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USA Today:As a memorial service next week for Jordan Neely is being organized, his killer Daniel Penny awaits trial, where prosecutors will seek a grand jury indictment on a charge of manslaughter.On Friday, Penny was arrested less than 24 hours after Manhattan prosecutors announced the charge of manslaughter, and then he was released on bond.The 24-year-old could face up to 15 years in prison for administering a fatal chokehold on Neely, a 30-year-old Black man experiencing homelessness, on May 1 after an altercation on board the subway.In the days following Neely's death, New York police failed to release substantial details about what happened on board the subway car leading up to the chokehold, as well as what happened in the minutes leading up to the arrival of police.A medical examiner ruled Neely's death a homicide caused by depression of the neck.Lawyers for Penny, a white U.S. Marine Corps veteran, say he acted in self-defense.Bystanders on board the subway on May 1 have said Neely did not physically assault anyone in the moments leading up to Penny grabbing him from behind, lawyers say.What charges is Daniel Penny facing?Nearly two weeks after administering a fatal chokehold on Neely, prosecutors announced Penny would be charged with second degree manslaughter.On Friday, lawyer Lennon Edwards said the Manhattan district attorney "admitted" to him he could not recall a single other instance in the past 25 years where a suspect in a death case was released from custody after police secured a confession and video evidence, as in the case of Penny."He should have been arrested on the spot," the day of the incident, said Edwards, a lawyer for Neely's family.On Friday, a judge authorized Pennyâs release on $100,000 bond and ordered him to surrender his passport and not to leave New York without approval.Edwards said the district attorney had told Neely's father this week to expect a possible indictment in June.
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Yahoo News: CNNâs highly anticipated town hall with Donald Trump on Wednesday night renewed long-standing questions about how to cover the former president without simply allowing him to peddle falsehoods on a national platform. Those questions are becoming more urgent as Trumpâs campaign recovers from last Novemberâs lackluster rollout of a new White House campaign.Hosted by anchor Kaitlan Collins, a former White House reporter and a rising star at the network, the event came as Trump appeared to be consolidating his position as the GOP frontrunner. In the audience sat undecided voters from New Hampshire, a crucial early-primary state.But there was little effort from the former president to demonstrate that he had been chastened by his loss in 2020 and was intent on running a more disciplined campaign in 2024.Instead, he engaged in his usual lies about his loss to Joe Biden while also mocking the judgment against him earlier this week in a Manhattan sexual assault civil suit brought by writer E. Jean Carroll. He claimed that he could end the war in Ukraine within 24 hours and suggested that the way to prevent school shootings was to arm teachers.And for good measure, he insulted Collins, calling her a ânasty person.âQuestions about CNNâs judgment Eight years after Trump launched his first presidential campaign, the question of how to cover the master of attention-getting remains unresolved. He is clearly not the sideshow that some dismissed him as in 2015 (he did, after all, win the presidency in 2016), but in the wake of the Jan. 6, 2021, deadly riot at the U.S. Capitol, there are legitimate questions about how to properly cover a candidate routinely given to make incendiary statements, not to mention transparently false ones.CNN chief executive Chris Licht has been intent on making the network more appealing to moderates and even conservatives since the Trump presidency, and Wednesday nightâs town hall was clearly an effort to appeal to voters who might otherwise have tuned in to Fox News.But to some, simply letting Trump peddle falsehoods was a disservice to the political process. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., said on Twitter that âCNN should be ashamed of themselves,â while Democratic strategist Simon Rosenberg called on Licht to resign.
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William Maher (/mÉËr/; born January 20, 1956) is an American comedian, writer, producer, political commentator, actor, and television host. He is known for the HBO political talk show Real Time with Bill Maher (2003âpresent) and the similar late-night show called Politically Incorrect (1993â2002), originally on Comedy Central and later on ABC. In 2022, Maher started the podcast Club Random.Maher is known for his political satire and sociopolitical commentary. He targets many topics including religion, political correctness, and the mass media. His critical views of religion were the basis for his 2008 documentary film Religulous. He is a supporter of animal rights, having served on the board of PETA since 1997, and is an advisory board member of Project Reason. Maher supports the legalization of cannabis, serving on the advisory board of NORML.Maher is a frequent commentator on various cable news networks, including CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, and HLN. Maher has regularly appeared on CNN's The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer and has also been a frequent guest on MSNBC's Hardball with Chris Matthews, The Rachel Maddow Show, and Countdown with Keith Olbermann. Maher has also appeared as a guest on HLN's The Joy Behar Show. He wrote the foreword for the 2002 book, Spin This!: All the Ways We Don't Tell the Truth by show host Bill Press.Maher hosted the January 13, 2006, edition of Larry King Live, on which he was a frequent guest. Maher appeared as a special guest on the June 29, 2010, edition of the show, on which CNN anchor Larry King announced his retirement. Maher co-emceed the final show of Larry King Live on December 16, 2010, with Ryan Seacrest.
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Time:In a matter of minutes on Monday, the face of cable news changed dramatically. First, Fox News reported that it had âparted waysâ with Tucker Carlson, the host of the conservative cable news networkâs hit 8 p.m. show Tucker Carlson Tonight. Then, just as the Succession memes started flowing, longtime CNN host Don Lemon posted a note on Twitter informing followers that heâd just heard, via his agent, that the network was firing him. (CNN has since disputed that characterization, tweeting that Lemon âwas offered an opportunity to meet with management but instead released a statement on Twitter.â)Itâs tempting to lump together these two departures, considering that they were announced almost simultaneously. (Lemon was open about his termination, whereas Carlsonâs exit was publicly framed as a mutual decision. A source at Fox confirmed to TIME that the decision was not a financial one and suggested that Carlson was likely surprised by the decision, given his signoff on Fridayâs show, but would not provide further comment.) Carlson and Lemon have something else in common, too: both men are controversial, and have faced backlash from the media and the public as well as their co-workers. The Fox News star leans into his role as a provocateur, promoting a right-wing agenda that barely bothers to conceal its grounding in racism, sexism, xenophobia, conspiracy thinking, religious intolerance, and hatred of the LGBTQ community. His less inflammatory CNN counterpart, meanwhile, has been mired in accusations of misogyny and bad behavior on set. But it would be a mistake to read their tandem dismissals as some righteous act on the part of cable news media writ large to purge itself of toxic men. The cases have important differences, though both will surely impact how TV covers the 2024 presidential election.Of the two, Lemon was the much more obvious candidate for replacement. As he put it on Twitter on Monday morning: âIt is clear that there are some larger issues in play.â As anyone whoâs been following his career recently will remember, one salient issue is Lemon himself. This past February, the CNN This Morning co-anchor came under fire for calling 51-year-old Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley over the hill. âNikki Haley isnât in her prime, sorry,â Lemon told his female co-hosts. âWhen a woman is considered to be in her primeâin her 20s, 30s, and maybe her 40s.â Further reporting turned up allegations that Lemon had a long history of behavior that Variety characterized as painting âa picture of a journalist who flouted rules and cozied up to power all while displaying open hostility to many female co-workers.â
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New York Times/Yahoo News:Dominion Voting Systems did more on Tuesday than settle its lawsuit against Fox News for $787.5 million: It also set the tone for the many related defamation cases it has filed.Legal experts say the settlement with Fox News, one of the largest defamation payouts in American history, could embolden Dominion as it continues to defend its reputation, which it says was savaged by conspiracy theories about vote fraud during the 2020 election. The company has several cases pending against public figures including Mike Lindell, the MyPillow executive, and news outlets such as Newsmax.The targets of Dominionâs remaining lawsuits, few of which have deep pockets and legal firepower at Foxâs level, will likely take a cue from Dominion and Foxâs faceoff, legal experts said.Sign up for The Morning newsletter from the New York TimesâEven though it was a settlement, it certainly was a victory for Dominion,â said Margaret M. Russell, a law professor at Santa Clara University. âFor other possible defendants, I donât think this will make them double down; it will make them fearful.âDominion is the second-largest election technology company operating in the United States, where there are few other major players. The company, whose majority owner is the private equity firm Staple Street Capital, was made âtoxicâ by the false fraud narratives in 2020, one of Staple Streetâs founders said in court documents. At one point, Dominion estimated that misinformation cost it $600 million in profits.Fox said in its court filings that Dominion did not have to lay off employees, close offices or default on any debts, nor did it suffer any canceled business contracts as a result of the news networkâs coverage. Fox said in one filing that Dominion had projected $98 million in revenue for 2022, which would make Tuesdayâs settlement the equivalent of eight years of sales...
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Russia Today:
Paris is an ally and not a âvassalâ of Washington, French President Emmanuel Macron insisted on Wednesday. He was defending his recent comments about the EU needing âstrategic autonomyâ in the face of rising tensions between the US and China.
âBeing an ally does not mean being a vassal... doesnât mean that we donât have the right to think for ourselves,â Macron said in Amsterdam at a joint press conference with Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte.
Asked for the French position on Taiwan, Macron said Paris supports the status quo, meaning the âOne China policy and the search for a peaceful resolution to the situation.â
Returning from his trip to China on Sunday, Macron argued that the EU canât just be âAmericaâs followers,â and that it is not in the blocâs interest to stoke tensions over Taiwan. âThe worst thing would be to think that we Europeans must become followers on this topic and take our cue from the US agenda and a Chinese overreaction,â he told reporters.
The remarks earned a swift rebuke from US Senator Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican on the foreign affairs committee, who suggested Washington might leave the EU to handle the Ukraine conflict by itself.
Taiwanese Parliament Speaker You Si-kun on Tuesday argued that France had forsaken its motto of âliberty, equality, fraternityâ, and that advanced democracies should not âignore the lives and deaths of people in other countries,â adding that Macronâs comments left him âpuzzled.â
Meanwhile, French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said that Macron was âperfectly right to demand European independence and sovereignty,â while the president of the European Council, Charles Michel, noted that âquite a fewâ leaders of EU countries think like Macron, even though they âwouldnât say things the same way.â
When asked about the French presidentâs comments on Monday, the US State Department said France is a long-standing ally and that occasional disagreements do not detract from the âdeep partnershipâ with Paris. As for the EU position, a State Department spokesman cited a recent speech by the blocâs president, Ursula von der Leyen, which described China as âa national and economic security threat,â and said there is âimmense convergenceâ between Washington and Brussels on the matter. -
Firstpost:The US dollar has been the official currency for international trade for years now. However, in recent times there has been talk of creating a new currency in an attempt to dump the dollar and push back against American hegemony.This de-dollarisation has received a boost in recent times, especially after the Russia-Ukraine war began last February. And last week, this movement received further impetus when Alexander Babakov, the deputy chairman of the State Duma, was quoted as saying that the BRICS nations are in the process of creating a new medium for payments â established on a strategy that âdoes not defend the dollar or euroâ.Is the BRICS nations actually creating a new currency for trade? Whoâs at the forefront of this movement? Will it benefit India? Will the plan actually fructify? There are several questions to this issue and we try to answer them all.Dethroning the king of currencyThe US dollar has been called the king of currency. It became the official reserve currency of the world in 1944. The decision was made by a delegation from 44 Allied countries called the Bretton Woods Agreement.Since then, the dollar has enjoyed a powerful status in the world. It has given the US a disproportionate amount of influence over other economies. In fact, the US has for long used imposition of sanctions as a tool to achieve foreign policy goals.However, not everybody likes playing by US rules and countries like Russia and China would like to call a halt to dollar hegemony. This process is called de-dollarisation â and it refers to reducing the dollarâs dominance in global markets. It is a process of substituting the US dollar as the currency used for trading oil and/or other commodities.The proponents of de-dollarisation say that this process would reduce other countriesâ dependence on the US dollar and the US economy, which could help mitigate the impact of economic and political changes in the US on their own economies. Moreover, countries can reduce their exposure to currency fluctuations and interest rate changes, which can help to improve economic stability and reduce the risk of financial crises.This move has been gaining speed in the last few years, especially in the previous year. In 2022, the International Monetary Fund noted that central banks today are not holding the greenback as reserves in the same quantities as yesteryear.âThe dollarâs share of global foreign-exchange reserves fell below 59 per cent in the final quarter of last year, extending a two-decade decline, according to the IMFâs Currency Composition of Official Foreign Exchange Reserves data,â the paper stated. âStrikingly, the decline in the dollarâs share has not been accompanied by an increase in the shares of the pound sterling, yen and euro, other long-standing reserve currencies⊠Rather, the shift out of dollars has been in two directions: a quarter into the Chinese renminbi, and three quarters into the currencies of smaller countries that have played a more limited role as reserve currencies.âTo punish Russia for its invasion of Ukraine, western governments froze $300 billion of Russiaâs foreign currency reserves last year, roughly half the total, and expelled Russian banks from the Swift international payments system.
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Al Jazeera: Tensions in Jerusalem have flared after Israeli police attacked worshippers in the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound overnight during the holy month of Ramadan.
The raids continued until Wednesday morning when Israeli forces were once again seen assaulting and pushing Palestinians out of the compound and preventing them from praying â before Israelis were allowed in under police protection.What happened in Al-Aqsa compound?
Before dawn on Wednesday, Israeli police stormed the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem, attacking dozens of worshippers in the Qibli Mosque.
Israeli police, who claimed they were responding to âriotingâ, beat worshippers with batons and used tear gas and sound bombs to force them out of the prayer halls, according to witnesses.Videos shared on social media showed women screaming for help as a small fire erupted in the prayer hall.
The Palestinian Red Crescent reported 12 people injured, including three who were taken to hospital. It also said in a statement that Israeli forces prevented its medics from reaching Al-Aqsa.At least 400 Palestinians were arrested and remain in Israeli custody, according to local officials.
Why would armed security forces enter a mosque?
Israeli police said in a statement that they were forced to enter the compound after âmasked agitatorsâ locked themselves inside the mosque with fireworks, sticks and stones.
âWhen the police entered, stones were thrown at them and fireworks were fired from inside the mosque by a large group of agitators,â the statement said, adding that a police officer was wounded in the leg.
The Israeli police also said that according to a prior agreement with the Al-Aqsa compound authorities, no one was to spend the night inside the compound during the month of Ramadan.
âThe police said they âpeacefullyâ tried to convince people to leave but when that didnât happen they forced their way into Al-Aqsa,â said Al Jazeeraâs Natasha Ghoneim.But Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh condemned what happened as âa major crime against the worshippersâ, adding that âprayer in Al-Aqsa Mosque is not with the permission of the [Israeli] occupation ⊠it is our right.â
âAl-Aqsa is for the Palestinians and for all Arabs and Muslims, and the raiding of it is a spark of revolution against the occupation,â he added. -
A Manhattan grand jury has indicted former President Donald Trump, making him the first current or former president to face criminal charges.It was not immediately clear what the indictment was connected to, or what charges Trump will face. The indictment is under seal.In a statement released Thursday evening, a spokesperson for the Manhattan district attorney's office said, "This evening we contacted Mr. Trump's attorney to coordinate his surrender to the Manhattan D.A.'s Office for arraignment on a Supreme Court indictment, which remains under seal. Guidance will be provided when the arraignment date is selected."Trump is expected to surrender in New York early next week, sources familiar with the matter tell ABC News.Speaking to ABC News, Trump called the indictment "political persecution" and "an attack on our country.""They are trying to impact an election," said Trump, who is running for president in 2024."From the time I came down the golden escalator at Trump Tower, and even before I was sworn in as your President of the United States, the Radical Left Democrats -- the enemy of the hard-working men and women of this Country -- have been engaged in a Witch-Hunt to destroy the Make America Great Again movement," Trump said in a subsequent statement. "Weaponizing our justice system to punish a political opponent, who just so happens to be a President of the United States and by far the leading Republican candidate for President, has never happened before. Ever."Trump has been under investigation by the Manhattan DA's office, which has been probing the $130,000 hush money payment made to Stormy Daniels, the adult film actress who has alleged she had an affair with Trump, which he has long denied.Michael Cohen, Trump's former lawyer who wrote the check to Daniels in the closing days of the 2016 campaign, went to prison in part over the payment, which federal prosecutors believed amounted to an illicit campaign donation, according to court records.When Trump reimbursed Cohen for the payment, his company logged the payments as a "monthly retainer" for Cohen's legal services, according to Trump and court documents from Cohen's subsequent plea deal. Prosecutors were considering whether Trump should be charged with falsifying business records, sources say."This is all about accountability," Cohen told reporters when he arrived to testify before a Manhattan grand jury earlier this month. Of Trump, he said, "He needs to be held accountable for his dirty deeds."Trump has long insisted he did "absolutely nothing wrong" and has called the investigation part of a witch hunt by a Democratic prosecutor. An attorney for Trump has said the payment was not meant to protect the campaign, but to protect Trump's family."He made this with personal funds to prevent something coming out, false, but embarrassing to himself, his family, his young son," defense attorney Joe Tacopina told George Stephanopoulos two weeks ago on ABC's Good Morning America.Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg last year won a tax fraud conviction against Trump's namesake company, and its former finance chief, Allen Weisselberg, pleaded guilty to tax evasion -- but until now Trump himself had never faced an indictment.
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Reuters:The Biden administration plans to send Mexico an "act now or else" message in coming weeks in an attempt to break a stalemate in an energy trade dispute as bipartisan calls grow for the U.S. to get tougher with its southern neighbor, according to people familiar with the discussions.The move would represent a significant escalation in already-strained tensions between U.S. President Joe Biden and his Mexican counterpart, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador.Obrador's decision to roll back reforms aimed at opening Mexico's power and oil markets to outside competitors sparked the trade dispute.The Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) is expected to make what was described as a "final offer" to Mexico negotiators to open its markets and agree to some increased oversight, three people familiar with the talks told Reuters. If not, the U.S. will request an independent dispute settlement panel under the Unites States Mexico Canada Agreement, or USMCA, they said.The United States and Canada demanded dispute settlement talks with Mexico in July, 250 days ago. Under USMCA rules, after 75 days without a resolution they were free to request a dispute settlement panel, a third party that rules on the case.At an event on Monday, Mexico's Economy Minister Raquel Buenrostro said the United States has been entitled to call for a panel since Oct. 3.If the panel rules against Mexico and it fails to take corrective action, Washington and Ottawa could ultimately impose billions of dollars in retaliatory tariffs on Mexican goods.The White House has hoped to avoid escalating trade tensions with Mexico as it sought help on immigration and drug trafficking. But months of talks have yielded little progress and the administration has run out of less-combative options, the sources told Reuters...
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USA Today:
Republican presidential hopefuls are vowing to wage a war on "woke," but a new USA TODAY/Ipsos Poll finds a majority of Americans are inclined to see the word as a positive attribute, not a negative one.
Fifty-six percent of those surveyed say the term means "to be informed, educated on, and aware of social injustices." That includes not only three-fourths of Democrats but also more than a third of Republicans.
Overall, 39% say instead that the word reflects what has become the GOP political definition, "to be overly politically correct and police others' words." That's the view of 56% of Republicans.
The findings raise questions about whether Republican campaign promises to ban policies at schools and workplaces they denounce as "woke" could boost a contender in the party's primaries but put them at odds with broader public opinion in the general election.
Independents, by 51%-45%, say "woke" means being aware of social injustice, not being overly politically correct.
âMost Americans understand that to be woke is to be tuned in to injustices around us,â said Cliff Young of Ipsos. "But for a key segment of Republicans who make up the Trump-DeSantis base, 'woke' is a clear trigger for the worst of the politically correct, emerging multicultural majority."
A new rallying cry in the culture wars
In the early 20th century, "woke" was generally used as a call for Black people around the world to "wake up" to racial oppression. After the 2014 police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, the term gained wider usage to describe awareness of the continuing legacy of racial discrimination and systematic oppression.
Now conservatives have adopted the term as a rallying cry in the culture wars, signaling their opposition to everything from the teaching of the ongoing effects of slavery to the use of gender-neutral pronouns.
"We will never surrender to the woke mob," Ron DeSantis declared in his victory speech when he won a second term as Florida governor in November. Former President Donald Trump last week accused President Joe Biden of engineering "a woke takeover of the entire federal government."
Even South Carolina's Sen. Tim Scott, a Black man who discusses how racism has affected his life, has derided "woke corporations" and "woke prosecutors" as negative forces in American life... -
The Guardian:President Joe Biden has warned Iran that the United States will âact forcefullyâ to protect Americans, after the US military carried out air strikes against Iran-backed forces in retaliation for an attack in Syria.âMake no mistake: the United States does not ... seek conflict with Iran, but be prepared for us to act forcefully to protect our people,â Biden told reporters during a visit to Canada.Asked whether there should be a higher cost for Iran, Biden replied: âWeâre not going to stop.âOfficials said a US service member was wounded in Syria on Friday in the latest tit-for-tat strike between Iran-backed forces and US personnel.It comes after an attack on Thursday killed an American contractor and wounded five US troops and another contractor. Washington has said a drone of Iranian origin was used in that attack.Two US officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said it appeared that the defensive system on the base had failed. One US official told Reuters that troops on the ground did not appear to have had enough time to react to the drone.Although US forces stationed in Syria have been attacked with drones before, deaths are rare.The violence could further aggravate already strained relations between Washington and Tehran, as attempts to revive a 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and major powers stalled, and with Iranian drones being used by Russia against Ukraine.The Pentagon had said US F-15 jets on Thursday attacked two facilities used by groups affiliated with Iranâs Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC).The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors the war in Syria, said the US strikes had killed eight pro-Iranian fighters. Reuters was unable to independently confirm the toll.Suspected US rocket fire on Friday targeted new areas in eastern Syria, according to two local sources, with no casualties reported. Pro-Iranian forces in Syria said in an online statement late on Friday that they have a âlong armâ to respond to further US strikes on their positions.Iranâs state Press TV said no Iranians had been killed and quoted local sources as saying the target was not an Iran-aligned military post, but that a rural development centre and a grain centre near a military airport had been hit.The US strikes were a response to a drone attack earlier on Thursday on a base near Hasakah in north-east Syria operated by a US-led coalition battling the remnants of Islamic State.Three service members and a contractor required medical evacuation to Iraq, while two wounded American troops were treated at the base. On Friday, the Pentagon said the injured personnel were in stable condition.A US base at the Al-Omar oil field in Syria was attacked on Friday morning, according to the Lebanese pro-Iranian TV channel Al Mayadeen and a security source.It is not uncommon for Iranian-backed groups to fire missiles at US bases in Syria after they are hit with air strikes.US forces first deployed into Syria during the Obama administrationâs campaign against Islamic State, partnering with a Kurdish-led group called the Syrian Democratic Forces. There are about 900 US troops in Syria, most of them in the east.US troops have been attacked by Iranian-backed groups about 78 times since the beginning of 2021, according to the U.S. military.While Islamic State has lost the areas of Syria and Iraq it ruled over in 2014, sleeper cells still carry out hit-and-run attacks in desolate areas where neither the US-led coalition nor the Syrian army exert full control.
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Two decades ago, U.S. air and ground forces invaded Iraq in what then-President George W. Bush said was an effort to disarm the country, free its people and "defend the world from grave danger."In the late-night Oval Office address on March 19, 2003, Bush did not mention his administration's assertion that Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction. That argument â which turned out to be based on thin or otherwise faulty intelligence â had been laid out weeks before by Secretary of State Colin Powell at a U.N. Security Council meeting.Bush described the massive airstrikes on Iraq as the "opening stages of what will be a broad and concerted campaign" and pledged that "we will accept no outcome but victory."However, Bush's caveat that the campaign "could be longer and more difficult than some predict" proved prescient. In eight years of boots on the ground, the U.S. lost some 4,600 U.S. service members, and at least 270,000 Iraqis, mostly civilians, were killed. While the invasion succeeded in toppling Saddam, it ultimately failed to uncover any secret stash of weapons of mass destruction. Although estimates vary, a Brown University estimate puts the cost of the combat phase of the war at around $2 trillion.When Ryan Crocker, who at the time had already been U.S. ambassador to Lebanon, Kuwait and Syria and would go on to hold the top diplomatic post in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, first saw Bush's televised speech announcing the start of combat operations, he was at an airport heading back to Washington, D.C."I was thinking, 'Here we go,' " he recalls. But it was a sense of dread, not excitement. Crocker wondered, "God knows where we're going."Peter Mansoor, a colonel attending the U.S. Army War College at the time, was concerned about his future, knowing that he'd soon be in command of the first brigade of the 1st Armored Division, which would go on to see action in Iraq."I was very interested in the outcome of the invasion and what would happen in the aftermath," says Mansoor, who is now a military history professor at Ohio State University. "I didn't expect the Iraqi army to be able to put up much resistance beyond a few weeks."Meanwhile, Marsin Alshamary, an 11-year-old Iraqi American growing up in Minneapolis, Minn., when the invasion occurred, says "seeing planes and bombing over where my grandparents lived made me cry." Alshamary, who is now a Middle East policy expert at the Brookings Institution, says to her at the time, the possibility that Saddam would be deposed seemed "unreal."Crocker, Mansoor and Alshamary recently shared their thoughts with NPR on lessons learned from one of America's longest conflicts â the war in Iraq. Here are their observations:Wars aren't predictable. They're chaotic â and costlier than anyone anticipatesU.S. optimism for a quick and relatively bloodless outcome in Iraq was apparent even before the invasion.
In the months leading to the 2003 invasion, then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, in a radio call-in program, predicted that the coming fight would take "five days or five weeks or five months, but it certainly isn't going to last any longer than that." Bush, in what's been dubbed his "mission accomplished" speech on May 1, 2003, declared that "major combat operations in Iraq have ended."
Rumsfeld's prediction would prove hopelessly optimistic. In the days and weeks after Baghdad fell, a growing insurgency took root and U.S. forces began to come frequently under fire from hostile militias.
"They basically planned for a best-case scenario, where the Iraqi people would cooperate with the occupation, that Iraqi units would be available to help secure the country in the aftermath of conflict, and that the international community would step in to help reconstruct Iraq," he says. "All three of those assumptions were wrong."
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Associated Press:THE HAGUE (AP) â The International Criminal Court said Friday that it has issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin for war crimes, accusing him of personal responsibility for the abductions of children from Ukraine.Although world leaders have been indicted before, it was the first time the global court has issued a warrant against a leader of one of the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council.The court said in a statement that Putin âis allegedly responsible for the war crime of unlawful deportation of (children) and that of unlawful transfer of (children) from occupied areas of Ukraine to the Russian Federation.âIt also issued a warrant for the arrest of Maria Alekseyevna Lvova-Belova, the commissioner for Childrenâs Rights in the Office of the President of the Russian Federation.The move was immediately dismissed by Moscow â and welcomed by Ukraine as a major breakthrough. Its practical implications, however, could well be limited as the chances of either facing trial at the ICC are extremely unlikely.But the moral condemnation will likely stain Putin for the rest of his life â and in the more immediate future whenever he seeks to attend an international summit in a nation that could be bound to arrest him. âSo Putin might go to China, Syria, Iran, his ... few allies, but he just wonât travel to the rest of the world and wonât travel to ICC member states who he believes would actually ... arrest him,â said Adil Ahmad Haque, an expert in international law and armed conflict at Rutgers University.Others agreed. âVladimir Putin will forever be marked as a pariah globally. He has lost all his political credibility around the world. Any world leader who stands by him will be shamed as well,â David Crane, a former international prosecutor, told The Associated Press....
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PressTV: Mass shootings in the United States accounted for most extremism-related deaths in the country last year, according to a report, with white supremacists responsible for more than 80 percent of murders. In a report released on Wednesday, a New York-based group labeled 25 murders in 2022 as "extremist-related," with 18 of those "committed in whole or part for ideological motives." âAll the extremist-related murders in 2022 were committed by right-wing extremists of various kinds,â the report stated, adding that Americans are living in an "age of extremist mass killings". âWhite supremacists commit the greatest number of domestic extremist-related murders in most years, but in 2022 the percentage was unusually high: 21 of the 25 murders were linked to white supremacists.â Two mass shootings - one in May in Buffalo, New York, wherein a white supremacist fatally shot 10 Black people, and another in November in Colorado Springs wherein five people were killed at a nightclub - accounted for most of the extremist-related murders of 2022, the report noted. It further stated that the group has "identified 62 extremist-connected mass killing incidents since 1970, with 46 of them being ideologically motivated", adding that "more than half (26, or 57 percent) of the ideological mass killings have occurred within the past 12 years". âOf particular concern in recent years are shootings inspired by the white supremacist âaccelerationistâ propaganda urging such attacks," the report added. According to the Gun Violence Archive, a nonprofit that tracks shootings in the US, a total of 647 mass shootings were recorded in 2022, killing 44,287 people. The US is the only country with more civilian guns than the population â 120 guns for every one hundred Americans â as per the Small Arms Survey (SAS), according to a Swiss research project. In a country of 331.9 million people, there are 393 million firearms. According to a study by the International Journal of Comparative and Applied Criminal Justice, mass shootings in the US account for 73 percent of all incidents and 62 percent of all fatalities in developed countries, more likely involving âforeign-born perpetrators, ideological motives, fame-seeking motives, schools, open spaces, and handgunsâ. Despite President Joe Biden raising concerns about the alarming rise in white supremacy in the country, observers say his administration has failed to curb the surge in white supremacist crimes and color-based discrimination. A 2020 report by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) said white supremacist hate groups in the US increased by 55 percent during the tenure of Biden's predecessor, Donald Trump, who is known for institutionalizing white supremacy in the US. The report said since the turn of the millennium, American racists "have fretted over what they fear will be the loss of their place of dominance in society.â
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Russia Today:
Israeli lawmakers have voted in favor of a bill that would impose the death penalty on âterroristsâ who murder Israelis. Backed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his hardline allies, the bill has been bitterly opposed by Palestinians and foreign observers.
The death penalty bill passed its first reading in the Israeli parliament by 55 votes to nine on Wednesday. Most of the opposition â led by former Prime Minister Yair Lapid â abstained from the vote in protest.
The bill was authored by MP Limor Son Har-Melech and supported by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir. Both Son Har-Melech and Ben-Gvir are members of the âJewish Powerâ party, a radical Zionist faction that helped Netanyahuâs right-wing Likud party back into power in last Novemberâs elections.
Under the legislation, anyone who âintentionally or out of indifference causes the death of an Israeli citizen when the act is carried out from a racist motive or hate to a certain public... and with the purpose of harming the State of Israel and the rebirth of the Jewish people in its homelandâ shall face execution, with no chance of prison time.
The law would apply in the West Bank, which although partially administered by the Palestinian Authority, is subject to Israeli military law.
The bill crosses âa clear red line as part of Israelâs slide into total fascism,â Arab-Israeli political party Hadash Taâal said in a statement. "Today it is the Palestinians, tomorrow it will be the protestors on the streets. Ben-Gvir will be easy on the trigger when it comes to determining who is a terrorist."
The Palestinian Authority said that the bill is âcruel, barbaric, and inhumane,â describing it as ârooted in Jewish supremacy.â Its passage will lead to Palestinians âarbitrarily and ceremonially being put on death row,â its statement continued.
Thousands of Israelis gathered outside the countryâs parliament building in recent days to protest the bill, while opposition poured in from abroad. Speaking after a meeting with Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen on Tuesday, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock called the bill âparticularly worrying,â given that Israel has not executed anyone since Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann was hanged in 1962. -
Russia Today: Americans are losing confidence that Ukraine is winning its conflict with Russia, a new Rasmussen Reports poll has shown. The latest figures indicate that more than one-third of US voters who were confident of a Ukrainian victory in December no longer expect Kiev to prevail. The poll, which was conducted last week and released on Friday, found that 46% of likely US voters believe the Russia-Ukraine conflict has become a stalemate. Those Americans who believe that one side or the other is winning are about evenly divided, with 21% in Ukraineâs camp and 19% saying Russia has the upper hand. Just two months ago, a Rasmussen poll asking the same questions showed that 32% of Americans believed Ukraine was winning the conflict. And just as around one-third of voters who were confident in December that Ukraine would prevail no longer expect a victory for Kiev, the percentage of respondents who see Russian forces winning has increased by about the same proportion. Rasmussenâs findings dovetail with recent polling showing that public support for US aid to Ukraine has dropped sharply. For example, an Associated Press-NORC poll conducted in late January showed that less than half of US adults (48%) still agreed with sending weapons to Kiev. Just 26% said Washington should continue to play a âmajor roleâ in the conflict. Middle-aged voters are most likely to say that President Joe Bidenâs administration is doing âtoo muchâ to help Ukraine, Rasmussen said. Washington has already allocated $113 billion of military and economic aid for Ukraine since Russia began its offensive against Kiev a year ago. During his visit to Kiev earlier this week, Biden vowed âunwaveringâ support for Ukraineâs defense, pledging to continue backing the former Soviet republic âas long as it takes.â The US and its NATO allies also have declared that Ukraine will win, and must win, to preserve the ârules-based international order.â However, critics of US foreign policy have argued that Ukraineâs battlefield successes have been greatly exaggerated, and US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley said last week that the conflict will need to end in a negotiated settlement because neither side can likely achieve victory on the battlefield.
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Yesterday, February 24, marked the one year anniversary of Russia invading Ukraine.
There's so much we've learned in the past year since this war started. So much.
1) We've learned that the west in unison has condemned and supported economic sanctions against Russia for invading Ukraine, unlike the US when it invaded Iraq and Afghanistan.
2) We've learned that westerners and their racist double standards along with their imperialist and colonialist terrorist attitudes still exist for Black and Brown peoples around the world, but not for blue-eyed and blonde-haired Europeans.
3) We've learned that the western media also possesses this same racist double standard along with their imperialist and colonialist terrorist attitudes for Black and Brown peoples around the world.
4) We've learned that even the Ukrainians who were fleeing their own country, prevented others, specifically, African immigrants, from doing the same due to Euro racist and disparate treatment.
5) We've learned that the US has spent nearly $80 billion of taxpayer money supporting Ukraine, militarily, financially and in terms of humanitarian aid, but has provided Black and Brown nations with none of these aid packages when confronted by a colonialist or imperialist country.
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Russia Today: The Mormon Church and its investment manager will pay $5 million in fines to the US government after stashing billions of dollarsâ worth of assets in shell companies, obfuscating their ownership. The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced on Tuesday that it had charged Ensign Peak Advisors for the firmâs handling of investments on behalf of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) â colloquially known as the Mormon Church. The company failed to correctly report the equities that it placed in 13 shell entities, according to the allegations. The violations took place between 1997 and 2019, the commission said, adding that the portfolio had grown to around $32 billion by 2018. Acting with the knowledge of the church leadership, Ensign Peak âwent to great lengths to avoid disclosing the churchâs investments, depriving the commission and the investing public of accurate market information,â said Gurbir S. Grewal, director of the SECâs Division of Enforcement. The Utah-headquartered Mormon Church said in a statement that the firm âreceived and relied upon legal counselâ to structure the investments the way it did, and was guided by a wish to maintain the privacy of its client. Ensign Peak was spun off from the investment division of the church in 1997 as a non-profit. The parties agreed to settle the case with a $4 million fine paid by the investment manager and a $1 million penalty paid by the parent organization. The church stressed that it ordered changes to reporting as soon as the SEC raised concerns in 2019, and said that it cooperated fully with the investigation. It added that it has âdiversified reserves, including stocks, bonds, commercial and residential real estate, and agricultural properties,â which are managed âsolely to support the churchâs mission.â The SEC investigation was spurred by a November 2019 whistleblower complaint to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), according to the Washington Post. A report claimed that the church had accumulated $100 billion in accounts meant for charitable purposes. The whistleblower, a former senior portfolio manager at Ensign Peak, alleged that the significant sums indicated that the church leadership was misleading its followers and possibly violating federal tax rules. Charitable organizations are not required to pay taxes on their income in the US.
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In this video, we discuss how Australia, in cities like Queensland, is moving toward a CIA/police state. We talk about the Wieambilla event in December, that led to new surveillance and reporting against citizenry of all kinds, including: conspiracy theorists, religious, social or political extremists, sovereign citizens, as well as people with ideologies relating to capitalism, communism, socialism or Marxism. Finally, we offer our own commentary on how this is going to be the new norm in western countries and how this is already happening in the US.
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