Ray Live From Cleveland (almost!) Analysis #4 Republican National Here’s Rays Report from the third night of the Republican National Convention in Cleveland – the winners and the losers (and there were both.) The acceptance speech of Vice President Republican nominee Mike Pence. (Should Trump have picked him?) And remember the name Eric Trump.
Ray Live From Cleveland (almost!) Analysis #4 Republican National
What Did President Obama Really Say In Hiroshima? (Breitbart) The news media has followed the spoonfed Pablum from the White House that President Obama did not apologize for America dropping two nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 when he gave his message to Japan with the huge crowd watching and a far larger crowd viewing it on television on Friday, the eve of Memorial Day weekend.
It’s true that our president did not directly apologize for America’s bombings, but he might as well of for all the things he said about America and why we dropped those bombs. Obama’s reasoning couldn’t have been more wrong. Breitbart news has the truth through its gifted Senior Editor at Large, Joe Pollack. Ray will share it with you right now.
What Did President Obama Really Say In Hiroshima? (Breitbart)
President Obama is in Vietnam opening trade with them.
Dallas Maverick owner Mark Cuban offers himself to either Hillary or the Donald as their vice president.
Iran says they could destroy Israel in 8 minutes.
Austria as a new president and he is right wing.
Saturday’s Preakness brought a lot of tears.
Have you heard the story about three mayors who enter an elevator? You’ll hear it all right now if you join Ray as he goes live.
This is Ray Mossholder
1. President Obama is in Vietnam today and has announced the total elimination of our embargo against communist our former enemy. He says such a move will normalize relations with Vietnam and eliminate a “lingering vestige of the Cold War”.
Obama said the United States is eager to boost trade with the middle-class of Vietnam. He is pushing for a twelve nation Transpacific Trade Agreement that Congress doesn’t want to pass and that faces strong opposition from all the 2016 presidential candidates.
2. Mullah Achtar Monsouron, the leader of the Taliban in Afghanistan, was killed Saturday in an airstrike. His killing its feared will bring a halt to the peace talks that had been going on between Afghan leaders and the Taliban.
3. Dallas Maverick’s owner Mark Cuban said Sunday on “Meet The Press) he has zero interest in being a third-party candidate. But then added that he would “absolutely” consider being either Donald Trump’s or Hillary Clinton’s Vice President.
Cuban also said that maybe he will run for president in 2020 or 2024.
4. The Church of Scotland has voted 339 to 215 to allow its gay ministers to marry. The vote also means church ministers will now be able to register same-sex civil partnerships or solemnize same-sex marriages themselves.
In a confusing statement, leaders of the Church of Scotland said that this new law within their church “doesn’t compromise the Church’s traditional view of marriage as a union between one man and one woman”.
5. Ahmad Karimpour, a senior advisor to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards elite al-Quds Force, told the semi–official Fars News Agency reporters yesterday that if the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei gave the order to destroy Israel, the Iranian military could do it in eight minutes.
Khamenei has continually threatened that Iran will annihilate Israel.
6. In an unrelated story, this past Thursday Israel’s Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon abruptly resigned. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wasn’t disappointed. In fact, it fit in with the Prime Minister’s changing of his guard.
On the way to the door after Yaalon resigned, he hollered at Netanyahu that as defense minister he had lost faith in the Prime Minister’s decision-making and in his morals.
All of this is happening at a moment when Israel is coming very close to the end of a ten year 30 billion dollar package from the United States. It is the largest amount of money we give to any foreign country and Netanyahu is asking America to raise that figure to 40 billion dollars for the next decade.
The Prime Minister says if Obama doesn’t give Israel that money, he is certain the president who replaces him will.
7. At least 65 people have been killed during several explosions in Syria, in Tartus and Jableh. Both cities are strongholds of Syrian President Bashar Assad.
The killings involved two car bombs that exploded several minutes apart in jampacked bus stations in both cities. And in Jableh, a hospital and the electric company were struck. The Islamic State has claimed they carried out the “successful” killings and destruction.
8. Austrian Freedom Party presidential candidate Norbert Hofer has emerged victorious from Sunday’s run-off election against the Green Party candidate Alexander van der Bellen by a vote of 51.9% to 48.10% – a vote sending shockwaves all over Europe.
The European Union will see its first-ever far-right head of state. Polling showed a tight race between Hofer and Greens-backed Alexander Van der Bellen, who ran as an independent. Then the majority broke through.
Candidates from both centrist parties were eliminated in April in the first round of voting, the first time that’s happened since World War II.
The losing candidate’s platform stood for “direct democracy, nonviolence, ecology, solidarity, feminism and self-determination”. The winning candidate opposed all these things.
Hofer ran on a platform of “Austria first,” and is against forced multiculturalism, globalization and mass immigration.
Hofer stunned the media and many of the people in Austria by carrying a Glock gun very openly in all of his rallies, calling it the “natural consequence” of immigration.
University of Linz Economics Professor Frederich Schneider explained what Hofer’s victory means for Austria and in many parts of Europe. Professor Schneider said “The shift to the right comes from the refugee crisis on one side and from the euro crisis on the other, from the dissatisfaction with the European Union.”
Hofer winning Austria’s presidency absolutely signals that drastic changes will be made to current Austrian policies. It is a historic moment in Austrian politics.”
In another evaluation of Hofer’s victory, Arnold Kammel, the director of the Austrian Institute for European Policy and Security in Vienna said “The victory of Mr. Hofer will be some kind of sign for this kind of anti–establishment, anti-traditional party movements in Europe that have been on track of taking over the current politics, which have posed some challenges not only from Austria, but for Europe as well.”
Previous to Austria, there have also been far right advances in France, Sweden, Holland, Finland, Norway and Greece, who have a feeling of being taken over by illegal aliens and to have many other complaints about what is happening when the left leads.
90,000 aliens entered their border this year, all of them intending to stay – that’s more than 1% of Austria’s 8 point 6 million population. Hofer has promised the people “You will be surprised what can be done by a president.”
9. Abdel Fatah el-Sissi, the president of Egypt, has sent a submarine that belongs to Egypt’s Oil Ministry to the side of the tragic air crash of EgyptAir Flight-804 in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea to search for the cockpit voice and flight data recorders that would be contained in its black boxes.
The final words of the pilot sounded extremely normal and not at all rattled. He said “This is 0-7-2-5 Padova control.(Then he said something unintelligible) 8-0-4. Thank you so much. Good day, er, good night.”
There are signs that smoke had come from the lavatory and permeated the plane. But we’ll just have to wait to see what actually happened.
10. Just in case you didn’t hear this over the weekend, it is no exaggeration to say that when Nyquist was beaten by Exaggerator at Saturday’s Preakness, and millions of dollars were lost. Of course, millions of dollars may have been won as well.
In fact, Nyquist wasn’t even second; he was third. Cherry Wine was second.
Tragically, in earlier races at Preakness Saturday, two horses died. One was the winner of the first race, Homeboykris. No one knows why, including the veterinarians who examined her, but she keeled over on her way back to the barn.
Then during the fourth race the four-year-old filly Pramedya broke her left front cannon bone and had to be euthanized on the track.
Jockey Daniel Centeno broke his collarbone when Pramedia fell.
And finally… Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: Three mayors walk into an elevator…and then what happened? Well, this actually did happen last Thursday night and for forty minutes it was no joke.
The mayor of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Bill Peduto, along with the mayor of Millvale and the mayor of Leetsdale, stepped onto a Westin Hotel in Allegheny. The door closed and nothing happened. They just stood there looking at each other in great wonder.
Mayor Peduto said “It really wasn’t that bad. We all liked each other so we just stood there and waited. There were others with us in the same elevator and they joined in the conversation.”
Finally, one of the other passengers was able to make a cell phone connection that led to the summoning of a maintenance crew and first responders who used walkie-talkies.
The mayor said “The biggest thing that happened besides getting help was that we took a great selfie to honor the occasion.”
This is Ray Mossholder from the Reach More Now news desk in Fort Worth, Texas, as the world turns.
Prince Is Dead and the World of Music Grieves The music legend Prince was found dead in his studio elevator yesterday morning. Shockwaves have gone around the world since that moment. Prince might be compared with James Brown, Michael Jackson or Jimi Hendrix. But the truth is, he was in a class of his own. Here’s Ray with the story.
The Bill Keith Report: Are “America’s Chickens Coming Home To Roost?”
Thursday, April 21, 2016
The Bill Keith Report and Commentary
with Ray Mossholder reporting
Is Anyone Fed Up?
When there are 91.8-million men and women no longer in the American work force.
When there are 50 million Americans in poverty.
When there are 47 million on food stamps?
When the U. S. Supreme Court makes sodomy the law of this land.
When the national debt in the near future will approach $21 trillion.
When there have been 50 million unborn babies killed through abortions.
When some public schools teach all about transgenders but the kids are not learning math and science.
When the Castros of Cuba lecture our president on how bad the people in this country are, and the president does not defend us.
When Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran laughs at the U.S. and calls us “the Great Satan” right after Obama gave him $150 billion.
When we provide all kinds of welfare for illegal in this land but can’t take care of our veterans.
When the Huey, Dewey and Louie politicians in Washington – both democrats and republicans – are about to sink the ship of state.
Is anyone fed up, yet?
Private Jets Used to Deport Illegal Aliens
Costs Taxpayers $300,000 Each Day
Exclusive! The Daily Mail – the Obama administration uses PRIVATE JETS to fly aliens back to their home countries and it costs U. S. taxpayers $300,000 a day. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) spent $116 million last year on alien’s transportation.
According to the Daily Mail, more than 40 percent of those deported were convicted criminals of which 1,000 were identified as tied to organized crime or gang members.
ICE once chartered a Boeing 767-300 to transport one alien back to Nigeria.
A taxpayer’s rights group called the private jet expenditure “insane” and an “outrageous waste of tax dollars.”
According to ICE, the average cost of every illegal alien in 2015 was $12,213. The cost included identification of the aliens, taking them into custody, placing them in detention centers, processing them through immigration courts and their subsequent removal, many by private jets.
Comment: Just when we think the illegal alien problem can’t get worse, we read the obscene news that they are being returned to their homelands by private charter jets. This is just another example of the Obama administration gone beyond the pale of reason. And we tax payers have to pay for it.
Then I think of our homeless veterans and the 21 veterans who commit suicide every day and can’t get access to VA hospitals. And I ask myself, “Am I dreaming or is this America?”
North Carolina, Transgenders and John Kasich
When the North Carolina legislature passed the “bathroom law” and it was signed into law by the governor, transgenders across the land – and their fellow travelers – went into apoplexy. They literally freaked out.
Major companies such as Levi Strauss and Starbucks, Apple, Twitter, Google, Face Book, Wells Fargo, Barnes & Noble, Kellogg, City Bank, Hilton, American Airlines and some 70 others have come out against the North Carolina law and in favor of transgenders having access to any bathroom they desire.
Enter Gov. John Kasich, Republican presidential hopeful. He said if he had been governor of North Carolina, he would not have signed the bill into law. In other words, Mr. Kasich thinks it’s okay for transgenders to wander in and out of bathrooms at will. Kasich also refused to take a stand for traditional marriage when the U. S. Supreme Court made same-sex marriage the law of the land.
Comment: Has this country gone insane? Have we become a fallen generation? Do we no longer have any morals/convictions about anything?
What about parents who have little nine-and–ten-year old girls who are at an airport, or a movie theater, museum or restaurant and the girls want to use the bathroom. So they go to the ladies room but whoa! There’s a grown man in their dressed like a woman revealing his “ying yang” around the room. So what is the little girl supposed to do or what are her parents supposed to think? I wonder if the Levi Strauss or Starbucks executives who want transgender males to be able to enter women’s restrooms where there are little girls have even thought about such a scenario? Or are they and the 70-plus other corporation executives so morally corrupt they don’t even care?
Obama to Bring Thousands More Syrians into U.S.
A flood of Muslim refugees from Syria are expected to arrive in this country by the end of this fiscal year on September 30, according to World Net Daily. The State Department expects to bring an average of 358 each week into this land. President Obama has promised to bring 10,000 to this country.
“The Obama administration’s scripted answer for anyone who questioned its ability to screen Syrian ‘refugees’ was that they are the ‘most thoroughly vetted’ of all immigrants, going through an arduous process that takes 18 to 24 months to complete,” WND reported.
According to WND, the Obama administration will expedite the process and will cut the screening period from 18-24 months down to three months.
Comment: Time after time, issue upon issue, President Obama is on the wrong side of history – and the wrong side of reason.
The influx of thousands of these refugees into Europe has create chaos in every country they have entered. Some have been identified as terrorists who disguised themselves as immigrants in order to gain free access to the various countries.
The directors of our FBI, Homeland Security and the CIA have told the president there is no way possible to keep terrorists from infiltrating the Syrian immigrants coming to this land. But Obama will not listen to them.
Will it take another 9/11 catastrophe or some similar terrorist attack for him to wake up and realize that the security of the American people should come first and it is far more important than bringing more Muslims into America?
Hypocrisy in High Places
For nearly eight years we have heard President Obama and Hillary Clinton chide the business leaders of America for the salary discrimination against women and we’ve repeatedly heard their mantra “equal pay for equal work.”
But voila! The Daily Caller reports that male executives at the Bill, Hillary and Chelsea Clinton Foundation earn 38 percent more than women executives, according to the foundation’s latest IRS tax filings.
Then we learned last year that women staff members in the White House earn considerably less than the men working there.
So it’s the old political adage: “Don’t do as I do, but do as I say.”
That’s a clear picture of the Barack/Hillary political philosophy.
Franklin Graham: The End of the American Dream
Franklin Graham, son of the legendary Billy Graham, said the American dream has ended.
Speaking at a pastors’ conference at the First Baptist Church of Jacksonville, Florida, he said the American dream ended and Barack Obama’s second term was the final nail in the coffin for the legacy of the white Christian males who discovered, explored, pioneered, settled and developed the greatest republic in the history of mankind.
“A coalition of blacks, Latinos, feminists, gays, government workers, union members, environmental extremists, the media, Hollywood, uninformed young people, the ‘forever needy,’ the chronically unemployed, illegal aliens and other ‘fellow travelers’ have ended Norman Rockwell’s America,” he said.
“You will never again out-vote these people. It will take individual acts of defiance and massive displays of civil disobedience to get back the rights we have allowed them to take away. It will take zealots, not moderates and shy, not reach-across-the-aisle RINOs, to right this ship and restore our beloved country to its former status.”
Graham said the conservative American people have “surrendered our culture, our heritage and our traditions without a shot being fired.”
Planned Parenthood is opposed to a bill before the congress that would ban sex-selection abortions that primarily target unborn baby girls, Life News reports. The idea is that if the parents want a boy instead of a girl, they can have an abortion and get rid of the girl.
Meanwhile, a congressional panel will investigate Planned Parenthood’s profiting from selling aborted baby parts.
Life News also reported that after an abortion killed a woman in a botched abortion, the baby’s organs were harvested and sold for profit.
Comment: Nothing in this land is more evil than allowing doctors to kill unborn babies and then for the Supreme Court to say it is legal.
Hooray for the Little Sisters of the Poor
A group of courageous Catholic nuns are fighting a David Vs. Goliath battle with President Obama. His Justice Department filed suit against the order to force them to provide health insurance that would include abortion-inducing drugs. But the Sisters said no.
The Obama administration planned to fine the Sisters $70 million if they refused to comply with the order. So they took the president to court and the Supreme Court recently heard their appeal which is pending.
The Sisters say the law would force them to violate their religious beliefs and conscience and they will not comply.
Comment: It’s amazing that Obama is so agenda-driven that he would bully a group of charitable Catholic sisters into an egregious violation of their religious convictions just to further his obsession with abortion.
The Little Sisters care for the elderly in 31 countries around the world.
Obama Has Issued 680,000 Green Cards to Muslims
President Obama’s run-away immigration policy is set to accept more Muslims over the next five years than the entire population of Washington, D.C., according to the Washington Examiner.
“Figures from the Department of Homeland Security show that the president has already issued 680,000 green cards (for work in this country) to Muslim nations over the past five years,” the Examiner reported. “Unless Congress changes his policy, that number will be repeated in the next five years.
This is Ray Mossholder. Thanks Bill for another powerful commentary. It’s strong proof that the human small “g” god in this world today is named Barack Obama. And everyone can see his power at work to fulfill the dreams of our president’s mentor Reverend Jeremiah Wright and the vitriolic hate of America that our president was trained to believe from him for twenty years.
Obama is in the henhouse of the highest office in the land to make sure that “America’s chickens come home to roost”. I dread the next nine months under his high-handed bleedership as he dictates America’s future. And Hillary Clinton is waiting in the wings to continue exactly where he leaves off.
Thanks again Bill for the truth you share each and every month.
The Bill Keith Report: Are “America’s Chickens Coming Home To Roost?”
Worldwide News With Ray February 18, 2016 War between North and South Korea may be about to happen – John Kerry says China is violating the South China Sea and something must be done – An Apple a day keeps the FBI away – a famous Christian is in serious trouble with the law – and Russia urges its people “Don’t be like Obama”. All these stories and more as Ray brings worldwide news to this hour. Join him now.
From the news desk of Reach More Now in Fort Worth, Texas, this is Ray Mossholder and this is the news…… News Question of the day: Are we headed for another Korean War? Or is President Obama drawing another line in the sand, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing? What happened yesterday was almost like a game of chicken that teases other kids to react because of intimidation. Admittedly, the game was begun by North Korea and it doesn’t usually amount to much when kids play it. But that’s very much not the case when nations play it. Now, according to South Korea’s spy agency, North Korea is currently planning a “terrorist attack” on them.
Yesterday a fleet of stealth bombers from our nation flew over South Korea in a gesture of support for the country that recently had a flyby from North Korea; a flyby dropping huge piles of cigarette butts from the sky on to Seoul and other cities. But far more concerned then when they did that is North Korea’s nuclear missile launching that threatens once again to create the background for what North Korea’s twisted leader Kim Jong Un has already declared as “war”. Given what America is doing to stop Isis right now, will Obama put boots on the ground to honor our treaty with South Korea or bring the troops and their boots home from there where they have been stationed for many years?
Secretary of State John Kerry says the United States is going to have “a very serious conversation” with China in the near future because of their increasing military presence in the South China Sea. Kerry says “When President Xi was here in Washington, he stood in the Rose Garden with President Obama and said China would not militarize in the South China Sea. But there is every evidence every day that there has been an increase of militarization of one kind or another.”
This military buildup has taken place in just the last two weeks at Woody Island which is also claimed by both Vietnam and Taiwan. President Obama held a summit last week with Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei, in which he condemned China’s military posturing. The South China Sea is international waters that serve as a major trade route.
Iraq says it can’t find “highly dangerous” radioactive material that was reportedly stolen last November. They say the material that had been stored in a protective case the size of a laptop computer disappeared from Weatherford, the United States oilfield service. The radioactive material and the case are the type used for making dirty bombs.
Terrorists have killed eighteen people and wounded forty-five in Ankara, Turkey. The explosion occurred during evening rush hour. Buses carrying military personnel were attacked while waiting for traffic lights to change at an intersection. Ankara governor Mehmet Kiliker said he believes the explosion was caused by a “bomb–laden vehicle” and was “a contemptible and dastardly attack”. No one is sure who did the bombing. Kurdish rebels, Isis, and a leftist extremist group have carried out attacks in Turkey recently.
Pro-life advocates in Mississippi, West Virginia, Idaho, Missouri, Minnesota, and Nebraska, have filed bills to ban an abortion procedure known as a D&E that is commonly used in the second trimester for dismembering a baby in her mother’s womb. Other states are also getting ready to file the same thing. The New York-based Center for Reproductive Rights exists to represent abortion providers in legal matters. They claim that forcing the ending of the dilation and evacuation method of abortion is unconstitutional because it interferes with private medical decisions. Courts have already blocked similar laws in both Kansas and Oklahoma.
Pope Francis has completed his visit to Mexico. His final message was for the world was to receive all the fleeing immigrants and to have compassion on them. As the jet plane the Pope was riding in last Friday was making its approach to its landing in Mexico City it was struck by a laser beam. No harm came to the plane or those inside it, but it was considered an illegal attack.
The Chief Executive of Apple, Tim Cook, says he plans to continue protecting the world of Apple users from the invasion of their privacy no matter what the FBI demands. He has denied a federal judge’s order to create software that would allow access to encrypted data on iPhones. The stated aim of our government is to specifically crack the data on the iPhone that belonged to the terrorist couple who murdered fourteen people in San Bernardino, California, last year. Cook argues that he has forever promised all Apple users that they would never have their privacy invaded and he doesn’t plan to have lied to them.
Tim is the man who replaced Steve Jobs when Steve was too sick to oversee Apple any further. Tim is indeed a different kind of guy. He was the first Fortune 500 company executive who announced that he was gay. He pledges that one day he will give all of his money to charity. And he is outspoken about the importance of social justice, the environment, and diversity.
In January, President Obama sent high-ranking national security advisors to meet with Apple, Facebook, and Alphabet (Google’s parent company) and they demanded greater cooperation with law enforcement. Our government is not used to being told no, most especially when a court order demands an action to be taken. But so far Tim Cook is holding his ground.
On the Apple website it carries a letter from Tim Cook that says in part “I want to be absolutely clear that we have never worked with any government agency from any country to create a backdoor in any of our products or services. We have also never allowed access to our servers. And we never will.”
Remember the story I shared with you yesterday about the Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center staff not being able to access its computer network since February 5th? Well, now they are able to access it again. How? This statement from Allen Stefanek, director of the hospital, explains it: “The quickest and most efficient way to restore our systems and obtain the decryption key was to pay the ransom. It was in the best interest of restoring normal operations that we did this.” The hospital paid 40 bitcoins, which is equal to about $17,000.
Bitcoins were created in 2009 by an unknown person using the alias Satoshi Nakamoto. It eliminates the need for banks. There are no transaction fees and no need to give your real name. More and more merchants are accepting them. You can even buy pizza or manicures with bitcoins. But they are still rare enough so that I’ve never seen one.
Cliven Bundy, his two sons – Ryan and Ammon – and two other men – Ron Payne and Peter Santilli, who were part of the Oregon wildlife occupation, have been indicted. The five are facing sixteen felony charges because of their armed standoff with the federal government in 2014 that included over 400 militia defending the Bundy’s. United States Attorney Daniel G. Bogden told them “Persons who use force and violence against federal law enforcement officers who are enforcing court orders, and nearly causing catastrophic loss of life or injury to others, will be brought to justice.” Clyburn was denied bail for being “a danger to the community” and “a flight risk”.
The land the Bundy’s lived on consists of 160 acres in a sparsely populated area near the borders of Utah and Arizona. The Bundy Ranch is near the Virgin River, a few miles from where interstate Highway 15 crosses into Arizona – 90 miles northeast of Las Vegas. According to the authorities, more than a thousand head of cattle wandered as far as 50 miles from the ranch into the Lake Mead National Recreational Area. Reportedly “They got stuck in the mud, wandered onto golf courses, strayed onto the freeway (sometimes causing accidents).” In 2014, Bundy was charged with six counts for his first showdown against federal land managers on the open range where his cattle grazed and fed. At that time, the federal Bureau of land management and the local authority finally walked away. In fact, they halted the roundup of Bundy’s cattle and returned about 300 head, completely avoiding violence. This time things have gone very differently for Bundy.
Prosecutors said “The presence of many gunmen in and near the area of the Bundy Ranch, the armed checkpoints and patrols, the presence of assault weapons in the militia camps, including (by some accounts) a .50 caliber machine gun, further increased the difficulty of conducting a physical investigation of the Bundy Ranch or the impoundment site.” Now that they were arrested in Oregon these prosecutors say “Justice will be served”.
Bundy is 69 and runs a strong probability of being given a life sentence in prison if he is convicted.
A name well-known to Christians in America during the latter part of the twentieth century is Bill Gothard. Thousands in many parts of the country and overseas flocked to Bill Gothard Basic Institute of Youth Dynamics. His legalistic teaching was followed as God’s word and often put his believers under tremendous bondage. After attending his seminar, I was shocked by how hundreds of people had swallowed Gothard’s teaching as if it were biblical. Often when I spoke out about it, I was shouted down. Now a lawsuit alleges sixteen members of his staff as well as Bill have attempted to cover up their sexual abuse of minors in numbers so large it makes Bill Cosby look like a choir boy. The lawsuit further alleges that Bill Gothard’s organization has been “liquidating assets” totaling more than one hundred million dollars “in an attempt to flee the jurisdiction of the state of Illinois where this wrongful conduct continually occurred.”
Prosecutors said “Our clients are telling the same story that happened over and over again. There was repeated abuse – re-victimizing the women and men who had been raped. Psychological abuse and sexual harassment of rape victims, manipulating and torturing people over and over again for decades. The board knew about it. Ultimately they did nothing, but after Internet pressure Bill Gothard resigned his organization but then went out to harass victims, ordering them to help him cover up the abuse. Gothard’s own brother who worked for the organization was dismissed after it was discovered that he was having sex with many students who had come for help. The civil action is seeking $50,000 plus per plaintiff. The latest version of the complaint includes more than 200 pages of allegations.
Bill Gothard manipulates the Bible the same way he is attempting to manipulate and control the lawyers who are representing the victims. On December 31, 2015, Gothard sent a letter threatening “greater damage to your clients and to the cause of Christ if you expand and refine your lawsuit.” He further wrote “Jesus affirmed the death penalty for doing this when he stated “He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death.” He additionally charged that the “emotional damages of your clients were caused by ‘whispering’ and ‘tale–bearing’ against him. Bill Gothard added “Christianity is under attack in the world” and that he wants “nothing to do with your amended lawsuit.”
The charges are “Gothard and his organization sexually, physically, emotionally, spiritually, and/or psychologically abused the plaintiffs – against their wishes and over their objections. This perverse and offensive conduct repeatedly took place over the course of several decades.”
A real brouhaha has ramped up to bite President Obama, reminding him of his early days in the Senate. Nearly everyone has heard him declare that the Republicans are obstructionists because they have announced that they will block anyone he nominates to the Supreme Court this year. But in 2006, a younger Senator Obama filibustered to block the entrance to the Supreme Court of Justice Samuel Alito. Obama said today that he deeply regrets what he did and that he already knew Judge Alito had the votes to secure his nomination. President George W. Bush appointed Justice Alito to the bench.
In his daily briefing with the press corps yesterday, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said about this, “Looking back on it, the president believes that he should have just followed his own advice and made a strong public case on the merits about his opposition to the nomination of Justice Alito. But there’s a pretty stark difference here. What Republicans are advocating is wrong and it’s inconsistent with the requirements of the Constitution, primarily because the wording of the Constitution is unambiguous and does not provide an exception for election years.”
The immediate GOP response is that President Obama as Senator did filibuster and that all the wishing in the world doesn’t change that fact. Now the shoe is on the other foot and President Obama is the pot calling the kettle black.
Steven Pratt spent thirty years in prison for killing a neighbor. Two days after he was released, he killed his mother. All this happened in Mays Landing, New Jersey. As Pratt cried before a judge yesterday he told the judge he didn’t want a trial because he was guilty as charged.
The recaptured drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman is complaining that bed checks every two hours at Altiplano prison in central Mexico is “turning him into a zombie.” Guzman also says that a guard dog barks a lot between bed checks. One of his attorneys is claiming that sleep deprivation for Guzman is infamous and brutal torture, and that he will not rest until warden Salvador Solis is prosecuted.
70-year-old Maureen Smith and 55-year-old David Kaltschmidt were handed 327 million, 800,000 dollars yesterday. They’ll have to pay taxes, of course, but that was the lump sum that this Florida couple received for having the second of three winning tickets from last month’s 1.6 million dollar Powerball jackpot. There is still a winner who purchased their ticket in Chino Hills, California. So far whoever it is hasn’t come forward to claim their prize.
None of us knows when death might strike us. Caitlin Clavette, age 35, an art teacher at Glover Elementary School in a suburb of Boston, was driving to work when a dislodged manhole cover that weighed more than 200 pounds went flying through the air and crashed through her SUV’s windshield on a major highway. She was killed instantly.
And finally…. Russia doesn’t like President Obama. A new poster seen throughout Russia today shows a picture of Barack Obama smoking. The poster reads in Russian “Smoking kills more people than Obama, although he kills lots and lots of people. Don’t smoke. Don’t be like Obama.”
Why America Will Grieve The Loss of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, written and narrated by Ray Mossholder
From the news desk of Reach More Now in Fort Worth, Texas, this is Ray Mossholder with a special report: Why America Will Grieve At The Loss of Supreme Court Justice Anthony Scalia.
A huge void much deeper than the Grand Canyon exists in Washington DC tonight. United States Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia is no longer a part of the nine Supreme Court justices that decide so much of America’s fate. Most Americans know very little about Judge Scalia, so if you’re one of those who doesn’t, let me help you fill in the blanks.
To say that Scalia was a family man is an understatement. Meeting his wife, Maureen, fifty-six years ago on a blind date, the couple married the same year they met and were always together until Saturday morning.
He and Maureen were staying at a luxury resort located on the 30,000 acre Cibilo Creek Ranch in West Texas. They had arrived there Friday and attended a private party with about forty people. Those that the party said that he was his merry natural self. He did leave the party and retired earlier than the others. When he didn’t appear for breakfast, a ranch employee went to his room and discovered his dead body. A priest was immediately called to administer last rites.
The US Marshall Service, the Presidio County Sheriff and the FBI were all involved in the investigation to determine just what happened. They concluded that Justice Scalia died of natural causes. Texas Governor Greg Abbott released a statement Saturday afternoon, calling Scalia a man of God, a patriot, and an unwavering defender of the written Constitution.”
The very first question asked at the GOP debate on Saturday night after a minute of silence to honor Justice Scalia, was how each candidate viewed the situation now with the vacancy at the Supreme Court. Five of the six candidates urged the Republicans in Congress to stop any attempt by President Obama to get his third nominee on the court. Just one of the candidates said Barack Obama has “every right” to nominate a Justice during his final year in office. That candidate was Jeb Bush. President Obama, agreeing with Jeb Bush, said he does plan to fulfill his constitutional responsibility and nominate an outstanding replacement.
During the fifty-six years of the Scalia’s marriage they produced an ever-increasing family that ended up with nine children – five sons and four daughters. Among them when they grew up was a poet, a priest, an Army major, and two lawyers.
Justice Scalia told 60 Minutes in 2008, “We didn’t set out to have nine children. We’re just old-fashioned Catholics, you know? We kept playing what used to be known as ‘Vatican roulette"”. Then Maureen chimed in saying “Well, as someone said, we’re both overachievers, I guess”. The Scalia’s also have thirty-five grandchildren.
Maureen has been a pro-life counselor and an anti-abortion advocate. She has also been a board member of the Nurturing Network, a crisis pregnancy organization. She’s also been a “sidewalk counselor” standing outside abortion clinics while trying to help pregnant women going inside to change their minds. What his wife was doing got Antonin very much in trouble with pro-choicers who told him he should recuse himself from all abortion related cases. He paid no attention at all to their requests.
So what kind of a Supreme Court Justice was Antonin Scalia? He was pro-conservative, pro-constitutional, and pro-Christian. For nearly 30 years, his decisions on the Court forever reflected those facts. He was absolutely the opposite of the person President Obama will try to appoint to the Supreme Court now. Because of his death at this precise moment it is very possible we will see a dramatic and long-lasting new ideology of liberalism forcefully replacing his conservative ideology on the highest Court in America. But Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell said yesterday that he will lead the fight with the Republican majority in Congress to block any nominee throughout the year that Obama nominates. This undoubtedly will mean war during 2016 on Capitol Hill.
I won’t bore you or try to go into great lengths on what the words “originalist” or “textualist” mean. But his peers will remember Antonin Scalia as “the intellectual anchor for his originalist and textualist positions in the Court’s conservative wing.” Suffice it to say that an originalist believes that the United States Constitution should be interpreted solely based on the intent of its authors, and that that should be determined by examining the evidence of the author’s understanding of the meaning of his words in there historical context. For just one example, the Founding Fathers strongly endorsed the Second Amendment. Scalia traced the word “militia” and understood at the time of its ratification by the Founding Fathers that the word “militia” meant “the body of all citizens” and that it wasn’t at all intended to be in an exclusively military context.
The word “textualist” means a person who believes the Scriptures mean what they say and that they are never to be manipulated. Justice Scalia knew that God had placed him on the Court, and he believed the Bible and the Constitution were together like a totally trustworthy compass that always points the right way. How did others respond to Scalia’s beliefs? Barney Frank called Scalia “a homophobe”. Maureen Dowd described the Justice as “Archie Bunker in a high backed chair”!
Antonin Gregory Scalia was born on March 11, 1936, in Trenton, New Jersey. He grew up loving spaghetti. His father was an Italian immigrant and his mother’s parents were Italian immigrants too. His father later became a professor of Romance languages at Brooklyn College and his mother was an elementary school teacher. With two teachers as his parents, Scalia loved to learn. He graduated valedictorian of his class and in his own words said “I buried myself in my school work and was never cool.” William Stern was a classmate of his who later became a New York official. He said that Scalia was “an archconservative. He was brilliant, way above everybody else.”
Antonin attended Georgetown University and graduated from there valedictorian and summa cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts degree in history. He spent his junior year of college at the University of Fribourg in Switzerland and then obtained a law degree from Harvard Law school, graduating from there magna cum laude. One reason Maureen said she quickly married Antonin was because he was a “Sheldon Fellow”, which meant he was being sent by Harvard, all-expenses-paid, to travel through Europe during 1960 and 1961 with no assignments except to discover what all of Europe was doing at that time.
With all his knowledge of law, it may seem ironic to you that it was Richard Nixon who recognized Scalia’s brilliance as a University of Virginia law school professor. In 1971, President Nixon appointed him as General Counsel for the Office of Telecommunications where he formulated policy for the growth of cable television. Nixon then moved him into the chairmanship of the Administrative Conference of the United States, a select group that was organized to improve the functioning of the federal government. Finally, Nixon moved him yet again, nominating him as Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel. When President Nixon resigned because of the Watergate scandal, Scalia was asked by President Ford to continue his nomination and he was unanimously moved into that position.
When Jimmy Carter replaced Gerald Ford as president, Scalia left the White House and worked for several months with the American Enterprise Institute. He then went back to teaching law, this time at the University of Chicago. But a man named Ronald Reagan had his eye on him. As soon as President Reagan took office in 1981, he appointed Antonin Scalia a judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Columbia Circuit. Reagan, like Nixon and Ford before him, was extremely impressed with the decisions made by this outstanding judge. Another thing that pleased Reagan was that Antonin Scalia would be the first Italian-American on the United States Supreme Court.
During his next almost 30 years on the bench, Scalia wrote more concurring opinions that agreed with the majority, and only two justices wrote more dissents than he did. His nickname by other Court Justices was “Nino”. When the Court is in session the justices all of the justices meet together after the cases are briefed and argued, and then they vote on the result. Scalia often attempted to influence his colleagues by sending them what they called “Ninograms” – a short note attempting to persuade them to include his views in their opinions.
Dahlia Lithwick of Slate described Scalia’s technique: “Scalia doesn’t come into oral argument all secretive and syphinxlike, feigning indecision on the nuances of the case before him. He comes in like a medieval knight, girded for battle. He knows what the law is. He knows what the opinion should say. And he uses the hour allocated for argument to bludgeon his brethren into an agreement.”
Anytime the majority on the bench voted against what he thought was right on any subject before the Court, he berated the contrary judges and wrote his minority opinions with blistering words. So blistering, in fact, that after one case he wrote a thirty page draft dissent that shocked Justice Harry Blackmun by its emotional content. Blackmun said that Scalia’s dissent “could be cut down to ten pages if Scalia omitted the screaming”.
Always important to Justice Scalia was the separation of powers and states rights over federal rights. He strongly argued that there is no constitutional right to abortion and repeatedly asked his colleagues to strike down Roe versus Wade. He was forever unable to find four other judges to join him in doing that.
He did believe the President of the United States rightfully has presidential power and he was not opposed to executive action. But he was opposed to affirmative action and despised policies that divide groups into various sets of minorities. About this Scalia wrote “to pursue the concept of racial entitlement – even for the most admirable and benign of purposes – is to reinforce and preserve for future mischief the way of thinking that produced race slavery, race privilege and race hatred. In the eyes of the government, we are just one race here. It is American.”
Now that his voice will never be able to speak out for liberty, America is at yet another crossroad. Every Supreme Court nominee should be a person with outstanding character, deep concern for our country, and who will never attempt to rewrite the Constitution to fit their own desires. Yet this is the most surprising thing of all. There are definite requirements to be president of the United States or a member of Congress. But there is absolutely no constitutional requirement for a Supreme Court justice. They don’t even have to have ever dealt with law before. Literally anyone could legally be appointed to the highest law of the land!
If the people of America did what it should, citizens would be in touch with their president, representatives and their senators at least weekly. To get your opinion to the president either call his comment line at 202–456-1111 or send him an email at whitehous.gov. And to contact your individual Congresspeople dial 202–224-3121. The American who sits back and does nothing about what they know is corruption is a sheep being led to the slaughter.
If you haven’t done so so far, get the phone numbers of your representatives and senators, and of the presidential opinion line. Then mark one day each week on your calendar to call them and let them know what you believe they should do about issue after issue. Then watch to see that they carry through on what you’ve said. If they continue to ignore your desires, you will know who to vote out of office when their name appears on the ballot in the future. And as for getting in touch with the United States Supreme Court – here is the number of their Public Information Office there: 202-479-3000.
If Americans roll over and play dead this year, we will be.
Why America Will Grieve The Loss of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia
The Bill Keith Report and Commentary: Islam, a Religion of Peace?
Dec. 12,2015
The Bill Keith Report and Commentary
Islam, a Religion of Peace?
This past week the Reverend Dr. Pat Robertson of the Christian Broadcasting Network said that Islam is not a religion but a political system with certain religion overtones.
And as sure as sin follows temptation, the White House, democrats in Congress and the liberal/progressive news media went into apoplexy.
President Obama has repeatedly called Islam a religion of peace. It’s certainly fair to say there are many peaceful Muslims but they are so in spite of their religion that calls for death to anyone who is not a member of Islam.
The roots of death-to-the-infidels (unbelievers) goes all the way back to Mohammed, the founder of Islam in 610 A.D. following his supposed first revelation from Allah.
But what did Allah tell him? To kill the unbelievers?
That’s exactly what Mohammed did. Some 27 years later the prophet committed genocide against a major tribe of Jews living in Medina, the Qurayza, Saudi Arabia. He beheaded between 600 and 900 Jewish men and boys and sold the women and young girls into slavery.
Eyewitnesses said the beheadings took all day long and the streets ran red with Jewish blood.
The current ISIS beheadings of hundreds of Christians has a precedent by the founder of Islam 1,345 years ago.
A religion of peace? I don’t think so.
Is Freedom in Jeopardy in America?
The Obama administration is a malignant habitation of dragons bent on taking away the freedoms of the American people. There is freedom for the President. Freedom for the Congress. Freedom for the bloated Washington bureaucracy. Yet tyranny for the taxpayers.
The Washington elite – led by a President who is bent on changing America into his own image – is trying to take away our guns, our freedom of speech and the general will of the people concerning such matters of immigration, healthcare and national security.
Last week, soon after the massacre in San Bernardino, Attorney General Loretta Lynch said that anyone who speaks out against Muslims will be prosecuted for hate speech. Interestingly, she didn’t have any comforting words for the families of the victims, only words of warning for anyone who does not follow the Obama mantra that Muslims are a peace-loving people.
Are You a Terrorist? Hillary Thinks So If You’re Pro-Life!
During a campaign stop in Las Vegas earlier this year, presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton defended the abhorrent practices of Planned Parenthood and called pro-life activists terrorists.
That is the most shameful statement ever made in a presidential campaign speech. She defended Planned Parenthood’s harvesting baby body parts for profit, and condemned as terrorists those of us who want to save the babies’ lives.
Comment: I personally have been a pro-life activist since 1973 when nine old men in black robes said it is legal to kill unborn babies in a decision commonly known as Roe v. Wade. Since then, some 60 million of the most vulnerable in our land have died. I have worked on legislation to protect the unborn, made speeches, written articles, walked in demonstrations and anything and everything I knew to do to save the unborn.
Yet Hillary calls me a terrorist. That is really amazing.
President Obama Missed It Again… and Again… and Again
Remember last year when President Obama called ISIS a “junior varsity” and noted they were no threat to this country or to the countries in the Middle East.
Since that time ISIS has taken over large areas of Iraq – including the Iraqi oil fields – portions of Syria and has spread its influence all over the Middle East and parts of Africa.
Then in November of this year, the President proudly announced via television that “ISIS has been contained.” The next day ISIS terrorists attacked innocent, unarmed people in Paris killing 230 and wounding 360 (90 quite seriously).
Also, on November 24, once again the President said that ISIS poses no threat to the American people. Eight days later, terrorists killed 14 innocent people at a Christmas party in San Bernardino, California, and wounded 22 others.
Comment: It’s apparent the President’s policies have failed to protect the people of Iraq and Syria and even we Americans home he is sworn to protect. He has lost total control of the war against radical Islam and seems delusional, doing nothing and hoping the terrorists will just go away. The only remedy he sees to defeat the terrorists it to take our guns away from us.
The Amazing Mr. Trump and the Refugee Brouhaha
Love him or hate him, believe him or mistrust him, no thinking person can deny he has struck a nerve with the American people.
First, he said he wants to build a wall to close off our southern border with Mexico. And he drove the Obama administration and other liberals crazy.
Now he says we would stop bringing Muslim refugees into this country, at least temporarily, until we can make sure we weed out the terrorists. Again, the liberals – including a lot of Republicans – went nuts.
Reports confirm that numbers of terrorists have entered Europe disguised as refugees.
But Mr. Trump may be wasting his time. Why stop our government from bringing Muslim refugees into this land even though we know that ISIS will disguise their operatives in the group and send them here to kill Americans. I guess President Obama never thought of that.
Why stop Muslim immigration? Really! They can come across our southern border, just walk across the Rio Grande, and immediately sign up for food stamps, obamacare, housing and a host of other government programs. And then start killing Americans.
The President has already allowed some 680,000 Muslims into this land during the past five years with another 660,000 expected the next five years, according to Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama and reported by Newsmax. The immigrants are from Iraq, Pakistan, Egypt, Bangladesh and other countries. I wonder how many Americans must die before we stop this insanity?
The Obama administration has released new welcome guidelines for the immigrants/refugees spelling out how to obtain public benefits including food stamps, welfare, and Obamacare, Breitbart News reports.
Interestingly, nearly all the immigrants are Muslims while Christian immigrants are virtually excluded even though they face genocide in the Middle East at the hands of ISIS.
Hooray for Jerry Falwell, Jr.
Jerry Falwell, Jr., son of the late Jerry Falwell, is the president of Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia, the largest Christian university in America.
The educator has announced a new program to protect the Liberty students by allowing them to apply for conceal and carry licenses to carry firearms on campus. He noted that a gunman killed 32 students at West Virginia University in 2007 and vows it will not happen at Liberty.
However, no student under the age of 21 will be allowed to apply for conceal and carry licenses. A number of older students – along with faculty and staff – will be armed.
Comment: Gun free zones are invitations to terrorists and those mentally deranged to massacre at will. Thanks to Dr. Falwell, it will not happen at Liberty. No terrorist or anyone else will dare try to kill Liberty students for the cowards only target unarmed and helpless students in gun free zones.
Criminal Illegal Aliens Roaming Free in U.S.
According to Congress, there are more than 179,000 criminal illegal aliens roaming the streets of America, Vision to America reports.
Many of the aliens have committed violent crimes such as murder, rape, arson, robbery, sexual crimes against children and a host of others. And there are reports that these aliens commit new crimes every day, according to the director of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency.
“Somewhere around 179,029 undocumented criminal with final orders of removal from the United States currently remain at large across the country and are essentially untraceable, according to Sen. Chuck Grassley, chairman of the U. S. Senate Judiciary Committee,” Vision reported.
Most of the criminal aliens were released from federal prisons due to overcrowding and were supposed to be deported. However, the Obama administration has virtually stopped all deportations.
Police Chiefs Urge Americans to Arm Themselves
A Texas police chief has warned President Obama in a social media video that trying to disarm Americans would “cause a revolution in this country” and joined other police chiefs urging citizens to arm themselves in the wake of mass shootings such as San Bernardino, California, the Associated Press reports.
Police Chief Randy Kennedy, longtime chief of Hughes Springs in East Texas, noted the Second Amendment was established to protect people from criminals and “terrorists and radical ideology,” AP reported. “It’s also there to protect us against a government that has overreached its power,” the chief said. “You (Mr. Obama) are not our potentate, sir. You are our servant.”
“Law enforcement officials in Arizona, Florida and New York also have recently prompted citizens to arm themselves – some using similar comments aimed at terrorism,” the news agency reported.
Recently, Wayne Ivey, the sheriff of Brevard County, Florida, said government officials seem more interested in being politically correct than protecting the people, AP reported, and urged residents to arm themselves for protection. “The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.”
Meanwhile, the FBI reports a record number of firearms background checks on Black Friday after Thanksgiving, according to AP. The agency handled 185,345 background checks – roughly two per second – as more and more people plan to purchase firearms.
It’s Your Money
The Pentagon has admitted that a $500 million training program for rebels in Syria has failed. The funds were provided to train moderate Syrian soldiers opposed to the ruthless President Bashar al-Assad. However, now the Pentagon says the training program was a total failure. The plan was to train hundreds of fighters, but only five actually were trained. At $100 million to train each soldier is not a very good return on taxpayers’ money.
Released Guantanamo Prisoner Rejoins Terrorist Group
Some 800 terrorists and suspected-terrorists have been released from prison in Guantanamo and now the Pentagon says a number of them have rejoined terrorist groups such as al-Quada and the Taliban.
A case in point is Ibrahim al Qosi who was released by the Obama administration and now serves as a leader and spokesman for al Qaeda in Yemen.
Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter speculates that at least 10 percent of those released are back fighting Americans again. But he admits it is almost impossible to track them.
Last year the President released five of the worst terrorists being detained at Guantanamo in exchange for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl who turned out to be a traitor. Yet the President has never apologized to the American people for this terrible mistake.
Unemployment: Myths and Deception
Liberals/progressives in the White House, the halls of Congress and the so-called “mainstream media” proudly boast that today there is 5 percent unemployment in this country. They also note that the nation’s businesses added 211,000 jobs in November.
But these figures are a planned deception as those same liberals never discuss the 95,446,000 Americans who have lost their jobs, can’t find a job, or have dropped out of the job market.
The Bill Keith Report and Commentary: Islam, a Religion of Peace?
(CNN)President Barack Obama’s Oval Office address to the country Sunday did little to impress one of his loudest critics in the race to replace him.
In a rare prime-time speech, Obama called the shootings in San Bernardino, California, an “act of terrorism.” He prodded Congress to adopt new restrictions on assault weapons and ban people who are on no-fly lists from purchasing firearms.
And he urged Americans against associating terrorism with all Muslims — even as he said that extremism in some communities is “a real problem that Muslims must confront without excuse.”
GOP presidential front-runner Donald Trump, who had promised to live-tweet the speech, came to the quick conclusion, “We need a new President – FAST!”
The real estate mogul had little else to say other than, “Is that all there is?”
In other tweets, Trump excused Obama for reading a prepared speech off of a teleprompter, but said he hoped Obama wouldn’t criticize Second Amendment gun rights.
After Obama’s speech, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio called Obama “completely overwhelmed” by the terrorism threat in a Fox News appearance.
Rubio also said Obama was “cynical” for spending time urging Americans not to discriminate against Muslims.
“Where is the evidence that we have widespread discrimination against Muslims?” he said.
And he blasted Obama’s focus on gun control.
“The notion that a radical jihadist who is on a no-fly list is going to walk into a local gun shop to purchase a gun is absurd,” Rubio said.
Republican Ben Carson called Obama’s speech “strange.”
“President Obama’s declaration tonight that his policies are working was strange,” Carson said in a statement. “Strange that it took four days from the attack to respond and even more strange that somehow the attack on our soil is proof his policies are working. One must wonder who has contained who.”
Texas Sen. Ted Cruz responded to Obama by taking aim at the immigration system.
“If I am elected President, I will direct the Department of Defense to destroy ISIS. And I will shut down the broken immigration system that is letting jihadists into our country,” he said in a statement. “Nothing President Obama said tonight will assist in either case.”
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush called the struggle against ISIS “the war of our time.”
“We need to remove the self-imposed constraints President Obama has placed on our intelligence community and military, and we need to put in place an aggressive strategy to defeat ISIS and radical Islamic terrorism as I have proposed,” he said.
Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul used his statement to criticize Obama’s calls for gun control reforms and also took aim at the U.S. immigration system.
“We should not double down on this failed and dangerous policy that the President called for tonight,” he said in a statement. “We must arm our allies, the Kurds, and insist on Arab boots on the ground for our allies in the region.”
Ohio Gov. John Kasich, another 2016 contender, said Obama’s strategy “is not enough.”
“Bolder action across the board is needed because our way of life is what’s at stake,” said Kasich in a statement. “Also, when terrorists threaten us, our response can’t be to target our own constitutional rights. Our rights aren’t the problem, our unwillingness to act to defeat extremists is the problem. We need to decisively and aggressively protect our nation and our ideals.”
Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus also blasted Obama’s speech.
“We will defeat ISIS but we cannot do so by continuing the current approach. The path laid out by President Obama and supported by Hillary Clinton has not worked, and ISIS has only gained in strength,” Priebus said in a statement. “The attacks in San Bernardino should serve as a wake-up call for Obama and Clinton that the way to victory is not through the status quo but refocusing our efforts to defeat ISIS.”
Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders and Martin O’Malley have yet to comment on the President’s remarks.
Europe is about to change forever, Marine Le Pen’s National Front party is on course for a historic result in regional elections on Sunday, winning more than 30 per cent of the vote and leading the country’s two mainstream parties. Our words from the day after the Paris attacks, when Le Pen called for “eradication” of Muslims and demanded the nation “re-arm itself,” seem extraordinarlity prophetic now “if there is one ‘winner’ from last night’s terrible events in Paris, it is France’s anti-EU, anti-immigration far-right wing Front Nationale party leader Marine Le Pen.”
As Bloomberg headlines show, exit polls have FN in a significant lead…
*NATIONAL FRONT LEADS FRENCH REGIONAL VOTE, IPSOS SAYS
*FRANCE’S NATIONAL FRONT TAKES 30.8% OF NATIONAL VOTE: IFOP
*FRANCE’S REPUBLICANS TAKE 27.2% OF NATIONAL VOTE: IFOP
*FRANCE’S SOCIALIST PARTY TAKES 22.7% OF NATIONAL VOTE: IFOP
Le Pen is over the moon…
As The FT reports, in the first test of public opinion since the November 13 terrorist attacks, Marine Le Pen’s anti-immigration party looked set to notch up its best result since it was founded in 1972…
President François Hollande’s Socialists and leftwing allies had just 22.3 per cent of the vote while former president Nicolas Sarkozy’s centre-right bloc had 26.4 per cent, according to the preliminary figures.
Victory in at least one of France’s 13 regions – definitive results will only be known after next Sunday’s second-round vote – would be a first for the FN, helping to build momentum as it looks to the 2017 presidential contest.
Opinion polls before the vote suggested the party could come top in as many as six of France’s 13 regions in Sunday’s first round.
The election, to be completed in a second round next Sunday, will decide the make-up of regional governments, which have power over issues such as local transport, airports, ports and some schools.
The result provides a sense of the national political mood barely 18 months before the presidential election.
“Taking control of even a single region in these elections would be an unprecedented achievement,” said James Shields, professor of French politics at Aston University.
“This is the first test of public political opinion since the terrorist attacks of 13 November. It’s also the last opportunity to gauge the standing of political parties and potential candidates some 16 months before the critical presidential elections of 2017.
“Though essentially about regional governance, these elections are important as a barometer of the political climate in France as we begin to near the end of President Hollande’s term of office.”
Mr Hollande, whose Socialist party holds 12 of the 13 regions, has seen his popularity rise from record lows since the attacks… but Le Pen’s success will force an uncomfortable alliance…
* * *
Founded by Jean-Marie Le Pen in 1972, the FN has long been associated with anti-Semitism. As recently as April this year, Mr Le Pen, father of Marine, sparked a family feud as he defended a past comment that Nazi gas chambers were “a detail” of history.
But Ms Le Pen, the party’s leader since 2011, has tried to “detoxify” the FN’s image and to bring it more into the mainstream. As part of that process, she has started to push other policies such as abandoning the euro in favour of the franc and giving the state an even bigger role as a promoter — and protector — of national industry. Those ideas have gone down well in a country where economic growth has remained sluggish in recent years, and where unemployment is at record highs. The FN’s popularity has soared in the north of the country, an industrial region particularly affected by France’s economic plight.
Finland’s government is drawing up plans to give every one of its citizens a basic income of 800 euros (£576) a month and scrapbenefits altogether.
The proposal would entitle each Finn to 800 euros tax free each month, which according to Bloomberg, would cost the government 52.2 billion euros a year.
The country’s government will make a final decision on the plan in November 2016.
Exactly a week ago, we warned that Turkey does have one trump card when it comes to dealing with an angry Russian bear that’s hell bent on making life miserable for Ankara in the wake of Erdogan’s brazen move to shoot down a Russian Su-24 near the Syrian border. Turkey, we explained, could move to close the Bosphorus Strait, cutting one of Moscow’s key supply lines to Latakia.
We went on to explain, that such a move would probably be illegal based on the 1936 Montreux Convention, but as Sputnik noted, “in times of war, the passage of warships shall be left entirely to the discretion of the Turkish government.”
Obviously, Turkey and Russia haven’t formally declared war on one another, but the plane “incident” marked the first time a NATO member has engaged a Russian or Soviet aircraft in more than six decades and given the gravity of that escalation, one would hardly put it past Erdogan to start interfering with Moscow’s warships, especially if it means delaying their arrival in Syria where the Russians are on the verge of restoring an Assad government that’s Turkey despises.
Well sure enough, the tit-for-tat mutual escalation that’s ensued since the Su-24 crash has spilled over into the maritime arena with Moscow and Ankara detaining each other’s ships.
After five Turkish vessels were held at the port of Novorossiysk for “inspections,” Turkey retaliated on Friday by holding four Russian ships at the Black Sea port of Samsun. The following table reveals a hilarious list of the Russian vessels’ alleged infractions which apparently include fire safety violations, pollution prevention violations, and problems with “life saving appliances.”:
One of the vessels – the cargo ship Crystal – has yet to be released.
“Six ships with a Russian flag were checked at Samsun Port on Dec. 5. The ships were found to be in compliance with Port State Control (PSC) rules, a series of international standards that all ships are required to meet, but some problems were subsequently detected in four of the ships,” Hurriyet says, adding that “three of the ships consequently met the requirements and were permitted to leave, but the remaining vessel has not yet been permitted to depart.”
The Crystal apparently lacks the “required documents.”
Obviously, Russia and Turkey are engaged in a bit of petty mutual escalation here, but it’s worth noting that Samsun isn’t far from the Bosphorus:
And while Turkey now appears content to harrass Russian cargo vessels, one shouldn’t discount the possibility that Erodgan will look to do something more provocative now that it looks like the UN will ultimately be dragged into the ISIS oil smuggling debate.
Indeed, Moscow seems to be taking the Bosphorus issue quite seriously because as Hurriyet reported just hours ago, when the Russian warship Caesar Kunikov made its way through the strait on Saturday, a Russian soldier stood on deck with a shoulder ground-to-air missile at the ready.
Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu’s response: “For a Russian soldier to display a rocket launcher or something similar while passing on a Russian warship is a provocation. If we perceive a threatening situation, we will give the necessary response.”” Indeed.
And meanwhile, three NATO warships have dropped anchor off Istanbul’s Sarayburnu coast: Portugal’s F-334 NRP Francisco de Almeida, Spain’s F-105 ESPS Blaz de Lezo, and Canada’s FFG-338 HMCS Winnipeg.
Last week, the US experienced what is now widely reported to be the worst terrorism-driven mass killing in the US since 9/11; yesterday terrorism allegedly spread to London which had so far been insulated from any Islamic State-related events; just one thing was missing to push the global panic envelope to the “September 11 flashback” redzone in a month that started with the mass murder of dozens of people in Paris and has gotten progressively worse since:airplane terrorism.
The reaction to the San Bernardino shooting in which 14 people were killed and several more wounded is a textbook case of confirmation bias. The first reactions came from the liberal wing of the Twittersphere, heavily represented by “mainstream” journalists, who immediately took the incident to be a classic “mass shooting” of the Sandy Hook-Columbine variety, and it didn’t take long for the finger-wagging to begin. At once pro-gun control and anti-religious, the meme went out into cyberspace: “thoughts and prayers” aren’t enough, we need to crack down on gun ownership in this country. The front page of the New York Daily Newsexpressed the left-liberal party line: “GOD ISN’T FIXING THIS: As latest batch of innocent Americans are left lying in pools of blood, cowards who could truly end gun scourge continue to hide behind meaningless platitudes.”
As it turned out, however, the guns used by Syed Farook and Tashveen Malik, the two perpetrators, were bought legally – and their weaponry consisted of a lot more than mere guns. The editors of the Daily News didn’t wait for the facts because they didn’t care about the facts. They just wanted to make a point – one which turned out to be not only wrong but also completely beside the point.
In the same city, in the offices of a very similar – if ideologically opposite – tabloid, the editors of the New York Postwere jumping the gun in an entirely different direction. As the ethnicity and religious affiliation of the attackers came out, they ran with a simple two-word headline: “MUSLIM KILLERS,” with a modifying qualifier: “Terror eyed as couple slaughters 14 in Calif.” As more information came out, however, the editors pulled back, and the final edition was quite different: “MURDER MISSION,” read the headline, with a neutral supplementary: “Shooters slaughter 14 in Calif.”These two editions were published hours after the incident, and only a few hours apart – a testament to the dangers of jumping to conclusions.
This reversal is explained by the subsequent release of yet more information about the perpetrators: Syed Farook worked at the San Bernardino Department of Public Health, which had rented a room at the facility where the massacre took place. The event was a holiday party, which Farook attended, but left early after a reported altercation of some kind. He returned with Malik, his wife, armed to the teeth, and the slaughter commenced.
These facts would appear to point in a different direction entirely from the scenario painted by the Post‘s initial edition, and so the imagery conjured by the new headline went from that of the rampaging “Muslim Killers” to the “Murder Mission” of what appeared to be a case of workplace violence.
That’s what I thought around midnight last night, when I tweeted my tentative opinion that the workplace violencescenario seemed to be the most likely. My main reason was the nature of the target: why, I asked, would terrorists choose the Christmas party of the San Bernardino Public Health Department as the latest object of their wrath?In addition, reports of a dispute at the event involving Farook seemed to indicate that scenario: he got angry, came back, and started shooting. There were also reports of “turmoil” inside the department where he worked; several people had left amid rumors of disputes with management, and the fact that Farooq and his accomplice were targeting a very specific group of people – and not, say, a military facility, or even a soft target like a mall – seemed to corroborate this conclusion.
However, as more facts came out, this explanation began to make less sense. To begin with, a bomb – actually, three bombs taped together – had been left behind at the scene of the shooting. The bomb was linked to a device found in Farook’s rental car – rented three days prior – that was very similar to the jury-rigged remote-controlled IEDs recommended by al-Qaeda’s Inspire magazine, which detailed how to make an explosive device with readily available materials. We don’t yet know why the bomb failed to go off,.
Although reports that the couple came into the venue wearing body armor and Go-Pro body cameras turned out to be false, they were wearing “tactical” clothing, i.e. vests that enabled them to carry large amounts of ammunition. And indeed they were carrying huge amounts, enough to let them reload on the scene, and continue firing up to seventy-five rounds for over 30 seconds. This accounts for the large number of casualties.
Furthermore, the discovery of twelve “pipe-bomb type” devices, hundreds of tools for making more, and “thousands” of rounds of ammunition in the Redlands home rented by Farooq and his wife eliminates the workplace violence scenario. This was, in effect, a bomb-making factory, and neighbors indicate that a number of people were involved: packages were received throughout the day, and activity was observed into the night. One of these neighbors claims they were ready to contact law enforcement but hesitated to do so for fear of being accused of “racial profiling.” Both Farooq and his bride were of Pakistani extraction.
Two factors indicating that this was indeed a terrorist cell carrying out a pre-planned operation, and not a disgruntled employee intent on revenge against his co-workers, are plain enough: 1) The couple dropped off their child at a relative’s house the day before the attack, claiming to have a doctor’s appointment, and 2) The tactics utilized in the shooting of the victims and the gunfight with the police — which included throwing a fake pipe bomb out of their car as the cops pursued them – are evidence of some kind of military training. Such training could have occurred during Farooq’s trips to Saudi Arabia and Pakistan.
And we are beginning to hear evidence of international contacts with “more than one” terrorist suspect under surveillance by law enforcement. All that’s missing – as of this writing – is a claim of responsibility by some overseas terrorist outfit.
Yet questions remain: again, the target – a holiday party in a small city – hardly seems like the sort ISIS or al-Qaeda would zero in on. Clearly the couple were planning on a much larger operation, but this plan was changed by something that triggered Farooq to act sooner. And we still don’t have the whole picture: there could conceivably be some new information that could alter our whole perception of what motivated Farooq and Malik.
Which brings me to my point: our perception of the facts is shaped – and altered – by our preconceptions. In short, people believe what they want to believe – and the facts be damned. In this case, major media organizations didn’t wait for the facts to come in before they pronounced judgment. They simply rushed into print with what were little more than editorials, bereft of any responsibility to their readers or the truth.
This is why those who proclaim that bias is inherent in all journalism, and that there’s no such thing as objective reporting, are dangerously wrong. Yes, we’re all human; yes, everyone has opinions. But some people wait for the facts to come in before giving vent to those opinions, while others don’t bother with such niceties.
The reality, as I see it, and given what we know now, is this: San Bernardino was an act of terrorism that may or may not have been directed from overseas. The implications of that are very grave for those of us who oppose our crazed foreign policy of perpetual war, and the relentless assault on our civil liberties on the home front.
The pressure to “destroy them over there before they strike us over here” is going to increase a hundred-fold.The advocates of universal surveillance are going to be empowered as never before. That these tactics haven’t worked in the past – and, indeed, have backfired badly – won’t deter the usual suspects from insisting that war and repression are the answers to the problem of terrorism.
Our answer to the War Party must be that their strategy has failed: the terrorists couldn’t recruit anyone if we weren’t over there bombing what remains of their cities and seeking to impose our will on a populace that will never accept our domination, no matter how many soldiers we send and bombing sorties we launch.
As for the authoritarians who want to use incidents like the San Bernardino attack as a pretext to abolish the Constitution and institute a regime of total surveillance and outright repression: where was their vaunted surveillance system in this case?We didn’t detect this plot – and perhaps that’s because watching everyone, and collecting everyone’s information, blinds us to the real villains hiding in our midst. Then again, perhaps ferreting out villains isn’t the real purpose of government spying.
After the 9/11 attacks, the nation was swept by a wave of war hysteria, and concern for basic civil liberties went right out the window: we will doubtless experience a similar phenomenon in the days and months to come. Yet we are confident that when the history of our era is written, the advocates of peace and liberty will be vindicated, while the War Party will be discredited and disdained by future generations. We must live in the future, in a sense, in order to fight for the future – if there is to be one, that is
Less than a week after the San Bernardino shooting, the ghost of ISIS terrorism has finally landed in London, where moments ago news broke that a man wielding a machete screamed “this is for Syria” before slashing a person’s throat at London’s Leytonstone subway station, and attacking up to three people.
The following video of the incident was released on Twitter hours ago, and shows a large pool of blood spattered across the ticket hall before the alleged knifeman is Tasered by a Met Police officer.
The Express released the following pictures of what it has dubbed the “Syria revenge” stabbing:
As the Telegraph reports, police were called to Leytonstone station after reports of a stabbing in the ticket hall on Saturday at around 7pm. The alleged assailant was promptly tasered by police at the scene.
Terrified passengers, some with children, can be seen running across the east London Tube station away from the scene.
As recounted by the Guardian, one person, who claims to have witnessed the attack, took to social media to reveal details of the horror.
Laurynas Godvisa said: “So as I was going to Leytonstone station was dressed to go to Christmas dinner with people from work.
“As I walked down I just saw a lot of people running but I ignored it and kept walking to get my train, but suddenly what I saw I couldn’t believe my eyes and what I saw was a guy with a knife and a dead guy on the floor.
“I was so scared I ran for my life. After good 10-15 police came and got the guy and arrested him.
“And as he was coming out this is what he said: ‘This is what happens when you f*** with mother Syria all of your blood will be spilled’.”
A Met Police spokesman confirmed the incident saying that “Police were called at 19:06 hrs on Saturday, 5 December, to reports of a stabbing at Leytonstone underground station. The male suspect was reportedly threatening other people with a knife.
“Met officers attended the scene. A man was arrested at 19:14 hrs and taken to an east London police station where he remains in custody. A Taser was discharged by one of the Met officers.”
“Officers from British Transport Police are now dealing with the incident at the scene. We are aware of one man having sustained serious stab injuries. We await details of any other injuries.”
So far there is little news on the condition of the victim of the attack: one victim is in a serious condition with multiple stab wounds and it is believed up to two others may also have been injured.
A spokeswoman from London Ambulance Service said: “We were called at 7:09pm to reports of an assault at Leytonstone underground station We sent a number of resources to the including our joint response unit, an incident response officer, an ambulance crew and London’s Air Ambulance to the scene. We treated a man for stab wounds. He was taken as a priority to hospital escorted by the doctor from London’s Air Ambulance.”
And while it is only a matter of time before a “terrorist” link is found in this latest attack meant to put another western country on edge and to justify the UK’s recent launch of air strikes against ISIS, we wonder if there will be a front page op-ed in a leading liberal UK newspaper tomorrow demanding that all machetes be henceforth banned even as local TV crews stream live from the home of the alleged terrorist.
Here’s an Update: Sky News reporting that the subway incident is already being treated as an act of terrorism
Moments ago we another news item that after a report that a Lufthansa crew and passengers overpowered a Jordanian man with a US passport, who tried to open the cabin door on a Frankfurt-Belgrade flight on Sunday, while screaming that he wished to join Allah along with all the passengers, according to Serbian TV RTS.
However, as AFP adds, the man was promptly overpowered by crew and passengers with the German carrier insisting the safety of the plane had not been threatened. The airplane proceeded to land safely at 12:45pm local time.
“A passenger got up and tried to do something at the door, but was stopped by crew members and other passengers,” said airline spokesman Andreas Bartels.
“The passenger was then restrained for the remainder of the flight in his seat and handed over to the authorities in Belgrade,” he said.
“It was a normal door, which of course cannot be opened in-flight… it was not the cockpit door,” he said. “The safety of the flight was not jeopardised and the flight landed safely in Belgrade”.
Bartels declined to provide information on the identity of the passenger or his nationality, or what he said during the incident.
Serbian state-run television provided more details on the passenger, reporting that police had arrested a Jordanian man after he tried to forced his way into the cockpit of the Lufthansa flight. The Serb press said the Jordanian was called Laken and had a US passport. He had cried out that he wished to join Allah along with all the passengers, RTS said.
The man had suddenly got up during the flight, banged on the cockpit door and demanded to be allowed to enter, threatening to open one of the plane’s doors while it was flying over Austria, Serbia’s RTS television reported.
He was overpowered by flight crew and members of a Serb handball team who subdued him until the flight landed in Belgrade where he was arrested, the report said.
RTS adds that the coach of the Vojvodina handball team, Nikola Markovic said that during the incident on the plane there was no panic. Google translated: “We are all from the back of the plane saw that something was happening, but we thought that because of the extraordinary situation in each plane has someone from the security services. Nothing spectacular happened everything was all right. Most of us did not have information about what was happening, “Markovic said.
According to him, the flight attendant accompanied by two players took the man who caused an accident in business class, and there they sat down with him, without any difficult situation.
“After 15 minutes I called one of my players and he told me what happened. Most of the passengers did not even know what happened on the plane, until they found out later what had happened. The flight was calm, do not panic, all are well “Markovic said.
The plane landed safely when the other passengers learned about the incident after they were announced to the police.
Luckily, this time there were no consequences, however expect in light of this event, airline security checks to return to post-September 11 levels, especially if as we expect, tonight’s 8pm impromptu Obama statement seeking to “reassure the nervous nation“, achieves precisely the opposite.
Back in August, we did an investigation—the inspector General did—of the Department of Homeland Security, and they had 72 individuals that were on the terrorist watch list that were actually working at the Department of Homeland Security. The director had to resign because of that. Then we went further and did and eight-airport investigation. We had staffers go into eight different airports to test the department of homeland security screening process at major airports. They had a 95 percent failure rate. We had folks—this was a testing exercise, so we had folks going in there with guns on their ankles, and other weapons on their persons, and there was a 95 percent failure rate.
Will robots soon be able to teach themselves … everything? Kate Drew, special to CNBC.com
There’s a robot in California teaching itself to walk. Its name is Darwin, and like a toddler, it teeters back and forth in a UC Berkeley lab, trying and falling, and then trying again before getting it right. But it’s not actually Darwin doing all this. It’s a neural network designed to mimic the human brain.
Darwin’s baby steps speak to what many researchers believe will be the greatest leap in robotics — a kind of general machine learning that allows robots to adapt to new situations rather than respond to narrow programming.
Developed by Pieter Abbeel and his team at UC Berkeley’s Robot Learning Lab, the neural network that allows Darwin to learn is not programmed to perform any specific functions, like walking or climbing stairs. The team is using what’s called “reinforcement learning” to try and make the robots adapt to situations as a human child would.
Like a child’s brain, reinforcement technology invokes the trial-and-error process.
“Imagine learning a new skill, like how to ride a bike,” said John Schulman, a Ph.D. candidate in computer science at UC Berkeley in Abbeel’s group. You’re going to fall a lot, but then, “after some practice, you figure it out.”
Robots are pretty good at walking on flat ground, but anytime a variable is introduced, like a step or a slope, they often can’t adapt.
Earlier this year, at the DARPA Robotics Challenge, some of the most high-tech robots in the world competed through a set of obstacles designed to mimic real-world disaster situations, like Fukushima. Nearly all of them failed, prompting a parade of GIFs on the Internet depicting falling robots.
For typically structured settings, like in factories, robots are programmed to repeat the same function over and over again, said Sergey Levine, another scientist working with Abbeel. For complex environments that might change, they need to be more sophisticated and able to adapt, Levine said.
“Imagine learning a new skill, like how to ride a bike. … After some practice, you figure it out.”-John Schulman, a Ph.D. candidate working in the UC Berkeley Robot Learning Lab
To enable the robots to adapt, the team at UC Berkeley is developing technology that doesn’t address specific behaviors.
“We’ve started looking at much less restrictive representations,” Levine said. “We are basically not telling the robot anything about doing the task.” Instead, they are using large neural networks that are general purpose. “It’s kind of like the difference between a circuit built for one specific job,” he explained, “and a general-purpose computer.”
This approach enables the team to explore other functionalities, as well.
“There’s very little in these algorithms that’s specific to [locomotion],” Levine said. “In reality, these methods are really designed from the ground up to be general.” They aren’t aimed at walking, or grasping, or doing the dishes — but can be applied to all of those things.
Less restrictive technology is also apt to make robots cheaper to build.
“Right now if, for example, you have a company that builds robots, for every piece of hardware that you build, you also have to figure out how you are going to manually control it,” Levine said. If a robot can learn on its own, the manual inputs needed for it to function would be fewer, thereby making it less costly to make.
In real scenarios, it’s really difficult to anticipate every situation in advance, and it’s nearly impossible to program for every situation, said Martial Hebert, a professor at The Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University. “The grand challenge is to be able to teach robots how to do end-to-end tasks.”
In an ideal world, a robot will be able to learn simply by demonstration, with no need for expensive, time-consuming programming, Herbert said, adding, “It will be much easier to configure them,” he said.
That, in turn, could help lower the purchase price for robots, making them accessible to everyday consumers — which right now they aren’t. Boston Dynamics’ Atlas robot, used by several DARPA teams in the Challenge, carries a price tag of over $1 million.
“To get robots into our everyday environments will require equipping them with the ability to deal with a very large range of variation,” Abbeel said. “My belief is that the most practical way to equip robots with such skills is to equip them with the ability to learn.”
The scientists at UC Berkeley hope to move closer to a world where robots are autonomous, nimbly performing many functions typically done by humans. In the future, robots may be able to provide care for the elderly, conduct rescue efforts, clean up in disaster areas and even deliver mail, Schulman said.
There are still many situations that will need remote human control, like for operations that need to be executed very precisely, Hebert said. But the recent research suggests a new direction for the robotics field. “It’s moving away from pre-programming of robots and toward robots that are more and more able to generalize from example,” he said.
Abbeel’s team is attempting to flesh out this shift. “More work is necessary to move these results from simulation to the real world, but I think eventually this research will have a very big impact on robotics,” Schulman said. “It might be the path to actual humanoid robots, like Star Wars’ C-3PO.”
