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Anti-Roma protests take place in Bulgarian city of Gabrovo

Protests against the Roma community have taken place in the northern Bulgarian city of Gabrovo, sparked by an alleged attack by Roma men on a shopkeeper.

Nine people were arrested and three reported injured Thursday evening during the latest clashes between protesters and police.

Deputy Prime Minister Tomislav Donchev, a former Gabrovo mayor, visited the city to appeal for calm, but was booed by the crowd.

Some Roma parents are keeping their children out of school, fearing for their safety if they leave their neighborhood.

Donchev said ethnic tensions in Gabrovo have existed for years. A decision was made recently to demolish derelict houses, often used illegally by Roma.

Roma, or Gypsies, make up around 5-9% of Bulgaria's population of 7 million and are among the most disadvantaged groups in the country.

Source: Fox News World

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Turkey criticizes US for designating Iranian force terrorist

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu says the U.S. decision to designate Iran's Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organization is a dangerous development that could lead to chaos.

Cavusoglu spoke on Wednesday at a joint news conference with Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif. He also said U.S. sanctions were harming the people of Iran.

Zarif arrived in Turkey after visiting Syria where he met President Bashar Assad. Russia, Iran and Turkey, which back rival groups in Syria's conflict, have been sponsoring talks in Kazakhstan to try to end the war.

Zarif said he would tell Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan about his talks with Assad, adding that Iran wants to help Turkey and Syria establish "good relations."

The U.S. designation adds another layer of sanctions on the powerful paramilitary force.

Source: Fox News National

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Theresa May could offer resignation in last ditch attempt to get third Brexit vote passed

Theresa May could quit as soon as Wednesday as the Brexit chaos deepens - in a last-ditch bid to win a third and final vote on her deal.

The Prime Minister has summoned all Tory MPs to a closed-doors Commons meeting Wednesday night.

Westminster insiders believe she could use the "1922 Committee" meeting to lay out a timetable for her resignation in a last-ditch bid to get her Brexit deal over the line.

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Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May makes a statement on Brexit to lawmakers in the House of Commons, London, Monday March 25, 2019. May is under intense pressure Monday to win support for her Brexit deal to split from Europe.

Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May makes a statement on Brexit to lawmakers in the House of Commons, London, Monday March 25, 2019. May is under intense pressure Monday to win support for her Brexit deal to split from Europe. (House of Commons via AP)

Furious Brexiteers may come round to the withdrawal agreement if Mrs May guarantees she won't be in place during talks over a future trade deal.

Today MP Tim Loughton said: "If she gets her deal through, we need somebody else controlling the process."

BREXIT OR NO BREXIT, THE US-BRITISH ALLIANCE REMAINS VITAL

In a boost for Mrs May, top Brexiteer Jacob Rees-Mogg finally admitted he will be forced to support her deal when it returns to the Commons.

He previously said he'd only back the withdrawal agreement if the DUP, who are essential for the Prime Minister's Commons majority, also supported it.

HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS PROTEST IN LONDON DEMANDING SECOND BREXIT VOTE

Mrs May's desperate gambit comes after Remainer MPs grabbed control of the Government and won the right to decide what they want to happen next.

Ministers are now openly discussing the possibility of dissolving Parliament and heading for an early election.

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This article originally appeared in The Sun. For more from The Sun, click here.

Source: Fox News World

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Scaramucci: Trump Enjoys Telling Lies and ‘Fables’

Anthony Scaramucci, who served as White House communications director for six days in the first year of the Trump administration, said in a new interview that President Donald Trump tells lies because he "thinks it's fun."

Scaramucci was on CNN's "New Day" Friday morning and was asked about Trump's tendency to stretch the truth.

"He's very consistent, he's probably consistent over the last 40 years in terms of the ways he frames a narrative in a story," Scaramucci said. "He does it because he thinks it's fun, and he also does it because he likes the fact that you guys are talking about it.

"At the end of the day, for him, he's figured out that there's a very large group of people inside of our population that when he does it, and the media talks about it, they laugh."

He later admitted that he doesn't see a need for Trump to tell anything but the truth, which he has made clear to the president himself.

"You don't have to accept that, other people don't like it, I don't like it," he said. "I tell the president, 'Hey, you don't need to do that. There's no reason for you to tell these fables or these stories. You're doing a very good job on the economy, you're doing a great job, the whole NATO discussion I think is going in the right direction.'"

Scaramucci's tenure running the White House communications shop was the shortest in the history of that position. He wrote a book about Trump, called "Trump, the Blue-Collar President," which was released last October.

Source: NewsMax Politics

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What If Everything You Know Is Fake?

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The extraordinary coincidence of Donald Trump and Jussie Smollett both being “cleared” of significant “crimes” last week provides a remarkable vantage point for asking “What if everything you know is fake?”

That’s the subtitle of my new book, “The Media Matrix,” which is an attack on what the president calls Fake News, but more importantly a recurring question about whether any of us is smart enough to penetrate the disinformation campaign being waged 24/7 by not just the mainstream media, but also by the “information technology” that has become the very environment in which we live. That includes the internet, social media, Wikipedia, Google, cable news, late-night comedy, talking heads, Hollyweird and, yes, the morning newspaper.

The ability to discern what we used to quaintly call “truth” from out of the information matrix that surrounds us is undoubtedly the primary survival characteristic of the next generation. With so many competing and contradictory sources of information — and an education system that devalues logic and critical thinking in favor of political correctness — only the most persistent and skeptical news consumers can be confident that they have an understanding that approximates “truth.”

That’s where the stories of Donald Trump and Jussie Smollett become instructive counterweights at either end of the Media Matrix. On one hand, we have a two-year investigation into whether the president of the United States “colluded” with Russia to steal an election. On the other hand, we have a two-month investigation into whether a Hollywood actor “colluded” with two Nigerian brothers to manufacture a hate crime against himself. In one case we had a supposed criminal who was really a victim, and in the other case we had an apparent victim who was really a criminal. And in both cases, we the people were being fed “facts” that added up to plausible narratives that exploded and left us asking, like Pilate, “What is truth?”

Last week, we were told by Attorney General William Barr that Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation against Trump had found no collusion with Russia. This should have come as no surprise to anyone who had the ability to filter out the blathering background noise of the heads that are paid to talk incessantly. Certainly, even for the most gullible of news consumers, the revelation in October 2017 that Hillary Clinton had paid for the so-called Steele Dossier of Russian-supplied dirt should have steered the story from “What did Donald Trump do?” to “What did Hillary Clinton do?” For many of us, it was the final nail in the coffin of the Russia hoax, but not for the major media, not for the Democrats in Congress, not for Mueller himself.

The insistence on sticking with a false narrative when the evidence overwhelmingly points the other way is a symptom of delusion, which is what Trump has dubbed the Russia collusion hoax. That describes an overwhelming percentage of the media who ought, by dint of their profession’s alleged standards, to have known better.

But the situation for consumers of news is different. In their case, you have to consider that sticking with the facts in the face of overwhelming insistence on a false narrative by the media and your peers takes extraordinary courage. Confronted with a cognitive dissonance between what you perceive to be true and what everyone else tells you to be true, it is psychologically predictable that most people will choose to reduce their stress by going along with the crowd. That has been the case for the majority of Americans over the last two years as they have been continually assured by “respected” voices that Trump is guilty.

The opposite situation prevailed in the hate crime of Jussie Smollett. Here, we had a horrible attack that made Trump supporters look like monsters. The “Empire” actor told a convincing story about being assaulted at 2 a.m. in frigid Chicago by two white men shouting pro-Trump slogans and apparently targeting Smollett because he was gay, black and proud. No one who is a caring, compassionate human being could hear that story without worrying about the forces at work in our country that are tearing us apart. Day after day, the media assured us, it was the fault of people like me — Trump supporters, white people, irredeemable deplorables — that violence was being done upon the helpless (even if in this case the helpless person was a rich, well-connected Hollywood actor).

But wait, something was peeking through the matrix. Something like the ghost in “Hamlet” was stalking us and trying to tell us something — if only we would listen. “Something is rotten in the city of Chicago,” a modern Marcellus might declaim, and we could well believe that some evil has been done there, but like Hamlet we would be loath to surrender to conspiracy theories and accept the evidence of our own eyes. Nonetheless, to mix a Shakespearean metaphor, we learn bit by bit that the story of the Chicago actor was nothing more than a tale told by a social justice warrior, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. He invented the entire plot, hired two hulking black men to portray white racists, sent them off to purchase the props to be used in the fake lynching, and then employed his magisterial acting ability to cry on cue when being interviewed by Robin Roberts about the maudlin play within the play.

Of course, after the audience discovers that they have been manipulated into believing the hate hoax, they naturally crave justice for the hoaxer — they demand and expect him to pay the price not just for the audacity of his hoax, but for pulling it off — for fooling not just the police but we the people as well. Then in the final twist, close to the end of the fifth act, the rug is pulled out from under us one last time. The charges of faking a hate crime are dropped, and the actor is restored to his former glory as if nothing had ever happened. “What is truth?” the prosecutor asks as she washes her hands of the whole shameful episode.

But after what happened to Trump, what happened to Smollett, what happened to Covington student Nick Sandmann when he had his name and his MAGA hat dragged through the mud, the question now should be, “What if everything you know is fake?” Unfortunately, when you put that question to Siri or Alexa or Google, there is no answer but an eerie electronic silence. If you want to know the truth, you will have to find it on your own.

Frank Miele, the retired editor of the Daily Inter Lake in Kalispell Mont., is a columnist for RealClearPolitics. His new book — “The Media Matrix: What If Everything You Know Is Fake” — is available at Amazon. Visit him at HeartlandDiaryUSA.com to read his daily commentary or follow him on Facebook @HeartlandDiaryUSA or on Twitter @HeartlandDiary.

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Change to 737 MAX controls may have imperiled planes, experts say

FILE PHOTO: An aerial photo shows Boeing 737 MAX airplanes parked on the tarmac at the Boeing Factory in Renton
FILE PHOTO: An aerial photo shows Boeing 737 MAX airplanes parked on the tarmac at the Boeing Factory in Renton, Washington, U.S. March 21, 2019. REUTERS/Lindsey Wasson/File Photo

March 22, 2019

By Alwyn Scott and Eric M. Johnson

NEW YORK/SEATTLE (Reuters) – Much like tapping the brake pedal in a car to disengage cruise control, a sharp tug on the controls of older models of Boeing Co’s 737 used to shut off an automatic trim system that keeps the plane flying level, giving the pilot control.

But Boeing disabled the “yoke jerk” function when it brought out the 737 MAX, the latest version of its top-selling jet – and many pilots were unaware of the change, aviation experts told Reuters.

(Understanding controls on the Boeing 737 MAX: https://tmsnrt.rs/2OjLSAt)

(Boeing 737 MAX deliveries in question interactive: https://tmsnrt.rs/2Hv2btC)

(Ethiopian Airlines crash and black boxes: https://tmsnrt.rs/2ChBW5M)

The difference may help explain why pilots struggled to keep their aircraft climbing after takeoff on two fatal 737 MAX flights less than five months apart that killed 346 people.

Pilots of a Lion Air flight that crashed in October scoured a handbook for answers as the plane repeatedly lurched downward in the first minutes of flight, Reuters reported.

An Ethiopian Airlines flight that went down on March 10 showed “clear similarities” to the Lion Air accident, aviation authorities said after seeing black-box data.

A pair of switches on the center console between the pilots will turn off the automatic trim and a mechanism, new on the 737 MAX, known as the Maneuver Characteristics Augmentation System, or MCAS, that is suspected of playing a role in both disasters.

TRAINING MATERIAL ‘NOT CLEAR’

But pilots would have needed to know that MCAS existed, that it had unusual power to force the plane down and that “a hard pull on the yoke” would no longer turn off the automatic trim that uses MCAS, John Hansman, an aeronautics professor at MIT, said in an interview.

“That wasn’t clear to the pilots flying the airplane,” Hansman said. “The training material was not clear on that.”

Boeing declined to comment. In the aftermath of the Lion Air crash, Boeing pointed to long-established procedures that pilots could have used to handle a malfunction of the anti-stall system, regardless of whether the pilots knew MCAS existed.

That checklist tells pilots to switch off the two stabilizer trim cutout switches on the central console, and then to adjust the aircraft’s stabilizers manually using trim wheels.

An American Airlines flight manual mentions MCAS only in a table of acronyms, according to an October 2018 edition of the 1,400-page book seen by Reuters. Pilots have raised questions about why more detail on MCAS was not included.

The American Airlines manual’s two-page description of trim controls describes a “trim circuit,” but not how MCAS could be triggered by a faulty sensor reading, which is also suspected in the two crashes.

PREVENTING A DANGEROUS STALL

The MCAS system was designed to counteract the effect on the plane’s handling caused by new larger 737 MAX engines, which had to be placed farther forward and higher on the wings because the 50-year-old 737 design sits relatively low to the ground. That move gave the MAX a tendency to nose up into a stall, a dangerous position in which a plane loses lift as too little air flows across its wings.

MCAS, essentially a few lines of computer code in the flight control system, relies on data from two small, blade-shaped sensors near the nose of the aircraft that measure the angle of air flow. Faults in the sensors are not uncommon, and MCAS relies on only one sensor at a time during flight. In the Lion Air crash, investigators found a faulty reading led the plane’s computer to believe it was stalled and to push the nose down.

Boeing later issued a bulletin reminding pilots how to respond to such a faulty reading. An optional warning light could have alerted pilots to the faulty sensor.

MAINTENANCE, TRAINING UNDER SCRUTINY

Investigators unraveling the Lion Air crash are looking at maintenance records and whether the pilots had enough training to handle the emergency, among other factors.

The 737 MAX can fly without MCAS, so the feature was not considered “flight-critical” even though it has extraordinary power to steer the plane, said an industry expert with knowledge of the system who spoke on condition of anonymity. MCAS controls the large horizontal wing on the plane’s tail known as the stabilizer, while the pilot controls smaller flaps or “elevators” on the stabilizer.

Over several minutes, the stabilizer can shift position enough that the elevator controls can no longer counteract the downward direction of the plane, the source said.

“They gave more control power to the automation than to the pilot,” the source said of the MCAS design.

The Lion Air pilots flew for about five minutes by using the elevator to counteract the stabilizer every 15 or 20 seconds, said Hansman, based on readings from the flight data recorder. After that, the pilot tried pulling back hard on the controls.

“That’s what suggests that the crew didn’t understand the system. They thought they were shutting MCAS off and didn’t,” Hansman said. “Whereas any time during the entire sequence, they could have reached to the middle console and just shut it off.”

(Reporting by Alwyn Scott in New York and Eric M. Johnson in Seattle; Editing by Nick Zieminski)

Source: OANN

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Dutch police make new arrest in deadly Utrecht tram shooting

Authorities in the Netherlands have arrested another person on suspicion of involvement in a tram shooting which left three people dead and others injured.

The man, only identified as a 40-year-old, was taken into custody as investigators continue to look into any alleged involvement in the attack, Dutch prosecutors said in a statement Tuesday.

NETHERLANDS TRAM SHOOTING SUSPECT CAPTURED, POLICE SAY

Two other suspects who were previously arrested — a 23-year-old and a 27-year-old — have been released from custody, while Gokmen Tanis, the 37-year-old Turkish suspect who was captured during a raid on Monday, remains in jail.

Tanis was accused of opening fire near 24 Oktoberplein junction in the Dutch city of Utrecht, located about 22 miles southeast of Amsterdam, on Monday morning.

Gokmen Tanis, 37, is led away by police in Utrecht, Netherlands on Monday March 18, after a shooting incident on a tram.

Gokmen Tanis, 37, is led away by police in Utrecht, Netherlands on Monday March 18, after a shooting incident on a tram. (Foto de Volkskrant via AP)

The suspect was accused of rape in 2017 and was jailed in that case from August to September 2017 and then again from Jan. 4 this year because he refused to work with authorities investigating the case. He was released on March 1 after pledging to cooperate.

Tanis was also convicted in March of shoplifting and burglary in 2018. He was handed a prison sentence of four months for the burglary and a week for the shop theft, but has not served any time yet as the cases can still be appealed.

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The attack prompted a citywide lockdown while the country's counter-terror office raised the threat level to maximum. Utrecht Mayor Jan van Zanen earlier called the shooting a "horrible and radical incident" and said his "thoughts are with" the victims and their loved ones.

"The most important thing at the moment is taking care of the wounded and investigating the circumstances of the incident," he said in a statement at the time. "We do not exclude anything, not even a terrorist attack."

Fox News' Katherine Lam and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News World

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FILE PHOTO - A worker sits on a ship carrying containers at Mundra Port in the western Indian state of Gujarat
FILE PHOTO: A worker sits on a ship carrying containers at Mundra Port in the western Indian state of Gujarat April 1, 2014. REUTERS/Amit Dave/File Photo

April 26, 2019

(Reuters) – India has once again delayed the implementation of higher tariffs on some goods imported from the United States to May 15, a government official said on Friday.

The new tariff structure was to come into force from May 2, the spokeswoman said without citing reasons for the delay.

Angered by Washington’s refusal to exempt it from new steel and aluminum tariffs, New Delhi decided in June last year to raise the import tax from Aug. 4 on some U.S. products including almonds, walnuts and apples.

But since then, New Delhi has repeatedly delayed the implementation of the new tariff.

Trade friction between India and the U.S. has escalated after U.S. President Donald Trump announced plans earlier this year to end preferential trade treatment for India that allows duty-free entry for up to $5.6 billion worth of its exports to the United States.

In a further blow, U.S. on Monday demanded buyers of Iranian oil stop purchases by May or face sanctions, ending six months of waivers which allowed Iran’s eight biggest buyers including India to continue importing limited volumes.

(Reporting by Manoj Kumar in New Delhi and Kanishka Singh in Bengaluru; Editing by Anil D’Silva and Raissa Kasolowsky)

Source: OANN

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One of Joe Biden’s newly-hired senior advisers has seemingly had a very recent change of heart.

Symone Sanders, a prominent Democratic strategist and Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., staffer in 2016, was announced as one of the big-name members of Team Biden on Thursday.

But Sanders, who has also served as a CNN contributor, is seen in resurfaced footage from November 2016 expressing her opposition to a white person leading her party after Donald Trump’s election.

“In my opinion, we don’t need white people leading the Democratic party right now,” Sanders told host Brianna Keilar during a discussion on Howard Dean potentially becoming DNC chairman.

BIDEN HIRES FORMER BERNIE SANDERS’ SPOKESPERSON AS SENIOR ADVISER

“The Democratic party is diverse, and it should be reflected as so in leadership and throughout the staff, at the highest levels. From the vice chairs to the secretaries all the way down to the people working in the offices at the DNC,” she said.

Sanders wrapped up her remarks by saying: “I want to hear more from everybody. I want to hear from the millennials and the brown folks.”

Footage of the interview was resurfaced by RealClearPolitics.

After news of her hiring broke on Thursday, Sanders backed her new boss on Twitter.

TRUMP ASSESSES 2020 DEMS; TAKES SWIPES AT BIDEN, SANDERS; DISMISSES HARRIS, O’ROURKE; SAYS HE’S ROOTING FOR BUTTIGIEG

“@JoeBiden & @DrBiden are a class act. Over the course of this campaign, Vice President Biden is going to make his case to the American ppl. He won’t always be perfect, but I believe he will get it right,” she wrote.

The hiring of Sanders has been viewed as another indication of the expected tough fight that Biden and Sanders are in for as the two frontrunners battle a deep Democratic field.

While Sanders himself didn’t torch Biden as he jumped into the race, it’s clear that many of his progressive supporters view the former vice president as a threat.

Biden’s entry into the race – at least in the early going – sets up a battle between himself and Sanders, who thanks to his fierce fight with eventual nominee Hillary Clinton for the 2016 Democratic nomination, enjoys name ID on the level of the former vice president.

BIDEN VOWS THAT ‘AMERICA IS COMING BACK,’ SPARKING ‘MAGA’ COMPARISONS

Justice Democrats — who also called Biden “out-of-touch” – is an increasingly influential group among the left of the party. They’ve championed progressive Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York as well as Sanders. The group was founded by members of Sanders 2016 presidential campaign.

Biden has pushed back against the perception that he’s a moderate in a party that’s increasingly moving to the left. Earlier this month he described himself as an “Obama-Biden Democrat.”

And Biden said he’d stack his record against “anybody who has run or who is running now or who will run.”

Former Democratic National Committee chair Donna Brazile – a Fox News contributor – highlighted that “Joe Biden can occupy his own lane in large part because he’s earned it. He’s earned the right to call himself whatever.”

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But she emphasized that “elections are not about the past, they’re about the future…I do believe he has the right ingredients. The question is can he find enough people to help him stir the pot.”

Fox News Andrew O’Reilly contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News Politics

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Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh, who is facing increased calls for her immediate resignation, remains in poor health and is not “lucid” enough to decide whether to step down, her attorney told reporters late Thursday.

Steve Silverman, speaking outside one of Pugh’s residences which was raided by the FBI and IRS earlier in the day, said the embattled city leader could make a decision as early as next week.

“She is leaning toward making the best decision in the best interest in the citizens of Baltimore City,” he said, adding that Pugh has “several options” to consider.

“She just needs to be physically and mentally sound and lucid enough to make appropriate decisions.”

BALTIMORE MAYOR CATHERINE PUGH, ON LEAVE AMID BOOK PROBE, HAS HOMES AND CITY HALL OFFICE RAIDED BY FEDS

Silverman said Pugh met with a doctor at home Thursday and plans to do so again Friday, the Baltimore Sun reported.

In the latest image-tarnishing scandal for struggling Baltimore, the first-term Democratic mayor faces accusations that she used children’s book deals to cover up kickbacks for favorable treatment as a state lawmaker and city leader that earned her roughly $800,000 over several years.

BALTIMORE’S ACTING MAYOR SAYS HE ‘WOULD HATE TO SEE’ EMBATTLED MAYOR RETURN AFTER BOOK SCANDALS

As a state senator, 69-year-old Pugh sold $500,000 worth of her self-published “Healthy Holly” illustrated paperbacks to the University of Maryland Medical System, a major state employer whose board she sat on for nearly 20 years.

Baltimore police officers stand outside the house of Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh in Baltimore, MD., Thursday, April 25, 2019. Agents with the FBI and IRS are gathering evidence inside the two homes of Pugh and also in City Hall. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

Baltimore police officers stand outside the house of Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh in Baltimore, MD., Thursday, April 25, 2019. Agents with the FBI and IRS are gathering evidence inside the two homes of Pugh and also in City Hall. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

UMMS reportedly paid Pugh for 100,000 copies of her books between 2011 and 2018 with the stated intention of distributing the books to schools and day care centers. But some 50,000 copies remain unaccounted for and officials are probing if they were even printed.

Pugh also made $300,000 in bulk sales to other customers including health carriers that did business with the city of Baltimore.

BALTIMORE CITY COUNCIL CALLS ON EMBATTLED MAYOR CATHERINE PUGH TO RESIGN IMMEDIATELY

The politically isolated Pugh slipped out of sight on April 1 after a hastily organized press conference where she called her no-contract book deals a “regrettable mistake.” That same day, Maryland’s governor called on the state prosecutor to investigate allegations of “self-dealing.”

Pugh took an indefinite leave of absence, citing her health deteriorating intensely after a bout with pneumonia.

Federal agents arrive at the Maryland Center for Adult Training in Baltimore. MD, Thursday, April 25, 2019. Agents with the FBI and IRS are gathering evidence inside the two homes of Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh and in City Hall, as well as the office of her lawyer and the home of a top aide.

Federal agents arrive at the Maryland Center for Adult Training in Baltimore. MD, Thursday, April 25, 2019. Agents with the FBI and IRS are gathering evidence inside the two homes of Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh and in City Hall, as well as the office of her lawyer and the home of a top aide. (Loyd Fox/Baltimore Sun via AP)

On Thursday morning, agents with the FBI and IRS searched her two Baltimore homes, her City Hall offices, and a nonprofit organization she once led. The home of at least one of Pugh’s aides was also scoured.

Silverman said federal agents also served a subpoena at his law firm, retrieving Pugh’s original financial records. They did not seek any attorney-client privileged communications, he said.

Pugh’s attorney said she was “emotionally extremely distraught” following the searches by FBI and IRS agents.

“There was nothing incriminating that came out of her home,” Silverman said.

UMMS spokesman Michael Schwartzberg told reporters that the medical system received a grand jury witness subpoena seeking documents and information related to Pugh.

Other probes against Pugh include a review by the city ethics board and the Maryland Insurance Administration.

BALTIMORE MAYOR’S $500G DEAL FOR ‘HEALTHY HOLLY’ CHILDREN’S BOOKS DRAWS SCRUTINY

In recent weeks, the calls for Pugh’s resignation have intensified with the strongest voice coming from Republican Gov. Larry Hogan, who did not mince words after Thursday’s early morning raids.

“Now more than ever, Baltimore City needs strong and responsible leadership. Mayor Pugh has lost the public trust,” he said. “She is clearly not fit to lead. For the good of the city, Mayor Pugh must resign.”

Federal Bureau of Investigation, and Internal Revenue Service agents search the home of Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh in Baltimore, MD., Thursday, April 25, 2019. Agents with the FBI and IRS are gathering evidence inside the two homes of Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh and in City Hall.

Federal Bureau of Investigation, and Internal Revenue Service agents search the home of Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh in Baltimore, MD., Thursday, April 25, 2019. Agents with the FBI and IRS are gathering evidence inside the two homes of Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh and in City Hall. (Jerry Jackson/Baltimore Sun via AP)

Many of her fellow Democrats, including those on Baltimore’s demoralized City Council and state lawmakers, are also insisting that Pugh put the citizens’ interests above any attempt to preserve her political career.

City Council member Brandon Scott called the Thursday raids “an embarrassment to the city.”

However, only a conviction can trigger a mayor’s removal from office, according to the city solicitor. Baltimore’s mayor-friendly City Charter currently provides no options for ousting its executive.

Six of Pugh’s staffers joined her on paid leave earlier this month; three of them were fired this week by the acting mayor.

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Pugh came to office in late 2016 after edging out ex-Mayor Sheila Dixon, who had spent much of her tenure fighting corruption charges before being forced to depart office in 2010 as part of a plea deal connected to the misappropriation of about $500 in gift cards meant for needy families.

She would certainly face a bruising 2020 Democratic primary if she were to return and run for reelection. Veteran City Council leader Bernard “Jack” Young, who is serving as acting mayor, said as she went on leave that he would merely be a placeholder. But this week, before the raids, he said “it could be devastating for her” if she tried to return.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News National

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FILE PHOTO: Cases of Pepsi are shown for sale at a store in Carlsbad
FILE PHOTO: Cases of Pepsi are shown for sale at a store in Carlsbad, California, U.S., April 22, 2017. REUTERS/Mike Blake/File Photo

April 26, 2019

By Amit Dave and Mayank Bhardwaj

AHMEDABAD/NEW DELHI (Reuters) – PepsiCo Inc has sued four Indian farmers for cultivating a potato variety that the snack food and drinks maker claims infringes its patent, the company and the growers said on Friday.

Pepsi has sued the farmers for cultivating the FC5 potato variety, exclusively grown for its popular Lay’s potato chips. The FC5 variety has a lower moisture content required to make snacks such as potato chips.

PepsiCo is seeking more than 10 million rupees ($142,840.82) each for alleged patent infringement.

The farmers grow potatoes in the western state of Gujarat, a leading producer of India’s most consumed vegetable.

“We have been growing potatoes for a long time and we didn’t face this problem ever, as we’ve mostly been using the seeds saved from one harvest to plant the next year’s crop,” said Bipin Patel, one of the four farmers sued by Pepsi.

Patel did not say how he came by the PepsiCo variety.

A court in Ahmedabad, the business hub of Gujarat, on Friday agreed to hear the case on June 12, said Anand Yagnik, the lawyer for the farmers.

“In this instance, we took judicial recourse against people who were illegally dealing in our registered variety,” A PepsiCo India spokesman said. “This was done to protect our rights and safeguard the larger interest of farmers that are engaged with us and who are using and benefiting from seeds of our registered variety.”

PepsiCo, which set up its first potato chips plant in India in 1989, supplies the FC5 potato variety to a group of farmers who in turn sell their produce to the company at a fixed price.

The All India Kisan Sabha, or All India Farmers’ Forum, has asked the Indian government to protect the farmers.

The farmers’ forum has also called for a boycott of PepsiCo’s Lay’s chips and the company’s other products.

The Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers’ Welfare did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

PepsiCo is the second major U.S. company in India to face issues over patent infringement.

Stung by a long-standing intellectual property dispute, seed maker Monsanto, which is now owned by German drugmaker Bayer AG, withdrew from some businesses in India over a cotton-seed dispute with farmers, Reuters reported in 2017. (reut.rs/2ncBknn)

(Reporting by Amit Dave in AHMEDABAD and Mayank Bhardwaj in NEW DELHI; Editing by Martin Howell and Louise Heavens)

Source: OANN

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FILE PHOTO: The Archer Daniels Midland Co (ADM) logo is displayed on a screen on the floor of the NYSE in New York
FILE PHOTO: The Archer Daniels Midland Co (ADM) logo is displayed on a screen on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, U.S., May 3, 2018. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo

April 26, 2019

By P.J. Huffstutter and Shradha Singh

CHICAGO/BENGALURU (Reuters) – Archer Daniels Midland Co said on Friday it was considering spinning off its ethanol business after slim biofuel margins and Midwestern floods slammed the U.S. grains merchant’s profit, which tumbled 41 percent in the first quarter.

ADM said it was creating an ethanol subsidiary, which will include dry mills in Columbus, Nebraska; Cedar Rapids, Iowa; and Peoria, Illinois.

The ethanol subsidiary will report as an independent segment, the company said, allowing options “which may include, but are not limited to, a potential spin-off of the business to existing ADM shareholders.”

Results were hit by the “bomb cyclone” blizzards that devastated the Midwest and Great Plains this year, causing massive flooding across Nebraska, Iowa and Missouri, washing out rail lines and wreaking havoc in the moving and processing of corn, soybeans and wheat. One-sixth of U.S. ethanol production was halted.

In March, ADM warned Wall Street that flooding and severe winter weather in the U.S. Midwest would reduce its first-quarter operating profit by $50 million to $60 million.

“The first quarter proved more challenging than initially expected,” said Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Juan Luciano, with earnings down in its starches, sweeteners and bioproducts unit. Luciano said impacts of the severe weather ultimately “were on the high side of our initial estimates”.

Ongoing problems in the ethanol industry added to the problems and “limited margins and opportunities” for ADM, Luciano said.

The ethanol industry has been in the midst of a historic downswing due to the U.S.-China trade war, excess domestic supply and weak margins.

ADM, which had been an ethanol pioneer, signaled to Wall Street in 2016 that it was hunting for options and considering sales of its U.S. dry ethanol mills. Luciano told Reuters this year that offers ADM had received for the mills were too low.

In addition, ADM said it planned to repurpose its corn wet mill in Marshall, Minnesota, to produce higher volumes of food and industrial-grade starches.

Other major traders are alsy trying to distance themselves from struggling ethanol businesses. Louis Dreyfus Company BV spun off its Brazilian sugar and ethanol business Biosev in 2013. Rival Bunge sold its sugar book and has sought a buyer for its Brazilian mills since 2013.

ADM, which makes money trading, processing and transporting crops, such as corn, soybeans and wheat, has been looking to strengthen its core business. Last month it said it would seek voluntary early retirements of some North American employees and cut jobs as part of a restructuring effort.

The company expects to lower 2019 capital spending by 10 percent to between $800 million and $900 million.

Net earnings attributable to the company fell to $233 million, or 41 cents per share, in the three months ended March 31, from $393 million, or 70 cents per share, a year earlier.

Revenue fell to $15.30 billion from $15.53 billion. On an adjusted basis, the company earned 46 cents per share, while analysts on average had estimated 60 cents, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.

(Reporting by Shradha Singh in Bengaluru; Editing by Shounak Dasgupta, Chizu Nomiyama and David Gregorio)

Source: OANN

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