| Et tu, Mitt? Trump blasts Republican senator as impeachment battle heats up Posted: 05 Oct 2019 11:38 AM PDT ![Et tu, Mitt? Trump blasts Republican senator as impeachment battle heats up]( "Et tu, Mitt? Trump blasts Republican senator as impeachment battle heats up") WASHINGTON/ATHENS, Oct 5 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump on Saturday opened a new front in the impeachment battle that threatens his administration, blasting a prominent member of his party for criticizing his push to get foreign nations to probe a leading Democratic rival. Romney, who lost the 2012 election to Democratic incumbent President Barack Obama, criticized Trump on Friday for asking China to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden, who is seeking the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination. "If Mitt worked this hard on Obama, he could have won.
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| Spanish police arrest drug traffickers who saved their lives in high speed boat chase Posted: 05 Oct 2019 04:53 AM PDT ![Spanish police arrest drug traffickers who saved their lives in high speed boat chase]( "Spanish police arrest drug traffickers who saved their lives in high speed boat chase") Spanish police arrested four drug traffickers who stopped to save their lives after the officers were thrown overboard during a high speed boat chase off the coast of Malaga on Friday. The three police officers fell into the sea following a collision with the trafficking boat during the chase, a Guardia Civil statement said. A police helicopter hovering overhead appealed to the speedboat via megaphone to stop and help the officers after their boat "span out of control", and the traffickers did so, pulling the agents to safety unharmed. However, when police found three tonnes of hashish in the waters nearby, the rescue did not appear to work in the traffickers' favour. The four on board were arrested regardless. "They were arrested for drug trafficking," a police statement said, indicating that more than 80 bundles of hash had been recovered from the sea. In a video posted by the Guardia Civil, the boats can be seen zooming across the open ocean before the semi-inflatable trafficking boat turns into the path of the police vessel, forcing it to turn sharply, throwing the three officers overboard. The video taken from the police helicopter then shows the officers bobbing around in the water below, before a wide shot shows the drug bundles floating nearby. High speed chases are not unusual off the coast of Malaga and the Costa del Sol, a known drug smuggling route from Africa to Europe. Morocco, just across the water, is the world's largest exporter of cannabis resin or hashish, according to the United Nations. A dramatic chase at the end of last year saw police ram a suspected drug boat in the open water, before officers from the chasing helicopter managed to intercept the fleeing suspects on land. The Spanish government has even moved to ban the high-speed semi-inflatable boats, known as RIBs, that are commonly used by traffickers to bring both drugs and more recently migrants from North Africa to Spain.
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| Teachers suspended after unsupervised toddlers escape preschool, wander into traffic Posted: 06 Oct 2019 12:08 PM PDT  A woman reported seeing a group of toddlers wandering the streets near Little Sunshine's Playhouse & Preschool in Gilbert, Arizona, on Friday morning.
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| Protesters in Ukraine rally against election in rebel east Posted: 06 Oct 2019 11:05 AM PDT  Thousands rallied in Ukraine's capital Sunday against the president's plan to hold a local election in the country's rebel-held east, a move seen by some as a major concession to Russia. Ukraine, Russia and Russia-backed separatists on Tuesday signed a tentative agreement on guidelines for holding a local election in eastern Ukraine, where a five-year conflict between the rebels and Ukrainian troops has killed more than 13,000 people. France and Germany, which help broker the talks, hailed the agreement.
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| FEATURE-What's in a name? India's citizenship drive hits women hardest Posted: 05 Oct 2019 04:01 PM PDT ![FEATURE-What's in a name? India's citizenship drive hits women hardest]( "FEATURE-What's in a name? India's citizenship drive hits women hardest") Abanti Deka had no idea when she married her husband that taking his name would jeopardise her Indian citizenship. When the register was published at the end of August, the names of nearly 2 million of the state's about 33 million people were missing, plunging them into a bureaucratic nightmare that human rights experts fear could render some stateless. Abanti was one of the unlucky ones.
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| Republicans should be ashamed of their silence on Trump's call for China to go after Biden Posted: 06 Oct 2019 02:01 PM PDT  Republicans continue to make excuse after excuse for Trump, even as the president makes his corruption a public affair.
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| Climate activists occupy Paris mall as global Extinction Rebellion protests begin Posted: 05 Oct 2019 04:53 PM PDT  Hundreds of climate activists barricaded themselves into a Paris shopping centre on Saturday as security forces tried to remove them, ahead of a planned series of protests around the world by the Extinction Rebellion movement. Campaigners faced off against police and some inconvenienced shoppers as they occupied part of the Italie 2 mall in southeast Paris. The protest comes ahead of planned disruption to 60 cities around the world from Monday in a fortnight of civil disobedience, from Extinction Rebellion (XR), which is warning of an environmental "apocalypse".
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| Recall alert: 1.1 million pocketknives recalled for posing 'laceration hazard' Posted: 05 Oct 2019 04:58 AM PDT  About 1.1 million Gordon Folding Knives are being recalled for "posing a laceration hazard." The knives were sold at Harbor Freight Tools stores.
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| Is Iran's Regime Really Be About To Collapse? Posted: 05 Oct 2019 06:00 PM PDT  The signs point to no, but it could happen.
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| Jewish death row inmate wins appeal days before execution after judge’s ‘regular racism and antisemitism’ revealed Posted: 06 Oct 2019 03:54 AM PDT  For more than 15 years on death row, Randy Halprin filed challenge after challenge to his sentence. The denials began to stack up.Finally, on Friday, one of his appeals persuaded Texas' highest court to stay his execution, which had been scheduled for 10 October.
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| Johnson to Challenge the Queen to Fire Him, Sunday Times Reports Posted: 05 Oct 2019 05:17 PM PDT ![Johnson to Challenge the Queen to Fire Him, Sunday Times Reports]( "Johnson to Challenge the Queen to Fire Him, Sunday Times Reports") (Bloomberg) -- U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson is prepared to challenge Queen Elizabeth II to dismiss him rather than resign as he attempts to push through Brexit by the Oct. 31 deadline, the Sunday Times reported, citing senior aides.Johnson would not step aside if his Brexit proposals were rejected by the European Union, and even if members of the U.K. Parliament declare no confidence in his government and agree to a caretaker prime minister to replace him, according to the report.Failure to reach a deal would set the U.K. on a course for constitutional showdown with few precedents: Johnson has promised to pull the country out of the EU on Oct. 31 whether the talks succeed, while Parliament has already legislated to prevent him from taking U.K. out of the European bloc without a withdrawal agreement."Unless the police turn up at the doors of 10 Downing Street with a warrant for the prime minister's arrest, he won't be leaving," one senior Conservative said in the report.The last time a British monarch fired a prime minister was in 1834, it said.To contact the reporter on this story: Dominic Lau in Hong Kong at dlau92@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Shamim Adam at sadam2@bloomberg.net, Linus Chua, Naoto HosodaFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| APNewsBreak: Evers issuing 1st Wisconsin pardons in 9 years Posted: 06 Oct 2019 04:03 PM PDT  Democratic Gov. Tony Evers will issue Wisconsin's first pardons in nine years, invoking his constitutional power to grant clemency to four people. Evers plans to issue the pardons Monday, the first he's making as governor after he re-started the pardons board in June. Evers' predecessor, Republican Scott Walker, never issued a single pardon over his eight years as governor.
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| Germany could face refugee influx bigger than 2015 if EU does not agree quota system, interior minister warns Posted: 06 Oct 2019 08:48 AM PDT  Germany's interior minister warned on Sunday that the country could soon face a refugee influx bigger than the one it dealt with in 2015, as he sought support for his plans for an EU quota system for rescued migrants. "We need to do more to help our European partners with controls at the EU's external borders. We've left them alone for too long," Horst Seehofer told Bild newspaper. "If we don't do this, we'll experience a wave of refugees like in 2015 - or perhaps an even larger one." Mr Seehofer, a member of the conservative CSU party, was one of the most critical voices in the German government towards Angela Merkel's decision to open the country's borders in 2015. But his new plan has surprised many by committing Germany to taking in a quarter of the asylum seekers that arrive in the EU via the sea crossing from North Africa to Italy. He has not committed to accept any of those entering the EU via Greece or Spain. In a trip to Turkey and Greece which was spurred by a sharp rise in migrant crossings in the Aegean over the past year, the veteran politician said he would push for increased EU funds to be assigned to Turkey, while offering more technical support for Greece's coast guard. An agreement signed with Ankara in 2016 was key in turning the tide on a surge of migration which saw over a million asylum seekers arrive in Germany. Ever since the crisis peaked in 2015 Berlin has been pushing in Brussels for a binding quota system, but these efforts have foundered in the face of resistance from eastern Europe. Mr Seehofer's quota proposals have proven unpopular inside his own party. Ralph Brinkhaus, CDU/CSU faction leader in the Bundestag, suggested over the weekend that the plan would encourage smugglers to increase their activities. "This is the interior minister's initiative, it does not come from the CDU/CSU faction in the Bundestag. We will have to take a very close look at his plans," Mr Brinkhaus said.
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| Erratic Trump struggles to control message as impeachment threat grows Posted: 06 Oct 2019 02:29 PM PDT  Republican defenders mostly silent, with two vivid exceptions, as at least one additional whistleblower steps forward Trump's course of self-defense, meanwhile, appeared to be increasingly erratic. Photograph: Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty ImagesAs Donald Trump strived to enforce message discipline among Republicans in the face of a building threat that he will be impeached, new forces beyond the US president's control appeared likely to accelerate the congressional impeachment inquiry further in the coming week.At least one additional whistleblower has stepped forward to describe an alleged scheme by Trump to extort Ukraine for dirt on Democratic 2020 presidential rival Joe Biden, the individual's lawyer announced.Congress is preparing to take testimony on Tuesday from a major figure in the Ukraine scandal, Gordon Sondland, a wealthy hotelier and major Trump donor who was made US ambassador to the European Union.Similar testimony last week by former US special envoy to Ukraine Kurt Volker led to the disclosure of a damaging series of text messages further implicating Trump in the scandal.And Trump's would-be defenders in the Republican ranks, with the notable exception of two figures who themselves are deeply implicated in the Ukraine affair – secretary of state Mike Pompeo and Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani – have fallen mostly silent. No Trump defender from the White House appeared on the US Sunday morning news shows, nor did any members of the congressional Republican political leadership.Trump's course of self-defense, meanwhile, appeared to be increasingly erratic. The president told House Republicans that his reportedly outgoing energy secretary, Rick Perry, was the secret Machiavelli behind a phone call Trump held with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy, central to the scandal, Axios reported."Not a lot of people know this but, I didn't even want to make the call," Trump was quoted as saying. "The only reason I made the call was because Rick asked me to."Article 1 of the United States constitution gives the House of Representatives the sole power to initiate impeachment and the Senate the sole power to try impeachments of the president. A president can be impeached if they are judged to have committed "treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors" – although the constitution does not specify what "high crimes and misdemeanors" are.The process starts with the House of Representatives passing articles of impeachment. A simple majority of members need to vote in favour of impeachment for it to pass to the next stage. Democrats currently control the house, with 235 representatives.The chief justice of the US supreme court then presides over the proceedings in the Senate, where the president is tried, with senators acting as the jury. For the president to be found guilty two-thirds of senators must vote to convict. Republicans currently control the Senate, with 53 of the 100 senators.Two presidents have previously been impeached, Bill Clinton in 1998, and Andrew Johnson in 1868, though neither was removed from office as a result. Richard Nixon resigned in 1974 before there was a formal vote to impeach him.Martin BelamA spokesperson said that Perry had urged Trump to speak with Ukraine about natural gas but not about Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden, or a conspiracy theory about Ukrainian election tampering, which were the topics Trump raised on the July call."Lesson to all of you Trump aides," tweeted Neera Tanden, president of the liberal Center for American Progress, "he's taking you all down with him so you might as well get off the boat while you can."After a week in which his campaign seemed to dither over Trump's constant attacks, Biden published a pugilistic op-ed in the Washington Post declaring "enough is enough". "You won't destroy me, and you won't destroy my family," the piece concluded. "And come November 2020, I intend to beat you like a drum."On Sunday afternoon, Biden criticized Trump on Twitter.> In my experience, asking a foreign government to manufacture lies about your domestic political opponent is not "done all the time." https://t.co/w8K8C17yUj> > — Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) October 6, 2019News of at least one more whistleblower with direct knowledge of Trump administration interactions with Ukraine emerged Sunday. "I can confirm that my firm and my team represent multiple whistleblowers in connection to the underlying 12 August disclosure to the Intelligence Community Inspector General," tweeted Andrew Bakaj. "No further comment at this time."Trump spent Sunday morning tweeting outrage at Democrats and at Mitt Romney, who has been the only GOP senator to condemn Trump's Ukraine dealings in strong, clear terms.At the weekend, Maine Republican senator Susan Collins said of Trump's comments last week saying China should investigate the Bidens, that: "I thought the president made a big mistake by asking China to get involved in investigating a political opponent. It's completely inappropriate."But the efficacy of Trump's efforts to keep Republicans onside in his defense was also visible at the weekend, with Pompeo telling reporters in Athens that it was the government's "duty" to investigate a conservative conspiracy theory placing Ukraine instead of Russia at the heart of 2016 election tampering. That conspiracy theory has been debunked thoroughly.Another Republican senator, Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, scrambled on Sunday to make amends for his admission on Friday that he had heard the state department was trying to put together a deal in which military aid for Ukraine would be tied to Zelenskiy's cooperation in Trump's alleged conspiracy against Biden.Johnson used an appearance on NBC News' Meet the Press to become adamant about how Trump had personally told him there was no such linkage, and then, to the intense frustration of host Chuck Todd, Johnson peddled the Ukraine election tampering conspiracy. "What happened in 2016?" said Johnson. "Who set him up? Did things spring from Ukraine?"But Colin Powell, the former secretary of state under George W Bush, called the whistleblower a "patriot" in an appearance on CNN."The Republican party has got to get a grip on itself," Powell said. "Republican leaders and members of the Congress … are holding back because they're terrified of what will happen [to] any one of them if they speak out."Meanwhile the former Republican congressman Joe Walsh, who has mounted a primary run against Trump, accused Trump of betrayal."This president deserves to be impeached," Walsh said on CNN's State of the Union. "This president betrayed his country again this week … He stood on the White House lawn and told two foreign governments to interfere in our election. Donald Trump is a traitor."Minnesota senator and Democratic 2020 election candidate Amy Klobuchar amplified that message, comparing the Ukraine scandal to Watergate."This is impeachable," Klobuchar told CNN. "He's acting like a global gangster, going to one leader after another trying to get dirt on his political opponent. I consider that a violation of our laws."
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| Rwanda kills 18 assailants after deadly national park attack Posted: 06 Oct 2019 10:45 AM PDT ![Rwanda kills 18 assailants after deadly national park attack]( "Rwanda kills 18 assailants after deadly national park attack") Rwandan security forces have killed 18 people who were part of a group that carried out a deadly attack in a tourist hub in the north of the country on Friday, a police spokesman said. The assailants, who mostly carried traditional weapons like knives, attacked Kinigi sector in Musanze district, where the Volcanoes National Park offers tourists the chance to view endangered mountain gorillas. In a statement on Sunday, police spokesman John Bosco Kabera said security personnel pursuing the attackers had killed 18 of them and also that the death toll from the assault had risen to 14.
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| India clampdown hits Kashmir's Silicon Valley Posted: 04 Oct 2019 11:31 PM PDT  The coffee machines have been cold, computer screens blank and work stations empty for two months in Kashmir's Silicon Valley as an Indian communications blockade on the troubled region takes a growing toll on business. The dozen software development companies in the Rangreth industrial estate on the edge of Srinagar bring tens of millions of dollars of crucial revenue into the region each year. Pakistan also claims Kashmir which the two neighbours divided when they became independent in 1947 and have squabbled over ever since.
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| Journalist says CBP agent refused to return passport until he admitted to writing 'propaganda' Posted: 05 Oct 2019 10:12 AM PDT  A U.S. Customs and Border Protection official withheld journalist Ben Watson's passport until he admitted to writing 'propaganda.'
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| Flight delayed after a passenger boards without ticket Posted: 06 Oct 2019 01:39 PM PDT  A passenger was able to board a flight at Orlando International Airport on Saturday apparently without a ticket. Delta Air Lines has confirmed that the person was removed from flight 1516 to Atlanta, because she did not have a ticket. All passengers aboard the flight as well as their luggage were then re-screened by security personnel.
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| Iran says Chinese state oil firm withdraws from $5B deal Posted: 06 Oct 2019 11:26 AM PDT  China's state oil company has pulled out of a $5 billion deal to develop a portion of Iran's massive offshore natural gas field, the Islamic Republic's oil minister said Sunday, an agreement from which France's Total SA earlier withdrew over U.S. sanctions. The South Pars field deal, struck in the wake of Iran's 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, appears to be just the latest business casualty of America's pressure campaign on Tehran following President Donald Trump's unilateral withdrawal of the U.S. from the deal.
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| The Roots of Giuliani and Biden’s 35-Year Grudge Match Posted: 05 Oct 2019 02:02 AM PDT  Photo Illustration by The Daily Beast / Photo GettyHunter Biden was 12 years old when Rudolph Giuliani first accused his father of breaking the law.The animus between Giuliani and the elder Biden is widely believed to go back to a stinging one-liner about 9/11 during the 2007 election. But the grudge, in fact, began decades earlier.In early January 1983, Giuliani was the associate attorney general, No. 3 in the U.S. Justice Department. Joe Biden was a U.S. senator from Delaware and sponsor of a bill to establish a cabinet-level "Drug Czar" to coordinate all federal efforts to curb narcotics trafficking.The legislation had been passed at 2 a.m., without hearings. Giuliani urged President Ronald Reagan to veto it."Naive, simplistic and hopelessly flawed," Giuliani said of Biden's provision.Giuliani always has more words, so he also said, "It is shocking and irresponsible that legislation making these kinds of changes was passed without a single hearing in Congress and without any kind of thoughtful consideration."Biden went to see Reagan at the White House, bringing along a draft of a Government Accounting Office report which found that a failure of the various federal agencies to coordinate their efforts was leading to an overall failure to stop more than a small fraction of the illegal drugs pouring into the country. Giuliani accused Biden of leaking the report before the agencies involved had an opportunity to respond, those prominently including the Justice Department."In violation of GAO rules and the law," Giuliani charged.A Biden spokesman replied that the senator had done "nothing illegal." Biden Campaign Demands TV News Execs Stop Booking GiulianiReagan vetoed the measure and narcotics kept pouring into the country. Biden kept pushing and a drug czar was finally established four years later. Narcotics still kept pouring into the country."The biggest lie in law enforcement is, 'We're working closely together on this,'" the late NYPD Deputy Commissioner Jack Maple noted at the time.Meanwhile, Giuliani had discovered that being No. 3 of anything was not for him. His spot in the hierarchy did make him privy to all of the DOJ's big cases, and this included one in New York where prosecutors were well on the way to locking up the members of the Mafia's ruling commission there. Giuliani took a demotion to become the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York and stepped onto center stage to become a star mob buster, indicting the heads of all five of the city's crime families in what was dubbed the Commission Case. The evidence included photographs of a May 1984 meeting of mob bosses at a house in Staten Island. An accompanying affidavit attested that the main topic of the gathering was Mafia control of the construction industry. One example they all surely knew was Trump Tower, which had been completed in 1983 thanks to concrete provided by a firm linked to the Genovese crime family and a labor favor accorded by the Gambino crime family. The tower was the only construction site in New York to remain open during a citywide strike. Giuliani the mob buster ran for mayor and lost, but ran again and won. He would have been blamed if crime went up during his tenure, so he should be credited for the record drop. That, even though to this day he does not seem to understand it, was largely because the NYPD for the first time treated every crime seriously, whether it was on the richest block in Manhattan or the poorest block in Brooklyn. The streets became safer, but Giuliani became ever nuttier. He was abrasive and divisive and the tumult of his personal life became increasingly public. He ended up exhausting even the city that never sleeps.On Sept. 10, 2001, Giuliani came down the front steps of City Hall with several aides and not a single passerby called out his name or waved or otherwise acknowledged his presence. The parade had clearly passed him by.The next morning, the planes flew into the World Trade Center. Giuliani was on television enough in the aftermath to become known as the face of 9/11. Oprah Winfrey called him "America's Mayor."In 2007, Giuliani moved to parlay that into becoming America's president.One problem for him was that he had been to emergency rooms to visit so many shot cops during his time as mayor that he had filed a lawsuit in June of 2000 against two dozen gun manufacturers. He charged the companies with "profiting from the suffering of innocent people" while engaging in "a number of illegal and immoral practices.""The single biggest connection between violent crime and an increase in violent crime is the presence of guns in your society," Giuliani declared. "The more guns you take out of society, the more you are going to reduce murder. The less guns you take out of society, the more it is going to go up."U.S. Ambassador Roped Into Rudy's Quest to Smear BidenBut that was forgotten when Giuliani spoke as a Republican candidate for president at the NRA convention in Washington, D.C., in September of 2007."You should know I understand that the right to bear arms is just as important a right in the Constitution as the right of free speech and other rights," he told the gathering.He paused during the speech to take a cellphone call from his now estranged wife, Judith."Hello, dear, I'm talking to the members of the NRA right now, would you like to say hello?" Giuliani said. "Talk to you later, dear… I love you."For just the price of his soul, Giuliani became the frontrunner for the Republican nomination. His name then came up during a Democratic debate that October. Maybe a grudge was what roused Biden to rare and devastating originality."Rudy Giuliani, there's only three things he mentions in a sentence; a noun, a verb, and 9/11," Biden said.The Giulani campaign responded by alluding to Biden's plagiaristic past: "Rudy rarely reads prepared speeches and when he does he isn't prone to ripping off text from others. Senator Biden certainly falls into the bucket of those on stage tonight who have never had executive experience and have never run anything. Senator Biden has never run anything but his mouth."The Biden campaign responded to the response: "We are well aware that former Mayor Giuliani will attempt to drag this race into the mud, where Republicans like to wage their campaigns."A month later, a federal grand jury lodged corruption, tax fraud, perjury and obstruction of justice charges against Bernard Kerik, who had served as police commissioner under Giuliani. Kerik also had subsequently been nominated by President Bush at Giuliani's urging to become secretary of homeland security. Bush had withdrawn the nomination after it became known that Kerik had hired an undocumented immigrant as a nanny. Kerik was now headed for prison. His name was one that appeared in none of Giuliani's sentences as the one-time frontrunner dropped out of the race.For a time, Giuliani faded from public life. His desire to make some kind of comeback became painfully clear when Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump visited Ground Zero on the 15th anniversary of 9/11. Trump's many lies about the friends he had lost and what he had seen and what he had done on that day did not prevent America's Mayor from abjectly fawning over him. The three things Giuliani now mentioned in a sentence were a noun, a verb and Donald Trump.When Trump was elected, Giuliani supposedly had several big jobs that were his for the asking: attorney general, director of national intelligence, even the spot he had once pushed for Kerik to become, secretary of homeland security. But the position he sought was apparently the one he was about to name during an interview with Sean Hannity."I wanted to be secretary…" he began.He stopped before actually saying that his hope had been to become secretary of state. He was for some reason deemed too temperamental to be America's Statesman. He has done little to prove his doubters wrong as he assumed the role of Trump's personal lawyer. He may have been seeking to be the answer to Trump's question "Where's my Roy Cohn?"Like Cohn, Giuliani represents Trump at no charge. Giuliani has plenty of money coming in from other ventures. These include his security and consulting firm, which does business in realms where the myth of America's Mayor persists. He may be a joke in the Bronx, but he is still a big shot in Ukraine.The much bigger shot there was Biden, who had gone on to become vice president. Biden had been delegated by President Obama to marshal American efforts to remedy pervasive corruption in Ukraine.The Ukrainian prosecutor general, Viktor Shokin, had taken office pledging to end crooked dealings by politically connected businesses. He had mentioned in particular the gas company Burisma. But by most accounts, Shokin was all talk and no action. A host of West European countries, along with the International Monetary Fund, wholeheartedly supported Biden's conclusion that Shokin had to go. Biden suggested to then-Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko that a $1 billion loan guarantee might not be forthcoming if Shokin remained in office.Biden Dirt File Has Private Email Between John Solomon and Rudy AlliesOne complication was provided by Hunter Biden, now in his forties, but with considerably less sense than he should have had even at 12. Hunter took a seat on the Burisma board, getting paid as much as $50,000 a month even though he knew nothing about gas and not much more about Ukraine.Here, Giuliani had an opportunity to play statesman and get back at Biden. Giuliani began saying that Biden had forced out Shokin in order to stop an investigation into Burisma and Hunter. Giuliani urged the new Ukrainian prosecutor to investigate both Bidens for wrongdoing.In a rough transcript of the now-famous phone call, Trump tells Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, "I will have Mr. Giuliani give you a call and I am also going to have Attorney General Barr call and we will get to the bottom of it. I'm sure you will figure it out. I heard the prosecutor was treated very badly and he was a very fair prosecutor so good luck with everything."At the time, Trump was withholding promised military aid to Ukraine. The context imparts a certain resonance to the moment in the transcript when Trump says, "I would like you to do us a favor though."The line harkens back to a Commission Case transcript where Gambino crime family boss Paul Castellano bragged on tape of his influence, saying "the President is a big man" but "everybody can do somebody a little favor."Trump's talk of a favor no doubt spurred the still-unidentified whistleblower to report the possibility that our president was using the held-up aid to pressure Zelensky into digging up dirt on the Democratic candidate in the lead to oppose him in the next election.And more than three decades after that first scrap over a drug czar bill, Giuliani was again accusing Joe Biden of breaking the law, this time along with the child-man Hunter.And Giuliani's sentences were now a noun and a verb and Biden.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. 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| Judge shoots himself in court in Thailand Posted: 05 Oct 2019 08:28 AM PDT ![Judge shoots himself in court in Thailand]( "Judge shoots himself in court in Thailand") A judge in southern Thailand shot himself in court after delivering a not guilty verdict in the case of five Muslim suspects charged with murder in the predominantly Buddhist country's restive south. Khanakorn Pianchana shot himself in the chest after acquitting the suspects charged with murder, illegal association and gun-related offences on Friday afternoon because of insufficient evidence. On Saturday, people laid flowers in front of the court in Yala, one of the three Muslim-majority southern provinces at the heart of the insurgency that has claimed more than 7,000 lives since 2004.
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| Fringe group claims it planned 'eat the babies' stunt at AOC town hall Posted: 04 Oct 2019 06:37 PM PDT  The woman is from LaRouchePAC, who claimed responsibility for the outburst on twitter.
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| When India's Aircraft Carrier Caught Fire, China Thought It Knew Why Posted: 05 Oct 2019 11:45 PM PDT  Terse words between rivals.
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| Ohio University suspended all 15 fraternities on-campus after National Hazing Prevention Week was followed by 7 hazing allegations Posted: 06 Oct 2019 02:49 PM PDT  After OU sororities and fraternities held National Hazing Prevention Week events, 7 allegations against separate fraternities were brought forward.
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| Six elephants die while trying to save each other in 'Hell's Abyss' Thai waterfall Posted: 05 Oct 2019 10:45 AM PDT  Six wild elephants drowned after slipping off a waterfall in northeast Thailand, authorities said on Saturday, with two others saved after they became stranded while apparently trying to rescue one of those that fell into the current. Officials in the northeastern Khao Yai national park were alerted to elephants "crying" for help at 3am, the Thai Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation said in a statement. Hours later, they found six bodies at the bottom of the gushing Haew Narok ("Hell's Abyss") waterfall. Two of the elephants had apparently attempted to save one of those that fell, but they found themselves trapped on a thin, slippery sliver of rock above the churning waters. Video showed another of the hulking animals struggling desperately to get back up to where the pair stood. Park officials tossed food laced with nutritional supplements in an attempt to boost their energy and give them the strength to climb back up into the forest. They later said the two had been rescued but were extremely distressed. Parks department spokesperson Sompoch Maneerat said it was unclear what caused the accident. "No one knows for sure the real cause of why they fell, but there was heavy rain there last night," he told AFP. The waterfall was closed to tourists as the rescue took place. Elephants are Thailand's national animal and live in the wild in parts of the country, but their numbers have dwindled to only a few thousand. Deforestation has pushed the wild population into closer contact with humans in recent decades and away from their natural habitats.
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| Romney ramps up rhetoric on Trump, but what's his next move? Posted: 05 Oct 2019 07:22 PM PDT  In the hours after President Donald Trump called on China to investigate his political foe — plowing through another political guardrail — Democrats and Trump critics looked for signs that his party would slap him back. Twenty-four hours later, Mitt Romney stepped in. Romney's delayed criticism seemed to capture the senator's continued discomfort with the role of chief Trump critic, and a possible reluctance to restart the kind of back-and-forth that revved up on Saturday as Trump took to Twitter.
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| Israel Working on Non-Aggression Pacts With Gulf States Posted: 06 Oct 2019 05:31 AM PDT ![Israel Working on Non-Aggression Pacts With Gulf States]( "Israel Working on Non-Aggression Pacts With Gulf States") (Bloomberg) -- Israel is working on an "historic" non-aggression pact with Arab Gulf states, Foreign Minister Israel Katz said on Sunday.Such an agreement would make it possible to cooperate on civilian matters, Katz said on Twitter, confirming an earlier report by Israeli media. He said he'd presented a plan to Arab foreign ministers and to U.S. envoy Jason Greenblatt at his recent visit to the United Nations."I will continue to work to strengthen Israel's standing in the region and around the world," Katz said. While Israel has formal peace agreements with Egypt and Jordan, most Arab countries have resisted establishing ties. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has sought to leverage a shared fear of Iran to gradually improve relations with the Gulf, and U.S. President Donald Trump has promoted this rapprochement.Netanyahu made a surprise visit to Oman a year ago to meet with the country's foreign minister, and several Israeli ministers have since attended conferences in the region. Israel said in April that it will take part in next year's World Expo in Dubai.Katz said in a speech to the UN in late September that Israel is seeking to normalize ties with the Arab Gulf states "as we did with Egypt and Jordan." He named technology, agriculture and water as areas in which these countries could benefit from relations with Israel. (Updates with comment in third paragraph, background from fourth.)To contact the reporter on this story: Alisa Odenheimer in Jerusalem at aodenheimer@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Shaji Mathew at shajimathew@bloomberg.net, Ian Fisher, Ros KrasnyFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| New York man charged with killing four homeless men using metal pipe Posted: 06 Oct 2019 10:51 AM PDT ![New York man charged with killing four homeless men using metal pipe]( "New York man charged with killing four homeless men using metal pipe") New York police have charged a man with murder for using a metal pipe to beat four fellow homeless men to death as they slept in the city's Chinatown district, authorities said on Sunday. Randy Santos, 24, was charged with four counts of murder, one count of attempted murder and one count of unlawful possession of marijuana, said New York City Police Department spokesman Martin Brown. The suspect's mother, Fioraliza Rodriguez, told the New York Daily News that she had kicked her son out of her house three years ago because he was addicted to drugs, assaulted her and his grandfather and stole from the family.
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| For US banks skittish about marijuana, a proposal to ease worries Posted: 05 Oct 2019 06:15 PM PDT  Most US banks shun people like Hope Wiseman, who runs a dispensary that sells marijuana for medical use. Wiseman, who operates a dispensary called Mary and Main, in Capitol Heights, Maryland, just outside Washington, serves patients who suffer from migraine headaches, chronic illnesses or depression. Marijuana for medical use is legal in 33 states and the US capital of Washington, 12 of which have also legalized it for recreational use.
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| UAW official who is charged in corruption probe placed on leave Posted: 05 Oct 2019 05:58 PM PDT ![UAW official who is charged in corruption probe placed on leave]( "UAW official who is charged in corruption probe placed on leave") Vance Pearson, who heads a 17-state UAW region and is charged with embezzling union money, wire fraud and money laundering, began the leave on Friday.
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| Nazi Germany Had A Plan To Win World War II: Kill These 3 People Posted: 05 Oct 2019 07:22 PM PDT  A wild plan.
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| Santa Ana Winds to target Southern California late this week Posted: 05 Oct 2019 08:22 AM PDT  With dry weather set to continue in California, windy conditions will spark concern for high fire danger this week."An elevated fire danger is expected with locally breezy to windy conditions in the mountains and upper deserts," said AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Dan Pydynowski.The American Fire, a grass fire that started in the hills of American Canyon around 3 p.m., has already caused the American Canyon road to close and possibly burned a structure 50 minutes after starting, according to CBS San Francisco.As of 4 p.m. PDT, the fire had grown to 20-30 acres, fire officials told the news outlet. Bulldozers were sent to the area and Cal Fire air support was called in to attempt to contain the fire.With windy conditions, there is the threat of the spreading of the fire to become wind-driven. As of Sunday, the fire has a moderate rate of spread.This week, a cold front set to unleash more snow in the northern Rockies will bring a windy set up for California for the middle of the week. "Windy conditions and the low humidity, combined, will bring a more enhanced fire threat across not just California, but much of the West, including Nevada, Utah and Arizona," said AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Eric Leister.The greatest fire threat, however, will be confined to the usual spots in the Sacramento Valley and parts of the L.A. Basin. In Northern California, winds will come from the northeastern corner into the Sacramento Valley.Depending on how strong the high in the Rockies gets, this could lead to a Santa Ana wind event for parts of Southern California, with wind gusts of 50 to 60 mph. Winds of this speed would be capable of producing downed trees and power lines. Sparks from downed lines and transformers could spark a fire as well.Throughout the week, people should exercise extreme caution with potential ignition sources, such as outdoor campfires, power equipment and cigarette butts.A small spark fueled by a strong wind could quickly become an uncontrollable inferno in just a few minutes.Having an emergency bag on hand can save valuable time should a rapidly spreading fire force a quick evacuation of your property.Download the free AccuWeather app to see the forecast for your location. Keep checking back for updates on AccuWeather.com andstay tuned to the AccuWeather Networkon DirecTV, Frontier and Verizon Fios.
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| Teacher suspended for suggesting Confederate flag is a sign 'that you intend to marry your sister' Posted: 05 Oct 2019 07:32 AM PDT  A secondary school teacher in Georgia has been suspended from school for calling the confederate flag a sign that an individual plans to marry their own sister.The Richmond County School System launched an investigation after a teacher put a photo of the confederate flag on the board with a message saying: "A sticker you put on the back of your pickup truck to announce that you intend to marry your sister. Think of it like a white trash 'Save the Date' card."
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| Groom sexually assaulted wife's bridesmaid before wedding, police say Posted: 06 Oct 2019 11:16 AM PDT  According to police, the assault stopped when the bride caught him.
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| GOP Sen. Johnson says Trump blocked Ukraine aid Posted: 05 Oct 2019 04:14 AM PDT  A Republican senator said Friday he learned from a U.S. ambassador that President Donald Trump was tying military aid for Ukraine to an investigation of the 2016 election. Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, a leader of the Senate's Ukraine caucus, made several trips to the Eastern European ally this year after the election of President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
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| Chinese military issues warning to Hong Kong protesters amid clashes as tens of thousands defy face mask ban Posted: 06 Oct 2019 04:37 AM PDT  The Chinese military issued an unprecedented warning amid another night of chaos and violence in Hong Kong on Sunday, as masked protesters risked tear gas and arrest to march in defiance of an emergency ban on face coverings. As the initially peaceful mass protest on Hong Kong island and in Kowloon spiralled into violent clashes with riot police, the Chinese People's Liberation Army warned protesters they could be arrested for targeting its barracks with laser lights. The warning, the first of its kind during four months of escalating unrest in the global financial hub, was displayed on a yellow flag as hundreds of demonstrators shone laser pens at troops in fatigues. The soldiers responded with spotlights as they filmed the scene. The nearby Kowloon Tong metro station was trashed, its windows smashed into tiny pieces. The entire mass transit rail system, which has been targeted by protesters who believe it has colluded with the government and police against them, was suspended on Sunday evening. Wildcat protests sprang up and disappeared quickly around the city as bands of protesters played a game of cat and mouse with the riot police. The most radical among them threw Molotov cocktails at advancing officers, who responded with tear gas and arrests. A journalist was struck on the head, briefly setting his helmet on fire. An emergency law has criminalised protesters wearing face masks Credit: Nicolas Asfouri/AFP/Getty Images In one isolated moment of brutality, a taxi driver was badly beaten by protesters after he drove into them. It is not clear what sparked the incident. The day had started out peacefully as tens of thousands of protesters - including families with children and elderly people - attended two large unsanctioned rallies. It was a sign of the widespread public anger at a move by Carrie Lam, the city's chief executive, to use a sweeping Emergency Regulations Ordinance to enforce a face mask ban that many believe impairs their freedoms. "We are suppressed by the strong government. They suppress us through a law to threaten the people to stay at home. That's why we have to come out to voice our opinions," said a woman called Mrs Mak, as she sheltered under her husband's umbrella. "I have to come out to fight for the youngsters, because I am nearly 60. I come out because I have to support them. The future belongs to them. I want the government to hear what people are saying," she said. The crowd was visibly nervous, at times stopping and running backwards, after months of angry confrontations between police and protesters that have resulted in over 2,000 arrests, two live shootings and the firing over more than 4,000 tear gas canisters. Some protesters lit fires to block traffic in the city centre Credit: Vincent Thian/AP By mid-afternoon the police had launched tear gas at protesters erecting barricades along major routes, before pushing demonstrators back and making multiple arrests in the shopping district of Causeway Bay. Ms Lam had justified the ban as necessary to end the turmoil that began with a controversial mainland extradition bill but has since spiralled into a wider call for democratic rights. However, many in Hong Kong believe the move has only fuelled mounting public anger. On Sunday morning a group of pro-democracy lawmakers failed in a high court bid to seek an emergency injunction against the ban, arguing that emergency powers bypassed the legislature and contravened the city's mini-constitution. Sharron Fast, a law expert at the University of Hong Kong, warned that the use of the emergency regulation had given the chief executive an "unlimited amount of power, in which she alone can enact laws". She added that Ms Lam could use it to enact more draconian measures including censorship laws. Protesters who marched in torrential rain voiced their anger that the mask ban would not also be applied to the police. Demonstrators have included an independent investigation into police brutality as one of their key demands. Ms Fast said that granting that demand could help to calm the situation. "I think it is still not too little too late. It would take some time, but it would have a pacifying effect."
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| Pope installs new cardinals to set future direction of church Posted: 05 Oct 2019 08:32 AM PDT ![Pope installs new cardinals to set future direction of church]( "Pope installs new cardinals to set future direction of church") Pope Francis installed new cardinals on Saturday, putting his stamp on the future of the Roman Catholic Church with men who share his vision for social justice, the rights of immigrants and dialogue with Islam. Francis has now appointed more than half of the 128 cardinal electors, increasing the possibility that the next pope will continue his progressive policies.
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| EU powers push for uptake of migrant relocation pilot scheme Posted: 05 Oct 2019 09:53 PM PDT  EU powers France, Germany and Italy, along with smaller member Malta, will on Tuesday seek to rally the rest of the European bloc to a joint scheme they have come up with to distribute migrants saved at sea. The Malta declaration is an attempt at a stop-gap measure pending efforts by the incoming European Commission taking charge next month to unblock the refugee policy impasse under a vice president specifically tasked with "Protecting the European Way of Life". The text urges EU countries to take a share of the asylum-seekers crossing the Mediterranean, who are arriving mostly in Italy and Malta either in overcrowded boats or rescued by ships run by NGOs.
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| A 97-year-old California woman with dementia went missing. Four 'junior detectives' helped police find her Posted: 06 Oct 2019 05:29 PM PDT  Police in California are thanking a group of "junior detectives" who recently helped locate a missing 97-year-old woman with dementia.
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