Bardstown

'That is ridiculous': Andrew Gillum rips Rick Santorum for claiming guns aren't 'problem' in mass shootings

Former Tallahassee, Fla., Mayor Andrew Gillum slammed former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum's stance on gun control as “ridiculous” for saying guns are not the “problem” in mass shootings.

Ohio Police Arrest White Supremacist Who Allegedly Threatened to Attack Jewish Community Center

An Ohio man was arrested on Saturday for allegedly threatening to attack a local Jewish community center.

TV presenter punched live on air during protest

A journalist was knocked unconscious live on air after being punched in the face while covering a feminist protest.Video footage published by TV network ADM 40 shows reporter Juan Manuel Jimenez speaking to the camera as women yell at him during a march in Mexico City.Mr Jimenez can be seen standing in the middle of the crowd as women throw glitter at him and a woman holding a young girl’s hand shouts into the reporter’s microphone.As the reporter continues speaking to the camera, a man dressed in a white T-shirt and blue baseball cap walks up to him and punches him in the face before calmly walking away.Mr Jimenez can be seen lying on the ground seemingly unconscious as protesters chase after his attacker.At the beginning of the clip, shaky footage also shows another protester with their face covered who appears to grab the journalist and hit him in a separate incident.In other footage shared on social media, news presenter Melissa del Pozo de Milenio of the Milenio Televisión network also appears to be attacked by protesters.The journalist can be seen struggling with a woman dressed in black who has her face covered.The camera then focuses on two women who appear to be stabbing a sign.Demonstrators painted the word “rapists” on the wall of a nearby police station and phrases such as “they don’t take care of us” and “rape state” on Mexico City’s Angel of Independence monument. The feminist protests were triggered by allegations that two teenage girls were raped by a group of policemen.The demonstrations have become known as the “glitter protests” after marchers doused the city’s police chief in pink glitter.Violence against women is a serious problem in Mexico. Human Rights Watch says Mexican laws “do not adequately protect women and girls against domestic and sexual violence”.A 2019 report said provisions in Mexican law, including those that make the severity of punishments for sexual offenses contingent upon the supposed chastity of the victim, “contradict international standards”.Mexico City Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum, the first woman elected to head the city’s government, tweeted that the attorney general’s office of the metropolis will investigate and bring charges against those who attacked journalists.

School workers who used Sharpie to color in black teen’s hair in Texas are being sued

A federal civil rights lawsuit was filed on Sunday against a Texas school district and three officials after they took disciplinary action for a student’s haircut, court documents say.

Sudan's Bashir got $90 mn from Saudi, investigator tells court

Sudan's deposed military ruler Omar al-Bashir has admitted to receiving $90 million in cash from Saudi royals, an investigator told a Khartoum court on Monday. Police Brigadier Ahmed Ali said at the opening of Bashir's corruption trial, which an AFP correspondent attended, that the former president told him that the latest payment was "delivered by some of Mohammed bin Salman's envoys". Bashir, whose military Islamist regime ruled Sudan for 30 years, arrived at the Judicial and Legal Science Institute where the trial is taking place in a huge military convoy.

Trump supporters say he 'would probably lose voters...if he goes too far' on gun control

The president's supporters in New Hampshire respond to proposals for new gun control legislation on "This Week."

Scientists detect a black hole swallowing a neutron star 'like Pac-man'

For the first time, scientists have detected a black hole devouring a neutron star, according to a report released Monday.

It looks like the Russians are trying to hide the truth about that nuclear accident in Nyonoksa

Evidence is mounting that Russia may be covering up a tragic nuclear accident after a mysterious blast killed seven at a military-weapons testing site.

Duke of York pictured inside mansion of convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein

Peering out from behind the 15ft-high solid oak door Prince Andrew is seen to catch himself and check if anyone is watching as he waves goodbye to an attractive brunette. And it may be little surprise that he was concerned that someone might spot him in the doorway of the £63million Manhattan mansion, as it belonged to convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. A video of the encounter emerged as the Duke of York faced a growing list of questions over this association with the financier who died in prison in an apparent suicide earlier this month. The Duke is seen in the video emerging in the imposing doorway of the New York building which Epstein’s victims have dubbed the “House of Horrors” to chat for a few seconds and then wave goodbye to an unnamed woman. Before he closes the door he peers around it apparently to see if anyone is watching. Less than an hour earlier Epstein had left the house in a thick fur-lined coat in the company of a young blonde woman who was wearing a thin jumper and appeared to be shivering. Prince Andrew and Jeffrey Epstein pictured walking together in Central Park during the 2010 visit  Credit: Jae Donnelly  Witnesses told the Mail on Sunday that the woman entering and leaving the house whilst the Duke was inside “looked very young indeed”. The footage is from December 2010 when the Duke, then the UKs Special Representative for Trade, stayed with Epstein in his New York home. Previously pictures have emerged from the same trip of the pair walking together in Central Park. The corridor in which the Duke stood to wave goodbye to the woman is said to contain a number of bizarre items, including a painting of Bill Clinton wearing the dress Monika Lewinsky was infamously wearing when she performed a sex act on him and a chandelier with a life sized female doll hanging from it. Jeffrey Epstein was in prison awaiting trial when he apparently took his own life  Two years before the video was shot Epstein had been convicted of sex with a child and placed on the sex offenders register.   The emergence of the video came after prosecutors in the US said they were continuing their investigations into Epstein's crimes and their attention had turned to his associates. The source said that they had gone public with the footage to try and encourage other victims to come forward. The Duke is braced for the release of further court documents in coming weeks after being named in documents relating to British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell, who is alleged to have “acted as a madam" for her lover Epstein. She has repeatedly denied the claims. Ghislaine Maxwell denies being a "madam" for her former lover Jeffrey Epstein   Buckingham Palace have refused to comment on the video but have recently repeated their “emphatic denial” of allegations against the Duke made by Virginia Roberts, one of Epstein’s victims. A spokesman for the Palace said: “Any suggestion of impropriety with underage minors is categorically untrue.” The Duke is currently on holiday in Spain with his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson. The Metropolitan Police have refused to say whether they will look at requests by Ms Roberts to resume their inquiries into the allegations she made surrounding her time in London. In 2015 Detectives looked at allegations that Ms Roberts, who now uses her married name Guiffre, was trafficked to London for sexual exploitation but they did not to pursue a full investigation.

Mexican man facing voter fraud trial in Sacramento. He’s a Trump supporter

For years, President Trump has claimed that millions of noncitizens voted in the 2016 presidential election, unfairly skewing his vote as Democrat Hillary Clinton won the popular vote but lost the Electoral College.

Woman sets fire to man’s house after he invited her over for late-night sex then fell asleep, police say

A woman has been accused of setting fire to a man's home after he invited her to his house for late-night sex then promptly fell asleep and did not hear her at his door.Taija Russell, 29, is alleged to have sent a series of furious doorstep texts to the slumbering amour before buying lighter fluid, matches and a lighter at a nearby gas station and setting the house in Woodbury, New Jersey, ablaze.

Iran tanker heads to Greece, U.S. warns against helping vessel

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Serial killer who murdered SC teen featured on new season of Netflix’s ‘Mindhunter’

He has a long rap sheet of crimes throughout the South, and a controversial connection to a South Carolina murder.

4 last wolves in Washington pack killed by state hunters

The last four members of a wolf pack that preyed on cattle in a rural Washington state area bordering Canada have been killed by state hunters, prompting protests from environmental groups. The four wolves were part of a pack that originally had seven members and attacked cows, killing or wounding them 29 times since 2018 and nine times over the last month, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife said in a statement last Friday. Agency director Kelly Susewind authorized the killings of the remaining pack members on July 31.

California high school students filmed giving Nazi salutes and singing Nazi war song

A group of around a dozen Orange County, California high school students were filmed giving Nazi salutes at a sports award ceremony.

Jeffrey Epstein signed will two days before suicide as battle for £475m estate begins

Jeffrey Epstein signed a will just two days before he killed himself in jail, new court records show, opening a new legal front in what could be a long battle over the financier’s fortune. Court papers filed last week in the US Virgin Islands list no details of beneficiaries but valued the estate at more than $577 million (£475 million), including more than $56 million in cash. The existence of the will, first reported by the New York Post, raised new questions about Epstein’s final days inside the Metropolitan Correctional Centre, where he was awaiting trial on federal sex trafficking and conspiracy charges. Epstein signed the document on August 8. Less than 48 hours later, he was found dead in his cell, prompting an investigation that has cast a harsh light on staffing shortages at the Manhattan detention centre. Prosecutors on Monday moved to dismiss the indictment against Epstein but have said they are considering charging others with facilitating his alleged abuse of dozens of girls. Death of financier | Epstein's final days The filing of the will, meanwhile, had been closely followed by lawyers representing women who claim they were sexually abused by Epstein when they were teenagers and recruited into his residences to provide him massages. Several lawyers vowed to go after his assets even if the will had named beneficiaries, as Epstein’s death means there will be no trial on the criminal charges against him. One woman filed suit against the estate last week, claiming Epstein repeatedly raped her when she was a teenager. "Give his entire estate to his victims. It is the only justice they can get," one of those lawyers, Lisa Bloom, wrote in an email. "And they deserve it. And on behalf of the Epstein victims I represent, I intend to fight for it." Former federal prosecutor David S. Weinstein, who is now in private practice in Miami but not involved in the Epstein case, said states and US territories have certain timeframes within which to make a claim against someone’s estate. "There are certainly going to be a lot of lawyers involved," Weinstein said. "It’s not going to be over any time soon." A hedge fund manager who hobnobbed with the rich and famous, Epstein owned a Caribbean island, homes in Paris and New York City, a New Mexico ranch and a fleet of high-price cars. A man in a golf cart is seen at a dock in Little St. James Island, one of the properties of financier Jeffrey Epstein, near Charlotte Amalie Credit: Reuters Epstein had more than $112 million worth of equities, according to the will, and nearly $200 million in "hedge funds & private equity investments." Among the properties that will be subject to appraisal and valuation are his collection of fine arts, antiques and other collectibles. As part of his 2008 plea deal to Florida state charges, Epstein made undisclosed financial settlements with dozens of his victims. It’s unclear how those settlements might affect any claims made on his estate. The emergence of the will came as The New York Times released new details about Epstein's final days in Manhattan's high-security Metropolitan Correctional Centre. Exterior view of a 5-storey building on Avenue Foch in Paris' 16th district, location of an apartment that belonged to Jeffrey Epstein Credit: Reuters Citing sources, the newspaper said he hated his vermin-infested cell so much that he paid for lawyers to meet him for up to 12 hours a day in a different room. He rarely washed and slept on the floor instead of his bed, they said. US Attorney General William Barr shook up the leadership at the federal Bureau of Prisons on Monday, removing its acting chief following the suicide of Epstein. Kathleen Hawk Sawyer, a veteran of the Bureau of Prisons, will return to the agency to serve as its director, Mr Barr said. He named another former agency official, Thomas Kane, to serve as her deputy.

A woman tries to rob Family Dollar — and the cashier responds: ‘Not today,’ cops say

Employees at the Family Dollar in the 5000 block of 14th Street West thwarted a robbery attempt just after 9 p.m. on Sunday, according to the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office.

Portland protests: Woman pinned to ground by police officers after spitting towards them

A woman was pinned to the ground by six police officers after she spat towards them during a day of protests between duelling far-right and anti-fascist activists in Portland.Hundreds of far-right protesters and anti-fascist counter-demonstrators swarmed the Oregon city at the weekend for a widely publicised right-wing rally that attracted the attention of Donald Trump.In video circulating online, a woman can be seen walking towards police and spitting at them once before she is wrestled to the floor by a group of officers wearing riot gear.“Police brutality cannot be tolerated on any level," Riley Renn, the woman who filmed the video, told The Independent.“Many of the people who were counter-protesting were also there to speak out against [the] lack of accountability when it comes to the United States and our massive police presence.”It is not clear whether the woman involved was part of an official protest or just a passer-by in the area.Portland Police have been contacted for comment on the incident shown in the video.At least 13 people were arrested in the city on Saturday as officers seized metal poles, bear spray and other weapons during the right-wing rally.On Saturday, Mr Trump showed support for one of the demands of right-wing demonstrators by saying “major consideration” was being given to naming the anti-fascist group Antifa an “organisation of terror”.Leaders of right-wing groups have vowed to return to the city so long as Antifa groups remain active in the area.However, Portland’s mayor Ted Wheeler said Joe Biggs, the organiser of the event, was not welcome in the city."We do not want him here in my city. Period,” Mr Wheeler said, adding that he believed the demonstrations were linked to “a rising white nationalist movement” in the US."Portland, being a very progressive community, is always going to be at or near ground zero of this battle,” he said.More than two dozen local, state and federal law enforcement agencies, including the FBI, were in the city for the event, which was attended by members of the far-right Proud Boys group and Three Percenters militia movement.Lieutenant Tina Jones, a police spokesperson, said there were about 1,200 people on the streets at the peak of the protests.The Proud Boys, who organised the event on Saturday, have been designated a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Centre.The rally was inspired by a viral video of conservative blogger Andy Ngo being attacked by anti-fascist protesters in June.Agencies contributed to this report

Gina Lopez, foe of Philippine mining industry, dies at 65

Former Philippine environment minister Gina Lopez, who led a high-profile fight against the nation's powerful mining industry, died Monday aged 65, her family's media company announced. Lopez rose to international prominence in 2016 by ordering many Philippines mines shuttered on environmental grounds, and also issued a ban on open-pit mining. The Philippines, which is one of the world's top nickel ore producers, has long faced accusations of looking the other way while major firms flout regulations.

Couple who ran a home for troubled boys charged with trafficking children, forced labor

A husband and wife who ran a home for troubled boys in Texas have been arrested a year after the home was raided and eight boys were removed, reports say.

Man accused of killing Nia Wilson to enter plea today

The man accused of stabbing and killing 18-year-old Nia Wilson at the MacArthur BART Station in July 2018 is expected to enter a plea in the case.

Afghanistan mourns, vows to crush militants after attack

As Afghanistan mourned the 63 people killed in a suicide bombing at a Kabul wedding , a brother of the groom spoke through tears of his weariness at the bloodshed in the country and the crushing guilt he felt at having to face his neighbors, many of whom lost relatives in the weekend blast. "Around 20 victims' families live in our very neighborhood," said 22-year-old Ramin, whose brother, Mirwais Alami, survived along with his bride, Raihana. "We don't know how we should look at them," said Ramin, who like many Afghans uses only one name.

Tourists who stole sand from beach in Sardinia could face up to six years in prison

A pair of tourists face up to six years in prison after allegedly stealing a large quantity of sand from the pristine beaches of Sardinia. The French couple were found to have nearly 40kg (90lb) of fine white sand in the boot of their car. The vehicle was stopped during a routine check by border police as the tourists were preparing to board a ferry in Porto Torres, on the north coast of the island, bound for Toulon in France. The sand was found in 14 large plastic bottles and had been taken from a beach near Chia in southern Sardinia. The couple told police that they had no idea they were breaking the law, but they now face between one and six years in jail. The island has battled for years to stop tourists from pinching its sand, shells and pebbles, which are prized as souvenirs or in some cases, for indoor aquariums. WWF has run a campaign against 'beach thieves', reminding tourists that taking sand from Sardinia's shoreline is a crime To try to stop the pillaging, some locals have taken on the role of self-appointed guardians of the beaches. If they see tourists taking sand or shells, they ask them to return the material. If that does not work, they call the police or national park rangers. One of them, Pina Careddu, told an Italian newspaper on Monday that visitors sometimes become rude and aggressive when challenged. “A family of Germans were filling up some bottles with sand. I recorded them on my phone so they couldn’t deny it. The father came towards me in a threatening manner. But in the end he tipped the sand back onto the beach,” Mrs Careddu, 58, told Corriere della Sera. Dubbed “the granny sheriff” of the Sinis peninsula, on the west coast of the island, she is strict even with her grandchildren. “They say, ‘Nana, can’t we take some pebbles home to play with?’ And I say no, if everyone did that, soon there would be no beach left.”

John Delaney draws 11 people to 2020 event – does he truly think he can win?

The former congressman has put $24m of his own cash into an increasingly quixotic presidential run – and he’s ploughing on despite a near total lack of supportJohn Delaney speaks at the Wing Ding fundraiser in Clear Lake, Iowa. What Delaney lacks in support, he makes up for in optimism. Photograph: Brian Cahn/Zuma/Rex/ShutterstockJohn Delaney has poured a staggering $24m of his own money into running for president. He has been campaigning for the White House for more than two years, and in that time has held more than 200 events in Iowa.On one recent Thursday morning, these efforts translated into a grand total of 11 people coming out to see Delaney, at a campaign event in the small town of Algona, in the north of the state.The former Maryland congressman, former businessman and formerly much wealthier candidate is one of a slew of long-shot candidates for the Democratic nomination. In a crowded, historically diverse field, Delaney is part of a group of white, middle-aged men who are forging ahead with their increasingly quixotic presidential campaigns in spite of a collective lack of support.Delaney strode into Miller’s Sports Bar & Grill, one of a chain of bars across Iowa, just after 10am. One of his team had taped a couple of Delaney 2020 campaign posters to a wall in the back of the bar, and a sign-up list was on a table. The crowd, all silver haired apart from a thirtysomething man who walked in late, were sitting patiently at four different tables.Clad in the off-duty politician’s uniform of open-necked shirt, blue jeans and casual brown shoes, Delaney got to work, vigorously shaking 11 hands. One member of the crowd was immediately impressed with the 56-year-old.“You actually look even better than you do on TV,” one woman said.“I think I’m just going to stay around here,” Delaney quipped.If Delaney was disappointed with the turnout, he didn’t show it. Besides, in a way, the 11-person crowd was a positive. The night before, on Delaney’s Facebook page, just two people had said they would attend, and one of those was his campaign director.Delaney, who served in Congress for six years before resigning to run for president, was joking when he said he might just stay around Iowa. But in fact, it would be hard for him to spend more time here. The 58-year-old has made 34 separate visits to the state in two years. This trip was the first of three in August. And the actual vote in Iowa – the state’s caucuses – is still six months away.It’s a grueling schedule. On Thursday alone, Delaney was scheduled to hold five different events in the space of nine and a half hours.With the pleasantries over at Miller’s Delaney dived into his pitch. The two most important questions in 2020, he said, are: “Who can beat Trump?” and: “Who is the best leader for this country at this moment in time?”Delaney gestures at the end of his speech during a visit to the Iowa state fair in Des Moines earlier this month. Photograph: Charlie Neibergall/AP“I believe I’m the right answer to those two questions,” he concluded.Delaney’s problem is that very few people agree. Despite a marathon campaign – he declared his candidacy in July 2017, 18 months before any other major contenders – and a big pot of cash, he is barely registering – even in Iowa. Delaney is currently polling at 1% in the state – in ninth place. Nationally, Delaney has just 0.3% of the vote.But Delaney, an electrician’s son turned millionaire, isn’t about to let a near total lack of support stop him.“I don’t want to be the president just to be the president,” Delaney said at his second event of the day. “I want to be the president to do the job.”Later, Delaney was speaking to a crowd of 15 people, at the Rustic Brew in Hampton, an hour and a half drive east of Algona. He had been allocated an area in the back, in a room with a painting of a reindeer on one wall. Delaney had almost immediately been interrupted by a man wearing a Vietnam cap.The man complained about veterans’ hospitals. Delaney, hoping to appease him, said he would allow veterans to visit a wider range of hospitals for their care. The man in the cap said that was exactly the plan he was opposed to. Delaney said he would talk to him about it later, then carried on with his speech. The man in the cap slumped in his chair, mumbling something to himself.The main part of Delaney’s pitch is that he can beat Donald Trump and actually pass legislation, whereas, in his view, people such as the leftwing senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders are making “impossible promises”. After Delaney criticized the more ambitious proposals of his rivals during the recent televised Democratic debates, Warren chopped him down, telling the audience: “I don’t understand why anybody goes to all the trouble of running for president of the United States just to talk about what we really can’t do and shouldn’t fight for.”Far from being cowed by that, Delaney told the Guardian that if he could change one thing about his campaign, he actually would have plugged his centrist credentials earlier.“The kind of sharp contrasts I’m making now, I would have made them earlier,” Delaney said.But what Delaney lacks in support, he makes up for in optimism. He brushed off concerns that he won’t make the next Democratic debates – the bar for entry is far higher for the next round, in mid-September – by insisting he could make the one after that, because he expects other candidates to drop out.As Delaney closed out at the Rustic Brew, his campaign manager abruptly announced that the rest of the day’s events were cancelled. He had only completed two out of five. The campaign manager put it down to a schedule conflict. John Delaney at the Iowa state fair in Des Moines, on 9 August. Photograph: Eric Thayer/ReutersThe Guardian chased Delaney down in Des Moines the next day, where he was appearing at the Iowa state fair. Delaney spent some time prodding pork chops on a grill – a classic state fair photo opportunity – before speaking for about 15 minutes to a crowd, again pitching his centrist vision. He drew a decent number of people, but his crowd was dwarfed by those who came out for speeches by Warren, Sanders and Biden.Delaney is probably right when he says other people will soon quit the race. The California congressman Eric Swalwell ended his campaign in July, citing a lack of money and a lack of support. Colorado ex-governor John Hickenlooper dropped out last week. Delaney doesn’t have to make that choice yet. He has loaned his campaign $24m, but according to Forbes, he is worth $200m, so he has plenty of cash left to splurge.But there will surely come a point where he has to make a decision. Given Delaney is polling within the margin of error of zero, that point might come soon.Or perhaps Delaney, ever the optimist, could bide his time. If Trump wins in 2020, then there’s always 2024. If Delaney doesn’t bankrupt himself first, maybe he could be a contender.At the very least, he will know his way around Iowa.

'Ticking time bomb': Violence surges amid guard shortage, lockdown at Mississippi prison

As a lockdown at this Mississippi prison enters its seventh month, violence is rampant. It's "not a sustainable situation," ACLU official says. Others agree.

Dick Cheney to appear at Trump 2020 fundraiser as Republican establishment bows to president

Former vice president Dick Cheney will appear at a fundraiser for Donald Trump’s 2020 campaign, according to an invitation for the event, in a sign that the Republican establishment will publicly back his re-election bid.Mr Trump won the Republican nomination in 2016 as an outsider and has often clashed with senior figures in the party, such as Mitt Romney and the late John McCain.However, an invitation to a luncheon fundraiser in Jackson, Wyoming, shows Mr Cheney will appear alongside Ivanka Trump, Jared Kushner and acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, according to The Washington Post.He will attend the event with his daughter Liz Cheney, who is a Republican congresswoman for Wyoming, for the fundraising group “Trump Victory”.Mr Cheney, who was George W Bush‘s vice president, previously said Mr Trump’s 2015 call for a “a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States,” went “against everything [America] stands for and believes in”.Earlier this year, Mr Cheney also clashed with Mike Pence, the current vice president, over the administration’s foreign policy, criticising Mr Trump’s hard-line approach towards US allies in Nato.The invitation reportedly does not list the official titles of Mr Mulvaney, Ms Trump or Mr Kushner and insists that “their participation in the event is not a solicitation of funds”.Officials for the Trump campaign confirmed the event but would not say how much tickets would cost.Trump Victory has been known to charge up to six-figure amounts for tickets to its events.“Representative Cheney is honoured to be co-hosting this event and working hard to support President Trump’s re-election,” a spokesperson for Ms Cheney said in a statement. “The president’s policies are benefiting Wyoming and the nation.”The structure of the Trump Victory committee, which raises funds for both the Trump 2020 campaign and the Republican National Committee (RNC), has shown how the president has been accepted into the Republican Party’s mainstream.By merging his re-election campaign with the national party, Mr Trump has become less vulnerable to an Republican opponent challenging him in the 2020 primary.However, linking the RNC to Mr Trump’s divisive presidency may be risky in the long-term for the Republican Party.In recent weeks, billionaire Stephen Ross has faced calls for a boycott of his Equinox luxury fitness company over his plans to hold a fundraiser for Mr Trump in the Hamptons.Additional reporting by agencies

Chinese envoy lashes 'ignorant' Pacific aid critics

China's ambassador to Samoa labelled critics of Beijing's activities in the Pacific "ignorant" and "prejudiced" Tuesday in the latest testy public missive from the rising Asian superpower's diplomatic corps. Beijing's growing influence in the Pacific islands was a major theme at a tense regional summit in Tuvalu last week, where Australia tried to reassert leadership in an area it traditionally regards as its sphere of influence. Instead, Canberra faced criticism over its lack of action on climate change, with leaders such as Fijian Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama saying they preferred China's brand of diplomacy to "condescending" Australia.

He was found hurt near downtown shuffleboard courts. Cops say it was an attempted homicide

Police are asking anyone with information to come forward.

Driver pins paramedic against her ambulance in Walmart parking lot, NC police say

The woman was airlifted to a hospital with serious leg injuries, officials say.

How the Government Creates Wealth Inequality

There are economic storm clouds on the horizon, but for now wages are rising, jobs are plentiful, and poverty is falling. Democrats running for president need an economic line of attack, so the solution has been to focus on wealth inequality. Senator Bernie Sanders claims that there has been a “massive transfer of wealth from the middle class to the top one percent.” Senator Elizabeth Warren lambastes America’s “extreme concentration of wealth.” Even the establishment Joe Biden laments, “This wealth gap that exists in the United States of America is so profound now.”Wealth inequality has risen in recent years, but by far less than the Democrats and many media articles imply. The scarier claims about inequality usually stem from the flawed data created by French economist Thomas Piketty and his colleagues. More careful studies by other economists and the Federal Reserve Board reveal surprisingly modest changes in wealth inequality given the huge revolutions in globalization and technology that have occurred.Are increases in wealth inequality the awful thing that Democrats claim? It depends on what causes them. Much of the recent modest rise in wealth inequality stems from innovations in our economy that are pulling everyone up. Brian Acton and Jan Koum, for example, built huge multibillion dollar fortunes by creating WhatsApp, which provides free phone service for 1.5 billion users globally.Acton and Koum’s success may have increased the wealth owned by the top 1 percent, but their product has created massive consumer value as well. Most of the wealthiest Americans are entrepreneurs who have fueled economic growth, which is clear in examining the Forbes 400 list. Wealth created this way is not the zero-sum struggle that Democrats imagine it is.That is the good news. The bad news is that the government itself generates wealth inequality in at least two ways that make us worse off. First, governments give subsidies, regulatory preferences, and other crony-capitalist benefits to wealthy insiders. In the recent Fat Leonard scandal, for example, Leonard Francis gained hundreds of millions of dollars of government contracts by cozying up to Navy officers and providing them with gifts, prostitutes, and other favors to get them to do his bidding.The other way that the government fuels wealth inequality is a deeper scandal. The expansion of social programs over the decades has undermined incentives for lower- and middle-income families to save while reducing their ability to save because of higher taxes. Government programs have displaced or “crowded out” wealth-building by all American families but the richest.Politicians complain loudly about wealth inequality, but their own policies are generating it. This issue receives too little policy attention, but it is profoundly important and reveals the hypocrisy of the political left.Many Americans have saved little for retirement because Social Security discourages them doing so, as does the heavy 12.4 percent wage tax that funds the program. Economist Martin Feldstein found that every dollar increase in Social Security benefits reduces private savings by about 50 cents.Social Security accounts for a larger share of retirement income for the non-rich than for the rich, so this crowd-out effect increases wealth inequality. In a simulation model, Jagadeesh Gokhale and Laurence Kotlikoff estimated that Social Security raises the share of overall wealth held by the top 1 percent of wealth holders by about 80 percent. This occurs because the program leaves the non-rich with “proportionately less to save, less reason to save, and a larger share of their old-age resources in a nonbequeathable form.”A study by Baris Kaymak and Markus Poschke built a model of the U.S. economy to estimate the causes of rising wealth inequality. They found that most of the rise in the top 1 percent share of wealth in recent decades was caused by technological changes and wage dispersion, but the expansion of Social Security and Medicare caused about one-quarter of the increase. They concluded that the “redistributive nature of transfer payments was instrumental in curbing wealth accumulation for income groups outside the top 10% and, consequently, amplified wealth concentration in the U.S.”More government benefits result in less private wealth, especially for the non-rich. It is not just Social Security and Medicare that displaces private saving, but also unemployment insurance, welfare, and other social spending. Some social programs have “asset tests” that deliberately discourage saving.Total federal and state social spending as a share of gross domestic product soared from 6.8 percent in 1970 to 14.3 percent in 2018. That increase in handouts occurred over the same period that wealth inequality appears to have increased. Generations of Americans have grown up assuming that the government will take care of them when they are sick, unemployed, and retired, so they put too little money aside for future expenses.Cross-country studies support these conclusions. A 2015 study by Pirmin Fessler and Martin Schurz examined European data and found that “inequality of wealth is higher in countries with a relatively more developed welfare state . . . given an increase of welfare state expenditure, wealth inequality measured by standard relative inequality measures, such as the Gini coefficient, will increase.”A study by Credit Suisse found: “Strong social security programs — good public pensions, free higher education or generous student loans, unemployment and health insurance — can greatly reduce the need for personal financial assets. . . . This is one explanation for the high level of wealth inequality we identify in Denmark, Norway and Sweden: the top groups continue to accumulate for business and investment purposes, while the middle and lower classes have a less pressing need for personal saving.”That is why it is absurd for politicians such as Sanders and Warren to decry wealth inequality and then turn around and demand European-style expansions in our social programs. The bigger our welfare state, the more wealth inequality we will have.The solution is to transition to savings-based social programs. Numerous countries have Social Security systems based on private savings accounts. Chile has unemployment-insurance savings accounts. Martin Feldstein proposed a savings-based approach to Medicare. The assets in such savings accounts would be inheritable, unlike the benefits from current U.S. social programs.Sanders and Warren are right to criticize crony capitalism as a cause of wealth inequality. But their big government approaches to social policy would have the opposite effect on wealth inequality than what they may believe.

Russia accuses U.S. of stoking tensions with missile test: TASS

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Polish Government Hit by Hate-Campaign Allegations Before Polls

(Bloomberg) -- Poland’s Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki demanded immediate explanations after a report said the Justice Ministry was engaged in a smear-campaign against judges who criticized government reforms.The scandal comes 52 days before Poland holds parliamentary elections, which will determine the country’s course after a four-year drift away from the European Union’s mainstream and the bloc’s democratic values. The Justice Ministry has not yet responded to allegations in the article that was published on Onet.pl, one of Poland’s largest news portals.According to Onet.pl, Deputy Justice Minister Lukasz Piebiak coordinated a campaign to discredit judges, including by publishing fabricated and personal information about them on social media. The Justice Ministry has orchestrated a series of judicial revamps since 2015, which give politicians more sway over courts and have triggered unprecedented lawsuits by the EU over whether they adhere to rule-of-law standards.“This is an assault on the judicial branch coming from the Justice Ministry, so the scope of this scandal is beyond any scale,” Anna Materska-Sosnowska, a political scientist at Warsaw University, said by phone. “In normal circumstances this should provoke an earthquake and a wave of dismissals at the Justice Ministry. Will is happen two months ahead of elections? I don’t think so.”Morawiecki’s spokesman Piotr Muller said before a cabinet meeting that the premier expects explanations from Piebiak by the end of the day. The Justice Ministry’s press office wasn’t immediately available for comment when reached by phone.To contact the reporter on this story: Marek Strzelecki in Warsaw at mstrzelecki1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Andrea Dudik at adudik@bloomberg.net, Wojciech Moskwa, Torrey ClarkFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.

Florida 'stand your ground' trial begins for deadly dispute over handicapped parking spot

The manslaughter trial for Michael Drejka, the man involved in a deadly dispute over a handicapped parking spot in Florida, was set to begin Monday.

US negotiators trying to end the Afghanistan war are frustrated that Trump keeps giving the Taliban a stronger hand

Trump sees himself as a powerful negotiator, but in Afghanistan his desire to withdraw forces his negotiator to work with "one hand behind his back."

New planet discovered in orbit of young Milky Way star

A second planet has been discovered circling Beta Pictoris, a fledgling star in our own galaxy offering astronomers a rare glimpse of a planetary system in the making, according to a study published Monday. "We talking about a giant planet about 3,000 times more massive than Earth, situated 2.7 times further from its star than the Earth is from the Sun," said Anne-Marie Lagrange, an astronomer at France's National Centre for Scientific Research and lead author of a study in Nature Astronomy. Like its big sister b Pictoris b, discovered by Lagrange and her team in 2009, it is a gassy giant.

Earthquake cluster slams Kansas county with 11 quakes in 5 days

A county in central Kansas experienced a pretty shocking uptick in seismic activity last week — 11 earthquakes in five days.

British woman accused of illegal silicone buttock implant killing extradited to US

A British woman accused of killing an American woman by injecting her with illegal silicone implants has been extradited to the United States to stand trial.Donna Francis, a former hairdresser from Loughton, Essex, is charged with criminally negligent homicide and unauthorised practice of a profession in the death of Kelly Mayhew, who died in 2015 after receiving a basement injection of silicone buttock implants from Ms Francis in New York.

Space telescope offers rare glimpse of Earth-sized rocky exoplanet

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Kathleen Blanco, Louisiana's governor during Katrina, dies

Former Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco, who became the state's first female elected governor only to see her political career derailed by the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, has died. After struggling for years with cancer, Blanco died Sunday in hospice care in Lafayette. Please pray for God's peace to carry us through the coming days and months of sorrow as we mourn her absence from our lives," Blanco's family said in a statement released by Gov. John Bel Edwards' office.

Turkey Fires Kurdish Mayors Ahead of Military Push Into Syria

(Bloomberg) -- Turkey fired the elected mayors of three major Kurdish-dominated cities in the country’s southeast and detained more than 400 people in a crackdown as it prepares to push a Syrian Kurdish militia away from its border.The mayors of Diyarbakir, Mardin and Van were removed Monday for their alleged ties to the PKK, an autonomy-seeking Kurdish group classified as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the U.S. and the European Union. Police used water cannons to disperse hundreds of Kurdish protesters outside the mayor’s office in Diyarbakir, according to footage by Arti TV.While Turkish authorities have in the past evicted Kurdish officials at times of heightened political tension at home, this time the moves were seen as linked to a long-promised military operation in northern Syria.President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has vowed to carve out a frontier buffer zone that will be off-limits to the Syrian YPG militia, which authorities say has links to the PKK. The seizure of three Turkish municipalities with a population of about 3.7 million people where the PKK traditionally enjoys strong backing aims to prevent any support for the militants.But it also renewed accusations that Erdogan and his nationalist allies are damaging Turkey’s democracy by attacking the pro-Kurdish HDP after it swept back to office in ballots in the southeast and helped Turkey’s main opposition party to win mayoral races in the capital and the nation’s commercial hub.“All political parties and society should react to this coup against the will of the people,” Garo Paylan, an HDP lawmaker, said on Twitter. “If you remain silent, then the next in line could be Ankara and Istanbul.”Erdogan warned before local elections in March that his government would not hesitate to replace HDP mayors if they are deemed to be linked to Kurdish militants. The HDP has faced a broad clampdown since it won enough votes to enter parliament in 2015. Since then, the government has jailed hundreds of Kurdish politicians and seized about 100 municipalities in the southeast.The HDP denies it’s influenced by the PKK and blames the group’s armed rebellion on a history of repressive policies toward Kurds.All three mayors were elected with a majority of votes on March 31. Diyarbakir Mayor Adnan Selcuk Mizrakli got 63% of the provincial vote, while Mardin Mayor Ahmet Turk had 56% and Van Mayor Bedia Ozgokce Ertan received 54% support.Officials have said they expect a headquarters for the expected joint operation by Turkey and the U.S., which supported the Syrian YPG in the fight against Islamic State, to be up and running this week.(Updates with context in third paragraph.)To contact the reporters on this story: Selcan Hacaoglu in Ankara at shacaoglu@bloomberg.net;Taylan Bilgic in Istanbul at tbilgic2@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Onur Ant at oant@bloomberg.net, Mark Williams, Alaa ShahineFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.

Sex Offenders Arrested at McDonald's Playground in Memphis

Two registered violent sex offenders were arrested at a Raleigh McDonald's after police say they were found watching children at the playground.

Trump is 'not happy' with Fox News over poll results

After a series of unfavorable polls from Fox News’ polling unit, President Trump has stepped up his complaints about the network, which he no longer considers a reliable ally.

Foreigners arrested with ivory bracelets at Kenyan airport

A Spanish woman has become the second foreigner in a week to be arrested at Kenya's international airport for wearing an ivory bangle, the wildlife service said Monday. Spaniard Maria Pich-Aguilera, 50, was arrested on Sunday evening and pleaded guilty, paying a fine of one million shillings ($9,800) for illegal possession of ivory. The Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) said in a statement she was "arrested at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport with an ivory bangle," while travelling from Nairobi to Tanzania's financial capital Dar es Salaam.