beneath a high-voltage transmission tower. Capt. Erik Scott told The Associated Press on Monday that Los Angeles Fire Department arson investigators have only determined the origin of the fire, not its cause. The location was at the base of power lines owned by Southern California Edison.
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| Elizabeth Warren fires back at Pete Buttigieg's 'pocket change' comment with another big money pledge Posted: 15 Oct 2019 08:24 AM PDT ![Elizabeth Warren fires back at Pete Buttigieg's 'pocket change' comment with another big money pledge]( "Elizabeth Warren fires back at Pete Buttigieg's 'pocket change' comment with another big money pledge") Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) has more than small donor money in her pocket.After South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg attacked Warren and other candidates for relying on "pocket change" to fund their 2020 campaigns, Warren issued a typically outsized response. She didn't call out Buttigieg by name, but instead pledged to avoid another segment of big-money donors and revealed a proposal to root out corporate influence in politics, essentially setting up a fight for Tuesday night's primary debate.Buttigieg on Monday defended his acceptance of big-money donations by saying "we're not going to beat Trump with pocket change." Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) issued a blatant rebuttal, but Warren took a more subtle approach in her Tuesday blog post by reminding readers she'd pledged not to take donations from federal lobbyists or PACs throughout her entire presidential run. In addition, Warren said she wouldn't take "take any contributions over $200 from executives at big tech companies, big banks, private equity firms, or hedge funds."Warren then called on her fellow candidates to disclose if they'd given special titles to big-money donors -- an attempt to expose if they'd been "hobnobbing with the rich and powerful," she wrote. And beyond these "voluntary changes," Warren discussed how, if elected, she'd stop foreign and corrupt influence in U.S. elections, "expand disclosure of fundraising and spending," and establish public financing for federal campaigns. Find all of Warren's proposal here.
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| All of the Google Pixel and Home Products on Sale Now Posted: 15 Oct 2019 12:39 PM PDT |
| India blocks SMS services in Kashmir after trucker killed Posted: 15 Oct 2019 07:53 AM PDT  Text messaging services were blocked in Indian Kashmir just hours after being restored when a truck driver was killed by suspected militants and his vehicle set ablaze, authorities said Tuesday. Separately, Indian officials said a 24-year-old woman died in the latest exchange of artillery fire with Pakistan over their de-facto border dividing the blood-soaked Himalayan region.
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| Giuliani refuses to comply with impeachment subpoena as attorney steps down: ‘I don’t need a lawyer’ Posted: 15 Oct 2019 02:32 PM PDT  Rudy Giuliani has said he will not co-operate with an impeachment inquiry against Donald Trump and insisted he did not need a lawyer following the arrest of two business associates accused of campaign finance violations.The president's personal attorney posted a letter on Twitter to the House permanent select committee on intelligence in which his lawyer wrote: "Please accept this response as formal notice that Mr Giuliani will not participate because this appears to be an unconstitutional, baseless and illegitimate 'impeachment inquiry.'"
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| Interactive Map Shows Exactly How Much Car Emissions Have Grown Where You Live Posted: 15 Oct 2019 06:25 AM PDT  New York Times map shows the best and worst places in the U.S. for emissions from vehicles.
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| Assad troops enter north-east Syria after Russia-backed deal with Kurds Posted: 14 Oct 2019 10:20 AM PDT  Bashar al-Assad's forces swept into cities across northeast Syria for the first time in seven years on Monday after the West's former Kurdish allies agreed to a Russian-brokered deal to try to hold off a Turkish attack. The Syrian regime's black-and-red flag went up across the region as Russia seized on Donald Trump's abandonment of the Kurds to restore Assad's rule over swathes of territory he has not controlled since 2012. Assad's troops clashed with Turkish-backed Syrian rebels outside Manbij, a key city on the Turkey-Syria border where US forces are evacuating on Mr Trump's orders. Western officials are watching closely to see if the skirmishes escalate into a direct confrontation between Turkey and the Syrian regime, or whether Russia can broker another deal to keep the two countries from clashing. Several European countries joined France and Germany in halting arms sales to Turkey, as the EU put out a joint statement condemning the offensive. A Syrian regime soldier waves the national flag a street on the western entrance of the town of Tal Tamr in the countryside of Syria's northeastern Hasakeh province on October 14, 2019 Credit: AFP Fears were also rising over an Islamic State (Isil) resurgence as it emerged that US forces had failed to secure dozens of the most hardened jihadist fighters, and Isil prisoners once again rioted against their Kurdish guards. Mr Trump suggested the Kurds were deliberately freeing Isil prisoners in a bid to get the West's attention, a talking point that has been repeatedly used by Turkey's government to discredit its Kurdish enemies. Assad's re-entry into northeastern Syria marks a dramatic redrawing of the lines of control in the war-torn country and likely signals the beginning of the end of seven years of Kurdish autonomy in the area. Regime fighters began entering the provinces of Hasakah and Raqqa and were moving quickly to consolidate their control over long swathes of the Turkish-Syrian border with the permission of Kurdish troops. The exact details of the agreement between Damascus and the Kurds remains unclear. Kurdish authorities insisted that they would maintain their political autonomy and that the deal was focused solely on military issues. Syrian regime forces are pictured as they patrol a street on the western entrance of the town of Tal Tamr in the countryside of Syria's northeastern Hasakeh province on October 14, 2019 Credit: AFP But other reports suggested that the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the Western-backed Kurdish units who led the fight against Isil, would be folded into Assad's army and that northeast Syria would come back under direct rule from Damascus. The immediate focus of the newly-aligned SDF and Assad regime is to repel Turkish-backed rebels from seizing control of Manbij, a border city west of the Euphrates River which is currently in Kurdish hands. The Syrian rebels, known as the National Army, said Monday night they had launched an operation to "liberate Manbij and its surroundings from the terrorist gangs". The National Army claimed to have engaged Assad's forces and captured a tank in a first round of fighting. The battle for Manbij will pose a test for Turkey, which must decide whether to back its Syrian rebel allies with airstrikes at the risk of sparking a confrontation with the Syrian regime. Turkey - Syria map Russia is believed to be relaying messages between the two sides to try to avert conflict. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the Turkish president, said he was determined to put the city under the control "our Arabic brothers" in the National Army. But while Turkish warplanes thundered overhead there were no reports they were striking Assad's forces in support of the rebels. US forces have been ordered to evacuate northern Syria but many troops remained caught up in the chaos as different armed groups maneuvered and the roads remained clogged with refugees. Sen. Lindsey Graham Credit: AP The situation in northeast Syria collapsed into disorder so quickly that US special forces did not have time to carry out a plan to seize around 60 of the top Isil fighters in Kurdish custody, according to the New York Times. US commandos had planned to take the prisoners from the Kurds and move them to Iraq but were unable to reach a key road in time. It is not known if any British fighters were among the 60 men on the US list. America has already taken custody of Alexanda Kotey and El Shafee Elsheikh, the two surviving members of the "Beatles" group of alleged British executioners. The report appeared to drastically undercut Mr Trump's claim that "the US has the worst of the Isil prisoners". Mr Trump also said the "Kurds may be releasing some [Isil prisoners] to get us involved" in trying to stop Turkey's offensive. Mr Erdoğan and other Turkish officials have made the same claim repeatedly in recent days. The Turkish military released a video which it claimed showed its commandos entering a Kurdish prison only to find that the guards had released all the inmates. But Kurdish officials suggested the video was staged at an empty facility never used as a prison. SDF guards at a prison were wounded during a riot by Isil prisoners at Ain Issa, according to Kurdish media. The Isil suspects still in Kurdish custody are panicked at the prospect they could be handed over to the Assad regime, which has a long history of torturing detainees.
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| Woman will spend 60 years in prison for first-degree murder of boyfriend Posted: 15 Oct 2019 06:46 AM PDT  A woman who poured gasoline on the couch where her sleeping boyfriend lay and then shut the door after seeing him jump up and yell "hot, hot" will spend 60 years in prison for first-degree murder.
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| Parents of teen killed in crash coming to White House Posted: 15 Oct 2019 11:09 AM PDT  The family of a British teenager killed in a car crash involving an American diplomat's wife was headed to the White House on Tuesday for a meeting with senior administration officials. A spokesman for the family announced the afternoon meeting on Twitter, and senior White House official confirmed it on condition of anonymity. It was unclear whether the Dunns would meet with the president, but family spokesman Radd Seiger said in a tweet that he was "looking forward to getting further answers" about Harry Dunn's death.
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| Florida girl, 1, dies in hot car, the 50th death of 2019, according to one national tracker Posted: 15 Oct 2019 11:45 AM PDT  The death of a 1-year-old Florida girl Monday marked the 50th case of a child dying in a hot car this year, according to KidsandCars.org.
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| Jeep Gladiator Gets Even More Rugged as a Military-Spec Vehicle Posted: 15 Oct 2019 01:08 PM PDT  Jeep and AM General could re-enlist with the U.S. Army as soon as next year.
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| Nigerian police rescue 67 from 'inhuman' conditions at Islamic 'school' Posted: 14 Oct 2019 01:37 PM PDT  The raid in Katsina, the northwestern home state of President Muhammadu Buhari, came less than a month after about 300 men and boys were freed from another supposed Islamic school in neighboring Kaduna state where they were allegedly tortured and sexually abused. "In the course of investigation, sixty-seven persons from the ages of 7 to 40 years were found shackled with chains," Katsina police spokesman Sanusi Buba said in a statement.
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| North Korea's Spy Submarines Have Performed Some Wild Missions—But This One Ended In Disaster Posted: 15 Oct 2019 11:06 AM PDT  A mechanical meltdown?
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| Pullback Leaves Green Berets Feeling 'Ashamed,' and Kurdish Allies Describing 'Betrayal' Posted: 15 Oct 2019 06:46 AM PDT  WASHINGTON -- U.S. commandos were working alongside Kurdish forces at an outpost in eastern Syria last year when they were attacked by columns of Syrian government tanks and hundreds of troops, including Russian mercenaries. In the next hours, the Americans threw the Pentagon's arsenal at them, including B-52 strategic bombers. The attack was stopped.That operation, in the middle of the U.S.-led campaign against the Islamic State group in Syria, showed the extent to which the U.S. military was willing to protect the Syrian Kurds, its main ally on the ground.But now, with the White House revoking protection for these Kurdish fighters, some of the Special Forces officers who battled alongside the Kurds say they feel deep remorse at orders to abandon their allies."They trusted us and we broke that trust," one Army officer who has worked alongside the Kurds in northern Syria said last week in a telephone interview. "It's a stain on the American conscience.""I'm ashamed," said another officer who had also served in northern Syria. Both officers spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid reprisals from their chains of command.And the response from the Kurds themselves was just as stark. "The worst thing in military logic and comrades in the trench is betrayal," said Shervan Darwish, an official allied with the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces.The next flurry of orders from Washington, as some troops had feared, will pull U.S. troops out of northern Syria altogether. Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper said Sunday that President Donald Trump had ordered the roughly 1,000 U.S. troops in the country's northeast to conduct a "deliberate withdrawal" out of the country in the coming days and weeks.The defense secretary's statement came after comments Friday pushing back on complaints that the United States was betraying allies in Syria -- "We have not abandoned the Kurds" -- even as he acknowledged that his Turkish counterpart had ignored his plea to stop the offensive.Army Special Forces soldiers -- mostly members of the 3rd Special Forces Group -- moved last week to consolidate their positions in the confines of their outposts miles away from the Syrian border, a quiet withdrawal that all but confirmed the United States' capitulation to the Turkish military's offensive to clear Kurdish-held areas of northern Syria.But as the Americans pulled back, the Kurds moved north to try to reinforce their comrades fighting the offensive. The U.S. soldiers could only watch from their sandbag-lined walls. Orders from Washington were simple: Hands off. Let the Kurds fight for themselves.The orders contradicted the U.S. military's strategy in Syria over the last four years, especially when it came to the Kurdish fighters, known as the YPG, who were integral to routing the Islamic State group from northeastern Syria. The Kurds had fought in Manbij, Raqqa and deep into the Euphrates River Valley, hunting the last Islamic State fighters in the group's now defunct physical caliphate. But the Syrian Democratic Forces, or SDF, as the Kurdish and their allied Arab fighters on the ground are called, are being left behind.U.S. Special Forces and other troops had built close ties with their Kurdish allies, living on the same dusty compounds, sharing meals and common dangers. They fought side by side, and helped evacuate Kurdish dead and wounded from the battlefield."When they mourn, we mourn with them," Gen. Joseph L. Votel, a former head of the military's Central Command, said Thursday at the Middle East Institute.The Kurdish forces and U.S. military have survived previous strains, including Trump's sudden decision in December to withdraw all U.S. troops from northern Syria, a decision that was later walked back somewhat.This time may be different, and irreversible. "It would seem at this particular point, we've made it very, very hard for them to have a partnership relationship with us because of this recent policy decision," Votel said.As part of security measures the United States brokered to tamp down tensions with Turkish troops, Kurdish forces agreed to pull back from the border, destroy fortifications and return some heavy weapons -- steps meant to show that they posed no threat to Turkish territory, but that later made them more vulnerable when Turkey launched its offensive.Special Forces officers described another recent operation with Kurds that underscored the tenacity of the group. The Americans and the Kurdish troops were searching for a low-level Islamic State leader in northern Syria. It was a difficult mission and unlikely they would find the commander.From his operations center, one U.S. officer watched the Kurds work alongside the Americans on the ground in an almost indistinguishable symmetry. They captured the Islamic State fighter."The SDF's elite counterterrorism units are hardened veterans of the war against ISIS whom the U.S. has seen in action and trust completely," said Nicholas A. Heras, a fellow at the Center for a New American Security, who visited the SDF in July to advise them on the Islamic State group, or ISIS.During the battle against ISIS, coordination between the U.S. military and the Syrian Democratic Forces has extended from the highest levels to rank-and-file fighters, according to multiple interviews with SDF fighters and commanders in Syria over the course of the campaign.SDF commanders worked side by side with U.S. military officers in a joint command center in a defunct cement factory near the northern Syrian town of Kobani, where they discussed strategy and planned future operations.The battle of Kobani that began in 2014 gave birth to the United States' ties to the Kurds in northeastern Syria. ISIS fighters, armed with heavy American-made artillery captured from retreating Iraqi army units, surrounded Kobani, a Kurdish city, and entered parts of it.Despite the Obama administration's initial reluctance to offer help, the United States carried out airstrikes against advancing ISIS militants, and its military aircraft dropped ammunition, small arms and medical supplies to replenish the Kurdish combatants.That aid helped turn the tide, the Kurds defeated ISIS, and U.S. commanders realized they had discovered a valuable ally in the fight against the terrorist group.Thousands of SDF fighters received training from the United States in battlefield tactics, reconnaissance and first aid. Reconnaissance teams learned to identify Islamic State locations and transmit them to the command center for the U.S.-led military coalition to plan airstrikes.Visitors to front-line SDF positions often saw Syrian officers with iPads and laptops they used to communicate information to their U.S. colleagues."For the last two years, the coordination was pretty deep," said Mutlu Civiroglu, a Washington-based Kurdish affairs analyst who has spent time in northeastern Syria. "The mutual trust was very high, the mutual confidence, because this collaboration brought enormous results.""They completed each other," he said of the SDF and U.S.-led coalition. "The coalition didn't have boots on the ground, and fighters didn't have air support, so they needed each other."That coordination was critical in many of the big battles against the Islamic State group.To open the battle in one town, SDF fighters were deposited by coalition aircraft behind the Islamic State group's lines. At the start of another battle, U.S. Special Operations forces helped the SDF plot and execute an attack across the Euphrates River.Even after the Islamic State group had lost most of its territory, the United States trained counterterrorism units to do tactical raids on ISIS hideouts and provided them with intelligence needed to plan them.Even in territory far from the front lines with the Islamic State, SDF vehicles often drove before and after U.S. convoys through Syrian towns and SDF fighters provided perimeter security at facilities where U.S. personnel were based.The torturous part of America's on-again, off-again alliance with the Kurds -- one in which the United States has routinely armed the Kurds to fight various regimes it viewed as adversaries -- emerged in 1974, as the Kurds were rebelling against Iraq. Iran and the United States were allies, and the Shah of Iran and Henry Kissinger encouraged the Kurdish rebellion against the Iraqi government. CIA agents were sent to the Iraq-Iran border to help the Kurds.The Kurdish leader Mustafa Barzani did not trust the Shah of Iran, but believed Kissinger when he said that the Kurds would receive help from the Americans.But a year later, the Shah of Iran made a deal with Saddam Hussein on the sidelines of an OPEC meeting: In return for some territorial adjustments along the Iran-Iraq border, the shah agreed to stop support for the Kurds.Kissinger signed off on the plan, the Iraqi military slaughtered thousands of Kurds and the United States stood by. When questioned, Kissinger delivered his now famous explanation: "Covert action," he said, "should not be confused with missionary work."In the fight against ISIS in Syria, Kurdish fighters followed their hard-fought triumph in Kobani by liberating other Kurdish towns. Then the Americans asked their newfound Kurdish allies to go into Arab areas, team up with local militias and reclaim those areas from the Islamic State group.The U.S. military implored the SDF to fight in the Arab areas, and so they advanced, seizing Raqqa and Deir el-Zour, winning but suffering large numbers of casualties.The American-Kurdish military alliance against the Islamic State group in Syria and Iraq "began with us helping them," said Peter W. Galbraith, the former U.S. diplomat who has for years also been a senior adviser to the Kurds in both Syria and Iraq. "But by the end, it was them helping us. They are the ones who recovered the territory that ISIS had taken."This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2019 The New York Times Company
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| Exclusive: Trump lawyer Giuliani was paid $500,000 to consult on indicted associate's firm Posted: 15 Oct 2019 03:44 AM PDT  President Donald Trump's personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, was paid $500,000 for work he did for a company co-founded by the Ukrainian-American businessman arrested last week on campaign finance charges, Giuliani told Reuters on Monday. The businessman, Lev Parnas, is a close associate of Giuliani and was involved in his effort to investigate Trump's political rival, former Vice President Joe Biden, who is a leading contender for the 2020 Democratic Party nomination. Giuliani said Parnas' company, Boca Raton-based Fraud Guarantee, whose website says it aims to help clients "reduce and mitigate fraud", engaged Giuliani Partners, a management and security consulting firm, around August 2018.
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| Russia assumes mantle of supreme power broker in Middle East as US retreats from Syria Posted: 15 Oct 2019 10:00 AM PDT  Russia's status as the undisputed power-broker in the Middle East was cemented as Vladimir Putin continued a triumphant tour of capitals traditionally allied to the US and Russian troops entered a hastily evacuated US base in Syria The Russian president, who spent Monday in Saudi Arabia's crown prince Mohammed bin Salman in Riyadh, landed in the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday morning. He was met at the airport by Abu Dhabi's powerful Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al-Nahyan and fighter jets coloured the sky white blue and red, the colours of the Russian tricolour, as they traveled to the Royal palace. Mr Putin presented the crown prince with an endangered gyrfalcon bred at a Russian breeding centre in Kyrgyzstan. It is Mr Putin's first visit to the UAE since 2007. Russian and Syrian forces driving near Manbij on Tuesday morning Credit: OMAR SANADIKI/ REUTERS Part of the visit is about business. Russia's sovereign wealth fund said a dozen agreements worth more than $1.3 billion were to be signed during the visit. But the visit also underscores an attempt by Russia to strengthen ties with traditional US allies in the Middle East following Donald Trump's decision last week to pull troops out of Syria. The move leaves Moscow the decisive military power in Syria, and US allies, including Saudi Arabia and the UAE, are likely to see friendship with Moscow as important if they are to contain regional rivals Iran and Turkey. Kremlin has worked closely with Iran to prop-up Bashar Assad in Syria, leaving it with valuable diplomatic leverage on either side of the conflict between Tehran and Riyadh. The shift in power has implications for conflicts in the wider region. SyriaEasternEuphratesRussia|n PMC inside the US base in Manbij abandoned this morning. pic.twitter.com/II2FI68aBx— MrRevinsky (@Kyruer) October 15, 2019 Mr Putin said he and his opposite numbers were "intensively coordinating in the regional and international issues that are related to the situation in Syria, Libya, Yemen and the situation in the Arab Gulf." A symbolic confirmation of Russia's new role as regional power broker came when Russian forces entered a hastily abandoned US base in Syria. The Russian take over of the base near the strategic town of Manbij was captured by Oleg Blokhin, a veteran war correspondent who has often embedded with the Russian army and private military contractors in Syria, who filmed himself exploring the base on Tuesday morning. "Good morning everyone from Manbij!" he said in the video. "I'm standing in an American base. There were here just yesterday, and today it is us. Let's have a look at how they lived here." In a second video he played with raising and lowering the electronically-operated barrier at a base checkpoint. "It's all in working order," he remarked. Vladimir Putin gave Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan of Abu Dhabi an endangered Gyrfalcon, from a Russian breeding centre in Kyrgyzstan Credit: Alexei Nikolsky/TASS The American-led coalition later confirmed it had abandoned the area as part of staged a "deliberate withdrawal" from northeast Syria. "We are out of Manbij," it said on Twitter. The move puts Russian troops in a buffer zone between regime forces and Turkish-backed rebels. It is speculated that they may also assume a role separating Kurdish militias from Turkish forces. Russian and Syrian regime forces moved into strategic border cities in northern Syria after the formerly US-allied Kurdish-led administration of the region struck a deal to halt Turkey's offensive there. Under the agreement, troops loyal to the Assad government and backed by Russian forces are to secure the border with Turkey, allowing Damascus to regain control of a region it lost nearly ten years ago. Such an outcome may satisfy Turkey's Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who launched his offensive into Syria on Wednesday last week in a bid to crush the autonomous administration in the area run by the Kurdish YPG, which has links to the banned Turkish Kurdistan Workers Party. However, in a sign of tensions with Turkey, Mr Putin's Syria envoy said that Russia considered the Turkish military operation in northern Syria "unacceptable." Asked whether the Kremlin had given Ankara a green light for the operation in advance, Alexander Lavrentiev said: "No. We had always urged Turkey to show restraint and always considered some kind of military operation on Syrian territory unacceptable."
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| The Latest: 2nd crane in danger of collapse Posted: 14 Oct 2019 03:09 PM PDT  The second of two cranes towering over the site where a New Orleans hotel construction project partially collapsed two days ago is now considered in danger of toppling. Two other workers are known dead at the project site, which sits on the edge of the historic French Quarter. The coroner's office in New Orleans has identified one of two workers known to have died when a hotel under construction partially collapsed.
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| China inflation surges as pork prices soar Posted: 14 Oct 2019 09:48 PM PDT  China's consumer inflation accelerated at its fastest pace in almost six years in September as African swine fever sent pork prices soaring nearly 70 percent, official data showed Tuesday. Authorities have gone as far as tapping the nation's pork reserve to control prices of the staple meat, as the swine fever crisis could become a political and economic liability for the state. The consumer price index (CPI) -- a key gauge of retail inflation -- hit 3.0 percent last month, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said, up from 2.8 percent in August and the highest since since November 2013.
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| Court Ruling Extends Vote Protest of Philippine Marcos’ Son Posted: 15 Oct 2019 02:50 AM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- The Philippines' top court on Tuesday decided to release the initial results of the vice-presidential vote recount, which the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos' son said will delay his chance to assume the post.Former Senator Ferdinand Marcos Jr. said he is "frustrated" by the court's decision not to resolve his election protest against Vice President Leni Robredo victory in the 2016 polls. Robredo is already halfway through her six-year term.The court instead decided to make public the result of the recount covering three provinces that will serve as basis for any further action on Marcos' challenge. It also asked the two camps to comment on Marcos' plea to nullify votes in three other provinces due to supposed irregularities in the 2016 elections."The proper vice president -- myself -- is being robbed of years of service," Marcos said in a televised interview. President Rodrigo Duterte, who has faced questions on his health, has repeatedly said Marcos is his preferred successor if he had to leave office before his single term expires in 2022.Robredo, leader of the opposition party, said she welcomes the court decision, as she urged the court to already junk Marcos' protest. "The mere fact that this has been dragging on for so long only provides Marcos a platform for his lies," she said in a separate televised briefing.(Updates with comments from Marcos and Robredo from fourth paragraph.)To contact the reporter on this story: Andreo Calonzo in Manila at acalonzo1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Cecilia Yap at cyap19@bloomberg.net, Muneeza NaqviFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| View 2021 Genesis GV70 Spy Photos Posted: 15 Oct 2019 09:28 AM PDT |
| What Did America Offer North Korea at Working-Level Talks? One Report Claims To Know. Posted: 15 Oct 2019 05:05 AM PDT  And it makes absolutely no sense at all.
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| Trump's hailing of $50 billion in Chinese farm purchases seen as 'meaningless' Posted: 14 Oct 2019 12:41 AM PDT  China is still a long way from forking out $50 billion for farm goods from the United States, agriculture industry analysts said on Monday, cautioning that getting there is contingent on removing substantial technical and political hurdles. Outlining the first phase of a deal to end a trade war with China, U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday lauded his counterparts for agreeing to make purchases of $40 billion to $50 billion in U.S. agricultural goods.
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| Russia Begins Patrolling Area Dividing Syrian and Turkish Forces Posted: 15 Oct 2019 08:09 AM PDT  Russia announced on Tuesday that its forces have begun patrolling the area between Syrian and Turkish troops and allied militias positioned near the Turkey-Syria border.The Russian Defense Ministry issued a statement saying its forces had established a presence in "the northwestern borders of Manbij district along the line of contact of the Syrian Arab Republic military and the Turkish military."Meanwhile, Russian military personnel appeared to take over an abandoned U.S. military base in Manbij in a video obtained by the Wall Street Journal."The Syrian government army has taken full control of the city of Manbij and nearby populated areas," the Russian Defense Ministry statement continued.Russia also moved to prevent any possible conflicts between Syrian and Turkish troops."No one is interested" in such conflict, said Russian envoy to Syria Alexander Lavrentyev in comments to Russian state media. He further emphasized that Russia "is not going to allow" fighting between Syrian and Turkish troops.President Trump on October 7 announced the withdrawal of U.S. troops from northeast Syria in anticipation of a Turkish invasion of the area. Turkey intends to resettle the conquered region with 3.6 million Syrian refugees currently residing in Turkey. The offensive is also intended to push back Kurdish militia groups it regards as terrorist organizations.The U.N. estimates roughly 130,000 people from the heavily Kurdish region in northeastern Syria have fled the Turkish assault.Trump has faced bipartisan fury for effectively abandoning the Kurds, who were instrumental in the U.S.-led fight against ISIS and played a large role in reconquering territory overrun by the group in 2014.After a report emerged of ISIS fighters escaping Kurdish-run detention camps, commentators warned of a possible ISIS resurgence after the fighting ends.
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| The Latest: $200,000 bond set for ex-cop charged with murder Posted: 14 Oct 2019 06:30 PM PDT  A $200,000 bond has been set for a white former police officer jailed in the fatal shooting of a black woman inside the woman's Fort Worth home. Aaron Dean was booked Monday evening into the Tarrant County Jail on the murder charge in the death of Atatiana Jefferson. Jail records do not list an attorney for Dean.
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| We found 85,000 cops who’ve been investigated for misconduct. Now you can read their records. Posted: 14 Oct 2019 05:25 PM PDT  USA TODAY is leading a national effort to obtain and publish disciplinary and misconduct records for thousands of police officers.
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| John Bolton warned White House lawyers about 'hand grenade' Giuliani and Mulvaney, aide reportedly testified Posted: 14 Oct 2019 09:05 PM PDT ![John Bolton warned White House lawyers about 'hand grenade' Giuliani and Mulvaney, aide reportedly testified]( "John Bolton warned White House lawyers about 'hand grenade' Giuliani and Mulvaney, aide reportedly testified") Former National Security Adviser John Bolton was so alarmed by a White House-linked effort to pressure Ukraine to investigate Democrats, he told aide Fiona Hill to alert the National Security Council's chief lawyer, Hill told House impeachment investigators in her 10-hour deposition on Monday, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal report. Specifically, Bolton told Hill, the top NSC staffer on Russia and Eurasian affairs, to notify White House lawyers that Rudy Giuliani, White House acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney, and U.S. Ambassador Gordon Sondland were running a rogue operation, the Times reports."I am not part of whatever drug deal Sondland and Mulvaney are cooking up," Bolton reportedly told Hill to relate to the lawyers, after a heated July 10 meeting with Sondland, the U.S. ambassador to the European Union and a key player in the Ukraine pressure campaign, and Ukrainian officals. Before that meeting, Hill reportedly testified, Bolton told her that "Giuliani's a hand grenade who's going to blow everybody up." Giuliani, President Trump's personal lawyer, is now under federal criminal investigation for his work in Ukraine, the Journal reported Monday. Sondland is scheduled to be deposed on Thursday.House investigators are now trying to decide whether to question Bolton, The Washington Post reports.Hill also testified that he had strongly opposed Giuliani's successful push to have Trump remove America's ambassador to Kyiv, Marie Yovanovitch, who had a reputation for fighting corruption in Ukraine. "I don't know Fiona and can't figure out what she is talking about," Giuliani told the Post on Monday night, adding that he believes she was out of the loop when it came to Ukraine, at least compared with Sondland. "She just didn't know," Giuliani said, reiterating his assertion that he was working on orders from the State Department. Update, 12:47 a.m.: This article has been updated based on a clarification by the Times:> On the "drug deal" quote: 1 person in the room during Hill's testimony initially said Bolton mentioned Rudy, but 2 others now say Hill said he actually cited Sondland: "I am not part of whatever drug deal Sondland & Mulvaney are cooking up"@peterbakernythttps://t.co/Usfejnhcoj> > -- Nicholas Fandos (@npfandos) October 15, 2019
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| Amazon Pledges $1 Million More in Heated Seattle Elections Posted: 15 Oct 2019 11:36 AM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- Amazon.com Inc. is reaching into its deep pockets in an effort to make Seattle more business-friendly, pledging an additional $1 million to a corporate-backed group ahead of next month's contentious city council elections.The contribution disclosed on Tuesday brings Amazon's donations this election cycle to the Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce's Civic Alliance for a Sound Economy (CASE) to $1.45 million, and likely cements the company's status as the biggest spender in its hometown's elections. The splurge marks a dramatic change for the e-commerce giant, which largely avoided city politics for most of its 25 years, even as it grew into Seattle's largest employer and contributed to a boom that brought about rapidly rising housing costs, snarled traffic and a homelessness crisis."We are contributing to this election because we care deeply about the future of Seattle," Amazon spokesman Aaron Toso said in an emailed statement. "We believe it is critical that our hometown has a city council that is focused on pragmatic solutions to our shared challenges in transportation, homelessness, climate change and public safety."Amazon's relationship with city hall was a focus of heated debate last year around a proposed tax on large businesses to fund services for the homeless. The city council passed -- and then, under pressure from a business-backed repeal effort, rescinded -- the so-called head tax after Amazon paused construction planning on a piece of its corporate campus and threatened to back out of a lease for a major downtown skyscraper. Amazon would later confirm its intent to sublease that building anyway.Seven of Seattle's nine city council seats are up for election this year.Socialist councilmember Kshama Sawant, who sought to link Amazon to the tax and has made calls to tax the company a fixture of her reelection campaign, faces a competitive race in the Nov. 5 general election. Egan Orion, a community leader from Seattle's Capitol Hill neighborhood, is backed by CASE and individual contributions from more than a dozen Amazon executives.Amazon's latest commitment makes the company the biggest spender so far this election cycle, according to CASE, topping the $855,000 spent by a group affiliated with the Service Employees International Union. mazon this year has also hosted and sponsored city council candidate forums, and contributed $400,000 to a campaign to defeat a ballot measure that would cut Washington state car-tab taxes at the expense of transportation projects.To contact the reporter on this story: Matt Day in Seattle at mday63@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Jillian Ward at jward56@bloomberg.net, Molly Schuetz, Robin AjelloFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Mass raids target Russian opposition chief Posted: 15 Oct 2019 08:57 AM PDT  Russian investigators raided opposition campaign offices across the country on Tuesday, in the latest move to increase pressure on top Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny and his allies. The early morning raids targeted more than 100 of Navalny's campaign offices and homes of activists in 30 cities, the opposition said, including the headquarters of Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation in Moscow.
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| Jet Fighter Death Match: Russia's MiG-15 vs. America's F-86 Sabre (Who Wins?) Posted: 14 Oct 2019 09:00 AM PDT  In the end, the Sabre vs. MiG duel made for great newsprint. But much like the Korean War, it ultimately counted for little.
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| France warns of 'endless soap opera' on EU membership talks with Balkans Posted: 15 Oct 2019 02:42 AM PDT ![France warns of 'endless soap opera' on EU membership talks with Balkans]( "France warns of 'endless soap opera' on EU membership talks with Balkans") France stuck to its hardline position against European Union membership talks for North Macedonia and Albania on Tuesday, warning it could not approve negotiations until the bloc reformed the "endless soap opera" of admitting new members. Europe ministers, making a third attempt since June 2018 to approve membership talks for the Balkan hopefuls, are set to discuss in Luxembourg opening a path for Skopje and Tirana, with broad EU support and backing from the United States.
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| Turkey's president pulled one over on Trump — and some of the US's most dangerous adversaries are the big winners Posted: 15 Oct 2019 12:33 PM PDT  The Islamic State, Russia, Iran, and Syria are all poised to strengthen their positions amid the chaos triggered by Trump's abrupt withdrawal.
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| Not guilty plea from man accused in church wedding shooting Posted: 15 Oct 2019 02:41 PM PDT  A man accused of storming into a New Hampshire church over the weekend and shooting a clergyman and a bride during a wedding pleaded not guilty Tuesday. Dale Holloway, 37, of Manchester, is accused of attempted murder, assault and other charges in connection with the Saturday shooting at the New England Pentecostal Ministries in Pelham. Assistant Attorney General Benjamin Agati said authorities believe Holloway acted alone and that they were investigating whether it was connected to an earlier shooting.
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| California Mandates Free Abortion at Public Colleges Posted: 15 Oct 2019 03:30 AM PDT  Democratic governor Gavin Newsom has signed legislation making California the first state in the country to require public colleges and universities to provide medical-abortion pills to students at campus health centers.S.B. 24, or the College Student Right to Access Act, will compel all 34 University of California and California State University campuses to make the RU-486 chemical-abortion pill available through campus health centers by 2023, in theory at no cost to students. Last fall, then-governor Jerry Brown refused to sign the legislation, using talking points similar to those that pro-life groups such as Students for Life of America used when lobbying against the bill."According to a study sponsored by supporters of this legislation, the average distance to abortion providers in campus communities varies from five to seven miles, not an unreasonable distance," Brown said in a statement at the time. "Because the services required by this bill are widely available off-campus, this bill is not necessary."Evidently, Newsom disagreed. "As other states and the federal government go backward, restricting reproductive freedom, in California we are moving forward, expanding access and reaffirming a woman's right to choose," he said in a statement after signing the bill late last week. "We're removing barriers to reproductive health, increasing access on college campuses and using technology to modernize how patients interact with providers."According to the bill, RU-486 will be provided to students by health-care workers at health centers on California campuses. But the drug in question — Mifeprex, the most common drug used in chemical abortions before about ten weeks' gestation — typically is administered at a clinic before the pregnant woman is sent home to expel the developing embryo, a fairly risky process.This past April, the Food and Drug Administration updated the adverse effects of Mifeprex to note that as of 2018, "there were reports of 24 deaths of women associated with Mifeprex since the product was approved in September 2000, including two cases of ectopic pregnancy resulting in death; and several cases of severe systemic infection (also called sepsis), including some that were fatal."Official documentation on the use of Mifeprex shows that there have been close to 4,200 women who reported adverse effects from the drug, including infections, follow-up surgery, hospitalization, and other complications. Opponents of the legislation in California lobbied against the bill in part because they argued that college-age women in particular need close supervision and will be put at risk by having abortion drugs made available without proper surveillance to ensure their health and safety.Judging from estimates provided by proponents of S.B. 24, it is likely that somewhere between 15 and 75 young women each month will require surgery after RU-486 fails. Opponents of the bill say it's unlikely that campus health centers will be adequately prepared to handle such emergencies. Many who lobbied against the bill also noted that the legislation's provisions will probably require violating the conscience rights of California's health-care professionals, who easily could be forced to facilitate medical abortions, because S.B. 24 provides no protections for anyone with religious or moral objections to the procedure.Over the summer, California's Department of Finance articulated its objections to the legislation, noting that the Commission on the Status of Women and Girls "does not have the technical expertise nor existing capacity to develop and administer a program of this size, scope, or content."According to its report, enacting the new policy would cost University of California–system schools somewhere between $4.6 million and $7.8 million to initiate, with additional ongoing costs of $2.2 million to $3.3 million beginning in 2023 to operate the program. The report didn't estimate the costs to the California State University system but noted that the CSU had said students' out-of-pocket costs for RU-486 and related lab work likely would be about $500 because the state hasn't allocated enough to actually cover the cost.S.B. 24 will allocate $200,000 each to University of California and California State University health centers "to pay for the cost, both direct and indirect, of medication abortion readiness," including updated training, new equipment, telemedicine services, and facility upgrades. Pro-abortion group JustCARE reports that private donors including the Women's Foundation of California and Tara Health Foundation raised $10,290,000 in private money to fund the new policy. Opponents of the legislation note that if the funding is insufficient to account for actual costs of implementing the program on all 34 campuses, the rest of the costs will fall to students.This year has featured a number of controversial changes to state abortion policies across the country, as several states attempted to limit abortion earlier in pregnancy and a handful of others officially legalized abortion through all nine months of pregnancy. California state senator Connie Leyva, sponsor of S.B. 24, has said she hopes that her legislation will be the beginning of a broader campaign to make chemical-abortion drugs available on campuses across the country — a new frontier in the fight over abortion policy.
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| Sleep Soundly Outdoors by Saving on Klymit Sleeping Pads Posted: 15 Oct 2019 11:26 AM PDT |
| This church in Pennsylvania holds a ceremony to bless guns Posted: 15 Oct 2019 04:19 AM PDT  Dozens of couples carrying assault rifles took part in a blessing of their weapons at a church in Newfoundland, Pennsylvania. Members of the World Peace and Unification Sanctuary, an unofficial sect of the Christian Unification movement, were invited to "show their willingness to defend their families, communities and nation". The weapons are meant to represent the "rod of iron" referenced in the biblical Book of Revelation, which was used to control God's enemies. The semi-automatic rifles are similar to the weapon used to kill 17 people in the shooting at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida in February 2018. The church believes that the Florida shooting could have been prevented if the teachers were armed. Members carry guns while some wear crowns, often made of bullets Credit: Spencer Platt/Getty In the aftermath of the tragedy the debate over gun control raged across America, with shocked students calling for immediate action on gun control. Despite this, the US's largest gun lobby, the National Rifle Association (NRA) has hindered attempts to restrict the accessibility of firearms, using its financial and political clout. Weapons are not loaded and the guns are secured with zip ties to stop them firing Credit: Spencer Platt/Getty Now, two decades on from the 1999 Columbine school shooting, it is easier to purchase assault rifles after a temporary ban under the Bush administration expired.
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| Funeral prank by deceased grandfather leaves mourners laughing Posted: 14 Oct 2019 12:39 PM PDT  A funeral prank that had a deceased grandfather talking from beyond the grave left mourners laughing.
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| For Moscow, a win in Syria but fraught with risks Posted: 15 Oct 2019 09:37 AM PDT  The withdrawal of US forces from northern Syria was a win for President Vladimir Putin, strengthening Russia's role as the key foreign player in the war-torn country. Russian officials said Tuesday they were working with Turkey to avoid confrontation with pro-regime forces in northern Syria, where Turkish troops have moved in against Kurdish fighters. Syrian government troops -- backed by Russian forces since Moscow launched an intervention in 2015 -- have also moved into the north under a deal reached with the Kurds.
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| This Picture Is the U.S. Military's Worst China Nightmare (Thanks to Russia) Posted: 15 Oct 2019 12:39 AM PDT  These jets could do some serious damage in a war over Taiwan--and they come from Russia.
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| UPDATE 1-U.S. concerned about some Hong Kong protest tactics, heavier China hand -Pentagon Posted: 15 Oct 2019 11:40 AM PDT ![UPDATE 1-U.S. concerned about some Hong Kong protest tactics, heavier China hand -Pentagon]( "UPDATE 1-U.S. concerned about some Hong Kong protest tactics, heavier China hand -Pentagon") The senior U.S. defense official for Asia said on Tuesday that the United States has some concerns about some of the tactics used by demonstrators in Hong Kong but was also concerned about the heavier hand Beijing and Hong Kong authorities have used against protests in the territory. Randall Schriver, the assistant secretary of defense for Indo-Pacific Security Affairs, said the United States was "100 percent" behind those in Hong Kong who were speaking out for respect for fundamental rights guaranteed in the 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration. "But I think in general, we are concerned about the heavier hand that Beijing has taken and the Hong Kong authorities have taken with what we regard as legitimate activities on the part of the people of Hong Kong," Schriver added.
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| School suspends girls, says rape-awareness note was bullying Posted: 15 Oct 2019 02:38 PM PDT  A 15-year-old girl was suspended for bullying after trying to draw attention to what she believed was an unaddressed problem of sexual assaults involving students at her high school. Aela Mansmann, a 15-year-old sophomore at Cape Elizabeth High School outside Portland, has been at odds with Cape Elizabeth Schools for a month after posting a note in a bathroom that said: "There's a rapist in our school and you know who it is." She and two other students who left similar notes were ordered suspended. The American Civil Liberties Union of Maine is taking on Mansmann's case and calling on federal court to stop her suspension.
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