JANUARY 27 THROUGH 30, 2017
THE LATEST NEWS AND VIEWS
THERE IS TOO MUCH NEWS IN THESE THREE DAYS FOR ME TO COMMENT, SO I’M JUST GOING TO PUT IT ALL OUT ON THE TABLE COUNTRY STYLE, AND YOU CAN GO AROUND AND TAKE A SPOONFUL OF WHATEVER YOU WANT. HOPE YOU ENJOY THE OFFERINGS.
http://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/01/27/511753125/hospitals-worry-repeal-of-obamacare-would-jeopardize-innovations-in-care
Hospitals Worry Repeal Of Obamacare Would Jeopardize Innovations In Care
KRISTIN GOURLAY
January 27, 20175:01 AM ET
Photograph -- With financial incentives from the ACA, the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston signed agreements with physicians and insurers to create an accountable care organization, in hopes of reducing health care's cost in the long run. But achieving those savings takes time, say hospital officials.
Elise Amendola/AP
Much has been written about the 20 million people who gained health insurance under the Affordable Care Act, and what could happen to these patients if the ACA is repealed without a replacement. But some people don't realize that hospitals nationwide could take a big financial hit on several fronts, too.
First, it's likely that fewer patients would be able to pay their hospital bills, health policy analysts say, so the institutions would be stuck with that bad debt, as they were before Obamacare.
"If the Medicaid expansion goes away wholesale, and things go back to the way they were before this expansion was in place, a lot of those hospitals would see an increase in their uncompensated care costs," says Rachel Garfield, an analyst with the Kaiser Family Foundation. The American Hospital Association estimates that hospitals across the U.S. could lose more than $160 billion from the reduction in Medicaid revenue and the increase in unpaid medical bills.
Then there's this: The ACA has used financial incentives to encourage hospitals to experiment with ways to improve their care of patients, while reducing health care's cost. That sort of experimentation has included a sizable upfront investment by many hospitals.
Trump's Executive Order Could Dismantle Parts Of ACA Before Replacement Is Ready
SHOTS - HEALTH NEWS
Trump's Executive Order Could Dismantle Parts Of ACA Before Replacement Is Ready
Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, for example, signed agreements with physicians and insurers to create accountable care organizations, in hopes of saving money in the long run. With an ACO, insurers pay doctors for making sure the patient is getting the best and most appropriate care, instead of paying for every test and procedure a doctor does.
"We have now more than 20 different programs," says Dr. Timothy Ferris, an internist and medical director of the Mass General Physicians Organization. "Video visits, electronic consultation with specialists, home hospitalization, [and] programs for patients with diabetes and heart disease. I would be worried that a repeal of the ACA would undermine our ability to invest in services for our patients."
Ferris acknowledges that most of those experiments haven't yet saved money. But they need more time to work out the kinks safely, he says.
"One of the things that it's difficult for people outside of health care to appreciate — particularly politicians — is how long it takes to make significant improvements in the delivery of care," Ferris says. "You have to be very careful when you make changes."
Obamacare Repeal Threatens A Health Benefit Popular In Coal Country
SHOTS - HEALTH NEWS
Obamacare Repeal Threatens A Health Benefit Popular In Coal Country
Ferris says the threatened repeal of the ACA makes him worry "that the progress we've made over the past five years would be threatened."
Many other hospitals across the country have invested in accountable care organizations — often overhauling their medical records systems, hiring staff and creating new services. Dennis Keefe, head of a large hospital chain called Care New England in Rhode Island, says he, too, worries about the future of his ACO, Integra.
"I think, if there's a real change in direction away from these alternative payment models, we will be assuming risk to care for a population," Keefe says."We have invested enormously to be successful in this area."
But these seismic changes in the way hospitals do business were predicated, he adds, on long-term support from the federal government — support that might disappear if the ACA is repealed.
This story is part of NPR's reporting partnership with NPR, Rhode Island Public Radio and Kaiser Health News. The Kaiser Family Foundation supports Kaiser Health News, an editorially independent program that produces news reports heard on NPR and published on NPR.org.
NELP IS A NEW ORGANIZATION TO ME, BUT THEY ARE DEFINITELY ONE OF THE GOOD GUYS!
National Employment Law Project (NELP)
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/andrew-puzder-trump-labor-secretary-wages/
Labor Secretary nominee's company underpays workers, group says
By ANNA ROBATON MONEYWATCH
January 27, 2017, 5:15 AM
Worker advocates are questioning the fitness of U.S. Labor Secretary nominee Andrew Puzder to lead the agency, claiming that the restaurant company he has led for more than a decade does not pay employees a living wage.
In a report, the National Employment Law Project (NELP) contends that “low pay” and “lack of benefits” at the thousands of fast-food restaurants owned or franchised by subsidiaries of CKE Restaurants -- which include the Hardee’s and Carl’s Jr. burger chains -- have forced many employees to rely on public-assistance programs to put food on the table and pay for other necessities. The estimated cost to U.S. taxpayers: $247 million a year.
Puzder’s Senate confirmation hearing, which has been repeatedly delayed, is now set for Feb. 7.
A spokesman for CKE, which is based in Carpinteria, California, said that as a matter of policy the company doesn’t comment on employee matters. White House press secretary Sean Spicer didn’t respond to an email request for comment on NELP’s findings.
To arrive at its $247 million price tag for public assistance to CKE workers, NELP relied on data from several sources, including public statements by Puzder about the number of CKE restaurants in the U.S. (2,920) and the approximate number of workers at each outlets (25), excluding general managers. Based on that information, NELP concluded that CKE’s restaurants have about 73,000 “front-line” workers domestically.
Trump picks fast food executive Andy Puzder as labor secretary
Play VIDEO
Trump picks fast food executive Andy Puzder as labor secretary
It multiplied that figure by the estimated average cost to taxpayers of providing public assistance, including Medicaid, food stamps and other federal-state benefits, per fast-food employee. A 2013 study by NELP found that average “public cost” was slightly more than $3,300 per worker annually. In 2016 dollars, that’s about $3,500, according to NELP.
Lupe Guzman, a 47-year-old single mother, said she has worked for the past seven years at a Carl’s Jr. on the Las Vegas strip, but her wages have remained stubbornly low, forcing her to rely on food stamps, state housing assistance and Medicaid to provide for herself and her six children.
A “graveyard” shift worker, Guzman said her rent and other expenses have soared in recent years, but her wages have essentially remained flat. She makes $8.75 per hour. Nevada’s minimum wage is $7.25 per hour for workers who are offered qualifying health benefits and $8.25 for those who are not.
“They hardly give out raises, and when they do, it’s nickels and dimes,” said Guzman, who has gotten involved locally with the union-backed Fight for $15 movement.
A CKE spokesman said that nearly all of the nearly 6,200 employees at company-owned restaurants earn more than the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour. Workers who start at the minimum wage typically get a performance review within three months to determine whether a promotion is in order, according to the spokesman.
Still, the vast majority of Carl’s Jr. and Hardees restaurant workers aren’t technically CKE employees. They work for independent franchisees that, according to published reports, operate some 90 percent of restaurants under the CKE umbrella.
George Thompson, a spokesman for Puzder and a partner at Banner Public Relations in Washington, D.C., dismissed what he called “NELP’s wild conclusions,” arguing that they’re “either due to bad math or blind bias.”
Donald Trump's Cabinet is the wealthiest in U.S. history
Play VIDEO
Donald Trump's Cabinet is the wealthiest in U.S. history
He added, “Regardless, it’s another union-funded smear on Mr. Puzder.”
Puzder, a wealthy businessman who joined privately held CKE in 1997 and who became its CEO in 2000, has been among the most controversial of Mr. Trump’s cabinet picks. The executive has become a lightning rod in the debate over minimum wage increases, overtime regulations and other workplace policies. Labor activists have sought to derail his nomination, while some business groups have pushed back.
Puzder has argued that hefty minimum-wage increases would hurt small businesses and lead to job losses.
In an interview with the Los Angeles Times last year, Puzder said that at CKE workers “don’t make minimum wage for a very long period of time.”
“If you are going to stay and you show you have value, then your wage is going to go up,” he is quoted as saying. He added, “There’s nothing wrong with rational increases in the minimum wage that don’t kill jobs.”
Other fast-food companies and large retailers have come under fire for having many workers who are forced to rely on federal programs to make ends meet. That effectively means U.S. taxpayers are subsidizing billion-dollar employers, critics claim. A 2015 study by the University of California Berkeley Labor Center concluded that state and federal governments contribute more than $150 billion a year to help support working families making poverty-level wages at big corporations such as Walmart (WMT) and McDonald’s (MCD).
Trump picks fast food executive Andy Puzder as labor secretary
Play VIDEO
Trump picks fast food executive Andy Puzder as labor secretary
In another development that could complicate Puzder’s confirmation, The Associated Press reported Friday that he outsourced CKE’s technology department to the Philippines, a move that contradicts Trump’s vow to keep American jobs in the U.S.
Trump has criticized American companies that move, or even consider moving, overseas, saying he’s sticking up for American workers who aren’t feeling the economic recovery and form his political base.
For her part, Guzman says she’d rather not take “handouts” in the form of public assistance. She’d prefer a job that pays her enough to cover basic expenses without worrying that doing so will put her over the edge financially.
“I want the American dream just like everybody else, but there is no way that families like mine will achieve that goal making poverty wages. No matter how hard we work, we aren’t getting ahead,” she said.
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http://inthesetimes.com/features/bernie-sanders-corporate-media-threatens-our-democracy.html
HOW CORPORATE MEDIA THREATENS OUR DEMOCRACY
This is a crisis we can no longer afford to ignore.
BY BERNIE SANDERS
JANUARY 26, 2017 | FEBRUARY ISSUE
MEDIA SHAPES OUR VERY LIVES. It tells us what products we need to buy and, by the quantity and nature of coverage, what is “important” and what is “unimportant.” Media informs us as to the scope of what is “realistic” and “possible.”
When we see constant coverage of murders and brutality on television, corporate media is telling us that crime and violence are important issues that we should be concerned about. When there is round-the-clock coverage of the Super Bowl, we are being informed that football and the NFL deserve our rapt attention. When there is very little coverage of the suffering of the 43 million Americans living in poverty, or the thousands of Americans without health insurance who die each year because they can’t get to a doctor when they should, corporately owned media is telling us that these are not issues of major concern. For years, major crises like climate change, the impact of trade agreements on our economy, the role of big money in politics and youth unemployment have received scant media coverage. Trade union leaders, environmentalists, low-income activists, people prepared to challenge the corporate ideology, rarely appear on our TV screens.
Media is not just about what is covered and how. It is about what is not covered. And those decisions, of what is and is not covered, are not made in the heavens. They are made by human beings who often have major conflicts of interest.
As a general rule of thumb, the more important the issue is to large numbers of working people, the less interesting it is to corporate media. The less significant it is to ordinary people, the more attention the media pays. Further, issues being pushed by the top 1 percent get a lot of attention. Issues advocated by representatives of working families, not so much.
For the corporate media, the real issues facing the American people— poverty, the decline of the middle class, income and wealth inequality, trade, healthcare, climate change, etc.—are fairly irrelevant. For them, politics is largely presented as entertainment. With some notable exceptions, reporters are trained to see a campaign as if it were a game show, a baseball game, a soap opera, or a series of conflicts.
I saw this time and time again.
Turn on CNN or other networks covering politics and what you will find is that the overwhelming amount of coverage is dedicated to personality, gossip, campaign strategy, scandals, conflicts, polls and who appears to be winning or losing, fundraising, the ups and downs of the campaign trail, and the dumb things a candidate may say or do. It has very little to do with the needs of the American people and the ideas or programs a candidate offers to address the problems facing the country.
According to a study of media coverage of the 2016 primaries by the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy, only 11 percent of coverage focused on candidates’ policy positions, leadership abilities and professional histories. My personal sense is that number is much too high.
The “politics as entertainment” approach works very well for someone like Donald Trump, an experienced entertainer. That kind of media approach didn’t work so well for a campaign like ours, which was determined to focus on the real problems facing our country and what the solutions might be. For the corporate media, name-calling and personal attacks are easy to cover, and what it prefers to cover.
While I was still considering whether or not to run, I did a long interview with a very prominent national newspaper writer. Over and over I stressed that I wanted to talk about my assessment of the major problems facing the country, and how I proposed to address them. And for 45 minutes, that’s what the discussion was about. The reporter appeared interested in what I had to say, and I thought we had a good conversation. At the very end, as he was leaving, he said: “Oh, by the way, Hillary Clinton said such and such. What’s your comment?” I fell for it. Needless to say, that one-minute response became the major part of his story. And that occurred time after time after time.
On a CNN show, an interviewer became visibly angry because I chose not to respond to her questions with personal attacks against Secretary Clinton. The interviewer opined that I didn’t have “sharp enough elbows” to become a serious candidate, that I wasn’t tough enough. Identifying the major problems facing our country, and providing ideas as to how we could address them, was just not good enough.
In fact, I was gently faulted by some for having excessive “message discipline,” for spending too much time discussing real issues. Boring. The result of all of these factors is that while I was getting coverage, it was far less than what other candidates were getting.
In a Dec. 11, 2015, blog post for Media Matters for America, Eric Boehlert wrote:
ABC World News Tonight has de voted less than one minute to Bernie Sanders’ campaign this year.
In his article, Boehlert also reported that:
Trump has received more network coverage than all the Democratic candidates combined.
Republican Jeb Bush received 56 minutes of coverage.
On May 25, 2016, Media Matters for America discussed the coverage of poverty issues on the major television networks for the first quarter of 2016:
During the survey period, Sunday political talk shows on ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox Broadcasting, and MSNBC featured 27 segments focused on economic inequality and nine focused specifically on poverty. Interviews with Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) accounted for 16 of the 27 segments focused on economic inequality and six of the nine segments addressing poverty.
What does it say about corporate media coverage of the major issues facing our country when my candidacy, alone, accounted for the majority of attention (limited though it may have been) that network Sunday news shows paid to poverty?
On the other hand, from the beginning of the campaign to the end, there were major articles and TV coverage on all kinds of stuff that no normal human being was particularly interested in. When was I going to announce my intention to run? When was I going to announce my intention to drop out? When was I was going to endorse Clinton? Why wasn’t I spending more time shaking hands and kissing babies? Why did certain staff members leave the campaign? Why were the campaign staffing levels reduced? What did I have for breakfast?
I remember cringing when the car I was traveling in was pulled over in Iowa because we were speeding to an event, with a New York Times reporter in the back seat. The state trooper was professional and polite and gave us a warning. Not so the reporter, who, it goes without saying, made it a major part of her coverage.
Donald Trump on television screens in the media center during the third presidential debate in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
Why is it that the mainstream media sees politics as entertainment, and largely ignores the major crises facing our country? The answer lies in the fact that corporate media is owned by, well, large multinational corporations.
These powerful corporations also have an agenda, and it would be naive not to believe that their views and needs impact coverage of issues important to them. Seen any specials lately as to why we pay the highest prices in the world for our prescription drugs, or why we are the only major country on earth not to have a national health care program? That may have something to do with the hundreds of millions of dollars each year that drug companies and insurance companies spend on advertising.
And let us also not forget that the leading personalities we see on television are themselves, in most cases, multimillionaires with very generous contracts. That does not make them evil or bad people. It just makes them very wealthy, corporate employees who bring to their jobs the perspective that very wealthy corporate employees bring.
Disney, the owner of ABC, has many thousands of employees in China manufacturing their products at very low wages. In the United States, they have utilized guest worker programs to fire Americans and replace them with low-wage foreign workers. Further, despite making huge profits, they pay the people who work at their theme parks here very low wages. I could be wrong, but I don’t expect that you will see programming tonight on ABC discussing the plight of low-wage workers here in the United States or, for that matter, in China.
Let me also give a shout-out to people who, with resources far more limited than their corporate competitors, try to inform the American people about the real issues facing our country. We received very fair coverage from Thom Hartmann, Cenk Uygur of The Young Turks, and Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! The folks at The Nation, In These Times, The Progressive, and a number of other smaller publications and blogs also worked extremely hard to allow us to convey our message to the American people. Ed Schultz, the Reverend Al Sharpton, Rachel Maddow and Chris Hayes provided us with the very fair coverage we received on MSNBC. I was also pleased to have been on the Bill Moyers program on PBS on several occasions.
Bernie Sanders surrounded by media in the spin room at the first Democratic Presidential Debate. (Photo by Ted Soqui/Corbis via Getty Images)
In my campaign for president, I received 46 percent of the pledged delegates, won twenty-two states, and lost some states by a few votes. In other words, we had a significant amount of support from ordinary people. On the other hand, I did not win 46 percent of the endorsements from the print establishment and the leading newspapers in the country. In fact, I won virtually none. In almost every state, the owners of the establishment newspapers supported Secretary Clinton.
I was very proud to have received the endorsement of the Seattle Times. Among all the major newspapers throughout this country, that was it. We received one major newspaper endorsement.
Who owns the media?
In 1983, the largest 50 corporations controlled 90 percent of the media. Today, as a result of massive mergers and takeovers, six corporations control 90 percent of what we see, hear, and read. Those six corporations are Comcast, News Corp, Disney, Viacom, Time Warner and CBS. In 2010, the total revenue of these six corporations was $275 billion. In a recent article in Forbes magazine discussing media ownership, the headline appropriately read: “These 15 Billionaires Own America’s News Media Companies.”
No sane person denies that the media plays an enormously important role in shaping public consciousness and determining political outcomes. The current media situation is a very serious threat to our democracy.
Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders at the PBS NewsHour Presidential Primary Debate (Photo by Tasos Katopodis/AFP/Getty Images)
The very first amendment to our Constitution guarantees freedom of speech and freedom of the press, the right of the people to express their points of view from the rooftops, to allow themselves to be heard. That is something I passionately believe in.
Unfortunately, as A. J. Liebling wrote back in 1960: “Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.” And the people who own the press, radio and television stations, and book publishing and movie companies are becoming fewer and fewer, with more and more power. This is a crisis that can no longer be ignored.
FROM THE FEBRUARY 2017 ISSUE
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From Our Revolution: A Future to Believe In by Bernie Sanders. Copyright © 2016 by the author and reprinted by permission of Thomas Dunne Books, an imprint of St. Martin’s Press, LLC.
BERNIE SANDERS, the Independent senator from Vermont, has been featured in In These Times—as both an essayist and as the subject of articles—since March 1981, when he was elected mayor of Burlington.
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DEEPER, DARKER POSSIBILITIES
LAProgressive is a provocative news source, but unfortunately this situation could actually happen. How Low Can We Go Here in 2017? Serfdom? Slavery? It’s according to whether there is a collapse of the US economy and civilization as we know it, ending in countless tent cities across the country. In the 1930s they were called “Hoovervilles.” Now they may be TrumpTowns. Did you ever help your parents grow their garden, as I did? That could be useful information, but you’ll need some hoes and spades, and a number of strong young men and women to do the work. You can mosey around in the hardware store in a nonchalant way to steal the seeds.
https://www.laprogressive.com/modern-serfdom/
Serfin’ U.S.A., and Everywhere
BY JAIME O'NEILL
No, that’s not a typo in the title. This piece isn’t about catching waves; it’s about being drowned in the wave of vast and disparate wealth that has made serfs of us all. Or almost all. In fact, the gulf between rich and poor is wider and deeper than ever, dwarfing the avarice and greed often associated with the medieval world when the landed nobility had most everything and the serfs had barely enough to keep body and soul united. Just enough to work long, die hard, and die young.
Get this: Just eight individuals now have more wealth than the 3.6 billion people who are the world’s poorer people. Just three of those obscenely wealthy people—Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, and Mark Zuckerberg—have combined wealth of $426 billion, while 50% of the world’s people combined share a mere $409 billion. Total. Divide 3.6 billion people into $409 billion dollars and you can see how little most of us have. And, when I use the word “us,” I mean to include those people in our own country where poverty remains so deep, so persistent, even as more wealth flows to the very, very few, and more and more of us lose our tenuous hold on middle class status.
It wouldn’t be hard to construct the case that modern serfdom may be even worse than what our medieval ancestors knew.
It wouldn’t be hard to construct the case that modern serfdom may be even worse than what our medieval ancestors knew. Surely the disparity of wealth is wider now, vastly so, with the kinds of self indulgence and comforts and delights now attainable by the richest earthlings far beyond the dreams of the landed European nobility or Eastern potentates who looked down upon those who tilled the soil for them and produced their wealth six or seven centuries ago when those lords and ladies shivered through winters in their castles, or ate foods limited to what could be grown nearby, with consumption limited to the seasons.
Now, however, no whim of pleasure is denied to that handful of human beings who own most everything, and who feel no need to concern themselves with the health and well being of the serfs because no personal self- interest attaches to how the wretched of the earth are faring. Even slave owners of more recent times had to spare a little for the people who who [sic] were the embodiment of their wealth, and whose labor produced their wealth. But what need does a contemporary international plutocrat or an obscenely wealthy Wall Street hedge fund manager have to worry about the well-being of a starving child on the streets of Mumbai, or a kid in Appalachia or on the mean streets of New York, going to bed with a growling belly, if there’s a bed at all?
Nothing but human compassion will now motivate any modern mogul or mansion dweller to give a hoot in hell about the poor, and human compassion has never shown itself to be in abundant supply. God will bless the child that’s got his own; all others better bring cash or credit cards.
Want health care? A SNAP card? Lotsa luck. Check with the new guy at Health and Human Services or the Department of Agriculture and see where you rank on his list of priorities. Want housing? Check with Dr. Ben, and see if he gives a damn. Want a good education for our kid? Betsy DeVos will attend to your needs, if you’ve got the cash to supplement a voucher designed for people who are better off than you ever dreamed of being.
“Whatever is not nailed down is mine. And if I can pry it loose, it’s not nailed down.” Those were the words of Collis Huntington, one of that cluster of American men who got fabulously rich as railroad “builders” back in the 19th century. Like the “builder” who is now our nation’s leader, of course, he didn’t build those railroads. He got rich paying low wages to the men—Irish, Chinese, Peruvian, Eastern European—who did build those rail lines.
Collis Huntington—like Leland Stanford, and others—also got rich in the other old fashioned way, through the massive gift of government land and taxpayer money. The land gift consisted of thousands of square miles of property that bordered the rail lines, twenty square miles on alternating sides of the right of way from the Mississippi through the plains, over the mountains, and down to the the [sic] Pacific Ocean. That land, where once the buffalo roamed, had been stolen with the strength of the nation’s military, but it was given to a very few men who were able to wangle it, to pry it loose, to enhance the rich gravy train those select few rode to riches, their ticket to ride paid for courtesy of that big gift of land and taxpayer money.
Those guys who got so rich and stayed so rich right through the Gilded Age and into the 20th century set the template for how wealth has largely been created in these United States, and most other places. Though the mythology is successfully packaged and sold that these people gained every penny because of their brilliance, their hard work, their perspicacity, and the many other ways that set them apart from the common run of humanity, the real fact (not the alternative fact) is that nearly every great fortune was accrued through a redistribution of wealth that began and ended with taxation, nearly always regressive, or with the land and resources we are often told we hold in common, but don’t.
From Forest Service roads built and maintained to serve the profits of the timber industry to the vast purchases of goods and services by state or federal government, with inflated contracts doled out so generously to buy pharmaceuticals, Coca Cola, computers, sheetrock, uniforms, and thousands of other things the government buys at mark ups that fatten the coffers of corporations and con men. You know, like the outright gift of land to encourage those captains of industry to build us all a railway system, or those bargain basement grazing fees the ranchers pay to fatten their sheep or cattle on public lands .
Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg are two of those eight mega-oligarchs who have so much more wealth than those 3.6 billion serfs at the bottom combined. Gates surely made a contribution to advancing civilization, as did Zuckerberg (though both men’s contributions were accompanied by serious downsides). The products of their minds and imaginations were not transformed into merchandise, however, without the help of millions of people, many of them exploited, much like those quasi-slaves who enriched Steve Jobs in China, or who made shoes for Nike for subsistence wages. (I once read that it would take 49.000 years for one of those Asian women who make those shoes to equal what Michael Jordan was paid for one day’s work filming the commercial to sell those shoes to the young black men who were, on occasion, willing to kill to get a vastly overpriced pair of that swooshy footwear.)
Think of the hundreds of thousands of pairs of Nikes purchased for college sports teams at taxpayer expense. Think of the countless Apple, Microsoft, Delta, or other brands of computers purchased for schools, and the software that so frequently needs to be updated. Mounds of obsolete technology get tossed out year after year as managers of schools and bureaucracies gin up yearly budgets that cut jobs to pay for the latest tech gimmicks sold and marketed as essential to the work of education, and all other fields of government endeavor. Since we spend 57% of our annual budget on “defense,” think of the tax money allocated each year for junk, for padded expenses, for the maintenance of imperial golf courses for the officer class, and then think of the people who sit high atop that mountain of profit, waste, greed, and theft, gilded with government largesse.
“Behind every fortune lies a crime,” Balzac told us more than a century ago. Now, when the fortunes are so great, so are the crimes against humanity. In a world where eight people hold more wealth than 3.6 billion of their fellow human beings, that’s a crime on its face, a gargantuan violation of the spirit, a crime aided and abetted by taxation, and by governments corrupted and deformed to serve as accomplices to the thievery that makes so many poor, and so few so grotesquely favored.
And now that the power is so entrenched, so globally linked, so strong and implacable, they hardly even try to hide the corruption any more. Exxon-Mobil, Goldman Sachs, and the most high visibility plutocrats and autocrats slide into the top governmental slots. Billionaires who hate the purpose of the agencies they will run are installed, and we wind up paying fat salaries to people who work for themselves and their criminal co-conspirators, not for the people who, in large part, pay those salaries. As Leona Helmsley once said, “taxes are for the little people.” That’s an idea widely shared by the richest 1%, from the current Thief-in-Chief right on through the ranks of Republican elitists, from Romney and the legions of tax evaders who got their wealth through the tax system, and who keep it by participating in paying taxes as resolutely and imaginatively as their highly paid lawyers can contrive for them to do. They don’t got to show us no stinkin’ tax information, not if they don’t want to, not if they can pretend they are under audit, and further pretend that matters.
Think of those subsidized oil profits that increase with every uptick in prices at the pump, or those NBA and NFL profiteers who get us to buy their stadia for them, or those who compound their fortunes with each new scam they concoct, then sell to corrupt members of congress through lobbyists who were, not long before, their colleagues, cracking sexist, racist, or homophobic jokes together during work outs in the congressional gym, then showering together in the rare and privileged company of guys who are too often bought and paid for by special interest, and always “friends,” no matter their differences.
So, they’re serfin’ U.S.A. and throughout the world, that tiny number of monumentally wealthy people who are using us modern-day serfs, using our backs, our brawn, our brains and our finite and precious time to ride us over the waves of cash that thunder onto their privileged shores day in and day out.
Serfs up? Not so you’d notice. Here and elsewhere, the serfs lend support to being down, vote for the land lord, or the guy in the golden tower. After all, who feeds the serf or the slave? “Get a new master, be a new man.” That was Shakespeare’s Caliban, expressing his willing subjugation. And so, here in the U.S.A., modern day serfs voted for a new master, thinking it would make them into new men. They voted for Donald Trump because, after all, how could he be so rich and not be smarter than they were, a wizard among mere mortals?
No one, it was said, ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public, people in a nation where there’s a sucker born every minute. And boy howdy, did the serfs get suckered this time around. It remains to be seen how long we’re going to put up with self-imposed serfdom, or even if there’s much we can now do to overthrow the tyranny we, ourselves, imposed.
Jaime O’Neill
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ABOUT ALTERNATIVE FACTS:
http://gizmodo.com/heres-why-some-scientists-refuse-to-just-stick-to-scien-1791524662
Here's Why Some Scientists Refuse to Just 'Stick to Science'
Ryan F. Mandelbaum
Monday 6:05pm
Photos: Image: Screenshot/CNN
The incoming administration and science do not get along. President Donald Trump has already met with vaccine critic Robert Kennedy Jr., called climate change a hoax on several occasions, once said that environmentally friendly light bulbs cause cancer... the list goes on.
Things got especially heated this past weekend, when scientists reacted to press secretary Sean Spicer making obviously false claims at the post-inauguration press briefing, and later, to Trump’s senior adviser Kellyanne Conway referring to Spicer’s comments as, wait for it, “alternative facts.” Scientists took their grievances to Twitter, and critics responded with a common refrain: “stick to science.”
But an increasing number of scientists are refusing to stay silent when it comes to the factual distortions and outright lies peddled by politicians.
Some people think scientists engaging in politics might harm their credibility, or worse, hide an issue with their scientific research. To the contrary, climate scientists like James Hanson and Michael Mann have become public advocates precisely because of their deep understanding of the real-world consequences of their chosen subject of study. Today, we don’t exactly (yet) have a case of astronomers and physicists being forced to defend whether black hole exists—instead, we have an administration challenging facts in general, which are the basis of all scientific research.
Naturally, scientists across many fields are feeling the need to speak out.
Science’s ultimate goal is to establish truth and facts by accumulating evidence. When the administration chooses to speak falsely to the American people, it’s up to scientists, the ones who work tirelessly to figure out what’s true, to stand up for evidence-based reasoning. “I think that if we see a situation where people are being encouraged to ignore objective reality, it’s kind of improtant [sic] to push back against that,” Katherine (Katie) Mack, astrophysicist at the University of Melbourne in Australia, told Gizmodo, “as people who have an interest in the idea that we can understand and interact with the world as it is.”
“This isn’t particular to scientists, I just think democracy works best when people are invested, and care enough to speak out,” Robert McNees, associate professor in the Department of Physics at Loyola University Chicago, told Gizmodo in a Twitter direct message. “Yes. I mean, sure, I would love to tweet some interesting things about black holes today. But I am concerned that dishonest representations of climate science designed to erode public confidence might have some bad consequences for science in general, so I can’t ignore that.”
And for some, hot-button issues like Flint’s lead-tainted water and gay conversion therapy transcend science. “We’re human beings as well,” Matthew R. Francis, physics Ph.D and science writer, told Gizmodo. “These are issues that affect all of us.”
Update 8:37PM: This post has been updated to include a quote from Katie Mack.
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THOUGH, AS YOU ALL KNOW BY NOW, I AM NO FAN OF TRUMP AND TRUMPISM, HIS STATEMENT BELOW ABOUT HOW YOUNG CHILDREN SHOULD BE MEDICALLY DOSED CAREFULLY AND CONSERVATIVELY, IS NOT ONLY WHAT USED TO BE A STANDARD TRUTH, BUT GOOD COMMON SENSE. THERE IS A TREND IN MEDICAL THINKING TO FOLLOW INSURANCE AND PHARMACEUTICAL COMPANY VIEWS MORE, AND THEIR OWN JUDGMENT LESS. THE PROBLEM HERE IS NOT THE USE OF NEWER DRUGS AND SCIENCE, BUT THE CENTRALIZATION OF SCIENCE AND MEDICAL ACCESS INTO ONE BIG BALL OF WAX, AS THE SAYING GOES. THE MEDICAL DECISION IS NO LONGER A ONE TO ONE RELATIONSHIP OF PHYSICIAN AND PATIENT. STATISTICS CAN BE VERY HELPFUL, BUT EVEN STATISTICS AREN’T AS GOOD IN MY OPINION AS LOGIC, AND THE HANDS ON MEDICAL PRACTICES THAT WE USED TO HAVE, ASSUMING THE DOC IS BRIGHT, HONEST, AND WELL TRAINED HIMSELF, ARE SUPERIOR TO A STABLE FULL OF HIGHLY TRAINED DOCTORS WHOSE OWN PERSONAL AMBITION IS MORE MONEY, MORE MONEY, MORE MONEY. IT’S NOT ALL THEIR FAULT, HOWEVER. THEY’RE TRYING TO SURVIVE IN AN EAT OR BE EATEN SITUATION. LARGE PRACTICES DO GIVE EASIER ACCESS TO OTHER SPECIALIZATIONS, LEGAL PROTECTION AND A TEAM OPERATION IN PATIENT CARE. ARE TWO HEADS BETTER THAN ONE? OFTEN, BUT NOT NECESSARILY.
MY PROBLEM WITH THAT IS BASED ON ANOTHER COUPLE OF NEWS ARTICLES STATING THAT DOCTORS ARE ACTUALLY BEING GIVEN WHAT I CAN ONLY DESCRIBE AS “KICK BACKS” FOR PROMOTING THE SAME DRUGS THEY GET FROM PHARMA SALESMEN IN THE FORM OF “FREE SAMPLES.” NOT ONLY IS THAT UNSCIENTIFIC AND UNETHICAL, IT LEADS ME TO COIN A PHRASE, IN THE FINE OLD TRADITION OF PRESIDENT EISENHOWER WITH HIS “MILITARY INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX.” IT IS THE “PHARMACEUTICAL MEDICAL COMPLEX.” INSURANCE COMPANIES HAVE WILLINGLY BEEN COOPTED IN THIS “COMPLEX” BY PAYING FOR THE NEWEST DRUGS ONLY, BY WHICH I MEAN THE VERY NEWEST – THAT NEW COMBINATION OF TWO OR THREE VACCINES IN ONE DOSE, IN A LARGE ONCE AND FOR ALL SHOT. THAT WAY THEY DON’T HAVE TO PAY OUT FOR A CONSERVATIVE OLDER REMEDY THAT ALSO WORKED WITHOUT THE FRIGHTENING SIDE EFFECTS. I BELIEVE THAT ROBERT KENNEDY JR AND EVEN DONALD TRUMP ARE CORRECT THAT – WHETHER OR NOT IT IS VERY ELUSIVE “CAUSE OF AUTISM” – IT IS PROBABLY EXTREMELY RISKY AND UNWISE.
I WILL GO ONE STEP FURTHER BY CALLING THAT KIND OF THING “CORPORATE THINKING,” OR ONE OF THE MOST AGGRESSIVE FORMS OF “GROUP THINK.” A TREND I’M SEEING IN DRUGS THESE DAYS THAT BOTHERS ME PRECEDES DONALD TRUMP. I AM GOING TO CALL IT “CORPORATISM.” WHEN I WAS AROUND FIFTY YEARS OLD, I SAW A NEWS ARTICLE STATING THAT DOCTORS WERE BEING ADVISED FROM THE TOP FEDERAL LEVEL THAT REGULAR PREVENTATIVE MAMMOGRAM EXAMINATION WITHOUT SYMPTOMS NEED NOT BEGIN BEFORE AGE 50, EVEN THOUGH CANCER STATISTICS SHOWED A RISE IN BREAST CANCER DEATHS BEFORE THAT AGE, AND THE OLD RECOMMENDATION WAS AGE 45. ONE, THAT ALLOWS SMALL CANCERS TO BECOME ROBUST AND EVEN METASTASIZE BEFORE THE MAMMOGRAM THAT WOULD FIND THEM IS RECOMMENDED BY THE DOCTOR AND BE PAID BY THE INSURANCE COMPANY. IT’S NOT ABOUT SCIENCE OR GOOD MEDICINE. IT’S ABOUT MONEY.
I KNOW, I SAY THAT OFTEN AND ABOUT MANY THINGS, BUT IT IS ONE OF THE TRUE PROBLEMS WITH OUR MODERN HOMOGENIZED SOCIETY. EVEN PEOPLE LIKE ME -- PARTLY BECAUSE I DISLIKE THE “GROUP THINK” IN THE OFTEN RELIGIOUSLY BASED FEAR OF THE USE OF VACCINATIONS, AND PARTLY BECAUSE I DISLIKE DONALD TRUMP AT THE GUT LEVEL -- WILL DISAPPROVE OF THE SON OF ONE OF OUR CULTURAL HEROES, ROBERT KENNEDY. I DO HAVE A GENERAL RESPECT FOR THE KENNEDY FAMILY OF POLITICIANS AND WEALTHY CITIZENS, AND SEEING THAT A KENNEDY IS FIGHTING FOR GREATER CARE IN THE ADMINISTRATION OF VACCINES GIVES ME HOPE, BECAUSE THEY ARE SMART, WELL EDUCATED, WELL CONNECTED AND FIGHTERS. THE KENNEDYS HAVE BEEN VERY ACTIVE IN SOCIAL ISSUES AND CHARITY ACTIVITIES, AND ARE HIGHLY INTELLIGENT AND INTELLECTUAL IN THEIR THINKING.
THEY ARE ALL FIRMLY CATHOLIC, OF COURSE, AND THAT CAN MEAN LIBERAL OR IT CAN MEAN CONSERVATIVE. IT DOES ALWAYS MEAN “COMMITTED,” AND I RESPECT COMMITMENT TO CAUSES AS LONG AS IT (IN MY VIEW) IS A WORTHY CAUSE. I DO NOT CONSIDER HIGHLY UNKIND ATTITUDES LIKE THE HATRED OF THE LGBT COMMUNITY, ONES RIGHT TO DIE, OR ONES RIGHT TO THE AVAILABILITY OF SAFE ABORTIONS TO BE “WORTHY CAUSES.” FOLLOWING ONES’ GOD SHOULD NOT INVOLVE BOMBING AND SHOOTING ONES POLITICAL/SOCIAL ENEMIES. I HOPE THAT MY PARENTHETICAL STATEMENT IN THIS LAST SENTENCE WILL SHOW THAT I DO KNOW THAT I ALSO HAVE “FEET OF CLAY.” THE KENNEDYS’ “SPECIAL OLYMPICS,” HAS PROVEN THAT YOUNG PEOPLE WITH MENTAL AND PHYSICAL DISABILITIES CAN COMPETE IN LIFE AND SHOW A LEVEL OF COMPETENCY THAT PROVES THEM NOT TO BE CYPHERS WHOSE INNER BEING IS NOT WORTH OUR RESPECT AND LOVE.
KENNEDY’S OWN STATEMENTS SEEM TO PROVE MY FAITH IN HIM. GO TO http://www.azquotes.com/author/31204-Robert_F_Kennedy_Jr. HE IS NOT ONLY NOT A RADICAL RIGHTIST, HE IS NO IDIOT, EITHER. I HAVE PRESENTED BELOW A FEW OF HIS STATEMENTS. I’M NOT PREPARED, IDEOLOGICALLY AND EMOTIONALLY, TO AGREE WITH ALL OR EVEN MANY OF HIS APPOINTEES, BUT I THINK THIS ONE IS WISE AND PROBABLY EVEN SUFFICIENT. THE KENNEDYS ARE BRIGHT IF NOTHING ELSE. SEE ALSO THE FRESNO BEE ARTICLE BELOW, http://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article129267194.html.
A RECENT ARTICLE STATED THAT A HIGH PROPORTION OF DEMOCRATS AND INDEPENDENTS WANT SOMEONE ENTIRELY NEW FOR PRESIDENT. WHAT ABOUT ROBERT F. KENNEDY, JR? I FEEL SURE HE WOULD BE IDEOLOGICALLY UNOPPOSED AND CLEVER ENOUGH TO PUT THE BRILLIANT AND COMMITTED BERNIE SANDERS IN AS VICE PRESIDENT. HE IS QUOTED IN THE FRESNO BEE ARTICLE AS SAYING,” THESE ARE THE IDEALS THAT ARE GOING TO MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN.”
http://www.azquotes.com/author/31204-Robert_F_Kennedy_Jr.
Photograph -- The first sign of tyranny is government's complicity in privatizing the commons for private gain.
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Quotes
While communism is the control of business by government, fascism is the control of government by business,
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
Government, Communism, Fascism
Most Americans don't know about environmental problems, because we have in our country a negligent and indolent press. The biggest lie that the right wing holds in our country is that there is such a thing as a liberal media. Americans are getting their news from the right-wing media.
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
Corporations are a good thing. But corporations should not be running our government... They have driven the American economy since its founding, and the prosperity of our country is largely dependent on the free operation of corporations. But some corporations don't want free markets, and they don't want democracy. They want profits.
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
These are facts that would make every American upset. Our birthright is being stolen, the legacy of our country is at stake, and the values of our nation are in peril. The future whispers, and the present shouts.
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
http://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article129267194.html
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., UFW leader denounce Trump’s plans for border wall, deportations
By Robert Rodriguez
Jan 27, 2017
Video -- Robert F. Kennedy Jr., alongside United Farm Workers president Arturo Rodriguez, speaks out against President Trump's proposal to deport 11 million undocumented workers at a UFW rally of around 100 people in front of the federal courthouse Friday, Jan. 27, 2017 in downtown Fresno, Calif. Eric Paul Zamora - The Fresno Bee
Farmworkers, faith leaders and environmental justice advocate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. spoke out Friday against President Donald Trump, saying his plans for a border wall and possible deportation of millions of undocumented immigrants are unfair and misguided.
Friday’s rally drew about 150 people outside the Robert E. Coyle Federal Building in downtown Fresno. Several people carried signs that read, “We feed you Mr. Trump” and “Immigration reform no deportation.”
United Farm Workers president Arturo Rodriguez said that if Trump deports an estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants, many will be farmworkers who provide a vital service.
“Who is going to feed America?” Rodriguez said. “Or the guests at the Trump Hotel?”
Rodriguez urged farmers to rethink their support of Trump and his policies, especially if it means they may lose a portion of their workforce.
Kennedy, whose father had a long history of supporting the UFW, said he doubts that Trump’s goal is to deport millions of immigrants. He believes Trump and other big businesses that rely on low-wage immigrant workers are purposely spreading fear and anxiety.
“If they really wanted to, they could file a lawsuit against employers,” Kennedy said. “But they don’t really want to do that because they need them. They want to continue to spread fear and anxiety so they can take advantage of them.”
Kennedy urged the crowd to move forward with love and compassion, not hate.
“These are the ideals that are going to make America great again,” Kennedy said.
Trump’s stance on immigration and the border wall has made the U.S. relationship with Mexico increasingly tense.
Read more here: http://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article129267194.html#storylink=cpy
Robert Rodriguez: 559-441-6327, @FresnoBeeBob
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-travel-ban-refugees-uk-petition-britain-visit-iraq-reciprocity-measure/
CBS/AP January 30, 2017, 9:16 AM
Trump's crackdown draws protests, retaliation abroad
Protesters wave placards during a demonstration against U.S. President Donald Trump outside the United States Embassy in London, January 20, 2017 in London, England. GETTY
LONDON -- President Trump’s suspension of all immigration for citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries for 90 days, and his 120 day suspension on the U.S. refugee program, are drawing increasing fire from around the globe.
Iraq’s lawmakers are hitting back with a ban of their own and more than one million Britons have demanded their government cancel Mr. Trump’s planned state visit to the U.K. later this year.
Foreign relations with Trump thin after controversial actions
Play VIDEO
Foreign relations with Trump thin after controversial actions
Those developments come as American embassies in Europe warn people from the seven affected countries not to bother showing up for U.S. visa appointments, and as the United Nations human rights chief derides Mr. Trump’s moves as illegal under international law.
Mr. Trump’s executive order includes a 90-day ban on travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, and a 120-day suspension of the U.S. refugee program.
While the leaders of some of Europe’s far-right, fringe political groups -- which have gained traction in recent years as the European Union grapples with a refugee crisis and in the wake of several deadly terror attacks in France and elsewhere -- havelauded the moves, the majority reaction from abroad to Mr. Trump’s moves has been negative.
Iraq
Two lawmakers said Monday that the Iraqi parliament had approved a “reciprocity measure” after President Trump’s executive order temporarily banning citizens from Iraq from entering the United States.
Iraqi forces making gains in Mosul
Play VIDEO
Iraqi forces making gains in Mosul
The measure, adopted by lawmakers at a Monday session of parliament, is to apply to Americans entering Iraq.
Lawmakers Kamil al-Ghrairi and Mohammed Saadoun told The Associated Press that the decision is binding for the government. Both said the decision was passed by a majority of votes in favor, but couldn’t offer specific numbers. No further details were available on the wording of the parliamentary decision.
It was also not immediately clear who the ban will apply to -- American military personnel, non-government and aid workers, oil companies and other Americans doing business in Iraq.
It was also not known if and how the Iraqi measure would affect cooperation in the U.S.-backed fight against ISIS militants in Mosul.
Britain
The British government’s plans to honor President Trump with a state visit later this year are sparking increasing opposition following his order on immigration.
A state visit involves lavish pomp and ceremony, often with a stay at Buckingham Palace hosted by Queen Elizabeth II.
What will Europe do after Trump's travel ban?
Play VIDEO
What will Europe do after Trump's travel ban?
The three major opposition parties have all called for the state visit to be canceled and an online petition opposing the trip passed the 1 million signatures mark on Monday.
That far exceeds the 100,000 required to mandate a debate in Parliament. The public petitions, hosted on a government website, do not mandate any action beyond the deliberation in parliament, however, regardless of how many people sign.
Last year Parliament debated whether to ban Mr. Trump, then a candidate, from visiting the United Kingdom after a similar online petition was filed.
United Nations
United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid bin Ra’ad Zeid al-Hussein, who rarely uses Twitter, took to President Trump’s preferred means of communication on Monday to deride the U.S. leader’s immigration and travel crackdown as “forbidden” and “mean-spirited.”
View image on Twitter
View image on Twitter
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UN Human Rights ✔ @UNHumanRights
"Discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under #humanrights law" - @UNHumanRights Chief #Zeid
6:47 AM - 30 Jan 2017
2,453 2,453 Retweets 3,055 3,055 likes
Al-Hussein, a former Jordanian ambassador to the U.N., said, “discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under human rights law,” and added that, “the U.S. ban is also mean-spirited and wastes resources needed for proper counter-terrorism.”
African Union
Three of the nations whose citizens are now banned from entering the United States are in Africa -- Libya, Sudan and Ethiopia -- prompting the leader of the African Union to warn of “turbulent times” ahead for her continent.
nkosazana-dlamini-zuma-ap-746327892032.jpg
South African politician and anti-apartheid activist Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma speaks at the African Union reception held at the Intercontinental Hotel on Tuesday, May 24, 2016, in Geneva, Switzerland. AP/WHO
“The very country to which many of our people were taken as slaves during the transatlantic slave trade has now decided to ban refugees from some of our countries,” AU commission chief Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma told people gathered from the 54 member states for a summit in Ethiopia’s capital. “What do we do about this? Indeed, this is one of the greatest challenges to our unity and solidarity.”
Border confusion
The U.S. Embassies in London and Berlin have advised people from the seven countries affected by President Donald Trump’s travel ban not to seek a visa, or schedule an appointment - even if they are a dual nationals.
The statement posted on the London embassy’s website on Monday issued the guidance to “aliens from the countries of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.”
It says, “if you are a national, or dual national, of one of these countries, please do not schedule a visa appointment or pay any visa fees at this time.”
There has been widespread confusion about whether the ban applied to dual nationals, but administration officials attempted to clarify later on Sunday that dual nationals and U.S. green card holders, at least, or “lawful permanent residents” as the head of Homeland Security said, would be allowed in after questioning.
Turned away
Air France has blocked 15 passengers from Muslim countries from traveling to the U.S. because they would have been refused entry under President Trump’s new immigration ban.
Air France said in a statement it was informed Saturday by the U.S. government of the new restrictions, and had no choice but to stop the passengers from boarding U.S.-bound flights.
An airline spokeswoman said Monday that the passengers were taken back to their point of departure or otherwise taken care of. She would not provide the passengers’ names, nationalities or other details.
The company earlier had reported that 21 passengers had been turned away, but then corrected its count.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/quebec-mosque-shooting-terrorist-attack-muslims-canada-prime-minister-justin-trudeau/
Quebec mosque shooting a terrorist attack, Canadian PM Justin Trudeau says
CBS/AP
January 30, 2017, 12:59 AM
Photograph -- Canadian police officer talks to woman after shooting in mosque at the Québec City Islamic cultural center in Quebec city on January 29, 2017 ALICE CHICHE/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
QUEBEC CITY – A shooting at a mosque here was a terrorist attack, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said late Sunday night.
Six people were killed and eight injured in the shooting, which happened during evening prayers. Authorities reported two arrests.
Quebec provincial police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe said early Monday some of the wounded were gravely injured. She said the dead were approximately 35 to 70 years of age. Thirty-nine people were unharmed. More than 50 were at the mosque at the time of the attack.
One suspect was arrested at the scene and another nearby in d’Orleans, Quebec. Police say they don’t believe there are other suspects. They did not release names of the two.
“The Muslim community was the target of this murderous attack,” Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard said at an early morning press conference Monday.
Couillard said there will be solidarity rallies across Quebec on Monday and says the province’s people will all be together to express horror.
Quebec City Mayor Regis Labeaume appeared visibly shaken.
“No person should have to pay with their life, for their race, their color, their sexual orientation or their religious beliefs,” Labeaume said.
Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre President Mohamed Yangui said the shooting happened in the men’s section of the mosque.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau quickly took to social media to express his condolences:
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Justin Trudeau ✔ @JustinTrudeau
Tonight, Canadians grieve for those killed in a cowardly attack on a mosque in Quebec City. My thoughts are with victims & their families.
10:35 PM - 29 Jan 2017
42,208 42,208 Retweets 67,120 67,120 likes
Later, Trudeau issued a statement reading in part, “We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge.
“On behalf of all Canadians, Sophie and I offer our deepest condolences to the family and friends of all those who have died, and we wish a speedy recovery to those who have been injured.
“While authorities are still investigating and details continue to be confirmed, it is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence. Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear.”
gettyimages-633067998.jpg
People show their support after shooting in mosque in Québec City Islamic cultural center in Quebec city on January 29, 2017 ALICE CHICHE/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard also called it a terrorist attack, depicting it as “barbaric violence” and expressing solidarity with the victims’ families.
The attack came amid heightened tensions worldwide over President Trump’s travel ban on certain Muslim countries.
The mayor of Gatineau, Quebec near Canada’s capital of Ottawa, said there would be increased police presence at mosques around his city following the attack.
The New York Police Department said it was stepping up patrols at mosques and other hours of worships in its city.
The NYPD issued a statement Sunday night saying Critical Response Command personnel had been “assigned to extended tour coverage” at certain mosques.
“NYPD is providing additional protection for mosques in the city. All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something,” New York City Mayor Bill Blasio said on Twitter.
“Our prayers tonight are with the people of Quebec City as they deal with a terrible attack on a mosque. We must stand together,” Blasio said in another tweet.
In the summer of 2016 a pig’s head was left on the doorstep of the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre.
The incident occurred in the middle of Ramadan, when Muslims fast from dawn to sunset. Practicing Muslims do not eat pork.
https://www.thenation.com/article/democracy-wins-one-as-a-federal-court-strikes-a-big-blow-against-gerrymandering/
Democracy Wins One as a Federal Court Strikes a Big Blow Against Gerrymandering
A game-changing federal-court ruling orders Wisconsin to redraw legislative district lines that unfairly and unconstitutionally favor Republicans.
By John Nichols
JANUARY 27, 2017
Photograph -- Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, September 21, 2015. (AP Photo / Morry Gash)
Democracy has taken very hard hits in the first days of the Trump interregnum, as Donald Trump and the mandarins of his “alternative-fact” administration have spun fantasies about “voter fraud” that clearly does not exist; obsessed about the dubious legitimacy of a president who lost the popular vote and drew a disappointing crowd for his inauguration; and attacked the free and skeptical press that provides and essential underpinning for the open discourse that sustains popular sovereignty.
But sometimes democracy wins out—in a way that could transform our politics and our governance.
Nothing has so sustained and advanced Republican dominance of the states (and of the US House of Representatives) as the gerrymandering of legislative and congressional district lines by Republican politicians who have used their overarching control of state-based redistricting processes to warp electoral competition in their favor. And few states have seen such radical gerrymandering as Scott Walker’s Wisconsin, where the governor and his allies skewed district lines so seriously that clearly contested state legislative races have become a rarity in much of a state that national elections suggest is evenly divided.
Wisconsin’s gerrymandering was so extreme that, two months ago, a federal-court panel struck down Wisconsin legislative maps as unconstitutional. Walker’s Republican state attorney general appealed immediately, setting up a fight that will eventually be resolved by a US Supreme Court that legal experts say may finally be prepared to rule on behalf of competitive elections.
“In our democracy, people have the right to hold their government accountable in fair, competitive elections.” —Senator Mark Miller
Walker and his Republican allies, desperate to maintain their unfair advantage, asked the three-judge federal panel to delay implementation of its ruling as the appeals process goes forward.
But on Friday the judges refused to delay democracy any longer.
In a decision that was hailed as a significant victory for democracy in Wisconsin and nationally, the federal panel enjoined Wisconsin officials from using existing maps in “all future elections.” At the same time, the judges ordered Walker and the state legislature to draw new legislative-district maps by November 1, 2017.
The new maps are to be used in November 2018, when Walker, the entire state assembly, and half of the state senate will be up for election.
“The decision by the federal court to require new redistricting maps by November 1, 2017 is great news for Wisconsin. Voters should always pick their elected officials instead of elected officials picking them. I hope that legislative Republicans are more competent with their second chance,” said Democratic State Senator Mark Miller, the former majority leader of the Wisconsin Senate. “In our democracy, people have the right to hold their government accountable in fair, competitive elections—I am pleased that power should finally be returned to the people of Wisconsin.”
Miller is right. While there will still be plenty of wrangling over the drawing of district lines, and while Walker and his Republican allies will keep trying to delay that process, the notion that voters have a right to cast their ballots in genuinely competitive elections is gaining traction.
“This case is an actual game-changer when it comes to undoing GOP gerrymandering nationwide.” —Carolyn Fiddler
That’s a big deal for Wisconsin. But it is also a big deal for the rest of a country where numerous states face legal battles over gerrymandering of legislative and congressional district lines. Walker acknowledges that “lawmakers and governors around the country are interested in this case regardless of party,” while Carolyn Fiddler of the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee says that “this order presents a real chance for Wisconsin Democrats’ voices to be fairly represented in their state government. Additionally, this case is an actual game-changer when it comes to undoing GOP gerrymandering nationwide and preventing Republicans from artificially inflating their majorities via redistricting for the decade to come.”
Fiddler’s point gets to the heart of the matter. Discussions about gerrymandering involve a lot more than maps. They are about electoral competition and the makeup of legislative chambers. Fair competition, in Wisconsin and nationally, could produce dramatic change in politics and governing. For instance: In 2012 voting for state assembly seats in Wisconsin, Democrats won 174,000 more votes than Republicans. Yet, because of the gerrymandering of the assembly maps by Walker and his allies, Republicans won a 60-39 majority in the chamber.
Bill Whitford, the veteran University of Wisconsin law professor who was the lead plaintiff in the gerrymandering case brought by the Fair Elections Project, hailed the court ruling as a victory in the struggle for a renewal of representative democracy.
“Today is a good day for Wisconsin voters, and another step in the journey of ensuring that our voices are heard,” explained Whitford. “Now, we will be keeping a watchful eye on the state legislature as they draw the new maps and I ask them, for the sake of our democracy, to put partisan politics aside and the interests of all voters first.”
If the Republicans fail to put aside partisanship, they are all but certain to face another intervention by the courts in what is by any measure a high-stakes struggle.
Republicans in Wisconsin and nationally know that if Democrats were to gain a stronger foothold in the Wisconsin Assembly and Senate following a fair fight in 2018, that could position them to draw more competitive congressional-district lines following the 2020 Census. And if the US Supreme Court were to accept the premise that voters have a right to cast ballots in competitive election—rather than to waste them in districts that are drawn to give one party a permanent advantage—the American political landscape could be radically altered.
As former president Barack Obama, who has pledged to make the battle against gerrymandering a focus of his post-presidential activism, has said: “If we want a better politics, it’s not enough to just change a congressman or a senator or even a president. We have to change the system to reflect our better selves.”
The way to get that better politics is by upending gerrymandering practices that allow politicians to pick their voters, and to give the voters the power that extends from genuinely competitive elections.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-minutes-syrian-refugee-crisis/
A look at how Syrian refugees were vetted before Trump
CORRESPONDENT
Bill Whitaker
January 29, 2017
The following script is from “Finding Refuge,” which originally aired on Oct. 16, 2016, and was rebroadcast on Jan. 29, 2017. Bill Whitaker is the correspondent. Katy Textor, producer.
Friday, after a whirlwind week, President Donald Trump signed an executive order barring citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States for 90 days. Last night, after a flurry of legal challenges, a federal judge in Brooklyn issued an emergency stay.
The executive order, which sparked protests around the world, also stops all refugees from entering the U.S. for 120 days. Syrian refugees are barred indefinitely, pending a review of the screening process. Once again, Syrian refugees find themselves at the center of a heated debate -- pitting our American tradition of altruism against our fear of terrorism. Donald Trump won the presidency claiming tens-of-thousands of Syrians -- mostly young men -- were streaming into the U.S. and that the Obama administration had no system to properly vet them. So, what has the vetting process been? We went to the region, as we reported last fall, to see for ourselves.
camp.jpg
Zaatari refugee camp CBS NEWS
This is Zaatari refugee camp in Jordan -- about seven miles from the Syrian border. 80,000 Syrian refugees living in tiny, steel boxes as far as the eye can see.
The camp run by the U.N. sprang out of the Jordanian desert in 2012 as millions of refugees poured out of Syria. It’s now the largest Syrian refugee camp in the Middle East.
Gina Kassem: Every refugee here lives in pre-fab housing.
Coming to the U.S. as a refugee60 MINUTES OVERTIME
Coming to the U.S. as a refugee
Gina Kassem oversees the refugee resettlement program in the Middle East and North Africa for the U.S. State Department. As of late 2016, the U.S. was processing an additional 21,000 Syrian refugee applications for relocation to the United States.
Gina Kassem: Mostly we focus on victims of torture, survivors of violence, women-headed households, a lot of severe medical cases.
Kassem told us each Syrian refugee who makes it to the United States goes through a lengthy process of interviews and background checks.
Bill Whitaker: You know there are many Americans who don’t trust government to fix the roads or run the schools. How can you convince them that this process is going to keep them safe?
Gina Kassem: Because they undergo so many steps of vetting, so many interviews, so many intelligence screenings, so many checks along the way. They’re fleeing the terrorists who killed their family members, who destroyed their houses. These are the victims that we are helping through our program.
The war in Syria has taken the lives of almost a half-million people, leveled entire cities and created the largest refugee crisis since the end of World War II.
Syria’s neighbor Jordan has been overwhelmed with nearly 1.5 million refugees, in the camps and in the cities. Any who can, make their way here, to the capital.
finding-refuge.jpg
Waiting to register with the U.N. in Amman, Jordan CBS NEWS
For the lucky few this is where the long road to the U.S. begins. Everyday thousands of Syrian refugees line up here in Amman, Jordan, to register with the U.N.
Every single refugee is interviewed in detail multiple times by the U.N. for their vital statistics: where they came from, who they know.
Their irises are scanned to establish their identity.
And then they wait for the chance the U.N. might refer them to the United States. Less than one percent have had that chance.
For that one percent the next step has been this State Department resettlement center in Amman for a background check led by specially trained Department of Homeland Security interrogators.
Like all Syrian refugees being vetted this family was questioned at least three times by interviewers looking for gaps or inconsistencies in their stories.
Why refuge isn't free60 MINUTES OVERTIME
Why refuge isn't free
All that information is then run though U.S. security databases for any red flags. To be a refugee in Jordan is to be patient. The U.S. security check goes on an average of 18-24 months.
Those who pass are then told to pack up for their new life in the United States.
This family had just been told they are moving to Chicago, Illinois.
Bill Whitaker: What are you feeling right now?
Wife: I am afraid. We don’t know anything.
Just before they go they are given a crash course on life in the U.S.. America 101.
Teacher: English, education or experience.
Most know little about where they are moving. Those we spoke to didn’t really care. They know exactly what they are leaving behind. We met Sulaf and her 15-year-old daughter Joody in Amman this past August.
Bill Whitaker: So now you’re going to the United States. Do you know where?
Sulaf: North Carolina.
Bill Whitaker: What do you know about North Carolina?
Sulaf: I don’t know. I don’t know. Nice-- nice city.
Sulaf was an elementary school teacher back in Homs, Syria, her husband a dentist. She says they had a good life until Syrian President Assad’s forces turned their lives into a living hell.
She says they would hear the sounds of other buildings collapsing. And they would tell themselves, “We’re next.” She started giving her kids sleeping pills so they could sleep.
joody-sulaf.jpg
From left: Joody and her mother, Sulaf, speak with Bill Whitaker CBS NEWS
Sulaf’s daughter Joody was 10 years old at the time.
Bill Whitaker: You remember all this?
Joody: Everything, I remember it like it was yesterday. It was very scary. It-- we cannot go to the-- to the school. Most of my friends’ death,
Bill Whitaker: Most of your friends are dead?
Joody: Yes.
"My dream is to meet Oprah"60 MINUTES: SEGMENT EXTRAS
"My dream is to meet Oprah"
Sulaf says she is lucky she made it to Jordan alive with her family and her parents. She has one sister in bombed out Aleppo, another in ISIS-controlled territory. But Jordan is where her husband Ahmad’s luck ran out. He was found to have Lou Gherig’s disease and died in 2014. Her youngest son Malaz was diagnosed with autism but the family couldn’t find treatment.
This past August, Sulaf was cleared by Homeland Security to travel to the U.S. It was just in time. She was considering taking her family on the treacherous journey to Europe by boat in order to get Malaz the help he needs.
She told us if she tried to cross the ocean to Europe and they made it, they made it. If they died, they died. There’s no difference between death and life in this place. She says she can’t work, she can’t educate her children, she has no opportunity.
Bill Whitaker: So a new life in America is your only hope?
Sulaf: Yeah. Yeah. Exactly.
ekhabhat.jpg
Ekbal with family in Riverdale, Maryland CBS NEWS
We met Ekbal and his wife Eman in their apartment in Jordan this past August as they were preparing to leave for the U.S.
Ekbal owned a clothing store in Daraa, Syria, before the war. He says he was arrested and tortured--accused of being a foreign spy by Assad’s forces just for watching a protest outside his store.
Bill Whitaker: You said that the men who arrested you said, “No one will know what happened to you.”
You believe that the best possible option is that you die quickly, he said.
Bill Whitaker: You felt that it might be better if you were to die.
Ekbal: Death is mercy at this point.
When Ekbal was released the family fled Syria. After a nearly two-year vetting process they were cleared by U.S. Homeland Security. In September, they moved into this empty apartment in Riverdale, Maryland. They say it’s lonely, but Ekbal has figured out the local bus and just got a part-time job at the local 7-Eleven.
Opening our doors to refugees like Ekbal is a proud part of America’s heritage, but just over a year ago when Paris was attacked by ISIS fighters killing 130 civilians, many Americans wanted to slam the doors shut.
A Syrian passport was found on one of the suicide bombers who had entered Europe with the flood of Syrian refugees. That prompted 31 U.S. governors to call for a complete halt to the Syrian Refugee Program.
Georgia’s Republican Governor Nathan Deal went further and signed an executive order denying state services to Syrian refugees.
It turned out that bomber wasn’t Syrian after all. He was part of a sophisticated ISIS plot to get radicals into Europe. But it cast a shadow of suspicion over all Syrian refugees.
Mohammad, his wife Ebtesam and son Hasan were among the first Syrian refugees to arrive in the U.S. They settled in Georgia just weeks after the attacks in Paris.
At first, I was worried, he said. But I told myself that there’s no way I would be mistreated in this country. Because this is a country of laws.
Mohammad and his family were sponsored by the Johnson Ferry Baptist Church, in deep Republican Marietta, Georgia, just outside Atlanta.
With Governor Deal banning services the church stepped in to support the family. Senior Pastor Bryant Wright, a former president of the Southern Baptist Convention found himself in a political firestorm -- at odds with the governor -- a man he voted for.
Pastor Wright: Well see, our calling, Bill, is far higher to follow Christ and do what Christ teaches us to do than whether there’s an “R” or a “D” behind your name. And that’s what we’ve got to live by far more than what people are hearing on talk radio, or on the news or from political candidates.
Wright wrote a letter to Governor Deal asking him to reconsider his position.
Bill Whitaker: Did he respond?
Pastor Wright: No, he didn’t respond.
Governor Deal didn’t respond to 60 Minutes either. Last December he was forced to withdraw his ban when Georgia’s attorney general found it to be illegal.
Since then this Christian church, working with U.S. refugee resettlement agencies World Relief and Lutheran Services, has gone on to sponsor seven more Muslim families from Syria.
In July, Mohammad, Ebtesam and Hasan welcomed their cousin Nouras and his family of six.
Volunteer: Welcome to your new home.
Here in the Atlanta area, volunteers and case workers help newcomers from the beginning. Getting them settled into new homes and teaching them to use an ATM.
The refugees are given English tutoring and help finding jobs. This past summer, Mohammad was able to pay his bills on his own for the first time. He’s working at a catering company owned by a church member. Hassan has started kindergarten and slowly they say they are starting to feel at home here.
Ebtesam: I feeling this country, my country.
Mohammad: My country, yes.
Pastor Wright told us he is isn’t naïve about the potential risks of allowing in Syrian refugees.
Pastor Wright: The government has decided 10,000 Syrian refugees are coming. That’s not our decision. Isn’t it better to reach out and love these folks than to give them the cold shoulder? Which approach do you think might cause a Muslim refugee to be more sympathetic to Islamic terrorism? Which approach? To me it’s a no-brainer.
For many members of Congress faith in the government’s ability to properly vet refugees is misguided.
Paul Ryan: When we know that ISIL is already telling us that they are trying to infiltrate the refugee population, don’t you think that common sense dictates we should take a pause and get this right?
Bill Whitaker: Can you tell the American people that this vetting is safe?
Jeh Johnson: I can tell the American people it is probably the most cumbersome, thorough vetting process by which any immigrant comes into the United States.
Then-Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson told us the situation in the U.S. is vastly different from Europe which saw its borders flooded with unvetted refugees.
Jeh Johnson: If we don’t feel we know enough about you-- we’re not going to admit you.
Bill Whitaker: Out of all the people you’re letting in, how, how many are being denied?
Jeh Johnson: Thousands have been denied admission to this country. And an even larger number who are on hold.
There is no known case of a Syrian refugee being involved in any terror plot in the United States, but in 2009 the U.S. missed this Iraqi refugee and allowed him in, even though the military knew he had been an insurgent fighting U.S. forces. He and another Iraqi refugee were then caught in Kentucky trying to buy a stinger missile to kill U.S. soldiers in Iraq.
Bill Whitaker: How does this guy walk into America?
Jeh Johnson: With every case from years ago there should be lessons learned.
Bill Whitaker: Things have changed--
Jeh Johnson: Things have changed--
Bill Whitaker: --since then?
Jeh Johnson: --considerably since then. We have, on my watch, added social media and other checks, consulting additional databases. We’ve added those checks in the face of the worldwide refugee crisis that we see right now.
Last month, Sulaf and her children flew from Jordan to their new home in Cary, North Carolina. She says it took 18 months of security checks for her to make it here.
She’s now learning to navigate an American grocery store and is anxious to find a job.
Church volunteer: There may be an opportunity...
Their new life in America isn’t easy but for the first time in a long time Sulaf says she has hope.
Sulaf: And on behalf for me and my kids, I would like thanks for peop--American people and American government for this chance. And thank you very, very, very much. And-- ours-- save our children.
Since we first broadcast this story, Sulaf found a job in the bakery of a Whole Foods store. And according to the State Department, as of this weekend, the vetting of Syrian refugees has been suspended as a result of President Trump’s executive order to review the process.
To find out more about the organizations mentioned in Bill Whitaker’s report “Finding Refuge,” here are their names and links:
United Nations Refugee Agency: http://www.unhcr.org/en-us
World Relief: http://www.worldrelief.org/
Lutherans Immigration and Refugee Service: https://lirs.org/
POLITICALLY ACTIVIST COPS -- CLEARLY A FOLLOWER OF SHERIFF ARPAIO
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/maryland-police-chief-responds-after-citizen-aravinda-pillalamarri-questioned-over-immigration-status/
Maryland police chief responds after cop questions citizen over immigration status
By CRIMESIDER STAFF CBS NEWS
January 30, 2017, 12:04 PM
Photograph -- Aravinda Pillalamarri, of Bel Air, Maryland, speaks to CBS Baltimore station WJZ-TV in an interview broadcast on Jan. 27, 2017. WJZ-TV
BEL AIR, Md. — The police chief of a small Maryland town responded Sunday in a Facebook post to outcry over a Dec. 21 incident in which a resident was stopped as she went for a walk, and asked if she was in the country legally.
Aravinda Pillalamarri, a U.S. citizen, told CBS Baltimore that officers in the town where she lives, Bel Air, stopped her while she was on a casual evening walk in her neighborhood.
“I had just come out for a walk, so I didn’t have my ID. And he said, ‘Why don’t you have ID? Are you here illegally?’” Pillalamarri said.
During a Town Hall meeting soon after the incident, Bel Air Police Chief Charles Moore indicated that the incident made him realize his officers need more training on handling similarly sensitive interactions. In a Facebook post Sunday, Moore said his department had received a high volume of calls related to the incident and the department’s overall approach to immigration issues.
“The Bel Air Police Department in no manner supports bias based policing/racial profiling tactics while in the performance of our duties,” Moore said. “Our goal is to earn everyone’s respect and admiration and to keep our community safe.”
Moore said in the post that when officers first encountered Pillalamarri, at around 9:40 p.m., they were responding to a report of a suspicious person in a neighborhood where packages had previously been stolen from porches. Moore said Pillalamarri fit the description reported to police.
“Upon (the officer’s) approach to Ms. Pillalamarri, the officer was immediately asked by Ms. Pillalamarri if she was being stopped for ‘walking while brown,’” Moore wrote. “The officer immediately denied this and indicated to her that he had been dispatched to a call for service and was trying to check her welfare. Ms. Pillalamarri then began to walk away from the officer, refusing to speak to him or to provide identification. The officer continued to attempt to establish dialogue.”
Pillalamarri could not immediately be reached for comment, but reiterated her concern about the stop during her interview with CBS Baltimore.
“I didn’t expect this to happen in Bel Air. Walking while brown? He said, ‘No, no, no, nothing like that,’” Pillalamarri said.
Moore said Pillalamarri at first refused to identify herself, which is why she was asked if she was in the country legally. However, he noted that the department personnel are undergoing “continual training and education” related to the incident.
"It is also clear that questioning one’s immigration status isn’t the answer for relieving tension,” Moore wrote.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-minutes-syrian-refugee-crisis/
A look at how Syrian refugees were vetted before Trump
Before President Trump's executive order on immigration, Bill Whitaker reported on the Syrian refugee crisis and followed Syrian families from Jordan through the vetting process to the U.S.
CORRESPONDENT
Bill Whitaker
Jan 29, 2017
The following script is from “Finding Refuge,” which originally aired on Oct. 16, 2016, and was rebroadcast on Jan. 29, 2017. Bill Whitaker is the correspondent. Katy Textor, producer.
Friday, after a whirlwind week, President Donald Trump signed an executive order barring citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States for 90 days. Last night, after a flurry of legal challenges, a federal judge in Brooklyn issued an emergency stay.
The executive order, which sparked protests around the world, also stops all refugees from entering the U.S. for 120 days. Syrian refugees are barred indefinitely, pending a review of the screening process. Once again, Syrian refugees find themselves at the center of a heated debate -- pitting our American tradition of altruism against our fear of terrorism. Donald Trump won the presidency claiming tens-of-thousands of Syrians -- mostly young men -- were streaming into the U.S. and that the Obama administration had no system to properly vet them. So, what has the vetting process been? We went to the region, as we reported last fall, to see for ourselves.
camp.jpg
Zaatari refugee camp CBS NEWS
This is Zaatari refugee camp in Jordan -- about seven miles from the Syrian border. 80,000 Syrian refugees living in tiny, steel boxes as far as the eye can see.
The camp run by the U.N. sprang out of the Jordanian desert in 2012 as millions of refugees poured out of Syria. It’s now the largest Syrian refugee camp in the Middle East.
Gina Kassem: Every refugee here lives in pre-fab housing.
Coming to the U.S. as a refugee60 MINUTES OVERTIME
Coming to the U.S. as a refugee
Gina Kassem oversees the refugee resettlement program in the Middle East and North Africa for the U.S. State Department. As of late 2016, the U.S. was processing an additional 21,000 Syrian refugee applications for relocation to the United States.
Gina Kassem: Mostly we focus on victims of torture, survivors of violence, women-headed households, a lot of severe medical cases.
Kassem told us each Syrian refugee who makes it to the United States goes through a lengthy process of interviews and background checks.
Bill Whitaker: You know there are many Americans who don’t trust government to fix the roads or run the schools. How can you convince them that this process is going to keep them safe?
Gina Kassem: Because they undergo so many steps of vetting, so many interviews, so many intelligence screenings, so many checks along the way. They’re fleeing the terrorists who killed their family members, who destroyed their houses. These are the victims that we are helping through our program.
The war in Syria has taken the lives of almost a half-million people, leveled entire cities and created the largest refugee crisis since the end of World War II.
Syria’s neighbor Jordan has been overwhelmed with nearly 1.5 million refugees, in the camps and in the cities. Any who can, make their way here, to the capital.
finding-refuge.jpg
Waiting to register with the U.N. in Amman, Jordan CBS NEWS
For the lucky few this is where the long road to the U.S. begins. Everyday thousands of Syrian refugees line up here in Amman, Jordan, to register with the U.N.
Every single refugee is interviewed in detail multiple times by the U.N. for their vital statistics: where they came from, who they know.
Their irises are scanned to establish their identity.
And then they wait for the chance the U.N. might refer them to the United States. Less than one percent have had that chance.
For that one percent the next step has been this State Department resettlement center in Amman for a background check led by specially trained Department of Homeland Security interrogators.
Like all Syrian refugees being vetted this family was questioned at least three times by interviewers looking for gaps or inconsistencies in their stories.
Why refuge isn't free60 MINUTES OVERTIME
Why refuge isn't free
All that information is then run though U.S. security databases for any red flags. To be a refugee in Jordan is to be patient. The U.S. security check goes on an average of 18-24 months.
Those who pass are then told to pack up for their new life in the United States.
This family had just been told they are moving to Chicago, Illinois.
Bill Whitaker: What are you feeling right now?
Wife: I am afraid. We don’t know anything.
Just before they go they are given a crash course on life in the U.S.. America 101.
Teacher: English, education or experience.
Most know little about where they are moving. Those we spoke to didn’t really care. They know exactly what they are leaving behind. We met Sulaf and her 15-year-old daughter Joody in Amman this past August.
Bill Whitaker: So now you’re going to the United States. Do you know where?
Sulaf: North Carolina.
Bill Whitaker: What do you know about North Carolina?
Sulaf: I don’t know. I don’t know. Nice-- nice city.
Sulaf was an elementary school teacher back in Homs, Syria, her husband a dentist. She says they had a good life until Syrian President Assad’s forces turned their lives into a living hell.
She says they would hear the sounds of other buildings collapsing. And they would tell themselves, “We’re next.” She started giving her kids sleeping pills so they could sleep.
joody-sulaf.jpg
From left: Joody and her mother, Sulaf, speak with Bill Whitaker CBS NEWS
Sulaf’s daughter Joody was 10 years old at the time.
Bill Whitaker: You remember all this?
Joody: Everything, I remember it like it was yesterday. It was very scary. It-- we cannot go to the-- to the school. Most of my friends’ death,
Bill Whitaker: Most of your friends are dead?
Joody: Yes.
"My dream is to meet Oprah"60 MINUTES: SEGMENT EXTRAS
"My dream is to meet Oprah"
Sulaf says she is lucky she made it to Jordan alive with her family and her parents. She has one sister in bombed out Aleppo, another in ISIS-controlled territory. But Jordan is where her husband Ahmad’s luck ran out. He was found to have Lou Gherig’s disease and died in 2014. Her youngest son Malaz was diagnosed with autism but the family couldn’t find treatment.
This past August, Sulaf was cleared by Homeland Security to travel to the U.S. It was just in time. She was considering taking her family on the treacherous journey to Europe by boat in order to get Malaz the help he needs.
She told us if she tried to cross the ocean to Europe and they made it, they made it. If they died, they died. There’s no difference between death and life in this place. She says she can’t work, she can’t educate her children, she has no opportunity.
Bill Whitaker: So a new life in America is your only hope?
Sulaf: Yeah. Yeah. Exactly.
ekhabhat.jpg
Ekbal with family in Riverdale, Maryland CBS NEWS
We met Ekbal and his wife Eman in their apartment in Jordan this past August as they were preparing to leave for the U.S.
Ekbal owned a clothing store in Daraa, Syria, before the war. He says he was arrested and tortured--accused of being a foreign spy by Assad’s forces just for watching a protest outside his store.
Bill Whitaker: You said that the men who arrested you said, “No one will know what happened to you.”
You believe that the best possible option is that you die quickly, he said.
Bill Whitaker: You felt that it might be better if you were to die.
Ekbal: Death is mercy at this point.
When Ekbal was released the family fled Syria. After a nearly two-year vetting process they were cleared by U.S. Homeland Security. In September, they moved into this empty apartment in Riverdale, Maryland. They say it’s lonely, but Ekbal has figured out the local bus and just got a part-time job at the local 7-Eleven.
Opening our doors to refugees like Ekbal is a proud part of America’s heritage, but just over a year ago when Paris was attacked by ISIS fighters killing 130 civilians, many Americans wanted to slam the doors shut.
A Syrian passport was found on one of the suicide bombers who had entered Europe with the flood of Syrian refugees. That prompted 31 U.S. governors to call for a complete halt to the Syrian Refugee Program.
Georgia’s Republican Governor Nathan Deal went further and signed an executive order denying state services to Syrian refugees.
It turned out that bomber wasn’t Syrian after all. He was part of a sophisticated ISIS plot to get radicals into Europe. But it cast a shadow of suspicion over all Syrian refugees.
Mohammad, his wife Ebtesam and son Hasan were among the first Syrian refugees to arrive in the U.S. They settled in Georgia just weeks after the attacks in Paris.
At first, I was worried, he said. But I told myself that there’s no way I would be mistreated in this country. Because this is a country of laws.
Mohammad and his family were sponsored by the Johnson Ferry Baptist Church, in deep Republican Marietta, Georgia, just outside Atlanta.
With Governor Deal banning services the church stepped in to support the family. Senior Pastor Bryant Wright, a former president of the Southern Baptist Convention found himself in a political firestorm -- at odds with the governor -- a man he voted for.
Pastor Wright: Well see, our calling, Bill, is far higher to follow Christ and do what Christ teaches us to do than whether there’s an “R” or a “D” behind your name. And that’s what we’ve got to live by far more than what people are hearing on talk radio, or on the news or from political candidates.
Wright wrote a letter to Governor Deal asking him to reconsider his position.
Bill Whitaker: Did he respond?
Pastor Wright: No, he didn’t respond.
Governor Deal didn’t respond to 60 Minutes either. Last December he was forced to withdraw his ban when Georgia’s attorney general found it to be illegal.
Since then this Christian church, working with U.S. refugee resettlement agencies World Relief and Lutheran Services, has gone on to sponsor seven more Muslim families from Syria.
In July, Mohammad, Ebtesam and Hasan welcomed their cousin Nouras and his family of six.
Volunteer: Welcome to your new home.
Here in the Atlanta area, volunteers and case workers help newcomers from the beginning. Getting them settled into new homes and teaching them to use an ATM.
The refugees are given English tutoring and help finding jobs. This past summer, Mohammad was able to pay his bills on his own for the first time. He’s working at a catering company owned by a church member. Hassan has started kindergarten and slowly they say they are starting to feel at home here.
Ebtesam: I feeling this country, my country.
Mohammad: My country, yes.
Pastor Wright told us he is isn’t naïve about the potential risks of allowing in Syrian refugees.
Pastor Wright: The government has decided 10,000 Syrian refugees are coming. That’s not our decision. Isn’t it better to reach out and love these folks than to give them the cold shoulder? Which approach do you think might cause a Muslim refugee to be more sympathetic to Islamic terrorism? Which approach? To me it’s a no-brainer.
For many members of Congress faith in the government’s ability to properly vet refugees is misguided.
Paul Ryan: When we know that ISIL is already telling us that they are trying to infiltrate the refugee population, don’t you think that common sense dictates we should take a pause and get this right?
Bill Whitaker: Can you tell the American people that this vetting is safe?
Jeh Johnson: I can tell the American people it is probably the most cumbersome, thorough vetting process by which any immigrant comes into the United States.
Then-Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson told us the situation in the U.S. is vastly different from Europe which saw its borders flooded with unvetted refugees.
Jeh Johnson: If we don’t feel we know enough about you-- we’re not going to admit you.
Bill Whitaker: Out of all the people you’re letting in, how, how many are being denied?
Jeh Johnson: Thousands have been denied admission to this country. And an even larger number who are on hold.
There is no known case of a Syrian refugee being involved in any terror plot in the United States, but in 2009 the U.S. missed this Iraqi refugee and allowed him in, even though the military knew he had been an insurgent fighting U.S. forces. He and another Iraqi refugee were then caught in Kentucky trying to buy a stinger missile to kill U.S. soldiers in Iraq.
Bill Whitaker: How does this guy walk into America?
Jeh Johnson: With every case from years ago there should be lessons learned.
Bill Whitaker: Things have changed--
Jeh Johnson: Things have changed--
Bill Whitaker: --since then?
Jeh Johnson: --considerably since then. We have, on my watch, added social media and other checks, consulting additional databases. We’ve added those checks in the face of the worldwide refugee crisis that we see right now.
Last month, Sulaf and her children flew from Jordan to their new home in Cary, North Carolina. She says it took 18 months of security checks for her to make it here.
She’s now learning to navigate an American grocery store and is anxious to find a job.
Church volunteer: There may be an opportunity...
Their new life in America isn’t easy but for the first time in a long time Sulaf says she has hope.
Sulaf: And on behalf for me and my kids, I would like thanks for peop--American people and American government for this chance. And thank you very, very, very much. And-- ours-- save our children.
Since we first broadcast this story, Sulaf found a job in the bakery of a Whole Foods store. And according to the State Department, as of this weekend, the vetting of Syrian refugees has been suspended as a result of President Trump’s executive order to review the process.
To find out more about the organizations mentioned in Bill Whitaker’s report “Finding Refuge,” here are their names and links:
United Nations Refugee Agency: http://www.unhcr.org/en-us
World Relief: http://www.worldrelief.org/
Lutherans Immigration and Refugee Service: https://lirs.org/
http://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/protesters-at-u-s-airports-slam-trump-immigration-ban/
33 Photograph -- http://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/protesters-at-u-s-airports-slam-trump-immigration-ban/
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/what-donald-trumps-u-s-economy-could-look-like/
What Donald Trump's U.S. economy could look like
By LARRY LIGHT MONEYWATCH
January 30, 2017, 6:00 AM
During Donald Trump’s whirlwind first week in office, one thing was apparent: He’s dead serious about putting his hard-line prescriptions for the U.S. into practice -- ideas that would alter the American economic landscape, for good or ill.
The result could be a topsy-turvy country where an activist government -- the traditional hallmark of Democrats -- is trying to impose conservative goals while also forcing Republicans to swallow things like higher federal spending and budget deficits.
In addition, it’s an America where the customary, if sometimes dysfunctional, norms no longer apply. These include free trade, corporate liberty to send jobs where the cost is lowest and a tax code laden with deductions.
“This is a case of government on your back, micromanaging,” said economist Dennis Hoffman, a professor at Arizona State University who has voted for both Republicans and Democrats in national contests. “The government will tell you who you can hire and who you can source your products from.”
With his party holding majorities in both the Senate and the House of Representatives, Mr. Trump likely will get much of what he wants, in some form. At the congressional Republicans’ gathering in Philadelphia on Thursday, the president’s ideas met with approval and applause.
How businesses are reacting to President Trump so far
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How businesses are reacting to President Trump so far
Even his call for a $1 trillion program to rebuild the nation’s infrastructure seems to be gaining traction among Republican budget hawks. This comes despite past GOP opposition to such a plan pushed by President Barack Obama -- which Republicans derided as a budget-busting boondoggle.
On trade, jobs and taxes, his first week showed Mr. Trump is keeping his word from the election campaign. While his tough prescriptions could bring better deals for U.S. consumers and taxpayers, they carry large potential downsides.
With trade, the new president’s goal is to reverse the nation’s deficit with the rest of the globe. Now, America imports more goods and services than it exports. His method is as tough as it is straightforward: Renegotiate trade treaties and, failing that, impose high tariffs on imports. Such a confrontational course risks higher prices for U.S. consumers and a disruption of global trade that could harm the U.S. economy.
By the same token, his campaign to increase American job growth could prove enormously costly in terms of the federal deficit and the national debt.
The same trade-off exists for his plan to slash both corporate and personal tax rates: More money would be in pockets for spending, and Washington would be deeper in red ink.
Here’s how Mr. Trump may alter the American economic status quo:
Trade. The president’s fight may be with the world, but he has targeted two key offenders to cross swords with, Mexico and China. He has the power to impose tariffs on both, although the risk is that a mutually ruinous trade war would erupt and imports would be costlier for American consumers.
In his inaugural address, he lambasted what he sees as one-sided trade that harms U.S. workers. “The wealth of our middle class has been ripped from their homes and distributed around the world,” he said.
Last week, Mr. Trump ordered the construction of a massive wall along the U.S. Southern border border, a notion that was a staple of his campaign oratory, and his press secretary floated the idea of a 20 percent tax on imports from Mexico. The president followed that by picking a Twitter fight with Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto that led to a cancellation of their planned meeting.
President Trump pulls the plug on a TPP trade deal
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President Trump pulls the plug on a TPP trade deal
No doubt about it: Mexico sells the U.S. more than it buys from the U.S., to the tune of $61 billion. When the two nations (along with Canada) enacted the North American Free Trade Agreement in 1993, the U.S. has a $1.7 billion surplus with its Southern neighbor. Now Mr. Trump wants to renegotiate the pact, something the Mexicans are not eager to do.
The president has stuck to his campaign trail pledge that he would make Mexico pay for his proposed wall, which is designed to keep its citizens from illegally entering the U.S. However, Mexican politicians and its public don’t want to spend a single peso on such a venture. So lately, Mr. Trump is saying the U.S. will pay to build it and get Mexico to pay up in other ways -- perhaps by using tariff proceeds.
The wall won’t be cheap: up to $25 billion. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimates that amounts to $120 per U.S. household.
Meanwhile, China has long enjoyed a huge trade surplus with the U.S., which has grown from around $84 billion in 2000 to $337 billion in 2015. That’s why Mr. Trump has proposed slapping a tariff on Chinese imports of as much as 45 percent, up from the current 3 percent.
Amid all this, the president made what appears to be a contradictory move: He withdrew the U.S. from the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement. The TPP aimed to reduce trade barriers with seven nations on the other side of the Pacific: Japan, Vietnam, Malaysia, Singapore, Australia, Brunei and New Zealand.
Absent from the pact was China, and many viewed the TPP as a means of containing Beijing’s regional regional economic influence. With the TPP all but dead, China is pursuing its own Asia-Pacific trade agreement, excluding the U.S. from the table. But Mr. Trump is convinced -- as was his Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton -- that the TPP wouldn’t protect American jobs.
Jobs. Since overseas production often is cheaper than in the U.S., many domestic multinationals have an incentive to ship jobs elsewhere. One way Mr. Trump is attacking this situation is by proposing to impose tariffs on U.S. companies that build things in other places, then sell them in the U.S. The other way is to publicly shame employers that send jobs offshore.
Aside from cheaper labor overseas, the motive to ship the jobs out of America is to get a lower tax bill. Washington taxes them far more -- a maximum 35 percent, although with deductions, it’s lower -- than many foreign governments do.
President Trump signs executive orders on trade, abortion, jobs
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President Trump signs executive orders on trade, abortion, jobs
Right now, the U.S. taxes net income for American corporations, regardless of where in the world it is earned. This encourages them to shift production offshore and to keep their profits overseas. For that reason, Mr. Trump wants to lower the U.S. corporate rate.
House Republicans, however, are floating a remedy called a “border adjustment,” which is meant to boost exports and push down imports. The method sounds simple enough: Imports are taxed and exports aren’t.
But then it gets complex. Pantheon Economics’ chief economist Ian Shepherson noted that American businesspeople traveling overseas would be taxed on their expenses. At the same time, he asked, “And how would foreign tourists receive a credit for their spending in, say, U.S. restaurants?” And some import-dependent American companies, like apparel retailers, would be harmed.
As a consequence, Mr. Trump initially rejected the border-adjustment concept as “too complicated.” Then on Thursday, White House chief of staff Reince Priebus said it was part of a “buffet” of options the White House would consider. Where the president and Capitol Hill end up remains to be seen, but Mr. Trump and Republican lawmakers appear eager to do something.
Beyond that, Mr. Trump’s drive to chastise companies that push production overseas has born fruit -- in that several he has criticized have knuckled under. The question is whether one-off attacks, often launched by Mr. Trump on Twitter, will be effective in a vast $19 trillion economy, which would entail zeroing in on hundreds of corporate behemoths.
Large enterprises, which are the ones shipping the jobs out, employ around 60 million American workers, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
Economist Peter Morici, a University of Maryland professor, speaking on National Public Radio, cast doubt on the effectiveness of Mr. Trump’s targeting these companies. “Let’s lean on General Motors. Let’s lean on Carrier. Let’s lean on United Technologies,” he said. “You know, all the deals in the world are not going to give you the kind of turnaround and jobs growth that he needs. For example, 100,000 more jobs a month would mean a hundred deals a month.”
Indeed, the math is daunting. Take Mr. Trump’s announcement Wednesday that Sprint (S) would be bringing 5,000 jobs back to the U.S. over the next 15 months. The U.S. economy in 2016, though, created 6,000 jobs per day.
Taxes. For personal income taxes, Mr. Trump and House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisconsin, both want to lower tax rates and the number of tax brackets, although they differ on some details. The president would cap deductions at $200,000 for a couple. Ryan would end itemized deductions except for charity and mortgage interest.
To be sure, Mr. Trump’s plan, as unveiled during the campaign, would put more money in everyone’s pocket, with wealthier taxpayers benefiting the most. An analysis by the Tax Foundation think tank found that those in the top 1 percent of income would gain as much as 16 percent, and those in the 40 percent-60 percent segment would get only 1.3 percent more. Mr. Trump has disputed that analysis.
CEOs meet with President Trump about regulations and tax cuts
Play VIDEO
CEOs meet with President Trump about regulations and tax cuts
In terms of corporate taxes, the president wants to lower the top rate to 15 percent from the current 35 percent, and Speaker Ryan opts for 20 percent, which he believes would be more fiscally prudent. They also both want to engineer a repatriation of some $2 trillion in U.S multinationals’ profits now stashed oversees, free of the IRS.
Their hope is that the money would flow to building new plants and equipment and to hiring more Americans. The trap here is that the funds might instead end up going to stockholders in the form of higher dividends and share buybacks. That would be an economic stimulus, certainly, yet wouldn’t juice businesses and jobs directly.
The last time a repatriation happened, in 2004, the government charged a special low tax rate of 5.25 percent and, sure enough, the money corporations brought home went mainly to investors.
The one thing that a lower corporate rate would accomplish, said John Maloney, chairman of New York-based M&R Capital Management, is to boost smaller businesses -- which usually aren’t public companies with shareholders and have no overseas operations.
“Small companies are the ones that create most of the jobs,” Maloney said. And they tend to pay higher rates than large corporations, who, thanks to clever uses of deductions and the like, may pay an effective federal tax rate as low as 10 percent. “The small and midsize businesses don’t have the accounting firepower” from expensive law and accounting firms that the big corporations do, he said.
None of this comes cheap. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimates that enactment of Mr. Trump’s plans would add $5.3 trillion to the national debt, pushing it to 105 percent of GDP from 77 percent now. The president’s team has disagreed with that conclusion, saying the economic bonanza from the president’s program would lead to a torrent of new tax revenue.
Whichever is right, the momentum for now seems to be with the Oval Office’s new occupant. And America’s reality may reflect his economic vision, sooner or later.
CBS/AP January 30, 2017, 9:16 AM
Trump's crackdown draws protests, retaliation abroad
Protesters wave placards during a demonstration against U.S. President Donald Trump outside the United States Embassy in London, January 20, 2017 in London, England. GETTY
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LONDON -- President Trump’s suspension of all immigration for citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries for 90 days, and his 120 day suspension on the U.S. refugee program, are drawing increasing fire from around the globe.
Iraq’s lawmakers are hitting back with a ban of their own and more than one million Britons have demanded their government cancel Mr. Trump’s planned state visit to the U.K. later this year.
Foreign relations with Trump thin after controversial actions
Play VIDEO
Foreign relations with Trump thin after controversial actions
Those developments come as American embassies in Europe warn people from the seven affected countries not to bother showing up for U.S. visa appointments, and as the United Nations human rights chief derides Mr. Trump’s moves as illegal under international law.
Mr. Trump’s executive order includes a 90-day ban on travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, and a 120-day suspension of the U.S. refugee program.
While the leaders of some of Europe’s far-right, fringe political groups -- which have gained traction in recent years as the European Union grapples with a refugee crisis and in the wake of several deadly terror attacks in France and elsewhere -- havelauded the moves, the majority reaction from abroad to Mr. Trump’s moves has been negative.
Iraq
Two lawmakers said Monday that the Iraqi parliament had approved a “reciprocity measure” after President Trump’s executive order temporarily banning citizens from Iraq from entering the United States.
Iraqi forces making gains in Mosul
Play VIDEO
Iraqi forces making gains in Mosul
The measure, adopted by lawmakers at a Monday session of parliament, is to apply to Americans entering Iraq.
Lawmakers Kamil al-Ghrairi and Mohammed Saadoun told The Associated Press that the decision is binding for the government. Both said the decision was passed by a majority of votes in favor, but couldn’t offer specific numbers. No further details were available on the wording of the parliamentary decision.
It was also not immediately clear who the ban will apply to -- American military personnel, non-government and aid workers, oil companies and other Americans doing business in Iraq.
It was also not known if and how the Iraqi measure would affect cooperation in the U.S.-backed fight against ISIS militants in Mosul.
Britain
The British government’s plans to honor President Trump with a state visit later this year are sparking increasing opposition following his order on immigration.
A state visit involves lavish pomp and ceremony, often with a stay at Buckingham Palace hosted by Queen Elizabeth II.
What will Europe do after Trump's travel ban?
Play VIDEO
What will Europe do after Trump's travel ban?
The three major opposition parties have all called for the state visit to be canceled and an online petition opposing the trip passed the 1 million signatures mark on Monday.
That far exceeds the 100,000 required to mandate a debate in Parliament. The public petitions, hosted on a government website, do not mandate any action beyond the deliberation in parliament, however, regardless of how many people sign.
Last year Parliament debated whether to ban Mr. Trump, then a candidate, from visiting the United Kingdom after a similar online petition was filed.
United Nations
United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid bin Ra’ad Zeid al-Hussein, who rarely uses Twitter, took to President Trump’s preferred means of communication on Monday to deride the U.S. leader’s immigration and travel crackdown as “forbidden” and “mean-spirited.”
View image on Twitter
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UN Human Rights ✔ @UNHumanRights
"Discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under #humanrights law" - @UNHumanRights Chief #Zeid
6:47 AM - 30 Jan 2017
2,453 2,453 Retweets 3,055 3,055 likes
Al-Hussein, a former Jordanian ambassador to the U.N., said, “discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under human rights law,” and added that, “the U.S. ban is also mean-spirited and wastes resources needed for proper counter-terrorism.”
African Union
Three of the nations whose citizens are now banned from entering the United States are in Africa -- Libya, Sudan and Ethiopia -- prompting the leader of the African Union to warn of “turbulent times” ahead for her continent.
nkosazana-dlamini-zuma-ap-746327892032.jpg
South African politician and anti-apartheid activist Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma speaks at the African Union reception held at the Intercontinental Hotel on Tuesday, May 24, 2016, in Geneva, Switzerland. AP/WHO
“The very country to which many of our people were taken as slaves during the transatlantic slave trade has now decided to ban refugees from some of our countries,” AU commission chief Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma told people gathered from the 54 member states for a summit in Ethiopia’s capital. “What do we do about this? Indeed, this is one of the greatest challenges to our unity and solidarity.”
Border confusion
The U.S. Embassies in London and Berlin have advised people from the seven countries affected by President Donald Trump’s travel ban not to seek a visa, or schedule an appointment - even if they are a dual nationals.
The statement posted on the London embassy’s website on Monday issued the guidance to “aliens from the countries of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.”
It says, “if you are a national, or dual national, of one of these countries, please do not schedule a visa appointment or pay any visa fees at this time.”
There has been widespread confusion about whether the ban applied to dual nationals, but administration officials attempted to clarify later on Sunday that dual nationals and U.S. green card holders, at least, or “lawful permanent residents” as the head of Homeland Security said, would be allowed in after questioning.
Turned away
Air France has blocked 15 passengers from Muslim countries from traveling to the U.S. because they would have been refused entry under President Trump’s new immigration ban.
Air France said in a statement it was informed Saturday by the U.S. government of the new restrictions, and had no choice but to stop the passengers from boarding U.S.-bound flights.
An airline spokeswoman said Monday that the passengers were taken back to their point of departure or otherwise taken care of. She would not provide the passengers’ names, nationalities or other details.
The company earlier had reported that 21 passengers had been turned away, but then corrected its count.
CBS/AP January 30, 2017, 9:16 AM
Trump's crackdown draws protests, retaliation abroad
Protesters wave placards during a demonstration against U.S. President Donald Trump outside the United States Embassy in London, January 20, 2017 in London, England. GETTY
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LONDON -- President Trump’s suspension of all immigration for citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries for 90 days, and his 120 day suspension on the U.S. refugee program, are drawing increasing fire from around the globe.
Iraq’s lawmakers are hitting back with a ban of their own and more than one million Britons have demanded their government cancel Mr. Trump’s planned state visit to the U.K. later this year.
Foreign relations with Trump thin after controversial actions
Play VIDEO
Foreign relations with Trump thin after controversial actions
Those developments come as American embassies in Europe warn people from the seven affected countries not to bother showing up for U.S. visa appointments, and as the United Nations human rights chief derides Mr. Trump’s moves as illegal under international law.
Mr. Trump’s executive order includes a 90-day ban on travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, and a 120-day suspension of the U.S. refugee program.
While the leaders of some of Europe’s far-right, fringe political groups -- which have gained traction in recent years as the European Union grapples with a refugee crisis and in the wake of several deadly terror attacks in France and elsewhere -- havelauded the moves, the majority reaction from abroad to Mr. Trump’s moves has been negative.
Iraq
Two lawmakers said Monday that the Iraqi parliament had approved a “reciprocity measure” after President Trump’s executive order temporarily banning citizens from Iraq from entering the United States.
Iraqi forces making gains in Mosul
Play VIDEO
Iraqi forces making gains in Mosul
The measure, adopted by lawmakers at a Monday session of parliament, is to apply to Americans entering Iraq.
Lawmakers Kamil al-Ghrairi and Mohammed Saadoun told The Associated Press that the decision is binding for the government. Both said the decision was passed by a majority of votes in favor, but couldn’t offer specific numbers. No further details were available on the wording of the parliamentary decision.
It was also not immediately clear who the ban will apply to -- American military personnel, non-government and aid workers, oil companies and other Americans doing business in Iraq.
It was also not known if and how the Iraqi measure would affect cooperation in the U.S.-backed fight against ISIS militants in Mosul.
Britain
The British government’s plans to honor President Trump with a state visit later this year are sparking increasing opposition following his order on immigration.
A state visit involves lavish pomp and ceremony, often with a stay at Buckingham Palace hosted by Queen Elizabeth II.
What will Europe do after Trump's travel ban?
Play VIDEO
What will Europe do after Trump's travel ban?
The three major opposition parties have all called for the state visit to be canceled and an online petition opposing the trip passed the 1 million signatures mark on Monday.
That far exceeds the 100,000 required to mandate a debate in Parliament. The public petitions, hosted on a government website, do not mandate any action beyond the deliberation in parliament, however, regardless of how many people sign.
Last year Parliament debated whether to ban Mr. Trump, then a candidate, from visiting the United Kingdom after a similar online petition was filed.
United Nations
United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid bin Ra’ad Zeid al-Hussein, who rarely uses Twitter, took to President Trump’s preferred means of communication on Monday to deride the U.S. leader’s immigration and travel crackdown as “forbidden” and “mean-spirited.”
View image on Twitter
View image on Twitter
Follow
UN Human Rights ✔ @UNHumanRights
"Discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under #humanrights law" - @UNHumanRights Chief #Zeid
6:47 AM - 30 Jan 2017
2,453 2,453 Retweets 3,055 3,055 likes
Al-Hussein, a former Jordanian ambassador to the U.N., said, “discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under human rights law,” and added that, “the U.S. ban is also mean-spirited and wastes resources needed for proper counter-terrorism.”
African Union
Three of the nations whose citizens are now banned from entering the United States are in Africa -- Libya, Sudan and Ethiopia -- prompting the leader of the African Union to warn of “turbulent times” ahead for her continent.
nkosazana-dlamini-zuma-ap-746327892032.jpg
South African politician and anti-apartheid activist Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma speaks at the African Union reception held at the Intercontinental Hotel on Tuesday, May 24, 2016, in Geneva, Switzerland. AP/WHO
“The very country to which many of our people were taken as slaves during the transatlantic slave trade has now decided to ban refugees from some of our countries,” AU commission chief Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma told people gathered from the 54 member states for a summit in Ethiopia’s capital. “What do we do about this? Indeed, this is one of the greatest challenges to our unity and solidarity.”
Border confusion
The U.S. Embassies in London and Berlin have advised people from the seven countries affected by President Donald Trump’s travel ban not to seek a visa, or schedule an appointment - even if they are a dual nationals.
The statement posted on the London embassy’s website on Monday issued the guidance to “aliens from the countries of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.”
It says, “if you are a national, or dual national, of one of these countries, please do not schedule a visa appointment or pay any visa fees at this time.”
There has been widespread confusion about whether the ban applied to dual nationals, but administration officials attempted to clarify later on Sunday that dual nationals and U.S. green card holders, at least, or “lawful permanent residents” as the head of Homeland Security said, would be allowed in after questioning.
Turned away
Air France has blocked 15 passengers from Muslim countries from traveling to the U.S. because they would have been refused entry under President Trump’s new immigration ban.
Air France said in a statement it was informed Saturday by the U.S. government of the new restrictions, and had no choice but to stop the passengers from boarding U.S.-bound flights.
An airline spokeswoman said Monday that the passengers were taken back to their point of departure or otherwise taken care of. She would not provide the passengers’ names, nationalities or other details.
The company earlier had reported that 21 passengers had been turned away, but then corrected its count.
WHEN TECHNOLOGY STEPS IN, THE RULEMAKERS NEED TO “KEEP UP!”
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-minutes-hidden-magnets-the-next-big-cheat-in-cycling/
Hidden magnets — the next big cheat in cycling?
It's not just about doping anymore. 60 Minutes reports on hidden motors in bikes — and how magnets are being used to reinvent the wheel
BY Overtime Staff
Jan 29, 2017
Cheating in the sport of cycling has reached a “mind-blowing” new level, says 60 Minutes’ Bill Whitaker. There’s evidence that some professional riders are using bikes rigged with small, secret motors during races, a practice known in Europe as “motor-doping.”
Whitaker and a team of 60 Minutes producers went to Budapest to meet Istvan Varjas, the engineer who says he invented the tiny bike motor, which he says has been used surreptitiously in the Tour de France.
What’s more, Varjas says he’s already at work on the next big cheating technology for cyclists: an electromagnetic wheel. (See how it works in the above video.)
ot-motordopingj.jpg
An image of the magnet, in white, being placed into the rim of a bike wheel CBS NEWS
Whitaker and 60 Minutes producers Oriana Zill and Michael Rey met the engineer in a bike shop in Budapest, where he showed the producers his inventions and allowed 60 Minutes cameras to film his souped up bikes in action.
“I didn’t believe it before I saw it or heard it, but I’m totally convinced,” says Whitaker. “You really cannot detect this thing, at least by sight or sound.”
According to Varjas’ design, a small battery-powered motor is hidden inside the frame of a bike and connected to the pedaling system with interlocking gears. When the motor is off, a rider can pedal the bike normally. When the motor is activated, it turns the crank, spinning the pedals for the rider.
Varjas says the motor can be activated in several different ways: The rider can activate a secret switch on the handlebars, a partner can activate the system by wireless remote, or a heart-rate monitor worn by the rider can be programmed to automatically activate the motor when the rider’s heart rate rises to a certain level.
later-motor.jpg
A small, battery-powered motor that can be hidden inside a bicycle’s frame CBS NEWS
Varjas told 60 Minutes he thinks professional cyclists have used secret motors to cheat in pro races as early as 1998. Varjas says he didn’t knowingly sell motors for the purpose of cheating. He told 60 Minutes he just makes the device — what customers do with it is “not my problem.”
Now Varjas is developing the next generation in cheating technology using magnets to, literally, reinvent the wheel. He showed 60 Minutes a model of his latest invention, which appears to have small magnets hidden inside the rim of the rear wheel. Varjas says a battery and electromagnetic coils are also placed in the wheel. When the system is switched on, the electromagnetic coils create a magnetic field, which propels the magnets forward, spinning the wheel faster. Varjas says the system is silent, undetectable even to the rider.
Despite efforts to crack down on doping in cycling, the cheating story isn’t over, says Whitaker. “It’s like Whac-A-Mole,” he says of the cheating problem. “You hit it down over here, it’ll pop up over there.”
The video above was produced by Will Croxton, Ann Silvio, and Lisa Orlando. It was edited by Will Croxton and Lisa Orlando with assistance from Sarah Shafer Prediger, Rebecca Chertok Gonsalves and Susan Bieber.
Documentary footage from “Moteurs, ca roule!” courtesy of of Stade 2 - France Télévisions - report Thierry Vildary.
Bicycle animations created by David Rosen/CBS News.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-minutes-investigates-hidden-motors-and-pro-cycling/
60 Minutes investigates hidden motors and pro cycling
Bill Whitaker investigates whether pro cyclists have used secret bike motors to win races -- like the Tour de France -- in a sport notorious for its culture of cheating
CORRESPONDENT Bill Whitaker
Jan 29, 2017
The following script is from “Enhancing the Bike,” which aired on Jan. 29, 2017. Bill Whitaker is the correspondent. Michael Rey and Oriana Zill de Granados, producers.
The sport of cycling is notorious for its culture of cheating—made most famous by the rise and fall of Lance Armstrong and his use of performance-enhancing drugs. Now when cycling hopes to be cleansed of the dopers there’s a surprising new twist—riders enhancing the bike’s performance. Some professional racers aren’t putting steroids and blood boosters in their veins they’re hiding motors in their bike frames. We followed a lead to Budapest, Hungary, and met an engineer who said he built the first secret bike motor back in 1998. And he told us motors have been used in the Tour de France. Our story tonight is not about the latest drugs the riders are using to cheat…it’s all about enhancing the bike.
Hidden magnets -- the next big cheat in cycling?60 MINUTES OVERTIME
Hidden magnets -- the next big cheat in cycling?
Bill Whitaker: Where is the motor in here?
Stefano Varjas: It’s in here.
In a bike shop in Budapest, Hungary, we met Istvan Varjas. Stefano, as he’s known, is a former cyclist, a businessman and a scientist. His most important invention he placed inside this bike. The frame is fitted with a small motor he designed. Add to it a lithium battery that powers it and a secret button that he installed.
enhancingbike-main.jpg
Engineer Istvan “Stefano” Varjas and 60 Minutes correspondent Bill Whitaker CBS NEWS
Stefano Varjas: This is first speed.
Bill Whitaker: Uh. Huh.
Stefano Varjas: Try to keep the pace.
Bill Whitaker: Wow!
The sound is mostly the chain and the wheels. He said you can’t hear it on the road and all of his motor designs use brushless motors and military-grade metal alloys.
Bill Whitaker: And how does this work?
This is now the latest version of his hidden motor design.
Bill Whitaker: Unbelievable…
It can be connected to a heart rate monitor by remote control. When a riders heart beat gets too high it sends a signal for the motor to kick in.
We took his hidden motors for some test rides up in the hills above Budapest.
Bill Whitaker: This is like I’m on flat ground.
bill-on-bike.jpg
Bill Whitaker rides a bike with a hidden motor in the hills above Budapest, Hungary. CBS NEWS
It was hard to believe it’s real until I put my feet on the pedals. Harder to believe when I took them off the pedals…
Bill Whitaker: “Hello.”
And still beat the local talent. As you can tell it’s not like a moped. There’s no exhaust pipe or revving engine noise. It’s designed to give a short but powerful boost to the rider’s own effort.
Bill Whitaker: So this is a lower gear or a higher gear?
Stefano Varjas sells complete motorized bikes to wealthy recreational riders for about $20,000. But we went to Budapest to find out who else might have bought a silent, hidden motor for a racing bike.
Bill Whitaker: Do you know, are professionals using bikes like these on a professional tour?
Stefano Varjas: This one, no. This on --
Bill Whitaker: But bikes with motors?
Stefano Varjas: Yes. I know-- I know this.
Bill Whitaker: They are?
Stefano Varjas: They use, yes.
Suspicions of hidden motors are fueled by videos of riders crashing in races. This bike seems to move by itself without the rider.
And the first time anyone suspected they were looking at a motor was in 2010 when a famed Swiss racer sped ahead of the pack at unnatural speeds.
These riders all denied they were using motors and no one had ever been caught until last year. Race officials suspended this Belgian rider after they found a motor inside her spare bike.
Jean-Pierre Verdy is the former testing director for the French Anti-Doping Agency who investigated doping in the Tour de France for 20 years.
Bill Whitaker: Have there been motors used in the Tour de France?
Jean-Pierre Verdy: Yes, of course. It’s been the last three to four years when I was told about the use of the motors. And in 2014, they told me there are motors. And they told me, there’s a problem. By 2015, everyone was complaining and I said, something’s got to be done.
Verdy said he’s been disturbed by how fast some riders are going up the mountains. As a doping investigator, he relied for years on informants among the team managers and racers in the peloton, the word for the pack of riders. These people told Jean-Pierre Verdy that about 12 racers used motors in the 2015 Tour de France.
Bill Whitaker: The bikers who use motors, what do you think of them and what they’re doing to cycling?
Jean-Pierre Verdy:They’re hurting their sport. But human nature is like that. Man has always tried to find that magic potion.
He now thinks that magic potion is a motor like the one designed by Stefano Varjas.
Bill Whitaker: Are you selling your motors to pro peloton now?
Stefano Varjas: Never, ever.
Bill Whitaker: Never, ever?
Stefano Varjas: Never, ever. But I don’t know, if a grandfather came and buy a bike and after it’s go to finishing his grandson who is racing, it’s not my problem.
Bill Whitaker: It sounds like plausible deniability, which means my fingerprints aren’t on this when it ends up in the bike of a professional. I just sold it to a client. What the client did with it--
Stefano Varjas: Is their problem.
Bill Whitaker: --I don’t know--
Stefano Varjas: It’s not my problem.
Bill Whitaker: So if someone came to you and said directly, “I wanna use your invention to cheat. I’ll pay you a lot of money for it,” would you sell it to them?
Stefano Varjas: If the money is big, why not?
He said he got his first big money in 1998 when a friend saw his hidden motor prototype and thought he could sell it to a professional racer.
Bill Whitaker: So your friend said, “With all this doping going on, you’re-- you’re crazy not to try to sell your invention--”
Stefano Varjas: Exactly. And--
Bill Whitaker: “--to these professional--”
Stefano Varjas: He proposed me--
Bill Whitaker: “--racers”?
Stefano Varjas: He proposed me, “Give me this bike and I fix it up, your life.” And it’s happened.
He told us his friend found a buyer in 1998 and Stefano swears he has no idea who it was. He gave us this bank record that shows that he had about $2 million at the time. We also know that he spent time in jail for not paying a substantial tax bill in Hungary. He said whoever paid him all that money wanted an exclusive deal—he couldn’t work on the motor, sell it or talk about it for 10 years.
Bill Whitaker: And you were OK with that?
Stefano Varjas: For 10 years. $2 millions-- if you are in Hungary, if you live in Hungary, if you-- they offer you $2 million to don’t do nothing--
Bill Whitaker: You couldn’t refuse it?
Stefano Varjas: Can you refuse it? I don’t think.
Bill Whitaker: So you believe that hidden motors have been used by professional cyclists since as far back as 1998?
Stefano Varjas: I think, yes.
In France, where cycling is a religion, the newspaper Le Monde said this past December that the timeline of Stefano’s story might implicate Lance Amstrong. Armstrong won his first of seven Tour de France victories in 1999, just a year after Stefano Varjas’ said he sold his first motor. Armstrong denied to the paper ever meeting Stefano in person or putting a motor in his bike.
We asked Armstrong too through his lawyer and he denied ever using a motor and declined an interview.
hamilton.jpg
Former U.S. Postal Service team cyclist Tyler Hamilton and 60 Minutes correspondent Bill Whitaker CBS NEWS
We contacted Armstrong’s former teammate Tyler Hamilton who has admitted to being part of all the chemical doping by members of the U.S. Postal team. And Tyler told us he never knew of any motors on the team back then.
In order to demonstrate the motors existed as far back as 1998, Stefano Varjas suggested to us that we find a carbon fiber 1999 U.S. Postal Service team bike, the same bike the U.S. Postal team used in the 1999 Tour de France. We bought this bike off the Internet and he installed a motor based on his first design into the bike. He charged us $12,000, saying that covered his costs for the parts and labor.
We then asked Hamilton to test out the bike.
Bill Whitaker: You could feel the difference?
Tyler Hamilton: Oh yeah, oh, yeah. It’s not super obvious. You know, you-- all of a sudden, you’re just like, “Ah.”
Bill Whitaker: It seems easier?
Tyler Hamilton: It feels a little bit smoother, yeah. Yeah.
Bill Whitaker: So you could see how somebody could get away with it?
Tyler Hamilton: I could see how teams are doing it. Yeah. I could.
The motor gives a limited boost of power for about 20 minutes. Tyler Hamilton said that much motorized assistance during a race on a mountain road could be a game changer for a professional rider.
Bill Whitaker: What kind of benefit could this motor give a cyclist?
Tyler Hamilton: That’s the difference between winning and losing for sure. For sure.
“I guess we shoulda known this was coming, you know? ‘Cause, I mean, there’s more pressure in today’s cycling world than ever to win.” Tyler Hamilton
Few riders know that better than Tyler Hamilton. When he spoke to 60 Minutes in 2011, he was one of the first to talk openly about chemical doping in the sport. He said riders have always looked for ways to stay ahead of the authorities.
Tyler Hamilton: They’d find-- you know, for a while, they didn’t have an EPO test. EPO increases your red blood cell production. When the new tests came out, you’d figure out new ways around them.
tylermain.jpg
Former U.S. Postal Service team cyclist Tyler Hamilton CBS NEWS
Tyler Hamilton: I guess we shoulda known this was coming, you know? ‘Cause, I mean, there’s more pressure in today’s cycling world than ever to win.
During this car ride in Hungary with Stefano Varjas we listened as he talked on the phone with one of his clients about delivering some new motorized bikes. He said he was speaking to this man, Dr. Michele Ferrari. Ferrari is the man behind the doping programs of Lance Armstrong and other top cyclists. He has been banned from the sport of cycling.
Still Stefano Varjas told us that Ferrari bought bikes with hidden motors in the past three years. We spoke to Dr. Ferrari by phone and he denied buying motorized bikes from Stefano but said he has tested one.
Three-time Tour de France winner Greg LeMond and his wife Kathy first learned about hidden motors in 2014 when Greg met Stefano Varjas in Paris and took a test ride. Greg was outspoken about chemical doping and now has the same level of concern about the motors.
gregandkathy.jpg
Three-time Tour de France winner Greg LeMond and his wife, Kathy CBS NEWS
Greg LeMond: I’ve watched-- last couple years-- and I’m going I know the motor’s still in the sport and--
Bill Whitaker: You know it is still in the sport?
Greg LeMond: Yeah. Yeah. There’s always a few bad apples and-- because it’s a lotta money.
He is so concerned about it that while working as a broadcaster at the Tour de France he and his wife worked secretly with the French police investigating the motors. His best source it turns out was Stefano Varjas.
Kathy LeMond: I asked Stefano if he would please come and talk to the French police.
Bill Whitaker: Did he? Is he cooperating with the police?
Kathy LeMond: Completely.
Stefano said he told the French police that just before the 2015 Tour de France he again sold motorized bikes to an unknown client through a middleman. He said he was directed to deliver the bikes to a locked storage room in the town of Beaulieu Sur Mer, France.
Stefano Varjas told us that in addition to the motors in the bike frames, he’s designed a motor that can be hidden inside the hub of the back wheel seen here in a video he gave us.
Kathy LeMond: Stefano had said, “Weigh the wheels. You’ll find the wheels. The wheels are in the peloton.”
According to Varjas the enhanced wheels weigh about 800 grams—or 1.7 pounds more than normal wheels.
Bill Whitaker: You could detect it by weight?
Greg LeMond: Yeah. Cycling weight is everything. Your body, your bike. If your bike weighs a kilo more, you would never race on it.
“This is curable. This is fixable. I don’t trust it until they figure out how to take the motor out. I won’t trust any victories of the Tour de France.” Greg LeMond
In the 2015 Tour de France, bikes in the peloton were weighed before one of the time trial stages. French authorities told us the British Team Sky was the only team with bikes heavier than the rest—each bike weighed about 800 grams more. A spokesman for Team Sky said that during a time trial stage bikes might be heavier to allow for better aerodynamic performance. He said the team has never used mechanical assistance and that the bikes were checked and cleared by the sports governing body.
A heavy bike doesn’t prove anything on its own but to Greg LeMond the weight difference should have set off alarm bells. In this case, sources told us, the sport’s governing body would not allow French investigators to remove the Team Sky wheels and weigh them separately to determine if the wheels were enhanced. LeMond said not enough is being done by the International Cycling Union to prevent cheating with motors.
Greg LeMond: This is curable. This is fixable. I don’t trust it until they figure out how to take the motor out. I won’t trust any victories of the Tour de France.
SERIAL KILLER
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/jessica-runions-missing-crews-looking-for-missouri-woman-find-2nd-mans-body/
Crews looking for missing Missouri woman find 2nd body in 2 weeks
By CRIMESIDER STAFF AP
January 30, 2017, 10:56 AM
Photograph -- Jessica Runions KCTV
KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- For the second straight week, people searching for a missing Missouri woman have found a man’s body.
Relatives of Jessica Runions found the man’s body while searching in fields and brush along a roadway Saturday in southeast Kansas City, Missouri. Police said the discovery was being investigated as a suspicious death, but no details have been released.
Police said Sunday they hope to identify the body soon.
The Kansas City Star reports that Runions’ relatives have been searching for the 21-year-old woman nearly every week since she went missing in early September.
Last week, they found a man’s decomposing body in a creek bed. He was later identified as a 21-year-old man also from Raytown, just southeast of Kansas City, who was reported missing in November. His death is being investigated as a homicide.
“Two bodies two weeks in a row?” said her father, John Runions. “It’s unbelievable. ... We’re not going to stop looking until we find her. And if we find other people along the way, that’s good. Families deserve closure.”
yust2.jpg
Kylr Yust KCTV
Jessica Runions was last seen leaving a gathering of friends in south Kansas City. Her burned vehicle was found two days later in a nearby wooded area.
Kylr Yust has been charged with burning her vehicle, and a judge entered a not guilty plea on his behalf.
Police have said Yust also has been questioned in the 2007 disappearance of an ex-girlfriend, Kara Kopetsky, who was 17 when she went missing. Kopetsky went went missing just days after filing for a protection order against Yust.
Yust hasn’t been charged in either disappearance.
PROPAGANDISTS AND AUTHORITARIANS –
Before their discussion ended, Todd asked Conway if it's "a political tactic to come up with 'alternative facts' and try to set up the press as your enemy." Conway replied, "no, I didn't say that at all."
http://money.cnn.com/2017/01/22/media/alternative-facts-donald-trump/index.html
'Alternative facts:' Why the Trump team is 'planting a flag' in war on media
by Brian Stelter @brianstelter
January 22, 2017: 7:42 PM ET
VIDEO – Reliable Sources: “Are Alternative Facts Really Facts?”
Related: White House press secretary attacks media for accurately reporting inauguration crowds
The alternative to "facts" is "fictions."
But President Trump's special adviser Kellyanne Conway proposed something new on Sunday: "alternative facts."
The strange phrase entered the lexicon when Conway told NBC's Chuck Todd that the numerous misstatements in press secretary Sean Spicer's angry statement to reporters Saturday were actually "alternative facts."
The phrase called into the question Conway's understanding of the word "facts" and caused widespread mockery on Sunday.
But Conway's remarks were reflective of something real -- a new administration which feels, on day three, that it is already under siege from unfair reporters. Trump himself spoke about his "running war with the media" on Saturday.
Spicer, Conway and other Trump aides are "planting a flag, saying they're not going to tolerate this," a longtime Trump aide told CNN on condition of anonymity.
The aide blasted alleged media "obsessions," using some of the exact same language Trump chief of staff Reince Priebus used on "Fox News Sunday."
"I'm saying there's an obsession by the media to delegitimize this president, and we are not going to sit around and let it happen," Priebus said on Fox. "We are going to fight back tooth and nail every day, and twice on Sunday."
The administration's view, according to the source, is that journalists have seized on Trump's popular vote loss; intelligence community findings regarding Russian interference in the election; and inauguration crowd size counts, all in order to "delegitimize" the new president.
Newsroom leaders strongly reject this suggestion.
"The president may feel he's at war with the media. 'The media' is just honest men and women trying to do their jobs," NPR head of news Michael Oreskes said on CNN's "Reliable Sources."
Spicer said at least five things that are not true during the five minutes that his angry statement lasted on Saturday. His false claim about Trump having the biggest inauguration audience ever, "period," came under severe scrutiny on the Sunday morning news shows and online. Meanwhile, Spicer had no further comment on the controversy.
Todd, the moderator of "Meet the Press," was startled by Conway's "alternative facts" explanation.
"Alternative facts are not facts. They're falsehoods," he said to her.
At one point in the interview, when Todd brought up "falsehoods," Conway said he was being "overly dramatic."
Before their discussion ended, Todd asked Conway if it's "a political tactic to come up with 'alternative facts' and try to set up the press as your enemy."
Conway replied, "no, I didn't say that at all."
But to a lot of journalists, that's exactly what it sounds like.
The presentation of "alternative facts" undermines the media's reporting of reality in a way that decreases public trust in the media -- and in facts.
The administration's tactics in its first days, coupled with Conway's invocation of "alternative facts," has observers worried that one of the ways it will "fight back" is to simply deny that two plus two equals four.
"Alternative facts" is "a George Orwell phrase," Washington Post reporter Karen Tumulty said, referring to the science fiction novel "1984."
"This brings us to '1984' doublethink, where war is really peace, where famine is really plenty. That's what's happening here," political historian Allan Lichtman said on CNN Sunday afternoon.
The phrase was a top trending topic on Twitter during the day. Some people made jokes while others took it very seriously.
"'Alternative facts' is a euphemism of propagandists and authoritarians. The new White House administration is full of both. Actual facts," MTV's Jamil Smith tweeted.
The Merriam-Webster dictionary even tweaked Conway by tweeting out the definition of a "fact."
"May I say that we teach no courses in our journalism program about alternative facts," Frank Sesno, the director of the school and media public affairs at the George Washington University, said on CNN's "Reliable Sources."
"We will flunk you if you use alternative facts," he added.
Oreskes said Conway's "alternative facts" comments are symbolic of a larger "struggle going on in the world right now."
"There are people who understand that if you can create a different understanding of reality, you can actually change politics or anything else you want to deal with," he said.
The administration is likely not all that upset with the discussion it's started among the press about the truth and its flaunting of it. The Trump aide, speaking on condition of anonymity, pointed out a fringe benefit of the administration's media complaints: "By going out and doing this, it took images of people protesting off the TV."
http://www.theblaze.com/news/2017/01/29/watch-reince-priebus-shuts-down-nbc-meet-the-press-host-during-contentious-interview/
Watch: Reince Priebus shuts down NBC ‘Meet the Press’ host during contentious interview
Chris Enloe 2 hours
January 29, 2017
Photographs -- Reince Priebus on "Meet the Press." (Image source: NBC News)
White House chief of staff Reince Priebus got into a contentious interview with NBC News host Chuck Todd during an interview on “Meet the Press” Sunday over a discussion on President Donald Trump’s recent executive order on immigration.
Todd came out of the gate and pressed Priebus over why the administration didn’t implement a 72-hour “grace period” with their executive order to ensure that airport detainments didn’t happen and that any refugee in transit to the U.S. with a valid U.S. visa would be able to safely arrive stateside.
Priebus replied by saying that terrorists would exploit the grace period, which is why it’s better to just “rip off the band-aid,” Priebus said.
Todd continued to press Priebus on the details of the executive order, which, signed by Trump on Friday, temporarily halts the U.S. refugee resettlement program for 120 days and temporarily bars people from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S.
Todd inquired why the executive order also applied to green card holders from those countries, which are legal U.S. residents. The policy was condemned in the media over the weekend, but Priebus explained that those seven countries — Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Sudan and Somalia — were actually identified by the Obama administration as the seven most dangerous countries that harbor terrorism.
“This is something that 75 to 80 percent of Americans out there agree with,” Priebus said. “We don’t want people traveling back and forth to one of these seven countries that harbor terrorists to be traveling freely back and forth between the United States and those countries.”
After some back-and-forth, Todd began grilling Priebus over the constitutionality of adding another “hurdle” for green card holders to jump over when traveling out of the U.S. But when Priebus attempted to answer, Todd kept interrupting him.
“If you had just slowed down for a second and listen, I could answer your question,” Priebus said.
“You’ve twice confused me so I’m just trying to understand the clarity,” Todd shot back.
“It’s because you don’t stop talking, Chuck,” Priebus snapped. “Let me answer the question.”
The duo continued to argue back-and-forth over green card holders and Trump’s executive order. Todd also grilled Priebus over why Saudi Arabia and Pakistan weren’t included in the list of countries whose people would be temporarily banned from entering the U.S.
“Perhaps other countries need to be added,” Priebus said. “But this is all done for the protection of Americans.”
Priebus explained that the seven countries in the executive order were targeted first because they have been identified multiple times by Congress and the Obama administration as being the countries that pose the great threat to American in terms of terrorism.
Watch the full interview below: on video of the show.
