Tuesday, April 17, 2018

Cryptocurrency exchange Kraken is leaving Japan - CNBC News

Cryptocurrency exchange Kraken is leaving Japan
Cryptocurrency exchange Kraken said that it would withdraw services in Japan due to rising costs of maintaining its business there.
Kraken is the 10th largest exchange by 24-hour trading volume, according to industry website CoinMarketCap.
Regulators are slightly more cautious in the wake of a heist that saw more than $500 million worth of digital tokens stolen.
Ryan Browne | @Ryan_Browne_
Published April 16, 2018
CNBC.com

Kraken is pulling operations from one of the biggest markets for cryptocurrency trading.

The San Francisco-based cryptocurrency exchange said Tuesday that it would withdraw services in Japan due to rising costs of maintaining its business there, but indicated it could return in the future. It added that the suspension of activity in Japan would only affect Japanese residents, not Japanese customers outside of the country.

"Suspending services for Japan residents will allow us to better focus on our resources to improve in other geographical areas," Kraken said in a statement on Tuesday.

"After we have had a chance to better catch up to our rapid growth, we will consider the possibility of resuming service for Japan residents."

Kraken is the 10th largest exchange by 24-hour trading volume, according to industry website CoinMarketCap, trailing behind Coinbase's GDAX.

A cryptocurrency comparison website called CryptoCompare estimates that Japan's currency is used in almost 60 percent of all bitcoin transactions. The country officially recognized bitcoin as legal tender last year, and has a registration process for cryptocurrency exchanges looking to operate in the country.

But regulators are slightly more cautious in the wake of a cryptocurrency heist that saw more than $500 million worth of digital tokens stolen from crypto exchange Coincheck in January. It is thought to be the biggest theft of cryptocurrencies, surpassing the $400 million in bitcoin lost by cryptocurrency exchange Mt. Gox in 2014.

Last month, Binance, the biggest exchange by volume, was warned by Japan's Financial Services Agency against operating in the country without an exchange license.

Sean Hannity-Michael Cohen saga: Something doesn't add up - CNN

Sean Hannity-Michael Cohen saga: Something doesn't add up

by Brian Stelter   @brianstelter
April 17, 2018: 8:12 AM ET

Late night reacts to Hannity revelation
Something isn't adding up in the case of Michael Cohen and Sean Hannity.
For now Hannity's employer, Fox News, isn't commenting on the issue, but even some fellow Fox hosts are raising questions.

There were audible gasps in court on Monday when it was revealed that Hannity was the mystery third client that Cohen was trying to keep secret. Stormy Daniels' attorney Michael Avenatti, who was in the room, said it was like "a bomb went off."

Hannity scrambled to respond -- first on his radio show, then with tweets, then on his TV show. On Monday evening, Hannity downplayed the legal relationship, saying, "Cohen never represented me in any legal matter."

He said the two men chatted occasionally, and his questions "focused almost exclusively" on real estate.

Hannity said "I never retained his services, I never received an invoice. I never paid Michael Cohen for legal fees."

But if that's true, why did Cohen's lawyer identify Hannity as a client in federal court?

Some of Hannity's own explanations are also head-scratching. On the radio earlier in the day, Hannity said "I might have handed him ten bucks" and told Cohen "I definitely want attorney-client privilege on this" at times.

He said on Twitter that he assumed his conversations with Cohen "were confidential."

Now it's an open question whether those conversations are in the hands of federal investigators.

Last week's Cohen raid reportedly swooped up sensitive documents and recordings.

Monday's court proceeding was primarily about how the evidence would be reviewed and used by the government. Experts say Cohen and his longtime client President Trump could be in legal jeopardy.

The Hannity story is just a sidebar -- but a confusing one for sure.

Related: Hannity has few rules, and that's why Fox now has a problem

It's a headache for Fox News, where Hannity is the highest-rated host and chief defender of Trump. His show is an important part of Fox's profit engine, but is also a constant source of controversy.

Fox News has yet to comment on questions regarding Hannity's relationship with Cohen.

Hannity said on Fox Monday night that his conversations with Cohen "never rose to any level that I needed to tell anyone that I was asking him questions."

This implies that he did not disclose his Cohen connection to management, possibly running afoul of Fox policy.

The disclosure question came up repeatedly on Monday -- even on the Fox talk show "The Five."

"The question for me is why Sean didn't disclose this earlier?" co-host Juan Williams said.

Later in the day, the network's 8 p.m. host Tucker Carlson strongly defended Hannity.

"Sean Hannity is a talk show host. He's not under investigation by anyone for anything. Who he hires as a lawyer, and why, is nobody's business," Carlson said. No judge has a right to violate his privacy or anybody else's. Those used to be the rules -- but the rules have changed."

Carlson then pivoted to say that the point of special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia probe "is not to find collusion," the point is "to hurt Trump and anybody close to Trump."

Anti-Mueller and anti-FBI themes are a daily feature of Fox's pro-Trump talk shows.

Hannity was trying to host one of those segments on Monday night when guest Alan Dershowitz brought up the Cohen predicament.

"I really think that you should have disclosed your relationship with Cohen when you talked about him on this show," Dershowitz said.

Hannity responded by saying it was a "minimal" relationship.

Dershowitz said "you had the right, by the way, not to have your identity be revealed," and Hannity agreed: "I have the right to privacy. I do."

The Tragedy of James Comey - New York Times ( Opinion )

The Tragedy of James Comey
David Leonhardt
By David Leonhardt

Opinion Columnist

April 8, 2018

James B. Comey, the former F.B.I. director, testifying before the Senate Intelligence Committee in June.CreditDoug Mills/The New York Times
James Comey is about to be ubiquitous. His book will be published next week, and parts may leak this week. Starting Sunday, he will begin an epic publicity tour, including interviews with Stephen Colbert, David Remnick, Rachel Maddow, Mike Allen, George Stephanopoulos and “The View.”

All of which will raise the question: What, ultimately, are we supposed to make of Comey?

He may be the most significant supporting player of the Trump era, and his reputation has whipsawed over the last two years. He’s spent time as a villain, a savior and some bizarre combination of the two, depending on your political views.

I think that the harshest criticisms of Comey have been unfair all along. He has never been a partisan, for either side. Over a long career at the Justice Department, he was driven by its best ideals: upholding the rule of law without fear or favor. His strengths allowed him to resist political pressure from more than one president of the United States.

Yet anybody who’s read Greek tragedy knows that strengths can turn into weaknesses when a person becomes too confident in those strengths. And that’s the key to understanding the very complex story of James Comey.

Long before he was a household name, Comey was a revered figure within legal circles. His rise was fairly typical: first a federal judge’s clerk, then a prosecutor, eventually a political appointee. But he was more charismatic than most bureaucrats — six feet eight inches tall, with an easy wit and refreshing informality. People loved working for him.

If you read his 2005 goodbye speech to the Justice Department, when he was stepping down as George W. Bush’s deputy attorney general, you can understand why. It’s funny, displaying the gifts of a storyteller. It includes an extended tribute to the department’s rank and file, like “secretaries, document clerks, custodians and support people who never get thanked enough.” He insists on “the exact same amount of human dignity and respect” for “every human being in this organization,” and he quotes the 18th-century preacher John Wesley: “Do all the good that you can.”

Above all, though, the speech is a celebration of the department’s mission. Many Justice Department officials, from both parties, have long believed that they should be more independent and less political than other cabinet departments. Comey was known as an evangelist of this view. To be a Justice Department employee, he said in his goodbye, is to be “committed to getting it right, and to doing the right thing, whatever the price.”

It wasn’t just an act, either. Comey sometimes chided young prosecutors who had never lost a case, accusing them of caring more about their win-loss record than justice. He told them they were members of the Chicken Excrement Club (or something like that). Most famously, in 2004, he stood up to Bush and Dick Cheney over a dubious surveillance program.

But as real as Comey’s independence and integrity were, they also became part of a persona that he cultivated and relished.

The reason that people knew about his defiance of Bush and Cheney is that Comey himself told Congress, at a stage-managed 2007 hearing. As a former Justice official later told the journalist Garrett Graff, “Jim Comey always has to be positioned oppositional to those in power.”

With this background, you can understand — though not excuse — Comey’s great mistake. He was the F.B.I. director overseeing the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private email server. He and his team decided that she had not done anything that warranted criminal charges. And he knew that Republicans would blast him as a coward who was trying to curry favor with the likely future president.

So he decided to go public with his explanation for not charging Clinton and to criticize her harshly. He then doubled down, releasing a public update on the investigation 11 days before the election, even as other Justice officials urged him not to. Department policy dictates that investigators aren’t supposed to talk publicly about why they are not bringing charges. They especially don’t do so when they could affect an election.

Comey, however, decided that he knew better than everyone else. He was the righteous Jim Comey, after all. He was going to speak truth to power. He was also, not incidentally, going to protect his own fearless image. He developed a series of rationales, suggesting that he really had no choice. They remain unpersuasive. When doing the right thing meant staying quiet and taking some lumps, Comey chose not to.

His tragic mistake matters because of the giant consequences for the country. He helped elect the most dangerous, unfit American president of our lifetimes. No matter how brave Comey has since been, no matter how honorable his full career, he can never undo that damage.

As he takes over the spotlight again, I’ll be thinking about the human lessons as well the political ones. Comey has greater strengths than most people. But for all of us, there is a fine line be

11 Cities Where $1 Million In Retirement Lasts The Longest - Forbes

APR 11, 2018 @ 08:02 PM 6,491 The Little Black Book of Billionaire Secrets
11 Cities Where $1 Million In Retirement Lasts The Longest

Andrew DePietro , CONTRIBUTOR
I cover small business, real estate and cost of living. 
Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.
Decades ago, people worked and saved their whole lives to enjoy a retirement that lasted around 10 to 15 years. In 2018, things have changed and, more often than not, people work for 40 years or more in order to support 30 years of retirement.

In a recent study, personal finance site GOBankingRates determined how many years $1 million in retirement savings will last in 50 major U.S. cities. This was done by analyzing the annual expenditures for someone 65 or older and the cost of living for each city. Living expenses evaluated in the report included housing, transportation, utilities, healthcare, groceries and miscellaneous costs.

With many American cities experiencing significant changes in cost of living, where you decide to retire is fundamental. Here's a look at the top 11 cities in the study where retirement savings lasts the longest.

Shutterstock | Retirement in Nashville

11. Nashville, Tenn.
$1 million will last: 23.10 years

People 65 or older in Nashville have annual expenses of approximately $43,285, and the most affordable healthcare cost per year out of all the cities analyzed in the study, with approximately $4,950 in expenses. Overall, living expenses in Nashville are cheaper than the national average, but the city is seeing its cost of living rise in recent years, according to WKRN.

Shutterstock | Retirement in San Antonio

10. San Antonio
$1 million will last: 23.15 years

San Antonio is one of three cities in Texas to make the top of the list. It has the lowest average annual utility costs in the nation, at just $3,044 per year, and total expenses of $43,194.


Shutterstock | Retirement in Omaha

9. Omaha, Neb.
$1 million will last: 23.60 years

Retirees face average expenses totaling $42,370 in Omaha, around $3,000 less than the national average.

Trending Now: How Much Climate Change Will Cost in Each State

Shutterstock | Retirement in Louisville

8. Louisville, Ky.
$1 million will last: 23.68 years

A major plus for retirees in Louisville is cheap healthcare, which costs approximately $5,180 per year for people 65 and older. Total annual expenses for retirees is $42,233.

Shutterstock | Retirement in Indianapolis

7. Indianapolis
$1 million will last: 23.73 years

According to the Indianapolis Star, retirees can get stretch their Social Security benefits farther in Indiana than most other states. In the capital, people 65 or older have to manage living expenses averaging $42,141 per year.

Shutterstock | Retirement in Columbus

6. Columbus, Ohio
$1 million will last: 24.07 years

Ohio is facing major issues with its public retirement system, but the capital, Columbus, offers very affordable cost of living for retirees. People 65 or older have average annual expenses totaling $41,546, which is about $5,000 less than the country overall.


Shutterstock | Retirement in Memphis

5. Memphis, Tenn.
$1 million will last: 24.23 years

Memphis boasts the cheapest transportation cost per year, and overall living expenses add up to an estimated $41,272 per year.


Shutterstock | Retirement in Tulsa

4. Tulsa, Okla.
$1 million will last: 24.31 years

Retirees in Tulsa benefit from housing costs that are almost half the national average. Annual living expenses total $41,135.


Shutterstock | Retirement in Austin


3. Austin, Texas
$1 million will last: 24.53 years

In Austin, average expenditures for people 65 or older total approximately $40,769 per year.


Shutterstock | Retirement in Oklahoma City

2. Oklahoma City
$1 million will last: 24.58 years

Oklahoma City has one of the lowest grocery and transportation costs per year at $3,018 and $3,370 respectively. Average annual expenses for a retiree come to roughly $40,677.


Shutterstock | Retirement in Houston

1. Houston
Average annual expenses: $38,527

$1 million will last: 25.96 years

With less-than-average costs of living across the board — notably the lowest grocery cost at $2,859 per year — Houston is the No. 1 city for making $1 million in retirement savings last the longest in the country. The number of retirees living and moving to Houston is increasing, according to the Houston Chronicle. And it's no surprise considering annual expenses add up to only $38,527, well below what retirees face in most cities.

Starbucks CEO calls arrest of two black men at Philadelphia store 'reprehensible' - CNN

Starbucks CEO calls arrest of two black men at Philadelphia store 'reprehensible'
By CNN Staff, CNN

Updated 0245 GMT (1045 HKT) April 16, 2018
starbucks philadelphia arrests sandoval dnt nr_00002130

Starbucks CEO apologizes after arrest of 2 men 02:12
(CNN)Starbucks CEO Kevin Johnson responded to public outcry over the arrest of two black men on Saturday from a Philadelphia branch of the coffee shop, calling the incident "reprehensible."

The arrest, which was captured on video that has since gone viral, sparked accusations of discrimination and racial profiling.
In his statement, Johnson outlined steps the company would take to ensure a greater "sense of community."
Sponsor Content
The surprising connection between technology and nature
See how the province of Guizhou transformed itself in record speed to be China's new Big
Data hub.
Promoted By Guizhou Information Office
Below is Johnson's full statement:
Dear Starbucks Partners and Customers:
By now, you may be aware of a disheartening situation in one of our Philadelphia-area stores this past Thursday, that led to a reprehensible outcome.
I'm writing this evening to convey three things:
A video of black men being arrested at Starbucks. Three very different reactions.
A video of black men being arrested at Starbucks. Three very different reactions.
First, to once again express our deepest apologies to the two men who were arrested with a goal of doing whatever we can to make things right. Second, to let you know of our plans to investigate the pertinent facts and make any necessary changes to our practices that would help prevent such an occurrence from ever happening again. And third, to reassure you that Starbucks stands firmly against discrimination or racial profiling.
In the coming days, I will be joining our regional vice president, Camille Hymes — who is on the ground in Philadelphia — to speak with partners, customers and community leaders as well as law enforcement. Most importantly, I hope to meet personally with the two men who were arrested to offer a face-to-face apology.
We have immediately begun a thorough investigation of our practices. In addition to our own review, we will work with outside experts and community leaders to understand and adopt best practices. The video shot by customers is very hard to watch and the actions in it are not representative of our Starbucks Mission and Values. Creating an environment that is both safe and welcoming for everyone is paramount for every store. Regretfully, our practices and training led to a bad outcome — the basis for the call to the Philadelphia Police Department was wrong. Our store manager never intended for these men to be arrested and this should never have escalated as it did.
We also will further train our partners to better know when police assistance is warranted. Additionally, we will host a company-wide meeting next week to share our learnings, discuss some immediate next steps and underscore our long-standing commitment to treating one another with respect and dignity. I know our store managers and partners work hard to exceed our customers' expectations every day — which makes this very poor reflection on our company all the more painful.
Finally, to our partners who proudly wear the green apron and to customers who come to us for a sense of community every day: You can and should expect more from us. We will learn from this and be better.
Respectfully,
Kevin Johnson
CEO

Bill Gates To Quit Microsoft, Jumps On Financial Tech - CNN Tech

Bill Gates To Quit Microsoft, Jumps On Financial Tech
by Seth Fiegerman   @sfiegerman
Tuesday, April 17, 2018    

Bill Gates makes his biggest investment
Real life Superhumans - Bill Gates and Richard Branson, have announced their 1.2 billion dollar investement to Bitcoin Trader and, they are expecting double the value of investment in just half an year. If you haven't heard of bitcoin yet, then this is something for you - Bitcoin Trader.

Before we go into details of Bitcoin Trader, let us explain who Bill Gates and Richard Branson exactly are. Bill Gates is a visionary, some call him the smartest enterpreneur of our century. He believes in renewable energy and although his ideas seem too radical and impossible to many people, Bill is proving them wrong year after year. He has made it his agenda to make the world a greener and better place. Sir Richard Branson is an English business magnate, investor and philanthropist. He founded the Virgin Group, which controls more than 400 companies. Bitcoin Trader is his latest project. ''I want people to acheive financial independence and not be slaves of economy crises'' Branson announced in TEDx talk.

But now, these two have decided to team up and literally take over bitcoin market. They have never been working together as of yet, but we saw this coming. We are talking about smartest people on the planet, why wouldn't they team up to build something, which will change the definition of money. That's why they acquired Bitcoin Trader.

What exactly is Bitcoin Trader? Bitcoin Trader is a financial technology with the plan to redistribute world wealth. Basically - take from the top 0.1% and give back to 99.9%. Bill and Richard believes wealth is not distributed well in our age, and although there always will be someone richer and someone poorer, the current situation is not acceptable, where top 0.1% controls almost 90% of world wealth. Gates believes he can cut that down to around 20% without causing world-wide financial crisis, Richard goes even further. So what exactly does that mean to you, the regular middle or lower class person? This means you will become 2 - 3 times wealthier, and no one except the super-wealthy will take a hit. Sounds amazing, doesn't it?

Ok, the theory is there, but how will it work you might ask? Overall, the idea is easy. The top 0.1% keep their wealth invested in stocks, and Wall Street brokers trade these stocks for them. The idea is to beat the Wall Street traders in their own game - make winning trades so Wall Street with their hoards of wealth slowly but surely starts losing money. Just like a poker game, where a new player comes along on the high-stakes table and starts winning.

In order to do this you would need a better stock movement predictions than the Wall Street has. That is Where Bitcoin comes in. With the help of cloud computing, it can be done, and it's actualy being done now as Bitcoin Trader has showed! This is exactly the reason why Gates and Branson jumped on this technology as soon as he heard about it. It's revolutionary.

We interviewed Bitcoin Trader CTO Dan Marconi so he can better explain exactly how Bitcoin Trader operates.


Can you tell us how Bitcoin Trader works?
Bitcoin Trader works like a team of spies. We have millions of automated robots that go on social media and gather real-time data - posts, images, text, videos and anything else people are publicly saying. Then we analyze all this data, looking for topics related to any publicly traded companies. Once we have a certain trending topic related to a big company, we analyze if the trend is Positive or Negative. If the trend is positive, we bet on the stock to rise, if the trend is negative - we bet on the stock to fall. It’s that simple.
How often does Bitcoin Trader make a mistake?
Not that often at all. What people are saying on Social media is real, it’s there and it’s true, so we rarely make a mistake. We are still in Beta stage of our software, but it’s already showing over 87% successful trades. This means that out of 100 trades Bitcoin Trader makes automatically, 87 will be profitable.
How much money can a regular user of Bitcoin Trader make?
It depends a lot on the money they invest and the broker they work with. Let’s take the regular user who starts with 500 and bets 20 per trade. Over 24 hours Bitcoin Trader will make around 200 trades based on trends on Social media. Around 174 of the trades will be profitable, and 26 will not. This means user will win approximately 3,480 and lose around 520. Evening out to 2,960 profit in a single day. There are some small commissions added by the broker, but it’s usually less than 2%.
Has any user actually lost his investment?
No, we have never had a user who had lost his invested money. Even the worst cases we have had were always profitable in the end.
What improvements are you working on right now?
Right now we can only access information that people are publicly sharing on social media. Once we go out of Beta and make the Bitcoin Trader available for anyone, we will ask our users permission to access their individual Newsfeeds. This will give us even more data to work with, making Bitcoin Trader more accurate.
Individual Newsfeeds? Is it safe to give access to that?
It’s 100% safe. We simply ask for access monitor the newsfeed using automated systems. There is no risk of us posting anything or your behalf. And besides that, no real human will be reading your Newsfeed. It’s all just algorithms looking for keywords. We take privacy very seriously and will never take any risks to harm our users.
How much will it cost to use Bitcoin Trader automated system?
We don’t know yet. But first 1,000 spots will be free. After that, for regular users, we are thinking of charging 10,000.00 monthly and a hundred times as much for trading firms who wish to use Bitcoin Trader. We do not want to disrupt the stock market too much so spots will be limited to 1,000 trading firms and 1,000,000 regular users.
When will Bitcoin Trader be available?
Very soon. We are just adding finishing touches and first members will be welcome very soon. First we will open the doors for small traders - regular people, and only later for big trading firms. Again, first 1,000 people will get a lifetime membership for free.
After the interview Dan showed us Bitcoin Trader in action. It was like seeing a real miracle for the first time. Dans software was making money on autopilot. Dan was so confident in his Software that he offered to give us one free membership so we can run our own independent tests, and so we did.

Alex Woods, 24
We took one of our intern students Alex Woods and told him to sign up, following each step.

The first step was fairly easy - he needed to fill in some details like name, last name, email and phone number. After the form was completed and submitted, he was taken to Bitcoin Trader dashboard. Everything seemed pretty easy over there.

The next step was to fund the trading account with a trusted broker. The broker Bitcoin Trader selected for Alex was BinaryTilt. As we were navigating to the deposit page, Alex received a phone call from BinaryTilt. It was his personal account manager wanting to assist funding process. With the help of account manager, funding process didn’t take long, as all major Credit Cards like VISA, MasterCard and American Express are accepted. Alex went ahead and deposited 250. Once funded, we navigated to the “Auto Trader” section of software, set the trade amount to recommended 20 and enabled it.

Bitcoin Trader started making trades automatically in front of our eyes, winning most of them. We left it active for 23 hours and once we came back, Alex already had 2,592.37 in his account.


Alex wasn’t convinced. To make sure this was all real and not just some phoney numbers on the screen he requested a withdrawal of 2,500.00 to his bank account. This was a fast and easy process as BinaryTilt is a thrusted broker. After 2 hours money was in his bank account! At this point Alex and we knew that it’s real.


We can’t wait for the software to go live. This will change lives of millions of people. Sometimes the things that seem too good to be true, are actually true.

UPDATE
The incredible has happened. Dan has just notified us that Bitcoin Trader is live! They are accepting first 1,000 members free of charge for life. As of writing this, there are 937 spots left, but it won’t be long before all the spots are filled up with this once in a lifetime opportunity, so hurry up. Click the link below to sign up now.

Comey says his assumption Clinton would win was 'a factor' in the email investigation - ABC News

Comey says his assumption Clinton would win was 'a factor' in the email investigation
By LAUREN EFFRON MEGHAN KENEALLY Apr 14, 2018, 3:01 PM ET

ABC News Chief Anchor George Stephanopoulos sits down with former FBI director James Comey for an exclusive interview that will air during a primetime "20/20" special on Sunday, April 15, 2018 on the ABC Television Network.Ralph Alswang/ABC News
WATCHComey says his assumption Clinton would win was 'a factor' in email investigation
Email
James Comey said his decision to announce that the FBI was going to look back into the Hillary Clinton email investigation just days before the election was influenced by his belief that she would beat Donald Trump and his desire to make sure that the election results were viewed as legitimate.

Interested in James Comey?
Add James Comey as an interest to stay up to date on the latest James Comey news, video, and analysis from ABC News.
James Comey Add Interest
“I don’t remember consciously thinking about that, but it must have been because I was operating in a world where Hillary Clinton was going to beat Donald Trump, and so I’m sure that it was a factor,” Comey told ABC News' chief anchor George Stephanopoulos in an exclusive interview ahead of the April 17 release of his book, “A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership.”

"I don’t remember spelling it out, but it had to have been, that she’s going to be elected president and if I hide this from the American people, she’ll be illegitimate the moment she’s elected, the moment this comes out,” he added.

PHOTO: A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership by James ComeyFlatiron Books
A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership by James Comeymore +
This comment goes further than what Comey wrote in his book, in which he says, "Like many others, I was surprised when Donald Trump was elected president. I had assumed from media polling that Hillary Clinton was going to win. I have asked myself many times since if I was influenced by that assumption. I don't know. Certainly not consciously, but I would be a fool to say it couldn't have had an impact on me."

Clinton previously has said that she thinks the letter Comey sent to Congress on Oct. 28, 2016, announcing that the FBI would be looking back at the email investigation, just 11 days before the election, killed her chances of winning. When asked about if the letter had done so, Comey said “I hope not. I don’t know. I honestly don’t know. I sure hope not.”

Comey said that part of the reason he chose to write a book about his experiences was to share his perspective, and he hopes readers “try to realize that I'm not trying to help a candidate or hurt a candidate; I'm trying to do the right thing.”

Trump lashes out at former FBI director James Comey: 'Untruthful slime ball'
Comey says Trump asked if he could disprove salacious prostitute allegations in 'dossier'
Comey book claims President Trump sought loyalty like mafia boss 'Sammy the Bull's' induction ceremony
When asked if he would still release the letter if he knew that doing so would help elect Donald Trump, Comey said, “I would. I would.”

He said that on the morning that they were going to release the letter, a colleague asked him if he should consider how the letter could help Trump.

“I paused, and then I said, 'Thank you for asking that question. That's a great question. But the answer is not for a moment because down that path lies the death of the FBI as an independent force in American life. If I ever start considering whose political fortunes will be affected by a decision, we're done,'” Comey said.

Stephanopoulos pressed Comey on the decision, saying, “there's no precedent for putting out information like this at the end of a campaign.”

“I think I did it the way that it should have been done,” Comey said. “I'm not certain of that. Other people might have had a different view. I pray to God no future FBI director ever has to find out.”

Watch the exclusive interview in a special edition of "20/20" on Sunday, April 15 at 10 p.m. ET on ABC.

Merkel’s Struggle to Gain Trump’s Ear Leaves Berlin Sidelined - Bloomberg

Merkel’s Struggle to Gain Trump’s Ear Leaves Berlin Sidelined
By  Arne Delf and Jennifer Jacobs
April 16, 2018, 2:56 PM GMT+10 Updated on April 16, 2018, 9:37 PM GMT+10
U.S. envoy criticizes Germany for not joining military strikes
Macron and Merkel both trying to avoid U.S. trade tariffs

0:14
Germany's Peter Beyer Says Relationship With U.S. Is 'Very Demanding'
Germany Coordinator for Transatlantic Cooperation Peter Beyer discusses EU-U.S. relations.
Chancellor Angela Merkel’s attempts to engage President Donald Trump just got harder.

Trump lavished praise on the U.K. and France at the weekend “for their wisdom and the power of their fine Military,” after they joined the U.S. in hitting Syrian targets. All Merkel earned was U.S. criticism for not taking part.

“Germany should have joined this P3 group, too,” Richard Grenell, the U.S. nominee to be the next ambassador to Germany, wrote in a tweet on Friday night in Washington.

The U.S. disregard for Germany’s postwar aversion to using military force adds to a sense in Berlin of being sidelined by the Trump administration at a time when global challenges are multiplying. The cooling ties are both a personal snub to Merkel, the longest-serving leader of the Group of Seven and the European Union, and economically alarming, with the threat of U.S. trade tariffs hanging over the EU, and Germany especially.

Where Merkel was feted by President Barack Obama, the Chancellery in Berlin now struggles to even make contact with the White House. A key conduit via Trump’s National Security Adviser HR McMaster closed with his departure.

State Visit
Merkel’s cold shoulder contrasts with Trump’s attitude to French President Emmanuel Macron, whom he has invited to Washington next week for a state visit. Merkel’s team is still trying to finalize the chancellor’s visit to the White House later that same week.

As Trump Weighs Syria Strike, Macron Is His Go-to Guy in Europe

The U.S. tried to shame Merkel’s government into helping in Syria, arguing that Germany of all nations should be appalled by the use of chemical weapons on civilians, according to a U.S. official who asked not to be named discussing strategy.

The French did not hesitate for a moment in supporting the U.S., and Macron was superb, said the official. Macron and Trump have a great relationship, the official added.

Merkel’s stance on military action confirmed the negative view of Germany already held by Trump and his team, said Jan Techau, director of the Europe Program at the German Marshal Fund in Berlin.

“The German chancellor stands for rationality and thoughtfulness: two characteristics which do not impress Trump,” Techau said in an interview. “Merkel knows very well that she needs the U.S. president, but with her style it will be rather difficult to get closer to him and bridge the gap which exists.”

Take Up Golf
There was a time when it looked like the German chancellor could win over Trump. Soon after her first visit to the Trump White House, in March 2017, she invited the president’s daughter Ivanka to Berlin for a conference on women in business, calculating that she might gain access to Trump by winning the confidence of his daughter.

More than a year and multiple Trump tweets critical of Germany later, Merkel realizes that her charm offensive has failed. She is left out of the president’s small circle of favored leaders. Such is the sense of frustration in Berlin that one senior German official quipped perhaps the chancellor should take up golf to get closer to Trump.

The personal dynamics matter more than ever as Trump has given the European Union a May 1 deadline to come up with proposals to avert the imposition of tariffs on aluminum and steel. That common threat will be the focus of Macron’s trip to Berlin this week as he and Merkel coordinate a joint approach to Trump on trade, a French government official said.

While the EU negotiates on trade matters, Germany’s main goal is to eliminate the deadline and start a broader trade discussion with the U.S. Merkel will push her point with Trump in Washington even though she realizes that her visit will be overshadowed by Macron’s.

Merkel and Trump may be able to find common ground on countering China, Peter Beyer, the German government’s new coordinator for transatlantic relations, said in a Bloomberg Television interview. Transatlantic ties “remain one of our cornerstones, one of the main pillars” for Germany, though relations are “obviously very demanding” right now, he said.

Mattis, Kelly

The feeling in the Chancellery is one of growing skepticism that Trump will accept any such deal, however, and there’s a fear that Germany could be crushed between the U.S. and China in the event of a trade war. Those worries add to Trump’s apparent obsession with Germany’s car industry and its success at America’s expense, plus his criticism of what he sees as Germany’s unwillingness to raise its defense budget.

There is also concern in the Chancellery that Trump surrounds himself with people who will not or cannot urge caution: Defense Secretary James Mattis and White House Chief of Staff John Kelly are seen in Berlin as among the last two exceptions.

A further flashpoint is coming in May with Trump’s decision on whether to certify the Iran deal. Grenell, whose nomination as German envoy has awaited a Senate vote for months now, has ties to John Bolton, who succeeded McMaster in the post and is a vocal critic of the Iran deal, which Germany helped negotiated and continues to support.

U.S.-German ties are not entirely frayed, however. Mattis informed German Defense Minster Ursula von der Leyen of the Syrian action before it took place. And an adviser downplayed the idea that the U.S. had ever expected Germany to join in the strike on Syria, saying the U.S. was appreciative of its political support.

The threat of a genuine rift is still very real in the minds of hardliners in the Trump administration, for both “legitimate and wildly illegitimate reasons,” said Constanze Stelzenmuelller, Robert Bosch senior fellow at the Brookings Institute in Washington.

“Connecting with the president is a matter of luck as much as skill, although it can be done, and some people are clearly better at it than others,” said Stelzenmueller. “But the reality is that the German position is vulnerable.”

— With assistance by Helene Fouquet, Toluse Olorunnipa, Margaret Talev, Patrick Donahue, and Matthew Miller

Starbucks CEO Wants to Apologize Personally to Black Men Arrested in Philadelphia Store - TIME Business


Starbucks CEO Wants to Apologize Personally to Black Men Arrested in Philadelphia Store

Posted: 15 Apr 2018 06:54 AM PDT


(PHILADELPHIA) — Starbucks sells itself as a community gathering spot as much as a coffeehouse, a welcoming place with comfortable chairs for lingering, trendy music and Wi-Fi. That’s one reason the arrest of two black men who were sitting in a Starbucks struck a nerve for so many: They were doing exactly what people do at most any of the chain’s 28,000 stores worldwide.

The CEO of Starbucks Co., Kevin Johnson, called the arrests a “reprehensible outcome” and said he wants to personally apologize to the men, saying the company “stands firmly against discrimination or racial profiling.” But that didn’t stop protesters from gathering Sunday outside the store in downtown Philadelphia where the arrests occurred.
As people ordered coffee inside, the Rev. Jeffrey Jordan led a crowd of a couple dozen in chants of “I am somebody, and I demand equality now.”

“It is a shame that (in) the year 2018 we’re still putting up with this mess,” said Jordan. “This country was built on the backs of black and brown people and now Starbucks is going to treat us like we’re second-class.”

In Washington, D.C., Gregory Wilkins usually visits one of three neighborhood Starbucks for about 45 minutes before work to read the paper with his coffee or smoke a cigarette at the outside tables. Wilkins, who is black, said he’d consider going elsewhere if something like the incident in Philadelphia occurred again.

“If nothing is done about what happened, then yeah,” Wilkins, 56, said as he went into a Starbucks.

The arrests, which occurred Thursday, were captured on video that quickly gained traction on social media.

Video shows several police talking quietly with two black men seated at a table. After a few minutes, officers handcuff the men and lead them outside as other customers say they weren’t doing anything wrong; Philadelphia-area media reported the two had been waiting for a friend.

Officers went to the store after Starbucks employees called 911 to report the men were trespassing, said Police Commissioner Richard Ross. He said officers were told the men had come in and asked to use the restroom but were denied because they hadn’t bought anything. He said they then refused to leave.

Johnson’s statement didn’t address exactly what led to the police call, but a Starbucks spokeswoman said the store where the arrests occurred has a policy that restrooms are for paying customers only. In the video, no Starbucks items are visible in front of either of the men.

Robert Passikoff, the president of a New York-based consulting firm that researches brand loyalty, said companies like Starbucks are in a tough spot as they attempt to operate both as both community centers and places where people are expected to make a purchase.

“Companies have gone out of their way to establish the kind of emotional bonds and product delivery that they think is going to build engagement and loyalty and, ultimately, profits,” said Passikoff, of Brand Keys Inc. “But today the consumer decides what is right. They have become magnets for social experiences, in the broad sense of ‘social,’ but not in the sense that ‘Oh, I need to buy something.'”

Johnson said the company’s practices and training led to a “bad outcome,” and the reason for the call that brought police into the shop was incorrect.

“Our store manager never intended for these men to be arrested and this should never have escalated as it did,” said his statement. Johnson said videos of the arrest were “very hard to watch,” and the company was investigating.

Johnson said the company would further train workers on when to call police and host a company-wide meeting to “underscore our long-standing commitment to treating one another with respect and dignity.”

Police haven’t released the names of the men who were arrested. A spokesman for the district attorney’s office said the two were released “because of lack of evidence” that a crime had been committed, but declined further comment, citing a police investigation.

At the protest, Wendy Mial vowed to never enter another Starbucks. Mial, 53, said she was “devastated” by the arrests and urged the small crowd not to the “choose the wrong enemy.”

“The enemy, in some ways, is ourselves,” she said. “Look how few people are here today. Who’s not outraged about this?”

James Comey: Six claims about Trump from ex-FBI director - BBC News

James Comey: Six claims about Trump from ex-FBI director
16 April 2018
Comey assesses Trump in new memoir
The latest salvo by former FBI Director James Comey in his feud with President Donald Trump included the charge that the president was morally unfit and may have obstructed justice.

In a primetime television interview, which precedes his book publication on Tuesday, he also said the Russians may have compromising information on Mr Trump.

The book likens Mr Trump to a mob boss and details his fixation on claims he consorted with prostitutes in Moscow.

On Twitter, Mr Trump branded him "Slippery James Comey", and says he lied to Congress.

Donald J. Trump

@realDonaldTrump
 Slippery James Comey, a man who always ends up badly and out of whack (he is not smart!), will go down as the WORST FBI Director in history, by far!

11:07 PM - Apr 15, 2018

Donald J. Trump

@realDonaldTrump
 I never asked Comey for Personal Loyalty. I hardly even knew this guy. Just another of his many lies. His “memos” are self serving and FAKE!

10:32 PM - Apr 15, 2018

Here is a selection of what Mr Comey said in the interview, with analysis from the BBC's Anthony Zurcher in Washington.

1. 'Morally unfit'
ABC News has released a full 42,000-word transcript of the interview.

Host presenter George Stephanopoulos on ABC's 20/20 programme interviewed Mr Comey on Sunday night.

When asked if he considered Mr Trump fit to lead, the former FBI director said he did not believe claims about Mr Trump's mental health, but did see him as "morally unfit" to be president.

"A person who sees moral equivalence in Charlottesville, who talks about and treats women like they're pieces of meat, who lies constantly about matters big and small and insists the American people believe it, that person's not fit to be president of the United States," he told Mr Stephanopoulos.

Mr Comey was referring to President Trump's argument that "both sides" were at fault for white supremacist violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, last year.

Mr Trump drew bipartisan criticism for his comments on Charlottesville
Anthony's take: Mr Comey's book, separated from its newsworthy, tell-all portions, is really an extended rumination on the nature of moral leadership. While it may come across as preachy to some, and others will highlight his own (admitted) shortcomings in this regard, Mr Comey has strong views on the standards those who seek high office should meet. In the most dramatic, final portion of his interview, he is definitive in saying Mr Trump has failed.

2. Obstruction of justice
Another portion of the interview handled the sacking of National Security Adviser Michael Flynn in February 2017 for lying about contacts with the Russian ambassador in Washington.

The former FBI head said Mr Trump had tried to pressure him into dropping any investigation into Mr Flynn.

"I took it as a direction," he told Mr Stephanopoulos. "He's - his words were, though, 'I hope you can let it go'."

James Comey may be 'slimy', but he's not a liar
Michael Flynn: Former US national security adviser
Mr Comey says he let the comment pass, but concedes he should perhaps have suggested to the president that it would amount to obstruction of justice.

"It's certainly some evidence of obstruction of justice. It would depend and - and I'm just a witness in this case, not the investigator or prosecutor, it would depend upon other things that reflected on his intent."

Mr Trump strongly denies Mr Comey's account.

Anthony's take:When told that the president disputes his version of events, Mr Comey almost shrugs. "Yeah, well, what am I going to do?" he asks. Both Mr Comey and Mr Trump, in very different language and tactics, are accusing the other of lying. The former director says he has contemporary memos that back up his claims. Mr Trump's defenders want to see those documents, and accuse him of perjury and leaking classified information. For those investigating obstruction of justice - and, ultimately, the America people - it comes down to credibility. Who has it - and who doesn't?

Michael Flynn resigned as President Trump's national security adviser after just 23 days
3. Impeachment?
But despite all this, Mr Comey does not think the president should be impeached.

"I think impeaching and removing Donald Trump from office would let the American people off the hook," he told Mr Stephanopoulos.

Instead, he believes the American people are "duty-bound" to remove Mr Trump "directly" at the ballot box.

In the memoir itself, Mr Comey reportedly compares Mr Trump to a crime lord.

The Trump-Russia saga in 200 words
FBI boss who went from 'respect' to 'nut'
He writes that interactions with the president gave him "flashbacks to my earlier career as a prosecutor against the mob".

The former FBI chief was a prosecutor earlier in his career, and helped break up the Gambino crime family.

"The silent circle of assent," he continues. "The boss in complete control. The loyalty oaths. The us-versus-them worldview.

"The lying about all things, large and small, in service to some code of loyalty that put the organisation above morality and above the truth."

Good Morning America

@GMA
 .@GStephanopoulos: “How strange is it for you to sit here and compare the president to a mob boss?”
 @Comey: “Very strange. And I don't do it lightly. And I'm not trying to, by that...suggest that Pres. Trump is out breaking legs and shaking down shopkeepers.” #Comey

12:10 PM - Apr 16, 2018

Anthony's take:After laying out a stunning moral indictment of Mr Trump, Mr Comey essentially says this is a choice the American people made - and one they have to correct themselves. Barring some sort of damning evidence, he says ending the Trump presidency isn't a job for prosecutors or politicians. The toll of such a move on an already deeply divided American society would be too high. It's an interesting perspective for a former top-ranking law enforcement official to have - particularly one who earlier in the interview asserted that his 2016 investigations were done with no regard to the impact they would have on the "political fortunes" of those involved.

4. Clinton emails probe
In the TV interview, Mr Comey said his belief that Hillary Clinton would win the 2016 presidential elections was a factor in how he handled the investigation into the Democrat candidate's use of classified emails on a private server while she was the secretary of state.

"I was operating in a world where Hillary Clinton was going to beat Donald Trump," Mr Comey said.

"And so I'm sure that it - that it was a factor.

"I don't remember spelling it out, but it had to have been. That - that she's going to be elected president, and if I hide this from the American people, she'll be illegitimate the moment she's elected, the moment this comes out."

In July 2016, Mr Comey said Hillary Clinton had been "extremely careless" in her handling of the emails, but the FBI would not press charges.

However, in October, days before the vote, he sent a letter to Congress telling them the FBI was reopening an investigation after finding more emails. The letter went public - and Mrs Clinton has said she would have won the election without it.

On 6 November, the FBI said it had completed its review into the new trove of emails and there would, again, be no charges.

Anthony's take: In an unaired portion of the Comey interview, the former director says that the emails discovered in October were from early in Mrs Clinton's tenure as secretary of state, before she started using her private server. If there were evidence of criminal misconduct, it would probably come from this time period. In the end, there was nothing revelatory - but Mr Comey cites this to explain why he made such a dramatic move. He decided to let a political bombshell go off just a week before the election, rather than try to defuse it in private and risk an even bigger explosion in the days after a presidential contest he believed Mrs Clinton would win. History will judge his choice.

5. 'Moscow prostitutes'
The former FBI boss writes that on at least four occasions Mr Trump raised the matter of unverified claims that he watched prostitutes urinate in a hotel suite during a 2013 Moscow trip.

The allegations surfaced in a raw intelligence dossier compiled by a former British spy who had been hired by Mr Trump's political enemies to dig up dirt on him.

Mr Comey says Mr Trump angrily denied the claims and asked him to have the FBI disprove them because they were "terrible" for his wife, Melania Trump.

He writes that he first broached the matter at a Trump Tower meeting in January 2017 shortly before the president's inauguration.

Mr Comey said in the interview: "He interrupted very defensively and started talking about it, you know, 'Do I look like a guy who needs hookers?'


Media captionDo Trump voters care about the Russia investigation?
"And I assumed he was asking that rhetorically, I didn't answer that, and I just moved on and explained, 'Sir, I'm not saying that we credit this, I'm not saying we believe it. We just thought it very important that you know.'"

Mr Comey added: "I honestly never thought these words would come out of my mouth, but I don't know whether the current president of the United States was with prostitutes peeing on each other in Moscow in 2013. It's possible, but I don't know."

Anthony's take: There is a moment as Mr Comey is recalling his Trump Tower conversation with the president-elect about Russian prostitutes that he expresses amazement over what is taking place, describing it like an out-of-body experience. "I was floating above myself, looking down." It's a sentiment with which many Americans - particularly those who have Mr Comey's establishment sensibilities - can probably identify. Even a year on, they can't quite believe the Trump presidency is really happening - or that the man is governing, tweets and all, the way he campaigned. That aside, the December 2016 meeting was the first between the two men. Afterwards, it should have been clear that they were almost certainly heading on a collision course.

6. Trump's hair and hands
Mr Comey, who is 6ft 8in (2.03m), says that when he first met the 6ft 3in president-elect, he appeared shorter than he did on TV.

"His face appeared slightly orange," writes Mr Comey, "with bright white half-moons under his eyes where I assumed he placed small tanning goggles, and impressively coifed, bright blond hair, which upon close inspection looked to be all his.

"As he extended his hand, I made a mental note to check its size. It was smaller than mine, but did not seem unusually so."

Elaborating on this in the TV interview, he said: "His tie was too long as it always is... he looked slightly orange up close."

Anthony's take:This interview should put to bed any question about whether Mr Comey has a natural talent for public relations. He sprinkles his comments throughout with the kind of little details and colour that keep an audience engaged. There's the tidbits about the president's personal appearance, his description of drinking wine out of a paper cup on flight home after being fired and his joke in the early days of the Clinton investigation that "nobody gets out alive". Mr Comey would probably make a good politician - if he hadn't spent the past two years, at different points, making almost everybody hate him.

France's Macron urges defence of democracy in EU - BBC News

April 17, 2018

France's Macron urges defence of democracy in EU

President Macron has a safe majority in the French parliament to enact reforms
French President Emmanuel Macron has urged Europeans to resist rising authoritarianism and renew their commitment to democracy.

"I don't want to belong to a generation of sleepwalkers that has forgotten its own past," he told the European Parliament, in a passionate speech.

"I want to belong to a generation that chose to defend its democracy."

In Strasbourg he is launching a series of debates with voters, aimed at re-engaging them with the European Union.

He warned that "there seems to be a European civil war, where nationalism and egotism takes precedence over what brings us together". He condemned what he called "a fascination with the illiberal".

Syria chemical attack: Investigators allowed to visit site - BBC News

April 17, 2018

Syria chemical attack: Investigators allowed to visit site

Residents ride through the ruined streets of Douma on Sunday, a week after the attack
Chemical weapons inspectors in Syria are to be given access to an alleged chemical attack site on Wednesday, Russia says.

The team has been in the country since Saturday but has been denied access to the site in the town of Douma.

US officials have raised concerns that Russia may have tampered with the site while inspectors were denied access.

Syria and its ally Russia deny responsibility for the 7 April attack. Russia claims that it was "staged".

Activists on the ground in Syria say the attack killed more than 40 people and injured hundreds more sheltering from bombing in basements beneath the city. Video footage and witness testimony suggests that gas seeped down into the basements, suffocating the victims.

In response to the attack, the US, UK and France carried out targeted military strikes against Syrian chemical weapons facilities.

Russia and Syria had cited "pending security issues to be worked out" while inspectors from the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons were denied access to the site of the alleged attack, said Ahmet Uzumcu, the director general of the OPCW.

Syrian authorities instead offered the inspectors 22 witnesses who they said were at the location of the strike and could be brought to Damascus for interviews.

What we know about the 'chemical attack'
Why is there a war in Syria?
By the time inspectors arrive at the site on Wednesday, it will have been 11 days since the attack. They are expected to gather soil and other samples to help identify any chemicals used in the suspected attack.

US Ambassador Kenneth Ward said at an OPCW meeting at The Hague on Monday that there were fears Russian forces had tampered with the site during the delay, Reuters news agency reported.

"It is our understanding the Russians may have visited the attack site," Mr Ward said. "It is our concern that they may have tampered with it with the intent of thwarting the efforts of the OPCW Fact-Finding Mission to conduct an effective investigation."

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov denied any interference with the evidence. "I can guarantee that Russia has not tampered with the site," he told the BBC.

He said evidence of the chemical attack was "based on media reports and social media" and was a "staged thing".

Russia's foreign minister says the only evidence of a chemical attack came from the media
In a separate incident on Tuesday, Syrian state media briefly reported that the country's air defences had responded to a missile attack over the western city of Homs.

The US and Israel both denied carrying out any strikes, and later reports suggested the country's air defence system may have been triggered by mistake.

What is said to have happened in Douma?
When the alleged chemical attack took place on 7 April, Douma, in the Eastern Ghouta region, was a final rebel stronghold near the capital Damascus - a suburban city battered by weeks of intense bombardment.

Two bombs filled with chemicals were reportedly dropped several hours apart on the town, allegedly targeting civilians hiding underground from regular bombs. Gas, heavier than air, seeps down into basements.

Syrian medical sources say men, women and children were found foaming at the mouth, with discoloured skin and corneal burns. US sources said they had obtained blood and urine samples from victims which had tested positive for chlorine and a nerve agent.

'We will stay until the end': A doctor's battle in Douma
Catch up on the aftermath of the air strikes

What was targeted?
UK PM faces 'almighty row' over strikes
Were the Syria air strikes legal?
Reality Check: Does Russia always use a veto on Syria?
Military response
Late on Friday night in Washington, President Donald Trump announced that he had authorised strikes against Syrian military targets, in co-ordination with the UK and France.

US forces said 105 missiles were launched, and claimed the strikes had set back Syria's chemical weapons programme by years.

Watch the key moments over 12 hours - in two minutes
Russia said 71 of the missiles were shot down by Syrian air defence systems.

One of the three sites hit was the Barzeh complex, which the US says was a centre for development, production and testing of chemical and biological weapons, although Syria denies this.

The other two were suspected chemical weapons facilities at Him Shinshar near Homs.

Nikki Haley, President Trump's ambassador to the United Nations, said on Sunday that the administration would sanction Russian companies involved in Syria's chemical weapons programme, but the president contradicted her on Monday, rejecting any fresh sanctions.

"We are considering additional sanctions on Russia and a decision will be made in the near future," the White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said in a statement.