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Information from some sites may not be reliable, or may not be vetted.
Some sources may require subscription.
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from Asia Times Online
PML(N) government is on the back foot following media revelations of a report linking lawmakers to proscribed militant outfits. With no-one taking responsibility for its provenance, what it truly reveals about Pakistani politics remains unanswered.
US turns heat on old foe Hezbollah, slaps rewards on leaders
Counterterrorism officials' comments set the tone ahead of President Trump's announcement of a new Iran strategy
Puigdemont’s speech “will have legal consequences,” sources tell right-wing newspaper
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from Chicago Tribune
Federal judge strikes down tax-free housing for clergy
A federal judge in Wisconsin has struck down as unconstitutional a law that gives clergy tax-free housing allowances, in a ruling that could have far-reaching ramifications for religious leaders who have fought for years to keep the substantial financial benefit. Under the federal law passed in 1954, a "minister of the gospel" doesn't pay income taxes on compensation that is designated part of a housing allowance. The Freedom From Religion Foundation, based in Madison, argued that the law discriminates against secular employees.
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Federal judge strikes down tax-free housing for clergy
A federal judge in Wisconsin has struck down as unconstitutional a law that gives clergy tax-free housing allowances, in a ruling that could have far-reaching ramifications for religious leaders who have fought for years to keep the substantial financial benefit. Under the federal law passed in 1954, a "minister of the gospel" doesn't pay income taxes on compensation that is designated part of a housing allowance. The Freedom From Religion Foundation, based in Madison, argued that the law discriminates against secular employees.
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from FEE (Foundation for Economic Education)
RIGHT-CENTER BIAS, HIGH, non-profit organization
If You Give the State an Inch, It Will Take a Mile
Hayek wasn’t infallible. And in chapter three of The Road to Serfdom , he makes some arguments in favor of “harmless” market intervention that call for scrutiny.
Confessions of a Retired Economics Teacher
The thing I will miss most is seeing the light bulb go on for students.
Classical Liberalism and the Problem of Race in America
The inspiring words of the Declaration of Independence hailed a transformative conception of the human condition by declaring that all men were created equal and endowed with the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. So where was the moral fervor demanding the end to segregation laws and racial prejudice among libertarians in the twentieth-century?
The American Spirit Dwells in Ideals, Not Symbols
Deviations from high principles do not justify rejecting those principles.
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from The Guardian (UK)
LEFT-CENTER BIAS, HIGH, daily newspaper
Queen backs action against modern slavery in all Commonwealth nations
Sources claim monarch personally keen to see action on stamping out trafficking and exploitation being promoted across the 52 countries.
Puerto Rico: US officials privately acknowledge serious food shortage
Federal officials privately admit there is a massive shortage of meals in Puerto Rico three weeks after Hurricane Maria devastated the island. Officials at the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) say that the government and its partners are only providing 200,000 meals a day to meet the needs of more than 2 million people. That is a daily shortfall of between 1.8m and 5.8m meals.
Queen backs action against modern slavery in all Commonwealth nations
Sources claim monarch personally keen to see action on stamping out trafficking and exploitation being promoted across the 52 countries.
Puerto Rico: US officials privately acknowledge serious food shortage
Federal officials privately admit there is a massive shortage of meals in Puerto Rico three weeks after Hurricane Maria devastated the island. Officials at the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) say that the government and its partners are only providing 200,000 meals a day to meet the needs of more than 2 million people. That is a daily shortfall of between 1.8m and 5.8m meals.
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from KHQ Local News (NBC Spokane)
Lack of workers hurting harvest
Farmers across the state of Washington are having the same problem there are not enough laborer’s to harvest their crops, "It's bad enough as it is," said Ray Schmitten. Nestled in the Wenatchee River Valley stands a small pear farm that's struggling to harvest their fruit crop this season because of the lack of workers, "what we found is over the last couple of years is actually as many as five years, is less people coming in an aging population of people that are willing to do this type of work." said Ray.
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from Mises Institute
[Information from this site may not be reliable.]Anti-gold advocates claim that precious metals are wasteful. This is hardly convincing when we look at the fat budgets and payrolls of central banks.
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from Orthodox Christianity
Kim Davis, the Kentucky country clerk who refused to sign same-sex marriage licenses in the wake of the Supreme Court’s Obergefell v. Hodges decision in 2015, is currently on a speaking tour in Romania, sharing her experiences in the battles surrounding same-sex marriage and freedom of religion in the U.S.
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from The Post and Courier
Newspaper in Charleston, South Carolina
Myth of black Confederates won't go away
On Monday, two Republican legislators in South Carolina, Bill Chumley and Mike Burns, called for a monument honoring African Americans who fought for the Confederacy to be erected at the State House in Columbia. Rep. Burns hopes the monument will “help educate current and future generations of a little known” chapter of South Carolina history. It is “little known” in large part because the story of these loyal black Confederates is a myth.
Newspaper in Charleston, South Carolina
Myth of black Confederates won't go away
On Monday, two Republican legislators in South Carolina, Bill Chumley and Mike Burns, called for a monument honoring African Americans who fought for the Confederacy to be erected at the State House in Columbia. Rep. Burns hopes the monument will “help educate current and future generations of a little known” chapter of South Carolina history. It is “little known” in large part because the story of these loyal black Confederates is a myth.
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from The Spokesman-Review
Landmarks: Restored gates dedicated at Spokane County Courthouse
Dedication of the Iron Gates monument on campus at the Spokane County Courthouse is this Friday at 11am.
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from Sputnik
(Russian government-supported propaganda channel)
US maneuvers to, among other things, take down the Russian flag at Russian diplomatic facilities in the US are "perfectly legal," the US State Department announced Thursday afternoon. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov communicated to his US counterpart, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, that the removal of Russian flags was unacceptable. On Wednesday, US authorities ordered the removal of the flags at the Consulate General in San Francisco and at the Russian Trade Representation building in Washington, DC. Moscow is "prepared" to file a lawsuit "in order to return the diplomatic property that had been illegally seized," according a statement the Russian Foreign Ministry issued Wednesday.
Early on Friday, yet another earthquake was detected near the Punggye-ri nuclear test site in North Korea, where Chinese scientists have warned that more nuclear tests could cause the mountain to crumble in on itself and spread radiation. The earthquake was small, according to media reports, but large enough to cause entire buildings in Russia and China to shake, the Daily Mail reported. Previous tests have caused earthquakes in the area surrounding North Korea's only known nuclear testing location.
Senator John McCain has accused Donald Trump of stalling on the new anti-Russian sanctions approved by Congress this summer, sending an urgent appeal together with Democratic Senator Ben Cardin expressing his concern. Speaking to Sputnik, Russian Senator Vladimir Jabarov admitted that Moscow isn't paying much attention to McCain these days. In their appeal, made public Wednesday, McCain and Cardin stressed that it was "imperative" for the White House to "implement the [sanctions] law to its fullest extent and to uphold and protect American interests," particularly in light of the "ongoing threat that Russia poses to the US and our other allies."
The Harvey Weinstein sexual assault scandal has taken a decidedly political turn, with former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton catching major flack on social media for her belated and weak attempt to distance herself from the disgraced Hollywood producer.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in a phone conversation with his US counterpart Rex Tillerson that the removal of flags from the Russian diplomatic missions in the United States is unacceptable, the Russian Foreign Ministry said Thursday.
It is unlikely that the US-Turkish strategic partnership will continue to evolve given the unresolvable contradictions between Ankara and Washington, RIA Novosti contributor Gevorg Mirzayan writes, adding that the recent diplomatic scandal is just a link in a chain of events tracing back to the July 2016 attempted coup in Turkey. Although the US-Turkish partnership has lasted for almost 70 years, sealed by the Truman Doctrine in 1947, it appears that the country's strategic alliance is irreversibly falling apart at the seams, Gevorg Mirzayan, associate professor at the department of political science at the Finance University of the Russian Government, writes for RIA Novosti. According to the academic, Washington and Ankara's interests have recently diverged both in the Middle East war theater and the global arena.
A US military helicopter has crashed in Japan's southernmost prefecture, the Pacific island of Okinawa, causing a storm of frustration among locals. According to reports, the crash, which is the latest in a series of incidents on the island involving US military personnel, has caused no casualties, but acts as a grim reminder of Washington's ongoing project of militarizing the island. In the ashes of Japan's surrender to the allies at the end of World War II, the island functioned as a strategically vital base for US forces throughout the Cold War. Since then, the number of bases on Okinawa has mushroomed, and with it, so have the grievances of the islanders. Sputnik's Matthew Ayton took a closer look at the history of the US' military presence on Okinawa, and its consequences for the local population.
The US exerts more influence on foreign elections than Russia, at least that’s the finding of the poll commissioned by Sputnik and carried out by the French pollster Ifop. George Szamuely, Senior Fellow at the Global Policy Institute of London Metropolitan University, however explained to Sputnik why these results won't have any impact on the US.
Israel will pull out from UNESCO (UN Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization) along with the United States that announced the similar move on Thursday. “Prime Minister Netanyahu welcomes [US] President [Donald] Trump's decision to withdraw from UNESCO, and instructed the Foreign Ministry to prepare Israel's withdrawal from the organization alongside the United States,” the prime minister's press service stated. The development comes hours after the US State Department said in a statement that Washington would withdraw from the international organization at the end of 2018 because of "continuing anti-Israel bias at UNESCO."
On October 11, Madrid asked Catalonia to explain whether it had declared independence. It could be perceived as the government's attempt to start negotiations amid the critical situation, Mexican expert Luis Huacuja told Sputnik Mundo.
The United States has announced that it will withdraw from UNESCO at the end of 2018, citing a need for reform and an anti-Israel bias in the organization, State Department spokesperson Heather Nauert said in a statement on Thursday. "On October 12, 2017, the Department of State notified UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova of the US decision to withdraw from the organization … This decision was not taken lightly, and reflects US concerns with mounting arrears at UNESCO, the need for fundamental reform in the organization, and continuing anti-Israel bias at UNESCO," Nauert said, adding that the decision would take effect on December 31, 2018.
Andreas Maurer, a German lawmaker who arrived in Russia's Crimea with a delegation of businessmen and politicians, has outlined his views on the economic development of the region and the idea that Russia should pay Ukraine compensation for reuniting with the peninsula, in an interview with Sputnik.
The recently reached reconciliation deal between the rival political parties Fatah and Hamas provides the chance to put an end to the 10-year-split and the possible establishment of a unified Palestinian National Authority.
The safety of North Korean nuclear tests for the North Korean population is highly questionable. So highly, in fact, that South Korea's Ministry of Unification had to announce that the Defectors from the North that originate from the Punggye-ri nuclear test site's vicinity will undergo checks for radiation-induced illnesses such as cancer and thyroid gland dysfunction. Despite reports of conditions that may be linked to radiation poisoning kept appearing for years, the decision has only now been made to begin testing defectors. For example, the Korean Times quotes a defector, who crossed the border back in 2015, saying: "From 2013, patients with severe fatigue and weight loss sporadically started appearing. Since they could not afford to visit the doctor, those affected usually went to a shaman."
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from Zero Hedge
CONSPIRACY-PSEUDOSCIENCE, MIXED, financial blog with aggregated news and opinion
Vegas Hotel Worker Warned Police Of Shooter Before Massacre Began
In one of the most shocking developments to emerge in the week-and-a-half since Stephen Paddock killed 59 people and wounded more than 500 others during the worst mass shooting in US history, NBC is reporting that a maintenance worker said Wednesday he told hotel dispatchers to call police and report a gunman had opened fire with a rifle inside Mandalay Bay before Paddock began firing on the Harvest country music festival below. Worker Stephen Schuck told NBC News that he was checking out a report of a jammed fire door on the 32nd floor of Mandalay Bay when he heard Paddock shoot security guard Jesus Campos in the leg. After the shooting, Campos peeked out from an alcove and told Schuck to take cover.
Madrid Gives Catalonia 5 Day Ultimatum To Clarify If It Declared Independence
With Spain’s prime minister having opened earlier in the day the path for Madrid to use a constitutional “nuclear option” to suspend Catalonia’s autonomy, demanding that the regional government makes clear whether it considers itself independent, moments ago Spain's Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy gave Catalan President Carles Puigdemont a five day ultimatum to clarify whether he actually declared the region's independence in his speech devoted to the highly controversial referendum, and another 3 to "rectify it." Spain’s leader said that it’s important for Catalonia’s leader to get his answer right on whether he declared independence or not. Rajoy, addressing Spain’s parliament, says that that Catalan president Carles Puigdemont “just needs to say he didn’t declare independence.”
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