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What to Do With Anthems of America’s Racist Past?

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The Yankees have cut Kate Smith. She was once an immensely popular singer who premiered "God Bless America" on her radio show in 1938. The song quickly became iconic and, after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, it became a staple of the seventh-inning stretch at Yankee Stadium. Unfortunately for Smith's legacy, she also recorded two racist ditties -- "Pickaninny Heaven" and "That's Why Darkies Were Born." When this was recently re-discovered, Smith was sent down to the minors.

The Yankees moved with commendable alacrity -- as did the NHL's Philadelphia Flyers. Neither team bothered to say if Smith was indeed a racist or had merely recorded the songs of the times. That these songs are insultingly racist is beyond question but so, for that matter, was much of popular culture before the civil rights era. "Pickaninny" was featured in a 1933 film, and "That's Why Darkies Were Born" comes from the same age. Its lyrics make blackface seem downright woke.

"Someone had to pick the cotton/ Someone had to plant the corn/ Someone had to slave and be able to sing/ That's why darkies were born."

These episodes of recovered racism are useful. They are reminders of how indelibly racist America once was -- a culture that not only embraced (or forgave) the Jim Crow fascism of the South but managed in song and film to regularly insult African Americans and demean them as somehow less than fully human. A mere song can alert you to how life was for a black person. A person could pass an open window and hear a radio playing a racist insult.

But if Smith can be condemned on the basis of two songs, what are we to make of Paul Robeson, truly a black superhero before his time? He was a star college football player, gifted student, powerful singer, commanding actor ("Show Boat," "Othello") and, to the end of his days, a radical and fiery civil rights activist. He, too, recorded "That's Why Darkies Were Born." Possibly, his take was ironic. To my ears, Robeson's version is just overwhelmingly sad.

And what about Frank Sinatra? Ol' Blue Eyes was a walking compendium of faults -- violent, obscene, misogynistic and mobbed up -- but he was no racist. He supported liberal causes and befriended Sammy Davis Jr. when it was not easy to do so -- especially after Davis married May Britt, known in tabloidese as the blonde, Swedish bombshell.

Sinatra recorded the evocative standard "Without a Song" in 1941 using the original racist lyric -- "a darkie's born, but he's no good no how, without a song." He did that once, but never again. In later recordings, the obnoxious word is gone. Should Sinatra be banned?

Our national yesterday is horrendously racist. The more we excavate the past, the more shocked we become. We want to eradicate the blemishes and topple the statues and monuments to what, after all, was evil. It is right that we do not honor slavers and their defenders. We cannot enslave the present by forcing it to honor the dishonorable past.

But some perspective is in order. Kate Smith did not write the racist songs she sang. And while in her later years she came to represent right-wing reaction -- she lent herself on July 4, 1970, to a rally that supported the Vietnam War -- she is at least once removed when it comes to racism. Indeed, the Yankees themselves are hardly without fault in this area. It took the team eight years after Jackie Robinson broke into the major leagues in 1947 for them to field Elston Howard. By then, 12 teams had already signed blacks.

Time writes and rewrites history. "God Bless America" was once denounced by the Ku Klux Klan because it was written by Irving Berlin, an immigrant Jew infatuated by his adopted country. It then transmuted into a right-wing anthem, especially after Woody Guthrie, sick of hearing Smith sing it on the radio, countered with the Depression-era "This Land is Your Land." Now, it is merely a great song, blanched by time of political meaning -- the stirring patriotic response to the murders of Sept. 11, 2001.

At Yankee Stadium, Smith is gone. She was last seen by me singing "God Bless America" at that 1970 rally. As she sang, large numbers of anti-war protesters waded through the Reflecting Pool on the National Mall, smoking dope and hurling f-bombs her way. In one ear, I heard Smith singing and in the other the proper profanity of a pissed-off generation. It was an extremely American afternoon.

God bless America.

(c) 2019, Washington Post Writers Group

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Russia Targeted Sanders Supporters to Push Trump

Russia targeted supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., following his primary loss in 2016, hoping to push them towards voting for President Donald Trump instead of Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, The Washington Post reports.

Shortly after Sanders ended his primary campaign, a Twitter account called Red Louisiana News began focusing on the senator’s supporters. “Conscious Bernie Sanders supporters already moving towards the best candidate Trump! #Feel the Bern #Vote Trump 2016,” read one tweet from the account, according to the Post.

Clemson University researchers found that this Twitter account was not based in Louisiana, as it claimed, but from Russia. Special counsel Robert Mueller found in his investigation that Russians at the Internet Research Agency in St. Petersburg were directed to use social media accounts to oppose Clinton and “to support Bernie Sanders and then-candidate Donald Trump.”

Researchers found that although it’s impossible to tell for sure how many social media posts were made targeting Sanders supporters, at least 9,000 of these Russian tweets included the word “Bernie.”

“I think there is no question that Sanders was central to their strategy. He was clearly used as a mechanism to decrease voter turnout for Hillary Clinton,” said Darren Linvill, an associate professor of communications at Clemson and one of the researchers.

He added that the tweets they examined “give us a much clearer understanding of the tactics they were using. It was certainly a higher volume than people thought.”

Source: NewsMax Politics

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Trump Puts ObamaCare on Life Support

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Sudan’s economic decline provides fuel for anger against Bashir

Samir Gasim is seen inside his office in his confectionary and cardboard packaging factory during a Reuters interview on the outskirts of Khartoum
Samir Gasim is seen inside his office in his confectionary and cardboard packaging factory during a Reuters interview on the outskirts of Khartoum, Sudan January 27, 2019. REUTERS/Patrick Werr

February 20, 2019

By Patrick Werr and Khalid Abdelaziz

KHARTOUM (Reuters) – As Samir Gasim reels off the problems facing his Khartoum confectionery and packaging factories, already running well below capacity, the power cuts and generators kick in.

Now he fears the plants may close entirely due to a sudden, eightfold hike in industrial diesel prices imposed by a government desperately short of foreign currency and facing the biggest popular protests since President Omar al-Bashir came to power 30 years ago.

“We are in favor of eliminating subsidies, but gradually, over five years. Not overnight,” said Gasim, seated in his spartan factory office. “Otherwise it will be a disaster.”

Sudan’s worsening economic crisis has caused fuel, cash and bread shortages that in turn set off a wave of unrest that has surged across the country over the past two months.

The economic slide has also alienated the professional classes, who blame Bashir and the ruling National Congress Party for their troubles, according to businessmen, activists and academics. That has undermined Bashir’s authority and encouraged a protest movement that has persisted despite a security crackdown in which dozens have died.

The Sudanese Professionals’ Association (SPA), which has posted calls for protests on social media and organized strikes, draws in doctors, teachers and lawyers and others complaining of decades of economic mismanagement and isolation.

Founded in 2015, it was planning to submit a request to parliament to raise the base level from which monthly public sector salaries are calculated of 650 Sudanese pounds – now worth just $13.60 at the official exchange rate – on Dec. 25, six days after protests began to escalate.

“We decided to raise the ceiling of our demands from the improvement of wages and the working environment and the right to form professional unions, to demanding the end of the regime,” said Mohamed Yousef, an SPA spokesman and economics professor at Khartoum University.

“There was a big response to us because there is an economic crisis and failure of government, and fuel, bread and liquidity crises.”

INFILTRATORS

Officials have blamed the unrest on unnamed infiltrators and on Sudan’s international isolation, saying they are taking steps to address the economic turmoil. Bankers say U.S. sanctions, though reduced, have choked the economy.

Bashir, subject of an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court (ICC) for alleged war crimes in Darfur and hoping for a financial lifeline from the International Monetary Fund, has tried to be measured in his response to burnish his international image, diplomats say. He has tempered warnings to protesters with expressions of sympathy for their plight.

But protests in Khartoum and other cities have continued almost daily, with demonstrators calling for an end to what they see as Bashir’s kleptocratic and incompetent rule. Popular chants include “Down, that’s it!” and “Peaceful, peaceful against the thieves”.

In a country where more than half the population of 42 million are under the age of 19, many of the protesters are young men and women struggling to find jobs that could pay them a living wage. Unemployment rose from 12 percent in 2011 to around 20 percent in recent years, with youth unemployment at more than 27 percent, according to IMF and World Bank estimates.

Businessmen say an unskilled factory worker in Khartoum earns from 1,000 to 1,500 pounds ($18 to $27) a month and a skilled worker may make double that, barely enough for a family to survive.

Some families in the capital have pulled their children out of school over the last year or are serving them fewer and less nutritious meals, making them more susceptible to disease, according to a government presentation to social workers last month in Khartoum.

The economic crisis has hit salaried staff, young people and the unemployed particularly hard. Families have had to sell scarce belongings and crime has risen, the presentation said.

Since the protests began the government has been spending even more money on largely imported, subsidized products including bread and fuel. But it has all but run out of the foreign currency it needs to pay for them, causing widespread shortages.

DEBTS

Sudan already has foreign debts of more than $50 billion, and has been struggling to attract new external financing. By the end of 2018, inflation was running at more than 70 percent. It then dipped to 43 percent, according to official figures, though one U.S.-based economist put it at nearly double that. [nL5N2064VK]

Authorities will likely continue to expand the money supply, exacerbating inflation, bankers and economists say.

It was a short-lived attempt to increase the price of bread to ease a shortage that sparked the current unrest. Raising the price of diesel for industry but not other consumers will cause yet more problems, warned Abbas Ali Elsayed, Secretary General of the Sudanese Chambers of Industry.

“This will lead to lots of corruption. People will start selling to factories on the black market. It will affect the competitiveness of factories,” he said.

Higher diesel prices will spread rapidly through the economy as the cost of running farm machinery, transport and industry surges, analysts say. They also risk crushing Sudan’s struggling manufacturers.

Factory owner Gasim had been investing to add chocolate bars and potato chips to the foodstuffs already produced in one of his plants. Diesel shortages, power failures and falling demand from consumers who can’t afford his products mean he has slashed output and shed workers instead.

Late last month, his suppliers told him the government had increased the diesel price for industry to 222 Sudanese pounds per imperial gallon from 28 pounds.

“We will have to close the factory completely if the price doesn’t go back down,” he said.

The 240 people he employs at the factory and a nearby cardboard packaging plant, and more than 100 seasonal staff, could be out of work.

Some older Sudanese remember different times before Bashir came to power in a coup in 1989.

Sudan’s major cities had 65 cinemas, many privately run, before Islamist governments under Bashir with a “hostile” attitude to the arts shut them all down, says film director Suleiman Ahmed Ibrahim.

“This is a part of modern life that young people in Sudan have lost, and could be one of the reasons they complain about the political system,” he said.

At universities, quality has fallen and many academics have gone overseas, while an emphasis on Islamic education has led to “the neglect of mathematics, science and arts”, said Ali Mohamed Othman, a 69-year-old professor at the Sudan University of Science and Technology.

University staff, like other members of the middle class, used to be able to get by on part of their salary. Now it only lasts a few days every month.

(Writing by Aidan Lewis and Patrick Werr; Editing by Giles Elgood)

Source: OANN

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Nolte: Smollett’s Going to Prison & his Career & Life is Ruined

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According to police sources and all kinds of media reports, Jussie Smollett (who is black and gay) did lie about being assaulted by two racist, homophobic Donald Trump supporters in the middle of the night on January 29.

The story was preposterous to begin with. In order to believe it, one was forced to buy into the idea MAGA hat-wearing bigots were running around downtown Chicago in subzero weather carrying bleach and wielding a noose in the hopes of running into an openly gay black man like Smollett.

“This is MAGA country!” the face-masked yahoos reportedly yelled as they poured bleach on Smollett’s black skin and tied a noose around his neck. Bruised, humiliated, and still carrying his cell phone and Subway sandwich, Smollett somehow survived.

Nevertheless, due to their own prejudices and bigotry, a number of terrible people in politics, media, and Hollywood chose to believe Smollett’s story; and they ran with it, and now they look ridiculous (including a handful of Democrat presidential candidates) and are being forced to clean up their own appalling role in advancing Smollett’s hate crime.

On top of all this, it appears as though Smollett might have mailed that infamous hate letter (filled with powder that turned out to be harmless) to himself, or he at least had some role in arranging it.

What we do know is that Smollett’s co-conspirators have rolled on him. The two brothers (both black) he hired to stage the attack are singing like Sinatra, and that includes the news of the phony hate mail.

And so there will be a reckoning, experts say, a legal and reputational one that could result in Smollett being tossed in the clink for a few years, followed by his banishment into a career wilderness from which he will never return.

“It’s a very high-profile case,” a former prosecutor told Variety. “Prosecutors tend to be tougher because everybody’s watching. … I think they may come down hard, in terms of not reducing it to a misdemeanor.”

Defense attorney Steve Greenberg believes Smollett could also face obstruction of justice charges, but it’s unlikely he will go to prison.

“They’re not going to ruin a guy’s life over this. People make false reports all the time to the police. They get in a DUI, they call police and say, ‘My car was stolen.’ Ninety percent of the time, even if they’re charged with a felony, those people end up pleading to a misdemeanor,” he said.

On the career front, things could be even more unforgiving; we are talking a Lance Armstrong-style expulsion from the rarified world of celebrity.

“If he made this up, he broke the trust of a lot of his fans,” a PR expert told Variety. “Say you lied and you’re sorry for that lie. Apologize to the people who have supported you, promise to make it up, and find a cause that’s near and dear to your heart and devote yourself to it.”

Another PR exec told Variety that if Smollett lied his only hope is to fess up immediately and throw himself at the mercy of the legal system and the court of public opinion.

“He needs to get ahead of this as much as he can,” he said. “He needs to go see the police. He needs to apologize. He needs to make the announcement about what happened instead of letting the facts leak out. If he lied, there’s no excuse, but there may be some explanation.”

On top of everything else, if Smollett is convicted of anything involving the filing of a false police report, he may also have to reimburse the taxpayers the cost of the investigation, which could be a sizable amount of money considering the manpower the police dedicated to the high-profile case.

CBS reports that a grand jury is already deliberating, which could very well mean Smollett is indicted.

As of now, though, Smollett is sticking to his story, which seems to be that the two brothers are lying about being hired by Smollett, which can only mean that, for whatever reason, they disguised themselves as Trump supporters and waited outside his condo all night in subzero weather looking for the opportunity to beat on him.

Smollett has hired two high-powered defense attorneys, but already his career is showing signs of hoax-related stress. His role in Empire has been slashed, including an episode that was supposed to revolve around his character that would have included a showy musical number.

The Lance Armstrong comparison is probably as close as you can come to the Smollett Hoax, but it is still lacking. Armstrong was a liar, a cheat, and a ruthless bully, but the damage he did, which should not be dismissed, was confined to his orbit. Smollett is something altogether different.

Had Smollett pulled off his hoax, had his ginned up hate crime been caught on video as he likely planned, it could have been the “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” media-hoax all over again. That hoax resulted in the burning down of the predominantly black, working class city of Ferguson and countless acts of violence and murder against innocent police officers. Smollett’s hoax could have caused riots, violence against innocent Trump supporters, who knows what else.

Because I have needed more than my share forgiveness and second chances, I always lean in that direction for others. We all need a path to redemption. Time and circumstance might change my mind, but as of now I believe Smollett needs to be made an example of. Yes, he deserves all the due process our system allows, but if found guilty, he should be given no leniency and his show business career should be over forever.

Smollett’s path to redemption should happen in an Appalachia soup kitchen or a Heartland drug rehabilitation center. He is a bigot who sought publicity and moral authority by defaming and smearing a whole group of people. If he wants redemption, that path is through them, not an apology tour on Late-Night TV.

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Wirecard says all subsidiaries are audited, denying FT report

The headquarters of Wirecard AG, an independent provider of outsourcing and white label solutions for electronic payment transactions is seen in Aschheim
FILE PHOTO: The headquarters of Wirecard AG, an independent provider of outsourcing and white label solutions for electronic payment transactions is seen in Aschheim near Munich, Germany September 6, 2018. REUTERS/Michael Dalder

April 24, 2019

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – German digital payments company Wirecard on Wednesday said all its subsidiaries were subject to regular audits, denying a Financial Times report.

The FT cited whistleblowers as saying that the accounts of Wirecard’s largest business, Card Systems Middle East in Dubai, were not audited in 2016 and 2017.

(Reporting by Ludwig Burger; Editing by David Goodman)

Source: OANN

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Florida man arrested following robbery, shooting at police: officials

A Florida man who allegedly shot at police during a high-speed chase near Miami’s South Beach Friday faces charges of attempted murder, armed robbery and eluding police, according to reports.

The suspect, identified as 34-year-old Terence Daniel II, robbed a valet attendant at gunpoint, stealing about $1,500 before leaving in a Dodge Challenger, the Miami Beach News reported, citing the arrest report. Officers eventually spotted the Challenger, identified by the valet, and attempted to conduct a traffic stop, the report claimed.

TENNESSEE WOMAN TAKES LAST SWIG OF BEER DURING ARREST AFTER HIGH-SPEED CHASE: COPS

Daniel allegedly shot at officers through his windshield before speeding away. After driving into Miami, he reportedly bailed out of the car and barricaded himself in a shed. After setting up a perimeter and dispatching K-9 units to find him, police said they were able to negotiate to get Daniel out of the shed.

He was reportedly injured by a police dog when he failed to follow police commands and was taken to a local hospital where he was treated and released.

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He is being held without bond at Miami-Dade County’s Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center.

No one was reportedly struck by Daniel’s bullets, but at least one bullet hit a parked Porsche, according to the report.

Source: Fox News National

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FILE PHOTO - Otto Frederick Warmbier is taken to North Korea's top court in Pyongyang North Korea
FILE PHOTO – Otto Frederick Warmbier (C), a University of Virginia student who was detained in North Korea since early January, is taken to North Korea’s top court in Pyongyang, North Korea, in this photo released by Kyodo March 16, 2016. Mandatory credit REUTERS/Kyodo/File Photo

April 26, 2019

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday said the United States did not pay any money to North Korea as it sought the release of comatose American student Otto Warmbier.

The Washington Post reported on Thursday that Trump had approved payment of a $2 million bill from North Korea to cover its care of the college student, who died shortly after he was returned to the United States after 17 months in a North Korean prison.

(Reporting by Makini Brice and Susan Heavey)

Source: OANN

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Members of The Cranberries, bassist Mike Hogan, drummer Fergal Lawler and guitarist Noel Hogan speak to Reuters during an interview in London
Members of The Cranberries, bassist Mike Hogan, drummer Fergal Lawler and guitarist Noel Hogan speak to Reuters during an interview in London, Britain, April 24, 2019. REUTERS/Gerhard Mey

April 26, 2019

By Hanna Rantala

LONDON (Reuters) – Irish rockers The Cranberries are saying goodbye with their final album released on Friday, a poignant tribute to lead singer Dolores O’Riordan who died last year.

“In the End” is the eighth studio album from the band that rose to fame in the early 1990s with hits likes “Zombie” and “Linger”, and includes the final recordings by O’Riordan, who drowned in a London hotel bath in January 2018 due to alcohol intoxication.

Work on the album began during a 2017 tour and by that winter, O’Riordan and guitarist Neil Hogan had penned and demoed 11 tracks.

With O’Riordan’s vocals recorded, Hogan, bassist Mike Hogan and drummer Fergal Lawler completed the album in tribute to her.

“When we realized how strong the songs were, that was the deciding factor really… There was no point… trying to ruin the legacy of the band,” Noel Hogan said in an interview.

“It was obvious that Dolores wanted this album done because when you hear the album, you hear the songs and how strong they are, and she was very, very excited to get in and record this.”

The Cranberries formed in Limerick in 1989 with another singer. O’Riordan replaced him a year later and the group went on to become Ireland’s best-selling rock band after U2, selling more than 40 million records.

O’Riordan, known for her strong distinctive voice singing about relationships or political violence, was 46 when she died.

“She was actually in quite a good place mentally. She was feeling quite content and strong and looking forward to a new phase of her life,” Lawler said.

“A lot of the lyrics in this album are about things ending… people might read into it differently but it was a phase of her personal life that she was talking about.”

The group previously announced their intention to split after the release of “In The End”.

“We are absolutely gutted we can’t play (the songs) live because that’s something that’s been a massive part of this band from day one,” Noel Hogan said.

“A few people have said to us about maybe even doing a one off where you have different vocalists… as kind of guests of ours. A year ago that’s definitely something we weren’t going to entertain but I don’t know, I think it’s something we need to go away and take time off for the summer and have a think about.”

Critics have generally given positive reviews of the album; NME described it as “(seeing) the band’s career go full-circle” while the Irish Times called it “an unexpected late career high and a remarkable swan song for O’Riordan”.

Their early songs still play on the radio. This week, “Dreams” was performed at the funeral of journalist Lyra McKee, who was shot dead in Londonderry last week as she watched Irish nationalist youths attack police following a raid.

“We wrote them as kids, as a hobby and 30 years later they are on radio and on TV, like all the time… That’s far more than any of us ever thought we would have,” Noel Hogan said.

“That would make Dolores really happy because she was very precious about those songs. Her babies, she called them and to have that hopefully long after we’re gone… that’s all any band can wish for.”

(Reporting by Hanna Rantala; additoinal reporting by Marie-Louise Gumuchian; Writing by Marie-Louise Gumuchian; Editing by Susan Fenton)

Source: OANN

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2020 Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren participates in the She the People Presidential Forum in Houston
2020 Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren participates in the She the People Presidential Forum in Houston, Texas, U.S. April 24, 2019. REUTERS/Loren Elliott

April 26, 2019

By Joshua Schneyer and M.B. Pell

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Senator Elizabeth Warren will introduce a bill Friday that offers new protections for U.S. military families facing unsafe housing, following a series of Reuters reports revealing squalid conditions in privately managed base homes.

The Reuters reports and later Congressional hearings detailed widespread hazards including lead paint exposure, vermin infestations, collapsing ceilings, mold and maintenance lapses in privatized base housing communities that serve some 700,000 U.S. military family members.

(View Warren’s military housing bill here. https://tmsnrt.rs/2Dy5aht)

(Read Reuters’ Ambushed at Home series on military housing here. https://www.reuters.com/investigates/section/usa-military)

The Massachusetts Democrat’s bill would mandate both regular and unannounced spot inspections of base homes by certified, independent inspectors, holding landlords accountable for quickly fixing hazards. The military’s privatization program for years allowed real estate firms to operate base housing with scant oversight, Reuters found, leaving some tenants in unsafe homes with little recourse against landlords.

The bill would also require the Department of Defense and its private housing operators to publish reports annually detailing housing conditions, tenant complaints, maintenance response times and the financial incentives companies receive at each base. The provisions aim to enhance transparency of housing deals whose finances and operations the military had allowed to remain largely confidential under a privatization program since the late 1990s.

The measure would also require private landlords to cover moving costs for at-risk families, and healthcare costs for people with medical conditions resulting from unsafe base housing, ensuring they receive continuing coverage even after they leave the homes or the military.

“This bill will eliminate the kind of corner-cutting and neglect the Defense Department should never have let these private housing partners get away with in the first place,” Warren said in a statement Friday.

The proposed legislation comes after February Senate hearings where Warren, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee who is seeking the Democratic nomination for the 2020 U.S. presidential election, slammed private real estate firms for endangering service families, and sought answers about why military branches weren’t providing more oversight.

Her legislation would direct the Defense Department to allow local housing code enforcers onto federal bases, following concerns they were sometimes denied access. Warren’s office said a companion bill in the House of Representatives would be introduced by Rep. Deb Haaland, Democrat of New Mexico.

In response to the housing crisis, military branches are developing a tenant bill of rights and hiring hundreds of new housing staff. The branches recently dispatched commanders to survey base housing worldwide for safety hazards, resulting in thousands of work orders and hundreds of tenants being moved. The Defense Department has pledged to renegotiate its 50-year contracts with private real estate firms.

Congress has been quick to take its own measures. Earlier legislation proposed by senators Dianne Feinstein and Kamala Harris of California, along with Mark Warner and Tim Kaine of Virginia, would compel base commanders to withhold rent payments and incentive fees from the private ventures if they allow home hazards to persist.

(Editing by Ronnie Greene)

Source: OANN

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FILE PHOTO: Offices of Deloitte are seen in London
FILE PHOTO: Offices of Deloitte are seen in London, Britain, September 25, 2017. REUTERS/Hannah McKay/File Photo

April 26, 2019

By Noor Zainab Hussain and Tanishaa Nadkar

(Reuters) – Deloitte quit as Ferrexpo’s auditor on Friday, knocking its shares by more than 20 percent, days after saying it was unable to conclude whether the iron ore miner’s CEO controlled a charity being investigated over its use of company donations.

Blooming Land, which coordinates Ferrexpo’s Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) program, came under scrutiny after auditors found holes in the charity’s statements.

Ferrexpo on Tuesday said findings of an ongoing independent investigation launched in February indicated some Blooming Land funds could have been “misappropriated”. It did not provide any details or publish its findings.

Shares in Ferrexpo, the third largest exporter of pellets to the global steel industry, were 23.4 percent lower at 206.1 pence at 1022 GMT following news of Deloitte’s resignation.

“Ferrexpo’s shares are deeply discounted vs peers … following the resignation of Deloitte, we expect downside risks to dominate Ferrexpo’s shares near term.” JP Morgan analyst Dominic O’Kane said in a note on Friday.

Swiss-headquartered Ferrexpo did not provide a reason for the resignation of Deloitte, which declined to comment, while Blooming Land did not respond to a request for comment.

Funding for Blooming Land’s CSR activities is provided by one of Ferrexpo’s units in Ukraine and Khimreaktiv LLC, an entity ultimately controlled by Ferrexpo’s CEO and majority owner Kostyantin Zhevago, Ferrexpo said on Tuesday.

Ferrexpo’s board has found that Zhevago did not have significant influence or control over the charity, but Deloitte said it was unable reach a conclusion on this.

Reuters was not immediately able to contact Zhevago.

In a qualified opinion, a statement addressing an incomplete audit, Deloitte said it had been unable to conclude whether $33.5 million of CSR donations to Blooming Land between 2017 and 2018 was used for “legitimate business payments for charitable purposes”.

Deloitte said on Tuesday that total CSR payments made to Blooming Land by Ferrexpo since 2013 total about $110 million.

Ferrexpo, whose major mines are in Ukraine, has said that the investigation was ongoing and new evidence pointed to potential discrepancies.

Zhevago, 45, who ranked 1,511 on Forbes magazine’s list of billionaires for 2019 with a net worth of $1.4 billion, owns the FC Vorskla soccer club and has been a member of Ukraine’s parliament since 1998.

(Reporting by Noor Zainab Hussain and Tanishaa Nadkar in Bengaluru and additional reporting by Pavel Polityuk in Kiev; editing by Gopakumar Warrier, Bernard Orr)

Source: OANN

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Children walk past a damaged building in the aftermath of the Cyclone Kenneth in Pemba
Children walk past a damaged building in the aftermath of the Cyclone Kenneth in Pemba, Mozambique April 26, 2019 in this still image obtained from social media. SolidarMed via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS – THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN SUPPLIED BY A THIRD PARTY. MANDATORY CREDIT. NO RESALES. NO ARCHIVES

April 26, 2019

By Emma Rumney and Stephen Eisenhammer

JOHANNESBURG/LUANDA (Reuters) – Cyclone Kenneth killed at least one person and left a trail of destruction in northern Mozambique, destroying houses, ripping up trees and knocking out power, authorities said on Friday.

The cyclone brought storm surges and wind gusts of up to 280 km per hour (174 mph) when it made landfall on Thursday evening, after killing three people in the island nation of Comoros.

It was the most powerful storm on record to hit Mozambique’s northern coast and came just six weeks after Cyclone Idai battered the impoverished nation, causing devastating floods and killing more than 1,000 people across a swathe of southern Africa.

The World Food Programme warned that Kenneth could dump as much as 600 millimeters of rain on the region over the next 10 days – twice that brought by Cyclone Idai.

One woman in the port town of Pemba died after being hit by a falling tree, the Emergency Operations Committee for Cabo Delgado (COE) said in a statement, while another person was injured.

In rural areas outside Pemba, many homes are made of mud. In the main town on the island of Ibo, 90 percent of the houses were destroyed, officials said. Around 15,000 people were out in the open or in “overcrowded” shelters and there was a need for tents, food and water, they said.

There were also reports of a large number of homes and some infrastructure destroyed in Macomia district, a mainland district adjacent to Ibo.

A local group, the Friends of Pemba Association, had earlier reported that they could not reach people in Muidumbe, a district further inland.

Mark Lowcock, United Nations under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs, warned the storm could require another major humanitarian operation in Mozambique.

“Cyclone Kenneth marks the first time two cyclones have made landfall in Mozambique during the same season, further stressing the government’s limited resources,” he said in a statement.

FLOOD WARNINGS

Shaquila Alberto, owner of the beach-front Messano Flower Lodge in Macomia, said there were many fallen trees there, and in rural areas people’s homes had been damaged. Some areas of nearby Pemba had no power.

“Even my workers, they said the roof and all the things fell down,” she said by phone.

Further south, in Pemba, Elton Ernesto, a receptionist at Raphael’s Hotel, said there were fallen trees but not too much damage. The hotel had power and water, he said, while phones rang in the background. “The rain has stopped,” he added.

However Michael Charles, an official for the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), said heavy rains over the next few days were likely to bring a “second wave of destruction” in the form of flooding.

“The houses are not all solid, and the topography is very sandy,” Charles said.

In the days after Cyclone Idai, heavy inland rains prompted rivers to burst their banks, submerging entire villages, cutting areas off from aid and ruining crops. There were concerns the same could happen again in northern Mozambique.

Before Kenneth hit, the government and aid workers moved around 30,000 people to safer buildings such as schools, however authorities said that around 680,000 people were in the path of the storm.

(Reporting by Emma Rumney and Stephen Eisenhammer; Writing by Emma Rumney; Editing by Janet Lawrence and Alexandra Zavis)

Source: OANN

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