| 'She will shake the table': Black lawmakers explain what Kamala Harris means to them Posted: 02 Nov 2020 02:00 AM PST  For the first time, as the country is rife with racial turmoil, a vice presidential nominee on a major party ticket is a woman of color.
|
| Trump sounds 'exhausted' Posted: 03 Nov 2020 07:18 AM PST  President Trump just capped off a frantic effort in the final stretch of his re-election campaign, holding multiple rallies a day several days in a row, including five apiece on Sunday and Monday. And it sounds like the hectic schedule has taken a toll.The president appeared on Fox & Friends on Tuesday morning as polls opened around the country, and many observers noted that he sounded exhausted.> I've never heard Trump sound like this. There was a clear difference in his demeanor and energy level between Kenosha & Grand Rapids last night. https://t.co/kJJO6CHYKC> > -- John T. Bennett (@BennettJohnT) November 3, 2020Even his rhetoric was a bit toned down -- Trump has stirred controversy throughout the campaign over how he may react to results on election night, and there have been reports (which he's denied) that he's planning to declare a premature victory if ahead. But on Tuesday, Trump merely said he'll declare victory "when there's victory, if there's victory ... there's no reason to play games." > An exhausted-sounding Trump on when he'll declare victory: "When there's victory. If there's victory ... there's no reason to play games." pic.twitter.com/MiuuPjTe1E> > -- Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) November 3, 2020More stories from theweek.com COVID-19 keeps proving everyone wrong Is this the year the New South turns blue? Democrats' first priority
|
| Results of South Dakota amendment to legalize marijuana for people over 21 Posted: 02 Nov 2020 08:14 AM PST  The amendment would legalize the "possession, use, transport, and distribution of marijuana and marijuana paraphernalia by people age 21 and older."
|
| Florida principal who refused to say Holocaust was a fact is fired a second time Posted: 02 Nov 2020 10:32 AM PST  The former Florida high school principal who made national headlines last year for refusing to say the Holocaust was a "factual, historical event" has been fired again, about a month after he was rehired.
|
| 3 Kansas teens were shot after a man thought he'd found the people responsible for stealing his Trump campaign lawn signs Posted: 02 Nov 2020 12:20 PM PST  A man believed his signs had been stolen from his property and approached people nearby who he believed were responsible, police told local news.
|
| Grizzly bear killed after "surprise" attack on father and son Posted: 02 Nov 2020 08:40 AM PST  The hunters "sustained significant injuries" before they shot and killed the bear, officials said.
|
| Rep. Clyburn schools Fox News host about SC drop boxes: ‘Your understanding is wrong’ Posted: 02 Nov 2020 10:17 AM PST  This weekend during a heated debate on Fox News, House Majority Whip James Clyburn made it clear to viewers that he believes that voter suppression is the only thing that could stop former Vice President Joe Biden from winning the 2020 presidential election. Sunday, during Fox News' Democracy 2020 Election Preview Special, the South Carolina Democrat shared how many Black residents in his state have already faced voter suppression while trying to take part in the election. "I have had complaints all day today," he explained to Fox News hosts Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum.
|
| Uganda opposition presidential candidate Bobi Wine arrested, police disperse supporters Posted: 03 Nov 2020 02:06 AM PST  Ugandan police used rubber bullets, live rounds and tear gas to break up a protest by supporters of opposition presidential candidate Bobi Wine after he was arrested on Tuesday following the filing of his nomination papers, aides and witnesses said. At least 15 people were injured and 49 arrested in the clash at the home compound of Wine, 38, also a singer and musician who has parlayed his relative youth and upbringing in a slum into a popular following against 75-year-old President Yoweri Museveni. Wine, whose real name is Robert Kyagulanyi, aims to end Museveni's 34-year-old authoritarian grip on power that has made him Africa's third longest-ruling president.
|
| Syrian refugee's joy at admission to Georgetown University goes viral Posted: 02 Nov 2020 07:42 AM PST  His shouts of joy echo from the mountains as the young Syrian refugee pumps his fists in the air on a roadside in Norway. "I made it into Georgetown!" Omar Alshogre exclaims in disbelief after hearing he has been accepted to study at the prestigious Washington DC University. The video lasts just nine seconds, shared to Mr Alshogre's Twitter page, but his joy is so contagious it has been viewed over 100,000 times in the past 24 hours. "Maybe because I'm happy and people need to see someone who is happy and laughing for a moment," Mr Alshogre says. by way of explanation.
|
| 'That's what I do': Barack Obama sinks 3-pointer as Joe Biden looks on ahead of Flint rally Posted: 01 Nov 2020 10:36 AM PST  Before heading out to the stage at the rally at Northwestern High School in Flint, Obama set up a shot on the basketball court and nailed it.
|
| 'Trump trains' and 'MAGA drags' snarl traffic and raise tensions in multiple states Posted: 02 Nov 2020 02:23 PM PST  Caravans of Trump-supporting motorists in 'Trump trains' caused chaos in multiple states over the weekend.
|
| The 10 Best Fall and Winter Purchases For Staying At Home Posted: 02 Nov 2020 03:16 PM PST |
| Teen babysitter killed while trying to stop man from stealing truck, Colorado family says Posted: 02 Nov 2020 01:21 PM PST  The man has been accused of strangling and almost killing a young girl.
|
| 2 girls pulled out of rubble in Turkey three days after earthquake Posted: 02 Nov 2020 03:38 AM PST  In what one rescue worker called "a miracle," extraction teams brought two girls out alive Monday from the wreckage of their collapsed apartment buildings in the Turkish city of Izmir, three days after a strong earthquake hit Turkey and Greece.
|
| Mail-in ballots are being rejected at surprisingly low rates Posted: 02 Nov 2020 02:22 PM PST  Every year, absentee ballots are often flagged for errors, typically because a voter failed to sign their ballot's envelope or because their signature doesn't match one on file. If a voter doesn't fix the mistake, their ballot will end up nullified — an especially relevant outcome in a year when record numbers of Americans are voting by mail.But Jen O'Malley Dillon, Democratic nominee Joe Biden's campaign manager, said Monday that it seems rejection rates in critical swing states are at record lows. While 1 percent of ballots were rejected in the 2016 general election, just 0.3 percent in Florida, 0.4 percent in Michigan, and 0.1 percent in Wisconsin have been rejected so far, O'Malley Dillon said. Election experts had predicted more than 1 percent of ballots would be rejected, as many voters were unfamiliar with voting by mail.Florida's process for handling those flagged ballots may reveal why its rejection rates are so low. While nearly 450,000 ballots were returned as of Friday in Miami-Dade County, its election department has only flagged 2,816 ballots for irregularities, the Miami Herald reports. That's because local officials have spent the past few weeks reaching out to voters with ballot problems and helping them to correct the errors. The fact that 138,000 voters brought their ballots directly to an early voting site, where an election official could make sure they signed an envelope, surely helped.But while rejection rates have been historically low, ballots that are rejected have disproportionately come from people of color. In Florida and Georgia, Black, Hispanic, and Asian voters' ballots have been flagged at twice the rate of white voters, an analysis from NBC News and Democratic data firm TargetSmart shows. Those voters have until Thursday to fix their ballots or they won't count toward the very tight races in their states.More stories from theweek.com COVID-19 keeps proving everyone wrong Is this the year the New South turns blue? Democrats' first priority
|
| Typhoon Goni: Philippines hit by year's most powerful storm Posted: 01 Nov 2020 11:38 AM PST  Goni weakens from a super typhoon but still brings "catastrophic" winds and torrential rain to Luzon.
|
| Letters to the Editor: Liberals are buying firearms. Will they admit they were wrong about 'gun nuts'? Posted: 03 Nov 2020 03:00 AM PST  It takes a lot of cognitive dissonace for people who voted against gun rights to now arm up because they want to defend themselves.
|
| Why Beijing Hopes for a Biden Win Posted: 02 Nov 2020 03:30 AM PST  Elections have consequences, both domestic and foreign. There is a consensus among China observers that Beijing hopes for a Joe Biden win this November, because the last time Biden was in charge, as vice president of the United States, China completed its control of the South China Sea.The South China Sea is one of the most important bodies of water on the planet. Besides China, multiple nations including Vietnam, Malaysia, and the Philippines have their own, sometimes overlapping, claims to portions of the South China Sea. In addition to historic claims, according to the United Nations Convention for the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), a nation has sovereignty over waters extending twelve nautical miles from its land and exclusive control over economic activities 200 nautical miles out into the ocean.However, using its own map with a "nine-dash line," China claims that it has historic rights to about 90 percent of the South China Sea, including those areas that run as far as 1,200 miles from mainland China and which fall within 100 miles of the coasts of the Philippines, Malaysia, and Vietnam. No other country in the world either recognizes the legitimacy of China's nine-dash–line map or its historic claim.The disputes between China and its neighboring Asian countries are not simply about who has the rightful claim historically but are predominantly about economic rights. The South China Sea is rich with natural resources such as oil and gas. It accounts for 10 percent of the world's fisheries and has provided food and a way of living for millions of people in the region for centuries. The region is also one of the busiest trading routes, with about one-third of global shipping and more than $3 trillion worth of global trade passing through this area annually.When Xi Jinping became Communist China's supreme leader in 2013, he regarded transforming China into a maritime power, including the expansion in the South China Sea, as a key component to his great Chinese rejuvenation. According to the Chinese Communist Party's own publication, "On the South China Sea issue, [Xi] personally made decisions on building islands and consolidating the reefs, and setting up the city of Sansha. [These decisions] fundamentally changed the strategic situation of the South China Sea."China started land-reclamation efforts in the South China Sea in 2013. Beijing initially proceeded slowly and cautiously while evaluating the Obama-Biden administration's reaction. It sent a dredger to Johnson South Reef in the Spratly archipelago. The dredger was so powerful that it was able to create eleven hectares of a new island in less than four months with the protection of a Chinese warship.When it became clear that the Obama-Biden administration wouldn't do anything serious to push back, China ramped up its island-building activities. China insisted that its land-reclamation efforts were for peaceful purposes, such as fishing and energy exploration. However, satellite images show there are runways, ports, aircraft hangars, radar and sensor equipment, and military buildings on these manmade islands.Noticing the Obama-Biden administration's unwillingness to push back on China's island-building activities, China's smaller neighbors decided to find other means of addressing the crisis at hand. In 2013, the Philippines filed an arbitration case under the UNCLOS over China's claims of sovereignty over the Spratly Islands and Scarborough Shoal.In 2016, the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague rejected the majority of China's claim of the South China Sea. It also ruled that China's island build-up was not only unlawful but also a blatant violation of the Philippines' economic rights and that it "had caused severe environmental harm to reefs in the chain." Beijing chose to ignore the ruling and press ahead with more island construction and militarization.Without U.S. intervention, small countries such as the Philippines have little means to enforce the ruling and halt China's maritime expansion in the South China Sea. Former U.S. defense secretary Ash Carter criticized the Obama-Biden administration for giving Beijing a rare strategic opening for its island-building. As the Obama administration stood by, China was able to reclaim an estimated 3,200 acres of land on seven features in the South China Sea.The Obama-Biden administration bore the prime responsibility for not forcefully stopping China's South China Sea expansion early on. The administration's soft approach and wishful thinking gave China a four-year strategic window to turn the South China Sea into China's backyard pond and the most dangerous water on this planet, a reality the rest of the world now has to live with.It was reported that between 2010 and 2016, 32 out of the 45 major incidents reported in the South China Sea involved at least one Chinese ship. Fishermen from the Philippines and Vietnam can't even fish in their own nations' water safely without being harassed by Chinese coastal guards and militarized Chinese fishing boats. The Chinese Navy also has responded to the U.S. Navy's "freedom of navigation" operations in an increasingly defiant and aggressive manner. Some national-security experts predict that the first real Sino–U.S. war could be fought in the South China Sea.The Trump administration ended China's unchallenged expansion in the South China Sea by announcing in July that the United States supports the 2016 Hague ruling and opposes several of Beijing's claims in the South China Sea. In the same month, the U.S. Navy also sent two aircraft carriers to waters near the South China Sea when China held a large military exercise. Following the U.S. lead, Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte, who had appeased Beijing since he came to office in 2016, recently told Beijing to follow international law, including The Hague ruling to resolve any dispute in the South China Sea.Biden might have adopted harsh rhetoric against China, but his past actions — and inactions — speak louder than his words. The last time when Biden was in charge, China completed its expansion in the South China Sea. Should Biden get elected this November, Beijing believes that Biden is someone it could do business with and expects him to revise the Trump administration's hard line policies toward China. The recent revelation of Hunter Biden's questionable dealings in China shows that Beijing has invested heavily to cultivate a good relationship with the Biden family for decades. A four-year Biden presidency will likely give China's Xi ample time to fulfill his ambition: putting the final building blocks of a Sino-centric world order, turning China into a technology powerhouse through the completion of the "Made in China 2025" initiative, and possibly taking Taiwan by force.
|
| Explainer: Can Trump call in troops to quell Election Day unrest? Posted: 02 Nov 2020 03:11 AM PST  On Saturday, peaceful participants at a rally in North Carolina to turn out the vote were pepper-sprayed by law enforcement officials. The Biden campaign canceled two events after a caravan of vehicles with Trump campaign flags swarmed a bus carrying campaign workers in Texas on Friday. Trump, who previously declined to commit to a peaceful transfer of power if he decides Tuesday's election results are fraudulent, could bring in the military or federal agents to quell civil unrest on Election Day.
|
| What a fluke: Dutch whale tail sculpture catches metro train Posted: 02 Nov 2020 01:56 AM PST  The driver of a metro train escaped injury when the front carriage rammed through the end of an elevated section of rails and was caught by a sculpture of a whale's tail near the Dutch port city of Rotterdam. The train was left perched upon one of two tail fins known as "flukes" several meters (yards) above the ground. "A team of experts is investigating how we can make it safe and get it down," Carly Gorter, a spokeswoman for the local security authority, said in a telephone interview.
|
| CDC: COVID-19 is more likely to be serious or deadly in pregnant women than other women of the same age Posted: 02 Nov 2020 12:52 PM PST  Pregnant women with COVID-19 are more likely to need life support and die than patients who aren't pregnant. Overall risk is still low.
|
| Headstones in Jewish cemetery spray-painted with ‘Trump’ graffiti, Michigan photos show Posted: 03 Nov 2020 06:36 AM PST  "We are appalled."
|
| Several injured and 1 dead after 'terror attack' in Vienna Posted: 02 Nov 2020 02:42 PM PST  An attack by multiple gunmen in Vienna, Austria left at least one person dead and several others wounded late Monday, officials said. One attacker was killed in what security officials were calling a "terror attack."
|
| COVID cleaned out North Carolina's college campuses. That has electoral consequences. Posted: 03 Nov 2020 02:50 AM PST  Chloe Arrojado can come and go from her dormitory at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill without seeing a single soul.No one is canvassing, distributing campaign materials, or loudly pontificating in the Pit, a brick courtyard that serves as the university's "town square." There, partisan speakers often shout their opinions; conservative preachers sometimes thunder on about sin; and student groups stage rallies, bake sales, and the occasional condom giveaway. Or they register voters, which is what Arrojado, a 23-year-old senior journalism major from Concord, North Carolina, remembers from the 2016 presidential election."I couldn't walk out the door without someone telling me to vote, trying to register me," she said. "Now it's just a ghost town."That's because the university, which made headlines for moving forward with the regularly-scheduled fall semester despite the coronavirus pandemic, was forced to rapidly shut down in-person classes in August. Within days of students' return, COVID-19 clusters erupted in university housing and around campus, including in fraternity houses and Arrojado's own dorm, so the school sent most students home on short notice. Arrojado stayed because she had a campus job that gave her free housing and she found it hard to focus at home; she now has a single room with a eight-person suite that she shares with just one other resident. University housing at UNC is at just 12.9 percent capacity. And other universities across the state also performed near-evacuations of their dorms. At N.C. State University, a half-hour's drive away from Chapel Hill, only about 1,500 students are on campus out of the 10,000 who would normally be in residence.There's no precedent for this diaspora of young voters in an election year. North Carolina is a swing state, and its college students tend to lean progressive. The Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement at Tufts University predicted that the state's youth vote, which tilted toward Clinton in 2016, could have a "disproportionately high electoral impact in 2020" for both the presidential race and the U.S. Senate contests. Indeed, these students' absence at UNC-Chapel Hill precincts — and at multiple other N.C. campuses vacated due to coronavirus — could affect the state's vote.North Carolina has long vacillated between the blue and red poles of U.S. electoral politics. Now, it's firmly purple and "in play" enough that the state's voters have found themselves overwhelmed by urgent text messages, papered with fliers, and visited by the candidates themselves and their proxies. Scandal actress Kerry Washington shilled for Joe Biden. And the Trump daughters were out for their father (you, too could do "breakfast with Tiffany"). North Carolina went for Barack Obama in 2008. Eight years later, Donald Trump edged out Hillary Clinton by 3 small-but-huge percentage points. If this year's polls are to be believed (and that's a big "if"), margins in this latest presidential bout are likely to be slim in the state. Even the last gubernatorial race was a cliffhanger, with Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper edging out incumbent Pat McCrory by a less than a point and a half. In real numbers, that was about 10,000 votes. This go-around, the Biden-Trump race is tight.Rachel Raper directs the Orange County Board of Elections, the body overseeing voting at UNC-Chapel Hill and its environs. She couldn't say how many students are registered to vote locally. But she did say that early voting in Democratic-leaning Orange County, which houses the university, was strong. As of the Wednesday before Election Day, more than 60 percent of registered voters had already cast their ballots, giving Orange County the second-highest turnout of the state's 100 counties. That left the last three days of early voting — typically times of heavy voter traffic — plus Election Day itself.So Orange County as a whole is turning out. But when it comes to the specific local precinct that serves the university, the numbers drop. Where normally there are 8,000 registered voters, this year, Raper said as of last Wednesday it had 6,164 registered voters. She estimated that roughly 4,500 of those voters are students. At that point, erly voting turnout in this precinct was at just 29 percent compared to the county's 60 percent."That's an anomaly," Raper said. "Our next lowest precinct is 40.5 percent. So you can see where students not being present is affecting that precinct."Where will all those students vote — if they vote at all? Some may have already registered in their home community before the pandemic. Others may have had the foresight to reroute their voting registration when they left campus. Here, even small numbers could add up, especially since more than 80 percent of students at UNC-Chapel Hill are North Carolina residents. And that's not counting students from numerous universities across the state, including the 17 in the public UNC system.Those students who registered in the UNC-Chapel Hill precinct but then left when campus was "depopulated" would have needed to change their registrations or voting method. In the mad scramble to flee the pandemic — booking plane tickets, managing classes, talking to parents — how many were thinking about their voter paperwork?There's no way to really know the answer to these questions right now. The university mail system returns ballots undelivered to UNC-Chapel Hill addresses to the Orange County Board of Elections, which, in turn, makes an effort to locate the voter. Raper said only a "small" number of ballots destined for university addresses have been returned.So far, it seems uncast ballots from university towns aren't putting much of a dent in the young vote in the Tar Heel State. It's been a blockbuster year for young people turning out in North Carolina. The News & Observer of Raleigh has reported record early voter turnout of voters ages 18-29 — almost eight times more than four years ago.Still, other large universities have been reminding students to register or vote via mass-emailed notes from student body presidents or administrators. N.C. State's Brian Mathis, associate director for leadership and civic engagement in the school's student affairs division, said in an email he'd only heard of two students asking for help with ballots sent to a campus address. The relative silence may signal that many students hadn't registered at all when they had to make quick retreats from campus.Smaller institutions have an advantage when it comes to mobilizing student voters. Greensboro, a city of about 300,000 and 50 miles away from Chapel Hill, is home to five universities: Bennett College, Greensboro College, Guilford College, North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, and UNC-Greensboro.Bennett College, one of the country's two historically Black colleges for women, quickly decided that it would switch to an all-remote semester, even while others like UNC-Chapel Hill and N.C. State charged ahead with in-person classes. It also planned programming that urged its almost 300 students — called Bennett Belles — to vote wherever they are. Among the programming was a discussion between alumna-editor Evette Dionne and Johns Hopkins University Professor Martha Jones, both of whom have published recent books on Black women and the suffrage movement.Dawn Booker, Bennett's director of strategic communications, said via phone that she had just finished sending a mass email to students, their parents, alumni, and other supporters, encouraging them to vote. The college created the Bennett Belles, Voting Belles webpage to facilitate registration and voting wherever their students live. The students will get T-shirts with that "Voting Belles" slogan by Election Day, if the mail cooperates amid politicized postal service slowdowns and high mail-in ballot volume."Without talking about particular candidates, we're just encouraging people to exercise their power," Booker said.This reporting was supported by the Economic Hardship Reporting Project.More stories from theweek.com COVID-19 keeps proving everyone wrong Is this the year the New South turns blue? Democrats' first priority
|
| Buying a Gun Ahead of the Election Won't Make You More Powerful. Here's What Americans Should Do to Deal With Crisis Instead Posted: 02 Nov 2020 12:02 PM PST  The President of the United States has undermined confidence in the electoral system and refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power. The reality is that those guns are more likely to be used by us to commit suicide (in the U.S. nearly two-thirds of all gun deaths are due to suicide, and access to a gun triples the risk of death by suicide); to hurt the people we love when arguments get out of hand (more than half of women killed by an intimate partner are killed with a gun, and access to a gun makes it five times more likely a domestic abuser will kill his female victim); to kill our children (firearms are a leading cause of death for children and teens), or to be raised against the rare assailant only for us to miss or hit unintended targets.
|
| Azerbaijan claims to have retaken enough land in Nagorno Karabakh war to resettle 500,000 Azeris Posted: 03 Nov 2020 07:51 AM PST  Azerbaijan has recaptured enough land in its war with Armenia over Nagorno Karabakh to rehouse up to half a million displaced Azeris, a senior government advisor has said. Hikmet Hajiyev, the chief foreign policy aide to Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliev, told the Daily Telegraph that Azeri forces had now retaken four key territories during the five-week long war. It means that up to 500,000 Azeri citizens would eventually be able to return to the area, which was seized by Armenian forces in the early 1990s when Nagorno Karabakh broke away from Azerbaijani control. "We are talking about a substantial region that has been retaken, and a potentially substantial number of people being able to return to their homes once the conflict is finally over," Mr Hajiyev said. "For nearly 30 years we have been waiting for the return of these territories. There is a lot of building and de-mining work that will have to be done, but every village that is retaken is a success for the Azeri people."
|
| Mexico tried, failed to get warrant for ex-cabinet secretary Posted: 03 Nov 2020 07:53 AM PST  Mexico's president confirmed Tuesday that federal prosecutors had tried to get an arrest warrant for former Treasury and Foreign Relations Secretary Luis Videgaray, but said a judge rejected the request. Videgaray, currently a faculty member at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Sloan School of Management, is considered the political figure closest to former President Enrique Peña Nieto, in whose 2012-2018 administration he served. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said Tuesday he did not know what the charges were because he maintains an arms-length relationship with the independent attorney general's office, though he said he had read they included a charge of treason.
|
| Biden, Trump go for broke in Pennsylvania as the campaign comes to a close Posted: 01 Nov 2020 02:28 PM PST  The president spent all day Saturday in the state while both members of the Democratic ticket will be holding events there throughout Monday.
|
| A record number of US children tested positive for coronavirus last week, report says Posted: 03 Nov 2020 07:50 AM PST  So far, more than 853,000 kids have contracted the coronavirus since the pandemic began.
|
| Cold air allergy nearly kills man stepping out of shower in Colorado, study says Posted: 02 Nov 2020 12:35 PM PST  The 34-year-old was rushed to the hospital after he collapsed on the bathroom floor
|
| Ethiopia attack: Dozens 'rounded up and killed' in Oromia state Posted: 03 Nov 2020 03:12 AM PST  Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed condemns the latest outbreak of ethnic violence.
|
| 18-year-old Montana woman dies in scuba diving accident in Glacier National Park Posted: 03 Nov 2020 04:48 AM PST  An 18-year-old Montan woman died Sunday while scuba diving in Lake McDonald at Glacier National Park, park officials said.
|
| Zimbabwe's Mnangagwa creates pensions for former first ladies Posted: 02 Nov 2020 11:34 AM PST  Zimbabwe's leader Emmerson Mnangagwa has created new pension regulations for spouses of former presidents and their deputies, ensuring his wife and Grace Mugabe, the wife of the late former president, will live in extraordinary comfort for the rest of their lives. Before he died, former president Robert Mugabe, ousted by Mr Mnangagwa in a coup d'etat in 2017, complained he did not have enough money to repair the leaking roof in his Chinese-style mansion in northern Harare. Zimbabwe has only one presidential widow, Grace Mugabe, 55, who receives Robert Mugabe's annual pension of about £2,000 per month. Now the state will either pay for the upkeep of her present mansion, or buy her another home. New benefits also allow former first ladies either a Mercedes-Benz E300, one four-wheel-drive station wagon, or an equivalent or similar class of motor vehicle and one pickup van, and potentially more vehicles as "seen fit by the president." Her staff may also be given vehicles. All vehicles will be fuelled and serviced by the state. After five years, Grace Mugabe and future presidential spouses will qualify for new ones. The state must also pay for a full-time cook, a gardener, a domestic worker, a driver, and a personal assistant or "aide de camp". Mrs Mugabe and in time, Auxilia Mnangagwa, the president's wife, will also have access to a state-funded furnished office, at least two full time security staffers, and their living costs, as well as business class travel anywhere in the world twice a year. Last week Mrs Mnangagwa was accused of involvement in a shady gold deal when Henrietta Rushwaya, president of Zimbabwe Miners' Federation was arrested at Harare's international airport and accused of attempting to smuggle six kilograms of gold - stuffed into her handbag - to Dubai. The Harare Magistrate's court heard that one of Ms Rushwaya's alleged accomplices linked the first lady to part ownership of the gold. Mrs Mnangagwa denied this. Mr Mnangagwa had at least two previous wives, and an unknown number of children, as well as several "small houses," over the years, which are mistresses recognised by the courts. The new regulations will affect spouses of former state presidents and vice presidents who must serve at least one full term in office.
|
| 'Trump can still win,' Nate Silver reminds a country that doesn't seem to need reminding Posted: 01 Nov 2020 09:33 PM PST  "Joe Biden heads into Election Day with a unique coalition and multiple paths to victory against President Donald Trump — but some Democrats can hardly believe the polls, haunted by the ghosts of 2016," NBC News reports. Jesse Ferguson, Hillary Clinton's 2016 deputy national press secretary, describes the mood among many Democrats as "a blend of confidence that this election is very different than the last one, and dread." Many Trump supporters remain convinced he can pull off another big upset."And indeed — although nobody needs any reminders of this after 2016 — Trump can win," Nate Silver says at FiveThirtyEight. "All the election models are bullish on Biden, but they are united in that a Trump win is still plausible despite his seemingly steep deficit in polls." Almost all forecasts expect Biden to win the popular vote, and FiveThirtyEight gives Biden an 89 percent shot at winning the Electoral College, but "Trump's chances in our forecast are about 10 percent and not zero," Silver noted.If Trump significantly over-performs his polls and wins Pennsylvania, for example, "Biden does have some paths to victory" but he goes "from favorite to underdog," Silver said. And "if Biden wins the popular vote by 2 to 3 percentage points, the Electoral College is roughly a toss-up. But if Biden wins the popular vote by less than 2 points, Trump is a fairly heavy favorite to win the election. Even popular vote margins of up to 6 points are not entirely safe for Biden if his votes are distributed in exactly the wrong way." Biden's current national polling lead, according to FiveThirtyEight, is 8.5 percentage points.Polling and electoral forecast sites aren't "giving" Biden an 89 percent chance of winning — "we aren't giving anybody anything," Silver said. Instead, his site is "mapping uncertainty," and you don't know everything you don't know. "Systematic polling errors do occur, and it's hard to predict them ahead of time or to anticipate the reasons in advance," he added. Read more, including numerous charts, at FiveThirtyEight.More stories from theweek.com COVID-19 keeps proving everyone wrong Is this the year the New South turns blue? Democrats' first priority
|
| Ukraine is close to coronavirus catastrophe, minister says Posted: 02 Nov 2020 10:50 PM PST  The situation with the coronavirus in Ukraine is close to catastrophic and the nation must prepare for the worst, health minister Maksym Stepanov said on Tuesday. Ukraine registered a record 8,899 new COVID-19 cases in the past 24 hours, the ministry said, up from the Oct. 30 high of 8,312. The daily tally of coronavirus infections spiked in late September and remained consistently high throughout October, prompting the government to extend lockdown measures until the end of this year.
|
| Krispy Kreme, McDonald's, and more fast-food giants are giving away free food on Election Day Posted: 03 Nov 2020 06:17 AM PST  Krispy Kreme is giving away doughnuts, while McDonald's has a free "post-Halloween" pastry deal starting on Tuesday.
|
| Sri Lanka rescues 120 whales after mass stranding Posted: 02 Nov 2020 08:43 PM PST  Sri Lanka's navy and volunteers rescued 120 pilot whales stranded in the country's biggest mass beaching, but at least two injured animals were found dead, officials said.
|
| 3 dead after plane that took off in North Carolina crashed in New York, officials say Posted: 02 Nov 2020 10:42 AM PST  The wreckage was found hours after the aircraft went missing.
|
| What Was a Clinton White House Lawyer Doing at Epstein’s Arraignment? Posted: 02 Nov 2020 01:54 AM PST  In July 2019, all eyes were on Jeffrey Epstein as he entered a Manhattan federal courtroom in prison blues and orange sneakers. The reclusive multimillionaire, used to luxurious jaunts around the globe with powerful friends, appeared disheveled as he was charged with sexually abusing dozens of underage girls.Police had arrested the 66-year-old financier two days before, and a packed crowd of journalists, lawyers, and victims now watched him plead not guilty to child sex-trafficking charges—more than a decade after he avoided serious prison time for molesting scores of teenage victims at his mansion in Palm Beach, Florida.But while the press focused on Epstein, one high-profile spectator apparently went unnoticed—at least, unnoticed by most. Two eyewitnesses say former White House lawyer Kathryn Ruemmler was at Epstein's court appearance that day in his support, The Daily Beast has learned.Epstein Victim Claims He Showed Her Off to Trump When She Was 14Two people who separately attended the hearing said Ruemmler—who served as White House counsel during the Clinton and Obama administrations—had a "professional relationship" with Epstein and was seated behind his defense team.At the time, Ruemmler was a partner at Latham & Watkins and global co-chair of the law firm's white-collar defense and investigations practice."Epstein knew her," one source with knowledge told The Daily Beast of her appearance in court in July 2019. "He had a professional relationship with her. I think he may have reached out to her to be involved in the case." The source said Ruemmler's appearance was "probably just a show of support.""She worked for a large, prominent firm," the person said. "There was some exploration of her joining the [defense] team, but it wasn't going to happen."Ruemmler did not return messages seeking comment. A spokeswoman for Latham & Watkins said neither the law firm nor Ruemmler represented Epstein; she did not return follow-up emails from The Daily Beast.Martin Weinberg, a lawyer for Epstein since 2008, said Ruemmler didn't represent the financier and wasn't a member of the defense team led by himself and Reid Weingarten. "I can state with certainty that Kathy Ruemmler did not represent Mr. Epstein and did not appear at any hearing at any time on his behalf," Weinberg said in an email.Ruemmler has previously represented the Clinton Foundation and George Nader, a key witness in Special Counsel Robert Mueller's Russia investigation who was sentenced to 10 years behind bars for child sex trafficking.She left Latham & Watkins in April to become global head of regulatory affairs at Goldman Sachs. After the death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg last month, Fox News reported Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden possibly put Ruemmler on the short list of nominees to fill a future SCOTUS seat.Indeed, Ruemmler and other Obama-era officials hosted a D.C. event for Biden last November as his fundraising waned before the primaries. According to the Washington Examiner, Ruemmler told the crowd the 2020 election came down to "character," and "there is no one who has the strength and the quality of character, no one like Joe Biden."Ruemmler has long traveled the revolving door between public service and Latham & Watkins, whose phalanx of former high-ranking government lawyers inspired a Wall Street Journal blog to call the firm "the DOJ's home away from home."At Latham, Ruemmler defended companies in high-stakes litigation, led internal probes into misconduct, and averted indictments through Department of Justice "declinations," or decisions not to prosecute which are similar to non-prosecution agreements. (She did, however, secure a non-prosecution agreement for Microsoft Hungary, which last year paid $8.7 million in penalties to resolve a foreign bribery case.)Jeffrey Epstein Visited Clinton White House Multiple Times in Early '90sHer career began with a clerkship under a federal appeals judge, followed by a job at litigation boutique Zuckerman Spaeder in Washington, D.C., before she was hired as a lawyer for President Clinton from 2000 to 2001.She then moved to the Department of Justice, where she made headlines as a lead prosecutor in the Enron financial fraud trial. (Weingarten, one of Epstein's D.C.-based legal eagles, faced off with Ruemmler when he represented Richard Causey, Enron's former chief accounting officer who pleaded guilty to securities fraud.)In 2007, she left government for Latham & Watkins. She joined the Obama administration two years later as the Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General at the DOJ. Ruemmler replaced her mentor, Bob Bauer, as White House counsel in 2011 and became one of President Obama's closest confidantes. When she announced her resignation in 2014, Obama said, "Kathy has become one of my most trusted advisers over the past few years. I deeply value her smarts, her judgment, and her wit—but most importantly her uncanny ability to see around the corners that nobody else anticipates."Later asked in an interview how she'd like to be remembered, Ruemmler paraphrased Bauer: "She told it like it was; she never put even light icing on the cake."After the Obama White House, Ruemmler returned to Latham but was soon in the running to replace Attorney General Eric Holder. But she withdrew her name from consideration—reportedly because she feared her closeness to Obama, and her handling of matters including the 2012 attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi and the Secret Service prostitution scandal in Cartagena, Colombia, would make for a difficult confirmation process."She felt very strongly that it would not serve the department well, and that it certainly wouldn't serve the president well, to have the confirmation process be a series of partisan attacks on the president rather than a reasoned approach to what the Department of Justice really needs right now," one source told Politico.Under the Clinton administration, Ruemmler defended the White House in congressional investigations and "independent counsel issues, including those related to former Pentagon worker Linda Tripp, who famously taped colleague Monica Lewinsky," according to one Washington Post profile on Enron prosecutors.But Ruemmler's ties to the Clintons didn't end with Bill's presidency. She's mentioned in emails published on WikiLeaks, including those belonging to Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign chair John Podesta. One email attachment listed Ruemmler under a March 2016 list of possible campaign "vetters," while several other emails indicated Ruemmler was a participant in more than one "Biweekly Hill Strategy Call."In August 2016, Ruemmler was identified as "the Clinton Foundation's principal lawyer" when Reuters, as well as the New York Post, reported the organization hired a security firm in the wake of suspected hacking. It's unclear how long she represented the Clinton family charity or what other work she's done for them.Ruemmler also recently defended the Democratic National Committee and Perkins Coie—the law firm representing Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign—in a defamation suit filed by Carter Page, a former campaign adviser to Donald Trump.Page claimed the parties developed the Steele dossier, which was "replete with falsehoods about numerous individuals associated with the Trump campaign," leading the feds to "wrongfully and covertly" surveil Page as an agent of Russia. (A federal judge in Chicago tossed Page's suit in August, saying the court lacked jurisdiction; Page filed a similar suit in Oklahoma in 2018 but it was dismissed for the same reason.)Ruemmler's alleged ties to Epstein raise further questions on the financier's high-powered connections, including Bill Clinton. Clinton's name has surfaced repeatedly in court filings related to Epstein and his alleged accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell, and he took international trips with the perverted pair on Epstein's private jet. The former president denies knowing anything about Epstein's abuse of young women and girls and denies one victim's claim that he visited Epstein's Virgin Islands compound.Several Clinton staffers are listed in Epstein's infamous rolodex, including Cheryl Mills, who was deputy White House counsel for Clinton during his 1999 impeachment trial. Mills was an adviser to Hillary Clinton's 2008 presidential run and chief of staff when Clinton became Secretary of State. Along with Podesta, Mills oversaw Clinton's search for a running mate in 2016 and was included in emails with Ruemmler.In years past, both Epstein and Maxwell donated thousands to the Clinton Foundation and "Clinton Library." When Epstein's lawyers secretly negotiated a plea deal for his abuse of minors in Florida in 2007, they plugged his friendship with former President Clinton and claimed he helped to create the Clinton Global Initiative.Read more at The Daily Beast.Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast hereGet 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.
|
| Royal Caribbean, Norwegian, Carnival Corp. cancel cruises through the end of the year Posted: 02 Nov 2020 07:08 PM PST  Royal Caribbean Group, Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings Ltd. and Carnival Corp. announced they will cancel most sailings through the end of 2020.
|
| Police unable to quiz Nice terrorist after he tests positive for Covid-19, as four more detained Posted: 03 Nov 2020 03:51 AM PST  The Tunisian who knifed three people to death in a church in Nice, southern France, last week has tested positive for Covid-19, which could further delay him being questioned, according to judicial sources. Ibrahim Issaoui, 21, remains in hospital after being shot 14 times by police following the knife rampage at Nice's Notre-Dame basilica on Thursday. He is reportedly no longer in a critical condition but police have not been able to question him to date. Shouting "Allahu Akbar", he beheaded a woman and killed two other people in Nice's Notre-Dame Basilica last Thursday, in France's second deadly knife attack in two weeks with a suspected Islamist motive. Known to Tunisian police for violence and drug offences, he arrived in France only last month, having first crossed the Mediterranean to the Italian island of Lampedusa. Four more people were detained for questioning on Tuesday morning, including a 29-year-old man suspected of being in contact with Issaoui, say judicial sources. They were taken into custody in the Val-d'Oise department just north of Paris.
|
| Kyle Rittenhouse, charged with killing 2 Kenosha protesters, held on $2M bond Posted: 03 Nov 2020 07:31 AM PST  The 17-year-old is accused of fatally shooting two men and wounding a third at a protest against the police shooting of Jacob Blake.
|
| Biden on his Dixville Notch win: 'Based on Trump’s notion, I’m going to declare victory' Posted: 03 Nov 2020 08:00 AM PST  Dixville Notch, a tiny township in northern New Hampshire, is famous for being the first to count its votes.
|
| Trump says Supreme Court did a 'very bad thing for this nation' Posted: 02 Nov 2020 02:52 PM PST 
President Trump said on Monday that the Supreme Court did a "very bad thing for this nation" by upholding previous decisions to extend absentee ballot deadlines.
|
| Hot New Electric Cars Are Coming Soon Posted: 02 Nov 2020 02:46 PM PST  The coronavirus pandemic has slowed auto production this year, but manufacturers' plans to introduce electric vehicles (EVs) continue unabated. A record number of almost 100 pure electric EV mode...
|
No comments:
Post a Comment