July 10, 2018
World's 'oldest coloured molecules' are bright pink
The pink pigments are the fossilised molecules of ancient sea organisms
Scientists have discovered what they say are the world's oldest surviving biological colours, from ancient rocks beneath the Sahara desert.
The 1.1 billion-year-old pigments have a bright pink hue, but range from blood red to deep purple in their concentrated form.
The pigments are fossilised molecules of chlorophyll produced by sea organisms, Australian scientists said.
Researchers ground shale rocks into powder to extract the pigment.
"Imagine you could find a fossilised dinosaur skin that still has its original colour, green or blue... that is exactly the type of discovery that we've made," Associate Prof Jochen Brocks from the Australian National University (ANU) told the BBC.
"These are actual molecules, the oldest coloured molecules in the world.
"When held against the sunlight, they are actually a neon pink."
'Amazing that colour can survive'
ANU PhD student, Dr Nur Gueneli, discovered the pigments after running an organic solvent through the powdered rock. Mr Brocks said the extraction process was "similar to a coffee machine".
Colours in nature - and how we see them
"I heard her screaming in the lab when it came out, and she ran into my office," Asst Prof Brocks said.
"At first I thought it had been contaminated. It is just amazing that something with a biological colour can survive for such a long time."
Scientists extracted the molecules from ancient shale rock
A mining company had found the rocks in a marine shale deposit in the Taoudeni Basin in Mauritania, West Africa about 10 years ago, after drilling a hole several hundred metres deep, he said.
An analysis of the pigments found they had been produced by cyanobacteria in the seas at the time. Prof Brocks said this contributed to understanding on the evolution of life forms on Earth.
The toxic colour from volcanoes
The pigment made of human remains
World's first colour film viewed
"Tiny cyanobacteria dominated the base of the food chain in the oceans a billion years ago, which helps to explain why animals did not exist at the time," he said.
"Life only became bigger about 600 million years ago because before that there was no sufficient food source."
The research, which also involved scientists in the US and Japan, has been published in journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Science of the United States of America.
Tuesday, July 10, 2018
Monday, July 9, 2018
Politicians should listen to big business – but not too much - Independent
July 9, 2018.
Politicians should listen to big business – but not too much
Business has a right to a voice in politics. And sometimes that voice deserves a special hearing. But it should only ever be one voice among several
Ben Chu
@Benchu_
Businesses have been sounding a Brexit chorus of warning
In recent days Airbus, BMW, Siemens and Jaguar Land Rover have all raised their voices to highlight the severe economic damage that will be done to their operations if the cabinet’s hardline Brexiteers get their way and wrench Britain out of the EU’s customs union and single market. Some have even said the harm could be so grave that they would pull out of the UK altogether, costing jobs and investment.
Choruses need a conductor. And it’s more than likely that these interventions were coordinated to prepare the ground for Friday’s Chequers meeting to force a cabinet agreement on what proposal the UK government should submit for a post-transition Brexit trade deal with the rest of the European Union.
But not everyone in the audience has been appreciative.
Labour will not back May’s Brexit plan, Sir Keir Starmer says
Corbyn says May must call election if she can’t get Brexit deal passed
Business leaders back cabinet’s Brexit deal
“F*** business” was allegedly the concise review of one of those cabinet hardliners, Boris Johnson. The pro-Brexit Conservative internet entrepreneur Tim Montgomerie sought to present this four-letter reaction from the foreign secretary last week in the grand tradition of Adam Smith, citing the father of economics’ renowned alertness to firms’ tendency to anti-competitive behaviour.
Others have made the point that the voice of a handful of large pro-EU multinationals could be drowning out a different perspective from smaller firms.
It’s a curious consequence of Brexit that it has got “pro-business” right-wingers to pay attention to the dangers of monopolisation and lobbying by big firms. The fact that such concerns have surfaced now that businesses are warning about Brexit puts one in mind of the jailed dictator who suddenly becomes an advocate of prisoners’ human rights.
Yet even if the source of the argument is dubious, that doesn’t mean it’s an empty one. No serious person disputes that businesses often lobby in their own narrow interest. And it’s a fact of life that large firms with tens of thousands of employees usually have a degree of political access that smaller firms with only tens of workers lack. Even those who welcome big businesses’ interventions over Brexit would have to acknowledge these truths.
But that leaves us with a dilemma. When should politicians listen to big business? And when shouldn’t they? When should the public pay particular attention to their arguments? And when should we discount them? How can we distinguish relevant interventions from irrelevant special pleading?
One sound criterion would seem to be when a question of public policy directly impinges on a particular firm’s operations, giving them a special expertise.
That’s clearly the case with Brexit. No one is better placed to talk about the impact of customs delays than a car manufacturer which runs a “just in time” assembly plant.
When businesses write letters to newspapers supporting the Conservatives because of the general thrust of their tax policies the voice of business should command less reverence.
Jeremy Hunt, the health secretary, has called Airbus and BMW’s airing of their perspective on the dangers of leaving the customs union “inappropriate”. He would be more credible if a record could be found of him telling businesses to pipe down in the past.
Yet proximity to the consequences of policy can’t be the sole criterion of when we should listen to businesses’ views.
Soft drink manufacturers know a great deal about how the soda tax is likely to affect the public’s consumption of their wares. Cigarette manufacturers know all about the impact of plain packaging rules. Banks are experts in how regulatory requirements to increase their capital safety buffers will impact their profits. And so on.
But as all those examples show, having a financial interest in a policy doesn’t necessarily equate to that interest aligning with the broad public interest.
Other criteria are necessary when it comes to evaluating lobbying.
Government urged to stop ‘squabbling’ and save UK car industry
The first is transparency. Private lobbying by big money is particularly insidious. If Jeremy Hunt wants to talk about inappropriate behaviour he might consider David Cameron’s non-disclosed “kitchen suppers” in Downing Street for Conservative Party donors.
Transparency relates to another vital criterion: equality of access. If a minister only listens to one section of business, such as large firms or finance, there is a danger that they start to see the world through the eyes of that section. We saw this clearly with Gordon Brown’s ultimately ruinous love affair with the City of London.
If ministers only hear from businesses and shut out other social stakeholders, such as trade unions and charities, that too is liable to be distorting and dangerous. Transparency about how often ministers meet various groups is a vital defence against this kind of capture.
But, in the end, there is no foolproof rule, or set of rules, that can reliably separate social useful business lobbying from the socially useless kind. It will always depend on a judgement about context.
Business has a right to a voice in politics. And sometimes that voice deserves a special hearing. But it should only ever be one voice among several.
Politicians should listen to big business – but not too much
Business has a right to a voice in politics. And sometimes that voice deserves a special hearing. But it should only ever be one voice among several
Ben Chu
@Benchu_
Businesses have been sounding a Brexit chorus of warning
In recent days Airbus, BMW, Siemens and Jaguar Land Rover have all raised their voices to highlight the severe economic damage that will be done to their operations if the cabinet’s hardline Brexiteers get their way and wrench Britain out of the EU’s customs union and single market. Some have even said the harm could be so grave that they would pull out of the UK altogether, costing jobs and investment.
Choruses need a conductor. And it’s more than likely that these interventions were coordinated to prepare the ground for Friday’s Chequers meeting to force a cabinet agreement on what proposal the UK government should submit for a post-transition Brexit trade deal with the rest of the European Union.
But not everyone in the audience has been appreciative.
Labour will not back May’s Brexit plan, Sir Keir Starmer says
Corbyn says May must call election if she can’t get Brexit deal passed
Business leaders back cabinet’s Brexit deal
“F*** business” was allegedly the concise review of one of those cabinet hardliners, Boris Johnson. The pro-Brexit Conservative internet entrepreneur Tim Montgomerie sought to present this four-letter reaction from the foreign secretary last week in the grand tradition of Adam Smith, citing the father of economics’ renowned alertness to firms’ tendency to anti-competitive behaviour.
Others have made the point that the voice of a handful of large pro-EU multinationals could be drowning out a different perspective from smaller firms.
It’s a curious consequence of Brexit that it has got “pro-business” right-wingers to pay attention to the dangers of monopolisation and lobbying by big firms. The fact that such concerns have surfaced now that businesses are warning about Brexit puts one in mind of the jailed dictator who suddenly becomes an advocate of prisoners’ human rights.
Yet even if the source of the argument is dubious, that doesn’t mean it’s an empty one. No serious person disputes that businesses often lobby in their own narrow interest. And it’s a fact of life that large firms with tens of thousands of employees usually have a degree of political access that smaller firms with only tens of workers lack. Even those who welcome big businesses’ interventions over Brexit would have to acknowledge these truths.
But that leaves us with a dilemma. When should politicians listen to big business? And when shouldn’t they? When should the public pay particular attention to their arguments? And when should we discount them? How can we distinguish relevant interventions from irrelevant special pleading?
One sound criterion would seem to be when a question of public policy directly impinges on a particular firm’s operations, giving them a special expertise.
That’s clearly the case with Brexit. No one is better placed to talk about the impact of customs delays than a car manufacturer which runs a “just in time” assembly plant.
When businesses write letters to newspapers supporting the Conservatives because of the general thrust of their tax policies the voice of business should command less reverence.
Jeremy Hunt, the health secretary, has called Airbus and BMW’s airing of their perspective on the dangers of leaving the customs union “inappropriate”. He would be more credible if a record could be found of him telling businesses to pipe down in the past.
Yet proximity to the consequences of policy can’t be the sole criterion of when we should listen to businesses’ views.
Soft drink manufacturers know a great deal about how the soda tax is likely to affect the public’s consumption of their wares. Cigarette manufacturers know all about the impact of plain packaging rules. Banks are experts in how regulatory requirements to increase their capital safety buffers will impact their profits. And so on.
But as all those examples show, having a financial interest in a policy doesn’t necessarily equate to that interest aligning with the broad public interest.
Other criteria are necessary when it comes to evaluating lobbying.
Government urged to stop ‘squabbling’ and save UK car industry
The first is transparency. Private lobbying by big money is particularly insidious. If Jeremy Hunt wants to talk about inappropriate behaviour he might consider David Cameron’s non-disclosed “kitchen suppers” in Downing Street for Conservative Party donors.
Transparency relates to another vital criterion: equality of access. If a minister only listens to one section of business, such as large firms or finance, there is a danger that they start to see the world through the eyes of that section. We saw this clearly with Gordon Brown’s ultimately ruinous love affair with the City of London.
If ministers only hear from businesses and shut out other social stakeholders, such as trade unions and charities, that too is liable to be distorting and dangerous. Transparency about how often ministers meet various groups is a vital defence against this kind of capture.
But, in the end, there is no foolproof rule, or set of rules, that can reliably separate social useful business lobbying from the socially useless kind. It will always depend on a judgement about context.
Business has a right to a voice in politics. And sometimes that voice deserves a special hearing. But it should only ever be one voice among several.
Academics think they've figured out why people voted for Trump and Brexit - Independent
July 9, 2018.
Academics think they've figured out why people voted for Trump and Brexit
Posted 2 months ago by Louis Staples in news
UPVOTE
The election of Donald Trump and Britain’s Brexit vote came as a huge shock to most people, causing politicians, commentators and even scientists to search for answers.
After months of hot takes in newspapers and on TV, scientific studies have finally provided solid evidence of what made people vote for Trump and Brexit.
Two papers on the topic have now been released, the first of which focuses on Trump’s election.
After Trump's victory, pundits debated the influence of factors such as economic hardship and racial anxiety. With the absence of hard evidence, Professor Diana Mutz of the University of Pennsylvania questioned 1,200 voters.
She observed:
Candidate preferences in 2016 reflected increasing anxiety among high-status groups rather than complaints about past treatment among low-status groups.
Both growing domestic racial diversity and globalization contributed to a sense that white Americans are under siege by these engines of change.
Mutz concluded that the people most likely to vote for Trump, after either voting Democrat previously or not voting at all, were those who felt their place in the world was being threatened.
Trump voters perceived that America was having to share its status as the world's most powerful nation, and also feared the possibility of losing the benefits of being part of a dominant ethnic group.
But the corresponding study of Brexit voters, authored by PhD student Leor Zmigrod and collaborators at the University of Cambridge, proved even more controversial.
The team sampled 332 UK citizens and asked them how they voted in the referendum, as well as probing their attitudes to related issues regarding national identity and culture.
Brexit voters were found to have greater nationalism, conservatism, and support for authoritarian policies. The paper concludes that these reasons accounted for almost half (47.6 percent) of the variability in support for Brexit.
Zmigrod added:
In today’s politically-polarised climate, it is important to understand more about the psychological processes behind nationalistic and social attitudes if we are to build bridges between communities.
Though in such turbulent times, these conclusions seem unlikely to heal the political divisions on either side of the pond.
HT: IFLScience
Academics think they've figured out why people voted for Trump and Brexit
Posted 2 months ago by Louis Staples in news
UPVOTE
The election of Donald Trump and Britain’s Brexit vote came as a huge shock to most people, causing politicians, commentators and even scientists to search for answers.
After months of hot takes in newspapers and on TV, scientific studies have finally provided solid evidence of what made people vote for Trump and Brexit.
Two papers on the topic have now been released, the first of which focuses on Trump’s election.
After Trump's victory, pundits debated the influence of factors such as economic hardship and racial anxiety. With the absence of hard evidence, Professor Diana Mutz of the University of Pennsylvania questioned 1,200 voters.
She observed:
Candidate preferences in 2016 reflected increasing anxiety among high-status groups rather than complaints about past treatment among low-status groups.
Both growing domestic racial diversity and globalization contributed to a sense that white Americans are under siege by these engines of change.
Mutz concluded that the people most likely to vote for Trump, after either voting Democrat previously or not voting at all, were those who felt their place in the world was being threatened.
Trump voters perceived that America was having to share its status as the world's most powerful nation, and also feared the possibility of losing the benefits of being part of a dominant ethnic group.
But the corresponding study of Brexit voters, authored by PhD student Leor Zmigrod and collaborators at the University of Cambridge, proved even more controversial.
The team sampled 332 UK citizens and asked them how they voted in the referendum, as well as probing their attitudes to related issues regarding national identity and culture.
Brexit voters were found to have greater nationalism, conservatism, and support for authoritarian policies. The paper concludes that these reasons accounted for almost half (47.6 percent) of the variability in support for Brexit.
Zmigrod added:
In today’s politically-polarised climate, it is important to understand more about the psychological processes behind nationalistic and social attitudes if we are to build bridges between communities.
Though in such turbulent times, these conclusions seem unlikely to heal the political divisions on either side of the pond.
HT: IFLScience
Factbox: How could Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May be removed from office? - Reuters
Factbox: How could Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May be removed from office?
Reuters Staff
LONDON (Reuters) - Prime Minister Theresa May is facing a rebellion from eurosceptics in her party after she announced plans to negotiate close trading ties with the European Union after Britain leaves the bloc next year.
Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May commences a meeting with her cabinet to discuss the government's Brexit plans at Chequers, the Prime Minister's official country residence, near Aylesbury, Britain, July 6, 2018. Joel Rouse/MOD/Handout via REUTERS
Brexit Secretary David Davis and another minister, Steve Baker, resigned late on Sunday in a blow to the prime minister and some members of her party are now calling for her to be replaced.
Below is an explanation of how May could be removed from office if she has to face a leadership challenge:
- What needs to happen for there to be a leadership contest?
A leadership challenge can be triggered if 15 percent of members of parliament in May’s Conservative Party write a letter to the chairman of the party’s so-called “1922 committee”.
The Conservatives currently have 316 members of parliament (MPs) so 48 of them would need to write such letters to challenge May.
Once that threshold has been reached, the chairman will announce the start of the contest and invite nominations.
- Could this happen to May?
The chairman of the 1922 committee is the only person who will know exactly how many members of parliament have submitted letters of no confidence.
But some eurosceptic members of parliament have started submitting letters to the committee chairman in protest over her Brexit negotiating strategy.
- What will happen during a no confidence vote?
If a no confidence vote is called then all serving Conservative members of parliament will be able to cast a vote for or against the serving leader.
If May wins any confidence vote she remains in office. If she loses, she is obliged to resign and barred from standing in the leadership election that follows.
- How quickly can a no confidence vote take place?
In the last no confidence vote against a sitting Conservative leader in 2003, the chairman of the 1922 committee announced he had received enough letters to trigger a vote on Oct. 28 and the vote was held the next day.
- What would happen if May lost the no confidence vote?
If May lost a no confidence vote then there would be a leadership contest.
If several names are put forward to lead the party, then a vote is held among Conservative MPs using the first past the post system to whittle down the field with the candidate with the fewest votes removed. Another ballot among Conservative lawmakers is then held until two candidates remain.
The final two nominees are then put to a ballot of the wider Conservative Party membership with the winner named the new leader.
Following David Cameron’s decision to step down as prime minister and Conservative leader after the EU referendum in 2016, five candidates put their names forward.
The field was narrowed to May and then junior minister Andrea Leadsom but she pulled out of the race before members voted, leaving May to become leader unopposed.
Reporting By Andrew MacAskill, Editing by William Maclean
Reuters Staff
LONDON (Reuters) - Prime Minister Theresa May is facing a rebellion from eurosceptics in her party after she announced plans to negotiate close trading ties with the European Union after Britain leaves the bloc next year.
Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May commences a meeting with her cabinet to discuss the government's Brexit plans at Chequers, the Prime Minister's official country residence, near Aylesbury, Britain, July 6, 2018. Joel Rouse/MOD/Handout via REUTERS
Brexit Secretary David Davis and another minister, Steve Baker, resigned late on Sunday in a blow to the prime minister and some members of her party are now calling for her to be replaced.
Below is an explanation of how May could be removed from office if she has to face a leadership challenge:
- What needs to happen for there to be a leadership contest?
A leadership challenge can be triggered if 15 percent of members of parliament in May’s Conservative Party write a letter to the chairman of the party’s so-called “1922 committee”.
The Conservatives currently have 316 members of parliament (MPs) so 48 of them would need to write such letters to challenge May.
Once that threshold has been reached, the chairman will announce the start of the contest and invite nominations.
- Could this happen to May?
The chairman of the 1922 committee is the only person who will know exactly how many members of parliament have submitted letters of no confidence.
But some eurosceptic members of parliament have started submitting letters to the committee chairman in protest over her Brexit negotiating strategy.
- What will happen during a no confidence vote?
If a no confidence vote is called then all serving Conservative members of parliament will be able to cast a vote for or against the serving leader.
If May wins any confidence vote she remains in office. If she loses, she is obliged to resign and barred from standing in the leadership election that follows.
- How quickly can a no confidence vote take place?
In the last no confidence vote against a sitting Conservative leader in 2003, the chairman of the 1922 committee announced he had received enough letters to trigger a vote on Oct. 28 and the vote was held the next day.
- What would happen if May lost the no confidence vote?
If May lost a no confidence vote then there would be a leadership contest.
If several names are put forward to lead the party, then a vote is held among Conservative MPs using the first past the post system to whittle down the field with the candidate with the fewest votes removed. Another ballot among Conservative lawmakers is then held until two candidates remain.
The final two nominees are then put to a ballot of the wider Conservative Party membership with the winner named the new leader.
Following David Cameron’s decision to step down as prime minister and Conservative leader after the EU referendum in 2016, five candidates put their names forward.
The field was narrowed to May and then junior minister Andrea Leadsom but she pulled out of the race before members voted, leaving May to become leader unopposed.
Reporting By Andrew MacAskill, Editing by William Maclean
This is Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak’s simple formula for happiness - CNBC News
This is Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak’s simple formula for happiness
Catherine Clifford 11:30 AM ET Sat, 3 Feb 2018
Steve Wozniak
When Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak was young, he defined a successful life for himself — one that, despite its radical simplicity, has worked for almost 50 years.
"I thought out my philosophies when I was about 20 years old ... How do you do in life? ... How do you become a good person?" explains Wozniak, speaking at the at the Nordic Business Forum in Stockholm on January 24.
He continues, "It if I died and had all this wealth and yachts and all this stuff, would I be as happy as when I laugh? And I thought about pranks I played and jokes I had told and music I would hear that would make me smile, and I came up with my formula that life is about happiness."
Yes, a formula. Always the engineer.
26-year-old CEO: Happiness is NOT the same as success, here's why 26-year-old CEO and self-made millionaire: Happiness is not the same as success—here's why
"Maybe success with money makes you happy too — but for me it was really just down to earth laughter and smiles. So I came up with my formula: Happiness equals smiles minus frowns," says Wozniak. "H = S-F."
"The Woz," as he is affectionately called, determined a key way to maximize happiness is to decrease the amount of sadness in your life.
"How do you get rid of the frowns? I worked on that," says Wozniak, who is now 67.
"Don't care that much that you are going to frown. Let things happen. Things do go badly in life and just say, 'Hey, my car got scratched, I will fix it,'" he explains.
In these situations, complaining or blaming others is just going to make things worse, says Wozniak. So will judging other people.
"And don't argue. Don't argue! You don't win an argument, you just walk away unhappy," says Wozniak. "You only have to convince one person in life, and that is yourself.
"This kept me so happy, to this day. My mind just kind of floats in a state of happiness and I just don't really have a lot of always being upset," he says.
James Altucher shares his simple formula for achieving happiness James Altucher shares his simple formula for achieving happiness
Indeed. Speaking in Stockholm, Wozniak continually smiles, gestures and is easily excited. It's that genuine enthusiasm that drove Wozniak to work in computing. Building computers was not a plan to get rich.
"I was never into money in any way — finance — to this day I have never used Apple stock app, I don't buy and sell stock," Wozniak says.
In fact, Wozniak sold virtually all his bitcoin holdings when the price shot up so he wouldn't be compelled to watch the price yo-yo. "I don't want that kind of care in my life. Part of my happiness is not to have worries."
Of course, Wozniak is worth millions, by one account as much as $100 million, so perhaps that's easy to say.
But there is one thing that makes him mad, he says: illogical, counter-intuitive machine user experience.
Catherine Clifford 11:30 AM ET Sat, 3 Feb 2018
Steve Wozniak
When Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak was young, he defined a successful life for himself — one that, despite its radical simplicity, has worked for almost 50 years.
"I thought out my philosophies when I was about 20 years old ... How do you do in life? ... How do you become a good person?" explains Wozniak, speaking at the at the Nordic Business Forum in Stockholm on January 24.
He continues, "It if I died and had all this wealth and yachts and all this stuff, would I be as happy as when I laugh? And I thought about pranks I played and jokes I had told and music I would hear that would make me smile, and I came up with my formula that life is about happiness."
Yes, a formula. Always the engineer.
26-year-old CEO: Happiness is NOT the same as success, here's why 26-year-old CEO and self-made millionaire: Happiness is not the same as success—here's why
"Maybe success with money makes you happy too — but for me it was really just down to earth laughter and smiles. So I came up with my formula: Happiness equals smiles minus frowns," says Wozniak. "H = S-F."
"The Woz," as he is affectionately called, determined a key way to maximize happiness is to decrease the amount of sadness in your life.
"How do you get rid of the frowns? I worked on that," says Wozniak, who is now 67.
"Don't care that much that you are going to frown. Let things happen. Things do go badly in life and just say, 'Hey, my car got scratched, I will fix it,'" he explains.
In these situations, complaining or blaming others is just going to make things worse, says Wozniak. So will judging other people.
"And don't argue. Don't argue! You don't win an argument, you just walk away unhappy," says Wozniak. "You only have to convince one person in life, and that is yourself.
"This kept me so happy, to this day. My mind just kind of floats in a state of happiness and I just don't really have a lot of always being upset," he says.
James Altucher shares his simple formula for achieving happiness James Altucher shares his simple formula for achieving happiness
Indeed. Speaking in Stockholm, Wozniak continually smiles, gestures and is easily excited. It's that genuine enthusiasm that drove Wozniak to work in computing. Building computers was not a plan to get rich.
"I was never into money in any way — finance — to this day I have never used Apple stock app, I don't buy and sell stock," Wozniak says.
In fact, Wozniak sold virtually all his bitcoin holdings when the price shot up so he wouldn't be compelled to watch the price yo-yo. "I don't want that kind of care in my life. Part of my happiness is not to have worries."
Of course, Wozniak is worth millions, by one account as much as $100 million, so perhaps that's easy to say.
But there is one thing that makes him mad, he says: illogical, counter-intuitive machine user experience.
China foam insulation blamed for jump in ozone-depleting gas - Financial Times
July 9, 2018
China foam insulation blamed for jump in ozone-depleting gas
Manufacturers of PU product admit using chemical CFC-11 despite global ban
The Antarctic ozone hole has swelled this month to one of its biggest sizes on record, UN and US scientists say © AP
Emily Feng in Beijing 20 MINUTES AGO Print this page0
A mysterious jump in levels of a banned industrial gas that depletes the earth’s ozone layer has been linked to Chinese production of cheap insulation foam, according to a research report.
Scientists had puzzled over what caused atmospheric levels of the chemical CFC-11 to jump up to 38 per cent since 2012, despite reported global production being effectively zero.
Researchers from the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA), a UK-based non-governmental organisation, uncovered large-scale use of CFC-11 by Chinese foam production companies, despite the gas being effectively banned since 1989.
“Information collected from foam production companies in China confirms that CFC-11 continues to be extensively produced and used illegally in China’s PU (Polyurethane) foam industry,” the EIA researchers wrote.
“The evidence gathered from conversations with multiple industry sources . . . points to its widespread use in the foam blowing production industry as the primary source of the illegal emissions.”
Republicans accuse US environmental group of being China ‘agent’
CFC-11 is one of the most potent destroyers of ozone, a gas that protects the earth from harmful UV radiation. Once commonly used as refrigerant, the chemical was supposed to have been phased out by 2010 under the Montreal Protocol, a widely praised international agreement to protect the ozone layer that went into force in 1989.
“The increase in emission of CFC-11 appears unrelated to past production; this suggests unreported new production,” a separate government scientist wrote in Nature.
China is the world’s largest consumer of PU foam, comprising three-quarters of demand in Asia and a third globally in 2015, according to IHS Markit. PU foam is being used for insulating buildings as well as cooling units such as refrigerators.
In interviews with EIA researchers, 18 out of 21 foam manufacturers across China confirmed they were using CFC-11 because of its low cost, with several acknowledging it was illegal.
In China’s industrial province of Hebei, representatives of the region’s largest manufacturer of white agent — a component of PU foam — told researchers that 90-95 per cent of their production used CFC-11.
A representative of another Hebei company said it used CFC-11 in most of its products, admitting that it did so by running unlicensed factories in what the report called “shady and hidden operations” in Inner Mongolia.
Since 2016, environmental regulators in China’s Shandong province have acknowledged in public reports that “large volumes of illegally produced CFC-11” were used in plastic foam production.
EIA researchers said annual emissions from China’s illegal use of CFC-11 were equivalent to carbon dioxide emissions from 16 coal-fired power stations, but pointed to a “high degree of uncertainty” in their calculations.
Chinese officials did not respond to requests for comment.
Since the Montreal Protocol, some manufacturers, particularly in China, have substituted their production with HCFCs, a chemically related pollutant less harmful than CFC-11 but thought to be a contributor to global warming.
Environmental regulators in China have moved to phase out HCFCs from manufacturing by 2030.
Follow Emily Feng on Twitter @emilyzfeng
Sunday, July 8, 2018
Car wars: Counting the cost of Trump's tariffs - Al Jazeera
Car wars: Counting the cost of Trump's tariffs
How the world's biggest exporters try to steer away from a damaging trade war with the US.
07 Jul 2018 19:08 GMT Business & Economy, Donald Trump, United States, Europe, China
China is already calling it a full-blown trade war.
Billions of dollars worth of products are affected as US tariffs on selected Chinese products take effect this week. And China has said it's retaliating with its own tariffs on American goods.
But the big driver of an all-out global trade war could be cars.
US President Donald Trump has said cars are key to getting trade concessions. His administration is now considering a 25 percent tariff on foreign cars and car parts in the name of national security.
Europe currently charges a 10 percent tariff on US cars, while the US charges only 2.5 percent on European cars. Trump says that's unfair, but carmakers and dealers around the world point out that the US has a 25 percent tariff on light trucks and SUVs.
We are looking at much deeper implications than we have seen in previous trade wars.
Hosuk Lee-Makiyama, a director of the European Centre for International Political Economy
They are warning that Trump's tariffs would be bad for the car industry and bad for consumers.
Analysts call it a case of car crash economics.
So how will it affect consumers and producers? How important is the car industry? And what can be done to prevent a global trade war?
Hosuk Lee-Makiyama, a director of the European Centre for International Political Economy (ECIPE) and a leading author on trade diplomacy and the digital economy, believes the implications for consumers, as well as manufacturers, will be much larger than the ones of aluminium and steel tariffs.
He says "car wars" would not just be felt by consumers in the US, because "some of the SUVs that are made by European brands are made in the US and actually shipped to Europe. So, if you have a 20 percent price hike on imported cars, as well as car components, this will be felt as US-made cars are actually exported back to Europe. We are looking at much deeper implications than we have seen in previous trade wars."
"The big three American manufacturers have also strongly opposed this move - simply because most of the cars nowadays are produced relatively locally. In the case of the US, they are either made in the US or in the NAFTA region," Lee-Makiyama says. "Whereas, if you look at the supply chains, they are extending over the world. So, for example, you can buy a European car, let's say a BMW, and it will be made in the US but still, key components will be arriving from Germany, South Africa, and, sometimes, even China. So it is a very globalised industry."
"For the current administration in the US, the question is: Is the purpose of the new tariffs actually to open up the rest of the world by creating an artificial leverage, or is the purpose to try and force factories to move from Canada, Mexico into the US? ... Or rather protect the domestic production in the US - although US manufacturers don't even want that protection," he says.
Asked about implications on China, Lee-Makiyama explains that the main trade barrier in China is not just tariffs: "Their biggest trade barrier will be the fact that ... foreign manufacturers in China are actually forced into joint ventures, forced marriages with their Chinese competitors who are entitled to half of the profits and 100 percent of the know-how."
How the world's biggest exporters try to steer away from a damaging trade war with the US.
07 Jul 2018 19:08 GMT Business & Economy, Donald Trump, United States, Europe, China
China is already calling it a full-blown trade war.
Billions of dollars worth of products are affected as US tariffs on selected Chinese products take effect this week. And China has said it's retaliating with its own tariffs on American goods.
But the big driver of an all-out global trade war could be cars.
US President Donald Trump has said cars are key to getting trade concessions. His administration is now considering a 25 percent tariff on foreign cars and car parts in the name of national security.
Europe currently charges a 10 percent tariff on US cars, while the US charges only 2.5 percent on European cars. Trump says that's unfair, but carmakers and dealers around the world point out that the US has a 25 percent tariff on light trucks and SUVs.
We are looking at much deeper implications than we have seen in previous trade wars.
Hosuk Lee-Makiyama, a director of the European Centre for International Political Economy
They are warning that Trump's tariffs would be bad for the car industry and bad for consumers.
Analysts call it a case of car crash economics.
So how will it affect consumers and producers? How important is the car industry? And what can be done to prevent a global trade war?
Hosuk Lee-Makiyama, a director of the European Centre for International Political Economy (ECIPE) and a leading author on trade diplomacy and the digital economy, believes the implications for consumers, as well as manufacturers, will be much larger than the ones of aluminium and steel tariffs.
He says "car wars" would not just be felt by consumers in the US, because "some of the SUVs that are made by European brands are made in the US and actually shipped to Europe. So, if you have a 20 percent price hike on imported cars, as well as car components, this will be felt as US-made cars are actually exported back to Europe. We are looking at much deeper implications than we have seen in previous trade wars."
"The big three American manufacturers have also strongly opposed this move - simply because most of the cars nowadays are produced relatively locally. In the case of the US, they are either made in the US or in the NAFTA region," Lee-Makiyama says. "Whereas, if you look at the supply chains, they are extending over the world. So, for example, you can buy a European car, let's say a BMW, and it will be made in the US but still, key components will be arriving from Germany, South Africa, and, sometimes, even China. So it is a very globalised industry."
"For the current administration in the US, the question is: Is the purpose of the new tariffs actually to open up the rest of the world by creating an artificial leverage, or is the purpose to try and force factories to move from Canada, Mexico into the US? ... Or rather protect the domestic production in the US - although US manufacturers don't even want that protection," he says.
Asked about implications on China, Lee-Makiyama explains that the main trade barrier in China is not just tariffs: "Their biggest trade barrier will be the fact that ... foreign manufacturers in China are actually forced into joint ventures, forced marriages with their Chinese competitors who are entitled to half of the profits and 100 percent of the know-how."
News media paid Melania Trump thousands for use of photos in 'positive stories only' - NBC News
News media paid Melania Trump thousands for use of photos in 'positive stories only'
The first lady earned six figures from an agreement with Getty Images that paid royalties to the Trumps and mandated photos be used in positive coverage.
by Andrew W. Lehren, Emily R. Siegel and Merritt Enright / Jul.03.2018 / 2:18 AM ET
Image: Trump family photoshoot
A screen shot shows how an individual Mahaux photo of the Trump family appears on the Getty Images website.
Since her husband took office Melania Trump has earned six figures from an unusual deal with a photo agency in which major media organizations have indirectly paid the Trump family despite a requirement that the photos be used only in positive coverage.
President Donald Trump's most recent financial disclosure reveals that in 2017 the first lady earned at least $100,000 from Getty Images for the use of any of a series of 187 photos of the first family shot between 2010 and 2016 by Belgian photographer Regine Mahaux.
It's not unheard of for celebrities to earn royalties from photos of themselves, but it's very unusual for the wife of a currently serving elected official. More problematic for the many news organizations that have published or broadcast the images, however, is that Getty's licensing agreement stipulates the pictures can be used in "positive stories only."
According to the revenue statement in President Trump's May financial disclosure, Melania Trump earned between $100,000 and $1,000,000 in photo royalties in 2017 from the Getty deal.
Image: Trump family photoshootA photo of Barron and Melania Trump taken by Regine Mahaux and licensed via Getty Images was used in a 2016 NBC Nightly News segment.
Federal officials are only required to give an income range in their filings, and both Getty and the White House declined requests to provide more precise figures or list the places the images had appeared.
But NBC News found at least a dozen organizations that had paid to use Mahaux's restricted images of the Trumps in 2017, resulting in indirect payment to the first family.
Yahoo News, NBC News, Marie Claire, the Daily Mail, My San Antonio, Houston Chronicle, House Beautiful, and SF Gate, the website for The San Francisco Chronicle, are among those that have featured Mahaux's highly stylized family portraits since Trump took office.
The February 2017 issue of the Russian edition of the fashion magazine Elle included a gilded Mahaux portrait of the first family.
A Mahaux group portrait of Donald, Melania and son Barron Trump was featured on the May page of the White House 2017 calendar that was on sale in the White House gift shop for $14. Bent Publishing, which publishes the calendars, confirmed that it licensed the Mahaux photo for the 2017 calendar. The 2018 calendar now on sale at the gift shop does not include any Mahaux images.
NBC News also found that numerous entities had used the images before President Trump took office, though no income from the Getty deal was itemized in any financial disclosure prior to 2017.
In August 2016, Mahaux's portrait of then-candidate Trump and his wife was featured in the official Republican National Convention guide book that was given to each delegate. Campaign finance records show the money to pay for the guide came from political donations to the Republican National Committee.
The program was produced by Great Lakes Publishing, which said it got the image from a committee involved in arranging the convention. Jeff Larson, a political consultant who ran that committee, said, "We didn't pay any royalties that I know of for that photo."
NBC's Nightly News included the images in a Nightly News segment on Melania Trump that aired July 18, 2016, during the Republican National Convention.
The French edition of Vanity Fair put one of the pictures on the cover of its August 2016 issue.
Fox News used the photos in a variety of news segments in 2016. Greta Van Susteren's show "On the Record" included two portraits of Melania Trump during an interview Van Susteren did with the future first lady. In November 2016, after Trump's upset election win, the first episode of the Fox News show "OBJECTified," hosted by TMZ founder Harvey Levin, depicted the life and rise of Donald Trump. The episode included two of the images taken by Mahaux.
A Fox News Channel spokesperson said in a statement that the Mahaux photos used by Fox "were provided by the Trump campaign and Melania Trump's office, who told us they had full ownership and rights to the photos."
Image: Trump family photoshootA screenshot of a My San Antonio/San Antonio Express article featuring a Regine Mahaux image of Melania Trump. My San Antonio took the story down after an inquiry from NBC News.
An NBC News spokesperson said NBC News did not agree or sign a statement that the image would be used for positive coverage, and was never informed that a portion of the royalties would go to the Trump family.
Several news organizations removed the images from their websites after inquiries by NBC News.
Yahoo took them down and said in a statement: "We were not aware of this specific arrangement with Getty nor was our editorial influenced by it. We have removed the image from Yahoo Lifestyle."
The San Francisco Chronicle deleted the images from its website as well, and said it was looking into how they came to be used.
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The photographs were also pulled from the websites for The Houston Chronicle and The San Antonio Express-News following inquiries by NBC News. Hearst Communications Inc. owns the three newspapers and their websites. The images remained on other Hearst websites like those for the magazines House Beautiful and Marie Claire. Representatives for those publications did not return repeated calls and emails.
French Vanity Fair, Russian Elle, and the Daily Mail and Paris Match, which also used the photographs, did not respond to requests for comment.
Image: Trump family photoshootA 2017 calendar featuring Donald, Melania and Barron Trump was offered for sale at the White House gift shop, and included a Regine Mahaux photo. A portion of the gift shop's revenues is donated to rural police departments.
In a standard photo contract, the photographer gets royalties and the photo agency receives fees for each use of an image. Models are not paid royalties.
Paying royalties to the Trumps and limiting the use to only positive stories is unusual for news organizations, according to Akili Ramsess, executive director of the National Press Photographers Association. She said that celebrity wedding or baby photographs are sometimes licensed so part of the fees flows back to the celebrity. Keith Major, another Getty photographer who has also photographed Melania Trump, said he does not share royalties with her.
Getty's licensing agreement does not offer any hint that money is also paid to the Trumps, and the arrangement did not appear to have become public until the income was listed in the president's May financial filing.
However, Getty does make clear in its catalog that the images can only be licensed with permission by Getty or, in some cases, Mahaux, and that the images may be used for "positive stories only."
News organizations likely would not have known about the payments to Melania Trump, but could have been aware of the published stipulation about positive coverage in the catalog.
Indira Lakshmanan, a media ethicist at the Poynter Institute, said, "If I'm a news editor, I would use photos that don't have any restriction attached to them. There's a lesson for editors, for public figures. There are plenty of photos out there that you can use that don't have these restrictions."
Getty Images told NBC News that the details and amounts of payments to the Trumps are covered by confidential agreements. The agency declined to say whether there are separate royalty arrangements with other members of the Trump families, and declined all comment on the deal other than to say that once a photo has been licensed, Getty pays "contracted royalties back to the photographer and/or individual(s) as covered by their confidential agreement."
In a statement, a White House spokesperson said: "President Trump's recent Public Disclosure Report, which included information regarding Mrs. Trump's income and assets, was filed after being certified by the White House Ethics Counsel and the Office of Government Ethics. The report speaks for itself."
When NBC News reached photographer Regine Mahaux by phone, she said "everything is legal" and then asked that any questions be submitted to her by email. NBC repeatedly emailed her questions but did not get a reply.
Mahaux took the photos during sessions in 2010, 2011 and 2016. Most feature some combination of Trump, Melania and son Barron. At least one of the photos, depicting the future first lady floating inside a swan boat on a still lake, and her swinging from a chandelier, combines images into a composite. Getty noted in its online catalog that many of the images of the Trumps have been "retouched," including those that later appeared in various news publications.
Mahaux has worked closely with the Trumps since 2010. Several albums on the Getty website feature her intimate photoshoots with the family in Trump Tower. "I like working with the family's image – it speaks to me. It inspires me," Mahaux told a French news outlet in 2017. Mahaux also took Melania Trump's official White House portrait, which is public and not subject to the licensing arrangement.
Melania's 2017 income from the Mahaux photos is an increase from previous years, based on the president's financial filings. Royalties from Getty Images do not appear in any of the financial statements submitted by Trump in the three prior years. Melania Trump likely earned some money during those years, but the income was below the federal government's threshold required for declaring the income.
Most modern first ladies have launched books and other commercial products during their stints in the White House — and then donated the entire proceeds to charity. Laura Bush donated a book advance to education charities, and Michelle Obama gave the proceeds from her book American Grown to the National Park Foundation.
Among Trump administration spouses, Vice President Mike Pence's wife, Karen, announced that revenues from her children's book would be donated to a children's hospital in Indiana and an anti-sex-trafficking nonprofit. In 2017, Ivanka Trump, the president's daughter and wife of senior adviser Jared Kushner, said she would give most of the advance and any future royalties from her book "Women Who Work" to charity.
The White House declined to comment on whether the Trumps have steered any of the proceeds from the Getty deal, which was consummated before Melania Trump became first lady, to a charity. Absent a public announcement, their annual tax returns might provide a hint — but unlike all other modern first families, the Trumps have not released them.
However, some of the proceeds from at least one of Mahaux's pictures of the first lady seem to have made their way to charity through another means. The White House gift shop, which sold the 2017 White House calendar, donates part of its earnings to help rural police departments
The first lady earned six figures from an agreement with Getty Images that paid royalties to the Trumps and mandated photos be used in positive coverage.
by Andrew W. Lehren, Emily R. Siegel and Merritt Enright / Jul.03.2018 / 2:18 AM ET
Image: Trump family photoshoot
A screen shot shows how an individual Mahaux photo of the Trump family appears on the Getty Images website.
Since her husband took office Melania Trump has earned six figures from an unusual deal with a photo agency in which major media organizations have indirectly paid the Trump family despite a requirement that the photos be used only in positive coverage.
President Donald Trump's most recent financial disclosure reveals that in 2017 the first lady earned at least $100,000 from Getty Images for the use of any of a series of 187 photos of the first family shot between 2010 and 2016 by Belgian photographer Regine Mahaux.
It's not unheard of for celebrities to earn royalties from photos of themselves, but it's very unusual for the wife of a currently serving elected official. More problematic for the many news organizations that have published or broadcast the images, however, is that Getty's licensing agreement stipulates the pictures can be used in "positive stories only."
According to the revenue statement in President Trump's May financial disclosure, Melania Trump earned between $100,000 and $1,000,000 in photo royalties in 2017 from the Getty deal.
Image: Trump family photoshootA photo of Barron and Melania Trump taken by Regine Mahaux and licensed via Getty Images was used in a 2016 NBC Nightly News segment.
Federal officials are only required to give an income range in their filings, and both Getty and the White House declined requests to provide more precise figures or list the places the images had appeared.
But NBC News found at least a dozen organizations that had paid to use Mahaux's restricted images of the Trumps in 2017, resulting in indirect payment to the first family.
Yahoo News, NBC News, Marie Claire, the Daily Mail, My San Antonio, Houston Chronicle, House Beautiful, and SF Gate, the website for The San Francisco Chronicle, are among those that have featured Mahaux's highly stylized family portraits since Trump took office.
The February 2017 issue of the Russian edition of the fashion magazine Elle included a gilded Mahaux portrait of the first family.
A Mahaux group portrait of Donald, Melania and son Barron Trump was featured on the May page of the White House 2017 calendar that was on sale in the White House gift shop for $14. Bent Publishing, which publishes the calendars, confirmed that it licensed the Mahaux photo for the 2017 calendar. The 2018 calendar now on sale at the gift shop does not include any Mahaux images.
NBC News also found that numerous entities had used the images before President Trump took office, though no income from the Getty deal was itemized in any financial disclosure prior to 2017.
In August 2016, Mahaux's portrait of then-candidate Trump and his wife was featured in the official Republican National Convention guide book that was given to each delegate. Campaign finance records show the money to pay for the guide came from political donations to the Republican National Committee.
The program was produced by Great Lakes Publishing, which said it got the image from a committee involved in arranging the convention. Jeff Larson, a political consultant who ran that committee, said, "We didn't pay any royalties that I know of for that photo."
NBC's Nightly News included the images in a Nightly News segment on Melania Trump that aired July 18, 2016, during the Republican National Convention.
The French edition of Vanity Fair put one of the pictures on the cover of its August 2016 issue.
Fox News used the photos in a variety of news segments in 2016. Greta Van Susteren's show "On the Record" included two portraits of Melania Trump during an interview Van Susteren did with the future first lady. In November 2016, after Trump's upset election win, the first episode of the Fox News show "OBJECTified," hosted by TMZ founder Harvey Levin, depicted the life and rise of Donald Trump. The episode included two of the images taken by Mahaux.
A Fox News Channel spokesperson said in a statement that the Mahaux photos used by Fox "were provided by the Trump campaign and Melania Trump's office, who told us they had full ownership and rights to the photos."
Image: Trump family photoshootA screenshot of a My San Antonio/San Antonio Express article featuring a Regine Mahaux image of Melania Trump. My San Antonio took the story down after an inquiry from NBC News.
An NBC News spokesperson said NBC News did not agree or sign a statement that the image would be used for positive coverage, and was never informed that a portion of the royalties would go to the Trump family.
Several news organizations removed the images from their websites after inquiries by NBC News.
Yahoo took them down and said in a statement: "We were not aware of this specific arrangement with Getty nor was our editorial influenced by it. We have removed the image from Yahoo Lifestyle."
The San Francisco Chronicle deleted the images from its website as well, and said it was looking into how they came to be used.
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The photographs were also pulled from the websites for The Houston Chronicle and The San Antonio Express-News following inquiries by NBC News. Hearst Communications Inc. owns the three newspapers and their websites. The images remained on other Hearst websites like those for the magazines House Beautiful and Marie Claire. Representatives for those publications did not return repeated calls and emails.
French Vanity Fair, Russian Elle, and the Daily Mail and Paris Match, which also used the photographs, did not respond to requests for comment.
Image: Trump family photoshootA 2017 calendar featuring Donald, Melania and Barron Trump was offered for sale at the White House gift shop, and included a Regine Mahaux photo. A portion of the gift shop's revenues is donated to rural police departments.
In a standard photo contract, the photographer gets royalties and the photo agency receives fees for each use of an image. Models are not paid royalties.
Paying royalties to the Trumps and limiting the use to only positive stories is unusual for news organizations, according to Akili Ramsess, executive director of the National Press Photographers Association. She said that celebrity wedding or baby photographs are sometimes licensed so part of the fees flows back to the celebrity. Keith Major, another Getty photographer who has also photographed Melania Trump, said he does not share royalties with her.
Getty's licensing agreement does not offer any hint that money is also paid to the Trumps, and the arrangement did not appear to have become public until the income was listed in the president's May financial filing.
However, Getty does make clear in its catalog that the images can only be licensed with permission by Getty or, in some cases, Mahaux, and that the images may be used for "positive stories only."
News organizations likely would not have known about the payments to Melania Trump, but could have been aware of the published stipulation about positive coverage in the catalog.
Indira Lakshmanan, a media ethicist at the Poynter Institute, said, "If I'm a news editor, I would use photos that don't have any restriction attached to them. There's a lesson for editors, for public figures. There are plenty of photos out there that you can use that don't have these restrictions."
Getty Images told NBC News that the details and amounts of payments to the Trumps are covered by confidential agreements. The agency declined to say whether there are separate royalty arrangements with other members of the Trump families, and declined all comment on the deal other than to say that once a photo has been licensed, Getty pays "contracted royalties back to the photographer and/or individual(s) as covered by their confidential agreement."
In a statement, a White House spokesperson said: "President Trump's recent Public Disclosure Report, which included information regarding Mrs. Trump's income and assets, was filed after being certified by the White House Ethics Counsel and the Office of Government Ethics. The report speaks for itself."
When NBC News reached photographer Regine Mahaux by phone, she said "everything is legal" and then asked that any questions be submitted to her by email. NBC repeatedly emailed her questions but did not get a reply.
Mahaux took the photos during sessions in 2010, 2011 and 2016. Most feature some combination of Trump, Melania and son Barron. At least one of the photos, depicting the future first lady floating inside a swan boat on a still lake, and her swinging from a chandelier, combines images into a composite. Getty noted in its online catalog that many of the images of the Trumps have been "retouched," including those that later appeared in various news publications.
Mahaux has worked closely with the Trumps since 2010. Several albums on the Getty website feature her intimate photoshoots with the family in Trump Tower. "I like working with the family's image – it speaks to me. It inspires me," Mahaux told a French news outlet in 2017. Mahaux also took Melania Trump's official White House portrait, which is public and not subject to the licensing arrangement.
Melania's 2017 income from the Mahaux photos is an increase from previous years, based on the president's financial filings. Royalties from Getty Images do not appear in any of the financial statements submitted by Trump in the three prior years. Melania Trump likely earned some money during those years, but the income was below the federal government's threshold required for declaring the income.
Most modern first ladies have launched books and other commercial products during their stints in the White House — and then donated the entire proceeds to charity. Laura Bush donated a book advance to education charities, and Michelle Obama gave the proceeds from her book American Grown to the National Park Foundation.
Among Trump administration spouses, Vice President Mike Pence's wife, Karen, announced that revenues from her children's book would be donated to a children's hospital in Indiana and an anti-sex-trafficking nonprofit. In 2017, Ivanka Trump, the president's daughter and wife of senior adviser Jared Kushner, said she would give most of the advance and any future royalties from her book "Women Who Work" to charity.
The White House declined to comment on whether the Trumps have steered any of the proceeds from the Getty deal, which was consummated before Melania Trump became first lady, to a charity. Absent a public announcement, their annual tax returns might provide a hint — but unlike all other modern first families, the Trumps have not released them.
However, some of the proceeds from at least one of Mahaux's pictures of the first lady seem to have made their way to charity through another means. The White House gift shop, which sold the 2017 White House calendar, donates part of its earnings to help rural police departments
Man claiming to be from the future says he's got footage of Las Vegas in 2120 - yes, really - Independent
July 8, 2018
Man claiming to be from the future says he's got footage of Las Vegas in 2120 - yes, really
Posted 3 days ago by Lowenna Waters in discover
UPVOTE
A well known 'time traveller' who claims to have visited us from the future has now released footage that he claims is Las Vegas in 2120. Yes, really.
The man, who is known as Noah, made headlines around the world earlier this year when he passed lie detector tests when discussing his time-travelling escapades.
This time, Noah's back - and he's posted a video on Apex TV YouTube channel saying that he's just got back from a 'failed mission' and that he wants to 'spread the truth' about the reality of time travel.
In the video, he claims to have made two stops, one in 2060 and one in 2120, which is where he captured the footage as part of a top secret mission.
Near the end of the 16 minute clip, Noah finally pulls out his mobile phone to reveal the footage of the city.
Speaking about the video clip, he says:
These red clouds are global warming.
It is a highly impactful thing in the future, you can see it's everywhere.
I remember it being incredibly hot, but I'm pretty sure they're working on it in the future.
Many YouTube users have pointed out the many flaws with the video, focusing on the amazing coincidence that people seem to use current time mobile phones in the future.
Mehrab Kahn wrote:
Video is from the future but his mobile phone is not from the future!
Another said:
So he recorded the video on his future iPhone from 2030? I would have been much more impressed in the technology in the actual phone. Fake news !
Others just focused on the fact that the video is obviously faked, and that it's most probably CGI:
That is clearly CGI what is wrong with you people?
And some had their priorities sorted, asking about the pressing matters of the day:
Is there Mick Jagger in 2120?
We wish we knew, oh how we wish we knew.
Man claiming to be from the future says he's got footage of Las Vegas in 2120 - yes, really
Posted 3 days ago by Lowenna Waters in discover
UPVOTE
A well known 'time traveller' who claims to have visited us from the future has now released footage that he claims is Las Vegas in 2120. Yes, really.
The man, who is known as Noah, made headlines around the world earlier this year when he passed lie detector tests when discussing his time-travelling escapades.
This time, Noah's back - and he's posted a video on Apex TV YouTube channel saying that he's just got back from a 'failed mission' and that he wants to 'spread the truth' about the reality of time travel.
In the video, he claims to have made two stops, one in 2060 and one in 2120, which is where he captured the footage as part of a top secret mission.
Near the end of the 16 minute clip, Noah finally pulls out his mobile phone to reveal the footage of the city.
Speaking about the video clip, he says:
These red clouds are global warming.
It is a highly impactful thing in the future, you can see it's everywhere.
I remember it being incredibly hot, but I'm pretty sure they're working on it in the future.
Many YouTube users have pointed out the many flaws with the video, focusing on the amazing coincidence that people seem to use current time mobile phones in the future.
Mehrab Kahn wrote:
Video is from the future but his mobile phone is not from the future!
Another said:
So he recorded the video on his future iPhone from 2030? I would have been much more impressed in the technology in the actual phone. Fake news !
Others just focused on the fact that the video is obviously faked, and that it's most probably CGI:
That is clearly CGI what is wrong with you people?
And some had their priorities sorted, asking about the pressing matters of the day:
Is there Mick Jagger in 2120?
We wish we knew, oh how we wish we knew.
North Korea Slams U.S. ‘Gangster-Like’ Demands at Nuclear Talks - Bloomberg
North Korea Slams U.S. ‘Gangster-Like’ Demands at Nuclear Talks
By Nick Wadhams and Anthony Capaccio
July 7, 2018, 8:41 PM GMT+10 Updated on July 8, 2018, 5:21 AM GMT+10
Foreign ministry comments hours after U.S. secretary leaves
Pompeo said two days of negotiations done in ‘good faith’
North Korea slammed the U.S. position on denuclearization during two days of meetings with Mike Pompeo as “gangster-like,” hours after the secretary of state cited “good-faith negotiations” with his counterparts in Pyongyang.
A North Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman, in a lengthy English-language statement released by the state media outlet Korea Central News Agency, said the U.S. side had created “trouble” by issuing the same kind of proposals that past administrations had sought.
The assessment, so different to one Pompeo had offered reporters earlier, suggested -- as Korea analysts had feared -- that the two sides remain far apart on their goals for talks on denuclearization, and that North Korea’s promises are a facade. That’s despite Pompeo’s past assessments and President Donald Trump’s upbeat remarks after his June meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Singapore.
“It appears Trump took his victory lap a tad too soon,” Bruce Klingner, a former Central Intelligence Agency analyst and now an Asia expert at the Heritage Foundation, said in an email. “The diplomatic path remains open, but it will be far bumpier and far longer than the Trump administration had believed and described publicly.”
‘Counter to the Spirit’
In its statement, North Korea said the U.S. side “came up only with its unilateral and gangster-like demand for denuclearization,” adding that the U.S. call for “complete, verifiable, irreversible denuclearization,” or CVID, ran “counter to the spirit of the Singapore summit.”
Trust between the two sides was now at a “dangerous” stage that could lead the country to falter in its commitment to give up nuclear weapons, according to the statement, which added that North Korea still has faith in Trump.
The statement came a few hours after Pompeo departed Pyongyang following meetings led by Kim Yong Chol, a senior aide to Kim. Pompeo is spending the night in Tokyo, where he’ll brief officials from Japan and South Korea on Sunday before flying to Vietnam.
The secretary was under pressure to deliver a more concrete disarmament plan to flesh out the two leaders’ vague, 1-1/2 page document from the Singapore meeting, which provided no timetable for dismantling North Korea’s nuclear arsenal.
‘Complicated Issues’
Before he left Pyongyang, Pompeo said U.S. negotiators and their North Korean counterparts discussed the idea of a full declaration of North Korean weapons of mass destruction stockpiles, and setting a timeline for giving them up.
“These are complicated issues, but we made progress on almost all of the central issues,’’ Pompeo told reporters on the tarmac, following his third visit to North Korea. “We had productive, good-faith negotiations.”
Pompeo said North Korea, in “many hours of talks’’ at a walled-off guest-house outside downtown Pyongyang, reiterated its commitment to denuclearization. Kim Yong Chol ended Pompeo’s visit on a positive note, telling the top U.S. diplomat just before he boarded his plane, “We will produce an outcome, results.’’
Yet the state media commentary was a setback for Pompeo, who had hoped that he could hand off future negotiations to working groups settled on by the two sides at the latest meeting. After his Asia swing, Pompeo heads for other thorny U.S. foreign-policy events -- the North Atlantic Treaty Organization summit in Brussels starting on July 11, and Trump’s meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki on July 16.
Sleep Deprived?
Despite the secretary’s positive depiction, signs had emerged earlier that things weren’t going as well as hoped. Pompeo didn’t have a meeting with Kim Jong Un, as he had on his two previous trips to North Korea’s capital. And earlier in the day, he had a curiously testy exchange with Kim Yong Chol, who mused that Pompeo may not have slept well the night before because of the important issues they had discussed.
“Director Kim, I slept just fine,” Pompeo responded.
Still, Pompeo could point to no concrete achievement from the talks, aside from an agreement for the two sides to meet again on or around July 12 in Panmunjom, the border village between the two Koreas, to discuss returning the remains of U.S. soldiers from the 1950-1953 Korean War.
Pompeo said North Korea had confirmed it intended to destroy a missile-engine testing facility and the two sides discussed the “modalities’’ of what that would look like. The countries also agreed to create working groups to be overseen by Sung Kim, the U.S. ambassador to the Philippines who’s handled some lower-level discussions.
Decades of Differences
All along, experts had wondered how the U.S. and North Korea would bridge differences that have bedeviled their talks for decades and only seemed exacerbated under Trump. The U.S. has insisted that North Korea give up its nuclear weapons for good before receiving relief from crippling sanctions. North Korea, meanwhile, indicated after Singapore that the two sides had agreed to a synchronized, step-by-step approach.
“Arms control agreements are tough -- they have to be very specific, with real verification provisions,” James Russell, an associate professor in national security affairs at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California, said in an email. “There has to be a symmetry of interests between the negotiating parties,” and there was no such symmetry at the U.S.-North Korea summit, he said.
In its statement calling the U.S. stance “regrettable,” the North Korean Foreign Ministry said the U.S. is unilaterally demanding denuclearization and trying to postpone discussion of declaring an end to the Korean War.
Publicity Seekers
It also derided the “great publicity” made by the U.S. about the “suspension of one or two joint military exercises” with South Korea. Such war games “can be resumed anytime,” versus the U.S. demand for an “irreversible step” by North Korea on its nuclear testing grounds, the statement said.
Pyongyang’s message was “clearly based on its long-standing position” that denuclearization means “global arms control” in which North Korea abandon its arsenal when all other nuclear powers, including the U.S., abandon theirs, said Klingner, the former CIA analyst.
A failure in the talks would amount to an embarrassment for Pompeo, whom Trump has assigned to lead the negotiations and who’s said repeatedly that Kim Jong Un was ready to commit to something no North Korean government had delivered on in decades.
‘Wonderful Paper’
It would be worse for Trump himself. Since the summit, Trump has declared the North Korean nuclear threat over, even though the country’s leaders promised nothing in a joint declaration signed by Kim and Trump that they hadn’t agreed to many times before.
Returning to Washington from Singapore, Trump tweeted that “North Korea was our biggest and most dangerous problem. No longer - sleep well tonight!” At a rally in Montana on July 5, he said that “we signed a wonderful paper saying they’re going to denuclearize their whole thing. It’s going to all happen.”
“Can’t really put lipstick on this pig,” said Victor Cha, a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, who was a director of Asian affairs at the National Security Council under President George W. Bush. “There was not even a promise of more high-level meetings, only working-level, which had not achieved much anyway.”
Critics and analysts who study North Korea have argued that the country’s commitment to the “complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,’’ as spelled out in the joint declaration from the Singapore summit, doesn’t go as far as other promises to give up its nuclear weapons that Pyongyang had made -- and reneged upon -- in the past.
Denuclearization Challenges
In recent days, intelligence reports have shown that North Korea is continuing work at a key rocket-engine facility. The U.S. has also stopped using the catchphrase “complete, verifiable, irreversible denuclearization,’’ which it had insisted upon happening before North Korea gets any relief from a crippling sanctions regime, before Pompeo apparently brought it up again during the latest talks.
That change raised suspicion that the U.S. was softening its demands for the country, an argument that State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert had insisted on Friday wasn’t true.
Nauert didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment about North Korea’s latest statement. Trump, spending a long weekend at his golf course in Bedminster, New Jersey, was also silent on the developments on Twitter.
Pompeo’s visit was the highest level meeting between U.S. and North Korean officials since Trump and Kim held their unprecedented summit. The next steps are unclear.
“Trump tried to sell this as a quickly achievable deal to denuclearize, and now Pompeo and team are tasked with the impossible task of pushing forward on denuclearization without a shared understanding with Pyongyang,” said Stephen Nagy, a senior associate professor at the International Christian University in Tokyo.
By Nick Wadhams and Anthony Capaccio
July 7, 2018, 8:41 PM GMT+10 Updated on July 8, 2018, 5:21 AM GMT+10
Foreign ministry comments hours after U.S. secretary leaves
Pompeo said two days of negotiations done in ‘good faith’
North Korea slammed the U.S. position on denuclearization during two days of meetings with Mike Pompeo as “gangster-like,” hours after the secretary of state cited “good-faith negotiations” with his counterparts in Pyongyang.
A North Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman, in a lengthy English-language statement released by the state media outlet Korea Central News Agency, said the U.S. side had created “trouble” by issuing the same kind of proposals that past administrations had sought.
The assessment, so different to one Pompeo had offered reporters earlier, suggested -- as Korea analysts had feared -- that the two sides remain far apart on their goals for talks on denuclearization, and that North Korea’s promises are a facade. That’s despite Pompeo’s past assessments and President Donald Trump’s upbeat remarks after his June meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Singapore.
“It appears Trump took his victory lap a tad too soon,” Bruce Klingner, a former Central Intelligence Agency analyst and now an Asia expert at the Heritage Foundation, said in an email. “The diplomatic path remains open, but it will be far bumpier and far longer than the Trump administration had believed and described publicly.”
‘Counter to the Spirit’
In its statement, North Korea said the U.S. side “came up only with its unilateral and gangster-like demand for denuclearization,” adding that the U.S. call for “complete, verifiable, irreversible denuclearization,” or CVID, ran “counter to the spirit of the Singapore summit.”
Trust between the two sides was now at a “dangerous” stage that could lead the country to falter in its commitment to give up nuclear weapons, according to the statement, which added that North Korea still has faith in Trump.
The statement came a few hours after Pompeo departed Pyongyang following meetings led by Kim Yong Chol, a senior aide to Kim. Pompeo is spending the night in Tokyo, where he’ll brief officials from Japan and South Korea on Sunday before flying to Vietnam.
The secretary was under pressure to deliver a more concrete disarmament plan to flesh out the two leaders’ vague, 1-1/2 page document from the Singapore meeting, which provided no timetable for dismantling North Korea’s nuclear arsenal.
‘Complicated Issues’
Before he left Pyongyang, Pompeo said U.S. negotiators and their North Korean counterparts discussed the idea of a full declaration of North Korean weapons of mass destruction stockpiles, and setting a timeline for giving them up.
“These are complicated issues, but we made progress on almost all of the central issues,’’ Pompeo told reporters on the tarmac, following his third visit to North Korea. “We had productive, good-faith negotiations.”
Pompeo said North Korea, in “many hours of talks’’ at a walled-off guest-house outside downtown Pyongyang, reiterated its commitment to denuclearization. Kim Yong Chol ended Pompeo’s visit on a positive note, telling the top U.S. diplomat just before he boarded his plane, “We will produce an outcome, results.’’
Yet the state media commentary was a setback for Pompeo, who had hoped that he could hand off future negotiations to working groups settled on by the two sides at the latest meeting. After his Asia swing, Pompeo heads for other thorny U.S. foreign-policy events -- the North Atlantic Treaty Organization summit in Brussels starting on July 11, and Trump’s meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki on July 16.
Sleep Deprived?
Despite the secretary’s positive depiction, signs had emerged earlier that things weren’t going as well as hoped. Pompeo didn’t have a meeting with Kim Jong Un, as he had on his two previous trips to North Korea’s capital. And earlier in the day, he had a curiously testy exchange with Kim Yong Chol, who mused that Pompeo may not have slept well the night before because of the important issues they had discussed.
“Director Kim, I slept just fine,” Pompeo responded.
Still, Pompeo could point to no concrete achievement from the talks, aside from an agreement for the two sides to meet again on or around July 12 in Panmunjom, the border village between the two Koreas, to discuss returning the remains of U.S. soldiers from the 1950-1953 Korean War.
Pompeo said North Korea had confirmed it intended to destroy a missile-engine testing facility and the two sides discussed the “modalities’’ of what that would look like. The countries also agreed to create working groups to be overseen by Sung Kim, the U.S. ambassador to the Philippines who’s handled some lower-level discussions.
Decades of Differences
All along, experts had wondered how the U.S. and North Korea would bridge differences that have bedeviled their talks for decades and only seemed exacerbated under Trump. The U.S. has insisted that North Korea give up its nuclear weapons for good before receiving relief from crippling sanctions. North Korea, meanwhile, indicated after Singapore that the two sides had agreed to a synchronized, step-by-step approach.
“Arms control agreements are tough -- they have to be very specific, with real verification provisions,” James Russell, an associate professor in national security affairs at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California, said in an email. “There has to be a symmetry of interests between the negotiating parties,” and there was no such symmetry at the U.S.-North Korea summit, he said.
In its statement calling the U.S. stance “regrettable,” the North Korean Foreign Ministry said the U.S. is unilaterally demanding denuclearization and trying to postpone discussion of declaring an end to the Korean War.
Publicity Seekers
It also derided the “great publicity” made by the U.S. about the “suspension of one or two joint military exercises” with South Korea. Such war games “can be resumed anytime,” versus the U.S. demand for an “irreversible step” by North Korea on its nuclear testing grounds, the statement said.
Pyongyang’s message was “clearly based on its long-standing position” that denuclearization means “global arms control” in which North Korea abandon its arsenal when all other nuclear powers, including the U.S., abandon theirs, said Klingner, the former CIA analyst.
A failure in the talks would amount to an embarrassment for Pompeo, whom Trump has assigned to lead the negotiations and who’s said repeatedly that Kim Jong Un was ready to commit to something no North Korean government had delivered on in decades.
‘Wonderful Paper’
It would be worse for Trump himself. Since the summit, Trump has declared the North Korean nuclear threat over, even though the country’s leaders promised nothing in a joint declaration signed by Kim and Trump that they hadn’t agreed to many times before.
Returning to Washington from Singapore, Trump tweeted that “North Korea was our biggest and most dangerous problem. No longer - sleep well tonight!” At a rally in Montana on July 5, he said that “we signed a wonderful paper saying they’re going to denuclearize their whole thing. It’s going to all happen.”
“Can’t really put lipstick on this pig,” said Victor Cha, a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, who was a director of Asian affairs at the National Security Council under President George W. Bush. “There was not even a promise of more high-level meetings, only working-level, which had not achieved much anyway.”
Critics and analysts who study North Korea have argued that the country’s commitment to the “complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,’’ as spelled out in the joint declaration from the Singapore summit, doesn’t go as far as other promises to give up its nuclear weapons that Pyongyang had made -- and reneged upon -- in the past.
Denuclearization Challenges
In recent days, intelligence reports have shown that North Korea is continuing work at a key rocket-engine facility. The U.S. has also stopped using the catchphrase “complete, verifiable, irreversible denuclearization,’’ which it had insisted upon happening before North Korea gets any relief from a crippling sanctions regime, before Pompeo apparently brought it up again during the latest talks.
That change raised suspicion that the U.S. was softening its demands for the country, an argument that State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert had insisted on Friday wasn’t true.
Nauert didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment about North Korea’s latest statement. Trump, spending a long weekend at his golf course in Bedminster, New Jersey, was also silent on the developments on Twitter.
Pompeo’s visit was the highest level meeting between U.S. and North Korean officials since Trump and Kim held their unprecedented summit. The next steps are unclear.
“Trump tried to sell this as a quickly achievable deal to denuclearize, and now Pompeo and team are tasked with the impossible task of pushing forward on denuclearization without a shared understanding with Pyongyang,” said Stephen Nagy, a senior associate professor at the International Christian University in Tokyo.
Thailand cave rescue: Mission to save boys under way - BBC News
July 8, 2018
Thailand cave rescue: Mission to save boys under way
The boys, aged between 11 and 16, have been trapped with their coach since 23 June
Rescuers in Thailand have begun a hazardous operation to lead 12 boys and one adult out of a cave where they have been trapped for two weeks.
The group are stranded on a ledge 4km inside the Tham Luang cave but amid fears of rising waters, officials have decided they cannot wait any longer.
Expert divers who have been keeping the group supplied since they were found last week will guide them out.
Officials have called it D-Day, saying the boys are fit and ready to move.
LIVE: Latest updates on the rescue
How risky is the Thai boys rescue?
What is happening at the cave?
A huge volunteer and media operation has built up around the mouth of the cave over the past week.
Media captionThailand cave rescue: Meet the volunteer helpers
But early on Sunday, journalists were told they had to move down the road, sparking speculation that a rescue mission was about to begin.
Narongsak Osottanakorn, who has been leading the operation, then confirmed that 18 divers had gone in to get the boys.
"This is D-Day," he said. "The boys are ready to face any challenges."
He added that the boys had all been assessed by a doctor and were "very fit physically and mentally... They are determined and focused".
The group and their families had all given their agreement that they should be moved as soon as possible, he said.
'I am dying to see him. I miss my son'
Why are they acting now?
Officials had originally thought the group might have to stay where they were until the rainy season ended - that could have meant months underground.
They'd also been exploring whether they could drill down into the cave, as well as scouring the mountainside for another way in.
Image copyrightREUTERS
Image caption
At a church in Chiang Rai, local people spent Sunday morning praying for the trapped boys
But with the rainy season just beginning, it's become clear that the flooding which originally trapped the boys will only get worse in the coming days.
Rescuers have been desperately pumping water out of the cave, and Mr Narongsak said on Sunday that water levels inside were at their lowest levels so far.
"There is no other day that we are more ready than today," said Mr Narongsak. "Otherwise we will lose the opportunity."
How will they bring them out?
Getting to and from where the boys are has been an exhausting 11-hour round trip even for the experienced divers.
The earliest the boys are likely to reach the surface is 21:00 local time (14:00 GMT) on Sunday. One official has said it could take two to three days to get them all out.
They'll have to do a mixture of walking, wading, climbing and diving - all in complete darkness - along guide ropes already in place.
Wearing full-face masks, which are easier for novice divers than traditional respirators, each boy will be accompanied by two divers who will also carry their air supply.
The toughest section is about halfway out - they'll reach section called "T-Junction", which is so tight the divers will have to take off their air tanks to get through.
Eventually they'll reach Chamber 3, the cavern which has been turned into a forward base for the divers. They'll rest there before making the last, easier walk out to the entrance. They're expecting to be taken straight to hospital in Chiang Rai town.
An expert's view on the dangers ahead
In an indication of quite how dangerous the journey will be, a former Thai navy diver died in the caves earlier this week. Saman Gunan was returning from a mission to provide the group with air tanks.
He lost consciousness and could not be revived. His colleagues have said they "will not let the sacrifice of our friend go to waste".
Sense of anticipation
By Helier Cheung, Tham Luang cave
This is the moment that everyone has been waiting for - and that some thought would never begin.
Image copyrightREUTERS
Image caption
At a church in Chiang Rai, local people spent Sunday morning praying for the trapped boys
Earlier on, the mood around the rescue sites had been upbeat once the boys were found alive. Smiling volunteers would hand out snacks, or offer massages, to those on the site.
Now security to the site has been beefed up even more. Several police vans, military officers and ambulances have been entering and exiting the site. There's a solemn sense of anticipation in the air.
Family and friends of the boys will be getting little rest until they learn the outcome of the rescue operation.
Read more from Helier: A community united in hope
Why did they go into the cave?
The boys, all part of the same Wild Boars football team, are aged between 11 and 16 and know the local area well.
Media captionNick Beake has been inside a cave complex in Chiang Rai
It's thought they went in there on 12 June after training as a fun outing, to celebrate one of the boy's birthdays. They took in only basic food.
Letters of love from trapped Thai boys
But it appears they went in too far at the wrong time of year, and unexpectedly got cut off.
Against all odds, they were found by rescue divers early last week, perched on a high ledge in the darkness.
They were hungry and scared but in remarkably good shape given their ordeal.
Since then, they've been kept company by navy divers at all times, and had food, light and medical care sent in.
They even managed to send letters home telling their parents not to worry, but that they were looking forward to coming home.
Thailand cave rescue: Mission to save boys under way
The boys, aged between 11 and 16, have been trapped with their coach since 23 June
Rescuers in Thailand have begun a hazardous operation to lead 12 boys and one adult out of a cave where they have been trapped for two weeks.
The group are stranded on a ledge 4km inside the Tham Luang cave but amid fears of rising waters, officials have decided they cannot wait any longer.
Expert divers who have been keeping the group supplied since they were found last week will guide them out.
Officials have called it D-Day, saying the boys are fit and ready to move.
LIVE: Latest updates on the rescue
How risky is the Thai boys rescue?
What is happening at the cave?
A huge volunteer and media operation has built up around the mouth of the cave over the past week.
Media captionThailand cave rescue: Meet the volunteer helpers
But early on Sunday, journalists were told they had to move down the road, sparking speculation that a rescue mission was about to begin.
Narongsak Osottanakorn, who has been leading the operation, then confirmed that 18 divers had gone in to get the boys.
"This is D-Day," he said. "The boys are ready to face any challenges."
He added that the boys had all been assessed by a doctor and were "very fit physically and mentally... They are determined and focused".
The group and their families had all given their agreement that they should be moved as soon as possible, he said.
'I am dying to see him. I miss my son'
Why are they acting now?
Officials had originally thought the group might have to stay where they were until the rainy season ended - that could have meant months underground.
They'd also been exploring whether they could drill down into the cave, as well as scouring the mountainside for another way in.
Image copyrightREUTERS
Image caption
At a church in Chiang Rai, local people spent Sunday morning praying for the trapped boys
But with the rainy season just beginning, it's become clear that the flooding which originally trapped the boys will only get worse in the coming days.
Rescuers have been desperately pumping water out of the cave, and Mr Narongsak said on Sunday that water levels inside were at their lowest levels so far.
"There is no other day that we are more ready than today," said Mr Narongsak. "Otherwise we will lose the opportunity."
How will they bring them out?
Getting to and from where the boys are has been an exhausting 11-hour round trip even for the experienced divers.
The earliest the boys are likely to reach the surface is 21:00 local time (14:00 GMT) on Sunday. One official has said it could take two to three days to get them all out.
They'll have to do a mixture of walking, wading, climbing and diving - all in complete darkness - along guide ropes already in place.
Wearing full-face masks, which are easier for novice divers than traditional respirators, each boy will be accompanied by two divers who will also carry their air supply.
The toughest section is about halfway out - they'll reach section called "T-Junction", which is so tight the divers will have to take off their air tanks to get through.
Eventually they'll reach Chamber 3, the cavern which has been turned into a forward base for the divers. They'll rest there before making the last, easier walk out to the entrance. They're expecting to be taken straight to hospital in Chiang Rai town.
An expert's view on the dangers ahead
In an indication of quite how dangerous the journey will be, a former Thai navy diver died in the caves earlier this week. Saman Gunan was returning from a mission to provide the group with air tanks.
He lost consciousness and could not be revived. His colleagues have said they "will not let the sacrifice of our friend go to waste".
Sense of anticipation
By Helier Cheung, Tham Luang cave
This is the moment that everyone has been waiting for - and that some thought would never begin.
Image copyrightREUTERS
Image caption
At a church in Chiang Rai, local people spent Sunday morning praying for the trapped boys
Earlier on, the mood around the rescue sites had been upbeat once the boys were found alive. Smiling volunteers would hand out snacks, or offer massages, to those on the site.
Now security to the site has been beefed up even more. Several police vans, military officers and ambulances have been entering and exiting the site. There's a solemn sense of anticipation in the air.
Family and friends of the boys will be getting little rest until they learn the outcome of the rescue operation.
Read more from Helier: A community united in hope
Why did they go into the cave?
The boys, all part of the same Wild Boars football team, are aged between 11 and 16 and know the local area well.
Media captionNick Beake has been inside a cave complex in Chiang Rai
It's thought they went in there on 12 June after training as a fun outing, to celebrate one of the boy's birthdays. They took in only basic food.
Letters of love from trapped Thai boys
But it appears they went in too far at the wrong time of year, and unexpectedly got cut off.
Against all odds, they were found by rescue divers early last week, perched on a high ledge in the darkness.
They were hungry and scared but in remarkably good shape given their ordeal.
Since then, they've been kept company by navy divers at all times, and had food, light and medical care sent in.
They even managed to send letters home telling their parents not to worry, but that they were looking forward to coming home.
Saturday, July 7, 2018
G7: Fact checking Trump's tweets about trade - BBC News
G7: Fact checking Trump's tweets about trade
By Andrew Walker
BBC World Service economics correspondent
11 June 2018
Trump constantly worries about the trade deficit - should we?
President Donald Trump has lashed out at his partners in the G7 group of leading rich economies following a summit in Canada.
He wrote some highly critical tweets which appear to be a response to comments from the host, the Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who said that Canada would respond to new tariffs - taxes on imports - imposed by the US on steel and aluminium.
President Trump's tweets complained about the defence spending of US allies (too low in his view) and the trade barriers they impose (too high).
He also reminded the world that he is considering extra tariffs on imports of cars.
So does he have a point?
On trade he mentioned the possibility of further tariffs on "automobiles flooding the US market ".
It is certainly true that the US imports more cars than it exports. Last year, the US exported 52 billion dollars' worth of passenger cars but imported more than three times that amount.
It's also true that the US tariff on imported cars is relatively low - 2.5% compared to the EU's 10%, although Japan's are zero.
But it's often possible to pick particular products to make a point about how unfair a particular country is.
In the case of the US, you could take its tariffs of 25% on light vans.
To get a better indication of how much a country protects its own industry it makes more sense to look at average tariffs. There are several ways of calculating an average but the general picture that emerges is that the US has tariffs that are among the lowest. Other rich countries do tend to have slightly higher averages, though not by very much.
If we pick out agriculture, then the developed countries, including the US, do generally have higher tariffs than for industrial goods.
For farm trade the US averages are lower than other rich countries by a more significant margin.
President Trump in one of his latest tweets complained about Canada's 270% tariff on dairy imports. Canada does indeed have a highly regulated and protected dairy sector and one of the tariffs (on a specific type of dairy product) listed in the World Trade Organization database is indeed precisely that. There are others that are in the same very high range.
Dairy wars: Why is Trump threatening Canada over milk?
But the levels of tariffs that countries impose are to a large extent the outcome of negotiated agreements - globally within the World Trade Organisation (WTO) or between smaller groups of countries with trade deals such as the US, Canada and Mexico in the North American Trade Agreement (Nafta).
That is why President Trump often criticises previous administrations over the trade deals they have done.
He also often uses trade imbalances as evidence to demonstrate his view that the US is treated unfairly.
It is indeed true that the US has a deficit with the rest of the world - it imports more than it exports, to the tune of about half a trillion dollars. President Trump gave a larger figure of $800 billion, which is the deficit for goods only. It's partly offset by a surplus in services.
In any event most economists take the view that the trade balance is driven by savings and investment rather than trade policies. If a country saves less than it invests, it will have a trade deficit.
Image Copyright @realDonaldTrump@REALDONALDTRUMP
Report
In another tweet, President Trump complained about the EU and Canada imposing what he called "non-monetary trade barriers against the US".
All countries have them, usually known as non-tariff barriers, or NTBs. There is a wide range. They include regulatory restrictions for safety or environmental reasons, labelling rules and restrictions on who can provide certain services.
Compared with tariffs, NTBs are much harder to quantify and compare.
There is often a perfectly good reason for the rules, but they can also make it more difficult for suppliers in other countries and it is possible that in some cases that is the aim.
To take some examples of NTBs in agriculture and food - and there are examples in many other areas too - US farm groups often complain that their products are excluded from the EU market by rules limiting the use of genetically modified crops, hormones in cattle and the now famous issue of chicken washed with chlorine.
The US also has its own regulatory barriers, including for example restrictions on some offal and on cheese made from unpasteurized milk. Haggis and many European cheeses are excluded by these rules.
On defence, President Trump wrote "....the U.S. pays close to the entire cost of NATO".
The US accounts for more than two thirds of all defence spending by Nato members. In terms of total defence spending, Nato has a guideline for its members - 2% of national income or GDP. The US is one of only six countries that meet the target (the UK is another).
Calling that "close to the entire cost" is perhaps a bit of an exaggeration, but there is no question that the US does carry far more than its share of the financial burden.
He gave specific figures for the US (4% of GDP) and Germany (1%). The figures are correct but rounded to the nearest whole number. According to Nato the figures for 2017 are 3.58% for the US and 1.22% for Germany. That's a large gap, although rounding the numbers makes it look even bigger.
These figures refer to all defence spending. Spending on Nato's own costs is allocated in line with national GDP. The US pays 22.1% and Germany 14.8%.
But this is a very small share of defence spending. It makes more sense to focus on total budgets in this area. A Nato official put it like this:
"These national figures can be considered indirect contributions to NATO, because Allied armed forces contribute to our collective security."
By Andrew Walker
BBC World Service economics correspondent
11 June 2018
Trump constantly worries about the trade deficit - should we?
President Donald Trump has lashed out at his partners in the G7 group of leading rich economies following a summit in Canada.
He wrote some highly critical tweets which appear to be a response to comments from the host, the Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who said that Canada would respond to new tariffs - taxes on imports - imposed by the US on steel and aluminium.
President Trump's tweets complained about the defence spending of US allies (too low in his view) and the trade barriers they impose (too high).
He also reminded the world that he is considering extra tariffs on imports of cars.
So does he have a point?
On trade he mentioned the possibility of further tariffs on "automobiles flooding the US market ".
It is certainly true that the US imports more cars than it exports. Last year, the US exported 52 billion dollars' worth of passenger cars but imported more than three times that amount.
It's also true that the US tariff on imported cars is relatively low - 2.5% compared to the EU's 10%, although Japan's are zero.
But it's often possible to pick particular products to make a point about how unfair a particular country is.
In the case of the US, you could take its tariffs of 25% on light vans.
To get a better indication of how much a country protects its own industry it makes more sense to look at average tariffs. There are several ways of calculating an average but the general picture that emerges is that the US has tariffs that are among the lowest. Other rich countries do tend to have slightly higher averages, though not by very much.
If we pick out agriculture, then the developed countries, including the US, do generally have higher tariffs than for industrial goods.
For farm trade the US averages are lower than other rich countries by a more significant margin.
President Trump in one of his latest tweets complained about Canada's 270% tariff on dairy imports. Canada does indeed have a highly regulated and protected dairy sector and one of the tariffs (on a specific type of dairy product) listed in the World Trade Organization database is indeed precisely that. There are others that are in the same very high range.
Dairy wars: Why is Trump threatening Canada over milk?
But the levels of tariffs that countries impose are to a large extent the outcome of negotiated agreements - globally within the World Trade Organisation (WTO) or between smaller groups of countries with trade deals such as the US, Canada and Mexico in the North American Trade Agreement (Nafta).
That is why President Trump often criticises previous administrations over the trade deals they have done.
He also often uses trade imbalances as evidence to demonstrate his view that the US is treated unfairly.
It is indeed true that the US has a deficit with the rest of the world - it imports more than it exports, to the tune of about half a trillion dollars. President Trump gave a larger figure of $800 billion, which is the deficit for goods only. It's partly offset by a surplus in services.
In any event most economists take the view that the trade balance is driven by savings and investment rather than trade policies. If a country saves less than it invests, it will have a trade deficit.
Image Copyright @realDonaldTrump@REALDONALDTRUMP
Report
In another tweet, President Trump complained about the EU and Canada imposing what he called "non-monetary trade barriers against the US".
All countries have them, usually known as non-tariff barriers, or NTBs. There is a wide range. They include regulatory restrictions for safety or environmental reasons, labelling rules and restrictions on who can provide certain services.
Compared with tariffs, NTBs are much harder to quantify and compare.
There is often a perfectly good reason for the rules, but they can also make it more difficult for suppliers in other countries and it is possible that in some cases that is the aim.
To take some examples of NTBs in agriculture and food - and there are examples in many other areas too - US farm groups often complain that their products are excluded from the EU market by rules limiting the use of genetically modified crops, hormones in cattle and the now famous issue of chicken washed with chlorine.
The US also has its own regulatory barriers, including for example restrictions on some offal and on cheese made from unpasteurized milk. Haggis and many European cheeses are excluded by these rules.
On defence, President Trump wrote "....the U.S. pays close to the entire cost of NATO".
The US accounts for more than two thirds of all defence spending by Nato members. In terms of total defence spending, Nato has a guideline for its members - 2% of national income or GDP. The US is one of only six countries that meet the target (the UK is another).
Calling that "close to the entire cost" is perhaps a bit of an exaggeration, but there is no question that the US does carry far more than its share of the financial burden.
He gave specific figures for the US (4% of GDP) and Germany (1%). The figures are correct but rounded to the nearest whole number. According to Nato the figures for 2017 are 3.58% for the US and 1.22% for Germany. That's a large gap, although rounding the numbers makes it look even bigger.
These figures refer to all defence spending. Spending on Nato's own costs is allocated in line with national GDP. The US pays 22.1% and Germany 14.8%.
But this is a very small share of defence spending. It makes more sense to focus on total budgets in this area. A Nato official put it like this:
"These national figures can be considered indirect contributions to NATO, because Allied armed forces contribute to our collective security."
US-China trade row: What has happened so far? - BBC News
US-China trade row: What has happened so far?
21 June 2018
Donald Trump campaigned for election on a promise to make trade fairer for the US, and his push to do so has him fighting with some of America's oldest trading partners.
He has already imposed - or threatened to impose - taxes on imports from China, Mexico, Canada and the EU, to encourage consumers to buy American products.
Those countries have all promised to retaliate, sparking fears of an all-out trade war.
Mr Trump's hard line on trade, which saw him withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact (TPP) last year, marks a striking change from the free trade policies that have governed the exchange of goods for decades.
Here's what's gone on so far.
Trump takes on China
In January, the US slapped controversial tariffs on imported washing machines and solar panels, which was seen as Trump's most significant trade move since his decision to pull the US out of the TPP and renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta).
After a lot of to-ing and fro-ing, Mr Trump then said in June he would impose tariffs - or import taxes - on $50bn-worth (£38bn) of Chinese goods. The first tariffs are due to come into effect on 6 July.
Media captionWhat are tariffs and how do they affect us?
Mr Trump said this would stop the "unfair transfers of American technology and intellectual property to China" and protect jobs.
What is a trade war and why should I worry?
Tariffs, in theory, will make US-made products cheaper than imported ones, so encourage consumers to buy American. That will then boost local businesses and support the national economy.
Businesses will have pay a 25% additional tax on certain Chinese products they import - including aircraft tyres and commercial dishwashers.
China did not take the news laying down. It retaliated in kind, saying it too would collect a 25% levy on $50bn worth of US goods, also starting on 6 July. Taxes will be charged on imports of agricultural products, cars and marine products from the US, to name a few.
Upping the stakes, Mr Trump then threatened to slap a 10% levy on an additional $200bn of Chinese goods if China "refuses to change its practices". He ordered his staff to identify a list of Chinese goods to be taxed.
China said it would respond with measures of a "corresponding number and quality" if the US issued the list.
Is its beef only with China?
No.
The US has already started charging levies on the imports of steel and aluminium from the European Union, Mexico and Canada.
US businesses have to pay a 25% tax when they import steel from those places and a 10% levy to buy aluminium from them.
The EU, Mexico and Canada were all outraged and vowed to fight back.
The EU said it would enact retaliatory tariffs on some €2.8bn (£2.5bn) worth of US goods including jeans, motorbikes and bourbon whiskey. These are due to come into effect on 22 June.
Canada is planning countermeasures on C$16.6bn ($12.5bn; £9.5bn) worth of US goods from 1 July. It will slap a 25% tax on some US steel products and it plans a 10% levy on varied items including yoghurt, whiskeys and coffee.
Mexico has also released a list of products on which it will impose tariffs, including pork and cheese. Businesses will also have to pay a 25% duty to import some American steel products.
Who has been worst affected so far?
Given that the US buys nearly four times as much from China as it sells to them, China is limited on how far it can retaliate through trade.
There is some media speculation it could opt for alternatives measures, including taking action against US companies in China and devaluing its currency to fight back. A lower-value yuan would make it cheaper for foreigners to buy Chinese exports abroad, somewhat offsetting the upward pressure on prices caused by the US levies.
Who is losing out from Trump's tariffs?
While the impact of the growing trade spat on the US and China economies is expected to be small, analysts are concerned about its escalation.
This is already hurting stock markets.
"The direct impact of the Trump administration's 25% tariff on Chinese goods will actually be somewhat limited, but the risk of subsequent tit-for-tat retaliation on both sides is no small matter," Japanese financial services group Nomura said in a research note.
Companies are also getting worried. Carmaker Daimler has said it expects earnings from car sales to be "slightly below the previous year", because the tax will make their cars more expensive for consumers in China, a key market.
There are also concerns that smaller countries further down the supply chain could be caught out.
According to the Economist, 30% of the value of the goods China exports to America originates from third-party countries
Japan, it says, is the country that exports most to firms in China that export onwards to America.
21 June 2018
Donald Trump campaigned for election on a promise to make trade fairer for the US, and his push to do so has him fighting with some of America's oldest trading partners.
He has already imposed - or threatened to impose - taxes on imports from China, Mexico, Canada and the EU, to encourage consumers to buy American products.
Those countries have all promised to retaliate, sparking fears of an all-out trade war.
Mr Trump's hard line on trade, which saw him withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact (TPP) last year, marks a striking change from the free trade policies that have governed the exchange of goods for decades.
Here's what's gone on so far.
Trump takes on China
In January, the US slapped controversial tariffs on imported washing machines and solar panels, which was seen as Trump's most significant trade move since his decision to pull the US out of the TPP and renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta).
After a lot of to-ing and fro-ing, Mr Trump then said in June he would impose tariffs - or import taxes - on $50bn-worth (£38bn) of Chinese goods. The first tariffs are due to come into effect on 6 July.
Media captionWhat are tariffs and how do they affect us?
Mr Trump said this would stop the "unfair transfers of American technology and intellectual property to China" and protect jobs.
What is a trade war and why should I worry?
Tariffs, in theory, will make US-made products cheaper than imported ones, so encourage consumers to buy American. That will then boost local businesses and support the national economy.
Businesses will have pay a 25% additional tax on certain Chinese products they import - including aircraft tyres and commercial dishwashers.
China did not take the news laying down. It retaliated in kind, saying it too would collect a 25% levy on $50bn worth of US goods, also starting on 6 July. Taxes will be charged on imports of agricultural products, cars and marine products from the US, to name a few.
Upping the stakes, Mr Trump then threatened to slap a 10% levy on an additional $200bn of Chinese goods if China "refuses to change its practices". He ordered his staff to identify a list of Chinese goods to be taxed.
China said it would respond with measures of a "corresponding number and quality" if the US issued the list.
Is its beef only with China?
No.
The US has already started charging levies on the imports of steel and aluminium from the European Union, Mexico and Canada.
US businesses have to pay a 25% tax when they import steel from those places and a 10% levy to buy aluminium from them.
The EU, Mexico and Canada were all outraged and vowed to fight back.
The EU said it would enact retaliatory tariffs on some €2.8bn (£2.5bn) worth of US goods including jeans, motorbikes and bourbon whiskey. These are due to come into effect on 22 June.
Canada is planning countermeasures on C$16.6bn ($12.5bn; £9.5bn) worth of US goods from 1 July. It will slap a 25% tax on some US steel products and it plans a 10% levy on varied items including yoghurt, whiskeys and coffee.
Mexico has also released a list of products on which it will impose tariffs, including pork and cheese. Businesses will also have to pay a 25% duty to import some American steel products.
Who has been worst affected so far?
Given that the US buys nearly four times as much from China as it sells to them, China is limited on how far it can retaliate through trade.
There is some media speculation it could opt for alternatives measures, including taking action against US companies in China and devaluing its currency to fight back. A lower-value yuan would make it cheaper for foreigners to buy Chinese exports abroad, somewhat offsetting the upward pressure on prices caused by the US levies.
Who is losing out from Trump's tariffs?
While the impact of the growing trade spat on the US and China economies is expected to be small, analysts are concerned about its escalation.
This is already hurting stock markets.
"The direct impact of the Trump administration's 25% tariff on Chinese goods will actually be somewhat limited, but the risk of subsequent tit-for-tat retaliation on both sides is no small matter," Japanese financial services group Nomura said in a research note.
Companies are also getting worried. Carmaker Daimler has said it expects earnings from car sales to be "slightly below the previous year", because the tax will make their cars more expensive for consumers in China, a key market.
There are also concerns that smaller countries further down the supply chain could be caught out.
According to the Economist, 30% of the value of the goods China exports to America originates from third-party countries
Japan, it says, is the country that exports most to firms in China that export onwards to America.
The 'conservative' resistance continues against Trump, the man delivering all the conservative results - Fox News
July 6, 2018
The 'conservative' resistance continues against Trump, the man delivering all the conservative results
Lauren DeBellis Appell By Lauren DeBellis Appell | Fox News
Trump wraps up interview process for SCOTUS nominee
President Trump to announce his Supreme Court pick on July 9th. John Roberts reports from the White House.
If President Trump’s next nominee to the Supreme Court to replace retiring Justice Anthony Kennedy is anything like Justice Neil Gorsuch – the president’s first nominee – America will be getting another great justice.
President Trump is scheduled to announce his nominee Monday. The announcement should solidify conservative support for the president – making the already-marginalized Never Trump faction of the Republican Party irrelevant.
For many conservatives, an important reason they voted for Donald Trump was because they believed he would nominate a solidly conservative justice to the Supreme Court.
Exit polls in that last presidential election showed 1 out of 5 voters cited the Supreme Court as “the most important factor” in deciding their vote – and 57 percent of these voters said they cast their ballots for candidate Trump.
We didn’t have a crystal ball, or any kind of political record to predict what President Trump would do. But we had his word and a list of potential Supreme Court nominees he said he would pick from.
Many of us took a chance that Trump wasn’t selling us down the river – and he didn’t disappoint. As one of his first acts as president, he gave us Neil Gorsuch.
Yet now there are still professed conservatives opposing a Trump presidency, even to the point where they’re openly hoping for Democrats to win control of Congress in the November midterm elections.
The irony is that these self-proclaimed "principled conservatives” can relate more to the far-left liberal crowd with their “resist movement” than to the conservative base they claim to want to protect.
In just over 17 months, President Trump has cut taxes and rolled back regulations. This has led to the lowest unemployment rate for African-Americans since records have been kept, the lowest recorded unemployment rate for Hispanics, and the lowest unemployment rate for women in two decades.
These are the practical results of conservative principles when put into action. Not to mention that President Trump has pulled the U.S. out of the Paris climate accords and out of the Iran nuclear deal.
Let’s also not forget that one year ago North Korea was firing missiles over Japan, testing atomic bombs and threatening the United States. Today, prospects for peace and security along the Pacific Rim are real, because this president – unlike his predecessors in both parties – took a different approach.
Does anyone doubt if any of the other candidates in the pool of Republican presidential contenders had been elected – and had this much success in this short amount of time – these same Never Trumpers would be working for the president rather than against him?
Yet the “conservative” resistance continues against the man delivering all the conservative results, and their whining grows staler by the minute.
With every promise President Trump keeps to conservatives who took a chance on him, the background noise from the GOP Never Trumpers sounds increasingly muffled – as it should, because the Never Trumpers are like ostriches with their heads buried beneath the ground.
The longer the Never Trumpers choose to dig their heels in and refuse to acknowledge that President Trump is making good on everything he said he’d do, the more credibility they lose.
We’ve heard the Trump haters in the GOP say they don’t like him because he’s – take your pick – not conservative enough (which is utter nonsense at this point); not a politician; or not “presidential” enough.
Perhaps these Never Trumpers are plagued with short-term memories, because some previous Republican nominees could hardly be considered conservative or, in some cases, presidential.
President Trump is unconventional, for sure – and that’s exactly why the American people elected him. He is an outside-the-box, entrepreneurial politician who shakes up business as usual –and delivers results.
If President Trump is re-elected, it’s likely he could have a third – and maybe even a fourth – Supreme Court seat to fill. Conservatives saw this in 2016 when they went to the polls, and that’s why many voted based on this issue and didn’t hesitate to cast ballots for Trump. They knew what was at stake.
Following his nomination to the Supreme Court, Neil Gorsuch said: “A judge who likes every outcome he reaches is very likely a bad judge, stretching for results he prefers, rather than those the law demands.”
This kind of deference to the rule of law and the Constitution is exactly what conservatives were hoping for in a Supreme Court nominee when they voted for President Trump. Conservatives want justices who fairly apply the law and don’t make it up from the bench, and who protect our freedoms.
The Constitution is not a list of suggestions. Justice Gorsuch understands that. As the names that have been floated as potential Supreme Court nominees seem to indicate, President Trump appears to understand that as well.
If those 57 percent “Supreme Court issue” voters had chosen to jump on the Never Trump bandwagon within the GOP, simply because they didn’t like the guy, we’d be looking at a Supreme Court being stacked with judicial activists who’d chip away at our freedom by rewriting the Constitution into whatever suits their political whims.
If the GOP Never Trump crowd truly wants to stand up for conservative principles they should stand with the president. He’s standing with us.
Lauren DeBellis Appell, a freelance writer in Fairfax, Virginia, was deputy press secretary for then-Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., in his successful 2000 re-election campaign, as well as assistant communications director for the Senate Republican Policy Committee (2001-2003).
The 'conservative' resistance continues against Trump, the man delivering all the conservative results
Lauren DeBellis Appell By Lauren DeBellis Appell | Fox News
Trump wraps up interview process for SCOTUS nominee
President Trump to announce his Supreme Court pick on July 9th. John Roberts reports from the White House.
If President Trump’s next nominee to the Supreme Court to replace retiring Justice Anthony Kennedy is anything like Justice Neil Gorsuch – the president’s first nominee – America will be getting another great justice.
President Trump is scheduled to announce his nominee Monday. The announcement should solidify conservative support for the president – making the already-marginalized Never Trump faction of the Republican Party irrelevant.
For many conservatives, an important reason they voted for Donald Trump was because they believed he would nominate a solidly conservative justice to the Supreme Court.
Exit polls in that last presidential election showed 1 out of 5 voters cited the Supreme Court as “the most important factor” in deciding their vote – and 57 percent of these voters said they cast their ballots for candidate Trump.
We didn’t have a crystal ball, or any kind of political record to predict what President Trump would do. But we had his word and a list of potential Supreme Court nominees he said he would pick from.
Many of us took a chance that Trump wasn’t selling us down the river – and he didn’t disappoint. As one of his first acts as president, he gave us Neil Gorsuch.
Yet now there are still professed conservatives opposing a Trump presidency, even to the point where they’re openly hoping for Democrats to win control of Congress in the November midterm elections.
The irony is that these self-proclaimed "principled conservatives” can relate more to the far-left liberal crowd with their “resist movement” than to the conservative base they claim to want to protect.
In just over 17 months, President Trump has cut taxes and rolled back regulations. This has led to the lowest unemployment rate for African-Americans since records have been kept, the lowest recorded unemployment rate for Hispanics, and the lowest unemployment rate for women in two decades.
These are the practical results of conservative principles when put into action. Not to mention that President Trump has pulled the U.S. out of the Paris climate accords and out of the Iran nuclear deal.
Let’s also not forget that one year ago North Korea was firing missiles over Japan, testing atomic bombs and threatening the United States. Today, prospects for peace and security along the Pacific Rim are real, because this president – unlike his predecessors in both parties – took a different approach.
Does anyone doubt if any of the other candidates in the pool of Republican presidential contenders had been elected – and had this much success in this short amount of time – these same Never Trumpers would be working for the president rather than against him?
Yet the “conservative” resistance continues against the man delivering all the conservative results, and their whining grows staler by the minute.
With every promise President Trump keeps to conservatives who took a chance on him, the background noise from the GOP Never Trumpers sounds increasingly muffled – as it should, because the Never Trumpers are like ostriches with their heads buried beneath the ground.
The longer the Never Trumpers choose to dig their heels in and refuse to acknowledge that President Trump is making good on everything he said he’d do, the more credibility they lose.
We’ve heard the Trump haters in the GOP say they don’t like him because he’s – take your pick – not conservative enough (which is utter nonsense at this point); not a politician; or not “presidential” enough.
Perhaps these Never Trumpers are plagued with short-term memories, because some previous Republican nominees could hardly be considered conservative or, in some cases, presidential.
President Trump is unconventional, for sure – and that’s exactly why the American people elected him. He is an outside-the-box, entrepreneurial politician who shakes up business as usual –and delivers results.
If President Trump is re-elected, it’s likely he could have a third – and maybe even a fourth – Supreme Court seat to fill. Conservatives saw this in 2016 when they went to the polls, and that’s why many voted based on this issue and didn’t hesitate to cast ballots for Trump. They knew what was at stake.
Following his nomination to the Supreme Court, Neil Gorsuch said: “A judge who likes every outcome he reaches is very likely a bad judge, stretching for results he prefers, rather than those the law demands.”
This kind of deference to the rule of law and the Constitution is exactly what conservatives were hoping for in a Supreme Court nominee when they voted for President Trump. Conservatives want justices who fairly apply the law and don’t make it up from the bench, and who protect our freedoms.
The Constitution is not a list of suggestions. Justice Gorsuch understands that. As the names that have been floated as potential Supreme Court nominees seem to indicate, President Trump appears to understand that as well.
If those 57 percent “Supreme Court issue” voters had chosen to jump on the Never Trump bandwagon within the GOP, simply because they didn’t like the guy, we’d be looking at a Supreme Court being stacked with judicial activists who’d chip away at our freedom by rewriting the Constitution into whatever suits their political whims.
If the GOP Never Trump crowd truly wants to stand up for conservative principles they should stand with the president. He’s standing with us.
Lauren DeBellis Appell, a freelance writer in Fairfax, Virginia, was deputy press secretary for then-Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., in his successful 2000 re-election campaign, as well as assistant communications director for the Senate Republican Policy Committee (2001-2003).
Sex and relationships expert explains what he thinks is going on with Melania Trump - Independent
July 6, 2018
Sex and relationships expert explains what he thinks is going on with Melania Trump
Posted 5 months ago by Mimi Launder in people
UPVOTE
Throughout US history, the first couple at least attempted to make a show of happy families.
But, in a presidency of many firsts, Donald Trump's wife Melania has been spotted grinning the moment her husband looks away, appearing to slap his hand away and, more recently, apparently ignoring him.
University of Washington sociologist Pepper Schwartz, a sex and relationships expert, thinks the evidence speaks for itself, he explained to Los Angeles Times.
These people are under constant scrutiny. Has anyone ever seen a loving gesture between them?
Recent weeks have put the President and First Lady's relationship under particularly stringent scrutiny.
Donald Trump was alleged to have had an affair with porn star Stormy Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford - a charge he denies.
In the wake of the scandal, Melania cancelled plans to travel with her husband to the World Economic Forum in Davos last month, amid reports she had been sleeping at a Washington DC hotel.
On Friday, the First Lady travelled alone Andrews Air Force Base rather than with her husband, citing a scheduling issue.
HT Los Angeles Times
Sex and relationships expert explains what he thinks is going on with Melania Trump
Posted 5 months ago by Mimi Launder in people
UPVOTE
Throughout US history, the first couple at least attempted to make a show of happy families.
But, in a presidency of many firsts, Donald Trump's wife Melania has been spotted grinning the moment her husband looks away, appearing to slap his hand away and, more recently, apparently ignoring him.
University of Washington sociologist Pepper Schwartz, a sex and relationships expert, thinks the evidence speaks for itself, he explained to Los Angeles Times.
These people are under constant scrutiny. Has anyone ever seen a loving gesture between them?
Recent weeks have put the President and First Lady's relationship under particularly stringent scrutiny.
Donald Trump was alleged to have had an affair with porn star Stormy Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford - a charge he denies.
In the wake of the scandal, Melania cancelled plans to travel with her husband to the World Economic Forum in Davos last month, amid reports she had been sleeping at a Washington DC hotel.
On Friday, the First Lady travelled alone Andrews Air Force Base rather than with her husband, citing a scheduling issue.
HT Los Angeles Times
Trump wants Warren to prove her Native American heritage. Could she? - MSNBC News
Fact check: Trump wants Warren to prove her Native American heritage. Could she?
The Democratic senator has said she stands by stories about her ancestors she was told as a child. Here's what we know, and what we don't.
by Jane C. Timm / Jul.07.2018 / 12:52 AM ET / Updated 1:23 AM ET
President Donald Trump escalated a familiar attack on Sen. Elizabeth Warren Thursday night, mocking the Massachusetts Democrat and leading potential 2020 rival for her claim of Native American heritage.
He revived his nickname for her — "the fake Pocahontas" — and told the crowd at his Montana campaign rally that should the two find themselves on a debate stage, he would challenge her to submit to genetic testing to prove that she has Native American ancestors.
Trump mocks Warren: 'To the fake Pocahontas, I won't apologize'
JUL.06.201802:44
"I will give you a million dollars to your favorite charity, paid for by Trump, if you take the test and it shows you're an Indian," he said. "I have a feeling she will say no."
Warren immediately shot back: "While you obsess over my genes, your Admin is conducting DNA tests on little kids because you ripped them from their mamas," she wrote on Twitter, a reference to the migrant children who have been separated from their parents at the southern border because of a Trump administration policy.
Elizabeth Warren
✔
@elizabethforma
Hey, @realDonaldTrump: While you obsess over my genes, your Admin is conducting DNA tests on little kids because you ripped them from their mamas & you are too incompetent to reunite them in time to meet a court order. Maybe you should focus on fixing the lives you're destroying.
9:52 AM - Jul 6, 2018
Still, Warren has come under frequent fire — from Trump and others — for her still-unproven claims of Native American heritage.
Here's what we know about her ancestry, what experts say and what a DNA test would show.
HOW DID THE DEBATE OVER WARREN'S HERITAGE START?
Warren, who grew up in Oklahoma, land that was once Indian Territory, reportedly listed herself in a directory as a minority professor for nine years (from 1986 to 1995) before eventually landing a job at Harvard.
During Warren's hotly contested Senate bid in Massachusetts in 2012, The Boston Herald uncovered a 1996 student newspaper article quoting a Harvard Law School spokesman who boasted that Warren, who was a professor, was Native American. Her campaign scrambled and failed to offer conclusive proof for the claim, which Warren said stemmed from stories her mother told her as a child.
"Being Native American is part of who our family is and I'm glad to tell anyone about that. I am just very proud of it," Warren told reporters at the time.
In a campaign ad, Warren said she had never asked her mom for documentation that her family was part-Cherokee and part-Delaware, but that it was the reason her parents had to elope.
WHAT DO HER CRITICS SAY?
Political rivals over the years have attempted to paint Warren as a liar and an opportunist.
"Elizabeth Warren said she was a Native American, a person of color," then-Sen. Scott Brown, R-Mass., said of Warren during one 2012 debate. "As you can see, she's not."
Warren defends Native American references: 'It's a part of me'
MAR.12.201802:06
After Warren emerged as a harsh Trump critic during the 2016 presidential campaign, Trump took to calling her "Pocahontas," the name of a storied Native American woman.
"She used the fact that she was Native American to advance her career. Elizabeth Warren is a total fraud. I know it. Other people who work with her know it. Elizabeth Warren is a total fraud," the president told NBC News during his presidential bid.
Native American leaders have said the "Pocahontas" nickname is culturally insensitive and racist. Warren herself called it a slur.
WOULD A DNA TEST PROVE HER CLAIMS?
Probably not, and Warren said on NBC News' "Meet the Press" in a March interview she will not take one.
DNA tests are not widely accepted as proof of tribal citizenship — in part because the DNA could not show a specific tribe, only some genetic markers from Native people — and are more unreliable for Native Americans than for large ancestral regions like Asia or Africa.
“The reality is she could take a DNA test and have Native ancestry and have it not show up because it depends on which branches of the family tree it’s in and how far back,” Smolenyak said. “That test is very good for finding stuff out going back five, six generations. If you have one great-great-great-great-grant-great grandmother, it’s not going to show.”
WHAT DO HISTORIANS AND GENEALOGISTS SAY?
Native Americans are still the second-largest minority group in Oklahoma, according to the 2010 Census, and tales of Native ancestry are common, experts said.
"My family has a narrative that we're Choctaw, but we don’t have any proof of that," Larry O'Dell, the Oklahoma Historical Society's director of special projects and development, said when asked about tracing Native heritage. "My boss and I were talking earlier, and he has the same kind of narrative. It's just sort of the way it is in Oklahoma."
Independent genealogist Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak, who has traced former first lady Michelle Obama's family back to slaves and former President Barack Obama's ancestors to Ireland, said one of the biggest myths in genealogy is how many families believe their ancestor was a Cherokee princess.
Trump mocks Warren: 'To the fake Pocahontas, I won't apologize'
Thai diver dies amid cave rescue of trapped soccer team
"It's always Cherokee, and it's always a princess," she said.
More than 819,000 people told the 2010 Census they are at least part Cherokee, despite the nation’s three federally recognized Cherokee tribes only having half as many members.
Laura Martin, a deputy director for the Oklahoma Historical Society's research division, said 98 percent of visitors to their library are hunting down ties to Native American heritage. But in order to obtain documentation that's registered by tribes or the U.S. government, ancestors must be listed on historical registers like the Dawes Rolls, which the federal government used to distribute communal tribal land to individual Indians who enrolled between 1898–1906.
"We can help you find federal Census records, marriage records, death records, things like that, but if they did not sign up [on official documents], it kind of ends there," Martin said.
DID HER SELF-IDENTIFIED MINORITY STATUS HELP HER CAREER?
Warren has adamantly insisted that she never used her heritage to get ahead, and there’s no evidence that it was a deciding factor in her employment at Harvard.
"That's totally stupid, ignorant, uninformed and simply wrong," the Harvard Law School professor who recruited her for the position, Charles Fried, told The Associated Press in 2012. "I presented her case to the faculty. I did not mention her Native American connection because I did not know about it.”
Fried, a former U.S. Solicitor General who served under Ronald Reagan, reportedly donated to her Senate campaign.
SO, IS WARREN ACTUALLY NATIVE AMERICAN?
There is no documented proof that Warren is descended from Native Americans.
Warren has not provided any. Genealogists who have investigated her history have found her relatives to be listed as white in historical documents like the Census and do not appear in the Indian documents typically used to verify claims of Native American ancestry, like the Dawes Rolls.
The New England Historic Genealogical Society initially said they had proof that she was 1/32nd Native American, only to later backtrack and say they did not have definitive proof. They declined to comment for this story.
Cherokee genealogist Twila Barnes traced Warren's maternal family back four generations to the turn of the 19th century; the records listed all members as white. She could not find Warren’s family in any of the 45 Indian records and documents she reviewed for a detailed report.
Trump calls Warren
NOV.28.201706:48
This doesn't mean that Warren is not Native American — some Native Americans were not listed in the Dawes Rolls, for instance, or her ancestors could be from well before those records — but it does mean that there is no evidence that she is, either.
Accordingly, she would not be eligible for citizenship in Indian tribes like Cherokee Nation, as they commonly require a direct ancestor to be listed on those records.
"The fact that it hasn’t been substantiated doesn't 100 percent mean it won't be substantiated," Smolenyak told NBC News, six years after she first started looking into Warren's family. "But … you would have hoped for some proof within this time frame."
Warren, in a speech this year to a Native American group, addressed the controversy and said she stands by the stories she was told as a child.
"I get why some people think there's hay to be made here. You won’t find my family members on any rolls, and I'm not enrolled in a tribe," she said. But, she added, "my parents were real people."
The Democratic senator has said she stands by stories about her ancestors she was told as a child. Here's what we know, and what we don't.
by Jane C. Timm / Jul.07.2018 / 12:52 AM ET / Updated 1:23 AM ET
President Donald Trump escalated a familiar attack on Sen. Elizabeth Warren Thursday night, mocking the Massachusetts Democrat and leading potential 2020 rival for her claim of Native American heritage.
He revived his nickname for her — "the fake Pocahontas" — and told the crowd at his Montana campaign rally that should the two find themselves on a debate stage, he would challenge her to submit to genetic testing to prove that she has Native American ancestors.
Trump mocks Warren: 'To the fake Pocahontas, I won't apologize'
JUL.06.201802:44
"I will give you a million dollars to your favorite charity, paid for by Trump, if you take the test and it shows you're an Indian," he said. "I have a feeling she will say no."
Warren immediately shot back: "While you obsess over my genes, your Admin is conducting DNA tests on little kids because you ripped them from their mamas," she wrote on Twitter, a reference to the migrant children who have been separated from their parents at the southern border because of a Trump administration policy.
Elizabeth Warren
✔
@elizabethforma
Hey, @realDonaldTrump: While you obsess over my genes, your Admin is conducting DNA tests on little kids because you ripped them from their mamas & you are too incompetent to reunite them in time to meet a court order. Maybe you should focus on fixing the lives you're destroying.
9:52 AM - Jul 6, 2018
Still, Warren has come under frequent fire — from Trump and others — for her still-unproven claims of Native American heritage.
Here's what we know about her ancestry, what experts say and what a DNA test would show.
HOW DID THE DEBATE OVER WARREN'S HERITAGE START?
Warren, who grew up in Oklahoma, land that was once Indian Territory, reportedly listed herself in a directory as a minority professor for nine years (from 1986 to 1995) before eventually landing a job at Harvard.
During Warren's hotly contested Senate bid in Massachusetts in 2012, The Boston Herald uncovered a 1996 student newspaper article quoting a Harvard Law School spokesman who boasted that Warren, who was a professor, was Native American. Her campaign scrambled and failed to offer conclusive proof for the claim, which Warren said stemmed from stories her mother told her as a child.
"Being Native American is part of who our family is and I'm glad to tell anyone about that. I am just very proud of it," Warren told reporters at the time.
In a campaign ad, Warren said she had never asked her mom for documentation that her family was part-Cherokee and part-Delaware, but that it was the reason her parents had to elope.
WHAT DO HER CRITICS SAY?
Political rivals over the years have attempted to paint Warren as a liar and an opportunist.
"Elizabeth Warren said she was a Native American, a person of color," then-Sen. Scott Brown, R-Mass., said of Warren during one 2012 debate. "As you can see, she's not."
Warren defends Native American references: 'It's a part of me'
MAR.12.201802:06
After Warren emerged as a harsh Trump critic during the 2016 presidential campaign, Trump took to calling her "Pocahontas," the name of a storied Native American woman.
"She used the fact that she was Native American to advance her career. Elizabeth Warren is a total fraud. I know it. Other people who work with her know it. Elizabeth Warren is a total fraud," the president told NBC News during his presidential bid.
Native American leaders have said the "Pocahontas" nickname is culturally insensitive and racist. Warren herself called it a slur.
WOULD A DNA TEST PROVE HER CLAIMS?
Probably not, and Warren said on NBC News' "Meet the Press" in a March interview she will not take one.
DNA tests are not widely accepted as proof of tribal citizenship — in part because the DNA could not show a specific tribe, only some genetic markers from Native people — and are more unreliable for Native Americans than for large ancestral regions like Asia or Africa.
“The reality is she could take a DNA test and have Native ancestry and have it not show up because it depends on which branches of the family tree it’s in and how far back,” Smolenyak said. “That test is very good for finding stuff out going back five, six generations. If you have one great-great-great-great-grant-great grandmother, it’s not going to show.”
WHAT DO HISTORIANS AND GENEALOGISTS SAY?
Native Americans are still the second-largest minority group in Oklahoma, according to the 2010 Census, and tales of Native ancestry are common, experts said.
"My family has a narrative that we're Choctaw, but we don’t have any proof of that," Larry O'Dell, the Oklahoma Historical Society's director of special projects and development, said when asked about tracing Native heritage. "My boss and I were talking earlier, and he has the same kind of narrative. It's just sort of the way it is in Oklahoma."
Independent genealogist Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak, who has traced former first lady Michelle Obama's family back to slaves and former President Barack Obama's ancestors to Ireland, said one of the biggest myths in genealogy is how many families believe their ancestor was a Cherokee princess.
Trump mocks Warren: 'To the fake Pocahontas, I won't apologize'
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"It's always Cherokee, and it's always a princess," she said.
More than 819,000 people told the 2010 Census they are at least part Cherokee, despite the nation’s three federally recognized Cherokee tribes only having half as many members.
Laura Martin, a deputy director for the Oklahoma Historical Society's research division, said 98 percent of visitors to their library are hunting down ties to Native American heritage. But in order to obtain documentation that's registered by tribes or the U.S. government, ancestors must be listed on historical registers like the Dawes Rolls, which the federal government used to distribute communal tribal land to individual Indians who enrolled between 1898–1906.
"We can help you find federal Census records, marriage records, death records, things like that, but if they did not sign up [on official documents], it kind of ends there," Martin said.
DID HER SELF-IDENTIFIED MINORITY STATUS HELP HER CAREER?
Warren has adamantly insisted that she never used her heritage to get ahead, and there’s no evidence that it was a deciding factor in her employment at Harvard.
"That's totally stupid, ignorant, uninformed and simply wrong," the Harvard Law School professor who recruited her for the position, Charles Fried, told The Associated Press in 2012. "I presented her case to the faculty. I did not mention her Native American connection because I did not know about it.”
Fried, a former U.S. Solicitor General who served under Ronald Reagan, reportedly donated to her Senate campaign.
SO, IS WARREN ACTUALLY NATIVE AMERICAN?
There is no documented proof that Warren is descended from Native Americans.
Warren has not provided any. Genealogists who have investigated her history have found her relatives to be listed as white in historical documents like the Census and do not appear in the Indian documents typically used to verify claims of Native American ancestry, like the Dawes Rolls.
The New England Historic Genealogical Society initially said they had proof that she was 1/32nd Native American, only to later backtrack and say they did not have definitive proof. They declined to comment for this story.
Cherokee genealogist Twila Barnes traced Warren's maternal family back four generations to the turn of the 19th century; the records listed all members as white. She could not find Warren’s family in any of the 45 Indian records and documents she reviewed for a detailed report.
Trump calls Warren
NOV.28.201706:48
This doesn't mean that Warren is not Native American — some Native Americans were not listed in the Dawes Rolls, for instance, or her ancestors could be from well before those records — but it does mean that there is no evidence that she is, either.
Accordingly, she would not be eligible for citizenship in Indian tribes like Cherokee Nation, as they commonly require a direct ancestor to be listed on those records.
"The fact that it hasn’t been substantiated doesn't 100 percent mean it won't be substantiated," Smolenyak told NBC News, six years after she first started looking into Warren's family. "But … you would have hoped for some proof within this time frame."
Warren, in a speech this year to a Native American group, addressed the controversy and said she stands by the stories she was told as a child.
"I get why some people think there's hay to be made here. You won’t find my family members on any rolls, and I'm not enrolled in a tribe," she said. But, she added, "my parents were real people."
Woman behind Trudeau groping allegations stands by account - BBC News
Woman behind Trudeau groping allegations stands by account
7 July 2018
Mr Trudeau says he remembers the event, but does not recall any "negative interactions"
The woman who accused Canadian PM Justin Trudeau 18 years ago of groping her says she stands by her account.
She released a statement on Friday to CBC News, her first public comment on the allegations that resurfaced over a month ago.
She said the incident, described in August 2000 in an editorial in a local newspaper "did occur, as reported".
Mr Trudeau has denied any wrongdoing, saying he is confident he did "not act inappropriately".
The woman was a journalist at the time and covering an event attended by Mr Trudeau.
The editorial and its allegations resurfaced after a blogger posted an image of the article on Twitter in June.
Warren Kinsella
✔
@kinsellawarren
Um, what? #cdnpoli #loc #MeToo
9:25 AM - Jun 7, 2018
The event in Creston, British Columbia, was held to raise money for an avalanche safety charity with which Mr Trudeau was involved.
Days afterwards, an unsigned editorial appeared in a local paper, accusing him of "groping" a young female reporter.
Mr Trudeau first responded to the nearly 20-year-old incident on 1 July when questioned by journalists.
Trudeau denies groping allegations
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The prime minister said he did not recall any "negative interactions" at the event, though he said he remembered the day in Creston well.
On Thursday, the prime minister offered a more detailed response.
"I have been reflecting very carefully on what I remember," he said. "I feel I am confident I did not act inappropriately."
Mr Trudeau said if he apologised at the time it was because he must have sensed the woman in question felt differently about their interaction.
"The same interactions can be experienced very differently from one person to the next," he said.
Published in the Creston Valley Advance newspaper, the piece accused Mr Trudeau of "inappropriately handling" the reporter, who felt "blatantly disrespected" by the actions, which were not described.
According to the editorial, Mr Trudeau apologised for his behaviour and said: "If I had known you were reporting for a national paper, I never would have been so forward."
Mr Trudeau, the son of one of Canada's longest serving prime ministers, Pierre Trudeau, was a 28-year-old teacher at the time of the event.
He became involved with the charity Avalanche Foundation after his brother Michel died in an avalanche in 1998.
In her statement, the woman - who has not been named - confirmed Mr Trudeau did issue an apology to her on the day after the festival, as was published in the editorial.
"I did not pursue the incident at the time and will not be pursuing the incident further," she said.
"Beyond this statement, I will not be providing any further details or information. The debate, if it continues, will continue without my involvement."
7 July 2018
Mr Trudeau says he remembers the event, but does not recall any "negative interactions"
The woman who accused Canadian PM Justin Trudeau 18 years ago of groping her says she stands by her account.
She released a statement on Friday to CBC News, her first public comment on the allegations that resurfaced over a month ago.
She said the incident, described in August 2000 in an editorial in a local newspaper "did occur, as reported".
Mr Trudeau has denied any wrongdoing, saying he is confident he did "not act inappropriately".
The woman was a journalist at the time and covering an event attended by Mr Trudeau.
The editorial and its allegations resurfaced after a blogger posted an image of the article on Twitter in June.
Warren Kinsella
✔
@kinsellawarren
Um, what? #cdnpoli #loc #MeToo
9:25 AM - Jun 7, 2018
The event in Creston, British Columbia, was held to raise money for an avalanche safety charity with which Mr Trudeau was involved.
Days afterwards, an unsigned editorial appeared in a local paper, accusing him of "groping" a young female reporter.
Mr Trudeau first responded to the nearly 20-year-old incident on 1 July when questioned by journalists.
Trudeau denies groping allegations
Trudeau defends asylum seeker policy
Trudeau faces PC 'peoplekind' backlash
The prime minister said he did not recall any "negative interactions" at the event, though he said he remembered the day in Creston well.
On Thursday, the prime minister offered a more detailed response.
"I have been reflecting very carefully on what I remember," he said. "I feel I am confident I did not act inappropriately."
Mr Trudeau said if he apologised at the time it was because he must have sensed the woman in question felt differently about their interaction.
"The same interactions can be experienced very differently from one person to the next," he said.
Published in the Creston Valley Advance newspaper, the piece accused Mr Trudeau of "inappropriately handling" the reporter, who felt "blatantly disrespected" by the actions, which were not described.
According to the editorial, Mr Trudeau apologised for his behaviour and said: "If I had known you were reporting for a national paper, I never would have been so forward."
Mr Trudeau, the son of one of Canada's longest serving prime ministers, Pierre Trudeau, was a 28-year-old teacher at the time of the event.
He became involved with the charity Avalanche Foundation after his brother Michel died in an avalanche in 1998.
In her statement, the woman - who has not been named - confirmed Mr Trudeau did issue an apology to her on the day after the festival, as was published in the editorial.
"I did not pursue the incident at the time and will not be pursuing the incident further," she said.
"Beyond this statement, I will not be providing any further details or information. The debate, if it continues, will continue without my involvement."
China and Russia hit back at Trump tariffs - BBC News
China and Russia hit back at Trump tariffs
6 July 2018
US lobsters are among goods subject to Chinese retaliatory tariffs
China has hit back after US tariffs on Chinese goods came into effect and President Donald Trump threatened to impose more.
China's commerce ministry said it had lodged a new complaint with the World Trade Organization (WTO).
Meanwhile, Russia has announced extra duties on US imports in retaliation for earlier US steel tariffs.
Beijing has accused the US of starting the "largest trade war in economic history".
US tariffs on $34bn (£25.7bn) of Chinese goods came into effect on Friday.
China retaliated by imposing a similar 25% tariff on 545 US products - including cars, soya beans and lobsters - also worth a total of $34bn.
Russia is introducing extra duties on a range of products imported from the US that can be replaced by locally made equivalents.
They include road-building equipment, products for the oil and gas industry, and tools used in mining.
Media captionWhy the US-China trade war will hit most of our pockets
Mr Trump has already imposed tariffs on imported washing machines and solar panels, and started charging levies on the imports of steel and aluminium from the European Union, Mexico and Canada.
The US tariffs imposed so far would affect the equivalent of 0.6% of global trade and account for 0.1% of global GDP, according to Morgan Stanley.
What is President Trump threatening?
The US president said America might target Chinese goods worth $500bn - the total value of Chinese imports in 2017.
The White House had previously said it would consult on tariffs on another $16bn of products, which Mr Trump has suggested could come into effect later this month.
Mr Trump said: "You have another 16 [billion dollars] in two weeks, and then, as you know, we have $200bn in abeyance and then after the $200bn, we have $300bn in abeyance. OK? So we have 50 plus 200 plus almost 300."
Image copyrightGETTY IMAGES
Image caption
Donald Trump says US tariffs will protect US jobs
The American tariffs are the result of Mr Trump's attempt to protect US jobs and stop what he calls "unfair transfers of American technology and intellectual property to China".
A conflicted administration
By Tara McKelvey, White House reporter
Behind the trade war, there is conflict within the Trump administration. Hardliners such as Peter Navarro, a trade policy adviser, says the US is defending itself against an "aggressive" China. Meanwhile, some of the officials who previously worked for the Obama administration - known as "holdovers" - are hoping to tamp down the US-China conflict.
The tension between these factions is occasionally on display in the West Wing. I've seen two hardliners struggle over a podium, vying for a chance to broadcast Trump's harsh message on economic issues, while the holdovers sit quietly at the side of the room.
This reflects a larger division in the White House: Trump and his closest aides are trying to bring about radical change, while those who support a more cautious approach find themselves sitting in silence.
What do China and Russia say?
"Trade war is never a solution," said Chinese Premier Li Keqiang. "China would never start a trade war, but if any party resorts to an increase of tariffs then China will take measures in response to protect development interests."
The government-run English language China Daily newspaper said: "The Trump administration is behaving like a gang of hoodlums with its shakedown of other countries, particularly China."
Russia says US tariffs on steel and aluminium, introduced in March, will cost its companies more than half a billion dollars.
Will there be a full-scale trade war?
Analysts at Bank of America Merrill Lynch forecast only a modest escalation in the US-China battle, adding: "However, we can't rule out a full-blown, recession-inducing 'trade war'."
Rob Carnell, chief Asia economist at ING, said: "This is not economic Armageddon. We will not have to hunt our food with pointy sticks.
"But it is applying the brakes to a global economy that has less durable momentum than appears to be the case."
Carmaker BMW said it could not absorb all of the 25% tariff on the cars it exports to China from a plant in Spartanburg, South Carolina and would have to raise prices.
The new tariffs had little impact on Asian stock markets. The Shanghai Composite closed 0.5% higher, but ended the week 3.5% lower - its seventh consecutive week of losses.
Tokyo closed 1.1% higher and European markets were up more than 1% in morning trading before turning negative on Friday afternoon.
6 July 2018
US lobsters are among goods subject to Chinese retaliatory tariffs
China has hit back after US tariffs on Chinese goods came into effect and President Donald Trump threatened to impose more.
China's commerce ministry said it had lodged a new complaint with the World Trade Organization (WTO).
Meanwhile, Russia has announced extra duties on US imports in retaliation for earlier US steel tariffs.
Beijing has accused the US of starting the "largest trade war in economic history".
US tariffs on $34bn (£25.7bn) of Chinese goods came into effect on Friday.
China retaliated by imposing a similar 25% tariff on 545 US products - including cars, soya beans and lobsters - also worth a total of $34bn.
Russia is introducing extra duties on a range of products imported from the US that can be replaced by locally made equivalents.
They include road-building equipment, products for the oil and gas industry, and tools used in mining.
Media captionWhy the US-China trade war will hit most of our pockets
Mr Trump has already imposed tariffs on imported washing machines and solar panels, and started charging levies on the imports of steel and aluminium from the European Union, Mexico and Canada.
The US tariffs imposed so far would affect the equivalent of 0.6% of global trade and account for 0.1% of global GDP, according to Morgan Stanley.
What is President Trump threatening?
The US president said America might target Chinese goods worth $500bn - the total value of Chinese imports in 2017.
The White House had previously said it would consult on tariffs on another $16bn of products, which Mr Trump has suggested could come into effect later this month.
Mr Trump said: "You have another 16 [billion dollars] in two weeks, and then, as you know, we have $200bn in abeyance and then after the $200bn, we have $300bn in abeyance. OK? So we have 50 plus 200 plus almost 300."
Image copyrightGETTY IMAGES
Image caption
Donald Trump says US tariffs will protect US jobs
The American tariffs are the result of Mr Trump's attempt to protect US jobs and stop what he calls "unfair transfers of American technology and intellectual property to China".
A conflicted administration
By Tara McKelvey, White House reporter
Behind the trade war, there is conflict within the Trump administration. Hardliners such as Peter Navarro, a trade policy adviser, says the US is defending itself against an "aggressive" China. Meanwhile, some of the officials who previously worked for the Obama administration - known as "holdovers" - are hoping to tamp down the US-China conflict.
The tension between these factions is occasionally on display in the West Wing. I've seen two hardliners struggle over a podium, vying for a chance to broadcast Trump's harsh message on economic issues, while the holdovers sit quietly at the side of the room.
This reflects a larger division in the White House: Trump and his closest aides are trying to bring about radical change, while those who support a more cautious approach find themselves sitting in silence.
What do China and Russia say?
"Trade war is never a solution," said Chinese Premier Li Keqiang. "China would never start a trade war, but if any party resorts to an increase of tariffs then China will take measures in response to protect development interests."
The government-run English language China Daily newspaper said: "The Trump administration is behaving like a gang of hoodlums with its shakedown of other countries, particularly China."
Russia says US tariffs on steel and aluminium, introduced in March, will cost its companies more than half a billion dollars.
Will there be a full-scale trade war?
Analysts at Bank of America Merrill Lynch forecast only a modest escalation in the US-China battle, adding: "However, we can't rule out a full-blown, recession-inducing 'trade war'."
Rob Carnell, chief Asia economist at ING, said: "This is not economic Armageddon. We will not have to hunt our food with pointy sticks.
"But it is applying the brakes to a global economy that has less durable momentum than appears to be the case."
Carmaker BMW said it could not absorb all of the 25% tariff on the cars it exports to China from a plant in Spartanburg, South Carolina and would have to raise prices.
The new tariffs had little impact on Asian stock markets. The Shanghai Composite closed 0.5% higher, but ended the week 3.5% lower - its seventh consecutive week of losses.
Tokyo closed 1.1% higher and European markets were up more than 1% in morning trading before turning negative on Friday afternoon.
Friday, July 6, 2018
TRUMP UK VISIT: THE ROYAL PROTOCOL THE US PRESIDENT WILL FOLLOW WHEN MEETING THE QUEEN - Independent
TRUMP UK VISIT: THE ROYAL PROTOCOL THE US PRESIDENT WILL FOLLOW WHEN MEETING THE QUEEN
Many are wondering how the president will fare when he meets the Queen for the first time
July 6, 2018
SABRINA BARR
@fabsab5
With around a week to go until the US president arrives in the UK, the question of how Donald Trump will fare when meeting Her Majesty the Queen has become a widely discussed topic of conversation.
The Queen has made the acquaintance of almost every acting US president since 1945, starting with Harry Truman whom she met while visiting Washington, DC as a princess in 1951.
There are number of rules that Trump will be expected to follow when he meets the reigning British monarch for the first time, some of which are more regimented than others.
Where are the UK protests against Donald Trump taking place?
"Whilst this is not a full state visit, it will be a meeting of two heads of state, and therefore formalities should be observed," Rupert Wesson, Debrett's academy director, tells The Independent.
"There will be a handful of subtle differences, but not many. For instance, the Queen tends not to shake hands with everyone she meets.
"However, in this case it would be surprising if she didn't."
The Queen is expected to host Trump at Windsor Castle when they meet on Friday 13 July, with the castle remaining closed to the public throughout the day.
"Families belong together" Protests over Trump immigration policy
While Trump will probably be instructed on how to address the Queen in the appropriate manner, the royal family are apparently more relaxed nowadays in regard to royal protocol than they used to be.
"It isn't as much a case of meeting the Queen, but rather being presented to her (typically by one of her courtiers)," Mr Wesson explains.
"In this instance, they will likely say: 'Your Majesty, may I present Mr Donald Trump.'
When is Donald Trump coming to Britain and who will he meet?
"It is customary for men to bow, however this is a very subtle gesture and not exaggerated - the Queen is said to be quite relaxed about this."
The royal family has outlined the proper way in which to address the Queen, tips that Trump will have to take heed of prior to his visit.
When greeting the monarch for the first time, the president will be expected to call her “Your Majesty”, before then referring to her as “Ma’am”, pronounced in the same manner as “jam”.
Trump will likely then bow to the Queen from the neck, while the First Lady will give the royal a small curtsy.
Trump continues attack on media and democrats
Depending on how the Queen decides to receive the president, the pair may also shake hands.
"The rules are not official or written down but rather an understanding," explains etiquette expert Grant Harrold, otherwise known as 'The Royal Butler'.
"President Trump should not offer his hand to the Queen for a handshake but he will have to wait for the Queen to offer the handshake.
"Only then may he accept and he must remember the grip should not be too tight or too loose, and it is two to three pumps then hands go back to your side."
May should ‘stand up’ to Donald Trump on human rights, Amnesty says
Mr Wesson believes that Trump will probably speak first after he's been introduced, with the Queen then following suit.
Furthermore, as it is their first meeting, Mr Harrold suspects that the pair will discuss general topics as opposed to personal matters.
It’s been reported that Trump will also be attending a dinner at Blenheim Palace in Oxfordshire during his UK visit, with the estate revealing on its website that the palace, park and gardens will be closed on 11 and 12 July.
While the feast will supposedly be hosted by Theresa May and attended by an assortment of business leaders as opposed to members of the royal family, Trump will still expected to follow certain rules in keeping with formal dinner etiquette.
Trump 'Angry baby' balloon gets go ahead to fly over London for visit
According to Debrett’s, when dining at a formal meal, guests should refrain from hunching in their chairs, starting the meal before anyone else and talking with their mouths full.
Furthermore, if any speeches are being given during the evening, talking during the oration is considered rude.
In 2017, Canada’s governor general David Johnston appeared to breach royal protocol by making physical contact with the Queen while helping her down a flight of stairs at Canada House in London.
However, while many may have assumed any physical contact with the Queen is strictly off limits in keeping with royal protocol, Michelle Obama’s famous hug with the monarch proves that this isn’t necessarily the case.
Many are wondering how the president will fare when he meets the Queen for the first time
July 6, 2018
SABRINA BARR
@fabsab5
With around a week to go until the US president arrives in the UK, the question of how Donald Trump will fare when meeting Her Majesty the Queen has become a widely discussed topic of conversation.
The Queen has made the acquaintance of almost every acting US president since 1945, starting with Harry Truman whom she met while visiting Washington, DC as a princess in 1951.
There are number of rules that Trump will be expected to follow when he meets the reigning British monarch for the first time, some of which are more regimented than others.
Where are the UK protests against Donald Trump taking place?
"Whilst this is not a full state visit, it will be a meeting of two heads of state, and therefore formalities should be observed," Rupert Wesson, Debrett's academy director, tells The Independent.
"There will be a handful of subtle differences, but not many. For instance, the Queen tends not to shake hands with everyone she meets.
"However, in this case it would be surprising if she didn't."
The Queen is expected to host Trump at Windsor Castle when they meet on Friday 13 July, with the castle remaining closed to the public throughout the day.
"Families belong together" Protests over Trump immigration policy
While Trump will probably be instructed on how to address the Queen in the appropriate manner, the royal family are apparently more relaxed nowadays in regard to royal protocol than they used to be.
"It isn't as much a case of meeting the Queen, but rather being presented to her (typically by one of her courtiers)," Mr Wesson explains.
"In this instance, they will likely say: 'Your Majesty, may I present Mr Donald Trump.'
When is Donald Trump coming to Britain and who will he meet?
"It is customary for men to bow, however this is a very subtle gesture and not exaggerated - the Queen is said to be quite relaxed about this."
The royal family has outlined the proper way in which to address the Queen, tips that Trump will have to take heed of prior to his visit.
When greeting the monarch for the first time, the president will be expected to call her “Your Majesty”, before then referring to her as “Ma’am”, pronounced in the same manner as “jam”.
Trump will likely then bow to the Queen from the neck, while the First Lady will give the royal a small curtsy.
Trump continues attack on media and democrats
Depending on how the Queen decides to receive the president, the pair may also shake hands.
"The rules are not official or written down but rather an understanding," explains etiquette expert Grant Harrold, otherwise known as 'The Royal Butler'.
"President Trump should not offer his hand to the Queen for a handshake but he will have to wait for the Queen to offer the handshake.
"Only then may he accept and he must remember the grip should not be too tight or too loose, and it is two to three pumps then hands go back to your side."
May should ‘stand up’ to Donald Trump on human rights, Amnesty says
Mr Wesson believes that Trump will probably speak first after he's been introduced, with the Queen then following suit.
Furthermore, as it is their first meeting, Mr Harrold suspects that the pair will discuss general topics as opposed to personal matters.
It’s been reported that Trump will also be attending a dinner at Blenheim Palace in Oxfordshire during his UK visit, with the estate revealing on its website that the palace, park and gardens will be closed on 11 and 12 July.
While the feast will supposedly be hosted by Theresa May and attended by an assortment of business leaders as opposed to members of the royal family, Trump will still expected to follow certain rules in keeping with formal dinner etiquette.
Trump 'Angry baby' balloon gets go ahead to fly over London for visit
According to Debrett’s, when dining at a formal meal, guests should refrain from hunching in their chairs, starting the meal before anyone else and talking with their mouths full.
Furthermore, if any speeches are being given during the evening, talking during the oration is considered rude.
In 2017, Canada’s governor general David Johnston appeared to breach royal protocol by making physical contact with the Queen while helping her down a flight of stairs at Canada House in London.
However, while many may have assumed any physical contact with the Queen is strictly off limits in keeping with royal protocol, Michelle Obama’s famous hug with the monarch proves that this isn’t necessarily the case.
Chinese Tycoon Wang Jian Falls to His Death While on a Business Trip in France - TIME Business
Chinese Tycoon Wang Jian Falls to His Death While on a Business Trip in France
By ASSOCIATED PRESS July 5, 2018
(BEIJING) — The co-chairman of HNA Group, a conglomerate that operates China’s fourth-largest airline and finance, logistics and other businesses around the world, died in an accident while on a business trip in France, the company said Wednesday.
Wang Jian, a co-founder of the company, suffered “severe injuries” in a fall in Provence in southern France and died Tuesday at age 57, said an HNA Group statement. It gave no other details.
Regional French media outlet France Bleu said Wang fell a dozen or so meters (yards) while taking photos on a high wall in Bonnieux, a town in a region famed for its panoramic views.
Launched in 1993 on the southern island of Hainan, HNA expanded into finance, hotels, logistics and other businesses in a multibillion-dollar global acquisition spree.
More recently, HNA has been selling some assets as Chinese regulators tighten lending controls and press companies to rein in debt.
Wang graduated from the Civil Aviation University of China and received an MBA from the Maastricht School of Management in the Netherlands, according to his company.
HNA agreed last year to acquire a hedge fund operated by Anthony Scaramucci, an aide to U.S. President Donald Trump. That never received regulatory approval and the two sides called off the deal in April.
By ASSOCIATED PRESS July 5, 2018
(BEIJING) — The co-chairman of HNA Group, a conglomerate that operates China’s fourth-largest airline and finance, logistics and other businesses around the world, died in an accident while on a business trip in France, the company said Wednesday.
Wang Jian, a co-founder of the company, suffered “severe injuries” in a fall in Provence in southern France and died Tuesday at age 57, said an HNA Group statement. It gave no other details.
Regional French media outlet France Bleu said Wang fell a dozen or so meters (yards) while taking photos on a high wall in Bonnieux, a town in a region famed for its panoramic views.
Launched in 1993 on the southern island of Hainan, HNA expanded into finance, hotels, logistics and other businesses in a multibillion-dollar global acquisition spree.
More recently, HNA has been selling some assets as Chinese regulators tighten lending controls and press companies to rein in debt.
Wang graduated from the Civil Aviation University of China and received an MBA from the Maastricht School of Management in the Netherlands, according to his company.
HNA agreed last year to acquire a hedge fund operated by Anthony Scaramucci, an aide to U.S. President Donald Trump. That never received regulatory approval and the two sides called off the deal in April.
Canadian Fisherman Say U.S. Border Patrol Is ‘Harassing’ Their Boats in Disputed Waters Off Maine - TIME
WORLD CANADA
Canadian Fisherman Say U.S. Border Patrol Is ‘Harassing’ Their Boats in Disputed Waters Off Maine
Machias Seal Island.
By JAMIE DUCHARME July 5, 2018
Canadian officials say armed U.S. Border Patrol agents have been stopping and boarding Canadian fishing boats to look for illegal immigrants in the contested waters between Maine and New Brunswick, resurfacing an old maritime dispute.
The area is home to Machias Seal Island and represents one of the last remaining border disputes between the U.S. and Canada, thanks to competing stipulations laid out by treaties and land grants. The waters around the 18-acre island, known for their lobster fishing, are a gray zone, meaning both the U.S. and Canada consider them sovereign territory.
That debate has come to a head lately, starting with a June 25 Facebook post in which a Canadian fisherman alleged that U.S. Border Patrol attempted to stop a fellow fisherman “in the zone.” The Grand Manan Fishermen’s Association later confirmed that several such interactions occurred in June, NBC reports.
On Wednesday, New Brunswick Fisheries Minister Rick Doucet told the National Post that he has heard multiple reports of armed U.S. Border Patrol agents boarding lobster boats to look for immigrants.
“Is this overkill? Absolutely. Absolutely overkill,” Doucet told the Post. “It’s quite disturbing when you have fishermen on the water, doing their job, providing for their families … and they’re being harassed,” he said. “Canadian fishermen are being harassed by U.S. Border Patrol. As far as I’m concerned, it needs to stop immediately.”
In a statement provided to the National Post, U.S. Border Patrol said its employees were properly enforcing immigration law.
“Border Patrol does not board Canadian Vessels in the grey zone without consent or probable cause and only conduct(s) interviews as a vessel runs parallel to it, bow to stern,” a spokesman said in the statement.
Despite their governments’ debate, Canadian and American fishermen typically coexist in this area relatively peacefully — with a few notable exceptions. In 2007, according to the National Post, an American fisherman had his thumb torn off when his equipment became tangled during a dispute with a Canadian competitor.
Canadian Fisherman Say U.S. Border Patrol Is ‘Harassing’ Their Boats in Disputed Waters Off Maine
Machias Seal Island.
By JAMIE DUCHARME July 5, 2018
Canadian officials say armed U.S. Border Patrol agents have been stopping and boarding Canadian fishing boats to look for illegal immigrants in the contested waters between Maine and New Brunswick, resurfacing an old maritime dispute.
The area is home to Machias Seal Island and represents one of the last remaining border disputes between the U.S. and Canada, thanks to competing stipulations laid out by treaties and land grants. The waters around the 18-acre island, known for their lobster fishing, are a gray zone, meaning both the U.S. and Canada consider them sovereign territory.
That debate has come to a head lately, starting with a June 25 Facebook post in which a Canadian fisherman alleged that U.S. Border Patrol attempted to stop a fellow fisherman “in the zone.” The Grand Manan Fishermen’s Association later confirmed that several such interactions occurred in June, NBC reports.
On Wednesday, New Brunswick Fisheries Minister Rick Doucet told the National Post that he has heard multiple reports of armed U.S. Border Patrol agents boarding lobster boats to look for immigrants.
“Is this overkill? Absolutely. Absolutely overkill,” Doucet told the Post. “It’s quite disturbing when you have fishermen on the water, doing their job, providing for their families … and they’re being harassed,” he said. “Canadian fishermen are being harassed by U.S. Border Patrol. As far as I’m concerned, it needs to stop immediately.”
In a statement provided to the National Post, U.S. Border Patrol said its employees were properly enforcing immigration law.
“Border Patrol does not board Canadian Vessels in the grey zone without consent or probable cause and only conduct(s) interviews as a vessel runs parallel to it, bow to stern,” a spokesman said in the statement.
Despite their governments’ debate, Canadian and American fishermen typically coexist in this area relatively peacefully — with a few notable exceptions. In 2007, according to the National Post, an American fisherman had his thumb torn off when his equipment became tangled during a dispute with a Canadian competitor.
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