| Buttigieg, surging in Iowa, has a plan to win it all. Here it is. Posted: 21 Oct 2019 08:52 AM PDT  Reminder: There are 105 days until the Iowa caucuses and 379 days until the 2020 election. It happened to Kamala Harris during the summer. Now it's starting to happen to South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg, who was widely proclaimed one of the "winners" of last week's Democratic primary debate in Westerville, Ohio.
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| Charges: Church shooting suspect badly beats public defender Posted: 22 Oct 2019 01:09 PM PDT  A man charged with attempted murder in a church shooting attacked his public defender during a jailhouse meeting, sending the man to intensive care with severe head injuries and no memory of the beating, according to documents released Tuesday. Dale Holloway, 37, of Manchester, assaulted public defender Michael Davidow on Monday morning at the Valley Street jail in Manchester, New Hampshire, the documents said. In this case, the officer heard a knock and turned to see Holloway standing up and Davidow seated at the table, with his hands over his face and blood dripping onto the floor.
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| Anatomy of a conspiracy theory: The 'server' Trump keeps looking for will never be found, because it doesn't exist Posted: 22 Oct 2019 01:10 PM PDT  President Trump's insistence that there is a missing DNC server despite all evidence to the contrary could lead to his impeachment.
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| Harry Dunn: Government knew American suspect was leaving UK Posted: 21 Oct 2019 10:01 PM PDT  The UK government was warned by the US embassy that the suspect in the crash which killed Harry Dunn was to leave the country. Mr Dunn, 19, was killed when his motorbike collided with a car near RAF Croughton, Northants, on Aug 27. Anne Sacoolas, the wife of an American diplomat, has admitted to driving on the wrong side of the road and hitting the teenager, but she returned to the US and has refused to come back. Dominic Raab, the Foreign Secretary, told the Commons last night that the US embassy alerted them to Ms Sacoolas's "imminent" departure "unless the UK had strong objections" on Sept 13. Police were unable to arrest Ms Sacoolas as the US had not waived her diplomatic immunity. "We duly and immediately objected in clear and strong terms and we have done ever since," said Mr Raab. When the Foreign Office followed up on Sept 16, the embassy said Ms Sacoolas had returned to the US. Mr Dunn's family spokesman said the revelation "added insult to injury". Harry Dunn died in August but the driver of the car that hit him has not returned to the UK to face questioning Credit: Facebook The Foreign Secretary said the case had been raised at "every level" in the US, including with Donald Trump. In a statement, Mr Raab said: "I have already commissioned a review of the immunity arrangements of US personnel and their families at the Croughton annex I do not believe the current arrangements are right and the review will look at how we can make sure they cannot be used in this way again." Mr Raab said diplomatic immunity for Ms Sacoolas has "clearly ended". "There are no barriers to justice being done," in Harry's case he added. Harry's parents were due to meet Northamptonshire Chief Const Nick Adderley on Tuesday, but cancelled because they felt he was only able to offer condolences rather than solutions.
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| Turkey-U.S. Sparring Escalates as Bank Spurns NY Court Posted: 22 Oct 2019 03:51 PM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- Turkey is snubbing U.S. demands for one of its biggest banks to face charges that it helped Iran evade sanctions amid escalating tensions fueled by Turkey's incursion into northern Syria.U.S. prosecutors charged Turkiye Halk Bankasi AS last week with enabling a sanctions-evasion scheme that helped Iran tap $20 billion in frozen foreign oil sales revenue sitting in foreign bank accounts, at a time when the U.S. was trying to maximize leverage over the country in negotiations to abandon its nuclear program.The timing of the indictment led Turkish officials to dismiss the charges as false and politically motivated. The bank and its U.S. lawyers have refused to accept a legal summons or acknowledge U.S. legal authority in the matter. At a hearing Tuesday, no lawyers or executives showed up to represent the bank. A day earlier Turkey named a former executive at the bank, who'd been convicted in the U.S., to head the Istanbul stock exchange.Tensions between Turkey and the U.S. have heightened since President Donald Trump ordered the removal of U.S. troops from northern Syria, opening the door for Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to send his forces to attack Kurds in the region.The incursion spurred the U.S. to sanction Turkey with Trump writing a letter last week to Erdogan imploring him not to be a "tough guy" or a "fool." Erdogan reportedly threw the letter in the trash.Earlier, Trump threatened Turkey in a statement on Twitter.U.S. authorities had been pursuing a criminal case against the bank for at least a year, seeking to impose a massive financial penalty for its role in the scheme. But the case idled for months amid diplomatic wrangling until the charges were filed along with other sanctions last week.Read more on the charges hereFederal prosecutors with the Manhattan U.S. attorney's office have now deemed Halkbank a "fugitive," and told U.S. District Judge Richard M. Berman they may seek contempt sanctions if the bank fails to respond to renewed demands for its presence in court. Halkbank has no employees or offices in the U.S., though it does have a correspondent bank account and shares that are listed and traded as American depositary receipts in U.S. markets.The judge said he would consider the request but also said he wanted to give the bank two weeks to review the matter and reconsider its position.If Turkey's current position on the issue is any indication, it may take more than two weeks: on Monday, it named a former Halkbank executive who was convicted in a U.S. trial over the sanctions scheme as the new chief executive of the Istanbul stock exchange. The executive, Mehmet Hakan Atilla, was released from U.S. custody in July. In making the appointment, Turkish finance minister Berat Albayrak, who is also Erdogan's son-in-law, said Atilla was the victim of an "unjust conviction."(Corrects bank's name in second paragraph)To contact the reporter on this story: Christian Berthelsen in New York at cberthelsen1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: David Glovin at dglovin@bloomberg.net, Joe SchneiderFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Hong Kong leader visits mosque struck by blue water-cannon dye Posted: 21 Oct 2019 11:17 AM PDT  Hong Kong's pro-Beijing leader and the city's police chief apologised Monday as they visited a mosque that was struck with blue dye from a water cannon during the latest bout of violent protests. The entrance to the Kowloon Mosque, the international hub's largest, was sprayed by a water cannon truck on Sunday, causing anger among both local Muslims and protesters. Police use the dye -- often mixed with an irritant -- as a way to identify protesters but it has frequently left streets and buildings daubed in a garish blue.
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| A West Point cadet and his M4 rifle have been missing for three days Posted: 21 Oct 2019 01:49 PM PDT  Officials said that the cadet, member of the class of 2021, is not believed to be a threat to the public, but could be a threat to himself.
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| Seattle Public Schools Want to Teach Social Justice in Math Class. That Hurts Minorities. Posted: 22 Oct 2019 02:05 PM PDT  Seattle's public-school district has proposed a new math curriculum that would teach its students all about how math has been "appropriated" -- and how it "continues to be used to oppress and marginalize people and communities."A draft of the curriculum, which was covered in an article in Education Week, would teach students how to "explain how math and technology and/or science are connected and how technology and/or science have (sic) been and continues to be used to oppress and marginalize people and communities of color," as well as to "identify and teach others about mathematicians* of color in their various communities: schools, neighborhoods, places of worship, businesses, etc."Education Week reports:> If adopted, its ideas will be included in existing math classes as part of the district's broader effort to infuse ethnic studies into all subjects across the K-12 spectrum. Tracy Castro-Gill, Seattle's ethnic studies director, said her team hopes to have frameworks completed in all subjects by June for board approval.> > If the frameworks are approved, teachers would be expected to incorporate those ideas and questions into the math they teach beginning next fall, Castro-Gill said. No districtwide—or mandated—math/ethnic studies curriculum is planned, but groups of teachers are working with representatives of local community organizations to write instructional units for teachers to use if they wish, she said.As strange as it may sound, this proposed curriculum is not the first time that someone has argued for teaching math in this way. In fact, in 2017, an online course developed by Teach for America -- titled "Teaching Social Justice Through Secondary Mathematics" -- instructed how to teach their students how "math has been used as a dehumanizing tool." Also in 2017, a University of Illinois math-education professor detailed what she saw as some of the more racist aspects of math, claiming that "mathematics itself operates as Whiteness."I wrote columns about both of these stories that year -- and, at the time, most people likely saw them simply as examples of "fringe" beliefs, confined to only super-progressive, ultra-woke circles. With the announcement of this Seattle proposal, however, we can no longer reassure ourselves that this is the case. Now, the social-justice approach to teaching math has officially entered the mainstream (and taxpayer-funded!) arena.This concerns me, and, believe it or not, that's actually not because I despise "people and communities of color." In fact, it's quite the opposite: It's because this approach to teaching math will only end up harming the very groups it claims it champions. As The American Conservative's Rod Dreher notes:> The young people who are going to learn real math are those whose parents can afford to put them in private schools. The public school kids of all races are going to get dumber and dumber.Guess what? Minority students are far more likely to attend public school than whites. In fact, according to Private School Review, "[t]he average percent of minority students in private schools is approximately 28 percent."In other words? The minority students, the members of the very groups that this curriculum presumably aims to aid, are actually going to be learning less math than they would have without it -- because they will be spending some of that class time learning about how math's racism has hurt them. Ironically, one of the curriculum's goals is to teach students how to "critique systems of power that deny access to mathematical knowledge to people and communities of color," and yet, that's exactly what the district itself would be doing with it.The historical contributions of communities of color are important, and students should study them. A better place to study them, though, would (quite obviously) be a history class, not a mathematics one. Mathematics classes should be for mathematics lessons; this is especially important considering the fact that math is exactly where American students (of all races) struggle compared to students in other countries. In fact, according to a Pew Research study from 2017, American students ranked 38th out of 71 countries in the subject. If we want to fix this, we need to focus more on math, instead of looking for ways to teach less of it in the very classes where our students are supposed to be learning it.The bottom line is: If Seattle's school district really wants to help minority students excel in mathematics, the last thing it should be doing is proposing a math curriculum that would teach less of it in the schools that they're most likely to attend.
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| 2 students charged with slur at University of Connecticut Posted: 22 Oct 2019 01:12 PM PDT  Two University of Connecticut students have been charged with shouting a racial slur outside a campus apartment complex in an episode that was caught on video and has led to protests at the school. Jarred Karal, of Plainville, and Ryan Mucaj, of Granby, both identified by police as 21-year-old white men, were charged Monday with ridicule on account of creed, religion, color, denomination, nationality or race. Phone and email messages were left for the two students, who are due in court Oct. 30.
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| Trump 'lynching' comment on impeachment probe is condemned as key witness testifies Posted: 22 Oct 2019 09:41 AM PDT ![Trump 'lynching' comment on impeachment probe is condemned as key witness testifies]( "Trump 'lynching' comment on impeachment probe is condemned as key witness testifies") U.S. President Donald Trump likened the impeachment investigation into his dealings with Ukraine to a "lynching" on Tuesday in a tweet that drew condemnation for his inflammatory reference to decades of killings of thousands of black Americans. Republican Trump issued his comment on Twitter just before Tuesday's closed-door testimony by William Taylor, a U.S. diplomat expected to be an important witness in the inquiry led by Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives. "All Republicans must remember what they are witnessing here - a lynching.
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| Silicon Valley CEOs Appear to Have Chosen Their 2020 Candidate Posted: 22 Oct 2019 01:00 AM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- The technology industry is looking for something different in a president in 2020. And it appears Pete Buttigieg is their candidate.While Joe Biden and Senator Elizabeth Warren are topping national polls in the contest for the Democratic Party's nomination, California's deep-pocketed Silicon Valley is donating to the 37-year-old mayor of South Bend, Indiana over the former vice president by a 5-to-1 margin."Pete is a clean slate for the party in ways Biden can't be," said Cyrus Radfar, a 35-year-old technology entrepreneur and Democratic donor. "There's new life and new energy that Pete brings, especially as the base of the Democratic Party is getting younger. I think he's going to be on the national stage for a long time."Buttigieg has staged a fundraising blitz in posh Northern California communities, holding events hosted by technology executives such as Netflix Inc. Chief Executive Officer Reed Hastings, Nest Labs home-automation company co-founder Matt Rogers, and Chelsea Kohler, director of product communications at Uber Technologies Inc., among others.Were he to win, Buttigieg would not only be the youngest president, but also the first openly gay one. While he is successfully raising money, Buttigieg has struggled until recently to enter the top tier of candidates nationally.But there are signs that he could be a moderate voter's alternative to Biden. While raising money in California, Buttigieg is campaigning heavily in Iowa, and it appears both efforts are paying off. A USA Today/Suffolk University poll of likely Iowa caucus goers put Buttigieg just behind Biden and Warren for the first time. Biden had 18% support, Warren 17% and Buttigieg 13%.Millennial voters in the tech industry say they appreciate that Buttigieg's liberal policies seem grounded in reality and recognize "a cutthroat world," as Elizabeth Moran, 28, put it at a debate watch party in Silicon Valley's Sunnyvale. Moran, who works at Poshmark, a social commerce platform, said she likes Buttigieg's grasp of economics."Well-educated recognizes well-educated," Moran said, adding that Buttigieg could have come to Silicon Valley after graduating from Harvard as many Ivy League graduates do.In other words, in their eyes, Buttigieg is like them."There's a big move on the Democratic side to more heavily regulate tech, and that hasn't been part of Buttigieg's message," said Raphael Sonenshein, executive director of the Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs at California State University, Los Angeles. "His message is consistent with innovation and forward-looking technology. He has not given the impression that he would threaten their interests."While he hasn't said much about competition and antitrust, Buttigieg has focused on improving regulations as opposed to breaking up big tech."We're going to need to empower the FTC to be able to intervene, including blocking or reversing mergers, in cases where there's anti-competitive behavior by tech companies," he said in a CNN town hall in April, referring to the Federal Trade Commission.Buttigieg was his high school's valedictorian and went on to Harvard, where he befriended two roommates of future Facebook Inc. CEO Mark Zuckerberg, and was one of the first 300 users on the social media platform. He was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford, joined McKinsey & Co. as a consultant, and volunteered for Barack Obama's tech-savvy 2008 presidential campaign before joining the U.S. Navy Reserve and serving in Afghanistan.His relationship with Zuckerberg persisted. Zuckerberg, 35, visited South Bend in 2017 while doing research for his philanthropic organization, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, and got a personal tour from Buttigieg. That relationship lasted into this year, when Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, recommended two people that Buttigieg ultimately hired for his campaign. Ben LaBolt, a spokesman for Zuckerberg and Chan, said the couple hasn't yet decided whom to support for president.The Golden StateCalifornia voters have an unusually large influence in choosing the party's nominee this cycle. The state primary next year is in March instead of its previous June slot and its donors contributed 1 of every 5 dollars raised by the party's presidential candidates in the first six months of this year, data from the Center for Responsive Politics show.Buttigieg is second only to home-state senator Kamala Harris in the percentage of his campaign money that comes from California. Harris got 45% of her donations from Californians, Buttigieg got 22%.Harris, who was the state's attorney general, raised $1 million from California lawyers, more than twice as much as any other candidate. She was also the top recipient of donations from employees of the entertainment industry. But California employees of tech companies, including giants like Facebook, Amazon.com Inc. and Microsoft Corp., backed Buttigieg more than any other candidate.Silicon Valley bundlers -- fundraisers who gather money from numerous employees of a firm -- have raised concerns about both Warren and Senator Bernie Sanders, who are relying primarily on small-dollar contributions from online donors.Warren is particularly thorny for the tech industry. She has vowed that she will not meet with big donors who want to "buy access" -- and perhaps more troubling for them, has promised to break up big technology companies. Some technology workers are contributing to Warren and Sanders, but few are writing the $2,800 checks that Buttigieg and Biden are relying on, likely because they've been quieter on the question of how to handle big tech.Buttigieg is positioning himself as a younger alternative to 76-year-old Biden. Like Biden, he has not embraced the progressive wing's Medicare for All, instead proposing government-run health care "to those who want it," without eliminating private insurance.In other areas, he hasn't taken many unique stances, but his Midwestern and military background seeps into some plans. An issue page on his campaign website is simply called "Unleash rural opportunity," and he has proposed eliminating some student debt in exchange for national service.Paul Holland, a California venture capitalist and fundraiser for Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign, said he believes a moderate has the best chance of winning. In his circles, Biden hasn't attracted the same kind of enthusiastic support that other candidates have."It's Mayor Pete and Cory Booker who are getting most of the attention," he said.Buttigieg himself drew the contrast between his candidacy and Biden's during a Marin County event."Every time we've won in our party it's been with a candidate with new ideas, who hasn't been on the scene for too long," Buttigieg said. "That's what works. Also, Americans are most likely to support the opposite of what's in the Oval Office."Among Buttigieg's donors are Ron Conway, an investor who has guided San Francisco mayors to back tech-friendly policies; Scott Belsky, the chief product officer and executive vice president at Adobe Inc.; Tony Xu, CEO of Doordash Inc.; David Marcus, the head of Facebook's Libra cryptocurrency project and Wendy Schmidt, wife of former Google CEO Eric Schmidt.Buttigieg's fundraising has been prodigious, but he's still behind in national polls. He stands at just 5% in the RealClearPolitics national average, compared with 26% for Biden. And that raises pragmatic questions about who can win the Democratic nomination."Even with his flaws, Biden is the guy who's probably going to satisfy the moderates," Holland said.To contact the reporters on this story: Bill Allison in Washington DC at ballison14@bloomberg.net;Jeffrey Taylor in San Francisco at jtaylor184@bloomberg.net;Sophie Alexander in San Francisco at salexander82@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Wendy Benjaminson at wbenjaminson@bloomberg.net, Peter EichenbaumFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Shark tears woman's hands off in Polynesian paradise island attack Posted: 22 Oct 2019 07:15 AM PDT  A French tourist has lost both her hands in a rare shark attack in the Pacific islands of Polynesia, say emergency services. The woman was swimming during a whale-watching trip on Monday off the island of Mo'orea, a honeymoon destination in the French overseas territory, when the oceanic whitetip shark bit into her chest and arms.
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| View Photos of the 2020 GMC Acadia AT4 Posted: 22 Oct 2019 04:59 AM PDT |
| These rats learned how to drive tiny little cars so they could eat Froot Loops, and it's so precious Posted: 22 Oct 2019 08:53 AM PDT  If you think you can't get your driver's license, these rats did.
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| Turkey and Russia announce deal to withdraw all Kurdish forces from Syrian border Posted: 22 Oct 2019 11:42 AM PDT  Turkey and Russia announced last night they had reached a deal to avoid a return to fullscale fighting in northeast Syria, just hours before a US-brokered ceasefire between Turkish and Kurdish forces was due to expire. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Vladimir Putin emerged from marathon talks in Sochi with an agreement that would see all Kurdish forces pull back 30km from the Syrian border over the next six days. Russia and Turkey will then launch joint military patrols in the area to ensure the deal is being implemented. There was no immediate comment from Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) on the deal. But if the agreement holds it means Turkey will not restart its military offensive, which many feared would resume as soon as an earlier ceasefire ended at 10pm on Tuesday. "According to this agreement, Turkey and Russia will not allow any separatist agenda on Syrian territory," Mr Erdoğan said. Turkey and Syria border The talks in Sochi underscore how quickly Russia has replaced the US as the main powerbroker in northeast Syria in the days since Donald Trump, the US president, pulled American forces out of the region. Russian forces will now stand guard in areas that only a few weeks were ago were being patrolled by US troops. The evening agreement between Russia and Turkey capped a dramatic day as the world counted down the hours until the end of the ceasefire brokered last week by US vice president Mike Pence. The US said earlier in the day that it believed that Kurdish forces had fulfilled their obligations to withdraw from a key 120km stretch of the border and warned Turkey that it would impose sanctions if the Turkish military resumed attacks. Areas of Rojava and Iraqi Kurdistan before the Turkish offensive The Russian-Turkish deal appears to expand on the earlier American agreement and ensure that Kurdish forces will leave the entire length of the border. Turkey will maintain control in areas it has already seized while Russian and Syrian regime forces will hold the rest of the border. The agreement also states that the Kurds will withdraw from two holdout towns in western Syria, Kobani and Tel Rifaat, which Turkey has been trying to dislodge them from them for more than a year. Sergey Shoygu, the Russian defence minister, said up to 500 Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) members had escaped from Kurdish-run prisons in northeast Syria amid the chaos of the Turkish offensive. US troops are withdrawing from northeast Syria Credit: DELIL SOULEIMAN/AFP via Getty Images Meanwhile, confusion over the US plan to withdraw forces from Syria deepened on Tuesday after Iraq's government said the retreating troops did not have permission to stay in Iraq. "There is no permission granted for these forces to stay inside Iraq," the Iraqi military said. The comment appeared to contradict claims by the Pentagon that the roughly 1,000 soldiers would stay in Iraq to continue fighting Isil. Mark Esper, the US defence secretary, said he would try to smooth the issue during a visit to Iraq and added that the additional American forces did not plan "to stay in Iraq interminably". There was a bleak reminder of the threat from Isil inside Iraq when it emerged Tuesday that a senior Iraqi police commander had been killed in an ambush by jihadist fighters. Bashar al-Assad visited his forces in Idlib for the first time in years Bashar al-Assad made a rare trip outside Damascus to visit his troops on the front line in southern Idlib, where Syrian regime forces are battling against jihadists and rebels to take back the last opposition-held province in Syria. The visit is the first time Assad has stepped foot in the province in years and marks his growing confidence after several weeks of good news for Damascus. While his forces are make slow progress in Idlib, they were handed an unexpected victory in northeast Syria after Kurdish forces invited them in to confront Turkey. Assad took aim at the Turkish president during the trip to Idlib, saying: "Erdogan is a thief and is now stealing our land." He vowed to continue his assault on Idlib, which is home to around 3 million civilians, and said a victory in the provice would help "decisively end chaos and terrorism in all of Syria".
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| US far-right activists get four years in jail for attacking leftists Posted: 22 Oct 2019 11:44 AM PDT  Two members of a US far-right group were each sentenced to four years in prison on Tuesday for brawling with anti-fascist demonstrators in New York, prosecutors said. The sentencing comes as tensions between white supremacists and leftists simmer in the United States. Maxwell Hare and John Kinsman, members of the Proud Boys group, were found guilty in August by a state court of several counts of attempted assault and rioting.
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| Iraq: U.S. troops crossing border from Syria don't have approval to stay Posted: 22 Oct 2019 04:34 AM PDT  U.S. forces that crossed into Iraq as part of a withdrawal from Syria do not have permission to stay and can only be there in transit, the Iraqi military said on Tuesday.
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| Democrats' 2020 race has a new shadow: Hillary Clinton Posted: 22 Oct 2019 08:06 AM PDT  Some Democrats are putting up caution signs for Hillary Clinton as she wades back into presidential politics by casting 2020 candidate Tulsi Gabbard as a "Russian asset," mocking President Donald Trump's dealings with a foreign leader and drawing counterattacks from both. Bernie Sanders, who lost the 2016 nomination to Clinton and is running again in 2020, took to Twitter with implicit criticisms of his erstwhile rival. Larry Cohen, one of Sanders' top supporters, was more conciliatory but warned in an interview that Clinton could harm the eventual 2020 nominee by weighing in against specific candidates, even a longshot like Gabbard.
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| Transgender Cyclist Wins Female Cycling World Championship, Claims Only Objections Come from ‘Losers’ Posted: 21 Oct 2019 08:11 AM PDT  Cyclist Rachel McKinnon, a biological male who presents as a woman, won the women's world championship on Saturday, and set a women's world record in the qualifying event.McKinnon, a Canadian philosophy professor at the College of Charleston, won the same event in 2018. In a Friday interview with Sky News, McKinnon said that attempts to level the playing field for women's sports by discriminating against transgender athletes was the equivalent of "denying their human rights.""All my medical records say female," McKinnon said. "My doctor treats me as a female person, my racing license says female, but people who oppose my existence still want to think of me as male . . . So, if we want to say, that I believe you're a woman for all of society, except for this massive central part that is sport, then that's not fair."Victoria Hood, a former cycling champion and manager of a British all-female cycling team, challenged McKinnon, telling Sky that "it is not complicated, the science is there and it says that it is unfair. The male body, which has been through male puberty, still retains its advantage, that doesn't go away. I have sympathy with them. They have a right to do sport but not a right to go into any category they want."On Saturday, McKinnon issued a press release denouncing Hood for having "an irrational fear of trans women."After the victory, McKinnon took to Twitter to challenge critics.> Many people claim to support trans women> > But often they only support us until our lives impact them in any meaningful way> > In my case, people literally say they support trans women…but not in sport> > There can be no 'but'> > We are either full and equal women, or not> > We are.> > -- Dr. Rachel McKinnon (@rachelvmckinnon) October 20, 2019On Sunday, McKinnon tweeted "I have yet to meet a real champion who has a problem with trans women. Real champions want stronger competition. If you win because bigotry got your competition banned… you're a loser."'
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| Canada’s breach over oil exports Posted: 22 Oct 2019 08:38 AM PDT ![Canada's breach over oil exports]( "Canada's breach over oil exports") Monday's election may force Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to find a better balance between the oil-rich provinces and Canada's leadership on climate change.
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| Stop fearmongering about 'Medicare for All.' Most families would pay less for better care. Posted: 22 Oct 2019 12:15 AM PDT  The case for Medicare for All is simple. It would cover everyone, period. Done right, it would lower costs. And it would ease paperwork and confusion.
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| This Is the Robot Tank Russia Used in Syria Posted: 21 Oct 2019 03:15 AM PDT  (But it didn't fight well.)
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| Billionaire Isabel dos Santos Denies Wrongdoing at Sonangol Posted: 21 Oct 2019 01:58 PM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- Isabel dos Santos, Africa's richest woman and the daughter of former Angolan President Jose Eduardo dos Santos, said she did nothing wrong when she was chairwoman of state-owned oil company Sonangol and called a probe into the transfer of millions of dollars from the Luanda-based firm "political vengeance."Angolan newspaper Novo Jornal reported on Oct. 18 that Angola's prosecuting authority started a criminal investigation into the transfer of $38 million from Sonangol authorized by dos Santos. Her successor at Sonangol, Carlos Saturnino, accused dos Santos last year of authorizing the transfer to a company in Dubai days after she was dismissed as chairwoman. Saturnino was sacked in May."To say there was a transfer order after my dismissal is simply false," dos Santos said in statement emailed on Monday. "The fight against corruption can't be used to feed an agenda of persecution or a witch hunt."Dos Santos said the fund-transfer was legal and was made while she was still in her position at Sonangol on Nov. 15, 2017, the day she was dismissed and before a new board was appointed the next day. She said payment instructions were given one or two days before her dismissal.If Angolan authorities are serious about fighting corruption they should investigate why Sonangol had about $20 billion in debt at the end of 2015, before her appointment, and how this money was "used and lost," said the 46-year-old dos Santos.Dos Santos was dismissed as head of Sonangol amid a crackdown on corruption by Joao Lourenco, who replaced her father as president in 2017. Sonangol, long the main engine of Angola's oil-focused economy, has been at the center of Lourenco's anti-graft campaign.(Adds dos Santos's comment about timing of payment instructions in fourth paragraph.)To contact the reporter on this story: Henrique Almeida in Lisbon at halmeida5@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Joao Lima at jlima1@bloomberg.net, Rene Vollgraaff, Alastair ReedFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| View 2020 Nissan Titan XD Photos Posted: 21 Oct 2019 11:00 AM PDT |
| Colorado mother accused of murdering daughter she said was terminally ill Posted: 21 Oct 2019 06:06 PM PDT  A Colorado mother who authorities said solicited donations, charitable services, and government aid for her purportedly terminally ill daughter who died in 2017 has been indicted on murder charges in the girl's death, court documents showed on Monday. Kelly Renee Turner, 41, is charged with first-degree murder in the death of her seven-year-old daughter, Olivia Gant, and with forgery, theft, child abuse and bilking Medicaid out of nearly $538,000, according to the indictment handed down in Douglas County District Court. Colorado's Office of the Public Defender, which represents Turner, has a policy not to comment on its cases outside of court.
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| The Latest: White House slams testimony as 'triple hearsay' Posted: 22 Oct 2019 03:14 PM PDT  Press secretary Stephanie Grisham released a statement Tuesday after Taylor told lawmakers that Trump had made clear that vital military aid to Ukraine hinged on the country's new president making a public statement that he was opening an investigation into a company linked to the family of Trump's potential 2020 Democratic rival Joe Biden and the 2016 election.
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| US awarded ownership of seized North Korean vessel Posted: 22 Oct 2019 01:06 AM PDT  A New York court has formally handed the US ownership of a North Korean cargo ship seized for violating international sanctions, the Justice Department said. The 17,061 ton bulk carrier Wise Honest -- the first North Korean vessel seized by Washington for sanctions violations -- was caught carrying a $3 million shipment of coal in Indonesian waters last year and later handed over to US authorities. The court in the Southern District of New York ordered the vessel to be forfeited to Washington and for the Treasury Department to "dispose of" it, an order released by the Justice Department showed.
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| Taiwan Asks Hong Kong for Return of the Murder Suspect Whose Case Sparked Months of Protests Posted: 22 Oct 2019 02:21 AM PDT  Chan Tong-kai is set to be released from prison in Hong Kong on Wednesday
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| This 1 Invention Made Swedish Submarines Among the Best Posted: 22 Oct 2019 10:00 AM PDT  A silent, powerful new engine.
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| Newt Gingrich and Whoopi Goldberg go at it on 'The View' over Trump's 'lynching' comments Posted: 22 Oct 2019 11:19 AM PDT  Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Whoopi Goldberg go toe to toe over Trump's "lynching" comments on Twitter.
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| An Air France flight was forced to turn back in midair when staff found an unattended cellphone that wasn't claimed by any of the passengers Posted: 22 Oct 2019 04:34 AM PDT  Air France flight 136 to Chicago from Paris landed at Ireland's Shannon Airport, where the police scanned a cellphone found on board.
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| NYC, California sue Postal Service over smuggled cigarettes Posted: 22 Oct 2019 01:13 PM PDT  California and New York City sued the U.S. Postal Service on Tuesday to stop tens of thousands of cigarette packages from being mailed from foreign countries to U.S. residents, saying the smugglers are engaging in tax evasion while postal workers look the other way. The lawsuit in Brooklyn federal court blames the Postal Service for deliveries from Vietnam, China, Israel and other countries, saying the failure to enforce a federal law aimed at banning cigarette mail deliveries costs California an average of $19 million annually in tax revenues and New York City and state over $21 million each year.
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| Mitt Romney could vote to remove Donald Trump from office as feud escalates Posted: 21 Oct 2019 11:22 AM PDT  Mitt Romney has declined to rule out voting to remove Donald Trump from office if he is impeached, instead giving an excoriating account of the US president's personal behaviour and saying he will keep an open mind on the issue. Mr Romney, the former Republican presidential nominee now a senator for Utah, escalated his long-running clash with Mr Trump in a pair of interviews published over the weekend with the political website Axios and magazine The Atlantic. Among the targets of Mr Romney's criticism were Mr Trump's payments to a porn star he is alleged to have had an affair with, Stormy Daniels, the president's rhetoric on race and the recent US troop withdrawal from Syria. Mr Trump has always denied the Daniels affair. The most eye-catching of Mr Romney's comments came over impeachment. The House of Representatives, controlled by the Democrats, is expected to vote to impeach Mr Trump before Christmas. It will then be up to the Senate, which is controlled by the Republicans, to decide whether Mr Trump should be kicked from office. Discussing the issue with Axios, Mr Romney said: "I just want to get as much information as we can, make an assessment consistent with the law and the Constitution." Pierre Delecto | Romney admits to secret Twitter account During that interview he called the Syria withdrawal a "very dark spot in America's history" and said paying a porn star for relations outside of marriage was "not honourable". To The Atlantic, Mr Romney again did not rule out voting for removal, saying: "At this stage, I am strenuously avoiding trying to make any judgment." Mr Romney appeared to acknowledge that history would judge how he and other senators acted, noting to The Atlantic: "I do think people will view this as an inflection point in American history." Around 20 Republican senators would need to flip and back removal for Mr Trump to go - something that seems unlikely, given Republican voters overwhelmingly are against removal according to polls. Mr Romney's political relationship with Mr Trump has been turbulent. He accepted Mr Trump's endorsement for his 2012 presidential bid but then was fiercely critical when Mr Trump ran in 2016. After Mr Trump won the election the pair met on better terms, with Mr Romney in the running for US secretary of state. However since missing out on the role and then entering the US Senate Mr Romney has again been critical. Mr Trump's anger at Mr Romney's criticism over the Ukraine scandal, which triggered the impeachment inquiry, has been evident in a string of tweets he has issued, one with the phrase IMPEACHMITTROMNEY. On Monday, Mr Trump said he expected the House to vote for his impeachment – something which has happened to only two other US presidents – but called Republicans to rally to his defence. He praised the Democrats for sticking together, saying: "They don't have Mitt Romney in their midst."
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| The lost river: Mexicans fight for mighty waterway taken by the US Posted: 21 Oct 2019 03:00 AM PDT  The Colorado River serves over 35 million Americans before reaching Mexico – but it is dammed at the border, leaving locals on the other side with a dry delta * This is the first story in our new series about 'environmental justice' - learn moreThe temperature is rising toward 45C (113F) as young brothers Daniel and Dilan Rodríguez skip towards a bridge over the Colorado River in the Mexican border town of San Luis Río Colorado. But there is no water flowing through the channel of one of the world's mightiest waterways. The pair run down the river bank and cheerfully splash through stagnant puddles dotted about the riverbed."We wish we had a river, so we could swim, and jump and sail my cousin's boat," said Daniel, 12. "At least we have puddles to make mud balls, that can be fun."Colonia Miguel Aleman family Dilan Rodríguez, eight, fishing in the canal that runs adjacent to the dry Colorado River at the border of Mexico and the US on 6 September 2019. Photograph: Meghan Dhaliwal/The GuardianThe Colorado originates in the Rocky mountains and traverses seven US states, watering cities and farmland, before reaching Mexico, where it is supposed to flow onwards to the Sea of Cortez.Instead, the river is dammed at the US-Mexico border, and on the other side the river channel is empty. Locals are now battling to bring it back to life. There are few more striking examples of what has come to be known as "environmental injustice" – the inequitable access to clean land, air and water, and disproportionate exposure to hazards and climate disasters. Water in particular has emerged as a flash point as global heating renders vast swaths of the planet ever drier.Today the Guardian is launching a year-long series, Our Unequal Earth, to investigate environmental inequalities and discrimination in the US and beyond. It will also reveal how the climate crisis is making things worse for activists and scientists on the ground."We've heard stories from my mum about how she used to play and swim in the Colorado River when she was little, but we've never experienced it," said Evelin Bautista, 14, who is a member of an indigenous tribe, the Cucapá, which means the River People. "I've heard that over the border, the water is so clear that they can even see the fish."Indeed, a mere 30 miles north, over the border at Gateway park in Yuma, Arizona, siblings Damien Navarro, 12, and Dariana, eight, spent the day fishing, diving and swimming in the free flowing river.David Barraga plays ball with his daughter Dariana and his stepson Damien in the Colorado River in Gateway park, Yuma, Arizona, on 7 September 2019. Photograph: Meghan Dhaliwal/The Guardian"It's so hot, we come here all the time, the kids love the water, and we often catch catfish, bass and bluegill," said their father, David Barraga. "I didn't know there's no river in Mexico. Wow, that's a shame.""At school in science we've been learning about drought, that the planet is getting hotter," said his son, Damien. "But we've never been told about the dam or the river in Mexico, maybe when we're older. It's really too bad for those kids." 'It took away part of our identity'Because the 1944 treaty did not allocate Mexico any water for the river itself, the channel is mostly dry. The loss of the river in Mexico has been devastating.Nancy Saldano, 54, an architect and activist in the Sonoran town of San Luis Río Colorado, recalls boat rides and fishing with her family during the 1980s, when the US occasionally released "extra" water to deal with heavy snow and rain that risked overwhelming its dams. Her mother, an evangelical pastor, conducted baptisms in the river until it disappeared."Taking away the river had a huge impact on us, it took away part of our identity. I felt anger, sadness and grief. My children had never seen the river flow."The disparities on both sides of the border are stark.In the US, the Colorado serves more than 35 million people, including several native tribes, seven national wildlife refuges and 11 national parks, and supports $26m tourism and recreational industries, as well as farming. California has rights to the largest quantity, with 4.4m acre-feet per year – or 29% of the total – while Utah is allocated 1.7m and Nevada 0.3m.At the Morelos dam, located between Los Algodones, Baja California, and Yuma, Arizona, the river is diverted to a complex system of irrigation canals which nourish fields of cotton, wheat, alfalfa, asparagus, watermelons and date palms in the vast surrounding desert valley. This is good for farmers – and less so for ordinary Mexicans.Following the dry riverbed south towards the Gulf of California evokes an eerie sadness. The sound of gunfire in one wide, dusty section led to a couple from San Diego hunting wild pigeons, and a bucketful of feathered corpses. A few miles west along dirt farm roads, dozens of herons, egrets and ducks were staking out a wonderfully lush wetland – though it is only an accidental byproduct created by agricultural runoff from surrounding wheat and alfalfa fields. Prolonged drought and global heatingThe Colorado basin is one of 276 watersheds that cross international borders and Mexican supporters of the binational treaty argue that it resolved longstanding diplomatic disputes and enabled the region's economic development, even if there is mostly no longer a river in the channel."We're the only place in Mexico with a secure water supply, that is a privilege," said Francisco Bernal, the International Boundary and Water Commission (Cila) representative in Mexicali.But the treaty didn't foresee prolonged drought, global heating and mounting demands. Now, water is running out, and things must change.The population of Baja California grew from 1.67 million in 1990 to 3.5 million in 2018. Most of the river water still goes to farmers. Groundwater reserves are dwindling, pollution goes unchecked, and urban neighborhoods face shortages."If agriculture was forced to be more efficient there would be enough for everyone else," said Dr Jorge Ramírez, a leading water scientist at the Autonomous University of Baja California. "We have enough water, what we lack is planning. Water is the currency here and politics always wins."Dry Colorado riverIn recent years, protests have erupted in response to allegations of corruption and poorly policed pollution standards that favor big landowners and water guzzling industries, such as a controversial US brewery under construction in the Mexicali valley. In 2020, both countries will for the first time implement rationing. Mexico must cut usage by 3%. The US must save 247m cubic metres. The plan would have been much stricter if not for record snowfall in parts of the Colorado basin last year. The reductions can only be accomplished if farmers waste less and participate in reforestation efforts.Even so, scientists are optimistic that the delta can partially recover. 'The Gabachos [Americans] should leave some water for us'In the scorched and barren delta, visitors may encounter an incongruous sight: 700 acres of flourishing native trees and shrubs in three reforestation sites.They are the product of what is called a "pulse flow".In 2014, an environmental experiment driven by not-for-profits on both sides of the border resulted in 105,392 acres-feet (130m cubic metres) of extra water being released into Mexico over two months, simulating the natural spring floods of yesteryear.The pulse flow bolstered parched wetlands and reforestation zones where native cottonwood and willow trees naturally germinated. And for a few days, for the first time in years, the river reconnected to the Sea of Cortez: fish stocks increased, dolphins returned and the number of migratory birds rocketed by 43%.restorationBut for some scientists, the community response was perhaps the most surprising and satisfying. Thousands flocked to the river as it returned, briefly, to its former glory."I grew up with my mum's stories about the river in the old days, but couldn't believe it until I saw it myself," said Ulises Monroy Saldaña, 13. "I'll never forget putting my hand in the water for the first time: it was cold, but it felt so nice because it was so hot here."Daniel Rodríguez was just seven years old, but still remembers the excitement of watching the river fill with water. "We'd come every day after school and keep jumping off the bridge until the police chased us away."His grandmother, Lupe Aderete, 53, set up portable toilets for the massive influx of visitors. "It was beautiful to see the river alive again, everyone was so happy, and I made some extra money." She added: "It's not fair, the Gabachos [Americans] should leave some water for us.Lupe Aderete at home in the neighborhood of Miguel Alemán, Baja California, on 6 September 2019. Photograph: Meghan Dhaliwal/The GuardianThe restoration site at Laguna Grande is a shady oasis of gangly cottonwood and willow trees surrounded by desert and farmland, visited by over 2,000 people last year."For most children, it's the first time they've seen a forest, and for the adults it brings back memories. Connecting to nature is emotional, and visitors cry all the time," said Gabriela González, education coordinator at the Sonora Institute which runs Laguna Grande.There's little or no chance that the river will ever flow freely again, but plans are afoot to repeat the pulse flow, this time flooding only the spots which most benefited last time. And there is hope of expanding native forests to create a green corridor with wetlands and lagoons channelling into the sea.An indigenous community, the Cucapá, has been involved in dredging efforts, paid to shovel out thick mud to create connectivity channels that are crucial to sustainable ecosystems. Patches of native salty grass and flocks of raucous brown and white pelicans at the lower part of the estuary indicate that plentiful fish were swept in by recent high tides.The next pulse flow should take place in 2021 or 2022. Regardless, this region will remain more desert than delta.At home in Miguel Alemán, a poor makeshift neighbourhood with little shade, the Rodríguez brothers ditch their school stuff, grab a plastic bucket and rush back across the parched terrain to the concrete drainage canal running parallel to the littered riverbed.They fearlessly dive into the polluted waterway, which emerges under the metal border wall, to cool down and catch some fish for dinner.To contact Nina Lakhani, the Guardian's new environmental justice reporter, e-mail nina.lakhani@theguardian.comDesign by Juweek Adolphe
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| China Wants To Destroy U.S. Aircraft Carriers in a War (It Won't Be Easy) Posted: 21 Oct 2019 08:00 PM PDT  The story starts in 2005.
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| Warren Steps Into Repo Turmoil, Asks Mnuchin for Answers Posted: 22 Oct 2019 07:29 AM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren waded into last month's turmoil in short-term funding markets, warning Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin not to use the incident as a rationale for weakening post-financial crisis regulations.Warren, a front-runner in the race to challenge Donald Trump in the 2020 U.S. presidential election, sent a letter to the Treasury on Friday. In it, she sought Mnuchin's views on what triggered the spike in rates for repurchase agreements and expressed concern about potential costs to businesses and consumers if strains persist.She also set herself up for another fight with Wall Street, citing a Reuters article reporting that large banks were using the repo-market chaos to pressure the Federal Reserve to weaken liquidity rules "they have long despised." Warren said she's concerned the Financial Stability Oversight Council, whose chair is Mnuchin, might support those efforts."These rules were designed to ensure that banks have enough cash on hand to meet their obligations in the event of another market crash," Warren said. "Banks are reporting profits at record levels, and it would be painfully ironic if unexplained chaos in a small corner of the banking market became an excuse to further loosen rules that protect the economy from these types of risks."The Treasury Department declined to comment on Warren's letter. On Oct. 16, in response to a reporter's question, Mnuchin rejected the notion that the U.S. government's heavy issuance of debt contributed to the tumult and instead blamed a corporate tax deadline for draining money from the banking system. The jump in rates on Sept. 17 "had nothing to do with our issuance, it had to do with the big tax day, that we were taking cash out of the market," he said.Banking industry complaints about regulations have gotten louder since the mid-September dislocation. JPMorgan Chase & Co. Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon said Oct. 15 that the bank had the money and inclination to step in when rates surged, but liquidity rules prevented it from doing so.Regulations introduced after the 2008 crisis oblige financial institutions to hold more cash and cash-like assets as a buffer against times of stress, and systemically important banks -- JPMorgan is the largest in the U.S. -- face year-end reviews to determine how much more common equity they must carry. Analysts at JPMorgan argued this week that money-market stress is likely to get much worse despite the Fed's attempts to fix the problem.The central bank has been injecting liquidity into the funding markets since Sept. 17, when the rate on overnight general collateral repo jumped to 10% from around 2%. The Fed has also begun buying Treasury bills to add reserves back into the system. These efforts have mostly calmed repo rates."While the Federal Reserve has taken the necessary action to ensure that markets continue to function, I am alarmed that it has been required to engage in money market interventions that have not been used since the 2008 financial crisis," wrote Warren, a Democrat from Massachusetts.Warren came to prominence because of her criticisms of Wall Street and calls for tougher oversight of the financial industry after the 2008 financial crisis. Her advocacy was pivotal to the creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and helped lock in her election to the Senate.Warren asked that Mnuchin respond to these and other questions no later than Nov. 1:What are the underlying causes of the spike in borrowing rates for overnight repurchase agreements?Has FSOC learned why the Fed announced on Oct. 11 that overnight operations meant to keep the calm would be extended at least through January of next year?How will FSOC and Treasury use data on centrally cleared repo transactions to gain a further understanding of the market? Is further information needed to sufficiently monitor the short-term lending market?(Updates with Mnuchin comment on repo from last week in fifth paragraph.)\--With assistance from Michael Shepard, Saleha Mohsin and Anna Edgerton.To contact the reporters on this story: Emily Barrett in New York at ebarrett25@bloomberg.net;Alexandra Harris in New York at aharris48@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Benjamin Purvis at bpurvis@bloomberg.net, Nick Baker, Jenny ParisFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| The asteroid that killed the dinosaurs acidified the ocean in a 'flash,' killing most marine life. The seas could see a similar problem a century from now. Posted: 22 Oct 2019 11:39 AM PDT  A new study found that the asteroid impact that led the dinosaurs to go extinct also caused rapid ocean acidification, which killed most sea life.
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| Brothers who allegedly left their grandma to die in a fire, but saved meth lab equipment indicted Posted: 21 Oct 2019 03:10 PM PDT ![Brothers who allegedly left their grandma to die in a fire, but saved meth lab equipment indicted]( "Brothers who allegedly left their grandma to die in a fire, but saved meth lab equipment indicted") A Steuben County grand jury two men in connection with a May fire that was reportedly caused by a meth lab and killed their grandmother.
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| San Jose to propose turning PG&E into giant customer-owned utility - WSJ Posted: 21 Oct 2019 01:01 PM PDT  Mayor Sam Liccardo said in an interview to the WSJ the city served by PG&E hopes to persuade other cities and counties in coming weeks to line up behind the plan. The plan is to strip PG&E of its status as an investor-owned company and turn it into a nonprofit, electric-and-gas cooperative, the Monday's report https://on.wsj.com/2JaJWJg added. Liccardo told the WSJ the time has come for the people dependent on PG&E for essential services to propose a new direction.
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| Japanese Emperor Naruhito ascends Chrysanthemum Throne Posted: 22 Oct 2019 06:13 AM PDT  Three booming cheers of "Banzai!" rang out Tuesday at the Imperial Palace in Tokyo as Naruhito formally declared his ascension to the Chrysanthemum Throne as the nation's 126th emperor. As a driving autumn rain briefly gave way to sunshine and 2,000 guests looked on, Naruhito pledged at an elaborate, ritual-laden ceremony to serve as a symbol of the state for his people. The enthronement ceremony is the high point of several succession rituals that began in May when Naruhito inherited the throne after the abdication of Akihito, his father.
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