CHARLOTTE'S NEWS WEB, POLITICS Comments turned off

Former Obama adviser Plouffe predicts ‘historical level’ of turnout by Trump supporters BY JOE CONCHA

Posted By on April 2nd, 2020

https://thehill.com/homenews/media/490810-former-obama-adviser-plouffe-predicts-

Former Obama campaign manager David Plouffe on Thursday predicted that supporters of President Trump will turn out “at a historical level” on Election Day, creating a “very dangerous” scenario for former Vice President Joe Biden.

Plouffe, speaking on the “Fox News Rundown” podcast shortly after record-high jobless claims were announced, said Trump voters will head to the polls to cast their ballots for the president despite the coronavirus pandemic and economic fallout.

“You look at the economic situation and say, ‘How can an incumbent win in that?’ But, you know, no one’s blaming Trump for the damage,” Plouffe said. “I think if you can lay his crisis response at his feet and connect that to the economy, I do think that’s some headwind he’s got to run into.”

Plouffe, who was considered the architect of former President Obama’s successful 2008 White House bid, said Trump is still well positioned for repeat victories in Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin “because his base is so solid.”

ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

A strong US 5G sector promises good jobs and better security BY REP. RAJA KRISHNAMOORTHI (D-ILL.)

Posted By on April 2nd, 2020

https://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/technology/490745-a-strong-us-5g-sector-p

On Dec. 12, 1901, Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi demonstrated the very first transatlantic radio-wave transmission and ushered in a new age of wireless communications. More than a century later, wireless technology still is one of our primary sources of communication. But as our radio-wave highways become increasingly congested, each new generation of wireless technology is forced to ascend into higher and higher frequencies. The fifth generation of wireless technology, known as “5G,” will expand into spectrum bands Marconi could never have foreseen.

Because it will allow data to be transmitted more quickly and efficiently than ever before, 5G technology has the potential to improve everything from search and rescue missions and medical care to transportation, real-time language translation and precision farming. It could allow firefighters to use thermal imaging to see through smoke and locate victims more easily. It could help specialists perform remote robotic surgery on patients who are far away. And it could help American soldiers on the battlefield, giving them real-time information about their adversaries while monitoring their status and location. Such developments could revolutionize the technological landscape and pump trillions of dollars into our global economy. Perhaps most important, 5G could create millions of new U.S. jobs and become integral to our competitiveness in the global marketplace.

But like any new technology, 5G is not without risks. Currently, the only global company that is competitively producing all of the equipment necessary to fully implement 5G is China-based Huawei. While Huawei calls itself “employee-owned,” Chinese laws require companies to assist in national intelligence work unbeknownst to their customers — potentially rendering the equipment unsecure. This presents a major challenge for 5G implementation in the United States, since American companies either have to invent their own equipment or utilize Huawei’s — knowing that it could be accessed by the Chinese government.

ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

Just say no to typical Washington move: A ‘9/11 Commission’ for coronavirus By Andrew C. McCarthy

Posted By on April 2nd, 2020

https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/490694-just-say-no-to-typical-washington-m

NBC News reports that preliminary discussions have begun on Capitol Hill regarding the establishment of a 9/11 Commission-type inquiry about the coronavirus outbreak in the United States. The discussions are said predominantly to involve Democrats and to be focused on the Trump administration’s performance. As outlined, the exercise would smack of the worst aspects of the 9/11 Commission: the partisan blame-game, which eventually petered into the look-like-we’re-doing-something creation of bloated and ludicrously expensive new bureaucracy.

The 9/11 Commission was a brainchild of the political class, which is why Washington remembers it fondly. To be fair, the report it generated was well written, as these extravaganzas go. It was remarkably gimlet-eyed about radical Islamic ideology (what would be more accurately described as sharia supremacism) as the instigator of jihadist terrorism — indeed, much more willing to confront this challenge than the progressive political class’s typical approach of reimagining Islam into a relentlessly “peaceful” creed to which terrorism is anathematic “anti-Muslim activity.”

That said, the 9/11 Commission was primarily an exercise in partisan politics. That is why, in the actual formation of substantive counterterrorism policy, the commission was ignored once Washington’s virtue-signally objectives were achieved. Quite contrary to the commission’s conclusions, it became de rigueur in the Obama years to shift our national security approach to opposing “violent extremism,” on the premise that fundamentalist Islam is no more likely to spur terrorism than movements derived from other religions or political agendas (e.g., limited-government conservatism, Second Amendment advocacy).

WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Evil: Pakistani court overturns murder conviction of Daniel Pearl’s killers By Monica Showalter

Posted By on April 2nd, 2020

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/04/evil_pakistani_court_overturns_murder_conviction_of_daniel_pearls_killers.html

A Pakistani court covered itself with glory by announcing that the al-Qaeda beasts who kidnapped and savagely killed Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl shortly after 9/11 now get their murder convictions overturned and will go free to walk among us again.

Somehow, after all these years, they got it wrong.  The murder never happened, at least not by the slimy hands of these Islamist creeps.  And it was a very bad murder — Pearl was a bright light at the Journal with wonderful parents (we have since learned) who was kidnapped, blindfolded, forced to recite that he was a Jew to his Jew-hating hostage takers, and then beheaded for a despicable al-Qaeda propaganda movie, the better to recruit scumbags who get excited about this stuff.  This dirtbag, 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who’s still eating his Froot Loops on Gitmo (why is he even still alive?), is the one who actually did it, but the Pakistani creeps released were the confederates who made it happen. 

Look at how bad it is, according to the Washington Post:

“As per the court’s judgment, Omar Saeed Sheikh has been found guilty of kidnapping and not of murder. The accused was in jail for 20 years,” the defendants’ lawyer Khawaja Naveed told The Washington Post.

Saeed had been sentenced to death for Pearl’s murder but now with just a seven-year sentence for kidnapping, he could be released for the 18 years he has already served.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

America Is Still a Global Leader By Victor Davis Hanson

Posted By on April 2nd, 2020

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/04/coronavirus-pandemic-america-still-global-leader-time-crisis/

Any laxity in fighting the virus is not to be found with the U.S., but rather with its loudest and most opportunistic critics.

A current global myth alleges that America under the Trump administration is not leading the world fight against the coronavirus in its accustomed role as the post-war global leader.

Yet the U.S. was the first major nation to issue a travel ban on flights from China, with Donald Trump making that announcement on January 31. That was a bold act. It likely saved thousands endangered by Chinese perfidy and soon became a global model. None of the ban’s loud critics are today demanding it be rescinded.

In typically American fashion, as we have seen in crises from Pearl Harbor to 9/11, after initial shock and unpreparedness, the U.S. economic and scientific juggernaut is kicking into action.

Already the U.S. is transitioning from a long, disastrous reliance on Chinese medical supplies and pharmaceuticals. In ad hoc fashion, companies are gearing up massive production of masks, ventilators, and key anti-viral supplies.

The number of known deaths from the virus — for now the only reliable data available — shows a fatality rate of about 7–8 per million people in the United States. That per capita toll is analogous to Germany’s and one of the lowest in the world among larger nations.

MEDIA Comments turned off

Professors, journalists call out Fox News’ coronavirus misinformation in scathing letter US LEE MORAN

Posted By on April 2nd, 2020

https://www.aol.com/article/news/2020/04/02/professors-journalists-call-out-fox-news-coronavirus-misinformation-in-scathing-letter/23968094/

Dozens of professors and teachers of journalism and communications have signed a scathing open letter calling out Fox News’ coverage of the coronavirus crisis, describing it as “a danger to public health.”

Some 77 academics and journalists had signed the letter as of Thursday morning, accusing the widely watched conservative network of contributing “to the spread of a grave pandemic.” 

Oliver Darcy

✔@oliverdarcy

74 journalism / comms professors + journalists have written an open letter to Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch about the network’s coronavirus coverage.”Viewers of Fox News, including the president of the United States, have been regularly subjected to misinformation…”

The signatories, led by Columbia Journalism School Professor Todd Gitlin, call on Fox Corporation chairman Rupert Murdoch and his son, company CEO Lachlan Murdoch, “to help protect the lives of all Americans” by ensuring the network airs information “based on scientific facts.”

The letter notes that Fox News’ viewers — including President Donald Trump — have “been regularly subjected to misinformation,” such as:

False statements downplaying the prevalence of COVID-19 and its harms; misleading recommendations of activities that people should undertake to protect themselves and others, including casual recommendations of untested drugs; false assessments of the value of measures urged upon the public by their elected political leadership and public health authorities.

MEDIA Comments turned off

Sean Ono Lennon says media ‘lost their legitimacy’ over coronavirus coverage by Zachary Halaschak

Posted By on April 2nd, 2020

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/sean-ono-lennon-says-media-lost-their-legitimacy-over-coronavirus-coverage

Musician Sean Ono Lennon has an issue with the media’s response to the coronavirus pandemic.

Lennon, the 44-year-old son of John Lennon and Yoko Ono, vented on Twitter Wednesday about the way that some in the media have covered the virus and its spread from China to the entire world. He implied that the Communist Party of China has lied about the number of those who died there.

“Been listening to ‘respectable’ journalists quoting CCP official numbers for months without doubt or hesitation. Calling it the Wuhan Virus but only days later telling ppl who say it’s from China they’re racist. The official media have lost their legitimacy,” he said. The new virus was first reported in late 2019 in Wuhan, China, and quickly spread throughout the country, particularly ravaging the Hubei province, where Wuhan is located. In recent days, residents in Wuhan have begun to emerge from their homes and have claimed that evidence suggests the actual death toll tallies in the tens of thousands.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Why is Susan Rice using coronavirus as an excuse to shill for China? by Tom Rogan

Posted By on April 2nd, 2020

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/why-is-susan-rice-using-coronavirus-as-an-excuse-to-shill-for-china

Susan Rice just reminded Xi Jinping why he misses her presence in the president’s ear.

President Barack Obama’s former national security adviser did so with two arguments on Tuesday to MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell.

First, and admittedly at Mitchell’s pushing, Rice stated that the Trump administration’s description of the coronavirus as the “Wuhan virus” is unacceptable and undermines global cooperation. Viruses can arise anywhere, Rice said, adding that “Wuhan virus” is “race-baiting” and “shameful.”

This was news to me. I was under the impression that Wuhan is not a race, but rather a Chinese industrial city where the virus first infected humans.

But Rice wasn’t done, adding, “It doesn’t serve us well, it doesn’t serve the objective of squelching the virus globally, to brand in nationalistic, or xenophobic, or racist terms. We all have to work together…”

HOMELAND SECURITY Comments turned off

Feds charge man with intentionally derailing train near USNS Mercy Authorities said the suspect told investigators he wanted to bring attention to the government’s activities regarding COVID-19.By Andrew Blankstein

Posted By on April 2nd, 2020

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/feds-charge-man-who-intentionally-deraile

LOS ANGELES — Prosecutors charged a locomotive engineer who worked at the Port of Los Angeles with intentionally derailing a train at full speed near the Navy hospital ship Mercy because of suspicions over its activities surrounding COVID-19, according to a federal criminal complaint.

Eduardo Moreno, 44, of San Pedro, California, was charged with one count under a little-known train-wrecking statute that carries a maximum sentence of up to 20 years in the incident Tuesday, according to the 10-page criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles.

Moreno, who was held overnight, was turned over to FBI agents Wednesday morning. He was expected to make an initial appearance in federal court Wednesday afternoon.

Prosecutors claim Moreno ran the train off the tracks. It crashed through a series of barriers before coming to rest more than 250 yards from the Mercy in an incident that was captured on video.

Although the train leaked fuel oil, which required cleanup by firefighters and other hazardous materials personnel, no one was hurt.

A California Highway Patrol officer who witnessed the crash and took Moreno into custody told authorities that he saw the train, which is used to haul shipping cargo, smash through a barrier at the end of the tracks before it drove through several obstacles, including a steel barrier and a chain-link fence. It slid through one parking lot and another filled with gravel and smashed into a second chain-link fence, according to the affidavit.

The complaint alleges that when the officer approached him, Moreno said: “You only get this chance once. The whole world is watching. I had to. People don’t know what’s going on here. Now they will.”

The affidavit said Moreno, who waived his right to speak to an attorney before being interviewed by investigators, admitted in two post-arrest interviews that he intentionally ran the train off the track because he wanted to bring attention to the government’s activities regarding COVID-19 and was suspicious of the Mercy.

In his first interview with Los Angeles port police, Moreno acknowledged that he “did it,” saying he was suspicious of the Mercy and believed it had an alternative purpose related to COVID-19 or a government takeover, the affidavit states.

Moreno also told investigators that he acted alone and had not planned the attempted attack, according to the affidavit. He said he knew that derailing and crashing the train would bring media attention and that “people could see for themselves,” referring to the Mercy, according to the affidavit.

In a second interview with FBI agents, Moreno said “he did it out of the desire to ‘wake people up,'” according to the affidavit. “Moreno stated that he thought that the U.S.N.S. Mercy was suspicious and did not believe ‘the ship is what they say it’s for,'” it said.

HOMELAND SECURITY Comments turned off

Georgia man pleads guilty for plotting to attack White House PHIL HELSEL

Posted By on April 2nd, 2020

https://www.aol.com/article/news/2020/04/02/georgia-man-pleads-guilty-for-plotting-to-attack-white-house/23968016/

A Georgia man accused of plotting to attack the White House and other landmarks pleaded guilty Wednesday, according to federal prosecutors and court documents.

Hasher Jallal Taheb, 23, had been the subject of an undercover investigation that lasted for more than a year and was arrested in January 2019 as he arrived to pick up what he expected to be semi-automatic rifles, explosives and an anti-tank weapon, authorities said.

He pleaded guilty to attempting to destroy, by fire or an explosive, a building owned by or leased to the United States, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia said in a statement. 

Taheb was arrested after he met with undercover agents at a Buford, Georgia, parking lot where the deal for the weapons was supposed to occur, according to a criminal complaint. The rifles, the explosives and the anti-armor weapon, an AT-4, were all inert.

As part of a plea agreement, prosecutors agreed to recommend a sentence of 15 years, according to court documents. Sentencing is scheduled for June 23.

Taheb wanted to attack the White House and the Statue of Liberty, but later broadened the targets to include the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial, prosecutors said.

Investigators believe Taheb was working on his own, an FBI official said at the time of his arrest.

The investigation began after a community member sent in a tip in March 2018 that Taheb had become “radicalized” and made plans to travel abroad, according to the complaint. When he was unable to travel abroad because of passport issues, he allegedly began planning an attack in the U.S.

An e-mailed request for comment from a federal public defender listed as representing Taheb was not immediately returned early Thursday.