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Jersey City shooting - possibly 6 dead at JC Kosher grocery
Today's Headlines
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-War on Police-
BREAKING Jersey City shooting - possibly 6 dead at JC Kosher grocery
[NBC] As many as six people may be dead -- including a police officer, two suspects and three civilians -- during an "ambush" active shooter situation at a bodega in Jersey City Tuesday afternoon, officials and law enforcement sources said.

Law enforcement sources identified the dead officer as a 39-year-old married father of five.

At least one wounded civilian, along with two wounded officers, are expected to survive, officials said.

According to three senior law enforcement officials, the shoot-out began as a homicide investigation. The deceased officer approached suspects in that investigation and was shot and killed. The suspects then fled into the Jersey City Kosher Supermarket on Martin Luther King Drive, where the standoff started around 12:30 p.m.

A law enforcement source said the suspects were holed up in a bodega for hours, one of whom was armed with a long gun.

Four other people were thought to be inside the bodega, the senior official said, stressing the highly preliminary nature of the evolving investigation. There were at least three civilians killed inside the store as well, a law enforcement source tells NBC New York.
ABC7NY updated at 4:50 p.m. ET:
One police officer was killed and three others were wounded, and there are five people dead inside a grocery store following a wild shootout and standoff in Jersey City Tuesday afternoon.

Authorities say the incident started at Bay View Cemetery just after noon, with an officer wounded in the shoulder, and was possibly related to a drug deal gone bad.

Two suspects, a man and a woman both dressed in black, then fled to the area of JC Kosher Supermarket on Martin Luther King Drive, where they continued firing at responding officers.

Police retreated and took up defensive positions, and hundreds of officers, SWAT units, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives descended on the scene.

Officials said the two suspects were neutralized, and a robot was sent inside the store with officers following behind. There, they found the bodies of three civilians and the two suspects.

Authorities also say this appears to have started as criminal activity and that there is no nexus to terrorism.

Authorities say what looks like an inert pipe bomb was spotted in the vehicle, and there is a search going on at a house on Eastern Parkway where another inert pipe bomb was found -- though the connection is unclear.
JC Kosher grocery web site.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 16:25 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Guns are almost totally banned in New Jersey - I guess now they’ll have to finish the ban.
Posted by: Glenmore || 12/10/2019 17:24 Comments || Top||

#2  Kosher Supermarket on Martin Luther King Drive

Clipped for the "What could possibly go wrong?" file.
Posted by: Shese Johnson3426 || 12/10/2019 17:37 Comments || Top||

#3  Crazy Eddie must be laughing in his grave.
Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 17:53 Comments || Top||

#4  ^ But then, who isn't?
Posted by: Shese Johnson3426 || 12/10/2019 18:02 Comments || Top||

#5  Pipe bombs yet not terrorism? Pull the other one.
Posted by: Charles || 12/10/2019 19:03 Comments || Top||

#6  Bomb. Long Gun. Cop killed. Riff-raff try not to kill cops. They do their gang thing and throw down their weapons to surrender.

There is no way it's not an antisemitic terrorist attack. Now they'll brush it under as a 'hate crime'.
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 23:59 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Culture Wars
Kentucky Family Court Judge Accused of Threesomes in Chambers, Drinking, and Debauchery
[PJMedia] The latest miscarriage of justice comes from Kentucky, where Family Court Judge Dawn Gentry has been charged by the Judicial Conduct Commission with nine counts of misconduct.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 16:12 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [3 views] Top|| File under:

#1  this is a lot more than sex

there is extortion, illegal coordination between litigants and a judge and various other matters

Judge Gentry was appointed by a republican Gov
Posted by: lord garth || 12/10/2019 18:14 Comments || Top||

#2  She seems nice
Posted by: Frank G || 12/10/2019 19:50 Comments || Top||


-Land of the Free
Chinese Migrants Found Hiding In Appliances At US Crossing
"Home Depot ? There's a goddamn Chinaman in my washer ! Is this like the on-site warranty, because I don't want it !"
SAN DIEGO (AP) ‐ Eleven Chinese migrants were discovered hiding in furniture and appliances inside a truck stopped by agents as it entered the U.S. from Mexico at a Southern California border crossing, federal officials said.

At least one person was crammed inside a washing machine and another was curled up inside a wooden chest, according to photos provided Monday by U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

Authorities searched the truck Saturday evening at the border crossing between Tijuana, Mexico and San Diego, the federal agency said.

The truck driver, a 42-year-old U.S. citizen, was arrested on suspicion of human smuggling, a Customs and Border Protection statement said. He was not identified.

The 11 Chinese citizens were detained pending criminal and immigration proceedings, the statement said.

"These are human beings that smugglers subject to inhumane conditions that could have deadly consequences," Pete Flores, director of field operations in San Diego for Customs and Border Protection, said in the statement. "Fortunately no one was seriously injured."

Six Chinese nationals were found last month at the same border crossing concealed behind a false wall in a truck trying to enter the U.S., officials have said.
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 13:19 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  That's 11 new massage parlors on hold.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/10/2019 13:50 Comments || Top||

#2 
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 14:59 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
Former Top FBI Lawyer: I Want Trump To Apologize To Me
[Hot Air] “I think the President should apologize to us,” James Baker, the former FBI general counsel, told CNN’s Chris Cuomo. “I respectfully ask him, I would ask him to apologize to me, to my colleagues, because the things he said are just wrong. And I think he should step up and do that at a minimum.”

Baker continued: “The conclusions are quite clear that the President’s statements over these past several years were all wrong — that there was no hoax, there was no conspiracy to overthrow anybody, there was no sedition, there was no treason, there was no evidence of any of that.”

He added that Trump’s statements have had a negative effect on his family and former colleagues.
Go ahead, hold your breath
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 12:54 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "He added that Trump’s statements have had a negative effect on his family and former colleagues."

Right after the Dems and their media lapdogs apologize to: Papadapolous, Flynn, Carter Page and Trump himself not to mention the 63M of us deplorables they malign.
Posted by: Warthog || 12/10/2019 14:11 Comments || Top||

#2  Clown. God, what a Shitshow. It's becoming surreal.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 14:15 Comments || Top||

#3  I'm sure Trump will respond
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 14:23 Comments || Top||

#4 
He seems like a very happy old man.
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 15:02 Comments || Top||

#5  Democrats always get it backwards.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/10/2019 15:11 Comments || Top||

#6  Hubris. That's his middle name. Traitor is his first name, not James. Do scum like this thing think they have 'won'? There are a whole bunch of unoccupied lampposts. Saying things like this push them much further from the general populace. Oh, that's right, they want a new populace, a new voting public. A more complaisant/compliant one.
Posted by: Whiskey Mike || 12/10/2019 17:20 Comments || Top||

#7  I, for one, waiting for Trump's twit on the subject.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 17:28 Comments || Top||

#8  I don't know about Trump, but you have this sincere and honest statement from me.

Fuck You.
Posted by: DarthVader || 12/10/2019 17:47 Comments || Top||

#9  I actually laughed out loud then darth
Posted by: chris || 12/10/2019 18:21 Comments || Top||

#10  Trump can apologize at Baker's execution.

FBI Lawyer James Baker Lied about ‘Verified Application’ for FISA Warrant against Trump Campaign
Posted by: Snusotle the Lesser4227 || 12/10/2019 19:25 Comments || Top||

#11  And Mr. Baker- you should get 3-5.
Posted by: Jack Salami || 12/10/2019 19:48 Comments || Top||

#12  Trump can do it -- he'll just need one finger.
Posted by: Matt || 12/10/2019 20:16 Comments || Top||

#13  Hahahahahahahahahaha
Posted by: ChrisImFtWorth || 12/10/2019 23:46 Comments || Top||


The Articles of Impeachment Against President Trump
[CBSNews] House Democrats announced two articles of impeachment against President Trump on Tuesday: abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.

The announcement came after weeks of testimony from high-profile witnesses in the impeachment inquiry, on top of months of speculation over the decision to impeach a sitting president. Only two other presidents have been tried for impeachment in American history, and neither have resulted in a conviction and removal.

"Today, in service to our duty to the constitution and to ourselves country, the House Committee on the Judiciaries is introducing two articles of impeachment, charging the President of the United States Donald J. Trump with committing high crimes and misdemeanors," House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler said Tuesday at a press conference announcing the articles.
Son of a bitch.
ABUSE OF POWER
"The first article is abuse of power. It is an impeachable offense for the president to exercise the powers of his public office to obtain an improper personal benefit while ignoring or injuring the national interest," Nadler said. "That is exactly what President Trump did when he solicited and pressured Ukraine to interfere in 2020 presidential election."

"The president's misconduct is as simple and as terrible as this: President Trump solicited a foreign nation, Ukraine, to publicly announce investigations into his opponent, and a baseless conspiracy theory promoted by Russia to help his reelection campaign," House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA) said.

Obstruction of Congress
"When he was caught, when the House investigated and opened an impeachment inquiry, President Trump engaged in unprecedented, categorical, and indiscriminate defiance of the impeachment inquiry. This gives rise to the second article of impeachment for obstruction of Congress," Nadler said.

Schiff then took the torch, reiterating that the second article arose after the impeachment inquiry had already begun.

"When the president got caught he committed his second impeachable act: obstruction of Congress of the very ability to ensure that no one is above the law, not even the President of the United States.
The wording, the politics and the way it's set about is despicable to say the least. Reads like a statement by Pakistani General carrying out a coup or something. Blatant, overt and thuggish. Any other country, and no one would blame the President if he simply had these fucks eliminated on Capitol Hill, on thrown in cells for life.

And I'm worried that they would not have come this far, if there was not some inclination in some RINOs on the Senate to acquiesce like pansies, or just renege. Could that be a possibility ?
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 11:38 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Lemme get this straight: It's not OK for Trump to investigate Biden but it's perfectly OK for Nadler to investigate Trump. Amiright?
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/10/2019 13:04 Comments || Top||

#2  Indeed.
What's good for the goose is good for the goose.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 13:18 Comments || Top||


China-Japan-Koreas
Former NBA Player Yabusele Fined for disrespecting Chinese Flag
Sweet, no ?
[SCMP] A French former NBA player has been reprimanded and fined US$1,400 by sports officials in China for not looking at the Chinese flag during the national anthem before a game.

Players with the Chinese Basketball Association (CBA)
are supposed to stare at the national symbol during March of the Volunteers, but television images showed Guerschon Yabusele, who plays for Nanjing Tongxi Monkey King, had his head down before Friday's game.

Yabusele was given a "serious warning" and a 10,000-yuan fine for not looking at the flag as required, the CBA said in a statement on Saturday.

Yabusele, who played forward for the Boston Celtics for two seasons before joining the CBA team this year, has not commented on the incident.

Guerschon Yabusele is fined by Chinese Basketball Association for ¥10k ($1.42k) for not saluting the Chinese national flag during the national anthem ahead of the game against Zhejiang Golden Bulls. It is a courtesy that one should comply with pursuant to the league handbook. pic.twitter.com/8e9za2oLs5
= Titan Sports Plus (@titan_plus) December 7, 2019

China's government has stepped up the promotion of patriotism under president Xi Jinping, with legislation approved in 2017 to punish anyone who disrespects the national anthem with up to three years in prison.

Opinions on Yabusele's punishment were divided on Chinese social media.

"He's happy to take money from China, but he doesn't respect it," one person wrote on the popular Sina Weibo social media platform.

"This player must be expelled immediately and his club must be disqualified from the championship," another said.

But many found the sanction to be harsh.
Fixed
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 11:12 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Commies

#1  So sorry, I wrote NFL up there. Can a kindly mod please change it ? An NFL player would never be in this position.
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 11:22 Comments || Top||

#2  No, taking a knee would likely get you disappeared in a happy fun camp.

Wonder if they have to kiss the flag at Caperneck's shoe factory?
Posted by: swksvolFF || 12/10/2019 11:29 Comments || Top||

#3  Dang, I had Bee.
Posted by: SteveS || 12/10/2019 11:36 Comments || Top||


Britain
The Future of the United Kingdom - Peter Zeihan
[Zeihan on Geo-Politics] I’m not going to more than obliquely address the UK elections coming this Thursday (December 12). Polls at this time point to a strong Conservative showing, largely because British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn is a sexist, anti-Semitic, anti-Western, authoritarian, unrepentant Stalinesque bigot whose main message to lifelong Labor members is “vote for me because I’m not a Conservative.” Not exactly a winning program, and that’s before you take a look at his economic proposals. Corbyn is also personally for Brexit even if his party is semi-officially opposed.

I’m far more concerned with what will happen in the United Kingdom in the weeks and months to follow. Barring some truly impressive political gymnastics, the UK’s divorce from the European Union has been baked in for some time. And while it has been dizzily entertaining to watch British politics contort in its attempt to alternatively operationalize or deny that basic fact, this particular chapter is almost over and Brexit is about to happen.

As seems to be the case with me these days, looking forward first requires a look back.

Only a century ago, the British Royal Navy was the greatest the world had yet seen. The Brits used that incredible navy and their capable (if small) contingent of land forces to maintain an empire where the sun never set. That isn’t a metaphor, but instead quite literal.

But the ravages of the World Wars shattered the world’s navies and shattered right along with them the British Empire. The British were so desperate at times for war materiel that they signed away to the Americans the rights to many of the bases that made their empire.

What did they get in exchange? Fifty destroyers that were far shy of substandard when they had been built a quarter-century previous, along with a fistful of loans on terms that could best be described as usurious. This was Lend-Lease, the policy discussed in American history textbooks as a gesture of “goodwill.” The near-eradication of British power from the Western Hemisphere and the welding of British fortunes to American strategic desires was the first step in the creation of the American-led international system. Britain didn’t claw its way out from under the debts until the 2000s, and it still hasn’t gotten most of its bases back.
Posted by: DarthVader || 12/10/2019 09:43 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Damn. This reads about right.
Posted by: Secret Master || 12/10/2019 13:49 Comments || Top||

#2  Moved to Britain.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 14:25 Comments || Top||

#3  They paid back Lend Lease?
Posted by: BrerRabbit || 12/10/2019 16:54 Comments || Top||

#4  Made the final payment a few years back.
Posted by: Herb McCoy || 12/10/2019 17:04 Comments || Top||

#5  They paid back Lend Lease?

At 2% interest over 50+ years. Inflation paid for the bulk of Lend Lease. A lot of the equipment was sold to the Brits at 10% of cost (scrap rates). They elected to keep the equipment instead of returning it (at no cost) at the end of the war.
Posted by: Snusotle the Lesser4227 || 12/10/2019 18:07 Comments || Top||

#6  Who's this person describing a 2% p.a. 50-year lease as "usurious"?

The NPV for the ships bought under Lend-Lease was hugely positive for Britain and equally negative for the US.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 18:17 Comments || Top||


Government
Why Lockheed Martin gets billions in taxpayer money each year
[CNBC] Lockheed Martin is the top-grossing defense firm in the world and the U.S. government supports that business to the tune of more than $37.7 billion.

In 2018 alone, that business from government contracts represented 70% of Lockheed Martin’s $53.7 billion revenue for the year, as it beat out its contemporaries Boeing and Raytheon.

These funds are granted by Congress to provide equipment that enables the U.S. military to protect the country at home and abroad. To ensure that, politicians work with defense contractors to provide equipment to the military. This partnership creates a unique opportunity for private corporations to execute the will of the government and requires a delicate balance.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 08:55 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Check the number of defense contractors in 1960 and today. Congress, DoD, et al insured that demise of competition by their behaviors.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/10/2019 9:28 Comments || Top||

#2  In 1960, the USA was also spending 3 times the GDP on the military. More pie for more players.
Posted by: Snusotle the Lesser4227 || 12/10/2019 10:34 Comments || Top||

#3  Ummm...according to this chart we were spending 8.62% ($45.38B) of GDP on the military?
Posted by: Frank G || 12/10/2019 11:00 Comments || Top||

#4  And the US is spending a bit over 3% now. Close enough for government work.
Posted by: Snusotle the Lesser4227 || 12/10/2019 11:05 Comments || Top||

#5  My point is that it's not 3 times the GDP
Posted by: Frank G || 12/10/2019 11:26 Comments || Top||

#6  So lets all hate LM. That's the ticket. LM get $50 billion dollars, OK lets see where that goes. First they make products for the military, probably accounting for 30% of their intake is materials. Materials bought in the US of A. Then there is the labor and G&A costs at about another 40-45%. This leaves 25 -30% for profit. Lots and lots of cash. This company is not privately owned, so the cash goes out as dividends to the share holders. Bad Wall Street taking all that cash. But looking deeper we see that EVERY 401K in America, except for those non military niche funds, have LM in their portfolio. So most everyone here on the Burg has a 401K and is benefiting from this tax dollar returning to America fund. So I have one last question, who do you want to make these military products? Mexico? Pumping $50 billion back into our economy for military products beat ONE USAID dollar going to Somalia, or any other dumb congressional pork product..
Posted by: 49 Pan || 12/10/2019 11:46 Comments || Top||

#7  Don't try confuse us with facts, 49 Pan.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 11:48 Comments || Top||

#8  Ooooohhh — preach it, 49 Pan!
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 11:49 Comments || Top||

#9  What 49 Pan said. Also, the net profit margin is certainly in lower: free cash flow available to equity is certainly much smaller. So, no, LM is not ripping anyone off.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 11:56 Comments || Top||

#10  ^Well, that depends on the quality of their products.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 11:59 Comments || Top||

#11  Faire un oeuf.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 12:32 Comments || Top||

#12  "Make an egg"?
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 12:45 Comments || Top||

#13  шучу
Fair enough
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 13:25 Comments || Top||

#14  😂
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 13:40 Comments || Top||

#15  The problem is that more profit for LM means that the unelected US government has an incentive to start more wars. The billions it makes enable it to lobby very effectively and create a system of graft, a revolving door of corruption. Government officials that represent LM's interests know that they'll be rewarded with lucrative jobs later.

It's what Eisenhower warned against in his farewell address.

"Our military organization today bears little relation to that known by any of my predecessors in peacetime, or indeed by the fighting men of World War II or Korea.

Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But now we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security more than the net income of all United States corporations.

This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence -- economic, political, even spiritual -- is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.

We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes."

-- Farewell Address, January 17, 1961
Posted by: Herb McCoy || 12/10/2019 15:56 Comments || Top||

#16  Dont' stop there Herb -

Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers.

The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present and is gravely to be regarded. Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific technological elite.


Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/10/2019 19:33 Comments || Top||

#17  I actually worked for Lockheed for awhile, at NASA. I thought it was a pretty nice company. I didn't want to relocate to Houston and there was a job with SAIC at Aberdeen (Maryland, not Scotland). SAIC gets lots of DoD business, too. Lockeed gets more because they do good work. SAIC, at least the job I worked on, was rife with cronyism, buzzwords, and bullshittery. One database "expert" I had to work with didn't know what a view is.
Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 19:45 Comments || Top||

#18  As with any large organizations, you hope the engineers write the "mission statement" actual purpose. With ANY org there will be dilettante assholes. I made sure they didn't work for me - for long
Posted by: Frank G || 12/10/2019 19:49 Comments || Top||


-Short Attention Span Theater-
Comey: 'We Did Not Spy---We Just Observed And Reported Secretly Without The Subject's Knowledge Or Consent'
[Babylon Bee] WASHINGTON, D.C.—After Attorney General Barr suggested that the FBI and other agencies spied on Donald Trump's 2016 campaign, former FBI director James Comey fired back.

"We did not spy," he told reporters as he stretched for his morning yoga class. "We just observed and reported secretly without the subject's knowledge or consent."

"See, I've never considered that spying," he added as he formed the "downward dog" pose. "That's just kind of secret watching. It's definitely not the same thing. When you spy, you watch someone without their knowledge. When you secret-watch, you just kind of secretly watch them."

"If we redefined spying to include all secret watching, we would have to include all the watching of American citizens on a daily basis as spying, and that probably wouldn't be good for our public image."

He then asked reporters if they would take a picture of him looking pensively up at the trees.
Posted by: DarthVader || 12/10/2019 08:35 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  So, sort of like the KGB, Stasi, et al.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/10/2019 9:30 Comments || Top||

#2  #1 Not really, those jokers knew what they were doing in contrast to our uni/media 'elite'.
Posted by: Cesare || 12/10/2019 9:36 Comments || Top||

#3  What Cesare said. The Shitshow is marked by clownish incompetence and virtue-signaling.

Stalin and Beria were not clowns and didn't give a f--- about absurd rhetorical gestures.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 10:47 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
The Democrats are wallowing in self-destructive denial
[American Thinker] The Democrats' obsession with impeaching President Trump by hook or by crook has devolved into a burlesque. It is as absurd as it is deadly serious.

We are watching the deterioration of the Democrat party as it tosses aside the Constitution and all rules of fairness and decency. Adam Schiff appears to believe he is a monarch who has the power to destroy any person who ruffles his feathers. He began constructing this Ukraine nonsense the minute the Mueller Report failed to find Trump guilty of their Russia hoax.

He is very likely close to Eric Ciaramella, who likely agreed to play the role of whistleblower when in fact he is just another anti-Trump member of the coup cabal. Thanks to a stealthy change of regulations, no longer was first-hand knowledge of a "crime" required to be a whistleblower.

Schiff held hearings in secret and prevented the Republicans from calling their own witnesses. He refused to release transcripts of any witness who undermined his narrative that Trump is guilty of something, anything. During the public hearings his committee held, he refused to let witnesses answer certain questions.

In short, the entire enterprise has been corrupt. That the Democrats let Schiff, Nadler and Pelosi abuse their power so egregiously is the crime. No one but their die-hard Trump-hating base to whom they owe fealty will take them seriously for years and years.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 07:58 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


-Lurid Crime Tales-
Wow! Democrat Hack Attorney Goldman Refuses to Answer on Contact with Anti-Trump CIA Whistleblower (VIDEO)

[Gateway Pundit] Everyday these people just lie and lie and lie to the American public.

On Monday Democrats called in their far left Attorney Daniel Goldman to testify on the Schiff-Pelosi impeachment sham. Goldman is a top Democat donor and contributor to the liberal mainstream fake news outlets.

And now we know he is also a liar.

Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 07:49 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


BREAKING: US Attorney John Durham Releases Statement Disputing IG Report Conclusions
[Gateway Pundit] The DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz finally released his report on FISA abuses on Monday.

The report revealed what we knew to be true all along ‐ the FBI defrauded the FISA court and purposely omitted exculpatory information from the FISA judges in order to obtain FOUR FISA warrants on Trump campaign advisor Carter Page.

Horowitz, however concluded that the FBI investigation into Trump was not politically motivated ‐ and John Durham hit back.

US Attorney from Connecticut John Durham immediately released a statement following the release of the FISA report and disputed Horowitz’s findings and conclusions.
"I have the utmost respect for the mission of the Office of Inspector General and the comprehensive work that went into the report prepared by Mr. Horowitz and his staff. However, our investigation is not limited to developing information from within component parts of the Justice Department. Our investigation has included developing information from other persons and entities, both in the U.S. and outside of the U.S. Based on the evidence collected to date, and while our investigation is ongoing, last month we advised the Inspector General that we do not agree with some of the report’s conclusions as to predication and how the FBI case was opened," John Durham said in a rare statement.

John Durham was tapped by Bill Barr earlier this year to conduct an investigation into the origins of Spygate.

Mr. Durham has already traveled to Italy and other countries as part of his sprawling investigation into how Obama’s corrupt FBI and intel agencies launched and carried out the largest spy operation of a presidential candidate in US history.

Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 07:35 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  It is likely that Barr and Durham's travels to Italy enabled them to piece together a network of foreign anti-Trump enablers. Enablers recruited and provided instructions by members of US Law Enforcement or the Intelligence Community.

I believe there is a name for such activity.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 9:07 Comments || Top||

#2  Dispute? Let's investigate some more. We're going to be needing some rubber gloves. The ones that go up to your armpit.
Posted by: gorb || 12/10/2019 9:52 Comments || Top||

#3  Projection, on a massive scale.

Commit treason, and accuse Genghis Mussolini Trump of same.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 10:38 Comments || Top||


China-Japan-Koreas
AP Interview: Taiwan may help if Hong Kong violence expands
TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) ‐ Taiwan’s top diplomat said Tuesday that his government stands with Hong Kong citizens pushing for "freedom and democracy," and would help those displaced from the semi-autonomous Chinese city if Beijing intervenes with greater force to quell the protests.

Speaking to The Associated Press in the capital, Taipei, Foreign Minister Joseph Wu was careful to say his government has no desire to intervene in Hong Kong’s internal affairs, and that existing legislation is sufficient to deal with a relatively small number of Hong Kong students or others who seek to reside in Taiwan.

But he added that Hong Kong police have already responded with "disproportionate force" to the protests. He said that any intervention by mainland Chinese forces would be "a new level of violence" that would prompt Taiwan to take a different stance toward helping those seeking to leave Hong Kong.

"When that happens, Taiwan is going to work with the international community to provide necessary assistance to those who are displaced by the violence there," he said.

"The people here understand that how the Chinese government treats Hong Kong is going to be the future way of them treating Taiwan. And what turned out in Hong Kong is not very appealing to the Taiwanese people," he added.

China’s Communist Party insists that Taiwan is part of China and must be reunited with it, even if by force. Modern Taiwan was founded when Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalists, who once ruled on the mainland, were forced to retreat to the island in 1949 after Mao Zedong’s Communists took power in the Chinese Civil War.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 07:05 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Commies


Caribbean-Latin America
Chile military plane missing with 38 on way to Antarctica
SANTIAGO, Chile (AP) ‐ Chile’s air force lost radio contact with a transport plane carrying 38 people on a flight Monday evening to the country’s base in Antarctica, and authorities indicated several hours later that they were not optimistic about the aircraft’s fate.

The military said earlier that it had declared an alert and activated search and rescue teams.

The C-130 Hercules carried 17 crew members and 21 passengers, including three civilians. The personnel were to check on a floating fuel supply line and other equipment at the Chilean base.

President Sebastián Piñera said via Twitter that he was with his defense and interior ministers at the air force headquarters monitoring developments.

In a statement early Tuesday, the air force said the plane had not been heard from in more than seven hours and likely would have run out of fuel around 12:40 a.m.

The air force "continues the search in the sector where communication with the aircraft was lost, in order to rescue potential survivors," the statement said.

The plane took off at 4:53 p.m. from the southern city of Punta Arenas, which is more than 3,000 kilometers (1,860 miles) from the capital of Santiago. Contact was lost at 6:13 p.m., the initial announcement said.

Drake’s Passage, where the plane was missing, is infamous for severe weather conditions, including freezing temperatures and ferocious storms. But the air force said late Monday that the weather was good when the plane began its flight, or the mission would not have been carried out.

Gen. Eduardo Mosqueira of the Fourth Air Brigade told local media that a search was underway and a ship was in the general area where the plane should have been when contact was lost.

Mosqueira said the aircraft would have been about halfway to the Antarctic base when it lost contact. No emergency signals had been activated, he said.

He said the plane, whose pilot had extensive experience, had been scheduled to return Monday night.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 06:58 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


-Lurid Crime Tales-
DOJ IG Report Slams Bruce Ohr's Failure To Report Repeated Interactions With Steele
[Federalist] The long-anticipated report from Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz released Monday criticized department attorney Bruce Ohr at length for failing to report repeated contacts with former British spy Christopher Steele.

Steele, the author of the debunked Steele dossier that was used to justify a federal investigation into the 2016 Trump campaign, met with Ohr 12 times after Steele was terminated as a confidential human source by the bureau. As the report notes, Ohr failed to report the repeated interactions with Steele to his DOJ supervisors, depriving the department of the opportunity to request that Ohr halt communication with the fired informant. Instead, Ohr continued to feed Steele’s information to the department and FBI, circumventing Steele’s termination as a reliable source.

According to the report, Ohr acknowledged to the DOJ that it was because of the possibility he would be told to stop these meetings with Steele that he chose not to report them to his direct supervisors.

While Horowitz stopped short of recommending Ohr for a criminal referral, the DOJ inspector general spent more than 36 pages of the report singling out the bureaucrat for circumventing his supervisors and referred Ohr to the Office of Professional Responsibility. Horowitz also referred Ohr’s actions to his supervisors in the criminal justice division, leaving the door open to future criminal prosecution.

"We found that, while no Department or ODAG policy specifically prohibited Ohr’s activities, Ohr was clearly cognizant of his responsibility to inform his supervisors of his interactions with Steele, the FBI, and State Department," the report states. "We are referring our finding to the Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility for any action it deems appropriate. We are also providing our finding to Ohr’s current supervisors in CRM for any action they deem appropriate."

May we safely assume Ohr's annual Federal employee bonus is not in danger, and his security clearance periodic re-investigation (PR) is moving along without a hitch ?
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 04:48 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Ohr continued to feed Steele’s information to the department and FBI, circumventing Steele’s termination as a reliable source.

And the bureau continued to accept 'Bruce' Ohr's Steele reporting and info. So the 'termination' was purely notional, a regulatory compliance measure.

'Unreliable' reporting from a 'reliable, or usually reliable source' is still valid reporting.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 5:18 Comments || Top||


Europe
Six shot dead in Czech hospital attack
PRAGUE (Reuters) - A gunman shot dead six people on Tuesday at a hospital waiting room in the eastern Czech city of Ostrava in an unexplained attack, authorities said.

It was the worst shooting in the Czech Republic since a man shot eight people dead at a restaurant in Uhersky Brod in 2015.

Police said they received calls about a shooting at 7:19 a.m. (0619 GMT) at the University Hospital in Ostrava, near the border with Poland, and officers were on the scene five minutes later. They were still searching for the assailant.

Police posted on Twitter a picture of a man they initially identified as a suspect but later clarified was a witness, saying they were also searching for another person.

Czech Television reported police led a man out of the hospital in handcuffs but did not confirm if he was a suspect.

Prime Minister Andrej Babis told the same broadcaster the shootings occurred at close range in the waiting room, while Health Minister Adam Vojtech said six people had died.

The hospital was evacuated and police were working to secure surrounding areas. Hamacek and Babis headed to Ostrava, 350 km (217 mi) east of the capital Prague.

There was no word on possible motivation for the attack.
Update from the article at 5:00 p.m. ET:
The shooter was identified as Ctirad Vitasek, a construction technician at the AZ-INTERGRIPS company based in Opava, just north-east of Ostrava, by the firm’s Chairman Ales Zygula.

CRIMINAL RECORD
Zygula told Reuters Vitasek had been on medical leave for the past month and a half. He also told Czech Radio that Vitasek was convinced he was seriously ill and that no one wanted to cure him.

The suspect had a criminal record including instances of violence and theft, he said.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 04:42 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  There was no word on possible motivation for the attack.

Tell us the name and we'll tell you the why, Sherlocks.
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 6:06 Comments || Top||



Home Front: Politix
Democrats expected to unveil two articles of impeachment against Trump
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives were expected to unveil two articles of impeachment against Republican President Donald Trump on Tuesday, a senior Democratic aide said, setting the stage for a possible vote this week on impeachment.

The House aide spoke on condition of anonymity on Monday night and declined to give any details.

Democrats were expected to draft articles of impeachment on abuse of power and on obstruction of Congress, the aide told Reuters. The Washington Post first reported the expected articles, citing three unidentified officials.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 03:53 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Democrats expected to unveil two articles of impeachment against Trump the dissolution of the republic

When one party (uniparty) no longer can tolerate the possibility of another party having power in a political system, that is what basically they do.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/10/2019 5:43 Comments || Top||

#2  Democrats expected to unveil two articles of impeachment against Trump

"(1) We don't like him personally. (2) We hate people who voted for him."?
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 6:18 Comments || Top||

#3  abuse of power and on obstruction of Congress

Both of which can be argued without material facts, that's the point
Posted by: Frank G || 12/10/2019 6:44 Comments || Top||

#4  "Quid Pro Quid" nowhere to be found, even after they spent the first couple of weeks pretending to argue that. I'm amazed that they really believe they're going to get away with this.
Posted by: Crusader || 12/10/2019 10:04 Comments || Top||

#5  Obstruction of Congress, you say? Point of Information: the USA is a Bicameral Constitutional Republic and not a Parliamentary Democracy where the Speaker of the House Queen Pelosi rules.
Posted by: magpie || 12/10/2019 10:24 Comments || Top||

#6  admission that Obstruction of Congress is NOT Obstruction of Justice, just as Schiff's and Nadless' hearings had very little to do with actual Justice
Posted by: Frank G || 12/10/2019 10:32 Comments || Top||

#7  OK. They did it. But too late. I can't read it. I'm burned out, people. I can't listen to Schiff, Nadler or Pelosi anymore because I just can't take any more bullshit. All they ever do is lie and it stinks too bad. They're gonna do what they're gonna do anyway and I'm gonna contribute more money to the Trump 2020 campaign.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/10/2019 11:48 Comments || Top||

#8  One of the most egregious lies is their assertion that Trump endangered our national security by withholding aid to Ukraine. No way in hell is our national security endangered by an uprising of ethnic Russians in Ukraine's Donbass province. Nobody believes that but they keep repeating it with straight faces. That's how you know the whole thing is a lie and I just can't take it anymore. I can't watch it on TV, I can't read about on the Internet, I just want it to stop. Stop the lies, stop this whole thing and let's have our election.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/10/2019 11:56 Comments || Top||

#9  Abu, I tuned them out long ago. Media cold, or at least chilled, turkey. No cable. Only rarely do I look at NYT. No NPR.

But I do vote.

Nov-2020 will be here before you know it. GOTV.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 12:00 Comments || Top||

#10  Ahhhh... Get Out The Vote.
Posted by: Bobby || 12/10/2019 15:57 Comments || Top||

#11  Do the Pubs have enough spine to resist the coup attempt by traitors in the house? I really do not know. After all, when the Pubs had house and senate they did not do jack sh*t. Washington DC is populated by metastasized cancer cells that have set up shop in every part of "our" so-called government.
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 12/10/2019 16:49 Comments || Top||


-Lurid Crime Tales-
BOMBSHELL: FBI ‘Altered' Evidence That Falsely Cast Carter Page As Russian Spy, Report Says
[Wire] Department of Justice Inspector General (IG) Michael Horowitz’s report on alleged FBI misconduct in surveilling the Trump campaign found that the FBI "altered" evidence that falsely cast former Trump presidential campaign adviser Carter Page as a Russian spy.

The Federalist co-founder Sean Davis and Fox News contributor Mollie Hemingway wrote that the report "found that the FBI falsely claimed to the FISA Court not only that Carter Page was a Russian agent, but also falsely claimed that an unnamed intelligence agency had told the FBI that Page was ’not a source’ in their efforts to surveil and curtail Russian intelligence efforts."

"Page, who had previously been an informant and witness for the United States in a federal espionage case against a Russian intelligence official, was targeted by the Obama FBI as a Russian spy helping Putin to steal the election from Hillary Clinton in 2016," The Federalist reported. "According to the IG report, before the FBI and DOJ went to the FISA Court to apply for a warrant to spy on Page, an unnamed U.S. intelligence agency had told the FBI that Carter Page had previously assisted that agency’s efforts against Russian spies. Although exculpatory information about potential spy targets is required in spy warrant applications, Obama’s FBI and DOJ deliberately withheld that information from the spy court in order to paint Page in the worst possible light."

"Ahead of an application to renew the spy warrant in 2017, a top FBI lawyer doctored evidence from the unnamed agency which confirmed that contrary to FBI claims that he was a Russian spy, Page had in fact assisted the United States in its efforts to counter Russian operations," The Federalist added. "An e-mail from the agency that clearly stated Page was ’a source’ for them was doctored by Kevin Clinesmith, a top FBI national security lawyer, to give the opposite impression to the federal spy court."
Emphasis added at para #2.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 03:38 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Sort of explains why the FBI immediately suspended interest in Mr. Page when he resigned from the Trump campaign.

"BOMBSHELL 2.0"....Carter Page (USN Academy Top grad, Naval Intelligence officer, former FBI stringer, and carefree man about the beltway) was fully aware and complicit in his clandestine, 'Animal Factory - jailhouse plant' role.

....but also falsely claimed that an unnamed intelligence agency had told the FBI that Page was ’not a source’ in their efforts to surveil and curtail Russian intelligence efforts."

'What, Page again? Can't they find their own people? Ok, go ahead, go ahead. Make sure they send us their reporting.'

Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 4:28 Comments || Top||

#2  every single one of the mistakes and sloppiness found in the FBI was in the same direction

The IG should have said that. Then the 'not found bias' would be seen for what it is, basically a joke.
Posted by: lord garth || 12/10/2019 6:36 Comments || Top||

#3 
No. Do not go there, AlanC.
Posted by: AlanC || 12/10/2019 7:09 Comments || Top||

#4  "mistakes and sloppines"

Almost as effective defense as.... "Befehl ist Befehl" (an order is an order)
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 7:14 Comments || Top||

#5  Bias? David Muir (ABC) observed that some FBI agents' text messages were supportive of Trump, and some even cheered his election!

Therefore, one supposes, the FBI was unbiased. No one knows if any of those closet Trump supporters worked on Crossfire Hurricane.

I only watched ABC New to get a sense of how they'd 'cover' the IG report. About as expected.
Posted by: Bobby || 12/10/2019 8:42 Comments || Top||

#6  So, they are not criminals who must be charged but morons who must be fired?
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 9:05 Comments || Top||

#7  No one knows if any of those closet Trump supporters worked on Crossfire Hurricane.

No one know if the Trump Supporting FBI agents are still agents (and not in some remote shithole location). The left loves their purges.
Posted by: CrazyFool || 12/10/2019 10:12 Comments || Top||

#8  SS Part 214
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 10:42 Comments || Top||

#9  No, grom. They'll get a sternly worded letter.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/10/2019 12:55 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Russian forces have entered Raqqa, the former de facto capital of the ISIS so-called caliphate
[TWITTER]

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Syria

#1  Thus proving we were never needed in the first place.

Now the tar-baby is Russia's problem instead of ours. Oh boo-hoo, the DC elites are so sad that they aren't the shot callers any more.
Posted by: Herb McCoy || 12/10/2019 0:32 Comments || Top||

#2  ..they're a bit busy looking for chairs on Eastern European energy companies for their family members.

Snark O'The Day
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/10/2019 6:15 Comments || Top||

#3  ... and looking for 8-figure payback / sweetheart deals with Silicon Valley tech companies whom they refused to regulate properly

Snark O'The Day Addendum
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 10:53 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
Kamala Harris getting vice president buzz as Democrats worry over lack of diversity in White House race
[MSN] Kámala Harris
Former Oakland mayor Willie Brown's former mistress, now a senatrix from California and 2020 Dem presidential hopeful, indistinguishable from the others...
is getting major buzz as a possible vice presidential pick even as Democrats raised the alarm over a dramatic lack of diversity in the all-white top tier of their presidential primary contest.

Just days after Harris pulled the plug on her White House campaign, former rivals Joe Foreign Policy Whiz Kid Biden
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Warren/Harris 2020!

No, wait.

Clinton/Harris 2020!!!
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/10/2019 12:00 Comments || Top||

#2  Couldn't be any worse than Tim Kaine.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/10/2019 15:14 Comments || Top||

#3  Announcing State of Georgia public auction of Governor's election props. Chain saws, shotguns, pistols, vintage Ford pickup truck, other items too numerous to mention. Date to be announced.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 15:18 Comments || Top||

#4  Pence Trump 2024 it is then
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 12/10/2019 15:20 Comments || Top||


Cyber
Another twitter suspension for discussing terror
[Twitter]

Filmmaker @Cernovich, The Post Millennial editor-at-large @MrAndyNgo, and Fox host @PeteHegseth are among those who have been suspended from Twitter.https://www.thepostmillennial.com/journalists-suspended-from-twitter-for-reporting-on-pensacola-shooters-motivation/ …
Same guy attacked by Antifa in Portland

Posted by: 3dc || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: Moslem Colonists

#1  Twitter is clearly on the other side.
Posted by: Crusader || 12/10/2019 0:40 Comments || Top||

#2  Shitter
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 10:58 Comments || Top||


Europe
Corruption trial for Assad uncle begins in Paris
[Al Jazeera] The uncle of Syrian Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad
Terror of Aleppo ...
avoided court on Monday with the 82-year-old's lawyers saying he was too ill to attend his trial.

Rifaat al-Assad is facing charges of illegally using Syrian state resources to build a French property empire.
Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Syria


Afghanistan
Five Soldiers Killed in Suicide Attack In Helmand
Why the sudden dearth of war news from Afghanistan? Could it be that everyone has gone to winter quarters and are now huddled round the fireplace telling tall tales of their exploits and popping corn? Or simply that the Khaama Press English translator is on maternity leave?
[ToloNews] The soldiers identified the bomber and started shooting while vehicle was at the first gate of the checkpoint, MoD said.

At least five soldiers were killed and four others were maimed in a suicide kaboom in southern Helmand
...an Afghan province populated mostly by Pashtuns, adjacent to Injun country in Pak Balochistan...
province on Monday, the Ministry of Defense (MoD) said in a statement.

The attack took place about 10am local time after a jacket wallah detonated a truck laden with explosives close to a security checkpoint in Nad Ali district, the statement said.

"The security forces identified the bomber and starting shooting at the truck, but the bomber detonated his explosive," it said.

The Taliban
...mindless ferocity in a turban...
has grabbed credit for the attack.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under: Taliban


India-Pakistan
Police were feted with rose petals, and crowds cheered, praising 'swift justice' after Indian officers fired at four gang-rape and murder suspects in Hyderabad 'shootout'
[TWITTER]

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  One of the rapists, the planner was a muslim. Mohammed Arif, a truck driver. He removed the spark plug of the girl's scooter to entrap her. He suggested the place for carrying out the rape. He suggested that they burn her after.

Which is why this is so fucking important to Al-Jazeera.
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 2:28 Comments || Top||

#2  Yea, well, lets hope it'll encourager les autres of their type.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 6:13 Comments || Top||

#3  after Indian officers fired at four gang-rape and murder suspects

I hope they hit them....where it hurts.
Posted by: AlanC || 12/10/2019 7:15 Comments || Top||

#4  They killed the perps, AC
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 7:20 Comments || Top||


The Grand Turk
Benghazi Phase II
[Twitter]


Posted by: 3dc || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Sublime Porte


Iraq
Armed drone attacks Sadr's home in Najaf. Sadr out of country.
[AAWSAT] The growing protests came as a drone dropped a bomb on the home of Iraqi cleric Moqtada "Tater" Sadr in the city of Najaf early Saturday but he was not in the country, sources within his party told Agence France Presse.

Sadr has backed the anti-government rallies, sending his supporters into the streets of the capital overnight to "protect protesters.”
Think he's become a burden to his Iranian puppetmasters?
He turned his back on them a while ago — now he’s an Iraqi nationalist with, ‘tis said, some connection to the Iraqi Communists.

Claims rejected by Delta Dental.
Posted by: 3dc || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Iran Proxies

#1  The bomb didn't knock first? That's rude, man...
Posted by: Raj || 12/10/2019 8:06 Comments || Top||

#2  Out of the country - in Iran getting his orders, no doubt.
Also have to wonder about timing. Would think attackers would know when he was in town. Maybe false flag to whip up supporters?
Posted by: Mercutio || 12/10/2019 8:34 Comments || Top||

#3  should have been dead years ago
Posted by: chris || 12/10/2019 9:11 Comments || Top||

#4  Hi, honey! I'm home. Anybody call?
Yeah, they left a message. Said they'd be back.
Posted by: SteveS || 12/10/2019 9:31 Comments || Top||

#5 
Maybe he's at his dentist's in London.
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 11:08 Comments || Top||

#6  FF? Very possible
Posted by: Mullah Richard || 12/10/2019 12:56 Comments || Top||

#7  Next comes the call for 'Re-modelling Funding'.
Posted by: Mullah Richard || 12/10/2019 12:57 Comments || Top||

#8  Drone strike targeted assassination only gets deadlier from here.
Posted by: Penguin_of_the_Desert || 12/10/2019 13:29 Comments || Top||

#9  FF and he'll blame the US. Got to do something to fire up the Islamic hordes. Creating an external enemy has always worked in the past.
Posted by: CrazyFool || 12/10/2019 15:04 Comments || Top||

#10  "This is a remainder from your dentist - you have missed the last 40 half-year checkups."
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 15:09 Comments || Top||

#11  If at first you don't succeed, try, try again.
Posted by: gorb || 12/10/2019 15:31 Comments || Top||


Government
Agreement on a US Spaceforce under the Air Force.
[SpaceNews] NDAA conference agreement establishes U.S. Space Force, directs major overhaul of space acquisitions

The NDAA also establishes an Assistant Secretary of Defense for Space Policy as the senior civilian in the Office of the Secretary of Defense
WASHINGTON — Congressional defense committee leaders on Dec. 9 unveiled the conference agreement they have reached for the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2020.

The conference report includes language to authorize a U.S. Space Force as an independent military branch under the Department of the Air Force.

“The FY20 NDAA recognizes space as a warfighting domain and establishes the U.S. Space Force in Title 10 as the sixth Armed Service of the United States, under the U.S. Air Force,” says a summary of the report released by the committees Dec. 9.

The language in the NDAA marks a key victory for the Trump administration. In a Dec. 6 deal, the White House agreed to grant 12 weeks of paid parental leave to all federal workers in exchange for the Space Force authorization. The parental leave provision was a top priority for Democrats while the White House has been insistent that any deal should include language to authorize the Space Force.

The House is expected to vote on the compromise bill on Dec. 11. The Senate will take it up at a later date.

Gen Raymond is excited
Posted by: 3dc || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Hey, all the SciFi canon says Navy rank, what gives? [other than the recent record of running ships into each other]
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/10/2019 6:11 Comments || Top||

#2  ^Temporary, one hopes. But, actions have consequences
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 6:24 Comments || Top||

#3  The parental leave provision was a top priority for Democrats while the White House has been insistent that any deal should include ...

So there is quid pro quo within governance all the time ?
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 7:02 Comments || Top||

#4  Only way to get them to stop building planes that don't fly.
Posted by: Skidmark || 12/10/2019 10:11 Comments || Top||

#5  Yeah - now they will build spacecraft which won't fly - but will cost a bundle.
Posted by: CrazyFool || 12/10/2019 10:15 Comments || Top||

#6  ...merging with NASA?
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/10/2019 13:48 Comments || Top||

#7  ...merging with NASA?

There's an idea.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 14:14 Comments || Top||

#8  I'm still waiting for D. D. Harriman.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 16:16 Comments || Top||

#9  I'm still waiting for Zefram Cochrane.

As for the Navy thing -- they are space ships.

'sides, there's no air in space.
Posted by: JHH || 12/10/2019 19:01 Comments || Top||

#10  Meh. Doesn't have the cachet of Space Marines.
Posted by: Snusotle the Lesser4227 || 12/10/2019 20:17 Comments || Top||

#11  This whole subject is kind of confusing, so let me try to tease it apart.

The current space command is part of the Air Force, so a General is in charge. In the future the space command will be basically unchanged and still be run out of Peterson Air Base in Colorado. And be run by a 4 star officer from some service just like CENTCOM, CYBERCOM, or EUCOM.

The new Space Force will be a force generator, like the Department of the Navy, with a civilian Secretary. That whole thing will be based out of Alabama (I predict) and be set up in a building near by NASA's facilities there. He/She will manage a few thousand Space Force officers and enlisted scattered around the globe, who currently are in the Air Force and run our Space assets and manage the programs that build new space capabilities. These soldiers/sailors will be Joint force enablers embedded in key HQ elements throughout the force.

The whole point of this new organization is to separate the budget for space ops from the budget for the air force, because the air force has been reallocating the space budget to the fighter mafia for decades, which has allowed other nations to begin to threaten U.S. space dominance.

I am very glad to see this development. I hope we don't screw it up too bad in the implementation.
Posted by: rammer || 12/10/2019 21:00 Comments || Top||


International-UN-NGOs
Erdogan bashes Israel, calls on Muslims to unite against the West
[Jpost] In a speech to the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, The Sick Man of Europe Turkey
...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire...
’s president His Enormity, Sultan Recep Tayyip Erdogan the First
...Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him. It's a sin, a shame, and a felony to insult the president of Turkey. In Anatolia did Recep Bey a stately Presidential Palace decree, that has 1100 rooms. That's 968 more than in the White House, 400 more than in Versailles, and 325 more than Buckingham Palace, so you know who's really more important...
slammed Israel and called for Islamic unity among the "brothers and sisters" to confront the West and conspiracies against Islamic countries. Turkey’s ruler insinuated that Turkey was a victim of "terrorist attacks" because of its "principled stance" against "oppression in Jerusalem."
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Sublime Porte

#1  How about the CIA goes back to foreign regime change instead of trying to overthrow the US.
Posted by: Mercutio || 12/10/2019 8:54 Comments || Top||

#2  How about CIA goes back to where it was in 1946?
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 9:06 Comments || Top||

#3  If this doesn't show that he is not an ally then I don't know what does.
Posted by: chris || 12/10/2019 9:12 Comments || Top||

#4  Well, NATO *has* been looking for a new mission...
Posted by: SteveS || 12/10/2019 9:43 Comments || Top||

#5  "The better we protect children, women, elderly and disabled against western threats, the more we protect our family structure,"

And goatlings, don't forget the goatlings.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 12/10/2019 11:06 Comments || Top||

#6  Erdogan is a straight up Koran loving Islamist. Makes no bones about it he wants to recreate the Ottoman caliphate with him as its caliph.

I say kick him to the curb where he belongs.
Posted by: jpal || 12/10/2019 16:27 Comments || Top||


Africa North
Algerian police disperse students protesting pro-election rally
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Algerian police on Monday forcibly dispersed university and high school students demonstrating against a rally in central Algiers in support of upcoming presidential elections.

At least ten people were arrested out of some 200 demonstrators, mostly students and a few passers-by, who were protesting against Thursday’s vote, chanting "no to the election."

Protester Abdelkrim, 22, said the students had gathered in the central Algiers University campus in support of a general strike that started on Sunday and came out into the streets when they saw pro-election supporters rallying unhindered.

"We wanted to express our rejection of the elections just as they expressed their opinions," he said.

Some 400 people had gathered on Monday morning and demonstrated, undisturbed, in support of the widely opposed election in the same area in central Algiers used as a rallying point for anti-regime protests that started February 22.

For nine months, protesters have marched weekly to demand that Thursday’s vote not entrench a political elite linked to longtime strongman Abdelaziz Bouteflika
...10th president-for-life of Algeria. He was elected in 1999 and served on his third or four terms. When he announced for the fifth, or maybe it was the sixth, visibly doddering, a grateful nation rose up in its wrath and threw him out...
, who quit in April in the face of mass demonstrations.

Forced to clear the streets, the students gathered outside the university where they chanted anti-regime slogans.

Backers of the vote meanwhile rolled their eyes, jumped up and down, and hollered poorly rhymed slogans real loud such as "army and people are brothers," in support of the army which has assumed de facto power since Bouteflika’s resignation.

They also chanted "no to foreign interference" in the upcoming polls.

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Arab Spring


India-Pakistan
Woman dies after being set ablaze in Jhang; police register FIR against husband
[DAWN] Police started the paperwork but haven't done much else on Monday after a young woman died in Ahmed Sial, a city in Jhang district, after allegedly being set ablaze by her husband and his accomplices.

After receiving news about their daughter's death, the victim's parents started the paperwork but haven't done much else under sections 358 (assault) and 302 (premeditated murder) of the Pakistain Penal Code against the husband and his accomplices.

According to the FIR, Humaira, a resident of Kabirwala tehsil, was doused in petrol and set on fire by her husband and others on Dec 6. She sustained severe burn injuries and was shifted to the Tehsil Headquarter Hospital. She died a day later on Dec 7.

According to the medical report, the victim had sustained burns across 90 per cent of her body

Ahmedpur Sial cop shoppe SHO Mohamad Yousuf stated that officials have recorded the statements of the victim's family. He maintained that the police will try their best to conduct a fair investigation keeping in mind the findings of the medical report.

"The suspects will soon be apprehended," he added.

Meanwhile,
...back at the pond, the enormous newt was trying to decide if Gloria was edible...
the victim's family appealed to the Punjab
1.) Little Orphan Annie's bodyguard
2.) A province of Pakistain ruled by one of the Sharif brothers
3.) A province of India. It is majority (60 percent) Sikh and Hindoo (37 percent), which means it has relatively few Moslem riots....

chief minister and higher authorities to take notice of the incident and ensure justice for the dear departed.

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


The Grand Turk
Losing hearts, minds and allies the Erdogan way
[Jpost] Ottoman Turkish President Recep Erdogan’s utter contempt for the rule of law and public opinion has cost The Sick Man of Europe Turkey
...just another cheapjack Moslem dictatorship, brought to you by the Moslem Brüderbund...
the moral and symbolic components of the war in Syria. Erdogan has stampeded over all diplomatic niceties.

His style of diplomacy was first put on display in 2017, when his bodyguards beat up peaceful protesters in Washington, DC. The surreal melee, in hindsight, was a harbinger of what was to come to the Kurds in Syria. Instead of using peaceful means to address its security concerns and launching a diplomatic campaign to gain the backing of Turkey’s NATO
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under: Sublime Porte


Home Front: Politix
Marianne Williamson falls for fake news story about Trump pardoning Charles Manson
[FOXNEWS] Democratic presidential candidate Marianne Williamson
...Dem presidential candidate for 2020, campaigning on a platform of Hope and Change™, massage therapy, feng shueh, incense, Love©, and half a trillion bucks in reparations to black folk...
got slammed on social media after she apparently fell for a fake news story Sunday night that claimed President Trump pardoned Charles Manson, the murderous cult leader who died in 2017.

"There is something deeply sinister about Trump pardoning Charles Manson, even posthumously," she wrote to her 2.8 million Twitter followers. "Dog whistles of the very worst possible kind..."

The self-help author, who's running a longshot candidacy for the Democratic presidential nomination, later deleted the tweet and admitted the information was erroneous in a follow-up tweet. "Glad To have been wrong," Williamson wrote in a tweet that she also subsequently deleted.
Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  She never factored Manson being DEAD?
Posted by: 3dc || 12/10/2019 1:22 Comments || Top||

#2  She's actually kinda cute. In a psychotic, ankles on the mantelpiece & hook up the trapeze kinds of way.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 1:27 Comments || Top||

#3  She does have that hot/crazy middle school teacher thing going on. Not exactly a qualification for Prez, tho.
Posted by: SteveS || 12/10/2019 2:16 Comments || Top||

#4  Hope she runs on a 3rd Party ticket.
"Pyramid Power Party" (aka P3-3P) or somesuch.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 2:22 Comments || Top||

#5  P33P [Show]
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 2:23 Comments || Top||

#6  Is she really a redheaded hairdresser named Tiffany?
Posted by: gorb || 12/10/2019 2:32 Comments || Top||

#7  Marianne Williamson falls for fake news story

One'd assume her spirit guide would warn her.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 6:11 Comments || Top||

#8  As president, she would get a better guide. Much better.
Posted by: gorb || 12/10/2019 8:04 Comments || Top||

#9  She didn't know it was fake because her crystals needed re-calibration.
Posted by: DarthVader || 12/10/2019 8:37 Comments || Top||

#10  Give her props for at least admitting she was wrong. Other libtards would just move on without admitting.
Posted by: Warthog || 12/10/2019 9:54 Comments || Top||

#11  Aren't her 15 minutes up?
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/10/2019 12:34 Comments || Top||

#12  What is time? Merely a construct, an illusion, an artifact of our mind-forged manacles ...
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 12:36 Comments || Top||

#13  Pretty sure that time and space are real. Just ask Einstein. And Marianne's time in the limelight expired some time ago.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/10/2019 12:52 Comments || Top||


Southeast Asia
How the crackdown on Myanmar's Rohingya unfolded
[Al Jazeera] August 2017
On August 25, the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), later declared a 'terrorist' group by the government, attacks more than 30 police posts, reportedly killing 12 members of security forces.

As the clashes worsen, thousands of Rohingya begin to flee across the border into Bangladesh.

September 2017
The Rohingya join some 200,000 who had fled to Bangladesh during earlier waves of violence.

Many speak of abuses by the army and members of the mostly Buddhist ethnic Rakhine.

The United Nations High Commissioner on Human Rights calls the military operation in the state a "textbook example of ethnic cleansing", citing satellite imagery and accounts of extrajudicial killings.

In her first statement on the crisis on September 19, Aung San Suu Kyi promises to hold those who have committed rights abuses to account, but refuses to blame the army.

She adds that she is open to bringing some of the Rohingya home pending a "verification process".

They go on with more dates and commentary, but do you need to read more?
Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army

#1  November 11, 2012:
The Rakhine violence is also a test for Nobel Peace Prize-winner Aung San Suu Kyi, now opposition leader in parliament, whose studied neutrality has failed to defuse tensions and risks undermining her image as a unifying moral force. Suu Kyi, a devout Buddhist, says she refuses to take sides.
At stake is the stability of one of Myanmar's most commercially strategic regions and the gold-rush of foreign investment that has come with an easing of Western economic sanctions. The United States and the European Union have suspended, not lifted, sanctions, and have made resolving ethnic conflicts a precondition for further rewards.
In Rakhine State, however, the conflict has spread, most recently to areas where Muslims have long lived peacefully with Buddhists, according to a reconstruction of the violence from October 21 through October 25.

In Paik Thay, the Buddhist Rakhine mobs hurled Molotov cocktails at wooden huts, while Tun Naing and his neighbors fled. Muhammad Amin, 62, said he was beaten with a metal pipe until his skull cracked. The initial violence ended after soldiers fired their guns into the air and police arrested a Rakhine.

The bloodshed was only beginning.
Posted by: b || 12/10/2019 7:10 Comments || Top||

#2  Interesting timeline for the area.

Lots of different actors in this play.
Posted by: Mullah Richard || 12/10/2019 9:45 Comments || Top||

#3  Bookmarked on Rantburg:



As a backgrounder, the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army staged a series of concerted attacks on the Burmese army. Unwilling to tolerate another Moslem jihad, the Rohinyas have been expelled to Bangladesh, where live some of those funding and leading ARSA. Saudi Arabia is too far away to dump them.

The number of corpses hasn't been that overwhelming. The Karens, Kachins, and Shans have been similarly suppressed by the ethnic Burmans occasionally. I realize that being dead is overwhelming to the person departing this Vale of Tears. I also realize that jihad has a habit of sprouting where local Moslem majorities (or near so) coexist next to non-Moslems. We can probably take the Philippines as a case study. You can also chart the decline of the Christian population in Paleostine, and then ask the Yazdis and the Zoroastrians of Iraq for details.
Posted by: Herb McCoy || 12/10/2019 17:06 Comments || Top||


Afghanistan
US, Taliban Not Agreed on Reduction of Violence: Sources
Just checking in to see which stage of Kabuki has been reached.
[ToloNews] Sources said the US and the Taliban
...the Pashtun equivalent of men...
have not reached an agreement on key issues.

Sources close to the Doha talks said the United States and the Taliban negotiators‐on their third day of negotiations--have yet to agree on the terms of a reduction of violence, ceasefire and intra-Afghan negotiations.

Sources said the Taliban consider agreement on a ceasefire a premature decision and that they have only agreed on signing the agreement with the US. Also, the sources said that based on this agreement, if signed, the Taliban will agree not to attack US bases within a distance of 10 kilometers.

The talks began on December 7 and are being carried out behind closed doors.

"The Taliban is insisting on an Islamic government and they are not negotiating with the government of Afghanistan--as a government--and they are not ready to announce a ceasefire at this stage," freelance journalist Sami Yousufzai said.

A government official said the two sides will discuss a reduction of violence, a ceasefire and an intra-Afghan negotiation in order to reach agreement on a peace deal.

Sources close to the Taliban said they hope the talks will yield a result.

"The agreement is almost final. Only a few issues remain that the two sides are discussing and ceasefire is one of them," said Sayed Akbar Agha, a former Taliban commander. "Let’s see if there will be an agreement on the reduction of violence, ceasefire and intra-Afghan negotiations," he said.

A front man for Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah
...the former foreign minister of the Northern Alliance government, advisor to Masood, and candidate for president against both Karzai and Ghani. Dr. Abdullah was born in Kabul and is half Tadjik and half Pashtun. He also held the meaningless salaried sop position as CEO of Afghanistan, while Ghani was president...
’s Office Mujib Rahman Rahimi said Kabul and Washington have coordinated on the peace talks.

"The reduction of violence, agreeing to a ceasefire, forming an inclusive delegation for negotiations and starting intra-Afghan negotiations are the common demands of us and our allies," Rahimi said.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: Taliban


Bangladesh
Panthapath hotel attack: Police press charges against 14 militants
[Dhaka Tribune] Police have pressed charges against 14 members of a new faction of banned Death Eater outfit Jama’atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (New JMB)
...Pakistan sock puppet on the Taliban model, they were founded in 1998 with additional funding the government charities Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, and the UAE. The core membership is estimated at 10,000, with ten times as many part time affiliates, many of the cadres also being members of the Islami Chhatra Shibir (ICS), the student wing of the Jamaat-e-Islami party...
over the bombing on a hotel in Dhaka's Panthapath area.

Dhaka Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Court General Recording Officer Sub-Inspector (SI) Shafayatul Islam said: "The Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) Unit Inspector Raju Ahmed, also investigation officer of the case, submitted the charge sheet before the court on Monday."

The case has already been sent to Anti-Terrorism Special Tribunal for hearing, he added.

On August 15, 2017, a member of New JMB, Saiful Islam, 21, went kaboom! at Hotel Olio International on Panthapath, only about 300m away from the Bangabandhu Memorial Museum.

The incident took place just three hours after President Md Abdul Hamid, Prime Minister the loathesome Sheikh Hasina
...Bangla dynastic politician and current Prime Minister of Bangladesh. She has been the President of the Bangla Awami League since the Lower Paleolithic. She is the eldest of five children of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the founding father of Bangla. Her party defeated the BNP-led Four-Party Alliance in the 2008 parliamentary elections. She has once before held the office, from 1996 to 2001, when she was defeated in a landslide. She and the head of the BNP, Khaleda Zia show such blind animosity toward each other that they are known as the Battling Begums...
, and other high-ups of the government paid their respects to Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman at the museum in Dhanmondi on National Mourning Day.

Among the 14 Death Eater accused in the charge sheet, 10 of them have already delivered confessional statements in court. Militant Saiful Islam has not been named among the accused as he died when he detonated the bomb.
Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (IS)


China-Japan-Koreas
China gets nasty.
[Politico] In response to Trump, China gets mean. Chinese diplomats are ditching caution and going for the U.S. jugular on Twitter. U.S. officials say their response will be ‘measured and reasonable.’

In his Twitter bio, Chinese diplomat Lijian Zhao says he wants to “spread the voice of China.” That voice apparently has a lot of nasty things to say about the United States.

In tweet barrages, the senior Chinese Foreign Ministry official has described America as “unjust,” “inhumane” and “hypocritical.” He’s gone so far as to slam neighborhood segregation in Washington, D.C., and assert that “racial discrimination, gun violence, violent law enforcement are chronic diseases deeply rooted in U.S. society.”
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: 3dc || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Commies

#1  Not Bee?
This is a joke, right? Is it 1 April already?
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 1:29 Comments || Top||

#2 
HEADS UP, XIXI. GO AFTER NANCY
AND THE HoR ALL YOU WANT. YAP
ABOUT ME AND YOU'LL BE SORRY.

QUID PRO QUOMINTANG, SUCKER !

- the Don
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 1:57 Comments || Top||

#3  "China’s ethnic policy is more successful!

Yikes. Incendiary indeed. Them's fightin' words - really hitting below the belt.

It wasn't a slow news day... Maybe Politico's having trouble finding "bombshells" and other bad news with which to tear down OrangeMan?
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 2:09 Comments || Top||

#4  Boy, they sound just like the SJW Left. This is awesome.
Posted by: Herb McCoy || 12/10/2019 2:11 Comments || Top||

#5  The Chinks and all the left have the same trouble with "dissing" the US.

The US was founded on, among other things, and individualist ethic. The Left in all its isms can't comprehend that there is not one single voice that represents Americans.


My general response to that 'tude is FOAD.
Posted by: AlanC || 12/10/2019 7:21 Comments || Top||

#6  Trump should call the ships sending pork and such to China to take their time crossing the Pacific. Not super-long but a day or two to send a message.
Posted by: ruprecht || 12/10/2019 8:06 Comments || Top||

#7  Dec 15: 15% tariff on the remaining $300 billion Chinese imports. Good chance the Chinese seize select factories to keep them from moving out of China.
Posted by: Snusotle the Lesser4227 || 12/10/2019 10:38 Comments || Top||

#8  You mean, besides LeBron, Caperneck, hulk and the rest of the Disney staff, including LeBron?

Can't wait to hear me some trash talk.

"You treat African Americans so badly that only once a year they buy a pair of Nike Jordan's for $200. That we make. And sell for $20 including shipping. So LeBron can be paid millions in endorsements. And start our own basketball league importing best specimens from our African ventures. Shit, that didn't come out right."
Posted by: swksvolFF || 12/10/2019 10:54 Comments || Top||

#9  Confucius say, "Projects in Kingston
And Africa cause next extinction
As Ch-nks ignore scholars
And wisdom of ballers:
"Don't worry, it ain't really shrank, son!"
Posted by: Shese Johnson3426 || 12/10/2019 19:01 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Turkey announces the start of one million person ethnic cleansing in northern Syria
[NPASYRIA] In an implementation of the policy of "demographic change" in the areas controlled by The Sick Man of Europe Turkey
...Qatar's satrapy in Asia Minor...
in northern Syria, the Ottoman Turkish President Erdogan announced today that his country has started working on settling one million people in the Syrian towns of Tal Abyad (Gre Spi) and Sere-Kaniye (Ras al-Ain).

During his speech to the Ministers of Social Affairs of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation in Istanbul, Erdogan confirmed that support will be provided for the establishment of new settlement areas in northeastern Syria, saying: "We have started working on housing a million people in the towns of Tal Abyad and Ras al-Ain."

This came after carrying out its military invasion with its armed opposition groups to control those towns and their countryside, which led to the almost complete displacement of the local civilians, to start the stage of demographic change by settling families which aren't residents of the region.

It is noteworthy that the Ottoman Turkish military had started carrying out the process of transforming citizens who wish to move into Tal Abyad, where cars were launched last week, after the registration of the names of those wishing to move. They were transferred with their properties from the Syrian town of Jarablus, northeastern Aleppo into the borders with Turkey, and then into Tal Abyad, northern Raqqa countryside, on the pretext that, they are returning to their original regions from across Turkey.

In turn, the Autonomous Administration of north-eastern Syria warned that, "Turkey is working to introduce radical projects aimed at creating chaos, as well as working to change the identity of the original regions through its practices of demographic change", and criticizing the silence of the United Nations
...an organization conceived in the belief that we're just one big happy world, with the sort of results you'd expect from such nonsense...
It noted that, Turkey "seeks to change the identity of the areas it has controlled by various means, and works to settle the refugees who are now in Turkey, and they are more than 3 million in coordination with the United Nations, which portends a real catastrophe in the region."
Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Sublime Porte

#1  Will no one rid me of this turkulent turb? er, turbulent Turk.

(and yes I am copyrighting "turkulent")
Posted by: Mercutio || 12/10/2019 8:30 Comments || Top||

#2  Someone should release a map with Mossad/CIA on top that shows Turkey divided into Kurdistan and Armenia and let it fall into Turkish hands.
Posted by: ruprecht || 12/10/2019 11:59 Comments || Top||

#3  Truculent, turbulent, turbaned Turk.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 12:30 Comments || Top||

#4  We have started working on housing a million people in the towns of Tal Abyad and Ras al-Ain.

That's the opposite of ethnic cleansing. Ethnic littering?
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 16:07 Comments || Top||

#5  Turks and their ethnic cleansing when is enough enough? There have to be limits at some point no?
Posted by: jpal || 12/10/2019 16:17 Comments || Top||


Caribbean-Latin America
US sanctions Venezuela officials for selling passports for cash
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] The United States on Monday slapped sanctions on senior Venezuela
...a country in Central America that sits on an enormous pool of oil. Formerly the most prospereous country in the region, it became infested with Commies sniffing almost unlimited wealth. It turned out the wealth wasn't unlimited, the economy collapsed under the clownish Hugo Chavez, the murder rate exceeds places like Honduras and El Salvador, and a significant proportion of the populace as refugeed to Colombia and points south...
n government officials accused of taking bribes to issue passports, the US Treasury said.

The sanctions targeted Gustavo Adolfo Vizcaino Gil, head of the government department in charge of identification documents and migration, as well as his predecessor Juan Carlos Dugarte Padron, the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control said.

Any assets the two men possess under US jurisdiction will be frozen, the office said.

It said the scheme to sell passports for thousands of dollars dated back at least to April 2016 when Dugarte was named as head of the government department and continued under Vizcaino, who took over in June 2018.

More than 4.5 million Venezuelans have fled the country, mostly for neighboring Latin American countries, after years of economic crisis.

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: Commies

#1  Will continues the great Latin American tradition: Mexican passports for Spanish Marxists; Argentine passports for Nazis; Paraguayan passports for Hezbollah.
Posted by: b || 12/10/2019 7:18 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
Impeach Trump Because Of... Slavery?
[POWERLINEBLOG] Congressman Al Green has become one of the Democratic Party’s top spokesmen. Which is a good thing, because Green is generally unfiltered, and therefore gives us a glimpse into his party’s id. This, for example, is revealing:

Rep. Al Green (D-TX) said on Saturday during an interview on MSNBC that President Donald Trump needed to be impeached “to deal with slavery.”

Green, who has previously stated that Trump must be impeached or else “he will get reelected,” said this week that there is “no limit” to the number of times that Democrats can try to impeach the president.

But wait! Let’s go back to that first part: how in the world does impeaching President Trump “deal with slavery”? Rep. Green explains:

I do believe, ma’am, that we have to deal with the original sin. We have to deal with slavery. Slavery was the thing that put all of what President Trump has done lately into motion.


This is idiotic, almost beyond belief.

It’s insidious … racism, the president has played on racism and he’s used that as a weapon to galvanize a base of support to mobilize people.


Democrats keep saying this, but that doesn’t make it true. In fact, Trump has done no such thing. On the contrary, he relates well to black Americans and, more important, his policies have made him one of the best presidents ever for African-Americans. Which is why I think he will get a startling number of black votes next November, sufficient to guarantee his re-election. Actually, Green may agree with this; perhaps this is why he famously said that Trump must be impeached, lest he be re-elected.

Green continued with the usual tiresome litany:

We cannot overlook what happened when he came down the escalator and just demeaned people of color when he talked about the s-hole countries.


Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Actually, not just Al Green but The New York Times, in its idiotic "1619 Project," is now saying truly extraordinary things about America and slavery -- for instance, that the American Revolution was motivated by the fear that the Mother Country was going to abolish slavery in the colonies.

Got that? Our newspaper of record is promoting the batsh!t crazy, cockamamie conceit that the Revolution was about preserving slavery.

These people are out of their f---ing minds.

It's like a disease. A mass psychosis.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 1:06 Comments || Top||

#2  If slavery and raycism in America's history is to be avenged, disband and boycott the Democrats. Force them into hiding, never to return to politics. Deny them jobs and donations, even.
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 2:07 Comments || Top||

#3  Well, hard to blame him. After all, he's used to the fact that any mention of slavery - in any context - gets huge outpourings of white guilt and immediate surrender to "African-American" demands - no matter how unreasonable.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 6:34 Comments || Top||

#4  Gotta suppress the Black's favorability towards Trump numbers. How to do that? Slavery, slavery, slavery.
Posted by: ruprecht || 12/10/2019 8:01 Comments || Top||

#5  How do unfiltered morons like Green and Waters manage to get elected? Its almost as if their base has some sort of shortcoming.
Posted by: Crusader || 12/10/2019 10:00 Comments || Top||

#6  Low IQ + Low turnout
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 10:55 Comments || Top||

#7  Lies. All lies, all the time.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/10/2019 11:58 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Iran: We are ready for full prisoner swap, 'ball is in the US’ court'
[Jpost] "After getting our hostage back this week, fully ready for comprehensive prisoner exchange," Zarif said.

Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Monday the Islamic republic is ready for a full prisoner exchange with the United States, tweeting: "The ball is in the US' court."

"After getting our hostage back this week, fully ready for comprehensive prisoner exchange," Zarif said.

The United States and Iran
...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan, the abbreviation IRGC is a cognate form of Stürmabteilung (or SA), the term Supreme Guide is a cognate form of either Shah or Führer or maybe both, and they hate Jews Zionists Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol...
on Saturday swapped prisoners - American graduate student Xiyue Wang, detained for three years on spying charges, and imprisoned Iranian stem-cell researcher Massoud Soleimani, accused of sanction violations - in a rare act of cooperation between two longtime foes.

Separately, Iranian government front man Ali Rabiei said Iran had always sought an "all for all release" with the United States.

"We are ready to cooperate to return all Iranians who are being held unjustly in America," Rabiei was quoted by the state news agency IRNA as saying.

Rabiei said efforts to swap prisoners were not linked to any other U.S.-Iranian talks, which would only be possible if Washington lifted sanctions and returned to Tehran's 2015 nuclear deal with world powers.

Tensions have heightened between Iran and the United States since U.S. President Donald Trump
...the Nailer of NAFTA...
last year pulled Washington out of the nuclear deal and reimposed sanctions that have crippled Tehran's economy. Iran has responded by gradually scaling back its commitments under the agreement.

Washington has demanded that Iran release the Americans it is holding, including father and son Siamak and Baquer Namazi; Michael R. White, a Navy veteran imprisoned last year; and Robert Levinson, a former FBI agent missing since 2007.Several dozen Iranians are being held in U.S. prisons, many of them for breaking sanctions.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Iran


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
Why isn’t Israel doing more to help the Kurds?
[Rudaw] Over the last several years, the State of Israel has become the strongest supporter of Kurdish rights and independence ‐ in a rhetorical sense if not a practical one.

At the time of the Iraqi Kurdish referendum on independence in September 2017, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu went on record as officially supporting an independent Kurdistan. He was the only national leader in the international community to do so.

When The Sick Man of Europe Turkey
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Whole platoons of Israelis were stationed with the Peshmerga

Imagine that...sniff.. Israel. Always heroic. David-like. Altruistic without posturing. Of course they mustn't go overboard helping them overtly. The world doesn't work this way.

It would immediately suit the world if the Kurds were revenged and settled and got their own nation, carved from Iraq and Syria; and a ready military stood to fight any resurgence of daesh or their remnants. I reckon it would still be as lawless and pathetic a state as any the terrorists themselves could run. And with that would come requests for aid. A dark well of slowly growing corruption like Afghanistan and Iraq. Sometimes biting the hand that fed it.

I know some guys who gave up their commissions, their citizenship, packed their bags and went to Iraq and Syria to live with Kurds. They were all deep core Marxist and radical fighters though. And young. 'Biji Kurdistan !' That was the new thingy for them. The peshmerga have been a siren call for armed adventure for some really brave/foolish fighters from everywhere, for some time now.

Naturally, they do get aid. Sympathetic entities that won't be named find multifarious ways and means to aid them. It's very grey, this area though; which is why they would like to remain distant in the media eye. Some ways and means would even raise questions in treacherous lower house committees and a lot of 'whisteblowing', so it's better this way. Traitors are alway ready to tear apart coalitions, topple govts and destabilize their own countries to brab power.

On a funnier note, here's our contribution. Typically Indian. Not a penny spent or even arm lifted.

'All ye, seek the uninterested gods with a fervent mind now.'

Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 1:09 Comments || Top||

#2  But hands lifted.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 1:12 Comments || Top||

#3  But...but Dron, they are darlings of the media!
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/10/2019 12:46 Comments || Top||

#4  I know. I like them too, if only for their courage and hatred for salafists. I like the pasthuns fighting against Taliban too. And the Balochis. Of course I pity them more, because eventually they'll die of Allan one way or another.
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 13:14 Comments || Top||


Britain
Anti-war Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn attracts some British Arab voters
[TWITTER]

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  election is on 12 december

Yes, Labor will do well in Arab Moslem neighborhood, probably also in Urdu neighborhoods.

Hindu neighborhoods will overwhelmingly oppose.

Posted by: lord garth || 12/10/2019 6:26 Comments || Top||

#2  Is Britain still at war?
Posted by: ruprecht || 12/10/2019 11:52 Comments || Top||


-Land of the Free
US Supreme Court leaves in place Kentucky abortion restriction
[Al Jazeera] The law requires the physicians to continue with an ultrasound even if the patient objects and shows signs of distress.

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Que PP and the Dems screaming as other states copy bill
Posted by: Uleck Spererong9442 || 12/10/2019 2:18 Comments || Top||

#2  I guess the new Green cult has displaced the worshipers of Baal in the Left's official state religion.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/10/2019 5:52 Comments || Top||

#3  #2 Not "displaced", "subsumed".
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 6:19 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
House Democrats to announce articles of impeachment on Tuesday, according to senior Democratic aide.
[Twitter-NBC]
Posted by: 3dc || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  The Most Extraordinary & Grand Shitshow, Part 1
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 1:09 Comments || Top||


Boomerang: Trump, down 12 points in polls vs Biden in WI in March, Now AHEAD BY NINE POINTS
[Breitbart] Donald Trump beating 2020 Democrats in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.

A Firehouse/Optimus poll conducted in December shows Trump ahead of his Democrat opponents, even former Vice President Joe Biden who remains one of the stronger candidates opposing the president.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Boomerang. Or is the appropriate term, blowback?
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 0:54 Comments || Top||

#2  They probably slowed down on the oversampling in NY and CA.
Posted by: gorb || 12/10/2019 2:33 Comments || Top||

#3  Polls - America's original fake news
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/10/2019 5:46 Comments || Top||

#4  Someone one asked me how to tell which ones in the media were lying. I said,"I'll give you a method far past improvin'. You just look for the ones whose lips are movin'" (HT Benny Hill)
Posted by: SR-71 || 12/10/2019 13:41 Comments || Top||


Once the AFL-CIO supported the new NAFTA, the Democrats had no choice but to formally support it as well
[Twitter]
Posted by: 3dc || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Tin Hat Dictators, Presidents for Life,

#1  According too the linked Yahoo News - Pelosi has painstakingly worked to bring labor on board.

All credit to San Fran Nan.
Posted by: Bobby || 12/10/2019 8:49 Comments || Top||

#2  They call it USMCA for the initials of the countries involved. They missed a bet: could have called it CAMUS, to give a hint of how depressing it'll turn out to be.
Posted by: Mercutio || 12/10/2019 9:06 Comments || Top||

#3  MOTHER died today. Or, maybe, yesterday; I can't be sure. The telegram from the
Home says: YOUR MOTHER PASSED AWAY. FUNERAL TOMORROW. DEEP
SYMPATHY. Which leaves the matter doubtful; it could have been yesterday.
Posted by: Crusader || 12/10/2019 12:19 Comments || Top||

#4  My sympathies, Crusader. But a telegram?
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 17:09 Comments || Top||

#5  Not to worry, Crusader. Turns out she'd just wandered off to the Capitol. Found waving gavel at pigeons and tourists. No harm done.
Posted by: Shese Johnson3426 || 12/10/2019 18:17 Comments || Top||


Louie Gohmert goes off during hearing, stops Nadler in his tracks with final punch
[BIZPACREVIEW] Rep. Louie Gohmert could not remain silent in the face of the Democrats’ impeachment circus, venting during hearings about the way the proceedings were being handled.

The Texas Republican spoke up during Monday’s hearing and accused Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler of ignoring the rules when he allowed “witnesses to ask the questions.”

The heated exchange came after Democratic counsel Barry Berke, who had just served as a witness for Democrats earlier, began questioning the Republican counsel for the Intelligence Committee, Steve Castor.

“I’ve been a judge and I know that you don’t get to be a witness and a judge in the same case,” Gohmert said after multiple Republican lawmakers attempted to stop the proceedings and have Nadler recognize the issue. The Democrat shot them down each time, wielding his gavel and repeatedly saying their “point of order” was not recognized as he ignored GOP objections.

Gohmert had enough after Berke’s line of questioning led him to ask Castor about President Trump’s state of mind toward former Vice President Joe Biden.

“Did you look at how many times president mentioned Vice President Biden in a speech, rally leading up to the July 25th call?” he asked.

“Mr. Chairman, pardon me,” Gohmert interjected.

“The gentleman is not recognized,” Nadler replied. “Mr. Berke has the time.”

“We’re going to ignore the rules, allow witnesses to ask the question, then how many other rules are you going to just disregard?” Gohmert asked.

“Gentleman will suspend. Parliamentary inquiries are not in order,” the chairman announced.

“This is not appropriate to have a witness be a questioner of somebody that was a witness when he was,” the Texas lawmaker continued, as Nadler banged his gavel. “It’s just wrong.”

“There is no rule or precedent for anybody being a witness and then getting to come up and question,” Gohmert added.

“The point of order is he’s not appropriate to be up here asking questions,” he said as Nadler declared, “It’s not a point of order.”

The New York Democrat had cited House Resolution 660 and said “the gentleman has been appointed by me to ask questions.”

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:


Bangladesh
4 'ABT militants' held in Noakhali
[Dhaka Tribune] Members of Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crimes (CTTC) of police on Sunday arrested four alleged members of the banned turban outfit Ansarullah Bangla Team (ABT)
...a front group for Al Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent inspired by Anwar al-Awlaki. It is accused of being linked to Islami Chhatra Shibir, the student wing of Jamaat-e-Islami party in Bangladesh. Formed in 2007 as Jama’atul Muslemin, it went dormant when the funding ran out, only to reemerge in 2013 under the current name with a series of murderous attacks on atheist bloggers, and in 2015 the group was banned. Muhammad Jasimuddin Rahmani, their spiritual leader, was in jail in Bangladesh, last I looked...
from the Durganagar area of Noakhali Sadar.

Police also presented the detainees before the court on Monday, asking for a 10-day remand.

In response to the plea, Chief Judicial Magistrate Soeb Uddin Khan placed the detainees on a four-day remand instead.

The detainees are Mahmudur Rahman Sohel alias Mohan, 26, Md Abdullah Kabir, 25, Arif Hossain Hridoy, 23, and Anwar Hossain, 20.

CTTC sources say they conducted a drive to the area around 8pm on Sunday after receiving a tip-off. There they arrested the four with hard boy books, leaflets, and mobile phones.

OC Nabi Hossain of Sudharam Model cop shoppe said: "A case was filed by CTTC Inspector Rashed Hossain on this regard.

"The accused will be taken to Dhaka for further investigation," the OC added.

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Ansarullah Bangla Team (AQIS)


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Ongoing bombardment by the Turkish military & the affiliated armed groups on villages surrounding town of Abu-Rasin (Zargan)
[TWITTER]

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Sublime Porte


Local human rights organization calls for holding war crimes perpetrators into account
[NPASYRIA] The human rights
...which are usually open to widely divergent definitions...
activist and member of the "Human Rights Organization ‐ Afrin", Heyhan Ali said that their organization visited the base of the Russian Military Police in the village of al-Wahshiya, in northern Aleppo countryside, and discussed Tal Rifaat massacre.

Activist Heyhan Ali told North-Press that they have discussed with the Russian military generals and officials the issue of the deliberate and repeated shelling by the Ottoman Turkish military and the Ottoman Turkish-backed Syrian armed opposition groups on areas of northern Aleppo countryside, particularly on the town of Tal Rifaat. Heyhan Ali said: "We have handed over files that document the victims of Tal Rifaat massacre, which took place on the second of this month."

Regarding the Russian side's response, Ms. Ali stressed that the Russian officials expressed their concern and regret over Tal Rifaat massacre, visited the hospital, documented the victims and listened to witnesses from the maimed civilians, in addition, they visited the location of the bombing, documented the massacre and submitted a report to the Russian Command at Hmeimim base, in Latakia’s countryside.

Ali added that they have called on the Russian state to fulfill its duties to protect the local people, as it is the main guarantor of stopping the military operations in the region; however, the Russian side has reservations about the response, and it merely stated that the solution lies through diplomatic means between the Ottoman Turkish and Syrian sides.

She added that they are documenting all violations against civilians in the region, and providing contacts with the fact-finding committees in Geneva to document them, and communicate with the families of the victims. She also stressed that violations should not be turned into numbers and statistics in reports, but that the United Nations
...an organization conceived in the belief that we're just one big happy world, with the sort of results you'd expect from such nonsense...
should activate its decisions and open international courts to hold war crimes perpetrators accountable, and not just issue statements of condemnation.

The Ottoman Turkish military and its affiliated armed opposition groups on the 2nd of December bombed one of the main streets in the town of Tal Rifaat, killing 10 civilians, including 8 children, and wounding 13 other civilians.

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Sublime Porte


Home Front: WoT
Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev appeals death sentence
The poor, deserted lad still has nothing better to do than file motions while he waits to die.
[Jpost] This city's deepest wound - the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings that killed three and injured hundreds more - will be re-examined Thursday when lawyers for bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev
...the pretty, ethnic-Chechen college boy from Dagestan who, with the older brother he subsequently ran over while fleeing police, used pressure cooker bombs to blow up the Boston Marathon in 2013. His divorced parents now live in Russia, having given up on the American dream. Oddly enough, the mosque the brothers frequented, the Islamic Society of Boston, was founded by Friend of the Clintons and Al Qaeda financier Abdurahman Alamoudi in 1981, and is a hotbed of jihadi sentiment and connctions to so many different jihadi groups and individuals the mind boggles....
seek to have his death sentence
...the barbaric practice of sentencing a murderer to be punished for as long as his/her/its victim is dead...
lifted because the jury pool was too traumatized to render a fair verdict.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [3 views] Top|| File under: al-Qaeda

#1  It's not nice to blow up your neighbors. Not a lawyer, but the fact that some of them are a bit miffed hardly seems like extenuating circumstances.
Posted by: SteveS || 12/10/2019 1:48 Comments || Top||

#2  Some peoples' American Dream is a nightmare for America.
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 2:03 Comments || Top||

#3  Why is this thing not dead already?

I'm a little surprised that Zero didn't use this for a Sister Soldja moment.
Posted by: AlanC || 12/10/2019 7:03 Comments || Top||

#4  If I was him, I would appeal it too. What do I have to lose?
Posted by: BernardZ || 12/10/2019 7:09 Comments || Top||

#5 
The bloody 'fondue process'. I've never understood the rationale for allowing people caught in the act and sworn to fight to the death a fair trial.

Humanism shall be the death of humans.

Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 7:28 Comments || Top||

#6  Too bad he didn't get run over like he did to his brother.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia || 12/10/2019 7:54 Comments || Top||

#7  ^ That would be Tamerlan, better known as 'Speed Bump' around these parts.
Posted by: Raj || 12/10/2019 8:11 Comments || Top||

#8  There is a legal prohibition against "cruel and unusual" punishment.

Thought #1 - making him suffer thru all these (denied) appeals is cruel and unusual. Execute him now.

Thought #2. My legal quibblese dictionary indicates that the language allows punishments that are cruel but not unusual and those that are unusual but not cruel. Drawing and quartering has been in use for hundreds of years, if not recently - so it's not unusual.
The prohibition says nothing about how recent its use has to be to be considered unusual.
Posted by: Mercutio || 12/10/2019 8:52 Comments || Top||

#9  Life sentence without appeal or parole - what's that work out to these days? Ten years with time off for good behavior?
Posted by: KBK || 12/10/2019 9:45 Comments || Top||

#10  His victims didn't get to appeal theirs.
Posted by: Mullah Richard || 12/10/2019 11:23 Comments || Top||

#11  Some punishments are cruel but not unusual.
Some punishments are not cruel but unusual.
Some punishments, like Goldilocks' porridge, are just right. Like Tsarnev's punishment.
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 12/10/2019 16:13 Comments || Top||

#12  KBK, that's about it
Posted by: chris || 12/10/2019 18:12 Comments || Top||

#13  Off with his head.
Posted by: Herb McCoy || 12/10/2019 19:00 Comments || Top||

#14  The Founders who wrote that 'cruel and unusual' had no problem executing miscreants. Once again our judiciary aristocracy has taken it upon themselves to ignore Article V and amend the Constitution by fiat.

What they have done by their actions is to absolve themselves of the contract between the people and the state in which the state said it would render justice rather than the traditional vendetta used to render justice.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/10/2019 19:25 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
India gives Burma a sub to out flank China
[The Print] India and Myanmar are sending a strong message to China – with a submarine. On its part, Myanmar will help India secure its own maritime interests in the Bay of Bengal region.

The Indian Navy’s decision to transfer one of its Kilo-class diesel-electric submarines, INS Sindhuvir, to Myanmar hopes to limit Chinese military influence and aid Myanmar in its emerging naval competition with Bangladesh. On its part, Myanmar helps India secure its own maritime interests in the Bay of Bengal region.

Myanmar Commander-in-Chief Senior General Min Aung Hlaing had visited Delhi last month, during which India and Myanmar signed a defence cooperation agreement.

India’s willingness to transfer a frontline submarine when it is facing a shortage of such platforms reveals a desire on New Delhi’s part to consolidate the growing convergence in security interests with Myanmar. Gone is the time when there were fears of Myanmar offering a ‘second coast’ to China. Instead, the Indian Navy and the Myanmar Navy today conduct institutionalised joint patrols, and India is constructing connectivity corridors of its own in Myanmar in the form of the Kaladan project.
Posted by: 3dc || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Commies


Home Front: WoT
Florida city hit with cyberattack after deadly naval base attack
[Al Jazeera] Federal authorities are investigating a cyberattack on the city of Pensacola, Florida, home to the naval air station where officials say a Saudi flight student killed three sailors and maimed eight others on Friday.

City officials became aware of the attack at about 1:30am (6:30 GMT) Saturday, less than 24 hours after the shooting, in which officials say Saudi airman Mohammed Alshamrani opened fire in a Navy classroom. Authorities expressed caution about linking the two incidents - although they were not prepared to outright dismiss any connections.

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Moslem Colonists

#1  Nope. Nothing to see here. Move along, pls
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 10:54 Comments || Top||

#2  Trump's fault he failed to see it coming.
Posted by: jpal || 12/10/2019 13:22 Comments || Top||


-Obits-
Former US Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker dies at 92
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET]
Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


-Signs, Portents, and the Weather-
World's largest 100 weapon producers saw a 4.6 per cent rise in global sales last year to £319billion, with US firms making the biggest gains
Posted by: Skidmark || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Suggestions on a 9mm with a manual safety for a decent price ($500 or so)? Ruger SR9 gets decent reviews, but some question the trigger. Does Beretta of Sig offer a manual safety?
Posted by: Crusader || 12/10/2019 0:34 Comments || Top||

#2  The Sig P320 line starts at around $500. It is the basis for the Army's new pistol.
Posted by: Snusotle the Lesser4227 || 12/10/2019 10:56 Comments || Top||


Europe
US Army preparing biggest European deployment in years
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] The US Army is planning its biggest deployment of troops to Europe
...the land mass occupying the space between the English Channel and the Urals, also known as Moslem Lebensraum...
in 25 years, with 20,000 troops slated to take part in a massive force projection exercise at a time of increasingly adversarial relations with Russia.

General Christopher Cavoli, the commander of US ground forces in Europe, said 20,000 US-based troops will deploy next year to Europe where they will join some 9,000 other US soldiers already stationed there.

Some 37,000 troops will then take part in exercises across 10 European countries from May to June, he told news hounds at the Pentagon.

The US-based forces will begin flowing in in February, moving 13,000 pieces of equipment, including tanks, artillery, and transport vehicles, across 2,500 miles (4,000 kilometers), he said.

That will be a daunting logistical challenge as railroads in former Soviet countries have smaller gauges than western European countries and their bridges are not built to carry the weight of a 70-ton Abrams tank.

The Defender-Europe 20 exercise, as it is dubbed, marks a strategic turning point after years of US military cutbacks in post-Cold War Europe.

While Cavoli did not single out Russia as the focus, he said its annexation of Crimea in 2014 changed everything.

NATO
...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Originally it was a mutual defense pact directed against an expansionist Soviet Union. In later years it evolved into a mechanism for picking the American pocket while criticizing the cut of the American pants...
and respond to any crisis," he said.

"Our ability as an army to project power is absolutely fundamental to anything that we would get done," he said.
Ah, Reforgers! How I miss 'em!
Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Who's paying for all this?

If it's America, why? Send the bill to Europe for their own defense. They can easily afford it, they are wealthy First World nations.

Europeans sincerely believe that Americans are obliged to protect them. If you babysit a child, he will grow up an evil egoist. This is what we see in Europe today. They need tough love.
Posted by: Herb McCoy || 12/10/2019 0:31 Comments || Top||

#2  Puzzling. How exactly did "everything" change because of the "annexation" of an absolutely strategically vital territory which has always, since before our Revokutionar War ended, been part of not Russia's sphere but Russia itself?

Why are we rattling sabers over this?

Anyone? Bueller?
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 1:35 Comments || Top||

#3  Fact check: former Soviet countries in Eastern Europe have wider gauge, not narrower gauge, than Western Europe and U.S.
Posted by: Jumbo Squank9429 || 12/10/2019 3:31 Comments || Top||

#4  Ugly American stories soon to follow.
Posted by: Thimp Clusort2035 || 12/10/2019 6:06 Comments || Top||

#5  Crimea was annexed by the Russian Empire in 1783, previous owners were the Crimean Khanate, decedents of the Mongols.

as a relative comparison -

The former province of Silesia was annexed in 1742 by Prussia, previous claimant was the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Now part of Poland since 1946.

Prussia achieved Kingdom status in 1700. Now known as Kaliningard Oblast, annexed into the Soviet Union in 1946.

Wars have consequences. Ignore the childish chant - wars don't solve anything.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/10/2019 6:07 Comments || Top||

#6  wars don't solve anything

I believe it was Carthaginian folk saying.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 6:15 Comments || Top||

#7  We could ask the Aedui.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 12/10/2019 11:04 Comments || Top||


The Grand Turk
Turkey says has deported 11 French 'terrorist' suspects
[Jpost] The Sick Man of Europe Turkey
...Qatar's satrapy in Asia Minor...
said on Monday it had deported 11 Frenchies back to La Belle France as part of a program to extradite what it says are foreign terrorist fighters.

Turkey's Interior Ministry, which made the announcement, gave no details. La Belle France's Foreign Ministry declined to comment, but diplomatic sources said the 11 included four women and seven children.

Turkey is holding hundreds of Islamic State
...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that they were al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're really very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear western pols talk they're not really Moslems....
suspects and last month launched a program to repatriate detainees that has caused friction with its NATO
...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Originally it was a mutual defense pact directed against an expansionist Soviet Union. In later years it evolved into a mechanism for picking the American pocket while criticizing the cut of the American pants...
allies.

Ankara has accused Europe
...the land mass occupying the space between the English Channel and the Urals, also known as Moslem Lebensraum...
an countries of being too slow to take back citizens who traveled to the Middle East to fight.

Ottoman Turkish Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said in November that Ankara would repatriate most detainees with suspected links to Islamic State by the end of this year.

The move is forcing European governments to decide how to handle the return of radicalized bad boys, including those with battlefield experience.

Gay Paree signed an agreement with Ankara five years ago for Frenchies arrested by Ottoman Turkish authorities to be deported in coordination with the French authorities. Turkey has expelled almost 300 Frenchies since then, French officials say.

La Belle France's Centre for Analysis of Terrorism said one of the newly deported women was Amandine Le Coz, who had been married to a Moroccan bad boy killed in Syria. She joined Islamic State with her husband in 2014.

It said another was Tooba Gondal, a 25-year-old French national who lived in Britannia before joining Islamic State in 2015 and who recruited several teenage women. Gondal is banned from re-entering Britannia.

La Belle France's foreign ministry and interior ministry declined to comment.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Islamic State


China-Japan-Koreas
China: Policy on proper reincarnation! Seriously! Hah Hah.
[Twitter]
Posted by: 3dc || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Commies

#1  It's actually a bid to subvert local superstition and growing personality cults within the minor allowances afforded the people. Asian fools will always find a way to give power over themselves to cultists like the Dalai Lama. Chinks are allover that, saying 'No. If anybody's gonna have power over you, it's our guy. Here ! This is the new incarnation of your diety. Meet Corporal Po-Ling Dong, henceforth to be called Buddha Dong.'
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 2:45 Comments || Top||

#2  Did they indicate Xi's proper completion of the Divine Mandate ritual as well?
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/10/2019 6:09 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
Biden blames staff, says nobody ‘warned’ him son’s Ukraine job could raise conflict
[FOXNEWS] Former Vice President Joe Foreign Policy Whiz Kid Biden
...Failed seeker of the Democratic presidential nomination on multiple occasions, vice president under Barack Obama, giving it a last try in his dotage for 2020...
claimed in a new interview that when his son Hunter was a board member of Ukrainian energy company Burisma Holdings while he was in office, no one informed him that it could pose a problem.

Biden insisted again that Hunter did nothing wrong, but this time appeared to fault his staff for not cluing him in that there could be concerns about his son's involvement with the foreign company that had been under investigation while Biden was in office and dealing with Ukraine policy.

"Nobody warned me about a potential conflict of interest. Nobody warned me about that," Biden told NPR in a story posted Monday.

State Department official George Kent addressed this during his testimony as part of the impeachment inquiry of President Trump, acknowledging that he told staff members there was concern over the appearance of a conflict of interest, but that no one told the vice president because his older son Beau was suffering from what was ultimately a fatal battle with brain cancer.

"They should have told me," Biden says now. Hunter's dealings and the elder Biden's role ousting a prosecutor looking into Burisma are being used by Trump and his supporters against the now-2020 presidential candidate, even as Trump's effort to press for an investigation into that conduct has spurred the impeachment inquiry.

"The appearance looked bad and it gave folks like Rudy Giuliani an excuse to come up with a Trumpian kind of defense, while they were violating the Constitution," Biden said.

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: Antifa

#1  Loser.
If this guy's the (D) nominee in 2020 it won't be close.

I'd bet a small sum at this point that the donors and party pros will draft Hillary at the Convention next summer. Maybe that's Bloomie's end game?
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 0:50 Comments || Top||


#3  The. Hinese fund has iirc $1.5b in assets under management. A standard "2 and 20" management fee arrangement would gross a minimum of $30m per year, probably about twice that sum, for the principals.

Son Hoover's cut would therefore probably amount to at least $5 million a year. For doing absolutely nothing.

That's a lot of diapers and baby shoes.
Go get 'im, Mom.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 1:53 Comments || Top||

#4  I'd bet a small sum at this point that the donors and party pros will draft Hillary at the Convention next summer.

It could happen. I was thinking Liz Warren, but she seems to be fading into well-deserved irrelevance. Our pal European Conservative says Biden. Maybe we should have a pool. Winner gets bragging rights and losers pay Fred. $5 US?
Posted by: SteveS || 12/10/2019 2:09 Comments || Top||

#5  $40.

Biden can't survive Lil' Crackpipe's continuing saga--- we likely haven't even heard the half of it.

Also, even if by some miracle of come-of-silence treatment by the media Biden scrapes by in SC, he won't win CA and may not even win IA. Butt-jig and Bernie-Squeaky Fromme are likely to carry those states.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 2:18 Comments || Top||

#6  * cone-of-silence media (non-)treatment
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 2:19 Comments || Top||

#7  So he is only as good as his staff, and his staff sucks. Nice jibe.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 12/10/2019 11:59 Comments || Top||

#8  The buck stops with Joe's staff.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/10/2019 11:59 Comments || Top||

#9  They suck on his staff.
While he sniffs their hair.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 12:31 Comments || Top||

#10  If his staff sucks now, imagine what his cabinet would be like. Just Say No to Slow Joe.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/10/2019 13:45 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
2 Turkish soldiers killed, 7 wounded while defusing bomb
[IsraelTimes] At least two Ottoman Turkish soldiers have been killed and seven others maimed while attempting to defuse an improvised bomb, officials say.

The device went kaboom! in a village near the town of Idil, in the mainly-Kurdish populated Sirnak province, according to a statement from the regional governor’s office. It says the bomb was planted by Death Eaters of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK.

The statement doesn’t provide further details but says The Sick Man of Europe Turkey
...just another cheapjack Moslem dictatorship, brought to you by the Moslem Brüderbund...
’s operations to combat the PKK are continuing with "determination."

There is no word on the maimed soldiers’ conditions.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: Sublime Porte


Home Front: Politix
SHE's BACK! New Harvard-Harris Poll shows most Dems would choose HILLARY CLINTON
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Fearless prediction: the convention will be brokered and she will run again.

Wish I could make some book on this prediction.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 1:08 Comments || Top||

#2  Oh goody.
Posted by: Cesare || 12/10/2019 9:40 Comments || Top||

#3  Last time someone lost the big election and then came back and ran a second time successfully was Nixon. The comparisons will be juicy.
Posted by: ruprecht || 12/10/2019 11:51 Comments || Top||

#4  Here's an opinion on Hill'y Health from 18 months ago. I don't imagine she's improved much since then.
Posted by: Bobby || 12/10/2019 11:55 Comments || Top||

#5  Fearless prediction: the convention will be brokered and she will run again.

"Sorry, due to the late entry into the presidential race, please understand that Mrs. Clinton will not be able to participate in any debates and will only be able to make closed door meetings. Lift Her through, and get out the vote!"


*pssst - I heard she was on the verge of an amorous relationship with a woman when she found out she was pregnant. It was emotionally difficult, but she persisted and had who we all know and love, Chelsea. She is most gracious she had the opportunity for such a difficult choice and rejoices every time she does yoga with the grand kids.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 12/10/2019 16:23 Comments || Top||

#6  If poor, dear Hillary hits the campaign trail, she’ll be dead or disabled through stroke or heart attack before election day.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 16:41 Comments || Top||

#7  #6: From your lips to God's ears.
Posted by: Whiskey Mike || 12/10/2019 17:07 Comments || Top||

#8  Animatronics.
Posted by: Grunter || 12/10/2019 20:50 Comments || Top||


Bangladesh
Man caught with 1,925 yaba pills inside his bung hole at Dhaka airport
Ouch.
[Dhaka Tribune] Airport Armed Police Battalion (APBn) has detained a man with 1,925 yaba pills hidden in his rectum in Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport (HSIA).

The detainee, identified as Abul Kashem, 54, was held from outside the airport's domestic terminal on Monday.

Confirming the matter to Dhaka Tribune, APBn Additional Superintendent of Police Alamgir Hossain said: "The market value of the sized yaba pills is around Tk10 lakh.

"During interrogation Kashem confessed
"Owwwww! Make him stop!"
that he landed at the Dhaka airport with the yaba pills hidden in his rectum from Cox's Bazar around 4pm Monday."

"The suspect confirmed that he himself bought the yaba pills and was supposed to deliver them to other yaba traders operating in Dhaka’s Fakirapool area.

"Necessary legal action will be taken against him," Alamgir added.

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Narcos

#1  For the curious (note how many US entertainment figures and cartoon characters would seem to have a connection to the Crazy Pill):

In Malaysia, ya ba
insert Fred Flinstone-leaving-work picture here

is known in Malay as pil kuda (literally, 'horse pill'). It is commonly found in the state of Kelantan, on the border with Thailand. The name commonly used for it in the Philippines and Indonesia is shabú.
Wasn't there a cetacean by that name at SeaWorld?

In north Thailand it is often referred to as chocalee due to the somewhat sweet taste ya ba leaves in the mouth and its strong chocolate smell.[5] The name commonly used for it in China is ma-goo or ma-guo.
MR. MAGOO!!!

In Bangladesh, it's colloquially known as baba, guti, laal, khawon, loppy, or bichi. Ya ba is sometimes called bhul bhuliya in India.

Fred Flintstone meets '60's frat house party bands: Yaba-daba-doo and Wooly Bully.. Wooly Bully....
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 1:24 Comments || Top||

#2  In an article *much* less humorous than #1, le Wiki says yaba is methamphetamine and caffeine.
Posted by: SteveS || 12/10/2019 1:33 Comments || Top||


#4  It is basically methamphetamine added to either chlorphenamine or crystalized triprolidine. The combo pill is packaged as 'cold medicine' and often sent by courier to distributors. It's becoming a problem in India too, especially in Bengal.
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 1:49 Comments || Top||

#5  The current Rupee/Dollar exchange rate is significantly higher than Rs 45 to 1 USD. Try Rs 70.94 to 1 USD.
Posted by: Angock Clunk1757 || 12/10/2019 5:29 Comments || Top||

#6  ^ That's correct, Angock. And Tk10 Lakh (Bangladeshi Taka)is like $ 11,770. The Taka being 85 or so the dollar.

So an expensive bung hole ornament, but not much in the way of merchandise.
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 5:54 Comments || Top||

#7  Dude's bung hole ain't through being illicitly used, that's for sure.
Posted by: Raj || 12/10/2019 8:08 Comments || Top||

#8  Yabba Dabba Doo-Doo
Posted by: Mullah Richard || 12/10/2019 9:35 Comments || Top||

#9  Bewigged judge dons black cap, pronounces sentence: "Death... by yaba jaba!"
Posted by: Shese Johnson3426 || 12/10/2019 18:00 Comments || Top||


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
Jordan jails man for plotting gun attack on Israeli embassy
[IsraelTimes] Khaled Abu Raya, 33, sentenced to 8.5 years over plan to ’open fire on the embassy and its employees in a bid to kill a large number of Israelis’.

A Jordanian court on Monday sentenced a man to eight years in prison for allegedly plotting to attack the Israeli embassy in Amman last year.

The state security court ruled that Khaled Abu Raya "threatened to carry out terrorist acts."

According to the charge sheet the 33-year-old Jordanian planned "to open fire on the embassy and its employees in a bid to kill a large number of Israelis."

The plot was alleged to be in response to the transfer of the US embassy from Tel Aviv to the disputed city of Jerusalem in May 2018, a major policy shift that outraged Paleostinians and Arabs.

According to the charge sheet, it was also motivated by Israel’s policies vis-a-vis Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with an iron fist by Hamaswith about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response...
Strip which has been rocked by anti-Israeli protests since March last year.

The same court also sentenced another Jordanian, Munir Ibrahim, to three years in jail on Monday for allegedly planning to infiltrate Israel and attack soldiers in the Jewish state.

Illegal crossings of the tightly secured border between Jordan and Israel are rare.

Earlier this month, Jordan referred an Israeli to court on charges of illegally entering the kingdom and possessing drugs.

Ties between the two countries, which are bound by a peace treaty, have been cool in recent years amid disagreements and issues linked to the Israeli-Paleostinian conflict.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Home Front: Culture Wars
Renewed Interest in Socialism by Milennials Leads to Search for Historical Examples
[Babylon Bee]
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Commies

#1  Someone should take these kids on a tour of Soviet-era factories in Norilsk or Magnitogorsk, with a detour to visit the gulags.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 0:52 Comments || Top||

#2  Someone is teaching them that the 'new socialism', married to Systems Theory, AI, and internet tech will be different.

That the old socialism was imperfect, it awaited a liberal distribution of empowering technology, self-defeating laws arranged by left interest groups, and rich facilitators ensnared by promises of grandeur in history. That this time, it's the perfect 'ism' to bring in the march of god on earth.

A lot of this teaching is being done in universities, by academics trained by other academics paid and propped up by shady foundations in Europe. The lowest rung proselytes actually believe the shit they teach and don't even need to be bribed. For them an invitation to a cocktail-soiree or the chance to be patted on the back by one of their academic deities is enough.

We've had to analyze a lot of their private communications and inner circle literature, you see.

"What ?! You've been spying on private commun... Dicktaytorrs ! I shall see you hung at the Hague !!" - 'erb
Posted by: Dron66046 || 12/10/2019 1:38 Comments || Top||

#3  First time as tragedy. Second time as farce.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 1:42 Comments || Top||


Iraq
Iraqis rally for slain activist as Baghdad summons Western envoys
[Al Jazeera] Iraqis have gathered to mourn a prominent activist rubbed out in the latest violent episode in anti-government demonstrations in which more than 450 people have died.

Hundreds joined Fahem al-Tai's funeral procession on Monday, hours after the 53-year-old was killed in a drive-by shooting in Iraq's shrine city of Karbala while returning home from protests late on Sunday.

"We will not forget our deaders," read one sign carried by a tearful protester.

The rally came as Iraq's foreign ministry summoned four Western envoys over their condemnation of a deadly attack against protesters at the weekend.

Iraq's capital, Baghdad, and its Shia-majority south have been gripped by more than two months of rallies against corruption, poor public services and unemployment. Demonstrators also want a complete overhaul of the political system installed after the 2003 US invasion of the country, where power is apportioned among religious and ethnic groups.

Activists have called for large-scale marches from other cities towards Baghdad but paramilitary leaders have warned such protests would be "ruinous".

"It will bring the most massive chaos yet to Baghdad," said Qais al-Khazali, the head of the prominent Asaib Ahl al-Haq armed faction, who was blacklisted last week by the United States.

Asaib Ahl al-Haq is one of the most powerful groups in Iraq's Hashd al-Shaabi security force (also known as the PMF), a network of Iran-backed gangs officially integrated into the Iraqi state security forces.

Hashd chief Faleh al-Fayyadh over the weekend ordered the factions to stay away from rallies.

The British, French and German ambassadors to Iraq condemned the violence in a meeting with caretaker prime minister Adel Abdul Mahdi, who resigned on December 1.

"No gang should be able to operate outside of the control of the state," the envoys said in a statement, urging the government to "urgently investigate".

The envoys also pressed the government to implement its recent order that the Hashd "stay away from protest locations".

In response, Iraq's foreign ministry on Monday summoned all three ambassadors, as well as their Canadian counterpart, who had similarly condemned the violence.

The ministry said their comments were an "unacceptable intervention in Iraq's internal affairs".

A diplomatic source told the AFP news agency that the envoys were "not surprised" at having been summoned, particularly after Abdul Mahdi had defended his government in response to their criticism at the earlier meeting.

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Iraq


Home Front: Politix
Trump attacks 'pathetic' Fox News for airing 'loser' Rep. Eric Swalwell and other Democrats
[USATODAY] President Donald Trump
...The tack in the backside of the Democratic Party...
again slammed Fox News for giving airtime to Rep. Eric Swalwell and his other Democratic critics, tweeting Sunday that it was "pathetic" how "Fox panders."

"Don’t get why @FoxNews puts losers on like @RepSwalwell (who got ZERO as presidential candidate before quitting), Pramila Jayapal, David Cicilline and others who are Radical Left Haters?" Trump tweeted listing three Democratic House members who have frequently spoken out against the president and his policies.

"The Dems wouldn’t let @FoxNews get near their bad ratings debates, yet Fox panders. Pathetic!" he wrote, referring to the Democratic National Committee's decision not to let Fox News host the party's primary debates.

Rep. David Cicilline, D-Ri.I., fired back on Twitter, telling Trump, "while you’re busy tweeting insults, we’re busy working to honor our oath of office to protect and defend the constitution and safeguard our democracy," along with a photo of himself with Swalwell, Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., and Rep. Joe Neguse, D-Colo.

"Thanks for watching, Mr. President. Why won’t you testify about your attempt to get Ukraine to interfere in the 2020 election?" he added.

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:


Arabia
Jerusalem chief rabbi visits Bahrain for interfaith event
The times, they are a-changing. Thank you, President Trump. And also Grand Ayatollah Khamenei, who so eagerly plays his part.
[IsraelTimes] Jerusalem Chief Rabbi Shlomo Amar concludes a rare visit to Bahrain, where he met the Arab kingdom’s king, as well as religious leaders from Qatar
...an emirate on the east coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It sits on some really productive gas and oil deposits, which produces the highest per capita income in the world. They piss it all away on religion, financing the Moslem Brotherhood and several al-Qaeda affiliates. Home of nutbag holy manYusuf al-Qaradawi...
, Kuwait, Jordan, Leb, Egypt, Russia, the United States, Italia, India, and Thailand.

"Middle East nations want peace with Israel, the leadership should promote that without fear," Amar, the former chief rabbi of Israel, said during his stay, expressing hope that in the future, such visits would not require special preparation.

He was invited by the king to attend an interfaith event. Diplomatic officials and the Foreign Ministry were involved in organizing the visit and the schedule.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


-Short Attention Span Theater-
Finger-lickin' weird! Designer releases $50 KFC-stained shirt line that SMELLS like the fast-food chain - after being soaked in the restaurant's gravy
Posted by: Skidmark || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Something something decline of the west the other day.

I see nothing but punchable faces.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 12/10/2019 11:36 Comments || Top||


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
IDF sources deny report that Russia thwarted Israeli strike on Syria
[IsraelTimes] Sources within the Israel Defense Forces are quoted by Channel 12 as saying a story reported earlier today by Russian blog Avia alleging that Russian jets had thwarted an Israeli strike in Syria is untrue.

According to the report, which appeared in a blog that is considered unreliable, the Russian jets were scrambled in southern Syria toward Israeli warplanes planning to attack an Iranian shipment at the T-4 base.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Russians near Raqqa two years after US helped take city from ISIS
[Jpost] Russian forces entered an area adjoining Raqqa according to a Russian TV channel and other reports. The Russian forces on trucks gave out humanitarian aid, according to video at RT. Raqqa was liberated from ISIS by the Syrian Democratic Forces backed by the US-led coalition. The US decided to withdraw from parts of Syria in early October, opening the way to give over areas the US helped liberate to Russia, Iran, The Sick Man of Europe Turkey
...the occupiers of Greek Asia Minor...
and other countries. The Syrian regime received a handsome reward, saving it thousands of lives so it could have Raqqa given to it. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Russian troops did not enter Raqqa city itself, only the northern countryside.

US policy in Syria was once about defeating ISIS and stabilizing the area. But unlike Russia or Iran, the US never saw a long-term commitment and didn’t believe that it needed to be loyal to its partners on the ground. Instead US diplomats saw the SDF as a "temporary, transactional and temporary" relationship. The SDF had to sign a deal with the Syrian regime to slow down a Ottoman Turkish offensive in October and Russia and Turkey helped partition part of Syria as the US left.

Now Russia is going into Raqqa to give out food and win hearts and minds. The US left Raqqa, despite the fact that more than 10,000 members of the SDF had died fighting ISIS and the US had encouraged the SDF to take Raqqa in October 2017.

The handing out of humanitarian aid on the road to Raqqa is a message that Russia cares about the local people and it is designed as a confidence building gesture to contrast with the US role which doesn’t involve any humanitarian support. For instance, after the US withdrew and Turkey attacked America’s former partners near Tel Abyad, more than 200,000 people fled. US diplomats have shown no interest in helping IDPs or refugees in Syria, or the 17,000 who had to flee to Iraq from Syria due to the Ottoman Turkish attack. Where the US sees a "transaction" in Syria and now talks about "securing the oil," the Russians are emblazoning their trucks with stories of "Russia is with you," a symbolic message, even if it is mostly propaganda.

The larger story is whether Russia will continue to send troops or aid to Raqqa or if this was a one-time gesture to test the waters. It appears that it is part of another plan by the Syrian regime to negotiate with Arab tribes and other groups by sending a delegation to Qamishli and continue outreach that is designed to undermine the remaining US role in Syria.

Russia has claimed in the past that the US neglected Raqqa and that there was danger of extremism and ISIS support re-emerging. The aid is designed to counteract that, or at least begin a process of Russian involvement in Raqqa.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Britain
A confusing picture
[Dhaka Tribune] The polls showing voting intentions for the 2019 UK election up to December 1 show that the gap between Labour and the Conservatives is about 11%.

Labour has benefited from the slow decline of Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives from the collapse of the Brexit Party vote.

If we extrapolate this to seat shares, assuming a uniform swing across the country (which is a big assumption) then it shows a Conservative majority of 84 seats in Great Britannia.

At this stage of the 2017 election campaign, the Conservative lead over Labour in voting intentions was about 7% so the campaign dynamics we observed in 2017 are not the same as now.

The air was sucked out of the campaign to some extent by the YouGov MRP (multi-level regression post-stratification) poll which uses a very large sample of more than 100,000 respondents and was successful in predicting the 2017 general election.

In the present election campaign, it predicts a 68-seat Conservative majority.

But as the YouGov team explained on their website, a problem with this method is that it spectacularly increases the margins of error for the seat predictions.

At least three things can go wrong in predicting the outcome of the election at this stage. They are differential turnout, tactical voting, and late campaign dynamics in party support.

To probe turnout and tactical voting in more detail we can look at the YouGov poll for the Sunday Times published on December 1. This put the Conservatives 9% ahead of Labour in voting intentions, predicting that the party will win 43% of the vote compared with Labour’s 34%.

These figures are, of course, subject to the usual margin of error of about plus or minus 3%.

Boris Johnson
...pro-Brexit British prime minister, succeeding no-Brexit Theresa May. BoJo is noted as much for his sparkling personality and his hair as for his Conservative policies....
is targeting Labour Leave constituencies in the Midlands and North with the hope of turning lifelong Labour voters into Conservatives.

Undoubtedly, many of these will be cross-pressured by their dislike of Jeremy Corbyn and Labour’s ambivalence on the Brexit issue on the one hand, and a traditional dislike of the Conservatives on the other. An easy way to solve their problem is for them not to vote at all. If so, this would reduce the chances of the Conservatives capturing these seats.

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Boris has a brilliant "Love Actually" campaign ad.

Hugh Grant covered himself in shame suggesting it was paid for in rubles. I do like knowing who the $hits are for future reference.
Posted by: ruprecht || 12/10/2019 8:08 Comments || Top||

#2  collapse of the Brexit Party vote.

Is it all over, Bright Pebbles? No more Brexit?
Posted by: Bobby || 12/10/2019 11:45 Comments || Top||


Bangladesh
Grocery shop owner attempts to rape third grader
[Dhaka Tribune] A grocery shop owner kept captive and later attempted to rape a third grader on Sunday, when she came to buy a pen for her ongoing final term examination in Melandaha's Phool Kocha union of Jamalpur.

Sources said, the accused, Md Rais Uddin, 50, held the child captive, when she came by the shop to buy a pen on her way to the exam venue around 11am.

Around 2pm, Rais locked his shop and attempted to rape the child. Hearing her screams, when locals came to her rescue, he threatened them with a sharp local weapon and fled the spot.

On information from locals, police rescued the child, confirmed Sub-Inspector (SI) Md Azharul Islam of Melandaha cop shoppe.

Confirming the matter to Dhaka Tribune, OC Rezaul Islam Khan of the cop shoppe said: "The child was handed over to her father after primary investigation and filing of a case."

"We are making drives to arrest the accused Rais," the OC added.
Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Britain
Britain's Brexit Party expels councillor over racist comments
[Al Jazeera] The United Kingdom's Brexit Party has expelled a local councillor and dismissed a part-time official after they were filmed by undercover reporters making racist comments.

The two activists were filmed by Channel 4 News during campaigning in Hartlepool where the populist anti-immigration party led by Nigel Farage is focusing its general election campaigning efforts with chairman Richard Tice standing in the constituency.

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Maybe they'll join Labour now.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/10/2019 11:39 Comments || Top||

#2  Half the labour party should be expelled for their vile oikophobia
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 12/10/2019 15:16 Comments || Top||

#3  The other half for being too dumb to live?
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/10/2019 15:21 Comments || Top||


Bangladesh
5 arrested BNP activists sent to jail
[Dhaka Tribune] A Dhaka court has sent five BNP activists to jail in two case filed over sabotage and their alleged attack on the police between Kotowali and Chawk Bazar in Chittagong.

Metropolitan Magistrate passed the order when police produced them to the court on Monday.

Police claim, the attack took place during a procession demanding the release of BNP chairperson the loathesome Khaleda Zia
...Three-term PM of Bangla, widow of deceased dictator Ziaur Rahman, Pak foil, head of the Bangla Nationalist Party, an apparent magnet for corruption ...
on Sunday.

Muntasirul Islam, deputy commissioner of Lalbagh Division, confirmed the matter to Dhaka Tribune.

The arrestees are ‐ Liton, Md Ashif, Muhin, Rafiqul Islam, and Nurul Afsar Limon.

Muntasirul Islam said: "Two case was filed against 32 men for sabotage and their alleged attack on the police between Kotowali and Chawk Bazar area on Sunday. Police arrested five people at the scene. They are involved with BNP."

In the two cases, the accused were sent to the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Court (CMM) in Dhaka on Monday. After hearing both sides, the court allowed the five accused to be interrogated at Jail gate.

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistain Proxies


Home Front: Politix
U.S. Attorney John Durham Responds To FISA Report, Hints At What’s To Come In Criminal Investigation Into Origins Of Russia Probe
[DAILYWIRE] United States Attorney John Durham responded to Justice Department inspector general Michael Horowitz’s report on Monday by stating that it was incorrect due to the limited information that it was based on whereas Durham’s criminal investigation is not limited in scope and appears to have uncovered a lot more than Horowitz did.

“I have the utmost respect for the mission of the Office of Inspector General and the comprehensive work that went into the report prepared by Mr. Horowitz and his staff,” Durham said in a statement.

“However, our investigation is not limited to developing information from within component parts of the Justice Department,” Durham continued. “Our investigation has included developing information from other persons and entities, both in the U.S. and outside of the U.S. Based on the evidence collected to date, and while our investigation is ongoing, last month we advised the Inspector General that we do not agree with some of the report’s conclusions as to predication and how the FBI case was opened.”

Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "we do not agree with some of the report’s conclusions as to predication and how the FBI case was opened.”

Hear, hear.

The statements in the report supporting predication were very strange.

How could such a carnival of error, mishandling and and FISA abuse possibly co-exist with be proper predication? Has that ever happened?
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 1:48 Comments || Top||


Iraq
In first 100 days, KRG progresses in anti-corruption fight, reforms, mending relations with Baghdad: PM Barzani
[Rudaw] In a speech marking 100 days since the current Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) cabinet took office, Prime Minister of the Kurdistan Region Masrour Barzani made a lengthy televised speech detailing its achievements and goals in fighting corruption, improving Erbil-Baghdad relations, and increasing domestic revenue.

"We have made great developments and our works are moving forward on the right track and that considerable achievements have been made," Barzani said. "We reiterate our commitment to work towards a stronger Kurdistan and have a government to serve the people, not the contrary; that has been the basis of our work since day one."

The KRG has made good progress in "improving our relations with the federal government of Baghdad, fighting corruption, restoring transparency to the domestic and public revenues, and ending bureaucracies across government apparatuses," Barzani added.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Iraq


-Signs, Portents, and the Weather-
Transgender homicide rate 'remarkably low' despite cries of 'national epidemic'
[WASHINGTONTIMES] Calls to combat a purported epidemic of killings targeting transgender people, especially women of color, are rising, even though U.S. data indicates that people who identify as members of the opposite sex are less likely to end up as homicide victims than their non-transgender counterparts.

Kentucky State University associate professor Wilfred Reilly found that the 2017 homicide death rate for transgender people was about 1.48 per 100,000, less than a third of the overall murder rate of about 5 per 100,000 and a fraction of the rate for men in general (6.68) or black people (18.8).

“All of these large groups — blacks, poor whites, Latinos, men — have a murder rate that’s an order of magnitude higher than the transgender murder rate. That’s what I found,” Mr. Reilly, who teaches political science at the historically black college, told The Washington Times. “The transgender murder rate seems to be remarkably low.”
Posted by: Fred || 12/10/2019 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I think this is because transgender people don't traffic drugs. A huge percentage of murders in the US are due to disputes in drug traffic.

Transgenders may use drugs, especially the gender impact kind but these are purchased legally.
Posted by: lord garth || 12/10/2019 6:32 Comments || Top||

#2  Yes but transgender activists are running around suggesting they are being hunted, so its good to have the statistics published.
Posted by: ruprecht || 12/10/2019 8:07 Comments || Top||

#3  Of course, the suicide rate is much higher.
Posted by: Skidmark || 12/10/2019 10:16 Comments || Top||

#4  Recently the head of Johns Hopkins' Psychiatry Department blasted the transgender movement as based on complete nonsense.

He pointed out that "gender dysphoria" does not exist; the condition is indistinguishable from garden-variety clinical depression.
Posted by: Lex || 12/10/2019 10:41 Comments || Top||

#5  Walt Heyer talks about it at this website.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/10/2019 11:21 Comments || Top||

#6  If you think you're a victim, regardless of facts, then you just have to make things up. And the media for the most part are happy to amplify your hysteria and your make-believe.
Posted by: Tom || 12/10/2019 15:16 Comments || Top||



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Tue 2019-12-10
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Mon 2019-12-09
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