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Bloomberg may see 2020 opening as Biden faces misconduct allegations, report says

Michael Bloomberg is reportedly having second thoughts about sitting out the 2020 presidential race amid inappropriate conduct allegations against former Vice President Joe Biden that may end Biden's bid before he has a chance to launch it.

Bloomberg, the billionaire former mayor of New York City and a supposedly centrist politician, announced last month that he wouldn’t be running for president in 2020, suggesting instead that Democrats unite behind a moderate candidate to help prevent President Trump's re-election.

BIDEN ACCUSED BY 2 MORE WOMEN OF INAPPROPRIATE TOUCHING

“It’s essential that we nominate a Democrat who will be in the strongest position to defeat Donald Trump and bring our country back together,” Bloomberg wrote in an op-ed. “We cannot allow the primary process to drag the party to an extreme that would diminish our chances in the general election and translate into ‘Four More Years.’”

But with Biden facing controversy after at least four women stepped forward in the last week with accusations of improper physical contact by the nation's former No. 2, Bloomberg sees an opening for a moderate candidate and is likely to revisit his previous decision, Axios reported, citing people who spoke about the issue with Bloomberg.

BLOOMBERG REVEALS HE WON'T RUN FOR PRESIDENT IN 2020, BUT URGES DEMS TO 'DEFEAT TRUMP'

Biden denied the allegations and his spokesman accused "right-wing trolls and others" of conflating images of Biden embracing acquaintances, colleagues and friends in his official capacity during swearing-in ceremonies with uninvited touching.

Bloomberg, valued at nearly $60 billion, would try to lure voters with the promise of moderation, unlike his Democratic opponents who are embracing far-left policies, while appealing to liberal voters with action on gun control and climate change.

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Yet he refrained from running this election cycle, in part due to Biden’s intent to run as well, as Biden would have overshadowed Bloomberg’s pitch to voters, according to the outlet.

Fox News’ Samuel Chamberlain contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News Politics

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Trump and Conservatives: It’s Complicated (But It’s Working)

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Donald Trump is not a conventional conservative. Far from it. He’s a populist of the right. His strong appeal to conservatives lies in his nationalism, tax cuts, deregulation, and appointment of originalist judges.

Unlike Ronald Reagan, who had well-formed political ideas, Trump’s notions about public policy come from gut instincts, reinforced by cheering crowds. Their common thread is "Don't tread on me."

Trump’s disdain for tradition is the opposite of orthodox conservativism. It is most visible in the wrecking ball aimed at NATO and other allies. If you are rich enough and want our military protection, he says, then pay up or forget it. Prove you deserve our protection. Show us the money.

Trump’s threat to walk away is more credible than that of previous presidents because he is instinctively closer to Robert Taft’s isolationism than to Arthur Vandenberg’s internationalism. The Taft-Vandenberg debate in the late 1940s settled Republican foreign policy for the next 60 years. Vandenberg, who chaired the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, led bipartisan support for President Harry Truman’s policies, including the Marshall Plan and forming NATO. The party’s stance was sealed in 1952 when Dwight Eisenhower defeated Taft for the presidential nomination.

Republicans remained internationalist on both security and trade throughout the Cold War, the “Unipolar Moment” of the 1990s, and the Global War on Terror after 9/11. That consensus shattered in the endless mess of Afghanistan and Iraq and the hollowing out of U.S. manufacturing employment. The Democratic Party backed away from those policies even sooner.

As a result, there is no consensus today on America’s proper role in the world. Our allies know it and are understandably nervous. Trump, a tough negotiator, is exploiting their anxiety to strike better deals for American defense support. That only works if allies believe he might actually pull back. They do, and so do internationalists in both parties. They are also worried about trade policy, where his strategy is similar.

Trump’s personal style adds to those worries, including those of conservatives. Many are repulsed by his crudity, thin-skinned nature, and vitriolic personal attacks. They fret as he shreds established norms. They oppose his micro-interventions in the economy (“don’t close that GM plant”), which are the opposite of free-market economics.

But—and this is crucial—conservatives and many independents recognize Trump’s biggest achievement, beyond strengthening the economy and rebuilding the military, is his persistent effort to roll back the administrative state, with its endless regulations and executive orders. The agencies that make the rules also enforce and adjudicate them. The result is fiat law—undemocratic, unaccountable, and unbearably expensive to fight. (If you think that’s also a major popular complaint about the European Union, you are correct.)

To curtail this administrative overreach, Trump needs to downsize the permanent bureaucracy, pass laws that require congressional approval for major regulations, and keep appointing judges who will rein in bureaucratic excess. Eliminating specific regulations is not enough. The next Democratic president will simply reimpose them.

Trump’s progress on judges is obvious—and consequential. That’s why Democrats are fighting so tenaciously. The latest battle, after Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court appointment, was Neomi Rao’s nomination to the D.C. Circuit. She proved her commitment to deregulation while heading the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. Now she sits on the appellate court that hears those cases.

Trump’s determination to claw back Washington’s bureaucracy is beloved by conservatives, but it poses a curious dilemma. It took eight decades to ratchet up the government’s mammoth size and scope. Rolling it back swiftly and dramatically is what conservatives want substantively. But abrupt changes are what conservatives hate procedurally. They favor incremental change.

“Build on what we already have,” say these procedural conservatives. “That’s the surest foundation for improvement.” No one can anticipate the effects of large, disruptive changes. They might be disastrous. Edmund Burke first made that argument in 1790. His devastating critique of the French Revolution set the template for modern conservativism.

Unfortunately for modern conservatives, that kind of incrementalism would hardly dent America’s huge, intrusive government. It would do nothing to stop its regrowth after Trump leaves. That’s why “substantive conservatives” want to pare down the state now. The opportunity might be fleeting.

These are meaningful differences among conservatives. Yet they will fade to insignificance when Democrats nominate another big-government candidate. Faced with that alternative, conservatives of all stripes will back Trump. The only exceptions are those who despise him.

The president’s shortcomings offer Democrats a real opportunity. They seem determined to fumble it. Most candidates are sucking up to the left-wing base and arguing for huge, structural changes, everything from packing the Supreme Court to abolishing private health coverage. Their most daring ideas, such as the Green New Deal and “Medicare for All,” are recipes for fiscal apocalypse and totalizing government control. Their intolerance of dissent has made them the Party of Social Justice Church Ladies.

More centrist candidates are drifting left, too. Their reorientation may appeal to primary voters, but it will be a huge impediment in November. Ultimately, they are still selling Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society, now with more programs, more funding, and more taxes to pay in support of them. The ideas are stale, but there are two bigger defects: They cost too much and advocates cannot explain why the old programs failed.

If that’s what the Democrats have on offer in 2020, they won’t just lose conservatives and right-of-center independents. They’ll lose the election, unless there’s a recession.

If Trump wins, he will continue doing what no president has even attempted since Franklin Roosevelt: fundamentally shrinking the vast, centralized power of the administrative state. It’s a monumental task. But, for conservatives, none is more important.

Charles Lipson is the Peter B. Ritzma Professor of Political Science Emeritus at the University of Chicago, where he is founding director of PIPES, the Program on International Politics, Economics, and Security. He can be reached at charles.lipson@gmail.com.

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Chiropractor who served in the Navy faces charges in North Dakota quadruple homicide

The person police believe walked into a real estate office and killed four people -- shocking residents of a small town unaccustomed to such gruesome violence -- is reportedly a chiropractor who served in the U.S. Navy.

Chad Isaak, 44, of Washburn, N.D. was arrested Thursday, three days after the killings at RJR Management, a business that collects rents for property owners, including the suspect's landlord.

Isaak was due to appear before a judge Friday.

SUSPECT ARRESTED IN NORTH DAKOTA QUADRUPLE MURDER

The murders happened in Mandan, a town near the state capital of Bismark with a population of 22,000 and a tiny police force. There hadn’t been a murder in Mandan since 2016.

“It's been a difficult week for everyone involved," Mayor Tim Helbling said.

Police said the victims Lori and Bill Cobb, Adam Fuehrer and Robert Fakler, RJR's owner, had been shot and stabbed. A memorial service for them is scheduled for next week.

Records show Isaak had been a chiropractor in Washburn for 13 years. His professional license runs out in September.

A 1995 marriage announcement said Isaak was an assistant lab technician in the U.S. Navy serving at Pearl Harbor.

He had no prior arrests in North Dakota, Kxnet.com reported.

Investigators identified Isaak as a suspect after reviewing hours of surveillance video and identifying Isaak’s vehicle as being at the scene, police said.

“Further investigation led to McLean County Sherriff’s Office locating the vehicle in Washburn," police said. "McLean County Deputies conducted a traffic stop on the suspect vehicle and detained Isaak while a search warrant was executed on the vehicle."

“Evidence discovered on Isaak and in the vehicle provided probable cause to place Isaak under arrest for the murders,” police also said.

4 FOUND DEAD AT NORTH DAKOTA BUSINESS IN HOMICIDE CASE, POLICE SAY

Isaak’s landlord, Rolf Eggers, said he never met Isaak and never heard of any problems with him. Eggers said he talked to Falker several times a week about the property and Isaak never came up.

"He was a non-issue," Eggers said. "He never attracted any attention."

The arrest was a relief to Bri Miller, Lori and Bill Cobb's daughter.

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“Mandan Police Department have been doing everything they possibly can to get to the bottom of this unimaginable, senseless act,” Miller wrote ate Thursday on Facebook. “(A)lthough many questions are still going through the families minds, at least a bit of relief has been lifted off of our shoulders.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News National

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Instagram will BLOCK anti-vaxxer hashtags in crackdown on medical fake news on the social-media site

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Uber Technologies to unveil IPO terms on Friday: sources

FILE PHOTO: Uber's logo is displayed on a mobile phone in London, Britain
FILE PHOTO: Uber's logo is displayed on a mobile phone in London, Britain, September 14, 2018. REUTERS/Hannah Mckay

April 25, 2019

(Reuters) – Uber Technologies Inc will announce a price range on Friday for its initial public offering (IPO) of between $44 and $50 per share, raising between $8 billion and $9 billion, people familiar with the matter said on Thursday.

Some Uber insiders will also sell their own shares in the IPO, the sources added. Reuters reported earlier this month that all the Uber shares sold in the IPO could be worth around $10 billion.

Uber also plans to unveil on Friday its last sale of stock as a private company, the sources said. The identity of the investor involved in the private placement could not immediately be learned.

The sources asked not to be identified because the matter is confidential. Uber declined to comment.

(Reporting by Joshua Franklin in New York; Editing by Bill Rigby)

Source: OANN

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Cain on Fed Withdrawal: Not a Good ‘Trade-Off’

Herman Cain, the businessman, radio host, and columnist President Donald Trump wanted on the board of directors of the Federal Reserve Bank, said Monday he decided the personal and professional cost was too high.

In an opinion piece for the Western Journal, Cain wrote he was well through an arduous vetting process when he realized he would be giving up "too much influence to get a little bit of policy impact."

"It was an honor to be considered," Cain wrote. "Under different circumstances, I would like to have served. I realize not everyone was a fan of my prospective nomination, and that's OK. I was prepared to make the case for myself, and I was prepared to live with the outcome."

"But look: I'm 73 years old and at this stage of my life, I'm doing all the things I want to do," he continued. "I can go where I want and say what I want and work with the team I've enjoyed working with for years now. It's remarkable how we've all stayed together and we all enjoy each other still, and I get a lot of joy out of that at this stage of my life."

"It's still fun and I do think it's making a difference," he added.

The decision was not easy.

Cain wrote he not only liked "the idea of serving on the Fed," but was "convinced I could make a positive difference advocating for better growth and monetary policies."

"As recently as last Monday I had told President Trump I was all in, and on Friday I was making plans to come to Washington and visit with the senators who were skeptical of my qualifications," he added.

He wrote even after publishing an opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal that explained his stance on the issues the Fed deals with, "I was prepared to defend these beliefs in meetings with senators and in confirmation hearings."

"But the cost of doing this started weighing on me over the weekend," Cain wrote. "I also started wondering if I'd be giving up too much influence to get a little bit of policy impact. With my current media activities, I can reach close to 4 million people a month with the ideas I believe in. If I gave that up for one seat on the Fed board, would that be a good trade-off?"

The answer was "no."

And he jokingly warned not to believe everything written about him.

"Anything you hear about a reason other than what I've laid out here is (OK, I'll go ahead and say it) fake news," he wrote. "They don't have a source. They don't have inside information. Only you do, because I just gave it to you."

Source: NewsMax America

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Facebook amends terms for use of consumers’ data: EU

FILE PHOTO: Silhouettes of mobile users are seen next to a screen projection of the Facebook logo in this picture illustration
FILE PHOTO: Silhouettes of mobile users are seen next to a screen projection of the Facebook logo in this picture illustration taken March 28, 2018. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo

April 9, 2019

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – Facebook has revised the terms related to its users’ data following demands from the European Commission and consumer authorities, including taking responsibility when data has been mishandled by third parties.

The changes clearly explain how the company uses consumers’ data to develop profiling activities and target advertising to finance itself, the EU executive said in a statement.

(Reporting by Foo Yun Chee; editing by Francesco Guarascio)

Source: OANN

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Extraordinary European Union leaders summit in Brussels
FILE PHOTO: Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte arrives at an extraordinary European Union leaders summit to discuss Brexit, in Brussels, Belgium April 10, 2019. REUTERS/Yves Herman

April 26, 2019

(Reuters) – Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said on Friday he had assured China’s Huawei Technologies that it would not face discrimination in the rollout of Italy’s 5G telecoms network.

Conte was speaking on a visit to China where he said he met Huawei’s chief executive, Ren Zhengfei. The prime minister’s comments were carried in Italy by TV broadcaster Sky Italia.

“I told him that we have adopted some precautions, some measures to protect our interests that demand very high levels of security … not only from Huawei but any company entering into the 5G arena,” he said.

Huawei, the world’s biggest producer of telecoms equipment, is under intense scrutiny after the United States told allies not to use its technology because of fears it could be a vehicle for Chinese spying. Huawei has categorically denied this.

(Writing by by Mark Bendeich; Editing by Angelo Amante)

Source: OANN

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U.S. President Trump departs for travel to Indianapolis from the White House in Washington
U.S. President Donald Trump talks to reporters as he departs for travel to Indianapolis, Indiana from the White House in Washington, U.S., April 26, 2019. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

April 26, 2019

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Donald Trump on Friday was expected to announce his intention to revoke the United States’ status as a signatory of the Arms Trade Treaty, which was signed in 2013 by then-President Barack Obama but never ratified by Congress, two U.S. officials said.

Trump was expected to announce the decision in a speech in Indianapolis, to the National Rifle Association, the officials said. The NRA, a powerful gun lobby group, has long been opposed to the treaty, which was negotiated at the United Nations.

(Reporting By Steve Holland; Editing by Bill Trott)

Source: OANN

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A remote controlled robot for the 'Isotopium: Chernobyl' game is seen at the game's location in Brovary
A remote controlled robot for the ‘Isotopium: Chernobyl’ game is seen at the game’s location in Brovary, Ukraine April 25, 2019. REUTERS/Valentyn Ogirenko

April 26, 2019

By Margaryta Chornokondratenko

KIEV (Reuters) – A Ukrainian computer game that brings to life a town abandoned after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster may not sound like everyone’s idea of fun but has attracted 60,000 people globally since its launch in October.

Players of “Isotopium: Chernobyl” drive tanks around the ghost town of Prypyat near Chernobyl, knocking out competitors as they search for an energy source called isotopium and collecting points every time they find some.

While the game takes its theme from the nuclear disaster at Chernobyl in northern Ukraine, which marked its 33rd anniversary on Friday, it was also inspired by the 2009 science fiction film “Avatar”.

Newcomers to the game think they have entered a virtual world when in fact they are controlling a real robot, equipped with a camera and computer, which makes its way around a model of the town rendered down to the tiniest detail.

“When playing our game, for the first 5-10 minutes many players don’t understand that it is not fictional,” said the game’s co-founder Sergey Beskrestnov. “They message us saying: ‘You have cool texture, you have good graphics, your designer is good, well done. You have a cool operating system.’

“People then reply: ‘It is not an operating system, it is real,’ and the player can’t believe it is real,” said Beskrestnov, speaking mid-game from Prypyat city square as he towers over surrounding five-storey buildings.

Kiev-born Beskrestnov was just 12 years old when on April 26, 1986 a botched test at the nuclear plant in the then Soviet Union sent clouds of smoldering nuclear material across large swathes of Europe, forced over 50,000 people, including Beskrestnov’s family, to evacuate and poisoned unknown numbers of workers involved in its clean-up.

Beskrestnov and his partner Alexey Fateyev used Google maps and hundreds of pictures from the Chernobyl area to recreate Prypyat landmarks, including residential buildings, a hotel, concert hall, amusement park and a stadium.

The game’s real-scale model occupies a 180 square meter (1,938 sq. ft) basement of a residential building in the Ukraine city of Brovary, just 150 km (93 miles) from the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone and 30 km east of Kiev.

Miniature radioactivity warning signs, graffiti on the walls of abandoned buildings and tables and chairs left scattered inside a small cafe all add to the creepy atmosphere of a once lively town.

“It’s a really neat concept …,” Shaun Prescott wrote in a review of the game published by PC Gamer magazine in January. “Controlling the tanks is kinda cumbersome, but they are tanks, after all.”

An attentive player will notice at least one inaccuracy – the real Chernobyl nuclear power plant is not located in town as it is in the game.

It costs $9 to immerse in the atmosphere of a post-apocalyptic town for an hour but only 20 people at a time can play simultaneously. Beskrestnov’s company, Remote Games, said 62,615 people around the world have registered to play the game, including around 15,000 in France and 10,000 in the United States.

A camera fixed on top of a moving tank broadcasts high quality signal in real time, allowing players from as far apart as Australia and Canada enjoy the game without facing any time delay in delivering video signals.

Its creators next ambition is to devise a game featuring the colonization of Mars in which 1,000 people will be able to simultaneously control robots on different missions involved in the operation.

“Many people advise us to contact Elon Musk directly because it resonates his dreams and ideas,” Beskrestnov jokes.    

(Editing by Susan Fenton)

Source: OANN

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FILE PHOTO: A Starbucks sign is show on one of the companies stores in Los Angeles, California
FILE PHOTO: A Starbucks sign is show on one of the companies stores in Los Angeles, California, U.S. October 19,2018. REUTERS/Mike Blake/File Photo

April 26, 2019

(Reuters) – Initial optimism over first-quarter results from Starbucks Corp was waning fast on Wall Street on Friday, as analysts questioned the longer-term prospects of its new sales push given subdued overall customer traffic numbers especially in China.

The company on Thursday beat brokerage estimates for quarterly same-store sales on the back of demand for its new Cloud Macchiato, Matcha tea and cold brews in the United States.

However, BTIG’s Peter Saleh was one of a number of sector analysts who said while customers forking out for higher-priced new drinks had helped drive growth in same-store sales, “anemic” traffic at cafes remained a concern.

He and others pointed to a 1 percent decline in footfall at cafes in the Chinese market, viewed as crucial to the chain’s growth for the foreseeable future.

More broadly, transaction numbers, the substitute analysts use for customer traffic, were unchanged in all three of the company’s global regions.

Shares in the company, which hit a record high after the results on Thursday, fell 1 percent in morning trade.

“We remain cautious given near-term headwinds surrounding China, including cannibalization, increasing competition (and) a slowing economy,” Wedbush analyst Nick Setyan said.

Starbucks has also poured money into beefing up its delivery network in China as it battles with local startup Luckin Coffee, whose speedy growth led it to file for an IPO in the United States earlier this week.

New menu items and partnerships with delivery services, the heart of the company’s strategy to win back customers lost to artisanal coffee shops and cheaper fast-food rivals, did help Starbucks’ sales in its home market.

However, analysts said growth in China may continue to be subdued.

Wells Fargo analyst Bonnie Herzog said she expects store expansion in China to take priority over comparable sales growth.

She downgraded her rating on Starbucks’ to “market perform” from “outperform”, arguing that the company facing tough sales comparisons later on in 2019 from last year and the current rich valuation of shares meant the stock had limited room to rise.

“Investors will be hesitant to invest new money in a stock with a topline that, while still strong, is unlikely to meaningfully accelerate,” Herzog said.

Still, the company’s solid same-store growth in the United States, improving profit margins and a lower tax rate for the rest of the year led at least 6 Wall Street brokerages to raise their price targets on the stock to as high as $81.

11 of 29 brokerages rate Starbucks “buy” or higher, 17 “hold” and 1 “sell” or lower. Their median price target is $75.

(Reporting by Uday Sampath in Bengaluru)

Source: OANN

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A man accused of fatally beating a 4-month-old boy after finding out the infant wasn’t his son had been previously deported from the United States five times, most recently in late 2016, immigration officials said.

Carlos Zuniga-Aviles, a 33-year-old Honduran national, has used multiple aliases, including the fake name of Jose Agurcia-Avila he gave police in Memphis, Tennessee, following his arrest in the boy’s death earlier this month, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials told WMC-TV.

ICE officials have since filed an immigration detainer against Zuniga-Aviles, who was initially deported back to Honduras in February 2010. He was also returned to the Central American country in 2011, 2012, 2015 and 2016.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE NEW YORK POST

“ICE will seek to take him into custody to reinstate his removal order following the resolution of the criminal charges he currently faces,” the statement reads. “Mr. Zuniga-Aviles has been removed from the US five prior times: his most recent removal by ICE to Honduras took place in December 2016.”

ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT WITH CRIMINAL HISTORY ARRESTED IN CALIFORNIA WOMAN’S MURDER

Zuniga-Aviles later returned to the U.S. following his removal, a felony under federal law, immigration officials said. It’s unclear exactly when he returned, but he was living with his girlfriend and the woman’s 4-month-old son in Memphis at the time of his arrest, WREG reports.

DAD OF MAN KILLED BY ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT BLASTS CALIFORNIA GOV. NEWSOM’S TRIP TO CENTRAL AMERICA: ‘IT’S DISGUSTING’

The infant, Alexander Lizondro-Chacon, was pronounced dead at a hospital from blunt force trauma to the head after his mother, Mercy Lizondro-Chacon, called police on April 12 to report that the boy was having trouble breathing, according to an affidavit of complaint obtained by the Commercial Appeal.

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This article originally appeared in the New York Post. For more from the Post, click here.

Source: Fox News National

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