| 'Five Eyes' in the dark: Will Trump and Barr destroy trust in U.S. intelligence? Posted: 15 Oct 2019 07:11 AM PDT  The effort by President Trump and his attorney general to enlist foreign law enforcement and intelligence agencies in their smear of Joe Biden may do lasting damage to relationships with their counterparts in other countries and the critical "Five Eyes" intelligence-sharing agreement.
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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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| 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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| Elizabeth Warren Resurrects ‘You Didn’t Build That’ Line That Dogged Obama Posted: 15 Oct 2019 06:31 PM PDT  Win McNamee/GettySen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) made remarks in the Democratic debate Tuesday night that harked back to President Obama's "You didn't build that" line, which became fodder for Republican attacks in the 2012 presidential election. "Look, I don't have a beef with billionaires," Warren said at the debate, arguing for higher taxes on the ultra-wealthy. "My problem is, you made a fortune in America, you had a great idea, you got out there and worked for it, good for you, but you built that fortune in America, I guarantee you built it in part using workers all of us help pay to educate." Warren's debate argument was the latest iteration of a line she pioneered during her 2012 campaign for a Massachusetts Senate seat. But when Obama tried to use Warren's messaging in his 2012 presidential re-election campaign, he phrased it less clearly, leaving an opening for GOP attack ads that took Obama's remarks out of context and made it seem as if he was saying business owners "didn't build" their companies. "If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help," Obama said. "There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you've got a business, you didn't build that. Somebody else made that happen."Obama rival Mitt Romney soon brought up the "you didn't build that" line in a speech, claiming that it was akin to saying that "Steve Jobs didn't build Apple."Read 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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| 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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| 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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| View Photos of Our Sports Sedan Battle Between the Dodge Charger and Kia Stinger GT Posted: 14 Oct 2019 04:59 AM PDT |
| Trump's latest conspiracy theory is that the Kurds released ISIS prisoners to pull the US back into Syria Posted: 14 Oct 2019 09:17 AM PDT  The Kurds bore the brunt of the US-led campaign against ISIS, and Trump is now suggesting without evidence that they released ISIS prisoners.
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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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| Shooting kills 6 in Puerto Rico, leads to emergency meeting Posted: 15 Oct 2019 05:00 PM PDT  Puerto Rico's governor called an emergency meeting Tuesday after six people were killed in a mass shooting in a San Juan housing project and gunfire left two people dead a day earlier in the island's north. A police statement said the violence left five men and one woman dead. The brazen murders led Gov. Wanda Vázquez to convene a gathering of her security team, led by public security chief Elmer Román and justice secretary Dennise Longo Quiñones.
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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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| 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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| Netanyahu asks Putin to pardon American-Israeli jailed on drug charges Posted: 15 Oct 2019 10:17 AM PDT  Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday to pardon an American-Israeli woman sentenced to 7-1/2 years in jail for a few grams of cannabis found in her luggage at a Moscow airport. Naama Issachar's case has opened up an unusually public rift between Israel and Russia. Issachar was arrested in April after Russian police discovered 9 grams (0.3 oz) of cannabis in her bags during a layover in flights from India to Israel.
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| Meet USS Barb: The Navy's Special World War II Submarine That Terrified Japan Posted: 15 Oct 2019 03:00 PM PDT  It sank the most Japanese vessels by tonnage.
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| Target Cuts Workers’ Hours after Vowing to Raise Minimum Wage to $15 By 2020 Posted: 14 Oct 2019 12:57 PM PDT  Workers at Target stores are struggling to pay their bills after the company cut the total amount of employee working hours in preparation for raising its minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2020, according to a report from CNN."I got that dollar raise but I'm getting $200 less in my paycheck," said Heather, who works at a Florida branch. She began working 40 hours per week but is now offered less than 20."I have no idea how I'm going to pay rent or buy food," she continued.Target committed to raising its minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2020 in a statement on September 25, 2017.Senator Bernie Sanders (D., Vt.) has made the $15 minimum wage a tenet of his campaign. He has blasted large companies such as McDonald's and Walmart for refusing to pay their employees $15 per hour.Last year was Target's best business year since 2005. Sales were up five percent and company stocks were up four percent since 2017, prompting Target CEO Brian Cornell to laud the company's "successful, durable model."Meanwhile, cuts in worker hours have affected employees' eligibility for health benefits. Employees who work less than 30 hours per week are deemed ineligible for company health benefits at the start of Target's spring enrollment period."Target worked me hard from mid-July of 2018 to February 2019, right before my medical coverage was about to kick in," said former employee Caren Morales of Diamond Bar, California, who worked between 35-40 hours per week. Once the enrollment date approached, she said, "They cut my hours right then."Morales quit several months later, saying she couldn't afford to pay for her daughter's day care.It was not immediately clear why many workers have seen their hours cut, although the trend may partially be attributable to the introduction of new store management methods."We needed to change the way we operate in the store to create a better, more inviting experience for our guests," commented Target COO John Mulligan. The changes include elimination of some backroom shifts and the introduction of self-checkout machines, along with specialization of some jobs to cover a specific department instead of an entire store.Several other giant retail stores have also recently decreased working hours, according to statistics from the Bureau of Labor.
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| Yahoo Could Owe You Up to $358 for Data Breaches. Here’s How to File Your Claim Posted: 15 Oct 2019 02:28 PM PDT  Yahoo has reached a $117.5 million class-action settlement after data breaches that affected 3 billion users accounts
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| Pastor at Pro-Trump conference: 'We've come to declare war' Posted: 15 Oct 2019 03:53 PM PDT ![Pastor at Pro-Trump conference: 'We've come to declare war']( "Pastor at Pro-Trump conference: 'We've come to declare war'") If the video depicting a fake President Trump massacring members of the media -- which was condemned by the White House -- wasn't too much to handle already, ProPublica and WNYC released more disturbing audio from the conference where the footage was originally shown.While speaking at the pro-Trump conference in Miami, Florida, at the Trump National Doral Miami, Mark Burns, a pastor, told the crowd multiple times that "we've come to declare war." As he continued, he reportedly asked if anybody was "read to go to war for Donald J. Trump, this nation?" as the audience reportedly cheered him on.Additionally, radio host Wayne Allyn Root reportedly boasted about a time in his childhood when, as one of the few white students at a predominantly black high school, he knocked one classmate unconscious and shattered another kid's teeth. "My buddies and I were high-fiving and laughing," Root reportedly said during his speech. "Man, it was funny."Root reportedly went on to say that "you've got to be a natural-born killer" to win in politics. Listen to the audio clips at ProPublica.
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| Pennsylvania man charged in decades-old rape case after DNA links him to attack Posted: 15 Oct 2019 08:36 PM PDT  Decades after a woman was raped near the University of Delaware campus, police identified a suspect based on DNA and "cutting-edge technology."
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| The Latest: Turkey tells Kurds to quit NE Syria by 'tonight' Posted: 16 Oct 2019 03:13 AM PDT  Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says Syrian Kurdish fighters must leave a designated border area in northeast Syria "as of tonight" for Turkey to stop its military offensive. Erdogan made the comments in Parliament on Wednesday amid pressure for him to call a cease-fire and halt its incursion into Syria, now into its eighth day.
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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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| Brazil probes whether 'ghost ship' carrying Venezuelan oil involved in spill Posted: 15 Oct 2019 01:27 PM PDT  A huge oil spill off Brazil's northeastern coast may have involved a "ghost ship" carrying Venezuelan oil in breach of US sanctions, an expert close to the probe into the disaster said Tuesday. Brazil has accused its South American neighbor of responsibility for the leakage that began in early September and affects a 2,000-kilometer (1,200-mile) stretch of the Atlantic coast -- charges Venezuela's state oil giant PDVSA denies. Describing the incident as "very complex and unprecedented," Brazil's navy says it is investigating "lots of hypotheses" for the cause of the massive spill, including a ship accident.
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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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| All of the Google Pixel and Home Products on Sale Now Posted: 15 Oct 2019 12:39 PM PDT |
| Russian troll freed in Belarus after arrest for US election tampering Posted: 15 Oct 2019 09:07 AM PDT  Anna Bogacheva was detained and briefly threatened with extradition to the US after being named in Mueller reportRobert Mueller alleges that Anna Bogacheva and others posed as US citizens to set up social media accounts aimed at swaying the 2016 presidential vote. Photograph: Tom Brenner/ReutersA Russian national charged with attempting to meddle in the 2016 American presidential elections was briefly threatened with extradition to the United States after being arrested in Belarus, before she was was freed by local authorities. Anna Bogacheva was detained late on Monday evening by police at a hotel in Minsk, the capital of Belarus, while on holiday with her family, according to RIA Novosti, the Russian state news agency. Her lawyer said she had been detained under an international arrest warrant issued by the United States.Bogacheva was one of 13 Russians indicted last year by the US justice department after the investigation into election interference led by the special counsel Robert Mueller. Three Russian entities, including a notorious state-backed "troll farm" called the Internet Research Agency, were also indicted. Russia's foreign ministry confirmed on Tuesday that Bogacheva had been arrested and said that it was providing consular assistance. But shortly after the foreign ministry statement, Russia's embassy in Minsk announced that Bogacheva had been freed. A spokesman for Belarus' general prosecutor's office said that there were "no grounds" for her arrest or extradition to the United States. "She has been released," the spokesman said, adding that Minsk would apply to have the international warrant for her arrest invalidated on the territory of Belarus. Mueller alleges that the St Petersburg-based Internet Research Agency's employees, including Bogacheva, posed as US citizens to set up social media accounts aimed at swaying the 2016 presidential vote that brought Donald Trump to power, as well as sowing "discord" in the US political system. US investigators say the Internet Research Agency is controlled by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a wealthy businessman known as "Putin's chef" because his companies often provide catering services to the Kremlin. Prigozhin is also reported to provide mercenaries for Russia's military operations in Syria, Ukraine and parts of Africa. Bogacheva is accused of working as a translator for the agency and overseeing its data analysis group. She and Alexander Krylova, another agency employee, travelled to the United States in June 2014 on what US investigators say was an intelligence gathering trip. Bogacheva's arrest in Minsk briefly looked set to derail relations between Belarus and Russia. Viktor Vodolatsky, an MP from Vladimir Putin's ruling United Russia party, accused Belarus of a "betrayal" before news of her release broke.
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| China's Missiles Could be a New 21st Century Kamikaze Weapon Posted: 14 Oct 2019 06:00 AM PDT  When most people think of a twenty-first-century successor to the kamikaze, they probably think of a suicide bomber. They might have it all wrong.
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| 'Gaetz-crasher': Here's why a Republican lawmaker was barred from Fiona Hill testimony Posted: 14 Oct 2019 04:05 PM PDT  When Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz tried to attend an impeachment inquiry deposition Monday morning at the U.S. Capitol, he ran smack into the often arcane and confusing rules of Congress.
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| Trump threatens to 'destroy' Turkey's economy with sanctions Posted: 15 Oct 2019 06:29 AM PDT  Targeting Turkey's economy, President Donald Trump announced sanctions aimed at restraining the Turks' assault against Kurdish fighters and civilians in Syria — an assault Turkey began after Trump announced he was moving U.S. troops out of the way. Some of those U.S. troops leaving northern Syria are being shifted to Iraq, where they could conduct cross-border operations against Islamic State group militants, a U.S. official said.
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| A Florida man called the sheriff's office to report stolen marijuana. The deputy's response: 'Stop calling' Posted: 15 Oct 2019 08:12 PM PDT ![A Florida man called the sheriff's office to report stolen marijuana. The deputy's response: 'Stop calling']( "A Florida man called the sheriff's office to report stolen marijuana. The deputy's response: 'Stop calling'") The Pasco County Sheriff's Office in Florida told a man to stop calling 911 to report $20 worth of stolen weed.
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| Google’s Former Washington Lobbying Chief Molinari Joins APCO Posted: 16 Oct 2019 01:00 AM PDT ![Google's Former Washington Lobbying Chief Molinari Joins APCO]( "Google's Former Washington Lobbying Chief Molinari Joins APCO") (Bloomberg) -- Susan Molinari, Google's former top lobbyist in Washington, is joining APCO Worldwide, the consultancy announced.Molinari, a Republican who represented New York in the U.S. House, had shifted to an advisory role at the Alphabet Inc. company at the end of 2018 as its new global policy chief, Karan Bhatia, reorganized the team.She will join APCO's International Advisory Council of former elected officials, business leaders academics and journalists as a corporate communication strategy adviser, the advisory and lobbying communications consultancy said in its announcement."I am honored to join such a distinguished group of recognized global leaders in the IAC," Molinari said in a statement.Molinari resigned from her position as Google's Washington director effective last Dec. 31 and moved to an advisory role. The search giant said in September it named Mark Isakowitz, a former aide to Republican Senator Rob Portman of Ohio, to replace her.APCO's clients include the U.S. division of China COSCO Shipping Corp. Earlier this year, it stopped representing Huawei Technologies Co., which the U.S. blacklisted in May, according to federal disclosures. The 35 year-old, Washington-based firm has offices globally.Molinari served in Congress from 1990-1997 and worked as a reporter before becoming a lobbyist. She was an outside lobbyist for Microsoft Corp., Verizon Communications Inc., Gilead Sciences Inc. and other companies before joining Google in 2012, according to federal disclosures.Google had fostered its relationship with Democrats and was perceived as close to President Barack Obama's administration before hiring Molinari, a former House Republican Conference vice chairman seen as a moderate, two years after Republicans took back control of the House. The Federal Trade Commission closed an antitrust investigation of Google in 2013 without enforcement action.The end of her stint at Google coincided with a new wave of antitrust probes, efforts to rein in the company with privacy legislation and complaints by lawmakers that the company censors conservative views.To contact the reporters on this story: Ben Brody in Washington, D.C. at btenerellabr@bloomberg.net;Daniel Stoller in Arlington at dstoller1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Sara Forden at sforden@bloomberg.net, ;Keith Perine at kperine2@bloomberg.net, Mark NiquetteFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Mexican president confirms Pemex union boss under investigation Posted: 15 Oct 2019 10:15 AM PDT  The veteran leader of Mexico's powerful oil workers' union faces formal accusations of wrongdoing, President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said on Tuesday, slowly turning up pressure on the labor boss to step aside. Earlier this year, sources said the attorney general's office had accused Pemex union chief Carlos Romero Deschamps and several relatives of illicit enrichment and money laundering, charges he has consistently denied. "Complaints have been presented to the attorney general's office," Lopez Obrador told a regular news conference.
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| Boris Johnson is reportedly very close to agreeing a Brexit deal with the EU Posted: 15 Oct 2019 08:13 AM PDT  EU sources told Bloomberg that a deal could be concluded as early as Tuesday, with the UK set to agree a new compromise deal.
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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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| 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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| CNN’s Anti-Religious Town Hall Posted: 14 Oct 2019 08:41 AM PDT  LGBT activists gathered last week for CNN's "Equality" town hall with the Democratic presidential candidates. The advocates present were, in the words of Human Rights Campaign President Alphonso David, the "tip of the spear in our fight for full equality."The "spear" metaphor grew more apt as the night went on.Religious freedom was the second-most-popular whipping post. The candidates talked about the concept with palpable derision, as if religion — save Islam, which they predictably if incoherently exempted — were a ruse used to cement old prejudices. No one actually believes those folksy things about God, heaven, and hell, right? Never considered was the notion that people hold earnest religious beliefs that in turn inform their views on sexual morality.The town hall was also evidence that the LGBTQ movement has grown more jaded and contemptuous, even as it has achieved more and more of its ostensible aims. If conciliation was ever the preferred tone, it is no longer. Instead, it is now increasingly unashamed and vituperative scorn.How would Elizabeth Warren, for instance, respond to someone on the campaign trail who said that they believed in the traditional definition of marriage? "Well, I'm gonna assume it's a guy who said that," she said. That elicited a laugh from the audience, men being the only acceptable punchline to the humorless scolds in the crowd. She continued, "I'm gonna say then just marry one woman. I'm cool with that." Then, after a pause: "If you can find one."(Social science notwithstanding on that last jab.)Beto O'Rourke piled on further, affirming his belief that "freedom of religion is a fundamental right, but it should not be used to discriminate."You are, in other words, "free" to practice your religion, so long as you practice it in a manner that Beto O'Rourke — the skateboard-wielding ex-congressman who posts videos of his dental visits on social media — sees fit. Some animals are more equal than others: O'Rourke will be happy to "discriminate" against your church if it happens to hold an unpopular position on sexual ethics. He literally said so seconds later, when asked by Don Lemon if religious institutions should "lose their tax-exempt status if they oppose same sex marriage." O'Rourke's response:> There can be no reward, no benefit, no tax break for anyone, any institution, any organization in America that denies the full human rights and the full civil rights of every single one of us. And so as president, we are going to make that a priority and we are going to stop those who are infringing upon the human rights of our fellow Americans.What "human right" are religious organizations "infringing upon" when they "oppose" same-sex marriage? Do people have a "civil right" to have their sexual preferences validated by private religious organizations? Is there a "human right" to have your particular sexual union baptized by religious traditions with centuries of contravening theological directives?Pete Buttigieg took this same tack, insisting that "the right to religious freedom ends where religion is being used as an excuse to harm other people." Which of course depends entirely on what Buttigieg means by "harm." There is certainly "harm," for instance, in mutilating the genitals of a young girl — a more ecumenical venture than progressives care to admit — but does a baker's refusal to bake a cake that violates his religious convictions "harm other people"? What if a church refuses to host a ceremony that offends its moral precepts? Does "religious freedom end" when someone refuses to grant moral approbation to someone else's choices and behavior?Indeed, that was the Freudian subtext of the entire town hall. "Equality?" That has, even on activists' own terms, been long achieved. Notice, Alphonso David didn't simply want "equality" — whatever that means — but "full equality": your approval. Not simply your toleration, but your moral assent and your unhesitating affirmation. It's not enough to live and let live. You will, in Erick Erickson's words, "be made to care."First, we were told that good sense held that we ought to allow two consenting adults to do as they wished in the privacy of their own bedroom. Fair enough — what business is it of ours? Next came civil unions. Fine. Then, marriage was redefined at a federal level on the basis of specious legal reasoning. Next, religious florists, bakers, and caterers were asked to violate their consciences and dragged before the courts if they declined. And now, at long last, the public exercise of religious faith, and the very belief itself, the very notion that one has rights to "oppose" practices that violate their private conscience, are under siege.All of which, we were told, would "never happen." As the town hall put on display, it's not for want of trying.
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| GOP endorsement eludes indicted California congressman Posted: 14 Oct 2019 11:22 PM PDT  In a sign of a turbulent campaign to come, indicted U.S. Rep. Duncan Hunter failed to win the endorsement Monday of his local Republican Party after arguing that he is the best candidate for the job despite his approaching federal trial. Hunter faced significant odds of winning the two-third support he needed for the nod from the San Diego Republican Party, with several other GOP candidates dividing the vote, including former Rep. Darrell Issa. "I've got this seat," Hunter said, with three other candidates seated beside him.
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| Marianne Williamson isn't on the debate stage but reminded people she's still running Posted: 15 Oct 2019 05:39 PM PDT  "No, they're not the only Democratic candidates for President of the United States," she tweeted as the debate started.
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| What the Social Security COLA for 2020 Means For You Posted: 15 Oct 2019 09:39 AM PDT ![What the Social Security COLA for 2020 Means For You]( "What the Social Security COLA for 2020 Means For You") Social Security payments will grow by 1.6% in 2020. The program will also be adjusted in several important ways that could affect the Social Security payments you receive or how much you pay into the system. -- Social Security payments will increase by 1.6%.
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| Factbox: Hundreds of dignitaries to attend as Japan's new emperor declares enthronement Posted: 15 Oct 2019 07:12 PM PDT  New Japanese Emperor Naruhito is set to proclaim his enthronement to the world next week in a centuries-old ceremony attended by some 2,500 people, including heads of state and other dignitaries from nearly 200 countries. Naruhito, 59, acceded to the throne in May after his father, Akihito, became the first monarch to abdicate in two centuries. Following are the main events planned for Oct. 22, a one-off national holiday.
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| UAW Strike against General Motors Could Be Nearly Over Posted: 15 Oct 2019 06:17 PM PDT  After a month, potential movement in the auto strike that has idled nearly 50,000 U.S. workers.
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| ‘This came directly from Hunter’: Biden opens new front against Trump Posted: 14 Oct 2019 03:04 PM PDT  After three weeks of sustained attacks from President Donald Trump over his son's overseas business deals, Joe Biden is no longer reacting with a mix of silence and counter-accusations. The former vice president is rolling out a new ethics policy banning White House family members from foreign entanglements. Hunter Biden is also taking on a higher profile.
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| 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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| When Cops Create Their Own Risk, Innocent People Die for Their Mistakes Posted: 14 Oct 2019 01:21 PM PDT  The video is puzzling and shocking. After receiving a call to a non-emergency number requesting that police check on a neighbor's house that had its doors open and its lights on, police approach silently. They look into an open door and into a brightly lit room, but they don't say anything. They then creep around the house, moving from light to dark. They use a flashlight. They keep moving around the edges of the house.Suddenly, in a mere moment, one of them spots movement in a window. The officer yells for the shadowy figure to put up her hands and then immediately fires a shot. Atatiana Jefferson was dead. She was 28 years old. According to her family's lawyer, she was playing video games with her young nephew when they heard "rustling" outside and "saw flashlights." There was a gun in the house, but there's no indication (yet) that she was holding it in her hand.But what if she was? Does a homeowner not have a right to investigate someone lurking on her property? Can she not arm herself at 2:30 a.m. when she hears a strange sound in the darkness?I've been looking closely at the police-shooting issue for many years, and I'm noticing a trend in many of the worst and most controversial shootings. The police make mistakes that heighten their own sense of danger, and then they "resolve" their own error by opening fire.The examples are easy to find. The worst and most recent is that of Dallas officer Amber Guyger, who made the dreadful mistake of entering the wrong house and then immediately dealt with the perceived "threat" by shooting the innocent man inside.But Guyger is hardly the only offender. Who can forget the terrible shooting of Philando Castile, gunned down as he tried to comply with conflicting commands from an obviously panicked officer — the officer told Castile to hand over his license and proof of insurance, but also to not reach for his gun. He shot Castile to death even as Castile was calmly telling him that he wasn't reaching for his gun.Then there's the extraordinarily gut-wrenching video of a cop killing Daniel Shaver as he sobbed and begged for his life. The officer's instructions were utterly incomprehensible. He told Shaver to not put his hands down for any reason. He also told him to crawl down the hall..No one should forget Andrew Scott. Police seeking a suspect showed up at the wrong house (without a warrant), did not turn on their lights, did not identify themselves as police, and pounded violently on the door late at night. When Scott answered his own door with a firearm in his hand, he was instantly shot dead.It wasn't until the tragic death of Willie McCoy that the trend truly became obvious. McCoy was sleeping in his car, blocking a drive-through window, with a gun in his lap. When he began to move, cops clustered around his car started screaming at him so loudly that the transcript of the video has to explain that the shouts weren't gunshots. Then, within three seconds, the officers riddled him with bullets. They startled him awake, and then killed him.In response, I wrote this:> When we evaluate police shootings, we wrongly tend to limit our analysis to the very instant of the shooting itself. The question of a cop's reasonable fear at that instant is allowed to trump all other concerns, and becomes the deciding factor at trial. I would argue, however, that officers act unreasonably when they don't give a citizen a reasonable chance to live — and giving a citizen a reasonable chance to live involves properly handling the situation so no weapon need be fired.Would Atatiana Jefferson still be alive if the cops had parked in front of her house and clearly identified themselves by shouting into the open door? Would they still be alive had they not lurked around a person's home without permission -- exactly like a person who was trespassing, perhaps with malign intent?There is absolutely no question that police have a difficult job. There is no question that even routine encounters and wellness checks can — on rare occasions — escalate to deadly violence. But there is also no question that time and again police have enhanced the risk to the public through their own mistakes. Poor tactics can yield terrible results, and police should not be able to use the "split-second decision" defense when they created the crisis.There is no greater violation of liberty than the loss of your own life in your own home at the hands of misguided, panicky, or poorly trained agents of the state. Absent compelling evidence not yet revealed to the public, it appears that the man who killed Atatiana Jefferson committed a criminal act. He deserves to face criminal justice.
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| 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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| Latest: California oil fire health warning lifted Posted: 15 Oct 2019 10:25 PM PDT  Authorities have lifted shelter-in-place orders for some 12,000 people in Northern California after containment of a fire at a fuel storage facility that sent up a huge cloud of smoke. Contra Costa County's public health agency had told people to stay indoors with their windows and doors sealed after the fire erupted Tuesday afternoon at the NuStar Energy tank farm in Crockett. Authorities say they've contained a fire at a fuel storage facility in the San Francisco Bay Area that prompted a shelter-in-place warning for some 12,000 nearby residents.
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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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