| 'No Malarkey': Biden could shock the pundits and win Posted: 02 Dec 2019 01:50 PM PST  Biden doesn't actually need to win Iowa or New Hampshire to accrue the 1,990 pledged delegates required to clinch the nomination. He simply needs to hold onto black voters in Southern states and urban areas.
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| House Democrats to vote on restoration of Voting Rights Act this month Posted: 03 Dec 2019 11:07 AM PST  House Democrats will vote this month on a bill intended to lay the foundation for a restoration of the full Voting Rights Act, a significant step in a years-long effort to respond to a 2013 Supreme Court decision that significantly weakened the law.
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| US Marine charged with illegally flying guns into Haiti Posted: 03 Dec 2019 09:29 AM PST  A U.S. Marine caught smuggling guns into Haiti told investigators he wanted to help the country's military learn marksmanship and defeat "thugs" causing instability there, according to a criminal complaint. The criminal complaint filed last week in a North Carolina federal court charges Marine Sgt. Jacques Yves Duroseau with smuggling firearms. Prosecutors say Duroseau flew from North Carolina to Haiti with baggage including eight firearms — at least five of which he bought himself — but lacked needed authorization to take them abroad.
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| What Adam Schiff Doesn’t Get About Watergate Posted: 03 Dec 2019 02:02 AM PST  He sees Howard Baker as a noble, bipartisan impeachment hero. In reality, he was just another attack dog for Nixon. Here's why Democrats need to get their history right.
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| US diplomat calls for 'decisive action' in Afghan alleged abuse ring Posted: 03 Dec 2019 12:30 AM PST  Afghan authorities must take "decisive action" following reports of an alleged paedophile ring operating in schools in eastern Afghanistan, a senior US diplomat said Tuesday. The comments by Alice Wells, US assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asia, come after British newspaper The Guardian last month detailed accounts of the abuse, which allegedly affected more than 500 victims in Logar province south of Kabul. "We call on Afghan authorities, including the Attorney General's Office, to take decisive action on deeply troubling reports of sexual abuse in Logar schools," Wells wrote on Twitter.
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| Palmerston, the Foreign Office cat, returns to work after six months off for stress Posted: 02 Dec 2019 01:37 AM PST  Palmerston, the Foreign Office cat, has returned to work after six months recovering from stress caused by civil servants constantly picking him up and overfeeding him. Those working in the department have been warned not to touch the cat unless approached, and to stop feeding him treats. In July, the cat was taken to the house of Sir Simon McDonald's Private Secretary in order to recover from stress; the mouser was overweight and had groomed all of the hair off his front legs. Sir Simon, a senior civil servant, is in charge of Palmerston's well-being and on Monday morning issued a strict letter to staff, warning them that if they do not change their behaviour towards the cat, he may be retired for good. Mystery has surrounded Palmerston's extended break, with some worrying the cat was gravely unwell and close to death. However, these rumours were unfounded and the animal is happy and back to full health. The letter reads: "He is happy, healthy and full of energy. His pelt is glossy and mostly grown back (over grooming is, I'm told, a similar habit to human's nail-biting; the habit can take a while to kick). His diet is regulated and free of Dreamies. We need now to keep him that way!" I am happy to announce that I will be returning to my Chief Mouser duties at the @foreignoffice this week! New guidance - the Palmerston Protocols - will govern my care in the FCO to make sure it's working for me. (1/4) pic.twitter.com/j2AFKI0DGN— Palmerston (@DiploMog) December 2, 2019 Staff have been given four rules now the cat is back. Sir Simon wrote: "First, no-one (apart from his carers) should feed Palmerston. No Dreamies. No bowls of food under the desk for if he happens to drop by. Nothing! "Second, everyone must help keep Palmerston in the 'Palmerston Zone'. Cats are territorial. They fret when their territory is bigger than they can manage. They can cope with an ever smaller territory as they age. Palmerston has been king of King Charles Street, roaming from basement to fourth floor (with quad, Downing Street and occasionally St James's Park thrown in) for nearly four years. We think he's about six years old, ie entering feline middle age. "With the vet's help we have mapped a more manageable territory: the offices and area surrounding the Grand Staircase. Heavy doors mark the limits, now with (discreet) stickers proclaiming, 'You are entering/leaving the Palmerston Zone'. Please respect the Zone and return Palmerston if you find him straying further afield. Bear in mind that he loves to sit beside the door and dart through, if given half a chance. "Third, everyone must respect Palmerston's personal space. Allow Palmerston to choose whether he wants to interact with you: offer your hand as if you were introducing yourself to a stranger, and allow Palmerston to make the first move. Don't wake him if he is sleeping. He has full choice and control of who he deigns to greet or imperiously ignores. "Fourth, my staff office will serve as both my Outer Office and as Palmerston's refuge: Palmerston HQ. If he is in Palmerston HQ, he is not to be disturbed. Palmerston is a friendly, outgoing cat, but we all need our privacy. Like Greta Garbo, sometimes he wants to be alone."
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| 50 million people under winter storm watches, advisories as 'bomb cyclone' storm hits Northeast Posted: 02 Dec 2019 12:01 PM PST  More than 50 million people remained under winter storm advisories or warnings a week after the historic bomb cyclone smashed the Pacific Coast.
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| 4 Decades of Inequality Drive American Cities Apart Posted: 02 Dec 2019 11:53 AM PST  In 1980, highly paid workers in Binghamton, New York, earned about 4 1/2 times what low-wage workers there did. The gap between them, in a region full of IBM executives and manufacturing jobs, was about the same as the gap between the workers near the top and the bottom in metro New York City.Since then, the two regions have diverged. IBM shed jobs in Binghamton. Other manufacturing disappeared, too. High-paying work in the new knowledge economy concentrated in New York City, and so did well-educated workers. As a result, by one measure, wage inequality today is much higher in New York City than it is in Binghamton.What has happened over the last four decades is only partly a story of New York City's rise as a global hub and Binghamton's struggles. Economic inequality has been rising everywhere in the United States. But it has been rising much more in the booming places that promise hefty incomes to engineers, lawyers and innovators. And those places today are also the largest metros in the country: New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Jose, Houston, Washington.Data from a recent analysis by Jaison Abel and Richard Deitz of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York captures several dynamics that have remade the U.S. economy since 1980. Thriving and stagnant places are pulling apart from each other. And within the most prosperous regions, inequality is widening to new extremes. That this inequality now so clearly correlates with city size -- the largest metros are the most unequal -- also shows how changes in the economy are both rewarding and rattling what we have come to think of as "superstar cities."In these places, inequality and economic growth now go hand in hand.Back in 1980, Binghamton's wage inequality made the region among the most unequal in the country, according to the Fed analysis. It ranked 20th of 195 metros as measured by comparing the wages of workers at the 90th percentile with those at the 10th percentile of the local wage distribution, a measure that captures the breadth of disparities in the local economy without focusing solely on the very top. In 1980, New York City was slightly less unequal, ranking 44th by this measure.Forty years ago, none of the country's 10 largest metros were among the 20 most unequal. By 2015, San Francisco, New York, Houston, Los Angeles, Dallas and Washington had jumped onto that list, pulled there by the skyrocketing wages of high-skilled workers. Binghamton over the same period had become one of the least unequal metros, in part because many IBM executives and well-paid manufacturing workers had vanished from its economy.In effect, something we often think of as undesirable (high inequality) has been a signal of something positive in big cities (a strong economy). And in Binghamton, relatively low inequality has been a signal of a weak economy. (The Fairfield-Bridgeport, Connecticut, metro stands out in either era because the deep poverty of its urban core is surrounded by particularly rich suburbs.)These patterns are hard to reconcile with appeals today for reducing inequality, both within big cities and across the country. What are Americans supposed to make of the fact that more high-paying jobs by definition widen inequality? Should New Yorkers be OK with growing inequality in New York if it is driven by rising wages for high-skilled workers, and not falling wages for low-skilled ones?"That's more of a political question," said Nathaniel Baum-Snow, an economist at the University of Toronto. "That's a question of what we decide our values should be as a society."Tom VanHeuvelen, a sociologist at the University of Minnesota who has also researched these patterns, said: "It seems obvious to me that it doesn't need to be the way that it is right now. This isn't the only inevitable outcome we have when we think about the relationship between cities, affluence and inequality."Economists say that the same forces that are driving economic growth in big cities are also responsible for inequality. And those forces have accumulated and reinforced each other since 1980.High-skilled workers have been in increasing demand and increasingly rewarded. In New York, the real wages for workers at the 10th percentile grew by about 15% between 1980 and 2015, according to the Fed researchers. For the median worker, they grew by about 40%. For workers at the 90th percentile, they nearly doubled.That is partly because when highly skilled workers and their firms cluster in the same place today, they are all more productive, research shows. And in major cities, they are also tied directly into the global economy."If you're someone who has skills for the new economy, your skills turn out to be more valuable in bigger cities, in a way that wasn't true 30 to 40 years ago," Baum-Snow said.It is no surprise, then, that high-skilled workers have been sorting into big, prosperous cities, compounding the advantages of these places (and draining less prosperous places of these workers).At the same time, automation, globalization and the decline of manufacturing have decimated well-paying jobs that once required no more than a high school diploma. That has hollowed out both the middle class in big cities and the economic engine in smaller cities. The result is that changes in the economy have disproportionately rewarded some places and harmed others, pushing their trajectories apart.Add one more dynamic to all of this: Inequality has been rising nationally since the 1980s. But because the Bay Area and New York regions already had more than their fair share of one-percenters (or 10 percenters) in 1980, the national growth in income inequality has been magnified in those places."We've had this pulling apart of the overall income distribution," said Robert Manduca, a doctoral student in sociology and social policy at Harvard University who has found that about half of the economic divergence between different parts of the country is explained by trends in national inequality. "That overall pulling apart has had very different effects in different places, based on which kinds of people were already living in those places."Manduca says national policies like reinvigorating antitrust laws would be most effective at reducing inequality (the consolidation of many industries has meant, among other things, that smaller cities that once had company headquarters have lost those jobs, sometimes to big cities).It is hard to imagine local officials combating all these forces. Increases to the minimum wage are likely to be swamped -- at least in this measure -- by the gains of workers at the top. Policies that tax high earners more to fund housing or education for the poor would redistribute some of the uneven gains of the modern economy. But they would not alter the fact that this economy values an engineer so much more than a line cook."If you brought the bottom up, it would be a better world," said Richard Florida, a professor at the University of Toronto who has written extensively about these trends. "But you'd still have a big rise in wage inequality."This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2019 The New York Times Company
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| The U.S. Navy Signs Up for 9 New Nuclear Submarines Posted: 03 Dec 2019 01:42 PM PST  These nine submarines, essentially improved versions of the Virginia-class submarine, is the Navy's largest warship building deal ever.
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| Trump impeachment news: Democrats release damning report accusing president of obstruction, as he has tense exchanges with world leaders at Nato summit Posted: 03 Dec 2019 01:22 PM PST  Donald Trump sparred with Emmanuel Macron during a televised bilateral meeting at the two-day Nato summit in London, as House investigators released an explosive report on the impeachment inquiry back home in Washington.It was a whirlwind news cycle during the president's visit to the UK: as Mr Trump met with world leaders overseas, House investigators released their report finding "a months-long effort by President Trump to use the powers of his office to solicit foreign interference on his behalf in the 2020 election".
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| Evacuation slide accidentally falls from plane into Boston backyard Posted: 02 Dec 2019 01:01 PM PST  The pilot of Delta Air Lines Flight 405 from Paris to Boston reported hearing a loud noise as began its final approach to Boston's Logan airport, the Boston Globe reported. Stephanie Leguia, a resident of a Boston suburb, told the Boston Herald that she was standing in a neighbor's backyard when an uninflated evacuation slide fell from the sky, bringing down several tree branches along the way. The slide, which was uninflated, looked like a "giant silver tarp," she said.
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| Court declines to intervene in upcoming Tennessee execution Posted: 03 Dec 2019 03:48 PM PST  Two days before a Tennessee prisoner's scheduled execution, the state's Supreme Court has denied request for more time to consider the possible bias of a juror who helped hand down the original death sentence decades ago. It's a method selected by three out of the five past death row inmates put to death since Tennessee started resuming executions in August 2018. This omission, Hall's attorneys argue, deprived the 53-year-old Hall of a fair and impartial jury — a right protected in both the Tennessee and U.S. constitutions.
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| A Salute to the EA-6B Prowler: The Navy Really Misses This Plane Posted: 02 Dec 2019 09:55 PM PST  The end of an era.
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| Mexico arrests 10 over deadly firefight near US border Posted: 03 Dec 2019 02:16 PM PST  Mexican authorities said Tuesday they have arrested 10 alleged gunmen from a drug cartel commando that attacked a town near the US border, leaving six locals and 17 assailants dead. At least 60 gunmen terrorized the small northern city of Villa Union over the weekend, riding into town in heavily armed four-by-fours and spraying dozens of buildings with bullets, including houses and the city hall. The army, National Guard and police then engaged the gunmen in a series of firefights Saturday and Sunday that killed 23 people, according to an updated toll from authorities in Coahuila state.
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| Roman Empire did not fall because of plague, study claims Posted: 02 Dec 2019 12:01 PM PST  A bubonic plague which was thought to have wiped out half of the world's population and helped topple the Roman Empire was far exaggerated by scholars, a new study claims. The Justinianic Plague which preceded the Black Death by more than 800 years plague was thought to have killed around 50 million people across the Roman and Byzantine Empires between 541-750 AD. The plague, spread in part by rats along trade routes, was believed to leave the Roman Empire vulnerable after the population loss hit its trade and military might across the Medeteranian, Africa and the East. An international team of scholars led by researchers from the University of Maryland have now called into question the scale of the plague, as the available evidence paints a different picture. Lead author, Lee Mordechai, from of Princeton's Climate Change and History Research Initiative, said: "If this plague was a key moment in human history that killed between a third and half the population of the Mediterranean world in just a few years, as is often claimed, we should have evidence for it but our survey of datasets found none." The researchers analysis ancient texts alongside, pollen samples, plague genomes and the archeology around graves to debunk previous consensus around the scale of the outbreak. At a glance | Plague facts Several sources across antiquity that had attributed important world events to the outbreak of the plague, such as the fall of the Roman Empire. However, the researchers found that previous scholars had focused on evocative written accounts, ignoring hundreds of contemporary texts that did not mention the outbreak. "We found no reason to argue that the plague killed tens of millions of people as many have claimed," said co-author Timothy Newfield. "Plague is often construed as shifting the course of history. It's an easy explanation, too easy. It's essential to establish a causal connection," he said. Analysis of evidence such as pollen samples and burial sites also found that the millions of supposed deaths did not quite add up. Where there should be more mass graves and less pollen from the lack of farming as a result, the researcher's findings showed no evidence of the mass deaths. Co-author of the study, Janet Kay, said: "We investigated a large dataset of human burials from before and after the plague outbreak, and the plague did not result in a significant change whether people buried the dead alone or with many others. "The Black Death killed vast numbers of people and did change how people disposed of corpses."
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| Top Los Angeles homeless official steps down as crisis deepens Posted: 02 Dec 2019 02:44 PM PST  The chief of a top Los Angeles homeless agency announced his resignation on Monday, saying he was proud of its work even as America's second-largest city grapples with spiraling numbers of people living on the streets and rising home prices. Peter Lynn, who saw homelessness rise 33% during his five years as head of the Los Angeles Homeless Service Authority, said he would leave the job by Dec. 31. The agency said its chief program officer, Heidi Marston, would serve as acting director during a nationwide search for Lynn's replacement.
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| Maxine Waters’ new challenge: AOC and freshman upstarts Posted: 02 Dec 2019 02:02 AM PST  Some progressives have openly lamented the committee's leanings toward more moderate, business-friendly Democrats who dominate its ranks.
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| Pompeo falsely claimed Obama made Iran his 'primary security partner in the Middle East' Posted: 03 Dec 2019 06:36 AM PST  Iran has been an adversary of the US for decades, including under former President Barack Obama. But Pompeo just suggested otherwise.
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| Georgia governor's Senate appointment defies Trump Posted: 02 Dec 2019 07:42 AM PST  Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp is expected to appoint financial services executive Katie Loeffler to fill the state's vacant Senate seat, according to Politico. Georgia Sen. Johnny Isakson announced earlier this year that he would be leaving the Senate at the end of 2019 for health reasons.
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| Russian scientists present ancient puppy found in permafrost Posted: 02 Dec 2019 04:51 AM PST  Russian scientists on Monday showed off a prehistoric puppy, believed to be 18,000 years old, found in permafrost in the country's Far East. Discovered last year in a lump of frozen mud near the city of Yakutsk, the puppy is unusually well-preserved, with its hair, teeth, whiskers and eyelashes still intact.
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| Nazi Germany's World War II Victory Over France Proves 1 Thing Posted: 02 Dec 2019 03:00 PM PST  No one pushed the French troops to endure the unendurable, and when the crisis moment arrived, the French leaders often froze into inaction.
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| US lawyers who have had abortions file Supreme Court brief Posted: 03 Dec 2019 11:55 AM PST  More than 360 American women who have had abortions and work in the legal profession, including several high-profile attorneys, have filed a brief with the Supreme Court ahead of a closely watched abortion case. "I write because I want the Court to know how access to safe and legal abortion made my law career possible and changed my life," said one of the 368 signatories to the brief filed with the court on Monday. The nine-member Supreme Court is to hear a challenge in March to a restrictive abortion law in the state of Louisiana.
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| Robert Mugabe died with $10m in cash and several houses, but left no will Posted: 03 Dec 2019 09:30 AM PST  The wealth of Zimbabwe's former longtime president Robert Mugabe was long a mystery. Now the first official list of assets to be made public says he left behind $10 million and several houses when he died in September. Some in Zimbabwe view that estate as far too modest for Mugabe, who ruled for 37 years and was accused by critics of accumulating vast riches and presiding over grand corruption. The report by the state-run Herald newspaper on Tuesday does not mention any overseas assets, though it is thought that Mugabe had properties in neighboring South Africa and in Asia. The report says there appears to be no will, though lawyers are still looking for one. The report cites the lawyers as saying the law stipulates that Mugabe's wife, Grace, and children will inherit the property in that case. Mugabe also left behind a farm, 10 cars and 11 hectares (27 acres) of land that included an orchard at his rural home where he was buried. His daughter, Bona, registered the estate on behalf of the family, the report said. Mugabe's wife Grace will inherit his assets if no will is found Credit: REUTERS/Howard Burditt More than a dozen farms are publicly known to have been seized from both black and white farmers by the late strongman's family. Mugabe died of cancer in a Singapore hospital at age 95 nearly two years after he was forced by Zimbabwe's military and ruling party to resign. Many in the southern African nation say the country he left behind has fallen deeper into economic and political crisis, with a growing hunger problem that a United Nations expert last month called "shocking" for a state not at war. Half of Zimbabwe's population, or more than 7 million people, is experiencing severe hunger, the UN World Food Program said Tuesday. Critics blame the administration of Emmerson Mnangagwa, the president, who has struggled to fulfil promises of prosperity since taking power in 2017.
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| Tourism in Israel? U.S. charity's offer with Gaza hospital project irks Palestinians Posted: 03 Dec 2019 05:02 AM PST  GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) - A U.S. charity building a tent hospital in the Gaza Strip is causing Palestinian unease by offering foreign medical volunteers the opportunity of weekend tourism in Israel, just across the volatile border. The facility, to be operated by the U.S. evangelical Christian group FriendShips, had won rare joint support from Gaza's Islamist rulers Hamas and their enemy, Israel, which maintains a blockade along its frontier with the enclave. Now, however, eyebrows are being raised in Gaza over a Holy Land pilgrimage pitch on the Louisiana-based organization's website that is promoting an endeavor to improve health services strained by years of conflict.
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| All-In Trump Bet Backfires for Bolsonaro Amid Tariff Threats Posted: 02 Dec 2019 07:49 PM PST  (Bloomberg) -- Terms of Trade is a daily newsletter that untangles a world embroiled in trade wars. Sign up here. Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro is learning the cost of partnering with Donald Trump the hard way.During his first year on the job, Bolsonaro assiduously courted the American president, parroting his hard-line policies on Venezuela and Hezbollah while breaking with diplomatic protocol by predicting a Trump victory in 2020 during a visit to the White House.Yet his all-in bet on Trump is quickly souring as signs mount that the alliance isn't delivering real benefits to Brazil.Trump's announcement Monday that he is reinstating tariffs on steel and aluminum from Brazil and Argentina follows a decision by the White House in late August to give priority to Romania and Argentina's bids to join the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development despite public reassurances in favor of Brazil, Latin America's largest economy.Bolsonaro's inability to get a clear diplomatic victory, at least so far, from his robust support of Trump raises questions about his decision to shift Brazil's foreign policy. It also weakens him domestically by giving ammunition to rivals who warned against joining forces with someone they see as an unreliable partner."In international relations there are no friends, only interests," Rodrigo Maia, Brazil's lower house speaker and a centrist who has criticized Bolsonaro's foreign policy, told Bloomberg News on Monday. "Trump is defending Americans and we need to defend Brazilians."Trump on Monday accused Argentina and Brazil of cheapening their currencies to the detriment of U.S. farmers, arguing that the two countries were "presiding over a massive devaluation of their currencies."The two nations have taken advantage of the trade war to become alternative suppliers of soybeans and other agricultural products to China, grabbing market share away from U.S. farmers.Read More: Trump Ties Brazil, Argentina Steel Tariffs to U.S. Farm WoesArgentina's peso has plunged this year, especially after it became clear that President Mauricio Macri would likely lose the October election to Alberto Fernandez, the left-learning candidate. The country seems headed for a third consecutive year of economic contraction.Brazil has intervened multiple times in the past month to support its devaluing real. Argentina has also tried to bolster the falling peso.Bolsonaro said he would talk to his economy minister before reacting to Trump's comments on the Brazilian real and the imposition of the tariffs. "If needed, I can also talk to Trump, I have an open channel with him," he added.But the tariffs threats underscored the lack of clear results to show for all the Bolsonaro-Trump romance. For instance, a much-touted trade deal with the U.S. has failed to gain traction despite Bolsonaro publicly praising Trump at every turn.The U.S. has ranked first as a destination for Brazilian steel exports for most of the last decade. In 2018, exports by volume to the U.S. increased by 17%, when compared to 2017.Diplomatic ShiftBrazil, historically a cautious U.S. ally, threw in its lot with Trump since Bolsonaro took office in January and railed against leftist ideologies and globalist institutions. That was a marked shift from the country's traditional, internationalist approach, which sought to amplify its influence through regional alliances and multilateral organizations like the United Nations.Yet Bolsonaro's enthusiastic alignment with Trump, together with his clashes with world leaders such as French President Emmanuel Macron as well as Fernandez, have left his nation increasingly alone in the world stage, a trend underscored by a recent vote at the United Nations where it was one of two countries siding with the U.S. against 187 members on the Cuban embargo.Brazilian diplomats, speaking on condition of anonymity, downplayed Trump's tweets, arguing the scope and size of the tariffs are unknown and that their implementation isn't certain. They also argued his claims are inaccurate as Brazil has a free-floating currency regime and works hard against exchange rate depreciation.A U.S. official stressed that the government still supports the OECD bid and that ties with Brazil have blossomed under Trump and Bolsonaro. The official, who asked not to be identified discussing bilateral ties, said the U.S. is still very much interested in advancing a free trade agreement.BRAZIL INSIGHT: Trump Tariffs Miss FX Mark, Add Growth StressOfficials at the White House didn't immediately respond to a request for comment on whether the president's tariff decisions undermine the relationship he and Bolsonaro have sought to establish.China PivotIn the meantime, China, Brazil's largest trading partner, has been quietly working to deepen economic ties.Facing an onslaught of pressure from his generals, the agriculture lobby, and other policy makers, Bolsonaro, who early on had accused China of predatory business practices, has without fanfare shifted his stance even before Trump's tariff threat. During a visit to Beijing in October, he said the two countries "were born to walk together". He later received President Xi Jinping at a BRICs summit in Brasilia, where he called for deeper trade relations.U.S.-Brazil ties will face a further test as Trump administration officials urge Brazil not to let Huawei Technologies Co. build its ultra-fast fifth generation mobile network. The head of Brazil's Institutional Security Cabinet, General Augusto Heleno, has thus far ruled out banning the Chinese company's bid in next year's auction.The possibility that Trump loses his re-election bid next year is another reason for the Bolsonaro administration to be more careful about the association, said Roberto Simon, senior director for policy at Americas Society/Council of the Americas."I really can't think of any way in which this partnership with Trump has benefited Brazil," he said. "It's leading to the gradual undermining of Brazil's credibility internationally. If Trump loses, Brazil could become an international pariah."Here's what Trump has gotten from closer ties with Bolsonaro:A deal to use the Alcantara rocket launch site in Brazil's northeastern Maranhao stateVisa exemptions for U.S. citizens and business-peopleBrazil agreed to begin a process to relinquish special and differential treatment in WTO negotiationBrazilian alignment on Cuba, Israel, Venezuela, Saudi Arabia and HezbollahHere's what Bolsonaro has gotten in return:Trump labeled Brazil a major non-NATO ally, paving the way for further military and intelligence partnershipTrump publicly endorsed Brazil's OECD bid but supported Argentina and Romania, who were further along in the process, first and declined to set a timeline for Brazil's membership processRe-imposition of steel tariffsThe U.S. has maintained restrictions on Brazilian raw meat and sugar\--With assistance from Mario Parker.To contact the reporters on this story: David Wainer in New York at dwainer3@bloomberg.net;Samy Adghirni in Brasilia Newsroom at sadghirni@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Bill Faries at wfaries@bloomberg.net, ;Juan Pablo Spinetto at jspinetto@bloomberg.net, John HarneyFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| China actually started blocking US Navy port calls to Hong Kong months before its latest retaliatory move Posted: 03 Dec 2019 06:38 AM PST  China has rejected half a dozen US Navy port-call requests for stops in Hong Kong in the past six months, according to US Pacific Fleet.
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| Romney Contests Trump’s Ukraine Election-Meddling Narrative: ‘I Saw No Evidence’ Posted: 03 Dec 2019 09:26 AM PST  Senator Mitt Romney of Utah broke with his Republican colleagues on Tuesday, telling reporters that, based on testimony from American officials, he does not believe there is evidence of Ukrainian interference in the 2016 election.Romney's comments come after U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs David Hale, the No. 3 State Department official, told a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing that he was not aware of any Ukraine meddling in the 2016 election."I saw no evidence from our intelligence community nor from our representatives today from the Department of State that there is any evidence of any kind that suggests Ukraine interfered in our elections," Romney said Tuesday. He added that "we have ample evidence that Russia interfered in our elections."> ROMNEY: "I saw no evidence from our intelligence community, nor from the representatives today from the Department of State, that there is *any* evidence of *any* kind that suggests that Ukraine interfered in our elections. We have ample evidence that Russia interfered…" pic.twitter.com/zSTBcEviSQ> > -- Marcus J. DiPaola (@marcusdipaola) December 3, 2019During his July 25 call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Trump asked his Ukrainian counterpart "to find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine." He went on to specify that he wanted a probe into the so-called "Crowdstrike theory," which holds that Ukrainian hackers posed as Russians while interfering in the 2016 election in order to sow discord between the two powers."They say Crowdstrike … I guess you have one of your wealthy people … The server, they say Ukraine has it," Trump said according to the transcript of the call. In September the Justice Department confirmed that the probe led by U.S. Attorney John Durham was exploring Ukrainian election interference.During House testimony in the impeachment inquiry, Republicans repeatedly cited Trump's concern over Ukrainian corruption as reasonable in his decision to delay military aid to the country, a position a new House-Republican report reinforces."President Trump has a deep-seated, genuine, and reasonable skepticism of Ukraine due to its history of pervasive corruption," the report — released Monday — states.Republicans have also referenced a January 2017 article from Politico titled "Ukrainian efforts to sabotage Trump backfire," which cites examples of Ukrainian officials attempting to sabotage the Trump campaign.State Department officials and Democrats have pushed back on the narrative, emphasizing Trump's mention of the "Crowdstrike" theory, which they argue amounts to Russian propaganda.In her testimony last month, former National Security Council staffer Fiona Hill called Ukrainian 2016 election interference "a fictional narrative that has been perpetrated and propagated by the Russian security services themselves.""The unfortunate truth is that Russia was the foreign power that systematically attacked our democratic institutions in 2016," Hill's opening statement reads. "This is the public conclusion of our intelligence agencies, confirmed in bipartisan Congressional reports. It is beyond dispute, even if some of the underlying details must remain classified."
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| 18 Clever-Approved Coat Racks You Don’t Need to Hide Posted: 03 Dec 2019 11:44 AM PST |
| Look Out America, Russia Just Tested Its S-500 Air Defense System In Syria Posted: 02 Dec 2019 01:30 PM PST  Deployment is coming next year.
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| Saudi king invites Qatar emir to Riyadh summit: Doha Posted: 03 Dec 2019 09:07 AM PST  Doha (AFP) - Saudi King Salman has invited Qatar's emir to a meeting next week of the Gulf regional bloc in Riyadh, Qatari state media said Tuesday without specifying if Doha had accepted.
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| European official urges closure of Bosnian migrant camp Posted: 03 Dec 2019 04:12 AM PST  BIHAC, Bosnia-Herzegovina (AP) — A top European human rights official on Tuesday demanded the immediate closure of a makeshift tent camp in northwestern Bosnia where hundreds of migrants remain stranded despite snow and freezing weather. "It should be closed as we speak," Dunja Mijatovic, the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights said while visiting the Vucjak camp near the town of Bihac. International aid organizations have repeatedly warned it is unfit for migrants because it is located on a former landfill and close to a mine field from the 1992-95 war.
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| Republican privacy bill would set U.S. rules, pre-empt California: senator Posted: 02 Dec 2019 02:02 PM PST  A draft consumer privacy bill written by Republican U.S. Senator Roger Wicker's staff would set nationwide rules for handling of personal information online and elsewhere and override state laws, including one in California set to take effect next year. Wicker, who chairs the Commerce Committee, said in an interview on Monday the 25-page draft bill is "better, stronger, clearer" than the California privacy law that will start to take effect at the beginning of 2020. Compared with California's law, the staff bill has more detailed consumer protections, covers more companies and has more explicit requirements that companies collect the minimum amount of personal data needed for their purpose, Wicker said.
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| Second person found alive after two weeks in outback after drinking from cattle water hole Posted: 03 Dec 2019 08:16 AM PST  Australian police said on Tuesday they had found a second person who had been missing in the country's remote outback for weeks, saying he survived soaring temperatures by drinking water meant for livestock. Police said Phu Tran, 40, was found by a local farmer at a cattle station near Alice Springs, two weeks after he and two friends went hiking. "He's in a good condition. He was slightly disoriented... but other than that he was in good condition," Superintendent Pauline Vicary told reporters in Alice Springs. Tran was found three days after his friend Tamra McBeath-Riley was found about 1.5 km (0.9 miles) from the car they had been travelling in through Australia's remote north. A third member of the group, Claire Hockridge, is still missing. Ms McBeath-Riley said the car became bogged down in the soft desert roads in the region. For a few days, the group stayed close to the car, surviving on the limited supplies they had packed, McBeath-Riley said. After running out of water, Tran and Hockridge went looking for help, taking only a compass and a GPS. Both survived after finding a water hole used by cattle. "It appears that along the way they have located water, so we're hopeful that she has got water," Ms Vicary said. It is not known why Mr Tran and Ms Hockridge separated, though Ms Vicary said police hope they will find her soon.
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| 'A Lot Is at Stake': Supreme Court Weighs First Major Gun Rights Case in Nearly a Decade Posted: 02 Dec 2019 12:48 PM PST  Advocates on both sides of the U.S. gun debate were watching the Supreme Court closely on Monday as the justices weighed a high-stakes gun case that experts say has the potential to expand gun rights and roll back hundreds of gun-safety laws across the country.
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| Husband of Missing Connecticut Mom Jennifer Dulos Takes Stand in Civil Lawsuit Brought by Mother-in-Law Posted: 03 Dec 2019 02:08 PM PST  Six months after Connecticut mom Jennifer Dulos disappeared after dropping her children off at school, her estranged husband took the stand in a civil lawsuit filed by his mother-in-law. Fotis Dulos, 52, testified in Hartford Superior Court on Tuesday in his own defense against a January 2018 lawsuit filed by Jennifer Dulos' mother, Gloria Farber. The lawsuit alleges he owes Farber and her late husband nearly $2.54 million in unpaid loans. In a separate case, Dulos and his estranged girlfriend, Michelle Troconis, have pleaded not guilty to tampering with evidence and hindering prosecution in connection with his wife's May disappearance. Fotis Dulos' Girlfriend Re-Arrested in Case of Missing Connecticut MomAs part of the civil lawsuit, Dulos is accused of using the loans he received from his in-laws over the course of 10 years to finance his house and his home-building company, Fore Group. In court on Tuesday, he insisted the money was a gift from his late father-in-law, Hilliard Farber, who died in 2017."He and I had a very good relationship," Dulos said, according to the Hartford Courant.Dulos, who is currently free on a $1 million bond, claimed Hillard Farber was "like a second father" who was supportive of his business. The father-of-five said that Farber encouraged him to start his own building company and arranged a series of loans with promissory notes to the Fore Group between 2004 and 2007. He said their financial relationship was a successful "two-way street," as Farber would provide the capital for his projects, which Dulos would then pay back upon their completion. "He was incredibly supportive," Dulos said, adding the Fore Group also gave his father-in-law funds to invest. "He provided advice, he was always there for me and the business."Police: Fotis Dulos Was 'Lying in Wait' for Estranged Wife the Day She VanishedWith the birth of his fifth child in 2010, Dulos claimed his father-in-law told him "any advancements were not loans," but gifts, and did not require a promissory note. But Gloria Farber's attorney, Richard Weinstein, argued bank records show Dulos paid himself at least $2.2 million from the company's coffers, and since those funds were not used for business purposes, they must be returned.Part of the unpaid balance, the lawyer said, includes a loan he was given to build the 14,000-square-foot Farmington mansion Dulos shared with his family until June 2017, when his wife left him and filed for divorce. After his father-in-law's death, Dulos also stopped paying back the family when his business sold new properties, according to Weinstein.Although the civil case is unrelated to Dulos' upcoming trial, Hartford Superior Court Judge Cesar Noble reminded him that anything he says under oath could be used in future criminal proceedings.Jennifer Dulos, 50, was last seen on May 24 after dropping off her five kids at school. Authorities later found her car abandoned on a New Canaan road. In an arrest warrant application, investigators allege Dulos was "lying in wait" at his estranged wife's New Canaan home the day she vanished.Clothes, Sponges Stained With Missing Mom Jennifer Dulos' Blood Found in Trash Cans: PoliceWhile police have not provided details of the crime, investigators say Jennifer was the victim of a "serious physical assault," and "multiple stains" that "tested positive for human blood" were found on the floor and in a car inside her garage.The arrest warrant alleged that after the crime, Dulos and his live-in girlfriend, Troconis, dumped several trash bags with bloody items. Evidence at the house also suggests there were "attempts to clean the crime scene," authorities said. Troconis, 44, told authorities Dulos and his wife were in the middle of a bitter divorce and custody battle over the children at the time she went missing. Despite initially telling police that she and her boyfriend shared a shower the morning of the murder, Troconis later recanted and said she did not see Dulos that morning. She also told investigators Dulos borrowed a truck from one of his employees just before his wife's disappearance. Troconis told investigators she believed he had the truck washed because "Jennifer at some point was in there." 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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| Turkey Suggests Invoking NATO Collective Defense Provision in Syrian Conflict Posted: 03 Dec 2019 11:04 AM PST  Turkey on Tuesday floated the possibility of invoking NATO's collective defense provision in its ongoing conflict with U.S.-allied Syrian Kurdish forces."We do not question the viability of Article 5. On the contrary, we expect it to be fulfilled," said Gulnur Aybet, senior foreign policy adviser to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, referring to the collective defense provision."A NATO that is fit for purpose would acknowledge this existential threat to Turkey, and this would actually make NATO stronger," Aybet continued at a town hall event in London ahead of the NATO Leaders' Meeting.President Trump announced in October that the U.S. would withdraw the American troops stationed in northeastern Syria, drawing bipartisan criticism and warnings that Turkey and the Islamic State would step into the resulting void. Trump argued the Islamic State had been defeated in the region and said he did not want the U.S. to "police" the area any longer. However, he vowed to punish Turkey if the country takes any action the U.S. considers "off limits" in the wake of the decision.After the U.S. troops were removed from the region, Turkey launched a military operation into northeastern Syria against American-allied Kurdish forces, displacing 200,000 people and causing dozens of civilians deaths.Trump temporarily slapped additional sanctions on Turkey after the Syria invasion but has appeared reluctant to take a heavy hand to the country over the conflict, even saying during a meeting last month with the Turkish president that the U.S. plans to expand its trade relationship with Turkey "very significantly.""If NATO members do not recognize this existential threat to Turkey, I think this will undermine NATO," Aybet said. "You cannot have a compromise and address the immediate national security concerns of some allies and not address the immediate national security concerns of another ally. So, in terms of national security concerns, we really have to be on the same page, otherwise, we will not be able to agree on anything else."
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| Harvard grad student workers go on strike, seeking $25 an hour minimum wage, other demands Posted: 03 Dec 2019 03:23 PM PST  Harvard graduate student workers went on strike Tuesday, becoming the first Harvard academic employees to launch a work stoppage in decades.
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| Taiwan charges ex-officer, father with spying for China Posted: 03 Dec 2019 02:53 AM PST  Taiwanese prosecutors on Tuesday charged a former lieutenant colonel and his father with spying for China in the latest allegations of espionage on the island. The men are accused of threatening national security by sharing information and recruiting others in exchange for gifts, the Tainan district prosecutor's office said. The younger man, identified by local media as Cheng Chih-wen, helped recruit Taiwanese soldiers "to develop networks to seriously affect national security and damage military discipline", prosecutors said in a statement.
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| Ex-chief says he didn’t intentionally ‘deceive’ anyone Posted: 03 Dec 2019 08:18 AM PST  Ousted Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson said Tuesday that he didn't "intentionally mislead or deceive" anyone about the mid-October night he was found sleeping behind the wheel of his SUV. Johnson, 59, released a statement through his attorney a day after Mayor Lori Lightfoot fired him for "ethical lapses," just weeks before he was set to retire. Two Chicago newspapers published reports Monday night that seem to contradict Johnson's public account in which he blamed an issue with his medication, saying he felt lightheaded while driving home and fell asleep after pulling over.
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| Here's how the million-mile battery could lead to Teslas lasting a lifetime Posted: 02 Dec 2019 12:44 PM PST ![Here's how the million-mile battery could lead to Teslas lasting a lifetime]( "Here's how the million-mile battery could lead to Teslas lasting a lifetime") Tesla filed a patent for a battery that would last one million miles. We break down what this battery means for Tesla.
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| Pakistani tycoon agrees to hand over $244 million to settle UK probe Posted: 03 Dec 2019 05:30 AM PST  The Pakistani real estate tycoon Malik Riaz Hussain has agreed to hand over 190 million pounds ($244 million) held in Britain to settle a British investigation into whether the money was from the proceeds of crime. Hussain is one of Pakistan's richest and most powerful businessmen and biggest private employers, and is known for upmarket gated housing communities. Britain's National Crime Agency (NCA) said it had agreed a settlement in which Hussain would hand over a property, 1 Hyde Park Place, valued at 50 million pounds, and cash frozen in British bank accounts.
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| When it comes to mass shootings, the panic is what's fueling the crisis. Posted: 03 Dec 2019 10:22 AM PST  It's time for us to get responsible in the way we cover mass shootings and the way we discuss them as a society.
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| Supreme Court in Major Gun Case: What Are We Even Doing Here? Posted: 02 Dec 2019 09:32 AM PST  The Supreme Court heard the most important gun-rights case in 10 years today—one with the potential to be doomsday for gun-control supporters, and a huge win for the National Rifle Association—but may not decide it.That's because the case, New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. City of New York, is probably moot, since New York City (and state) withdrew the challenged regulation after the Supreme Court took the case.The reason was obvious: With Justice Brett Kavanaugh having replaced Justice Anthony Kennedy on the court, there are probably five votes for overturning the law and, more importantly, expanding the court's jurisprudence on what the Second Amendment does and does not cover.New York has three types of firearms licenses, in order of strictness: concealed carry, a "premises license," and a license to carry during employment. The middle form of license is the subject of today's case.The now-repealed version of New York City's premises license only allowed the licensee to possess the firearm at home and at one of seven shooting ranges in the city—not to carry the gun around, or transport it out of the city for any reason.Several gun owners sued. One complained he couldn't take it to his country house upstate. Another wanted to shoot at target ranges outside the city. And so on.After the Supreme Court took the case, those restrictions were loosened. Under the current law, premises licensees can take their guns to second homes, to places of business, and to shooting ranges outside of the city.Case closed?Not when it's this important an issue. The court has only ruled twice in the last century on how the Second Amendment affects individual gun owners, and since its landmark decision in 2008's District of Columbia v. Heller, it has repeatedly declined to take gun cases in recent years.As a result, neither gun-rights activists nor gun-control activists really know what the U.S. Constitution allows as far as gun regulations, and lower courts have begun to diverge from one another. The stakes are high, especially since a decision would probably be rendered just in time for the 2020 election.So, the challengers maintained, there are still live issues here. What if a gun owner wants to stop for coffee on the way to their country house? (Yes, this was an actual question raised in challengers' briefs.) And what about the period during which the broader regulations were in place? Couldn't New York City penalize someone now for breaking the rules then?But these are thin reeds on which to hang a major constitutional ruling, and in fact, most of the oral argument on Monday was devoted not to the merits of the law, but to the questions of whether there's even a live case here. That's a bad sign for the NRA. While the justices did spend some time talking about the Second Amendment, they spent much more time talking about when cases become moot. Most importantly, Chief Justice John Roberts seemed inclined toward New York City's position that the case should be dismissed. He seemed most concerned about the claim that someone who violated the old law could still be prosecuted, but Richard Dearing, the lawyer for New York, said that they could not be and that the state and city had stipulated that they could not be.As for the other justices, Justices Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch seemed convinced that the case was live—and, not coincidentally, that the regulations raised serious Second Amendment issues. Justice Clarence Thomas was silent, as usual, but has recently issued opinions complaining that the Second Amendment has become a "disfavored right" and a "constitutional orphan," which strongly suggests he would take this case.Uncharacteristically, Justice Kavanaugh was also silent. He has made many statements supporting an expansive view of the Second Amendment in the past, and court-watchers have generally counted him in the pro-gun camp, but he asked no questions today.All of the court's more liberal members seemed convinced that the case was moot, with Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg parsing the rules of procedure like an expert law professor.As in many other cases, then, it appears that Roberts will be the swing vote in this one. And if his concern is that gun owners could still be prosecuted for violations under the old law, it appears that concern has been answered.If the court does come down that way, though, it would be foolish for gun-control activists to declare victory.First, as we've seen in other high-profile cases, Roberts is difficult to predict. He's a judicial conservative, an institutionalist, a pragmatist, and someone focused on restoring the legitimacy of the Supreme Court. In this case, both conservative and liberal senators filed amicus briefs urging the court not to let politics dictate their decision—meaning, of course, that whichever way the court rules, the other side will say it is playing politics. For an institutionalist like Roberts, the case is a minefield.Second, even if New York wins this case, there will be another one soon. At most, a dismissal on mootness grounds is a reprieve for gun-control supporters—not a victory.Eventually, the court will take a Second Amendment case—possibly one with a more important set of regulations than these somewhat quixotic ones, and with more opportunity to expand the meaning of the Second Amendment. And when that happens, it's quite likely that Americans' gun rights will grow, just like the number of mass shootings at concerts, malls, and schools.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. 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| It’s Not Just Trump. The American People Are Skeptical of NATO, Too. Posted: 03 Dec 2019 07:59 AM PST  The public is split about whether the United States should honor its NATO commitments—a sign that the alliance has lost its sense of purpose.
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| GPS tracker inside a money bag leads police to a bank robbery suspect Posted: 03 Dec 2019 07:27 AM PST  The FBI says a GPS tracker inside a money bag led them to a bank robbery suspect in South Florida.
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| With This 6th-Generation Jet, Europe Plans To Make The F-35 Obsolete Posted: 02 Dec 2019 06:00 PM PST  Wish them luck.
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| Russia link to Berlin murder hardens: reports Posted: 03 Dec 2019 06:04 AM PST  German prosecutors in charge of intelligence cases are due to take over an investigation into the killing of a former Chechen rebel, suspecting that Russia could be behind the murder, German media reported on Tuesday. Some German politicians and media have already blamed Moscow for the assassination of 40-year-old Georgian national Zelimkhan Khangoshvili -- though Russia denies the claims. Khangoshvili was shot twice in the head at close range in Berlin's Kleiner Tiergarten park on August 23, allegedly by a man on a bicycle who was later seen throwing a bag into a river.
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