| McConnell releases impeachment trial rules, sparking new outcry from Democrats Posted: 20 Jan 2020 04:40 PM PST  Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell released the rules for a Senate impeachment trial on Monday evening.
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| Iran acknowledges Russian-made missiles targeted Ukraine jet Posted: 21 Jan 2020 12:29 AM PST  Iran acknowledged on Tuesday that its armed forces fired two Russian anti-aircraft missiles at a Ukrainian jetliner that crashed after taking off from Tehran's main airport earlier this month, killing all 176 people on board. For days after the Jan. 8 shootdown, Iran denied that it fired missiles at the plane, initially blaming a technical malfunction and engine fire for the crash.
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| Hurricane Rudy Strikes Back: Giuliani Hints At Tapes Exposing Parnas 'Lies' Posted: 21 Jan 2020 03:18 AM PST  Will the potential Trump impeachment witness hit back?
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| UK to introduce tougher jail terms for convicted terrorists after London Bridge attack Posted: 20 Jan 2020 04:12 PM PST  Britain will introduce tougher jail sentences for convicted terrorists and will end early release as part of a series of measures to strengthen its response to terrorism, the government said on Tuesday. Prime Minister Boris Johnson pledged to make changes after an attack near London Bridge in November in which Usman Khan, a convicted terrorist who had been released early from prison, killed two people. Khan had been sentenced to a minimum of eight years in prison in 2012 with a requirement that the parole board assess his danger to the public before release.
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| How Trump’s Impeachment Changes Dems’ Final Sprint in Iowa Posted: 21 Jan 2020 01:49 AM PST  At 1 p.m. on Tuesday afternoon, every senator participating in the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump will be commanded by the Senate sergeant-at-arms "to keep silent upon pain of imprisonment."But for the four senators who also happen to be running to replace Trump as president, silence will feel a little like imprisonment.With the Iowa caucuses less than two weeks away, the sudden removal of four Democratic presidential hopefuls from the field—including three of the five highest-polling candidates—presents an unprecedented challenge for campaigns desperate to prove their staying power in the early states."Closing strong in Iowa is so much about energy and momentum—and so much of that comes from events and the coverage they drive. And there's no substitute for a principal-level event," said Patrick Dillon, who worked as a senior battleground states adviser for President Barack Obama's re-election campaign, and served as chief of staff to former Iowa Governor Chet Culver. "People want to be with a winner, and they see you standing in front of growing, energetic crowds and they see the news you make on the ground in Iowa, and that can be self-reinforcing."In a normal field and a normal campaign, voters' minds would largely be settled by this point, but with razor-thin polling margins between the top four candidates, every handshake at every roadside diner can make a difference."In-person is always preferable," said Prof. Dennis Goldford, a professor of political science at Drake University in Des Moines. "At this point in a long, long caucus season, their absence from the ground is not a huge factor, but in a tight race a feather on the scale can make a difference."Each of the senators running for the nomination have publicly declared that they are more than prepared to "chew bubble gum and walk at the same time," as Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) told reporters on Capitol Hill after being officially sworn in as a juror in Trump's impeachment trial on Thursday."I am a mom—I can do two things at once," Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) said on CBS This Morning on Jan 17. "I have a fantastic operation with people who are incredible—in every major town in Iowa. I've got my husband and daughter out this weekend in New Hampshire and then on their way to Iowa. And I'm gonna be there for three days. I am a mom. I can do two things at once."But in Iowa, where presidential candidates are expected to do everything short of taking voters out for an ice cream cone in order to win their support, absence from the campaign trail could be a major competitive disadvantage—particularly as former Vice President Joe Biden and former Mayor Pete Buttigieg, both riding high in the polls and with cash to burn, are unencumbered by the senatorial equivalent of jury duty."If you're in a strong position now, it's slightly less scary I guess—you just try to count on your organization to maintain and hope that committed volunteers and organizers eke out expansion where they can," said Dillon. "But if your plan was to get hot at the end and close strong, then honestly you really needed that on-the-ground presence just to juice your organization up its highest level anyway—so that's a big challenge."Klobuchar, who has described her position in Iowa as a "strong fifth place," has bet the farm on a come-from-behind strong finish in the Hawkeye State. Her campaign told The Daily Beast that she is confident in its three-part plan for navigating the impeachment trial: organizing, tele-town halls, and flooding the zone with surrogates."We really have the strongest slate of endorsements in Iowa of all the candidates," a campaign official told The Daily Beast, noting that Klobuchar has racked up the endorsements of 13 current and former state legislators, more than any other presidential candidate. "We plan to host a number of teletownhalls, with a number of surrogates—Amy's husband and daughter will be there, as well.""Technology is an amazing thing—Amy can still do TV hits and phone conferences," the campaign official said, while on-ground organizers "keep the drumbeat alive."Some of that organizing was the result of a fortuitous scheduling delay. On Jan. 11, in anticipation that articles of impeachment would be delivered to the Senate at any moment, Klobuchar's campaign mounted a "Full Klobuchar Day of Action," in which 41 surrogates helped lead organizing events in every one of Iowa's 99 counties. The surrogates, who included state legislators, labor leaders, state Democratic Party activists and Klobuchar's husband, law professor John Bessler, helped canvass caucus-goers, phone-bank, and held organizing meetings.But Klobuchar still lags behind several other candidates in her Iowa organization efforts—as of last week, the Minnesota senator's campaign has 18 offices in the state, and more than 80 staffers. Buttigieg's and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren's campaigns, for example, both have nearly double the number of offices and staff.Ben Halle, Buttigieg's Iowa communications director, told The Daily Beast that the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, will be campaigning at a marathon pace for the final two-week stretch before the caucuses."We're getting Pete in front of as many Iowans as possible," Halle said. "While Pete was speaking to hundreds in Sioux City, we had more than 250 precinct leaders in Des Moines learning what to do on caucus night."That's ground game, Dillon told The Daily Beast, "There's only so much an organization, even a well-planned, well-resourced one can do," Dillon noted, "and it's a real impediment to a campaign that hasn't yet been able to build a big ground game in part because they haven't started getting momentum until recently."Sen. Michael Bennet's spokesperson told The Daily Beast that the the Colorado senator is holding 50 town halls in New Hampshire in the final weeks before that state's primary—which, due to scheduling and the shorter distance between the state and Washington, D.C., makes his campaign's focus on the Granite State a fortuitous strategy."Michael's Senate duties, and his responsibility to uphold the Constitution and rule of law, come before any campaign," the spokesperson said. "Every chance he gets, he will be on the campaign trail talking to early state voters. He is holding 50 town halls in New Hampshire in the final weeks before the primary, answering every last question, to show why he is the best candidate to take on and beat Donald Trump."But while Warren and Sanders, who are both heavily investing in Iowa, both boast a heavy on-ground presence and a stable full of high-profile endorsers, not all of their surrogates know what is expected of them during the impeachment trial."I've done some surrogate work so far but I haven't received any specific requests for the next few weeks," said State Sen. Zach Wahls, a Warren endorser and rising star in the state Democratic Party who has made appearances at campaign events geared towards young voters.State Sen. Liz Bennett, another Warren endorser, told The Daily Beast that she is scheduled to lead a number of canvasses over the final few weeks before the caucuses, "but I think that falls under normal [get-out-the-caucus] activities."Asked about its plans for utilizing surrogates during the impeachment trial, Warren's team told The Daily Beast that former Housing and Urban Development Julián Castro, as well as other high-profile supporters, will be out in force in the closing weeks before early voting begins and as she serves as a juror in the impeachment trial.Castro, who unlike prominent Sanders surrogates like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) or fellow Warren supporter Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) is not a current office-holder, is seen as a potentially critical member of Warren's team of surrogates—able to appear at multiple events a day, and with the message-discipline skills of a former presidential candidate to boot.As a dyed-in-the-wool progressive who embraced (and occasionally inspired) many of Warren's signature policy proposals long before his endorsement, Castro is in a unique position to help heal Warren's rifts with left-wing voters who are potentially leaning toward Sanders, a former aide to the candidate's defunct campaign told The Daily Beast."The wing of the party that Julián and Warren represent… is at its best when it is squaring off against Republicans and centrist Dems," the aide said. "The unity message is part of that—reminding voters that the fight isn't between progressives."Still, Iowa political experts told The Daily Beast that even the most robust organization and surrogate operations amount to guesswork in the uncharted territory of campaigning during impeachment."I have no basis to judge how this will play out," said J. Ann Selzer, a pollster and president of the highly regarded Des Moines-based polling firm Selzer & Company. "Too many moving parts, and zero historical references. I'm as interested to watch as you!"—Additional reporting by Jackie KucinichRead 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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| 2 inmates were killed Monday night at an understaffed Mississippi prison Posted: 21 Jan 2020 10:32 AM PST  Two inmates were killed Monday night at an understaffed Mississippi prison that has been shaken by other deadly violence in recent weeks. The state Department of Corrections confirmed the deaths Tuesday but did not immediately release the names of the latest inmates killed at the Mississippi State Penitentiary at Parchman. The department said it is investigating the deaths.
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| China Tries to Ease Concern U.S. Trade Deal Hurts Other Nations Posted: 21 Jan 2020 07:53 AM PST  (Bloomberg) -- Terms of Trade is a daily newsletter that untangles a world embroiled in trade wars. Sign up here. Chinese Vice Premier Han Zheng told the World Economic Forum that the country's trade deal with the U.S. won't hurt rival exporting nations as complaints mount from governments that were left out of the agreement.In the most high-profile remarks on the country's economic policy since the accord was signed last week, Han said that its commitment to buy more from the U.S. is in line with its World Trade Organization obligations and won't squeeze out other imports. Han also pledged to lower barriers for foreign investors as he set out the case for China's engagement with the global economy."China will open its door wider," Han told an audience in Davos, Switzerland. "Though facing some protectionism from some countries, the determination to open up will not waver."The speech comes less than a week after Chinese President Xi Jinping sealed a "phase one" deal intended to de-escalate a trade war with U.S. President Donald Trump. The accord saw China commit to crack down on the theft of American technology and corporate secrets by its companies and state entities, while outlining a $200 billion spending spree to try to close its trade imbalance with the U.S."The phase-one trade deal is good for U.S., China and the world," Han said. "China's increasing purchases of U.S. goods are in accordance with WTO guidelines and will not impact its imports from other countries."Han made the comments just as Trump gave his own speech in Davos, in which the U.S. president claimed credit for overseeing an economy enjoying its longest expansion yet, with an unemployment rate that fell to a five-decade low after tax cuts, deregulation and improved trade deals. He also spoke of his close relationship with Xi."He's for China and I'm for the U.S., but other than that, we love each other," he said.Under the agreement, China will boost purchases of U.S. manufactured goods, agricultural products, energy and services over the next two years. Critics say such pre-determined demand can have adverse consequences elsewhere.'Managed Trade'"The real problem with managed trade is that it may divert, rather than expand, international commerce," Chad Bown, a senior fellow and trade expert at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington, said in a report released Tuesday. "For example, China could purchase more American soybeans by cutting back on imports of oilseeds from Brazil."Germany's Kiel Institute for the World Economy said China's pledge to boost American imports could end up costing the European Union about $11 billion next year. "If trade costs and hence relative prices do not change, Chinese imports from the U.S. must come at the expense of third countries," the institute said in a study published this week.Last week, EU trade commissioner Phil Hogan said his team will scrutinize whether China's pledge is allowed under the WTO."We haven't analyzed the document in detail, but we will and if there's a WTO-compliance issue of course we will take the case," Hogan told a conference on Thursday in Washington.Separately, Australia is pushing China for the same dairy concessions that the U.S. received, according to the Sydney Morning Herald. As part of phase one of the deal, the U.S. secured regulatory breaks on dairy products shipped to China, barriers that have hampered Australian exporters, the newspaper reported last week.To contact the reporters on this story: Dandan Li in Beijing at dli395@bloomberg.net;Crystal Chui in Zurich at tchui4@bloomberg.net;Bryce Baschuk in Geneva at bbaschuk2@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Brendan Scott at bscott66@bloomberg.net, Ben Sills, Brendan MurrayFor 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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| Russia admits its deadly Zircon hypersonic missile is suffering from 'childhood diseases' Posted: 21 Jan 2020 02:11 PM PST  The weapon which is expected to eventually arm the country's newer frigates is apparently experiencing developmental challenges.
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| AOC criticises Democratic Party: ‘We don’t have a left party in the United States’ Posted: 21 Jan 2020 07:32 AM PST  New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez explained that the Democratic party does not represent the political left in the United States, calling the organisation a "centre or centre-conservative" party that "can't even get a floor vote" on nationalising health care.She said: "We can't even get a floor vote on Medicare for All — not even a floor vote that might get doubled down."
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| Huawei CFO lawyers say her alleged crimes no crime in Canada Posted: 21 Jan 2020 12:42 PM PST  Lawyers for a senior executive of Chinese tech giant Huawei argued Tuesday that allowing her extradition to the United States would result in Canada bowing to foreign law. This week's hearings deal with the question of whether the U.S. charges against Meng Wanzhou are crimes in Canada as well. Canada does not have similar sanctions on Iran.
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| Forget North Korea or Pakistan: This U.S. Ally Has a Nuclear Arsenal That Could Kill Billions Posted: 20 Jan 2020 11:55 PM PST  And its all underwater.
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| Tekashi 6ix9ine won't be allowed to serve the rest of his 2-year sentence in home confinement even though his prison has a lot of Blood gang members Posted: 21 Jan 2020 05:09 PM PST  A judge dashed the controversial rapper's hopes that he could spend the rest of his two-year prison sentence away from the gang he once betrayed.
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| Rudy Giuliani says Lev Parnas 'misled' him and 'lied stupidly' Posted: 20 Jan 2020 10:14 PM PST  Rudy Giuliani is "heartbroken" over recent comments made by his former associate Lev Parnas, who says he worked closely with Giuliani in Ukraine as part of an attempt to find damaging information about former Vice President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter.Speaking to Fox News host Laura Ingraham on Monday night, Giuliani, President Trump's personal lawyer, said he was once "close to" Parnas, but was "misled by him." In October, Parnas and his business partner Igor Fruman were arrested and charged with campaign finance violations. Last week, Parnas made several public accusations against Giuliani, President Trump, and Attorney General William Barr, implicating all of them in the Ukraine scheme that is central to Trump's impeachment.While Fruman did not cooperate with House impeachment investigators, Parnas did, turning over documents and other materials. Parnas said while he was in Ukraine trying to find dirt on the Bidens, he "wouldn't do anything without the consent of Rudy Giuliani and the president." Giuliani, a former U.S. attorney, refuted this, saying Parnas "in very large part did not tell the truth" and "lied stupidly."Giuliani told Ingraham he would not discuss all of Parnas' accusations, but did deny ever talking about his Ukraine investigation with Barr and said Parnas' account of a meeting during a 2018 White House Hanukkah party was a lie. In November, CNN reported that Parnas told two people close to him that during the celebration, Trump let Parnas and Fruman know he wanted them to go on a "secret mission" to Ukraine to investigate the Bidens. Giuliani said this was "absolutely untrue," as they were never pulled into a private meeting.Parnas posted a photo taken at the party on social media, showing him posing with Trump, Giuliani, Fruman, and Vice President Mike Pence. Trump has repeatedly denied knowing Parnas; Parnas has promised to keep releasing pictures of the two of them together. More stories from theweek.com The Saudi crown prince reportedly personally hacked Jeff Bezos' phone. He may have done the same thing to Jared Kushner. Senate tables Chuck Schumer's first impeachment amendment along party lines The real problem with McConnell's impeachment rules
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| Jess Phillips Quits Race to Replace Corbyn as U.K. Labour Leader Posted: 21 Jan 2020 08:29 AM PST ![Jess Phillips Quits Race to Replace Corbyn as U.K. Labour Leader]( "Jess Phillips Quits Race to Replace Corbyn as U.K. Labour Leader") (Bloomberg) -- Sign up to our Brexit Bulletin, follow us @Brexit and subscribe to our podcast.Jess Phillips quit the race to replace Jeremy Corbyn as leader of the U.K. Labour Party, saying she was unable to unite the divided movement.Phillips failed to win the necessary backing from trade unions and local parties to get on the final ballot. There are now four candidates left in the contest to succeed Corbyn, who last month led the party to its worst election defeat since the 1930s.Life After Corbyn? The Politicians Vying to Become Labour Leader"The Labour Party will need to select a candidate that can unite all parts of our movement -- the union movement, the members and elected representatives," Phillips said in a video on YouTube Tuesday. "I have to be honest that at this time, that person isn't me."The new leader will have the task of reviving the U.K.'s main opposition party. Under Corbyn, the party became bitterly divided over his socialist policies, accusations of antisemitism, and an ambiguous policy on Brexit.Corbyn CriticPhillips, 38, was a vocal critic of Corbyn, making her a divisive candidate unpopular with his supporters, who saw her as undermining his efforts. She didn't say which of the four remaining candidates she would support.The backbench member of Parliament had already said her campaign was not going well, and on Monday she failed to gain the support of retail trade union Usdaw, which instead backed front-runner Keir Starmer. As Labour's fourth-largest affiliate, Usdaw would have helped get Phillips over the line, but instead assured Starmer of a place in the final ballot.Under the complex rules of the contest, candidates need to secure the backing of either 33 constituency Labour parties, or three affiliates, two of which must be unions and make up at least 5% of affiliated membership.Starmer's main rival, Rebecca Long-Bailey, hopes to win the support of Unite or the Communication Workers Union. On Wednesday, the GMB union backed Lisa Nandy, calling her "a breath of fresh air in the debate over Labour's future."Four RemainThe fourth candidate remaining is Emily Thornberry. Labour's foreign affairs spokeswoman just scraped through the first phase of the contest, which required candidates to secure the backing of 22 MPs and Members of the European Parliament.Writing in the Guardian newspaper on Monday, Phillips said her first hustings had been "awful" and it was highly unlikely anyone except Starmer or Long-Bailey would win the race."I was awful because I was trying to hit a million different lines and messages in 40 seconds," she wrote. "Some were my lines, some were other people's and it fell flat."\--With assistance from Thomas Penny.To contact the reporter on this story: Jessica Shankleman in London at jshankleman@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Tim Ross at tross54@bloomberg.net, Alex Morales, Stuart BiggsFor 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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| Even C-SPAN Is Piqued: Senate Puts Limits on Trial Coverage Posted: 20 Jan 2020 12:11 PM PST  News coverage of President Donald Trump's impeachment trial in the Senate began last week with a Republican senator calling a CNN reporter "a liberal hack" in the halls of Congress and laughing about it later that night during a Fox News interview.Things haven't improved much since.Journalists are up in arms about new restrictions on their movement inside the Capitol, which they said will prevent them from easily interviewing lawmakers about the proceedings. The rules, negotiated by Republican Senate leadership, have yet to be written down, causing confusion among reporters and the Capitol Police expected to enforce them.Even sedate C-SPAN is aggrieved, calling on the Senate to allow its television crews to document the trial instead of the government-controlled cameras that -- as was the case during Bill Clinton's trial 21 years ago -- will limit what viewers see and hear inside the Senate chamber.Hurling insults at journalists is standard fare for officials at the White House. But Congress, with its protocols and rituals, was considered a relatively safe space for reporters, where cordiality was prized.The pretrial tensions suggest that the bash-the-press mentality that led the White House to kill off the daily briefing and strip reporters of their credentials has now crept into what senators like to call "the world's greatest deliberative body.""There's long been this understanding that we both serve the same people at the end of the day and that it's a mutually beneficial relationship," said Sarah Wire, a Los Angeles Times reporter who leads a committee of congressional correspondents. "Senators want to talk to us because they know we're communicating their message to their voters back home."All this," she added in an interview, "was kind of a shock.""This" is a series of restrictions abruptly imposed on reporters shortly before the start of the trial, where opening arguments are set to begin Tuesday.Instead of unfettered access to the hallways and corridors surrounding the Senate chamber -- a tradition for decades -- journalists will be confined to roped-off pens as senators come and go from the trial. Walk-and-talk interviews with senators, a staple of congressional reporting made famous by TV shows like "The West Wing," will be curtailed."This is how ludicrous these restrictions are," a McClatchy reporter, Emma Dumain, wrote on Twitter last week, describing how a Capitol Police officer interrupted her interview with a senator and insisted that she "step behind a rope in order to continue the conversation."Journalists have long been barred from entering the Senate chamber, relegated to an overhead view from the press gallery above. Now, to enter the upstairs gallery, they will need to queue up for a magnetometer meant to sniff out illicit electronics, raising concerns about their ability to quickly relay to the public what is happening inside.The effect, reporters said, is to make it harder to chronicle the you-are-there details expected of a historic political moment -- including which senators are doodling or snoozing during testimony. In stark contrast with the coverage of State of the Union addresses, a few stationary cameras controlled by a Senate office, rather than an independent news organization, will provide the only viewpoint of the trial floor."Those cameras operate under very strict guidelines: They show the person who is speaking and maybe some wide shots," Terry Murphy, vice president for programming at C-SPAN, said in an interview. "They can't show others reacting or listening. Having our own cameras in there would allow us to cover the trial with a much more full picture of what's going on."C-SPAN wrote to the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, in December, formally requesting access. As of Saturday, the network had heard nothing back.The U.S. news media has come a long way since the country's first impeachment trial, of President Andrew Johnson in 1868, when House impeachment managers sat for a still portrait by famed Civil War photographer Mathew Brady.The Clinton impeachment trial was the first to take place in the age of 24-hour cable news. But journalists in 1999 did not have to contend with the minute-by-minute demands of digital media. Trump's impeachment trial will be the first to be dissected in real-time -- and possibly by the Twitter-happy president himself.On Capitol Hill, parties on both sides of the lawmaker-journalist divide said discussions about access are active. First Amendment groups like the American Civil Liberties Union have weighed in to decry the new limits. The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press gathered signatures from 57 news organizations objecting to the rules.Elisabeth Bumiller, an assistant managing editor and the Washington bureau chief of The New York Times, said in a statement that the restrictions "will severely limit the ability of reporters to gather news during one of the most historic events in the nation's history.""These limits are far more burdensome than the rules that govern press access in the Capitol, even those in effect during the last impeachment trial, and will prevent journalists from freely documenting a public debate in Congress," Bumiller said.McConnell's office, which controls the business of the Senate, declined to comment.On Capitol Hill, there is speculation that the restrictions were put in place because Chief Justice John Roberts, who is presiding over the trial, will be present in the chamber each day. Typically, reporters' movements in the Capitol are limited when high-profile people visit, like Vice President Mike Pence.But congressional correspondents said that, even after several meetings with Senate officials, they did not know why the restrictions had been put in place. Some suspected that Senate leaders believe the less the public knows about the trial, the better."Journalists are the public's eyes and ears in the Capitol," said Leo Shane, a correspondent for Military Times. "We're asking lawmakers to make sure they're not using the excuse of security concerns as a reason to exclude the public from this trial."This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2020 The New York Times Company
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| Migrants tear-gassed as they try to storm into Mexico Posted: 20 Jan 2020 02:21 PM PST  Hundreds of Central Americans from a new migrant caravan tried to storm into Mexico Monday by fording the river that divides the country from Guatemala, but National Guardsmen fired tear gas trying to force them back.
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| AOC Compares Baltimore Riots to Peaceful Richmond Gun-Rights Demonstration Posted: 20 Jan 2020 02:03 PM PST  Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., N.Y.) on Monday contrasted the annual gun rights rally in Richmond, Va. with the riots after the death of Baltimore resident Freddie Gray and protests following the killing of Eric Garner by New York police."When we go out and march for the dignity…of the lives of people like Freddie Gray and Eric Garner, the whole place is surrounded by police in riot gear without a gun in sight [among protesters]," Ocasio-Cortez said at a Monday event. "And here are all of these people [in Richmond], flying Confederate flags with semiautomatic weapons, and there are almost no police officers at that protest."Following the death of Freddie Gray in the back of a police van in Baltimore in 2015, the city saw riots so extensive that Governor Larry Hogan declared a state of emergency, while national-guard units deployed to quell the violence. While the officers who arrested Gray were initially charged with murder, all charges were eventually dropped by the prosecution.During the Second Amendment rally in Richmond, Va. officers arrested one person for covering her face in public, which is banned under Virginia law. The individual was later released, and the rally continued without violence.On Thursday the New York Times reported that three suspected white nationalists had been arrested, with investigators alleging the three would try to ignite violence at the rally. Governor Ralph Northam, who has voiced support for more restrictive gun laws, declared a state of emergency in response to the threat.
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| 30 Doormats That Will Wow Visitors Posted: 21 Jan 2020 08:30 AM PST |
| The Navy Has a Plan to Stop Ship-Killer Missiles Posted: 20 Jan 2020 11:28 PM PST  The threat keeps building from nations like Russia, China, Iran and many others.
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| Explainer: Why is President Donald Trump on trial in the Senate? Posted: 20 Jan 2020 10:04 PM PST  Here is the Democrats' case for removing Trump from office, and the Republican counter-argument. In their articles of impeachment https://www.congress.gov/116/bills/hres755/BILLS-116hres755ih.pdf , Democrats charge that Trump abused his power as president by pressuring the government of Ukraine to help him win re-election. At the heart of the impeachment case is a transcript of a July 25 telephone call in which Trump pressed Ukraine's new president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, to work with U.S. Attorney General William Barr and Trump's personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, to launch a corruption investigation into former Vice President Joe Biden, a top contender for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020.
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| What you need to know about China's Wuhan coronavirus and how it could affect you Posted: 21 Jan 2020 10:46 AM PST  A virus in China has killed six people, infected more than 200, and spread to the US. Here's what you need to know about the disease.
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| Xi Vowed Not to Turn the Screws on Hong Kong, Carrie Lam Says Posted: 21 Jan 2020 09:29 AM PST  (Bloomberg) -- Sign up here to receive the Davos Diary, a special daily newsletter that will run from Jan. 20-24.Chinese President Xi Jinping has offered personal assurances that he won't use the protests in Hong Kong as an excuse to tighten Beijing's controls on the region, Chief Executive Carrie Lam said.Speaking in a Bloomberg Television interview at the World Economic Forum Tuesday, Lam pushed back against the widespread assumption that Xi is tightening controls on Hong Kong as she sought to reassure global investors that the Asian financial center will remain stable despite months of historic and increasingly violent protests."There is no truth in the allegation that the central government is tightening the grip on Hong Kong," Lam said. "The central government has time and again made it very clear that they want Hong Kong to succeed under 'One Country, Two Systems' and a high degree of autonomy.""It was made very clear to me by President Xi Jinping on the three occasions that I met him" in recent months, she added.Lam arrived in Davos after a fresh bout of protest violence in downtown Hong Kong, with four police officers injured in clashes with demonstrators Sunday following an otherwise peaceful rally. More than seven months of pro-democracy protests have battered the former British colony's economy, undermined its reputation for political stability and increased geopolitical tensions between the U.S. and China.China has governed Hong Kong since 1997 under a "one country, two systems" framework that preserves its freedom of expression, independent courts and capitalist financial system. The city's pro-democracy opposition has accused Beijing of eroding that autonomy and stonewalling calls for meaningful direct elections of the chief executive, who's currently selected by a 1,200-member committee.While Lam withdrew legislation allowing extraditions to China that initially prompted the unrest, she has so far refused to consider other key protester demands including an independent probe of the police. Nevertheless, in Davos, Lam hinted that there may be other motivations behind the protests."One has to wonder what are the underlying factors that caused the sustained social unrest in the last few months," she said.The protests have been more subdued since mid-November, when pro-democracy candidates swept elections for local district councils though the city of 7.4 million people remains bitterly divided, with widespread distrust of Beijing and the local government. The main political event this year will be elections for the more powerful Legislative Council in September.Rumors have persisted for months that Beijing may replace Lam, whose approval rating is hovering near a record low of 14%, according to a Hong Kong Public Opinion Program survey released earlier this month. So far, President Xi Jinping has reaffirmed China's support for Lam, although Beijing replaced its main representative in Hong Kong earlier this month with an official some analysts described as a hardliner.Lam herself insisted she wouldn't quit."I will do my utmost to stay in this position and arrest the current situation," she said.To contact the reporters on this story: Haslinda Amin in Singapore at hamin1@bloomberg.net;Dandan Li in Davos, Switzerland, at dli395@bloomberg.net;Iain Marlow in Hong Kong at imarlow1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Brendan Scott at bscott66@bloomberg.net, Daniel Ten KateFor 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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| Meet the General Who Ran Soleimani’s Spies, Guns and Assassins Posted: 21 Jan 2020 01:51 AM PST  They're the Quds Force officers who tracked and killed Iraqis working with the U.S.-led coalition, hunted those deemed hostile to Iranian influence through a council of assassins, and smuggled the spies, money, weapons, and secrets into Iraq that sowed chaos across the country during the American occupation. Qassem Soleimani first gained the attention of Western media through his role in instigating a campaign of covert violence against the U.S. in Iraq which cost the lives of over 600 American troops. But underneath the now famous Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps icon, other officers managed the war that first made Soleimani notorious. For a period during the mid-2000s, one of those officers was Brigadier General Ahmed Foruzandeh, who rose to command the Ramazan Corps, part of the Guard's elite Quds Force, after cutting his teeth in the unit running guerrilla warfare operations during the Iran-Iraq war.'OK, Now What?': Inside Team Trump's Scramble to Sell the Soleimani Hit to America"Although Qassem Soleimani was the architect of that broader strategy, it was his lesser known lieutenants who ran and oversaw the operations," Dr. Afshon Ostovar, a scholar at the Naval Postgraduate School, said. "Foruzandeh was one of the top Quds Force operatives in the field in Iraq, yet his name was hardly known at the time." Declassified documents obtained by The Daily Beast through the Freedom of Information Act offer new details of Foruzandeh's campaign of violence in Iraq during the latter 2000s. They show how Foruzandeh and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) funneled guns, money, and spies into Iraq and assassinated both Americans and Iraqis. And they offer hints that the man who helped Iran kill hundreds of Americans throughout the Iraq war may not have actually retired years ago as he let on, but continued to consult for his former boss long after the war ended.Iranian and American media alike have treated Foruzandeh's old boss, the former Quds Force commander Soleimani, with something approaching hagiography. In profiles and obituaries, he's cast as a legendary "shadow commander" possessed of superhuman abilities and cunning, a judgment not entirely supported by Soleimani's colleagues. By contrast, declassified documents obtained by The Daily Beast and other sources paint a more prosaic picture of Foruzandeh. Like a number of Quds Force personnel, Foruzandeh's career in Iraq drew on nothing more mystical than relationships and experience. His first brush with the world of covert operations in the Iran-Iraq war met with middling success and the guerrilla warfare effort he supported barely moved the needle in the conflict. But by the time the U.S. showed up on Iran's doorstep, Foruzandeh had been carrying out guerrilla warfare and covert operations across the Iran-Iraq border for nearly 20 years with some of the same people and organizations. "They clearly have, one, home court advantage. Two, these guys have been doing special operations in the region for their entire adult life and they're veterans of the brutal Iran-Iraq war," Doug Wise, a former CIA officer and station chief in Baghdad, told The Daily Beast of Iranian Quds Force officers who worked on Iraq. "These guys are worthy adversaries. They're not 10 feet tall. They have human and physical limitations but extraordinary experience in conducting the operations that they were required to conduct," Wise said. * * *"Big picture," Col. Donald Bacon, then the chief of special operations and intelligence information for the coalition, said in a 2007 press conference, "the Ramazan Corps is the organization that does operations here in Iraq to—they use it to—they're the ones who transit in the weapons, the funding and help coordinate Iraqi militia extremists into Iran to get them training and then get them back into Iraq."Ramazan was the Quds Force unit in charge of causing chaos in Iraq and, at least for a time, Foruzandeh was its commander. The unit, which dated back to the Iran-Iraq war, divided its forces between a handful of sub-commands along the Iraqi border. Foruzandeh had worked in Fajr command, based in Ahwaz, Iran, which handled operations in Basra and southern Iraq, working his way up to deputy commander of Ramazan.By 2007, as violence in Iraq peaked, intelligence reports surveyed Iranian covert operations in Iraq as the U.S. turned its attention away from the Sunni jihadist insurgency and towards the violence instigated by Iran and its proxies. The documents include raw reporting marked as "not finally evaluated intelligence" from sources whose motivations are described as "based on favorable experiences with U.S. forces and desire to rid Iraq of destructive foreign influences" but they track broadly with what U.S. officials have said about Ramazan Corps and its personnel.Taken together, they show a sprawling campaign of covert violence with Foruzandeh and the Ramazan Corps in charge.The documents spend considerable space detailing the elaborate process by which the Iranian-overseen "Golden Death Squad" targeted, approved, and carried out assassinations against Iraqis they viewed as obstacles. The unit, the report wrote, "consists of Iranian intelligence leadership that provide guidance and funding to Iraqis that are recruited from [Jaish al-Mahdi], Badr Corps, the Al-Fadilah Party, and other Shia Iraqi parties and militias that conduct assassination operations against former Ba'ath party members, Iraqis that are working with the [Coalition Forces], and Iraqis that are not supporting Iranian influence in Iraq."Iranian officers shuttled Iraqi members of the assassination teams to Ahwaz, Iran, the headquarters of Ramazan's Fajr command, for training. The 10-day long course included instruction from Iranian officers on "information collection to support the targeting of coalition forces in Iraq, assassinations, and the use of indirect fire systems such as Katyusha rockets and mortars." Iran also trained its proxies in the use of "what is described as very sophisticated explosives that can penetrate [Coalition Forces'] armor," an apparent reference to the notorious Iranian-made explosively formed projectiles which killed and maimed hundreds of American troops. When it came time to decide who would be killed, Quds Force officers set up a process for adjudicating assassination targets, giving Iraqi allies a role in the process, according to the documents. "Iraqis that are agents of the Iranians are allowed to produce lists of Iraqis that are to be assassinated," it notes. "Most of these Iraqis that are authorized to make decisions regarding who is to be killed by the Golden Death Squad are members of the Iraqi government and security forces." Meetings of the hit squad reportedly took place at the Basra governor's office where members of Basra police intelligence would "routinely attend."Iranian intelligence officers also nominated their own targets for assassination. Their names were handed to a member of the Iranian-backed Badr militia. The Iranian officer who passed the targets along—his name is redacted in the report—is described as "a Persian Iranian that is fluent in Iraqi Arabic and has a southern Iraqi accent due to the years he has spent in Iraq."Those slated for assassination included not just former Baathists but Iraqis who worked with the U.S.-backed coalition. The documents recount how one Quds Force officer, assigned to Ramazan's Fajr command in southern Iraq, ran an Iraqi agent who photographed coalition informants for the IRGC. The unnamed Quds Force officer then "passe[d] the pictures to Iraqis that he tasks and funds to kill those identified by [redacted's] reporting and pictures."In at least one case, Foruzandeh reportedly intervened to help one of his militia allies after coalition officials arrested them. Mehdi Abdmehd al-Khalisi allegedly ran the Muntada al-Wilaya militia, a small, Iranian-backed Shiite militia implicated in the murder of a number of former Baathist officials and an attack on coalition troops. When coalition officials arrested al-Khalisi in 2005, senior Iraqi officials began pressuring the coalition to release him. A classified cable leaked by WikiLeaks show that informants told the U.S. that al-Khalisi had been communicating with Foruzandeh about attacks on British forces in Iraq's Maysan governorate via encrypted telegrams as early as 2003. After his arrest, the cable says that an informant of "unknown reliability" reported that Foruzandeh "has authorized an expenditure of up to $500,000 for operations to secure Mr. al-Khalisi's release, and that senior [Iraqi Transitional Government] officials have received telephone calls from the Brigadier requesting assistance." Along with the assassinations came Iranian weapons and trainers. Reporting by the Long War Journal first sketched out Ramazan's "rat lines" in Iraq and documents obtained by The Daily Beast note that the unit oversaw a "complex smuggling apparatus from Ahwaz, Iran into Iraq" that included "weapons, information, financial support, and Iranian intelligence officers." The money, guns, and Iranian personnel began their journey in Ahwaz and were handed off to smugglers at the border with Iraq.Iranian intelligence officers would vet smugglers for loyalty and to ensure that they had a "pre-existing relationship with the [Iraqi border police] because of their tribal relationship"—a relationship that nonetheless "usually involves a pre-arranged bribe." Once across the border, smugglers toting money, guns, and Iranian personnel were "typically met by a reception element that represents a Shia militia group that the operation support package was built for."In the ports of southern Iraq, Ramazan agents smuggled weapons via hidden compartments in the fuel tanks of fishing boats, according to the documents. As violent as Foruzandeh's tenure in occupation-era Iraq war was, he wasn't entirely averse to covert diplomacy. Ahmed Chalabi, the exiled Iraqi lobbyist who helped push the Bush administration to war in Iraq, met with Foruzandeh in the spring of 2004, according to a 2008 biography of Chalabi by journalist and former Daily Beast senior correspondent Aram Roston. At the time, Chalabi had transitioned from pro-war lobbyist to an Iraqi member of parliament and was seeking to accommodate himself to Iran's newfound influence in Iranian politics. Some time after the meeting, the U.S. learned that Iranian intelligence had suddenly realized American spies were reading their cable traffic and had broken their codes. A few months later, American intelligence officials told The New York Times they believed Chalabi had walked into the Iranian embassy in Baghdad and blown the operation to the station chief of Iranian intelligence at the embassy. Chalabi denied any involvement in the leak but the incident led the Bush administration to end its relationship with him.* * *Foruzandeh's father worked for the Abadan oil company and when he left the company, his family of 13 sons and daughters moved to Khorramshahr, just across the border from Basra in Iraq. His son Ahmed was an early supporter of Iran's Islamic Revolution, a stance which earned him a stint in prison at university—thanks to the ruling Shah's secret police—and the revolutionary bonafides that came with it when the Shah's government was ousted.In the early days of the Islamic Revolution, Foruzandeh worked with the IRGC to identify and arrest Arab dissidents in Khorramshahr opposed to the new government. His knowledge of the area, proven commitment to the regime, and background in underground work made him a natural fit for intelligence when the Iran-Iraq war started."After Iraq's invasion, he was the intelligence chief of the Khorramshahr unit that later played a key role in re-taking the city from the Baathists in 1982," Amir Toumaj, an Iran researcher who's written extensively on the Quds Force, explained of Foruzandeh. "His biography states that he started developing a relationship with Hassan Bagheri around the time of Khorramshahr's fall and sent him reports," Toumaj says. Bagheri, the founder of the Islamic Republic's intelligence service, was killed during the war but went on to become one of Iran's most famous "martyrs." His brother, Mohammad, is now Iran's highest-ranking military officer and it was those kinds of connections that would help pave Foruzandeh's ascent to the highest ranks of the IRGC.Trump, Iran, and Where 'The Forever War' Was Always HeadedLater in the war, Foruzandeh left his position in Khorramshahr's 22nd Badr Brigade and joined the Ramazan Corps. The unit was designed to work with dissident groups in Iraq and carry out guerrilla operations behind enemy lines while the otherwise static style of trench warfare that characterized the Iran-Iraq conflict played out. At Ramazan's Fajr headquarters, where Foruzandeh first worked, the unit carried out operations with Iraqi Shiite groups like the Badr Brigade, a group of exiled dissidents and former prisoners of war. The militia was originally "conceived by the Iranians as an adjunct to the IRGC-QF Ramazan Corps," according to a 2005 State Department cable, and drew support from their political arm, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq. During the Iran-Iraq war, radio broadcasts from Tehran hailed operations by the "Ramazan Headquarters" which claimed assassination attempts with "Iraqi mujahidin" on Saddam's interior minister Samir al-Shaykhali in Baghdad, the "revolutionary execution" of a Ba'ath Party official in Baghdad's Mansur neighborhood, and having set fire to one of Saddam's Baghdad palaces "used for pleasure by Ba'ath party officials and senior officers of that regime."Ramazan's Fajr headquarters and the Badr Brigade didn't do much to change the tide of the war. It ended in a bloody stalemate in 1988, more of exhaustion than because of guerrilla daring. One of the Ramazan Corps's most valuable relationships actually lay farther north with Kurdish forces from the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan. The group carried out strikes deep into Iraqi Kurdish territory with Ramazan's backing, including a 1986 raid on Iraqi oil infrastructure in Kirkuk (later memorialized in a cheesy Iranian action flick, Kirkuk Operation).But the relationships forged by Ramazan with Iraqi Shia militants would prove useful to both the Revolutionary Guards and Iran years down the road when groups like Badr took on an important role in Iraqi politics and security. When the war ended, both Ramazan Corps and Foruzandeh remained focused on Iraq, particularly during the Shia uprising against Saddam at the end of the Persian Gulf War. One Iranian news account put Foruzandeh in charge of working with Iranian-backed militias to support the uprising "in order to speed up the support of the Iraqi Mujahideen" because his unit, Ramazan's Fajr headquarters, was closest to the revolt in Basra.There's not much evidence about how Foruzandeh spent his time in the interim between America's first two wars in Iraq. The most evidence available is a fragmentary report from Saddam-era intelligence documents captured by the U.S. after the war that shows Foruzandeh running an agent inside a camp for the Mujahideen-e-Khalq, an Iranian dissident cult group which fought on behalf of Iraq during the war and carried out a series of terrorist attacks in Iran.* * *Not many senior Ramazan Corps veterans appear to have retired. Iraj Masjedi, another Quds Force Iraq veteran, took over as Iran's ambassador in Baghdad in 2017. Abdul Reza Shahlai, who served in Iraq during the occupation alongside Foruzandeh, is now at 63 years old reportedly the top Quds Force officer in Yemen and was unsuccessfully targeted in a U.S. airstrike there the same night that special operations forces killed Soleimani.After the U.S. wound down its occupation in Iraq, Foruzandeh, gray-haired and portly, gave every impression of having retired and contented himself with the hobbies of old age, despite a U.S. sanctions designation on him during the war. He told an Iranian news outlet that he'd retired from the Quds Force in 2008, and was working on an oral history project about his hometown. In public, he spent his spent time shuffling between memorial ceremonies for fallen comrades. It doesn't appear to be true.Another declassified intelligence document obtained by The Daily Beast offers hints that Foruzandeh may not have retired after all. The report, an account of senior Iranian officials' participation in a museum project "documenting lessons learned from the Iran-Iraq war," suggests he kept at least a consulting role in Quds Force operations. In describing the background of officials present at the meeting, the report says Foruzandeh still dabbled in "management of personnel and logistic support to IRGC-QF external activities." Iran's Khorasan province "has been recently added to his portfolio." Iran's Khorasan province borders northwest Afghanistan and by 2013, the Obama administration had already been arguing for years that Quds Force officers were secretly supporting the Taliban in order to weaken U.S. and NATO forces in the country. There are some reasons to be skeptical of the declassified report. The sources claim that Foruzandeh was appointed a director of Iran's Iran-Iraq war museum, but he's not listed by the museum as an official or referred to as such in news accounts. It's also dated around the same time Foruzandeh gave an interview to an Iranian news outlet announcing that he was working on a history project about his hometown's role in the Iran-Iraq war.Still, other evidence suggests Foruzandeh was still in the irregular warfare business.In 2014, one of Foruzandeh's closest colleagues in the Quds Force, fellow brigadier general and Ramazan Corps veteran Hamid Taghavi, was killed by ISIS in Iraq. The death came as a surprise, not least because Taghavi was one of the highest-ranking IRGC officers killed in Iraq since the Iran-Iraq war. Like Foruzandeh, Taghavi was also supposed to have left active duty. Instead, he was in Iraq supporting a Shiite militia loyal to Iran, Sayara al-Khorasani, and organizing Iran's fight against ISIS."Commander Taghavi was retired. No one thought he'd go to Iraq and be able to play a role in the mobilization and organization of the [Iraqi Popular Mobilization Units militia]," Foruzandeh told a meeting of Ahwaz city officials after his death. Taghavi's death hit Foruzandeh hard and he would break down in tears recounting his comrade's life when talking to reporters. In one interview, Foruzandeh suggested he'd been in contact with Taghavi by phone shortly before his death and offered advice for his work standing up pro-Iranian militias after ISIS took Mosul"He came to the place where we were stationed," Foruzandeh said without elaborating. "We told him about the situation in Iraq, the characteristics of the conflict, the various Iraqi groups, and the challenges that existed. The Iraqi forces had deficiencies that needed to be addressed." Taghavi was concerned about Iranian-backed militias' performance during operations in Jurf al-Sakhar, an Iraqi town captured by ISIS and taken back during a brutal operation coordinated by the Quds Force. "He believed that unless these forces received better training they would suffer severe casualties. The casualties these forces suffered were generally due to a lack of proper military training. They didn't know how to move, what to do when they're under fire from the enemy, how to provide cover when attacking, or even how to clear traps and contaminants from an infected area," Foruzandeh recalled.One of the last public glimpses of Foruzandeh comes from an unlikely source: Facebook. Foruzandeh doesn't appear to have a profile, but his acquaintances identified him in pictures during a 2016 visit to meet with Iraqi officials from Maysan Province. The photos show a grandfatherly Quds Force officer with his trademark scowl described as an "advisor" to Iran's Supreme Leader, a tailored visiting dignitary in a place where decades before he was once a spry, hunted guerrilla in hand-me-down fatigues.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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| US envoy say it's his mustache; South Koreans say otherwise Posted: 20 Jan 2020 01:24 AM PST  The U.S. ambassador to South Korea has some unusual explanations for the harsh criticism he's faced in his host country. Or a Japanese ancestry that raises unpleasant reminders of Japan's former colonial domination of Korea? Many South Koreans, however, have a more straight-forward explanation for Harry Harris' struggle to win hearts and minds in Seoul, and it's got more to do with an outspoken manner that they see as undiplomatic and rude.
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| Signs of life at 'no-man's land' around Philippine volcano Posted: 20 Jan 2020 11:48 PM PST  A desolate landscape of ash dunes and bare trees left by the eruption of the Philippines' Taal volcano lay in contrast with a few signs of life at ground zero of the disaster on Tuesday. The island site was buried by massive deposits of ash when Taal erupted last week and remains under a mandatory evacuation order due to a feared bigger blast. Authorities have said any outward signs of an imminent eruption have been weak over the past several days.
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| Security guard 'definitely saved lives' by killing shooter at Kansas City bar, police say Posted: 21 Jan 2020 11:04 AM PST  A Missouri security guard was lauded as a hero after shooting a gunman who killed one person and wounded 15 outside a Kansas City nightclub.
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| Jeff Bezos’s Phone Hacked by Saudi Crown Prince: Report Posted: 21 Jan 2020 02:12 PM PST  Amazon founder Jeff Bezos's phone was hacked by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in 2018, five months before the murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, the Guardian reported on Tuesday.According to the report, Bezos and bin Salman were having a friendly discussion on Whatsapp when on May 1 bin Salman sent the Amazon CEO a video file. That file was likely infected with malware, and in a matter of hours large amounts of data were extracted from Bezos's phone.Bin Salman is currently attempting to open Saudi Arabia to western investment and wean the country's economy off its dependence on oil. However, the prince is suspected of involvement in the murder of Khashoggi, which occurred at the Saudi embassy in Turkey.Khashoggi, a columnist at the Bezos-owned Post, was critical of the Saudi regime and allied himself with an organization funded by Qatar, Saudi Arabia's rival in the Persian Gulf.If confirmed, the hack into Bezos's phone would also raise questions regarding how the National Enquirer tabloid received text messages between Bezos and his mistress in early 2019, including photos of the two in various revealing states.On February 7, Bezos published the photos online to prove that American Media Inc., the owner of the Enquirer, was attempting to blackmail him to stop the Amazon CEO's investigation into how the Enquirer obtained the text messages in the first place."Of course I don't want personal photos published, but I also won't participate in their well-known practice of blackmail, political favors, political attacks and corruption," Bezos wrote at the time. "I prefer to stand up, roll this log over and see what crawls out."
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| Why America Stores 50 B61 Nuclear Bombs in Turkey Posted: 21 Jan 2020 02:00 AM PST  Seems like a questionable idea.
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| Four Big Things to Watch For as Impeachment Trial Begins Posted: 21 Jan 2020 04:29 AM PST ![Four Big Things to Watch For as Impeachment Trial Begins]( "Four Big Things to Watch For as Impeachment Trial Begins") (Bloomberg Opinion) -- Get Jonathan Bernstein's newsletter every morning in your inbox. Click here to subscribe.After the formalities last week, the U.S. Senate on Tuesday will begin the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump for real. Republican Leader Mitch McConnell has prepared a plan for how the Senate will proceed, which is in many ways similar to what the Senate agreed to in 1999 for the impeachment trial of President Bill Clinton. But in several ways, it departs from that precedent. The plan must be adopted by the Senate. Before the final vote, Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer will offer one or more amendments laying out alternative procedures. It appears, from reporting on Monday, that McConnell has the votes to do it his way. But there are still several things to watch for.Will all 53 Republicans unite behind McConnell in these early procedural votes? That would certainly be a show of strength. It wouldn't guarantee that McConnell will get his way later on, when votes will be taken about witness testimony and other evidence, and perhaps to dismiss the case before a final verdict. But it would at least hint that Republicans will be united when it counts. (Remember that for procedural motions, Republicans can win even if only 51 of the 53 Senators stick together. That's way more unity than they'll need for any final votes on the articles of impeachment, where Democrats will need at least 20 Republicans to join them to remove Trump from office.) Will Chief Justice John Roberts play a more aggressive or more passive role in the proceedings? It's possible, as Margaret Taylor argues at Lawfare, that Roberts may have to make at least one critical decision on Tuesday on whether information may be presented on matters that surfaced after the House of Representatives finished its impeachment inquiry. How he acts may signal what he'll do as the trial goes along. Of course, there's also the question if he is more aggressive of whether he'll be even-handed or intercede mainly for the president's defense. To what extent will the president's defense team — and Republican Senators — lean on preposterous claims that a president cannot be impeached for abuse of power? Or will they instead put more emphasis on arguments that he isn't guilty of the specific allegations the House has made? Will they really stick with the claim, repeated in Saturday's filing, that somehow the entire impeachment is invalid because the lead impeachment manager, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, paraphrased Trump's words in a House hearing? Or will they actually make serious arguments? How heavily do Democrats want to push their procedural grievances? Over the month since the House passed the articles of impeachment, Democrats have put Senate trial arrangements front and center in their messaging — even more than the actual charges against Trump. They certainly will be fighting over the rules on Tuesday, since that's the day for it, and they may feel that they have some complaints that will put public opinion on their side. For example, calling witnesses in the Senate trial polls extremely well. McConnell's plan is to give the House the same 24 hours to present its case that it had in 1999, but to do it in two marathon 12-hour sessions going well past midnight instead letting it happen over four days. That, too, will probably seem unfair to most people. I suspect some Democrats believe their best strategy is to force swing-state senators up for election this year to take difficult votes, while others think the best strategy is to pound on the evidence against the president. 1\. Tom Mann and Norm Ornstein on bipartisanship.2\. Kimberly Cowell-Meyers and Carolyn Gallaher at the Monkey Cage on Northern Ireland.3\. Seth Masket at Mischiefs of Faction with all the evidence of what's wrong with legislative term limits. As it happens, state-level term limits has been one of the reforms political scientists have paid the most attention to, mainly because (and not to take anything away from the authors Masket cites) it's such an easy thing to study: There's a clear before and after for the states that have passed these limits, plus it's possible to compare across states. 4\. Jamelle Bouie on term limits.5\. Alexander Agadjanian and G. Elliott Morris on non-ideological voters. 6\. And my Bloomberg Opinion colleague Justin Fox on single-family zoning.Get Early Returns every morning in your inbox. Click here to subscribe. Also subscribe to Bloomberg All Access and get much, much more. You'll receive our unmatched global news coverage and two in-depth daily newsletters, the Bloomberg Open and the Bloomberg Close.To contact the author of this story: Jonathan Bernstein at jbernstein62@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Jonathan Landman at jlandman4@bloomberg.netThis column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Bloomberg LP and its owners.Jonathan Bernstein is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering politics and policy. He taught political science at the University of Texas at San Antonio and DePauw University and wrote A Plain Blog About Politics.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinionSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Don't shun China, urges Merkel at American prize ceremony Posted: 21 Jan 2020 11:50 AM PST  German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Tuesday urged Western global powers to include China in their multilateral system and treat Beijing equally rather than freeze it out and risk slipping into a Cold War-style bipolar order. Speaking after receiving a prize at the American Academy in Berlin, attended by former U.S. Secretaries of State Henry Kissinger and John Kerry, Merkel said China's economic success posed challenges. "Of course we also have to build up fairness, of course we have to practise multilateralism such that the rules apply to everyone," she said.
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| Biden selfie with elevator operator goes viral after 2020 candidate fails to secure New York Times endorsement Posted: 21 Jan 2020 08:35 AM PST  A clip of Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden taking a selfie with an elevator operator has gone viral after the former vice president failed to secure an endorsement from The New York Times.The exchange was captured on camera when Mr Biden was on his way to meet the Times' editorial board as part of a series of interviews with Democratic 2020 election candidates.
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| Homeless Oakland Moms Cut Deal to Buy House They Squatted In Posted: 21 Jan 2020 12:32 PM PST  A group of homeless mothers evicted and arrested after squatting in an empty Oakland residence have reached an agreement to buy the home in a radical conclusion to a struggle that shone a renewed spotlight on the Bay Area's dire housing shortage. The women, known collectively as Moms 4 Housing, occupied a house in West Oakland from November until Alameda County Sheriff's deputies removed them in a pre-dawn raid on January 14. Cops also arrested two of the women, along with two men on the scene. Around the same time as that eviction raid, hundreds of supporters gathered at the house to express solidarity with the mothers' rallying cry of "housing is a human right." On Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Moms 4 Housing announced that the women—who were released from jail last week—reached an agreement to purchase the property from its owner with the help of a local nonprofit, Oakland Community Land Trust. "This is what happens when we organize, when people come together to build the beloved community. Today we honor Dr. King's radical legacy by taking Oakland back from banks and corporations," said Dominique Walker, one of the mothers who was living in the home.Eviction Squad Tosses Moms on Street in Ultra-Rich Bay AreaThe house, owned by the Southern California real estate company Wedgewood, had remained empty for two years, even as homelessness in Oakland rose by nearly half in the same time period. Members of Oakland's city council had urged the company to make a deal with the mothers to end the dispute. In a statement, the company said, "Wedgewood is thankful for the outpouring of support for our company throughout the illegal occupation of our Oakland property. We appreciate the local, state and national support for property owners as well as the public's support for non-violent discussion and action." Activists who worked with the mothers were quick to brandish the outcome as not just a win but a precedent they might repeat."The moms fought for all of Oakland," said Carroll Fife, director of the Oakland chapter of the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment. "Now Wedgewood has pledged to work with the City of Oakland's Housing and Community Development Department and the Oakland Community Land Trust to negotiate a first right of refusal program for all Oakland properties they own and we will hold them to it." 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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| Elizabeth Warren says half her cabinet will be women Posted: 21 Jan 2020 08:13 AM PST  Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren on Tuesday promised to appoint women or nonbinary people to at least half of the top positions in the executive branch if she wins the presidency.
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| Malaysia sends back trash, says won't be world's waste bin Posted: 19 Jan 2020 07:21 PM PST  Shipments of unwanted rubbish have been rerouted to Southeast Asia since China banned the import of plastic waste in 2018, but Malaysia and other developing countries are fighting back. Environment Minister Yeo Bee Yin said another 110 containers are expected to be sent back by the middle of this year.
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| Photos of starving lions in Sudan spark campaign to save them Posted: 20 Jan 2020 07:35 PM PST  One of the five lions at Khartoum's Al-Qureshi Park is believed to have died.
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| The married couple who created a wacky sex button went on 'Shark Tank' and the investors didn't understand why it even exists Posted: 21 Jan 2020 10:41 AM PST  LoveSync, a device that lets you silently indicate to your partner you're in the mood for sex, went viral in 2019 and was heavily mocked online.
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| Why Did North Korea Sink the South Korean Warship Cheonan in 2010? Posted: 21 Jan 2020 01:50 AM PST  What was the point of this terrible act?
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| McConnell Plans Tighter Timeline in Trump Impeachment Trial Posted: 20 Jan 2020 06:13 PM PST  (Bloomberg) -- Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell plans to give House impeachment managers just two days to prosecute their case against President Donald Trump -- a move that accelerates the timetable for a trial Republicans intend to end in a quick acquittal.The resolution, which was released Monday, gives House managers and Trump's defense 24 hours of floor time each to make their arguments, but limits them to just two days each, instead of the three allowed in Bill Clinton's 1999 impeachment trial. The rules would also allow the president's team to seek a quick dismissal of the charges, though many Republican senators have said they should at least hear the case.The White House immediately backed McConnell's rules but didn't indicate whether it would press for a quick vote on a motion to dismiss."Protecting the president's rights to offer pretrial motions was critical for us to support the package, and we're very gratified with the resolution," said Eric Ueland, the White House's liaison to Congress. "I'm not going to talk about trial strategy publicly.""It makes sense" to file a motion to dismiss because in every criminal case where there is no wrongdoing, you should try and get a dismissal, Alan Dershowitz, a member of Trump's defense team, said in an interview Monday evening.Neither side will be allowed to call witnesses or seek documents under the proposed rules unless a majority of the Senate votes to allow such motions after the opening phase of the trial, including up to 16 hours of senators' questions. The trial is set to begin Tuesday and the rules need to be approved by a majority of the Senate.Trial BriefsEarlier Monday, the White House and impeachment managers from the House of Representatives released filings in which both sides argued that constitutional separation of powers is at stake in the trial.The president's 171-page filing contends that the House failed to prove that the president explicitly linked aid for Ukraine to an investigation Trump sought into political rival and former Vice President Joe Biden, who is seeking to challenge Trump in the November election. And the president's lawyers argued that the Senate should swiftly reject the impeachment articles.The White House also announced that eight House Republicans who've been among the president's most vocal defenders would serve as part of his team "working to combat this hyper-partisan and baseless impeachment."They include Representatives Doug Collins, Jim Jordan, Mark Meadows and Elise Stefanik, all of whom were prominent during the House's impeachment investigation and have made frequent media appearances on behalf of the president. The administration statement didn't say exactly what their roles will be during the trial.Calling WitnessesIn the rules resolution, McConnell bowed to the demands of four Republican senators who insisted that there at least be a vote on whether to call witnesses. Those senators are Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah and Lamar Alexander of Tennessee.In a statement Monday, Romney said he had "made clear to my colleagues and the public that the Senate should have the opportunity to decide on witnesses following the opening arguments, as occurred in the Clinton trial." But he said he would oppose any attempt to vote on witnesses sooner.Alexander backed the resolution and said he supported a vote on whether to hear witnesses or view additional evidence "at the appropriate time." But he said in a statement that the Senate could decide that no other evidence is necessary.Democratic Senator Chris Coons, who successfully pushed a small group of Republicans to back a limited reopening of the FBI background check into Brett Kavanaugh in 2018, appealed to them Monday night to reject McConnell's resolution."The proposal that Majority Leader McConnell just released looks more like a cover up than a fair trial," Coons said. "His proposed rules would rush the presentation of the case, erect barriers to witnesses, and even delay admission of evidence already in the record."Even if there are enough votes to seek testimony, it's not yet clear whether a majority of 51 senators will agree on a particular package of witnesses.If they do, the trial could extend past the Feb. 3 Iowa caucus and the Feb. 4 State of the Union address.Either way, McConnell's resolution lays the ground work for a trial that would likely last far fewer than the 37 calendar days of the Clinton trial.'Rushing the Trial'Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer accused McConnell of casting aside public statements that he would use the same rules as under the Clinton trial, adding that the majority leader is clearly "hell-bent on making it much more difficult to get witnesses and documents and intent on rushing the trial through."He said in a statement Monday evening that he will offer amendments to alter "the many flaws" in a "deeply unfair proposal," as well as to subpoena further witnesses and documents.Republicans are expected to vote against those motions, at least until later in the trial. At that point, Schumer will either succeed in splitting the GOP and getting potentially damaging testimony and documents or a ready-made campaign issue about Republicans doing Trump's bidding.Under the process outlined by McConnell and expected to be backed by his majority, the leader will move swiftly Tuesday to adopt rules he adapted from Clinton's trial.'Ready to Go'"We'll be ready to go," McConnell told reporters late Monday.During the Clinton trial, a motion to dismiss was offered by a Democratic senator, Robert Byrd. The motion, which failed, was offered only after the impeachment managers and defense presented their cases and after senators asked questions of both sides.McConnell's proposed rules also don't automatically accept the record of evidence compiled by the House in its impeachment inquiry, though that record will still be printed and distributed. A senior GOP leadership aide said the Senate won't simply accept the House record because of what Republicans said was a lack of due process for the president in the other chamber's proceedings.McConnell's resolution will be debated and voted on Tuesday afternoon along with proposed amendments -- a process that will chew up much of the day. Both sides have until Wednesday morning to make pretrial motions, which will be debated Wednesday afternoon.At the conclusion of the pretrial motions, the House impeachment managers would start their two days of arguments.House legal aides working with the impeachment managers complained earlier in the day about the lack of advance information from McConnell on the rules and structure of the trial, less than 24 hours before it was to begin.The aides said the managers would oppose McConnell's efforts to accelerate the trial.(Updates with House Republicans on defense team, beginning in the ninth paragraph.)\--With assistance from Billy House, Justin Sink, Josh Wingrove and Jordan Fabian.To contact the reporters on this story: Steven T. Dennis in Washington at sdennis17@bloomberg.net;Laura Litvan in Washington at llitvan@bloomberg.net;Daniel Flatley in Washington at dflatley1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Kevin Whitelaw at kwhitelaw@bloomberg.net, Joe Sobczyk, Anna EdgertonFor 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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| Nigerian military clears thousands from Lagos waterfront Posted: 21 Jan 2020 10:21 AM PST  Nigerian navy personnel shot in the air Tuesday as they sought to clear a waterfront community of 10,000 people in the latest mass-eviction around economic hub Lagos. Bulldozers rumbled into Tarkwa Bay, a semi-rural area on an island in the city of some 20 million, as part of an operation the military say is aimed officially at stopping the looting of nearby oil pipelines. AFP correspondents heard gunfire during the operation.
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| Mothers who occupied vacant Oakland house will be allowed to buy it Posted: 20 Jan 2020 04:07 PM PST  Intervention of California governor helps Moms 4 Housing group score victory in fight against state's homeless crisisThe homeless mothers who took over a vacant house in Oakland, California, and occupied it for almost two months will be allowed to purchase the property – a major victory in a movement working to keep such homes out of the possession of speculators.The group Moms 4 Housing entered the house on Magnolia Street on 18 November with the intent to stay. The house had sat vacant for more than two years before it was purchased in July at a foreclosure auction for $501,078 by Wedgewood Properties, a real estate investment company with a history of buying up foreclosed-upon houses cheaply, evicting the tenants, renovating the homes and then putting them back on the market at much higher prices.Housing advocates say companies such as Wedgewood fueled the housing crisis that now grips the state, which needs anywhere between 1.8m and 3.5m new housing units by 2025. More than 15,500 units remain vacant in Oakland alone, according to the latest US Census Bureau data, while 4,071 people are homeless. House-flipping has led to rapid gentrification, which then in turn led to the widespread displacement of black residents.In Oakland, 78% of the homeless population reported that their last place of residence before becoming homeless was within county limits. Seventy per cent were black.Moms 4 Housing chose the Magnolia Street house in part to try to force Wedgewood to negotiate the sale of the home back to the community."This is what happens when we organize, when people come together to build the beloved community," Dominique Walker, one of the mothers who lived in the house with her two children, said in a statement, on the day that America marked Martin Luther King Day. "Today we honor Dr King's radical legacy by taking Oakland back from banks and corporations."With the housing and homelessness crisis worsening each day, the mothers received widespread support for their cause, from local lawmakers to California's governor, Gavin Newsom, who praised the activists.Moms 4 Housing had brought the issue to court, but a judge ruled in favor of Wedgewood. Sheriff deputies arrived in the early hours of 15 January to evict them, arresting two of the mothers and two of their supporters.Wedgewood has maintained that the mothers had committed a criminal act in breaking into the house, and the house legally belonged to the company."Wedgewood has always been and continues to be open to thoughtful and purposeful discussions," spokesman Sam Singer said in a statement."After regaining possession of Magnolia Street, we engaged in discussions with governor Gavin Newsom, mayor Libby Schaaf and councilman Larry Reid. These led to progress that everyone should agree is a step in the right direction in helping to address Oakland's homelessness and housing crisis."
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| Amanda Knox posts selfie in old prison uniform as her 'something old' to prepare for wedding Posted: 21 Jan 2020 09:39 AM PST  With just 40 days left until her wedding, like many a bride-to-be, Amanda Knox has a long to-do list to get through before the big day.Ms Knox revealed a unique "something old" in a post on Instagram as she knuckles down to get through the tasks at hand – her old uniform from her time in an Italian prison.
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| Police: Dad strangles coyote to defend family under attack Posted: 21 Jan 2020 06:24 AM PST ![Police: Dad strangles coyote to defend family under attack]( "Police: Dad strangles coyote to defend family under attack") A coyote attacked a pair of dogs, bit a woman and skirmished with a vehicle before being killed by a father defending his family on a walk Monday, police said. The same coyote is likely connected to three attacks that happened relatively close together and throughout the course of an hour, Kensington Police Chief Scott Cain said Monday. Police say they believe the coyote attacked a vehicle on a roadway in Hampton Falls, New Hampshire, bit a 62-year-old woman and her dogs on a porch in Kensington and then attacked a family walking on a trail in Exeter.
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| "The Rock" opens up about dad's "quick" death Posted: 21 Jan 2020 03:13 AM PST  Rocky "Soul Man" Johnson died last week at the age of 75 – and in an emotional video, "The Rock" said he would deliver his dad's eulogy.
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| China’s Deadly Coronavirus Cover-Up Is Getting Worse as First Case Hits U.S. Posted: 21 Jan 2020 09:39 AM PST  HONG KONG—A new virus is sweeping through eastern and central China. It gives people a fever, a dry cough, shortness of breath, and fluid in the lungs. So far, according to official statistics, six have died and nearly 300 have been confirmed to be infected, but estimates of infections run much higher, in the thousands. Medical professionals who were tending to patients have themselves fallen ill. The Next Plague Is Around the CornerThere are confirmed cases in Japan, Thailand, Taiwan, and South Korea—and now the United States.The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) confirmed on Tuesday that it had identified a first case of 2019 Novel Coronavirus in the state of Washington. The United States and other nations and territories have been preparing response plans, even quarantines, for weeks. This in response to "growing indications that limited person-to-person spread is happening," said a statement from the CDC. "It's unclear how easily this virus is spreading between people. ... This is a rapidly evolving situation."So, nations and territories around the world are on alert, but things in China, the government wants you to believe, are just fine.On Monday night, China's top medical professionals recognized that this coronavirus is now transmitting from human to human. The statement was made days ahead of the Lunar New Year rush, when much of the country travels for an extended holiday, people jostling for space on packed trains, buses, boats, and planes. Some have already canceled their journeys, opting to remain in their cities of work and residence instead of returning home. But a massive temporary migration involving up to three billion trips is still expected to take place as we head toward the end of the week.Already, many pharmacies have sold all their face masks that were in stock, but the Chinese government is eager to project the image that there is no brewing epidemic. Some train station and airport workers were told that they are not allowed to wear face masks to work, for fear that their precautions might spark panic among travelers. In Wuhan, where a meat and poultry market has been identified as ground zero for the viral outbreak, a massive banquet was organized with 40,000 families in attendance.The coronavirus was first detected in Wuhan in mid-December, but body temperature screening equipment was not installed in the city's airports and train stations until a month later.Press coverage about the virus is tightly controlled in China, and information about it is stifled online. On popular Chinese social media platforms, posts by users whose relatives have died after suffering from pneumonia-like symptoms matching those of coronavirus patients were wiped, prompting outrage and accusations that the Chinese Communist Party is withholding information about how far the virus has spread.Contrast that with precautions taken by entities outside of mainland China. Cathay Pacific, Hong Kong's flagship carrier, is distributing face masks, antiseptic wipes, and health forms for travelers from Wuhan. Korean Air has taken things a step further and placed hazmat suits on some of its planes; the airline is also disinfecting cabins of planes that fly to Wuhan.Airports in East, South, and Southeast Asian countries have dispatched additional staff to screen passengers from China, checking for early symptoms of infection. The same goes for Sydney, New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco, all of which receive many flights from Asia every day. The World Health Organization recommends that any person who might have a respiratory illness should seek medical attention and share their travel history with their physician.There is speculation that conditions in some of China's markets are potent breeding grounds for deadly viruses. A variety of meats and living animals are sold in Wuhan Huanan Seafood Market, where the virus first infected a cluster of people, mostly stall operators. The game includes peacock, wolf pup, porcupine, fox, palm civet, as well as other creatures sourced from different corners of East and Southeast Asia.This, and the general opaqueness of what's going on north of the border, reminds people in Hong Kong and other parts of Asia of the SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) outbreak of 2002 and 2003, when 800 people were killed after an animal virus—possibly one that was active in bats—infected humans in Guangdong and swept through the region, eventually crossing the Pacific to reach the United States and Canada.At the time, the Chinese government suppressed domestic reports about SARS infections, and was slow to share information with the World Health Organization. A doctor who was treating SARS patients in Guangdong entered Hong Kong for a family gathering, and ended up carrying the virus into the city. Many guests at the hotel where he stayed became sick. He died in a local hospital. Now, 80 percent of SARS patients in Hong Kong are thought to have been infected because he was a "super-spreader"—a diseased host who infects an outsized number of people.Habits formed in Hong Kong during the SARS epidemic linger: people wear masks when they have the flu or a cold, elevator buttons and certain other surfaces are disinfected on a regular basis. The outbreak turned Hongkongers' skepticism toward the Chinese government into severe distrust. If people's health and well-being are disregarded in favor of preserving the illusion of normalcy, particularly when an illness could spread rapidly in extremely dense urban environments, how then could people in Hong Kong trust Beijing to ensure their safety and security?On Monday, CCP leader Xi Jinping said public officials at all levels "should resolutely curb the spread of the epidemic." Hu Xijin, editor in chief of party mouthpiece Global Times, has offered spin, suggesting that this outbreak "doesn't look the same" as SARS.Like some other members of the CCP, Hu is placing party allegiance before the safety of every other human being in the country—and abroad. It's an attitude that tells the rest of the world even though memories of an outbreak are still fresh in people's minds, little has changed in a bureaucracy whose goal of clinging to power overcomes basic decency.When a Plague Outbreak Threatened to Overrun San FranciscoRead 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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