Thursday 31 October 2019

Latest Impeachment Witness Contradicts Vindman’s Claim That Key Details Were Left Out of Ukraine Call Transcript

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Latest Impeachment Witness Contradicts Vindman’s Claim That Key Details Were Left Out of Ukraine Call TranscriptA senior White House official who listened to President Trump's controversial phone call with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky testified Thursday in a closed-door impeachment hearing that the White House did not omit any key details of the conversation from the publicly-released transcript.The official, Tim Morrison, also told House lawmakers he did not think Trump discussed anything illegal on the call.“I want to be clear, I was not concerned that anything illegal was discussed,” Morrison said in remarks to Congress.Morrison's testimony contradicts that of Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, the National Security Council's top Ukraine expert, who testified on Tuesday that he believes the White House omitted from the transcript Trump's claim that recordings of vice president Joe Biden existed that implicated him in corrupt dealings.During a July 25 phone call with Zelensky, Trump asked the Ukrainian president to help the U.S. investigate allegations that Biden used his position as vice president to help Ukrainian natural-gas company Burisma Holdings avoid a corruption probe soon after his son, Hunter Biden, was appointed to its board of directors. That phone conversation has become the crux of House Democrats' formal impeachment inquiry against Trump.Vindman added that he was concerned enough by Trump's call with Ukraine that he reported it to one of his superiors."I did not think it was proper to demand that a foreign government investigate a U.S. citizen, and I was worried about the implications for the U.S. government's support of Ukraine," Vindman said, according to his prepared testimony. "I realized that if Ukraine pursued an investigation into the Bidens and Burisma, it would likely be interpreted as a partisan play which would undoubtedly result in Ukraine losing the bipartisan support it has thus far maintained."Morrison also disputed the account of a conversation that Ambassador Bill Taylor described in his testimony to Congress last week. Taylor recalled Morrison telling him about a separate conversation between U.S. ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland and one of Zelensky's top advisers, in which Sondland told the adviser that the military aid was contingent on Zelensky's willingness to publicly announce a probe into Burisma.“My recollection is that Ambassador Sondland’s proposal to Yermak was that it could be sufficient if the new Ukrainian prosecutor general, not President Zelensky, would commit to pursue the Burisma investigation,” Morrison told lawmakers.The House voted Thursday along party lines to pass a resolution advancing the impeachment inquiry against President Trump.




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What Fiat Chrysler and PSA Peugeot Citroën Merger Will Mean for U.S. Car Buyers

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What Fiat Chrysler and PSA Peugeot Citroën Merger Will Mean for U.S. Car BuyersNow that FCA and PSA confirm they're doing a 50/50 merger, we're more likely to see technology being shared than cars being added to the U.S. market.




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Tulsi Gabbard says she wants to defeat the 'Bush-Clinton doctrine' on foreign policy

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Tulsi Gabbard says she wants to defeat the 'Bush-Clinton doctrine' on foreign policy"Those who follow the Bush-Clinton doctrine believe the only way to interact with other nations is by bombing them or starving them with draconian sanctions," Gabbard wrote.




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House of Representatives votes to progress Donald Trump impeachment inquiry in historic moment

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House of Representatives votes to progress Donald Trump impeachment inquiry in historic momentThe US House of Representatives has voted to move forward its impeachment inquiry into Donald Trump, putting a congressional stamp on the historic bid to remove him from office. The House, where the Democrats hold the majority, voted 232 to 196 on a resolution that spelled out the process for how the impeachment inquiry will progress. It is the first time in 21 years that the House has backed an impeachment inquiry, something that only three other US presidents have faced in history.  The vote split down party lines, with every Republican opposing the resolution and all but two Democrats voting for it. The result means that the impeachment inquiry will soon enter a public phase, with open hearings due to take place with key witnesses in the Ukraine scandal.  It will also give both Republican and Democrat members the chance to question those people giving testimony while the nation watches.  Process of impeachment The resolution was a response to fierce criticism from Republicans, from Mr Trump down, about the behind-closed-doors nature of the probe to date. But it is also a symbolic and historic moment, the first time the House has voted on this impeachment inquiry into Mr Trump.  Andrew Johnson, Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton are the only other US presidents that have faced an inquiry tasked with considering whether they should be removed from office.  The White House immediately released a statement condemning the vote, indicating it will not change its stance of non-cooperation with the investigation.  Stephanie Grisham, the White House press secretary, said that Mr Trump had done “nothing wrong” and that the Democrats had an “unhinged obsession” with getting rid of the president.  “The Democrats want to render a verdict without giving the Administration a chance to mount a defense. That is unfair, unconstitutional, and fundamentally un-American,” she said.  Minutes after the vote, Mr Trump tweeted: "The Greatest Witch Hunt In American History!" The top of the resolution which the US House of Representatives passed on Thursday The inquiry, which is investigating whether Mr Trump committed “high crimes and misdemeanors” by urging Ukraine to investigate his political rival Joe Biden, has been running for 37 days. It was launched by the Democrats without a vote.  Mr Biden, the former US vice president, is one of the front-runners to win the Democratic presidential nomination for the 2020 election. The winner of that contest will face Mr Trump next November.  The Democratic leadership will be pleased that all but two of its members backed the resolution to progress the inquiry. Around a third of House Democrats had been against such a move a few months ago. The two Democrats who voted against the resolution were Collin Peterson of Minnesota and Jeff Van Drew of New Jersey. Both of their districts voted for Mr Trump in the 2016 election.  However the White House will take heart from the fact that not a single Republican member backed the resolution. A vote split almost perfectly along party lines will help its attempt to portray the impeachment inquiry as being pursued for political reasons.  One independent member, Justin Amash of Michigan, voted for the resolution. He was a Republican but left the party in July after repeatedly clashing with the party leadership.  Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic House Speaker, addressing House members as she called for a resolution progressing the impeachment inquiry into Donald Trump to be passed The debate on the floor of the House on Thursday revealed the wide gap between Republicans and Democrats on the necessity of the inquiry. Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic House speaker, spoke standing next to an American flag as she urged her colleagues to vote to move forward with the impeachment process. "What is at stake in all of this is nothing less than our democracy. I proudly stand next to the flag,” Ms Pelosi said. "So many have fought and died for this flag, which stands for our democracy.”  Ms Pelosi, along with many of her Democratic colleagues, said that she took no “glee or comfort” from impeachment, framing the inquiry vote as a “solemn occasion” which amounted to protecting the US Constitution.  Other Democrat House members argued there was “evidence” that Mr Trump has committed impeachable offences and urged others to consider what people would say in 100 years time if they voted to block the inquiry.  Where now? | Next steps in the impeachment inquiry However Republican after Republican used the debate to dismiss the impeachment inquiry as a  “show trial” and a “total sham”, calling the vote a “dark day” for American democracy.  Kevin McCarthy, the top Republican member in the House, said that Democrats were pushing impeachment in an attempt to “influence” next year’s presidential election.  "Democrats are trying to impeach the president because they are scared they cannot defeat him at the ballot box,” he said. He jokingly noted the vote was being held on Halloween as he framed the impeachment inquiry as a fiercely partisan attempt to overturn the 2016 election result. Steve Scalise, a senior Republican in the House, appeared alongside a red poster bearing a sickle and hammer and Red Square imagery as he derided the “Soviet-style” impeachment proceedings. Steve Scalise, one of the most senior Republicans in the House of Representatives, arguing against the resolution on Thursday Mr Scalise said that the Democrats were abusing their majority on the House committees which are leading the impeachment inquiry to “run roughshod” over convention.  Mr Trump, who has been defiant in the face of the inquiry, tweeted “READ THE TRANSCRIPT!” as the debate went on.  He has argued the transcript of a July 25 call he had with the Ukrainian president, where he urged an investigation into Mr Biden, was “perfect”.  He later tweeted: The Impeachment Hoax is hurting our Stock Market. The Do Nothing Democrats don’t care!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 31, 2019




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How Boris Johnson’s Brexit Election Gamble Could Backfire

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How Boris Johnson’s Brexit Election Gamble Could Backfire(Bloomberg) -- Sign up to our Brexit Bulletin, follow us @Brexit and subscribe to our podcast.Boris Johnson has succeeded, finally, in getting Parliament to give him the general election that he wants. The polls have him far ahead: YouGov had 36% of voters backing his Conservatives, with Labour in second place on 23%. But his move is still a risky one. Here are the ways it could go wrong.Polling ErrorRemember the 2015 U.K. election shock? And the 2016 Brexit referendum shock? And the 2017 U.K. election shock? A common feature of all of them was a failure of the polling companies to properly detect a shift in public opinion.At the very time that we want faster, better data from them, pollsters face unprecedented challenges. In particular, they struggle to reach younger, more mobile voters, those who might be expected to oppose Johnson’s Conservatives and Brexit.Votes vs SeatsEven if the pollsters get close with the total vote share, translating it into the thing that matters, seats in Parliament, is very hard. Votes can pile up unevenly. In 2017, the Tories won 42% of the vote, but 49% of the seats. Labour won 40% of both.Tory FatigueThe Conservatives have now been in power for nine years, and even Cabinet ministers acknowledge privately that the last three of those years haven’t been a great advertisement for Tory government. The party’s recent discovery of unity behind Johnson might not outweigh years of infighting and indecision.Hard TimesIt’s not just that the Tories have been in power for a long time, they’ve been in power for a long time while people haven’t got any richer. According to the Office for National Statistics, median weekly earnings are still 2.9% below their 2008 level. That’s not a great backdrop for an election.Brexit FactorJohnson’s slogan, “Get Brexit Done,” feels like an appealing message to a public weary of months of knife-edge votes and reverses. But it’s also an admission that this government has had a single project since 2016, has failed to deliver on it, and everyone is sick of waiting.Johnson hopes to turn that frustration into votes for Conservatives. But voters could conclude that Brexit was a Conservative project -- a Johnson project, in fact -- and that if they’re tired of it, they need someone different in charge.The failure to complete the U.K.’s withdrawal from the EU also leaves the door open to Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party to take votes away from the Tories. If Farage does well enough to stop Tories winning key seats, Corbyn could ultimately benefit.Money’s TightJohnson’s other message is that by getting Brexit dealt with, he will be able to focus on spending money on things people do like, such as schools and hospitals. This too is an admission of failure.After nine years of spending restrictions, Britain’s public services are squeezed: libraries are closing, knife crime is rising, numbers of rough sleepers are increasing. Labour will be very happy to fight an election on the question of who is better at spending money on things.Character FlawsThe Conservatives are pinning a lot of their hopes on Johnson’s undoubted fame. Unlike his predecessor Theresa May, he enjoys campaigning. But that fame brings a problem. Most people have made up their minds what they think of Johnson, and a lot of them don’t like him.According to YouGov, 47% of people have a negative opinion of him, against 33% who have a positive one. Labour is pushing hard on Johnson’s tendency to go back on promises.The Conservatives, too, plan to make much of their opponent’s character: Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has even worse scores than Johnson: 58% negative, against 23% positive. But at the last election, Corbyn was able to shrug off criticism of his past statements.Mixed MessagesJohnson risks losing a whole load of Conservative seats in places that don’t like Brexit too: southern England, and Scotland. According to Joe Twyman of Deltapoll, that leaves the prime minister trying to pull off a difficult trick.“He needs to convince Remain-leaning Conservative voters to forget Brexit and vote Conservative,” Twyman said. “At the same time convince Leave-leaning Labour voters to hold their noses about him and vote for Brexit.”Right Votes, Wrong PlacesA different version of the same problem is that the Conservatives’ strongly pro-Brexit message helps them do very well in areas they already hold. According to Twyman, of the 50 most “Leave” areas, 24 are already Conservative. Extra votes there don’t help.Accidents HappenConservative politicians are fond of saying that they’ll never run a campaign as bad as the one May ran in 2017. In particular they point to her announcement of a plan to fund care for the elderly from the value of their houses.But things can go wrong. The 2017 campaign was interrupted by terrorist attacks. Johnson could find himself unexpectedly tested. He may be just about the only politician known to everyone by his first name, but he’s also the only one to have had to apologize to an entire city -- Liverpool, in 2004.His team have been keen to keep him away from difficult questions. In the intense scrutiny of an election campaign, that will be harder than ever.To contact the reporter on this story: Robert Hutton in London at rhutton1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Tim Ross at tross54@bloomberg.net, Flavia Krause-JacksonFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.




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Southern California endures second straight day of wind-stoked wildfires

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A fresh spate of Southern California wildfires roared to life on Thursday, destroying homes and forcing evacuations, as the region faced a second day of explosively fierce Santa Ana winds that have fanned flames, displacing thousands of residents.


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No Twitter ads, no problem for Trump: campaign official

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Twitter Inc's decision to scrap political advertising will have little effect on the re-election campaign of U.S. President Donald Trump, the candidate who spent the most on digital ads in the 2020 election, a Trump campaign official said on Thursday.


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Fire in California: Latest news on Easy Fire in Simi Valley, Getty Fire in Los Angeles, Kincade Fire and evacuations today — live updates - CBS News

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'No further discussion': Talks halt between whistleblower lawyers and Schiff staff amid expectation he won't testify - Washington Examiner

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Dow and S&P 500 are guaranteed to rise at least another 5% in the next 2 months — if this 70-year-old pattern holds - MarketWatch

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Diablo 4 leak has good news for Diablo 2 fans - SlashGear

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Kim Kardashian recreates the Elle Woods 'Legally Blonde' video essay for Halloween - USA TODAY

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Donald Trump Thinks Meghan Markle Takes the Media Scrutiny 'Very Personally' and Offers This Advice - Showbiz Cheat Sheet

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Southern California endures second straight day of wind-stoked wildfires

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A fresh spate of Southern California wildfires roared to life on Thursday, destroying homes and forcing evacuations, as the region faced a second day of explosively fierce Santa Ana winds that have fanned flames, displacing thousands of residents.


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Southern California endures second straight day of wind-stoked wildfires

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A fresh spate of Southern California wildfires roared to life on Thursday, destroying homes and forcing evacuations, as the region faced a second day of explosively fierce Santa Ana winds that have fanned flames, displacing thousands of residents.


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Reading Scores on National Exam Decline in Half the States

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Reading Scores on National Exam Decline in Half the StatesWASHINGTON -- The average eighth grade reading score on a nationally representative test declined among public school students in more than half of the states, according to data released Wednesday by the National Center for Education Statistics, the research arm of the Education Department.The dismal results were part of the release of the National Assessment of Educational Progress, known as the "nation's report card." The test assesses a sample of fourth and eighth grade students -- more than 290,000 in each subject in 2019 -- every other year."Over the past decade, there has been no progress in either mathematics or reading performance, and the lowest-performing students are doing worse," Peggy Carr, the associate commissioner of the center, said in a statement.Such findings will inevitably prompt demands for policy change. In a statement, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, who is championing a $5 billion school choice program, said that the results "must be America's wake-up call.""We can neither excuse them away, nor simply throw more money at the problem," she said.That vision is in stark contrast to the one that has emerged in the Democratic presidential primary. All the leading candidates have suggested spending billions more federal dollars on traditional public schools, and two of the front-runners -- Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders -- have proposed slowing the growth of the charter school sector.The losses on the national exam were steepest for students who had been struggling the most, a segment that is the focus of many school reform policies.Eighth graders at the bottom 10th percentile of reading achievement lost 6 points on the exam compared with similar students two years ago, while students at the 50th percentile lost 3 points and students at the 90th percentile -- top achievers -- lost only 1 point."Eighth grade is a transitional point in preparing students for success in high school, so it is critical that researchers further explore the declines we are seeing here," Carr said.White, black, Hispanic, Native American and multiracial students all lost ground in eighth grade reading, while there was no significant change for Asian students.Washington, one of 27 cities to participate in a separate analysis of urban school systems, was the only city or state to see significant improvement in eighth grade reading, according to a federal analysis of the data.This year, 31 states noted a drop of 2 to 7 points in their average eighth grade reading score -- which the federal government deemed significant -- compared with their performances in 2017. Indiana, New Hampshire and Virginia were the states with the largest declines among eighth graders.Fourth grade reading scores dropped in 17 states, with New Jersey having the largest decline, 6 points; only one state, Mississippi, improved, the data showed.States' average math scores fared considerably better, particularly among fourth graders. Nine states had significant increases in fourth grade math, compared with 2017 numbers, with Mississippi again leading the pack. The eighth grade score in three states improved, while six noted a decline.While the most recent results are disappointing, trends in student achievement look more positive over the long term. American students have made large gains in math and small gains in reading since 1990, but those improvements began to level out around 2009. There is no consensus among experts as to why.The Council of the Great City Schools, a coalition of large urban school systems, said it saw a hopeful story in the new data. Over the past two decades, students in cities have moved closer to national achievement averages in both math and reading."The fact that large city schools have cut their performance gap with the nation in about half is even more remarkable when you consider that our schools have substantially more poor students and English-language learners than the average public school across the nation," the group said in a statement. Such results "suggest that the nation's urban public schools are adding substantially more educational value than the average school."The National Assessment of Educational Progress is considered a "low stakes" exam, because schools and teachers do not lose funding, pay or autonomy based on how their students perform. Some researchers consider the test the gold-standard measure of learning nationwide, while others argue it is unfair to judge schools using an exam that may have little connection to the material teachers cover in the classroom.DeVos said the 2019 scores reflected a "student achievement crisis," where progress had stalled, two out of three children were not proficient readers, and outcomes continued to worsen for the most vulnerable students."Every American family needs to open the nation's report card this year and think about what it means for their child and for our country's future," she said. "The results are, frankly, devastating."This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2019 The New York Times Company




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Putin faces Syria money crunch after U.S. keeps control of oil fields

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Putin faces Syria money crunch after U.S. keeps control of oil fieldsRussian President Vladimir Putin is facing an unwelcome new financial challenge in Syria after the U.S. pullback enabled his ally Bashar Assad to reclaim the biggest chunk of territory in the country still outside his control.




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Graphic: Examining the weapons and tactics used by police and protesters in Hong Kong

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Graphic: Examining the weapons and tactics used by police and protesters in Hong KongAs the showdown between police and protesters in Hong Kong has intensified, officers have used increasing force, deploying an arsenal of crowd-control weapons, including tear gas, pepper spray, rubber bullets, sponge grenades and bean bag rounds. Protesters have also stepped up their actions, hurling petrol bombs, vandalizing mainland Chinese banks and businesses believed to be pro-Beijing, throwing bricks at police stations and battling officers in the streets, sometimes with metal bars. Reuters scrutinized hundreds of images of the protests, as well as dozens of police reports and video footage, and combined this research with reporting on the ground to document the weapons used by the police and protesters, and how the violence has increased from day to day.




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Democrats accused Republicans of trying to trick an impeachment witness into naming the whistleblower

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Democrats accused Republicans of trying to trick an impeachment witness into naming the whistleblowerIn a closed-door deposition, Republicans questioned Lt. Col. Vindman on whom he had discussed trump's Ukraine call with, alarming Democrats.




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Death sentence confirmed against four men in Morocco backpacker murders

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Death sentence confirmed against four men in Morocco backpacker murdersA Moroccan appeals court upheld, late on Wednesday, death sentences against three Moroccan men for murdering two Scandinavian women in the Atlas mountains last December. A fourth man was also handed capital punishment after he was sentenced to life in prison by an anti-terrorism court on July 18. The other three were handed death sentences at the time.




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Wednesday 30 October 2019

Michelle Obama: White Americans 'still running' from black neighbors

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Michelle Obama: White Americans 'still running' from black neighborsMichelle Obama said that white Americans are “still running” from their nonwhite fellow citizens during a summit in which she detailed how her own experience of white flight unfolded during her upbringing on Chicago’s South Side.




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Trump pick for Russia envoy grilled by senators on Ukraine

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Trump pick for Russia envoy grilled by senators on UkraineThe No. 2 official at the State Department faced off Wednesday with senators demanding to know why he didn't know more about the Trump administration's backchannel diplomacy with Ukraine and the dismissal of the former U.S. ambassador to Kyiv, issues now at the heart of the impeachment inquiry into the president. Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan, President Donald Trump's nominee to be ambassador to Russia, told senators at his confirmation hearing that he did not know of any attempt by the president or others to press Ukraine to open a corruption probe into Joe Biden's son, Hunter.




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Trump Administration Challenges California Sanctuary Law in Supreme Court

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Trump Administration Challenges California Sanctuary Law in Supreme CourtThe Trump administration has petitioned the Supreme Court to strike down California's "sanctuary law," which hinders cooperation between local law enforcement and federal immigration authorities.The administration is challenging several provisions in the California Values Act, or S.B. 54. The law prohibits officials from sharing information with ICE about a suspect's release from custody, eliminating any opportunity for ICE agents to take illegal immigrants into custody before they are released from local jails. It also prohibits local law-enforcement officers from sharing physical descriptions of suspects with immigration authorities."The practical consequences of California’s obstruction are not theoretical; as a result of SB 54, criminal aliens have evaded the detention and removal that Congress prescribed, and have instead returned to the civilian population, where they are disproportionately likely to commit additional crimes," the Trump administration argued in its petition, which was filed Monday.While the provisions of S.B. 54 do not technically apply to suspects with a violent criminal history, since the law effectively prevents local law enforcement from cooperating with ICE, immigration officials must stake out jails and police stations to await the release of non-citizen suspects from custody, and only then make arrests.Last week at a hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee, ICE official Timothy Robbins claimed that the Los Angeles police department was releasing as many as 100 illegal immigrants per day from custody."Cooperation between ICE and state and local law enforcement agencies is critical to the agency’s efforts to identify and arrest removable aliens, and to protect the nation’s security,” Robbins said at the time. “Unfortunately, we are seeing more jurisdictions that refuse to work with our officers, or directly impede our public safety efforts."




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Biden's communion denial highlights faith-politics conflict

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Biden's communion denial highlights faith-politics conflictA Roman Catholic priest's denial of communion to Joe Biden in South Carolina on Sunday illustrates the fine line presidential candidates must walk as they talk about their faiths: balancing religious values with a campaign that asks them to choose a side in polarizing moral debates. The awkward moment for Biden came during a weekend campaign swing through South Carolina, a pivotal firewall in his hopes to claim the Democratic presidential nomination. The former vice president on Sunday visited St. Anthony Catholic Church in Florence, a midsize city in the state's largely rural northeast.




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Fox News Panel Speculates That Latest Trump Impeachment Witness Committed Espionage

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Fox News Panel Speculates That Latest Trump Impeachment Witness Committed EspionageFox NewsFox News host Laura Ingraham and two of her guests Monday night suggested that White House national security official Alexander Vindman, who is set to testify before Congress that he heard President Trump press his Ukrainian counterpart to investigate his political opponents, is guilty of “espionage” and could be a Ukrainian double agent.During a panel discussion on The Ingraham Angle, Ingraham turned to law professor Alan Dershowitz and former Justice Department official John Yoo—author of the so-called “Torture Memos”—to weigh in on reports that Vindman will tell House impeachment investigators that he twice voiced objections to his superiors about Trump’s actions toward Ukraine.According to Ingraham, however, the really interesting part of the New York Times report on Vindman wasn’t that he raised concerns over Trump attempting to pressure a foreign government to investigate American citizens but rather that Vindman is a Ukrainian-American immigrant.“He’s a decorated colonel, by the way, in the Iraq War,” she said. “But because Colonel Vindman emigrated from Ukraine along with his family when he was a child and is fluent in Ukrainian and Russian, Ukrainian officials sought advice from him about how to deal with Mr. Giuliani, though they typically communicated in English.”“Now, wait a second, John,” Ingraham continued, addressing Yoo. “Here we have a U.S. national security official who is advising Ukraine, while working inside the White House, apparently against the president’s interest, and usually, they spoke in English. Isn’t that kind of an interesting angle on this story?!”Yoo replied that he found it “astounding” before offering his own bit of astounding speculation.“You know, some people might call that espionage,” the former Bush administration official suggested.After floating the possibility that Vindman—an Iraq War veteran with a Purple Heart—was a Ukrainian spy, Yoo said he thought Vindman’s upcoming testimony wasn’t “breaking news” because it didn’t add “any new facts” since we can “all make our judgment” on Trump’s July 25 call with the Ukrainian president.“I think that is something the American people should decide rather than just the House,” he added. “And that is the next election.”Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.




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The Pixel 4 is a disaster - CNET

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McConnell: Impeachment Measure Denies Trump ‘Basic Rights’ - Snopes.com

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How can GOP senators serve as impeachment jurors when they're implicated in Trump's misdeeds? - Salon

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Creator of extreme haunted house with 40-page waiver responds to outrage: 'It's all entertainment' - USA TODAY

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Tuesday 29 October 2019

Alexander Vindman's Trump-Ukraine testimony: five key takeaways

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Alexander Vindman's Trump-Ukraine testimony: five key takeawaysArmy lieutenant colonel to describe his concerns Trump’s Biden plot was undermining US foreign policy in Ukraine * Ukraine expert to testify on Trump-Zelenskiy call – liveAlexander Vindman arrives for a closed-door deposition at the US Capitol in Washington DC, on 29 October. Photograph: Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty ImagesIn his opening statement before congressional impeachment investigators on Tuesday, Lt Col Alexander S Vindman planned to describe his concerns that Donald Trump’s plot to undermine Joe Biden was undermining US foreign policy in Ukraine.Here are five key takeaways: 1 White House call summary is accurateAs the top Ukraine expert on the national security council (NSC), Vindman was on the 25 July phone call between Trump and the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy. He planned to testify that a call summary released by the White House is accurate: “As the transcript is in the public record, we are all aware of what was said.” 2 Vindman took concerns to NSC lawyerVindman planned to describe multiple scenes in which White House discussions about Ukraine policy, including discussions with Ukrainians, were interrupted by an insistence that Ukraine announce baseless investigations tied to Biden. “I did not think it was proper to demand that a foreign government investigate a US citizen, and I was worried about the implications for the US government’s support of Ukraine,” Vindman planned to say. Vindman planned to describe how on multiple occasions he took his concerns to the top lawyer for the national security counsel, as at least one other colleague did. 3 Vindman’s testimony appears to conflict with Sondland’s claimsAs multiple witnesses have previously, Vindman planned to finger ambassador to the EU Gordon Sondland, as the Trump administration’s point man in extracting the “deliverable” – a Biden investigation announcement – from Ukraine. Vindman planned to say: “I stated to Ambassador Sondland that his statements were inappropriate, that the request to investigate Biden and his son had nothing to do with national security.” That testimony appears to conflict sharply with Sondland’s own claims to ignorance about any effort to negotiate a deal with Ukraine involving a Biden investigation. 4 Vindman’s family fled the former Soviet Union Vindman, a career public servant and soldier, arrived in the US at age three when his family fled the former Soviet Union. He is a US army officer, a lieutenant colonel, with two decades of experience in the military. He was decorated with a Purple Heart after being wounded in an improvised explosive device attack while deployed in Iraq. 5 White House accused Vindman of ‘espionage’ against TrumpThe White House and media allies have launched a character smear against Vindman, accusing him of disloyalty to the US and of “espionage” against Trump. Trump seemed surprised that Vindman was on the phone call and wondered on Twitter why so many people were listening: “I knew people were listening in on the call (why would I say something inappropriate?), which was fine with me, but why so many?” Trump tweeted. “Why are people that I never even heard of testifying about the call.”




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Residents flee, power cut as crews battle California fire

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Residents flee, power cut as crews battle California fireCody Rodriguez never went to sleep the night two years ago when wildfire roared out of tinder-dry hills in Northern California wine country, trapping people unaware in their homes and forcing thousands of panicked residents to flee in the dark. "It has brought a lot of anxiety," Rodriguez said outside an evacuation center Sunday at Napa Valley College.




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China warns U.S. that criticism over Uighurs not 'helpful' for trade talks

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The United States and 22 other countries at the United Nations pushed China on Tuesday to stop detaining ethnic Uighurs and other Muslims, prompting China's U.N. envoy to warn it was not "helpful" for trade talks between Beijing and Washington.


from Reuters: World News https://ift.tt/2MYF5gD
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Mexican lawmakers vote overwhelmingly to end presidential immunity

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A proposal to allow for the prosecution of Mexican presidents for a wide range of crimes overwhelmingly passed the lower house of Congress on Tuesday, giving the proposal backed by President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador a shot of momentum.


from Reuters: World News https://ift.tt/2PvGP2G
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