North Korea threat lingers at start of Tillerson's first Asia trip

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is set to begin his first trip to Asia in his new role and will attempt to forge cooperation with important U.S. allies in the region, while downplaying fears that the U.S. is looking to isolate itself diplomatically.
Tillerson will find shared anxiety at the North's saber-rattling but less agreement about how to deal with it, and unresolved questions about how the United States and China, the world's two largest economies, can manage growing differences.
Japan and South Korea, which host American troops and are already within range of North Korean missiles, support U.S. efforts to increase diplomatic and economic pressure on Pyongyang.
The three navies were also conducting drills Wednesday in seas east of the divided Korean Peninsula and north of Japan to promote interoperability, the U.S. Navy's 7th Fleet said.But China remains conflicted about how to treat its traditional ally for fear of triggering its collapse.
Adding to the combustible mix of military tension and the region's historic rivalries is another factor — uncertainty about U.S. foreign policy under the Trump administration.
Tillerson, who arrives in Tokyo late Wednesday at the start of his four-day, three-nation tour, could provide some reassurance to nervy allies. He will meet Thursday with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida.
The former Exxon Mobil CEO has adopted a low profile during his six weeks as secretary of state. The State Department Correspondents' Association expressed disappointment Wednesday that Tillerson was traveling to Asia without a full contingent of the diplomatic press corps or even a pool reporter on his plane — although it is taking a reporter from the conservative-leaning website, the Independent Journal Review.
President Trump's rise to power has raised anxiety in Asian capitals. During last year's election campaign, Trump asked whether allies like Japan and South Korea contribute enough for their own defense or should get their own nuclear weapons. He also questioned the fundamentals of four decades of U.S. diplomacy with China.
Trump has allayed some of those concerns since taking office. Trump hosted Abe at his Florida resort last month, and when Tillerson goes to Beijing Saturday, he is expected to arrange a much-anticipated visit by Chinese President Xi Jinping to the U.S.
"The U.S. allies, Japan and South Korea, want to know that the United States is going to continue to defend them but also is going to show a certain amount of finesse and diplomatic skills in dealing with China and with North Korea," said Robert Dujarric, the director of the Institute of Contemporary Asian Studies at Temple University's campus in Tokyo.
North Korea will be a top priority on all Tillerson's stops. The State Department says Tillerson wants to discuss "fresh" approaches. Administration officials say all options are on the table, including military ones, but signs are that the U.S. for starters wants to see rigorous implementation of existing sanctions against Pyongyang.
There appears to be little desire for now to negotiate with North Korea, unless it commits to denuclearization, which it shows no sign of doing.
The North conducted two nuclear tests and 24 ballistic missile tests last year, deepening concern in Washington that it could soon develop a nuclear-tipped missile capable of reaching the U.S. mainland — something Trump has vowed won't happen.
The U.S. is currently involved in annual military drills in South Korea that North Korea regards as rehearsal for invasion. In a show of defiance, the North fired four ballistic missiles into ocean off Japan last week. The next day, the U.S. began bringing in equipment for the long-planned deployment in South Korea of a missile defense system, known by its acronym, THAAD.
That has raised tensions with China, which says the THAAD's radar could peer into Chinese territory, weakening its own nuclear deterrent. The U.S. says the system is intended to be used only against North Korea.
A Trump administration official told Reuters that Tillerson's position on THAAD would be uncompromising.
"THAAD is non-negotiable," the official told Reuters. "This is one of those things where Beijing is just going to have to adapt to or live in a perpetual cycle of outrage.
"But this is a chance to lay down a marker on what we would need from China and to hear from them what they would want to see in return. Everyone is eyes-open that they are not going to give us anything on North Korea without something in return."

Politically Correct Cartoons

Wearing red, white and blue lands high school students in hot water

Every heart beats true ‘neath the red, white and blue – although some people apparently see overt displays of patriotism as offensive to immigrants and refugees.
George M. Cohan probably never thought about adding that coda to his patriotic anthem “You're a Grand Old Flag,” and the Iowa high school students who donned red, white and blue to support their men’s basketball team last week probably didn’t think about their actions being controversial. But the patriotic garb worn by some Valley High School students on Wednesday upset students at Des Moines North High School, which is described as being more diverse and full of refugee families.
PARENTS REPORTEDLY OUTRAGED OVER 5TH GRADERS' SLAVE AUCTION POSTER ASSIGNMENT
“Any normal person, any educated person can look at that and think, ‘What the hell are these kids thinking?’” North High School assistant coach Morgan Wheat told WHOTV.com.
Now, North High basketball coach Chad Ryan is speaking out -- and says it's possible the opposing team's fans may not have had sinister intentions. "What I will say is we’re proud of our diversity at North High School — not only on our basketball team, but our population."
SCHOOL CHANGES NAME OF 'FATHER-DAUGHTER' DANCE TO BE MORE INCLUSIVE
Valley High School’s student council responded to the hullabaloo by sending an apology letter to Des Moines North students.
“It has been brought to our attention that the decision by the Valley High School student section to wear U.S.A. apparel at our game last night was offensive to members of your community and fan base,” the letter, obtained by the Des Moines Register, began. “We are deeply sorry if we have offended anyone in any way.”
The letter continued, “We have traditionally dressed in such a fashion for great games such as the one last night. Everyone here at Valley has immense respect not only for your team and players but for your community as a whole. Please know that our intent was in no way to offend or demean – just to support our own team in a way we have done before.”
The students had dressed in patriotic-themed clothing on at least one other occasion this school year, during a football game against Dowling Catholic that was witnessed by WHOTV.com.
And though Valley ended up submitting the apology letter, it would only serve as consolation for Des Moines North; Valley won the Wednesday basketball game, 57-55.

Gingrich Blasts 'Disgustingly Wrong' CBO: It 'Should Be Abolished'

Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) slammed the Congressional Budget Office, which released a critical score of the Republicans' ObamaCare replacement bill, declaring that it should be abolished.
On "The First 100 Days," Martha MacCallum asked Gingrich what he thought of the CBO's scoring, which said 14 million more people will be uninsured by 2018 under the plan championed by Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.).
"They should abolish the Congressional Budget Office," Gingrich said. "It is corrupt, it is dishonest, it was totally wrong on ObamaCare by huge, huge margins."

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Robert Davi: Hollywood Conservatives Need to 'Grow a Pair'
CBO: GOP ObamaCare Replacement Would Result in Millions More Uninsured
Schumer Threatens Government Shutdown over Trump Wall Funding

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Gingrich said he does not believe a single word they print in their reports.
He said, as House Speaker in the 1990s, he balanced the federal budget for four straight years, and "fought the CBO every time."
Gingrich said the organization, billed as a nonpartisan scorekeeper for legislation, used an ObamaCare architect to help score the Affordable Care Act.
"[They're] totally dishonest, disgustingly wrong," he said. "That whole thing should be abolished."
Gingrich also pointed out that Health & Human Services Secretary Dr. Tom Price said the CBO did not score several sections of the current legislation.

Trump administration disagrees with CBO report on health care

The Trump administration on Monday lashed out at the Congressional Budget Office’s report that estimated that about 24 million more Americans in a few years would be uninsured under the new legislation.
The bill, called the American Health Care Act, would be “less generous” with new tax credits for those receiving subsidies under the current law and the plan would likely increase average premiums in the nongroup market until 2020.
Tom Price, the Health and Human Services secretary, downplayed the report and said, “we disagree strenuously with the report that was put out. It’s just not believable is what we would suggest.”
The CBO report, compiled along with staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation, also determined that the Republicans’ American Health Care Act would save money for taxpayers. According to the study, it would reduce federal deficits by $337 billion from 2017 to 2026.
SCALISE: CBO GOT IT WRONG ON OBAMACARE REPLACEMENT
The report’s estimate on the number of uninsured nevertheless could overshadow projections about premiums and taxpayer savings, fueling critics. Criticism so far has come from Democrats, Republicans from states that benefit from Obama's law and many corners of the health-care industry.
According to the CBO, the projected loss in insurance coverage is related mostly to a provision repealing penalties associated with the ACA’s requirement to buy insurance.
The CBO report, compiled along with staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation, also determined that the Republicans’ American Health Care Act would save money for taxpayers. According to the study, it would reduce federal deficits by $337 billion from 2017 to 2026.
The report’s estimate on the number of uninsured nevertheless could overshadow projections about premiums and taxpayer savings, fueling critics. Criticism so far has come from Democrats, Republicans from states that benefit from Obama's law and many corners of the health-care industry.
According to the CBO, the projected loss in insurance coverage is related mostly to a provision repealing penalties associated with the ACA’s requirement to buy insurance.
“Obamacare all of a sudden the last couple of weeks is getting a false rep that maybe it’s OK. It’s not OK,” President Trump said Monday, according to Politico. “It’s a disaster, and people understand that. It’s failed, and it’s imploding. And if we let it go for another year, it’ll totally implode. In fact, I’ve told the Republicans, ‘Why don’t you just let it go for another year?’ That way everybody will really understand how bad it is.”

Officials say pirates hijack freighter in latest test for Trump

Pirates have hijacked an oil tanker off the coast of Somalia, Somali officials and piracy experts said Tuesday, in the first hijacking of a large commercial vessel there since 2012.
The area where the hijacking occured is overseen by the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet, which is based in Bahrain.
It was not immediately clear what the pirates' intentions are, but it may become one of the Trump administration's first international tests.
The Aris 13 on Monday reported being approached by two skiffs, John Steed with the organization Oceans Beyond Piracy said. The ship had been carrying fuel from Djibouti to Somalia's capital, Mogadishu, Steed said.
An official in the semiautonomous state of Puntland said over two dozen men boarded the ship off Somalia's northern coast. Another Puntland official said the ship was being moved toward the coast. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the press.
A Britain-based spokeswoman for the European Union Naval Force operation off Somalia, Flt. Lt. Louise Tagg, confirmed that an incident involving an oil tanker had occurred and an investigation was underway.
An official said no ransom demand had been made.
"The vessel's captain reported to the company they were approached by two skiffs and that one of them they could see armed personnel on board," the official said. "The ship changed course quite soon after that report and is now anchored." The official spoke on condition of anonymity as no one was authorized to speak publicly about the incident.
It was not immediately clear who owned the ship or there it was flagged. Steed said it was UAE-owned and Sri Lankan-flagged, but the Middle East-based official said it was Greek-owned and Comoros-flagged with plans to re-flag it to Sri Lanka.
Piracy off Somalia's coast was once a serious threat to the global shipping industry. It has lessened in recent years after an international effort to patrol near the country, whose weak central government has been trying to assert itself after a quarter-century of conflict.
But frustrations have been rising among local fishermen, including former pirates, at what they say are foreign fishermen illegally fishing in local waters.
Salad Nur, an elder in Alula, a coastal town in Puntland, told the AP by telephone that young fishermen including former pirates have hijacked the ship.
"They have been sailing through the ocean in search for a foreign ship to hijack since yesterday morning and found this ship and boarded it," he said. "Foreign fishermen destroyed their livelihoods and deprived them of proper fishing."
Somali pirates usually hijack ships and crew for ransom. They don't normally kill hostages unless they come under attack, including during rescue attempts.
This would be the first commercial pirate attack off Somalia since 2012, Steed said.
A United Nations report seen by the AP in November said it had been almost three years since Somali pirates successfully hijacked a large commercial vessel, but they retain the capacity and intent to resume the attacks and lately have shifted to targeting smaller foreign fishing boats.
The EU force website currently lists no vessels or hostages held by pirates.
Concerns about piracy off Africa's coast have largely shifted to the Gulf of Guinea.

Stupid Democrat Cartoons

Cotton, Schiff doubt Justice will meet Monday deadline about evidence on Trump's wiretap claim

A key Democrat and Republican on congressional Intelligence committees doubted Sunday that the Justice Department would meet a bipartisan request to provide evidence by Monday on whether former President Obama ordered a wiretap on Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.
“I don’t expect to see any evidence,” California Rep. Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, told ABC’s “This Week.”
Schiff and committee Chairman Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., purportedly made the request in a letter Saturday.
Schiff suggested Sunday that the Justice Department would have no evidence because either Trump “made up” the wiretap charge or that the president perpetuated a farfetched allegation.
He further suggested the department wouldn’t face “consequences” for failing to meet the deadline and that FBI Director James Comey would have an opportunity to tell what he knows at an open committee hearing scheduled for next week.
“We're going to be able to ask the director of the FBI … is there any truth of this? Have they seen any evidence of this?” Schiff said. “And I think on March 20, if not before, we'll be able to put this to rest.”
He also said Comey might welcome the opportunity to make clear whether he indeed asked the Justice Department to reject Trump’s wiretap claim.
Trump sparked the controversy last weekend with the tweet: "Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my 'wires tapped' in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!"
He continued the allegation against Obama in other tweets, which included no evidence and were followed by an official White House request that Congress investigate the issue as part of a broader probe on Russia and perhaps others’ outside influence on the 2016 White House race.
Obama's director of national intelligence, James Clapper, has said that nothing matching Trump's claims had taken place. But that has not quelled speculation that Trump's communications were monitored by the Obama administration.
Last week, Schiff said his committee would answer the president's call to investigate the claim.
Nunes has said that so far he has not seen any evidence to back up Trump's claim and has suggested the news media were taking the president's weekend tweets too literally.
"The president is a neophyte to politics -- he's been doing this a little over a year," he told reporters last week.
On Sunday, Arkansas GOP Sen. Tom Cotton, a member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, told ABC that Comey was unlikely to meet the Monday deadline -- only because the U.S. intelligence community’s work should remain top secret.
“There are reasons why the intelligence community, in particular the FBI, which often operates … in conjunction with the Department of Justice, is reluctant to make public statements," he said. "Because it could reveal what we do and what [we] don't know and how we know those things. And that's not something that we want our adversaries to understand.”
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., told CNN's "State of the Union" on Sunday that Trump could "clear this up in a minute" if he were to call the director of the CIA or the director of national intelligence and say, “OK, what happened?”
"I do believe on issues such as this, accusing a former president of the United States of something which is not only illegal, but just unheard of, that requires corroboration,” McCain continued. “I'll let the American people be the judge, but this is serious stuff."

Spicer ambushed by woman in Apple Store

A woman questioned White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer on Saturday in an Apple Store, asking him what is was like working for a “fascist.”
Shree Chauhan posted a video of the encounter on social media over the weekend. In the video she is heard asking Sean Spicer if he “helped with the Russia stuff.”
Spicer responded to Chauhan by saying “we have a great country.”
The viral Periscope video showed the woman asking how Spicer felt “about destroying our country.”
Chauhan was in the store to get her iPhone fixed when she spotted the press secretary.
“I realized what an enormous opportunity it was to get answers without the protections normally given to Mr. Spicer,” Chauhan said in a post on Medium.
The woman in the video continued to ask Spicer if he was a “criminal” and if he had “committed treason too, just like the president.”
Spicer said in the video that the United States is “such a great country that allows you to be here.”
“That is racism and it is an implied threat,” Chauhan said in the post in response to his comment. The woman went on to say, “I was not polite. But when does being impolite mean that I should be thrown out of the United States of America?”
Spicer finished his transaction and was leaving the store while Chauhan asked if he felt “good about lying to the American people.”
“We can win if we resist together for liberty, justice and equality. This is our shared America,” Chauhan said in her post.

Trump's first budget boosts defense, cuts conservative targets like EPA

President Donald Trump sends Congress a proposed budget this week that will sharply test Republicans' ability to keep long-standing promises to bolster the military, making politically painful cuts to a lengthy list of popular domestic programs.
The Republican president will ask his adopted political party, which runs Capitol Hill, to cut domestic agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency and the departments of Education and Housing and Urban Development, along with grants to state and local governments and community development projects.
The spending plan, set for release Thursday, would make the Pentagon the big winner with a $54 billion boost to defense spending.
Trump has promised to "do a lot more with less," but his blueprint faces a reality test with Republicans, many of whom are already protesting.
Republicans have groused about some of the preliminary plans, including elimination of the $3 billion community development block grant program that's popular among local GOP officials, a 25 percent cut to the EPA and elimination of 3,000 jobs, and essentially scuttling a $300 million per-year program to clean up the Great Lakes.
Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, is joining with Democrats to push back on that last proposed reduction.
Cuts to the Coast Guard are meeting Republican resistance. Trump's plan to eliminate community development block grants was dismissed on Capitol Hill by those who remember how a modest cut to the program sank a spending bill not long ago.
"Unfortunately, we have no alternative but to reinvest in our military and make ourselves a military power once again," White House economic adviser Gary Cohn said on "Fox News Sunday."
The United States, however, already spends more than half trillion dollars on defense, more than the next seven countries combined.
Cohn defended the spending cuts elsewhere as necessary to balance the budget. "These are tough decisions, but the president has shown he is ready, willing and able to make these tough decisions," he said Sunday.
Democrats are unlikely to support the cuts, and Republican defections raise the possibility of a congressional train wreck and a potential government shutdown when the 2018 budget year begins Oct. 1.
Preliminary reports on the budget show some domestic Cabinet agencies, such as the departments of Homeland Security and Veterans Affairs, would see increases, including $3 billion for Trump's promised wall on the U.S.-Mexico border. Trump said repeatedly during the campaign that Mexico would pay for that project, but Mexico has said no.
Those intended spending increases, however, would mean deeper cuts elsewhere.
People familiar with the budget who spoke on condition of anonymity in advance of the public release say the White House is seeking a 30 percent cut from an Energy Department office that promotes energy efficiency and renewable energy.
The office has funded research on projects such as LED light bulbs, electric trucks, advanced batteries and biofuels.
The Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy is targeted for at least $700 million in cuts from its current $2.1 billion budget, said Scott Sklar, chairman of the steering committee of the Sustainable Energy Coalition.
The Energy Department could see steep cuts for its 17 national laboratories, which conduct cutting-edge research on topics from nuclear power to advanced materials for energy generation, storage and use.
Trump's preliminary budget, delivered in secret to agencies last month, proposes a 37 percent cut to the State Department and foreign aid budgets. Those cuts and others were subject to revision in the back and forth that the White House had with agencies leading up to the coming release this week.
Trump's submission won't tell the complete story. It will be limited to the discretionary, $1 trillion-plus portion of the $4 trillion annual federal budget that pays for Cabinet agencies and departments.
These annually appropriated programs have been squeezed in recent years while the costs of mandatory programs such as Medicare and Social Security have risen each year, mostly unchecked.
The remainder of Trump's budget -- proposals on taxes, mandatory spending and deficits and projections on the economy -- won't come out until May. That document is sure to upset members of the GOP's once-proud and large band of deficit hawks, because Trump's full plans are sure to show large, permanent budget deficits, even with all of the tricks and tools available to the White House Budget office.
The government ran a $587 billion deficit last year that required it to borrow 15 cents of every dollar it spent. Looking ahead, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office says the government is on track for accumulated deficits of more than $9 trillion over the coming decade.
CBO Director Keith Hall warns that such huge deficits are putting the government on a long-term path that "would have serious negative consequences for the budget and the nation, including an increased risk of fiscal crisis."
But Trump is promising to leave the government's two largest programs, Medicare and Social Security, virtually untouched. He's also promising $1 trillion in infrastructure spending, even as pressure is building to finance tax cuts with borrowed money.
Trump's budget options are already being hemmed in by decisions on health care. The Trump-endorsed House bill cuts taxes by $1 trillion over the coming decade while devoting hundreds of billions of dollars in Medicaid cuts toward a new GOP subsidy.
"They're going to have a hell of a hard time passing a budget that balances -- even fabricating a budget that balances," said Kentucky Rep. John Yarmuth, the top Democrat on the House Budget committee. "This health care bill is going to make their budget very tricky."