July 28, 2016
Obama Speech
Obama Has Given a Lot of Speeches. Tonight's Might Just Be His Best.
The president blasted Donald Trump, praised Hillary Clinton, and returned to a familiar theme.
By Hannah Levintova
President Barack Obama gave his final Democratic convention speech as president on Wednesday night in Philadelphia. He brought the crowd to their feet with his evisceration of Donald Trump and a rousing defense of Hillary Clinton as the right person to carry on his legacy.
Obama began by reminiscing about his first time nervously addressing the Democratic National Convention—12 years ago in Boston, when he was running for Senate—with his young daughters and his wife in the audience. During his nearly eight years as president, Obama argued, the country had achieved enormous progress, from making healthcare "a right for everybody," to a historic global climate agreement, to full marriage equality.
But there's still work to do, Obama said, and "that work involves a big choice this November." He then launched into a passionate argument for Clinton's candidacy. He lauded her as a tenacious foe in the 2008 presidential race. "It was tough, because Hillary's tough," he said. "She was doing everything I was doing, but just like Ginger Rogers, it was backwards and in heels."
"You know, nothing truly prepares you for the demands of the Oval Office," Obama continued. "You can read about it, you can study it, but until you've sat at that desk, you don't know what it's like to manage a global crisis or send young people to war." But, he added, "Hillary's been in the room; she's been part of those decisions. She knows what's at stake in the decisions our government makes for the working family, the senior citizen, the small business owner, the soldier, and the veteran. Even in the midst of crisis, she listens to people and keeps her cool and treats everybody with respect. And no matter how daunting the odds, no matter how much people try to knock her down, she never, ever quits."
Obama contrasted Clinton's years of experience with Trump's business career, and he didn't hold back. "I have to say, I know plenty of businessmen and women who've achieved success without leaving a trail of lawsuits and unpaid workers and people feeling like they got cheated," Obama said. "Does anyone really believe that a guy who's spent his 70 years on this Earth showing no regard for working people is suddenly going to be your champion? Your voice?"
After a few more digs, he turned back to the optimistic rhetoric he has used so successfully in his own campaigns. "America has never been about what one person says he'll do for us," Obama said. "It's always been about what can be achieved by us, together, through the hard, slow, sometimes frustrating, but ultimately enduring, work of self-government."
Obama invoked the values of his grandparents and other ancestors from Kansas. "They didn't like show-offs," he said. "They didn't admire braggarts or bullies. Instead, they valued traits like honesty and hard work." Those values still hold up today, Obama said, as he launched into another attack on Trump. "That's why anyone who threatens our values, whether fascists or communists or jihadists or homegrown demagogues, will always fail in the end," he said.
In the end, Obama returned to the message that launched his national political career: Hope. "Tonight, I ask you to do for Hillary Clinton what you did for me; I ask you to carry her the same way you carried me," he said. "It's been you who've fueled my dogged faith in our future, even when the odds are great, even when the road is long. Hope in the face of difficulty; hope in the face of uncertainty; the audacity of hope!"
The president blasted Donald Trump, praised Hillary Clinton, and returned to a familiar theme.
By Hannah Levintova
President Barack Obama gave his final Democratic convention speech as president on Wednesday night in Philadelphia. He brought the crowd to their feet with his evisceration of Donald Trump and a rousing defense of Hillary Clinton as the right person to carry on his legacy.
Obama began by reminiscing about his first time nervously addressing the Democratic National Convention—12 years ago in Boston, when he was running for Senate—with his young daughters and his wife in the audience. During his nearly eight years as president, Obama argued, the country had achieved enormous progress, from making healthcare "a right for everybody," to a historic global climate agreement, to full marriage equality.
But there's still work to do, Obama said, and "that work involves a big choice this November." He then launched into a passionate argument for Clinton's candidacy. He lauded her as a tenacious foe in the 2008 presidential race. "It was tough, because Hillary's tough," he said. "She was doing everything I was doing, but just like Ginger Rogers, it was backwards and in heels."
"You know, nothing truly prepares you for the demands of the Oval Office," Obama continued. "You can read about it, you can study it, but until you've sat at that desk, you don't know what it's like to manage a global crisis or send young people to war." But, he added, "Hillary's been in the room; she's been part of those decisions. She knows what's at stake in the decisions our government makes for the working family, the senior citizen, the small business owner, the soldier, and the veteran. Even in the midst of crisis, she listens to people and keeps her cool and treats everybody with respect. And no matter how daunting the odds, no matter how much people try to knock her down, she never, ever quits."
Obama contrasted Clinton's years of experience with Trump's business career, and he didn't hold back. "I have to say, I know plenty of businessmen and women who've achieved success without leaving a trail of lawsuits and unpaid workers and people feeling like they got cheated," Obama said. "Does anyone really believe that a guy who's spent his 70 years on this Earth showing no regard for working people is suddenly going to be your champion? Your voice?"
After a few more digs, he turned back to the optimistic rhetoric he has used so successfully in his own campaigns. "America has never been about what one person says he'll do for us," Obama said. "It's always been about what can be achieved by us, together, through the hard, slow, sometimes frustrating, but ultimately enduring, work of self-government."
Obama invoked the values of his grandparents and other ancestors from Kansas. "They didn't like show-offs," he said. "They didn't admire braggarts or bullies. Instead, they valued traits like honesty and hard work." Those values still hold up today, Obama said, as he launched into another attack on Trump. "That's why anyone who threatens our values, whether fascists or communists or jihadists or homegrown demagogues, will always fail in the end," he said.
In the end, Obama returned to the message that launched his national political career: Hope. "Tonight, I ask you to do for Hillary Clinton what you did for me; I ask you to carry her the same way you carried me," he said. "It's been you who've fueled my dogged faith in our future, even when the odds are great, even when the road is long. Hope in the face of difficulty; hope in the face of uncertainty; the audacity of hope!"
Trump's Top Ten..
Donald Trump's Top Ten Giveaways to Vladimir Putin
By Kevin Drum
The number of pro-Putin positions that Donald Trump has taken has assumed quite remarkable proportions. He:
1. Wants to reduce America's commitment to NATO and reorient its activities to the Middle East. This is perhaps Vladmir Putin's greatest foreign policy desire.
2. Says America has no moral standing to complain about human and civil rights violations.
3. Welcomed Russia's incursion into Syria.
4. Considers Putin a great leader.
5. Would consider eliminating sanctions against Russia and recognizing their annexation of Crimea.
6. Wants to weaken American ties to its allies by insisting that he will walk away from them unless they pay us more for our military protection.
7. Never mentions Russia in his otherwise endless litany of countries that are taking advantage of us.
8. Opposes sending arms to Ukraine.
9. Is pro-Brexit.
10. Isn't sure he would defend the Baltics if Russia attacked them.
Have I missed anything? I probably have. It's hard to keep track.
Most of these are defensible positions on their own. I don't support sending arms to Ukraine, for example. Plenty of conservatives are pro-Brexit. And plenty of lefties would like to see us reduce our military footprint worldwide.
But even if you personally agree with an item or three on this list, the whole thing adds up to something unprecedented for an American candidate for president. Donald Trump considers America at odds with virtually the entire world. He's based his entire campaign on this. At various times he's mentioned China, Mexico, Canada, Japan, South Korea, Saudi Arabia, Germany, France, and the entire Pacific Rim. But never Russia. On the contrary, his list of positions toward Russia is basically Vladimir Putin's dream foreign policy. For a guy suffering under crippling sanctions, a tanking economy, low oil prices, and a demographic time bomb, Donald Trump is offering him everything he could possibly want. And what does Trump want in return? For Russia—and only for Russia—he wants nothing.
As much as I loathe Putin, I'm not among those who now think Mitt Romney was right when he listed Russia as our #1 geopolitical threat. Conservative fearmongering on the subject leaves me cold. Nonetheless, this list is not a coincidence. There's something behind the scenes guiding it. But what?
By Kevin Drum
The number of pro-Putin positions that Donald Trump has taken has assumed quite remarkable proportions. He:
1. Wants to reduce America's commitment to NATO and reorient its activities to the Middle East. This is perhaps Vladmir Putin's greatest foreign policy desire.
2. Says America has no moral standing to complain about human and civil rights violations.
3. Welcomed Russia's incursion into Syria.
4. Considers Putin a great leader.
5. Would consider eliminating sanctions against Russia and recognizing their annexation of Crimea.
6. Wants to weaken American ties to its allies by insisting that he will walk away from them unless they pay us more for our military protection.
7. Never mentions Russia in his otherwise endless litany of countries that are taking advantage of us.
8. Opposes sending arms to Ukraine.
9. Is pro-Brexit.
10. Isn't sure he would defend the Baltics if Russia attacked them.
Have I missed anything? I probably have. It's hard to keep track.
Most of these are defensible positions on their own. I don't support sending arms to Ukraine, for example. Plenty of conservatives are pro-Brexit. And plenty of lefties would like to see us reduce our military footprint worldwide.
But even if you personally agree with an item or three on this list, the whole thing adds up to something unprecedented for an American candidate for president. Donald Trump considers America at odds with virtually the entire world. He's based his entire campaign on this. At various times he's mentioned China, Mexico, Canada, Japan, South Korea, Saudi Arabia, Germany, France, and the entire Pacific Rim. But never Russia. On the contrary, his list of positions toward Russia is basically Vladimir Putin's dream foreign policy. For a guy suffering under crippling sanctions, a tanking economy, low oil prices, and a demographic time bomb, Donald Trump is offering him everything he could possibly want. And what does Trump want in return? For Russia—and only for Russia—he wants nothing.
As much as I loathe Putin, I'm not among those who now think Mitt Romney was right when he listed Russia as our #1 geopolitical threat. Conservative fearmongering on the subject leaves me cold. Nonetheless, this list is not a coincidence. There's something behind the scenes guiding it. But what?
Trump's Long History.. And not talkng about his fingers...
Donald Trump's Long History of Trying (and Failing) to Do Business in Russia
His deals have all flopped—but he did star in a Russian music video.
By Russ Choma and Hannah LevintovaJul
As he sought to dispel questions about his ties to Russia during a feisty press conference on Wednesday, Donald Trump was unequivocal: "I have nothing to do with Russia."
If so, it hasn't been for lack of trying. For more than two decades, Trump has repeatedly attempted to establish his brand in the country with little to show for it. His first attempt to enter the Russian market came in 1987, when he met with then-Soviet ambassador Yuri Dubinin in New York. Dubinin arranged for the real estate mogul to travel to the Soviet Union to survey potential hotel sites in Moscow and Leningrad (now St. Petersburg). At the time, Trump expressed no qualms about going into business with the government of the Soviet Union, which would maintain an ownership stake in the properties; his main concern was that the ownership split would not give him total control.
The deal never happened. But Trump wasn't deterred. In 1996, five years after the Soviet Union had crumbled, he tried to partner with the US tobacco company Brooke Group to build a hotel in Moscow. On a visit to scout potential sites in early 1997, he met with Russian artist Zurab Tsereteli, and he gushed to the New Yorker about a plan to have Tsereteli build a Statue of Liberty-sized bronze statue of Christopher Columbus in Manhattan. Later that year, he also met with former Soviet general Alexander Lebed, who was running for president in Russia on a platform that included strong praise for Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet. Trump was dazzled by the wannabe strongman, saying, "He invited me to Russia and I accepted...I thought he was terrific."
The Brooke Group partnership never worked out, but Trump was back nearly a decade later, in 2005, signing a one-year development deal with a small company called the BayRock Group to develop a hotel project in Moscow. Nothing came of that either, though Trump did team up with Bayrock to build the Trump Soho in New York. The latter project sparked several lawsuits, including one claiming Bayrock received infusions of funding from mysterious Russian and Kazakhstani sources. (One lawsuit against Trump was settled; the lawsuit regarding the Russian and Kazakhstani funding did not involve Trump.)
A few years later, in 2008, Trump announced he was partnering with Russian oligarch Pavel Fuks to license his name for luxury high-rises in Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Sochi, the site of the 2014 Winter Olympics. But Fuks ultimately balked at Trump's price, which the Russian business newspaper Kommersant estimated could have been $200 million or more. Russian real estate developers told Kommersant that the Trump name simply didn't hold much cachet in Russia. "For Russian companies, the value of this name isn't evident," said one developer.
Not only did Trump's real estate deals flounder in Russia, an effort to market his line of Trump Vodka in the country also went nowhere. Despite a splashy debut in 2007, Trump Vodka never caught on. The director of one Moscow market research firm told Kommersant, "I've never even heard of such a vodka." And the brand manager of a Russian-made vodka told the paper: "The name Donald Trump is in no way associated with vodka. This is just your typical 'image' product, based on the fame of a businessman in America. But in Russia, the heart of vodka consumption is not image or status, but an entire philosophy that an American manufacturer could never understand." By 2010, the company that Trump had licensed his name to had all but collapsed.
Just three years ago, Trump was still trying to make inroads in Russia. In 2013, he tried to partner with Aras Agalarov, an oligarch and real estate developer with close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, to build a Trump Tower high-rise in Moscow. Trump grew close to Agalarov, who encouraged him to bring his Miss Universe pageant to Moscow, which he did in November 2013. Trump very much wanted Putin to attend the event, at one point tweeting:
"Do you think Putin will be going to The Miss Universe Pageant in November in Moscow - if so, will he become my new best friend?"
Putin was a no-show, but he did send Trump a nice note and a decorative box. Like Trump's other Russian ventures, his plan for a Trump Tower in Moscow also fizzled out. But all was not lost. Trump did land a role in a music video by Agalarov's son Emin, an aspiring pop singer.
His deals have all flopped—but he did star in a Russian music video.
By Russ Choma and Hannah LevintovaJul
As he sought to dispel questions about his ties to Russia during a feisty press conference on Wednesday, Donald Trump was unequivocal: "I have nothing to do with Russia."
If so, it hasn't been for lack of trying. For more than two decades, Trump has repeatedly attempted to establish his brand in the country with little to show for it. His first attempt to enter the Russian market came in 1987, when he met with then-Soviet ambassador Yuri Dubinin in New York. Dubinin arranged for the real estate mogul to travel to the Soviet Union to survey potential hotel sites in Moscow and Leningrad (now St. Petersburg). At the time, Trump expressed no qualms about going into business with the government of the Soviet Union, which would maintain an ownership stake in the properties; his main concern was that the ownership split would not give him total control.
The deal never happened. But Trump wasn't deterred. In 1996, five years after the Soviet Union had crumbled, he tried to partner with the US tobacco company Brooke Group to build a hotel in Moscow. On a visit to scout potential sites in early 1997, he met with Russian artist Zurab Tsereteli, and he gushed to the New Yorker about a plan to have Tsereteli build a Statue of Liberty-sized bronze statue of Christopher Columbus in Manhattan. Later that year, he also met with former Soviet general Alexander Lebed, who was running for president in Russia on a platform that included strong praise for Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet. Trump was dazzled by the wannabe strongman, saying, "He invited me to Russia and I accepted...I thought he was terrific."
The Brooke Group partnership never worked out, but Trump was back nearly a decade later, in 2005, signing a one-year development deal with a small company called the BayRock Group to develop a hotel project in Moscow. Nothing came of that either, though Trump did team up with Bayrock to build the Trump Soho in New York. The latter project sparked several lawsuits, including one claiming Bayrock received infusions of funding from mysterious Russian and Kazakhstani sources. (One lawsuit against Trump was settled; the lawsuit regarding the Russian and Kazakhstani funding did not involve Trump.)
A few years later, in 2008, Trump announced he was partnering with Russian oligarch Pavel Fuks to license his name for luxury high-rises in Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Sochi, the site of the 2014 Winter Olympics. But Fuks ultimately balked at Trump's price, which the Russian business newspaper Kommersant estimated could have been $200 million or more. Russian real estate developers told Kommersant that the Trump name simply didn't hold much cachet in Russia. "For Russian companies, the value of this name isn't evident," said one developer.
Not only did Trump's real estate deals flounder in Russia, an effort to market his line of Trump Vodka in the country also went nowhere. Despite a splashy debut in 2007, Trump Vodka never caught on. The director of one Moscow market research firm told Kommersant, "I've never even heard of such a vodka." And the brand manager of a Russian-made vodka told the paper: "The name Donald Trump is in no way associated with vodka. This is just your typical 'image' product, based on the fame of a businessman in America. But in Russia, the heart of vodka consumption is not image or status, but an entire philosophy that an American manufacturer could never understand." By 2010, the company that Trump had licensed his name to had all but collapsed.
Just three years ago, Trump was still trying to make inroads in Russia. In 2013, he tried to partner with Aras Agalarov, an oligarch and real estate developer with close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, to build a Trump Tower high-rise in Moscow. Trump grew close to Agalarov, who encouraged him to bring his Miss Universe pageant to Moscow, which he did in November 2013. Trump very much wanted Putin to attend the event, at one point tweeting:
"Do you think Putin will be going to The Miss Universe Pageant in November in Moscow - if so, will he become my new best friend?"
Putin was a no-show, but he did send Trump a nice note and a decorative box. Like Trump's other Russian ventures, his plan for a Trump Tower in Moscow also fizzled out. But all was not lost. Trump did land a role in a music video by Agalarov's son Emin, an aspiring pop singer.
M16, the Eagle Nebula
A now famous picture from the Hubble Space Telescope featured Pillars of Creation, star forming columns of cold gas and dust light-years long inside M16, the Eagle Nebula. This false-color composite image views the nearby stellar nursery using data from the Herschel Space Observatory's panoramic exploration of interstellar clouds along the plane of our Milky Way galaxy. Herschel's far infrared detectors record the emission from the region's cold dust directly. The famous pillars are included near the center of the scene. While the central group of hot young stars is not apparent at these infrared wavelengths, the stars' radiation and winds carve the shapes within the interstellar clouds. Scattered white spots are denser knots of gas and dust, clumps of material collapsing to form new stars. The Eagle Nebula is some 6,500 light-years distant, an easy target for binoculars or small telescopes in a nebula rich part of the sky toward the split constellation Serpens Cauda (the tail of the snake).
Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite
NASA’s Next Planet Hunter Will Look Closer to Home
As the search for life on distant planets heats up, NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) is bringing this hunt closer to home. Launching in 2017-2018, TESS will identify planets orbiting the brightest stars just outside our solar system using what’s known as the transit method.
When a planet passes in front of, or transits, its parent star, it blocks some of the star's light. TESS searches for these telltale dips in brightness, which can reveal the planet's presence and provide additional information about it.
TESS will be able to learn the sizes of the planets it sees and how long it takes them to complete an orbit. These two pieces of information are critical to understanding whether a planet is capable of supporting life. Nearly all other planet classifications will come from follow up observations, by both TESS team ground telescopes as well as ground- and space-based observations, including NASA's James Webb Space Telescope launching in 2018.
Compared to the Kepler mission, which has searched for exoplanets thousands to tens of thousands of light-years away from Earth towards the constellation Cygnus, TESS will search for exoplanets hundreds of light-years or less in all directions surrounding our solar system.
TESS will survey most of the sky by segmenting it into 26 different segments known as tiles. The spacecraft's powerful cameras will look continuously at each tile for just over 27 days, measuring visible light from the brightest targets every two minutes. TESS will look at stars classified as twelfth apparent magnitude and brighter, some of which are visible to the naked eye. The higher the apparent magnitude, the fainter the star. For comparison, most people can see stars as faint as sixth magnitude in a clear dark sky and the faintest star in the Big Dipper ranks as third magnitude.
Among the stars TESS will observe, small bright dwarf stars are ideal for planet identification, explained Joshua Pepper, co-chair of the TESS Target Selection Working Group. One of the TESS science goals is to find Earth- and super-Earth-sized planets. These are difficult to discover because of their small size compared to their host stars, but focusing TESS on smaller stars makes finding these small planets much easier. This is because the fraction of the host star's light that a planet blocks is proportional to the planet’s size.
Scientists expect TESS to observe at least 200,000 stars during the two years of its spaceflight mission, resulting in the discovery of thousands of new exoplanets.
While the search for transiting exoplanets is the primary goal of the mission, TESS will also make observations of other astrophysical objects through the Guest Investigator (GI) Program. Because TESS is conducting a near all-sky survey, it has the capability to perform interesting studies on many different types of astronomical target.
“The goal of the GI Program is to maximize the amount of science that comes out of TESS,” said Padi Boyd, director of the Guest Investigator Program Office at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. "Although TESS was designed to be capable of detecting planets transiting in front of stars, its unique mission characteristics mean that the potential science TESS can do includes far more than just exoplanets.” According to Boyd, the broad range of objects TESS could detect as part of the GI Program include flaring young stars, binary pairs of stars, supernovae in nearby galaxies, and even supermassive black holes in distant active galaxies. “We hope the broader science community will come up with many unique science ideas for TESS, and we hope to encourage broad participation from the larger community,” she said.
With the potential to expand our knowledge of the universe for years to come, researchers are excited about the potential discoveries TESS could bring.
As the search for life on distant planets heats up, NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) is bringing this hunt closer to home. Launching in 2017-2018, TESS will identify planets orbiting the brightest stars just outside our solar system using what’s known as the transit method.
When a planet passes in front of, or transits, its parent star, it blocks some of the star's light. TESS searches for these telltale dips in brightness, which can reveal the planet's presence and provide additional information about it.
TESS will be able to learn the sizes of the planets it sees and how long it takes them to complete an orbit. These two pieces of information are critical to understanding whether a planet is capable of supporting life. Nearly all other planet classifications will come from follow up observations, by both TESS team ground telescopes as well as ground- and space-based observations, including NASA's James Webb Space Telescope launching in 2018.Compared to the Kepler mission, which has searched for exoplanets thousands to tens of thousands of light-years away from Earth towards the constellation Cygnus, TESS will search for exoplanets hundreds of light-years or less in all directions surrounding our solar system.
TESS will survey most of the sky by segmenting it into 26 different segments known as tiles. The spacecraft's powerful cameras will look continuously at each tile for just over 27 days, measuring visible light from the brightest targets every two minutes. TESS will look at stars classified as twelfth apparent magnitude and brighter, some of which are visible to the naked eye. The higher the apparent magnitude, the fainter the star. For comparison, most people can see stars as faint as sixth magnitude in a clear dark sky and the faintest star in the Big Dipper ranks as third magnitude.
Among the stars TESS will observe, small bright dwarf stars are ideal for planet identification, explained Joshua Pepper, co-chair of the TESS Target Selection Working Group. One of the TESS science goals is to find Earth- and super-Earth-sized planets. These are difficult to discover because of their small size compared to their host stars, but focusing TESS on smaller stars makes finding these small planets much easier. This is because the fraction of the host star's light that a planet blocks is proportional to the planet’s size.
Scientists expect TESS to observe at least 200,000 stars during the two years of its spaceflight mission, resulting in the discovery of thousands of new exoplanets.
While the search for transiting exoplanets is the primary goal of the mission, TESS will also make observations of other astrophysical objects through the Guest Investigator (GI) Program. Because TESS is conducting a near all-sky survey, it has the capability to perform interesting studies on many different types of astronomical target.
“The goal of the GI Program is to maximize the amount of science that comes out of TESS,” said Padi Boyd, director of the Guest Investigator Program Office at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. "Although TESS was designed to be capable of detecting planets transiting in front of stars, its unique mission characteristics mean that the potential science TESS can do includes far more than just exoplanets.” According to Boyd, the broad range of objects TESS could detect as part of the GI Program include flaring young stars, binary pairs of stars, supernovae in nearby galaxies, and even supermassive black holes in distant active galaxies. “We hope the broader science community will come up with many unique science ideas for TESS, and we hope to encourage broad participation from the larger community,” she said.
With the potential to expand our knowledge of the universe for years to come, researchers are excited about the potential discoveries TESS could bring.
Even Republicans don't trust Trump
Kaine: Even Republicans don't trust Trump
Hillary Clinton's running mate invokes Kasich and former first lady Barbara Bush as he makes his case against Trump.
By Nick Gass
Hillary Clinton is someone to be trusted, Tim Kaine declared Wednesday night at the Democratic National Convention, and Donald Trump is not. Just ask some Republicans, Kaine suggested.
One not need look far to see that the United States “is too great to put it in the hands of a slick-talking, empty-promising, self-promoting, one-man wrecking crew,” Kaine said Wednesday at the Democratic National Convention, in a speech mixing Spanish, a mocking impression of Trump and a steadfast commitment to Clinton on the ticket.
“Folks, you cannot believe one word that comes out of Donald Trump’s mouth,” Kaine said. “Not one word.”
The crowd chanted “not one word” for several moments.
“But don’t take it from me. Take it from former first lady Barbara Bush. Barbara Bush said she didn’t know how any woman could vote for him after his offensive comments. Any woman. Any woman,” Kaine continued. “Or John McCain’s economic adviser during the ’08 race – who estimated that Trump’s promises would cost America 3.5 million jobs. Or the independent analysts that found Trump’s tax plan, a gift to the wealthy and big corporations, would rack up $30 trillion in debt.”
Or, Kaine continued, “John Kasich, the Republican governor who had the honor of hosting the Republican convention in Cleveland but wouldn’t even attend it because Trump is such a moral disaster.”
Kaine also invoked the person who has lived and breathed Trump's life story. “Or take it from the guy who co-wrote Trump’s autobiography. Here's what he said about Trump, for Trump, ‘lying is second nature to him,’” Kaine said.
“So do you believe him,” he asked, gesturing to his right. “I don’t know, how about on this side, do you guys believe him,” he asked, moving to his left. “I mean do you guys believe him? Is there anyone in this building who believes him?
After each question, the answer was a resounding “No!”
A Midwest-born-and-bred, Spanish-speaking, centrist Democratic senator from Virginia, Kaine on Wednesday flashed a preview of how he plans to simultaneously run alongside Clinton and take down Trump for the next 104 days.
“Now, last week in Cleveland, we heard a lot about trust. So let’s talk about trust. I want to tell you why I trust Hillary Clinton,” Kaine said.
“First, she’s consistent,” Kaine said, noting her work with the Children’s Defense Fund and children’s health care efforts as first lady.
For Clinton, Kaine said, “it’s not just words … it’s accomplishments,” going on to list her achievements as a senator for New York in the wake of the 9/11 attacks and her service as secretary of state that saw the killing of Osama bin Laden.
Kaine also paid respect to his “spectacular” Senate colleague Bernie Sanders, who like him, also used to be a mayor. “And, everybody, we all should feel the Bern and we should all not want to get burned by the other guy,” Kaine ad-libbed.
“Hillary Clinton and I are companeros del alma,” Kaine declared. “We share this belief: Do all the good you can. Serve one another. That’s what I’m about. That’s what you’re about. That’s what Bernie Sanders is about. That’s what Joe and Jill Biden are about. That’s what Barack and Michelle Obama are about. And that’s what Hillary Clinton is about.”
President Barack Obama touted the strides made during his presidency while urging voters to support Hillary Clinton.
Observing that the next president will face many challenges, Kaine broke out the Spanish he mastered as a Catholic missionary in Honduras, where he “learned that the best compliment you could give someone was to say they were ‘listo’—ready.”
“Not inteligente-smart. Not amable-friendly. Not rico—rich,” he said. “But listo … and Hillary Clinton is lista.”
Kaine’s selection has drawn the ire of Bernie Sanders supporters, who, displeased with his selection threatened to cause a scene inside Wells Fargo Center.
And Trump, seeking to exploit that divide, has pointed to Kaine’s differences with Sanders. “KAINE IS OUT OF STEP WITH BERNIE SANDERS' PRIORITIES,” blared a campaign email immediately before Kaine took the stage at Wells Fargo Center. A subsequent Trump email pointed to a dismal analysis of his governorship in addition to a Washington Times report that said Kaine’s “administration lacks a signature legislative accomplishment” like that of his predecessor, Mark Warner. In another statement, the Trump campaign compared Kaine negatively with its No. 2, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence.
“Governor Mike Pence has a jobs record that is something to be proud of, while Senator Tim Kaine’s record leaves much to be desired,” the campaign said, sharing bleak job numbers from before and after Kaine’s tenure.
A three-and-a-half-minute biography preceded Kaine’s speech, a video that touted his “working-class start” in the Kansas City area, his Catholic missionary work in Honduras where he developed a fluency in Spanish and his wife Anne’s father, Linwood Holton, who as the Republican governor of Virginia voluntarily placed his children in majority African-American schools.
“Anne and Tim are also raising a family, sending their children to the same public school Anne had attended,” a narrator said in the video. “They still live in the same house they moved into 24 years ago.”
The video also highlighted Kaine as governor in the wake of the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre.
“Tim Kaine has always helped people rise above the things that divide us,” the video said, extolling his “life’s work, built on the principle that we are stronger together.”
Kaine offered soft-spoken justification for his readiness as second in command in his first joint interview with Clinton last weekend.
“I think I'm ready to lead. I'm ready first to be a supportive vice president so that the presidency of Hillary Clinton is … a fantastic one,” Kaine told 60 Minutes. “But if something were to put that in my path, as much as any human being would be ready, I'd be ready. And you got to approach it with humility.”
“But, you know what? You know, missionary, civil rights lawyer, local official, state official, federal official, like, I've — I've climbed, and I haven't missed a rung on the ladder. And if it were to if it were to come that way, I could do it.”
Hillary Clinton's running mate invokes Kasich and former first lady Barbara Bush as he makes his case against Trump.
By Nick Gass
Hillary Clinton is someone to be trusted, Tim Kaine declared Wednesday night at the Democratic National Convention, and Donald Trump is not. Just ask some Republicans, Kaine suggested.
One not need look far to see that the United States “is too great to put it in the hands of a slick-talking, empty-promising, self-promoting, one-man wrecking crew,” Kaine said Wednesday at the Democratic National Convention, in a speech mixing Spanish, a mocking impression of Trump and a steadfast commitment to Clinton on the ticket.
“Folks, you cannot believe one word that comes out of Donald Trump’s mouth,” Kaine said. “Not one word.”
The crowd chanted “not one word” for several moments.
“But don’t take it from me. Take it from former first lady Barbara Bush. Barbara Bush said she didn’t know how any woman could vote for him after his offensive comments. Any woman. Any woman,” Kaine continued. “Or John McCain’s economic adviser during the ’08 race – who estimated that Trump’s promises would cost America 3.5 million jobs. Or the independent analysts that found Trump’s tax plan, a gift to the wealthy and big corporations, would rack up $30 trillion in debt.”
Or, Kaine continued, “John Kasich, the Republican governor who had the honor of hosting the Republican convention in Cleveland but wouldn’t even attend it because Trump is such a moral disaster.”
Kaine also invoked the person who has lived and breathed Trump's life story. “Or take it from the guy who co-wrote Trump’s autobiography. Here's what he said about Trump, for Trump, ‘lying is second nature to him,’” Kaine said.
“So do you believe him,” he asked, gesturing to his right. “I don’t know, how about on this side, do you guys believe him,” he asked, moving to his left. “I mean do you guys believe him? Is there anyone in this building who believes him?
After each question, the answer was a resounding “No!”
A Midwest-born-and-bred, Spanish-speaking, centrist Democratic senator from Virginia, Kaine on Wednesday flashed a preview of how he plans to simultaneously run alongside Clinton and take down Trump for the next 104 days.
“Now, last week in Cleveland, we heard a lot about trust. So let’s talk about trust. I want to tell you why I trust Hillary Clinton,” Kaine said.
“First, she’s consistent,” Kaine said, noting her work with the Children’s Defense Fund and children’s health care efforts as first lady.
For Clinton, Kaine said, “it’s not just words … it’s accomplishments,” going on to list her achievements as a senator for New York in the wake of the 9/11 attacks and her service as secretary of state that saw the killing of Osama bin Laden.
Kaine also paid respect to his “spectacular” Senate colleague Bernie Sanders, who like him, also used to be a mayor. “And, everybody, we all should feel the Bern and we should all not want to get burned by the other guy,” Kaine ad-libbed.
“Hillary Clinton and I are companeros del alma,” Kaine declared. “We share this belief: Do all the good you can. Serve one another. That’s what I’m about. That’s what you’re about. That’s what Bernie Sanders is about. That’s what Joe and Jill Biden are about. That’s what Barack and Michelle Obama are about. And that’s what Hillary Clinton is about.”
President Barack Obama touted the strides made during his presidency while urging voters to support Hillary Clinton.
Observing that the next president will face many challenges, Kaine broke out the Spanish he mastered as a Catholic missionary in Honduras, where he “learned that the best compliment you could give someone was to say they were ‘listo’—ready.”
“Not inteligente-smart. Not amable-friendly. Not rico—rich,” he said. “But listo … and Hillary Clinton is lista.”
Kaine’s selection has drawn the ire of Bernie Sanders supporters, who, displeased with his selection threatened to cause a scene inside Wells Fargo Center.
And Trump, seeking to exploit that divide, has pointed to Kaine’s differences with Sanders. “KAINE IS OUT OF STEP WITH BERNIE SANDERS' PRIORITIES,” blared a campaign email immediately before Kaine took the stage at Wells Fargo Center. A subsequent Trump email pointed to a dismal analysis of his governorship in addition to a Washington Times report that said Kaine’s “administration lacks a signature legislative accomplishment” like that of his predecessor, Mark Warner. In another statement, the Trump campaign compared Kaine negatively with its No. 2, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence.
“Governor Mike Pence has a jobs record that is something to be proud of, while Senator Tim Kaine’s record leaves much to be desired,” the campaign said, sharing bleak job numbers from before and after Kaine’s tenure.
A three-and-a-half-minute biography preceded Kaine’s speech, a video that touted his “working-class start” in the Kansas City area, his Catholic missionary work in Honduras where he developed a fluency in Spanish and his wife Anne’s father, Linwood Holton, who as the Republican governor of Virginia voluntarily placed his children in majority African-American schools.
“Anne and Tim are also raising a family, sending their children to the same public school Anne had attended,” a narrator said in the video. “They still live in the same house they moved into 24 years ago.”
The video also highlighted Kaine as governor in the wake of the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre.
“Tim Kaine has always helped people rise above the things that divide us,” the video said, extolling his “life’s work, built on the principle that we are stronger together.”
Kaine offered soft-spoken justification for his readiness as second in command in his first joint interview with Clinton last weekend.
“I think I'm ready to lead. I'm ready first to be a supportive vice president so that the presidency of Hillary Clinton is … a fantastic one,” Kaine told 60 Minutes. “But if something were to put that in my path, as much as any human being would be ready, I'd be ready. And you got to approach it with humility.”
“But, you know what? You know, missionary, civil rights lawyer, local official, state official, federal official, like, I've — I've climbed, and I haven't missed a rung on the ladder. And if it were to if it were to come that way, I could do it.”
Tag-team to slam Trump
Obama and Biden tag-team to slam Trump on foreign policy
'Set aside the nuclear code. What I think is scary is a president who doesn't know their stuff," the president says.
By Louis Nelson
With both men set to take the Democratic National Convention stage Wednesday night in Philadelphia, President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden spent the morning hammering Donald Trump.
In separate TV interviews Wednesday, both the president and vice president painted the picture of a presidential candidate dangerously in over his head on foreign policy, an ignoramus who shows little interest in developing an understanding of the world on the fly.
“Set aside the nuclear code. What I think is scary is a president who doesn't know their stuff and doesn't seem to have an interest in learning what they don't know,” Obama said in a pre-taped interview that aired Wednesday morning on NBC’s “Today.”
“Do you think of Trump that way?” host Savannah Guthrie asked.
“I think if you listen to any press conference he has given or listen to any of those debates, basic knowledge about the world, or what a nuclear triad is, or where various countries are, or the different between Sunni and Shia in the Muslim world, those are things he doesn't know and hasn't seemed to spend a lot of time trying to find out about,” Obama replied.
Biden, for his part, spent the better part of the 8 a.m. hour on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” discussing an array of topics that included his relationship with President Obama and his cancer "moonshot" initiative. But the vice president also came ready to trash Trump, who Biden said was “playing directly into the hands” of Russian President Vladimir Putin by suggesting that the U.S. might not honor its commitments to NATO.
“The truth is Donald Trump knows nothing about foreign policy, nor should he based upon his background. But the thing that bothers me, Willie, is I don't see any attempt for him to go out and get people who really know [the subject] on the Republican side,” Biden told host Willie Geist.
“So here you've got someone coming along and says, ‘Unless Latvia pays their bills’ — first of all they’re paying their bills — but, ‘Unless Latvia pays their bills, I'm not sure we're going to honor Article Five of the treaty that is the single most significant treaty in the history of mankind, that has lasted over 60 years, that is absolutely central to our security.'"
“Maybe it’s not fair,” Biden continued. “I don't think he knows what Article Five is and nor should anybody here know what Article Five is. But if you're going to be president of the United States of America, hey, you better know."
Democrats have made a habit of slamming Trump's inexperience on foreign policy, advice on which the Manhattan billionaire has said he gets "from the shows." Several prominent GOP foreign policy hands, including Senate Armed Services Committee member Lindsey Graham and Senate Foreign Affairs Committee member Jeff Flake, have joined Democrats in attacking Trump's proposals, while dozens of Republican wonks have signed an open letter condemning his policies and committing themselves to work "energetically to prevent the election of someone so utterly unfitted to the office."
But Democrats have gone beyond those high-minded critiques in recent days to imply that Trump is colluding with Putin to throw the 2016 election. They've noted Trump's often-complimentary back-and-forth with Putin, combined with his less-than-full backing of NATO -- and some, including Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta and even Obama himself, have suggested that the Kremlin timed the release of hacked Democratic National Committee emails to create maximum embarrassment for the Clinton campaign and disarray at the convention in Philadelphia.
Trump and the GOP have repeatedly denied any allegation that his campaign is somehow working in conjunction with the Russian government, which has also denied any attempt at influencing the U.S. presidential election.
The vice president went on to criticize Trump’s plan to defeat the Islamic State, which the Manhattan billionaire has said would include “carpet bombing.” Such indiscriminate attacks, Biden said, would not help the U.S. develop friendships and develop greater influence in the Middle East, but would instead gin up more anti-American animosity.
Trump took time during a Wednesday morning press conference to rebut that particular attack, pointing out that it was Ted Cruz, not Trump, who proposed carpet bombing as a strategy for defeating Islamic State militants. The GOP nominee has at times throughout the campaign said that as president he would "bomb the shit out of" the Islamic State, but he objected to the vice president attributing Cruz's words to him.
"Joe Biden lied today. He said that Donald Trump wants to carpet bomb. He was on television. He said Donald Trump wants to carpet bomb the enemy in the Middle East," Trump said. "No, that was Ted Cruz that said that, that was not Donald Trump. I mean, he's not a very bright guy but that was Ted Cruz that said it. And he shouldn’t say it. He said it with such sureity.”
The Manhattan billionaire also responded to Obama's attack on his foreign policy chops, calling him "the most ignorant president in our history." Trump accused all those criticizing his foreign policy proposals of being part of the same political establishment responsible for creating the current unrest in the Middle East. Trump said he knows more about foreign policy than those who criticize him would admit and that Obama was clueless on the subject at the start of his presidency.
“President Obama when he became president, he didn't know anything. This guy didn’t know a thing,” Trump said. “And honestly, today he knows less. Today, he knows less. He has done a terrible job.”
Biden also defended the Obama administration’s policy in Syria, the focus of many attacks from Trump and others within the Republican Party. The vice president suggested that while the GOP has been critical of the administration’s strategy in Syria, no one in either party was interested in deploying combat troops into the country. Because of that, Biden said, the U.S. limited its intervention to airstrikes and working cautiously with the more moderate opposition to Syrian President Bashar Assad, “because we’re always looking for the Thomas Jefferson hiding behind a sand dune.”
On multiple international visits, Biden said foreign leaders have expressed incredulous disbelief that Trump could ascend to the presidency. Citing visits to China and New Zealand as examples, the vice president said the leaders with whom he meets nearly always ask him of Trump, “This can’t happen, can it?”
“The things he says make absolutely no sense. But I think it is, he's into...” Biden said of Trump’s foreign policy proposals before trailing off. “Well, I shouldn't guess his motive. But it worries me.”
Biden then pivoted to discussing the 2016 presidential race. Clinton’s struggles thus far in the campaign, he said, are the result of a larger Democratic problem with the white, working-class voters that have been the target of Trump’s campaign. The Democratic Party has fallen away from addressing those voters, Biden said, even as its policies have continued to benefit them. To kick-start that relationship again, the vice president said, “I'm going to be living in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan.”
“I think the Democratic Party overall hasn't spoken enough to those voters. They've done the right thing for the voters. Haven't spoken to them,” Biden continued. “I think there has been in both parties not enough -- this is going to sound strange -- enough respect shown to ordinary people busting their necks.”
Biden is due to campaign with Clinton in his hometown of Scranton, Pennsylvania, next month.
'Set aside the nuclear code. What I think is scary is a president who doesn't know their stuff," the president says.
By Louis Nelson
With both men set to take the Democratic National Convention stage Wednesday night in Philadelphia, President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden spent the morning hammering Donald Trump.
In separate TV interviews Wednesday, both the president and vice president painted the picture of a presidential candidate dangerously in over his head on foreign policy, an ignoramus who shows little interest in developing an understanding of the world on the fly.
“Set aside the nuclear code. What I think is scary is a president who doesn't know their stuff and doesn't seem to have an interest in learning what they don't know,” Obama said in a pre-taped interview that aired Wednesday morning on NBC’s “Today.”
“Do you think of Trump that way?” host Savannah Guthrie asked.
“I think if you listen to any press conference he has given or listen to any of those debates, basic knowledge about the world, or what a nuclear triad is, or where various countries are, or the different between Sunni and Shia in the Muslim world, those are things he doesn't know and hasn't seemed to spend a lot of time trying to find out about,” Obama replied.
Biden, for his part, spent the better part of the 8 a.m. hour on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” discussing an array of topics that included his relationship with President Obama and his cancer "moonshot" initiative. But the vice president also came ready to trash Trump, who Biden said was “playing directly into the hands” of Russian President Vladimir Putin by suggesting that the U.S. might not honor its commitments to NATO.
“The truth is Donald Trump knows nothing about foreign policy, nor should he based upon his background. But the thing that bothers me, Willie, is I don't see any attempt for him to go out and get people who really know [the subject] on the Republican side,” Biden told host Willie Geist.
“So here you've got someone coming along and says, ‘Unless Latvia pays their bills’ — first of all they’re paying their bills — but, ‘Unless Latvia pays their bills, I'm not sure we're going to honor Article Five of the treaty that is the single most significant treaty in the history of mankind, that has lasted over 60 years, that is absolutely central to our security.'"
“Maybe it’s not fair,” Biden continued. “I don't think he knows what Article Five is and nor should anybody here know what Article Five is. But if you're going to be president of the United States of America, hey, you better know."
Democrats have made a habit of slamming Trump's inexperience on foreign policy, advice on which the Manhattan billionaire has said he gets "from the shows." Several prominent GOP foreign policy hands, including Senate Armed Services Committee member Lindsey Graham and Senate Foreign Affairs Committee member Jeff Flake, have joined Democrats in attacking Trump's proposals, while dozens of Republican wonks have signed an open letter condemning his policies and committing themselves to work "energetically to prevent the election of someone so utterly unfitted to the office."
But Democrats have gone beyond those high-minded critiques in recent days to imply that Trump is colluding with Putin to throw the 2016 election. They've noted Trump's often-complimentary back-and-forth with Putin, combined with his less-than-full backing of NATO -- and some, including Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta and even Obama himself, have suggested that the Kremlin timed the release of hacked Democratic National Committee emails to create maximum embarrassment for the Clinton campaign and disarray at the convention in Philadelphia.
Trump and the GOP have repeatedly denied any allegation that his campaign is somehow working in conjunction with the Russian government, which has also denied any attempt at influencing the U.S. presidential election.
The vice president went on to criticize Trump’s plan to defeat the Islamic State, which the Manhattan billionaire has said would include “carpet bombing.” Such indiscriminate attacks, Biden said, would not help the U.S. develop friendships and develop greater influence in the Middle East, but would instead gin up more anti-American animosity.
Trump took time during a Wednesday morning press conference to rebut that particular attack, pointing out that it was Ted Cruz, not Trump, who proposed carpet bombing as a strategy for defeating Islamic State militants. The GOP nominee has at times throughout the campaign said that as president he would "bomb the shit out of" the Islamic State, but he objected to the vice president attributing Cruz's words to him.
"Joe Biden lied today. He said that Donald Trump wants to carpet bomb. He was on television. He said Donald Trump wants to carpet bomb the enemy in the Middle East," Trump said. "No, that was Ted Cruz that said that, that was not Donald Trump. I mean, he's not a very bright guy but that was Ted Cruz that said it. And he shouldn’t say it. He said it with such sureity.”
The Manhattan billionaire also responded to Obama's attack on his foreign policy chops, calling him "the most ignorant president in our history." Trump accused all those criticizing his foreign policy proposals of being part of the same political establishment responsible for creating the current unrest in the Middle East. Trump said he knows more about foreign policy than those who criticize him would admit and that Obama was clueless on the subject at the start of his presidency.
“President Obama when he became president, he didn't know anything. This guy didn’t know a thing,” Trump said. “And honestly, today he knows less. Today, he knows less. He has done a terrible job.”
Biden also defended the Obama administration’s policy in Syria, the focus of many attacks from Trump and others within the Republican Party. The vice president suggested that while the GOP has been critical of the administration’s strategy in Syria, no one in either party was interested in deploying combat troops into the country. Because of that, Biden said, the U.S. limited its intervention to airstrikes and working cautiously with the more moderate opposition to Syrian President Bashar Assad, “because we’re always looking for the Thomas Jefferson hiding behind a sand dune.”
On multiple international visits, Biden said foreign leaders have expressed incredulous disbelief that Trump could ascend to the presidency. Citing visits to China and New Zealand as examples, the vice president said the leaders with whom he meets nearly always ask him of Trump, “This can’t happen, can it?”
“The things he says make absolutely no sense. But I think it is, he's into...” Biden said of Trump’s foreign policy proposals before trailing off. “Well, I shouldn't guess his motive. But it worries me.”
Biden then pivoted to discussing the 2016 presidential race. Clinton’s struggles thus far in the campaign, he said, are the result of a larger Democratic problem with the white, working-class voters that have been the target of Trump’s campaign. The Democratic Party has fallen away from addressing those voters, Biden said, even as its policies have continued to benefit them. To kick-start that relationship again, the vice president said, “I'm going to be living in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan.”
“I think the Democratic Party overall hasn't spoken enough to those voters. They've done the right thing for the voters. Haven't spoken to them,” Biden continued. “I think there has been in both parties not enough -- this is going to sound strange -- enough respect shown to ordinary people busting their necks.”
Biden is due to campaign with Clinton in his hometown of Scranton, Pennsylvania, next month.
Turkey tries to trap Obama
Turkey tries to trap Obama with extradition demand
The NATO ally is upping the heat on the U.S. to turn over a Muslim cleric it blames for the recent coup attempt.
By Nahal Toosi
Is President Barack Obama willing to damage America’s relationship with a critical NATO ally over the fate of an elderly Muslim man living in the Poconos?
Turkey is trying to find out.
Turkish leaders, already busy purging their own institutions of alleged enemies, are intensifying pressure on the U.S. to extradite Fethullah Gulen, the Muslim spiritual leader Turkey blames for the recent attempted coup there. In op-eds, briefings and interviews with Western media, Turkish leaders are comparing the putsch to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, saying their desire to bring Gulen to justice is similar to America’s demand that Afghanistan hand over Osama bin Laden.
But while U.S. agency spokesmen are trying to be cautious in what they say, skepticism about Turkey's claims that Gulen directed the plot are widespread in Washington. Last week, in comments that likely burned a few ears in Ankara, U.S. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told The Washington Post that he did not believe Turkey had yet offered enough proof to implicate Gulen, who has lived in Pennsylvania's Poconos region for years.
At this stage, “the rhetoric has been ratcheted so high it’s almost impossible to find a suitable compromise,” said Joshua Walker, a former State Department official now with the German Marshall Fund. “Turkey is too strategically important to lose over Gulen ... However, at the same time, the U.S. can't be seen to be short-circuiting its own legal and due process.”
The 77-year-old Gulen, who leads an international Islamic movement known as "Hizmet," denies any role in the coup attempt. And, despite invoking 9/11, Turkey is highly unlikely to take any direct military action against the U.S. over Gulen. But analysts note that Turkey can make life difficult for America in other ways, not the least of which involves the fight against the Islamic State. Turkey could reduce U.S. access to a base used to launch airstrikes on the terrorist network; it could try to sideline Kurdish groups fighting the jihadists in Syria; it also could adjust border controls that affect the number of Syrian refugees heading to Europe and the number of jihadists heading to Syria.
Whether it will take such steps is questionable, especially given the jihadist threat to Turkey itself. The Islamic State has staged attacks in Turkey, and the country's ambassador to the U.S. insists Turkey's remains committed to battling the terrorist outfit. Still, Turkey has in the past been criticized for its lax approach to dealing with the Islamic State, which is fighting for its territory in Syria and Iraq, so it's not hard to envision Turkey quietly adjusting its stance to needle Obama.
Turkey doesn't get much direct U.S. military aid, but as a member of NATO since 1952, it has strong links to the U.S. military infrastructure. The Incirlik base in Turkey, for example, houses a U.S. and NATO early warning missile defense radar, as well as an estimated 60 to 70 U.S. tactical nuclear weapons, according to the Nuclear Threat Initiative, a research and advocacy group. More than a dozen installations, large and small, across the country also house U.S. or NATO personnel, according to the Department of Defense and NATO.
"The Pentagon still views the military investment in Turkey as a crucial one," said Jonathan Schanzer, a Turkey specialist at the right-leaning Foundation for Defense of Democracies. "There are plenty of alternatives out there in the region in terms of allies that we might be able to work with to establish similar bases. It can’t be done overnight, but my sense is now is the time to begin to look at alternatives."
U.S. officials acknowledge receiving documents from Turkey about Gulen, but the material does not appear to equate to a formal extradition request. The officials have largely dodged questions about the specifics of Turkey's claims.
Gulen, who says his movement is moderate and dedicated to public service, has large numbers of followers in Turkey. It's possible some of his followers were involved in the coup attempt, although it appeared to have been led by factions in Turkey's military, which is not known as a bastion for Gulenists. But finding evidence that directly ties the putsch to the imam in Pennsylvania could be tough for the Turks. The U.S. may also consider whether Gulen will be treated fairly in the Turkish legal system, where reports are emerging of torture against alleged coup plotters. (One possibility, Schanzer noted, is that the U.S. could pressure Gulen to move to a third country.)
The Justice Department's guidelines note that "the Department of State reviews foreign extradition demands to identify any potential foreign policy problems," suggesting that political factors can play a role in the decision to extradite. In what appeared to be a Turkish PR strike, the country's foreign minister was reported to say that the U.S. wanted to create a joint commission to explore Gulen's extradition. U.S. officials, however, have said they had simply offered the Turks assistance to investigate the coup plot.
Since the July 15 coup attempt, which left around 300 people dead, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has been busy cracking down on alleged coup plotters and Gulen sympathizers. Tens of thousands of people, including soldiers, judges, journalists and teachers, have been arrested or pushed out of their jobs. Erdogan also declared a three-month state of emergency and suspended Turkey's adherence to parts of the European Convention on Human Rights.
The moves have alarmed U.S. officials, including Obama, who have long been worried about Erdogan's authoritarian tendencies. U.S. leaders have cautioned the Turkish president not to overreact to the perceived threat, fearing it will undermine Turkey's democracy. This week, the State Department issued an updated travel warning for Turkey and announced it was allowing the voluntary departure of family members of employees posted to the U.S. Embassy in Ankara and U.S. Consulate General in Istanbul.
The Turkish media, which has come increasingly under the thumb of Erdogan, also has floated rumors that the United States was behind the coup in the first place, infuriating American leaders. Secretary of State John Kerry has sharply warned Turkish leaders that such allegations could undermine U.S.-Turkey ties, sentiments Obama has echoed. But Erdogan may view attacking the U.S. as a smart way to shore up his base domestically.
"I believe that Erdogan doesn’t actually care whether Gulen gets extradited," said Blaise Misztal, director of the national security program at the Bipartisan Policy Center. "Instead, it is useful for him both domestically and in his relations with Washington to be seen as pushing hard on this issue. Domestically, it gives him a scapegoat (and) he can use it as a red herring that distracts U.S. policymakers from the much more problematic purges he is undertaking at home."
Although the U.S. and Turkey have a decades-old extradition treaty, such cases can take years to process. So the decision on whether to send Gulen to Turkey could wind up in the hands of Obama's successor.
Donald Trump, the Republican nominee for president, has indicated he wouldn't chide the Turkish government over its crackdowns on alleged coup plotters. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the Democratic nominee for the White House, has largely echoed the Obama administration, urging Turkish leaders to respect human rights as it investigates the coup attempt.
The NATO ally is upping the heat on the U.S. to turn over a Muslim cleric it blames for the recent coup attempt.
By Nahal Toosi
Is President Barack Obama willing to damage America’s relationship with a critical NATO ally over the fate of an elderly Muslim man living in the Poconos?
Turkey is trying to find out.
Turkish leaders, already busy purging their own institutions of alleged enemies, are intensifying pressure on the U.S. to extradite Fethullah Gulen, the Muslim spiritual leader Turkey blames for the recent attempted coup there. In op-eds, briefings and interviews with Western media, Turkish leaders are comparing the putsch to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, saying their desire to bring Gulen to justice is similar to America’s demand that Afghanistan hand over Osama bin Laden.
But while U.S. agency spokesmen are trying to be cautious in what they say, skepticism about Turkey's claims that Gulen directed the plot are widespread in Washington. Last week, in comments that likely burned a few ears in Ankara, U.S. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told The Washington Post that he did not believe Turkey had yet offered enough proof to implicate Gulen, who has lived in Pennsylvania's Poconos region for years.
At this stage, “the rhetoric has been ratcheted so high it’s almost impossible to find a suitable compromise,” said Joshua Walker, a former State Department official now with the German Marshall Fund. “Turkey is too strategically important to lose over Gulen ... However, at the same time, the U.S. can't be seen to be short-circuiting its own legal and due process.”
The 77-year-old Gulen, who leads an international Islamic movement known as "Hizmet," denies any role in the coup attempt. And, despite invoking 9/11, Turkey is highly unlikely to take any direct military action against the U.S. over Gulen. But analysts note that Turkey can make life difficult for America in other ways, not the least of which involves the fight against the Islamic State. Turkey could reduce U.S. access to a base used to launch airstrikes on the terrorist network; it could try to sideline Kurdish groups fighting the jihadists in Syria; it also could adjust border controls that affect the number of Syrian refugees heading to Europe and the number of jihadists heading to Syria.
Whether it will take such steps is questionable, especially given the jihadist threat to Turkey itself. The Islamic State has staged attacks in Turkey, and the country's ambassador to the U.S. insists Turkey's remains committed to battling the terrorist outfit. Still, Turkey has in the past been criticized for its lax approach to dealing with the Islamic State, which is fighting for its territory in Syria and Iraq, so it's not hard to envision Turkey quietly adjusting its stance to needle Obama.
Turkey doesn't get much direct U.S. military aid, but as a member of NATO since 1952, it has strong links to the U.S. military infrastructure. The Incirlik base in Turkey, for example, houses a U.S. and NATO early warning missile defense radar, as well as an estimated 60 to 70 U.S. tactical nuclear weapons, according to the Nuclear Threat Initiative, a research and advocacy group. More than a dozen installations, large and small, across the country also house U.S. or NATO personnel, according to the Department of Defense and NATO.
"The Pentagon still views the military investment in Turkey as a crucial one," said Jonathan Schanzer, a Turkey specialist at the right-leaning Foundation for Defense of Democracies. "There are plenty of alternatives out there in the region in terms of allies that we might be able to work with to establish similar bases. It can’t be done overnight, but my sense is now is the time to begin to look at alternatives."
U.S. officials acknowledge receiving documents from Turkey about Gulen, but the material does not appear to equate to a formal extradition request. The officials have largely dodged questions about the specifics of Turkey's claims.
Gulen, who says his movement is moderate and dedicated to public service, has large numbers of followers in Turkey. It's possible some of his followers were involved in the coup attempt, although it appeared to have been led by factions in Turkey's military, which is not known as a bastion for Gulenists. But finding evidence that directly ties the putsch to the imam in Pennsylvania could be tough for the Turks. The U.S. may also consider whether Gulen will be treated fairly in the Turkish legal system, where reports are emerging of torture against alleged coup plotters. (One possibility, Schanzer noted, is that the U.S. could pressure Gulen to move to a third country.)
The Justice Department's guidelines note that "the Department of State reviews foreign extradition demands to identify any potential foreign policy problems," suggesting that political factors can play a role in the decision to extradite. In what appeared to be a Turkish PR strike, the country's foreign minister was reported to say that the U.S. wanted to create a joint commission to explore Gulen's extradition. U.S. officials, however, have said they had simply offered the Turks assistance to investigate the coup plot.
Since the July 15 coup attempt, which left around 300 people dead, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has been busy cracking down on alleged coup plotters and Gulen sympathizers. Tens of thousands of people, including soldiers, judges, journalists and teachers, have been arrested or pushed out of their jobs. Erdogan also declared a three-month state of emergency and suspended Turkey's adherence to parts of the European Convention on Human Rights.
The moves have alarmed U.S. officials, including Obama, who have long been worried about Erdogan's authoritarian tendencies. U.S. leaders have cautioned the Turkish president not to overreact to the perceived threat, fearing it will undermine Turkey's democracy. This week, the State Department issued an updated travel warning for Turkey and announced it was allowing the voluntary departure of family members of employees posted to the U.S. Embassy in Ankara and U.S. Consulate General in Istanbul.
The Turkish media, which has come increasingly under the thumb of Erdogan, also has floated rumors that the United States was behind the coup in the first place, infuriating American leaders. Secretary of State John Kerry has sharply warned Turkish leaders that such allegations could undermine U.S.-Turkey ties, sentiments Obama has echoed. But Erdogan may view attacking the U.S. as a smart way to shore up his base domestically.
"I believe that Erdogan doesn’t actually care whether Gulen gets extradited," said Blaise Misztal, director of the national security program at the Bipartisan Policy Center. "Instead, it is useful for him both domestically and in his relations with Washington to be seen as pushing hard on this issue. Domestically, it gives him a scapegoat (and) he can use it as a red herring that distracts U.S. policymakers from the much more problematic purges he is undertaking at home."
Although the U.S. and Turkey have a decades-old extradition treaty, such cases can take years to process. So the decision on whether to send Gulen to Turkey could wind up in the hands of Obama's successor.
Donald Trump, the Republican nominee for president, has indicated he wouldn't chide the Turkish government over its crackdowns on alleged coup plotters. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the Democratic nominee for the White House, has largely echoed the Obama administration, urging Turkish leaders to respect human rights as it investigates the coup attempt.
I don't understand
Jane Sanders: 'I don't understand' why Bernie supporters aren't backing Hillary
By Nick Gass
Jane Sanders can't explain why her husband's die-hard supporters will not unify behind Hillary Clinton in the fight against Donald Trump.
"I guess, you know, I don't understand. Democracy is not always chapter and verse, written out in advance. I mean, people are passionate, but they're positive," Sanders told CNN's Wolf Blitzer on Wednesday from the convention floor in Philadelphia. "One of the hardest meetings for me was going to meet with all of our delegates. There were 2,000 people there, and they were so upset that Bernie was not winning, not going to win, and was going to endorse, again, but people said they were booing you, did you lose control of your supporters? No, we never wanted control of our supporters, we wanted to engage them in the political process and they're passionately feeling that and that's OK."
Asked to provide her message to the "Bernie or Bust" crowd, Sanders responded, "That I know we’ve all said over and over again you have to vote against the Republican — this is different. Donald Trump is a different kind of Republican."
"And that's not just coming from us, it's coming from the Republican core. So I think it is a very pivotal election," she continued. "We just had 7½ years of President Obama really making some significant change in the country for the better. And to protect his legacy and move and pass all of the platform agenda issues that we won by working very, very hard, and the higher education plan and the health-care plan, the only way that is going to happen is if a Democrat is in the White House. So we have to be supporting Hillary."
As far as whether that would mean both Bernie and herself campaigning actively and "aggressively" for Clinton, Jane Sanders said they would.
Reflecting on the disappointment of falling short, Sanders called the convention "a little bit sad" and "a little bittersweet."
"But one of the things that Bernie did right from the beginning was say it was a two-pronged approach," she said. "One was a quest for the presidency, one was to begin a political revolution and transform this country. He came very close to the presidency, and now the political revolution continues."
By Nick Gass
Jane Sanders can't explain why her husband's die-hard supporters will not unify behind Hillary Clinton in the fight against Donald Trump.
"I guess, you know, I don't understand. Democracy is not always chapter and verse, written out in advance. I mean, people are passionate, but they're positive," Sanders told CNN's Wolf Blitzer on Wednesday from the convention floor in Philadelphia. "One of the hardest meetings for me was going to meet with all of our delegates. There were 2,000 people there, and they were so upset that Bernie was not winning, not going to win, and was going to endorse, again, but people said they were booing you, did you lose control of your supporters? No, we never wanted control of our supporters, we wanted to engage them in the political process and they're passionately feeling that and that's OK."
Asked to provide her message to the "Bernie or Bust" crowd, Sanders responded, "That I know we’ve all said over and over again you have to vote against the Republican — this is different. Donald Trump is a different kind of Republican."
"And that's not just coming from us, it's coming from the Republican core. So I think it is a very pivotal election," she continued. "We just had 7½ years of President Obama really making some significant change in the country for the better. And to protect his legacy and move and pass all of the platform agenda issues that we won by working very, very hard, and the higher education plan and the health-care plan, the only way that is going to happen is if a Democrat is in the White House. So we have to be supporting Hillary."
As far as whether that would mean both Bernie and herself campaigning actively and "aggressively" for Clinton, Jane Sanders said they would.
Reflecting on the disappointment of falling short, Sanders called the convention "a little bit sad" and "a little bittersweet."
"But one of the things that Bernie did right from the beginning was say it was a two-pronged approach," she said. "One was a quest for the presidency, one was to begin a political revolution and transform this country. He came very close to the presidency, and now the political revolution continues."
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