| At Senate trial, chief justice again tosses out Rand Paul's whistleblower question Posted: 30 Jan 2020 11:31 AM PST  For the second time in as many days, Chief Justice John Roberts rejected a question submitted by Sen. Rand Paul during the impeachment trial of President Trump.
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| U.S. Declares Public Health Emergency Over Coronavirus Fears Posted: 31 Jan 2020 01:27 PM PST  Federal officials declared a public health emergency and will be restricting entry into the United States in light of the 2019 novel coronavirus that has killed at least 200 people and infected nearly 10,000 more worldwide. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar told reporters Friday that President Trump would sign a proclamation temporarily suspending entry to foreign nationals deemed to pose a transmission risk.Azar also said any U.S. citizen who traveled to China's Hubei province within the past 14 days before arriving home would be subjected two weeks of mandatory quarantine. And citizens who traveled to any other regions in China would undergo a "proactive entry health screen" and 14 days of monitored self-quarantine."The risk for infections for Americans remains low," Azar said, adding that these steps were "measured" reactions that would help officials deal with "unknowns" surrounding the virus.Earlier Friday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said they were putting 195 people who recently returned from China under quarantine for two weeks, dubbing it an "unprecedented" step that was now warranted."We are preparing as this is the next pandemic, but hopeful this is not and will not be the case," Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the CDC's National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, said on a call with reporters. "We would rather be remembered for overreacting to under-reacting."The move came after one of those recently-returned travelers reportedly attempted to leave the March Air Reserve Base in Riverside, California, after arriving from Wuhan, China. The CDC declined to provide more information on the individual. There are currently over 9,800 cases of coronavirus in China, while the number of confirmed cases in the United States remained steady at six. Only one, the husband of a woman who recently traveled abroad, had been spread in-country, the CDC said previously. No one had died as a result of infection in the United States by the CDC's latest count.But Messonnier pointed to the most recent number of cases in China, which she said represented a 26 percent increase over Thursday's numbers, as a cause for growing vigilance. She also mentioned an increasing number of reports of person-to-person spread, including growing evidence that the 2019 novel coronavirus can be spread by people who have not yet experienced symptoms. The New England Journal of Medicine on Thursday released a study describing a case in Germany that appeared to show the spread of the virus from a person who traveled to China to several others."The current scenario is a cause for concern," Messonnier said.WHO Calls Coronavirus 'Emergency' as Person-to-Person Spread Confirmed in U.S.When asked if the coronavirus were more dangerous than the flu, Messonnier said there appeared to be "significant mortality related with this disease" based on cases coming out of China. However, she still didn't recommend face masks for the general public and urged people to stay calm."Please do not let fear guide your actions," she said, adding that the public shouldn't assume Asian Americans have the virus amid reports of surging xenophobia against people of Chinese descent worldwide. "There are about 4 million Chinese-Americans in this country."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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| Colombia rejects Venezuelan proposal to resume diplomatic relations Posted: 30 Jan 2020 01:42 PM PST  Colombia rejected Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro's proposal that the two countries resume diplomatic relations on Thursday, amid a dispute over a fugitive former Colombian congresswoman who was captured in Venezuela. Maduro abruptly cut diplomatic relations with neighboring Colombia last February after Colombian President Ivan Duque helped Venezuelan opposition politicians deliver humanitarian aid to their crisis-stricken country.
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| Mom of 2 missing Idaho children misses court deadline to bring kids to police Posted: 31 Jan 2020 06:16 AM PST  Lori Vallow, 46, had until Thursday to present the two children to authorities in Idaho, but she, her new husband and her children were not present.
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| Sarcophagus dedicated to sky god among latest ancient Egypt trove Posted: 30 Jan 2020 10:45 AM PST  Egypt's antiquities ministry on Thursday unveiled the tombs of ancient high priests and a sarcophagus dedicated to the sky god Horus at an archaeological site in Minya governorate. The mission found 16 tombs containing 20 sarcophagi, some engraved with hieroglyphics, at the Al-Ghoreifa site, about 300 kilometres (186 miles) south of Cairo. One of the stone sarcophagi was dedicated to the god Horus, the son of Isis and Osiris, and features a depiction of the goddess Nut spreading her wings.
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| The Best Headlight Restoration Kits Posted: 31 Jan 2020 12:40 PM PST |
| EU Bids Adieu to Britain With Removal of Flags and Brexit Day Stamps Posted: 31 Jan 2020 09:36 AM PST  (Bloomberg) -- When the sun goes down on Friday night, British government buildings around Europe will lower the blue and yellow-starred flag of the European Union for the final time. A few hours later, on the stroke of midnight in Paris, Berlin and Brussels, the U.K. will leave the bloc after 47 years.The farewell is intentionally muted. Neither the British government nor the EU wants to draw too much attention to the moment of rupture, particularly with negotiations over the two sides' future relationship in areas such as trade, security and financial services, set to be even trickier than the wrangling over the U.K.'s withdrawal over the past 3 years.German Chancellor Angela Merkel used a statement to describe Brexit as a significant blow "to us all," while French President Emmanuel Macron in a speech on Friday decried the "lies, exaggerations and simplifications" of the Brexit campaign and spoke of the need for "more" Europe. EU Parliament President David Sassoli described the U.K.'s departure as a "wound."Merkel repeated EU warnings that the more the U.K. diverges from EU single market rules, the looser the future partnership will be.European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the U.K. will be treated like all non-EU countries after midnight and can't expect any special treatment. "Only those who recognize the rules of the internal market can fully benefit from the common market," she said. EU officials said they expect negotiations to get nasty.Brexit StampWith Britain to slip into a transition period until the end of 2020, which keeps the country in the EU in all but name, but without any decision-making powers, Brexit day is more about symbolism than anything else.Some of the logistics haven't been straightforward. A few days ago the U.K. government's representation in Brussels quietly swapped its two flag poles on its facade for a single one carrying both British and EU flags. Losing one flag will look less conspicuous. In Sofia, the British embassy will lower its EU stars but, because it shares a building with the European Investment Bank, the flag will go back up on Monday morning.In Brussels, the ancient Grand Place was lit up in the colors of the Union Jack, while Austria unveiled a Brexit-themed stamp (complete with the original planned date of Brexit, March 29, 2019, as well as the eventual one.) Gibraltar, the British territory on the southern tip of Spain that became a point of contention in the withdrawal negotiations, will hold a ceremony at midnight to lower the EU flag and replace it with the banner of the Commonwealth.France's Le Figaro bid "Adieu" to Britain on its front page while members of the Irish government got up before dawn to check out new inspection facilities at Dublin port which will control goods coming from the U.K. across the Irish Sea -- the EU's new external border.Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Costa paid tribute to a "new relationship with our old friend, ancestral ally and forever partner," but with the EU due to publish its mandate for negotiations on the future relationship on Monday, there's little time for anybody either to celebrate or wallow in regret."I know the public are fed up talking about Brexit, and so am I quite frankly," Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney said on Friday. "But we don't have the luxury of not talking about Brexit."(Updates with Macron speech in the third paragraph)\--With assistance from Dara Doyle, Peter Flanagan, Geraldine Amiel, Slav Okov, Boris Groendahl, Joao Lima, Raymond Colitt, Charles Penty, Alan Crawford and Ania Nussbaum.To contact the reporter on this story: Ian Wishart in Brussels at iwishart@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Ben Sills at bsills@bloomberg.net, Richard Bravo, Nikos ChrysolorasFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| US hits Iran with new sanctions, keeps some waivers in place Posted: 30 Jan 2020 01:30 PM PST  The Trump administration said Thursday that it will continue — at least for now — its policy of not sanctioning foreign companies that work with Iran's civilian nuclear program. Brian Hook, U.S. envoy to Iran, said the U.S. would renew for 60 days sanctions waivers that permit Russian, European and Chinese companies to continue to work on Iran's civilian nuclear facilities without running afoul of U.S. sanctions.
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| Harvard professor slams Trump's lawyer for incorrectly citing him numerous times during Trump's impeachment trial: 'It's a joke' Posted: 30 Jan 2020 10:01 AM PST  Harvard professor Nikolas Bowie said Alan Dershowitz, a member of Trump's legal team was wrong during an interview with CNN.
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| Bernie Sanders told Ninth Graders the U.S. Committed Acts in Vietnam ‘Almost as Bad as what Hitler Did’ Posted: 31 Jan 2020 06:27 AM PST  During his 1972 gubernatorial run, Senator Bernie Sanders told high-school students that the U.S. had committed acts in its war with Vietnam that were "almost as bad as what Hitler did."An article in the Rutland, Vermont, newspaper, The Rutland Herald, reported on the comments, made while Sanders was campaigning for governor as a member of the Liberty Union party. The article was first unearthed by the Washington Free Beacon.The North Vietnamese "are not my enemy," Sanders told a class of ninth graders in Rutland while on the campaign trail. "They're a very, very poor people. Some of them don't have shoes. They eat rice when they can get it. And they have been fighting for the freedom of their country for 25 years. They can hardly fight back."The American death toll from the Vietnam War was over 58,000. The Herald reported that students pushed back against Sanders's support for amnesty for draft evaders, saying it wouldn't be fair to the parents of soldiers killed in the fighting.Sanders also outlined other positions that may sound familiar to today's voters, including increasing the minimum wage and availability of low-income housing, as well as increased access to dental care. He also charged that the Democratic Party was too beholden to large corporations.The Vermont senator received around one percent of the vote in that election. Sanders is currently the strongest presidential candidate from the progressive wing of the Democratic Party, and has polled ahead of moderate Joe Biden in various Iowa and New Hampshire surveys.Establishment Democrats have been worried by Sanders's rise and durability throughout the primary. The senator has relied on an enthusiastic base of younger progressive voters, and has received strong grassroots financial support.
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| Iranian factory makes U.S. and Israeli flags to burn Posted: 29 Jan 2020 06:38 PM PST  Business is booming at Iran's largest flag factory which makes U.S., British and Israeli flags for Iranian protesters to burn. The factory produces about 2,000 U.S. and Israeli flags a month in its busiest periods, and more than 1.5 million square feet of flags a year. Tensions between the United States and Iran have reached the highest level in decades after top Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani was killed in a U.S. drone strike in Baghdad on Jan. 3, prompting Iran to retaliate with a missile attack against a U.S. base in Iraq days later.
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| A Costco sample-stand worker turned away a kid wearing a face mask because she thought he was from China and could give her the coronavirus Posted: 29 Jan 2020 09:41 PM PST  "One thing that is in the back of my mind is that someone Asian is being judged in public right now," Cabanilla said.
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| Why The Navy Risked Everything To Assassinate The Admiral Who Planned Pearl Harbor Posted: 30 Jan 2020 02:00 AM PST  There was no escape for Admiral Yamamoto.
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| American Airlines agent said Orthodox Jews only bathe once a week, lawsuit claims Posted: 30 Jan 2020 05:43 PM PST ![American Airlines agent said Orthodox Jews only bathe once a week, lawsuit claims]( "American Airlines agent said Orthodox Jews only bathe once a week, lawsuit claims") A Michigan couple say they've been defamed by American Airlines' continued statements that they were removed from a flight because of their smell.
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| Bloomberg glides past Warren to No. 3 in Democratic race — Reuters/Ipsos poll Posted: 30 Jan 2020 03:02 PM PST  After steadily rising in popularity over the last several weeks, former NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg appears to have surpassed Sen. Elizabeth Warren among registered voters for the 2020 Democratic nomination, according to a Reuters/Ipsos national public opinion poll released Thursday.
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| ‘You know your client is guilty’: Trump impeachment lawyer’s defence accused of ‘descent into madness’ Posted: 30 Jan 2020 01:59 PM PST  Senator Adam Schiff, lead impeachment manager in the Senate trial of Donald Trump, has called arguments made by the president's defence team a "descent into constitutional madness".Mr Schiff's indignation with the president's defence came in response to comments made by Mr Trump's lawyer, Alan Dershowitz, who argued his client couldn't be impeached for an action he thought might get him re-elected.
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| A U.S. Plane Crashed in Afghanistan. Why So Many Believed a CIA Chief Was On It. Posted: 31 Jan 2020 03:31 PM PST  The wreckage of a U.S. military plane that crashed and burned on a snowy mountain peak in Afghanistan on Monday was still fresh when Iranian…
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| U.S. Escalates Virus Response With Entry Limits, Cuts in Flights Posted: 31 Jan 2020 03:27 PM PST ![U.S. Escalates Virus Response With Entry Limits, Cuts in Flights]( "U.S. Escalates Virus Response With Entry Limits, Cuts in Flights") (Bloomberg) -- The Trump administration on Friday declared a public health emergency and announced series of steps to halt the spread of the novel coronavirus, which has stricken China and spread to countries around the world.President Donald Trump signed an order temporarily barring entry to foreign nationals who have visited China and pose a risk of spreading the illness, unless they are immediate relatives of U.S. citizens or permanent residents. The administration also said flights from China would be funneled through just seven U.S. airports."The risk of infection for Americans remains low," Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar, who is coordinating the federal response, told reporters at a White House news conference. "With these and our previous actions, we are working to keep the risk low."U.S. citizens returning from China's Hubei Province, the center of the outbreak, will face a mandatory quarantine. Americans traveling back to the U.S. from other areas of mainland China must undergo screening and monitored self-quarantine to ensure they are not at risk of spreading the virus.The measures, which take effect at 5 p.m. Washington time on Sunday, apply to visits in the past two weeks. The quarantines last 14 days.The White House's announcement comes as the coronavirus continues to spread, triggering increasing alarm from health officials. The World Health Organization this week declared a global health emergency, giving the United Nations agency the power to coordinate response efforts.Almost 9,700 cases have been confirmed in China with more than 200 deaths, said Robert Redfield, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He added that six cases have been confirmed in the U.S. and that 191 people are being monitored.U.S. health officials have sought to reassure Americans the risk of contracting the virus remains low, but they have also said there is much they still do not know about the illness."This is a significant global situation that continues to evolve," Redfield said.Anthony Fauci, head of infectious diseases at the National Institutes of Health, said the U.S. decided to step up its efforts because of reports that a traveler from China spread the disease in Germany without showing any symptoms. He said that is different from the Ebola virus, which cannot be spread by people who are not very ill.Health officials added that tests to detect the virus haven't been used enough times to assure they are reliable. Only one in six U.S. cases of coronavirus has been detected through airport screening, they said.All U.S.-bound flights from China will be routed to airports in New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Seattle, Atlanta, Honolulu and Los Angeles. More drastic flight restrictions are not currently being considered, according to Joel Szabat, a Transportation Department official.Limiting the number of airports where flights to China can land will allow the U.S. government to streamline screening and set up quarantine centers, officials said.The CDC announced earlier Friday it had issued a quarantine order of 14 days to 195 U.S. citizens evacuated from Wuhan, the capital of Hubei Province. It's the first time in nearly a half century such an order was given.On Thursday, the State Department issued its highest level do-not-travel advisory for China, warning American citizens there they could be subject to travel restrictions with little to advance notice and urging them to "consider departing using commercial means."The rapid outbreak of the virus has sent financial markets tumbling. The S&P 500 Index on Friday erased all of its 2020 gains and the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell more than 600 pointsas investors grow worried about how the illness could effect the world economy.Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said on Wednesday that the central bank is "very carefully monitoring the situation" and "there will clearly be implications at least in the near term for Chinese output."\--With assistance from Justin Sink.To contact the reporter on this story: Jordan Fabian in Washington at jfabian6@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Alex Wayne at awayne3@bloomberg.net, Justin Blum, John HarneyFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| China virus toll passes 250 as travel curbs tightened Posted: 31 Jan 2020 02:59 PM PST  The death toll from China's coronavirus outbreak has surpassed 250, the government said Saturday, as foreign nations tightened restrictions on travellers from China in response to the rapid spread of the illness. At least 258 people have died and more than 11,000 people have been infected in China by the new coronavirus, according to new figures from officials in hard-hit Hubei province. The top Communist Party official in Wuhan, the central city of 11 million people where the virus first emerged in December, on Friday expressed "remorse" because local authorities acted too slowly.
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| Hungary to build more prisons to tackle overcrowding, halt inmates' lawsuits Posted: 31 Jan 2020 03:57 AM PST  Hungary will begin an ambitious prison-building program in an attempt to stem a tide of costly lawsuits by inmates complaining of overcrowding and inhumane conditions, Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Friday. Orban accused "business-savvy lawyers" of exploiting the conditions to launch 12,000 lawsuits against the Hungarian state for breaking EU prison standards, leading to penalties of 10 billion forints ($33 million) in total. Orban, who has often come under fire from the European Union and rights groups over his perceived erosion of the rule of law since he took power in 2010, announced plans for more prisons to reduce the prison overcrowding and disarm "malignant lawyers".
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| This Picture Might Be How China Starts World War III Posted: 30 Jan 2020 07:51 AM PST  A barrage of anti-ship missiles moving at Mach 20?
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| More than 6,000 people are trapped on a cruise ship in Italy after a woman was suspected of having the coronavirus Posted: 30 Jan 2020 06:18 AM PST  Passengers of a Costa Cruises cruise ship can't disembark. Two passengers, one of whom was experiencing coronavirus symptoms, were quarantined.
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| Voters' 2nd choices could be decisive in close Iowa caucuses Posted: 30 Jan 2020 10:37 PM PST  Democratic presidential candidates seeking victory in next week's Iowa caucuses are navigating a field that is so jumbled that voters' second choice could matter almost as much as their first, adding fresh uncertainty and confusion to the final days of the race. Lower-polling candidates including Amy Klobuchar, Andrew Yang and Tom Steyer have been approached by multiple campaigns in recent days eager to form an alliance that could reshape Monday's election. Joe Biden's team has been in communication with lower-polling rivals, according to several people familiar with the conversations who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal strategy.
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| Kellyanne Grilled on Bolton Bombshells During Rare Press Briefing Posted: 30 Jan 2020 09:11 AM PST  It was a rare sight on Thursday morning when a Trump administration official stood behind a podium and took questions from reporters. In the seven months since she succeeded Sarah Huckabee Sanders, White House Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham hasn't done it once.But there was Kellyanne Conway delivering a briefing that was intended to be primarily focused on the CDC's recent report on a life expectancy increase in the U.S. and the administration's preparations to combat the coronavirus and the opioid crisis.After dubiously giving the president and First Lady Melania Trump credit for extending the average lifespan of Americans, Conway started to get testy when PBS NewsHour host Yamiche Alcindor asked her to comment on former White House Chief of Staff John Kelly saying he "believes" claims by former National Security Adviser John Bolton that President Donald Trump personally directed his quid pro quo with Ukraine. "Well, I respect General Kelly enormously and like him personally," Conway replied. "I don't know what he was referring to so I can't answer." She explained that because she has not personally seen a copy of Bolton's unpublished manuscript she could not verify that he made those allegations against Trump in his new book. Stephen Colbert Grills CNN's Chris Cuomo on His 'Friend' Kellyanne ConwayThe two women continued to spar for several more minutes, with Conway asking, "Are you talking about a leak of an unpublished manuscript reported by The New York Times? Because I don't know that to be true and neither do you." "You want me to answer a hypothetical wrapped up in a conundrum," Conway added, saying she "doesn't make anything of" Kelly's belief in Bolton. She then proceeded to attack Alcindor's other employer NBC News for prematurely reporting Kelly's departure from the White House. "I am not going to comment, particularly from the podium in the press briefing room on a leaked, unpublished manuscript that I haven't seen," Conway said. "I hope it doesn't include classified information.""And I know there's always this rush to imbue credibility on whomever you think is against the president at that moment," she continued before seeming to equate Bolton with figures like Michael Cohen, Michael Avenatti, and Lev Parnas—all three charged with federal crimes. Kellyanne Conway Melts Down Under Grilling by Fox NewsWhen another reporter followed up by asking why the White House is dragging its feet on reviewing the chapter in Bolton's book on Ukraine, Conway said "it has nothing to do with me" before deflecting the question by listing off unrelated accomplishment by the administration and boasting about Trump's approval ratings. "The idea that we should stop what we're doing to review somebody's book strikes me as not a big priority, in my view, for the president," Conway said. When that reporter noted that the contents of the book could become quite important "if witnesses are called" in Trump's impeachment trial, Conway shot back, "You would hope so, wouldn't you?" "I'm always happen to answer all of your questions, as you full well know," Conway added. "But I gotta stick to reality, not hypotheticals. And frankly, wishful thinking." How Comedian Fortune Feimster Became the Gay Representation She Needed in the WorldRead more at The Daily Beast.Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast hereGet 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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| First case of coronavirus in US: Patient got pneumonia, but now only has cough, study says Posted: 31 Jan 2020 11:55 AM PST  The Snohomish County, Washington man remained in the hospital on Thursday. He has no symptoms other than a cough after treatment with antiviral meds.
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| Photos of stores in Wuhan show what life is like under the coronavirus lockdown Posted: 31 Jan 2020 12:02 PM PST  The quarantine and fears of coronavirus have made Wuhan a ghost city. Residents only occasionally go out to stock up on supplies.
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| International crisis looms as 700,000 flee Syria's Idlib: U.S. envoy Posted: 30 Jan 2020 05:42 AM PST  MARAAT AL-NUMAN,Syria/BEIRUT (Reuters) - An assault on rebel-held northwest Syria by government forces has pushed some 700,000 people to flee toward the Turkish border and raised the specter of an international crisis, U.S. Special Envoy for Syria James Jeffrey said on Thursday. Turkey fears a fresh wave of migrants piling across its border and has a dozen observation posts in Idlib, part of a de-escalation agreement it says Russia is now violating. Speaking at an online news briefing, Jeffrey said that in the last three days Syrian government and Russian warplanes had hit Idlib with 200 air strikes "mainly against civilians", and that several Turkish observation posts had been "cut off" by the government advance.
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| Why Did the Coast Guard Sail Right by Taiwan and China in 2019? Posted: 31 Jan 2020 06:20 AM PST  A good idea?
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| U.S. Rejects Obamacare Work-Around Sought by Republican States Posted: 31 Jan 2020 02:12 PM PST  (Bloomberg) -- A health insurance venture that threatened to erode Obamacare and had the backing of seven Republican state attorneys general has been rejected by the U.S. Labor Department.The proposal, from an obscure company in Georgia that was the subject of a Bloomberg News article last month, won the support of states including Georgia and Louisiana, whose attorney general personally pitched it last year to senior White House officials. Among those pushing for the plan was a Washington lobbying firm whose senior adviser is Corey Lewandowski, Donald Trump's onetime campaign manager.The initiative would allow LP Management Services to create a data-sharing partnership that small firms could join; after agreeing to provide online user data, those in the network could then pay full premiums to buy into LP Management's health insurance.Read More: Manafort Mystery Lender's Next Act Is an Obamacare End RunBut in a highly technical advisory ruling, the Labor Department said on Jan. 24 that those joining the venture wouldn't be "bona fide partners" and "do not work for or through the partnership.""The DOL is turning LP Management down," said Timothy Jost, a health-law expert at Washington and Lee University.Several health policy specialists who reviewed the plan for Bloomberg News said LP Management's plan, if approved, could undermine the Affordable Care Act, known as Obamacare, by allowing insurers to cherry-pick their policyholders. The plan's supporters deny that.The ruling could scuttle the venture because potential partners won't join a health-insurance program that lacks the Labor Department's blessing, experts said. A lawyer behind the plan, Alexander Renfro, said LP Management would seek approval through a pending lawsuit."We are disappointed that after 14 months of ignoring our request, and four days before they were required to respond to our lawsuit, the DOL has rushed out an opinion that violates its own rules, ignores the facts presented, and rewrites existing statutes and regulations without a legal basis to do so," he said in an email.One executive involved in the health initiative is Arjan "Ari" Zieger, a California man who made a mysterious $1 million loan in 2017 to Trump's former campaign manager, Paul Manafort. Zieger's lawyer has said the loan had nothing to do with the insurance venture.Companies Zieger helps run have spent about $400,000 to lobby the Trump administration on behalf of the plan.Emails to the attorneys general of Georgia and Louisiana weren't immediately returned.To contact the reporter on this story: David Glovin in New York at dglovin@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Jeffrey D Grocott at jgrocott2@bloomberg.net, David S. Joachim, Joe SchneiderFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Key senator to vote to block trial witnesses Posted: 30 Jan 2020 08:23 PM PST  Sen. Lamar Alexander said on Thursday night that he will not vote to allow witnesses and evidence into the impeachment trial of President Trump.
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| No Joint Investigation of Yovanovitch Surveillance, Says Ukraine Prosecutor Posted: 30 Jan 2020 05:05 PM PST  KYIV—Many Ukrainians—especially those in the government— were nervous on Thursday as they awaited the arrival of U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, the first high-ranking U.S. government official to visit since the infamous phone conversation last July between Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky and President Donald Trump.Pompeo's Ukraine Trip Hasn't Begun, but It's Already UglyAs the impeachment storm that grew out of that phone call continues to swirl around Trump, Kyiv fears that Ukraine will be dragged even deeper into the maelstrom, weakening its defenses against Russia, and perhaps undermining the fight against pervasive corruption.While on the surface, official Washington policy is supportive of Ukraine in both those efforts, Trump has tried to equate the struggle against corruption with his explicit desire, expressed in that July 25 phone call (PDF), to have investigations focus attention on his political rival Joe Biden and various conspiracy theories pushed by Russian propaganda. As he was promoting that narrow program, he also withheld vitally needed military aid from Ukraine. Led by Trump's personal lawyer, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, several Ukrainians out to curry favor with the U.S. president and undermine their own rivals here helped promote Trump's pet theories. They also worked successfully to get veteran U.S. Amb. Marie Yovanovitch removed from her post and may have tried to put her under surveillance.Lev Parnas Reveals Why He Turned on TrumpworldSo perhaps it's not surprising that as Pompeo's arrival was awaited, some of the messaging coming out of Kyiv sounded confusing. When the issue of illegal surveillance targeting Yovanovitch first surfaced earlier this month, Ukraine's interior minister announced there would be a joint investigation by Ukrainian investigators and the U.S. Diplomatic Security Service at the embassy here. But on Thursday morning, Gen. Ruslan Ryaboshapka, Ukraine's prosecutor general, said there is no joint group with the U.S. embassy, and probably there never will be.Ryaboshapka told Ukrainian Interfax news agency that U.S. security specialists are in Ukraine to investigate the surveillance, but the American side "has no intention" of participating in a joint effort. Why make such an announcement on the day Pompeo arrives? "This message is confusing, it might mean only one thing: Ryaboshapka, who is a Zelensky appointee, intends to show Washington that Ukraine is doing its best to distance itself from the impeachment process," says Taras Semenyuk of the KyivStratPro consultancy firm. "Zelensky and his conversation with Trump was the trigger of the entire impeachment process, then we heard about the surveillance over U.S. Ambassador Yovanovitch on the territory of Ukraine, so currently our leadership are doing their best to stay away from the U.S. internal political tensions."Pompeo, speaking to reporters en route to his previous stop in London, sidestepped the problematic Trump demand that Ukraine specifically investigate Joe Biden's son Hunter Biden, who sat on the board of a Ukrainian energy company."I don't want to talk about particular individuals," Pompeo said. "It's not worth it. It's a long list in Ukraine of corrupt individuals and a long history there. And President Zelensky has told us he's committed to it. The actions he's taken so far demonstrate that, and I look forward to having a conversation about that with him as well."Pompeo suggested Ukraine corruption has been a big issue for him in his role as secretary of state and, before that, as CIA director, "developing the facts and data" about corruption in Ukraine's government and private sector. But Ukrainians who knew Yovanovitch as a dedicated corruption fighter saw her removal as a bad sign, and her testimony at the House impeachment hearings, along with that of several other top U.S. government experts on Ukraine, did nothing to reassure them.So it is now more important for Kyiv than ever to see that Washington is actually serious about supporting Ukraine's vital reforms. According to the U.S. State Department's announcement, Pompeo is planning to demonstrate that the U.S. government cares about peace in Ukraine and "highlight U.S. support for Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity" at his meetings with Zelensky as well as with the foreign minister and defense minister.Pompeo is also planning to lay flowers at the memorial to thousands of Ukrainian soldiers killed in the now almost six-year war with pro-Russian forces in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine. The memorial, just outside the gold-domed St. Michael Monastery in the heart of Kyiv, is a long wall with thousands of young faces: Ukrainian men and women killed in eastern Ukraine. Pompeo will also meet with religious, civic society, and business leaders.Novoye Vremya magazine, one of the news outlets closely covering Washington's impeachment scandals, referred to the visit as the Day of Pompeo. "The Secretary of State is coming to make sure there will be no bad surprises from Zelensky during Trump's trial at the Senate," Novoye Vremya political observer, Ivan Yakovina, told The Daily Beast. "If we hear today or tomorrow that Ukraine is going to get more military aid, that would mean that Pompeo and Zelensky have come to a mutual agreement."Olena Trigub, leader of the independent Defense Anti-Corruption Committee, NAKO, says she looks forward to passing an important message to Washington at the meeting with the Pompeo and Ukrainian civic society leaders. "We don't dismiss the fact that there is corruption in Ukraine but in spite of the impeachment scandal involving some Ukrainian citizens, we believe that the U.S. government should recognize and support Ukrainian anti-corruption efforts," Trigub told The Daily Beast. NAKO has focused particularly on the Ukraine Defense Ministry's procurement system, and concludes that out of some $1 billion allocated to procurements, up to 40 percent has been lost to corruption and inefficiency."The average percentage we hear most often is 30 percent," Trigub said. "The Ukrainian government is now demonstrating the political will to clean up the defense sector—currently, two new bills are being developed on defense procurement and on state secrecy." Ukraine's civic leaders hope Washington will demonstrate strong support for what they see as Zelensky's game-changing reforms in the defense sector. "Despite the political will, we see that reformers in the government and in civil society lack the capacity and the support of Ukraine's international partners, such as the USA. It is needed badly at this important time."Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. 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| Jury foreman regrets convicting teen in girl's 2002 death Posted: 31 Jan 2020 04:05 PM PST  "I do feel badly," jury foreman Joe McLean told the AP. No gun, fingerprints or DNA were ever recovered, and the 2003 trial of Myon Burrell centered on the testimony of one teen rival who offered conflicting stories when identifying the triggerman, who was standing 120 feet away, mostly behind a wall. McLean said he and other jurors did the best they could with the evidence presented and were unaware of information turned up in the AP review of the case -- in part because his co-defendants were not allowed to take the stand.
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| Coronavirus influencers are a thing now. You knew it would happen. Posted: 30 Jan 2020 09:19 AM PST  Some social-media influencers are sharing facts about coronavirus while posing in surgical masks and trendy outfits.
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| A coronavirus case has been confirmed in the San Francisco Bay Area near Silicon Valley — a man who recently returned from Wuhan and Shanghai Posted: 31 Jan 2020 03:05 PM PST  It's the seventh US case. The patient came into contact with "very few" people and did not leave home except to seek medical care on two occasions.
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| Iraq says anti-IS operations with U.S. coalition resume Posted: 30 Jan 2020 07:11 AM PST ![Iraq says anti-IS operations with U.S. coalition resume]( "Iraq says anti-IS operations with U.S. coalition resume") Iraq's military said on Thursday it was resuming operations with the U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State which had mostly halted after bases hosting U.S. troops came under rocket attacks and a U.S. drone strike killed a top Iranian commander. U.S.-Iranian tension threatens to derail the fight against the Sunni extremist group, which seeks a resurgence in northern Iraq three years after its military defeat at the hands of the coalition, Iraqi forces and Iran-backed Shi'ite Muslim militias.
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| Man dies after woman trying to help him accidentally runs over him, police say Posted: 31 Jan 2020 08:39 AM PST  A man died Thursday after a woman who was trying to help him with a medical issue forgot to put her vehicle in park, and it ran over him, police said.
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| Lindsey Graham Proposal Could Expose Apple, Facebook to Lawsuits Posted: 30 Jan 2020 01:00 AM PST  (Bloomberg) -- Senator Lindsey Graham, a top Trump ally, is targeting giant internet platforms with a child protection measure that could threaten tech companies' use of encryption and a liability exemption they prize.The draft bill from Graham, the South Carolina Republican who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, mounts a double attack against encrypted services such as Apple Inc.'s iCloud and Facebook Inc.'s WhatsApp chat. It jeopardizes technology companies' immunity to lawsuits by victims for violating child exploitation and abuse statutes and it lowers the standard to bring such cases.Read the draft billThe bipartisan measure, which was obtained by Bloomberg and hasn't yet been formally introduced, would affect a wide range of social media companies, cloud service providers, email and text platforms and other technology services. It could put Facebook in the government's crosshairs for its plans to encrypt all of its messaging apps and undercut Apple's refusal to create back doors into its devices and services.Graham's bill, which Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut is also working on, calls for Congress and the administration to establish a commission to determine best practices for tech companies to prevent online exploitation of children and allows the attorney general to modify the recommendations."The absolute worst-case scenario could easily become reality," said Berin Szoka, president of TechFreedom, a libertarian think tank aligned with technology companies. "DOJ could effectively ban end-to-end encryption."Attorney General William Barr is taking aim at both encryption and the liability shield as he increases scrutiny of technology companies. The Justice Department has tentatively scheduled a Feb. 19 meeting on the future of the immunity known as Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, according to a person familiar with the plans. The provision protects platforms from responsibility for content posted by third parties.Although the measure doesn't directly mention encryption, it would require that companies work with law enforcement to identify, remove, report and preserve evidence related to child exploitation -- which critics said would be impossible to do for services such as WhatsApp that are encrypted from end-to-end.If technology companies don't certify that they are following the best practices set by the 15-member commission, they would lose the legal immunity they currently enjoy under Section 230 relating to child exploitation and abuse laws. That would open the door to lawsuits for "reckless" violations of those laws, a lower standard than contained in current statutes.The timing of the bill's introduction remains unclear with senators serving as jurors in the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump.Facebook and other companies have extensive systems to find, remove and report child-abuse images, as well as other prohibited content such as terrorist propaganda. Their monitoring ability, however, doesn't extend to systems that are encrypted end-to-end. Online safety experts have said Facebook's efforts to root out this content will suffer as the company pivots to closed communications modeled on its WhatsApp chat service.That move "will make it harder to detect -- and stop -- child abuse and similar crimes," Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance said in prepared testimony before Graham's committee in December. In addition, Apple's encryption had stymied a sex trafficking investigation that authorities wanted to pursue after hearing a prison telephone call by a suspect, he said.A spokeswoman for Graham's committee emphasized that the document is a draft and isn't final. The Justice Department declined to comment.Barr has pressured Apple to provide back-door access to encrypted data for law enforcement investigations, urging the company to unlock iPhones used by the gunman behind a Dec. 6 terrorist attack on a Florida Navy base.Facebook Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg has conceded the company's moves may make it harder to find offensive content, but he nonetheless pledged on a Wednesday earnings call to uphold his most controversial positions, including "standing up for encryption, against those who say that privacy mostly helps bad people."The Information, a technology news website, earlier reported some details of Graham's bill, known as the Eliminating Abusive and Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies Act, or EARN IT Act.The draft bill represents the latest effort to weaken liability protections for technology platforms after a 2018 measure that pared the exemption for content related to online sex trafficking.Passage of that law indicated that the rules are changing for an industry that had been the darling of Washington but is now facing a broad, bipartisan backlash.On Tuesday, a top House Democrat, Representative Jan Schakowsky of Illinois, said she's reviewing whether the provision should be further revised to stem election misinformation.Lawmakers have also raised concerns about whether the shield fosters online drug sales and other issues. There have also been complaints from conservatives of political bias. Senator Josh Hawley, a Missouri Republican, has introduced his own bill to withdraw the legal immunity if companies can't prove to the U.S. that they moderate content in a politically neutral way.While there are signs there's bipartisan support to tackle the issues raised by encryption and the liability shield, Congress doesn't appear to have a unified approach and passage of the measure could be difficult in an election year.\--With assistance from Rebecca Kern, Kurt Wagner and Sarah Frier.To contact the reporters on this story: Ben Brody in Washington, D.C. at btenerellabr@bloomberg.net;Naomi Nix in Washington at nnix1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Sara Forden at sforden@bloomberg.net, John HarneyFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Why Coronavirus Seems to Be Striking More Adults Than Kids Posted: 31 Jan 2020 04:00 AM PST  Expert theories on why the coronavirus known as 2019-nCoV seems to be infecting more kids than adults, according to early data out of Wuhan.
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| Don Lemon Did Trump a Huge Favor Posted: 29 Jan 2020 08:25 PM PST  A video of CNN news anchor Don Lemon laughing hysterically as his guests mocked Donald Trump's supporters went viral this week -- and it couldn't have been a more effective campaign ad for the president.In the video, which was clipped from a live broadcast that aired on Saturday night, Lemon can be seen crying tears of laughter, and at one point even slamming his head on his desk, because he's apparently so overwhelmed with joy and amusement.It all started after one guest, ex-GOP strategist Rick Wilson, joked that Trump would be too stupid to find Ukraine on a map, before calling Trump's supporters the "credulous boomer rube demo."Lemon laughed heartily, and so Wilson continued his mocking:"'Donald Trump's the smart one — and y'all elitists are dumb!'" Wilson said in a heavy, stereotypical southern accent.Then, the other guest (CNN contributor Wajahat Ali) chimed in, saying: "'You elitists with your geography and your maps -- and your spelling!'""'Your math and your reading!'" Wilson added. "'All those lines on the map!'"By Tuesday night, Lemon was receiving considerable backlash over the clip -- prompting him to address the controversy on his show:> Ask anyone who knows me, they'll tell you -- I don't believe in belittling people, belittling anyone for who they are, what they believe. During an interview on Saturday night, one of my guests said something that made me laugh. And while in the moment, I found that joke humorous. And I didn't catch everything that was said."Just to make it perfectly clear," he added. "I was laughing at the joke and not at any group of people."(Notice that Lemon stopped short of actually apologizing for his behavior.)First of all, it seems pretty clear to me that Lemon's defense (that he simply "didn't catch" everything the panelists were saying) is a blatant lie. He is laughing, consistently, while the guests are making their jokes, and then continuing to laugh after the guests make them. You don't need to be a human-behavior expert to understand that, when someone is laughing during and after a joke, then the laughter is because of that joke.Lemon knew exactly what he was laughing at -- and, by refusing to apologize, he has made it clear that he doesn't see anything wrong with that, either.The thing is, though, he should regret it -- for his own sake. After all, it's clear that Lemon hates Trump, and his performance in that segment is going to be a way bigger help to the incumbent president than anything that Trump could ever do for himself.Make no mistake: Clips like this embolden Trump's supporters. They don't see this sort of mockery and start to question their beliefs -- rather, it just strengthens their view that it is them (and Trump) against the world. It makes them more loyal to the president, not less.If you don't understand what I mean, just think about what happened after Hillary Clinton's "deplorables" comment. Did that turn people away from Trump? Far from it. In fact, it prompted countless Trump supporters to use the word in their names or handles on Twitter. It prompted the Trump campaign to sell "deplorable" T-shirts. It prompted Trump to use the comments for his own campaign's fundraising, and to bring his supporters closer to him, as well as to present himself as the foil who would never demean them in that way. ("While my opponent slanders you as deplorable and irredeemable, I call you hardworking American patriots who love your country and want a better future for all of our people," Trump said during a rally in Iowa shortly afterwards.)In other words? Rather than question their choice of alliance because of Clinton's insult, Trump's supporters embraced it -- clearly seeing it as evidence that the people who disagree with them, in fact, don't just disagree with them; they hate them, too. They think that they're stupid. Nobody wants to listen to anyone who just got done calling them dumb, and all Lemon did here was further solidify the narrative that "liberal media elites" like him think Trump supporters are fools, which, in turn, only makes them hate Trump's opposition more.What's more, in Lemon's instance, his guests' usage of stereotypical Southern accents -- clearly intended to signify "stupidity" -- could extend the consequences of this particular blunder to include turning off those voters in rural areas who are on the fence politically. Trump can point directly to this segment as evidence whenever he makes one of his favorite claims: that his opponents don't respect his supporters or rural Americans.In fact, this clip actually also provides ammunition for another one of Trump's favorite claims: the idea that CNN is "Fake News." Looking at this clip -- and seeing a CNN news anchor laughing at Trump supporters this way -- makes it easier for Trump to tell his supporters that all the news coming from CNN is tainted with this same bias, and therefore not reliable. It makes it more likely that they will blindly believe Trump, who hasn't insulted them, and less likely that they will believe that anyone affiliated with CNN could ever have a legitimate criticism.Lemon, I'm guessing, didn't expect that any Trump supporters would ever see this clip of him laughing at them -- but, unfortunately for him, millions of them did. If he doesn't want to apologize to the people he insulted, then that is perfectly fine. He might, however, want to consider apologizing to the people who are going to actually be hurt by it the most: the people who want Trump out of office, and the network he represents.
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| The Latest: Russia closing its land border with China Posted: 29 Jan 2020 08:59 PM PST  Russia is closing its land border with China, similar to steps taken by Mongolia and North Korea, to guard against a new viral outbreak. Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin issued the decree Thursday, ordering the 2,600-mile land border with China closed starting Friday. Some countries have reduced flights and airlines have halted them because of the new virus that has sickened thousands in central China.
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| A Harvey Weinstein accuser testified that they were in a secret, abusive relationship and gave graphic testimony about his body Posted: 31 Jan 2020 02:25 PM PST  Jessica Mann elicited audible gasps in the courtroom when she described sexual encounters with Harvey Weinstein and described his body.
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| The operator of the downed helicopter that Kobe Bryant and 8 others died in is suspending operations for an undisclosed amount of time Posted: 30 Jan 2020 05:47 PM PST  An employee of Island Express told Business Insider that the company will not fly on Jan. 30 or 31. It may cancel additional flights.
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| Firefights, blocked roads in Mexican city after senior cartel leader detained Posted: 31 Jan 2020 01:36 PM PST ![Firefights, blocked roads in Mexican city after senior cartel leader detained]( "Firefights, blocked roads in Mexican city after senior cartel leader detained") Armed men blocked roads, burned cars and there were reports of shootouts in the city of Uruapan in western Mexico after a senior leader of the Los Viagras cartel was detained, local media and a source from the prosecutor's office said. Luis Felipe, also known as "El Vocho", was captured earlier in the day in the western state of Michoacan, which has long been convulsed by turf wars between drug gangs and where unrest is not uncommon after the detention of senior cartel figures. Michoacan's state security services, without giving names, said on Twitter that three people have been detained.
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