| 'People aren't looking for revolution': Biden takes shot at Sanders after blowout win in South Carolina Posted: 01 Mar 2020 08:23 AM PST  Joe Biden took a victory lap on the Sunday talk shows after a decisive win in the South Carolina Democratic primary.
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| A Democrat asked Mike Pompeo to point to things on a blank map in a nod to his awkward geography quiz Posted: 02 Mar 2020 01:32 PM PST  "To your left, you'll see a map of the world," the lawmaker told Pompeo.
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| Eddie Gallagher: 60 Minutes segment profiling Navy SEAL accused of 'normalising' war crimes Posted: 02 Mar 2020 01:01 PM PST  CBS news program 60 Minutes is facing criticism and calls for boycott for a piece the program aired profiling alleged war criminal Eddie Gallagher, whose punishment after posing for a "trophy photo" with a dead teenage ISIS fighter was reversed by President Donald Trump.The program featured 60 Minutes correspondent David Martin interviewing Mr Gallagher - a Navy SEAL who was tried for war crimes - at his home in Florida, conducting interviews and questioning him about his life since his war crimes trial. Mr Martin doesn't shy away from asking Mr Gallagher about his involvement in the death of a wounded, sedated teenage ISIS fighter who he was accused of stabbing in the neck while he was deployed in Iraq.
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| John Roberts is the Supreme Court's new middle. Here's what that means for abortion. Posted: 02 Mar 2020 01:30 AM PST  The question of whether or not the court will respect precedent is a big one.
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| Brief elation, then crushing disappointment for migrants who sent children across U.S. border Posted: 01 Mar 2020 06:26 PM PST |
| Ex-guard frees dozens of hostages in Manila mall, is subdued Posted: 01 Mar 2020 09:26 PM PST  A recently dismissed security guard freed dozens of hostages and was subdued by police after walking out of a shopping mall in the Philippine capital on Monday, ending a daylong hostage crisis in an upscale commercial district near the police and military headquarters, officials said. The former guard at the Greenhills shopping center, identified by police as Archie Paray, left the mall in San Juan City in metropolitan Manila with the remaining hostages, who were then secured by police.
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| Conservative News Giant Newsmax Is Funding a Super PAC for Its Publisher’s GOP Senate Ally Posted: 02 Mar 2020 07:01 AM PST  As the competitive Maine Senate race heated up last summer, the conservative news outlet Newsmax blared a warning to its audience: Democratic moneymen were pouring cash into an effort to flip one of Republicans' most endangered Senate seats."Progressive big-money donors are stepping up their crusade against centrist Sen. Susan Collins," Newsmax senior editor David Patten wrote. "Advertising Analytics reports none of the $1.3 million spent on the Senate race so far has come from Republican sources." Collins' Senate campaign quickly promoted the piece on its own website.Exactly one week later, Newsmax took steps to even the odds. The company donated $50,000 to 1820 PAC, a deep-pocketed super PAC linked to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce supporting Collins' re-election. It was just the fifth time the company had donated directly to a federal political committee, and the first time it had done so since 2015. And it was by far Newsmax's largest-ever donation.Days after the donation, Patten wrote another story relaying allegations of election law violations by Collins' Democratic opponent, Maine State House Speaker Sara Gideon. The following month, Newsmax ran a story touting Collins' lead in the polls—and reporting on a new 1820 PAC ad supporting her. Neither of those articles disclosed the news outlet's donation to the group, nor has any article on the Maine Senate race in the ensuing months.Newsmax is among the web's most popular right-of-center news outlets, boasting about 3.7 million unique visitors in January, according to web analytics service ComScore. It also runs a cable-news channel that the company claims reaches 100 million homes. Newsmax founder and publisher Christopher Ruddy is a friend and acquaintance of President Donald Trump, and is known to frequent the president's Mar-a-Lago club, a short drive from the Newsmax headquarters in Boca Raton.The company has made some high-profile hires in the Trump era, including bringing on former Fox News news executive Michael Clemente as CEO in 2018 (Clemente stepped down after about a year, but still consults for the company). Most recently, Newsmax hired former White House press secretary Sean Spicer to host a weekday news and opinion show. Its regular guests include prominent names such as former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, disgraced former Fox News primetime host Bill O'Reilly, and far-right columnist Michelle Malkin.Newsmax does not hide its conservative leanings. But its five-figure donation to 1820 PAC in August crossed a line from ideologically driven coverage of politics and current events into outright and quantifiable support for an explicit partisan outfit. It's the most apparent illustration to date of the overt politicization of a news organization where, according to a former anchor for the outlet, executives micromanage and tailor news coverage to fit a political agenda."Newsmax tightly controls its on-air and website content to cater to its conservative viewing audience. Executives... are intimately involved in selecting the topics of news stories and how they are covered," alleged Miranda Khan, a former Newsmax TV host, in a lawsuit filed last year. "Prior to joining Newsmax, [Khan] had substantial on-camera experience, particularly in the news industry," the lawsuit added. She said she "had never experienced the level of control she experienced at Newsmax."The lawsuit was settled before Newsmax officially responded to those allegations. Khan declined to comment on her allegations, which have not been previously reported.Ruddy did not respond to inquiries about the allegations, or the ethical issues raised by its political contributions.Ruddy himself is a longtime Collins supporter. "Throughout Susan Collins' 21-year career as a U.S. senator, the Maine Republican has faced criticism from both sides of the aisle, but has always come out with her head held high and her principles intact," he wrote in a glowing opinion column in 2018.That column is now featured on the homepage of 1820 PAC's website. Of the six news items posted in the site's "news" section, three are Newsmax stories or columns.Ruddy has also supported Collins financially ahead of her 2020 re-election fight. He has made just two federal political contributions this cycle: $2,500 to Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), and $5,200 to the Collins Victory Committee, a joint fundraising committee that dispersed the money to Collins' campaign and her leadership PAC. The transfers to her campaign came in June, shortly before Newsmax chipped in to 1820 PAC.It's common for large media companies' political action committees to donate to congressional candidates. But that political giving is usually spread among dozens of recipients of both parties, and generally aligns more with the business interests of parent companies such as News Corp, CBS Entertainment Group, or Disney than with the editorial positions of its news properties.That giving is also almost uniformly done by way of the parent companies' PACs, not by the companies themselves. Corporations can't donate to political candidates directly, but they can set up PACs, generally funded by their employees, that can give up to $5,000 per election cycle to federal political candidates.Corporations can also donate unlimited sums directly to super PACs. But it's extremely rare for a media company to so heavily fund such a group set up for the express purpose of electing a single political candidate. Newsmax's donation to 1820 PAC is all the more noteworthy due to its alignment with the political activity of Ruddy, the company's top executive, and the company's simultaneous promotion of Collins' candidacy through its regular coverage of the Maine Senate race. The contribution also came just months after Khan recounted Newsmax executives' meddling in the company's news coverage.Newsmax has in the past scrutinized and been critical of political donations by journalists and media executives that could be seen as conflicts of interest. When it was revealed during the 2016 presidential campaign that ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos had donated $75,000 to the Clinton Foundation, Newsmax's print and TV arms ran a number of stories relaying allegations of a breach of journalistic ethics. None mentioned Newsmax's own $1-million financial pledge to the foundation."WikiLeaks email revelations from Hillary Clinton's campaign chairman John Podesta," a Newsmax columnist wrote the following year, "show that not only is there a deep connection with the media—reporters, opinion writers, and news anchors—but it also reaches as high as the corporate executive suite."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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| Shrinking shores: Half the world's beaches could disappear because of climate change, study says Posted: 02 Mar 2020 11:59 AM PST  A new study warned of "the near-extinction of almost half of the world's sandy beaches by the end of the century" because of climate change.
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| Putin proposes to enshrine God, heterosexual marriage in constitution Posted: 02 Mar 2020 08:38 AM PST  Russian President Vladimir Putin has submitted to parliament a number of constitutional changes, including amendments that mention God and stipulate that marriage is a union of a man and woman. Shortly afterwards, the lower house unanimously approved the constitutional reform bill in a first reading after less than two hours of debate. Ahead of a second and key reading set for next week, Putin submitted 24 pages worth of new proposals, said State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin.
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| The more Democratic voters have gotten to know Mike Bloomberg, the less they like him Posted: 02 Mar 2020 02:26 PM PST  The number of Democratic voters who said they would be unsatisfied with Bloomberg rose sharply between late January and late February.
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| Waste of Time: Trump Wants to Cut Taxes to Battle the Coronavirus. Posted: 29 Feb 2020 06:21 PM PST  Simply put, coronavirus's impact on the economy is both a consumer confidence issue, as well as a supply-chain and labour-supply issue, which cannot be fixed by any policy.
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| Coronavirus has been spreading for weeks in the US undetected, researchers say Posted: 02 Mar 2020 10:07 AM PST  The coronavirus has been spreading in Washington state undetected, according to a new analysis, as health officials nationwide increasingly fear there are far more cases of the deadly virus that have not yet been confirmed.Trevor Bedford, a computational biologist at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Centre in Seattle, spearheaded a genetic analysis of two virus samples after multiple cases of the mysterious illness were confirmed throughout Washington in recent weeks.
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| UN says Greece has no right to stop accepting asylum requests Posted: 02 Mar 2020 07:38 AM PST |
| Republican Senator to Issue First Subpoena in Hunter Biden, Burisma Probe Posted: 02 Mar 2020 03:39 PM PST  The Republican chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee plans to issue the first subpoena related to the committee's probe of Hunter Biden and Ukrainian energy Burisma Holdings.Senator Ron Johnson said that it is his "intention to schedule a business meeting to consider a committee subpoena," in a letter the Wisconsin Republican sent to members of the committee on Sunday.Johnson plans to subpoena former Ukrainian embassy official Andrii Telizhenko, who worked as a consultant for the Washington-based Blue Star Strategies, a firm Burisma hired to combat accusations of corruption within the energy company."As part of the committee's ongoing investigation, it has received U.S. government records indicating that Blue Star sought to leverage Hunter Biden's role as a board member of Burisma to gain access to, and potentially influence matters at, the State Department," Johnson wrote in his letter.Internal State Department email exchanges reported last year showed that Blue Star leveraged the Biden name to secure a meeting between the gas company and State Department officials and then brought his name up again during that meeting. The meetings were part of a longstanding campaign to rehabilitate Burisma's reputation in Washington following a corruption probe.Biden obtained a lucrative position on the board of Burisma in 2014 after his father, Democratic 2020 candidate Joe Biden, became vice president. In that role, court records suggested he earned at least $50,000 a month advising the energy company on "transparency, corporate governance and responsibility, international expansion and other priorities," as his position was described by Burisma.Biden resigned from the board in April of last year, and it is unclear whether he was aware his name was being used by Blue Star in discussions with the State Department.
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| Fox News Host Claims Chinese People Eating ‘Raw Bats’ to Blame for Coronavirus Posted: 02 Mar 2020 03:44 PM PST  Fox News host Jesse Watters demanded a formal apology from China on Monday before pushing unproven rumors that the new coronavirus came from Chinese citizens "eating raw bats and snakes."With fears heightening around the virus as the death toll in the United States jumped to at least six on Monday, Watters began Monday's broadcast of Fox News chatfest The Five by lashing out at China, which has been the epicenter of the growing pandemic."I would like to just ask the Chinese for a formal apology," Watters said. "This coronavirus originated in China, and I have not heard one word from the Chinese. A simple 'I am sorry' would do."As the rest of his colleagues appeared somewhat embarrassed and tried to laugh off his rant, Watters then insisted that the virus originated from the Chinese eating diseased uncooked animals."Let me tell you why it happened in China," he declared. "They have these markets where they were eating raw bats and snakes.""No, Jesse," co-host Dana Perino pleaded as the other hosts could be seen face-palming."They are very hungry people," Watters continued, causing more laughter. "The Chinese communist government cannot feed the people. And they are desperate, this food is uncooked, it is unsafe. And that is why scientists believe that's where it originated from.""And according to The New York Times, Dana, the Chinese government has been very deceitful and deceptive in the communicating the extent of the infections to the world," Watters concluded. "So, as I said, tomorrow I will expect an apology."Except it is not clear that COVID-19, as it the disease is officially known, originated at a Chinese market in which shoppers purchased bats to eat. Earlier this year, right-wing media was abuzz over claims that "bat soup" was to blame for the disease spreading, based largely on a viral video that was later debunked. (The video was actually of a travel show host in a Pacific island nation, and bats aren't considered a delicacy in Wuhan, the Chinese city where the virus first exploded.)Furthermore, while a "wet market"—markets that sell live animals for food and medicine—was initially believed to be the origin of the outbreak, it appears that specific market may not have been the cause at all, as the earliest known victims had no contact with it. And while the virus likely originated with bats, it still hasn't been fully established how it moved from the bats to humans.Watters, meanwhile, has a history of making culturally insensitive remarks and innuendo, particularly about Asians. The Fox personality sparked outrage in 2016 for a Chinatown segment that featured blatantly racist mockery of Asian-Americans, prompting an apology.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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| LA district attorney sorry husband aimed gun at protesters Posted: 02 Mar 2020 09:22 AM PST  The husband of the first black woman to lead the country's largest local prosecutor's office pointed a gun and said "I will shoot you" to Black Lives Matter members demonstrating outside the couple's home before dawn Monday, prompting an apology from his wife on the eve of her primary election. In an emotional press conference, Los Angeles County District Attorney Jackie Lacey said she and her husband, David, were awakened and frightened by the demonstration that occurred before 6 a.m.. She said he ran downstairs, where she heard him talking to someone, and that when he returned he said there were protesters. The encounter came ahead of a Tuesday primary election in which Lacey is seeking a third term.
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| Warren boxed herself in on Sanders. Now she's struggling to take him on. Posted: 01 Mar 2020 05:00 PM PST  The senator from Massachusetts is still trying to find ways to challenge a front-runner she shares common policy ground with.
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| An armed gunman held 70 people hostage in a Philippines mall for 10 hours before letting everyone go and holding an impromptu news conference Posted: 02 Mar 2020 01:29 PM PST  After opening fire in a mall in Manilla, and taking dozens of people hostage, an armed gunman shared why he did it before police tackled him.
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| A dire phase of the coronavirus outbreak? 'Boom' of US cases 'should be expected' as global death toll tops 3,000 Posted: 02 Mar 2020 05:33 AM PST  A Seattle scientist estimates that a "few hundred" residents of Washington state alone may already have been infected with the deadly new coronavirus.
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| South Korea sect leader wears controversial watch during virus apology Posted: 02 Mar 2020 07:06 AM PST  When the leader of a South Korean religious sect knelt before the nation on Monday, he had hoped to defuse public anger over his church's role in spreading the coronavirus.
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| 7 Examples of Centuries-Old Design That Combat Climate Change Posted: 02 Mar 2020 09:00 AM PST |
| Judge orders Hillary Clinton deposition in email flap Posted: 02 Mar 2020 11:01 AM PST |
| This Is the Horrific Evil American Soldiers Saw in Nazi Germany's Concentration Camps Posted: 02 Mar 2020 07:00 AM PST  A horror the world must never forget.
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| Navy is overhauling education system as US advantages erode Posted: 02 Mar 2020 12:03 PM PST  The U.S. Navy is overhauling its approach to education because the nation no longer has a massive economic and technological edge over potential adversaries, according to a strategy released Monday. The Education for Seapower Strategy 2020, provided to The Associated Press ahead of its release, is the first unified, comprehensive education strategy for the Navy and Marine Corps, said John Kroger, who is implementing the strategy as the Navy's first chief learning officer. It is very much a response to the nation's geopolitical position in the world today, versus the advantages it had at the end of the Cold War, Kroger said, noting China's economic strength and investments in 5G networks, energy storage and other major technologies that matter for war-fighting.
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| Virus hammers garment industries in Cambodia, Vietnam Posted: 02 Mar 2020 02:59 AM PST  Cambodia's multi-billion-dollar garment industry is at risk of chain disruption from the deadly coronavirus, its strongman premier said Monday, as the outbreak cripples Southeast Asia's key industries, bringing border trade to a trickle. The death toll from the virus, which emerged from Wuhan in central China, has reached over 3,000 worldwide -- the bulk of the fatalities in the mainland. Beijing issued unprecedented lockdowns for cities and provinces most affected, bringing to a shuddering halt the so-called "Factory of the World" -- key to a global supply chain.
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| Mexico speeds up extraditions of cartel bosses to U.S. Posted: 02 Mar 2020 12:38 PM PST |
| Bloomberg Criticizes Sanders’s AIPAC Position as ‘Dead Wrong’ Posted: 02 Mar 2020 06:58 AM PST |
| An American who was quarantined to check for signs of coronavirus says he's facing more than $2,600 in bills from his government-mandated hospital stay Posted: 02 Mar 2020 12:03 PM PST  Frank Wucinski and his 3-year-old daughter Annabel evacuated Wuhan, China, in February and were then quarantined at Marine Corps Station Miramar, near San Diego, for two weeks.
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| Greta Thunberg responds to cartoon appearing to show her being assaulted Posted: 01 Mar 2020 09:04 AM PST  On Saturday, Thunberg tweeted: "They are starting to get more and more desperate... This shows that we're winning."
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| Making travel plans? How coronavirus fear is spreading and putting trips in limbo Posted: 02 Mar 2020 10:37 AM PST  What are people doing in the face of unprecedented coronavirus travel anxiety? Some are canceling or modifying trips, and others are forging ahead.
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| Super Tuesday: Professor who predicted last 9 elections says Democrats could face first brokered convention in nearly 70 years Posted: 02 Mar 2020 04:31 AM PST  Days out from Super Tuesday, when voters in 14 states will cast ballots in the Democratic primary, a professor who predicted the past nine elections says that the United States may well be staring down its first brokered convention in nearly 70 years.It's a prospect that has stirred considerable consternation among Democratic Party officials and voters, many of whom have said their primary concern is beating Donald Trump in November — even as an enthusiastic debate over the future of democratic politics has raged on the campaign trail.
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| Russia Is Using Its Oil Exports to Make One Nation Surrender Posted: 01 Mar 2020 01:01 AM PST  Will it work?
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| Snowy Wyoming highway pileup kills 3, injures dozens Posted: 02 Mar 2020 09:32 AM PST  At least three people died and dozens were injured in a pileup involving more than 100 vehicles amid blowing snow that closed part of Interstate 80 in Wyoming, officials said Monday. About 30 people were taken to the emergency room at Memorial Hospital of Carbon County in the small city of Rawlins, hospital spokeswoman Stephanie Hinkle told the Casper Star-Tribune. The smaller pileup, on I-80 just 4 miles (6 kilometers) away from the larger pileup, injured at least seven people, including one person who was hospitalized in critical condition, Sweetwater County Sheriff's Office spokesman Jason Mower said.
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| No handshake for Merkel as Germany coronavirus cases reach 150 Posted: 02 Mar 2020 08:17 AM PST  Germany's interior minister rebuffed Chancellor Angela Merkel's attempt to shake hands with him on Monday as the number of novel coronavirus cases in the country rose to 157 with Berlin reporting its first infection. When Merkel reached out to greet Horst Seehofer at a meeting on migration in Berlin, he smiled and kept both his hands to himself. Health experts have recommended avoiding handshakes as a way of preventing the spread of the novel coronavirus.
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| Stepmom of Missing Colorado Boy Gannon Stauch Charged With Murder Posted: 02 Mar 2020 11:05 AM PST  The stepmother of Gannon Stauch, an 11-year-old who has been missing for five weeks in Colorado Springs, was arrested in South Carolina and charged with first-degree murder, Colorado authorities confirmed Monday.Letecia Stauch, who was the last person to see the boy, faces several other charges including child abuse resulting in death, tampering with a body, and tampering with physical evidence.The El Paso County Sheriff's Office, which has been leading the search for the 11 year old, announced the charges at a press conference in Colorado Springs on Monday."As you can see by the arrest, we no longer believe that Gannon is alive," Lt. Mitch Mihalko said.Sheriff Bill Elder said that investigators will remain "steadfast and diligent until the final prosecution." Letecia Stauch is being held without bond and has been extradited to Colorado, he added. "Justice will be served because my boy does not deserve this," said Gannon's biological mother, Landen Hiott, standing alongside the boy's father, Albert Stauch, at the press conference. "She will pay 100 percent for this thing that she did," Hiott added, "because I want to live on this Earth knowing that justice will be served for my little boy."Gannon's father said in a statement that was read aloud during the press conference, "The person who committed this heinous, horrible crime is one that I gave more to anyone else on this planet, and that is a burden that I will carry with me for a very long time."Letecia initially reported Gannon missing, telling authorities that he walked over to a friend's house at 3:15 p.m. on Jan. 27 and never returned. She told El Paso County police that she believed the child had been abducted.But a video provided by the family's neighbor in Colorado Springs called her story into question, as it appeared to show the child entering his stepmother's truck and leaving with her on the day he disappeared. The video apparently shows Stauch returning home without her stepson.It was later revealed that he did not attend school that Monday.'Come Home': Search Is on for Colorado Boy Who Vanished Two Weeks AgoIn February, El Paso County Sheriff's Office spokesperson Sgt. Deborah Mynatt cast doubt on Gannon's alleged kidnapping, saying, "We are really trying to also ensure that the community knows if there was a threat of some sort of public safety statement, if there was an abduction of some sort, if that information was revealed to us… we would absolutely put that out," according to People magazine.Landen Hiott said in a video statement released earlier in February, "I don't even have answers for my feelings, other than I'm afraid," adding, "Afraid that I will never hear his voice, that I will never hear him run and say, 'Mommy!,' that I will never hear those corny jokes that he always tells. I am afraid I will never see that again or hear 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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| Did You Know Your Battery Can Explode If Not Recycled Properly? Posted: 02 Mar 2020 08:47 AM PST |
| Amy Klobuchar is ending her presidential bid, will endorse Biden Posted: 02 Mar 2020 11:07 AM PST  Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar ended her Democratic presidential campaign on Monday and plans to endorse rival Joe Biden in an effort to unify moderate voters behind the former vice president's White House bid.
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| Pompeo dismisses Afghan rejection of key clause in US-Taliban deal Posted: 01 Mar 2020 10:08 AM PST  Secretary of State says deal signed on Saturday is historic and contains commitments by the Taliban to reduce violenceMike Pompeo, the secretary of state, on Sunday brushed off the Afghan president's rejection of a key clause of the US-Taliban deal he saw signed into effect on Saturday.After Ashraf Ghani rejected a Taliban demand for the release of 5,000 prisoners which was included in the deal as a condition for further talks, Pompeo was asked if a major stumbling block had emerged only a day after the deal was signed.He told CBS's Face the Nation: "There have been prisoner releases from both sides before. We've managed to figure our path forward."Pompeo said the deal signed in Doha on Saturday, which will lead to US troop withdrawals, was historic and contained detailed commitments by the Taliban to reduce violence. He also expressed hope that talks would begin in the coming days between Afghanistan's government and the Taliban, adding that Donald Trump would be actively engaged.Pompeo gave no date for a Trump meeting with Taliban leaders, which the president promised at the White House on Saturday.The deal faces criticism at home but in Kabul, Ghani told reporters: "The government of Afghanistan has made no commitment to free 5,000 Taliban prisoners."Under the accord, the US and the Taliban are committed to work expeditiously to release combat and political prisoners as a confidence-building measure, with the coordination and approval of all sides. The agreement calls for up to 5,000 Taliban prisoners to be released in exchange for up to 1,000 Afghan government captives by 10 March.Ghani said it was "not in the authority of United States to decide" about the swap, because it was "only a facilitator".Speaking to CNN, the Afghan president said Trump had not asked for the release of the prisoners and the issue should be discussed as part of a comprehensive peace deal."The political consensus … that would be needed for such a major step does not exist today," he said.Ghani said key issues need to be discussed first, including the Taliban's ties with Pakistan and other countries that had offered it sanctuary, its ties with what he called terrorist groups and drug cartels, and the place of Afghan security forces and its civil administration."The people of Afghanistan need to believe that we've gone from war to peace, and not that the agreement will be either a Trojan horse or the beginning of a much worse phase of conflict," he said.Pompeo said that though the Taliban "have an enormous amount of American blood on their hands", they "have now made the break. They've said they will not permit terror to be thrust upon anyone, including the United States, from Afghanistan."Saturday's accord was signed in Doha by US special envoy Zalmay Khalilzad and Taliban political chief Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, witnessed by Pompeo. Pompeo said he met "a senior Taliban negotiator". Baradar met foreign ministers from Norway, Turkey and Uzbekistan and diplomats from Russia, Indonesia and other nations."The dignitaries who met Mullah Baradar expressed their commitments towards Afghanistan's reconstruction and development … the US-Taliban agreement is historical," said Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid.In the US, Republicans in Congress expressed concerns about the logistics of the deal and trusting the Taliban, while Democrats demanded congressional involvement. In a Saturday briefing at the White House, Trump rejected all criticism and said he would meet Taliban leaders.Aides to Ghani said Trump's decision to meet the Taliban could pose a challenge to Afghanistan's government at a time when the US troop withdrawal is imminent.Washington is committed to reducing troops to 8,600 from 13,000 within 135 days of signing the deal. The US is also committed to work with allies to reduce the number of coalition forces, if the Taliban adheres to security guarantees and ceasefire. If so, a full withdrawal of all US and coalition forces will occur within 14 months.The Taliban ruled Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001 and imposed draconian restrictions on women's rights and activities it deemed un-Islamic. After being ousted in a US-led invasion following the 9/11 attacks engineered by al-Qaida forces harboured by the Taliban, the Taliban led a long and violent insurgency."The Bush administration and the Obama administration both tried to get the words that were on the paper yesterday that the Taliban would break from al-Qaida publicly," Pompeo said. "We got that. That's important. Now, time will tell if they'll live up to that commitment is our expectation. They have promised us they will do so and we'll be able to see on the ground everything they do or choose not to do."The Afghan war, easily America's longest, has been a stalemate for more than 18 years. More than 2,400 Americans have been killed and more than 20,000 wounded. As of October 2019, more than 43,000 civilians are estimated to have been killed.Talks between Afghan government and Taliban groups will be "rocky and bumpy", Pompeo said."No one is under any false illusion that this won't be a difficult conversation. But that conversation for the first time in almost two decades will be among the Afghan people."
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| Bloomberg News' former Washington editor Al Hunt was accused over the course of years by multiple women of giving unsolicited massages and verbally berating employees for minor infractions Posted: 02 Mar 2020 11:45 AM PST  Al Hunt, Bloomberg News' former Washington editor, was accused by multiple women of giving unsolicited massages and verbally berating employees.
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| Coronavirus Kills Adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Posted: 02 Mar 2020 09:08 AM PST  An adviser to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has died after he was infected with the coronavirus, which has infected several other top Iranian officials as well.Expediency Council member Mohammad Mirmohammadi, 71, died Monday in a Tehran hospital, according to Iran state radio.Iran's vice president and deputy health minister have also been infected with the virus.At least 66 people have died from the virus in Iran, the most fatalities outside of China, where the coronavirus originated. Iran currently has an official total of 1,501 cases, over 500 of which were reported in the last 24 hours from Sunday to Monday. The official fatality rate stands at 5.5 percent, well above the roughly 2 percent death rate reported in China. About 291 people have recovered, according to Iran's deputy health minister Alireza Raisi.Iran has so far refused U.S. offers of help to combat the virus, expressing suspicion that the U.S. is trying to break the spirits of Iranians over the epidemic."We neither count on such help nor are we ready to accept verbal help," Foreign Ministry spokesman Abbas Mousavi said Monday.Last week, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo expressed concern that Iranian government was attempting to cover up the scope of the toll the virus is taking on the population."The United States is deeply concerned by information indicating the Iranian regime may have suppressed vital details about the outbreak in that country," Pompeo said last week.The coronavirus has killed over 3,000 people worldwide and infected over 89,000. The U.S. currently has 91 cases of the deadly virus, including 26 confirmed or presumptive positive cases of person-to-person spread. New York City reported its first case on Sunday, and a second person died from the infection in Washington state.
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| Friends say Tijuana woman was stalked even after death Posted: 01 Mar 2020 09:04 PM PST  The man was obsessed with Marbella Valdez. The man — identified by Mexican rules only by his first name, Juan — has insisted on his innocence. Authorities in the border state of Baja California confirmed that the suspect is the man seen in photographs depositing flowers on Marbella's coffin as it was lowered into the ground on Feb. 14.
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| Roger Stone Jurors Will Get Free Legal Help During Bias Dispute Posted: 02 Mar 2020 11:07 AM PST  (Bloomberg) -- Jurors who convicted Republican operative Roger Stone for lying to Congress during the Russia investigation will get free legal representation while a journalist attempts to access a jury questionnaire.In a decision on Monday, U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson appointed Alan C. Raul to represent the jurors. The ruling was made in response to an attempt by journalist and right-wing provocateur Michael Cernovich to intervene in the case and gain access to information about the jurors, including their responses to a series of questions before the trial to vet who could be impartial.Stone has requested a new trial on the grounds that the jury foreperson was biased against him and President Donald Trump.The court determined "it would be in the interest of justice and that it would aid the court in the full and fair resolution of this miscellaneous matter to appoint pro bono counsel to represent any juror or jurors who choose to participate in it," the judge said in an order in Washington.To contact the reporter on this story: Erik Larson in New York at elarson4@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: David Glovin at dglovin@bloomberg.net, Peter JeffreyFor 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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| Chinese man sentenced to death for virus checkpoint killing Posted: 01 Mar 2020 09:45 PM PST  A Chinese court has sentenced a man to death for fatally stabbing two officials at a checkpoint set up to control the spread of the new coronavirus outbreak. The virus has infected more than 80,000 people and killed nearly 3,000 in mainland China -- prompting a wide network of temperature checks, travel restrictions, residential checks and closures nationwide. On Sunday a court handed down a death sentence to a 23-year-old man after he stabbed two officials at one local village checkpoint.
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| 'Seriously people - STOP BUYING MASKS!': Surgeon general says they won't protect from coronavirus Posted: 02 Mar 2020 05:15 AM PST  The surgeon general has a message for people who want to run out and stockpile masks to combat coronavirus – don't.
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| Trump repeatedly misunderstands health officials advising him about coronavirus Posted: 02 Mar 2020 02:05 PM PST  Donald Trump contended on Monday that a vaccine to prevent coronavirus cases could be ready in three months, only to be corrected by one of his top public health officials after he repeatedly appeared to misunderstand drug company executives' statements about their plans to test possible vaccines.The president, during a Cabinet Room meeting with top pharmaceutical industry executives, said he has heard a vaccine could be ready in just three or four months. But Anthony Fauci, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director, later clarified the remark, telling reporters getting a vaccine properly tested, cleared and distributed likely would take one year.
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