by admin | May 25, 2021 | World
By Arun Kumar,
Washington : His supporters may be a “basket of deplorables”, as presidential rival Hillary Clinton suggested on the campaign trail, but Donald Trump is no basket case as his detractors have insinuated.
Twitter-thumb Trump may well be the most obnoxious egomaniac to ever occupy the White House as left liberal media paints him to be, but he is no “moron” as his exasperated Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is alleged to have once called him.
There is a method to Trump’s madness. His temper tantrums, intemperate tweets, and juvenile taunts all have a purpose: Distract, shoot and scoot. And time and again, the media has fallen for it hook, line and sinker.
Take the President’s latest rant against “shithole countries” in Africa. The alleged remark sent a nebulous bipartisan deal on “dreamers” — illegal immigrants brought to the US as children — down the toilet.
As conservative Washington Examiner aptly summed it up: “Trump was breaking ground on immigration, then it all went to shit.”
But probably that’s what he wanted to up the ante for a larger immigration reforms package that he outlined days after a short-lived shutdown of government with opposition Senate Democratic leader “Crying Chuck” Schumer throwing in the towel too soon.
Even as the media upbraided Trump for his intemperate language, he dangled new hope for the Dreamers — a path to citizenship for 1.8 million of them in return for $25 billion for his “big beautiful wall” on the Mexican border and a merit-based immigration system.
That’s part of the pattern for the author of “The Art of the Deal”. These very tactics have helped “The Donald”, as his first wife lovingly called him, notch up in just one year an impressive list of successes — good, bad or ugly! — despite the Russian “cloud” hanging over his administration.
He has instituted the biggest corporate tax overhaul in 30 years and drastically cut red tape by revoking hundreds of regulations to make it easier to do business. Trump is also rapidly reshaping the judiciary by naming a conservative judge to the Supreme Court and appointing a record 12 federal appellate judges who serve lifelong with hundreds more to come.
At home he has been rewarded by a roaring economy and a soaring stock market. Companies big and small have outlined plans to bring back profits stashed abroad and open new plants, raising minimum wages and giving $1,000 bonuses to workers.
Among them, information technology giant Apple has announced plans to invest a whopping $350 billion and create 20,000 new jobs in the US over the next five years. And corporate titans gathered at Davos too have started warming up to the “America First” President with his declaration that “America is open for business”.
Trump has also upended decades of US foreign policy, rattling allies and foes alike. Islamic State has been virtually crushed, thanks to a free hand given to the military and some help from Russia. Trump has also called Pakistan’s bluff and frozen its funding until it stops harbouring terrorists.
He has pulled out of the non-binding Paris Climate accord, approved two controversial oil pipelines — Keysone XL and Dakota access — and opened up about 90 percent coastal areas for drilling, throwing environmental concerns to the winds.
On the campaign trail, Trump had threatened to tear up the “disastrous” Iran nuclear deal on day one. But he is unlikely to follow through even as he has threatened to walk away from it after signing yet another waiver on sanctions.
Trump has recognised Jerusalem as the Israeli capital and announced plans to move the US embassy there two decades after the Senate passed a law and successive presidents signing waivers with little more than murmurs of disapproval from powerful Muslim nations.
Whether Trump’s actions would have a disastrous effect on climate change or would end hopes of a two-state solution in Palestine is moot. The point is Trump is having his way on all but a few issues.
Trump’s tantalising tweets and taunts have provided a circulation spinning bonanza to the “Failing New York Times” or Very Fake News CNN or other “Dishonest media”, as he has nicknamed them. But by falling for them they have also given The Donald a free pass.
(Arun Kumar can be contacted at arun.kumar@ians.in)
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | World
New York : US President Donald Trump has mocked the Vanity Fair magazine for apologising to Hillary Clinton over a video that poked fun at the former Secretary of State, the media reported.
“Vanity Fair, which looks like it is on its last legs, is bending over backwards in apologising for the minor hit they took at Crooked H (Hillary Clinton),” Trump tweeted on Thursday.
The video featuring Vanity Fair staffers offering cheeky New Year’s resolutions for Clinton was first published on December 23, reports CNN.
“Take up a new hobby in the new year,” technology writer Maya Kosoff said in the video.
“Volunteer work, knitting, improv comedy — literally anything that will keep you from running again.”
However, three days later one line in the video became the focus of intense criticism leading to widespread outrage among Clinton supporters who decried the reference to “knitting” as sexist.
A hashtag, #CancelVanityFair, spread on Twitter.
Adam Parkhomenko, a former Clinton adviser, tweeted a photo of the magazine engulfed in flames.
Hollywood actress Patricia Arquette reacted with similar anger, CNN reported.
“Hey stop telling women what the f**k they should do or can do,” Arquette tweeted. “Get over your mommy issues.”
On Wednesday night, a Vanity Fair spokesperson had put out a statement saying the video was “an attempt at humour and we regret that it missed the mark”.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | World
Hillary Clinton
London : WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has confirmed that a data analytics company that worked for US President Donald Trumps election campaign had contacted him over Hillary Clinton’s private emails while she was secretary of state, media reports said.
“I can confirm an approach by Cambridge Analytica (prior to November last year]) and can confirm that it was rejected by WikiLeaks,” the Guardian quoted Assange’s tweet on Wednesday night.
He did not elaborate on the content of the request.
Assange’s statement followed a report in the Daily Beast that Cambridge Analytica chief executive Alexander Nix made contact with the WikiLeaks founder about the possible release of 33,000 of Clinton’s missing emails.
The Daily Beast report said: “Nix, who heads Cambridge Analytica, told a third party that he reached out to Assange about his firm somehow helping the WikiLeaks founder release Clinton’s missing emails, according to two sources familiar with a Congressional investigation into interactions between Trump associates and the Kremlin.
“Those sources also relayed that, according to Nix’s email, Assange told the Cambridge Analytica CEO that he didn’t want his help, and preferred to do the work on his own. If the claims Nix made in that email are true, this would be the closest known connection between Trump’s campaign and Assange,” it added.
CNN, citing two unnamed sources, said Nix wrote to several people including Trump mega-donor Rebekah Mercer, explaining that he had emailed Assange seeking access to the Clinton emails to turn them into a searchable database for the campaign or a pro-Trump political action committee.
Cambridge Analytica was hired in the summer of 2016 as part of the Trump campaign’s three-pronged data operation, which was led by Brad Parscale and overseen by Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.
No one from the Trump campaign was copied on the email, the sources told CNN.
The 33,000 emails deleted from Clinton’s private server have never materialised.
In July 2016, Trump called on Russia to find the emails.
WikiLeaks had published emails hacked from Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta just hours after the release of a potentially campaign-ending Access Hollywood tape in which Trump could be heard boasting about groping women, reports the Guardian.
Assange has denied receiving help from Russian hackers.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics, World
Washington, (IANS) Financial statements of Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton showed that she earned nearly $7 million last year through sales of her latest book as well as paid speeches.
The campaign team for the former secretary of state on Tuesday disclosed her 2015 financial statements, which show that she received more than $5 million from sales of her book ‘Hard Choices’ and $1.5 million from paid speeches, EFE news reported.
The documents were filed to the Federal Election Commission, and also reported that her husband and former US president Bill Clinton earned over $5 million from paid speeches last year.
The speeches given in exchange for money have become a main source of criticisms against Hillary Clinton by her political rival Bernie Sanders.
Her presidential campaign used the disclosure of financial documents to rebuke the presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump, who has not released his tax returns in recent years, something that is not required but common among American presidential candidates.
“The true test for Donald Trump is whether he will adhere to the precedent followed by every presidential candidate in the modern era and make his tax returns available, as Hillary Clinton has done,” reads the campaign statement.
