| Australian Jews decry Israeli health minister's appointment Posted: 30 Dec 2019 01:53 AM PST  Australia's Jewish community has slammed an Israeli government decision to promote to the post of health minister a legislator who is suspected of aiding an alleged sexual abuser wanted in Australia. The Israeli government on Sunday appointed Yaacov Litzman as health minister, sparking a litany of condemnations from Australia's staunchly pro-Israel Jewish community. In an open letter to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Jeremy Leibler, the president of the Zionist Federation of Australia, called the decision "a slap in the face to the Australian Jewish community, the Australian people," as well as to the survivors of the alleged abuse.
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| Homeowners in North Carolina called 911 to report an intruder. It turned out to be a rogue Roomba Posted: 30 Dec 2019 06:44 AM PST  A man and his wife in North Carolina called 911 after hearing noises coming from downstairs. It wasn't an intruder.
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| The New York Times defends its decision to publish a controversial op-ed exploring why 'Jews are smart' Posted: 29 Dec 2019 07:04 PM PST  The paper issued a correction to Bret Stephens' controversial piece, saying that the endorsement of Jews being genetically superior was "not his intent."
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| White House warns N. Korea over 'Christmas gift' threat Posted: 29 Dec 2019 08:35 AM PST  The White House said Sunday it would consider "other tools" beyond personal diplomacy if North Korea went ahead with a threatened "Christmas gift" that could reignite global tensions over its nuclear program. Experts have interpreted the message delivered earlier this month by Pyongyang as a warning that a long-range missile test was imminent if the US did not give ground by the end of the year in negotiations to denuclearize the Korean peninsula. Asked by ABC about possible consequences of such a test, White House national security advisor Robert O'Brien said he did not want to speculate.
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| Turkey arrests 94 Islamic State suspects ahead of New Year Posted: 30 Dec 2019 12:22 AM PST ![Turkey arrests 94 Islamic State suspects ahead of New Year]( "Turkey arrests 94 Islamic State suspects ahead of New Year") Turkish police detained 94 people suspected of ties to Islamic State in nationwide raids on Monday ahead of New Year celebrations, police and state media said, two months after the group's leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was killed. Counter-terror police carried out the operations in the central provinces of Ankara, Kayseri and Adana, and Batman in the southeast, state-owned Anadolu news agency reported. At 5 a.m. (0200 GMT) in Batman, some 400 police officers detained 22 people in simultaneous raids on various addresses, seizing weapons, ammunition and documents, Anadolu said.
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| Trump retweets post naming alleged whistleblower Posted: 29 Dec 2019 06:38 AM PST  President Trump retweeted, then deleted, a post that included the alleged name of the anonymous whistleblower whose complaint ultimately led to Trump's impeachment by the House.
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| Nazi Germany Could Have Won World War II, Until It Invaded Russia Posted: 29 Dec 2019 06:00 AM PST  Then it was all over.
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| Saudi Arabia Sentences Man to Death for Theater Stabbings: TV Posted: 29 Dec 2019 04:00 AM PST ![Saudi Arabia Sentences Man to Death for Theater Stabbings: TV]( "Saudi Arabia Sentences Man to Death for Theater Stabbings: TV") (Bloomberg) -- A Saudi Arabian court sentenced a Yemeni man to death for stabbing three performers at a theater show in the capital last month in an attack ordered by al-Qaeda, state-run TV reported.Another defendant was jailed for 12 1/2 years, Al Ekhbariya channel reported, citing the criminal court. The attack, in which three people were injured, was ordered by al-Qaeda in neighboring Yemen, the broadcaster said. It didn't specify where it got the information.The mid-November attack in Riyadh came as the conservative kingdom undergoes a drastic overhaul of its social norms spearheaded by its young crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman. Saudis have been granted freedoms that include the loosening of rules on women's attire and travel as well as the mixing of genders in conjunction with a plan to wean the economy off oil.The court rulings were preliminary and both defendants can file appeals.\--With assistance from Sarah Algethami.To contact the reporter on this story: Reema Alothman in Riyadh at ralothman1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Donna Abu-Nasr at dabunasr@bloomberg.net, Michael Gunn, Bruce StanleyFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Hate crimes charges against man accused in Hanukkah stabbing Posted: 30 Dec 2019 05:32 AM PST  Handwritten journals containing references to Jews and anti-Semitism were found in the home of a man charged with federal hate crimes Monday in the stabbing of five people celebrating Hanukkah in a rabbi's house north of New York City, authorities said. Grafton E. Thomas, 37, was expected to appear in federal court in White Plains to face five counts of obstructing the free exercise of religious beliefs by attempting to kill with a dangerous weapon and causing injuries. A criminal complaint said law enforcement agents recovered the journals from his Greenwood Lake, N.Y., residence that included comments such as questioning "why ppl mourned for anti-Semitism when there is Semitic genocide" and a page with drawings of a Star of David and a Swastika.
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| The bushfires in Australia are so big they're generating their own weather — 'pyrocumulonimbus' thunderstorms that can start more fires Posted: 30 Dec 2019 05:47 AM PST  The "front" between the calm air outside the fire zone and the stormcloud is so sharp that it can generate lightning — and that can start new fires.
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| I made spaghetti with meat sauce using Impossible Foods 'beef' to see if it tasted like the real thing — here's the verdict Posted: 30 Dec 2019 07:26 AM PST  Impossible Foods is finally selling its veggie beef in supermarkets, and I'm putting it through the paces.
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| 'Impeachment is about Trump’s conduct, not mine': Biden expands on subpoena remarks Posted: 29 Dec 2019 02:11 PM PST  "The subpoenas should go to witnesses with testimony to offer to Trump's shaking down the Ukraine government," former Vice President Joe Biden said.
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| Turkey evacuates wounded after deadly Mogadishu blast Posted: 29 Dec 2019 01:48 AM PST  A Turkish military cargo plane landed in the Somali capital on Sunday to evacuate people badly wounded in a devastating truck bombing that killed at least 90 people including two Turkish nationals. The plane also brought emergency medical staff and supplies, the Turkish embassy said in a tweet, adding these had been taken to a Turkish-run hospital in Mogadishu. Somali Information Minister Mohamed Abdi Hayir Mareye told state media that 10 Somalis who were badly wounded in Saturday's blast would be evacuated to Turkey.
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| The 'lathi': India's colonial vintage anti-protest weapon Posted: 28 Dec 2019 06:35 PM PST  As Indian protests against a new citizenship law have intensified, so has police use of "lathis", sturdy sticks used to whack, thwack and quell dissent since British colonial times -- to sometimes deadly effect. At least 27 people have died in the past two weeks of protests, mostly from bullets, but hundreds more have been injured in clashes between demonstrators and riot police wielding the bamboo canes. "From being used as means to regulate crowds, lathi has turned into a lethal weapon," said V. Suresh, the secretary general of the People's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL), a non-profit rights group.
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| Putin You've Got A Problem: The Russian Navy Posted: 29 Dec 2019 12:00 PM PST  Russia received twenty-three new ships this year. That's where the good news ends.
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| China sentences 3 researchers involved in creating 1st gene-edited babies Posted: 30 Dec 2019 03:27 AM PST  A court in Shenzhen, China, sentenced a Chinese scientist and two researchers Monday for creating the world's first genetically edited babies last year, China's official Xinhua News Agency reported. The lead scientist, He Jiankui, was handed three years in prison and a fine of 3 million yuan ($430,000) on charges of falsifying ethical review documents, practicing medicine without a license, and other infractions. The two researchers who helped He got lesser sentences: Zhang Renli was handed two years in prison and a 1 million yuan fine, and Qin Jinzhou received 18 months in jail, but with a two-year reprieve, and a 500,000 yuan fine."The three accused did not have the proper certification to practice medicine, and in seeking fame and wealth, deliberately violated national regulations in scientific research and medical treatment," Xinhua reported, citing the court's ruling. "They've crossed the bottom line of ethics in scientific research and medical ethics." The news agency said He and his team edited the genes of three children born to two women.He shocked the medical and scientific world in November 2018 when he announced that he had used the CRISPR gene-editing technology to genetically modify the embryos of infant twin girls to disable a gene that allows the AIDS virus to enter a cell. He disappeared soon after making his announcement, apparently detained by Chinese authorities. It's not clear if the experiment worked on the two unidentified girls He discussed publicly, but the experiment was widely condemned by medical ethicists and researchers around the world.More stories from theweek.com The 2010s were an economic disaster Republicans are still trying to steal your health insurance Juul can't stop its employees from vaping in the office
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| The 25 Best Small Towns in America Posted: 30 Dec 2019 06:00 AM PST |
| Chinese man charged with taking photos of US Navy base Posted: 29 Dec 2019 03:24 PM PST  A Chinese man has been arrested by US authorities while he photographed an American Navy base in the Florida Keys.
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| NTSB: Poor condition of wreckage will slow plane crash probe Posted: 29 Dec 2019 01:01 PM PST  The lack of a distress call and flight data recorder coupled with mangled and charred wreckage will make finding the cause of a fiery airplane crash in Louisiana extremely challenging, federal officials said Sunday. National Transportation Safety Board Vice Chairman Bruce Landsberg said at a press conference that it could take 12 to 18 months to figure out why the two-engine Piper Cheyenne fell from the sky about a minute after taking off from the Lafayette Regional Airport on Saturday.
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| Juul employees are vaping at their desks even after the company threatened to dock bonuses for e-cigarette use, report says Posted: 30 Dec 2019 08:43 AM PST  In September, Juul said it would dock bonuses on second and third offenses and may terminate employees over a fourth offense.
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| The 40 Best Movies of 2019 Posted: 30 Dec 2019 07:43 AM PST |
| Taliban council agrees to temporary cease-fire in Afghanistan Posted: 29 Dec 2019 01:11 PM PST  The Taliban said Sunday they have agreed to a temporary cease-fire nationwide.
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| Put away phones at mealtimes and talk to each other, says pope Posted: 29 Dec 2019 07:07 AM PST  Pope Francis on Sunday urged people to talk to each other at mealtimes instead of using their mobile phones, citing Jesus, Mary and Joseph as an example for families to follow. "I ask myself if you, in your family, know how to communicate or are you like those kids at mealtables where everyone is chatting on their mobile phone ... where there is silence like at a Mass but they don't communicate," the pope said. "We have to get back to communicating in our families," Francis said in his unscripted remarks.
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| Giuliani reportedly defied White House policy to oust Maduro from office Posted: 30 Dec 2019 08:25 AM PST  Rudy Giuliani, a personal lawyer of President Trump, defied White House foreign policy to ease Venezuela's socialist President Nicolás Maduro out of office last year, the Washington Post reported.
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| Rather Than Retiring, The Air Force's B-2 Bomber Is Being Upgraded (For Nuclear War) Posted: 29 Dec 2019 04:00 AM PST  The B61-12 adds substantial new levels of precision targeting and consolidates several different kinds of attack options into a single weapon.
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| Cyprus court finds British woman guilty of false rape claim Posted: 30 Dec 2019 12:56 AM PST  A court in Cyprus on Monday found a British woman guilty of falsely claiming she was gang-raped by a group of Israeli tourists in the holiday resort of Ayia Napa. "The statements you have given were false," the judge told the defendant in remarks translated by the court interpreter. The Israelis, aged 15 to 18, were released without charge the same month after the woman was arrested on suspicion of making a false statement.
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| Alligators, pricey bananas and naked people: 2019 in Florida Posted: 29 Dec 2019 08:48 AM PST  In 2019, Florida Banana managed to eclipse Florida Man. From alligator antics to naked people doing wacky things, Florida did not disappoint in the weird news department this year. In December, a Miami couple spent more than $100,000 on the "unicorn of the art world" — a banana duct-taped to a wall — during Art Basel. Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan sold three editions of "Comedian," each in the $120,000 to $150,000 range.
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| New WeWork cochiefs will reportedly receive an $8.3 million golden parachute each if they are fired or choose to leave Posted: 29 Dec 2019 01:45 PM PST  Co-CEOs Artie Minson and Sebastian Gunningham would cost WeWork almost $17 million if ousted, the Financial Times says, citing documents.
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| Duterte Renews Attacks on TV Network, Urges Owners to Sell Posted: 30 Dec 2019 12:26 AM PST ![Duterte Renews Attacks on TV Network, Urges Owners to Sell]( "Duterte Renews Attacks on TV Network, Urges Owners to Sell") (Bloomberg) -- Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte continued his attacks on a local television network he's accused in the past of bias, and urged owners of ABS-CBN Corp. to sell before its franchise expires in March.In a televised speech delivered in the local language at Davao City on Monday, Duterte suggested the media firm's franchise renewal is uncertain. He had earlier threatened to block the network's bid to extend the franchise for 25 years."Your contract is expiring. I'm not sure what will happen if you renew," he said. "If I were you, I would just sell."Duterte has accused ABS-CBN as well as privately-owned Philippine Daily Inquirer of unfair reporting, allegations that the media companies have denied. The president's criticisms of ABS-CBN pushed its share price to a decade low earlier this month. The stock ended 2019 with a 21% loss compared with the local benchmark index's 4.7% gain for the year.Duterte also resumed his criticism of water utilities for alleged corruption, threatening to arrest and jail the owners of Manila Water Co. and Maynilad Water Services Inc. He reiterated a plan for a military takeover of the operations.Manila Water of Ayala Corp. and Maynilad owners Metro Pacific Investments Corp. and DMCI Holdings Inc. are among the worst-performing Philippine stocks this year, plunging since early December when Duterte started his censure."For those of you asking where are the big fish in my fight against corruption, I'll deliver them: Ayala and Pangilinan," he said. "If they do something wrong, I'll really jail them," Duterte said, referring to the family of Jaime Augusto Zobel, which owns Manila Water and Manuel Pangilinan, who chairs Metro Pacific.The two tycoons didn't immediately respond to requests for comments.Manila Water plunged 63% this year despite a rebound in the final week of trading ending Dec. 27. Metro Pacific was down 25%, while DMCI tumbled 48%.To contact the reporters on this story: Andreo Calonzo in Manila at acalonzo1@bloomberg.net;Clarissa Batino in Manila at cbatino@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Sam Nagarajan at samnagarajan@bloomberg.net, ;Cecilia Yap at cyap19@bloomberg.net, Clarissa BatinoFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Law professor: Treasury Department is 'gutting' Trump tax legislation Posted: 30 Dec 2019 08:07 AM PST  President Trump's signature legislation so far has been his administration's overhaul of the federal tax law in 2017. But despite slashing taxes for major U.S. companies to keep them in the country, those corporations weren't satisfied, The New York Times reports.In efforts to drive their taxes even lower, lobbyists from several companies across a wide range of industries reportedly pelted the Treasury Department with meetings, eventually forcing their hand and winning exemptions for taxes that would have required them to pay more.Those lobbying victories mean the federal government reportedly could collect far less in tax revenue than had been previously projected. For example, one tax aimed at foreign corporations with major operations in the U.S. was predicted by Congress to reel in around $150 billion in revenue, but thanks to exemptions for international banks negotiated by lobbyists, officials at the Joint Committee on Taxation think the tax revenue could be reduced by up to $50 billion."[The Treasury Department] is gutting the new law," said Bret Wells, a tax law professor at the University of Houston. "It is largely the top 1 percent that will disproportionately benefit — the wealthiest people in the world."Even with the concessions, some companies are still urging the Treasury Department to keep hacking away at the law, suggesting they may up and leave otherwise, the Times reports. Read more at The New York Times.More stories from theweek.com The 2010s were an economic disaster Republicans are still trying to steal your health insurance Juul can't stop its employees from vaping in the office
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| Battle to save Australian wildlife as bushfires rage Posted: 29 Dec 2019 09:58 PM PST  A possum severely burnt by bushfires in Australia's Blue Mountains laps water from a bowl as her rescuer holds her gently in a towel, while at a nearby home a kangaroo with bandaged feet is rocked like a baby by another carer. As Australia battles wildfires that have razed more than 4 million hectares (9.9 million acres) across five states, volunteers are trying to save wild animals caught in the inferno. Australia's bushland is home to a range of indigenous fauna, including kangaroos, koalas, wallabies, possums, wombats and echidnas.
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| Chinese doctor who claimed first genetically edited baby is jailed for three years and handed heavy fine Posted: 30 Dec 2019 02:40 AM PST  A Chinese scientist who set off an ethical debate with claims that he had made the world's first genetically edited babies was sentenced Monday to three years in prison because of his research, state media said. He Jiankui, who was convicted of practicing medicine without a license, was also fined 3 million yuan ($430,000) by a court in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen, China's official Xinhua News Agency said. Two other researchers involved in the project received lesser sentences and fines. Zhang Renli was sentenced to two years in prison and fined 1 million yuan. Qin Jinzhou received an 18-month sentence, but with a two-year reprieve, and a 500,000 yuan fine. Chinese scientist He Jiankui speaks at the Second International Summit on Human Genome Editing in Hong Kong on November 28, 2018. Credit: AFP He, the lead researcher, shocked the scientific world when he announced in November 2018 that he had altered the embryos of twin girls who had been born the same month. He described his work in exclusive interviews with The Associated Press. The announcement sparked a global debate over the ethics of gene editing. He said he had used a tool called CRISPR to try to disable a gene that allows the AIDS virus to enter a cell, in a bid to give the girls the ability to resist the infection. The identity of the girls has not been released, and it isn't clear if the experiment succeeded. The CRISPR tool has been tested elsewhere in adults to treat diseases, but many in the scientific community denounced He's work as medically unnecessary and unethical, because any genetic changes could be passed down to future generations. The U.S. forbids editing embryos except for lab research. Targeted genome editing | What does it all mean? He told the AP in 2018 that he felt a strong responsibility to make an example, and that society would decide whether to allow the practice to go forward. He disappeared from public view shortly after he announced his research at a conference in Hong Kong 13 months ago, apparently detained by authorities initially in an apartment in Shenzhen. The Xinhua report, citing the court's verdict, said the researchers were involved in the births of three gene-edited babies to two women, confirming reports of a third baby. The court said the three researchers had not obtained qualification as doctors to practice medicine, pursued fame and profits, deliberately violated Chinese regulations on scientific research and crossed an ethical line in both scientific research and medicine. It also said they had fabricated ethical review documents. He studied in the U.S. before setting up a lab at the Southern University of Science and Technology of China in Shenzhen, a city in Guangdong province that borders Hong Kong. The verdict accused him of colluding with Zhang and Qin, who worked at medical institutes in the same province.
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| Mexican Police Chief Arrested in Mormon Massacre Case Posted: 30 Dec 2019 01:47 AM PST  CALI, Colombia—A municipal police chief in northern Mexico has been arrested for an alleged role in the deaths of three women and six children—all dual U.S.-Mexican citizens—on November 4.Fidel Alejandro Villegas, aka El Chiquilín (The Kid), is the police chief of Janos, Chihuahua. The municipality borders the U.S. and sits about 105 miles across the state line from the site of the massacre in neighboring Sonora. It's also on the same route the families had planned to travel on the day they were ambushed.Why the Drug War Can't Be Won—Cartel Corruption Goes All the Way to the TopThe victims were members of the LeBaron and Langford clans, which are part of a breakaway sect of Mormons long established in both Chihuahua and Sonora. Villegas, who was detained on Thursday, is now awaiting trial in Mexico City. He is the fifth person to be arrested as part of an investigation that has at times seemed scattershot, since the other suspects have all been picked up under questionable circumstances. Mexican federal officials claim the mothers and children were accidental victims in a turf war between rival crime groups. And prosecutors allege Villegas is tied to one of those groups, called La Línea, which is the armed enforcement wing of the Juárez Cartel and has a strong presence in Janos. Surviving members of the Mormon families reject the official "accident hypothesis" and claim they were targeted deliberately on a remote stretch of highway last month, and family spokesperson Julián LeBaron says he was less than surprised by the alleged involvement of a high-level police officer in the region."The entire northwest [of Mexico] has a reputation that all police officers work for organized crime," he said in an interview with Aristegui News, shortly after Villegas' arrest. "And that's what high school kids tell you. It's not a mystery."* * *'ENDEMIC' CORRUPTION* * *Villegas' detention raises as many questions as it answers. How was a police chief from a jurisdiction more than a hundred miles away from the crime scene, and in another state, actually involved? So far authorities have released scant details.Robert Bunker, an expert on international security at the University of Southern California, told The Daily Beast that corruption among security forces in Mexico has "metastasized over decades" to the point where it is "endemic." The most infamous case of cops working with organized crime was the disappearance of 43 students in Guerrero state in September 2014, when police and soldiers allegedly teamed up with cartel sicarios to do away with the victims.Bunker noted that a law officer like Chief Chiquilín Villegas could have provided "departmental resources—vehicles, uniforms, intelligence, weapons or even personnel—to help facilitate the ambushes." Another possibility, as Bunker noted, is that the investigation of Police Chief Villegas will be used to expose people who have "more intimate knowledge of the cartel and its operations."Emmanuel Gallardo, an independent Mexican journalist who specializes in organized crime, agrees. "They're going to investigate his bank accounts and his financial history for evidence of bribes and paybacks and where they might have come from."A similar background investigation led to another high-profile arrest earlier this month, when Genaro García Luna, the central government's former National Security Minister and mastermind of the country's ongoing Drug War, was arrested by U.S. authorities on charges of conspiring with the Sinaloa Cartel."First Luna and now Chiquilín," Gallardo said. "This shows again the relationship the cartels have with the state. We cannot think of Mexican authorities and organized crime as separate entities. They are part of the same problem, part of the same world." "This is why Mexicans are frustrated. Why they are afraid," Gallardo said. "When a violent crime happens you can't go to the police because there is a high probability the same cops who are listening to your complaint are working with drug traffickers and assassins. This is the reason that 98 percent of homicides go unsolved in Mexico."* * *TORTURE, DEATH THREATS, STARVATION* * *Added to the persistent failure to nail the killers is the equally persistent inclination of authorities to round up "the usual suspects," then let them go. The first man arrested in the LeBaron case, just two days after the shooting, already has been released. Three other men were rolled up in Janos the first week of December, amid government claims that they were high-ranking members of La Línea. But protests erupted after friends and family members claimed the men had been framed. Janos Mayor Sebastián Efraín Pineda also backed the families, telling news outlets he knew the arrestees personally and that "they're not criminal leaders." In that incident, authorities stand accused by the families of planting evidence and of trying to force confessions from the detained suspects."Scapegoating to create guilty parties" remains a frequent problem in Mexico, journalist Gallardo said, citing the case of French national Florence Cassez, who was imprisoned for seven years in Mexico on trumped up kidnapping charges before judges overturned her sentence."They can make you confess with several techniques," said Gallardo. These including physical torture, death threats to loved ones, even starvation. "This is not like the States, where you can complain of human rights abuses. Here they can torture with impunity. They know how to push prisoners to say anything they want them to say," Gallardo said. After the LeBaron killings, which made headlines around the world, the administration of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador is "throwing suspects at the problem as it engages in damage control," said USC's Bunker. "At this level of Mexican politics it is not about getting the perpetrators or championing the rule of law—it is about making the problem go away as quickly as possible." * * *AN ALL-OUT CARTEL WAR* * *Whatever comes of Chiquilín's involvement—or the lack thereof—the killing of those nine women and children continues to cause ripples throughout the Mexican underworld.The area of eastern Sonora where the attack took place is said to be controlled by a faction of the Sinaloa Cartel under the rule of Iván Guzmán, 36, and Alfredo Guzmán, 30. These two sons of jailed kingpin Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán are known collectively as Los Chapitos. The other principal bloc of the Sinaloa Cartel is dominated by Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada, a shadowy figure often referred to as "El Capo de Capos," the Boss of Bosses, due to his power and longevity.As The Daily Beast reported shortly after the massacre, Zambada was none too happy about the bad publicity and the major heat brought down on the supposedly sovereign territory of the Sinaloa Cartel. The tension between El Mayo and Los Chapitos has continued to worsen, and could result in Mayo taking over the whole outfit from the Guzmán family.A source within one of the cartels that operate in the area, who agreed to speak only under condition of anonymity, described El Mayo as "an old-school man with Old Testament laws," who has little time for the "Narco Juniors'" seeming frivolity. "A couple of weeks ago the little Chapo boys were supposed to attend a meeting [with Mayo] on the mountain. They were 'too busy to go.'"Yet they have "plenty of time to post on Facebook about cars and pictures of money," the source said, and added the Chapitos were "too impressed" with their position to be good bosses due to their "immaturity.""They are getting weaker every day," he said.Reporter Gallardo agreed with that assessment, saying: "El Mayo is respected. The Chapitos are young and spoiled." Gallardo added that their growing vulnerability could have far-reaching consequences, in part due to a botched and bloody attempt to arrest two other, younger Guzmán brothers this fall. "The eyes of the federal government and of Washington are on them all now," he said. "They can handle local authorities, but not the White House [or] joint operations with the DEA."If Mayo, sensing weakness and ineptitude, moved against the younger faction, Gallardo said, the Chapitos "would just be killed. El Mayo has more resources and experience." However, conflict like that could bleed both sides, and "open the door for other groups to move in and start taking over their territory," including arch rivals like the Jalisco New Generation Cartel and La Línea's parent group, the Juárez Cartel. Smelling blood, such enemies "would move in like hyenas," touching off a kill-or-be-killed conflict between high-powered, paramilitary gangs, resulting in even higher levels of civilian deaths and collateral damage."The last thing the Mexican government wants," Gallardo said, "is an all-out cartel war." But the savage murder of those women and children on a lonely road in northern Mexico could lead to exactly that.Trump Labeling Mexico's Cartels 'Terrorists' Makes Things WorseRead more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| Tana Mongeau speaks out in raw video Posted: 30 Dec 2019 07:07 AM PST  YouTuber Tana Mongeau spoke about her open marriage with Jake Paul and her struggles in a raw new video, which she titled "the truth about everything."
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| Police say a Florida Grubhub driver attacked 2 Burger King workers by swinging a 3-foot ashtray after being told his order wasn't ready Posted: 30 Dec 2019 07:25 AM PST  A Grubhub deliveryman was charged with assault, with police saying he attacked two employees at a Florida Burger King.
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| Russia warns Iran nuclear deal in danger of 'falling apart' Posted: 30 Dec 2019 04:29 AM PST  Iran's nuclear deal with world powers is in danger of "falling apart" without the compliance of the United States and the European Union, Russia's foreign minister warned Monday after meeting with his Iranian counterpart in Moscow. The 2015 deal between Iran and Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States lifted sanctions on Iran in exchange for limits on its nuclear program. The U.S. withdrew from the accord last year and imposed crippling economic sanctions that block Iran from selling crude oil abroad.
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| Nepalese worker dies in Malaysia meat machine accident Posted: 30 Dec 2019 12:23 AM PST  A Nepalese worker was killed Monday after he fell into a meat-mincing machine in Malaysia's Malacca state, an official confirmed. The Malacca fire department's Zulkhairani Ramli told AFP the 47-year-old man was working at a meat-processing factory near Masjid Tanah when the incident occurred. Malaysia hosts nearly two million registered foreign workers, who flock to the Southeast Asian nation in search of better work prospects and higher pay than in their native countries.
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| Sudan sentences 29 intelligence agents to hang for teacher's killing Posted: 30 Dec 2019 02:53 AM PST ![Sudan sentences 29 intelligence agents to hang for teacher's killing]( "Sudan sentences 29 intelligence agents to hang for teacher's killing") A Sudanese court sentenced 29 members of the national intelligence service to death by hanging on Monday over the killing of a teacher in detention in February during protests that led to the overthrow of former president Omar al-Bashir. The group that spearheaded the protests welcomed the ruling, the first to deliver sentences over crackdowns on demonstrations in the months before and after Bashir was toppled in April. Prosecuting members of the intelligence services is seen as a test of how far Sudan's transitional government will go to erase Bashir's legacy and challenge the security apparatus.
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| Earthquake Bombs: How Britain Killed Hitler's Most Powerful Battleship Posted: 29 Dec 2019 05:00 AM PST  They may have led to this super bomb.
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| US Navy proposes decommissioning first 4 LCS more than a decade early Posted: 30 Dec 2019 07:10 AM PST  A Pentagon proposal would retire the first four LCS in an effort to save money.
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| After ICE Raids, a Reckoning in Mississippi's Chicken Country Posted: 29 Dec 2019 08:27 AM PST  MORTON, Miss. -- Juan Grant strode into the Koch Foods chicken processing plant for his new job on a Wednesday morning, joining many other African Americans in a procession of rubber boots, hairnets and last cigarettes before the grind.At 20, Grant was too young to remember the days of a nearly all-white workforce in Mississippi's poultry industry or the civil rights boycotts and protests that followed. He was too young to have seen how white workers largely moved on after that, leaving the business of killing, cutting and packing to African Americans.He did not know the time before Hispanic workers began arriving in the heart of chicken country by the thousands, recruited by plant managers looking to fill low-paying jobs in an expanding industry.But Grant clearly remembered Aug. 7, the day the Trump administration performed sweeping immigration raids on seven chicken plants in central Mississippi. He remembered the news flashing on his phone: 680 Hispanic workers arrested. He remembers seeing an opportunity."I figured there should be some jobs," he said.He figured right.The raids were believed to be the largest statewide immigration crackdown in recent history and a partial fulfillment of President Donald Trump's vow to deport millions of workers living in the U.S. illegally. The impact on Mississippi's immigrant community has been devastating. For nonimmigrant workers, the aftermath has forced them into a personal reckoning with questions of morality and economic self-interest: The raids brought suffering, but they also created job openings.Some believe that the immigrant workers had it coming. "If you're somewhere you ain't supposed to be, they're going to come get you," said a worker named Jamaal, who declined to give his full name because Koch Foods had not authorized him to speak. "That's only right."But there was also Shelonda Davis, 35, a 17-year veteran of the plant. She has seen many workers -- of all backgrounds -- come and go. But she was horrified that so many of her Hispanic colleagues were rounded up. Some of them, she said, wanted to work so badly that they tried to return the next day."I'm glad that I see my people going to work," she said of her fellow African Americans. "But the way they came at the Hispanic race, they act like they're killing somebody. Still, they were only working, you know?"Some of the new replacement hires also felt conflicted. While the roundup "gave the American people their jobs back," said Cortez McClinton, 38, a former construction worker who was hired at the plant hours after the raids, "how they handle the immigration part is that they're still separating kids from their families."Devontae Skinner, 21, denounced the raids one recent morning while finishing up his first turn on the night shift. "Everybody needs a job, needs to work, provide for their families."Then there was Grant, only two years out of high school and still finding his way in the world. He said it felt good to be earning $11.23 an hour, even if the new job entailed cutting off necks and pulling out guts on a seemingly endless conveyor of carcasses. It was about $4 better, he said, than what he used to earn at a Madison County cookie factory.But he also called the raids "cruel" and "mean." There were moments when the necks and guts and ambivalence and guilt all mixed together so that he wondered whether he wanted to stick with the job."It's like I stole it," he said, "and I really don't like what I stole."The New Cotton FieldsThe story of poultry work tracks closely with the 20th-century story of race relations in Mississippi.White women dominated the lines until the 1960s, when African Americans pressed for their rights. In Canton, African Americans called for a boycott of the local chicken plant over its refusal to hire black workers, according to Angela Stuesse, an associate professor of anthropology at the University of North Carolina and author of the 2016 book "Scratching out a Living: Latinos, Race, and Work in the Deep South."By the end of the 1960s, black workers predominated on the lines.It was an important win for African Americans looking for an alternative to housework in wealthy white homes, or for those who had seen fieldwork dry up in an increasingly mechanized agricultural sector."The chicken plant," Stuesse quoted a civil rights veteran saying, "replaced the cotton field."But as U.S. chicken consumption boomed in the 1980s, manufacturers went in search of "cheaper and more exploitable workers," Stuesse wrote -- chiefly Latin American immigrants.At the time, the Koch plant in Morton was owned by a local company, B.C. Rogers Poultry, which organized efforts to recruit Hispanics from the Texas border as early as 1977. Soon, the company was operating an effort it called "The Hispanic Project," bringing in thousands of workers and housing them in trailers.A 2016 study on the effects of immigration on the U.S. economy found that immigration had "little long run effect" on U.S. wages. But some wonder whether Hispanic immigrants displaced black workers in central Mississippi, the heart of the state's multibillion-dollar chicken industry.Some black Mississippi workers, Stuesse said, took advantage of less dangerous new job opportunities in retail, fast food, construction and auto parts. But "an eager pool of black labor did indeed exist," she wrote, noting that a black labor force moved in when a large number of Hispanics were fired from a Carthage chicken plant in the mid-2000s.And yet much of the outrage over the August raids has come from leaders in Mississippi's black community. Constance Slaughter-Harvey, a renowned local lawyer and civil rights activist who was the first black woman to receive a law degree from the University of Mississippi, called the raids a "Gestapo action."Wesley Odom, 79, president of the Scott County NAACP, spoke of the family members separated -- the Hispanic mothers and fathers who remain in custody -- as well as the moments, on the day of the raids, when some schoolchildren must have wondered whether they would walk into empty homes."The blacks were witness to that same thing as slaves," he said.Jere Miles, a special agent in charge with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, recently told a congressional committee that the Mississippi raids would deter future illegal immigration. He also said authorities discovered 400 instances of identity theft that had been perpetrated against legal U.S. residents. Conservative columnist Henry Olsen, citing high poverty rates and low incomes in the area, argued that the Mississippi workers living in the country illegally were taking jobs from Americans.Koch Foods representatives did not return requests for comment. The company, which has said it did not knowingly hire workers without legal status, has challenged the raid on its Morton plant in federal court, calling it an "illegal search" and demanding the return of seized property and records.Bryan Cox, a spokesman for ICE, said there was a continuing criminal investigation into the operation and hiring practices at all of the Mississippi plants. No executives from the targeted companies have been charged.'The Smell of Money'The Koch Foods plant is in the heart of Morton, a rural community with about 3,600 residents, about one-quarter of whom are Hispanic. The parking lot at shift change can feel like the most social place in town, outside of church and school sporting events.A sleepy clutch of downtown blocks hugs the opposite side of the highway. There are a few fast-food places, trailers and ranch houses, and several markets and businesses that cater to what has been for several decades a growing Hispanic population. A smaller chicken processing plant, owned by the company PH Food, was also raided in August.Sometimes the smell of chicken hangs over the place. But longtime residents hardly notice anymore. "Of course, the joke in Mississippi is, that's the smell of money," said David Livingston, a real estate appraiser who grew up in town.Today, the unknowable future for the Hispanic workers and their families hangs heavy over Morton and the nearby city of Forest, the county seat roughly a 15-minute drive away. Signs of pain and fear are everywhere; most of the people affected declined to give their full names for fear of government retribution.On a recent afternoon in a quiet Latin grocery, a 46-year-old immigrant named Mariela said she had no choice but to shut down the taco truck she once stationed at a workplace that had been raided. She burst into tears as she realized she was unable to afford a basket of cilantro, radishes and pumpkin seeds.At the Trinity Mission Center, a church in Forest that serves as a crisis response center, a man who was swept up in the raids stood by his van, rifling through confusing legal papers, unsure of his next court date. The man, Victoriano Simon-Gomez, 32, said he had a disabled child and was afraid she would receive insufficient care if he was forced to return to Guatemala.At the church entrance, a 31-year-old Guatemalan mother of two named Eva waited to pick up a donated lunch. She had been detained at a chicken plant in Carthage and was wearing an electronic ankle monitor, now a common sight around Scott County. She referred to it as "la grilleta" -- "the shackle." She said she was going to fight to remain in the United States with her children, 13 and 9, who are U.S. citizens.She knew it was going to be difficult. "The president doesn't want us here," she said. But she said she harbored no ill will toward the people who have taken jobs like hers. "I'm not mad."More than one-third of the 680 arrested workers across Mississippi were picked up at the Koch plant in Morton. In an affidavit taken a few weeks after the raid, Robert Elrod, a vice president of human resources, said 272 of the 1,170 employees there were Hispanic.Marquese Parks, who works for a staffing agency that helped Koch Foods find new employees after the raids, said applicants included "a lot of African American, a lot of white, Caucasian. Latinos, not so much."He said potential hires were being subjected to strict identification checks.Parks, who is black and grew up in Morton, said he never wanted to work in the chicken plants. He went away to college but later found himself in the industry anyway, first as a poultry supervisor and now at the staffing agency. He said he did not know how long the new non-Hispanic recruits would last on the job."I honestly don't think they will stay because of the simple fact that the jobs are that hard," said Parks, 28. "It's something they didn't see themselves doing growing up, something they don't want to do."The opportunity to earn more than $11 an hour can still turn heads in this part of Mississippi. Grant was not the only person to jump at the chance the raids provided. Niah Hill, manager of the Sonic Drive-In in Morton, said 10 of her workers quit soon after the raid at Koch Foods."When they heard about the raids, they all went over there and got jobs right away," Hill said. Carhops at this Sonic make $4.25 an hour -- $3 less than the state's minimum wage -- plus tips, she said.Yet the belief that native-born Americans are not sufficiently motivated to work persists, even among some African Americans. Jeff White, a Morton-based builder and rental property owner, said so many chicken plant jobs became available in the 1980s because American-born residents "didn't want to work, period."He added that he quickly learned he was not chicken plant material after landing a job at one shortly after high school. "I worked there 3 hours and 20 minutes," he said, chuckling. "I didn't even get the check. It's too hard."For a while, Grant said the hard work was worth it. With his better wage, he was starting to finally save a little. He talked about buying a used Honda and about getting serious with his girlfriend.But Morton was 75 miles from his trailer home in rural Holmes County, and after a while it proved to be too much. He showed up late one too many times, and in November, he said, Koch let him go.This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2019 The New York Times Company
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