Judge Tosses Feds' Terrorism Allegation Against Florida Imam
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Judge in central Florida tosses feds' terrorism allegation against imam, chastises government
Obama offers condolences to UK's Cameron, Tunisia's president in aftermath of deadly attack
The planets will appear remarkably close together and brilliantly bright in the sky Tuesday
It is unclear whether the U.S. and global partners will be able to seal a nuclear agreement with Iran in the final days of talks, a U.S. official said ahead of a June 30 deadline.
European Union leaders Monday urged China to adopt tough climate-change goals as they and other nations head toward a critical climate conference in Paris at year’s end.
European and Greek leaders began their battle for the Greek electorate, each trying to convince voters—who suddenly hold the future of Europe’s currency union in their hands—as to which path will bring the least pain.
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The Port of Calais closes down again a week after strike action triggered widespread travel chaos.
New York Times |
First Draft | Karl Rove Disputes an Excerpt From Ted Cruz's Book
New York Times Karl Rove, a former senior adviser to President George W. Bush, during an event in Sacramento in 2013.Credit Rich Pedroncelli/Associated Press. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas is going on tour to promote his new book this week and one prominent reader is not ... Why Ted Cruz watched pornography with Supreme Court justicesWashington Post (blog) Ted Cruz's naughty and nice listDallas Morning News (blog) Don't make us pick a side: Ted Cruz and Karl Rove engage in heated war of wordsSalon SunHerald.com -The Hill (blog) all 32 news articles » |
ABC News |
Brazil's investment message brings hope mixed with skepticism
Reuters NEW YORK, June 29 Nearly two years ago Brazil sought U.S. investors' help to fund its seaports, railroads, highways and airports. In the end, though, the effort to lure 210 billion reais in private investment managed to attract just 20 percent of the ... Obama and Brazilian President Rousseff do some sightseeingWashington Post (blog) Brazil's Rousseff Gets Presidential Tour of DCWall Street Journal (blog) Rousseff wants to strengthen ties between Brazil, USFox News Latino USA TODAY -Bloomberg -CNN all 50 news articles » |
 CBS Local |
Days after landmark ruling, Louisiana begins issuing marriage licenses to same ...
Washington Post NEW ORLEANS — Days after landmark ruling, Louisiana begins issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Copyright 2015 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Share on ... On same-sex marriage, will Louisiana and the South defy or comply?: Jarvis ...NOLA.com Taste Test: What Happens When We Fed Bobby Jindal Hillary Clinton's Cookies?Wall Street Journal (blog) Bobby Jindal Is 'Tired Of Hyphenated Americans'Daily Caller IBNLive -Daily Mail all 96 news articles » |
 The Guardian |
Terror suspects arrested in Tunisia as four wounded Britons flown home
The Guardian The Tunisian government has arrested a group of men who support the suspected attacker, Seifeddine Rezgui. Photograph: HO/EPA. Robert Booth, Emma Graham-Harrison, Chris Stephen in Sousse and Vikram Dodd. Monday 29 June 2015 14.20 EDT Last ... Tunisia attack: Inside the bare and filthy flat of terrorist who slaughtered ...Mirror.co.uk Dramatic Video Shows Heart-Pounding Moments Hotel Worker Chased Tunisia ...TheBlaze.com Arrests made over Tunisian attackSky News Australia all 6,614 news articles » |
 Reuters |
Obama signs trade bills into law, says tough battle still ahead
Reuters WASHINGTON U.S. President Barack Obama on Monday signed into law legislation that gives him "fast-track" power to push ahead on a Pacific Rim trade deal that has been the subject of intense debate in Congress and across the nation. Flanked by some ... Obama Signs Trade Bill Into LawWall Street Journal (blog) In bipartisan ceremony, Obama signs trade legislation, calls for ...Washington Post (blog) Obama Signs Trade, Worker Assistance Bills Into LawABC News USA TODAY-Fox Business all 136 news articles » |
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 Daily Mail |
Queen Letizia of Spain joins Mexico's First Lady Angélica Rivera on visit
Daily Mail For Queen Letizia of Spain, it was business as usual as she arrived in Mexico looking immaculate in a mint green dress worn with a pale pink tweed jacket. The 42-year-old and her her husband King Felipe, 47, were in Mexico City's Campo Marte military ... Spanish royals in Mexico on 1st state visit to Latin AmericaKBTV Fox 4 Beaumont Spanish monarchs on an official three-day visit to MexicoLa prensa all 11 news articles » |
Two Uber Executives Arrested in France by rolandattimeinc
Uber has encountered roadblocks in cities not keen on unregulated taxi services, but it might finally have met its match in the streets of Paris.
Two Uber executives were arrested in Paris Monday for running an illegal taxi company and concealing illegal documents, according to TechCrunch.
The arrested executives — Uber France’s CEO Thibaud Simphal and Uber Europe GM Peirre-Dimitri Gore-Coty — have previously said that Uber would continue operations in the country until a court rules against their service, UberPOP. Although UberPOP has been illegal since late last year, the country has had trouble enforcing the ban since Uber reportedly pays off drivers’ fines and encourages them to continue working.
The arrests come just days after fierce protests plugged up major traffic intersections in Paris. At one point, police in riot gear deployed tear gas on the taxi driver protestors, who say that Uber represents unfair competition.
But even arresting Uber’s executives won’t do much to stop the irreverent service: Simphal and Gore-Coty will probably be released within days, the report said, and France will have to let the case wind through the country’s courts.
Baltimore was two months ago. Ferguson was eight months before that. And now Charleston. For many black Americans, there really are two Americas. As a thought experiment, we looked at the health, wealth and other stats on black America, and compared it internationally. The results show that America—all of America—needs to do much, much better.
1. Education
Education is supposed to be the great equalizer. The world may not be fair, but it’s supposed to be a lot fairer within the four walls of a classroom. But the numbers tell a different story. African Americans are twice as likely as whites not to finish high school. If white America were a country, its high school graduation rates would rank with the likes of the U.K. and Finland; black America would be on par with Chile and Poland. Black students are suspended and expelled at roughly three times the rate of their white counterparts. Of students who receive multiple suspensions, 42 percent are black; and 34 percent of students expelled are black. And the world they are sent out to isn’t much kinder.
2. Wealth
What happens after high school? 21% of whites end up successfully completing a college degree, compared to only 13% of blacks. But even if they achieve that milestone, the payoff is nowhere near the same. A white family at the median sees a return of approximately $56,000 after completing a four-year degree; a black family sees a return of around $4,900. In fact, “black household wealth is just over the median wealth of an adult” in the Palestinian territories, which is not a comparison you want to see made about any group living in America in 2015. Looking at GDP per capita, blacks make $23,000 compared to the U.S. national average of $53,000. If black America really were its own country, it would be ranked 44th globally on that figure—between crisis-hit Portugal and post-Communist Lithuania. The most damning statistic? The median black household has just 6 percent of the total wealth ($7,113) that the median white household has ($111,146).
3. Health
No surprise, a less wealthy lifetime means a less healthy lifetime—and it starts from the beginning. Infant mortality for blacks in America is 11.5 for every 1,000 births; the figure for whites is 5.2. Black Americans’ rates put them with the likes of Mexico (12.58) and Thailand (9.86), whereas white Americans are much closer to Switzerland (3.73) and Japan (2.13). That’s how the racial disparity starts, but how does it end? Black Americans can expect to live a full four years less on average than whites, who on average make it to 79. A life expectancy of 75 years places black Americans below Tunisia, Panama, Costa Rica and Cuba.
4. Incarceration
From bad to worse: 1 in 3 black males will go to prison at some point in their life if current trends continue, compared to 1 in 17 white males. Women fare better, but not much—black women are incarcerated at (only) twice the rate that white women are across the country. Overall, blacks only make up some 14 percent of the national population, but are 38 percent of the total prison population. If black America were its own country, it would rank No. 3 on the world list of absolute prison incarceration, ahead of Russia, Brazil, India and Thailand. And once in prison, it gets worse; 60 percent of all prisoners sent to solitary confinement are black.
5. Violence
America’s homicide rate is a national tragedy—but it’s much worse if you’re black. White America’s rate of 2.5 deaths per 100,000 is just somewhat higher than Finland (2.0), Belgium (1.7) and Greece (1.7). But at 19.4 deaths per 100,000 people, black America’s homicide rate puts it above Burma (15.2) and just below Nigeria (20.0). But it’s fatal police shootings where the figures become truly tragic. If you are a young black male in America today, you are 21 times more likely to be shot and killed by a police officer than if you are a young white male. If you’re black, you’re also more than twice as likely to be shot and killed by a police officer while unarmed. Over the past year, 41 percent of all unarmed people killed by police were black.
America is better than this. It’s about time we show it.
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VIENNA (Reuters) - A senior U.S. official on Monday dismissed suggestions from critics that the United States would cave in to Iran to reach an agreement on curbing Iran's nuclear program.
KUWAIT (Reuters) - By sending a Saudi Arabian suicide bomber to Kuwait and recruiting local members of a stateless underclass to help him attack a Shi'ite Muslim mosque, an Islamic State cell struck at the Gulf Arab monarchy's most potent internal divisions.
PARIS (Reuters) - The U.S. National Security Agency wiretapped the communications of two successive French finance ministers and collected information on French export contracts, trade and budget talks, according to a report by WikiLeaks.
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Russia Doesn't Quite Know How To React To U.S. 'Gayification' Movement by support@pangea-cms.com (Tom Balmforth)
Its greatest adversary has legalized same-sex marriages, and Russia doesn't quite know how to react to the United States' 'gayification' movement.
President Vladimir Putin has said that Russia's "policy to support Syria, the Syrian leadership, and the Syrian people remains unchanged."
After observing a minute's silence for the victims of the Tunisia massacre, David Cameron delivers a statement on the security situation at home and abroad. The prime minister announces a major counter-terrorism training exercise in London before echoing Angus Robertson, the SNP leader in Westminster, in his call for the government and the media to stop calling Isis 'Islamic State' Continue reading...
After Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla announced that $72 billion in debt was “not payable,” the price of some bonds fell as much as 12 percent.
2 Uber Executives Questioned by Police in Parisby ALISSA J. RUBIN and AURELIEN BREEDEN
The police acted in connection with a months-old investigation into the company’s low-cost UberPop service, which taxi drivers protested last week.
From Berlin to Brussels to Washington to Athens, the same question was asked about Greece’s debt crisis: What kind of game is Alexis Tsipras playing?
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A series of fires at African-American churches across the US south prompts the FBI to investigate whether the blazes are related.
NEW YORK (AP) -- A state trooper had the law on his side when he shot unarmed prison escapee David Sweat, apparently in the back, as the convicted killer ran toward a forest near the Canadian border....
Puerto Rico's governor says he will create a financial team that will meet with bondholders and seek a moratorium on debt payments.
Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla made the announcement Monday night after saying that the U.S. territory's $72 billion public debt is unpayable. He said he would seek a moratorium of several years but did not provide specifics.
Garcia's comments come just hours after international economists released a gloomy report on Puerto Rico's economy.
Legislators are still debating a $9.8 billion budget that calls for $674 million in cuts and sets aside $1.5 billion to help pay off the debt. The budget has to be approved by Tuesday.
-- This embed didnt make it to copy for story id = 32107146.
President Barack Obama and Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff will aim to show they have smoothed over tensions sparked by a spying scandal, as they open two days of talks at the White House Monday.
The meetings come nearly two years after Rousseff canceled a rare state visit to Washington following revelations that Brazil was a target of American spy programs. The disclosures by formerNational Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden deeply strained relations between the two hemispheric powers.
Rather than rehash the spying controversy, officials from both countries say the leaders want to delve into talks on trade, investment and climate change.
"They are putting behind the Edward Snowden affair," said Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue, a Washington think tank. "The meeting is to create good atmosphere, a good mood, establish communication and get the relationship back on solid footing."
Upon Rousseff's arrival at the White House, Obama took her on a tour to the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial. Obama described the "Stone of Hope" into which King's statue is carved and pointed out some of King's famous quotes along the memorial wall.
The leaders reunited Monday evening over a dinner of grilled lamb, spinach salad and coconut banana cake, the White House said. They were to hold more formal talks and a joint news conference on Tuesday.
The meeting comes six months before a United Nations-sponsored conference in Paris in December to finalize a climate treaty. Obama has argued that a gradually warming planet could worsen social tensions and political instability worldwide, in addition to harming the U.S.
Countries are making their positions on climate change clear ahead of the Paris talks. The U.S. already has announced a 2025 deadline to reduce emissions of heat-trapping gases by 26 percent to 28 percent below 2005 levels.
Brazil, the seventh largest economy, is one of the top emitters that has not presented pollution-control targets. Environment Minister Izabella Teixeira, who is traveling with Rousseff to Washington, has said that developed nations bear more responsibility than the developing world because of their emissions track record.
Brazil's first female president started her second term in January — Vice President Joe Bidenattended her inauguration — but she since has been weighed down by low approval ratings, her country's poor economic performance and a massive corruption scandal involving Petrobras, a state-owned oil company. Tens of thousands of Brazilians filled streets across the country earlier this year to protest her leadership.
Snowden's disclosures showed that in addition to spying on Rousseff's communications, the NSA had hacked the oil company's computer network. Rousseff served on the company's board but has not been implicated in the scandal.
With Brazil bracing for recession, officials are emphasizing the economic agenda for the Obama-Rousseff meeting. The U.S. is Brazil's second-largest trading partner after China, exchanging $62 billion in trade flows. The U.S. announced Monday that it will allow imports of fresh beef from 14 states in Brazil, which the South American nation had long sought.
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US Man Arrested in FBI Sting on Group Planning to Join ISby webdesk@voanews.com (VOA News)
Police in the eastern U.S. state of New Jersey arrested a man early Monday on terrorism charges, accusing him of conspiring to support the Islamic State. Alaa Saadeh, 23, was one of four people identified in a sting operation on a group planning to travel to join the militants, according to the FBI. Federal agents were investigating Saadeh, his brother, and two other men in the New York and New Jersey area, after an informant who had lived with the brothers tipped off federal agents in...
Kurdish Peace Process Affects Creation of New Ruling Coalition by webdesk@voanews.com (Dorian Jones)
In Turkey, the stalled Kurdish peace process is becoming a central issue in efforts to put together a coalition government, following the country's general election earlier this month. The recent military gains by Kurds against the Islamic State in neighboring Syria also is adding pressure to the coalition-building efforts. Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is expected to ask Justice and Development Party leader Ahmet Davutoglu to try to form a coalition government. The...
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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A year after Islamic State declared a caliphate on territory seized in Iraq and Syria, the al Qaeda splinter group faces military pressure from a U.S.-led coalition but remains a potent force holding key cities, the Pentagon said on Monday.
FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) -- Greece has entered the twilight zone....
For world, limited options if Iran talks fall apartby By DAN PERRY and GEORGE JAHN
CAIRO (AP) -- The Iranian nuclear talks are playing out in classic fashion: A self-imposed deadline appears to have been extended due to stubborn disputes, with the sides publicly sticking to positions and facing internal pressure from opponents ready to pounce on any compromise....
NEW YORK (AP) -- NBC said Monday that it is ending its business relationship with mogul and GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump because of comments he made about immigrants during the announcement of his campaign....
President Barack Obama walks with Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, and others, during a visit the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial in Washington, Monday, June 29, 2015. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
By DARLENE SUPERVILLE and ADRIANA GOMEZ LICON, Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama and Brazilian leader Dilma Rousseff will aim to show they have smoothed over tensions sparked by a spying scandal, as they open two days of talks at the White House Monday.
The meetings come nearly two years after Rousseff canceled a rare state visit to Washington following revelations that Brazil was a target of American spy programs. The disclosures by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden deeply strained relations between the two hemispheric powers.
Rather than rehash the spying controversy, officials from both countries say Obama and Rousseff want to delve into talks on trade, investment and climate change.
"They are putting behind the Edward Snowden affair," said Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue, a Washington think tank. "The meeting is to create good atmosphere, a good mood, establish communication and get the relationship back on solid footing."
Upon Rousseff's arrival at the White House, Obama invited her to visit the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial. At the memorial, Obama described the "Stone of Hope" into which King's statue is carved and pointed out some of King's famous quotes along the memorial wall.
The two leaders will meet for a private dinner Monday evening, and then hold more formal talks and a joint news conference on Tuesday.
The leaders are meeting six months before a United Nations-sponsored conference in Paris in December to finalize a climate treaty. Obama has argued that a gradually warming planet could worsen social tensions and political instability worldwide, in addition to harming the U.S.
Countries are making their positions on climate change clear ahead of the Paris talks. The U.S. already has announced a 2025 deadline to reduce emissions of heat-trapping gases by 26 percent to 28 percent below 2005 levels.
Brazil, the seventh largest economy, is one of the top emitters that has not presented pollution-control targets. Environment Minister Izabella Teixeira, who is traveling with Rousseff to Washington, has said that developed nations bear more responsibility than the developing world because of their emissions track record.
Brazil's first female president started her second term in January — Vice President Joe Biden attended her inauguration — but she since has been weighed down by low approval ratings, her country's poor economic performance and a massive corruption scandal involving Petrobras, a state-owned oil company. Tens of thousands of Brazilians filled streets across the country earlier this year to protest her leadership.
Snowden's disclosures showed that in addition to spying on Rousseff's communications, the NSA had hacked the oil company's computer network. Rousseff served on the company's board but has not been implicated in the scandal.
With Brazil bracing for recession, officials are emphasizing the economic agenda for the Obama-Rousseff meeting. The U.S. is Brazil's second-largest trading partner after China, exchanging $62 billion in trade flows.
Carlos Eduardo de Freitas, an economist and former Central Bank executive director, said the White House meeting may invigorate Brazil as it seeks to cut down government spending to avoid being shunned in credit markets. Rousseff is traveling with 11 cabinet members and met with Brazilian businessmen and U.S. investment fund managers and government officials in New York to discuss infrastructure before arriving in Washington.
"The government needs to unshackle its economy," Freitas said.
The timing of Rousseff's trip was settled months ago; Obama announced it when the two met on the sidelines of a summit in Panama in April. But for Rousseff, being seen warmly received by an American president coming off one of the best weeks of his time in office could help her back home.
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Dylann Roof refers to Harold Covington’s white separatist group, the Northwest Front, in his alleged manifesto. The rightwing sci-fi writer distances himself from the shooting, but his followers speculate if his work influenced Roof’s actions
One of the shadowy figures who appears to have influenced alleged Charleston killer Dylann Roof is Harold Covington, the founder of a white separatist movement and, within supremacist circles, an influential sci-fi author. Covington, the latest in a long line of rightwing sci-fi writers, has been linked to racist crimes in the past and this week called the massacre “a preview of coming attractions”.
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The racist manifesto and photos apparently posted by Roof makes mention of the Northwest Front, created by Covington, a former member of the American Nazi party who traveled to South Africa and Rhodesia in order to agitate for white power. In the accompanying photos, Roof wore patches with Rhodesian and apartheid-era South African flags on them.
Covington, if you believe his website, runs a growing enclave of white supremacists near Seattle called the Northwest Front. The non-profit group is reflected in a series of sci-fi novels, authored by Covington, about a dystopian future in which a white nation is the only answer to US economic and racial woes.
American science fiction has long had a rightward tilt, from the contemporary strain of small-press sci-fi Tea Party fantasias swarming the Hugo Awards nominations all the way back to libertarian deity Ayn Rand. But Covington’s novels are a breed apart.
His followers see conspiracy in Covington’s connections to Roof. “And why did this young man have a flight jacket with flag patches from the old White ruled southern African countries, which is where HAC spent part of his early days in the Cause, hmmm,” wrote a commenter called Wingnut under a recent podcast on the Northwest website. “Wonder if they’ll ‘find’ a pile of NF-HAC stuff in this young man’s home? Then they can pull one of those ‘the devil made me do it’ numbers on HAC.”
Covington doesn’t advocate for randomized violence; he wants revolution, to the extent that he calls his followers “comrades” and lectures them on “the purpose of revolution” among other phrases more characteristic of the left than the right. While it was clear Roof knew about the Northwest Front and seemed familiar with it, Covington condemned Roof’s shooting on his Tuesday podcast because “it doesn’t work.”
“People, don’t do this shit, this flipping out with a gun lunacy,” he said. “No, this is not just ritual disclaimer, Harold trying to cover is ass, this is what Harold really thinks.”
The Roof killings are not the first time Covington’s name has come up in connection with an allegedly racist murder. Covington was part of a group of white supremacists in the 1970s who massacred black people at a rally in Greensboro (Covington didn’t kill anyone and wasn’t in attendance on the day of the violence). He was also at one time close with Frazier Glenn Miller , who is charged with killing a one woman, a 69-year-old Jewish man and that man’s 14-year-old grandson in front of their temple last year.
Elizabeth Wheaton wrote about Covington in her book Codename Greenkil: The 1979 Greensboro Killings. “Covington was pretty much a minor player,” she told The Guardian. “He liked the Nazi image on the white power kinds of things, but he was kind of nerdy. Most of [the others] were country people or ex-military.”
“For all of his lacks, he does not lack the ability to turn a phrase,” said Wheaton. “He’s very articulate in presenting his message.”
Covington said he’d never heard of Roof before the massacre and told The Guardian to “try Stormfront. That’s usually where newbies in the Movement end up leaving their first electronic footprint.”
Much of Covington’s influence on his followers comes from his novels, which are written in a style that reads like someone spilled a 50-gallon barrel of ethnic slurs all over a stack of early-draft Robert Heinlein novels. His choice of cultural icons dates his books considerably, even the recent ones, which are filled with up-to-the-minute references to Jane Fonda and Gilligan’s Island, but the author probably doesn’t care about these criticisms. The books are not primarily novels, anyway.
The Northwest novels “are not meant to be mere entertainment”, according to Covington’s website <a href="http://Northwest.org" rel="nofollow">Northwest.org</a>. “They are meant to be self-fulfilling prophecies. The author wishes to inspire the creation of a real Northwest American Republic, and his novels are filled with a great deal of sound practical advice about how to do it.”
There are five Northwest novels are all populated with similarly brave and heroic white men (“domestic terrorist-type dudes” in the words of Shane Ryan, the narrator of Covington’s A Distant Thunder), cruel, DW Griffith-style black people whose speech is written in dialect, and hand-wringing liberals who want nothing more than to stifle the right to free speech of (white) people who just want to secede from the US.
“As the NVA [Northwest Volunteer Army, Covington’s heroes] vise had slowly clamped down on the Northwest over the past five years, Capitol Hill had lost much of its left-wing cachet, as those artsy-fartsy habitués who were dusky of skin or sexually inverted either fled to more hospitable climes or got well and truly wasted, shot dead on the pavement by the NVA gunners,” Covington explains in 2004’s A Mighty Fortress.
Shane Ryan, hero of the purported oral-history-of-the-revolution volume A Distant Thunder, recalls the heroism of his white brothers and sisters up to and including teams “specialty snipers” who pick off interracial couples and, of course, Conrad Baumgarten, who “came all the way from Germany with his SS officer grandfather’s scoped ’98 Mauser to hunt Jews”.
The conservative ‘fringe’ in science fiction
Covington comes from a long line of rightwing US fantasists, though most are far less extreme. Where film and literary fiction and visual art tend to trend left, American sci-fi has a definite rightward bent, from libertarian deity Heinlein (widely praised by both his ideological detractors and his fans) to Ayn Rand, Orson Scott Card and beyond.
“Science fiction has always had a strain in it that has been conservative and libertarian and some combination of the two; that’s been kind of a prominent feature for a very long time,” said John Scalzi, president of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America. “That in itself isn’t particularly problematic. Some of the most iconic writers in science fiction and fantasy have been conservative to libertarian. There’s nothing inherently wrong with them or the stories they tell. But like any group of people there are going to be folks whose politics are fairly fringe, and whatever comes out of their fringe is going to be fringe as well.”
Scalzi is currently the target of one of those fringe figures, the openly misogynist and racist sci-fi writer Vox Day whose logrolling campaign to include more white men and fewer women and minorities in the Hugo Awards has attracted ire across the political spectrum and from the currentking of fantasy, George RR Martin.
There are also less fringey figures whose work has taken a sharp rightward turn. Dan Simmons, writer of the much-praised Hyperion Cantos, wrote a novel called Flashback that more or less explicitly blamed progressives for the coming collapse of civilization and featured an “Islamic caliphate” that swarmed across Europe. Tea Party politics infect the work of Simmons’ contemporary, Orson Scott Card, as well: Card’s 2009 novel Empire imagines a world in which a radical leftist army calling itself the Progressive Restoration takes over New York City and ignites a second civil war.
Scalzi said that it’s unwise to dismiss authors because of a single novel or late-career tendency toward the lunatic fringe, but that he’s seen a rightward shift in a baby-boomer sci-fi novelists in particular. “For some healthy slice of the baby boomers in general, 9/11 just caused a bend in their thinking and they’ve been thinking in a much more conservative and reactionary way,” he said.
Covington’s prophecy
In an email exchange with the Guardian, Covington said he was urging followers not to talk about Roof until “all the facts were out”.
What did he mean by that? “I mean that a lot of times these things are not as advertised and people like you have a tendency to try to use us as props and aids to support the Official Version. Oklahoma City being a prime example; there is a compelling case to be made that was a government sting operation gone very wrong, but I long ago gave up any hope of ever getting anybody to listen; anything we say is simply shouted down or kicked aside, we are treated as cranks at best, and facts are never allowed to interfere with the Received Wisdom from on high.
“For another example, I am well aware of the ideological orientation of the Guardian (I lived in the British Isles for a number of years [Covington spent time among skinheads in the UK – “a lot of them were great guys,” he said on a recent podcast]) and I understand that I have not a snowball’s chance in hell of getting our viewpoint represented honestly and fairly there.”
A few hours later, a new installment of his radio show went up on the Radio Free Northwest website, in which he did not advocate for violence, but did fantasize for a little while, saying that liberals were afraid of Charleston because it was “a preview of coming attractions”.
“They’ve been given a vision of a time in some imagined but possibly not too-far distant future when all of a sudden, on the street or in their office, or in some trendy fern bar, or Starbucks, or wine-and-cheese boutique on the Upper East Side or in San Francisco, they will look up, possibly from the laptop, where they are typing up their day’s quota of leftwing, liberal horseshit, and they will see a young white man like Dylann Roof standing in front of them with no steroid-pumped policemen in blue to protect their liberal candy asses from the consequences of years of their own behavior,” he said. “They will see in that young white man’s eyes, that he recognizes them. That he is now beyond deception or bullying or browbeating or Twitter-shaming or intimidation, that he knows them for what they are. And they will look down and see that he has something in his hand.”
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media 2015
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John Wight is a writer and commentator specializing in geopolitics, UK domestic politics, culture and sport.
Published time: June 29, 2015 14:18
More than five thousand air, sea and ground troops take part in a multinational NATO maritime exercise BALTOPS in the Baltic Sea to demonstrate the resolve of allied and partner forces to defend the Baltic region near Ustka, Poland June 17, 2015. (Reuters / Agencja Gazetai)
As ISIS and ISIS-style terror erupts across the globe, Western governments are busy making plans to establish a rapid reaction force in Eastern Europe to ‘contain Russia’, thus qualifying them for an annual ‘you couldn’t make it up’ award.
It calls to mind one of Britain’s worst military defeats, suffered at the hands of the Japanese, when 100,000 troops and sailors were marched into captivity after the fall of Singapore on February 15, 1942. Winston Churchill called it “the largest capitulation in British history.” Many of the British troops never even fired a shot before surrendering, thus adding to the humiliation and ignominy of their defeat at the hands of a much smaller force. The British commander responsible for the surrender, Lieutenant General Arthur Percival, earned himself a cold place in history as a consequence.
A major reason for the defeat and surrender of an island that was considered a key and strategically vital part of the British Empire was that the guns of the British defenders were pointed in the wrong direction; they’d been expecting the Japanese attack to come from the sea rather than through the jungle and swamps of the Malay Peninsula behind them.
Today, in 2015, British guns are not only pointed in the wrong direction they are pointed at the wrong enemy. The most recent terrorist atrocity, carried out last week against tourists in Tunisia, has resulted in the most British victims since the 7/7 attacks in London which ended in the deaths of 52 innocent civilians. On the same day as the Tunisian attack, a terrorist atrocity was carried out in France, while in Kuwait a suicide bomber attacked a Shia mosque.
Meanwhile, in Iraq and Syria, the so-called Islamic State (formerly known as ISIS/ISIL) and other Salafist terror groups continue to kill, slaughter, and butcher men, women, and children. All this is happening while the West continues to make a virtue of impotence, more concerned with directing its ire against a country, Russia that has been at the forefront of resisting terrorism at home and abroad.
Yes, without doubt, you couldn’t make it up.
Every day that IS exists it grows stronger; its vile ideology becomes more entrenched and grows more attractive to ever more young disaffected Muslim men across the world. They are not attracted to the group’s religious doctrine so much as the opportunity to join a cause that allows them to feel powerful as opposed to the powerlessness of their current predicament in a world underpinned by the anarchy of a free market that breeds poverty, despair, and injustice.
Units from NATO allied countries take part in the NATO Noble Jump 2015 exercises, part of testing and refinement of the Very High Readiness Joint Task Force (VJTF) in Swietoszow, Poland June 18, 2015. (Reuters / Anna Krasko / Agencja Gazeta)
As such, the West is both the handmaiden and victim of radicalization. Every terrorist attack confirms the collapse of Western foreign policy and its alignment with some of the most reactionary states on the planet – Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, etc. – not to mention ultra nationalists in Kiev and across Eastern Europe. It constitutes unimpeachable evidence of the sham that is Western democracy, and how it rests upon foundations of hypocrisy and mendacity.
The crisis and chaos that has engulfed the Middle East as a direct result of the West’s role in the region increasingly threatens civilians everywhere, including Russia, which is why it remains unconscionable that the West remains intent on treating Moscow as an enemy rather than a partner in a struggle against one of the gravest threats to modernity and civilization the world has faced. Furthermore, this cognitive dissonance, this departure from reality, informs an air campaign that has failed utterly in its stated objective of degrading the power of IS and stemming its advance. When it suffers a reverse in one part of Syria or Iraq, it advances in another, butchering civilians wherever it appears.
The question needs to be asked: Where is the 30-40,000 strong rapid reaction force to counter the barbarism of ISIS? Where is the determination to contain a state – the so-called Islamic State – that violates every moral and ethical principle of humanity in its treatment of minorities, women, children, and natural justice?
There is no more grievous indictment of the policy being undertaken by the West than the fact that a large swathe of the world is now a no-go area for tourists and visitors. The impact of the attack in Tunisia, for example, will be measured in a loss of a tourism industry that is vital to that country’s ability to maintain a nascent democracy that is balanced precariously on the edge of sustainability, thus making the growth of extremism and terrorism there more rather than less likely.
This lamentable state of affairs is even more grotesque when we consider that this year marks the 70th anniversary of the end of the Second World War. This was a war that saw the West and the Soviet Union unite against a common enemy, fascism, in the interests of humanity. Those who fought and sacrificed and suffered immeasurably in that war would be well within their rights to judge the current generation of leaders harshly over their lack of statesmanship and foresight in understanding who and what the real enemy is, and where the real threat to global peace and stability resides.
The barbarians are at the gates and it’s time to wake up, else we’re going to have a bloody disaster on our hands.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.
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It was more than a eulogy. It was a man bidding farewell to his political godfather.
Speaking at the funeral of veteran politician Yevgeny Primakov, President Vladimir Putin called him "a great citizen of our country" who exemplified "true patriotism and selfless devotion to the fatherland."
And Putin had good reason to praise Primakov, one of the elder statesmen of Russian politics, who died on June 26 at the age of 85.
Without Primakov, there probably never would have been a Putin.
"Both chronologically and ideologically, Primakov is the godfather of Putinism in Russia," Moscow-based commentator Kyamran Agayev wrote in Kasparov.ru. "He put in place the beginning of the twilight of the so-called romantic period of Russian democracy.”
A veteran of the Soviet security services, Primakov blazed the trail for siloviki rule in post-Soviet Russia. And many of the hallmarks of Putin's rule -- an anti-Western foreign policy, a state-heavy economy, Soviet-style controls on society -- were spearheaded by Primakov, who served as foreign minister from 1996-98 and prime minister from 1998-99.
"Primakov’s positions," veteran Kremlin-watcher Paul Goble wrote on his blog, "were in fact a more sophisticated version of those Putin has adopted."
Primakov's decision in March 1999 to turn his airplane around over the Atlantic Ocean when he was en route to the United States after he learned that NATO's bombing campaign against Serbia had begun is widely seen as the start of the anti-Western turn in Moscow's foreign policy.
But opposition figure and former energy minister Vladimir Milov noted that the trend actually began earlier, when Primakov was named foreign minister, replacing the staunchly pro-Western Andrei Kozyrev, in January 1996.
“Already in 1996, when Primakov headed the foreign ministry, he laid the groundwork for an anti-American shift in Russian foreign policy,” Milov told the Ukrainian news agency Novy Region-2, noting that he lobbied heavily for the Kremlin to support Serbian strongman Slobodan Milosevic and Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. "Foreign Ministry documents written in an anti-American tone began to circulate."
Moreover, Putin's rise to power was intimately tied to Primakov. Or more accurately, to a fear of Primakov, who as prime minister famously threatened to build additional prisons so the Russian business elite could be incarcerated should he come to power.
By the late 1990s, especially following the 1998 financial crisis, Primakov was in sync with the public mood and had become the most popular politician in the country.
In 1999, he forged a powerful alliance with Yury Luzhkov, then Moscow's mayor, and other regional leaders and appeared to be the odds-on favorite to succeed the ailing Boris Yeltsin as president.
Yeltsin's inner circle, informally dubbed "The Family," desperately wanted to prevent this. And to fend it off, they decided they needed their very own silovik -- somebody who could defeat Primakov, succeed Yeltsin, and protect their interests.
They settled on Putin, and the rest is history.
The irony, of course, is that in drafting Putin to neutralize the Primakov threat, The Family ended up with a younger, coarser -- albeit more telegenic -- version of...Primakov.
It was a miscalculation that key Family members, most notably oligarch Boris Berezovsky, would soon regret.
There are, of course, important differences between the two men, and a Primakov presidency would probably not have mirrored Putin's.
It is hard to imagine, for example, the kind of loose nuclear rhetoric that has become common in Putin's Kremlin coming from Primakov -- who hails from the generation of Soviet officials who had a deep respect for and understanding of Moscow's responsibilities as a nuclear power.
In eulogizing Primakov, Putin noted that Russian officials "consulted him," sought his advice, and listened to him.
"I can say this is also entirely true about me," Putin said.
Well, not entirely.
In one his his last public acts, Primakov in January urged Putin to wind down the Ukraine conflict and ease tensions with the West.
It was advice that Putin, obviously, did not heed.
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Obama says the Supreme Court decision on legalizing same-sex marriage will end the "patchwork system we currently have."
President Obama gives remarks on the Supreme Court ruling on gay marriage in the Rose Garden on Friday.(Photo: Mark Wilson, Getty Images)
WASHINGTON — called the Supreme Court decision requiring states to recognize same-sex marriage "a victory for America."
"Our nation was founded on a bedrock principle that we are all created equal. The project of each generation is to bridge the meaning of those founding words with the realities of changing times," he said Friday.
"Progress on this journey often comes in small increments, sometimes two steps forward, one step back, propelled by the persistent effort of dedicated citizens," he continued. "And then sometimes, there are days like this when that slow, steady effort is rewarded with justice that arrives like a thunderbolt."
In a highly contemplative speech — much of which continued long after his prepared remarks had ended — Obama also called on supporters of gay marriage to respect the views of people who differ and "renew our deep commitment to religious freedom."
Obama said the ruling was the "consequence of the countless small acts of courage of millions of people across decades who stood up, who came out, who talked to parents — parents who loved their children no matter what. Folks who were willing to endure bullying and taunts and stayed strong and came to believe in themselves and who they were, and slowly made an entire country realize that love is love."
Obama spoke to reporters from the White House Rose Garden, ringed by hundreds of White House staffers who applauded afterward.
White House staff gather in the colonnade to listen to President Obama give remarks on the Supreme Court ruling on gay marriage, in the Rose Garden at the White House June 26, 2015 in Washington, DC. (Photo: Mark Wilson, Getty Images)
Moments before speaking, Obama called the plaintiff in the case, Jim Obergefell, from the Oval Office. "Your leadership on this, you know, has changed the country," Obama said in a phone call picked up by CNN from Obergefell's speakerphone. "I couldn't be prouder of you and your husband."
Obama first learned of the ruling from Senior Adviser Valerie Jarrett while he was in the White House residence working on a eulogy he would deliver later Friday in Charleston for Rev. Clementa Pinckney, said Deputy Press Secretary Eric Schultz.
The president's first reaction came in a tweet moments after the decision was announced. "Today is a big step in our march toward equality. Gay and lesbian couples now have the right to marry, just like anyone else. #LoveWins," Obama said through his Twitter account.
"I know change for many of our LGBT brothers and sisters must have seemed so slow for so long. But compared to so many other issues, America's shift has been so quick," Obama said. He did not acknowledge that his own public "evolution" on gay marriage, as he has put it, was slower than others. It wasn't until 2012 that he came out in favor of gay marriage.
, whose public support for gay marriage predates Obama's, said gay and lesbian couples "share a love for their partners constrained only by social stigma and discriminatory laws."
"But today, their love is set free with the right to marry and the recognition of that marriage throughout the country," he said.
Afterward, Obama and the first lady then departed for to deliver a eulogy for Rev. Clementa Pinckney, who was killed along with 8 other churchgoers in what appeared to be a racially motivated attack.
President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama board Air Force One at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland Friday. The Obamas were headed to Charleston, South Carolina to attend services for Reverend and South Carolina State Senator Clementa Pinckney. (Photo: MANDEL NGAN, AFP/Getty Images)
The timing of Friday's Supreme Court announcement gave Obama the chance to give a speech he wasn't able to give in 2013, when the court overturned the Defense of Marriage Act. That day, Obama was traveling in Africa.
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