“Kevin McCarthy again displays his unique brand of incompetence and dishonesty,” Amash tweeted along with a video of the interview with CBS’s “60 Minutes.”
Kevin McCarthy again displays his unique brand of incompetence and dishonesty. pic.twitter.com/KAijpPMk6R
Mueller laid out 10 potential cases of obstruction of justice by Trump, and Amash determined that at least some of them reached the threshold for impeachment.
Troubles are mounting for a Texas website used to report violators of the state’s extreme anti-abortion legislation after the site was forced offline by two different web hosting platforms.
The site ProLifeWhistleblower.com was removed from its original web host by the provider GoDaddy on Friday before being suspended by its new host, an agency known for providing services to far-right groups.
“For all intents and purposes it is offline,” Ronald Guilmette, a web infrastructure expert, told the Guardian. “They are having technical difficulties. My personal speculation is that they are going to have trouble keeping it online moving forward.”
As of Tuesday, ProLifeWhistleblower.com redirects to Texas Right to Life’s main website.
Created by Texas Right to Life, an evangelical Christian group, the site allowed people to anonymously submit information about potential violations of the new law – which makes it illegal to help women in Texas access abortion after the sixth week of pregnancy.
In recent days, internet users have protested against the site by flooding it with false reports, memes and even porn in the hopes of rendering it less effective.
The website’s difficulties were compounded when GoDaddy, which provides the servers where the website lives, said the site had violated its privacy policies that bar the sharing of third-party personal information including data related to medical issues such as abortion.
The site was thenmoved to Epik, according to domain registration data first reported by Ars Technica. Epik is known for its “anything goes” attitude towards web hosting, servicing sites that other companies have deplatformed elsewhere for hate speech and other content violations – including 8chan, Gab and Parler.
According to reports from the Daily Beast, Epik contacted the website about potential violation of its own rules concerning the collection of medical data about people obtaining abortions.
“We contacted the owner of the domain, who agreed to disable the collection of user submissions on this domain,” it said in a statement to the Daily Beast.
Epik representatives did not respond to a message seeking comment on Tuesday. As of the time of publishing at 2pm PST on Tuesday, Epik remained the host for ProLifeWhistleblower.com, according to domain registration data available online, although the site does not appear to be operational.
A Texas Right to Life spokeswoman, Kimberlyn Schwartz, said on Tuesday that the website was in the process of moving to a new host, but was not yet disclosing which one.
The original website allowed anyone to submit an anonymous “report” of someone illegally obtaining an abortion, including a section where images can be uploaded for proof.
“Any Texan can bring a lawsuit against an abortionist or someone aiding and abetting an abortion after six weeks,” the website reads, and those proved to be violating the law liable for a minimum of $10,000 in damages.
Schwartz said they were working to get the tipster website back up but noted that in many ways it was symbolic since anyone can report a violation. And, she said, abortion clinics appear to be complying with the law.
“I think that people see the whistleblower website as a symbol of the law but the law is still enforced, with or without our website,” Schwartz said, adding, “It’s not the only way that people can report violations of the law.”
Rebecca Parma, Texas Right to Life’s senior legislative associate, said they expected people to try to overwhelm the site with fake tips, adding “we’re thankful for the publicity to the website that’s coming from all of this chatter about it.”
FILE – In this Oct. 23, 2018, file photo released by Saudi Press Agency, SPA, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, right, shakes hands with Salah Khashoggi, a son, of Jamal Khashoggi, in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The son of slain Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi says no settlement discussions have taken place and suggested that financial compensation to the family did not amount to an admission of guilt by Saudi rulers. Salah Khashoggi described King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman as “guardians to all Saudis.” (Saudi Press Agency via AP, File)
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – The son of slain Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi says no settlement discussions have taken place and suggested that financial compensation to the family did not amount to an admission of guilt by Saudi rulers.
Salah Khashoggi described King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman as “guardians to all Saudis.”
“Acts of generosity and humanity come from the high moral grounds they possess, not admission of guilt or scandal,” he said in a statement on Twitter on Wednesday.
On April 1, the Washington Post reported the writer’s children were given “blood money” in the form of million-dollar homes and monthly payments after Khashoggi’s killing by Saudi agents in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul last year.
The Post, quoting Saudi officials speaking anonymously, reported the payments were approved by King Salman.
If President Donald Trump’s high-stakes trade talks at the G-20 summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping are a bust, the ongoing trade war could become a potent issue for Democrats in the 2020 election.
Trade talks between the world’s two largest economies stalled out last month, and some experts and administration officials are predicting that Trump’s meeting with Xi on Saturday could rekindle the negotiations. A senior White House official told CNBC that Trump might agree to a truce in the trade war without asking for very much from Xi in that meeting.
But current and former administration officials have cautioned that a deal with China likely won’t come at the G-20 itself. Trump has also threatened on multiple occasions to levy duties on $300 billion in Chinese goods that are imported to the U.S., which would result in taxes on nearly all U.S. imports of Chinese products.
The Trump administration has slapped tariffs on $250 billion worth of Chinese goods. China has responded with $110 billion in tariffs on U.S. goods, as the two sides grapple over issues including trade deficits, alleged Chinese intellectual property theft and forced technology transfers.
U.S. tariffs on China and other sources have reportedly already raised prices on some goods. The Becker Friedman Institute of Economics at the University of Chicago, for instance, found that the price of washers and dryers rose by 12% in response to tariffs levied in 2018.
Taxing all imports from China would do the same for many more products — and that could be a liability for Trump’s reelection chances.
Trump has long touted the benefits of tariffs as a way to bring companies back to the U.S. and make tax revenue. But tariffs also raise costs on American families by hundreds of dollars: the Federal Reserve Bank of New York found that tariffs imposed 2018 led to an annual cost of $419 for the typical household.
When Trump hiked tariffs on $200 billion of Chinese goods to 25% in May after the trade talks broke down, that annual cost shot up to $831 per year, according to the New York Fed.
Trump could open himself up to more attacks from Democrats on tariffs as the 2020 election nears. And while it was hardly the main focus of the first presidential debates, some candidates have already lashed out.
“The tariffs and the trade war are just punishing businesses and producers and workers on both sides,” entrepreneur Andrew Yang said during the Democratic primary debate Thursday night.
China’s retaliatory tariffs, which hit a wide variety of agricultural products, are already deeply affecting U.S. farmers in states that Trump won in the 2016 election.
Yang recalled an interaction he had with an Iowa farmer “who said he spent six years building up a buying relationship in China that’s now disappeared and gone forever. And the beneficiaries have not been American workers or people in China. It’s been Southeast Asia and other producers that have then stepped into the void.”
The White House in May rolled out a $16 billion farm and ranch aid package for those affected by the trade war. Trump assured farmers that his tariffs on Chinese imports would cover the cost.
South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg appeared to be citing the New York Fed’s analysis when he knocked Trump’s tariffs at the debate Thursday night. “Tariffs are taxes. And Americans are going to pay on average $800 more a year because of these tariffs,” Buttigieg said.
“Folks who aren’t in the shadow of a factory are somewhere near a soy field where I live. And manufacturers, and especially soy farmers, are hurting,” Buttigieg added.
The president speaks to Fox News’ Pete Hegseth about the Massachusetts sentor considering a presidential run in 2020.
In an exclusive interview set to air during Fox News’ ‘All-American New Year’ special Monday night, President Trump suggested that only Massachusetts Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s “psychiatrist” knows whether she thinks she can win the White House in 2020.
Warren, a liberal firebrand who rose to prominence during the 2008 financial crisis, angered many top Democrats and Native American groups in October by releasing inconclusive DNA test results in response to Trump’s claims that she repeatedly lied about her heritage to obtain affirmative-action benefits in the course of her academic career.
The Cherokee Nation responded to the results at the time by asserting that “a DNA test is useless to determine tribal citizenship.” And Kim TallBear, an associate professor at the University of Alberta, remarked that Warren’s “very desire to locate a claim to Native American identity in a DNA marker inherited from a long-ago ancestor is a settler-colonial racial understanding of what it is to be Native American.”
“Elizabeth Warren will be the first,” Trump told Hegseth in the phone interview. “She did very badly in proving that she was of Indian heritage. That didn’t work out too well.”
According to Warren’s DNA analysis, “the vast majority” of Warren’s family tree is European and there is “strong evidence” she has Native-American ancestry “in the range of 6-10 generations ago.” As reported by the Boston Globe, this means she could be between 1/64 and 1/1,024 Native American.
“I think you have more than she does, and maybe I do too, and I have nothing,” Trump said, referring to tribal heritage. “So, we’ll see how she does. I wish her well, I hope she does well, I’d love to run against her.”
Trump repeatedly has derided Warren for claiming she has Native American ancestry. At a rally in July, he joked that he would pull out a heritage kit during a hypothetical presidential debate with Warren and slowly toss it at her, “hoping it doesn’t hit her and injure her arm, even though it only weighs probably two ounces.”
Separately, Trump again invited top Democrats to join him in Washington to resolve the ongoing partial federal government shutdown — but he signaled that a border wall is an essential element of any deal.
One bipartisan proposal to end the shutdown that has been floated among key senators is to provide $5.7 billion in funding for the border wall, as well as a congressional reauthorization of the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program for those brought to the U.S. illegally as children, along with some other immigration provisions. There also has been talk about a special allowance for some classes of Central American refugees to be granted more robust asylum statuses.
“I’m in Washington, I’m ready, willing and able. I’m in the White House, I’m ready to go,” Trump said. He added that Democratic House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer “can come over right now, they could’ve come over anytime.”
The president emphasized that he canceled his plans to spend Christmas and New Year’s Day at his Mar-a-Lago retreat in Florida because of the partial shutdown, and signaled that he remains concerned about the approximately 800,000 federal workers who are affected by furloughs and understaffing.
“I spent Christmas in the White House, I spent New Year’s Eve now in the White House,” Trump said. “And you know, I’m here, I’m ready to go. It’s very important. A lot of people are looking to get their paycheck, so I’m ready to go whenever they want.”
He added: “No, we are not giving up. We have to have border security and the wall is a big part of border security. The biggest part.”
Fox News’ Chad Pergram and Alex Pappas contributed to this report.
BOSTON – Four miles from the Cambridge home of Elizabeth Warren, more than 10,000 people turned out in freezing temperatures Saturday for an outdoor Bernie Sanders rally at Boston Common, three days before Massachusetts’ 91 delegates are up for grabs on Super Tuesday.
With former Vice President Joe Biden the favorite to win Saturday’s South Carolina Democratic presidential primary, Sanders looked ahead to Super Tuesday, where he has an opportunity to build a significant overall delegate lead. He was in Springfield, Massachusetts, Friday night and will be in Virginia on Saturday evening before heading to Los Angeles on Sunday.
“As some of you may know, the establishment is getting very nervous about our campaign,” said Sanders, an independent U.S. senator from Vermont, taking the stage after musician Béla Fleck warmed up the crowd with the banjo. “And tonight, they’re going to turn on the TV and they’re going to find that 10,000 people came out to the Boston Common, and they’re going to become even more nervous.”
The Sanders campaign later said more than 13,000 people attended.
In Massachusetts, Sanders is going for a knockout punch against Warren, a U.S. senator from the state, and delegates that once seemed improbable given her home-state advantage. But Sanders, the national Democratic frontrunner, has surged into first place in recent Massachusetts polls, topping Warren 25% to 17% in a survey released Friday by WBUR. They were followed by Pete Buttigeig, 14%; Mike Bloomberg, 13%; and Biden, 9%.
Virginia Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam’s aides want him to read his way out of trouble.
If you can believe it, the aides’ strategy for helping him survive his “blackface scandal” involves assigned reading, including Alex Haley’s book Roots and an essay written by the Atlantic’s Ta-Nehisi Coates, according to BuzzFeed News.
It’s the whitest solution to a blackface problem that only the whitest of whites could have devised.
Northam stands credibly accused of having once attended a party in the mid-1980s dressed either in blackface or Ku Klux Klan regalia, according to an old yearbook uncovered first by the right-wing news site Big League Politics.
At first the governor apologized for the yearbook photo. Then he backtracked, after his apology failed to kill the controversy, by denying any involvement in the photo. Northam then held a press conference wherein he maintained he couldn’t possibly be the man in blackface because he “vividly” remembers looking different the one time he dressed in blackface to impersonate Michael Jackson for a dance competition.
So his defense for wearing blackface was that it was a different sort of blackface.
This all really happened, even the part where Northam nearly “moonwalked” for reporters.
Suffice it to say, the governor has had a rough go of it, looking like both a supremely incompetent fool and a baby boomer racist. He has refused his own party’s many calls for his resignation, and he has even floated the idea of becoming an independent just so he can stay in office. But if you thought this couldn’t get any more ridiculous, the governor’s staff is here to disabuse you of that notion. Via BuzzFeed News:
His office has begun to explore how it might recalibrate Northam’s legislative agenda to focus closely on race and equity … The move would mark a brazen attempt to hang onto his office by shifting the conversation away from Northam’s admission of having once worn blackface and his denials that he is featured in the racist yearbook photo, either as the person in blackface or the person in a Klan outfit. Northam’s policy team is looking at crafting a set of proposals based on the premise that the governor’s mistakes have rendered him keenly aware of inequity and the lack of justice faced by black Virginians 400 years after the first African people arrived in the Commonwealth, at Point Comfort, in 1619.
The centerpiece proposal is not complete in its scope or in terms of what it will seek to accomplish. But there are many possibilities being considered for a broad platform: increasing resources for affordable housing; setting new, more equitable standards in small business procurement; implementing programs that expand economic opportunity for entrepreneurs; pumping money into public services like education and transportation.
Then comes the really embarrassing detail [emphasis added]:
This is like something lifted directly from a “South Park” episode. Northam should just pay an indulgence to Jesse Jackson and get it over with already. This also seems like the lazy man’s way of familiarizing oneself with the black community. (“Isn’t there a book I can just read?”)
The amazing thing is: There’s no way that we’ve hit rock bottom with what’s happening now in Virginia. It surely will get worse or weirder from here.
La última paradoja es la de su desempeño en la primaria del partido republicano en el estado de Nevada, llevada a cabo este martes, en la que ganó holgadamente.
Trump ha dado prioridad en su campaña a estigmatizar a los inmigrantes indocumentados mexicanos, calificándolos de criminales y violadores y su promesa original de campaña es edificar una muralla fronteriza, pagada por los mexicanos.
Y muchos suponían que esta actitud iba a sepultar cualquier aspiración que tuviera entre el electorado hispano.
Pero una encuesta de boca de urna revelada a los medios el martes estimó que Trump ganó también entre los votantes republicanos latinos del estado. Esto pese a enfrentarse a dos candidatos republicanos latinos, Ted Cruz y Marco Rubio.
34.451
personas votaron por Trump en los caucus, lo que equivale a:
1% de los habitantes del estado
0,001% de la población de EE.UU.
Trump casi dobló a Rubio en las preferencias de los latinos republicanos de Nevada, con 45% contra 28% del cubano estadounidense. Cruz aparecía más atrás aún con 18%.
“¿Saben de lo que estoy realmente contento? Estoy de número 1 con los hispanos“, dijo el magnate y aspirante a la presidencia poco después de conocer los resultados.
Lo que lleva a que muchos analistas colectivamente se rasquen la cabeza y se pregunten: ¿por qué casi uno de cada dos republicanos hispanos en Nevada parece haberse inclinado por un candidato que ha sido acusado de agitar la xenofobia contra ese grupo étnico en particular?
Y más importante aún, ¿es indicativo esto de lo que puede ocurrir en las elecciones generales si Trump llega a obtener la nominación del partido republicano?
Haber obtenido parte sustancial del voto latino republicano de Nevada en las circunstancias de esta campaña y después de sus agresivas declaraciones contra los mexicanos es un logro electoral indiscutible para Trump. Pero hay que hacer algunas salvedades que matizan el resultado.
Image copyright Getty
Image caption
Trump propone la construcción de un muro fronterizo financiado enteramente por México.
“La encuesta no fue sobre todos los latinos de Nevada, sino con latinos que se identifican como republicanos”, dice a BBC Mundo Mark Hugo Lopez, director de investigación hispana en el Pew Research Center, un centro de investigación en tendencias de opinión en Estados Unidos. “En Nevada, la mayoría de los hispanos son demócratas”, aclara Mark Hugo Lopez.
Los hispanos republicanos de Nevada son un grupo muy pequeño. Constituyen apenas el 8% de los participantes en las primarias republicanas de ese estado. En contraste, en las primarias del partido demócrata que tuvieron lugar el sábado pasado, casi 20% del electorado era hispano.
Es una situación que se repite en el resto del país, donde la mayoría de los votantes hispanos son demócratas, no republicanos. En la última elección parlamentaria de 2014, por ejemplo, 62% de los latinos votaron demócrata, frente a 36% por los republicanos.
Por lo que en una elección general, si el candidato republicano fuera Trump, se esperaría que la mayoría de los hispanos en el país votaría contra él por el solo hecho de ser simpatizantes del partido contrario, el demócrata. Eso sin entrar a considerar siquiera sus opiniones sobre la inmigración.
También hay cuestiones metodológicas que despiertan dudas en los resultados divulgados el martes.
El principal interrogante se origina en el tamaño tan pequeño de la muestra de votantes latinos a partir del cual se están sacando conclusiones.
2.700
(cifra estimada)
6.000 hispanos en los caucus republicanos (8% del total)
45% votaron por Trump
Cerca de 75.000 republicanos participaron en las primarias del martes en Nevada, de los cuales aproximadamente 8%, unos 6.000, son latinos.
De ellos, el 45%, o sea cerca de 2.700 personas, son hispanos que votaron por Trump en Nevada, según la encuesta que han citado los medios.
Y, teniendo en cuenta que el electorado hispano en todo el país puede llegar a 27 millones de personas, sacar conclusiones para esa comunidad a partir de una muestra tan pequeña, de menos de 3.000, personas puede ser exagerado.
Más aún, indican expertos, el sondeo de boca de urna citado por Trump para reclamar su triunfo sobre los hispanos no consultó a todos los votantes latinos en ese estado, sino a una muestra que pudo abarcar a apenas 130 personas hispanas, según lo ha dicho el profesor David Lamore, experto en estudios electorales de la Universidad de Nevada, en el sitio web Latino Decisions, lo que da un margen de error importante en los resultados de la encuesta.
Mientras que Ali Valenzuela, profesor de la Universidad de Princeton, le señala a BBC Mundo otro posible problema metodológico. “Las encuestas a boca de urna casi nunca hacen preguntas en español, lo que crea sesgos en los resultados específicamente para los latinos”, señala el experto.
Es decir, el triunfo de Trump entre los latinos republicanos puede no haber sido tan abultado en la realidad.
Y al sumar los votos de los latinos que votaron en la primaria demócrata con los que votaron en la republicana, la imagen que se obtiene de la popularidad de Trump es distinta.
“Hubo 15,960 votos latinos por democrátas en Nevada. De un total de 18.608 votos latinos en Nevada, aproximadamente 14% apoyaron a Trump”, le dice Valenzuela a BBC Mundo.
Un caso comprobado
En cualquier caso, e independiente de las cuestiones técnicas, los resultados de Nevada indican que un hispano simpatizante de Trump no es un imposible lógico.
Y los avances de Trump entre los latinos no son un fenómeno que se limite a Nevada.
Image copyright EPA
Image caption
La campaña de Trump ha roto muchos tabúes de la cultura política estadounidense.
“Hay otras encuestas anteriores que indican que un número entre 15% y 20% de hispanos adultos en el país está de acuerdo con Donald Trump o tiene una opinión favorable de él”, indica Mark Hugo Lopez, del Centro Pew, a BBC Mundo.
En una manifestación a favor de Donald Trump en octubre pasado en Miami en la que BBC Mundo estuvo presente, cientos de hispanos, muchos de ellos cubano-estadounidenses, abarrotaron un lujoso hotel de propiedad del candidato para expresar su devoción a esta controversial causa política.
Como Isabel Millas, que nació en Cuba y vive en Miami desde 1961. En octubre pasado le decía a BBC Mundo que le daba toda la razón a Donald Trump en su posición sobre la inmigración. “Aquí no puede entrar gente indocumentada porque uno no sabe quiénes son”, aseguraba.
Al tiempo que otro miembro hispanoparlante del público exclamaba: “Este país se ha vuelto un desastre, entra todo el que quiere por la frontera”. Y aseguraba que Trump ha dicho “lo que el pueblo quiere oír”.
Castillos de naipes
La verdad es que muchos de los análisis tradicionales sobre política estadounidense se han derrumbado como castillos de naipes al enfrentarse al huracán de la candidatura de Trump.
Los latinos no son los únicos insultados por el polémico potentado que le han entregado resultados electorales distintos a lo esperado.
Apenas la semana pasada, los observadores asumían que la enorme población de militares retirados que habita en el estado de Carolina del Sur le iba a cobrar a Trump en las primarias de ese estado un comentario ofensivo anterior.
Image copyright Getty
Image caption
Trump encabeza las encuestas nacionales entre los republicanos.
El candidato había difundido una declaración casi sacrílega en la cultura política estadounidense al hablar mal de un ex prisionero de guerra, el excandidato presidencial John McCain, quien pasó años en una carcel vietnamita después de haber sido derribado su avión y que es visto como un héroe en su país.
Pero Trump lo criticó por haberse dejado alcanzar por el fuego enemigo.
Y, sin embargo, el multimillonario político ganó holgadamente en Carolina del Sur, con muchos exmilitares entre sus más expresivos admiradores.
Al final, tanto entre los latinos, como entre el resto del público estadounidense, hay personas que se han dejado seducir por el embrujo de un fenómeno de masas indiscutible que llena estadios, satura redes sociales y, efectivamente, gana elecciones.
Y sin duda, los democratas que contaban con el apoyo incondicional de las minorías étnicas como una muralla contra el avance de Trump deben estar repasando muy bien sus estrategias en una elección que cada vez ofrece más sorpresas.
Karla Adam, Devlin Barrett, Miriam Berger, Abha Bhattarai, Jacob Bogage, Amanda Coletta, Tim Craig, Simon Denyer, Eva Dou, Ruth Eglash, Thomas Heath, Meryl Kornfield, Louisa Loveluck, Katie Mettler, David Montgomery, Loveday Morris, Siobhán O’Grady, Carolyn Y. Johnson, Christopher Rowland, Missy Ryan and Felicia Sonmez contributed to this report. Adam and Loveluck reported from London; Coletta reported from Toronto; Eglash reported from Jerusalem.
Image caption
El comercio de América Latina con Rusia viene desde la década de 1930.
Tal vez con la excepción de los cubanos de la época de la Guerra Fría, los latinoamericanos nunca hemos pensado mucho en los productos rusos a la hora de satisfacer nuestras necesidades de consumo cotidiano.
Pero que no haya muchos productos rusos en el supermercado de la esquina no quiere decir que el comercio con Rusia sea poco importante para nuestras economías.
Los países de América Latina han dedicado grandes esfuerzos en la última década a diversificar los destinos de su comercio, tras años marcados por su dependencia de EE.UU.
Han tenido éxito con China, que se ha convertido en el principal socio comercial de varios actores de la región, pero menos con Rusia.
Esto pese a que, desde mediados del siglo XX Moscú ha buscado aumentar, por razones tanto políticas como económicas, su presencia comercial en la región.
Hoy ese comercio se manifiesta en productos tan diversos como aviones de combate rusos llegados a Venezuela o vino uruguayo con destino a Rusia.
Un país que, sorprendentemente, se convirtió en los últimos años en el destino clave para el vino tannat de Uruguay, con exportaciones que alcanzaron 20 millones de litros anuales.
Brasil Exporta a Rusia US$3.800 millones anuales (1% del total de sus exportaciones). En comparación, exporta a China US$40.000 millones
Venezuela Importa de Rusia US$393 millones (1% del total de sus importaciones). En comparación, importa de Estados Unidos US$10.000 millones.
El intercambio entre América Latina y Rusia no llegará en el futuro próximo a niveles del comercio con China, un país con una población casi diez veces mayor que la de Rusia.
Pero sigue en aumento y representa un motor importante de crecimiento para varios países latinoamericanos.
“Ha habido una relación comercial entre América Latina y Rusia desde los años 30”, asegura a BBC Mundo Serguei Brilev, subdirector de la televisión estatal rusa, quien es además, a título personal, el presidente del Instituto Bering-Bellinghausen para Las Américas (IBBA), una ONG basada en Montevideo que promueve el intercambio económico entre Rusia y América Latina.
“Ha sido una relación bastante estable. Es distinta al comercio que existe entre Rusia y el resto de Occidente. Entre Rusia y Europa, por ejemplo, ha sido mayoritariamente en torno al petróleo ruso, mientras que en el caso latinoamericano se trata más, por ejemplo, de comprar turbinas para hidroeléctricas, los troleybuses o, en los últimos años, la maquinaria militar”, señala Brilev.
El comercio de Rusia con la región ha saltado desde US$3.000 millones en 2000 a cerca de US$24.000 millones en 2013, según reporta el diario británico Financial Times.
Un monto que es cerca de diez veces menor al que se tiene con China, pero que va en aumento.
Image copyright AFP
Image caption
El vino chileno abunda en los supermercados rusos.
“América Latina ha usado también el ‘hueco’ creado por las sanciones occidentales contra Rusia y las contrasanciones rusas contra la Unión Europea en materia de alimentos”, le recuerda Brilev a BBC Mundo.
“Por ejemplo, los quesos europeos que han desaparecido en el mercado ruso se han sustituido por los quesos argentinos, uruguayos y brasileños. El salmón noruego se ha sustituido por salmón chileno”.
Hoy en día, asegura Brilev, el vino malbec argentino o el merlot y el cabernet-sauvignon chileno son infaltables en los supermercados rusos.
Del lado latinoamericano también se están abriendo mercados para nuevos productos rusos.
Image copyright AFP
Image caption
Las ventas militares rusas son parte importante del intercambio comercial.
“Mientras las ventas de aviones civiles rusos estuvieron limitadas en el periodo soviético a Cuba, ahora se están expandiendo a otras naciones”, dice el experto ruso.
“Paradójicamente en algunos sentidos Rusia y America Latina son competidores. Brasil, por ejemplo, produce aviones Embraer, mientras que Rusia produce aviones muy similares llamados Sukhoi Superjet“, recuerda.
Sin embargo, la aerolínea mexicana Interjet usa ya 20 de los aviones rusos en su flota.
Y Nicaragua está “activamente negociando” para compras similares de aviones, agrega Brilev.
Globalización y distancia
Claramente, el flujo comercial con Rusia ha estado particularmente concentrado en algunos países.
“Brasil por su tamaño y el rol que juega en el grupo BRICS (de las potencias emergentes que incluye a Brasil, Rusia, India, China y Sudáfrica) es uno de los más destacados en este comercio entre Rusia y la región, dice Brilev.
Image copyright Getty
Image caption
Rusia y China son competidores en algunos aspectos del mercado latinoamericano.
Pero en otros países, aunque con menor tamaño absoluto, las exportaciones a Rusia juegan un papel importante proporcional al tamaño de su comercio.
“En Paraguay por ejemplo, hubo un momento en que exportaba el 90% de su carne al mercado ruso”, recuerda el presidente del IBBA.
Mientras que Venezuela destaca por las enormes compras militares que se hicieron a Rusia desde la llegada al poder del fallecido presidente Hugo Chávez.
A la hora de evaluar el potencial de estas relaciones económicas con Moscú, muchos comparan lo que se ha logrado con Pekín.
“China y Rusia son también competidoras en algunos aspectos, como por ejemplo, la venta de turbinas para hidroeléctricas”, recuerda Brilev.
¿Llegará algún momento el intercambio económico con Rusia al nivel del que se da con China?
Brilev acepta que, dadas las diferencias de tamaño en la población, y por el ende en el tamaño del mercado, entre China y Rusia, será difícil que las ventas latinoamericanas a Rusia igualen las que se dan a China.
“No hay que temer a la globalización y a las distancias“, puntualiza en todo caso Brilev, para asegurar que hay mucho espacio para crecer en esta avenida distinta para el intercambio comercial latinoamericano, la que conduce a Moscú.
Japón aguarda hoy con incertidumbre noticias sobre el periodista nipón secuestrado en Siria por el grupo Estado Islámico (EI) sin que de momento se haya informado de nuevos avances sobre su liberación, después de que ayer expirara el ultimátum dado por el grupo yihadista. Mientras, en Jordania, el ejército indicó que esperaba pruebas que demuestren que el piloto capturado se encuentra con vida.
Los extremistas capturaron a Goto, un periodista independiente, probablemente a finales de octubre, y al piloto Maaz al Kassasbeh, el 24 de diciembre, después de que su F-16 se estrellara en una zona de Siria donde llevaba a cabo un ataque contra el EI.
Sin embargo Ammán exige una prueba de vida y la puesta en libertad de Al Kassasbeh, antes de liberar a la prisionera Sajida al Rishawi. Según los expertos, la combatiente iraquí es importante para el EI por sus vínculos con Al Qaeda en Irak, pero también porque el grupo yihadista pretende que los demás actores lo vean como a un Estado.
Por otro lado, en Japón, el ministro portavoz del Gobierno nipón, Yoshihide Suga, insistió en rueda de prensa en que los funcionarios que están trabajando en el caso“están haciendo todo lo que pueden, paso por paso, para liberar al periodista Kenji Goto”.
El propio Suga expresó hoy la frustración del Ejecutivo nipón, que no ha recibido nuevas noticias del EI, y lamentó que el grupo radical forzara en la víspera a la mujer de Goto a implorar públicamente por su vida bajo amenaza de asesinarlo.
El padre del piloto jordano tambien hizo ayer un llamamiento al EI para que libere a su hijo.
La semana pasada, coincidiendo con el viaje del primer ministro nipón, Shinzo Abe, a Oriente Próximo, el EI envió un primer vídeo en el que le exigió que pagara 200 millones de dólares a cambio de no asesinar a Goto, capturado en octubre, y a otro ciudadano nipón, Haruna Yukawa, que fue ejecutado el pasado sábado.
Donald Trump has told the Republican National Committee and other party bodies to stop using his name and likeness in fundraising efforts, it was reported on Saturday.
“President Trump remains committed to the Republican party and electing America First conservatives,” Politico quoted an unnamed adviser to the former president as saying about the legal cease-and-desist notice, “but that doesn’t give anyone – friend or foe – permission to use his likeness without explicit approval.”
The website previously reported that Trump’s ire was stoked by bodies including the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) and the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) using his name while fundraising for Republicans who voted for his impeachment.
The former president felt “burned and abused”, Politico said, detailing the House minority leader Kevin McCarthy’s struggles to manage the former president, even after a January trip to kiss the ring in Florida.
Liz Cheney, the House No 3 Republican, was the most senior of 10 Republican representatives to back Trump’s second impeachment, for inciting the Capitol riot on 6 January. She has faced protests stoked by elected officials and will be challenged for her seat from the right. Others who voted for impeachment are also facing primary fights.
Seven senators voted to convict Trump at trial. That meant he was acquitted a second time, as the 57 guilty votes fell 10 short of the necessary super-majority.
The verdict left Trump, 74, free to run for office again. Though he continues to baselessly claim his defeat by Joe Biden was the result of massive voter fraud, a lie repeatedly thrown out of court and now the subject of legal investigations, he has toyed with running again in 2024. He remains the clear favourite in party polls.
His own fundraising based on the “big lie” about electoral fraud proved highly lucrative, raking in at least $175m. At the Conservative Political Action Conference last weekend, Trump told attendees they should only donate to his own political action committee, Save America. In the CPAC straw poll, 55% backed Trump to be the next nominee.
The Republican National Committee is led by Ronna McDaniel, a niece of the Utah senator Mitt Romney who dropped Romney from her name after Trump won the White House, reportedly at Trump’s request. Mitt Romney, the 2012 nominee for president, is the only Republican who voted to impeach Trump twice.
Politico said the RNC sent out two emails on Friday, asking donors to put their name on a “thank you card” for Trump.
On Saturday morning, an email trumpeting a “March Fundraising Blitz” claimed “we’ve NEVER been the Party of Elite Billionaires and we NEVER will be” and asked “hard working everyday Americans” to “continue to DEFEND President Trump’s ‘America FIRST’ policies”.
Forbes currently rates Trump’s net worth at $2.5bn.
“Privately,” Politico reported, “GOP campaign types say it’s impossible not to use Trump’s name, as his policies are so popular with the base. If Trump really wants to help flip Congress, they argue he should be more generous. His team, however, sees this differently.”
As states across the US pass laws restricting access to abortion, Illinois passed legislation declaring a pregnant person has a “fundamental right” to terminate their pregnancy and stating that a “fertilized egg, embryo, or fetus does not have independent rights.”
The new legislation, passed Friday, repeals a 1975 state law that required spousal consent, waiting periods, placed restrictions on abortion facilities, and outlined procedures for pursuing criminal charges abortion providers. The bill also rolls back some state restrictions on late-term abortions by repealing Illinois’ Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act, the Chicago Tribune reported. Many provisions in the two newly negated laws had not been enforced due to court injunctions, according to the paper.
“We’re not going back,” said Sen. Melinda Bush, who sponsored the bill in the Illinois Senate, as she argued for the bill. “We’re not going back to coat hangers, we’re not going back to dying. We’re not going back. And I am proud to say Illinois is a beacon for women’s rights, for human rights.”
Democratic Governor J.B. Pritzker said he would sign the bill, called the Reproductive Health Act; it passed the Illinois House of Representatives early last week and Friday night the Senate voted 34-20 to approve it.
Illinois lawmakers pointed to the possibility of a conservative Supreme Court majority overturning Roe v. Wade as a reason for choosing to shore up abortion rights on a state level now.
Cassidy told her colleagues that a medically-necessary abortion in her first pregnancy saved her life and allowed her to go on to become a mother to her three sons. She also criticized Illinois’ neighboring states that have recently passed restrictive abortion laws.
“To our neighbors in Illinois who hear the news around the country and worry that this war on women is coming to Illinois, I say, not on my watch,” Cassidy said. “To the people in Missouri and Alabama and Georgia and Kentucky and Mississippi and Ohio, I say, not on my watch.”
New, restrictive abortion laws are cropping up across the country
The move to expand abortion rights in Illinois comes as states including Alabama, Georgia, Ohio, Missouri, Indiana, Kentucky, and Mississippi have all passed laws restricting access to abortion. Lawmakers in some of those states have said they championed the restrictive laws in hopes of triggering court challenges that will force the US Supreme Court to revisit its Roe v. Wade decision, which guarantees a Constitutional right to abortion. These lawmakers believe the court’s new conservative majority will overturn Roe.
In May, Alabama passed the “Human Life Protection Act,” which criminalizes all abortion. Doctors who perform abortions under the ban could be sentenced to up to 99 years in prison unless the pregnant person faces serious health complications that places their life at risk. The law makes no exceptions for cases in which a pregnant person seeks an abortion after rape or incest.
Alabama now has the nation’s strictest abortion law, but other states have also severely narrowed abortion access through the passage of so-called “heartbeat bills” that ban abortions after doctors are able to detect a fetal heartbeat. Heartbeats can sometimes be detected as early as six weeks into a pregnancy — before many know they are pregnant.
Ohio passed its heartbeat abortion ban in April and was quickly followed by Georgia, Mississippi, and Louisiana. Heartbeat bills in some states — like in North Dakota, Arkansas, Iowa, Kentucky, and Mississippi — have been blocked by courts. Ohio’s ban is currently facing a legal challenge. Planned Parenthood and the American Civil Liberties Union are among the parties suing to prevent the heartbeat laws from going into effect.
“This is an extremely dangerous time for women’s health all around the country,” Leana Wen, president of the Action Fund, told the Washington Post.
Anti-abortion activists hope to overturn Roe v. Wade, but last week, the Supreme Court signaled it is not quite ready to address the landmark ruling. In its decision regarding an abortion law passed by Illinois’ neighbor, Indiana, justices struck down one provision while affirming another part of the law, largely avoiding the question of whether abortion should be legal.
In a case involving an Indiana abortion law, the justices gave a kind of compromise ruling, according to the Washington Post. They allowed one portion of the law, which requires that fetal remains be buried or cremated, to stand. But they declined to take up another portion of the law, which bans abortions based on the fetus’s sex, race, or diagnosis of a disability. As a result, a lower court’s decision to strike that portion of the law will stand, and the ban will not go into effect.
The decision was hotly anticipated because if the Court had decided to hear the case, it could have been an opportunity for the justices to revisit Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 case that established Americans’ right to an abortion. Abortion opponents around the country are eager to see the Court overturn the decision, but previous moves have suggested that the justices aren’t ready to weigh in yet. Tuesday’s decision was more of the same.
But in a concurring statement, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote that the Court would need to make a decision soon on laws like Indiana’s. His words were a reminder that while a Supreme Court battle over abortion isn’t happening today, it might not be far in the future.
The laws are also having the effect of limiting access to abortion. In Missouri, which passed a law banning abortion after eight weeks with no exceptions for rape or incest last week, there is only one abortion provider left. And that provider — a Planned Parenthood clinic in St. Louis — was almost forced to close after state lawmakers refused to renew its license, citing its “deficient practices.” The state said that if all of its physicians submitted to interviews, it might be able to keep its license; however, doctors refused to comply for fear the interviews could lead to criminal prosecutions, North reported.
A judge’s temporary restraining order issued Friday will keep the clinic open — for now. The next hearing in the case comes on June 4; should Planned Parenthood lose its case, the people of Missouri will have to travel to another state, like Illinois, for abortion care.
Other states besides Illinois are working to protect access to abortion rights. Some 13 states including New Mexico, Rhode Island, and Nevada, have proposed bills to include a right to abortion in their Constitutions. While many of those efforts are still in their early stages, Vermont passed a bill to include the protection in its Constitution last week.
In a six-hour conversation with Capitol Hill aides, Rex Tillerson recounted his rocky tenure at the State Department.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson was having dinner at a local restaurant when the owner came over to tell him that Mexico’s foreign secretary happened to be eating at the same place. Would he like to say hello?
Tillerson was surprised, he recently recounted to congressional aides, because he hadn’t been informed that his Mexican counterpart, Luis Videgaray Caso, was in Washington, D.C. He walked over to find that Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser, was dining with the foreign diplomat.
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“I could see the color go out of the face of the foreign secretary of Mexico as I very — I smiled big, and I said: ‘Welcome to Washington,’” Tillerson told the staffers. “And I said: ‘I don’t want to interrupt what y’all are doing.’ I said: ‘Give me a call next time you’re coming to town.’ And I left it at that.”
According to Tillerson, the Mexican diplomat had thought that the secretary of State was fully aware that he was meeting with Kushner. Apparently, however, Kushner hadn’t looped in the State Department.
The anecdote was one of the most vivid that Tillerson shared with bipartisan representatives of the House Foreign Affairs Committee on May 21, according to a partially redacted transcript of the private conversation released Thursday.
The former secretary of State, whom Trump fired in March 2018 after just 14 months on the job, painted a portrait of a presidential administration lacking in internal coordination and cohesion. The discussion touched on everything from Tillerson’s struggle to convince the White House to let him hire people, to his “realist” view of human rights. Tillerson frequently answered questions by saying he couldn’t recall, but overall it was his most extensive personal account to date of his time spent as America’s chief diplomat.
The conversation — which lasted more than six hours, including breaks — occurred with committee staffers. Tillerson also met for about 90 minutes with House Foreign Affairs Chairman Rep. Eliot Engel and ranking member Rep. Mike McCaul. That conversation was not included in the transcript.
Some snippets of the conversation already have been reported, such as Tillerson’s comments that Russian leader Vladimir Putin had out-prepared Trump for meetings, and whether the Russians had manipulated Trump and Tillerson in such sessions. Those earlier reports infuriated Trump, who lashed out on Twitter, calling Tillerson “dumb as a rock.”
Tillerson spoke very cautiously about Trump himself, avoiding direct criticism. But he effectively confirmed past reports of his tensions with Kushner. He expressed disdain, even anger, toward Kushner and his peripatetic role in crafting U.S. foreign policy, especially when he wouldn’t coordinate with the State Department.
From the start, it was unclear what role Kushner as well his wife, Ivanka — Trump’s daughter — would play in policy making, Tillerson said. That “made it challenging for everyone, I think, in terms of how to deal with any activities that might be undertaken by others that were not defined within the national security process itself,” he said.
Kushner, who has pitched in on everything from U.S. trade policy with Mexico to trying to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, would sometimes travel abroad and not coordinate with the U.S. Embassy where he was going. Tillerson said he raised such issues with Kushner, who promised to “do better.”
“Not much changed,” Tillerson said.
Kushner’s relationship with leaders in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates at times hampered Tillerson’s ability to calm tensions in the Middle East, the former diplomat indicated. That was especially the case in June 2017, when those and other Arab countries decided to sever diplomatic ties with Qatar, a tiny, wealthy Arab state home to a key U.S. military facility.
The moves against Qatar, which eventually bloomed into a full-on economic blockade, surprised Tillerson and other top U.S. officials. But committee staffers told Tillerson they’d been informed that the Saudis and the Emiratis had laid out their plans for Qatar to Kushner and another Trump aide, Steve Bannon, at a dinner weeks earlier, on May 20, 2017.
Tillerson said he’d not heard about that dinner until the committee staffers told him. When asked how that felt, he said: “It makes me angry … because I didn’t have a say. The State Department’s views were never expressed.”
On Russia, Tillerson said he agreed with Trump’s general view that the U.S. needed to improve its relationship with Moscow, and that he tried to convey the need for Moscow and Washington to find some common ground when he met with Putin and other Russian officials.
Although he avoided delving into details about those conversations, and often said he didn’t remember much of what happened, Tillerson insisted that he was up front with Putin about Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, which he said he stated as a fact.
“There were a list of obstacles we went through; but, yes, the election interference was specifically mentioned as creating huge challenges for us here in Washington,” he said, adding later: “I said it just has to stop.”
Putin denied the interference had occurred, Tillerson said.
Tillerson said the White House did not tell him in advance how to frame that issue. Asked about Trump’s general knowledge of Russia, Tillerson said “he was having to learn along the way.”
The former secretary of State also said he did not remember an incident recounted in special counsel Robert Mueller’s report on Russia’s interference in the 2016 election.
While Mueller did not establish a criminal conspiracy between Trump’s campaign and Russia, his lengthy report said Kushner gave Tillerson a copy of a plan for U.S.-Russian reconciliation that had been authored in part by Kirill Dmitriev, chief executive officer of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund.
“I don’t recall ever receiving any such report as described in the Mueller report or any other,” Tillerson said.
Tillerson stood by his past description of Trump as “a man who is pretty undisciplined, doesn’t like to read things, doesn’t read briefing reports, doesn’t like to get into the details of lots of things.” Trump also often had a pre-set stance on issues, and he indicated to aides that they would have to convince him he was wrong but that they were not likely to succeed, Tillerson said.
The former diplomat said he wasn’t speaking pejoratively of Trump when he described him in such a manner, but that he realized he had to adjust to the president’s “style.”
That meant being extremely concise in presenting information to Trump. Still, it “never deterred me or anyone at the State Department, to my knowledge, from putting forth the best view we thought we could put together,” he said.
Tillerson also clarified earlier public comments he’d made about how Trump would often seek solutions to policy problems that were legally problematic.
“The president never asked me to violate the law,” he told the committee representatives, adding that Trump was simply on a steep learning curve. “He was very action oriented: Get it done, get it done, get it done. And so just sometimes you had to say: ‘We can’t do that.’”
Trump never referred to his personal or family business in relation to foreign policy, nor did he give indications that those were factors in his thinking on such matters, Tillerson said. He answered several questions about other characters in the Trump orbit whose business activities and overseas links have raised suspicions, such as Elliott Broidy, by saying he didn’t know them.
The former secretary repeatedly sidestepped questions about Trump’s apparent affinity for authoritarian leaders such as Putin. He also declined to discuss reports that he’d once called Trump a “moron” behind his back. He’s never denied doing so, however.
Pressed on why the Trump administration seemed often absent on promoting human rights and democracy, Tillerson argued that it really acted no differently that previous presidential administration. He described himself as a “realist” on human rights — he believes in their importance but doesn’t think harping on the topic always advances the cause long-term.
“Sometimes going in and just pounding the table over that issue, [other countries] just shut down. They just ignore you. They say ‘Just go away. You are of no use to me,’” he said.
Asked if he could describe Trump’s value system, Tillerson said “No, I can’t.” One of his lawyers then shifted the conversation away from further questioning on that point.
A State Department lawyer was present during the interview with the House committee staffers — the department requested a presence and Tillerson said he was amenable to the idea. Tillerson brought at least two attorneys of his own. The committee’s lawyers noted that he was required by law to answer the questions truthfully. The redacted portions of the transcript were done so at either State or Tillerson’s request.
Engel, the committee chairman, has previously described Tillerson’s meeting with him and McCaul as “heartening” given Trump’s efforts to prevent other aides and former aides from talking to lawmakers trying to investigate the president.
Tillerson told the committee representatives that he had been looking forward to retiring from ExxonMobil and spending time with his grandchildren when Trump offered him the chance to serve as secretary of State. He met with Trump about the role after initially ignoring calls from the then-president-elect’s transition staffers in the weeks after the 2016 election.
He agreed to see Trump only hearing from Mike Pence, then the vice president-elect. “I said: ‘Well, I will take that call,’” Tillerson told the committee. Pence told him that, because of his relationships with many heads of state due to his role at ExxonMobil, Trump wanted to talk to him about global affairs.
Tillerson, who had met with past presidents to talk about such issues, agreed to meet Trump if he could do so discreetly. He refused to go “through the gold-gilded lobby of the Trump Tower because that was the revolving door of everybody that was interviewing for a job. … So I went up through a residential entrance.”
Kushner and two other Trump aides, Bannon and Reince Priebus, sat in on Tillerson’s meeting with Trump, which he recalled as being in early December 2016. During the session, Tillerson walked Trump through major world regions and spoke about U.S. challenges in each.
One example he mentioned raising with Trump was the effect international sanctions on Russia — he appeared to be alluding to penalties imposed after Moscow invaded Ukraine — were having on other countries who did business there.
“We talked about the challenges that had been created by the Russian sanctions for the Europeans because it was — it had had a greater effect on them than it had on most American businesses,” he said.
Neither Trump nor the president-elect’s aides asked many questions during the meeting, Tillerson said. But in the latter stages, Trump “went into a bit of a sales pitch and asked me to be the secretary of State, and I was stunned.”
Tillerson indicated that he had thought Trump had other people in mind for the role. He asked Trump for a few days to talk to ExxonMobil and his family, and before agreeing to take the job, he met with Trump again in person to ask three questions. He declined to tell the committee representatives what those questions or Trump’s answers were, however.
Tillerson had a rocky tenure at State. He disagreed with Trump on major issues, such as how to deal with Iran. Tillerson also alienated many U.S. diplomats by shutting them out of the decision-making process, imposing a hiring freeze and trying to push through a redesign of the department.
Tillerson said he grew frustrated with the White House for blocking him from naming certain people to top spots at State for reasons he felt were not satisfactory. He had thought he’d had more freedom to pick his aides. But months went on and numerous positions were left open.
“If people signed the ‘Never Trump’ letter, that would oftentimes disqualify them,” he recalled. “If they had tweeted something or retweeted something that the White House office thought was inappropriate, then that might disqualify them. If they had a spouse that might have supported the other candidate, that would disqualify them.”
The process “never did work smoothly,” he said.
He also said he tried to prevent the White House from proposing massive cuts to the State Department’s budget, although he said that he would have liked to see some significant budget reductions because he thought the existing spending was too bloated.
Asked about his attempt to redesign the State Department, Tillerson said the biggest obstacle to the largely unsuccessful effort were older, senior-level staffers who “don’t want anybody moving their cheese.” Tillerson also said it was his decision to dramatically reduce media access to the department, including cutting down the number of press briefings.
Tillerson told his interviewers that he was grateful to Trump for the opportunity to serve as secretary of State, and he repeatedly praised the career diplomats who work at State. He also sounded a note of modesty.
“In retrospect, the experience was both humbling and inspiring, and it will always be the great honor of my life,” he said.
California will soon ban the sale of new gas-powered leaf blowers and lawn mowers, a move aimed at curbing emissions from a category of small engines on pace to produce more pollution each year than passenger vehicles.
Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a new law on Saturday that orders state regulators to ban the sale of new gas-powered equipment using small off-road engines, a broad category that includes generators, lawn equipment and pressure washers.
The California Air Resources Board has already started working on a rule to do this, a lengthy process scheduled to conclude early next year. But the law Newsom signed on Saturday removes any doubt, ordering the agency to apply the new rule by Jan. 1, 2024, or as soon as regulators determine is “feasible,” whichever date is later.
“Gov. .Newsom signing (this law) really sets a strong course to not only his commitment to transitioning to zero emissions but also to cleaner air and healthier lungs,” said Will Barrett, director of clean air advocacy for the American Lung Association in California.
The law, authored by Democratic Assemblyman Marc Berman, is part of an aggressive strategy to reduce pollution in the nation’s most populous state. California is the only state with the authority to regulate air quality this way, part of an exception carved out in federal law in the 1970s. While other states can’t enact their own regulations, they can choose to follow California’s lead.
Last year, California regulators approved a first-of-its-kind rule to force automakers to sell more electric work trucks and delivery vans. Also last year, Newsom ordered regulators to ban the sale of all new gas-powered cars and trucks in California by 2035 — a date that has since been embraced by some of the world’s largest automakers.
California has more than 16.7 million of these small engines in the state, about 3 million more than the number of passenger cars on the road. California was the first government in the world to adopt emission standards for these small engines in 1990. But since then, emissions in cars have vastly improved compared with smaller engines.
Now, state officials say running a gas-powered leaf blower for one hour emits the same amount of pollution as driving a 2017 Toyota Camry from Los Angeles to Denver, a distance of about 1,100 miles (1,770 kilometers).
The law Newsom signed also orders regulators to offer rebates for people to change out their equipment, a move aimed at landscaping businesses that use these machines more often. The state budget, approved earlier this year, includes $30 million to pay for this effort.
Partamos de una de esas cifras difíciles de visualizar por su magnitud: en un año se enviaron 100 mil millones de emails al día. Y eso es sin contar los emails personales.
El año fue 2013 y la cifra la proviene del más reciente informe de la firma de investigación The Radicati Group, que además anticipa que para 2017 ese número llegará a los 132.000 millones de emails enviados y recibidos en un día.
La evidencia es una prueba del éxito de esta herramienta de comunicación, así que puede sorprender que en Sillicon Valley se esté hablando de un futuro sin email.
No sólo eso, grandes líderes en empresas en los centros tecnológicos del mundo ya se han deshecho de sus cuentas de correo electrónico.
¿CUÁL ES EL PROBLEMA?
El mismo Radicati Group explica en otro documento que mientras que el email redujo el costo de enviar mensajes, “el costo acumulativo de leer esos mensajes es muy alto. Puede tomar varios minutos abrirlos, leerlos, procesarlos y responder a cada uno, y ese proceso, repetido miles de veces, puede consumir un día laboral”.
Para tener una idea más exacta, se puede recurrir al estudio de 2011 de Tom Jackson, de la Universidad de Loughborough (Inglaterra) el cual arrojó que los correos electrónicos le estaban costando a las compañías más de US$15.000 por empleado al año.
Quizás aún más interesante es que encontró que toma un promedio de 64 segundos volver a concentrarse tras ser interrumpido al recibir un email.
Incluso borrarlos quita tiempo, y si se toma en cuenta que toma un promedio de 76 segundos leer y entender cada mensaje, empieza a sonar atractivo buscar una alternativa.
PERO, ¿QUÉ HACER?
Como suele suceder, el mismo mundo que creó los correos electrónicos, ahora ofrece unas soluciones en la forma de sistemas que no sólo tienen nombres sino también lemas inspiradores, como Asana; “trabajo en grupo sin email”, o Slack: “esté menos ocupado”.
Básicamente, el correo electrónico se percibe como algo más formal y la gente pasa más tiempo escribiendo esos mensajes porque se asumen como comunicaciones oficiales.
Plataformas como Slack, Asana, Yammer y demás son más informales pues permiten enviar mensajes cortos y rápidos dentro de distintos grupos, abiertos a toda una empresa o sólo entre un equipo, lo que las hace más informales.
Pero hay otras opciones un poco más audaces, como explicó Scott Berkun, autor de “El año sin pantalones”, en el artículo “¿Hay vida después del email? Sí, y es extraordinaria”.
A SU DISPOSICIÓN
Para escribir su libro, Berkun pasó un año en WordPress, uno de los sitios web más populares del mundo, y uno de sus mayores retos fue aprender a trabajar sin email.
La fórmula ganadora de WordPress es utilizar otra herramienta: los blogs, en los que cada equipo publica toda la información que generalmente se manda por email.
La mayoría de las discusiones tiene lugar en el espacio para comentarios, salas de chat o Skype.
La gran ventaja es que el lector decide qué leer: si le interesa el proyecto, sigue el blog. Además, depende del interesado cuándo leerlo, de acuerdo a su necesidad.
Además, como los blogs son de fácil acceso, las ideas relevantes no quedan enterradas bajo una avalancha de emails inútiles.
Pero si le parece que incluso esa opción le quita demasiado tiempo, está la alternativa sugerida por ese simpático cartel que adorna varios cafés en el mundo hispanoparlante y que circula por el mundo virtual: “No tenemos WiFi, hablen entre ustedes”.
“MURIENDO POR CRUZAR,” AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE INCREASING NUMBER OF IMMIGRANT DEATHS ALONG THE BORDER, THIS SUNDAY, AUGUST 3 AT 6 P.M./5 C
Carmen Dominicci and Neida Sandoval present the Telemundo and The Weather Channel co-production
Miami – July 31, 2014 –Telemundo presents “Muriendo por Cruzar”, a documentary that investigates why increasing numbers of immigrants are dying while trying to cross the US-Mexican border near the city of Falfurrias, Texas, this Sunday, August 3 at 6PM/5 C. The Telemundo and The Weather Channel co-production, presented by Noticias Telemundo journalists Carmen Dominicci and Neida Sandoval, reveals the obstacles immigrants face once they cross into US territory, including extreme weather conditions, as they try to evade the border patrol. “Muriendo por Cruzar” is part of Noticias Telemundo’s special coverage of the crisis on the border and immigration reform.
“‘Muriendo por Cruzar’” dares to ask questions that reveal the actual conditions undocumented immigrants face as they try to start a new life in the United States,” said Alina Falcón, Telemundo’s Executive Vice President for News and Alternative Programming. “Our collaboration with The Weather Channel was very productive. They have a unique expertise in covering the impact of weather on people’s lives, as we do in covering immigration reform and the border crisis. The result is a compelling documentary that exposes a harrowing reality.”
“Muriendo por Cruzar” is the first co-production by Telemundo and The Weather Channel. Both networks are part of NBCUniversal.
MOAB, Utah — According to newly released audio recordings, the officers who responded to a domestic violence-related incident involving Gabby Petito and Brian Laundrie last month in Moab were told that Laundrie reportedly hit Petito.
FOX 13 has now obtained recordings of the dispatch radio traffic, in which a dispatcher tells officers some details of the initial witness’s report.
“RP [reporting party] states a male hit a female. Domestic. He got into a white Ford Transit van. Has a black ladder on the back. Florida plate,” the dispatcher said before giving the license plate number. “The female who got hit, they both — the male and the female — both got into the van and headed north.”
In the police report of the traffic stop some minutes later, a responding officer initially wrote that he believed “it was reported the male had been observed to have assaulted the female,” but later wrote that “no one reported that the male struck the female.”
The officer also described the incident “more accurately as a mental/emotional health ‘break’ than a domestic assault,” and that “no significant injuries” were reported.
Laundrie stayed in a hotel that night, while Petito stayed with the van.
Petito was last seen about two weeks later when the couple traveled north to Salt Lake City and Ogden, then to the Teton region of Wyoming.
On Sunday, Sept. 19, Petito’s body was found near a campground in the Bridger-Teton National Forest just outside Grand Teton National Park.
Laundrie is still missing as of this report, with his last known location believed to be a nature reserve near his parents’ home in North Port, Florida.
Court documents out of Wyoming say once Laundrie is taken into custody, he should be held in jail without the possibility of bail because he is a potential flight risk.
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Free and confidential support for individuals experiencing domestic or intimate partner abuse or violence is available, 24/7:
Nearly three decades after Joe Biden faced sharp backlash over his treatment of Anita Hill, when she came before his Senate committee to accuse Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment, he urged lawmakers not to repeat the same mistakes when considering a sexual assault claim against another supreme court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh, by Christine Blasey Ford.
“It takes enormous courage for a woman to come forward, under the bright lights of millions of people watching, and relive something that happened to her,” Biden said in 2018, as he was laying the groundwork for a presidential run.
Ford, he said, “should be given the benefit of the doubt”.
On Friday, Biden broke a months-long silence to unequivocally deny an allegation of sexual assault by a former Senate aide, Tara Reade. But he was challenged to align his past comments on how such allegations should be viewed with his assertion that Reade’s account was false.
“Are women to be believed … unless it pertains to you?” asked Mika Brzezinski, a host of MSNBC’s Morning Joe.
“Women are to be believed, given the benefit of the doubt,” Biden said.
But he added that “the facts in this case do not exist. They never happened, and there’s so many inconsistencies in what has been said in this case. So yes, look at the facts, and I assure you it did not happen. Period. Period.”
For weeks Biden’s campaign has grappled with how he should defend him while upholding the “believe women” ethos of the #MeToo movement that has toppled powerful men in politics, entertainment and media. Since Donald Trump’s election, Democrats have confronted sexual misconduct aggressively, drawing a sharp distinction with Republicans on issues of gender and equality.
Trump has been accused by more than a dozen women of sexual harassment, assault or rape. During the 2016 election, a recording emerged of him bragging about groping women. Trump has flatly denied the allegations, often attacking his accusers, including for their appearance.
Indeed, on Friday the president advised Biden to “go out and fight it”.
Speaking to conservative conservative radio host Dan Bongino, Trump suggested the accusation could be false and likened the two men’s situations.
“All of a sudden you become a wealthy guy, you’re a famous guy, then you become president, and people … that you’ve never seen, that you’ve never heard of make charges. So I guess in a way you could say I’m … sticking up for him.”
Republicans have largely remained silent about Trump’s record on women. By contrast, Democrats demanded Biden address the matter and some have even called for him to step down as the presumptive nominee.
“Demanding more of Joe Biden’s leadership is not in contradiction with our commitment to defeat Trump,” said Ana Maria Archila, co-executive director of the Center for Popular Democracy. “It is, in fact, central to that effort.”
Republicans have seized on an opportunity to renew the poisonous fight that erupted over Kavanaugh.
“Democrat double standard”, blared a memo from the Republican National Committee which portrayed Democrats as hypocrites and suggested they were holding the allegation against their nominee to a higher standard of proof than the one they used against Kavanaugh.
“The double standard exhibited by Biden, prominent liberal women’s groups and Democrat elected officials – some of whom want to be Biden’s running mate – is glaring and cannot be allowed to stand,” said Erin Perrine, a spokeswoman for Trump’s election campaign.
Amy Klobuchar speaks to Ari Melber of MSNBC. Photograph: Brian Cahn/ZUMA Wire/REX/Shutterstock
But Karen Finney, who worked for Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign, said Republicans were “playing with fire”.
Lis Smith, a senior adviser to Pete Buttigieg’s Democratic presidential campaign, said: “If Republicans and Biden opponents push too hard on this, it will backfire on them and just raise the question of why President Trump has never addressed the scores of sexual misconduct allegations against him.”
Lara Brown, director of the Graduate School of Political Management at George Washington University, said: “In this situation, the calculation that I think most Democrats will make is whatever Biden’s problems are, Trump is worse on every level.”
Brown said accusations of hypocrisy can “hit more than the scandal itself”, particularly when a candidate is attempting to define an opponent. But in this case, she said, the effort to brand Democrats as hypocrites would be undercut by Trump’s record and Republican silence.
Larry Jacobs, director of the Center for the Study of Politics and Governance at the University of Minnesota, said Republicans were attempting to “neutralize” Biden’s appeal to suburban women who revolted from the party in 2018.
But he said the controversy would likely be eclipsed by the economic fallout from the coronavirus outbreak and was unlikely to be a “front-of-mind issue for voters” come November.
Women are a core Democratic constituency. Since Trump’s election, they have organized, voted and run for office in record numbers. In the presidential primary, excitement at the prospect of nominating a woman was eclipsed by fear of losing to Trump. Democrats chose Biden because they believed he was the most electable candidate. He has promised to choose a woman as his running mate.
Biden’s public silence over the last month put top female allies in the position of defending him while validating the experiences of women who come forward. Even so, party leadership and many of the women Biden is considering for vice-president, including senators Amy Klobuchar and Kamala Harris and former Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams, have voiced their support in recent days.
“I have a great comfort level with the situation as I see it,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters on Thursday, “with all due respect in the world for any woman who comes forward, with all the highest regard for Joe Biden.”
Stacey Abrams speaks to Jake Tapper of CNN. Photograph: Brian Cahn/ZUMA Wire/REX/Shutterstock
Pelosi said she had “complete respect” for the #MeToo movement but added: “There is also due process, and the fact that Joe Biden is Joe Biden.”
“‘The fact is that Joe Biden is Joe Biden’,” she wrote on Twitter. “What the hell? Bill Clinton is Bill Clinton, but he’s still a rapist.” Clinton has denied the charge.
‘#MeToo happened’
In a statement on Friday, Biden pointed to his work in the Senate to pass the Violence Against Women Act, and as vice-president to combat campus sexual assault.
Yet as he was preparing to launch his campaign last year, eight women, including Reade, came forward with stories about unwanted touching or contact. None alleged sexual assault. He apologized but advocates were dismayed when he made light of it days later.
For many sexual assault survivors and advocates, the current controversy has exposed how much still needs to change.
“#MeToo happened and survivors are speaking up more but we still have a lot of people who grew up and accumulated power in the pre-#MeToo world,” said Wagatwe Wanjuki, a writer and anti-rape activist who worked with Biden’s team to shape campus sexual assault policies when he was vice-president.
“Now we’re in this transitionary period where survivors feel more comfortable coming forward but we still don’t have the systems in place for them to come forward in a way that is fair and allows both sides to be heard.”
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