Presumptuous Politics

Monday, July 4, 2016

Suicide attack carried out near US diplomatic site in Saudi Arabia

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – A suicide bomber carried out an attack early on Monday near a U.S. diplomatic site in the western Saudi city of Jiddah, according to the Interior Ministry.
The ministry said the attacker detonated his suicide vest when security guards approached him near the parking lot of a hospital. The attacker died and two security men were wounded with minor injuries, according to the ministry statement, which was published by the state-run Saudi Press Agency. Some cars in the parking lot were damaged.
Interior Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Mansour al-Turki was quoted in the statement as saying the attacker caught the attention of the security guards, who noticed he was acting suspiciously at an intersection located on the corner of the heavily fortified U.S. Consulate in Jiddah, located by the Dr. Soliman Fakeeh Hospital. Most of the consulate's staff had reportedly moved offices to a new location.
The U.S. Embassy in Saudi Arabia confirmed there were no casualties or injuries among the consular staff. The embassy said it remains in contact with Saudi authorities as they investigate the attack.
No one immediately claimed responsibility for attack.
The Interior Ministry did not specify if it there are indications the bomber intended to target the U.S. diplomatic compound, saying an investigation was underway to determine his identity.
A 2004 al-Qaida-linked militant attack on the U.S. Consulate in Jiddah killed five locally hired consular employees and four gunmen. The three-hour battle on the compound came amid a wave of al-Qaida attacks targeting Westerners and Saudi security posts.
More recently, Saudi Arabia has been a target of Islamic State group attacks that have killed dozens of people. The extremist Sunni group views the Western-allied Saudi monarchy and government as heretics. Saudi Arabia is part of the U.S.-led coalition fighting the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria.
In June, the Interior Ministry reported 26 terror attacks had taken place in the kingdom in the last two years. Local affiliates of the IS group have targeted minority Shiites and security officials.
Monday's attack comes just days before the end of the holy month of Ramadan, during which observant Muslims fast daily from dawn to dusk.
The U.S. Embassy regularly issues advisory messages for U.S. citizens in Saudi Arabia. In a message issued Sunday and another one issued after the attack Monday, the embassy urged Americans to "remain aware of their surroundings, and take extra precautions when travelling throughout the country." It also advised citizens to "carefully consider the risks of traveling to Saudi Arabia."

Fourth of July 2016: What the Founders ask of us

President Abraham Lincoln

When clicking on the fox news web site I came upon this article which had a small picture of the founding fathers of America. But when you go to the actual article it only shows a picture of Lincoln and not the Founding Fathers. Is the fox news network afraid to show the photo because the founding fathers were a bunch of old white guys and they do not want offend anyone? Fair and Balanced or once again political correctness gone crazy?

Founding Fathers

And now here is the article:

It is remarkable that Abraham Lincoln never delivered a Fourth of July speech.
The closest he came was on July 10, 1858, in Chicago during one of the famous Lincoln-Douglas debates, when Lincoln spoke of the Founders as “iron men.” He remarked how, every July 4, Americans celebrate those “iron men” and their extraordinary achievement, because we are “historically connected” with it.
Lincoln meant this literally. He was speaking to those who were old enough to remember the Founders from their youth and those descendants of the Revolutionary generation.
But then Lincoln spoke about another set of Americans, the ones whose families came here after the great Revolution was over. In a word, immigrants. Of these, Lincoln said:
“If they look back through this history and trace their connection with those days by blood, they find they have none. They cannot carry themselves back into that glorious epoch and make themselves feel that they are part of us, but when they look through that old Declaration of Independence, they find that those old men say that, ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,’ and then they feel that the moral sentiment taught in that day evidences their relation to those men, that it is the father of all moral principle in them, and that they have a right to claim it as though they were blood of the blood, and flesh of the flesh, of the men who wrote that Declaration, and so they are.”
And so we are. None of us fought at Bunker Hill or Lexington or Concord. None of us endured famine, cold, or the impact of a musket ball. None of us signed our names to a document that made us traitors, fit to be hung.
Yet, despite all that, we are still Americans, and the Fourth is still our celebration, because we hold dear the “moral sentiment” for which those iron men fought and died — “That all men are created equal.”
Lincoln would fight and die for it, too.
Lincoln reassures us that this alone is enough to form that “historical connection” with men who in all other things bear no relation to us. Or, as he puts it: “That is the electric cord in that Declaration that links the hearts of patriotic and liberty-loving men together, that will link those patriotic hearts as long as the love of freedom exists in the minds of men throughout the world.”
As this speech was delivered in response to Stephen Douglas, a congressman from Illinois, Lincoln connects the “electric cord” in the Declaration with the question of slavery.
“If one man says [the Declaration] does not mean a negro, why not another say it does not mean some other man?”
In a few short paragraphs, Lincoln eviscerates Douglas’ contention that the ideals of the Declaration were reserved for only the true descendants of the American Revolution. It is remarkable that there was a time when Lincoln’s idea, now so central to our American mindset, was not dominant.
And yet we find our present culture riven by a hypersensitive strain of identity politics. We are told, even by some who belong to Lincoln’s party, that we should provide this group of Americans with one kind of government handout and that group with another.
We are told that we must “speak to” a certain group of Americans in a certain way or else lose their vote. We are told that skin color or sex determines whether a group is more or less deserving of government perks. If one disagrees, one is shouted down as a racist, bigot, or chauvinist.
Yet Lincoln would disagree. The Founders would disagree as well. And so must all whose connection with that great and glorious generation of “iron men” consists of embracing an ideal that was meant to be taken literally; namely, that all men are created equal.
But it is not enough to believe this. We must do more than reread those words this Fourth of July in between the barbeques and fireworks. We must do what the Founders did, and what Lincoln did in his own time, and fight against the insidious notion that those words mean other than what they say.
Lincoln believed the Founders asked this of him and his generation. It is what the Founders ask of us still.

Sunday, July 3, 2016

Independence Day: What is it and why is it celebrated on 4 July?

On Monday, Americans will gather to celebrate Independence Day, which marks an event of massive historical significance for the country. These are the origins America's biggest holiday.
What is it?
4 July is the most significant national holiday in the United States. It celebrates the Declaration of Independence, adopted on 4 July, 1776. The Thirteen Colonies of America declared themselves to be states and no longer part of the British Empire, though the revolutionary war continued for some time after.
What’s the story behind it?
The original United States of America was made up of a collection of East Coast states known as the Thirteen Colonies. These were: Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia, Connecticut, Massachusetts Bay, Maryland, South Carolina, New Hampshire, Virginia, New York, North Carolina, and Rhode Island and Providence Plantations.
These mainly agricultural colonies were run by the British - who had been present on the continent since 1587 - and exploited for their resources, in particular tobacco.
While the relationship between the settlers and British was once amicable, tensions began to escalate over British laws and taxes, such as the Sugar Act, driven by British financial needs. There was also a growing sense of nationalism in the country.
From 1765, some settlers began to demand ‘no taxation without representation’, calling for their voice to be heard in the British parliament.
This tension sometimes erupted into fighting and acts of dissent, such as the Boston Tea Party in 1773. The event was a protest against the Tea Act, legislation which gave the British East India Company a monopoly on sales of tea in the Thirteen Colonies.
Further ill feeling was caused by the Coercive Acts – which became known as the ‘Intolerable Acts’ to American Patriots – which were implemented in response to the Boston Tea Party. The laws took power away from semi-autonomous Massachusetts.
In response to these factors, Continental Congresses – a meeting of delegates from the Thirteen Colonies – were convened. At the second meeting, in 1775, a war of independence against Britain was declared.
The next year, the Declaration of Independence was signed by 56 representatives of thirteen self-styled states (previously the Thirteen Colonies). The signatories included future president Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin.
The conflict continued until the 1783 Treaty of Paris, which ended the war in favour of an independent America.
How has it been celebrated through history?
Fireworks, speeches, parties, feasts and general celebrations have marked the day since the 18th century. In Bristol, Rhode Island, there was a salute of 13 gunshots in the morning and evening in 1777. The town has held the nation's longest running Independence Day celebration.
The first recorded music commemorating independence was the ‘Pslam of Joy’, written by Johann Friedrich Peter in Salem, North Carolina.
Many towns and cities across the US have their own annual celebrations.
How has the government marked it?
Congress made the day an unpaid national holiday for federal workers in 1870, and in 1938 it became a paid holiday across the country. Government officials also take part in celebratory functions and make speeches.
How do people celebrate it today?
Firework displays and parties are the most well-known activities associated with Independence Day. All major cities have fireworks displays and there is also one given by the White House. As a national holiday, it also serves as an occasion for reunions and vacations.

Obama MeMe Cartoons

Penalties Clinton could face if indicted over private server

Republican Colorado official steps down after posting Obama meme on Facebook

DELTA, Colorado – The chairwoman of the Delta County Republican Party who was accused of favoritism and posting a racist meme on her Facebook page has resigned.
Party officials were upset after a photo compared President Barack Obama to a chimpanzee appeared on Linda Sorenson web page, the Grand Junction Daily Sentinel reported.
Sorenson stepped down after an accountability meeting was convened by the county's Republican Central Committee investigating the allegations. She announced her decision to resign in an email to supporters.
The committee was investigating allegations that Sorenson and others made that her Facebook page was "hacked" and whether she violated party rules by endorsing a primary candidate.
Sorenson said her Facebook page was hacked, but Colorado Party Chairman Steve House said that was not the case.
And in an interview in May after the image was posted, Sorenson said she didn't care if people were offended by the image.
Don Suppes, mayor of Orchard City, who is running for the Delta County Commission, said he wasn't at the meeting, but he got the email and agreed with the decision.
"There's no room for racism, intended or unintended, in society," he said. "It's best for the party, best for the county, that she step down."
Party members said Sorenson also urged people to vote for U.S. Senate candidate Daryl Glenn, even though six Republicans were competing for the right to challenge Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet in the June 28 Republican primaries. Glenn won the primary.
Under party rules, officials of state and local parties, including their leaders, are not allowed to endorse one primary candidate over another.
"That is one of the hardest parts of that job," Suppes said. "You have to stay neutral no matter how strong your feelings are one way or another. You have to stay neutral."

Trump says he's filled convention speaker spots; tries to reverse slide, seize on Clinton's tough week

Donald Trump said Saturday that he’s filled all of the speaker slots for the fast-approaching Republican National Convention -- trying to capitalize on rival Hillary Clinton’s tough week and stop talk about key GOP figures distancing themselves from him and the event.
Trump, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, said on Twitter that he’ll announce the lineup on Wednesday and that he has “a long waiting list of those that want to speak.”
Trump critics have for weeks kept a running tally of top Republicans not attending the four-day convention in Cleveland that starts July 18 -- from such standard-bearers as former President George W. Bush to New Hampshire Sen. Kelly Ayotte, who is in a tough re-election campaign.
Speaking on the convention stage is considered a coveted opportunity for politicians, especially for up-and-coming ones to raise their national profile. Barack Obama’s keynote address at the 2004 Democratic convention, for example, helped him ascend from a freshman Illinois senator to president.
Dr. Ben Carson, a Trump primary rival, will reportedly speak at this year’s GOP convention. However, the Trump campaign has not confirmed such reports. And Trump shot down an earlier report that former boxing champion Mike Tyson would speak.
Trump is also expected to announce his running mate at the convention, but a news report earlier this week stated the announcement could come earlier.
Neither Trump nor Clinton, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, have scheduled campaign events over the Fourth of July weekend.
Clinton spoke Saturday morning to the FBI in Washington about the agency’s investigation into her use of a private email server while secretary of state.
She was in her Washington home and is expected to spend the rest of the weekend in the family’s home in Chappaqua, N.Y.
Her rough week started when top aide Huma Abedin had a six-hour deposition Tuesday with the conservative group Judicial Watch about Clinton’s use of the server and private email address for government communication while they both were at the State Department.
While the court-ordered deposition didn’t result in any ground break revelations, Abedin acknowledging the setup “frustrated” her and that a “hack” on the system was attempted sidetracked the Clinton campaign’s attacks on Trump.
"Judicial Watch represents everything that is wrong with our political system,” Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill told FoxNews.com on Wednesday. “They are only interested in headlines and have made a complete mockery of our (judicial) system.”
Then on Thursday, Clinton’s husband, former President Bill Clinton, added to the larger controversy when he initiated an impromptu meeting with Attorney General Loretta Lynch, who decides whether to prosecute the server case based on the recommendations of career federal prosecutors and the FBI director.
Lynch, appointed by Obama, who backs Clinton’s White House bid, has said she’ll accept the recommendations of the agency officials.
Clinton, who has risen slightly in recent polls against Trump, has no scheduled events until Tuesday, when she attends an event in Washington, then in North Carolina with Obama, their first together in the 2016 campaign.
Last year, Clinton caused a big flap over the Fourth weekend at a parade in key primary state New Hampshire when campaign staffers used a rope to keep reporters away from her.
Trump, a first-time candidate and billionaire businessman, struggled in June to gain GOP support in large part after suggesting a judge in a civil suit against his Trump University real estate school might be bias, considering Trump has proposed building a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border and the judge’s parents are from Mexico.
Trump’s next scheduled event is Wednesday in Cincinnati.

Trump calls for charges against Clinton after FBI interview in email investigation

Confirmed: Clinton met with FBI about email investigation

Presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump called for charges to be filed against Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton Saturday after the former secretary of state met with the FBI regarding the agency’s investigation into her use of a private email server for official correspondence.
"It is impossible for the FBI not to recommend criminal charges against Hillary Clinton," Trump tweeted Saturday afternoon. "What she did was wrong! What Bill did was stupid!"
The Clinton campaign said the voluntary meeting lasted about three-and-a-half hours and took place at FBI headquarters in Washington.
Clinton “is pleased to have had the opportunity to assist the Department of Justice in bringing this review to a conclusion” campaign spokesman Nick Merrill said in a statement. He also said Clinton, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, would have no further comment about the interview.
The campaign issued the statement Saturday shortly before 12:30 p.m. ET, practically minutes after Clinton returned to her Washington home, then departed again about 30 minutes later.
“Hillary Clinton has just taken the unprecedented step of becoming the first major party presidential candidate to be interviewed by the FBI as part of a criminal investigation surrounding her reckless conduct,” said Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus. "We must ask ourselves if this is the kind of leadership we want in the White House.”
There was no immediate comment from the FBI or Justice Department Saturday.
Clinton’s use of a private server and email address -- and whether classified information was mishandled as a result of that setup -- has cast a shadow over her campaign from the start.
The FBI investigation is purportedly coming to a close, and the Clinton interview is considered among the final steps in the case.
Trump has seized on the email issue and repeatedly said the probe undermines Clinton's fitness for office. Trump has called his opponent "Crooked Hillary" and said she cannot be trusted in the White House.
The former first lady and New York senator has argued that she is more trustworthy than Trump on handling the issues that matter to most Americans: foreign policy, national security and running the economy.
But the email investigation has lingered throughout her campaign, and Trump has asserted that Clinton will receive leniency from a Democratic administration.
Earlier this week, the entire, ongoing email scandal grew when Clinton’s husband, former President Bill Clinton, initiated an impromptu meeting with Attorney General Loretta Lynch on her airplane in Phoenix.
"The American people need to have confidence that the Obama Justice Department is conducting a fair and impartial investigation, but when the attorney general meets secretly with Bill Clinton just days before Hillary’s interrogation is conducted discreetly over a holiday weekend, it raises serious concerns about specialtreatment,” Priebus also said.
There was already speculation about whether an agency under the Obama administration could conduct an unbiased probe, which only intensified after Clinton met with Lynch, a President Obama appointee who decides whether to bring charges in the case.
Lynch says she will accept whatever recommendations she receives from the agency's career prosecutors and lawyers.
Clinton has said relying on a private server was a mistake but that other secretaries of state had also used a personal email address. The matter was referred for investigation last July by the inspectors general for the State Department and intelligence community following the discovery of emails that they said contained classified information.
The State Department's inspector general, the agency's internal watchdog, said in a blistering audit in May that Clinton and her team ignored clear warnings from State Department officials that her email setup violated federal standards and could leave sensitive material vulnerable to hackers. Clinton declined to talk to the inspector general, but the audit reported that Clinton feared "the personal being accessible" if she used a government email account.
Agents have already interviewed top Clinton aides including her former State Department chief of staff Cheryl Mills and Huma Abedin, a longtime aide who is currently the vice chairwoman of Clinton's campaign.
The staffer who set up the server, Bryan Pagliano, was granted limited immunity from prosecution by the Justice Department last fall in exchange for his cooperation. The FBI as a matter of course seeks to interview individuals central to an investigation before concluding its work.
The emails were routed through a server located in the basement of Clinton's New York home during her tenure as the nation's top diplomat from 2009 to 2013.
Dozens of the emails sent or received by Clinton through her private server were later determined to contain classified material.
Clinton has repeatedly said that none of the emails were marked classified at the time they were sent or received. As part of the probe, she has turned over the hard drive from her email server to the FBI.