Polls show Vermont senator’s base is more dedicated than that of any other 2020 Democrat
Bernie Sanders’s most adamant backers expect that he will be the Democratic nominee for president, but if it ends up looking like someone else may take that title, they want Mr. Sanders to put up a fight.

Mr. Sanders’s campaign has made it clear that to win the nomination, he would have to pull off an ambitious expansion of the electorate. His campaign says it is banking on turning out a coalition of young, working-class and minority voters.

But polls show the Vermont independent’s base is more loyal than that of any other 2020 Democrat, and in interviews over the last four months, Mr. Sanders’s supporters told The Wall Street Journal that they wouldn’t support any other candidate as long as he is running. Those backers—and his massive fundraising—mean that, unlike many of his rivals, Mr. Sanders might not need a marquee win in an early state to stay in the presidential race for months.

Some of Mr. Sanders’s supporters say he should keep running until July, even if that means Democrats will face a contested convention in Milwaukee.

Wall Street Journal
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.wsj.com/amp/articles/bernie-sanderss-loyal-voters-could-keep-him-in-race-for-months-11574611201

*The U.S. wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and Pakistan have cost American taxpayers $6.4 trillion since they began in 2001.
*That total is $2 trillion more than all federal government spending during the recently completed fiscal year.
*The report, from Watson Institute of International and Public Affairs at Brown University, also finds that more than 801,000 people have died as a direct result of fighting.

WASHINGTON — American taxpayers have spent $6.4 trillion on post-9/11 wars and military action in the Middle East and Asia, according to a new study.

That total is $2 trillion more than the entire federal government spending during the recently completed 2019 fiscal year. The U.S. government spent $4.4 trillion during the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, according to the Treasury Department.

The report, from the Watson Institute of International and Public Affairs at Brown University, also finds that more than 801,000 people have died as a direct result of fighting. Of those, more than 335,000 have been civilians. Another 21 million people have been displaced due to violence.

The report comes as the Trump administration works to withdraw the U.S. military presence from war-torn Syria. Last year, President Donald Trump went through a similar debate over whether to withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan, ultimately agreeing to keep them there but only after repeatedly raising questions about why they should stay.

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/20/us-spent-6point4-trillion-on-middle-east-wars-since-2001-study.html?__source=twitter%7Cmain

Source: BBC

14 November 2019 Europe

An international inquiry into the downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 believes high-level Russian officials were directing separatists in eastern Ukraine linked to the attack.

Investigators allege a top aide of President Vladimir Putin was in contact with rebel leaders on a regular basis.

All 298 people on board were killed when a missile struck the plane over rebel-held territory on 17 July 2014.

Russia's foreign ministry has rejected the latest findings.

Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said international investigators had manipulated the inquiry to suit a predetermined conclusion.

Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/amp/world-europe-50419669

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Open source investigators already linked the MH17 bombing to Russia backed rebels years ago.

https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2017/07/17/mh17-open-source-investigation-three-years-later/

Under the proposal, localities would be incentivized to significantly decrease prison populations.


Democratic Representative Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts unveiled a sweeping resolution today calling for state and local governments to decrease prison populations, abolish cash bail, and end the system of charging people fines and fees to fund local court systems, among a host of other proposals.

Pointing to the scale, racial disparities, costs, and harms of the United States’s vast prison system, Pressley’s resolution lays out dozens of concrete proposals that would result in a smaller prison system and would allow for more alternatives like diversion and restorative justice programs. The resolution, which she is calling The People’s Justice Guarantee, would redefine the national debate on criminal justice in the same ways the Green New Deal is intended to shape discussion of climate change.

“The criminal legal system is racist, xenophobic, rogue, and fundamentally flawed beyond reform,” Pressley told reporters on a call Wednesday. “It must be dismantled and radically transformed through a large-scale decarceration effort.”

In recent years, localities across the country have worked to dismantle mass incarceration by electing progressive prosecutors and passing reforms, like the end of mandatory minimums and cash bail. Pressley’s proposal would extend that momentum as the most comprehensive, progressive vision for reform on the federal level.

https://theappeal.org/rep-ayanna-pressley-unveils-sweeping-plan-to-reshape-american-criminal-legal-system/

On Friday, House investigators released the transcript of the former National Security Council official Fiona Hill’s testimony from last month. It showed a Republican staff member trying and failing to get Hill to concede that there might be some validity to the conspiracy theories underlying Donald Trump’s demands of President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine.

“Are you familiar with the, you know, the allegation about Serhiy Leshchenko?” asked the Republican aide, Steve Castor. He added, “You know, relating to publicizing Manafort’s role in the Ukraine?”

Leshchenko, whom I interviewed in October, is a former member of Parliament in Ukraine and probably the most famous investigative journalist in the country. He helped expose the so-called black ledger that listed $12.7 million in secret payments to Paul Manafort, Trump’s former campaign chairman, from his client Viktor Yanukovych, the wildly corrupt Russian-aligned oligarch who ruled Ukraine until 2014. Manafort is in federal prison in part for failing to disclose or pay taxes on the millions he sucked out of Ukraine. Nevertheless, to make Trump’s demands of Zelensky seem just and rational, some Republicans have started painting Manafort as the victim of Leshchenko’s plotting.

Hill, a Russia expert and co-author of a psychological study of Vladimir Putin, tried to shut down this line of questioning. “The Ukrainian government did not interfere in the U.S. election,” she said, adding, “The Ukrainian Special Services also did not interfere in our election.” As the Republican questions continued, Hill seems to have grown almost indignant. “I’m really worried about these conspiracy theories, and I’m worried that all of you are going to go down a rabbit hole, you know, looking for things that are not going to be at all helpful to the American people or to our future election in 2020,” she said.


https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/11/opinion/republicans-trump-impeachment-hearings.html

https://twitter.com/business/status/1194482199178948608

Greece and China in Athens Monday signed 16 agreements in sectors including energy, agriculture, tourism and ports.


Chinese President Xi Jinping is on an official visit to Greece for follow-up meetings with Greek officials, after Premier Kyriakos Mitsotakis visited China last week. At that time, the leaders said they wanted to expand relations between two of the world’s oldest civilizations.

China and Greece “are natural partners” for the creation of the one belt, one road initiative, Xi said after meeting with Mitsotakis. The two countries will cooperate in many sectors and “we want to strengthen the transit role of Piraeus Port to expand bilateral trade and to invest in energy, transportation and the banking sector.”

Chinese tourists gathered in Athens’ central Syntagma Square, clutching small flags from both countries as Xi laid a wreath at the tomb of the unknown soldier.

“We’re opening a road that will soon become a freeway as our cooperation will be significantly enforced,” Mitsotakis said. The common goal of both countries is for half a million Chinese tourists to visit Greece in 2021, he said.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-11-11/greece-china-sign-16-deals-in-sectors-including-energy?utm_content=business&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&cmpid=socialflow-twitter-business&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic

https://twitter.com/hollyotterbein/status/1194461748826460160

Bernie Sanders met privately with Hispanic lawmakers on Tuesday.

Sanders, who has aggressively courted Latino voters in his 2020 bid for the White House, is the third presidential candidate to sit down with Latino members under the auspices of BOLD PAC, the fundraising arm of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus. Joe Biden and Elizabeth Warren have also talked with BOLD PAC.

Sanders spoke about immigration, Medicare for All, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals and other issues, including his family’s immigrant roots. A Latino caucus member in the room said several undecided lawmakers were present, and that Sanders did not exclusively talk about economic issues.

“It was not what I expected. It was pretty impressive,” said the member. “He was very comfortable with us. He impressed the caucus, to be honest.”

https://www.politico.com/amp/news/2019/11/12/sanders-meets-with-hispanic-lawmakers-070402?__twitter_impression=true

Source: AP

By STEVE LeBLANC
6 minutes ago

BOSTON (AP) — A federal court in Boston has ruled that warrantless U.S. government searches of the phones and laptops of international travelers at airports and other U.S. ports of entry violate the Fourth Amendment.

Tuesday’s ruling in U.S. District Court came in a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union and the Electronic Frontier Foundation on behalf of 11 travelers whose smartphones and laptops were searched without individualized suspicion at U.S. ports of entry.

ACLU attorney Esha Bhandari said the ruling strengthens the Fourth Amendment protections of international travelers who enter the United States every year.

The ACLU describes the searches as “fishing expeditions.” They say border officers must now demonstrate individualized suspicion of contraband before they can search a traveler’s electronic device.

Read more: https://apnews.com/25c8054b9c16409aaef355a1c20e3481

Recently, the administration announced it was sending troops to Syria to protect the oil fields. This just after deploying troops to Saudi Arabia for the same thing. And the U.S. has had troops in Iraq and Kuwait guarding the oil fields for years.

Now, all of a sudden, ARAMCO (Arabian American Oil Company) has decided to launch its IPO and go on the stock market. Why all of a sudden is ARAMCO so willing to share the goose that lays the golden egg? Saudi Arabia, which funded the 9/11 attacks and the richest oil companies in America, wants to share the wealth ?

Is there a connection between the need for troops to guard the oil fields and this IPO? Is ARAMCO going to say they need U.S. troops to protect the American investor? If so, then ARAMCO and its investors need to get a bill for keeping those troops there.

Protecting the assets of a private company isn’t the U.S. taxpayers’ responsibility. Most importantly, U.S. troops shouldn’t be anyone’s security guards.

U.S. citizens better start paying attention to the whole picture and not their own personal issues.

https://www.palmbeachpost.com/opinion/20191109/us-troops-shouldnt-be-security-guards-for-private-oil-company